Oh how sadly sound the songs the queen must sing of dying*
A prisoner upon her throne of melancholy sighing
If she could see her mirror now
She would be free of those who bow and
Scrape the ground before her feet*
Silently she walks among her dying midnight roses
Watches as each moment goes that never really know us
And so it seems she doesn’t careIf she has dreams of no one there
Within the shadows of her room*
But all my frozen words agree, and say it’s time to
Call back, all the birds I sent to
Fly behind her castle walls, and I’m
Weary of the nights I’ve seen
Inside these empty halls*
Wooden lady turn and turn among my weary secrets
And wave within the hours past and other empty pockets
Maybe we’ve found what we have lost
When we’ve unwound so many crossed entangling
Misunderstandings; but*
This could be any landscape that is important to you; whether east coast,*Rocky Mountain West or west coast:*
“The drama of this landscape is in the sky, pouring with light and always moving. The earth is passive. And yet the beauty I am struck by, both as present fact and as revived memory, is a fusion: this sky would not be so spectacular without this earth to change and glow and darken under it. And whatever the sky may do, however the earth is shaken or darkened, the Euclidean perfection abides. The very scale, the hugeness of simple forms, emphasizes stability. It is not hills and mountains which we should call eternal. Nature abhors an elevation as much as it abhors a vacuum; a hill is no sooner elevated than the forces of erosion begin tearing it down. …Eternity is a peneplain.”
Let me run with you tonight* Iill take you on a moonlight ride* Thereis someone I used to see** But she donit give a damn for me*
But let me get to the point, lets roll another joint* And turn the radio loud, Iim too alone to be proud* You donit know how it feels, You donit know how it feels to be me.
“What is it I can have that I still want?i
Another great poem this week from Writer’s Almanac
Starfish
This is what life does. It lets you walk up to
the store to buy breakfast and the paper, on a
stiff knee. It lets you choose the way you have
your eggs, your coffee. Then it sits a fisherman
down beside you at the counter who says, Last night,
the channel was full of starfish. And you wonder,
is this a message, finally, or just another day?
Life lets you take the dog for a walk down to the
pond, where whole generations of biological
processes are boiling beneath the mud. Reeds
speak to you of the natural world: they whisper,
they sing. And herons pass by. Are you old
enough to appreciate the moment? Too old?
There is movement beneath the water, but it
may be nothing. There may be nothing going on.
And then life suggests that you remember the
years you ran around, the years you developed
a shocking lifestyle, advocated careless abandon,
owned a chilly heart. Upon reflection, you are
genuinely surprised to find how quiet you have
become. And then life lets you go home to think
about all this. Which you do, for quite a long time.
Later, you wake up beside your old love, the one
who never had any conditions, the one who waited
you out. This is life’s way of letting you know that
you are lucky. (It won’t give you smart or brave,
so you’ll have to settle for lucky.) Because you
were born at a good time. Because you were able
to listen when people spoke to you. Because you
stopped when you should have and started again.
So life lets you have a sandwich, and pie for your
late night dessert. (Pie for the dog, as well.) And
then life sends you back to bed, to dreamland,
while outside, the starfish drift through the channel,
with smiles on their starry faces as they head
out to deep water, to the far and boundless sea
Kindness
Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
Very Interesting article about the future of email communication.
ithe ultimate outcome of anyone’s* life is a matter of personal choice Oe outside influences are not responsible for where you are mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally, or financially. You have chosen the pathway to your present destination. The responsibility for your situation is you.i
“At any rate, it is a constant idea of mine that behind the cotton wall is hidden a pattern, that we–I mean all human beings–are connected with this, that the whole world is a work of art, that we are parts of the work of art. Hamlet, or a Beethoven quartet, is the truth about this vast mass that we call the world. But there is no Shakespeare, there is no Beethoven. Certainly and emphatically, there is no God. We are the words. We are the music. We are the thing itself.”
Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) was fascinated by the connections between literature and music. From the start of her discussions about the sonorous art, Woolf is concerned with its imbrication in social circumstances.
iAny place deeply lived in, any place where the vitality has been high and the emotions freely involved, can fill the sensory attic with images enough for a lifetime of nostalgia. Because I believe in the influence of places on personalities, I think it somehow important that certain songs we sang as high school or college students still mean particular and personal things. I recently had the experience of recognizing, and with pleasure, what the city [Salt Lake City] meant to me, but I was not heartbroken to leave either it or that youth of mine that it embalms, and I do not necessarily yearn to return to either. There is only this solid sense of having had or having been or having lived something real and good and satisfying, and the knowledge that having had or been or lived these things I can never lose them again. Home is what you can take away with you.i
(Substitute island life with mountain life and this song would be about me)
She comes from Boston. Works at the jewelry store. Down in the harbor Where the ferries come to shore She never really knew how good it would feel To finally find herself in a place so warm and real* She wears a Red Sox cap To hide her baby dreads The girl she was in New Englandis different now and then. In all the local bars She flirts and tells the boys while they’re talkin’ She’s from Boston*
She comes from Boston Talks to her family now and then Through e-mails and postcards She tries to explain to them That education and occupation will have to wait for now She loves the Rasta, reggae rhythms, her dreams have changed somehow* Her toes dig deep and deeper in the sand She’s seduced by the sunsets and her new life at hand
You know I’m not training, but I still read many tri blogs and will do this madness again. Today I read Andrew’s Perspective: http://1happyathlete.blogspot.com/
So why is it we put ourselves, and those close to us, through this madness? For me at least, it’s more about the challenge than it is the sport. It’s about turning something seemingly impossible into reality. It’s about a massive change in perspective of what’s possible. It’s about taking a long term view of something in this short-term culture that we live in. And it’s about doing something where commitment, consistency, determination and overcoming obstacles is the only way to the finish line.
Since the ski area is just outside my door, I take this hike everyday after work. Today we saw a fox and this deer, maybe a mule deer if there is such a thing. The temperature was cool and the intense sun was hiding behind clouds. There are no bubbling brooks for Abbey to play in so the temperature was perfect.
The light on the mountain was interesting creating shadows for just this moment.
This weekend is the CrankWorks/Mountain Bike Capital party in Winter Park. Gary and I went up to check out the races and take the chairlift up Zeypher for some downhill (there was uphill climbing, too) riding.
View from the Roof of the Rockies Trail:
Me:
Then here’s Gary going down the trail:
View from across the Mountain Range:
We came down a black diamond trail named: Downhill. I caught air like never before and landed. What a rush!
