A Clutch of Keys

A Clutch of Keys

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From a neighbor, we’ve received a windfall of dubious utility and uncertain origin: a clutch of keys — if that’s the best collective noun to use for them.

Some are for doors, some are for clocks. All are antiques. They hail from an era when keys were king. No plastic card, no fob, no key code. These are the real thing, known as bit or barrel keys, Wikipedia informs me. They’re the kind of keys that belong on a big ring, the kind of keys zealously guarded by housekeepers or superintendents.

Before I began this blog I would not have photographed these keys sitting on the counter. They would have been just another pile of stuff. But now I see the illustrative potential of things, find myself stopping to admire the kooky wall art in the lobby of my building (see yesterday’s illustration) or to snap picture of leaf shadows on siding.

It’s a new way of seeing … and yesterday, I saw these keys.

The Plague

The Plague

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And so it begins. The averted handshake at this morning’s Ash Wednesday service. The shunning on Metro of anyone who’s coughing or sniffling. The headlines and newscasts and public health warnings.

It will worsen, no doubt. There will be closures and restrictions, dire predictions. There will be confusion and panic. Truth will be elusive.

It’s no less than what other eras have had to bear, but for us it will be novel (in more ways than one).  Because we were raised with vaccines not quarantines.

I’m reminded of the ending of one of my favorite novels, Albert Camus’ The Plague:

He knew what those jubilant crowds did not know but could have learned from books: that the plague bacillus never dies or disappears for good; that it can lie dormant for years and years in furniture and linen chests; that it bides its time in bedrooms, cellars, trunks and bookshelves; and that perhaps the day would come when, for the bane and the enlightening of men, it would rouse up its rats again and send them forth to die in a happy city. 

Virtual Vacation

Virtual Vacation

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Time for a virtual vacation. Today I’m heading to Florida, where I go every summer to walk the beach, inhale the sea air, and watch dune grass swaying in the breeze.

I’m thinking about how sultry it is there, and how I always intend to do more writing than I actually do — but how it works out anyway. Because the trip is always an inspiration and a restorative, much longed for, much appreciated.

It’s still months away but already I can feel a warm breeze on my face and the fine white sand between my toes. One of the best things about a virtual vacation is that it can happen whenever you want it to! And for me, it’s happening … right … now.

Shortcuts

Shortcuts

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Walkers in the suburbs may look serene and zen-like as they trod the paths and sidewalks, but underneath it all, they’re looking out for shortcuts, cut-throughs, a faster way to get from A to Z.

On the surface this makes no sense. Almost by definition, walkers in the suburbs aren’t trying to actually get anywhere. They’re walking just to walk. So why would they (read me!) want to shorten the trip?

Sometimes for variety. Sometimes because they really are trying to get somewhere (which was the case when I snapped this shot). And sometimes, just for the heck of it.

A shortcut can be a path to adventure.

Ready for its Closeup

Ready for its Closeup

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The bathroom remodeling project is drawing to a close; the room is almost complete. It’s marble and gray, a cool neutral space — one that already puts the rest of the house to shame.

I marvel at its elegance, wonder if we’ve overdone it, but tell myself, no, this is the first of several projects that will spiff up the old place, make it more livable now and perhaps boost its market value later. I remind myself that this is money earmarked for just such a use. I tell myself to chill out.

Mostly, I tell myself to wait for the first ceremonial soak, perhaps as soon as tonight, though that may be overly optimistic. To wait for the warm water that I can slide into, up to my shoulders. To wait for the room to be finished and polished and gussied up — ready, like these lights here, for its closeup.

By George!

By George!

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It’s the birth anniversary of our first president, and I went in search of his words, thinking they might shed some light on the craziness of our current politics.

Here is an excerpt from his farewell address — in one paragraph a plea for peace and harmony, in the next a desire for forgiveness, and finally a request for a well-earned rest.

Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. 


…


Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence; and that, after forty five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.


Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations, I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever-favorite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers.

Dropping In

Dropping In

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Yesterday my brother Drew surprised us by stopping by the house on his way home from an appointment. We chatted, nibbled on cookies and caught up. It turned an otherwise ordinary evening into a delight.

First, there is the wonderful reality that he now lives close enough to do such a thing. But more than that, I realized how much I relish a custom that has vanished to the extent that even its replacement (calling someone on the phone without texting them first) is on the way out.

In the old days, dropping in was how you stayed in touch, the original face time. As someone on the shy/introverted end of the sociability scale, this sometimes gave me fits. I once lived in a mountaintop community where people not only dropped by but walked right into your house unannounced. While that was taking things a bit too far, I’d rather have that than no dropping in at all.

(One home I dropped in on a few years ago.)

Driving In

Driving In

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Every so often, I drive to the office rather than taking Metro. Whenever I do, I’m amazed at how easy it is to get here. Public transportation turns a journey into a series of segments — the drive to the Metro, the Orange Line ride to Rosslyn, changing to the Blue Line for the five stops to Crystal City, then the walk from the Metro Station to the office.

On the other hand, driving in is all of a piece. Yes, there are directions to follow; there is merging, passing and the usual frustrations of life behind the wheel. But in terms of steps taken, it’s simple.

Why don’t I do it all the time, you wonder. Because I can’t, at least not easily.  The most direct route charges solo drivers up to $50 for the privilege of traveling nine miles on pockmarked roads. So unless I have a passenger, or the high-occupancy vehicle restrictions are lifted, I take Metro.

This is good for my carbon footprint, but bad for the only bottom line that really matters in the end —  time spent.

As I was strolling to the office from the parking garage this morning, I noticed how close it is to what will be our new office location. That may be incentive enough to drive in the long-way around (which is possible). Maybe that will be my treat to myself for the next year or two. A bit more simplicity, and, in the end, a lot more time.

Lasting Impressions

Lasting Impressions

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Remembering where I was this time last year, zooming through the streets of Phnom Penh in a tuk-tuk, about to leave for the eastern part of the country, where I would have a strange and unforgettable experience with bats.

The trips I’ve taken the last few years will never leave me. Though the reporting I’ve done has long since been turned into articles, the impressions it left will always be part of my writing.

They come in especially handy when I need to remind myself that the world is much larger than my little corner of it. The last few days I’ve been remembering a woman who seemed the incarnation of sadness. She had been trafficked, beaten and abused. Through a series of remarkable occurrences she found her way back home. But the poverty she returned to was so severe — her kids ate rice and roasted rat because that’s all they had — that it wouldn’t surprise me to learn she’d once again taken her chances with a job offer abroad.

She was a beautiful woman whose children hugged her tenderly. They seemed to know what she had done for them. How could they not?

February Flowers

February Flowers

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I photographed these daffodils on February 7. They were sheltered by a brick wall and no doubt blooming early because of it. But yesterday, I noticed that my own daffodil shoots are plumped with buds — and they’re not sheltered at all.

The winter jasmine has been out since January,  the early spring buttercups for at least two weeks and I just spied a Lenten rose. I wrote about snowdrops a while ago; they’ve been blooming almost a month now.


If spring continues unabated we’ll have a three-month-long procession of bloom, starting with the shyest white crocus and leading up to the gaudiest pink Kwanzan cherry. It’s the other side of global warming — an early spring. And right now, I’m feeling grateful for it.