The rainy season has started. Unlike my prior lives in the Midwest and East Coast, I love winter in Oregon. The rains turn the Willamette Valley into a waterfowl haven. Duck, geese and gulls by the millions return from their northern summers to spend winter here.
Along the river walk in Eugene today I admired the new arrivals -- wigeon, gadwalls, cormorants, glaucous-winged gulls. Then a white-headed runner went by. It happens to me now and then. He reminded me of Craig, though not as fluid. I could picture Craig effortlessly running along. An ephemera.
Then the sadness, thoughts of the tragedy of his passing, tears welled up. I focused binoculars on a pair of wood ducks, among the most beautiful birds in all the world, feeding in the pond weeds. That returned me to the moment.
A blue kingfisher sat on a wire. Away I went again, remembering other exotic kingfishers: over-sized ringed kingfishers that Craig and I savored along Rio Grande marshes. Tiny green kingfishers, tropical-emerald hued, that we discovered after a dusty winter hike along the San Pedro River in southern Arizona. If I let it, virtually anything I see in Nature can remind me of a moment with Craig, or make me wish I could tell him about it.
Funny, it's not like we spent all that much time together. You could total it in weeks, though those were some quality weeks. I really don't know how you could live with such loss if the measure was in quality years. I wish I could help Jean but it's not like my sadness makes any difference.
I spotted four river otters. They had discovered a pond near the river, just a block from Eugene's big mall. It was a fast food court for the otters -- each caught a fish every couple of minutes and would chomp it down. An amazing urban spectacle.
I wanted to stop the people passing by, eyes front, oblivious to the otters dancing just a hundred feet away, rushing to get somewhere before the rain returned. "Look, look there!" But I didn't. Craig would have.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
COLUMBUS DAY - 2009
"End Is Coming/ Are-U-Saved/ Yeshua's blood/ at-one-ment"
I can't explain it either, but that's what the guy's sign read at the crossroads on the University of Oregon campus. He stood there -- gray beard, little white pork-pie hat, his dog patiently lying in the sun -- ranting about Columbine and brainwashing and what-not. I don't think it had anything to do with today, which is Columbus Day. I'm sure he's just as nuts on regular days.
It was news to me to learn that there is an entire online universe obsessed about whether "Yeshua" is the correct name for Jesus. News, but not surprising. I guess each of us has to fill our lives with something.
Across the mall, the messages were more timely:
"For America To Live/ Columbus Must Die"
"Columbus Was a White Supremist (sic)"
"Custer Had It Coming"
"Christopher Columbus/ America's 1st Terrorist"
Polite-looking and nicely-dressed young Indian fellows sitting at the tables seemed to belie the radical slogans on the signs. But who knows? I was just glad to be refreshed by snippets of conversations going on about politics and social issues -- hardly the stuff of sidewalk talk where I live in Cottage Grove.
Here it's just 20 miles but a world away from the campus where bright young things have the luxury of going class to class on a sunny Monday. Soon enough they will confront the realities of earning a living in a depressing economy while changing diapers at 3am. Still, I doubt that many of them will end up in Cottage Grove pumping gas at the Safeway or standing all day at a checkout lane at the Walmart. Even on Columbus Day.
According to the Eugene newspaper some felt the anti-Columbus Day signs "went a bit too far": "Their effort is legitimate but the 'Columbus must die' sign may be a little extreme," said David McNeary, a 21-year-old former UO student. I wonder how he felt about the "end is coming" sign.
I can't explain it either, but that's what the guy's sign read at the crossroads on the University of Oregon campus. He stood there -- gray beard, little white pork-pie hat, his dog patiently lying in the sun -- ranting about Columbine and brainwashing and what-not. I don't think it had anything to do with today, which is Columbus Day. I'm sure he's just as nuts on regular days.
It was news to me to learn that there is an entire online universe obsessed about whether "Yeshua" is the correct name for Jesus. News, but not surprising. I guess each of us has to fill our lives with something.
Across the mall, the messages were more timely:
"For America To Live/ Columbus Must Die"
"Columbus Was a White Supremist (sic)"
"Custer Had It Coming"
"Christopher Columbus/ America's 1st Terrorist"
Polite-looking and nicely-dressed young Indian fellows sitting at the tables seemed to belie the radical slogans on the signs. But who knows? I was just glad to be refreshed by snippets of conversations going on about politics and social issues -- hardly the stuff of sidewalk talk where I live in Cottage Grove.
Here it's just 20 miles but a world away from the campus where bright young things have the luxury of going class to class on a sunny Monday. Soon enough they will confront the realities of earning a living in a depressing economy while changing diapers at 3am. Still, I doubt that many of them will end up in Cottage Grove pumping gas at the Safeway or standing all day at a checkout lane at the Walmart. Even on Columbus Day.
According to the Eugene newspaper some felt the anti-Columbus Day signs "went a bit too far": "Their effort is legitimate but the 'Columbus must die' sign may be a little extreme," said David McNeary, a 21-year-old former UO student. I wonder how he felt about the "end is coming" sign.
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