Evolution of a Carp and His Pond

My little pond along my running route is going through a transition. Too bad. Even my heron has bugged out. I should have known maybe that the carp in the pond were starving for oxygen in the heat and lack of rain, and the other day there was clear proof--the tactile odor of dead fish wafting across the gravel road. Here you see some small fish, bullheads, I think, sipping at the air, but a day later they too had turned belly-up.
Not all pictures worth looking at are pretty.

 

Saying Goodbye to Sinner

Back in my wilder days one of my good friends was Leo Durkin, who grew up on a ranch south of Ft. Pierre and who always took his own approach to life. We hadn't seen each other for a long time, having taken different roads, and my last visit was to help his friends and family say goodbye one last time. Mine kept taking me further away, on to new things, while Leo--or Sinner, as his family called him--stayed close to home, making his travels between the pages of the many books he read and from the stories that others would come to tell him. He kept a close eye on the things nearby, the wind over the Missouri River, the plants and animals that came and went with the seasons.
It was with Leo (furthest left) that I had my first political discussions, back in '72 when McGovern was running against Nixon, my first physics debates (Can a two-wheel-drive motorcycle do wheelies?), some of my first drinking, my introduction to some great books (Another Roadside Attraction and Even Cowgirls Get the Blues), and some great bluegrass music (Norman Blake).
He had a lot of friends, and the simple ceremony and the Native American drum group would have been just what he would have wanted. Danny Hall put a fitting end to the farewell, singing "My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys" and "Desperado" at the lonely cemetary at St. George as they placed Leo's ashes in the bone-dry hill overlooking the Missouri and the Durkin ranch.

Tuesday Night at Chautauquaville

Sacagawea packed them in on the last night of the Great Plains Chautauqua in Madison, with nearly 200 people under the tent for her presentation, preceded by a rousing performance of "The Great Bottleneck Diamond." Contented Madisonians and others helped pack up the tent, fold up the banners, and pack away the chairs. Soon all that remained were the holes from tent stakes and the well-trod paths of the audiences. Wednesday they headed for Pierre, where I hope their attendance is even better.


 

Chautauqua Hits Its Stride

After tonight, only one more day remains of the Great Plains Chautauqua in Madison, and when they leave here on Wednesday, they will set up camp in Pierre, which hit 117 degrees on Saturday. It's supposed to be cooler later in the week, both here and there. We're hoping for a good crowd tonight and an even better tomorrow.
So far crowds have been okay, considering the heat, and the conditions under the tent aren't bad once you get sat down and let the breeze work its magic. The first night, William Clark (Patrick McGinnis) played his role as explorer and adventurer to the hilt, and Saturday his manservant York (Charles Everett Pace) was an excellent example of a man committed to his charge. Last night Tecumseh (Jerome Kills Small) made his point clear in opposition to American expansion into his people's homeland. Tonight Jerome Tweton plays John Jacob Astor. Much more is going on, and you can look at the Chautauqua pics on my Flickr site.

Chautauqua Good Times

My concerns about attendance at the Great Plains Chautauqua in Madison have been allayed. After 120 or so people appeared at DSU last night to set up the big blue and white Chautauqua tent, when 5o were needed, I thought we were in good shape, and in the first event today, over 50 kids were there, and 15 attended the first adult workshop. The Kiwanis served over 200 pork sandwiches, and over 150 people braved the heat to hear James McGinnis's adept portrayal of William Clark, a healthy crowd with great questions. Tomorrow I hope things go as well.

Blue Heron of Happiness

Rarely do I run with any devices, especially a cell phone. This morning, though, the wife convinced me to carry her iPod, which had on it some NPR Driveway Moments, including one about quadriplegic psychologist Dr. Dan Gottlieb, who told about the despair he sometimes felt and he knew others felt. But he told a story about a man who had come to see him and, when the session was over, the man strugged to get out of his chair as Gottlieb watched. "I'm glad I can at least still get out of the chair," the man admitted. "I'm glad I don't have to struggle with that," the psychologist said, and they both laughed. That story is here: "Lessons from a Psychologist, and Grandad."
As I listened I was just coming to my blue heron pond, and I slowed to a walk, hoping to see the heron. Gottleib told about his father who sometimes wished he could slough off "this veil of tears," and just then the heron rose, its wings stroking the air, quietly lifting the giant bird into the sky. He wasn't startled today, it seemed, just cautious, and I noticed the carp that usually swirl away so quickly were still lined up gulping at the air along the pond's flat surface.
Later I listened to another story of wonder, a woman whose vision had always been monocular, seeing everything as a flat surface, though she could drive and play tennis. In an unusual development, she began to develop binocular vision, and her description of seeing herself in a snowfall, rather than just observing it, is well worth the listen.
As I ran along, listening to these stories and seeing once again my random rabbit, my patient blue heron, my chorus of carp, poet Mary Oliver's book Why I Wake Early came to mind, her emphatic joy in the life around us.
(This image is from Mark Goldstein's collection of photos at PhotographyBlog.)

Let's Meet Our Friend the Chigger

There's nothing humorous about chigger bites, not a damned thing. They itch, they hurt, they look like hell. But it's not always clear whether you actually have chigger bites, since they might look like spider bites or something else. But these little rascals are not friendly, and they don't have a dramatic mythology to give them that street cred. They're just nasty. Take a look at this fellow.

Now take a look at the damage he and his mates did to my mate (at least he's the primary suspect). There might not have been poison ivy poisoning, but there was damned sure ill effects from the lovely Roy Lake camping expedition.

When a Tree Falls in the Forest . . .

Today was a day for a good long run, 9.7 miles according to G-Maps, so after much delay this morning, I finally headed out while it was still cool, about 65 degrees. Read on. I include herein a narrow brush with death, and I don't mean neglecting to bring my cell phone on the run.
I remembered to look for the blue heron that usually rises from a pond on the route, surprising me and flapping away, but he wasn't there today. In his place was a family of ducks that hustled in line out away. No dogs chased me on the way out, the lake was calm, and turkeys called to each other from the trees. A half-dozen rabbits were out and about, and only two people were free enough to gaze out over the water, one guy with a bike and a poor overweight woman who looked as though she were a figure of mud that had been dropped from on high. She was fixing her makeup. I enjoyed the jaunt through the trees, Lake Herman State Park featuring several trail sections that are like half-mile long arbors. But as I came out of one, turned, and headed into another, I hear behind me what appeared to be a tree falling. So I went back, and sure enough, a dead branch, about five inches in diameter and maybe 20 feet long, was lying across the path where I had just run. My reminder of life, the tree branch must have been jostled by my heft. But I dragged the tree branch off the path, tidied up the twigs, and carried on, bouyed by my personal reminder, knowing that branch, or the sound of it at least, was meant for me. Later, I had another kind of luck, as during my cool-down walk, I found a rolled-up, undelivered copy of today's Argus Leader lying in the park with nary a soul around. It too must have been dropped there for me. Two kinds of luck? There are many.

A Flying Trip to Roy Lake, Ft. Sisseton

After seeing Risë Smith's presentation about the Lake Madison Chautauqua on Saturday morning, the wife and I hit the trail and joined TQ and LS camping at Roy Lake. We headed over to Ft. Sisseton, where the Northern State University Theatre Department is kicking off its first year of a summer theater season there. The play was an interesting and fun rendition of A. R. Gurney's play "Sylvia," about a dog that enters the lives of a couple. The play was set up in the old barracks at the fort, which didn't always work well. It was too warm, and the seating left a lot to be desired, but the food was good and I saw some people from Sisseton I knew.

We had a good evening camping (despite mosquitos) and hiking today, and we ate well, as always. No one got poison ivy, I hope! It's a beautiful park and the whole area up in NE South Dakota is beautiful right now. In addition, we paused in Roslyn to drive by the Vinegar Museum, which was closed. Dang!

 

A Trip to Carthage

It must have been the windy day. For some reason I wanted to go to Carthage for the end of the filming there of "Into the Wild," a new film directed by Sean Penn and starring Vince Vaughn, among others. It's a true story of Chris "Alexander Supertramp" McCandless, who died in the Alaskan wilderness a few weeks after he left this sleepy town north and west of Howard.
So, five of us trucked up there to have a look, and one of us spotted Spiccoli crossing the dusty alley behind the establishment where we stopped. They were just getting ready for some filming, and we watched a bit as they set up some of the sound equipment.
But, a little was enough, and the wind soon brought us back home without even stopping at the beer tent that flapped in the gale like six sheets in the wind. Read more about the story here and here.
We got the inside scoop on two things. It was Chewy's birthday today (as noted by the sound crew), and the food served to the crew is like nothing you can get around here; it beats anything Taco Bell can offer (according to one of the security guys from Mitchell).
Too bad I couldn't have tried that good food and met Chewy so I could give him birthday wishes.

Chautauqua is Coming

On another front, I hopped out of bed early enough to snap this picture of the city crew hanging up the "Chautauqua is Coming" banner over the "Welcome to Madison" sign that graces Egan Avenue. They ran my photo with a Chautauqua story in the Madison Daily Leader. Yay! (But not online, apparently).

Hats Off to Sophie

The hats you see here were made by Sophie Holt, a woman from Arlington, SD, who was born in 1896 and went to a millnery school in St. Paul and worked in Chicago for Stanley Korshak as a designerfor 38 years. Mavis Sorenson, a resident of Ramona, has a collection of more than 250 of these hats, some of them with a Mister John label. Sophie Holt made them all by hand. The flapper hat on the figurehead on the counter belonged to Mavis herself, Sophie's niece. The wife tried on several, finally deciding on one that went with her cool coat, the black one on the rack.

July 4 According to the Dune Buggy

If the dune buggy is in the Ramona parade, then it must be the Fourth of July, Independence Day, Firecracker Day, and my niece Melanie's birthday (along with George M. Cohan). It must be the anniversary of that day when my grandma told me, "Don't let one of those blow up in your hand," just before a big Black Cat exploded next to my ear and made my head and hand throb for the rest of the day, especially when the big boomers rattled the air over Lake Herman.
But enough about me. The dadgum Ramona Fire Department put on a heck of a fireworks display with plenty of dazzle. J and C B, with A, came for the big show, as did SR. Cool.
As you see here, the poor vehicle was enlisted to hawk the Madison Chautauqua, which it did well, though it much prefers spinning cookies in the Howard High School parking lot. 

Five-K Firsts

The big news in Howard yesterday wasn't the Tootsie Rolls, not really, nor the fact that it was (and is) celebrating its 125th anniversary. The bigger news was that the niece and the wife ran their first 5k races ever, handily dispatching the distance, although not without some effort and weak moments. They earned their t-shirts, so it didn't help that the organizers announced, right after the race (for which participants paid $15), that left over road race shirts would be available for $5. Sister-in-law bought one just to get my goat, but she can't have it. I'll wear mine with a clean conscience.
My conscience is clear too, with the knowledge that as we three ran together, I stuck with the wife (over her stated objections) when the niece began to pull away. Don't know when the next race is, but the wife now has a PR she can work on improving. Cool.

Tootsie Roll Tragedy in Howard

In the excitement of the celebration of Howard's 125th anniversary, a lot of candy got overlooked as the long parade made its way down the main street, and as children darted into the street to collect the goods that flew from car and float. Most of them, sadly, were Tootsie Rolls like these, candy that on any other day would be regarded as treasures.

Dune Buggy vs. the Bugs

At the last minute today, on the way to Howard for some golf, the dune buggy called out to me and I threw in my clubs, topped off the gas, and headed down the road. No problem. This old dune buggy, a 1959 model VW, was happy to scoot down the road, past Junius, past the Vermillion River, past Winfred, into Howard, where the golf course was breezy and pleasant, and we had a great time, and on the way home, the DB pulverized a few wayward insects, something it doesn't often get to do. It now shows 30,502 miles, about 600 miles only in the last three years, but more coming.

Superman vs. Blacktop

While in Ft. Pierre over the weekend for the mother's birthday, my nephew and I climbed Blacktop, one of the shale hills ringing the town, named for the rocky black stones you see in the photo. A geological marker still stands there, barely. This hill, which stands just south of the house where my family lived, was the center of much of our outdoor activity--a place for sledding, go-karting, riding motorcycles, hunting snakes, telling ghost stories, etc., and it's still an attraction. The Bad River twists through the tree-lined cut in the distance, on its way to the Missouri River, where Lewis and Clark met the Teton Sioux.
My nephew enjoyed the steady breeze, which gave a dramatic lift to his Superman cape. 

Harmonious Night

The wife and I headed for the Dakota Prairie Playhouse last night to support the USD theatre group that is presenting "Forever Plaid" here and in Vermillion and Sioux Falls. The play is minimal, but the music is a lot of fun, and the three-minute, eleven-second version of the Ed Sullivan Show is hilarious.
If you haven't seen it, and you like 60's music featuring male harmonizing, you're in for a treat. It's showing tonight and tomorrow at the DPP and June 30 and July 1 and 2 at the Orpheum Theater in Sioux Falls.

Reservations for Out on the Horizon

On October First, the year of our blog 2006, I've got a date with 7499 others, all of us planning to meet at the Metrodome in downtown Minneapolis and hightail it over hill, over dale, to the capitol in St. Paul. We're calling it the Twin Cities Marathon and figure, what the heck, we'll run 26.2 miles. It will be my 12th time running it, I think, and the first after last year's meltdown when my poor left foot gave out after running my last long run, two weeks before the race. Bummer. This year is for redemption. Note, if you come and watch (joining about 200,000 others, by the way, you won't see me running with a lean bunch like these young gazelles. I'll be somewhere back in the pack, bemoaning my decision to keep living a leisurely life and prepare for the long jaunt in my usual lacksadasical fashion. I do have hotel reservations now, though! Now back to my training!

Walter Made the Cuteness Cut

Our dog Walter has made the cut for the photo banner for Boston Terrier Photo Blog, a blog devoted to photos of the most attractive Boston terriers in the world. Check it out, and you'll see Walter proudly guarding the flowers in our back yard. He's the guy just below the B in Blog. I wonder if I'd get millions of hits if I just posted pictures of Walter . . .

Why the Air is Fresh

On the way back from the Twin Cities on Saturday, I stopped at an auction for a bunch of old cars and old car parts, just for the pictures, and it was easy to read in the items arrayed for sale what the old man was interested in--saving the old machines from destruction. But an old man can't keep the ravages of time from so many cars and parts at once, and in the end it may be as important that he's kept them so that others can come along and take up the cause. The old Studebakers and DeSotos are probably in jeopardy, but a complete old Chevy pickup, 30's model, will surely hit the road again. So it goes. Antiques are the old things that someone still wants; some people probably wandered among this guy's treasures and saw only junk. I saw the interior of this car and and knew then why the air in Gaylord was clean and clear. Check the Flickr site for more photos.

Magna Comes Home

Saturday I got home with the new Magna and recruited JB to come and help me unload it. Here's how it arrived. Yesterday after some problems getting it started I learned about the kickstand kill-switch and then was able to take it for a spin, which included a close encounter with a duck and an actual encounter with a small bird, which made me appreciate the windshield.
Otherwise, the day was a good one, with a backyard grilling, good ribs, company, and then a later ride with the wife.

Becoming Magna-ficat

Surprises in store at every turn, suddenly yours truly finds himself here in the Twin Cities, the proud owner of a spanking Honda Magna, 1996 version, 750cc's of motorcycle. Who knew? This photo isn't mine (it's a 1999 model), but it's almost identical. Mine doesn't have the leather dangles on the levers.

Fading Peonies

You've got to enjoy peony season while it lasts. For a week or more, you've got the most beautiful, best smelling flowers that will make the whole house a kind of scented envelope, where you're the love letter and the recipient all at once. Add a good wind chime and it's a summer concert, and the ants that always come with the peonies just make it more of a picnic. So what if the peonies start to droop and lose their petals? Remember instead how they smelled when they were at their peak.
On another note, April is having a big day today--getting teeth pulled and having a performance review at work on the same day. Wish her luck!
 

Working on Chautauqua Stuff

Chautauqua preparations proceed. I've posted a couple of times recently to my Chautauqua Madison blog, and we're getting ready to roll out a new website providing the Chautauqua schedule, too, which is already available at the Madison Chamber of Commerce site. Check them out and pass the word.

Our Lady of the Park

Across the street from our house an elderly woman spends much of the day in the park, sitting on a bench or at a picnic table, watching. She doesn't typically talk to people, as far as I can tell; she doesn't say hello when you greet her, but she simply sits quietly, gazing out at the park, where, usually, very little is happening.
Today I sat in the pickup listening to the end of a story on the radio, and I watched her sitting there, and she appeared to notice me and perhaps wondered what I was doing. She got up, walked away, and came back several times, only to settle in again at the same bench. She keeps her head up, she dresses neatly with her white hair tidy, and she carries a small purse.
When the kids start gathering at the pool, or when there's a group meeting at the shelter, or when the adolescents begin to gather at the skateboard park, she usually disappears, but when it's quiet, she's there.
What she did before she started watching the park I don't know, but if they gave awards for diligence at park observation, she would be voted by those who know--squirrels, robins, grackles, and other birds--as the best in the city.
I suspect she has learned the pleasure of observing--watching the way the limbs of the trees bend and sway in the wind, how the grackle will chase the robin through aerobatic maneuvers, how the traffic changes endlessly. Maybe she never had a chance to watch this way before.

Nada y pues nada y nada y pues nada

A quiet day, reading the paper, a trip to Howard for services (three is one, one is three), coffee, a birthday party, a nap, a meeting, a run, a fine supper, a good movie (Everything is Illuminated--thanks, TQ), and this quiet moment to note it here.

Oh Fickle, Fickle Golfball

Golf. You know golf, the game for people with not enough frustrations in their lives already. It seems a game for whom life is good, for whom the sandtraps and water hazards of life are not enough. Their lives don't contain sufficient challenge; they seek the trial of striking a tiny object a mighty distance with another small object. But they could take up hitting a pea with a pencil, or learn pingpong. Golf has prestige--and cool equipment. What golfer can't resist the notion that new clubs will help their game, or a better ball, a different glove. Plus, there's golf carts!
I played on Monday in Hot Springs, Thursday in Howard, and Friday in Madison. That should be enough frustration for anyone in a week. Then again, there was that long putt that curved and dropped, that nice chip shot that rolled up near the hole . . .

List of Activities

What's a trip without some cool activities along the way? My trip to Ft. Pierre and the Black Hills included the following:

• Going to the Ft. Pierre Museum
• Swimming in Hot Springs' Coldbrook Resevoir
• Golfing at Hot Springs renovated golf course
• Garage sale hopping with my nephew in Whitewood
• Dining with my mom at the Chateau
• Dining with a group at Roma's in Spearfish
• Riding with my brother on a pair of Ducati motorcycles
• Running the Deadwood half-marathon
• Having breakfast with the in-laws after the race
• Visiting my sister's new house
• Napping in her house Sunday afternoon
  
• Listening to Margaret Atwood's Alias Grace on tape
• Playing the X-Men game with my nephew and my sister
• Watching my niece play softball
• Coming home

Taken together, an excellent trip.

Voyage West

My trip out west for the half marathon included a stop in Ft. Pierre to visit my mom and look things over, so we drove around town and looked over the city. We also visited the newly updated Verendrye Monument there, where French explorers buried a lead plate in 1743. The photo here was taken from the site where the plate was found.
The Missouri river is visible, and the Bad River runs through town from the big Mo to the right side of the photo.
I'm still sore from my run on Sunday.

Downhill Most of the Way

Waking up at 3:00am this morning I realized my race packet for the DMT half marathon still sat at the registration site--boo hoo. I checked online and saw that no race day pickup was available, so I resolved to get up a little early, make a number 188 and pin it to my shirt, and run anyway. All was well; nobody kicked me off the course and they even handed me a medal at the end, 2:02 after starting. Not bad for a guy whose longest run was five miles. It was at about that point today that I started to feel good and reel off 8(+) minute miles, chugga chugga, steamrolling downhill. It was good to be done! In the parking lot afterwards there were some well wishers I didn't expect to see, the wife's parents, who the day before had hiked the Volksmarch at Crazy Horse Monument and stood on the arm of the warrior.
TQ and LS and her ontourage from Aberdeen were proud finishers, and his parents were there to cheer him on. Now for recovery.

Packing for Travel

Packing these days might include now some time spent loading up the media device, making sure you've got listening material for the road. That's what I find myself doing this morning as I get ready to drive out west to run the Deadwood Mickelson Trail half-marathon (despite being pretty unprepared to actually run the whole thing) and visit some family.
Specifically I wanted to upload my new Ditty Bops cd, Moon over the Freeway, which just came out. If you check out their website you'll find all sorts of pictures, video, and music, plus the itinerary for their bicycle tour of the US as they bike and tour. They are blogging their ride, which has begun in California. In all, it's a great cd (what Newsweek called "what Betty Boop might have had on her iPod") and a cool website.
I'm also uploading Bruce Springsteen's We Shall Overcome--The Seeger Sessions, which has a bunch of cool traditional tunes, and the Dixie Chicks' new cd, Taking the Long Way. Of course, I had to make sure that my Buckskin Bible Revue music was on the iRiver, too.
The Dixie Chicks album was a disappointment. I had high expectations, thinking of them as a group that brought a lot of traditional bluegrass sounds to songs playable on country music stations, but this one, probably slated for very little airplay after the flap over their remarks about the president, seems aimed directly at the country music fans they angered. Fiddle and banjo riffs are almost entirely absent, and every tune has the same tone and sound, as though they ran every one of them through the same stamper. They're good tunes, but taken all in a lump, they underwhelm.
Meanwhile, I'll be posting again later about the fun in the hills.