February 28, 2013

When technology works right, it is such a blessing, when it's not working right . . . ohhhh the frustration!!!  For some reason my MS Word seems to want to give me a window that cannot be moved or closed, disappears my editing tool bar, and puts this big wide sidebar on my blank document page.  <BIG SIGH>  I was having such a hassle with it, I decided not to deal with it for a few days so I could approach it in a more rational manner.  Yelling and beating my keyboard tray brought no efficacious solution. 

Today I did something, and no, don't ask me what because I don't know, and I can move the window and my husband said I could make it so I couldn't see the distracting side bar by just making it really tiny.  So, I'm going to try this and see if I can actually get through this note without having a stroke or anything similar. 

Wednesday when I came out of school, it sounded like an electronic orchestra was tuning up in the field next to the school.  There is a flock of grackles that are there most mornings, but, except for an occasional whistle or electronic note, they are pretty quiet.  Well, yesterday they sounded like an electronic orchestra tuning up, runs of whistles, clicks, chirps, all sounding like they were made using a Moog synthesizer.  I stood there on the sidewalk just amazed at what I was hearing.   I find myself doing that a lot, stopping in amazement at something weird or wonderful.  Some of it sounded like the birds were cooperating to make cool lines of melody, though I suspect, with what I know about birds, that it was some kind of competition.  Never mind the cause the sounds were just fascinating.  I love the songs the birds make, so many mimic other birds or sounds in the environment.  We used to have a crow that called out "ow, ow, ow!!" because that's what it heard every morning when I brushed Mikayla's hair.  And a mockingbird that made our electronic alarm clock's sound at 4 am for weeks on end. 

I'm sure everything growing thinks it's spring whether the forecasters think it is or not,  ash trees are getting their fresh green leaves, the oaks are blooming and getting leaves at the same time, the bald cypress is hazed with green, and some little tree we saw yesterday on the median on Bay Area boulevard was awash with purpley pink flowers, no leaves yet just flowers.  My maple is covered with ripening seeds, still very red but now drying out so they have a little less red and a little more orange from the ones that are close to ripe, the tan-in-the-middle ripeness they get before they let go.  If they were ripe already, they would have been stripped off by the wind we have been getting lately.  What's missing today and the last few days is the soft humid warm air that is the hallmark of spring here.  A front has moved down and dropped both the temperature and the humidity.  Last time I saw the news, our humidity was 19% and that is certainly dry for here.  The low humidity coupled with the wind has made trying to get my hair up a real challenge.  Every strand want to repel every other strand until it stands out like a corona when I brush it. 

This poem is sort of what I felt like, standing there on the edge of that field of shiny black and brown grackles, surrounded by their wild and weird music: 

And For No Reason

And
For no reason
I start skipping like a child.

And
For no reason
I turn into a leaf
That is carried so high
I kiss the Sun's mouth
And dissolve.

And
For no reason
A thousand birds
Choose my head for a conference table,
Start passing their
Cups of wine
And their wild songbooks all around.

And
For every reason in existence
I begin to eternally,
To eternally laugh and love!

When I turn into a leaf
And start dancing,
I run to kiss our beautiful Friend
And I dissolve in the Truth
That I Am. 

Hafiz
Translated by Daniel Ladinsky

Though I don't think I could manage skipping like a child, I can still feel like doing it!  The birds choosing my head for a conference table, and passing their cups of wine and their songbooks, well, that was very close to the experience yesterday!  I love it when the world just smacks you up the side of the head with beauty and wonder and you get that dazed feeling of gratitude and gladness just to be alive!