Afternoon Thoughts

The temperature had warmed to 45° F by this afternoon, so I decided to walk around the ‘hood. A lot of snow still covers the ground and makes the wind cold, and there are icy patches on the sidewalk and streets. I couldn’t walk far without encountering an icy patch and then I had to tread carefully. Where the street or sidewalk is in the sun, the pavement is clear. Where the pavement is shaded by trees or houses, there is ice. I ran into one of my neighbors – Judy is her name. She lives around the corner with a woman named Chris and Chris's son. I've talked with Judy several times, including once when I ran into her at Walmart, and she always seems like a nice, genuine person. Chris's father recently passed away and her mother was spending Christmas with them. Judy had just washed off the front porch and steps because she had salted them after the Christmas day snow. She wanted to wash the salt off before it caused a stain. After rinsing the porch with a hose, she was using a broom to sweep water off the porch and steps. We talked for a while and then I proceeded home.

I was just looking through my dusty archive at some of my early writings – I thought I might find something interesting to post. But even when I wrote those pages I knew they were lame. After the passage of time, they are even lamer. My prose is like beer, not wine. Wine may age well; beer does not. I have a few poems that I could publish without being embarrassed, but a blog isn’t the proper forum for them.

My dad served in the Army during World War 2, and I have a lot of letters he sent to my mother during that time. In fact, I have all the letters he sent. Mom saved every letter, I’ve no doubt. I have read only a few. “I’m sorry I haven’t written in the last two weeks, but I participated in an invasion, and now I’m living in a coconut grove on a coconut plantation.” You get the idea. I don’t know what to do with these letters. Reading them feels voyeuristic, yet no one alive today would mind. It’s almost like archeology: artifacts from the past. Maybe I’ll keep ‘em until I pass on, then they’ll be someone else’s stack of mail.

I also have beaucoup photographs. I could scan in a few that have a story … if my scanner worked. I’ll put “buy a scanner” on my to-do list. I inherited quite a few old black-and-white photos of people I don’t know. Seems a shame to throw them away. I know someone somewhere is working on a genealogy and would love to have a photo of this or that person, and I have the photo they want. But I don’t know who they are and they don’t know me. I guess the old photos will end up in the trash can. It won’t be long before someone will find photos of me, and they’ll think, “Who is this guy?” And there will be no one alive who knows or cares who the guy in the photo is or what he did while he was on Earth.