Angels

Posted on June 21, 2012 by fsdthreshold

Summer begins! Last night, the sunset’s afterglow was of that perfect deep hue that only appears on the hottest days. I was delighted to see it. At work, guys are complaining about how their clothes are rimed with white salt from sweat. On the breaks, I guzzle a lot of water from the big water coolers. I have my balcony door wide open in the afternoon and early evening. The little fan is whirring valiantly. At any moment, something magical might happen. Well-loved stories and ones yet unread call to me from the shelves. Those yet unwritten whisper from the warm air. The best season is here again!

For my book, I’m thinking of summer stars, the brightest ones, visible from this hemisphere in June. Does anyone have favorites? Speak now — this may be your chance to have a direct influence on The House of the Worm! I need to pick three good stars. I’m also trying to track down a helpful on-line directory or guide of stars, when they appear, what colors they are, what constellations they’re in, and any other facts and folkloric associations. Any advice, dear readers? I’ve been reading about how, over the thousands of years, the heavens have shifted. For ancient Egyptians, the pole star wasn’t Polaris at all! It was Thuban in the constellation of Draco. Is that not cool?! That name Thuban has been ringing in my mind as I sort trash at work. Summer: the season when stars whisper their names.

Anyway, the theme of this post is “Angels” for two reasons: 1.) I have some graveyard angel photos to show you, and 2.) my guardian angels were working hard today and saved me from what could have been a really serious injury.

Let’s start with some pictures. A couple days ago, a friend asked out of the blue if I’d be interested in going up to the cemetery where I’ve written and taking photos of gravestones and statuary. This was on Midsummer’s Eve, in fact, and I thought it sounded like the perfect way to greet the dusk on that glorious day. The friend isn’t familiar with this neighborhood, so she came to my place, and I drove us up to the hilltop and St. Mary’s Cemetery.

St. Mary's Cemetery, Pittsburgh

I’m sure my friend’s photos are a lot better than mine. All I have is a bottom-of-the-line camera, and I haven’t really felt I was taking pictures since the days of 35mm, which I loved. But I suppose it’s still capturing the way light strikes objects, so we can still call it “photography.” It’s a whole different world now, though.

I like this angel in St. Mary's Cemetery.

So anyway, I should tell my story from work today. The machines were up and running all day, and Greenstar was going for volume, trying to maximize the amount of trash we sorted. That meant the stuff was coming at us constantly and full blast, piled deep on the belt, with no respite.

Well, about an hour before lunch break, I heard a shuddering KER-WHAM! right beside me. Instinctively, as we do whenever we hear the sound of something heavy tumbling out of the chute, I ducked, but there was no time at all to get out of the way. I saw a brownish blur heading straight for me, and at the last instant, it veered and threw itself away in my trash bin, immediately to my left. The impact I’d heard was when it bounced off the belt. The object was so heavy that it sank straight to the bottom of my bin, through all the packed garbage. It was like a meteorite coming down.

Across the belt from me, Ralph just about fainted! He has an uncanny ability to see everything that’s happening on the line. I don’t know how he does it. Heavy, metallic junk can jam up and break the machines, so whenever something like that comes through, we grab it and throw it onto the floor, off of the belt. Later, when we have a free minute, we carry it over to a special barrel for pipes, hubcaps, tools, jagged nondescript items, etc. (The other day, I found an Illinois license plate! I looked to see if I recognized the number — it didn’t seem to belong to anyone I knew. That would have been just the sort of coincidence that you read about.) Well, when heavy stuff crashes onto the belt, Ralph almost invariably sees exactly where it lands and is able to retrieve it from the deep trash. I generally know that something heavy has come down, but I have no idea where it is.

What Ralph saw was a rusty disc, flying upright like a wheel, slicing straight toward me. He was sure it was going to take my head off or cut my throat, and there wouldn’t have been a thing he could have done about it except to pull the cord and stop the belt after the fact. I did catch a glimpse of it coming toward me in one of those frozen instants, like in The Matrix. I thought the thing was a round saw blade.

Well, I fished it out of my trash barrel. My next thought was that it was a disc off a farm implement — you know, the kind that discs the field in the spring. I dropped it onto the deck behind me. When we had time, we examined it and saw that it was probably the base off a lamp or a standing fan — something industrial-grade. I can’t estimate weights, but it took two hands to hold it. Ralph and I agreed that it was eighteen inches across, with a hole in the center.

Since it was vertical, I don’t think it would have injured me in the way that Ralph thought, but it certainly could have given me a nasty gash and maybe broken some bones, and I would have needed a tetanus shot.

About ten minutes after that happened, CRASH! — a lawnmower blade came down right between us. On this rare occasion, I saw it and retrieved it. So it was a wild day at Greenstar. And thank you, guardian angels!

There was also some nice news yesterday: Triad Staffing, the agency that sends me to Greenstar, has decided to name me their first-ever Employee of the Month! The boss has gotten clearance to award me with some gift certificates. He says I have no idea how much they appreciate me, and he wanted to do something to express that. So that’s really nice! All glory to God! I couldn’t be a good employee without good health and a car that runs.

Speaking of my car, I had to get its tire fixed the other day. I finally had time to do it. It’s had a very slow leak for several weeks now. Turns out there was a screw that had impaled it. The screw was in there deeply and tightly, so that just a tiny bit of air was leaking out around it. That’s all fixed now. I hope I don’t run over anything else sharp.

An angel watches over St. Mary's Cemetery, Pittsburgh.

Out at Greenstar, my car gets covered with dust. When it rains, it gets washed off. But now and then on weekends, I like to just wash it, because it’s dusty in the extreme.

This profile is pretty nice, huh? (I mean the one below.)

And here’s a silhouette:

An Angel on Midsummer's Eve

Summer stories from all you readers are still most welcome! How are you kicking the season off? Are the fireflies out in your part of the world?

This small angel is intriguing:

We certainly need guarding from below, too. Maybe this is the sort of angel that keeps us from dashing our feet against stones.

As the summer gets underway for you, whether you’re on vacation or laboring away, may the angels watch over you. And may it be a season of joy, productivity, and enchantment.

 

50 Responses to Angels

  1. Buurenaar says:

    Well, I have a few that I’ve been itching to write. More importantly, I got my father reunited with his manuscript. Hopefully, I’ll see him turn out a few dozen chapters this year. Then, it’ll be my time to proofread. The cemetery pics always remind me of Uncle Henry and the picnics out on the green…

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      That’s really exciting about your writing and your father’s! I would definitely like to hear more about those if you ever feel inclined to tell us more!

      Thanks also for the Dragonfly reference!

      Reply
  2. Daylily says:

    My three favorite stars are the ones in Orion’s Belt: Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka. I like them because I can always find them and because I like Orion the Hunter. According to Wikipedia: “Orion’s Belt is called Drie Konings (Three Kings) or the Drie Susters (Three Sisters) by Afrikaans speakers in South Africa and are referred to as les Trois Rois (the Three Kings) in Daudet’s Lettres de Mon Moulin (1866). The appellation Driekoningen (the Three Kings) is also often found in 17th- and 18th-century Dutch star charts and seaman’s guides. The same three stars are known in Spain and Latin America as ‘Las Tres Marías’.”

    Nice angel pictures! I especially like the fourth one from the top, with the long shadows falling over the cemetery. Very evocative. Almost a sense of expectancy about it, perhaps a story about to unfold . . .

    I’m glad that your story was about escaping injury rather about a trip to the emergency room! I hope that your guardian angel continues to be watchful!

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Thanks, Daylily! That’s fascinating about the stars in Orion’s belt! I like that constellation a lot, too — yes, largely because it’s the one I can find right away! That, and Cassiopeia. You also indirectly clarified a misconception I’d had. I’d thought the red giant Betelgeuse was one of the stars in Orion’s belt. I just looked it up to see if that might be a different name for one of those belt stars. I see that Betelgeuse is near the shoulder of Orion.

      For us in the Northern Hemisphere, I think Orion is a winter constellation, isn’t it? Do you know if it’s visible now, in the summer? It would probably be a summer constellation for most speakers of Afrikaans! 🙂

      Thanks for the thoughts on the angel pictures! Yes, that fourth one allows us to see more of the cemetery. Right: Midsummer’s Eve has that sense of hush and expectancy. I’m glad the photo captures something of that!

      I’m also grateful that I didn’t have to go to the emergency room. Thanks! I think there’s probably more than one guardian angel assigned to my case. Guarding me is a big job!

      Reply
      • Daylily says:

        I can see that Orion’s Belt won’t do for your book. Perhaps the Summer Triangle? Wikipedia: “Summer Triangle is an astronomical asterism involving an imaginary triangle drawn on the northern hemisphere’s celestial sphere, with its defining vertices at Altair, Deneb, and Vega, being the brightest stars in the three constellations of Aquila, Cygnus, and Lyra.”

        Reply
        • fsdthreshold says:

          Oohh! Oohh! Get this: I didn’t know about the Summer Triangle (though, come to think of it, I think I’ve heard that phrase before). But in an independent search for bright summer stars, I had narrowed my list to:

          Altair in Aquila
          Deneb in Cygnus
          Vega in Lyra
          Antares in Scorpius

          If Altair, Deneb, and Vega are already grouped together as a triangle of acknowledged bright summer stars, I see no reason to break the pattern. I think we’ve got our three stars! I like eagles, swans, and lyres better than scorpions, anyway!

          I know Deneb is a bright blue supergiant. Its name is Arabic for “tail” — the tail of the swan! (Interestingly, Aldebaran is also from the Arabic. I discovered this fact while writing The Sacred Woods. It means “The Follower.” Aldebaran is the red eye of Taurus and “follows” the Pleiades. To quote from TSW: “Find twice the number Taurus follows with his eye / Sisters dancing in the water and the sky . . .”)

          Thank you, Daylily! I believe I’ll focus on the Summer Triangle!

          Reply
          • fsdthreshold says:

            And while we’re on constellations: Did you all know that “Subaru” is Japanese for “Pleiades”? So if you drive a Subaru, you’re driving a Pleiades. That’s why Subaru uses that emblem of stars. As Professor Froehlich would say: “Mythology is alive; mythology is ubiquitous.”

          • Daylily says:

            My pleasure! Now I’m wondering, is there a way to mention the Green Star in your novel, as a recent appearance in the summer sky . . . 🙂

          • fsdthreshold says:

            That’s a good idea! 🙂 Quite possibly! It would be funny, too, if it could be done in conjunction with a scene involving the characters sorting through trash or something trash-like.

            On another note, I was thinking today of how my story of the hurtling disc yesterday could be written to sound a lot like a headline in the fifties:

            Laborers at Recycling Plant Sight Flying Disc

            Some snatches of the article might read: “. . . Precise origin and nature of the object unknown . . .” “. . . Disc suddenly changed its trajectory in mid-flight . . .” “. . . Erratic path . . .” “. . . Authorities had no comment . . .”

      • Hagiograph says:

        When traveling in New Zealand I had the joy of seeing Orion UPSIDE DOWN! It was a more strange experience than I would have predicted. It was like regular life, only inverted!

        Reply
  3. fsdthreshold says:

    Before I forget: today was not without its magical little happening at Greenstar. I try to bring my guys in anywhere from half an hour to fifteen minutes before the 7:00 a.m. shift begins (I give a couple guys rides to and from work — carpooling is better for the environment, and they chip in generously to help with gas). We get there, clock in, and usually sit in the narrow yard between the work building and the office trailer, collecting ourselves before the day begins, as the early light brightens on the wooded hills and casts a pinkish glow on the corrugated metal buildings.

    Also as we sit there, watching our buddies arrive, the guys of the third shift are just getting off, crawling down from the belts all bedraggled and exhausted. One of those guys, a full-timer identified by his name patch as “Mr. Lee,” had a special “passenger” this morning: a huge moth had landed on his shoulder and seemed to have taken quite a liking to Mr. Lee. Even when he moved from place to place, the moth sat there contentedly.

    The foreman, Spider, said, “Oh, yeah. Those come through here at this time of year.” This moth was big — it was about the size of my hand with the fingers spread. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a moth that big. One guy joked that “an eagle” had landed on Mr. Lee, and another said, “That’s the Greenstar mascot.” It was somehow funny to see all these rough-and-tumble guys in their hardhats, bone-weary and needing showers and food, all pulling out their cell phones to take pictures of this moth. I thought only Japanese teenagers did that!

    The moth was gray, brown, and white, as I recall, maybe with a little russet. I was particularly impressed with how it had white crescent moon patterns on its wings, one each in the center of the upper and lower wings (or wing parts — I’m not familiar with moth anatomy). It had an austere beauty, not the bright prettiness of a butterfly — definitely a creature of summer’s dark hours. I don’t know how far it rode with Mr. Lee today.

    Reply
  4. Hagiograph says:

    On my last trip to Paris I was going to hit the Louvre again and take a bit more time focusing but the line was so long that I meandered back to Notre Dame. Speaking of angel pictures I gravitated back to one of my favorite carvings of St. Denis (a “cephalophore saint”) and the angels on either side of him
    (https://picasaweb.google.com/101511554251686571193/Paris2012#5749831016731680882)
    The angels seem to be saying “Whoa, Denny, you should really have that looked at by a doctor…” (presumably St. Denis was working the line at the Recycling Plant when a large halo came crashing down the line and took his head off, if I recall my French History correctly).

    Reply
  5. fsdthreshold says:

    Heh, heh! Thanks for the photo, Hagiograph! Speaking of flying discs, have you ever encountered the phenomenon that various medieval paintings show objects in the background that look very much like flying saucers? In one famous example, a man and his dog are on a cliff in the background of a Christian/religious portrait, clearly watching this object in the sky. Sorry I don’t have a link for you to follow, but it’s interesting. One theory is that medieval painters showed the glory or presence of God through the commonly-accepted motif of a flying “crown.” Not sure if I buy that . . .

    3,020 words written today in Frick Park, by grace! That’s an excellent writing day! I thought the total would be much lower, because I had to think a lot. It didn’t feel like I was turning out very much.

    One more chance, everyone, to celebrate Midsummer’s Eve this year! Tomorrow (Sunday) night is the eve of the commemoration of the birth of St. John the Baptist. That makes it the Christian Midsummer’s Eve. So let’s get out there and view some Christian fey folk!

    Reply
  6. Morwenna says:

    I love these serene stone angels, Fred.

    Thank heavens you weren’t injured by the falling metal whatever-it-was.

    Maybe it really was a flying disc from outer space. The tiny Venusians piloting it must have been very shaken up. “The saucer’s losing power fast! We’re plummeting down a giant garbage chute!”

    Reply
  8. I am Mr. Brown Snowflake says:

    As this blog’s official guardian of October, November and December (or ‘DON’ as some might say) allow me to assure you Orion IS NOT a summer constellation in the nothern hemisphere. It is very much an autumn arrival and one I look forward to very much each year, as it heralds the death of summer.

    There is only one ‘real’ summer star: Sirius (Seirios, or ‘scorcher’ in the ancient Greek). AKA the Dog Star, Sirius is the brightest star in the nothern hemisphere (outshining Canopus) and is the big player in Canis Major, or Greater Dog. The ancient Egyptians knew its heliacal rising (when a star is first seen at sunset low in the east after being out of view for a month or more) coincided with the annual Nile flood and summer solstice.

    Sirius was considered a herald of warm weather and thus the saying “Dog Days of August.”

    p.s. — Dearest Fred, a sancho and large nacho were consumed, in your honor, for lunch June 21.

    Reply
  10. fsdthreshold says:

    Statistics in! This weekend at Frick Park:

    3,020 words Saturday
    2,905 words Sunday
    5,925 total for the weekend
    THOW is at 93,482!
    Soli Deo Gloria!

    Mr. Brown, thank you for the Taco Gringo news! Thanks also for the information on Sirius. I’ve always liked that star and its connection to the Dog Days of August, which has delightful associations for me — good dogs and the hottest weather!

    Thanks for the congrats, Daylily! And Morwenna, I enjoyed the notion of a Venusian saucer crashing at the recycling plant — funny! Greenstar could become the new Roswell! The satiric possibilities are endless!

    Hagio, I took a look at the photo of the cephalo-challenged saint. The angels on either side of him seem to be inconspicuously but determinedly keeping their robes out of the way of his spurting, dripping gore, which, thankfully, doesn’t show up in a marble rendering.

    On the subject of aliens, you know the Predator movies? I’ve noted before that a few guys at work look like the Predators — helmets and dreadlocks! 🙂 I know where the next Alien vs. Predator film should be set . . . and it should involve a hand-to-hand battle to the death on the moving conveyor belt, before one or both combatants are carried over the falls! Maybe we can work in some fire balloons, giant moths, and rusty iron halos.

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      Dog days indeed! Sirius shines a bit brighter this year since our beloved “Spot” has now ascended unto the right hand of Dog where he will come to judge the quick and the not so quick with a swift bite to the ankle. Spot, the compatriot of Fleshy and the sweetest dog to inhabit the couch had to be euthanized recently because he bit one too many people.

      While a sweetheart at home with us on the sofa, out in public he was a terror. Fear agression was his game and after seriously biting a child in Atlanta, a guy who came to our door in SoCal and now one of Mrs. H’s coworkers we decided that since we live in a neighborhood full of toddlers that the only responsible thing to do was to send Spot back to the factory. It was extremely hard because he was our buddy for 11 years.

      Rescue leagues won’t take a “biter” and a new family would run the risk that they wouldn’t be as used to Spot’s penchants as we had gotten and Spot might be able to get out and do something truly awful.

      He will be missed.

      https://picasaweb.google.com/101511554251686571193/UsefulPix?authkey=Gv1sRgCPO7hfDG1MzNLA#5517584733727059474

      Reply
      • fsdthreshold says:

        Yes, I remember the golf cart action, too! Since we (you) had a golf cart on hand, our protagonist drove a golf cart . . . into the forest . . . to hunt monsters . . .

        Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Ha, ha! Well, we had a cairn. That was the reason. Can’t waste a good cairn when you’re making a movie!

      Reply
      • Scott says:

        Whatever happened to the movies? When you moved back from Japan, you were going to open the FSD vault and try to copy them to digital format. That was the last we heard of them.

        Reply
        • fsdthreshold says:

          That is still a project that needs doing! I’m closer now than I was on the far side of the ocean. The movies are buried under a lot of stuff and hard to get to, but it’s certainly an endeavor I’d like to tackle. Time . . . money . . . 🙂

          Reply
  12. Swordlily says:

    This summer feels different somehow. It feels like some ancient spirit awakened on the summer socialistic. I feel like so much is possible now, so many unknowns now drift in the fog of what might happen.
    You may feel a little like this every summer, Fred, but I’m not a summer person. I do my best thinking in the serene cold of winter. But, as I said, this summer is different. The muddy green heat of the thunderstorm drifting into the room I’m in right now is making me feel inspired. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever felt in the heat. I want to write till my fingers ache! I want to draw till I can’t hold a pencil! I want to take pictures of anything and everything, because things are more beautiful when one is inspired. I want to put all these feeling into pictures and into words so that other’s can feel this boundlessness!

    Maybe this feeling comes partially from that I have actually been writing! Constantly! I have been writing the same story every day since the beginning of June! Not a whole lot of words, 700 to 800 a day, usually, but it’s piling up. It’s scary and frustrating because I keeping hitting blocks, and I don’t know whether I’m writing the story in the right direction or not. In spite of that uncertainty, I’m glad that I’m still writing, as opposed to just giving up and waiting for the inspiration that never comes.
    Well this is post certainly has to many exclamation marks in it, but one wants to exclaim when one is inspired! 🙂
    Anyway, I hope this summer lives up to it’s potential.
    I love the pictures of the angel statues. Especially the little one in the ground. How I would like to know the story behind her.

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      I’m feelin’ that today! I just wanna hit the keyboard and write til I’m spent! And then crawl back to the keyboard and write some more. Here’s an example of something I’ve been working on lately (tell me if anyone here “feels” what I’m sayin’) —

      “After an extensive root cause analysis an hypothesis was developed. Generally ink bleed is a function not only of the ability of the paper to control it through rapid absorption of the vehicle and the use of the additive, but also affected by writing system set up. In the testbed printer K and Y go down on the paper very close together in space and time and the potential for convective mixing driven by “surface pressure” (the difference between the surface tension of the vehicle with and without its surfactant packages) is in competition with absorption as well as pigment flocculation to induce bleed.”

      I’m afriad, however, that even though I have character “motive” I don’t feel the “passion” is there for either K or Y to truly bleed into each other. It’s frustrating when you hit a wall like this. What is their motivation apart from surface pressure differentials? Where’s the real root of their actions?

      At this point I’m up to 15,987,976.5 words. I’m hoping someone options this for a movie!

      Reply
      • fsdthreshold says:

        Hagio, this is ground-breaking lit! Word on the street is that John Malkovitch is quite interested in playing “K” in the film, if his agent can work things out with F.C. Studios . . .

        Reply
      • Morwenna says:

        Hagio, I think Sesame Street would be interested in this vehicle for K or Y, but you’d have to cut the violence (no bleeding, please). Try to rewrite with a view to cooperation.

        Reply
        • Hagiograph says:

          If anything in my world was cooperating with anying else I’d be a lot happier! At least on the webpress itself K and Y are on opposite ends of the print arch! It’s K and C that often don’t do well in real life.

          (In the world of printing K is black, c is cyan, y is yellow amd m is magenta…the subtractive primary colors.)

          Reply
  13. I am Mr. Brown Snowflake says:

    Oh Swordlily, I am moved by your passion. Keep at it … every writer hits blocks. And exclaim away!!! It is your excitement and love for writing that will carry you through. One day you will be sitting down writing and before you know it 1,500 words will have poured out …

    Reply
  14. fsdthreshold says:

    Wow, Swordlily! I second what Mr. Brown Snowflake said! I’m really happy and excited for you, too! How wonderful that you’ve gotten a major dose of summer inspiration! YES! That sheer joy of creating is what will carry you through any project, even if challenges come along the way. We always come back to it: it is like no other feeling in the world when you’re making something (out of the pieces God provides) that wasn’t there before! I can’t wait to hear more about this story of yours! I really like that little angel half-in-the-ground, too.

    I’ll build a twilight tower
    Of stones that ice and time have cut
    And hidden in the bower
    Of the hedgehog, half in the ground.

    Reply
  15. fsdthreshold says:

    Swordlily, while I’m quoting poetry, I wanted to copy out for you my poem “Giant.” Your comment bowled me over with powerful, vivid memories of how I felt when I wrote it. I was a college senior, just about to graduate, leave the place and friends I’d known for four years, and go off into the unknown on a new stage of life’s journey. It was a poignant, uncertain, sad, happy, thrilling, memorable, weird time . . . a time when I felt very much alive and aware of possibilities, as you described feeling this summer. Here it is. I was . . . let’s see, about 21, I guess, when I wrote this:

    GIANT

    Standing at the Window
    Just before Lilacs
    Giant in the Fog
    Color of Stretching

    Stretching Thin Days

    Thin Days Count
    No More Songs to Sing
    Not Here
    He has forgotten himself

    No Matter — Stretching

    Just the Biggest Thing
    Passing in Fog
    Standing at the Window

    It’s gone
    What’s coming

    Reply
  16. fsdthreshold says:

    I learned an intriguing fact from my co-worker Ralph today. First, the context is this: the company was going for volume again, so the stuff was coming at us at full speed along the belt, piled a foot-and-a-half deep. In an unfortunate case of timing, we were also short-handed today, working without the backup of two guys behind us on the line. So we had to try to get every piece of non-paper that we possibly could. Ralph called the method “spray and pray” — diving in with both arms, flailing stuff in the directions it was supposed to go, and hoping most of it ended up in the right place.

    He says that in the Old West, manufacturers put more powder in shells, so there was a whole lot more smoke involved in gunfire. Come to think of it, I’ve seen that in a lot of Western movies — clouds of smoke surrounding shooters. The problem it created was that you really couldn’t see after a shot or two. In situations like at the O.K. Corral, Ralph says, the guys would just blast away and hope their bullets were hitting the targets. “Spray and pray.” I will have to remember that for when I set another story in the world of “Someplace Cool and Dark”!

    Reply
    • jhagman says:

      The 19th Century was the era of blackpowder, besides burning at a slower rate and being very caustic, it did create alot more smoke than today’s “smokeless” powders. Having spent (from my ranch days) much time with former snipers, and competitive shooters I can say for great precision results, you don’t trust factory ammo. These shooters weigh out various types of powders with beam balances (at least that is what it looks like to me) use specially manufactured bullets, use calipers to measure the length, record everything, and at a range chrono the speed of the bullet (more special instruments), and measure spread and accuracy of each load- AMAZING GUN FREAKS, they are very dedicated. They do this for both rifles and pistols, as well as revolvers, I have not seen them do it for shotguns, but I would bet they do. It would take a Hagio to understand a tenth of it.

      Reply
  17. Buurenaar says:

    “And hidden in the bower/Of the hedgehog, half in the ground.” This made me a bit sad. My little hedgehog just died, about a fortnight before my 22nd (June 21st at high noon). On the up side, I’ve had a few story lines congealing into one lately…I feel behind on what I’m supposed to be churning out when I check your blog. However, I thought you guys might like the Psalm of Balance. It has a strange rhyme pattern and rhythm, but it popped into my head as a song…
    “Bind yourself to shadow,
    Let it hide your darkest fears,
    Welcome in the light,
    To dry up all your tears…
    It’s a world of wonder–
    And a world of deepest pain,
    A world of wide-eyed joy–
    A world tattooed with shame.
    Let the day guide your path,
    Let the night hide your steps,
    Let the stars be your companions,
    Let your heart drown in the depths.
    In this mind, in this place,
    There is beauty; there’s disgrace.
    Two sides of coins from fountains, wishes unfulfilled,
    Let loose to roam the canyons, till their motion’s killed.
    The time given to all men,
    With friends and loves so dear,
    So much to care and live for,
    And still so much to fear.”

    Reply
  18. Scott says:

    It looks like I’m the first on the blog to wish Brown Snowflake a Happy Birthday.

    Happy Birthday Brown!

    Reply
  19. Treefrog says:

    That was a close one at Greenstar! Good thing you had some guardian angels looking out for you!
    As for stars, I don’t know too much about individual stars, but I do know a bit about constellations. A while ago, I read somewhere that when spring time nears, the constellation Leo will “jump over” the winter constellation Orion and will be higher in the sky. It’s not exactly a summertime constellation, but it’s interesting.

    Reply
  20. fsdthreshold says:

    Lest you think I’m a cold and callous blog host, I wished Mr. Brown Snowflake a Happy Birthday by e-mail. 🙂 But publicly, too — Happy Birthday, Mr. Brown Snowflake!

    In our culture, people often ask each other “Is it hot enough for you?” as a joke — a joke which most are tired of hearing. But those who know me ask me that question quite seriously. How hot is hot enough for Fred? Well, it’s getting there, but it’s not quite there yet. If it would stop dipping back into the eighties every few days, then we’d have it.

    Hey, this is the anniversary of the day I started reading Enchanted Night, by Steven Millhauser, back in 2000. This is the season to read it! But read it only at night. It’s not a daytime book. It is amazing, magical, wonderful, wistful — all those things you want in a summer book. I also strongly recommend The Summer Book, by Tove Jansson. I started it on August 29, 2009. It’s more of a daytime summer book, but equally a must-read.

    It was hot, hot, HOT on the paper line today! My co-worker Ralph wasn’t there today. He had to take a family member to an appointment. There was no one to fill in for him, so it was me at the chute and two guys in the secondary position, across from each other. I would much, much rather have Ralph there. But the silver lining is, I got to grab all the choice, dramatic stuff, such as the huge pieces of cardboard, no matter where on the belt they landed. Tipping or flipping those into the cardboard chute makes you feel like you’re doing something! I did pretty well at locating the heavy things that crashed down. One big, thin, rectangular piece of shiny metal slammed down flat straight in front of me. It made me jump, because it sounded like orchestral cymbals being crashed in my face!

    During the lunch break, Spider took a powerful hose, and I thought we were about to see some professional recycling technique of watering down the trash. But he trained it straight up in the air, a plume about twenty feet high, and stood there for a while without his hat on, letting the rain of spray cool him down. I couldn’t help thinking of nursery rhymes like: The eensy-weensy Spider sent up a water spout . . .

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      You are a disturbed young man, Mr. Durbin. Disturbed. Perhaps this is the essence of creativity: a skewed approach to the world. A love of the unlovable (heat for goshsake…HEAT! Ugh!)

      Earlier this year I had the supreme joy of doing a pilot trial and mill visit in Finland in the beginning of February! It was VICIOUSLY cold! While I didn’t enjoy the sitting-in-the-car and warming it up and scraping glacial ice off the windows, the ability to scamper across the parking lot into the warmth of the paper mill or the pilot facility was greatly appreciated. Sitting an hotel room looking out over (literally) sub-arctic lands and occasionally venturing out for a few minutes while your nose and face freeze are great and wonderful experiences.

      HEAT = SUCK.

      Reply
  21. fsdthreshold says:

    Buurenaar, I’m sorry to hear about your hedgehog. I really like your poem/song! The last two lines are powerful indeed! They sound like the transcendent lines from great poems in the literary canon that everyone knows, like something people could quote from memory.

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      This is a hard June for everyone! Dogs and Hedgehogs and mothers-in-law. Hot and oppressive.

      You have my condolences Buurenaar!

      I like the ease of summer but hate the heat. It makes all events of sadness harder to bear.

      At least in the cold of winter when you gather with others to console yourself over the loss you feel closer when holding back the cold.

      In the heat of summer all I want to do is stay as far away from others as possible.

      (That is why I always turn on the AC in a hotel room to near arctic conditions so I can actually sleep).

      Thankfully back here in the desert Southwest the nights cool quickly (low cloud cover allows for ease of re-radiation of heat and the low vegetation amount allow for quicker re-radiation).

      So it gets relatively cool in the evening.

      NOW WE ARE IN JULY! LET THE DEATHS OF JUNE BE OVER!

      Reply

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