I don't have the appropriate pictures for this entry...but...I've always loved this picture of a cat in a compound on the Serengeti...Alas I doubt that he ever went to a Veterinarian, but he held court and was probably very aware of the lions holding court just outside the door...
For the tourists he was a poignant reminder of home.
But the entry is a fragment:
My superintendent has a love bird. When you go to his door, he answers with the love bird on his shoulder. The love bird seems to understand the discussion and it is distracting. He is a beautiful and much beloved bird. I took my friend and her two children to see him.
The children were charmed. The bird...screeched...he too was excited. As I stood there, I felt a gentle tap...on my waist. I turned around and there stood the six-year-old Korean girl from the next apartment.
She said: "Would you please be quiet. My bunny is trying to sleep." And having delivered her message, she turned and closed her door. We all stood staring. I illogically wondered why the bunny was asleep at ten in the morning...but of course that was not the point.  We all smiled...and the bird...screeched!

I could get used to this talking to oneself once again. I was bemoaning the fact that I had to cancel my trip to Toronto...I am in the midst of a Veterinarian Vortex....
Teeth? Check...
Blood Tests? Check...
Kidney Failure? Not yet but...only Vet food will stay its return...
Dandruff? Wait...that's not dandruff...that's something we can look into...infection? Parasites? Allergies? Oh my goodness...we'll just play with this one!
Heart Murmur? We'll put that aside for a moment...
Weight? Naturally! There's an elephant in the room...something about the mistress?

So I cancelled my trip to Toronto where I was ironically going to visit a former student who is now...a Veterinarian!!!

But there's nothing like a fall nasturtian...
And I just heard of the death of bright young kid with a wicked smile who laughed at my asides...wait...that was long enough ago to make him 61. And that puts things into perspective. I'll get to Toronto...I know that.

When in doubt...choose echinecia!

I've often conjured up these Stephen Crane lines in times of disarray:


I even can imagine the accompanying stick figure!

I accidentally erased my Amy input so I have to do that one again...

A man said to the universe:

“Sir, I exist!”

“However,” replied the universe,

“The fact has not created in me

A sense of obligation.”

My problem is that I can't fictionalize...I lack the imagination...and that dismays me...I'm supposed to have imagination but instead, I feed off the imagination of others...

At one time I thought of creating a repository for fragments...bits and pieces and vignettes that others could borrow...

Someone has already taken Great Aunt Martha...At the age of 21 I heard her for the first time and realized that genetically deep voices were a fact. We growled at each other.

I met her for the first time at 7:30 in the morning. I had just gotten off a boat from Glasgow...actually it was a boat with a trailer...there was a trailer of very drunken Scottish football fans going to Ireland to beat the Irish...

Great Aunt Martha...aged eighty something in curlers and a dressing gown that was left over from rationing...opened the door...grinned and said: God, we're an ugly family."

I wonder how long she had been planning that one. For some reason or other, it didn't bother me...It still doesn't.bother me...

Several days into my visit we went walking in Belfast and suddenly she said she had to sit down. I understood true manipulations when she chose to sit down in her hair dressers and since we were already there, she said that I might as well get get my hair cut.

I got my hair cut.

After all she had managed a golf club near the Giants' Causeway, bought three houses (She had two sisters other than my grandmother and they refused to live together,) and married a Belfast banker at the age of 50. In Belfast, the bankers owned the bank...

So there's my fragment for today...

I have become enamored with Pintrest...I just found the quote that made my day. There's nothing that peanut butter and a spoon can't fix.
That is why I reached for the peanut butter jar yesterday after returning home from the Vet's with my cat who may have allergies...
I will be enjoying the simple pleasures for the next few months and I don't care if this picture isn't a piece of art...I like it!

Getting back to blogging is a stumbling process...What shall I remind myself of today? Since this blog is really all about me - I'm pretty well the only one to read it...save those might stumble in (There's that word again!) It is a season of vernisages and I am fortunate enough to have some artist friends and some artist acquaintances...so I am vernisaging. One show featured my friend who is working in ten foot panels of digital manipulation. She uses transparencies. And I immediately thought of all the photos I could make transparent.
The other artist works in clay. Stunning clay statements. Her largest work, Autobiography, is a desk with clay telephone and note paper and detail. She made that one in art school twenty some years ago when representational art was a no no and she had spent her whole life being told no by those who know. She actually was in Our Town, a play I directed when I was a new teacher. I didn't know her; I only knew she was such a relief because she knew what she was doing...and I didn't...know what I was doing. She spoke of her blog. I went to her blog. The most recent input was warning retired persons who thought they might like to make art and sell it that they shouldn't! And it brought up the damn fool dilemma I face. There's no doubt but I love taking pictures. I have a good camera. Not expensive but good. But in order for me to do art, I'm going to have to manipulate pictures and that's where it becomes messy. I don't want to sell art but I do like playing with pictures.
      This picture is not art. This is just...a good picture!
      The other show was that of my friend who does stunning art...representational at one level but also symbolic. Someone pointed out her piece of a ten-year-old girl standing strong and obstinate...in a nice dress but with great big bare feet. We are all stuck at some phase of our life and I had to laughingly admit that that ten-year-old was me...right down to the feet.
      What I am considering is that art, like writing, is a matter of manipulation. Anyone can write a blog. Anyone can take a picture. It's what one does with the writing or the picture that counts.

I'm hesitantly back...not much to say or too much to say but I have been working on writing and I miss the spontaneous. I joined a puzzle making site and offended a gardener by speaking of the beauty of these insects...but they are astonishing...and better than slugs!