Well-Swept Yard

The title of this blog has left some, maybe more than some, maybe many, has left people wondering about the significance, if any, of sweeping yards.  Sweeping is an old custom and for many people a lost skill. Done properly, sweeping creates a mood, a feel, a culmination of well-put effort. Done poorly, sweeping leaves a mess and causes people to reach for the medicine cabinet. Time was, and not so long ago, sweeping, sweeping with a broom I am speaking of, was an indoor skill (please do not mention "indoor" and "yard" and such--all in due course) that would make quick work of tidying things. Patent offices worldwide must have millions, maybe billions, of replacements for the broom and for the act of sweeping. Some of the claimed replacements are plain silly. Racking my brain I find no replacement of the broom as pleasing as the broom.  Swish is nice. Swish is more agreeable to the ear than vroom. Vroom. Need I describe? Of course not. You agree even if you sell Ele

 Or thinking. At least thinking.  About

  Today No. Not today, but back then. It was a nice time. 2019. France   I think it was the  Restaurant le Carré d'Art, Nimes

I brought Philip Glass to campus for a presentation. Some time ago. A colleague and I did a short interview on our NPR affiliate about the visit. We played excerpts from the composer's music.  "My mother would enjoy this," I thought to myself and sent her a copy. Going through her things recently, I came across the cassette I sent. On the envelope my mother had written "Killing hogs I think." Milton Puryeur killing hogs on his land. Marion Post Wolcott, Library of Congress, Farm Security Administration

  I sold that snapshot. I am sorry. It is a good one and a fine moral lesson. I should have kept the photograph and tacked it above my desk as a reminder and guilt-inducer to stay on track with my tasks.  And this weekend, last one in March 2024, I discovered that I had a second copy. 

June 11, 2018 San Francisco. Visit. Early morning. Thought to myself: I probably need to change money. SF is another country. And that's good. 

Overheard at Magritte exhibition at SFMOMA: "We should use that blue in our hallway"

If, however, Finland has been rated the world’s most literate country, it may also have something to do with a 19th-century decree that a couple could not marry in the Lutheran church before both passed a reading test. “Quite an incentive,” observes Halonen, “to learn to read.” Safe, happy and free: does Finland have all the answers? | World news | The Guardian

Found

The flu can kill millions. In 1918, a pandemic was fueled by World War I. - The Washington Post My mother was eight years old when the pandemic spread to rural Alabama and the farm that the family cultivated. Mama was the only person in the family who did not contract the flu. She was the only caregiver for the family. She remembered that she had to rotate and change bedpans for the patients. Her father gave her instruction on feeding the farm animals. She was a brave little girl.

Were you able to breathe through your ears, presumable you could sense the aromas of sounds. 

There's a difference between "don't remember" and "don't know"

I enjoy seeing this photograph several times a year. Walker Evans

Things we used to know changed. Inconsiderate.

Rainer Maria Rilke said of a new year, " And now we welcome the new year. Full of things that have never been." Unfortunately, I doubt this is going to be one of those years. 

I'm talking to the glassware if that's your concern.

The hurt's gone but not the memory.

You can estimate the age of a person by the number of pillows they need.

This photograph dates to 1899 and shows my Grandfather and Grandmother Allen (Julius Henry Allen, Lillian Eremine McKinley) on their wedding day. Showing front and back of the card photograph. The notes were made by Lucille Allen Back of photograph. No month/day has been determined for their 1899 marriage. This was the second marriage for Julius. His first wife, Josephine Farmer (also known as Mary Josephine and Josie) died 11 May 1897.

Repeal and Replace Nobody said it was going to easy With apologies to a couple of really rational guys.