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Saturday August 12, 2000 "To a great experience one thing is essential, an experiencing nature." Bagehot
pumpkin patch
I can drink out of a glass so I must be ready for fine dining.
storm sunset
Meta: I may be a little erratic in updating for the next few weeks. |
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a small routine and a birthday I decide that a good long walk is the way to start my day. There is a hike and bike trail right behind the house. Could it be more interesting than the neighborhood? Maybe. Dad walks as far as the next street and turns back. He has the stamina but his hips start hurting him. I feel better as I walk. I'm gald for that. The backs of people's houses along the trail are a little more interesting than the fronts. But not much. Many have divided their yards into a personal one and one near the trail. Some grow things outside their second fence by the trail. Like the pumpkins shown here. Finally the trail bores me a little and I try the streets again. There are pleasant parks, some PeeWee football players running laps, a garage sale of baby clothes. But it's still sterile. Covenant protected. Covenants enforced. The long walk feels good, though, even if this isn't a neighborhood of art cars and outsider art and various styles and ages of construction. That's the kind of neighborhood I like. Covenants tend to prevent that. My sister offers an excursion to a secondhand book store. Because it's my birthday. Mom and Dad both give me some money for this. I buy a few computer books, a tennis book and a wonderful old portfolio of Venice postcards. My niece has taken my mother on an outing, but my sister and brother-in-law and Dad enjoy the bookstore and then a ride down some adjoining streets where there are many antique and junk shops and old book stores. A more thorough investigation on another day, on another visit, might be warranted. The truth is: I do like to shop. Even though I am drowning in things. Things are polluting my brain. Things keep me from concentrating. You spend part of your life thinking, "If I just had more money...." If you get it, you have to be careful to spend it for freedom, not things. Still, I am enjoying my new digital camera, aren't I? The point is to enjoy the things you have...that's it! And enjoy looking at lots of things you don't want. My niece and her boyfriend and my mother have purchased fake food for my birthday. This is a big joke now because I've been threatening to make a collection of fake food since I did a search on ebay and such to amuse my sister with pictures of things for sale. Well, it just may happen. This gift of fake garlic and vegies and my set of fake desserts purchased from a junk shop could just be the start of something. Maybe the flamingos or the bendable posable figures need to go to storage. But not just yet. The nieces have selected a restaurant for my birthday. It's called Fourth Story Restaurant and it's inside the Tattered Cover Bookstore, a Denver institution. Is that perfect or what? Seven of us load up in Dad's van and we head out to Cherry Creek, the upscale area where this store is located. We shop for an hour. They do have a very pleasant store and I end up getting an interesting French tape and a book on digital photography. My sister is interested in Carl Sandburg suddenly. She remembers writing a paper in high school about him and writing him a letter and getting an answer. He died in 1967. So my mom buys her a book of his work. We meet my niece, her husband and Jack the wonder boy for an early dinner at the restaurant. We are an interesting crew...my sister using her tripod cane, Mike (Jack's dad) on crutches with the busted knee cap, Mom a little slow and a not quite six-month-old baby. But it goes well. I have some delicious foie gras and a taste of my niece Lisa's fig and goat cheese salad and a taste of my mom's plantain soup. My entree is pheasant breast. They have my favorite sherry (Sandeman Olarosso). Jack did well at the table for a while and then had to have a parent carry him around. The manager, a parent of an infant himself, made Jen an entire new plate when Mike took over so she could have hot food. Jack charmed everyone while being walked about by various adults. Even the hostess wanted to hold him. He smilled a lot. We drove home in an impending storm. The sun set through a slit between cloud and horizon. I enjoyed my day with my family. The low key atmosphere. Walks, bookstores, reading, working the crossword in the newspaper. When I'm home, all the things I should do pulse around me. When I'm away, I can focus on the entertainments at hand and not on the many things I need and want to do.
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