3.1 miles
marshall loop
72 degrees / dew point: 59
It seemed warmer than 72 out there this morning. Ran with Scott. First Scott talked about Russia and Wagner, then I talked about the You and I and how we start as one and become the other as we acknowledge each other. This discussion was partly inspired by encountering one walker who called out good morning! and another who instead of offering a greeting ignored us and almost ran into me. What else do I remember? Rowers! Scott counted at least 6 shells on the river. Mostly I only saw them, but for one brief moment I heard the coxswain’s voice.
wordle challenge
4 tries: handy / drain / brand / grand
For the third day in the row I had to choose between equally fitting options. This time, brand or grand? I chose incorrectly.
a refreshing shandy
the pro cyclist Indurain
Rembrandt teeth whitening (brand)
Grand Old Days — the start of summer in St. Paul
She defeated him handily.
Yesterday I came across Annie Proloux’s book, Fen, Bog, and Swamp, and I’m certain that she disagrees with the phrase/metaphor, drain the swamp.
Mostly I don’t care, but I have 2 brands that I especially like. For swimming, TYR, and for running, Saucony. I used to mispronounce both of them. It’s tear (cry) not tire, and sock-a-knee not something that rhymes with Marconi.
Before I got into watching pro cycling or running and before my vision made it almost impossible to track the ball, I loved watching Grand Slam tennis. My favorite was always Wimbledon — Jennifer Capriati, Monica Seles, Steffi Graf, Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, and Roger Federer.
handy dandy notebook
down the drain
brand spanking new
you’re a grand old flag, you’re a high flying flag
Somewhere along the way, what is marketed as handy and convenient is not always user-friendly.
a drain, a sewer, a causeway, a sluice
I hate shopping at Target. Endless aisles, filled with only 1 or 2 brands. The illusion of choice.
In 2008, we almost moved to Grand Rapids, MI. We had already picked out a house to rent, almost signed a lease, told neighbors we were leaving. Then I was told I might be able to have a full-time position at the U. Scott and I walked along Lake Michigan and had a gut-wrenching talk. I decided to turn down a guaranteed job for the possibility of a preferable one.
Crossing Water/ Tony Hoaglund
In late summer I swim across the lake to the stand of reeds
that grows calmly in the foot-deep water on the other side.
It is like going to a florist’s shop
you have to take your clothes off to get to,
where nothing is for sale
and nothing on display
but some tall, vertical green spears,
and the small, already half-shriveled pale-purple blossoms
sprouted halfway up the sides of them.
Squatting softly in the cool, tea-colored water,
hearing my own breath move in and out,
leaning close to see the tattered, soft-edged
purses of the flowers,
with their downward hanging cones and coppery antennae.
—This is more tenderness than I had reason to expect
from this rude life in which I built
a wall around myself, in which I couldn’t manage to repair
my cracked-up little heart.
Each time I make the trip, I get the strange idea that this
is what is waiting at the end of life–
long stalks slanting in teh breeze, then straightening—
flowers, loose-petaled as memory, gray
as the aftertaste of grief.
Tonight, I’ll lie in bed and feel the day exhaling me
as part of its long sigh into the dark,
knowing that I have no plan,
knowing that I have no chance of getting there.
I will remember how those flowers swayed and then held still
for me to look at them.
Oh, I love this poem! And I love Tony Hoaglund. I know that he died several years ago (in 2018), but I didn’t know the cause. Looked it up: pancreatic cancer. Just like my mom.