August 5: Tree with the Lights, Conjunctivitis, Olympic Opening Ceremony

When her doctor took her bandages off and led her into the garden, the girl who was no longer blind saw “the tree with the lights in it.” It was for this tree I searched through the peach orchards of summer, in the forests of fall and down winter and spring for years. Then one day I was walking along Tinker creek and thinking of nothing at all and I saw the tree with the lights in it. I saw the backyard cedar where the mourning doves roost charged and transfigured, each cell buzzing with flame. I stood on the grass with the lights in it, grass that was wholly fire, utterly focused and utterly dreamed. It was less like seeing than like being for the first time seen, knocked breathless by a powerful glance. The flood of fire abated, but I’m still spending the power. Gradually the lights went out in the cedar, the colors died, the cells un-flamed and disappeared. I was still ringing. I had been my whole life a bell and never knew it until at that moment I was lifted and struck. I have since only very rarely seen the tree with the lights in it. The vision comes and goes, mostly goes, but I live for it, for the moment the mountains open and a new light roars in spate through the crack, and the mountains slam.

Dillard is writing about a girl who was blind.  The girl underwent a surgery which restored her vision.  One of the first things she sees when the bandages are removed from her eyes is a tree "with lights in it."  The girl's perception of light and color was dependent upon her blind life, where she categorized the world in terms of every other sense besides sight.

I use this passage because it has to do with sight, and tonight I found out that my daughter has a case of conjunctivitis, or pink eye.  This comes after my wife and son were diagnosed with conjunctivitis on Thursday.  So, my whole family is walking around with crusty eyeballs.  Tomorrow, my daughter goes to the doctor in the morning to get some eye drops.

My eyes are burning, too.  Not because they are infected.  They're not.  Yet.  My eyes are burning because I just finished five hours of grading.  It feels as though my eyes are about to fall out of their sockets. 

I'm sitting in my living room, watching the Parade of Nations in the Opening Ceremony of the Rio Olympics.  Barely staying awake.  And the torch hasn't even made an appearance. 

Saint Marty is ready for his Olympic event:  sleeping.  He plans to win a gold medal.

Just because it's funny . . . If you know "Star Trek"

November 1: The Plague, Tina Kelley, "People Who Live Near the Hospital"

Yes, I have the plague in my house.  My daughter has strep throat, possibly mono.  My son has conjunctivitis in one eye, possibly two.  The school nurse sent three e-mail messages to parents this week.  The first was about strep.  The second was about conjunctivitis.  The third was about head lice.

Strep.  Check.

Conjunctivitis.  Check.

Head lice...Nit yet.  (Get it?)

I'm still healthy at the moment.  No guarantee that will continue.  But my eyes aren't oozing, and I can still swallow my kids' Halloween candy.

I have a poem from poet Tina Kelley that is very appropriate for my situation tonight.  It comes from her collection The Gospel of Galore.

Saint Marty's going to go take some Vitamin C and eat an apple now.

People Who Live Near the Hospital

Sick ones and survivors look down and see
real life going on, presumably unscarred,
the tricycle on the lawn, the garage door open,
the truck on the highway going under
the overpass, emerging on.

From the solarium window the scene below
looks fragile, cinematic and deaf,
a model railroad, an oasis of health,
the people there unknowingly blessed
by the wishes of those who wait.

A great book

October 28: Einstein's Brain, Pumpkin Guts, New Cartoon

It has been a long day.  My wife has been to the ER twice this weekend.  On Friday, she had ear infections and a sore throat.  This morning, she woke up with a case of conjunctivitis.  So, while my wife made her second trip to the hospital, I made lunch for our son and daughter.

My daughter got her pointe shoes for ballet this afternoon.  We met her dance teacher at the store, and, after about half an hour of trying on shoe after shoe, my little Cinderella had her glass slippers.  She was so excited that she held her shoes in her lap like a new puppy all the way home.  She even took a picture of herself with them.  She's planning on wearing them to bed tonight.  (Her dance teacher said that was OK.  It will help the shoes mold to her feet.)

Then we picked up two pumpkins to carve tonight.  My daughter picked out a "super" pumpkin and a "medium" pumpkin.  The pumpkin patch was picked pretty clean, but we ended up with some nice squashes.  After dinner, I gutted them and sifted through the innards for seeds.  My son, who usually wants to roll in mud like a pig, wanted nothing to do with pumpkin guts.  He looked like a cast member of The Walking Dead, trying to avoid zombie contamination.

Now, I am at home, and my daughter is doing homework.  She's tired and more than a little cranky.  I'm also watching Nova on PBS.  It's about Einstein's brain.  Pretty gross and fascinating at the same time.  It's the public television version of a Halloween special, I think.  I had no idea that Einstein's brain was removed illegally and chopped into 40 blocks.  The guy who did the autopsy actually took pictures of Einstein's brain after it was removed, before he diced and sliced it.  When he eventually left Princeton, he took the brain with him.  Einstein's brain travelled all over the Midwest of the United States.  When Dr. Igor, the brain thief, died, Einstein's brain was returned to Princeton, where it is kept under lock and key these days.

Yes, I am tired.  Yes, I find pictures of a dissected brain more than a little disgusting.  Yes, I am ready to go to bed.  Yes, I want to go to sleep and not get up for about two or three days.  I wonder if Einstein ever got this tired.  I'm sure he did, but, when Einstein's head hit the pillow, he probably counted prime numbers or light years or abstract algebraic equations.  When I finally go to bed tonight, I will think about Bugs Bunny or Tweety Bird.  I am not Albert Einstein.

Marty is just a tired saint, facing another week of labor, with trick-or-treating thrown in for fun.

Confessions of Saint Marty