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Category: time

Gathering Rosebuds

Gathering Rosebuds

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The weather gods have given us one more warm day, one more day to walk and bounce and write outside before the cold moves in. It could be 30 degrees cooler tomorrow than it is today.

I can hear the lawnmower outside. Does it only seem more fast and frantic because I’m feeling that way about making the most of this day?

The second bloom roses I’ve been enjoying brought this verse to mind:

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
   Old Time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today
   Tomorrow will be dying.

The Summer Book

The Summer Book

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I picked up Tove Jansson’s The Summer Book because it showed up in a list of books that feature grandparents. There are precious few of these, I’ve noticed. 

Jansson’s Grandmother (she’s given no other name) is crotchety and wise and foolish and loving. She smokes cigarettes and breaks into a neighbor’s house. No cookie-baking for this grandma. She’s a renegade. But she also understands her granddaughter Sophia, pushes her and puts her in situations where she is bound to succeed. 

Grandmother also levels with herself and with others (when she’s not lying, that is). Here she is after the break-in: 

“My dear child,” said Grandmother impatiently [to Sophia], “every human being has to make his own mistakes.” … Sometimes people never saw things clearly until it was too late and they no longer had the strength to start again. Or else they forgot their idea along the way and didn’t even realize that they had forgotten.”

That’s the kind of gem Jansson strews about for us through the pages of this slim and lovely book, all of it amidst a natural world (an island in the Gulf of Finland) that is as beautiful as it is dangerous. 

New Month

New Month

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The witch hazel tree, first to bloom, is also the first to turn. But this year, other trees are following suit. Cold evenings have also tinged the maples and oaks. 

In the garden, the weeds I haven’t pulled are thinning and retreating on their own. Summer is giving up the ghost.

It’s a new month, an autumnal month. And months matter more in this time of few markers. 

A Post at Midday

A Post at Midday

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While I would like to bookend last evening’s “A Post at Sundown” with “A Post at Sunrise,” alas it is far too late for that. Perhaps “A Post at Midday.” 

Which gets to one of my favorite topics, which is time: the numerous time zones in which we live — not just around the world but within individual lives. To the young, days and weeks pass oh so slowly. To those of us who have a few more years under our belts, they fly. 

And nowhere does this reveal itself more clearly than with the arrival of a new generation. To a grandparent, the changes a baby undergoes during those first precious weeks and months, from a completely helpless newborn with wise eyes that seem to carry within them the wisdom of the ages to a smiley six-week-old are doubly amazing. Miraculous in and of themselves — and more so for us, because the transformation occurs at warp speed. 

With change happening this quickly, no wonder A Post at Sunrise becomes … A Post at Midday.

 

A Post at Sundown

A Post at Sundown

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It’s past six on a Sunday evening, late enough that if I hadn’t written a blog post I would just skip it for the day. But not this Sunday — or any of the 51 others we’ve had this year.

That’s because about this time in 2019, I realized that if I wrote a post every day, I might hit the 3,000-mark at about the same time as this blog’s 10-year anniversary in February. I figured that if I could write five or six posts a week I could probably write seven. And so I did.

I didn’t quite make 3,000 posts by the 10-year mark, though I was close. But as it turns out, I’ve kept up the daily blog-writing routine for more than 365 days now. Come October 1,  I’ll start giving myself an occasional pass on a Saturday or Sunday.

It’s all rather silly, I know — a resolution I didn’t have to make for a blog I don’t have to write. But that’s the fun of it.

The Late Show

The Late Show

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Like many people these days, I’m not skimping on the indoor entertainment budget. I’ve splurged recently and signed up for two online streaming services. Add to that the DVD rentals to which I still subscribe, plus cable television, which has its own delights, chiefly the movie channels.

I’ve been watching one of those the last couple of evenings. Strangely enough, though I could choose from a wide variety of streaming programs, it’s the more limited menu of old black-and-white films that’s holding my attention most these days. 

This probably says something about the limits of choice, but what it’s doing most is reminding me fondly of those old-fashioned late shows. Back when television had a sign-off time and binge-watching wasn’t yet possible, I would stumble upon “The Blackboard Jungle” or “The Philadelphia Story” when I was babysitting or after returning from my 3-11 p.m. shift at Jerry’s Restaurant. 

I was the only one awake in the house. It was just me and the movie — be it comedy or drama or romance. It was then, I think, that I learned to love film. And watching these old movies now, sometimes once again the only one awake in the house, reminds me of those early discoveries. How good they were then; how good they are still.

(Photo of “The Philadelphia Story” courtesy IMBD)

Perfectly Balanced

Perfectly Balanced

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Approximately one hour from now the Northern Hemisphere will leave summer behind and enter fall. While there is plenty of reason to mourn this passage — and I will certainly miss summer— there is something about these days, one in the spring and the fall, these equinox days of perfect balance, that I always admire. 

It has something to do with moderation and tolerance, with being able to hold in one’s mind two opposite thoughts and feelings. Here we are with summer flowers and autumn chill. I like the variety of the day. It is a hinge, a bridge, a passageway.

So instead of concentrating on what we’re losing, I’m going to try and think about what we have today. In this moment we are perfectly balanced: a rarity in nature and in time.

The Bells

The Bells

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I found a new online Mass this morning, the first one to pop up when I did a search. One of the ways it  recommended itself was by the playing of church bells at the opening.

In earlier times, the sound of bells was far more a part of life. Bells marked times to rise and work and pray. They commemorated the passing of lives and eras.

Of course, now we are in unusual times, but even in pre-pandemic days I seldom heard church bells. In fact, my church was taken to task for their modest bell-ringing. As a result bells are rung shortly before services for a couple minutes at a time.

Thus are we deprived of one of humankind’s more sonorous sounds — and of the reminders they provide us.

(The bells of Notre Dame during an exhibition in 2013.)

Quickly

Quickly

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As I watch two of my daughters go through pregnancy and motherhood together, I try to explain what it feels like. “You were once that size,” I say, pointing at my grandson. “And now you’re having babies of your own.”

They smile and laugh. They get it. Sort of. 

But not really, not yet. They think it’s passing quickly. They don’t know what quickly is yet. But some day,  I imagine — I hope — they will. 

(Photo of moonrise in North Arlington, taken as I was leaving the girls after a virtual baby shower.)

Most of All

Most of All

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Yesterday, I read an entire book. The title isn’t important. Let’s just say it wasn’t War and Peace. But it’s worth mentioning because it’s been a while since I’ve read a book in a day, and it was satisfying in and of itself.

I must clarify that by “day” I mean 24 hours, which includes reclining in the hammock on a perfect late-summer afternoon as well as reading in the middle of the night, unable to sleep — with the latter a more common condition than the former, I’m sorry to say. But still, the words were digested, the book was read.

What this means, what I’ve known all along, is that reading is one of those things I’ll find a way to do no matter what. It’s one of the things I love to do most of all.