Vote Screwdriver!

I’m running for mayor of Newburyport.

To stop any further damage resulting from the current administration’s “New for the sake of new” and “If it ain’t broke, break it” policies, I hereby present a ten-point plan:

First: Restore the American principle of “innocent until proven guilty” gutted when Mayor Sean Reardon treated the library volunteers as guilty as soon as charged.

Second: Reinstate the volunteers and the recently “retired”—despite being highly skilled, engaging, dedicated, and relatively young—archivist.

Third: Replace NPL’s head-nodding board of directors with people who actually pay attention to what happens and act rather than look the other way when ethics are violated.

Fourth: Reinstate the Parks Dept. and highly successful director who served Newburyport from 2006 to 2023.

Fifth: Fire any member of any city agency or board who attempted to circumvent the advice of scientists, architects, economists, environmentalists, historians, and other professional consultants for the sake of pet projects.

Sixth: Reinstate one said consultant and provide him with an office aside Frog Pond and an alarm to sound if Reardon’s Toy-Boats-R-Us proposal is ever again mentioned anywhere near it.

Seventh: Fix the green arrow at the juncture of Low St. and US-1, even if I have to get a ladder and do it myself. I know something about electricity.

And that’s just between the time I take the oath and get myself to The Grog for a couple pints of Guinness.

City Hall? I’ll have the place fumigated and left vacant with all windows open for a week before I set foot in it.

Ditto the crime scene that calls itself a public library. Eighth: Demand one of two things from all library staff: Specific documentation of their charges against the volunteers or an apology for smearing them.

They made the charges public, so they must make the proof public, or they are unfit for public service. Ditto the mayor and others in City Hall who have coddled them.

Ninth: Fire any city employee who believes that an “investigation” regarding the dispute at NPL ever happened—other than a few softball questions to a few cherry-picked stooges—on the grounds of gullibility.

Good luck finding that word in a union contract!

City Council? I’ll be inclined to approve what they plan. Sure, I’ll view all plans with my advisor and parole officer, Helen Highwater, before signing off on anything.

But if there’s any attempt to turn another traffic circle into real-life dodgems, I’ll slam the brakes.

My strength is getting rid of incompetence, undoing incompetence, and cleaning up incompetence made by incompetents so incompetent that they get rid of experienced, dedicated, talented public servants for no better reason than “having new people.”

Thanks to a way-over-his-head mayor who equates “new” with “improved,” there’s a lot of incompetence to clean up.

And I alone can do it! As my former crew-leader, former Polish Pres. Lech Walesa, a life-long electrician before he led a peaceful revolution, told me:

“In all my years, I’ve broken no more than two or three screwdrivers tightening a screw. But I’ve broken dozens trying to loosen them.”

Years ago, a mayoral candidate declared herself “here to listen.” Well, I’m here to loosen.

Tenth: I will unscrew at least one City Council practice. In 2022, it held a joint meeting with the School Committee to hear presentations from five candidates for an open seat.

The very purpose of joint meetings is to allow two groups to gain information and then deliberate among themselves before making a decision.

The record shows that Reardon “chaired” the meeting. If so, then hammers “chair” nails: No discussion, no debate, no careful consideration. Just the vote.

To call Reardon’s Newburyport a banana republic would be to insult bananas.

Votes require thought. So, think of voting for me, “Jack the Slack,” as your mayor.

Call it the Hammer vs. the Screwdriver. As a loose screw myself, I’ll fit right in to City Hall.

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POSTSCRIPT: If you haven’t already classified this as satire, please know that it was intended for publication in the Newburyport Daily News on April Fools Day. Someone missed a signal, and it ran Friday. As a result, I am now answering requests from people looking for lawn signs and volunteering for the campaign. A nice problem to have. In fact, considering how the word “incompetence” is repeatedly used like a dagger, the Ides of March actually was a better choice. Just know that was not done in the back, but head-on, in full view.

Campaign Photo by Paul Shaughnessy at King Richard’s Faire.

In the Coffin of Common Sense

On our island’s one and only road to the mainland, we now have signs instructing “MOTORISTS GIVE 4 FT TO PASS”–a reference to a courtesy more agreeably known as “share the road.”

My middle finger shot up spontaneously, and I heard my voice spit out my preferred verb for mindless rules followed by a non-negotiable pronoun for whoever put them up. Call it “therapy.”

Calmed down, I can’t help but wonder about yet another nail in the coffin of common sense. Does the sign apply when cyclists pedal outside the line giving them their own four-foot lane on Plum Island’s two-lane, one-in-each-direction, causeway? Not too many of those, but there’s no lack of cyclists who ride two abreast, one of them entirely on the motorists’ side of the bike-lane line.

In accordance with a state law that took effect a year ago, these signs are starting to appear on roads I frequently drive on my delivery routes in other parts of the state, as far as Erving halfway out on the Mohawk Trail and Hopkinton near the start of the Boston Marathon. These roads are often two-lane stretching up and down hills as well as around bends. In such places, maybe they help remind drivers to be on the lookout.

Our causeway, however, is flat except for a small bridge across the narrow channel, and as straight as the Pesky Pole on both the mainland and island sides of that bridge. With a line for bicycle lanes in both directions, what is the IQ of anyone who thinks that such a sign is needed? Hint: Negative numbers are in play.

Forgive me, but whether that question strikes you as rhetorical or hyperbolic, gratuitous or wild, there’s no denying the point:

Yes, there are times when the proximity of bicycles to large trucks is dicey. However, danger never results from a lack of space between a bike and any motor vehicle if the two merely stay in the middle of their lanes. The four feet will be there, no need to afford extra room. Moreover, an attentive driver, seeing no one close in the on-coming lane, will give much more than four feet while passing.

All of the risk is taken, all of the danger is created, when bicyclists pedal outside their lane–as when they ride two abreast–while on-coming traffic is well within view.

So, here’s a question that cannot be dismissed as either hyperbolic or rhetorical, though it can’t help but sound wild: Are motorists supposed to drive on or over the line that divides us from the other lane into the face of on-coming cars and trucks? Put another way, which would you rather risk: A head-on with another car? A rear-end if you slam the brakes? Or knocking some oblivious fool for a loop?

Of course, I’d hit the horn and lay on it before choosing the last option. If that didn’t get them to move over, well, that’s what helmets are for–although I might ask what such people have up there worth protecting.

If anyone who frequently drives the causeway wanted to make a sign to improve its safety, that sign would read: CYCLISTS, STAY IN YOUR LANE!

If I had my say, there would be a therapuetic “ing” word in front of LANE. And I might add a few exclamation points at the end. Still, I’d be satisfied that there would be no wimpy “please” asking people to be considerate while they are in the very act of being inconsiderate.

Then again, if a such a sign did say “please,” it would serve me as good therapy.

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https://www.cityofmelrose.org/home/news/new-massachusetts-traffic-law-biker-and-pedestrian-safety-effect

The crest of the only bridge on the only road to Plum Island. This may be the narrowest point on the two-mile road, and yet, as the next photo shows, there’s plenty of room for motorists to pass cyclists.
https://baystatements.blogspot.com/2013/11/bay-circuit-trail-at-plum-island.html

The Sgt. Donald Wilkinson Bridge, on the Plum Island Turnpike between Newburyport and Plum Island, has a grid deck like the other two bridges in this photo essay. There is a striped shoulder, and there is sufficient roadway width for motorists to overtake bicyclists. Unlike on the other grid-deck bridges nearby, there are no signs instructing bicyclists to walk.
Photo & caption by John S. Allen
https://john-s-allen.com/galleries/newburyport/slides/DSCF0162Plumbridge.html

Oscar for Best Time Warp

Back in the day–1963 to be exact–and well into the day or two after, there was a weekly TV comedy that spoofed the news, a predecessor to Saturday Night Live that also aired on Saturday nights: That Was the Week That Was.

As someone who never watched much television as a high-schooler, and who lived without a television through all of my college years and well past 1985 when the show ended its admirable run, I rarely saw it. But I recall a few nights when I enjoyed its political satire with friends, particularly when David Frost was on.

This past Weekend That Was had me doing the time warp again.

Like many folks, I spent last Friday and Saturday awaiting SNL‘s cold open take of Sen. Katie Britt’s 1-800-KITCHEN Republican response to Pres. Biden’s State of the Union Address on Thursday. But I was also already counting on whoever the host of the next night’s Oscars might be to add another stab. In his opening monologue, Jimmy Kimmel did not disappoint with his comparison of Emma Stone’s character in Poor Things to the Alabama senator as “an adult with the brain of a baby.”

People from Alabama might be forgiven for yawning or shrugging, “What’s wrong with that?” Their other senator, Tom Tuberville, is now nationally renowned for his use of a technicality of senate rules to block all military promotions through most of 2023. And before that, for taking phone calls from Rudy Giuliani while on the senate floor on Jan. 6 asking him to delay certification. The rest of us might ask which Alabama Republican senator Kimmel had in mind.

Following that one quip, the Oscar broadcast was surprisingly free of political content unless you count the subjects of nominated films, little of which figured in the speeches of presenters or winners. Only sustained exception I recall was the acceptance speech for 20 Days in Mariupol as Best Documentary, the first Oscar won by a citizen of Ukraine. But the spell was broken near the end when Kimmel announced that he had received his first review and proceeded to read a laughably ridiculous social media post from “a former president.” Kimmel had to wait for the laughter to die down. “Glad he’s watching,” he began before looking away from the audience and directly into the camera:

Isn’t it past your jail time?”

This year’s Oscars may have been tame, but the quality of all ten films nominated for Best Picture more than made up for any lack of excitement. And you could make the case that Ryan Gosling’s tour de force rendition of “I’m Just Ken” with a guitar solo from Guns & Roses’ Slash was excitement enough.*

Low points were few. Almost all memorial tributes were impossible for me to read on a modestly sized screen, and the nude man shtick struck me as hopelessly juvenile at the time–although I learned why the next day when I read that the presentation of…

… the Costume Design category [was] tied to the demand the Costume Designers Union is making. Their slogan is ‘You’re naked without us.’

So many high points, that, fearing inevitable oversights, I won’t risk a list. Instead, I’ll pick the highest: 92-year-old Rita Moreno singing America Ferrera’s name and reminding us that Ferrera’s soliloquy in Barbie was the most riveting, talked about, and memorable statement in any film released last year–as was Moreno’s sizzling rendition of “I Want to Live in America” in 1961’s West Side Story.

Friends are wishing that Killers of the Harvest Moon won a few awards or that Jeffrey Wright won Best Actor or that Greta Gerwig had been nominated for Best Director. I agree on all counts, but as a projectionist at a cinema, I had an easy time seeing all ten nominees for Best Picture–not only do I not pay to see them, I get paid. All ten were worthy of the award, and of awards in every category for which they were nominated.

At heart, the problem is a single category that lumps all films together. The result is an inate bias for films that are straightforward, realistic. Satirical films such as Barbie, American Fiction, and, to use a glaring example from 2021, Don’t Look Up are easily dismissed as unrealistic no matter how spot-on the implied comparisons. The Golden Globes avoids this with two categories, dividing drama from comedy/musical. Not only does it give satire–comedic by definition–a fair shake, but it also spares its voters the absurdity of measuring, say, The Holdovers against The Zone of Interest.

Here’s a theory: Had Oppenheimer not been made, Killers of Harvest Moon (which won nothing), American Fiction (which won Adapted Screenplay), and Barbie (Best Song), would have split its seven awards–and Barbie would have had at least three more nominations, including Greta Gerwig for Best Director.

But no complaints. In my book, 2023 was film’s Year That Was. To have its highlight reel one night following SNL’s cold opening on the Weekend That Was was exquisite timing. Had there been an Oscar for Best Impersonation, Scarlett Johansson might have accepted it in character, doing a time warp again.

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*Turns out that Slash worked on Barbie‘s soundtrack. Also, Gosling himself planned for the pink stairs and costumes as a tribute to Marilyn Monroe’s “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” performance in 1953’s Gentlemen Prefer Blondes:

https://variety.com/2024/awards/awards/ryan-gosling-im-just-ken-marilyn-monroe-tribute-oscars-1235938402

https://www.looper.com/1536351/ryan-gosling-im-just-ken-oscars-2024-revealed-barbie-secret-ken-slash-guitar-solo/

A very young David Frost raises a pencil and perhaps a question or at least a point. This is from the British show that ran for two years before emmigrating (with Frost) to the USA. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057789/

Pitch & Bitch Perfect

Was there ever a more anticipated five to ten minutes of any show in the history of television than Saturday Night Live‘s cold opening this weekend?

From the moment that the junior senator from Alabama ended her audition for MAGA Mom Superior on Thursday night, we all knew what the target of SNL’s opening had to be. Even most Republicans admit that it was, to quote more than one, a “disaster.” Her only positive review came from fellow Alabama Senator Tom Tuberville who unwittingly tipped the Republican Party’s hand by saying she was purposefully cast “as a housewife.”

Katie Britt’s response to Biden’s State of the Union Address was so bizarre, berserk, and freakish that, were I a writer for SNL, I’d have suggested having the cast walk onto the set waving white flags.

Instead, SNL treated it as deftly as any of the subjects handled by the best of television and radio satirists–at my age, that would be The Smothers Brothers, Rocky and Bullwinkle, and more recently, A Prairie Home Companion. By first poking fun at the president, the show allowed Biden (actor James Austin Johnson) to introduce Britt “who’s going to help me more tonight than anything I can say here.”

Took everyone by surprise to see–or learn as I did the next day–that it was Scarlett Johansson in the role. She proved me wrong about Britt being beyond satire. With daggers at the start, she spit out what Britt did not say when she cited an incident about sex-trafficking:

And rest assured that every detail about it is real except the year, where it took place, and who was president when it happened.

Hilariously pitch and bitch perfect, Johansson emphasized that list with both voice and fingers that rendered the mention of each missing item an accusation. Not long after she was done, Britt dodged questions about her claims, changing the subject when confronted with the truth:

The incident she used to smear Biden took place in Mexico, 600 miles south of the Rio Grande, while George W. Bush was in the White House.*

All from a kitchen “just like yours” at a table “just like yours” where her family “just like yours” talks about dreams “just like yours” with a crucifix prominently hanging from a neck just like the one you should have hanging around yours.

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*https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2024/03/11/katie-britt-trafficking-in-sotu-response/72932385007/

https://www.showbizglow.com/news-scarlett-johansson-impersonates-katie-britt-in#google_vignette

A Modest Request

One friend dubbed it, “writing with your feet.” That’s better than any description I ever had for my head-down, lost-in-thought scheming to the tune of a pair of New Balance high-cuts padding time.

As friends who live nearby know, I’m frequently taking walks on the road that runs the length of Plum Island’s wildlife refuge. Some have noticed that I sit for long spells on one of the two benches across from Parking Lot 3 in blessed silence save for the occasional passing vehicle. Or, they (you) see me sitting on the hill overlooking the marsh just before the gate.

While seated in either spot, I’m either scheming in a slower tempo–perhaps that of a duck or Canada goose or swan gliding on the panne–or reading the results of someone else’s scheme, plunged as much into their world as I am into my own while writing with my feet.

While I appreciate the friendly expressions of those driving past, I wish they (you) knew that the last thing I want to hear while walking or while seated is a car horn.

Even when I see a friend’s car approaching, the sound is not just jarring, but ruinous of the mood I’m in, derailing my Amtrak of thought and grounding all flights of fancy. When the car is behind or right aside me, I can feel my central nervous system shatter like a pane of glass smashed with a hammer.

That’s also true of a sudden voice from bicyclists who wait until they are already beside me. And how is it that, now that cyclists have these signs on the causeway telling motorists to give them four feet, some of them barely give a pedestrian one–even when there are no cars to be seen in either direction nearby?

Now that the seasons are changing, the experience of my last few walks–and of my seat just on the other side of this window where I write–does not bode well for the summer that is to come.

If only these friends would refrain from that reflexive urge, and perhaps send a greeting via email or social media or even a phone call: “Hey, I saw you today…” Or just let me know the next time we cross paths–with or without four-foot clearance.

Think of it as a season of conversation–free of noise.

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https://www.yelp.com/biz/parker-river-national-wildlife-refuge-newburyport

Loving the ‘Poorly Educated’

How often have you seen or heard someone ask how Trump’s “grab ’em by” remarks in 2016 did not prevent him from winning that election?

And how often have you seen the photo of him mocking the handicapped reporter with the same question posted on social media?

Both versions are lately being asked with increasing frequency in this election year while Trump racks up landslide after landslide in the Republican primaries.

Hard to tell if this is rhetorical, or if people actually expect and want an answer. To the former, I say there is an answer. To the latter, the answer is worse than you think.

Not only did he not lose any support, he actually gained it–both times. No one offended by either would have ever voted for him anyway. So he loses nothing. Much of the base that rallied to him in 2016 were people who never voted, people who disdain anything that requires thought or attention. Compassion? Ethics? You gotta be kidding!

Nor would they have voted in 2016, but they saw Trump, a self-styled champion of the crude and stupid. This is what has liberals who ask that question so perplexed. Liberals refuse to openly discuss crudeness and stupidity, disdain using the very words, put up a show of “respecting the intelligence” of Trump supporters. With that straight-jacket on their own ability to think, it’s no wonder they keep asking the question.

“Worse than you think”? Yes, because Trump supporters also see and crave him as a middle finger to the rest of us who talk of and strive for better government. Up until 2016, both Democrats and Republicans, despite wide differences, gave speeches and offered plans for an entire American population. Some of us subscribed to Democratic ideals, others to Republican, many to a balance of the two.

Trump’s appeal was to none of the above. Instead, it was and still is to those too lazy or too cynical to be bothered with any of it–people whose most cherished freedom is to not give a shit about others. People who will flock to a “Revenge Tour” and cheer the promise of “retribution.” People who always insisted, “They are all the same,” an excuse not to think and be smug about it. That’s why they hate what they call “woke” or “PC” and the slightest mention of diversity or inclusion–and why they are erasing any history that upsets their complacent present.

Democrats were appalled from the beginning. So were Republicans, but they were seduced by Trump’s contempt for government regulations on business, and so they made the Faustian bargain to take what they want and look away from what they would rather not admit.

Have I been too blunt, too harsh? Am I to be reprimanded for not “respecting their intelligence”? Or scolded for using words like “crude” and “stupid” talking about the people who cheered and applauded and voted for the guy who ridicules the handicapped and boasts of grabbing women when he’s not on trial for defaming the character of a woman he raped?

If so, I’ll be glad to hear your answers to the question that got me going. But I’ll have no patience if you keep asking it.

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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3334489/Donald-Trump-slammed-outrageous-impression-disabled-New-York-Times-reporter.html

A Taste of Afterglow

And I thought potato pancakes were labor intensive!

You may wonder, as I did, just how many dishes are being prepared in the prolonged opening scene in the vast kitchen of a French estate a century ago. Action is non-stop as a master chef–“the Napoleon of the culinary arts”–directs his personal cook, Eugenie (Juliette Binoche at her most angelic), and a young assistant to boil this, blanche that, pour something else, drain yet more, all while moving a pot from the stove to the sink, a tray from a table into the oven, or chopping vegetables just out of the garden.

As will happen throughout The Taste of Things, sounds of chopping, simmering, and pouring serve as dialogue since, with the exception of Dodin Bouffant’s (Benoit Magimel’s) directions, the cooking scenes speak for themselves. Call it a dual feast, one each for food and film gourmets–with tracking scenes as long as elaborate 19th Century menus, visuals that tell the story while satisfying the appetite.

Eventually characters do speak. When Dodin describes ingredients and flavors and textures and seasonings and “subtle notes” to his cronies, you might wonder if the film is turning satirical. More than once, the Screening Room audience laughed out loud. But when he speaks with Eugenie, a love story unfolds.

Takes us by surprise after so much silence in the kitchen leads to an assumption that chef and cook are husband and wife, and even then the relationship is kept to the perifery of The Taste of Things with a mystery as subtle as any of the “hints” in the broth that, as Didon boasts, “only Eugenie can make.” Both sound as eager as parents hoping to adopt when they agree to bring an “astonishing” young apprentice, Pauline, into their kitchen, but the actual parents are hesitant.

Not much of a spoiler in telling you that they do marry, “in the autumn of our lives” as Didon declares. “Speak for yourself,” Eugenie chides him, “I’m in the summer. I’ll always be in the summer.” Indeed, by the time it’s over Eugenie will ask Didon a question that “is very important to me.”

Hard to tell which is more surprising: Her question or his answer. But that’s something of a dessert you shouldn’t have until you’ve finished the dinner.

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Newburyport Postscript: Just five more shows at the Screening Room: Tomorrow (Tuesday) through Thursday at 3:45; Thursday again at 7:00; and a Saturday matinee at 12:45

Both Sides of a Cross

Listen to our side–to each other, to me–and the threat facing America as we know it comes from states already restricting voting, reproductive, and educational rights. Listen to the other side, and it’s from “illegal aliens” crossing our southern border.

The term all by itself highlights the difference in perception. From Central American countries they flee poverty, drug trafficking, and violence, the very definition of refugee, a word that should remind white Americans on any side of any divide of their own ancestors–or ring a Christmas bell with images of a nativity scene.

But it doesn’t, and so let’s ask what might.

Call it serendipity. While checking the Screening Room website to see what time I had to arrive one day, something I hadn’t seen caught my eye: “About the Owners” or, “About Becca & Ben” when you click it. Which I did. And there was Ben Fundis shaking hands with a broadly smiling Jimmy Carter whose other hand was giving Ben a thumbs up.

https://www.newburyportmovies.com/owners

That scene took place in Paris in 2008, but the reason for it was a documentary series, Border Stories, which reveals the lives of people who live and work along the 1,952 mile boundary between the US and Mexico. Fundis–one of the film’s three co-directors and writers along with Clara Long and John Drew–was in Paris to accept the “Every Human Has Rights” Media Award from Internews, a media development organization that hosted the celebration of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights’ 60th anniversary.

May seem like a folksie title for an award, but Border Stories engages as wide an assortment of people that you could hope to meet on any trip between two places spread over three time zones. The film takes us into homes and businesses across deserts and ranches on both sides of the Rio Grande, the southern boundary of the Gadsden Purchase, and California’s bottom line. As we listen to residents and workers from the Gulf to the Pacific, the subtitles on screen keep shifting to and from Spanish and English.

“Beyond a boundary drawn on a map, a border is a mosaic of stories from both sides of the line,” offers an introductory title. Before long, the film makes good on the claim.

We hear from one of 400 Mexican dentists–“more dentists than dogs”–in the border city of Progresso treating patients from as far as Minnesota looking for far-lower costs. Don’t know what those sets of false teeth go for, but crowns can be had for as low as $160, and “promoters” employed by the dentists might negotiate lower prices for a 10% slice–while also acting as translators.

We hear the mayors of Laredo, Texas, and Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, testify that their cities and their people thrive in a co-existence now threatened by the imposition of new restrictions and a possible wall. They agree to a “mutual vision” for their “metropolitan area,” and they estimate a daily passage of 13,000 trucks and 1,200 rail cars. Says Mayor Raul Salinas on the American side:

I hate to say it, but immigration has become a racial issue… We legislate without ever coming to Mexican soil and say, we’re going to build a wall come hell or highwater. And that’s all attitude. I’m an FBI agent, retired, 27 years. I think I understand a bit or two about security. Don’t impede trade and commerce with security. Let’s not confuse both.”

Between cities, we hear residents of American towns who hire workers, and from the workers who cross the river daily to and from their homes on the Mexican side. We are taken inside medical clinics and schools on either side that serve both. As one insists, “When you live here long enough, you realize: There is no border.”

Even the American men who relish their golf course do not want a wall standing aside it.

We hear from self-styled patriots who have moved into the desert with hi-tech tracking systems and their Second Amendment right to protect America from what they believe are criminal hordes. One grew tired of “losing battles” in California before he realized that “a good general picks his battles,” and “what better place than the desert” in Arizona?

We hear from–and ride in the pickup alongside–a federal border agent in San Diego who seems somewhat amused by the irony of his own parents having been immigrants. But this is the good life they imagined for him, and now he’s able to care for them while doing his part to “keep immigration legal.”

And from Brownsvillle on the Gulf to Tijuana on the Pacific, we hear from people who want nothing more than to visit relatives, to move freely between old and new countries just as those of us of European descent have always been free to do.

Put this in the historical context of a Mexico that once extended north and west well past what is now Texas–with generations of a people deeply steeped in the religious concept of love thy neighbor–and the film brings to life one of Muhammed Ali’s most curious quips:

It’s not the deer that crosses the road, it’s the road that crosses the forest.

Border Stories asks just who is crossing what.

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To view the film:

https://borderstories.org

A Day in the Marsh

After a three-month backslide, I walked just over a mile into the wildlife reserve and sat on a bench overlooking the marsh yesterday.

Admittedly, I didn’t set any speed records, but neither did I slow to a pace that would make anyone think I was in need of a walker. That embarrassment was reserved for my return. In fact, I sat for another ten minutes on the guardrail across from Parking Lot Two, about halfway back.

Still, two-and-a-quarter miles is a promising start to a renewed effort to keep what few clothes I have that still fit fitting. When I arrived back home, yes, I plopped onto my bed for awhile before standing in the shower, but I was nowhere near the comatose state I had feared. Moreover, on this morning after, I’m feeling rather optimistic because, right about noon, I’ll be doing it again.

None of this is urgent news. I offer it partly as encouragement to many who share my predicament: Exercise or scroll on social media after breakfast? And will breakfast be a banana with oatmeal or potato pancakes topped by sour cream?

Mostly, however, I’m here–and after breakfast I’ll be walking back there–to tell you about the bench where I sat for longer than usual yesterday. Actually, quite a bit longer than I ordinarily would in the cold of February, but not so long as I do in June or July when I carry a book or magazine and a pair of glasses.

Luckily the sun was out and any wind was blocked by the dune behind me. I almost wished I’d brought the new March issue of Harper’s, but soon an elderly couple came by and I was glad I didn’t. Always sitting at one end of the bench for just this reason, I invited them to sit. No, they were out for a walk–which gave me a pang of guilt for my own walk’s “intermission”–but did I know if those were black duck some 200 feet away on the salt panne in front of us.*

“That’s my guess, but I didn’t bring my field glasses. They’re the ones with the wide, fat bills, right?”

“Yes.”

“Well, zoom in with your camera and tell me.”

The two laughed, “But they all have their heads under water!”

“Well, get ready for one to come up. Can’t be long.”

But it was long, so long I started wondering if they were MAGA ducks.

“Boy, they sure like to eat,” the man said.

“I can relate to that,” I quipped.

The couple laughed again, wished me a nice day, and walked on. I turned back to the duck who kept their heads down. Then I noticed, and thought it a bit strange, that I could still hear the couple talking, though they were not at all loud, until they were well away from me.

That’s when I noticed that I heard nothing at all. The surf had to be down on the other side of the dune. The panne before me, according to the Beaufort Wind Scale, was “calm, mirror-like.” No cars drove by nor planes flew over for a solid five minutes. And there was no sound in the distance. I was sitting in absolute silence.

Eventually a car did pass, and before long another. But even then, I felt like I had attained–without realizing it, much less making any attempt–a higher level of being. On the other side of the two-lane road, three people walked by speaking in an Eastern European language that was so clear to me, I could have recreated it phonetically, syllable for syllable, had I a pen and a piece of paper.

After they were out of hearing, I noticed that the duck had disappeared, soundlessly, and chuckled at the thought that I should thank them for leaving the silence behind. So enthralled was I, that it took forever and great effort, perhaps aided by a string of four SUVs, one with bass thumping out its sides, to get me off the bench and on the way back.

Today, a Monday, there should be far fewer cars, and I’ll be returning to the bench after breakfast, potato pancakes topped with sour cream.

-30-

*Salt panne: a water retaining depression located within salt and brackish marshes.