Loose Leaf Notes

1. This Easter I was missing having an Easter bonnet. And then this happened.

2. I like to call this series of shots “You Wear It Well.”

3. It all started when I was looking for flat bean seeds for planting and no one had them in Floyd, a crop failure I was told.  Joe and I were driving to Roanoke to spend the day with our grandsons and I googled “garden center in Roanoke” and the “Parakeet Garden” at the Science Museum in the Center in the Square came up. I couldn’t resist.

4. I had a blue parakeet named Pisces in the 70s that I didn’t like to land on my head. I must have gotten braver because look at this.  There were 150 of them!

5. “A Japanese woman certified the world’s oldest person has died at the age of 119 died Monday. “Kane Tanaka was born January 2, 1903, the same year the Wright brothers flew for the first time…Tanaka was in relatively good health until recently and lived at a nursing home, where she enjoyed board games, solving math problems, soda and chocolate. In her younger years, Tanaka ran various businesses including a noodle shop and a rice cake store. She married Hideo Tanaka a century ago in 1922, giving birth to four children and adopting a fifth. She had planned to use a wheelchair to take part in the torch relay for the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, but the pandemic prevented her from doing so. When the Guinness World Records recognized her as the oldest person alive in 2019, she was asked what moment was the happiest in her life. Her answer: “Now.” – More HERE.

6. When asked ‘when did you feel old?’ I answered,” “When I turned 71. I would have felt old when I turned 70 but I lie about my age by a year to give myself time to get used to it. I call it buffering.”

7. I didn’t feel old in my ’60s and I felt young in my ‘50s.

8. Birthdays: “I was going to celebrate how age and the grace of myopia have given me the perspective that almost everything sorts itself out in the end. That good will and decency and charity and love always eventually conspire to bring light into the darkest corners. That the crucifixion looked like a big win for the Romans. But turning 68 means you weren’t born yesterday. Turning 68 means you’ve seen what you’ve seen—Ukraine, Sandy Hook, the permafrost…Marjorie Taylor Greene. By 68, you have seen dear friends literally ravaged by cancer, lost children, unspeakable losses. The midterms are coming up. My mind is slipping. My dog died.” Anne Lamont

9. “So we look up. In 68 years, I have never seen a boring sky. I have never felt blasé about the moon, or birdsong, or paper whites in bloom. But how does us appreciating spring help the people of Ukraine? If we believe in chaos theory, and the butterfly effect, that the flapping of a Monarch’s wings near my home can lead to a weather change in Tokyo, then maybe noticing beauty—flapping our wings with amazement—changes things in ways we cannot begin to imagine. It means goodness is quantum. Even to help the small world helps. Even prayer, which seems to do nothing. Everything is connected.” Anne Lamont

10. Parakeets live for about 6 years in the wild and 15 years as a pet. The male parakeets have blue patch over the beak and females have a white or light tan one. Parakeets don’t tweet as much as the chirp incessantly. They are very social and, as part of the parrot family, can learn to speak words.

11. I received a call last Thursday that my dear friend of 30+ years was likely on her way out, and I had planned to see her briefly the next day, as many of her dear friends probably were. I likely would have whispered in her ear some lines from a poem I recently wrote called The Final Leaving: Become a disembodied name that slips the mind / Fall out of character / Start at the end/ and take a number / Walk through walls / or walk on water / Become the air/ for others to breathe / A memory that floats / like a fragrance. But it was her poetry Joe and I read this morning to the light of a candle flame in honor of her after we heard she has passed.  – More For Alwyn from  HERE.

12. Peace activist, environmentalist, animal lover, artist, Waldorf kindergarten teacher, fellow-writer/poet, lover of mystery and depth psychology, Alwyn was primarily my girlfriend. She passed peacefully the morning after the phone call. And these are her own words, a poem from her book Remembering Their Names: A Gathering Time, read at her burial service: The Longing – Take me to the Ocean / get me to the Sea / lay my weakened body /where sand and shells must be / Let my fading hearing /awaken to the sounds / of pounding waves and bird call / where water meets the skies. / There, O there, there only / my longing can be met. / Where vastness overwhelms the small / and drowns the fear of death.

13. Birds are your angels now / You practice to be one / You save your voice / and hold out for an heirloom / You vow not to forget / love’s lasting imprint / when life has been spent / and time no longer counts you … From When Time Doesn’t Rhyme HERE.

__________Thirteen Thursday