Thursday morning

Paul Klee makes me happy. And to think this image represents/is named by him "flora on the sand" and looks as it does. Klee put everything in its rightful place--for him--and for us to consider and wonder about. This image of his makes for joyous musings.

Flora on the Sand

Paul Klee

1927

Flora on the Sand: Remembrances of dwarf wild flowers standing bravely amid the sandy shores of the Tuolumne River in the meadow by Soda Springs on our way to Glen Aulin. Late June. Wild flowers all over the place, holding their heads up to gather sunshine while their summer days are with them. Farther down the trail and away from the river, as if in a memorial like meadow of its own, white corn lilies everywhere. Later, we would find out that such a mighty blooming of these flowers happens only every few years in the high country. These white lilies need a perfect match of conditions for blooming.

Those days the sun set late. After our hikes, we bought ice cream at the canvas clad tent store by our campground before we walked to our campsite for dinner. Tired and happy, with the sweetnesses and labors of the day collected in the dust on our boots and socks and legs, we sat on granite rocks out in front of the store watching the meadow.

Friday morning in Berkeley

Thinking about things:

11 vues de la flèche de la cathédrale by Gerard Michel [not Berkeley]

It's foggy this Friday morning in Berkeley. Goose is asleep in his circle bed by my dresser. He is a good boy. Desie has just finished chewing her bone and is stretched out on her l.l.bean bed that I moved over to the center of my room so she could have a place close to me. [Her circle bed over by the brown chair is empty for the time being.] Desie is quite inconstant about chewing her bone. She seems to discover it anew every once in a while, spend an amount of time working on it, and then push it away. Chewing her bone is not a part of her quotidian endeavors as it was for my dear Isidore. He chewed regularly--perhaps to fend off his worries about things. Desie is napping now, a bit of let up after a eventful Thursday night.

To begin with, Desie was a naughty girl on our walk last evening. In the courtyard at the Clark Kerr campus, she ran off during our off leash training. She had been such a good girl up until then: running back to me on command [and with a determined look and playful gait]. But, as in the past, she became distracted and chose to disregard my call and instead, ate many many many tiny tree berries before I could get to her.

When I did get to her, I insisted on a few moments of reflection: I told Desie [who was in a sit] that she must never never eat berries because they can make her sick. She had a hard time with such principled talk. She would not look at me: a sign of submission of sorts, I know, but too, this is a stubborn girl when it comes to repentance. We walked home with Desie on leash. I was despondent. I worried that the berries could be poisonous. And, Shanan was due at our house in a little while to deliver Goose Dog for the weekend.

When we got home at around 7:00, I fed Desie her usual dinner and she waited close by [in a down] while I prepared my salad. Desie always gets carrots during this salad making time. And she did. But, uncharacteristically, she got up and walked over to me, leaned in a bit, and threw up a massive amount of stuff. On the little rug by the sink. Poor girl. When she was done, she leaned in even more for some comforting. I comforted her.

Only minutes later, after I had hosed down the rug in the driveway, Shanan and Goose arrived. And of course, lots of hugs [people] and pats [people and dogs] and running around in the yard [dogs] for a fine family reunion. Then a brief visit in the living room with talk about Shanan's trip to D.C in the morning, his job, my teaching adventures and Brandon and everyone in Evanston. As for Desie and Goose, to our surprise, lots of rolling around and growling playfully on the rug. Usually, Goose will have nothing to do with Desie. Her attempts to get him to romp with her are steadfastly ignored. [I do hope they will play together a bit over the next few days.] After Shanan left, Goose and Desie and I snuggled for a short while before we headed upstairs for bed.

[A few words for further thinking about things:

I am pleased Goose has his very own circle bed from home for sleeping in at my house. Especially since Shanan, who thinks my notions about dog beds are crazy [good crazy] and wanted not to abide by my request for him to transport Goose's bed to Berkeley for the weekend, remembered to bring his bed over last night. I think it is important that each dog have his/her own home base bed. I am very sure such accommodations provide for much needed security and a hint of dog joy.

Just yesterday afternoon, I mentioned to a dear friend how much I still miss Isidore. I think Izzy is on my mind more so than usual because my dear friends Ina and Ron put down their beloved 12 year old dog Corky on Wednesday. He was a good dog. They loved him very much. I have been talking with them about such difficult to do acts. And remembering how it was with Isidore.

And just now, Desie moved to her circle bed over by the brown chair. And Goose has gone downstairs. I think he is sitting by the window so he can watch for Shanan.]

Wednesday morning

Today is my sweet son Brandon's birthday. Just so you know. I think Stephanie and Skylar and Jordan and Dylan will make an angel food cake for Brandon. With strawberries on top.

Brandon

Yesterday, my sweet son Shanan launched his first app Chatmapr. It is a way to share locations with close friends and is now available on iTunes. Take a look!

chatmapr logo

[whose feet are these, I wonder]

A list of things to do today:

1. Go to the gym. [read The Invisible Bridge]
2. Straighten up the house for my new Salon class which begins tonight. [This must include vacuuming because Desie is shedding and shedding and shedding. Oh dear me. I should wait until late afternoon to do this. Just in case.]
3. Prepare materials for class: Delp, Bakhtin, Alexie, Jefferson [and maybe Rosenblatt] articles and chart and folders for keeping everyone's writing and lined paper for writing and notemaking.
4. Organize all the papers on my desk in my study
5. Organize all the papers on my desk in my bedroom
6. Organize all the papers on my bench in my bedroom
7. Take Desie for a nice walk in afternoon
8. Call Brandon to wish him HB.
9. Talk to Shanan about his first app Chatmapr that is now available on iTunes.

Tuesday morning

Looking back at The New Yorker covers.

These two covers are from the magazines that were issued during the weeks my sweet sons Brandon and Shanan were born. I think they are beautiful. The New Yorker Rebound.

April 1973

Brandon was born on April 20th 1973.

This first cover makes me happy. It is filled with horizontality and joy. Rows and rows of buildings stacked up upon each other. Rows of buildings leaning on each other for comfort. So many windows for looking out and looking in. And then there are the green green trees that live among the buildings and look, from afar, like lace adornments dispersed every so carefully by a thoughtful one. Looking like honeycomb [apartments]. Lots of opportunities.

Brandon from the moment he was born. A placid and content observer. Brandon pondered how everything in his world worked. Aways watching and trying to understand. A content little boy who purposefully dropped cheerios on the floor while he leaned over his highchair tray to watch them fall and squeaked with joy when we counted how many he had dropped. A curious little boy who liked to watch the worker bees that gathered by the flowery hedges in our yard. A little boy who, many times, held bees in his hand bravely so he could study their lives. Always and still loving the science of life.

September 1975

Shanan was born on September 24th 1975.

This second cover makes me happy, too. Horizontality and joy abound here. Lots of sky [mostly sky, in fact] made from quiet sweeps of muted tones: browns and pale pale greens and rusty oranges. The colors of this unthought of sky reflecting back the definitive terms of the russet fields. This beautiful and open sky stands ready, it seems to shout. And a young rider makes his way through the the tall rustic grasses on his bike. Back straight. Eyes forward. Seeming to be fixed on his destination.

Shanan from the beginning. Never sitting still. Needing always to get somewhere. And to figure out these travels on his own terms. First scooting across the floor instead of crawling. Sitting up this way rather than moving about on all fours gave him a taller perspective on things it seems. Then running everywhere, sometimes without taking a hand when he ran/crossed a street. Later, riding AC Transit [with Willie Mae Ellington and then on his own] all over the bay area to authenticate the maps he had consulted. And, when he was still quite young, traveling on BART to the end of the line for making even more maps and charts of his travels. Always traveling still.

Evanston revisited: the other 1/5

During my visit in Evanston, my daughter-in-law Stephanie was mostly at a trade show in Chicago, where she exhibited her new company's lunch boxes. [That's partly why I was there: to help out with the kids while she worked!] They are called Bright Bin New Generation Lunchboxes. I think these lunchboxes are quite wonderful! As she explains on her BrightBin, LLC web page, "They are colorful, fun, non-toxic, and eco-friendly. They are waste-free and save time and money."

This is what they look like:

Just in case you might want to buy one [they come in blueberry blue and cherry red], click here to enter her web page, which, I must point out, was designed by my son Brandon. Photos of Skylar and Jordan are everywhere on the web page. There is also a great photo of Stephane [with Maggie and Cody] and another one of the whole family [5/5] on the about us page. Take a look.

And just so you know, I have a blue one.

Thursday morning in Berkeley

3/5 of my Evanston Family

[click to view larger image]

1/5 of my Evanston Family

[click to view larger image]

Back home

Sitting at my desk with my coffee and lots of memories from my trip to see my Evanston family.

Images of little girls giggling; art projects; yogurt snacks [with special k, honey and berries for Jordan and apples for Skylar]; reading books [Where the sidewalks Ends and Ming Lo Moves the Mountain, to name just two, and doing math problems [ 2+0 and 4+4, for example]; ichatting with Shanan; solving dog and cat puzzles from Martha; reading a biology book with Dylan [even though he didn't want to talk to me]; "hanging out" with everyone, as they put it; snowflakes falling outside.

And more images of the ride home from the airport with Shanan and Desie and Goose [my Berkeley family] last night.
Lots of hugs and wags and catching up about Brandon and his family.

2/4 of my Berkeley Family [at Crissy Field while I was away]

[click to view larger image]

It is quiet this morning.

Sunshine abounds.
Desie is in her bed--she is a bit confused about my comings and goings and her place here with me.
She is a reserved happy girl on this morning.

Thinking about family.
And how lovely love and affection can be.

An excerpt from one of last year's Valentines

which seems appropriate to put right here.

Monday morning in Evanston

It's been snowing here in Evanston

Daytime temperature today 32 degrees

I am in Evanston visiting my sweet son Brandon and Stephanie and Skylar and Jordan and Dylan.

Here is a list of some of the things we did Saturday night and yesterday:

1. hugged hello when I arrived from the airport. The girls were hiding but their giggles helped me find them.
2. talked about everything: how much we missed each other and how happy we are to be together; shanan and goose and desiree, cody and maggie and so on.
3. read books after dinner: Frederick by Leo Lionni and the beginning of Spinky Sulks by Williian Steig.
4. made Valentines with a heart stamp and lots of curly letters and xoxox's. Skylar can spell just about every word she wrote and Jordan knows all the sounds of all the letters.
5. practiced addition and subtraction: Skylar and Jordan did worksheets I brought about adding on 0 and 1. jordan learned how to made a beautiful 8!
6. cleaned out the bookcase in Skylar and Jordan's room and chose books for reading tomorrow.
7. had dinner and read books

more later....

Friday morning in Berkeley

View of Yosemite Falls Tail from the meadow

Remembering winter days in the snow.

Our annual December 24th trip to Yosemite with my boys. Mostly we stayed in a tiny cabin by the Merced River with its door that faced Half Dome to the east. Or else, we stayed at the Lodge with its back door that opened up to a tiny forest by the Merced River.

There were our hikes: From Happy Isles to Mirror Lake and then along the meadow. And one year to the top of Yosemite Falls in deep [deep] snow on a demanding switchback trial. I remember how, at one point, when Brandon and Shanan got ahead of me and I couldn't see where they were, I hollered to them and they threw snow balls up in the air to indicate their whereabouts! And one time [during a drought], to Glacier Point. [Usually the Four-Mile trail was closed in the winter.] The day was sunny and there was quite a bit of black ice on the upper part of the trail because of the long afternoon shade on the [upper] south side of the valley. These conditions brought about lots of slipping and sliding and laughing [on the part of my boys]. And falling down [on my part]. I remember the next day. It was another sunny day. We went snow shoeing [me with my broken arm in a splint] at Badger Pass. Our leader, a beloved ranger, led us to a location that provided a splendid view of the high country of Yosemite. It was a grand sight. The three of us and the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the blue blue sky.

[And,of course, there was skiing at Badger Pass for Brandon and Shanan and cross country for me on the Glacier Point Road.]

We regularly ended up at the Ahwahnee Hotel [sometime twice a day] for warming up by the giant fire place in the Grand Lounge. And, after dinner at the cafeteria, we watched movies about Yosemite at the Lodge and wandered around in the gift shop to pass time before bedtime.

Grand Lounge at the Ahvanhee Hotel

Thinking about things/memories and how they are remembered.

Friday

A list:

1. Desie is feeling better.
2. She is such a sweet girl.
3. We are going to be home most of today cleaning up and doing a bit of reading of logs for CW.
4. My sweet son Brandon is coming tonight.
5. He will stay with my sweet son Shanan in S.F.
6. Tomorrow, Brandon and Shanan are going to to the Cal game: Cal vs UCD.
7. [Just so you know, Brandon went to UCD for undergrad and Berkeley for grad school]
8. I am going to the game with my dear friend Liz: she has season tickets in honor of her husband Herb.
9. Goose will stay with Desie during the game.
10. After the game, Brandon and Shanan and I will have dinner at La Mediterranee.
11. Brandon will stay with me overnight.
12. And then, I will take him to the airport for an early morning flight back to Evanston.

All of this is going to be so wonderful!

Friday

Just back from Evanston.

These sweet grand girls of mine, Jordan on the left and Skylar on the right, must have jumped from this ledge at Millennium Park in Chicago at least 25 times. Such simple joy for them and for me!

click on photo for larger image!

Here is a list of some of the simple and joyful things we [Skylar, Jordan, Dylan, Brandon, Stephanie and I] did together during my visit in Evanston:

1. held hands with S and J in the car on the way home from the airport while they told me stories about their daddy [S and J and B and me]
2. got to see [in person] and hear more about dear Stephanie's new and quite wonderful BrightBin lunch boxes [s and me and everyone]
3. shared Luna bars for breakfast [S and J and me]
4. watched Sesame Street [S and J and me]
5. went to Millennium Park in downtown Chicago where we had lunch [with BrightBin lunch boxes], played with blocks and hoola hoops, watched Jordan on stage juggling and watched Skylar get drenched under the waterfall with the man's face [S and J and B and me]
6. walked and rode bikes to the blue swing park a few blocks from home [S and J and B and D and S and me]
7. walked and rode bikes to the blue swing park a few blocks from home [J and me]
8. visited Skylar's school and played on the equipment --most especially the monkey bars [These two grand girls of mine are strong and determined athletes. [S and J and B and me]
9. went to library in Evanston [S and J and me]
10. taught me/ learned about insects and their legs and antenna at the library [S and J and me]
11. went to Peet's for muffins and coffee: there were no muffins left for us so we had giant oatmeal cookies instead
12. enjoyed watching my sweet son Brandon teach little Dylan and other children at the park about centipedes [S and J and B and D and S and me]
13. organized and used arts and crafts material I brought for S and J in their bedroom [S and J and me]
14. watched Skylar decorate the box of art supplies
15. watched Jordan wrap [via a home made envelop] a present for Shanan and me
16. read chapter 1 of The Trumpet Swan by E.B. White [S and J and me]
17. listened [with great amounts of joy] to Skylar read a book ["with an annoying mouse"on the cover, as she put it] to me.
18. 
    
19. [to be continued]

Addendum to list:

15. Video chatting with my sweet son Brandon and my granddaughter Skylar [11 days until her birthday]