Tuesday has settled into the spring groove. A light breeze frolics. Lawns and trees vibrate with greens and flowers add rainbow splashes. A dusting of high white clouds flavor the blue sky. Sunshine adorns every corner. The temperature is 62 F and we expect 81 F. Darkness will come after sunset at 8:34 this evening while sunset let the sun’s influence in beginning at 5:42 this morning. So it goes this May 24, 2022. The back door is open, bees dance and zip around, and the house felines are pleased.
The cats are responsible for today’s music. Both insisted on heading out around eleven thirty-ish last night, prompting me to say, “Okay, go dance the night away. Bang on the door when you want back in.” I said that even though I’d already created a mental note to let them in a few hours. Fast as you can say van Halen, the neurons brought out their 1979 song, “Dance the Night Away”. I’m always a little surprised that the group wrote it. It seems like, even feels like it could’ve been a cover of a song that already existed. It’s more mellow and light-hearted than the majority of van Halen offerings.
Stay positive, test negative, etc. I’m here for the coffee. Got any left? Here’s the tune. Cheers
We’ve been plopped into a Monday, in a very merry month of May, on a day — 23 — in a year — 2022. For most of us, it feels about the same as the day before, except, you know, the ones who lost something or someone the day before, or the ones whose crimes were revealed, whose cheating was exposed. Also different for those who awoke to gunfire and explosions.
Here in Ashland, the sunrise came at 5:43 and sunset will take place in our valley at 8:33 PM. It’s 57 F and a high of 77 is anticipated. Clouds? Yes, we have no clouds. The cats are happy. This is floof weather.
The morning neurons didn’t drop a song into my morning mental music stream. I went looking for one. I’d met to do this before, but one thing led to another, and the next thing that I knew, a few weeks had shot by underfoot. Remembering today, I sought out “Hey, Hey, Rise Up” by Pink Floyd. Released in 2022, it’s base on the Ukrainian anthem, “Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow“, and features the Ukrainian singer Andriy Khlyvnyuk. David Gilmour wrote the song to support Ukraine and its people as they fight against the Russian invasion.
Stay positive, test negative, and so on. Rise up, vote, make a difference. Help set us on a better path, one where equality, freedom, and rights are respected. And yes, I’m pro-choice: her body, her choice. Not my business.
Forward, he cried from the rear. Forward. Now, I’m off for coffee. Can’t move forward without my coffee. Here’s the music. Cheers
It’s a friendly sun arriving on this Sunday, May 22, 2022. Opening with bright sunshine at 5:44, a dappled blaze on the backyard, she followed up with warm caresses. The cats approve. Temperatures are up to 60 F, on their way to the mid-seventies. Although clouds sprinkle the blue cup holding us in, we don’t expect precipitation. The sun will pack up its sunshine and exit stage west at 8:32 this evening.
While it’s lovely here, other parts of the country are baking. Wildfires are raging in Texas and New Mexico. Europe is bracing for a heat wave. Haven’t seen what’s going on in Australia recently but I hope they’re enjoying a stretch of comfortable and non-threatening weather.
Reading recap of shootings and deaths in the U.S. brings today’s music to the morning mental music stream. First, I think that we should have a name for shooting deaths. You know, we have ‘hangry’ now and the like. Shouldn’t a shooting death be a sheadth or something? You know, call it out from the many other ways of death? Yes, there is murder, I suppose…
Speaking of murder, haven’t heard much about the murder hornets this year. Killer bees have also been out of the news, although bird flu has jumped back into my feeds. I bring it up after reading about the monkeypox. Children who survive wild weather twists, murder hornets, killer bees, shootings, COVID-19, and monkeypox will certainly have a lot to reminisce about in their middle years. Kind of like boomers reflecting back on telephone landlines, three television channels, and having to ‘manually’ change the channel but getting up and walking over to the device. Yeah, I guess it’s not the same. Oh, we did also have the nuclear threat, though, didn’t we? And other flus, and then, later, AIDs, hijackings and skyjackings, and several more wars. Does that make us even?
How many times, I wondered about several things while perusing news. Naturally, the neurons believed that I was asking them to sing the Bob Dylan classic, “Blowin in the Wind”. Bob asked some questions in the 1962 song.
Yes, 'n' how many years can some people exist
Before they're allowed to be free
Yes, 'n' how many times can a man turn his head
And pretend that he just doesn't see
The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind
Full sunshine, full leaves. Leafy trees square up shadows across the back lawn, ripe with weeds. Bees visit the slumping dandelions. Sunshine jumps into the open spaces.
It’s a lazy morning for me and the cats. Done eating, they wash up and chat up birds, twisting heads to regard a squirrel’s noisy trespassing, resuming their grooming after the squirrel takes his business away. I tend a cup of coffee, sneaking hot sips past my lips, waiting for the caffeine’s magic to jump into the blood and brain.
It’s Saturday, May 21, 2022. Had blood tests done yesterday, routine matters to see what’s what, mentioned because I was asked to sign my name and date a document. The neurons were instantly amused; how long has it been since I was asked to do these things that were once daily routines?
Sunrise was sprung on us at 5:44 AM, I’m told. I didn’t witness it, staying in bed at that point to wrestle dreams. Sunset will come around at 8:31 PM. We had a cool morning, 50 F when the cats and I went out back, but sunshine was rapidly warming it. The weather masters say that the high will be 73 F. I will do yardwork, I decide, regarding the bushes and trees.
Later, inside, awaiting the caffeine’s arrival, I surfed the net and hummed a song. For some reason, the neurons had dumped “New York State of Mind” (1976) by Billy Joel into the morning mental music stream. “Surprise,” they shouted, when I recognize the song. “But why?” I asked them. “Why that song?”
One volunteered, “It’s a slow, bluesy, sleepy song about routine moments and found-again places.”
“So?”
The neurons shrugged. “It just feels like the morning.”
Impeccable logic.
Stay positive, test negative. The caffeine is pulling into the station. Brain cells are climbing aboard. Here we go. Cheers
Time is suddenly slowed for me. Like I was on Chronos Highway, speeding along, making, um, good time, when suddenly everything slowed down. Wonder how many others are feeling it?
Today is Friday, May 20, 2022. Sunrise spidered in through leafy boughs at 5:45 this morning. Sol will skedaddle from these environs at 8:30 PM.
It’s a clear sky, empty of clouds, but haziness hovers on the western horizon. Reflecting that clear sky, temperatures dropped to 35 F last night and sit at 42 now. We expect a high of 68 F. The cats are out digging the sunshine. I told them, “Don’t you put holes in the sunshine.” They were like WTF you talkin’ ’bout?
The neurons put nothing into the morning mental music stream. First no dreams are remembered, and then the neurons abandon their musical motif. Interesting Friday. Well, I lie a bit. The neurons did have “Time Is On My Side” sliding around the music stream for about seventeen seconds. I sat and wondered, what song should I put out there today? As I did, I came across a video of Tears for Fear playing “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” in 2022. With the primary elections in full swing in the U.S., Ukraine trying to fend off Russia, Putin threatening Finland and Sweden, Turkey saying “Nyet” to NATO, the GOP trying to undo established precedent and foster election corruption, and billionaires attempting to become trillionaires, I thought, “Why that’s a perfect song for this age and time, innit?”
Sure, the neurons said, yawning. Go for it. Which I did.
Regardless of the little neurons’ mood, I’m going for coffee. Care to come? Here’s the music while you decide. Cheers
As the world turns, we clock the date and time, making it out to be May 19, 2022, Thursday. Hah. Cold spring weather has returned on us. 50 F, with a wind barking out of the mountain snow. Will only achieve 60 today. Although there’s sunshine out there, and the sun rise was at 5:46 this morning, thick towering clouds loom over the valley. They look like they plan to stay here until past sunset at 8:29 PM.
Fred provoked the neurons into playing today’s theme music. Fred is a NIP character. I’d just finished writing a section from his POV yesterday, and was walking, preparing to move on from the writing day. He still resided in me as I walked. Picking up on that, the neurons fed “Silent footsteps crowding me, sudden darkness, but I can see.” That’s Fred. The song, “No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature” by the Guess Who (1970) took over the morning mental music stream. It’s okay, though, because Fred is still on today’s writing menu.
Stay positive and test negative. Don’t get complacent. Telling myself as much as you. Here’s the music. No sugar in my coffee, thanks. Cheers
Basking in some weak sunshine on a chilly morning. 50 F out but you can’t prove that by me. The cats agree, it’s meh outside.
Today is Wednesday, 18 May 2022. Lethargic today. I need coffee to get up and get my coffee. I exercise almost every morning. Five out of seven is the weekly average. Early errands usually forestall the other days’ exercising. This morning, I did one and thought, should I do more? I did, later.
While it’s 50 now, we expect 75 before sunset is struck at 8:28 PM. The sunrise, a lightening of the gray, was at 5:47 this morning. I wasn’t there for it.
I don’t know where the song in my morning mental music stream came from. Originating in the 1970s by the glam rock band, the Tubes, “White Punks on Dope”. The song reminds me of songs that were played in “This is Spinal Tap”, the mockrockumentary. Don’t know why the neurons dragged the song up out of the subconscious basement. It seems like a strange twist even for them.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as or when needed, and so on. And vote. Vote for some positive change this year. Also vote to have someone bring me a cuppa coffee so I can become a white punk on caffeine. No?
Yesterday was a gorgeous day locally, and today extends a promise that it came be the same. Today is May 17, 2022, a Tuesday, as it goes. The sun crowded into the valley at 5:48 AM. It was already in the mid fifties by then. Now it’s up to the low sixties, and we expect a high around 73 F. As I noted, it’s much like yesterday. Sunset should come at 8:27 PM.
We breakfasted out this morning, the first time we’ve eaten breakfast out locally since Feb. 2020. See, back in 2019, we participated in an auction to support exchange students with our sister city in Mexico. One of the things we successfully bid on was a gift card for one of our local favorite restaurants, Brothers. My wife has some anxiety that COVID-19 will surge back into the area as tourism kicks in and people become complacent, so we took advantage of the low local numbers to use our gift card. She had mushroom and onion omelet while I did the Mediterranean scramble with artichokes, dried tomatoes, feta cheese, kalamata olives, and spinach. It was a pleasant, relaxing, and welcome change to our routines of the past two years.
I ran into a very friendly big black dog while I was out walking yesterday. Muzzle grayed with age, his body went into a hyper frenzy of wagging, like we were favorite cousins encountering one another after decades away. I was in the street so I worried that he was a stray but his person came out and reassured me. The dog and I spent a few minutes together and then he went home with his person, back to his yard. After I resumed walking, the neurons unleased “Black Dog” by Led Zeppelin into my mental music stream, where it still resides this morning.
So, here’s the music, and there’s my coffee. Stay positive and test negative, you know? Right. Cheers
Another lovely sunrise, full of bravado and promise. Then clouds announced, “That’s enough,” and blanketed the sunshine. “Save some for later.”
Today is Monda, May 16, 2022. The sun’s entrance was made five hours and forty-nine minutes after midnight. Sunset will begin at 8:29 PM. Our valley’s temperature is 52, with breezes running warm and cool playing around us. A high of 69 F is possible, they say.
One of my cats lost their fight with cancer two months ago. As always, it was a gritty fight. I wrote about his passing at the time and I’m dealing with the soft sorrow of reminders and gaps. Well, one of those happened. The late Boo had a specific nesting spot in the backyard. He’d face the back door and do a loaf in the sun. Whenever I came to the door, he’d been watching and say hello. My other two cats, Tucker and Papi, have taken to resting in Boo’s old space. They began this the past few days. First Tucker did it two days in a row, and then Papi.
My mind said, WTF? It of course channeled Boo back into immediate thoughts. This morning, seeing Papi out in Boo’s spot, watching him watching me, hearing him give me a soft hello, the neurons called out “The Needle and the Damage Done” by Neil Young (1972). No, Boo didn’t pass from heroin and a needle. Neil’s raw introspection and simple melody is what I felt when considering Boo’s absence, for that’s what the song is about — “Gone, gone, the damage done” — whether it’s by drugs, cancer, or other diseases. So, for Boo.
Stay positive, test negative, etc. I gotta see a cat about some coffee. They’re onto me. Cheers
This is Sunday. We’ve awoken to that fact. Other information filters in. May 15, 2022. Almost half of May numbered as the past. Almost half of 2022 joining the historic ranks. Sunrise, 5:50 AM, was bright and strong. There to see it, because Papi stayed up and outside to see it, and called me to come see it. Temperature is 56 F. Anticipated high is around 77 F. Sunset: 8:25 PM.
The neurons floated multiple songs through the morning mental music stream, creating, for a while, a morning mental music stream medley. Yeah, I went there. Most of these songs were from the late 1970s. Putting it together, I think they go well with the age I was in a dream and put it all down to wishful thinking about when, where, and was.
The medley eventually thinned. Linda Ronstadt rose with “Blue Bayou” from 1977 and took over the MMMS. I once won a small wager with this song. About ten years after it’d been a hit for Linda, a young guy was talking about the song. I realized that he attributed it to her as the original artist and told him that Roy Orbison had it as a hit when I was a child. He was flabbergasted. We went through several other songs that night, including, “Knocking on Heaven’s Door”, which he ascribed to Guns ‘n Roses, and “A Hazy Shade of Winter” ‘by’ the Bangles.
I love that one line from the song, “If I could only see that familiar sunrise through sleepy eyes, how happy I’d be.”
Okay, coffee time. Stay positive and test negative. Be on guard, but chill. Here’s the music. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 