Hassayampa, Temple Grandin

Hassayampa River Preserve, near Wickenberg.

This is an oasis in the desert, complete with native palms. The river emerges from underground here, via 26 springs (originally), dug out decades ago to form a small lake, which is now being allowed to sediment in and revert to its natural form, which will take a while, already almost three decades since The Nature Conservancy got hold of it and stopped messing with it. An area with picnic tables is surrounded by desert palms (like the one in my front yard) which are loaded with drooping, fruit-heavy inflorescences. Birds make a constant racket here when most of the preserve is pretty quiet by mid-afternoon when I've been able to drag my butt out of the house to go anywhere. It's said to be a birdwatcher's paradise, which I hope to sample one day early and binoc-equipped. Squinting, I saw robins and flickers, and a ring-neck duck on the pond, and coots of course, and smaller birds I couldn't see well enough to name. I had a pleasant, slow walk. Half the trails were wiped out by our recent rainfall extravaganza, which also remodeled the riverbanks. I was surprised to see an enormous bull stopping for a drink, though why I was surprised, having already seen cloven imprints in the sand, is beyond me and a testament to scatterbrained relaxation in retirement, apparently not only from work.

Tonight I watched the HBO film "Temple Grandin," which I've been hearing about for weeks on NPR as they interview her and replay old interviews. I also saw her at a local bookstore where she plugged her latest book along with the film and was quite entertaining. She's a damned handsome sixty-something woman! Poised, gracious, funny, with a tendency to coast off track in response to some questions. Oh how she must get tired of repeating the same stories over and over! I heard her say how much she liked the film and how Claire Danes played her absolutely perfectly, so I've been eager to see it. It is a wonderful film! It kept me laughing, choking up, and teary-eyed the whole way through. Claire Danes really ought to get some awesome award for the role. She played its heart out.

Films, poetry, dog stuff

Two more excellent films! "A Single Man" is powerful, characters dealing with & talking about heavy issues with absolute honesty. So rare. Role model much needed for most of us. It is a painful, hopeful, moving film, serious about love and death. Colin Firth has my full attention now. Fine acting, deep writing. "Appaloosa" is a western so non-formulaic it took my breath away. Ed Harris has had my attention for a long time, and he just gets better. So interesting and unexpected.

I won a poetry prize! This time first place, community college lit magazine competition. Moving on up!

Saw/heard Temple Grandin at a book-signing talk. I admire her so much, and she is a very handsome woman now at just about my age. She's all over the place pushing latest book and an HBO film about her early life & eventual success. She said on npr that Claire Danes does an excellent job being her, just perfect. Thesis on mooing. Can't you see the cowboy profs' faces? Got her master's here at ASU! I never knew that. Out in the stockyards with the guys (whose wives complained, this being the 70's) giving her a hard time, covering her car with bull testicles, etc. Now who's laughing?

Grandin says if you have a whiny separation-anxious dog, get another dog for company, or dog sitter, gave the impression you're dreaming to imagine there's a cure (though a friend tells me there are anti-anxiety meds for dogs that work). Lady is a case study in separation anxiety. If I leave and Grumpy is asleep, she howls and cries and carries on like she's been tossed down a well! If both of us are gone and we forgot to close the bedroom door, our nice moccasin slippers take a beating and every sort of paper and plastic within reach gets spread all around the living room. At least she doesn't destroy furniture or piss on everything. It could be worse.

I went dog shopping this weekend, finally deciding that's just not going to work, too much more on our plates than we can live with. But maybe a kitten. I have a mental image of Lady curled up with kitten while I'm gone. Is that too far-fetched? I dread kitty-litter stink though.

Lost Dutchman State Park

Last Sunday, just before the weather got crappy, I hiked a 2.4-mile loop trail here. It was a mile relentlessly uphill, a jiggle across, and a blessed downhill mile, watching the sun disappear, back to the car. My thighs burned and were sore for two days. The rocks are more striking the closer one gets to them. Of course, being MLK weekend, there were too many people, and one has to remember to keep facing east to avoid gazing at citified views, but I felt my mind expanding, as always when I get outside and out of town and walk. Keeps me sane. This park has more trail distance to expand into as I get tougher (presumably). One can hope.

Chickeny bone!

Days of rain, little explosions of high winds, tornado warnings (unclear whether any actually touched down), floods, feet of snow up north, highways closed, streets closed, power outages. We chose to hunker down, wide-eyed. Most of "Gray's Anatomy" was lost, and I finished another A. S. Byatt novel.

The poor dog seems never to have experienced rain. On the screened-in back porch by the doggie door, she looked out, then at me, squatted and peed inside with a look that said her decision was logical and surely... I shoved her out into the rain! She didn't die out there but finished peeing. I praised her like she'd mastered calculus, rewarded her with a treat, and she glowed with joy and ridiculously elevated self esteem. The pee-pee war continues.

This was back-to-school week, and Lady is coping with separation anxiety once again. I brought home a bag full of treats and chewy things, including two very expensive rawhide "bones" making dental health claims and incorporating a layer of "chicken." I put it in quotes because the color is strange and I have no idea what was done to it since it was a bird. When the first one disappeared unusually quickly, I thought, oh, gee, she chewed it all up in one day? Must be good. Then we had a sunny spell. I sat outside reading while Lady carried the prized and clearly too-precious-to-chew second chickeny bone around burying it, digging it up, burying it somewhere else, digging it up, etc. I was so excited I went in to get the camera. I had never seen this before except in cartoons! Slapping forehead, previous brown nose observations and dried mud on sofa suddenly make sense! On the other hand, I swear to never again spend $7.99 on a rawhide chickeny bone. Yesterday one mud-caked chickeny bone reappeared on a doggie bed in the living room. I confiscated it for a wash and dry.

Tonto Natural Bridge

Winter session online poetry course completed, poetry reading done, four-day weekend before a new class begins -- time to get out of town. I chose a state park I've never visited -- Tonto Natural Bridge State Park. The state parks are closing down for lack of $, so I'd better visit some while I can.

The old guy at the gate looked me over skeptically when I drove in and went on about how steep the trail is. Ha! If I can climb up out of Walnut Canyon, I can get out of this one. It's only a quarter of a mile long with a 200-ft elevation change. I'm pleased to report that it was absolutely no problem. I'm stronger than I look. :)

The bridge formation is very pretty, with water showering down from above. I am so pleased the rainbow actually shows in the photo. I had only my iPhone for a camera. It was so cloudy when I left home I didn't bother to carry the good camera along. I wish I had. The zoom would have come in handy to capture the woman posing nude for a photographer on the rocks under the bridge. She was lovely, though a bit of a looney tunes taking it all off as chilly as it was.

I wanted badly to poke at the mounds of bright green moss on some of the rocks, but I played it safe and didn't climb down to it. Next time I'll bring my walking stick for balance.

Poetry reading

Well! Last night I did a 20-minute reading of twelve of my poems for a small group that meets one Tuesday a month. I've read single poems there three times (open mike) and was invited to be a feature poet -- a first for me.

I thought I was perfectly calm. Ha. It hit me when I got up on stage. Turned red, of course, and kept bumping into the teetery mike. It went well, all things considered. Being winter break at the college, the crowd was smaller than usual, and quieter. I missed the usual guffaws when I read my bawdy poems. That was a little disconcerting. But I soldiered on, seeing smiles and nods of encouragement. They weren't all bawdy. I spread out into a couple of more serious ones, and two nature poems including the grackle sestina I'm so proud of. I survived, ate a cookie, received a nice little gift from the school, came home and had five shots of Glenfiddich in front of the TV. Yum.

FREEZE!

What is the world coming to? Freeze warning tonight, 20's or 30's. I don't think it's ever been that cold in Phoenix since I moved here. Well, maybe once or twice in 20 years. Creepy.

Another creepy thing? Lady likes grapefruit, if I peel off the thin membrane, which I did today and swear I will never do again. That's just too much. She's craziest about nuts, any kind. She and Grumpy feast on pistachios together. Oranges too, but grapefruit? It took me a lifetime to develop a taste for them.

I've stayed home all day, avoiding people wishing me a Merry, content with my NPR, computer fiddling, picking at a poem, cleaning the kitchen. I made food for breakfast, turkey stew, lovely. Maybe I'm about to start cooking again? Grumpy pissed me off months ago rejecting anything with cumin or any other "weird" additive. I love cumin. I have a long memory, a bit much. I've been in house refusal status for months and months, but I got busy with a broom day before yesterday and swept up the heap of grass Lady has rolled in and deposited in the living room. Bedroom next. I have no explanation, just observing myself.