3.8 miles river road, north/south 76 degrees humidity: 70% / dew point: 67 7:45 am
Hot and steamy this morning. As I left the house and walked down my block, I could hear lots of birds. At some point, not sure if it was because they stopped singing, or I stopped listening, I couldn’t hear them anymore.
10 Thing I Noticed
the light reflecting off of the river, blinding and bright
a male coxswain’s voice drifting up from below
at least 2, maybe 3, big groups of runners
a water station set-up for some event — a marathon training run?
a runner ahead of me in a bright yellow shirt
bikers, but no roller skiers
a little white dog with its human, stopping to poop
a few bugs on my shoulders, but no bites
white flowers under the trestle
something approaching from behind, sounding like a saw. I thought it was an eplitigo, but it was a fat tire, blasting music — was it the music that made it sound like a saw? I couldn’t tell.
This sounds like a fun experiment to try:
One way you might achieve a similar effect in your own poetry is through the cut-up method I’ve described. If you have a few less-than-wonderful drafts, try splicing them together. In a way, it’s like braiding hair: You pull a line from here and a line from there, weaving them together until you have created a more complex structure than what you had to begin with. If your original two drafts are on the same subject, they may fit organically together to form a new poem. But it’s especially interesting if the original poems are very different from each other. You’ll likely have to weave in new thoughts too. For those of you who keep a file of evocative fragments, as I recommended in my first craft capsule, that file would be a good source to consult for a project like this.
swim: 1 loop lake nokomis open swim 75 degrees 9:30 am
FWA did it! Today, he swam across the lake and back again. 1200 yards. It was fun to stop at the little beach and talk with other swimmers, while we took a break. We met an older woman, who loves to swim around the lake, even when it’s not open swim. She said her kids told her she better stop because the fine is big if you are caught. (I think it might be $2500!) One of her responses, Technically I’m not swimming across the lake, but around it. I like her.
The water was great for the swim: smooth, and not choppy at all. Much easier than when it’s windy. It has been fun training with FWA. I’m hoping he’ll swim some in August. What a gift to spend this time with my wonderful son!
run: 3 miles marshall loop, shortened 80 degrees 11 am
A little while later, I ran with Scott. It was hot. We walked a lot, which was fine with me. A memorable sighting: an eagle circling around, high above us, riding a thermal. It took a while for me to be able to see it in my central vision, but finally I could. What a wing span!
The other day, searching for something else, I found this beautiful interview with Marie Howe from 2013 for Tricycle. She’s talking about losing her beloved brother Johnny and the space she had for grieving. These words fit with other words of her that I’ve read and loved and just used in my class. Putting them in the context of her grief makes them glow even brighter for me:
MH: That was really a big deal. I was given this place to be without any expectations really. And everything changed so that the particulars of life—this white dish, the shadow of the bottle on it—everything mattered so much more to me. And I saw what happened in these spaces. You can never even say what happened, because what happened is rarely said, but it occurs among the glasses with water and lemon in them. And so you can’t say what happened but you can talk about the glasses or the lemon. And that something is in between all that.
KPE: It’s like the Japanese esthetic word of ma. It’s so wonderful. The space between….
MH: This is the space I love more than anything. And this became very important, but there’s no way to describe that, except to describe “you and me.” And there’s the space. I make my students write 10 observations a week—really simple. Like, this morning I saw. . . , this morning I saw. . . , this morning I saw. . . —and they hate it. They always say, “This morning I saw ten lucky people.” And I say, “No. You didn’t see ten lucky people. What did you see?” And then they try to find something spectacular to see. And I say, “No.” It’s just, “What did you see?” “I saw the white towel crumpled on the blue tiles of the bathroom.” That’s all. No big deal. And then, finally, they begin to do it. It takes weeks. And then the white towels pour in and the blue tiles on the bathroom, and it’s so thrilling. It’s like, “Ding-a-ling, da-ding!” And some people never really take to it. But I insist on it. What you saw. What you heard. Just the facts, ma’am. The world begins to clank in the room, drop and fall, and clutter it up, and it’s so thrilling.
KPE: Because it clanks and falls?
MH: Yes! It does. It’s like, “Did you see it? Did you see it?” Everybody goes “Whoa!”
It is thrilling to notice the world! To hear it clank and drop, watch it create clutter. This reminds me of 2 other things I have recently encountered, one for the first time, one again, after a few years.
First, this poem was posted on twitter the other day:
Do Not Ask Your Children To Strive for Extraordinary Things/ William Martin
Do not ask your children to strive for extraordinary lives. Such striving may seem admirable, but it is the way of foolishness. Help them instead to find the wonder and the marvel of an ordinary life. Show them the joy of tasting tomatoes, apples and pears. Show them how to cry when pets and people die. Show them the infinite pleasure in the touch of a hand. And make the ordinary come alive for them. The extraordinary will take care of itself.
The space between us, reminds me of Juliana Spahr’s amazing post 9-11 poem: This Connection of Everyone With Lungs
as everyone with lungs breathes the space between the hands and the space around the hands and the space of the room and the space of the building that surrounds the room and the space of the neighborhoods nearby and the space of the cities and the space of the regions and the space of the nations and the space of the continents and islands and the space of the oceans and the space of the troposphere and the space of the stratosphere and the space of the mesosphere in and out.
3.3 miles douglas trail / rochester, mn 67 / humidity: 81% 7:45 am
Ran with Scott this morning on the Douglas trail, right next to his parent’s new apartment in Rochester. A great path! Mostly shaded, off road, smooth. Heard some birds I didn’t recognize; they were very bird-y, meaning their chirps and trills seemed to embody the classic form of a bird. It had rained earlier, and there were puddles on the road and moisture in the air.
10 Things I Encountered
a short pedestrian bridge, crossing over a road, at the start of our run
a long pedestrian bridge, arching over a highway
a helmet-less biker, one hand carrying a small cooler
a fast walker
a speedy runner with long, loping limbs
an adult biker, whose on your left from behind sounded like a little kid’s
only one small, empty road to cross
a runner approaching, listening to music — it was either loud music coming out of headphones, or soft music coming from a speaker
2 guys, dressed in business casual, walking on the other side of the trail
the parking lot at the trailhead, which included: a big sign with a map of the trail, 2 bathrooms, a picnic trail tucked behind a tree, lots of lush grass
breaklight/ lucille clifton
light keeps on breaking. i keep knowing the language of other nations. i keep hearing tree talk water words and i keep knowing what they mean. and light just keeps on breaking. last night the fears of my mother came knocking and when i opened the door they tried to explain themselves and i understood everything they said.
I don’t remember much from my run because I’m writing this entry a day late.
7 Things I Remember More than a Day After my Run
it was hot and sticky, and I sweat a lot
the trail was crowded with bikers and walkers and a few runners
I could hear the rowers, faintly, below
I chanted a lot of my triple berries: strawberry/blueberry/blackberry
oh — just remembered! — a jackhammer and some other construction sounds. At the beginning, one of them sounded like the noise a roller coaster makes at the start of the ride, when it’s slowly climbing up the first hill
instead of running through the oak savanna, I climbed up the 38th street steps to the paved path. Before starting again, I turned on a playlist
as I ran with music, I picked up the pace, to match my feet to the beat
Seven was all I could remember today. That’s cool. I’m happy that I remembered the roller coaster sound. When I hear that sound, I don’t have one strong memory of a roller coaster ride — I used to ride roller coasters as a kid, but I was never really into them — just a swirl of fragments and feelings: that scary and exciting anticipation of the speed to come, the painfully slow climb of the car, the clicking/groaning/turning of the belt louder than anything else.
Another beautiful day! After all the biking yesterday, feeling tired today. The run felt good, but now I lack motivation to write or remember my run. Still, I’ll try. This week in my class, we’re shifting gears to talk about rhythm, breathing, and translating wonder into words. I decided I’d try to think in triples as I ran: strawberry/blueberry/raspberry/blackberry. Now I’ll try to summarize my run in triples:
singing birds serenade neighborhood daycare kids playground yells lake street bridge up the hill one lane closed passing cars feeling tired sweating lots stop to walk cross the road avoid bikes yellow vest trimming trees shadow falls up the steps down a hill music on Taylor Swift Paper Rings lifting knees quick fast feet ending strong check my stones wipe my face breathe in deep
That was fun! Writing out, “singing birds,” reminded me of the birds I first heard as I walked out my door and up the block. Their 2 note song (not the black-capped chickadee “feebee”) sounded like they kept telling me to Wake up! Wake up! No rowers on the river, which was a pretty shade of blue. Admired how the trees along the shore cast a gentle shadow on the water.
Last night, or was it very early this morning?, I woke up and went downstairs to get some water. Something bright was behind the curtain. The moon? The moon! So big, so bright, so perfect hanging half way up the sky over my backyard. I went out on the deck and marveled at it for a moment. The moon, never not astonishing! Here’s an acrostic poem (I love acrostic poems!) about the moon.
swim: 3 loops lake nokomis open swim 85 degrees 5:30 pm
Writing this the morning after. Arrived at the beach: so windy! The water was choppy, but not too bad. Tried to think about rhythms and breathing as I swam. I remember thinking about how chanting words can help in many different ways: connect you with your breathing, keep you focused and on pace, open you up and make words strange which could lead to new (and better?) words, and is a way to hold onto/remember ideas that come to you while you’re moving (try to remember the idea through a few words or a phrase). I thought about that for just a few minutes. The rest of the time, I was preoccupied with breathing, staying on course, avoiding other swimmers, and worrying that my calf and feet might be tightening up. Can I remember 10 things?
10 Things I Noticed
a silver flash below me — this has to be fish, right?
one dark plane hovering in the air, hanging in the sky for a long time
nearing an orange buoy, it shifted in the wind and the waves. Hard to get around it.
the green buoy was closer than it often is to the big beach, so was the first orange buoy
clouds, no sun
far off to my right: steady, speedy swimmers, approaching the buoy at a sharp angle
a lifeguard kayaking in just before the beginning of open swim, apologizing for the wait (even though it was just 5:30). My response, “no worries,” and I meant it. The lifeguards really have their shit together this year
wiped out after the 3rd loop, I thought I tucked my cap under the strap of my suit. Nope, it must have fallen in the water. Bummer
lots of muck and sand and a few little bits of vegetation under my suit when I got home and took a shower
feeling both so much love for the lake, the lifeguards, and the other swimmers AND also feeling irritated by and competitive with any swimmers near me.
No ducks, or seagulls, or dragonflies, or swans (peddle boats)…not too many people at the beach — are they on vacation this week?
run: 3.1 miles dogwood coffee run 66 degrees 6:45 am
An early run with Scott to beat the heat. We ran north on the river road trail, then over to Brackett Park, then to Dogwood Coffee. We stopped to admire my stacked stones at the ancient boulder. Heard some bluejays. Noticed the sun sparkling on the water, and cutting through the thick, humid air. Heard the loud whooshing? thrashing? of an eliptigo as it sped past us on the bike trail. Scott said he thought it sounded like two lumberjacks were sawing down a tree, with one of those big saws that you hold on either end and push back and forth. I remember thinking Scott’s acting out of this saw was entertaining.
swim: 3 loops lake nokomis open swim 80 degrees 5:30 pm
Another great swim, even though it was very choppy on the way back from the little beach. Managed to stay on course with barely any sighting of the orange buoys. I write about this so much, but it’s always strange and amazing to be able to swim straight and keep going when I can’t really see where I am.
Half the sky was blue and clear, the other half looked like a storm was moving in. Later, after we left the lake, it poured. I wondered how much it would have to be raining for them to cancel open swim. Usually they only cancel it when there’s thunder or lightening.
Saw more silver flashes below me. Also, a dark shadow as I swam around one of the buoys. At some point, I heard a squeak. Someone else’s wetsuit? I got to punch the water a few times, when I swam straight into it. Fun! Breathed every 5, then when it got choppier, every 4, or 3 then 4 then 3 again. I don’t remember seeing any swan boats or sail boats or paddle boarders. No music or yelling, laughing kids.
Back in April, I collected poems about dirt — soil, humus, fungi, and dust. Here’s another poem to add to the dust pile. It’s by Ted Kooser. He is such a wonderful poet!
“There’s never an end to dust and dusting,” my aunt would say as her rag, like a thunderhead, scudded across the yellow oak of her little house. There she lived seventy years with a ball of compulsion closed in her fist, and an elbow that creaked and popped like a branch in a storm. Now dust is her hands and dust her heart. There’s never an end to it.
I love his line breaks and his beautiful first sentences. I should check out his collected works and study him more.
3.25 miles 2 trails (long)* 78 degrees dew point: 67 10:30 am
Another hot morning. Couldn’t go out for my run until after 10. Would it have mattered if I went earlier? Already at 7, it felt uncomfortably humid and warm. For much of the run, I was thinking about the lecture I’m working on for next week and trying to work through a problem. A little over a mile and a half in, part of a solution came to me. I stopped and recorded my thoughts.
10 Things I Noticed
overheard: a neighbor saying to someone else as she watched me run by, “I’m sweating just watching her run.”
a bike behind me, very slowly approaching. First, a bell, the sound of bike wheels, a little kid talking. Then, a woman with a young kid in a bike trailer, and another little kid on a bike behind her passed by
at least 2 women chatting far behind me — were they on bikes? on foot? how soon would they reach me? Never saw or heard them again
the steady buzzing/thumping of a jack hammer
the coxswain speaking through a bullhorn to her rowers
the rush of wind through the trees sounding like water falling or rushing or being forced out of a hose
the trickle of water out of the sewer pipe near 42nd street
even through all of the clouds, the sun cast shadows of the trees on the sidewalk…a strange, slightly muted, image
looked for my usual view of light and water piercing through the leaves near the tunnel of trees. It’s not there this year — why not? more vegetation? the angle from which I looking?
the little stones I stacked on the ancient boulder yesterday were gone. Did the wind blow them off? Did someone/something knock them over? Were they there and I just didn’t see them?
3.25 miles 2 trails, the mostly dirt version* 76 degrees humidity: 81% / dew point: 70 9:15 am
*I ran south on the dirt trail between Edmund and the river road. Crossed over at 42nd to the river road trail, then down to the Winchell Trail. Through the oak savanna, up the gravel by the ravine, down through the tunnel of trees, over to the dirt trail at 33rd and Edmund.
A dew point of 70? That’s pretty miserable. It didn’t bother me today. I was thinking about attention and listening to all of the sounds: birds, trucks, lawn mowers, cicadas, cars, roller skiers, singing bikers.
one thing I remembered, one I forgot
remembered: As I ran by the ancient boulder, I remembered to check if there were any stacked stones. Yes! 4 tiny stacked stones, hidden in the curve of the boulder. I saw these stones yesterday too, but forgot to write about them. Seeing these small stones, I wonder how many times I’ve glanced at the boulder and thought there were no stacked stones on it, when there were these tiny ones, hidden.
forgot: I forgot to look at the river even once. I even ran closer to it, down on the Winchell Trail, then forgot to turn right and look. Was it blue? brown?
Near the end of my run, I stopped for a few minutes to record my thoughts:
thought after run / july 7
letting attention flow through you, not holding onto it, letting it go things remembered: the steady soundtrack of my striking feet and my labored lungs because of the humidity people talking loudly in the background trading off of lines between birds and cicadas, no constant soundtrack, in and out cars zooming by, a loud truck, bikers singing what were the bikers singing? ridiculously delightful overheard: a biker listening to talk radio more cars whooshing by all the things I’m curious about: surfaces and how they’re made — who made them and through what process birds chirping, the steady striking of my feet on the dirt
As I listen back to the recording, I’m struck by all the background sounds, some of which I notice and remark on, others which I don’t. It’s funny how much of our surroundings we tune out — like the cars or the birds or the people.
Here’s a poem I found on twitter this morning. Love Carl Phillips!
Sure, there’s a spell the leaves can make, shuddering, and in their lying suddenly still again — flat, and still, like time itself when it seems unexpectedly more available, more to lose therefore, more to love, or try to…
But to look up from the leaves, remember,
is a choice also, as if up from the shame of it all, the promiscuity, the seeing-how-nothing-now-will- save-you, up to the wind-stripped branches shadow- signing the ground before you the way, lately, all the branches seem to, or you like to say they do, which is at least half of the way, isn’t it, toward belief — whatever, in the end, belief is… You can look up, or you can close the eyes entirely, making some of the world, for a moment, go away, but only some of it, not the part about hurting others as the one good answer to being hurt, and not the part that can at first seem, understandably, a life in ruins, even if — refusing ruin, because you can refuse — you look again, down the steep corridor of what’s just another late winter afternoon, dark as night already, dark the leaves and, darker still, the door that, each night, you keep meaning to find again, having lost it, you had only to touch it, just once, and it bloomed wide open…
swim: 3 loops lake nokomis open swim 80 degrees 5:30 pm
A great night for a swim! Calm water, overcast, not too crowded. I swam without stopping for 45 minutes, and I swam straight to each buoy, even though I hardly saw them. As usual, just the smallest flash that something was there. Sometimes I could tell it was orange or green, but usually it was just the idea of a hulking shape way ahead of me, or the smallest smudge of something. So strange.
10 Things I Noticed
no fish below me
the orange buoys were in a straight line, the one closest to the little beach wasn’t that close
most of the buoys tethered to torsos were yellow
a flash of green, then a swimmer directly ahead of me, way off course — I had to swing wide to avoid them
another swimmer, pushing me off to the side. I had to stop and swim behind, then around them (this happened at least twice)
the far green buoy was in line with at least two white sailboats, which made it hard to sight
a plane overhead, no blue sky, only clouds
breathed every 5 strokes: 1 2 3 4 5 breathe right 1 2 3 4 5 breathe left
encountered a family of ducks out in the middle of the lake
the water was slightly clearer than on Tuesday, but not as clear as at Cedar Lake. I could watch my hand stretch out in front of me, but only saw dark green below
5 miles bottom of franklin hill 69 degrees humidity: 79% / dew point: 64 8:30 am
Even though the dew point was high, it was a good run. I tried my new experiment for the franklin hill route (which I first tried on june 22): run 2.5 miles to the bottom of the hill, turn around and walk back up it while paying attention.
recording:
thoughts while walking up the franklin hill
transcript:
july 6, 2022. 8:54 am. Just ran about 2 and a half miles to the bottom of the franklin hill, and now I’m walking up it, and it’s so LOUD. Everything is loud: the rumbling of the rushing cars and trucks above me on the bridge, the cars whooshing by, the bikes, the air is buzzing. It was doing this last night too when I was at the lake swimming. So much energy in the air, made it seem more intense.
The noise of the traffic is almost drowning out all the birdsong. Occasionally it pierces through the heavy curtain of sound.
When I was running earlier, I started chanting in triple berries as a way to get in the mindset [of being open to noticing]. I did strawberry/blueberry/raspberry, then wondering/wondering/wandering, wondering/wandering/mystery, and then, wonder where/wonder why/wonder when/wonder what. I wonder how that would work if I kept chanting it as a way to get into this trance? If I did, wonder what/wonder what/wonder what until I found something that I wondered about.
Heading under the Franklin bridge, I hear some roller skiers behind me. I love the sound of the click [of their poles]. *the sound of roller skiers’ poles hitting the pavement.* click? maybe a click clack? click? yeah. click click.I can’t quite tell. *me, humming*
note: I find it fascinating to listen back to my transcripts — how I don’t finish my thoughts; speak using run-on sentences with and…and…and; and hum without realizing it!
One more thing: As I was running, I remembered something I’d like to add for my class today in terms of wonder as curiosity: I’m calling it, “fill in the blank.” With this activity, you listen for fragments of conversation and try to imagine what the next word would be. I often hear unfinished bits of conversation as I run near others and I wonder what they were talking about or how they finished the sentence that I only heard the first half of. It’s fun, entertaining, a good way to use your imagination, and might lead to a story or a poem.
Here are 2 things I want to archive from twitter: a poem by Wendell Berry and a quote from Mary Ruefle, and one thing I heard from Scott about creativity and dyslexia:
1
To Know the Dark/ Wendell Berry
To go in the dark with a light is to know the light. To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight, and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings, and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.
2
John Ashbery, in an interview… : “I waste a lot of time. That’s part of the [creative process] ….The problem is, you can’t really use this wasted time. You have to have it wasted. Poetry disequips you for the requirements of life. You can’t use your time.” — Mary Ruefle in Madness, Rack, and Honey
note: I’m a little confused by this notation but I assume it means that Mary Ruefle is quoting John Ashbery in her quote?
3
An article to check out about how people with dyslexia might think more creatively: Dyslexia Helped Evolutionary Survival of Humans, Research suggest. As with most poplular reporting on scientific research, I want to find the original study that inspired this pop article for Newsweek. A few lines caught my eye, including:
Schools, academic institutes and workplaces are not designed to make the most of explorative learning.
But we urgently need to start nurturing this way of thinking to allow humanity to continue to adapt and solve key challenges.
Yes, we need to radically rethink what skills are taught/learned if we’re going to survive the 21st century!
swim: 1 small loop cedar lake open swim 80 degrees 6:00 pm
Swam across the lake with my 19 year old son! We’ve been practicing and building up his endurance for the last couple of weeks. Today he didn’t seem to have any problem swimming across and back. Hooray! It was fun to swim with him.
addendum: returning to this post a day later — Besides swimming with FWA, one of the best things about swimming at Cedar Lake last night was how clear the water was. It wasn’t absolutely clear, where you could see all the way to bottom 50 feet below, but it was clear enough that I could my legs and hands under the water (they were glowing white) and FWA as he did the breast-stroke. Then, as we left the beach, we both noticed the vegetation below us, growing up from some bottom that stretched endlessly and invisibly beneath us.
4.1 miles minnehaha falls and back 72 degrees humidity: 97% / dew point: 70! 11:00 am
Scott and I were supposed to run the Red, White, and Boom 4 mile race this morning, but they cancelled it because of bad weather (thunderstorms). After the storm, which wasn’t really that bad, at least here in south Minneapolis, I decided to go out and run my 4 miles. It was hot and sticky and the dew point was terrible, but I had a good run. I was inspired by Jorie Graham’s line from her poem, “All”:
After the rain stops you can hear the rained-on.
When I was running, I couldn’t quite think of the line; I didn’t remember it being specific to hearing, so I tried to notice all evidence — visual, aural, etc — of the rained-on.
10 Things: Evidence of the Rained-on
sound: a constant drip drip drip
branches of trees and flowers bent down, heavy with rain
running too close to the vines on the side of the trail, getting my shorts wet
running under some dripping trees, 1: feeling like it’s raining again
running under some dripping trees, 2: hearing a loud ping ping ping
my feet striking the grit makes a deeper, heavier sound than when the grit/dirt is dry
the slick whoosh of wet tires
the roar of the falls, the rush in the ravine
puddles on the path, and on the edge between the sidewalk and the road
sometimes the grass was beaded with drips, othertimes it squished under my feet
Around the 5k point, I stopped to record some thoughts into my phone. Here’s a transcript:
I had a thought about next week’s lecture, which is on wonder and delight. I was thinking about this idea of wonder as knowing and 2 important moments of it, as least for me.
`There’s the wonder and curiosity, where you wonder about something because you don’t know about it, and there’s this kind of magical time before you find out what it is — there’s room for all these possibilities. Of course, what you find out that it is, isn’t necessarily what it actually is, but what we’ve determined it is. This is the moment of possibility. It’s important to not shut this down, to leave room for speculating and imagining possibilities.
When you wonder about something and then go in search of answers for your questions, and instead of delivering certainty to you, it just raises more questions, and enables you to see that what you thought was magical and amazing is even moreso. In fact, learning things, becoming more familiar with them, doesn’t have to make them boring and settled. It can open up more questions and doors into wondering about them.