Green, so many shades,

subtle motion from this breeze

sharp, round and oval

stems, spikes, shoots, vines and pods

why ask more from this old path?

I haven't been doing much walking these last few weeks. One, I slipped at work and wrenched my back; and two, I've been writing this blog and to do that, I have to stay within range of one of the few wifi networks in this little community.

When I do get out, I enjoy the path along the Patoka "River," one of the mud-colored 20-feet wide flows of water they call rivers here. Even though it's clearly not a clear mountain brook, there's always much to see: dandelions, all manners of bugs, rabbits & other creatures, wild grape strangling the young saplings of tulip trees. All of it fodder for thought, and thus potential inspiration for haiku or tanka.

A ring of black ants

surround a centipede corpse,

come to take him home

"The End is Near"

Woke to see the moon

last night, didn't know it rained

my feet are cold and wet

I spent quite a bit of time on the phone today: talking to Social Security, talking to my tax preparer, to a temp agency in Bloomington, to my wife. I even got some work done, thankyouverymuch.

Indeed I think the end is near. The missing link -- the only but crucial missing piece -- is a job that earns something in the realm of $15K a year. If that can be achieved working 20-30 hours, great; I'd love the time off during the week. If it means I'd have to work 30-40 hours, I could deal w/ that but would prefer the former. In either case, I do believe I will jump from my current ship and bring all of my Self back to Bloomington. Between the net of such a job and my SS check (even drawing it earlier than full age 66), I'll replace my current income. Side benefits: I'll be back home, among friends and family (Karen and the Kats); I'll experience much less stress than I now do; I'll cut my commute-related expenses by some $400 a month and wear-and-tear on my truck by a minimum of 800 miles a week.

Highest on this list, though, is being back w/ my family. It just does not work for me to live apart for 4.75 out of 7 days of the week, trying to jam everything into Friday evening and the weekend. Maintaining a household -- not to mention the house itself -- can be a challenge when I'm 'on-site'; and maintaining a full and meaningful relationship with Karen is, as MasterCard would phrase it, "priceless."

So I'm bending all my efforts to turn up something in the temp, temp-to-perm or long-term temp field, and have high hopes. I'm also still sending out resumes to jobs posted on several different websites I scour, announcements that come to me from newsletters or friends, and so on....things for which I qualify and would feel good. Something will break soon, I feel it in my bones.

I am home again

a slow walk on a fast day

just what I needed

This past weekend

Karen's family held their 2nd annual family reunion on Saturday. Most folks come from north, up around Indianapolis, but we have to drive up from Bloomington, so it's been held at a location in between.

About 25 people were there this year, ranging from Karen's 81-year old mother to a 3-month old baby...Karen's mother's greatgranddaughter in fact. Not a lot of kids but lots of kid-energy, if you know what I mean...yelling, running about, saying "NO!" a lot, whispering and giggling in the corners. I enjoyed myself and the day was splendid - not too hot, not too cold, surprising for Indiana in mid-August. It sprinkled about for 5 minutes then stopped.

When we got home, there was a card from one of the friends we'd made when we visited other friends who've retired to central Mexico. Chris & Kimberly live in San Miguel de Allende during 8 or so months of the year, and have a cabin on Olympic peninsula in Washington for the summer months. Kimber's young cousin was visiting when we were there last fall and we became fast friends: the card was from her, Hannah.

While in Mexico, we attended Kimber & Hannah's writing group. The process of this group is that one person thinks up 3 words as "prompts" for everybody to write a short story about while you're with the group. Didn't have to be that long, just had to incorporate the given three words. It's best not to overthink it, just write as the story flows out of your imagination. Sometimes the words coax the story out, sometimes you have to put some thought into it. But back to the card: I used Hannah's prior set of prompts to create a single-sentence story. In yesterday's card, Hannah gave us "lilac," "alphabet soup" and "static."

I love it when words have multiple meanings -- static, for instance, has four or five that come immediately to mind. We wrote our stories Sunday evening, and I think both our stories were good. Karen's story was so different from mine, and so funny I laughed out loud! I sent the stories off to Hannah (California) and Kimber (now in Washington) w/ their next prompts: basalt, birdhouse, ballerina. We'll see what next week brings.

Ravens speak Spanish

that far south of the border

What did you think? French?

Chiaroscuro

Water cascading

over the cliff's stony lip

smiles on its way down

I love the quality of light at certain times of the day. This isn't a "go toward the light" kind of thing, I'm talking about when the sun is at just the right angle and maybe there's a little haze in the air -- not too much, but some -- so that every protrusion and every depression is picked out and cast either in the brightest of light or in dark shadows.

Painters, especially those of the heyday of 16th & 17th century Europe, used this approach to accentuate their works.... a face glowing in light from an unseen window or door, workers out in the haystacked field casting shadows many times longer than their physical selves. Some three-dimensional artists and a few other practitioners create with an eye toward the interplay of light and shadow on their pieces.

But mostly, I notice this quality in the late afternoons. I'm looking out on a field now, with birds the size of crows hopping around talking to each other and catching bugs, and outsized bird-like shadows hop laterally on the ground every time the birds move. A bird in flight between me and sunlight so intense I can see right through most of its wing as it flares to land. That kind of light. I love it!

It rained again today, not a big storm but enough to get me wet as I ran from my truck to the office. Then it stopped. And started and stopped through the morning before the clouds blew on to the east. Ground too wet and muddy to take a walk, sun too bright to ignore, but the day too fine to stay indoors..... what to do, what to do? Guess I'll write about it!

Deep blue cloudless sky

bright lamp hanging up above

it's a wonderful day!

and the waters came down

Incredible storms, both last night and this afternoon. Just before midnight last night, I saw repetitive bright flashes through the windows. I thought maybe there was a search or something going on and flashlights were shining all around. But it was cloud-to-cloud lightning, not just heat lightning, and it went on for a long time, accompanied by loud claps of thunder. Not much wind, though.

It seemed to go right over me and didn't feel all that high above my head. Just as it passed over, the rains began to POUR down. I mean pour! Within minutes, the yard was covered with several inches of water looking for somewhere to go. It let up after 15-20 minutes, and then passed on. I heard from several coworkers that it didn't even rain where they live and that's only 10-15 miles from me. Storm cells are like that. My father was a meteorologist for, well, pretty much his entire adult life, and I picked up a lot from him that helps me make sense of the weather.

Inspired by the light show, and in the middle of the storm, I wrote this triptych:

Strobe after bright strobe
illuminates the tree line
my eyes the camera

Flash and bang at night
rain falls in slim silver strands
I stand, mouth open

Flashes receding
and diminishing thunder
this storm has played out

During the day today, I got to thinking of all the creatures -- in the woods, along the creek beds, in the trees and ponds -- and wrote more verses:

Diagonal rain
thunder rolling, lightning flash
crayfish cheer and dance

Heavy rain all day
when it stopped I walked outside
the earth just said "squish"

Magnifying lens
raindrops balance on a stem
which way will you slide?

Peace. Tim

Writing as a path to Spirit

It's been said that if one writes 12 or 15 really good haiku in their lifetime, they are accomplished in this art. It's mostly traditionalists who say this, although one certainly strives to be good at one's chosen art. The recommendations to acquire 12-15 good verses are: write, write, write. Then revise. Then write some more.

As I'd mentioned in my first post, I've read haiku off and on for years -- decades even -- and I'm sure I wrote a few verses back when, but I never kept them. Everything changed in the Spring of 2008, when I made a nine-month commitment to attend a once-a-month group called "A Year To Live," offered through our church. The group is based on Stephen Levine's book by the same name. Both the group and the book ask you to imagine you have just received a diagnosis of one more year of life....what are you going to do with that year? What unfinished business do you have in your life? Who do you need/want to talk with, visit again? What's necessary to bring yourself to peace and awareness with your circumstances?

Karen and I were one of three couples among the 18 enrollees. The group invited speakers to advise us on end-of-life considerations and options, met in different configurations within our group to discuss "our lives so far," wrote in our individual journals, and then wrapped up with a retreat at a resort in the hills west of Bloomington. Man, did we write! One of our co-ministers facilitated the group, and she suggested haiku as a positive addition to our contemplative tools. That's what really got me into this latest incarnation of writing.

I love to walk in wild places, even when I'm in the suburbs. I find a natural resource area, a bird sanctuary, or even out-of-the-way corners of a college campus. Wild creatures act out their true selves; nature informs my world view. I look around as I walk; I also look within, taking the pulse of my feelings. Many times I fixated on a leaf, a dead twig or log, or an ant walking across my path. But underneath, I was counting out "5/7/5" syllables, turning over words and verses in my head, working my way to the true center of my feeling and a poetic description of what was in front of me.

I used to carry around one of those little voice recorders but it got too cumbersome and distracting. Now I keep a miniature journal in my back pocket. I like pen-to-paper contact. What can I say, I was a journalism major. Sometimes I have 8 or 10 haiku to transcribe to my harddrive's documents folder, sometimes only one or two. Sometimes none, but that's OK too. There's always tomorrow - or tonight - or dreamtime.

I write in my book

an ant crawls across the page

my smallest critic

"Will nobody rid me of this job?"

Here I am, away from my home for yet another week, working in a job I am very willing to give up when I find a replacement closer to home...or one that let's me work from home again. I looked at our finances and know I can't retire yet -- too much 'grasshopper' not enough 'ant' in my past; economy blow-out; failure to adequately plan in earlier years. But in discussions over this past weekend, my wife came up with Plan C (or D, or E, maybe).

I am close enough to full retirement age that I could begin to draw Social Security... which, come to think of it, might be a good thing to get while the gettin' is good.... although my SS check would be reduced since I'm not yet Full Retirement Age. If I continue to work as well, SS sets an earnings maximum (in the neighborhood of $14500 for 2009). Earning more than that would trigger a $1 reduction of my SS check for every $2 I earned over the threshold. Of course, that means I'd still come out ahead since I'd be earning more than the reduction. But there's a catch -- or at least so I hear from the kindly folks @ Soc Sec Admin.

If I tell them I'm likely to earn, for instance, $20,000 while drawing SS, they calculate my reduction up front. That $5500 over the threshold = $2750 reduction = $230/month less, and I could deal w/ that since I'd be netting about $360/month more from the extra $5500. $20K job + SS check <$230> would work. But SSA says they don't send out partial checks -- only full months' checks. So their solution, bless their pointy heads, is simply to not send any check at all until they've withheld at least the $2750 for that year. That would mean no SS check of any size for the 1st three or four months of every year, and $1300 by itself isn't enough to replace my current job for those months, even though I'd be receiving my "normal" SS check for the remainder of each year. There are some more ins and outs, but my brain is full.

Oh, but back to Plan C/D/E which would be to work only up to the SS threshold for earned income while drawing a check. $14500 is low enough that net would be about $975/mo which, on top of an unmitigated SS check, would just about do it for me. So now the search is on for, ideally, a part-time position at a reasonable salary but only for 25-30 hours a week, yielding an annual income somewhere in the neighborhood of the SS threshold. Even better would be the sort of p/t job that I could cut back hours as/if I started getting close to the threshold.

There has to be something out there that fits the bill. Keep the faith!

A catastrophe

but the earth turns and renews.

Oh - make other plans.