A break from vacation

This blog is on vacation, officially.

Unofficially, this blog would be remiss in not taking note of the best holiday display in the neighborhood, which on a clear day (at least in Pittsburgh) after Christmas, put all puny yard-light displays to shame.

I'm in a rare position of, for a short week at least, having no dog-walking responsibilities. So it was a real treat to take a "me" walk around the block on Dec. 26. The crescent moon floated low in the western sky, resting elegantly behind branches of bare trees, in a deep blue-black dusk.
There was a star or planet to the moon's left. I can't describe how lovely this sky was, except to say, lamely, that it took my breath away.

All Christmas decorations ... go away. You cannot compete.

Monday's clear skies gave way to a soggy Tuesday of unrelenting rain. I went out at around 1 p.m. to run errands, umbrella in hand. Here's what the world looked like, with Mount Washington (way in the background, seen from Stanwix Street) fogged in.

Noisy world

Since about 2009, my cell phone has been my alarm clock. I've set it to a nice, chime-y wake up jingle that is infinitely preferable to the high-decibel beep-beep-beep of my alarm clock.

Unfortunately for me, no matter what the alarm sound, my drowsy brain is in enough command to order fingers to smash the snooze button.

What can I say? I am not a morning person.

That said, if I am forced to be out and about in the early hours, I truly enjoy the experience: the early morning light, the birdsong, the water dripping off leaves in the park, my dog trotting nicely beside me.

At this time of year, morning or evening (though it seems mostly to be evening) one of the loveliest sounds is of wind, acting like a bow, sliding across tree branches, acting like strings. The effect is most certainly not that of a violin, or cello, or violincello. But it is definitely the effect of an instrument, trees, being played, by the wind. The music is a long, deeply sighing and swiftly moving rush.

It is a large sound, confident yet hurried. You can hear it, sitting inside, in bed. So persistent, but there is no message, except that of presence.

Presence of the wind through the boughs.

One of my favorite books of all time is Ray Bradbury's "The October Country," a short story collection. One tale is titled "The Wind." It is, like most of Bradbury's tales, richly written, bursting with the sense of an age fading farther and farther away in our collective rear-view mirror. The illustrations by Joe Mugnaini in the original make a perfect match of art and story.
There is a cool left-to-right scrolling gallery here.

Meanwhile, the image is of a nearby park, altered to look sort of October Country-ish. Because at this time of year, it does feel that lonely.

Thinking our way out

The headlines these days are so depressing.

Congress is dysfunctional.

Here in Pennsylvania, a lump of a governor sits and waits for bills on issues like school vouchers and English-as-the-official-language, abortion clinic limitations because of one crazed lunatic in Philadelphia, voter ID cards, to sign. Solutions in search of problems.

The people we elect to represent us are in the pockets of lobbyists and and an energy industry drooling at the prospect of profits from the Marcellus Shale.

Disposing of the fracking fluid, providing clean drinking water for communities with fouled wells, decimating aquifers, well, that's someone else's problem. After all, the industry is creating jobs – the mantra, the be-all and end-all. Somehow, it never matters that the jobs are ruining other people's lives, and that there are never any jobs, except at taxpayer expense, to clean up the mess once those other jobs have gone away.

And that's where the power lies, but it should be used proactively.

We need a new way of thinking. Energy is a problem. Here is a thought for a solution:
Feet, pedals and zoning.

Our communities are built for the last century. For cars.

We can't afford that anymore. My idea is to start thinking differently about where we live.

Zoning laws can be changed to allow a little corner shop with milk and veggies, so neighbors don't have to get in the car for one thing.

We can reconfigure our communities to be pedestrian and bike friendly. Pittsburgh isn't the most conducive city to biking, but that can be addressed here and elsewhere with a commitment dedicated funding for public transportation. In Pennsylvania, a lot of legislators from the middle of the state don't like this idea. But they are looking at it parochially.

Mass transit cuts down on gasoline consumption and keeps air (relatively) cleaner and reduces wear and tear on roads, saving money for repairs.

It's not just about helping one group at the expense of another. It's about using what we have and about what we can do to help reduce our dependence on foreign AND domestic energy. Sun and wind are free. Foot power is free. Bikes aren't free, but pretty friendly in terms of sustainability, not to mention fitness.

If we find ways to lessen our dependence on, let's face it, Big Energy (which is global, not just Middle Eastern), we the Average Joes and Janes who just want to get on with our lives, will win.

Big time.

Cities of stone

I like graveyards.

They are so quiet and contemplation inducing, to use a really inelegant turn of phrase.

A very long time ago, when I worked for the Associated Press in Pittsburgh, I wrote a feature story on Allegheny Cemetery, which has its main entrance on Butler Street in Lawrenceville. It is a lovely place to wander. Stephen Foster is buried there, among many other luminaries and not-so-much luminaries, like Harry K. Thaw, murderer of Stanford White, architect and hmmm, ladies man.

Anyway. A few years ago in Paris, I visited with friends the Cimetiere Montparnasse, final resting place of Susan Sontag, Serge Gainsbourg and I can't even remember how many others.

In at least these two places I have visited, I am struck by the age of so many monuments and gravestones. They are so worn by time and elements; I wonder, does anyone remember these people, their lives reduced to "born" and "died" and, if you were a widow, "Relict of."

In Downtown Pittsburgh, between two very old churches on 6th Avenue, Trinity Episcopal Cathedral and First Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh, there is a graveyard dating to the early 18th century. So many slabs are broken and unreadable, but it is a lovely place, above the sidewalk, for a short wander during a busy day. Many of the graves are of children.

The picture is of the cemetery

Misc.

Christmas makes me melancholy, because I miss my family.

Today I walked through Market Square, which is coolly decorated and has Christmas music piped in. It was lunchtime and not too many people were out, but it was nice enough that some folks sat down at the few tables still left. I went in to Starbucks and Charlie Brown music was playing, the instrumental version of "Christmas Time is Here." It's solemn and bluesy all at once and it really sent me off into a reverie of Christmases past.

I walked past the ice skaters at PPG Place ice rink and back on to the office, wishing I had time to just wander, look and listen.

The picture is the rink on Monday night, Dec. 13, 2011.

Walkabout

On Sunday, I was in Marshall's and overheard a cashier telling a customer she knew about her upcoming Christmas trip to Paris. The customer asked what the weather was like and it was all I could do to blurt out "It's just like here!" which was what the cashier told her friend a split second later.

Paris (48 degrees, 48 minutes north of the equator) sits at nearly the same latitude as Pittsburgh (48 degrees, 27 minutes north of the equator) in the northern hemisphere, so it's not surprising that the weather would be similar. Which means Paris must be having a mild winter so far. We've had barely any snow, and it has been unseasonably warm (with a few exceptions), with temperatures in the 40s and 50s fairly consistently.

I'm sure another shoe is waiting to drop and we'll have two or three months of pure snowy, icy, grey sky misery after Christmas, but for now I am enjoying the sunshine and dry days. The light is so pretty at this time of year; the sun is so low in the sky that when the light reflects up against bare trees, the contrast between brown branch and blue sky is astounding.

As much as I dislike winter for making me hunch my shoulders, making my feet cold and making me hole up in a hot, dry house, I love the light; it has a slanting horizontal quality that really changes how the world around me looks.

Anyway, today was nice enough to take a late lunch walk around town. I went past some of my favorite buildings: The old (1953!) Alcoa building, the old Union Trust building and the tiny HYP Club, the only remaining 18th-century tenement structure in the city. It is tucked away along William Penn Place, not far from another neat building the very early 20th century William Penn Hotel with the very cool mid 20th century Mellon Square across from it.

I love the HYP's tiny courtyard and fountain. It is so quiet and shady amid the surrounding skyscrapers. The Union Trust, for reasons that I am unaware of, has lost or kicked out all of its street level tenants over the past couple years and limited access through its Grant Street-to-William Penn Place lobby. The building has a street-level to top-of-the-building atrium, so you can stand it the lobby and see glimpses people on any floor at that floor's balcony and there is a beautiful arched glass window way at the top of the atrium. It is, or was, an exhilarating experience to stand in that space.

The picture is of the HYP Club's sheltered courtyard. The entrance is between the garlanded columns on the right.

Meeting hijackers

So.

There are always Luddites out there, in various forms. In fact, I think almost everyone on the planet has a Luddite tendency toward something.

Why, oh why, does there always, ALWAYS, have to be one in whatever tech meeting I am in?

The meetings usually start with the trainer talking about what he or she will be training the group on, followed by slides, goodies for folks who ask pertinent questions or offer pertinent observations, more explanations interrupted often by intelligent questions but also often by questions such as "I don't know what the heck you are talking about!"

These interruptions are always voiced belligerently, as if the trainer was imposing some impossible technology on the meetees. There is an expectation, almost, of a chorus of "Yeah! What are you talkin' about!?" Expectation is usually never met, because interruptor is a MORON, who wants to hijack the meeting and use it as a lesson for everything he doesn't know about email, or Google, or whatever.

The good trainer, and most of them are, say with a big smile, "Hey, I am teaching you about options. Use however many of them you want." In other words, (I'm interpreting, because I so would not want this job) Use your brain and figure it out. Not hard.

As a total technology aside, I really miss my pink Motorola Razr phone, which I lost on the morning bus in January. I think in 10 or 20 years it will be a collectible. Did I mention it was pink?

Quotidian music

Parked on the Mon Wharf this morning, for $8. The going rate at the lot across the street from the office, because the Steelers play the Browns across the Point tonight, was $20.

So.

The wharf has a sort of nice trail along the river that someday will connect to something, but for now, it is just a trapped expanse of Pennsylvania blue stone that gets flooded frequently and covered with goose poop even more often. Still, if you have to park on the wharf, the trail is a much nicer stroll to the steps up to Fort Pitt Boulevard than the lot's dirty drive lanes.

I walked west toward the office and on the other side of the Mon, a coal train, its warning horn blasting on, off, on, then off again in long and short bursts chugged past Station Square heading east.

Not a very long train, but quite loud. I wonder what it would be like to be an engineer, sounding notes of the symphony of a day?

I love the music of trains. One of my favorite songs, from a favorite album from long ago, is "City of New Orleans" by Arlo Guthrie. I still have this vinyl LP.

My dogs are awesome

My dogs are awesome, although, right now, I can only say "My dog is awesome."

We have been down to just on greyhound now for a bit more than a year, since losing Holli the Honey Hound in August 2010. I miss her. She was my heart dog, so sweet and loving. Twist is a goofy kick (and so smart!) and Anni was fascinating and regal, but Holli was a special love. Truly, though, they've all been great and have taught me so much. Like patience, and the need to be unselfish and to remember to regard the world with wonder.

They also have and continue to make me laugh; getting spooked by turtles and snakes, being scared of hardwood floors and, in Twist's case, cameras, and snoozing in completely ridiculous fashion on their backs, legs splayed in the air and heads lolled back. Totally undignified for such regal hounds.

When Anni was still alive, she escaped my Mom's backyard one summer day because the lawn crew had left the fence gate open. She flew into the big field next to the garage, but the little training that she had had up to that point somehow stuck. When we finally realized where she was, it only took two "Anni! Come!" commands for her to zoom back to me. My heart was in my mouth. She could have been in the next county, or ruined under a truck, but it didn't happen.

That's when she got the nickname "Adventure Girl." So I used that to create a poster about her for a design class I took. Truthfully, they have all been Adventure Girls.

A propos de ... rien

Not to be overly original, but, summed up, "le weekend, trop breve."

I'm in a French mood, thanks to two of the three movies I saw this weekend.
"Mozart's Sister" and "Sarah's Key"

The former got good reviews for its cinematography, but really, the editing was strange and the lead actress, Marie Feret, passionless. That might be the script's fault. It meandered. All over the place. The movie was more a series of vignettes than a story. But I loved the one that showed Nannerl in Paris, teaching music, and bending down at the end of a lesson so her young pupil could give her a "baiser" before leaving. That scene, so French, in the closeness and distance described in one moment.

The latter suffered from the same fault as the book: halfway through, the heroine, Sarah Starzynski disappears; and at the end she is a cipher. I love Paris, and to think of what happened to the French Jews there during World War II, as described in "Sarah's Key" is past awful. Credit to Tatiana de Rosnay for bringing this story to light. But the film fails on the same level as the book, Kristin Scott Thomas notwithstanding.

Bien. Pour ce soir, c'est tout.

L'image est de le Metro de Pittsburgh, une piece de Romare Bearden.

To Russia with ... love? and Kate's peepshow confessions!

Hi everybody! All you readers in Russia! How are ya tonight!? Feeling good? All right!
So let me just say thank you! No really, thank you!

If it wasn't for your spambots, this blog would have no readership! None. Nada. Niente. Rien. And however you say "none" in Russian. (I'm not looking it up.)

Seriously though, this is a tiny blog. Only four followers (one day we hope to have five!). Let us go. We really can't do you much good.

To my four faithful readers, it appears that spambots, originating in Russia, like this one http://domar.ru (DON'T CLICK) hijack blog traffic, for reasons they can fathom, but I can't.
Here's my Russian readership, that pale green area stretching across a big part of the upper northern hemisphere.
Who knew? So if for some reason you get anything Russian related, or with a .ru in the address, add an "n" and run. Do not click on anything. Nothing. Nada. Niente. Rien.
Capiscono?

OK. I could explain in greater detail, but, bottom line is spammers. And I'm not special, that's why spambots do the hijacking.

Onward

My peepshow tonight revealed a young man in a house up the street, playing his violin. I confess with no guilt that I love to look in my neighbors' windows (from the street, of course. My nose never, ever meets glass!)

A lot of homeowners in my neighborhood have converted open-air porches to indoor rooms and these spaces generally have lots of glass real estate. One of my favorite windows looks into a living room that has a huge piece of modern art on one wall, a silhouette of a cool sofa and nothing else visible. The painting is in colors of red and yellow-green and is striking, all the more so for flying solo in that room.

Anyway, the dog and I were wandering up the street, her nose to the ground, mine up in the air, when I heard some really lovely music.

In a home on the uphill side of the street, a young man in a blue and white sweater was practicing his violin, on one of those closed in porches.

His music was really lovely; thankfully Twist was totally absorbed in some moist, earthy scent, so I could pause to listen.

I wished for a hundred-thousandth time that I had kept up with piano, but I also was reminded of how it is really good to get out of your shell once in a while, and take the time to appreciate the passions of the other souls who occupy our earth.