motion, yellow, pomegranate

*I stand on the Path and all around me is motion: the aspens, red flags, blue flags, darting insects.

*Yellow deer, yellow umbrellas half way up the Stupa.

*K whispers to me, "Come see." The icons from cut marble are worked into the floor: a lotus, flowers on stems. By her feet is a pomegranate of marble. But wait! The pomegranate has be sliced open, exposing red beads. Seeds.

the Path, silence, observing

*We follow the Path to the Stupa up,up,up. We walk slowing because the Path is quite steep and the altitude is, gasp. But we also want to savor this walk--a son with his fiancee, a mother.

*The silence is deafening interrupted only by the crunch of the gravel path and the wind through the trees.

*We walk around the Stupa with B observing, pointing out the saffron deer, the discreet drain pipes (a lot of snow to drain off) which I call the gargoyles of the temple.I realize that this could be 24 years ago. We used to walk together while I pointed to, showed him things, taught him to notice the world.And now we walk together and see the world.

river, going down, eavesdropping

*Two seconds after one of us says "I wouldn't want to go down the river when it is that high" five rafts zoom past us. We watch as two of them collide, disentangle, then continue down the river.

*Going down to the city from the mountains.

*Eavesdropping on people in the restaurant to figure out what they do to earn money.

knobs, icon, drift

*Cara talks of her childhood home and what it meant to her. When her father finally moved out of it he replaced all the very old doorknobs with reproductions and gave her the old knobs.

*Submerged in a sea of "he was an icon" I am content that "icon" means something completely, totally different (and more sane)to me.

*Listening to Mma Ramotswe as I drift off to sleep.

reflection, suitcase, face

*The houses on the foothills blend into the vegetation so that I cannot see them during the day--but the early morning sun reflected in their windows sparkles so I can tell there are houses there.

*I have one suitcase of my mother's set and when I look at it I remember all the happy family trips we took together.

*We've devised a barricade across the bathroom doorway to keep the dog in during the night. We had to add a quilt to muffle her scratching on the barricade. Now when I get up in the morning her sweet face is patiently poking up over it.

bat, water,glories

*We find a level place on the rocks just off the bike path in the cool shade under the bridge and set up our chairs with the dog attached to a leg. I sink into Dreaming in Hindi by Katherine Rich and get submerged in India. The dog does not settle to nap but instead watches the tubers as they rush by on the high, frigid water. Birds swoop above us--in and out of the mud packed homes they have created under the bridge. Plop! A foot to the right of my chair a winged animal drops--a bird, no, a bat. Not fully in love with bats, I shudder. Then because it does not thrash about or fly into my hair I remain totally still and really look at it. I can see the individual hairs on its body and notice that it is not all black as I thought bats are but instead its back is a rosy pink.

*I grew up in the water of Hawaii but my friend did not get into even a swimming pool until he was in his 20's. Everyday he challenges his comfort zone and gets into the pool to water walk with me. To mask the terror (for him) I get him to do a new "trick" in the water. Yesterday he held onto my hands and took his feet up off the pool floor.

*After lunch Kaitlin walks out on my balcony and is delighted by the way I have landscaped (balconyscaped) it with plants. As she turns to enter back into the apt her eyes find the morning glories.

balloon, post, it comes back

*Just as I am opening the blinds a fierce dragon breath exhalation sound startles me. A red hot air balloon glides by close enough to reach out and touch.

*Neon bright post it notes against a white dry erase board.

*How lovely and satisfying to have guided and taught a child! And now that they are all brung up they take the time and have the patience to teach me things.