2023

Finally finished this review on February 28, 2024. Reviewing past entries is such a helpful thing to do, even if it takes a long time!

note: Tried to proofread as I went, but there are probably typos everywhere.

January

Began the year with two big snow storms that forced me down into the basement for my workouts and with some anxiety-ridden prepping for a colonoscopy. Successfully completed the colonoscopy, using the 10 things I noticed exercise to distract me in the waiting room. Finally ran outside on the 7th, when it was still snow-covered and cold, but there was no wind and some sun. Swam at the Y. Complained about the too soft snow. Prepped for my class, which was starting at the end of the month. Kept wondering when the paths would finally be clear. Worried about my feet freezing when the path turned into a lake (with walls of snow on either side of the trail, there was nowhere for the melting snow to go). Ran faster to avoid a coughing/hacking runner behind me. Recited a common refrain: if only the path hadn’t been so icy and snowy, this would have been a near-perfect run. Ended the month with a glorious and chilly (felt like 9 below) run.

wrote about

  • the different reasons why I’m nervous about my colonoscopy (3 jan)
  • orange (jan 6)
  • the sun, the moon, the snow yesterday (7 jan)
  • other swimmers in the pool (9 jan)
  • an article on mindfullness and crud on the pool floor (12 jan)
  • nets and swimming through air and Jake Skeets: My Name is Beauty (13 jan)
  • not only making the familiar strange, but the strange familiar, robins, and too many typos (14 jan)
  • hearing a kid yell while sledding down a hill and thinking about how we can see with our ears (15 jan)
  • puddles and how they help me to see where the cracks and craters are (16 jan)
  • people I encountered on the Y track (17 jan)
  • snow falling outside, making shadows on the pool floor dance and Edgar Allen Poe, expert swimmer (19 jan)
  • 2 poems about dead mothers (20 jan)
  • an amazing poetry project by Anna Swansoncalled “The Garbage Poems.” (23 jan)
  • ice swimming (24 jan 2023)
  • how running tethers us to our bodies and the world (27 jan)
  • goals for my running and this log (28 jan)
  • vision struggles at the Y (29 jan)

books listened to

  • Disappearing Earth/ Julia Phillips
  • An Eldery Lady Must Not Be Crossed/ Helene Tursten
  • Morning with Rosemary, or the British title, The Lido/ Libby Page

february

Began with the birds — pileated woodpeckers and black-capped chickadees — and an icy, chunk-filled path. Swam at the Y with my daughter, the light and shadows, and lots of little things floating in the water. Longed for temperatures above freezing. Did a one-way run to Lake Nokomis, admiring my breath as it hovered, frozen, in front of me. Tracked the progress of the ice as it covered the river. Tried, sometimes unsuccessfully, to avoid the puddles when it got warmer and the snow (briefly) melted. Imagined a choir singing when I saw a birch tree sparkling in the sun. Ran the Franklin Loop (first time since December!) and stopped to record water gushing down the drain pipes under the lake street bridge. Wondered if a walker heard me talking to myself and thought my well, that’s no good after finding a hole in my glove was about them. Ran in the rain. Loved the old woman energy in the Y locker room — so much happiness and confidence and loving support! Regretted not wearing my yak-trax one day, then wearing them the next. Shoveled — almost 2 hours, over 16 inches of snow. Ended the month avoiding a “slushy icy nightmare” by running on Edmund right past the strange tree with a utility pole growing through the middle of it.

wrote about

  • Roland Barthes and distraction (1 feb)
  • curiosity and knowing, Thoreau vs. Kimmerer (2 feb)
  • Linda Pastan and the tree outside her window (3 feb)
  • poems that describe movement and how I see birds with my peripheral vision (6 feb)
  • kids in 3 versions and Pastan, Hoaglund, swimming, and writing (9 feb)
  • Kelly Agodon and the value of play (10 feb)
  • Seeing what you want to see: beauty (Agodon) / danger (Pastan) (11 feb)
  • hearing voices, turkeys, and looking into another’s eyes (13 feb)
  • a new regular, just outside my window: Miss Wake Up Call (14 feb)
  • a craft tip from Maggie Smith about empty/blank space and slowing the poem and the reader down (15 feb)
  • Linda Pastan’s poems, “Ode to My Car Key” and “Cataracts” and my vision loss (17 feb)
  • a wild-sounding howl that could have been a dog, a coyote, or a kid pretending (18 feb)
  • tips for not slipping while running on snow-covered ice and a forest of Lindas (20 feb)
  • the delight of seeing a skier ski down the middle of the street and the joy in not thinking I could do something (shovel the entire driveway) but starting anyway and then doing it (23 feb)
  • My Emily Dickinson (24 feb)
  • what Scott overheard 2 “Chatty Cathys” saying when he passed them on the track (25 feb)

books listened to

  • Moonflower Murders/ Anthony Horowitz

march

Began the month with lots of walks. Listened to the birds and watched their reflections fly in the puddles on the sidewalk. Ran 6 miles. Noticed the river, and remembered to remember what I noticed: blue, sparkling, a trail of light stretching from the west bank to the east. Made friends with the gross things floating in the pool. Biked in the basement. Stewed over a neighbor’s fallen branch sprawled across our lawn — would they ever deal with it (answer: no; we had to). Suffered (and maybe was a bit too dramatic about it) from an episode of tinnitus that forced me to lie down for half the day. Shoveled. Recorded some extra loud crunching snow. Birds! Birds! Birds! Jumped a bunch of puddles on the path, especially near Shadow Falls. Caught a bug (not covid) that knocked me out and slept for almost a day. Slowly recovered. Added another route that included running down and back up the hill at Locks and Dam no. 1. Imagined, as I ran over the high bridge to the Veterans’ home that the big shadow I was seeing way down by the creek was me and that I was having fun running below. After many years of not doing it, I stopped and looked when a stranger on the trail asked me too and saw a baby owl in a tree. Ended the month with mud and puddles and the possibility of more snow — plus a plan for next month’s challenge: A.R. Ammons!

wrote about

  • which do I prefer: seeing a black glove and having it affirm my view of the world (that when I see a glove on the ground it will almost always be black), or seeing a glove of another color and having it challenge my worldview? (1 march)
  • Kelli Agodon Russell and Emily Dickinson (3 march)
  • Kelli Agodon Russell and swimming and writing (4 march)
  • forgetting the clock (6 march)
  • some “how to” poems I could write (8 march)
  • “road-testing” all of my poems by reciting them as I run: if it’s not easy to speak (but not too easy), then it needs to be revised! (9 march)
  • deciding on my monthly challenge: James Schuyler’s Hymn to Life
  • Jericho Brown and always adding the opposite to a poem (13 march)
  • color, the glitter effect, and examples of Schuyler’s gray depressions (14 march)
  • the little wet things of ordinary life (15 march)
  • contemplation vs. wondering/wandering and hearing a poem appear in your ears (20 march)
  • different forms of water, including buckets of it (23 march)
  • 10 Thawing/Thawed Things (24 march)
  • Diane Seuss, Emily Dickinson, and exclamation points — with useful sources (27 march)
  • the Void, monarch butterflies, Ross Gay, and how Auden made nothing happen (29 march)
  • a walking tour of places/things that happened, or used to be there but now aren’t, 2 walking poems, one by Elizabeth Bishop, the other by A. R. Ammon, and the delightful difference made when you add much to the phrase, “doing nothing” (30 march)
  • on literal and metaphorical meanings for orbiting an idea (31 march)

books listened to

  • Lying Game/ Ruth Ware

april

On the 2nd of April: snow that weighed down our backyard arborvitae, making them look like an ice spider, then melted before I went out for my run. As I ran, I listened for what the wind was saying, but all I heard were shrill whispers. Noticed a cascade on the way to Hidden Falls. Enjoyed wearing less layers and feeling the warmer air on bare legs. Sweat too much. Admired the view of intense blue against the evergreen. Watched ice melt. Hated the wind. Listened to the grit sizzle. Kept track of the river as it flooded the flats and closed the river road north of Franklin. Scheduled around and in-between the rain. Witnessed what the April snow does to tree branches (it splits them) and what happens to the river when it melts (fast moving foam). Overheard someone talking to their walking partner about the limits of late capitalism. Retired an old shoe (black Saucony Rides) and broke in a new one (white with orange and blue laces Saucony Rides). Ended the month back in running tights.

wrote about

  • Ammons, Levertov, and secrets to discover and forget and discover again (2 april)
  • Crones, laughs that scare kids, and RJP and the coffee roasting guy (6 april)
  • Hearing some birds sing the melody to Weather Report’s Birdland, A.R. Ammons’ ordinary/garbage time, writing poetry, and Mary Oliver’s The Leaf and the Cloud, shit, and slow jamming the ideas in a poem (7 april)
  • birds, humility, entanglement and a shifting of focus and not despair as the source of poetry (8 april)
  • motion as spirit (9 april)
  • bone xylophones (10 april)
  • Ammons’ spring aspen speech (15 april)
  • time’s and guts alembics (17 april)
  • colorblind plate inspirations (18 april)
  • on lying while birding with Naomi Shihab Nye (20 april)
  • some fun author bios (23 april)
  • Dorothy Wordsworth’s journal (24 april)
  • grass, Ted Kooser (25 april)
  • dying bees and dead metaphors (29 april)

resources

may

Began with wild wind (27 mph), cool air (47 degrees), and fire warnings. Then it warmed up: shorts and short sleeves! Open trails! Green everywhere! Then humidity and heat. Wondered: could we, me and humidity, be friends this summer? Noticed swirling white foam on the river but no rowers. Breathed in spring — grass, flowers that smell like Big Red gum — and heard lots of birds. Had the house painted a dark gray with white trim and a bright green door. Mowed the lawn, pulled weeds. Became overheated. Listened to “Dear Evan Hanson” in the last miles of many runs. Tried to dodge mud, red birds emerging from bushes, graduates and their families crowding the sidewalk at St. Thomas, and big school groups at the falls. Marveled at the orangish-pinkish light from forest fires in Canada. Was overdressed and distracted by irritating weed-whackers. Biked for the first time this year. Made the reason for my run to see purple. Felt summer arriving — bugs, buoys, rowers! Ended with heat, shade, and a small patch of shimmering water burning through the trees.

wrote about

  • Not today, Satan! (1 may)
  • Pa, I can’t see! and reading (2 may)
  • Red — including William Carlos Williams’ “The Red Wheelbarrow” and Mary Ruefle’s response (3 may)
  • Pink and bee shadows (4 may)
  • beginnings, endings, and the MIDDLE and semi-colons (6 may)
  • the strange and impossible things my brain sees and legs that feel like stumps (7 may)
  • green and RW Kimmerer’s green teachers, green patience/resilience, green enoughness (8 may)
  • on remembering (9 may)
  • washing dishes (10 may)
  • brown, white, and the constant interruption of GREEN GREEN GREEN (11 may)
  • the regular, Mr. Walker Sitter / people who are open and generous (12 may)
  • fear and letters from Emily Dickinson (15 may)
  • 10 Things I Noticed When I Wasn’t Noticing and the meanings of madness, rack, and honey (17 may)
  • nothing as useless (19 may)
  • secrets (21 may)
  • it’s a reel mower not a real mower / not knowing and knowing nothing (22 may)
  • immortal cupboards, windows, offerings at Emily Dickinson’s grave, and purple (24 may)
  • Orange Theory and translating orange effort for writing and wondering (25 may)
  • Yellow (26 may)
  • black thoughts and darkness as essential for finding hope (27 may)
  • butter (30 may)
  • eavesdropping, the subject = You, unhitching (31 may)

future reading and rereading

words I liked

  • sidereal and barn and gravel and gone (11 may)
  • In the end, I would rather wonder than know (21 may)

june

Celebrated my 12th running anniversary with a 6 mile run. Ran through sprinklers to cool down. Witnessed an altercation between a woodpecker and a squirrel. Breathed in bad air from Canadian forest fires. Felt sore and overheated. Was delighted by 2 little yippy dogs in a neighbor’s yard, a unicycle on the path, the start of open swim season, and when a walker called out to me, you’re looking strong! Ran through Austin — one of the last times? — then drove to Rochester to pick up Scott’s Dad’s stuff and move him into assisted living. Missed a few open swims. Saw and heard rowers on the river. Encountered a woman in an inner-tube floating in the middle of the lake, a swarm of Vespas on the river road. Endured lots of choppy water. Recited Tony Hoaglund water poems in my head while I swam from the little beach to the big beach. Swam with my son across Cedar Lake. Felt hot and slow and sluggish in the heat and humidity. Swam 4 loops at Nokomis with the big swans. Admired the lifeguards for really having their shit together: often we start early because they’ve already put the buoys out! Got new tires and swam twice, once in Nokomis, once in Cedar on the same day. Watched in disbelief as a swan boat cut across the lake and straight through the course. Dreamed about being the poet laureate of Lake Nokomis. Celebrated my birthday by running with Scott to a new coffee place, swimming 3 loops, then testing positive for COVID.

wrote about

  • Alice Oswald on swimming, poetry, thinking, and the dis/connections between the mind and body / I – animal – machine (2 june)
  • Carl Phillips and how a river loves (3 june)
  • stagnant water and restless (5 june)
  • purple mountain scout (6 june)
  • how my vision works (12 june)

books listened to

  • The Covenant of Water

july

Started the month with COVID, which kept me from running for 4 days and swimming for 8. Sat outside in the shade in my red chair a lot. After open swim, tried out the new restaurant — The Painted Turtle — then walked around the lake. Felt sore all over. Spotted a few rowers on the river. Heard several birds. Saw the idea of orange more than the actual orange buoy. Swam more than I ran, but swan mostly alone — FWA decided swimming across the lake wasn’t fun and stopped — or minnows Managed to make it a few times to the big beach for a non-open swim club swim. Encountered a drunk woman by St. Thomas loudly singing Dude looks like a lady and yelling, I paid for my kids to go here! Did a final clean out of Scott’s Dad’s apartment and thought again about how little stuff — lamps, bookcases, dishes — matters to others when you’re gone. Longest swim: 5 loops. Swam in the wind, the rain, the bright sun, a thunder storm. Raced some swan boats. Encountered a body, wrapped in a blue tent, on the Winchell Trail — someone passed out or sleeping. Recited Tony Hoaglund water poems in my head as I swam from the little beach ot the big beach again. Endured a few 100 degree days. Ended the month hearing the first acorns of the season falling. Sure it’s still months away, but fall is coming!

wrote about

  • COVID updates for future Sara (1 july, 3 july, 4 july, 5 july, 6 july, 7 july, 8 july)
  • Christina Sharpe and Ordinary Notes and the need for white people to shift from guilt to grief (4 july)
  • Oak Skin — a poem declaring love for a place that sheltered them as they struggled coming to terms with their deafness (5 july)
  • what does it mean to be brave? (8 july)
  • Carl Phillips and 2 forms of swimming (9 july)
  • kestrels and a woman willing herself to run into the cold water with a battlecry (16 july)
  • being in water instead of on it or above it (23 july)
  • the interview: Sick and Writing (28 july)
  • watched read said (29 july)
  • the ghostly plants reaching up from the bottom of Cedar Lake (31 july)

read

  • Less (audiobook)
  • The Memory of Animals (ebook)

for later

august

Visited the UP for the first time in 7 or 8 or more years. Made past Sara proud by taking a dip in the uncharacteristically calm and clear Lake Superior. Later, watched the sun fully set on it. Hiked in the Porkies. Listened to Scott sing Squeeze’s Hourglass as we ran down the Summit Hill. Battled with a uncooperative nose plug and eyes burning from the “no tears” shampoo I had used to de-fog my goggles. Found a way to get deeper and quieter, like Mary (Oliver) told me to. Received the most enthusiastic MORNING! I’ve ever gotten from Mr. Morning! — he called it out from across the river road and the grassy boulevard. Sweat a lot. Experienced a moment of silence in the tunnel of trees. Encountered a big, bloated, dead fish — possibly a Northern Pike, according to Sara with an h, another swimmer — in the shallow water before open swim club. Yuck! On August 12th, put Scott’s Dad into hospice. Felt some twinges in my IT band so created some more IT incantations — my favorite: Icarus trend. Punched some walls of water as I swam across a choppy lake. Ran into wind, swam into wind, recited lines about wind. Ripped off vines that had wrapped themselves around my head, shoulders, arms while I swam. Wasn’t too bothered by the lifeguard shortage near the end of the month until I realized that the shortage meant a shorter course and no saying good-bye to my favorite part of the course (the long stretch between the last green buoy and first orange buoy). Was delighted when a runner passing me said that it was “a peach of a morning.” Felt awkward when a walker tried to fix me up with another runner she sees running on the trail all the time who runs like me and is cuuute! On August 24, sad good-bye to another open swim season and to Scott’s dad for the last time.

wrote about

  • rust, the things poet love to write about: that stars are already dead when we see them and that ponies are not baby horses, and how eye doctors have difficulty understanding what it feels like to (not) see (8 aug)
  • definition of poetry as something that can’t otherwise be said or heard (9 aug)
  • when swimming, I like floating not sinking (11 aug)
  • how Sara with an h told her husband to bike to the wrong restaurant (16 aug)
  • bats (18 aug)
  • some poems to put together: May Swenson’s “October,” Emily Dickinson’s “A yellow lane led the lane,” and Robert Frost’s “Come in” and a field of dragonflies (21 aug)
  • because I can’t often recognize faces, I rely on gestures (22 aug)
  • polaroids, movement, and the illusion of vision (24 aug)
  • delightful dogs (31 aug)

read

  • The Country of the Blind (ebook)
  • Unnatural Death (audio)
  • Killers of a Certain Age (audio)
  • A Good House for Children (ebook — not finished yet because I had to return it)

september

Woke up in September to news that Scott’s dad had died. The next day, drove FWA back for his junior year of college. Congratulated myself for firing up and biking over to the lake to swim. Endured heat, enjoyed Falls coffee with Scott. Couldn’t tune out the construction noise. Thanked several walkers on the Winchell Trail for moving over for me. Witnessed Fall arriving. Swam for the last time this year (14 sept) in a wetsuit in the lake. Buried Scott’s dad in the Austin cemetery. Had fun using lines in a Forrest Gander poem for a treasure hunt. Smelled a lot of things. Taught a class for the Loft. Ended the month with a warm and very humid 10k training run for next month’s race.

wrote about

for later

october

Was overheated at the beginning (so hot that the marathon was cancelled!) and over the flu that I had already had for 10 days. Ran to Longfellow Gardens and admired the fall flowers. Listened to the water gushing, the wind rushing, machines moaning, oars slapping. Watched a rowing tournament as we climbed the Summit hill. Finally felt some cooler (45 degrees) air on October 7th. Admired the rowers on the river. Chanted in triple berries. Ran on the treadmill for the first time this season. Was excited to see (and photograph) a sandbar exposed and stretching out from the bridge to the east bank of the river. Noticed yellow everywhere. Climbed the spot on the Winchell Trail that I call “the edge of the world” because it’s right on the edge of the bluff and before it curves looks like you’ll fall off into open sky if you keep following it. Stopped at my favorite spot across from Minnehaha falls. For the first time (ever?), had my hat blown off in the wind — luckily I was able to catch it before it blew into the street! Felt angry and upset and overwhelmed by the attacks on Palestinians and the US government’s support of Israel. Avoided obstacles — tree trimmers, street sweepers, path patchers, leaf blowers, and young kids on narrow trails. Felt everything glowing yellows and reds and oranges: the sidewalk, the sky, the air. Finished a 10k race with Scott for the first time in 4 years — only stopped for Scott to tie his shoe, sang “Eye of the Tiger” as I ran up the steepest part of the last hill. Ended the month with 2 inches of snow and an unpleasant discovery: someone had cut the wire on the skeleton lights we’ve put out on the front lawn for the past 5 or 6 years. Boo.

wrote about

  • birds (2 oct)
  • the glitter effect (9 oct)
  • a photo and video of how I see plus birds! (10 oct)
  • Loverboy’s “Loving every minute of it” (21 oct)
  • rust (23 oct)
  • the earliest beginnings of a new project: revisiting poems I’ve already posted (25 oct)
  • becoming friends with the pain (27 oct)
  • memorable racers, including the guy portaging a canoe! (28 oct)
  • bats, bells, noisy road work, and late fall leaves (30 oct)

for later

november

Began with some beautiful — clear, not too cold — morning runs, including one with Scott near the confluence. A week later, another loop with Scott — this time, going down the steps near the confluence and over another bridge to Fort Snelling. Enjoyed a wonderful run mid-month — relaxed, happy, great weather — and pledged to remember the feeling for when I needed it. A few days later, forgot my phone and decided to be safe and shorten my run. Ran with Scott to Crosby Falls and encountered root embedded in a sidewalk looking like a python. Gave myself a task related to a poem on one run: stop and take a picture of every bench plaque I encountered. Began noticing how almost all of the street lamps on the lake street bridge weren’t working: their wires been cut for copper. Discovered that the monument I run by on the ford loop is for the Civil War and not World War I. Drove to the top of the franklin hill then ran with Scott to Stone Arch bridge and back. Sang “Eye of the Tiger” as I neared the top of a steep hill. Ended the month with a sparkling river, sharp shadows, a clear path, and 32 degrees.

wrote about

  • all month: girls, ghosts, and a gorge
  • poetry is not a project but an obsession (1 nov)
  • getting down in the muck of making (3 nov)
  • a candy wrapper marching in the wind and loops, repetitions, projects, time, and echoes (6 nov)
  • Susan Tichy’s North | Rock | Edge (8 nov)
  • Donika Kelly’s sun on a turning oak, smelting its leaves bronze (9 nov)
  • poetic term: chiasmus (13 nov)
  • plaque picture project and why I want to be remembered by a poem and not a plaque (22 nov)
  • Heather Christle and how poems make me less alone (23 nov)
  • Wendell Berry and feet first following (28 nov)

for later

december

Inhaled the fresh, cold air. Sprinted across Cretin before the light changed. Was nominated for a Pushcart Prize for two of my mood ring poems. Captured some video of the half-frozen falls. At the end of a run with Scott, encountered a grumpy goose. Couldn’t get a song from “Merrily We Roll Along” (“Old Friends”) out of my head as a I ran to the falls. Admired the shadows in the neighborhood, especially the one from a tree so slender it looked like a pencil line. Enjoyed running in the rain. Ran in shorts! on Christmas Eve. Took a break from running, traveled to Chicago to see my sister and my dad. Ended the month and the year by running on the treadmill.

wrote about

  • sensorial empathy (5 dec)
  • writing and knowing when to keep moving, when to settle, plus water! (15 dec)
  • Seamus Heaney’s beautiful poem, Good Night (16 dec)
  • some inspiration for my February Feels like project (19 dec)
  • shadows and a fun experiment to try: write a poem that orbits around an interesting “fact” (20 dec)
  • a ridiculous performance (running up Franklin hill backwards) and seeps (22 dec)
  • trippin’ and fainting (29 dec)
  • Natasha Badmann and letting go during hard moments in a race and an Edward Hirsc talk (31 dec)

for later