I'm back...unfamiliar changes to the blog; how to do issues for me. I will have to learn more. My plan is to start posting writings here, but likely short fiction, stories, pieces, ideas...I've started a list of "ideas" to expand and will get around to writing and posting more soon. I may also alert others that I have a blog, a best-kept secret.

return, almost two years away!

I lost this blog, not sure how. Some change of computers and I could not find this blog. Then, via Google, just playing, there it is again. I'll try to keep something going, photos, too...no one reads this but that's okay.

back again...it's been a long, long time

Headache on my day off






oh my god...it's November...the earth whirling in loops around the sun, blink, a month is gone, Thanksgiving, Christmas mounting again...all so fast, all too fast...bad weather in the wings, over Canada, looking for a passage to sweep down on Illinois, ice, snow, sleet, blizzards, high drama of driving...

That is to say time is passing swiftly. There's a trip coming up shortly to see my kids in California; I leave here November 8th and return November 19th, so rougly eleven days. This moment, today, the tides of thoughts have shifted to some odd sense of regret or disinterest in making the trip. Old fears of flying impose, but beyond that, I sense a major disconnection there, I am not in any way central, the kids are remote physically--as in far away--but even more so emotionally. Matt's working with an attorney to convert my share of the Goleta house to him and Lauren, a done deal. If I could now go to New Zealand or Sicily to live under a bridge (far away, the ends of the earth) I would.

I'm tired of working, a painful proceedure, up and at 'em, headaches, backaches, arthritis, because I'm old. I'm not sure of Social Security, when it starts, how much, but guess it's not enough...

it used to be Pacific-August

this summer, the length of it, has been very rainy, cooler and rainier than normal.

In my youth there was some magic to "August" the month, the place, on the coast of California...less fog, warmth at night, a sensual feeling to the climate. Now, here, older, in Illinois, it--August--means a tilt of the seasons, as summer becomes autumn and autumn then becomes winter with all that that entails, ice, cold, bare trees, discontent. Coasting into eight years here! Amazing.

My friend Robert Joseph has been diagnosed with cancer of the colon; surgery, he has opted, as least for the present, to avoid chemotherapy and radiation and yesterday flew from Nevada, where he lives, to Tijuana, California Sur, Mexico, for some vegan sort of treatment at a clinic there.

email to the kids

this is an email I sent to Matt, Saniata, Lauren a few minutes ago...a testament to good eating maybe, as much as a gesture to be included...such a drift from the kids, mostly Lauren. I'm left with a sense of having to guess what I might have done to be in such disdain? Fairly clueless. So here's the email which is mostly joyous with the sense of food, always a good binder with me and my kids...I like that in them.
the email:


So I was really hungry this afternoon, I'm not sure why. I made dinner. Thick Iowa pork chops, 1.5 inches thick, very slowly browned in the electric skillet in olive oil and canola oil; added chopped onion, chopped garlic, large chopped bell pepper, large chopped celery, a very little hot chile, salt, pepper, fresh oregano, fresh basil and let it meld...lid on, lid off



Meanwhile I made my own sort of egg noodles alfredo, parmesan~pecorino...



Noodles rich, soft, creamy, pork chop on top of that, fresh home grown tomato slices over that, (from friends) sprinkled with fresh basil



Fork tender, I though I'd died and gone to hog heaven, really the best pork chops I've ever made.



The fresh (not cooked) tomato slices really added zing, sweet, bitter, a nice blend with the onion, garlic, pepper concoction...I'm sure you do something like this, but wonderful...Jim, picky roomie, scraped all the veggies off and ate it, too, and liked it, he said. Well, he said, "not bad" which is midwestern-speak for "very good!"



So how are you? How's Matt feeling? Where is Lauren? Alameda, Cleveland, Alaska, Bahamas? Did you have a party for Kaliya? Lauren there, the Rosebaum tribe there?



Let me know...Love you all and Happy Birthday Sweetheart Kaliya! Grandpa David, Papa

The picture above, high summer, everything blooming, fecund, making seeds and fragrance and withering with the season. Oh...I'm still not smoking! Amazing! I think it's six month on August 13th

I'm still here--not good at keeping this going, I'll do more to blog better...

not smoking...

February 13th, stop day, so March 13th., April 13th., about two months and two days...no smoking!

Long winter has passed. Spring here, everything blooming. I bought tomatoes to plant, heirlooms...some peppers and chilis and flowers. Work, bad weather, laziness keeps the garden mostly unplanted, but I'll get to it.

smokeless

Hyacinth, February, 2009




Valentine's Day, more or less, marks the end to cigarettes. Chantix, restarted, today at 17 February, it's four days without, not excruciating; I'm thinking I've quit. Time will tell.

Bumpy at work, it's not horrible...

winter view

Inside~Outside






Law, say the gardners, is the sun...

Below Zero Ain't Pretty!



Hard Winter, It Seems Endless....

Long time gone from here. Barack Obama is president of the United States! I voted, I saw that happened, I watched the inauguration on TV; it real! The change is estatic but terribly complicated, the economy in free-fall, hard times, the depth of bleak winter.

I'm not sure where I've been, or, one day seems like the next. I had two weeks of paid vacation and did very little. Some hope of a plan to see my kids in California, maybe in April. Goals had been, yes-to stop smoking, to paint my bedroom, to make some oil paintings: I did none of that. The winter has been very cold, minus degrees, down to minus 28 F.,a record low for the Quad Cities...I lived through that.

Matt phones me as he drives home from work and it cheers me greatly. We talk of orchids amd grandkids and grand food. It came up that maybe I should end my Prairie Exile, come home, and the complications of that still abound, money mostly, it's so expensive to live in California; but it works, it should happen, foggy notions of transits, out of here, back to there. The problems I escaped--essentially isolation and lonliness--would, could reinsue, but maybe I'm more apt to deal with it now, Lexapro, philosophical shifts--as I age some insurmountable things seem more do-able in the sense that karma allows the unthinkable to become likely, inevitible.

I made Shrimp, Brussles Sprouts, Ramen noodles


Some sense of winter upon us; I got up on Friday and the back deck thermometer read 13 degrees F. Since them some coolness out. Today, Sunday, sunny, maybe 50 degrees, a day off from work, Jim at home, too.

Wednesday evening, after work, out with Joy, Alan, Vicki to a red-neck bar in Lyndon, Illinois (population 600) for food and beer; then, Thursday, the day off, turkey at home for Thanksgiving with Jim. Time whizzing by in increments of weeks, paydays, come and go. Plants, tender ones, have been moved inside to sunny windows; a trial to find enough sun for Helenium seedlings, doing the best I can.

Not much from my kids...a quick chat with Lauren on Yahoo from time to time but no depth and she often wanders off, parental duties, so I mostly give up. Matt phones from time to time and that's nice. Odd calm--like bordem--this weekend off. The kitchen sink leaked so Jim fixed it, leftovers for dinner because the sink was in the repair. He's so quiet it's like being alone, only a constant din of tv in the living room, crime drama, doctor shows, me at my computer, the day goes by. To bed early tonight as I will get up early to get off to work.

near mid-November, a day off...rain coming

Ascelpias (butterfly flower) seed fluff

The second of two days off from work in a row. I raked then hosed off the back deck, a clean slate, moving this year's pots to the garage...it looks good. A second, rare second cup of coffee just now, normally only a wake-up cup. The sky is slatey, grey, rain coming, not brrrrr! cold, about 60 degrees F.

Not so depressed today as idle. Some "exile" sense again, strongly, my southern Californian connections rearing up. Lauren's Meg is four years old today, a party for her on Sunday; it'd be nice to be there...or on a beach, some place with vistas.

Minor dilemma: I planted Helenium seeds in September, they sprouted, but I'm not sure they can survive outside; inside, difficult to find a place for them with good light. I planted three Lowe's bargain, end of the season daylilies yesterday, called "Final Touch" pink, yellow, green throat.

what happened to October?

Obama Elected! I'm so used to waking up from election eves to utter dissapointment, it's an unusal, even caustious feeling I have. Stem cell research, a belief in global warming, some possible curtailment to wars, inclusion, global community, they seem within grasp.

The first snow flurries today, some vast, plentiful, as I entered Hy-Vee super market; winter's here. My tender plants have been brought indoors, squished in the few bright windows available...orchids and epiphyllums from Matt, others, geraniums, I hope they find some comfort and prosper.

Work as always, weary just now from a string of openings, up at 4:30am to awaken, have coffe, get to work by 6:30am.

Kids afar, Lauren and her family are just back from Orlando DisneyWorld, a sort of annual Rosenbaum Family reunion; Matt, built a new elegant greenhouse for his orchids, his enthusiasm so pleasant when he talks about his plants, their color and fragrance; that's good for me to hear. All of them voted for Obama, Lauren for sure, but my feeling that for Matthew it was "iffy" but he did it and did it for the right reasons.





Last month a trip to Chicago, the Art Institute, the "Bean" at Millenium Park, Frank Gerhy Pavilion, too, with Jim, the roommate, a very nice trip via Amtrak from Galesburg to Chicago, roundtrip.

sliding past August...

Muscatine Musk Melon, a local tradition

Well past the center of August, "high summer" has gone by a bit, the days are noticeably shorter, nights are coming on sooner. The tomatoes, Brandywine, Green Zebra, Russian Krim, Cherokee Purple, Better Boy, Yellow Boy, have been fruitful and outstanding...and Zinnias have been popping open everywhere, spectacular! Some dread at winter coming, another winter coming, that season, joyful at the start, first snow, chill, turns horrible at the middle, endless, dark.

I'm off work today and tomorrow, still foot weary, my hours too long, I work too hard. It takes me a day to recover enough to make use of the second day off, so today, I mowed the lawn well, watered the garden, and sat a lot playing with Flickr. Alone most of today--Jim's off playing cards with friends--I'm amazed often at my capacity to be alone or nearly alone. An odd flow of life these days, from prior days of beach and sun and something of family and friends; now, it's different, just work mostly, or rare excusrsions with friends from work, last week to Clinton, Iowa for Wide River Winery then over to Fulton, Illinois for pizza and beer, then, what seemed a long haul, to Lyndon, Illinois, population 600, for the rest of the night in a karioke bar, red-necks partying-up, boycotting Budweiser because it's gone "Communist". So very out of place yet comfortable. The intensity of being "alone" is often so much more severe when I'm in a crowd...that ancient sense that I'm different, don't belong, out of place...I offer it up and move on, smile a lot, and drink an "American" beer--Coors.

My age--or aging--worries me. None of this easy. Seven or eight years in Milan, Illinois now with nary a plan to move "back" anywhere; mostly I don't know how to do it or suspect a worse environment. I think that one day a "spark" will hit me and I'll be off to California, announcing first to my kids, "deal with it!" Or how about Idaho or New Mexico, rural, snowbound, an artist--eccentric for sure--in a shack somewhere living on Social Security! Pretty, solo dinners, pasta alla putanesca or alle vongole in the midst of wilderness, some "pesto" of design, emailed to me from god-knows-where, or grown for myself.

Lauren phoned today for proof of my Illinois residency, for copies of my W-2 forms and Income Tax for 2004; Libby says she has a lein on the house for my "back taxes" unpaid, because I had no income from California for 2004. Somewhat resolved--I found my 2004 tax forms and will xerox that off to someone soon, but it sits me thinking of the long tenure here--seven or eight years--lousy wages and backbreaking work. I'm a pay check or two from homelessness and it isn't getting any better. Wow, and I'm down in the dumps.

Lovely photos, many of them, posted to Flickr...a spot of lightness. I need, maybe tomorrow--to put some order in my basement bedroom, throw things away, lots and lots. Make it homier.

...into July

Oriental Lily "Latvia"

Sunday evening, almost 10pm, home from work--seven days in a row--tomorrow, Monday off, back to work at 6:30am on Tuesday...all of that a little overwhelming. My feet hurt, just an achey weariness.

The photo is of "Latvia" (mentioned in the post prior to this one), planted very late in the season, the bulbs were sprouting, a few of them had aenemic bloom-sprouts, and into the soil, within a week, they had popped up, and the one pictured has bloomed, very nice. They should be taller!

I chatted with Lauren in Alameda; today was Cate's 5th Birthday Party, Matt and family there, some friends; next week is Kaliya's birthday, such sweethearts. I feel a little displaced, out of the loop.

Jim, the roommate, had the entire week off, vacation, while I worked seven days in a row...I think he liked that I was not around.



Midwest Sky, Morning

An overwhelming sense of "sky" here, often...the flow, the depth, the color, the drama of the clouds. This "exile" blessed with atomospherics...part of the tumult of mid-continent living, storms sweep down from Canada, or up from the Gulf of Mexico, or from the Pacific, and pass over, or play out, lightening, thunder, shuddering wind, at night, as day breaks, as waves from the west, or north, or south. It amazes me always!

lilies and hollyhocks


...too much work, days off sporadic, Monday and Tuesday to go, then, at last, I have Wednesday and Thursday off; my birthday is Friday, June 27; I'll be 65.

My garden areas are looking good. I've already had some home grown broccoli; the tomatoes will be very late this year, planting postponed many times due to rain. Many lilies are budding up this year and I planted a bunch more a week or so ago, several, maybe nine, called "Latvia" bright green with maroon markings within the flower, but others, too. Echinaceas have begun to bloom, regular purple-pink ones, a white here and there, a new orange-cast one called "Summer Sky", bought at Lowe's, not cheap. A new stretch of garden, just off the back deck is a mish-mash of annuals, cabbage, broccoli, roses, Lysimanchia punctata--Yellow Loosestrife--gladioli, daylilies, etc.



white trumpet lily with yellow throat

Summer's Here!

Homage a van Gogh, maybe


An odious exhaustion on this Saturday, the first of two days off from Lowe's. In the morning I pulled weeds from around the broccoli and cabbage and irises and lillies in the side garden. Oppressive early with humidity, my glasses sweated up so the work became tacile and inutitive rather than wholly visual. It got very warm. Into the house I had lunch--a salami sandwich--and dozed off. My next intelligence: it was thundering. A stormette, out of nowhere, up from Missouri, an orange-red dot spread over the weather map at Moline. It lasted 20-30 minutes, a monsoonal, gullywasher rain, and left. The sun came out. Oppresive heat returned.

Good plans, to plant the rest of my tomatoes, to plant lillies and gladioli I order from on line, well, that didn't get done. And I didn't make the most of an indoors day by going down to my studio and painting, either. Tomorrow, instead. The logic, the bone-weariness of work will have gone somewhat and armed with new energy, I'll plant and clean, and tidy up, wash dishes, do laundry like crazy. A slim sense of lonliness to day, not bad. I usually push that out with busy work, but today no tact to do that. Still smoking, I smoked and made a gallon of ice tea and played on the computer; photoed plants and puddles, and storms, and posted them to Flickr.

Beautiful here--just at that juncture when spring turns to jungle, a long string of tempid days, pleasant, breezes, spring buds giving way to full blown summer, like the tropics...I imagine.





Hostas, blue and yellow

I ordered a couple of books today from Amazon about how to build a sundial..for me, for Matthew, if it's too mathematically complicated, then just for Matthew. I've always wanted a wall sundial and not sure how to go about doing that...maybe as an emblellishment to a mosaic or a painting, an outdoors art work?

I wrote to Lauren tonight asking her advice for buying a Nikon digital camera, nothing too outrageously expensive, but something to expand that intetest; I really enjoy documenting life with the cameras.

Some deep pledge (inwardly) to stop smoking, Chantix useless, I need to ween myself...and to paint! A great space, all the supplies I need, and nothing gets done. If only for myself, I should paint!

I'm back.....

Home from the California trip about two weeks now. On return, right back to work the next day.

I'll post a family photo here before too long, in Lauren's photos, not mine. But my kids and grandkids looked fine, a sort of quiet happiness about them, smart, goodlooking, seemingly secure, good parents; they don't present worries for me, that's for sure.

A freaky six days (out of seven) of a warm heat wave, the Bay area in the 80s, up to 87 or 88 degrees in San Jose-Monterey area; Chinatown over the top, a place I like a lot, two of them really, San Francisco and Oakland. I bought some jade talismans, a small, floral Japanese rice bowl...$3.99. Monterey Aquarium exceeded my expectations, great flow to it, architecture, crowds, vistas, sea views, a lunch in Cannery Row easy, delicious, flowers blooming everywhere, natives and aliens, California poppies and agapanthus...brilliant day. At the Aquarium gift shop I bought a beautiful Tunisian serving bowl, marine themed, fish...carted in home on my lap in the plane.

Matt on the morning of his 35th birthday chomped the tips of three fingers of his left hand (he's left-handed) by sticking his hand into the running lawn mower...good treatment, quickly, a plastic surgeon reconstructed what he could and apparently there's a prognosis of a very good recovery, feeling, movement. The middle finger was bobbed, shortened and the finger nail grafted lower so it will look like a normal finger, but the same length as his ring finger next to it. It could have been worse. Great party for him, outdoors, catered Taco-frenzy, good, and drinks, a pinata, birthday cake.

My niece Wendy showed up with her daughter Monica, out of my life for 18 years or more and she was sweet, timeless, beautiful..warming for me to see her! All of us at Saniata's parents' for roast baby back pork ribs, steel head trout, potato salad, rice, fine wine, tarts for dessert, a wonderful, comfortable meal and gathering!

Julie, friend, fellow traveller, was an obnoxious pain in the ass, goofy, on pills for pain and everything else she could swallow. We've parted company.

I'm glad I went. I would like to have stayed longer. Maybe another trip in the offing, maybe in October. We ate Thai, and Mexican, and fish and calamari, and chowder in the sourdough crust...just a great trip

Matthew's Orchids--California

An ensemble of Matthew's orchids!




My son sent some pictures of his orchids in bloom. They are spectacular--mostly grown outdoors or in a small, rigged-up green house he's built. He says they will still be in bloom when I visit, sometime between April 7 and April 14. Some of them have strange, exotic fragrances; the large yellow flowered one, Matt says, smells like musk perfume. I don't think I've ever sniffed an orchid for fragrance--content some how that the visual beauty was more than enough--so maybe a surprise for me. Out of Moline on Monday afternoon, landing in Oakland about 8pm, Lauren has a nice motel reserved; Matt has an old pickup truck I can use in San Jose...the trips seems to be pulling together, shaping up. Good!

off to California....

Yesterday, hail, sleet, rain, snow, lightening and thunder; today 50 degrees F. and sunny. Aspects of spring, robins, maples and the poplar sprouting buds, it seems the shift is on...as the world turns.

I'm doing a quick trip to see my kids and grandkids in California. With work-buddy Julie, we fly out of Moline April 7, via Denver, to Oakland, and return on April 14...a quickie. A northern California trip, no time or money to see Rachel and the family in Santa Paula, maybe another trip in the works--longer--in October. So this one is about family, San Francisco, the beach (Julie has never flown in an airplane or seen an ocean), good food, with an eye ~maybe~ to looking for potentials places I might alight in some future life. I've never been much of a fan of northern California, spoiled by the Santa Barbara tenure. All of California an expensive proposition, that's for sure! "Famous Artist" might pay the bill, but not working at Lowe's. So, the trip is on my mind.