No spark today

It is lunchtime and I am taking a walk in the rain. There seems to be almost no electricity in my brain today. I feel no creative spark whatsoever. I see only dull dimness. I do not want to take a picture, because I can't think of one or see one and I do not want to face the torment that Squarespace will ultimately inflict upon me when I attempt to post it. But I have kind of made a habit of documenting various moments throughout the day and people expect it of me. So here is a picture I just now took: Shadow Me in a mud puddle, dead leaves sunk all about.

From the time of color to the time of gray

As you can see, we have suddenly gone from the bright time of golden leaves to the time of bare gray. Yes, leaves still hang on here and there and a few well protected or rather stubborn trees do still cling to their mantles of gold, but, for the most part, the colors are gone, the dead leaves have fallen. Leaves will not be back probably until mid-May. Then they will be green - fresh green and the world will be a refreshed place, about to burst forth in a wide array of new life and limitless possibility.

No wind yet, just rain

It's raining pretty good, but the high winds forecast have not materialized. The branches of the trees are barely swaying. That's here of course – I don't know what is happening in Anchorage, the Hillside, Turnagain Arm or the Knik River. Sometimes, if it's windy one place around here it's windy everywhere. Sometimes, wind can absolutely be tearing in one area, and one mile away be dead calm. Usually, when it's windy we get a pretty good blow here, but not as bad as at Walmart.

Walmart is not far from the Knik River and just gets the hell blown out of it. On a windy day at Walmart, you want to park facing the wind. You might have to struggle and push to get your door open and squeeze out, but if the wind is coming from behind you it will grab your door the moment you open it and slam it against its hinges so hard you can't believe it didn't rip it right off. I wouldn't be surprised to learn the wind has taken a few doors at Walmart. Trucks passing by sometimes get tipped over. Camper canopies get ripped right off the back of pickup trucks.

Anyway, it's hardly blowing at all here – but the day is still young– I just heard high wind warning on the radio, so it could still come.

I can't believe I'm seeing green; blue and orange train wreck at the window; poet tells me of the generation that grew up not reading comic books

I really can't believe it...

...yet there you have it...

Green!

I zipped into town tonight, grabbed Margie and zipped right back home. Just before we left Anchorage, Jobe caused a train wreck in the window.

Today, I had my at least-once weekly breakfast at Abby's, the breakfast Arlene picks up for me in exchange for shooting the December wedding of her daughter, Aurora. 

You will notice that Allie, the poet and advanced student who, at the age of 16, graduated from high school with high honors, is no longer a blonde, but a red head - a bright red head. If there is a ever a slow moment when I am at Abby's and Allie is there, she will tell me a story or two or three or four about being a teenager in today's world.

Today, she told me about going to Blockbuster all winter long to check out and watch movies, but now that the darkness is gone and we are definitely into the season of light, she doesn't check out so many movies anymore, because who wants to sit or lie around in the living room watching movies when it's light outside?

So I asked if she had seen The Avengers, because to watch a movie in the darkness of a theatre rather than a sun-lit living room is quite a different thing. Yes, she said, in 3D and she had loved it. Fun movie. She asked if I had seen it. I told her how Margie and I tried on Sunday, but got shut out because it was sold out. I told her we will try again. She said we would enjoy it.

I told her I was sure we would, but I also said I doubted that any comic book movie could ever surpass or even equal the experiences I had reading comic books as a kid growing up. It was absolute Magic. "My generation didn't read comic books," she told me. Instead, she explained, they grew up watching movies and reading Harry Potter - but not comic books.

Allie very recently turned 17. She was very pleased. She got to go to an "R" rated movie. She told me which one, but I can't remember. It wasn't that bad, she said, but still... a bit surprising...

Note: As I put together my Return to India series, I continued to make my regular stops at Metro Cafe and Abby's and I shot quite a few pictures. Sometime within the next week, I will catch up with a major post, maybe even two, on both Metro and Abby's.