Ashes Denote That Fire Was
By Emily Dickinson
Ashes denote that fire was;
Respect the grayest pile
For the departed creature’s sake
That hovered there awhile.
Fire exists the first in light,
And then consolidates,—
Only the chemist can disclose
Into what carbonates.
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Friday was chilly but mostly sunny, so easier to stay awake. I mostly had chores to do, and in the afternoon we went to the post office to mail stuff to our kids, which given the season was exactly as crowded as you would expect. We also stopped at Giant and wound up with a longer list than we originally anticipated, so hopefully we remembered everything for next week!
We had dinner with my parents, then we came home and watched Black Adam. It's a much better movie than I was led to believe -- could have used less exposition at the start and more humor throughout, but it has a decent number of women and a strong anti-imperialist storyline. Here are Ellicott City's old Firehouse Museum and Howard County's Fire and Rescue Station:
Another quickie because I'm behind on everything! I had an ambitious project for Monday, clearing off the top of the bookcase that for years held all my Star Trek collectibles, so there were mugs, plastic cups, vinyl records, piles of magazines, jigsaw puzzles, and various small things, so it ended up taking most of the day to get that sorted and I didn't get the things getting sold or freecycled listed. But the bookcase top was clear and now has model ships on it, including a new birthday present Queen Anne's Revenge with Edward Teach's flag, that had been hidden behind the stereo! I did not get to the laundry or all the email I neglected while I was out yesterday.
Paul had an afternoon dentist appointment while I was sorting old TV Guides and plastic phasers and communicators, and when he came home, we ordered the Ethiopian food from Sheba that we didn't get for my birthday, which was delicious. Plus he had made brownies that we never ate the night before, so we had that with ice cream from South Mountain. Evening TV was this week's His Dark Materials episodes around Monday Night Football. Pics from Ellicott City's holiday festival, B&O Railroad Museum holiday train displays, and county fire station with its train display, plus dinner from Sheba tonight (will save the Symphony of Lights for another post)!
Extreme quickie on the night of my birthday after a late-night chat with my kids, one of whom was trying to keep his kitten out of a Christmas tree and the other of whom was at a friend's playing Pokemon. I had a very nice day:
Lucy's Song
By Charles Dickens
How beautiful at eventide
To see the twilight shadows pale,
Steal o'er the landscape, far and wide,
O'er stream and meadow, mound and dale!
How soft is Nature's calm repose
When ev'ning skies their cool dews weep:
The gentlest wind more gently blows,
As if to soothe her in her sleep!
The gay morn breaks,
Mists roll away,
All Nature awakes
To glorious day.
In my breast alone
Dark shadows remain;
The peace it has known
It can never regain.
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No idea where Monday went -- some work, laundry, labeling and stamping of holiday cards, and we took a long walk on this cold but lovely afternoon because we're supposed to have rain for most of the rest of the week. Then I watched some Rings of Power with Kristen after dinner, but I am behind on everything!
We watched the end of Wednesday, which I really hope is coming back next season -- very enjoyable performances and clever structure -- then the first episode of the last season of His Dark Materials, which is also very well done, but, well, dark. From A Dickens of a Christmas in Chestertown last weekend:
Starlight
By William Meredith
Going abruptly into a starry night
It is ignorance we blink from, dark, unhoused;
There is a gaze of animal delight
Before the human vision. Then, aroused
To nebulous danger, we may look for easy stars,
Orion and the Dipper; but they are not ours,
These learned fields. Dark and ignorant,
Unable to see here what our forebears saw,
We keep some fear of random firmament
Vestigial in us. And we think, Ah,
If I had lived then, when these stories were made up, I
Could have found more likely pictures in haphazard sky.
But this is not so. Indeed, we have proved fools
When it comes to myths and images. A few
Old bestiaries, pantheons and tools
Translated to the heavens years ago—
Scales and hunter, goat and horologe—are all
That save us when, time and again, our systems fall.
And what would we do, given a fresh sky
And our dearth of image? Our fears, our few beliefs
Do not have shapes. They are like that astral way
We have called milky, vague stars and star-reefs
That were shapeless even to the fecund eye of myth—
Surely these are no forms to start a zodiac with.
To keep the sky free of luxurious shapes
Is an occupation for most of us, the mind
Free of luxurious thoughts. If we choose to escape,
What venial constellations will unwind
Around a point of light, and then cannot be found
Another night or by another man or from other ground.
As for me, I would find faces there,
Or perhaps one face I have long taken for guide;
Far-fetched, maybe, like Cygnus, but as fair,
And a constellation anyone could read
Once it was pointed out; an enlightenment of night,
The way the pronoun you will turn dark verses bright.
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Tuesday was not as warm as Monday, which is just as well because I had a huge number of things to get done and was only partly successful as a result of having gotten up at 5 a.m. to see the lunar eclipse, then falling back asleep until 9:30. (Eclipse was worth it, and now I'm too tired to watch Democalypse 2022 all night, which is just as well.) Crucial laundry was finished and folded, but pills were not sorted and photos weren't backed up. We did take a walk to enjoy the crunchy leaves and cricket song before dinner (spaghetti) and my Voyager group -- minus the one evacuated for Tropical Storm Nicole -- watched "Hope and Fear" (not too bad though once again it was all about Seven of Nine even in the season finale). Now we're watching Ghosts because we missed the Halloween episode and Thor-and-Baby-Bjorn, which are delightful. From the Sultana Downrigging Festival, Kalmar Nyckel:
