October 10: "Bathtub Families," Nobel Prize in Literature, "Lost in Space"

I spent the first couple hours of my day listening to a livestream of the announcement of this year's winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature.  It was supposed to happen at 6:45 a.m. EST.  It didn't hadn't until after 7 a.m.  I never realized that Swedes weren't punctual.

In case you're curious, I didn't win.  It was the South Korean experimental novelist Han Kang.  A few minutes after the announcement, I received a message from one of my best friends.  "Robbed again!" he texted.  "You were the first person I thought of this morning when I saw that.  Always the bridesmaid never the bride, dammit!!!"

Perhaps next year, now that my Bigfoot book has been released, I will win.  In the meantime, I will just continue to love language, like Billy Collins . . . 

Bathtub Families

by: Billy Collins

is not just a phrase I made up
though it would have given me pleasure
to have written those words in a notebook
then looked up at the sky wondering what they meant.
No, I saw Bathtub Families in a pharmacy
on the label of a clear plastic package
containing one cow and four calves,
a little family of animals meant to float in your tub.

I hesitated to buy it because I knew
I would then want the entire series of Bathtub Families,
which would leave no room in the tub
for the turtles, the pigs, the seals, the giraffes, and me.

It's enough just to have the words,
which alone make me even more grateful
that I was born in America
and English is my mother tongue.

I was lucky, too, that I waited
for the pharmacist to fill my prescription,
otherwise I might not have wandered
down the aisle with the Bathtub Families.

I think what I am really saying is that language
is better than reality, so it doesn't have
to be bath time for you to enjoy
all the Bathtub Families as they float in the air around your head.

It was a long day of teaching and work, with very little in the way of downtime.  I did host the monthly meeting of the Marquette Poets Circle this evening.  Lots of people showed up, including some new faces.  We workshopped some drafts of poems and then celebrated an Open Mic.  I read from my new book (the first time I've been able to do that).

When I got home, I was pretty beat.  But then I got a text from another friend:  "Can you see the lights from your backyard?  We can see them here."

So, near 10 p.m., I found myself in my backyard, taking picture after picture of the auroras jetting across the heavens, unfolding like butterflies just out of their cocoons.  And it was magical.

Sure Han Kang won the Nobel Prize today, but Saint Marty got to show his son the Northern Lights for the first time.

A poem from yesterday . . .

Lost in Space

by: Martin Achatz

I'm not allowed to enter

my son's room anymore,

must stand at the bottom

of his steps, call up to him

the way I used to call him

from the front door when he was

younger and outside playing

in the backyard with sticks

and rocks and garden hose.

Tonight, under a bite of moon,

I gaze at two bright stars

in the heavens.  They may be

planets.  Perhaps Venus and Mars.

I don't know, refuse to dig out

my phone to check.  No, 

I'm simply happy to see 

them together up there,

so close, as if they could

throw their cosmic arms

around each other, embrace

like old classmates or war buddies.

Or maybe, just maybe, they are

father and son, separated by

hundreds of thousands of miles,

a divide that would take months

to cross.  Yet, there they are, 

next to each other up there,

so bright and alike they could

be each other on this dark 

night when my son is locked

in his room, light years away.

January 16: I Need a Drink, Poet Laureate, Northern Lights

Ford Prefect is on his way to the pub with Arthur Dent:

He saw the bulldozer driver's union representative approaching and let his head sink back and closed his eyes.  He was trying to marshal his arguments for proving that he did not now constitute a mental health hazard himself.  He was far from certain about this--his mind seemed to be full of noise, horses, smoke, and the stench of blood.  This always happened when he felt miserable and put upon, and he had never been able to explain it to himself.  In a high discussion of which we know nothing  the mighty  Khan bellowed with rage, but Mr. Prosser only trembled slightly and whimpered.  He began to feel little pricks of water behind the eyelids.  Bureaucratic cock-ups, angry men lying in the mud, indecipherable strangers handing out inexplicable humiliations and an unidentified army of horsemen laughing at him in his head--what a day.

What a day.  Ford Prefect knew that it didn't matter a pair of dingo's kidneys whether Arthur's house got knocked down or not now.  

Arthur remained very worried.

"But can we trust him?" he said.

"Myself I'd trust him to the end of the Earth," said Ford.

"Oh yes," said Arthur, "and how far's that?"

"About twelve minutes away," said Ford, "come on, I need a drink."

Mr. Prosser has had quite a day.  Arthur Dent has had quite a day.  Ford Prefect is having quite a day.  I've had an eventful day.  Work.  Teaching.  Getting my laptop fixed.  Finding out that I'm one of the top ten finalists for 2019/2020 Poet Laureate of the Upper Peninsula.  Not sure if I'm going to be in the top five finalists, which would put it to a public vote, but the news was pretty cool.

Now, I'm sitting on my couch, typing this VERY short post.  My daughter just texted me a little while ago:  "Northern lights outside right now."  So I went outside.

It was -4 degrees outside.  The sky was filled with streaks of green light.  Amazing.  An end to quite a day.  

I'm still feeling like crap.  Bad cough.  Tired.  Sore throat.  Sandwiched in all of that, though, are moments of wonder.

Saint Marty is feeling blessed tonight, by friends and family.

March 10: Aurora Borealis, Wisconsin Dells, Bailey's Irish Cream

Before the aurora borealis appears, the sensitive needles of compasses all over the world are restless for hours, agitating on their pins in airplanes and ships, trembling in desk drawers, in attics, in boxes on shelves.

I never knew this about the aurora borealis before, how it's presaged by this strange phenomenon.  Obviously, it has something to do with magnetism and the poles.  I have read explanations of the aurora.  I once sat through a planetarium show that explained the mysteries of the aurora, coupled with a beautiful display of snaking green lights in the domed sky.  The program lasted two hours.  At the end of the night, I still couldn't explain why the Northern Lights light.

It is Thursday night.  Tomorrow morning, my family leaves for the Wisconsin Dells where my daughter has a dance competition.  Since I couldn't get the time off, I will be going to work, coming home, drinking Bailey's Irish Cream, and going to bed.

I've known this weekend has been coming for quite some time.  I thought I would be prepared, but, like a compass needle before the appearance of the aurora, I've been feeling a little jittery and anxious all day.  Leaving for work tomorrow morning is going to be incredibly difficult.  Not to mention being at work and coming home to an empty house.

I haven't missed one of my daughter's dance competitions since she took her first ballet class in kindergarten.  That's ten years' worth of tutus and sequins.  Now, I'm going to have to be satisfied with texts and photos.  I feel as though I'm failing the daddy test this weekend.

Anyway, that's Saint Marty this evening:  a compass without direction, twirling under ribbons of green light.

And the Bailey's . . .

October 8: Northern Lights, Northern Darks, "Carol" Dip Monday

This morning, driving into work at 4:30 a.m., the Northern Lights were brilliant in the sky.  Clouds of green and yellow light streamed across the heavens.  I have seen the aurora borealis before, but it has been quite some time.  As I drove along, I started feeling quite small and insignificant in the face of something of such beauty.  And then I thought, God really is amazing.  And then I thought, you better keep your eyes on the road, dumbshit, or you're going to kill yourself.

Then I remembered my iPad.  I pulled over to the side of the road and took several pictures of the light show.  This is just one sample of what I got:

That's right.  I got twelve pictures of utter blackness.  My Northern Lights are Nothern Darks.  So, if you will, imagine a jagged, dark treeline against a dark sky.  Then, imagine bright fingers of light reaching across the stars and moon, so bright it almost looks like dawn is happening in fast forward.  That's what I saw this morning, and that's what this picture is supposed to capture.  Pretty stunning, I know.

Now that I have sufficiently inspired you with my National Geographic photography skills, I will move on to the business at hand.  It is Monday, and that means it's time for a Carol dip.  My question this morning is inspired by the presidential debates of last Wednesday:

Will Mitt Romney win the presidential election because of his debate performance last week?

And the answer from Chuck Dickens is:

It was not an agreeable idea.  Scrooge shivered, and wiped the perspiration from his brow.

See.  Even a dead Victorian novelist doesn't like Mitt Romney.  I mean, Romney dissed Big Bird.  You can't get much lower than that.

This message has been brought to you by the Saint Marty Committee to reelect Barack Obama.