OK....so, after a many month hiatus, I returned to my blog, coaxed back by The Cloth Diaper Sniffer..... it's a long story. So, here I am. Musings from Maine. My last Musings is still out there...somewhere....but this is the authentic new/improved version with the old one clipped and pasted below.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Stop Grabbing My Lapels
I don't know about you, but are you sick and tired of having the commentators on the news say, "Look, this is what you need to know..."? I crave educated discourse and discussion. Not loud-mouthed know-it-all's telling me to "LOOK...." Each time somebody says, "Look..." I don't want to. "Look" is an obnoxious way of trying to grab my attention, perhaps even interrupt a conversation with the message, "I have something more important to say than you and you need to hear it NOW! Give me a break. "Look" is simply said too many times. When I'm watching Larry King or Wolf Blitzer or any of these info-schmo's and someone begins saying, "Look...", I just go away, knowing my brain needs better input. I flip on some comforting music, perhaps one of those CD's that's buried deep in my stacks of music. And I listen. Relax. Often I read one of those old-fashioned pieces of paper that purports to contain news. Some papers actually carry news. How refreshing to read them on occasion. And the papers generally don't shout, "LOOK!" Politely tell those on the tube who are getting in your face and grabbing your lapels and saying, "Look...I'm talking here..." to go away, in the most polite, passive-aggressive kind of way. Amen.
Posted by H. Phillips Smith at 5:46 AM 1 comments
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
A New Year, A New Way
Well, it's been quite a month. First there's the matter of the snow. Lots of it. But more importantly, it's been a month of change for the nation. Who among us, other than pompous gasbags on the AM radio dial, has not been moved by the arrival of Barack Obama as President? Young, happy, moving, changing things, helping us hold our heads up high, this is the President now in office. Our expectations are soaring. And I know there's not a chance he will live up to our expectations. Many will feel the disappointment and bitterly complain that he's like all the rest. But for many others, I hope myself included, his daring to start changing the world view of the USA is one of the most important things he can do. He's doing it with the appointment of Senator Mitchell from Maine....a man who has considerable success in bringing people together both in Ireland and the Middle East. Mitchell will work hard to bring peace to that troubled region. The President is shutting down Guantanamo. He is ending torture of enemy combatants. He is actually talking to Republicans. What a breath of fresh air. I wish him luck. I hope he uses his immense popularity to ask us all to sacrifice. I hope he leads. It's been so long we've had no leader. I hope he deals with the thieves who have raided the pensions of innocents and the executives who collect their millions and millions as their corporations fail.Last Saturday night, under star-filled skies, I stood alongside a frozen Maine lake and felt a sense of awe. The stars shimmered above and it felt so peaceful. I thought about my parents and all those who have come before us who struggled to give us the lives we now have. In the zero degree air, I felt comfort that my country is again being set on a course I could believe in. As I turned to go back to the winter camp I shared with friends, a slight breeze came up. I had this warm feeling that my Dad was at my side saying, 'All is well.' It feels good. First time in a long time.
Posted by H. Phillips Smith at 4:27 PM 0 comments
Labels: Winter politics
Sunday, January 11, 2009
More Snow
More snow. The gnome still sees above it, so it's really no big deal. It is Maine, after all. And it's winter. And, I guess we could be in Washington state. So, no griping here. Just hunkered down on a snowy Sunday, listening to nice music, smelling the herb marinade for the pork tenderloin that is festering for dinner, watching the birds avoid the peanut butter I put out for them, and getting ready to blow snow out of the driveway. Just another winter day in Maine.
Posted by H. Phillips Smith at 8:58 AM 0 comments
Labels: Another lazy winter Sunday in Maine
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Mule Musings on a Day Off
Here I am back. I have decided. I am like the mule racked with indecision. The mule sits between two bales of hay and starves because he can't decide. Well, maybe I'm not totally like the mule. I can't decide. I'm more like the mule stuck between two ROWS of bales of hay. I move toward one, then meander to the other side before being distracted to move on to the next. Then I turn around and start over. Yeh. That's it. Of course it's not flattering to be the mule. But I digress.So....here it is, Saturday morning. A day off for me. We sit and drink coffee and watch the birds at the feeders frantically eating, getting ready for the next snow storm. I'm referring here to the BIRDS frantcially eating and not US. We were just eating in a normal Saturday morning fashion. A little toast and juice. But I digress. I need to shovel the driveway before the next storm. But it's so cold out there and all the previous snow has turned hard and can't be shoveled anyway. So, thoughts turn to money. The household cash flow. Sure. We watch endless news reports of lay-offs and pay cuts and economic decline. We see each story filled with b-roll shots of sheets of money at the printing press...this to symbolize what is about to be infused into the economy by the man who will be President. But we all know that money will not be arriving here. It will be sent out to all of us in such small amounts that we'll not notice and life will go on as usual. That's partly because here in Maine, the ups and downs of the economy don't matter much...we're accustomed to being one of the lowest per capita income states in the nation anyhow. So, the big ups and downs of America don't matter all that much, especially when, as Lou Rawls used to sing, "It's an uphill climb to the bottom." We'll get by, just fine, I figure, since we both run our own businesses and can push them hard enough to put money in our pockets that will far excede the imaginary money we see being printed on TV. Our money will be real. That money on the government printing presses is just stuff we'll have to mail off to China anyhow. But all that aside... It's Saturday and we're cutting back on our lavish lifestyle because that's just the right thing to do after a Christmas in which we overspent. (Although, according to all the TV news reports, we didn't spend enough and now the makers of junk nobody wants are singing the blues.) Now we need to tighten belts, get into fiscal and physical shape and blah, blah, blah. So, Saturday, with our new fiscal austerity, we'll pool our resources, buy a tank of cheap gas and go out to see the grandson...take him sledding...yeh, that's it.But first, I should find the gift certificate for the tickets to the movie theater so we can go on the cheap tonight. I look for it right where I put it and of course it's not there. I look again. Still not there. I pull the drawer out to look and find 2008 tax information I need to file in the pile that I'll no doubt misplace later. So, off I go to file it. Oh, and I need to shred that other stuff I found. Oh, and pay the bills I left in the mail pile..or at least schedule them to be paid. But first, above all else, I need to check my e-mail. And in so doing, decide, en route, that that poor plant needs water and fertilizer. I prepare the water with liquid fertilizer and remember the plants I have cowering in the basement...they need water, too. So, down I go, wondering, when I get there, if the bigger of the two plants is really dead or just pretending to be frost-bitten from having been left in the garage until Christmas. Both get water and I figure I'll check them again sometime in the spring.You see what I'm getting at, I imagine? I am the mule musing about stuff I need to do and nibbling at the hay, but still being hungry. OY. So I must focus. Perhaps this can be my blog? Writing about something that surely everyone experiences when they are highly disorganized and confronted with a day filled with luxurious time.But for now, I'm off. Perhaps I'll call the guy who gave me the tickets... But first I have to check my VISA bill and while I'm at it, figure out when the cable bill is due and see if I scheduled it to be paid by the bank and see if Discover is also due and how I'll pay it if it's due at the same time as the mortgage. Or maybe we'll just go sledding and not worry about the bales of hay that litter my life. HEE HAW. Great idea.
Posted by H. Phillips Smith at 8:04 AM 0 comments
Labels: Organizational Mule
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Lilacs in winter
The holiday season is over. Amen. Farewell. I know this because I took the tree down yesterday, helping each ornament find its way to a container in big plastic bins. Each ornament says, 'Remember me?' Some hung on trees 50 years ago...smiling elves, ceramic bells, plastic gingerbread men. Others found their way to our tree from mergers of family. A sadness in this putting away.But all around me, a new season dawns. The lilacs tell me so. Big, fat, greenish yellow buds laugh-off the winter chill and remind me that brother crocus and tulip are already stirring underground, right by the foundation facing south. Now I await the song of the cardinal, the song that comes every winter in the hashest part of the season. In a bright red attire, he will sing the next season to us. But that's still a few weeks away. Meanwhile, I find brightness and a smile in the lilacs in winter.
Posted by H. Phillips Smith at 7:17 AM 1 comments
Labels: Christmas
Thursday, January 1, 2009
A Nasty Cold Start
My feet are cold. It's mid-afternoon in Maine and the sun is on its way down. The wind is howling and the weather people on TV insist on giving the temperatures based on the wind chill. I'm safely inside listening to the wind. But my feet are cold. A week ago, when the temps were about 60 degrees, I was saying, 'Hah! Wasn't much of a winter was it?' And now my feet are cold and my dog won't even take a walk. The closest to going out for young Baxter is to dash onto the deck in pursuit of the tree rat (squirrel) that's raiding my squirrel-proof bird feeders. The squirrel dashes to the spruce trees nearby, and Baxter proudly dashes back into the house to a thousand accolades for his work in behalf of the household. But my feet are cold and I must leave this place, this space in the house to find a warmer zone.
Posted by H. Phillips Smith at 12:19 PM 1 comments
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