Dear You,
Sitting in waiting rooms requires a certain level of patience, and I guess I can always use more practice. Generally I bring something to occupy my mind -- a newspaper, this morning, and often a book; but my iTouch is also useful if there's connectivity. I am not averse, however, to looking around and thinking my thoughts when other avenues are not possible.
This is why my attention was fixed on a dreadful pair of lime-green Crocs (I think I have the name right) covering the feet of the fellow across from me. I'd looked at his face, of course, and quickly determined that he had enjoyed rather too many french fries for one lifetime, and then -- avoiding the rudeness that accompanies discovered staring -- dropped my eyes to the floor. That's when I discovered the footwear.
I shall never be invited to participate in a fashion show, and I am well aware that my appearance in public never rises above Acceptable. Still. Those shoes really should never appear outside one's house unless one stays in the back yard to weed the roses or rotate the compost soil. Whatever impression this fellow, stuffed into his blue jeans, might have retained was surely lost at his first step outside this morning.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Off With Its Limb
Dear You,
After nearly twenty years of mowing the grass around it, the tree had changed from an impediment to a stalwart and dependable friend. So it was a shock last Fall to turn the corner from the back of the house and find a major part of Shigawa (he was, after all, a flowering Japanese cherry tree) broken out and lying on the ground.
The piece that had given way was not just a small part -- near the trunk it was a foot or more in diameter, and the whole thing was easily thirty feet long.
As with any creature with a broken limb, I called a doctor. Bob came right away, appropriately for such an emergency, and as he surveyed the damage in his dry, tsk-tsk way, said there was nothing to be done but surgery. "Will he survive?" I asked.
More silent study, and finally, "Well, yes . . . but every tree has a lifespan, and this is a pretty old one." The next day the Assistants came, and in a few minutes cut and tended to the wound. At Christmas, I burned in the fireplace the portions they saved for me -- sort of a ritual, I guess, and wondered how the amputee would look come Spring.
Well, it's here, it's just as pretty as ever, and cutting the lawn was even a little easier today.
After nearly twenty years of mowing the grass around it, the tree had changed from an impediment to a stalwart and dependable friend. So it was a shock last Fall to turn the corner from the back of the house and find a major part of Shigawa (he was, after all, a flowering Japanese cherry tree) broken out and lying on the ground.
The piece that had given way was not just a small part -- near the trunk it was a foot or more in diameter, and the whole thing was easily thirty feet long.
As with any creature with a broken limb, I called a doctor. Bob came right away, appropriately for such an emergency, and as he surveyed the damage in his dry, tsk-tsk way, said there was nothing to be done but surgery. "Will he survive?" I asked.
More silent study, and finally, "Well, yes . . . but every tree has a lifespan, and this is a pretty old one." The next day the Assistants came, and in a few minutes cut and tended to the wound. At Christmas, I burned in the fireplace the portions they saved for me -- sort of a ritual, I guess, and wondered how the amputee would look come Spring.
Well, it's here, it's just as pretty as ever, and cutting the lawn was even a little easier today.
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