Month: September 2017

Caveat: Library Check-out Time

Banalities & Journaling

Later today I will be saying goodbye to my mom and driving back down to Cairns. I fly to Brisbane tonight, where I will have an overnight layover and fly back to Seoul tomorrow.

picture

I have had a good visit with my mom, although I have probably been less useful than I might have been. It's easy to get a bit lazy when on vacation. I read some books, anyway. I am also taking some books with me – a bit of a random selection from my mom's library, I suppose. There are these old books on Latin/Greek philosophy, probably from her college days, and a some poetry or such. I always end up taking some books when I visit. These books are well-travelled, anyway, given they were all originally acquired in North America, have spent a few decades in Queensland, and are now off to Korea. 

I'll be back in Seoul on Friday – originally I was slated to work on Saturday, but I think I don't have to, because of the naesin (test-prep) schedule for the middle-schoolers. So I'll have a nice 3-day weekend to "recover" from my vacation.

More later.

[daily log: walking, 2km]

Caveat: Touristic Behavior

Banalities & Journaling / Hiking & Travel / My Photos

Today being my last full day here at my mom's house, we decided to do some tourism type stuff.

We drove down to the rainforest at Mamu (Wooroonooran National Park) where I walked a trail and saw some rainforest and some mountains and a river valley. It was beautiful.

Then we drove to the "platypus park" at Malanda, where I saw some platypi. It was the first time – in all my visits to Australia, I've never actually seen a platypus. So now I have.

Then we drove to the Hasties Swamp, where there were many migratory birds, and we came back to Ravenshoe via Herberton.

I took a lot of pictures, but they are a bit scattered and I need to go through them on my phone. Perhaps I'll post some additional pictures after I have gone through them. For now, here is a quick snap of the cute Herberton post office building as we raced by in the car.

picture

[daily log: walking, 4km]

Caveat: Random Poem #106

A Daily Poem / Book 1 / My Poetry & Fiction

(Poem #407 on new numbering scheme)

I walked on highways made from earth and smoke,
Congealed by time's long thoughtful discourses:
A dreamlike, dark assemblage faintly seen,
Engravings wide inscribed on broken stones,
Tectonic disputations, spoken gaps
Between the layers stacked up deep in dreams,
Abstractions merely cast away by stars,
Untouchable lost ages all arrayed
Like heaven's bland mementoes filed away,
And sun-slaked silt that's filled up ancient seas;
Constraints all drawn like lines upon a map
To paint the present's smooth soliloquies.

Caveat: sun-dappled goats, instead

Banalities & Journaling / Hiking & Travel / My Photos

I was feeling restless this morning.

So I took a long walk in the wind – up to the "T" in the road, which I estimate to be about 4.5km from my mom's front door. So it was a 9km walk, round trip.

I saw no wallabies. So I can only offer an unexotic assemblage of some sun-dappled goats, instead.

picture

[daily log: walking, 9km] 

Caveat: Random Poem #105

A Daily Poem / Book 1 / My Poetry & Fiction

(Poem #406 on new numbering scheme)

An ancient blueness dwelt beneath the day;
and leaves were lifted to the sun and moon
without regard for what the earthlings say:
those moody trees might fly away so soon.
The cool green frog announced her patient tune;
a bird or ten sang songs in answer, then;
the stones partook with geologic swoon;
the clouds were only dreaming it again.
Some grasping stars told all the plants that when
they dared to push against the ground, arising
up heavenward like ghosts in unison;
they'd show the world their strength, uncompromising.
But plants are slow to act despite their needs.
And finally they only hum, just reeds.

Caveat: Wind. Cloud. Flower.

Banalities & Journaling / My Photos

picture

The whole time I've been here, it has been quite windy. The skies have been mostly clear, just occasional clouds scudding by. A sustained period of windy days feels a bit unusual to me – Korea doesn't really have them, for more than a day or two at a time. So it's been a long time since I've experienced it.

My mother makes fires in her fireplace at night, though the temperatures drop to around 12 C (maybe 55 F) at lowest. I'm enjoying the cooler weather, though in fact the week before I left Korea we were having a taste of early fall, with a few nights at similar temperatures.

This morning is more overcast than it has been, with actual periods of sunlessness. The wind continues – the equinoctial clouds being herded up the Tully River gorge from the Pacific – over the sugar cane plantations on the coast, over the rainforest on the Eastern-facing slopes, and over this sclerophyllous plateau. Everything here is very dry. I went out to the driveway and took a picture of an orange flower hovering over lichen-covered rocks. In that moment, I could feel like I am in a poem by Robinson Jeffers, where place is stronger than species or idea.

[daily log: walking, 3km]

Caveat: Always a First Time for Something

Banalities & Journaling / Food & Drink

pictureIf you have watched this blog over many long years, you know I happen to like pea soup.
My mother likes to cook sometimes, so when she asked if there was anything I was craving, I told her I hadn’t made pea soup for myself in a long time. I think I just got lazy, after the cancer thing dulled my tasting ability, and I just haven’t bothered in recent years, since everything I make that I crave ends up being a bit disappointing.
Anyway, we bought the ingredients and she made pea soup. In fact, I already knew it wasn’t something she commonly made – I grew to like it after I was living on my own – it’s not anything like a “nostalgia” dish from my childhood. But I was quite surprised when she announced, after we were eating it for dinner, that it was the first time she’d made pea soup.
It was a good pea soup, I think.
picture[daily log: walking, 2.5km]

Caveat: The End of the Republic

Banalities & Journaling / Media (Texts/Music/Movies etc) / Philosophy & Cultural Criticism / Politics, Economics & Current Affairs

In fact, hanging out at my mom's house, I have a lot of free time. A true vacation, I guess.

So I read books, as I tend to do.

I have nearly finished this history of the Roman Republic which I picked up at random the other day.

Sometimes I am struck by the parallels, culturally, militarily, or whatever, between late Republican Rome and the modern United States. Who shall be our Caesar? Julius Caesar was little more than a charismatic gangster, according this particular historian I'm reading. And it all makes sense. President Turnip is no Caesar, but is he a Marius? A Crassus? One of those guys, perhaps. Study your Roman history – I bet it's relevant.

I think I'll take a walk and watch wallabies.

[daily log: walking, 3km]

Caveat: Do Not Run

Banalities & Journaling / Hiking & Travel / My Photos

I didn't see a cassowary today.

I thought I might, because I went on a drive and walked around the rainforest at a national park (Mt Hypipamee) about 30 km north of here for a while.

Cassowaries are type of giant, flightless bird, maybe a bit emu-ish. Apparently they are somewhat dangerous (there was a sign that said, "Beware of cassowaries: Do not run" – I guess if you run they will chase you).

The closest I came to seeing a cassowary was a group of German tourists who claimed to have just seen one.

I did see a forest turkey. Some random pictures, below.

picture

picture

picture

picture

picture

picture

picture

[daily log: walking, 4.5km] 

Caveat: Grocery Shopping Expedition

Banalities & Journaling / Hiking & Travel

We drove to the BIG town today. Atherton, Queensland, has maybe 15000 inhabitants, and it's the giantest city around. It's about an hour's drive north from here. It's a pretty long drive for just going grocery shopping, but that's my mom's lifestyle. That's where the store is. I suppose I would adapt, but it's really hard for me to imagine, given I have a hard enough time working up the gumption to go downstairs to the store in my building.

Shopping becomes an EXPEDITION. This combines with the need to compare all the prices and choose the exact right brand. I simply don't do this, in my own life – decades ago I decided it seemed to be more stress than the savings procured were worth. In essence, I pay a "premium" or "tax": I pay in the form of not necessarily getting the best bargain on any individual product or purchase, and in return for this premium or tax that I pay, I experience very little stress for day to day shopping. I just grab the things that match my vague notion of what I need, and NEVER look at prices. I still end up spending very little for groceries, I think, compared to many people, by the simple expedient that I never buy stuff I don't actually NEED. And even given that, I hate shopping. I think if I tried to hunt bargains, I would never shop again.

Alien as it is to me in my current incarnation, she navigates her lifestyle quite competently, though. Actually, I was pretty impressed with my mother's driving skill on the drive up to Atherton and back. Her age doesn't show in her driving at all, that I could see – she seems the same as decades ago.

In Atherton I walked around a bit, and saw a VW microbus. I have always had a weak spot for old VWs, so  I took a picture.

picture

There are flowering trees in the background (it's Spring here, after all), and on the hill behind you can just make out a store called "Big W" behind, which seems to be a kind of Australian version of Wal-Mart, roughly (though there's no relationship to Wal-Mart, despite the "W" – the "W" comes from Woolworths, the huge Australian retailing conglomerate).

[daily log: walking, 3km]

Caveat: Bookshelves as home

Banalities & Journaling

In fact I don't have much to report. I am definitely on vacation. I spend a great deal of time talking with my mom, about all kinds of things. When I'm not doing that, I look around outside at the somewhat exotic (to me) locale, or listen to the unexpected sounds of birds. And there are books. I pick up books from the shelves – sometimes books I've read before, sometimes books I haven't read before. She has a lot of history books, which as people know, I read  a lot of these days. I started reading a history of the Roman Republic. Just a random book from the bookshelves. This was the environment I grew up in – the environment was in California at the time, but the books followed her when she moved to Australia decades ago, and so the bookshelves are the "home" that I come back to when I visit my mom. 

Later we will drive into town. This is a fairly involved undertaking. More later.

[daily log: walking, 1km]

Caveat: Wallabies-of-the-day

Banalities & Journaling / Hiking & Travel

I saw some wallabies in my mom's driveway. They were cute. 

picture

I took a walk up to the main road. It's about a kilometer and a half each way – so it's a bit of walking. I could walk to town – that would only be 10 kilometers or so, right? The town has a store and a gas station. Frankly, it seems like a tropical, Australian version of Garberville, CA – which will mean nothing to you unless you're a denizen or former denizen of Humboldt, in which case you now have a pretty good picture of Ravenshoe, Queensland.

[daily log: walking, 4.5km]

Caveat: Southbound in a lived calculus

Banalities & Journaling

So I'll go to the airport.

I'll get on an airplane.

I will fly south.

A lot. For many hours.

Then I will get off the airplane.

I will get on another airplane.

I will fly north.

But a lot less than I flew south. Still, a few hours, anyway.

Then I will rent a car.

I will drive south (and a bit west).

But a lot less than I flew north. For a few hours, though.

By such approximations, as a kind of lived calculus, as a kind of human pendulum bob, I will arrive at my mother's house.

[daily log: walking, 3km]

Caveat: Random Poem #96

A Daily Poem / Book 1 / My Poetry & Fiction

(Poem #397 on new numbering scheme)

The sound of airplanes passing overhead
reminds me, passingly, of summers past,
when airplanes passed like youthful memories,
and mowed the air, and shortened history's arms.
Back to Top