The Silken Tent -- Dwelling in Possibility

October 31, 2004 Sunday Margaret, are you grieving Over goldengrove unleaving? — Gerard Manley Hopkins The leaves dropped like flakes of gold this morning, shimmering as they twisted loose and floated to the ground. The cork bush beside the garage is a slash of deep crimson, and the mountains to the north of us are dotted with color. When I drove Lynn back to school midafternoon I chose the long way, Route 441 south along the river to just beyond the 40th parallel at Washington Boro, and then east on Route 999 into Millersville. After I dropped her at her dorm and helped her carry in her stuff, I drove down Frederick to Lee and parked across from the building where I'd lived my senior year. (It was "University Apts" then, a non-college-owned block of apartments for upperclassman women. Now it's "Millersville Manor," subsidized housing for the elderly. The irony is not lost upon me.) I took a different route back, driving down Wabank Road into Lancaster City and then a turn around Long's Park just before dusk. The other day I happened to pluck out of my pile of journals the notebook I kept during this season in 1994. I noted that my young friend Shawn Dugan had called with the news that he was moving to Florida upon his release from the Marine Corps, and I expressed a concern that I would never see him again. Never is a long time, my mother would say. It's been ten years now, and indeed, I haven't seen him since, nor heard from him since a few letters from his new situation. But if he called me up today, my first words would not be Where have you been!!, an accusatory exclamation rather than a question, but instead, Hi, welcome back. I've missed you. I haven't posted here since May. I haven't posted at my alternative site, The Open Page, since I came back from Vermont. Where have I been? Here and there, not writing, not reading, losing the energy and the enthusiasm I'd developed over the summer. Lynn turned 19 and began her freshman year at my alma mater, Millersville University. The water bill has declined by two-thirds, even though only one-third of the users is no longer showering here every day, but the energy she consumed was more than replaced by the energy she gave this house, and I miss her. We went to a lot of her hockey games (now needing two or three hours rather than ten minutes of travel time). Trick or treat was disappointing. The golden grove on the hill across the meadow has been partially but permanently unleaved by an expansion project at the church on that site, and the noise and disruption that started some mornings before 6:30 sapped my energy and soured my mood. I could go on, but why bother? It's time to stop grieving and start moving again. I hope your response will be, welcome back. I've missed you.

October 31, 2004
Sunday

Margaret, are you grieving
Over goldengrove unleaving?
— Gerard Manley Hopkins

The leaves dropped like flakes of gold this morning, shimmering as they twisted loose and floated to the ground. The cork bush beside the garage is a slash of deep crimson, and the mountains to the north of us are dotted with color. When I drove Lynn back to school midafternoon I chose the long way, Route 441 south along the river to just beyond the 40th parallel at Washington Boro, and then east on Route 999 into Millersville. After I dropped her at her dorm and helped her carry in her stuff, I drove down Frederick to Lee and parked across from the building where I'd lived my senior year. (It was "University Apts" then, a non-college-owned block of apartments for upperclassman women. Now it's "Millersville Manor," subsidized housing for the elderly. The irony is not lost upon me.) I took a different route back, driving down Wabank Road into Lancaster City and then a turn around Long's Park just before dusk.

The other day I happened to pluck out of my pile of journals the notebook I kept during this season in 1994. I noted that my young friend Shawn Dugan had called with the news that he was moving to Florida upon his release from the Marine Corps, and I expressed a concern that I would never see him again.

Never is a long time, my mother would say. It's been ten years now, and indeed, I haven't seen him since, nor heard from him since a few letters from his new situation. But if he called me up today, my first words would not be Where have you been!!, an accusatory exclamation rather than a question, but instead, Hi, welcome back. I've missed you.

I haven't posted here since May. I haven't posted at my alternative site, The Open Page, since I came back from Vermont. Where have I been? Here and there, not writing, not reading, losing the energy and the enthusiasm I'd developed over the summer. Lynn turned 19 and began her freshman year at my alma mater, Millersville University. The water bill has declined by two-thirds, even though only one-third of the users is no longer showering here every day, but the energy she consumed was more than replaced by the energy she gave this house, and I miss her. We went to a lot of her hockey games (now needing two or three hours rather than ten minutes of travel time). Trick or treat was disappointing. The golden grove on the hill across the meadow has been partially but permanently unleaved by an expansion project at the church on that site, and the noise and disruption that started some mornings before 6:30 sapped my energy and soured my mood. I could go on, but why bother? It's time to stop grieving and start moving again.

I hope your response will be, welcome back. I've missed you.