Blah Humblog
This week I’ve given four freshman classes writing exams, and a class of seniors a journalism-writing exam. I am learning to become a diplomat writer-in-residence/educator in secondary education. The semester deadline for my MTSU Writer’s Loft students has arrived in synchronicity, as has a request for the title and a synopsis of a January lecture at MTSU (Unveiling the Narrative: Meta Code for Metaphor. --I think).
Yet a moment of joy arrives, truly; the homecoming of my sons from college was also this week. Boy-men, their dogs, their duffel bags and contents from college all landed in my two-bedroom cottage. We are a cozy tribe, the boys and I. Everything is as it should be and I am grateful; oh, filled with the light of celebration.
Then, Scout, my youngest son’s youthful black lab decides to go on a wingding with my dear Gracie in tow. Scout swims across Bayou Liberty to play with chickens, a neighbor’s experiment for their young children: Chickens who live in a coop, an Acadian coop that resembles the owner’s home, with a door that Scout learned to unlatch.
My son Michael’s dog played. She played and played with several chickens until the poor birds stopped playing. A few escaped death by roosting in the eaves of my across-the- bayou neighbor’s home. Gracie lay in my neighbor's driveway swaggering, welcoming them with her wagging tail. Scout pounced on the last chicken available and jumped in the bayou. The phone vibrated in the middle of a freshman exam.
This afternoon I am trying hard to become inspired to offer a word or two that might hold some meaning. But I’m afraid that anything I might conjure would feel untrue. I am tired and I am a grump. The truth for me is that the Chef’s Choice today would be to have someone cook especially for me.
Time passes . . . this evening I am going to an old abbey to listen and watch the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra perform Handel’s Messiah: between dogs and chickens and boy-men and me. Here I blend into the harmonics and find the one life I recognize. Home, now, renewing, I think: wonderful chaos. There might even be a story in the chicken chasing dog.
3 comments:
Betsy--Life is coming fast and furiously at you and seems overly full, yet rather sweet in the midst of all that chaos. I love visualizing your sons dumping the contents of their duffle bags, the wild play of the dogs with the poor, dear chickens, and then you sitting in an old abbey listening to Handel's Messiah and making sense of it all. Thanks for sharing this all, and here's wishing you a few moments of peace!
I heard Garrison Keiller once say that bad things never happen to writers, they just get more material for their stories. Although that may be true, some days it's easier to appreciate this sentiment than others.
Hoping that things are settling into a calmer place for you, Betsy.
Dear Betsy,
I hope Handel's Messiah brought back some harmony to your life and that you're now relishing your sons' presence (and dogs) in your home on the bayou.
Thinking of you...
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