October 17: It's Raining, Wisconsin Dells, Nobel Prize

I hear a roar, a high windy sound more like air than like water, like the run-together whaps of a helicopter's propeller after the engine is off, a high million rushings.  The air smells damp and acrid, like fuel oil, or insecticide.  It's raining.

Dillard is talking about floods and rain.  The power of Nature to redefine the landscape with water.  She has seen Tinker Creek revised by summer storms--trees uprooted, banks washed away, and bridges damaged. 

Just got back from the Wisconsin Dells a little over an hour ago.  The drive was fairly uneventful, but, as we got closer to home, it started to rain.  It's still raining and thundering and lightning.  We got soaked unloading the car.  There weren't any trees down, but the wind was pretty strong.  My Clinton-Kaine yard sign was taking a beating, but so were the Trump-Pence signs down the street.

Tomorrow, I return to my normal life.  At work by 6 a.m.  Teaching until 9:30 p.m.  In between, grading papers and midterm exams.  Plus, I have to prepare for my poetry reading on Thursday.  It's always difficult settling back into routine after several days of non-routine.  Sort of like Bob Dylan giving a concert after winning the Nobel Prize last Thursday morning.  (He performed a concert that night, and so far he has not responded to the news at all.)

So, unless massive floodwaters wash away his car tonight, Saint Marty will be back at it, making the world a better place, one comma splice at a time. 

The Swedish Academy is still blowin' in the wind . . .