Around Here

Many people talk about unconditional love, including Oprah and Dr. Phil, as if it were something that human beings are capable of, the pious cant and personal divinization marketed by pop spirituality notwithstanding. Mere love, apparently, doesn't quite get us there any more. Those pesky conditions do spring up of course, usually sooner than later, often the moment our convenience isn’t consulted. Yeah, I know... unconditional love does have its limits. But that's OK. Be real, and we'll get along fine. "Let your 'yes' be yes, let your 'no' be no." Love, in my experience, is pretty amazing as-is. Steven was certainly one of the most generous human beings I’ve ever had the pleasure to know, asking nothing in return. He plucked me out of a difficult situation and let me stay in the Christopher Street apartment of a friend of his who was abroad for months, no strings, no rent, no problem, until it ran out. And when it did, he invited me to join the ...

I use the coin-operated laundry at the condo, so I’ve developed a watchfulness about quarters, and sequester them from the rest of my coins. They’re kept in a jar of their own in the kitchen. The rest, pennies, nickels, and dimes, go ecumenically in a dish on the sideboard, handfuls of which I grab when I’m on my way out. My strategy when making a cash purchase is to accept change if it is likely to include two or more quarters. So if the decimal portion of my purchase is over fifty cents, I dig into my pocket and tender the change. I suspect this is not altogether appreciated by cashiers, since I assume it’s easier to make change than to receive and sort it. When I was a boy pocket change played a significantly more important role in my life than it does now. Its value loomed large, first, because it was usually the only money I had, and second, because it was simply worth more then. Coins had totemic significance. Personality. Pennies, earth-colored, acorn-common, and imperishably fr...

  My new neighbor Kathy, who turned out to be an avid kayaker, joined me for an outing on Tuesday down the Estero River. We put in at the Estero River Outfitter's launch, where a friendly and knowledgeable salt pointed us in the right direction. map courtesy The Great Calusa Blueway It was a sweltering day. Minutes into the paddle we were enclosed in an exotic setting for all the world like a scene from Apocalypse Now. "Are we in Florida or Cambodia?" I wondered. We half expected a detachment of chalk-dusted natives, bristling with spears, to be lurking around the bend. Dragonflies abounded... and bounded, difficult to capture from the boat. We spotted a half-dozen species, from garnet red to bottle blue. This one had a touch of bronze on the sunlight side. How long before these rivers and trails, their ecologies eons in the making, run desolate with oil and blood and death? I'm taking in as much as I can, while we can. Wildlife on the kayak trail seems remarkabl...