Closer to Heaven?

In the Downtown Pittsburgh ghost town that is G-20, there were still a few civilians, clued in and clueless alike, populating the streets.

Police, police cars and security officers were everywhere. Sidewalks were blocked and shops were closed.

And yet! Starbucks in ripped-up Market Square was open. As I walked back to the office with my small skim latte, a passed a tiny old woman walking hesitantly across the Boulevard of the Allies. When I reached the office door, the security guards asked me if I knew where 21 West Park was.

It's not a where, it's a what. It's a bus route. Tiny old woman had asked them, and they, not knowing, sent her along without an answer. I left my latte and wallet in their hands, sprinted after her and brought her back -- turns out she could barely speak -- scribbling to her on her pad that the buses had been rerouted and I would take her to her stop, once I knew where it was.

Well, the guards ushered her into the lobby, I went upstairs, found the route, came back down, explained to her it was up the street only to learn from her hand motions that she expected me to drive her.

Much pointing and gesticulating ensued, including her mouthing that I was crazy. I kept trying to explain that her stop was just up the street but she was having none of it.

Finally I wrote on her pad: "Do you want me to walk you to the bus stop or not?"

She agreed. By the time we had gotten halfway up the block, I pointed out to her where the buses were stopping. She had a flash of recognition, waved me off and trotted ahead.

Hope she figured out the stops for the rest of the weekend.

Anyway tiny old woman. You're welcome.

Sights to see

Earlier this year I posted a list of online sites that are beautifully designed, gorgeous all around and last, but most definitely not least, easy to navigate.

In the course of doing class homework last night, I was introduced to another one, Core77. It skews too young for me but a quick skim really had me interested. I love the idea of industrial design, because I am always looking at things that we use and dreaming up ways I could make them better.

Yet there are other sights to see. The entire world is not online. This morning walking the dogs, I saw a young, antlered buck in a neighbor's front yard. He saw us, the dogs had their noses to the ground and so there we were. I hustled us all along and turned to see him, in the morning sunlight, treading down the street, toward the park. Thank goodness for the lightness of early morning traffic. We consider them pests because they eat our plants, but still, they share the planet with us.

The September sky is another sight to see. The light is starting to turn toward its "opposite of February" slant, that is to say, waning. In February, the same light is "waxing," you can feel when it is on your face that it is young light, growing more vibrant with each day to the brightness we will enjoy in summer.

It was beautiful tonight when I got off the bus. Deep midnight blue scattered with stars and thin silver gray clouds. The only thing February light is missing is the sleepy buzz of September crickets.

Summer night

I love the sounds of late summer.

Nights have been so cool and, oddly, the days seem to be getting shorter much earlier than normal.

Here's what I heard in Bird Park tonight and last night: Two owls, hooting at each other. Drowsy crickets. A blue jay, flapping above in the twilight, singing. Chirps and chatters all around.

Summer gets so quiet as it winds down. In fact, it matches the beginning of the season, quiet. Late June, July and through mid -August are the noisiest times of the season, but living creatures seem to know that as the light changes, the days grow short, as does their time as well.

Is there a human analogy? I think so. We all wind down and make less noise as our seasons on this planet circle to a close. But we pay so little attention to each other in these matters, so that when those near us are winding down, we are distracted, frustrated, rarely present to the moment.

Life is so busy, so stressful. I'm glad I have the chance, everyday, to walk outside and listen to the other creatures of the world going through the circles of their time here.

Wisdom

My friend Sharon and I went out for wine and appetizers after work today, talking, along the way to the bar, about family, work, life.

Sharon and I have known each other for more than 20 years. And have been working together for the same amount of time.

So we share a history, reference points that need no explaining. We each know what the other is talking about.

In that way we are like family, which is nothing more than groups of people who share a history, except it's on the basis of blood relation, not life circumstance.

It's interesting to think about that kind of relationship in the context of the where Sharon and I work. A newspaper called the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

A newspaper, more than most businesses, relies on the institutional wisdom, the family wisdom, if you will, that is shared among the reporters, editors and photographers who tell the stories for it each day.

As you tell stories about a place over the years, you acquire a knowledge of people. People who have influence, people who simply know things, people who are empathetic enough or opinionated enough that they can talk about many things.

This is good and it is bad. Good, because this knowledge gives your reporting breadth, bad, because after a time, you begin to rely on the same people. You end up with boilerplate.

No matter. If you live in a community and read a newspaper, in print or online, think about the work of the people whose names are attached to the stories, the photographs, the videos. They are repositories of received, conventional and family wisdom. And they have value because they are associated with a newspaper, something that has a cachet as a place for information.

A place where people call people. Ask questions. Call more people. Ask more questions. Sit. Think. Talk to others face to face. Condense information. Write. Re-write. Make more phone calls. Answer an editor's questions.

Then, and only then. Tell a story.

And then:

Think about it overnight. Come up with a follow up story idea asking all the questions you missed the first time.

If newspapers could download their reporters' and photographers' brains, that would be so much more valuable than keeping their contacts.

A contact to a new person is just a phone number or an e-mail address. Not a relationship.

And relationships are formed in families, of blood or circumstance, whose essential component is the rich medium of human contact.

Eyes, mouths, ears, noses, fingers, sharing contact, has got to be the finest technology of all. Because, pretty much, there's not much room for miscommunication.

Around the block

Late Monday night, after a late dinner.

I can't go to bed on a full stomach and it's a perfectly cool and lovely night for a walk. Around the block I go.

Starting with a pink hoodie around my shoulders, ending with the hoodie wrapped around my waist in the perfectly lovely, cool summer night.

Cicadas and crickets chirping and thrumming and an ethereal crescent moon, Mars red, sliding down out of my view behind trees, teasing me with its sublime shape and color, in the northwestern sky. I am so distracted by the mystery of it that the night's constellations elude my gaze entirely.

Around the block. There is a home that recently sold that has a stunning elm tree in the front yard; it's dripline must be at least 100 feet in diameter. To even be in this tree's vicinity, in full summer leaf, is to feel as if you are under the roof of a church. The real estate sign is gone, windows open to show bare rooms and as I walk past, I hope to myself that the new owners will keep the tree, not cut it down.

Home again and the dogs and I go out. 10 p.m. Time for bed. The best part of late summer is being sung to sleep by the insects, cooled by the fresh air, sheltered by the night's stars.

In fact, I think night time is the best part of late summer days.

August, after

Thank you, Counting Crows, for the inspiration for the title of this post.

I love August.

The crickets and cicadas buzz and sing at night, having taken over the night air from the fireflies of June and July. The sun is moving lower in the sky and there is a sense of gathering in the world. A gathering of last enjoyments of summer -- even though the warm days will last another six to eight weeks or so. A gathering up in the mind of preparation for winter's dark months. A gathering up of all that has been enjoyed -- quiet talks at dusk, dogs snoozing on the summer lawn, the pleasures (and frustrations) of the summer garden, the sun on bare skin, the cool sparkle of a clear pool-- and the anticipation of enjoying it all again next year.

August.

I think the year should be counted by halves. March to August and September to February. It is a richer way of marking time, and more subtle too, than the artificial observance of a calendar year's passing.


A musical ending. Some years ago, my sister Suzanne presented Carl with a CD by Pete Yorn. It rested, unlistened to, for a while. We have recently pulled it out of the pile, and have been enjoying it so much. He has a new release coming out in September with Scarlett Johansson.

So, we're late to the party, but thanks Pete Yorn. "Music for the Morning After" is tremendous.

Rhythms

There's a small bird's nest, fallen from its perch, sitting in a neighbor's yard up the street. It's been resting there for a few days this week, tiny branches woven into a tiny brown wreath and studded with tufts of white fur. I think it could be Holli's fur, she's shedding so much these days.

I noticed the nest at the beginning of the week, lying on the neighbors' lawn, with a soft indentation for eggs. The dogs sniffed and we walked on.

The weather has been tumultuous, so the nest must have been blown out of a tree during a storm. I thought about it. A home. Parents. Babies, fledglings, new families.

Life on earth. The smallest things reveal how splendid and beautiful it is.