kronos

The mantle clock I got at an antique shop about 15 years ago stopped working, again, a number of months after my wife had taken it in to be fixed. Despite the rather expensive repair, the clock stopped working, only to sometimes just start up again. Then, over a year ago, it stopped working and didn't start up again. Recently, I was watching the Incredibles with my youngest daughter...we like the movie. There is a scene in the movie, early on, where Bob Parr is meeting with the owner of the insurance company where Bob works. The boss begins a lecture about the importance of all the parts of a company working together, like a clock, "...well oiled and wound tight." I realized the problem with my clock was not the wound tight issue, but maybe it needed oil. So, I applied the lubrication and the click is back to continuous movement again. It's a bit like being home again.

Level

While there is evidence tectonic plates shift and mountains increase in height, weather conditions and water...whether rain or snow...wear down what grows. Geologic life is a pattern of increase and erosion, with erosion the more powerful and sustaining force. One day folk will exist on a level playing field.

close, and only two noticed

I headed off to work this past Tuesday, in a good mood overall, and as I was heading west on Meinecke, I noticed a car traveling south on 67th Street...traveling quite fast. I slowed, though I had the right-of-way, and monitored if the other car was going to stop. That driver didn't stop...appeared to be texting...and I was 2-feet short of a collision. I've not told anyone of this incident, other than in my journal and now this blog. Much exists in life that few to none notice.

what would I sacrifice

the way to the US for a Central American is horribly dangerous. our government refuses salvadoran immigrants. we, a nation of immigrants, are restrictive and elitist. I cannot live at peace with the way things are, and am helpless to instigate change. I feel like when i was on the junior school bus and bullied by steve s., the bully who found my head a sufficient target for his book and fist. in another life, i would have feared less and defended more than my perception of rules. I look forward to reading enrique's journey, and wondering about what it is like to be more of an outsider than i already was

what matters

started listening to the Vice Presidential debate tonight...quickly grew irritated by the blathering and apparent inability to get questions answered. compared what I watched on the television to what I watched at my youngest daughter's school playground: two 4-year old junior kindergarten students debating height. the kindergarten students were more coherent; their debate mattered more, to them, and to me.

Curious

I am quite similar to my father

en guinda

In 1999 I traveled to a small village in northern El Salvador and met a young woman who wrote a brief history of the Salvadoran civil war. Returning home, I had that history translated by my son's high school spanish language class. One phrase in the history was a bit confusing, but was finally translated as "wild cherry tree". The history included reference to the young woman's brother who was reportedly born under a wild cherry tree..."en guinda". Returning to that village 12 years later, I visited that young woman...now 30, married with a young son, and lived for a few days with her parents and her extended family. I rekindled the strong affinity I have for this family and for the people in that small village...all survivors of the Salvadoran war. I remarked to her of the history she wrote, and how profoundly it had affected me.

Researching El Salvador after this latest visit, I came across a recently published book on the campesinos...peasants...of El Salvador, and how they organized themselves to handle the impact of the civil war. I was horrified and awe-struck to discover that "en guinda" has nothing to do with wild cherry trees, but was in fact a very organized and complex process whereby the campesinos in northern El Salvador literally lived "on the run" as a way to manage the impact of the war.

I want to go back to that village and re-thank that young woman for her history, and find a better way to express my incredible dismay and respect and awe and affinity for something she shared of her life, and her family life, and her people...now supported by a North American writer's book about en guinda.