a great day for soft worn jeans bleached by sun

[smile]
You know those times in your life when you feel particularly blessed if you have a jingle of a few changes in your pocket. You know, a quarter seems like ten bucks? Those Days? But you've got a lot going for you, you're convinced of that and things just seem like summer and sunshine and miraculously pulling-through-ish? Maybe I'll tell you more about these days some time. But for now, just know:
I am listening to the music samples for my documentary. This is going to be the greatest thing ever.
[smile]

then gustav came

It's been windy and I love it.

Normally I have this little melancholy lodged in my soul, mourning the prairie and wide open spaces that I grew up and stretched my arms in. I could hardly call it emptiness anymore, the gracious space that charmingly sandwiches you between golden field and soft blue sky. The mountains are lovely, but I sometimes feel as though I'm up against a wall. Albeit a majestic wall.

However, today, as the mountains drifted up and disappeared into the heavy white mash of foggy clouds I was amazed at how tall they'd grown. They'd probably been so ten miles high all this time, but you never notice the grandeur until it's embraced by sky. And so the mountains grew on me a little bit more today.

I would like it to be warm and I would like to go swimming.

will a pilgrim meet me 'round the corner?

Out of all the fanciful things and stalwart heroes that go through all those throes, I've finally found my patriotism. It stands on the firm foundatation of the Upper Midwest. I believe in the life I had, cashing my paycheck chatting with my regular bank teller, getting the gossip. I believe in knowing all of the workers at my grocery store, knowing where they went to elementary school, high school, and if they even went to college, and their grandparents country of origin. I believe in diners with knoefla soup. I believe in library ladies who tell me about their grandkids. I believe in wind.
They have the funniest accents.
The winters, you ask about. Each day I hear someone say, there? It must be cold there. Well....yes. Winter tends to be cold in many places. Maybe ours were extreme. Though I guess I've begun to romanticize the cold that makes you run out to your car periodically during the day to run the engine so that later, when you need to drive, you can. Running from car to house, then sitting under blankets and blankets while you watch a movie at a friends. Yes multiple blankets even though you're already wearing two pairs of socks and a long sleeved shirt and a sweater and a sweatshirt. All the autostart buttons, a few more minutes with a chum because their car has to heat up. The space heater in the kitchen because of the draft from the back door. Thoughts about foot amputation.
That one evening when it was dinnertime and snowing and black as night. I stepped outside to the middle of the street with the black arms of trees arching over the fresh snow. No tracks, only glows from street lamps highlighting flakes in rainbow colors.
Driving through the prairie on frosty winter mornings when the shelter belts (rows of trees between fields) are fuzzy white and one can only tell the sky from the trees from the land by the different shades and textures of whiteness.
Februaries with days that warm up to 40 degrees and everyone goes wild and stops wearing coats for a day.
Late springs that everyone feels hesitant about. Is it really spring? Is it really getting warmer? Roads covered in rootbeer colored slush. Muddy yards. Sweatshirts and damp chill. Cool sun afternoons.
Junes full of drizzle. By the end of grey June you ask yourself, will we be able to light fire crackers this fourth of July?
August full of voices carried over from the pool. Actually my augusts started running season. Waking up for a four mile run at 7am followed by another three/four miles at 7:30pm. In the mornings and afternoons when you run, you run through the country. no matter the direction, one mile or so and you're in the country. Mornings past the airport. Past one red house and their adjoining fields. Afternoon the other direction, sky (Oh the sky! gloriously large and wrapping you all about) threatening rain storm, running past the cemetary and a few more farmhouses. Gravel, gravel, gravel ways.
Octobers of Halloween costumes made useless by winter coats and cross country races through snow.
Thanksgivings with my dad's colleague playing an indian flute for us. The little pilgrim people that sit on the bathroom window and in odd little corners about the house. The Mayflower here, a stalk of corn there.

Oh for an afternoon in the heartland, listening to records all day, playing Global pursuit and eating ice cream and watching Algiers with mes parents, then off to the chums.

But my room has become an adolescent relic.

donc your electric organ

Aujourd'hui it looked as though someone (with better cutting skills than I) cut out the mountains and laid them against a bright blue sky backdrop. Was someone who had great connections (connexions for the UK inclined) filming a fine day? It was perfect, all the shadows were crisp, leaves turning colors were crisp and still, the sun lay out so nicely on the pavement and the air was warm warm warm but not too chaud. Summer was welcoming your fall nicely.

d'où je vien.

do any of you happen to have french audio books? It's my new plan for mastery. I'm lacking in the comprehension business.