Twisted Steel

I wanted to write this down, while my memory was still clear, and the event just hours before.

I had spent today listening to NPR while in the car, and CNN while home, and all the commemorations of the 20th anniversary of September 11, 2001.

In particular I was struck while listening to former President George W. Bush speaking at the Flight 93 Memorial about the bravery of those on that flight that day and how we now have to defend against threats not only from abroad but from within, He spoke of unity, in a nation that seems to currently know only dissent and division.

I found myself for the second time today, just wanting to pray. So I drove to downtown Saratoga's High Rock Park where the "Tempered by Memory", a 9/11 memorial sculpture using steel artifacts from the World Trade Center Towers is. There I stayed, sometimes on my knees and just prayed.

It was silent most of the time, except for the sound of crickets and the occasional other visitors who were mostly silent in the own contemplations.

I ended up on a bench, just lost in thought and prayer, and paused every now and then to look at the twisted steel that was the memorial. Then I closed my eyes, to pray some more. Then I looked up again and the sun was just at the angle where the light shown and obstructed the sculpture. In fact the light seemed to take on a presence all of it's own, bright and all encompassing. For a few moments there it felt like a holy place, and then the sun lowered slightly in the sky and the memorial was visible again.

It came to me in the moment that Light will always defeat Darkness. That what brought us together twenty years ago and united us, is not lost. It is just there waiting, waiting for us to take hold of it again.

9/11/21

Little Fish

 Has anyone seen this movie, "Little Fish", it's now on Hulu, about a virus spreading throughout the world, where you lose your memory and it's focus is tightly on one couple and the affect on them of what's happening. It was excellent but left me so melancholy. I was thinking that with this pandemic I am forgetting, what it felt like to just call a friend and go for coffee, our go shopping with your girlfriends or see a movie with your husband without giving it a thought. That with Delta brewing and who knows what else down the road, will we forget the spontaneity and intimacy of all those moments. I think I almost have.....

Beautiful Things

 "glioblastoma multiforme is a mean relentless horror", from page 28 of Hunter Biden's Beautiful Things, in reference to his brother Beau's cancer diagnosis. I will continue to read this book, even though those words struck me like a blow across the face. I will continue to read because I know those words when I heard my own mother's diagnosis of the same. I will continue to read because of beautiful things in the story of their lives, that the diagnosis is not what defined them. but the beauty of the lives they lived. Beau Biden, 1969-2105, Anne Venti Nozzolillo, 1921-1983

SpringThaw

 After the second Covid-19 vaccine on Tuesday and the following days of fever, chills and exhaustion, I finally felt up to the inglorious task of cleaning up the backyard. Unless pestered and prodded, the rest of my family tends to ignore the fact that we have two dogs who regualrly use our yard, to be reguular dogs.

The weather was warm today, not as warm as the last few days which I had spent mostly sleeping on the couch as my body prepared itself and learn to fight in case it needed to, this enemy that has cost so much to so many. Today though, I felt stronger. Strong enough to take a smal walk with the dogs, and returning home decided to tackle the backyard task that I knew others had not done.

Opening the door, I felt momentarily startled, the yard nearly devoid of the snow that had persisted all winter, Had I not been so intent on the walk of keep my pace slow and taking my steps gingerly, I might have noticed it then. When I had last returned home on Tuesday, until now there had been a transformation. The winter that felt as neverending as the snow covered landscape, had turned into a muddy promise of spring to come.

How fitting, to feel the same way. Second vaccine, day five.

The Libby App by Overdrive

I used to always love holding a book in my hands. From when I was little and barely knew the words on the page. When I was older and waiting for the Bookmobile to come, sitting on the curb, re-reading the pages of the book I was returning, it was magic.

Then came the pandemic, and all that old anxiety came roaring back. All those years of counseling to not be afraid, well of just about everything. I love my Mom, more than words. She had OCD and it ruled her life at times, and for a long time it ruled mine. She would obsessively clean everything and for a good while, I had some of the same demons.

So it is funny to think that neither of us every thought about that when it came to books, We borrowed them, we read them propped on the couch, she on one end, me on the other. Books were magical and books were a reprieve from all that world outside. So scary that the only thing you could do, was make sure you washed your hands a hundred times, because that is what you could control.

Here I am now though now, afraid to touch a real book, especially a borrowed book, which really is not only my lifetime passion but my livelihood. Working in a library, you touch books, you interact with people, and you know I love it. The pandemic has taken so much away from everyone, for me it's that safety, that comfort long earned and long felt.

So if I don't leave my house, if I don't touch anything, let alone a borrowed book, may be I'll feel that I have some sort of control. It is all an illusion though.

Libby, with lets you read electronic books, gave me my books back.  Yet, I miss those physical books so much. They were about the journey while electronic books for me, are a race to the finish before the loan period ends and the book disappears. Funny, I never thought of books that way.

Books were permanent when everything in my life seemed fleeting. How can I and how can we get that feeling back again. That feeling of permanence, of safety and normalcy.

1/20/21

 1/20/21 - I am not a runner, but I was thinking today of the sermon, given by one of the clergyman who officiated at my wedding, in the small Baptist Church a few weeks before my wedding. He spoke about his first time participating in the Boston Marathon. The challenges with the weather of the day, the tiredness and discouragement he felt, and getting to the twenty mile mark and Heartbreak Hill. I don't remember every word he said, but I do remember the look on his face, when he spoke of cresting that hill and knowing that he would make it to the finishing line. That is how I felt today, cresting that hill....1/20/21 - The Inauguration of President Joe Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris.

First Draft

 I have been struggling to work on this workplace bullying chapter that I agreed to do, for an upcoming library textbook. Despite writing my graduate thesis project on workplace bullying in libraries, despite presenting on the topic at library conferences, despite getting an article published, it still felt like an insurmountable task. The words are there, the research is there, but the underlying pain that this topic brings is still there. So I have spent months running from it. Sometimes though, you just have to start and before you know it, first draft. Needs so much work, so much yet to do, but first draft. One bridge crossed, still lots of the journey to go.