Out of the slanting western skies, mid-day Thanksgiving comes to a Rochester WI orchard; Boxes and boxes of cookies; First formal

Over the back hill, solar panels push electronic turkey and fixings ovens out of sight, save  small silvery reflections through the woods. It was an old fashioned Thanksgiving family gathering this year at the Willard Ela Orchard farmhouse. The sun drove it all, per usual. The gaiety, merriment, flowing happinesses of laughter and simmering steaming sauces and rightly crisping turkey skin was all plugged into the sun. Before the dinner began to appear Ben ceremoniously gave the 'grand hailing sign' at the  temporarily empty table. Blindy, elevated barn cat who paid his dues and long has been granted beloved housecat status hung out at the table corner by the Franklin wood stove soaking in the good smells. Hannah and her mother Jane Willard share a similar laugh. Erin's husband Ben feeds the chickens their dinner early. Bob Willard makes people feel welcome. Bob carves sun-baked festive bird. David, elderly guest, samples house product Ela Cider (unpasteurized, keep refrigerated) sitting next to a sun-bathed years-old family Rosemary plant, in purple blossom for the holiday. Rosemary blooms; chickens feeding without; sun 'bubbles' camera lens. Ben breaks  a Rosemary leaf and smells the fragrance. Dee, Erin's mother, samples glorious fare. At table left to right: Erin, Ben, Hannah's friend Raman, Hannah, cork replacer Jane's arm. The story of the day at the table: ('above and beyond' dep't) Erin telling the call she got Tuesday after library archives closing from an attorney asking Erin the Archivist if she could help settle a real estate property sale matter. The subject was an allegely stolen two ton granite rock given to Lawrence College in the 1800s but missing for the last 17 years. Buried beneath a farm, the selling and buying parties wanted to assure clear title was given at sale. With the fluxuating cat population at the Willards including  numerous barn cats - and Blindy - the Willards need to hurriedly fix scratched screens with cat-bothering adhesive tape. Jane recalls the sight of one-eyed Blindy out in the back fields with other regular-sighted cats, her one eye catching the headlights of an approaching auto as though finding her way using a miner's lamp. Jane knows thereby that Blindy is still there. ^,^ A regular Christmas box of treats The Priscilla Ladies Circle of the First Congregational Church UCC unleashes a whirlwind of Xmas baking each Yule. Here,  a cookie box is first indented, then demolished quickly. Buy them at the church, 100 E Broadway, Waukesha WI. 262-542-8008 while they last. ^,^ First Formal

By Sharon Olds

Listen Online

She rises up above the strapless, her dewy flesh like a soul half out of a body. It makes me remember her one week old, soft, elegant, startled, alone. She stands still, as if, if she moved, her body might pour up out of the bodice, she keeps her steady gaze raised when she walks, she looks exactly forward, led by some radar of the strapless, or with a cup runneth over held perfectly level, her almost sea-sick beauty shimmering a little. She looks brave, shoulders made of some extra-visible element, or as if some of her cells, tonight, were faceted like a fly's eye, and her skin was seeing us see it. She looks hatched this moment, and yet weary—she would lie in her crib, so slight, looking worn out from her journey, and gaze at the world and at us in dubious willingness. “First Formal” by Sharon Olds from The Wellspring. © Knopf, 1996

Wis's Xmas idea for yr 2013; Raccoon rescue; Through many trials and snares; Zepata's creekets, revisited, Agnus Dei, Paul Winter Chorus, Kings College

When autumn leaves turn to Xmas cards

^,^

If a tree happens to fall

https://www.facebook.com/Amazinganimalintheworld/posts/381562245597824 --

^,^

Trials of spider webs

imaginary beast further tethered by insects

and held-onto ears

girl grabs ears riding bear sculpture along the Fox

during a farmers market

^,^

Zepata's Creekets

revisited

Gender Studies
by Michael Blumenthal

Listen Online


A cricket chirps in the grass.
Another cricket, all ears,
joins him. Now there are two.
Up above, birds shriek
like drunken gods, the air
is atizzy with the melodrama
of what is about to be.
The two crickets
eye each other
out of the corner
of their cricket eyes.
Each desires something
the other has, each
abhors its own desire.
After a brief silence,
there will be little
cricket mating, a little
cricket love. Soon,
the air will be abuzz
with the sounds
of heavy cricket breathing,
legs rubbing together,
the sound of war in the air
in crickatese,
a subject for specialists.

"Gender Studies" by Michael C. Blumenthal.


....................


Review:


In 1998 the pre-SRN writer ran a series
called 'Zepata's Adventures'
Synthesizing the famed name
of Mexican Robin Hood-style outlaw
ZAPATA





SEE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emiliano_Zapata




Today's Writers Almanac poem
about crickets (above)
reminded us of our prior work
on the subject:



Zepata and the creekets


Instalment 6




The expected storm arrives
Just before dawn
Zepata and Irena
Pull the tarp down upon them
It was either that or have it blown away
So high were the winds

The red-bandana clad creekets
had long ago retired to
their stow-away saddle bag
and if their legs had been
fine instruments
which in a way they were
the creekets would have put
them away
in velvet-lined music cases;
as it was, to the little mariachi band,
they just blew them off
like smoke from fired
pistols

This weather pattern was a frik
Zepata say to Irena
He nevair see one like
Cyclonic winds seem to blow
Around and around the mountain

A stream-rinsed red union suit
Hanging on a makeshift line blew off
Only to return fifteen minutes later
From the opposite direction
It had traveled around the mountain

Daylight slowly comes
But the rain and crying wind does not let up
El Dayo appears at their active
Bundle of tarp and he sounds
His battle call
Zepata and Irena look out from inside
Their waterproof canvas
Cocoon of rest and love

Raising himself again and again
On his powerful hind legs
Dayo gives a primeval battle cry
At the sky, daring it to strike
Him with lightning
His bulging eyes blazing

Zeus himself might refrain
From hurling a bolt at such a
Dreadnaught
For fear El Dayo would perhaps
catch it
In his frothing gaping mouth
And hurl it back

Zepata calls out to the drenched
Beast:
Issy Boy issy
Go get Mare
We liff in half an hour

Soon Dayo and Mare
stand waiting
And the terrible storm
Relents
Zepata checks the dynamite
Eet is try he proclaims
And with Irena breaks camp

Vowing never to forget that storm
And the jump-started Mexican saviour
Ponders its portent

Now mud is their greatest danger
It is too risky to ride
So Zepata and Irena walk
Beside their mounts
All morning they descend
In this way

In the early afternoon
They discover that the storm
Did not happen at the lower
Altitude
It had been a mountaintop
Electric cyclone only
Like nobody ever saw before

Zepata thinks it must
Have been a sight to see
From down below
And indeed the compadres
Had looked up from their campsite
And thought of Zepata and Irena
And offered prayers
for their safekeeping

The waters that had rushed
Down the mountain
Were torrential
And the air had taken on
A charged crispness
Following the high winds
That had swirled through
The compadres' tentative
repose

Zepata who was a simple Indian
with cause and effect
thought patterns at root
Divined the storm had been
Stirred by the pro-creative
Madness
Exhibited by humans and horses
In the night

After all, he mused
If a little Zepata or Irena
Was being conceived
Or a foal to match or even
Exceed Dayo and Mare's
Powerful exhuberances
Should it not storm?

These were all natural things
To the mind of Zepata
For himself he knew
That the inflammations
Stirred by Irena
and her surfeit of oil
Produced energy that not even
He, ZEPATA, could fully combust
Try as he might

He thought as he watched
Her riding ahead of him:
Here was an exciting fuel
That could never be burned
Completely

Irena possessed a life force
That commenced as female
Gateway of life physiology
That which every woman has
But in Irena's instance
A bellows of only guessed-at origin
Had blown her womanly propensities
Into a conflagration whose
Raging flames licked
The highest clouds and
Changed weather patterns

The Indians knew
The northern lights were caused
By a woman such as this

In the north, it was said,
there was such a woman
And in other parts
Of the world
Rainmakers, storm-causers
Interacting with mighty men
Their powers are released
This is what Zepata believed

How could he not believe it
As he watched Irena's
Buttocks ahead of him
Nudging and shunting
The hand-tooled saddle
He had rubbed to smoothness
himself
And presented to his Real Woman

It must be time for siesta
He mused
Irena felt his eyes upon her
And she smiled without turning

^,^

Agnus Dei

Paul Winter chorus

King's College

Play https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uECsfzG8mi0

Background Info on Paul Winter
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Winter

^,^

Can't help falling; Review of toasted cheese, Wauk. Mem. Hospital Cafeteria; Round redounds; Struggling waitress; Backs to the wall; Old poets; Mahalia at Satch's 70th

Wise men say...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSF89swJ9IU

^,^

Toasted cheese sandwich

(A review of a sandwich at the Waukesha Memorial Hospital Caferia)

Just the right amount of grit
to slosh around the golden creamy
'merik'n cheese in the washer 
 tub of my juicing mouth 

the thick texas toast
fried in the buttered pan
while four fat slices of cheese
melted before the hungry short-orderer

laying down his coin, a mass consumption ~
washed, deluged down by an iced
Dr. Pepper and fries in the hospital
outpatient cafeteria


DZD 11-8-17

^,^

ROUND REDOUNDS

Is it a sign of being civilized
To live in spaces that always have an angle
Squares and rectangles
Cornering us in the dust

When all uncivilized simple creatures
Around the globe
- Under the dome of heaven -
Live in tepees, igloos, round or oval nests

Without reservation
The choice is automatically made
Make it round;
:"We'll have what nature's having."

Why our angular fixation then when
Our own preliminarily-cultured children
Given their first crayon will draw
Instinctive curves and ovals

Nothing in nature is straight
We use our squares, plumbs, transits,
And snapped chalk lines to get it straight
We need straight to build high; but not nature

Nature is round
Even a squirrel outside my window
Chewed a near-perfect circle enlargement
In a gourd filled with bird-feed

He'd squeezed through my smaller
Bird-sized hole but it was a tight fit
So while I secretly watched him
He went around my circle all the way

So I wouldn't notice what he'd done?
He could have hacked a jagged opening
Any shape to gain access to the seed
But he carefully widened my circle

I think this wasn't really a squirrel squirrel
It was an Indian squirrel
Or an Esquimaux squirrel
A spirit squirrel from another world

Following an instinctive blueprint
And I sat in my square room
Looking out my square window, amazed;
Roundly amused

Zep 6-2000

^,^

STRUGGLING WAITRESS
BY CHANTELLE PENCE
Alaska Dispatch News. Anchorage

Sent to the Raccoon by daughter Laurie  Kari
Director, family Promise Homeless Shelter, Wasilla AK
http://www.familypromisematsu.org/About_us.html

She fumbled with her pen and paper when she took our order at the restaurant we had chosen for our special night out. A blank look came over her face, in the midst of our exchange, and she asked us to repeat our meal request. She apologized a couple of times before leaving our table, and I couldn't help but notice what she was wearing as she walked away. Frayed black athletic pants stretched over her thin frame. We were at a place that was reputed to have good steaks, but the service had me questioning our choice to eat there.

I joked to my husband that she might be on drugs, but was not really kidding. We agreed that there was something "off" about her. I observed her while she struggled to tend to a table with a large party of people, all asking different things of her. She walked swiftly back to the kitchen, to retrieve a forgotten item, and then returned to our table to bring our drinks, somewhat sloppily. I felt uneasy.



I breathed deeply and thought about my options. We could leave, as it seemed the evening was off to a bad start. Or we could stay and look for good things to see. I asked my partner to play a game with me. "Let's try to find something to appreciate about her," I said. So we did.


"She has good posture!" "She is trying really hard." "She gave a genuine response when I asked her opinion about a dish." We sat back in our chairs, each of us reaching for more good things to notice about our waitress, and the establishment. She returned with our appetizer and I caught her eyes. They were clear, to my surprise. We ate our small plate, enjoying the food and each other's company.



When the waitress brought our main course, I expressed my delight about how good it looked. She kept apologizing for her awkwardness. "No worries!" I said. "It's OK, this is great!" my husband offered. She walked away and we continued to find the good while we ate. His steak with blue cheese sauce was incredible. My chicken fettuccine was tasty and not too heavy. The conversation was light, easy and loving. A perfect date.


Our waitress moved about, tending to her tasks. Midway through our meal she came over and began sharing with us. She had a young daughter and was working hard to provide for her. She told us how, two years ago, she was addicted to heroin. She was still climbing out of the hellhole she had been living in. "Look at you now!" I exclaimed. "Your eyes are so bright." "You're doing awesome," my husband said. She left again to go back to the kitchen.


At the end of our meal, she came back to visit. "I love it when couples like you come in. I've been enjoying listening to your conversation. This is what I want," she said, waving her hand between the two of us. "A love like this. …" She had shared some of her story, so we shared some of ours.


"What you see now is not how it's always been. We were not always like this." We, also, had a difficult past. Not the same, exactly, but ours was not always a life of pleasure or prosperity. There were bouts of pain and poverty in our individual and shared histories. We had each experienced the shame of being looked down on by people on high. Though we didn't use those words, exactly, our different experiences on the rough side of life gave us some insight, and compassion, for her plight. We talked a little bit about self-care and healing, and how our relationship as a couple is only good when we care for ourselves individually. The path to wellness takes work; it is not always easy. She said that her daughter's father is in recovery, and she knows that she has to look after her own well-being, and her baby, as a priority.



It was an evening to remember. I always enjoy our date nights. Sometimes they are light and happy, fun and playful. This one was warm, caring and humbling in all the right ways. It reminded me that we never serve another, or ourselves, by focusing on flaws. There is more than meets the eye in situations that, at first glance, appear ugly. One of my favorite quotes, by Gary Zukav, says: "Let us not run from the unattractiveness of a shattered soul, let us heal them." When we look for the best in another, we help draw it to the surface. A person who is a mess one minute can become poised and present under the gaze of someone looking for it.


We left the restaurant with happy bellies and a peaceful feeling. The waitress gave the gift of her time, effort and story, and allowed us the opportunity to experience the power of influence, and how easily we can help or hurt another just by how we see them. I am thankful I made the choice to find the best in her. It took very little effort, and it opened the door for a rich experience that benefited each of us — the waitress, my husband and me. We left a big tip.


Chantelle Pence is the author of "Homestead Girl: The View From Here." She divides her time between Anchorage and Chistochina.


The views expressed here are the writer's and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary@alaskadispatch.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@alaskadispatch.com.

^,^

Backs to the wall

Maneuvering room there is none

The sun inexorably nears the eastern horizon

And the town must awaken

To back to school day

Backs to the wall

Condemned prisoners of time

Parents and children arise because they must

Lunch meats quiver in refrigerated cellophane

Legions of new shoes vibrate

At end-of-summer bedsides

Loaves of bread know they will soon

Be missing some members

Alarm clocks get turned off

Without ringing

They've been stared at for an hour

Housecats pace nervously

Mothers, dads and children know

There is something wonderfully rueful

This morning as everyone is edged

Moment by moment to an abyss

Time marches on is the indictment

On this morning of reckoning

Of idled playthings

Of wistfulness, of swishing pendulums

Like scythes through dewy hayfields

Like the migrants' soft songs

As they toss melons to the catcher in the wagon

Summer's offense yields to autumn's defense

Gears mesh incrementally

This clock cannot be stopped

Moms and dads take the annual picture

By the back yard gate

There is bravery afoot

Warriors donning dented armor

A sense of inescapable duty met

And false joy

Mom exclaims

"Ah, the page is turned! September first!"

Flying wax paper

Clouds of dust

[David Zep Dix 9-1-2000]

^,^

Old Poets

^,^

Mahalia
as Satchmo turns 70 at jazz festival

JUST A CLOSER WALK WITH THEE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wX-YWOr8RQ

Halloween configurations; Impressions of Angels Grace Hospice, Oconomoc WI; Teraoka's gift - Anything Goes

Odd Fellows pose  ~ 

Wis Guthrie's DIRT MONSTER

and WINGED CREATURE

join KD Cat for a special Halloween scare

with full moon

^,^

Normally Conservative Jon T.

- leading Waukesha businessman -

wears dress-down marijuana socks

 at the editor's Odd Fellows poor man's penthouse

on Halloween night, 11-1-17

^,^

Dallas Oregon writer, retired US Army Major, 

G. Nel O'Neil

(see Avalon Reflections)

dons unwidely disseminated uniform of the annual night.

^,^

Flight CANCELLED

At Angels Grace Hospice, Oconomowoc, WI

This editor spent two weeks at the runway terminal
in October of 2017, as though just prior  hacking impassably
 through a dense jungle with a dull machette.

At last, exhausted, tight vines
twisting all around him holding him down,
a vast runway clear of all impediments appeared
before him stretching to a far blue-skied horizon.

He taxied onto this glorious airstrip
ready for take-off at last but

he could not pull the engine throttle back.

It was not time for departure.
This flight was cancelled.

This was just a dream that could not spoil his take on 
the facility.  Situated on a peninsula with a small lake
called simply The Pond on three sides, in a wilderness setting,
with sandhill cranes making a seasonal encampment in
their migratory pattern, roaming the grounds searching for grubs 
in the landscape mulching

or sheering tender greens sprouting from rained-upon birdseed
beneath the many birdfeeders on hospice patients'
patios;

with tranquil walkways around the pond shore.

Many donations to keep this lovely place are recorded.

The blue pond is at the foot of this zinnia-plaited outdoor area.

The building is shaped in a hexagonal configuration
with a central living room, and the six spokes house the patients' private rooms,
each with their own patio.

Dee waters a plant.  She brought a compass so the Raccoonteur could tell where he was.

A recently acquired dragonfly metal sculpture sat on his solo patio
where whole beds could be rolled out onto the lushly-surrounded
cement flats.

As he was expected to soon expire

he was afforded all the salted french fries

and hot fudge malts he could consume.

No one was counting.

Similarly the popcorn was free, 24-7.

A large frog crockery stood at the end of one of the halls.

Son-in-law Ben brought this satellite shot print

from his Lawrence University home computer complex,

allowing a raccoonoitering when the editor was still

confined to his bed.

Dee's compass also helped.

^,^

John and Janelle brought this harbinger of a future year to come

as a gift the other evening.

His marijuana socks by the way were a gift from a playful friend

who sings with him in the church choir.

He may be arch, but he's also ANYTHING GOES.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7NJ9ylAhos