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When I got home from work, the moth was crawling slowly on the breadboard. I was hungry and working fast, but I still worked carefully around the moth as I made dinner. After dinner, comfortably full, I looked at the small moth and decided to take it outside. I picked it up with a towel and - oops! It fell on the floor. Fox started running towards it and I yelled "No!" I tried to scoop it up with the towel but I wasn't sure it was in the towel or not. I opened the door and laid the towel on the cement outside.

And up and out of the towel the small moth flew away, high up in the air. I just stood there and watched until it reached the field at the end of the cement.

An unexpected pleasure, watching that small moth fly free in the outdoors.

A small joy.
]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=59 Mon, 29 Sep 2008 19:16:38 -0600 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=58 Tempus curro in Hicksvillio hodie . . . Time flies in Hicksville today. My grandmother and her sister would look at each other and share a private smile.

The young dog who once leapt across the field, shaking her head and barking with the sheer joy of being alive, now pushes slowly up from the floor and puts her gray muzzle on my lap.

When this dog was a puppy, my teenaged son slumped on the couch, tired and sick from the chemotherapy that we were pouring into him.

Today he stands at the altar, a smiling young man, his bride at his side. Full of life, and love.

Take a deep breath, let time slow, look around, and savor this moment of life.

weddingThese words came to me in the early, dark morning a few days before my son's wedding. The dog is my Lucy, who was sleeping on my bed at the time - as usual. "Time flies in Hicksville today" comes from my Grandma Burch and her sister Aunt Lottie. They were born in the late 1800s in the small town of Hicksville, Ohio. Latin was, I am sure, taught in their school, and they made up the "Hicksvillio" and I think that's what they always thought was so funny. I didn't know - I was just a little girl.

I wish I'd had the nerve to say these words at the wedding as a toast, but, I truly freeze in the spotlight. Maybe it sounds too hokie anyway, but what can I say, my heritage is from Hicksville.

]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=58 Tue, 26 Aug 2008 20:06:25 -0600 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=57
where do these bugs go when the light is off

do they gather into a loosely assembled ball of dusty wings and small fly bodies, a dust buggy under the bed

or crawl on my skin, entering my dreams as feathery monsters, always just out of sight (but I know they are there)

or return to their own separate cubbies in the room . . . on a shelf . . . one of the books . . . the teddy bear . . . the lurking gnome . . . each bug in its own spot, amenities included

or do they live for just one night, party late (faint cries of delight) then recede to tiny graves in the carpet, seeding a new generation to plaster the wall on a future night, in the light

bugs on wall]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=57 Wed, 16 Jul 2008 18:50:13 -0600 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=56
Yes, 99% of the time we are all content grown-ups. But now and then, we just want someone to take care of us. Sometimes we don't want to keep going towards the end of the journey, but want to stay where we are.

No, I'm not colorblind
I know the world is black and white
Try to keep an open mind
But I just can't sleep on this tonight

Stop this train
I wanna get off
And go home again
I can't take the speed it's moving in
I know I can
But honestly, won't someone stop this train?

Don't know how else to say it
Don't want to see my parents go
One generation's length away
From fighting life out on my own

Stop this train
I wanna get off
And go home again
I can't take the speed it's moving in
I know I can
But honestly, won't someone stop this train?

So scared of getting older
I'm only good at being young
So I play the numbers game
To find a way to say that life has just begun

Had a talk with my old man
Said "help me understand"
He said "turn sixty-eight
You renegotiate"

"Don't stop this train
Don't for a minute change the place you're in
And don't think I couldn't ever understand
I tried my hand
John, honestly we'll never stop this train"

Once in awhile, when it's good
It'll feel like it should
And they're all still around
And you're still safe and sound
And you don't miss a thing
Till you cry when you're driving away in the dark
Singing

Stop this train
I wanna get off
And go home again
I can't take the speed it's moving in
I know I can
Cause now I see I'll never stop this train

Stop This Train, John Mayer, Continuum.

John Mayer Continuum]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=56 Fri, 25 Apr 2008 19:17:27 -0600 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=55
Grabbing a post-it, I jotted down a clue to where I left off on one track that I was on. Then I chuckled, thinking of my life as a book that I could mark and get back to a little later.

bookmark

]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=55 Mon, 14 Apr 2008 19:08:40 -0600 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=54
Then something really cool happened. I went to the rec center and was getting ready for my workout. And then - and then! - I noted that in the stall the case that usually covers the toilet paper roll was off and folded back. The whole huge roll was exposed! No reaching up to try to find the start of the roll. No getting my hand stuck between the roll and the case. No spinning the roll one way and then the other hoping that the end would dislodge and decide to let the user know where the start was. No pulling on the end of the cheap paper and having it crumble into small bits. I could gracefully unwrap as much as I wanted.

I sat there staring in rapt amazement. Now THAT'S the sign of a good day.]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=54 Wed, 19 Mar 2008 20:29:46 -0600 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=53
Maybe the hippies will be a generation that does indeed age gracefully, back into the fog.

onward through the fogJohn and I were introduced to "Onward through the fog" by some friends of ours who were from Austin, Texas. I remember the phrase on a comic or a cartoon or a roommate's T-shirt. There were a lot of silly comics floating around back then, like Fat Freddy and his cat. I remember sort of what the cartoon looked like but can't find it today on the internet. There are currently web references to Oat Willies, a pipe shop in Austin.

The photo I did find and put on this blog is from my father's slide collection. It's not real foggy, and I don't know exactly where the picture was taken, but it is a real picture taken by a real member of my family and the road went . . . somewhere into the fog.]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=53 Fri, 14 Mar 2008 20:39:10 -0600 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=52
For copyright reasons, I won't quote all of Stewart's poem. It's entitled "as much as most". Here are the parts that I find especially compelling:

"Here is as much as most folks need to know about space, time . . . If you go fast enough from as many A to as many B as you can why then you will eventually come to a place where you see yourself across a river. . . . And here is as much as most folks will want to know about Freud and the boys - whether you can meet your dreams on the AB itinerary will determine whether you look yourself in the eye when you do, or blink if you do - or want to wave."

Each time I read this, I think of it anew. If I saw myself across a river, like a river of time, would I look myself in the eye, blink, or wave?

I'd wave.

I think of this as I pass through my days. What am I working towards? It comes to me that I should choose to do things that would make my old and young me's want to wave at my now-me. It's a kind of a philosophy, if you think about it.

across time 1

across time 2]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=52 Sun, 2 Mar 2008 13:58:42 -0700 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=51
But . . . maybe my collection wasn't driven by a simple whim. Maybe an underlying supernatural force guided my homage to the chicken, because today I saw a sign - a sign! - from the Great Chicken God in the burned-food patterns of the toaster oven tray.
a sign from the Chicken God]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=51 Wed, 23 Jan 2008 18:57:33 -0700 http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=50 older woman in room . . . "

Could they mean me? Am I now in the category of older people?

Later, at home, I looked at my face in the mirror. Not the usual cursory glance to make sure I am somewhat presentable, but a full, glasses-on scrutinization. Perhaps those deep lines, lost eyelashes, waddly neck skin do make me appear "older". Sometimes I sit on the couch and study my hands, intrigued by the many patterns of wrinkles and folds of skin and age spots.

I don't mind much, but it is interesting to know that others think of me as older. I still think of myself as in my favorite photo of myself at 5 years old, roller-skating down the sidewalk.
older hands
Go to read more for my younger photo.I wrote the first part of this blog entry way back in December, right after my birthday. But I didn't take the photo until yesterday. I decided to take it up at work so I could use the Olympus SLR digital camera and a tripod. It took me all this time - over a month - to get motivated enough to dig out the Olympus and set it up on the tripod. And then, both sets of batteries did not want to charge up, so I had to bring some AAs from home. To take a photo of both my hands at once, I had to dig out the manual and figure out how to set it for delayed shutter activation. I hadn't used the camera in over a year and I was rusty. It still is an excellent camera and I like the feel of it in my hands again.

Anyway, as promised, here is the photo of me on my 5th birthday.
younger
]]> public http://www.pfeist.net/blog/index.php?itemid=50 Sat, 19 Jan 2008 15:51:28 -0700