Another weekend, a new Fall

This weekend started with a trip over to Cissie's home to sit under the trees and among the bushes and relax in the coolness of the beginning of Autumn. Everything is relatively dry, but the breezes are beginning to cool and it was rather delightful to sit on her porch among the evergreens and relax. Afterward, we drove down to Slice's pizza place and had a beer, salad and a couple of slices of pizza. The pizza slices are so huge there that we were forced to take some home for the next day. But, there again, it was pleasant to sit around a cast iron outdoor table and watch the cars drift by up and down Solomon Street and the young high school students walk over down to the stadium for the Friday night football game between Spalding And Peach County. After we left Cissie's house and it finally became dark, Cindy and I stopped by Brewsters and ordered pumpkin and apple-pie flavored ice cream. It was delightful and we finally got to bed.

The next day, Cindy and I were going to pick up Cissie and drive over to Concord for a photographic exhibit. Unfortunately, Cindy didn't feel up to it and so I drove over to Concord for a loan closing. The drive through the country was pleasant, the farmland rolling along as I drove to the Borrower's house. I met with the borrowers and their daughter gave me a card she had drawn for me. That was a first. I thanked her for the card and brought it home for Cindy's inspection.

That afternoon, Cindy and I travelled up to Cobb County to watch the Atlanta Opera perform Puccini's "Turandot." Turandot is an opera composed in the twenties by Puccini and was incomplete when he died. Another composer completed the opera after he died. The story of the opera is set in China. The daughter of the Emperor, Turandot, had decided that any man who would dare to attempt to court her should answer three riddles. If he failed, the man would be executed. The scene at the beginning of the opera is decorated with pikes with the heads of her potential suitors stuffed on top, these pikes interposed throughout the scenery. The first act shows the execution of one of these suitors and the singers in the crowd are about as bloodthirsty as the princess.

However, the hero, Calaf, ignores the bloodthirstiness of the Princess and wants to court her. For some unknown reason, the inscrutable oriental is able to look beyond the crazy bloodthirstiness of the princess and wants to marry her despite her character idiosyncrasies.

The second act shows the hero answering the riddles of the princess and, in turn, giving her a riddle to solve: to find out his name before dawn breaks. If she does, he dies. If she doesn't, she must marry him. The third act begins with Calaf lying in a forest or garden, listening to Peking awaken to try to find out the name of the suitor. He sings the only major aria from the opera: "nessun dorma." In this aria, he sings a plea to the awakened citizens of Peking, trying to get everyone to be quiet so that his beloved will have to marry him.

Nevertheless, despite the torture of his former beloved servant and her subsequent suicide, the hero is left with the princess, where he courts her and kisses her. This is the part of the opera which stretches the imagination. You are required to believe that with very little prompting and just one kiss, the princess can change all of her preconcieved notions about men and fall in love with him. When this kiss happened on stage and the princess suddenly fell for the suitor, the crowd at the opera tittered at the silliness of the story.

The opera ends with the princess and the suitor brought together in love. Love is the ultimate weapon which melts the heart of the ice princess and brings her into the relationship with the suitor. Overall, the music and the pageantry and show of the opera was very nice. Usually, I suppose, you are not supposed to look to an opera for a great plot and reasonable, believable story. It is the music and the color and the span of the presentation that grabs you.

It was also nice that the new hall in Cobb County was brand new and shining with its first performance sparkle. Unfortunately, Cindy couldn't walk to the car, so I had to drive around and around the area to get to her. When I finally picked her up, most of the crowd was gone and we were able to quickly drive down to Howell Mill Road to eat at Figo Pasta. That night, we ate a late supper of pasta and salad and Italian wine in the coolness and darkness of Figo Pasta.

We got home about 12:30 and had to go to bed as soon as possible. The next morning, I woke up late and groggy and missed Sunday School. When Cindy finally got out of bed, I made steel cut oatmeal for both of us and then quickly showered, shaved and dressed for church. Dr. Ben Mathes, a missionary from Decatur,was preaching in the pulpit and he was his usual arresting speaker. He spoke about his work and told us a story about when his son, a marine captain, asked him to come to Iraq. Of course he did, and he was imbedded as a "journalist" in his son's marine brigade. When he and the other Presbyterian minister from Dunwoody were looking for "ieds" in trash cans and boxes with the other marines, his son was amazed at his father's courage. Ben said it was his faith in God and the surrounding marines which allowed him to do this. He also told a story about a drug dealer in the Brazilian jungle who had left a life of drug dealing to become a Presbyterian minister, and how they planned to tear down the old drug selling house and use the same building materials to build a Presbyterian Church in the jungle. He challenged us (First Presbyterian) to come down to Brazil and sail down the Amazon on the boat for which we raised money and help this new minister build a new church in the jungle. I would love to do this. Cindy thought Kate would like to do this too.

That afternoon, Cindy and I drove down to Concord and looked over the photographic display. It was fun and we got to talk to Walker Chandler for awhile. He is a good guy, for a Wahoo.

Well, now I am in the office trying to get ready for the next morning. I will leave with this. This weekend was pretty good overall and the coming week has new challenges. I hope we can work this out. I am looking forward to next weekend up in Clinton.

Foreclosure day-October 2

Well, next Tuesday is foreclosure day and a law firm which employs us to cry out foreclosure sales is asking us to drive all over Georgia. I kind of wish that Kate was at home because I could send her on some of these. Without her, Patti and I are going to be driving all over the north part of the state. Hall, Lumpkin, Gilmer, Bartow, Cherokee, Polk, Troup, Carroll, Forsyth, Muscogee, Macon counties. That cuts quite a wide swath through Georgia. I feel a little like Sherman planning the march through Georgia. Come to think of it, I don't think Sherman had to travel that much.

It seems like some of these closings are cutting loose and it would be nice to keep some of these bill payments coming in on a regular basis. Everyone has his hands out; why not me too?

Envy's green bayou in Louisiana

I have been reading a new book written by one of the PHDs over at the University of Georgia, Griffin campus (the Experiment Station, for those of you old timers). This book is an abridged version of a diary that the writer kept when she and her former boyfriend (?) were living on a houseboat on a bayou in Southeastern Louisiana. This took place in the 1970's when a lot of students were "tuning out" to borrow a phrase from Dr. Leary. This couple were raised in Louisiana and went to live off the land in a houseboat in Atchafalaya. They ran trot lines, raised crawfish and chickens and lived off bartering with their neighbors. It is an interesting book, albeit somewhat short (Which is apparently the comment of the writer's former housemate, when she sent him a draft).

The troubling part of this book is the poetic tone of the writing. The writer, who is a PHD at the Griffin campus of UGA is quite poetic in her writing style. It really appeals to me, but also bothers me in the sense that I really appreciate her writing and wish to emulate her tone, if not her style.

Now I understand that the book is abridged and probably a lot of the passages that were less than literary or poetic may have found their way to the editorial wastebasket. However, what is left is quite ably depicted in her prose. When she describes the terrain or the life they lead on the bayou it is quite literary. I am sorry that it is only about 200 pages long.

There was a National Geographic article on them which was illustrated by a photographer. I would like to find that issue and take a look at the series of pictures he took of the young couple out in the bayou and at home on the houseboat.

Well, anyway, my envy apparently knows no bounds here so I will let it go for awhile.

Wednesday morning bouncing ball

As we head toward the weekend once again, I am looking at the business ahead and what will get the week's expenses handled. I am looking forward to weekends in the future with Kate's homecoming, weekends spent among the scarlet and orange of the Autumn in North Georgia. I am even looking toward the opera in Cobb County this weekend. The only part of this which is a little of concern is the efforts of Cindy to get the rooms cleared out for installation of flooring in the living room, dining room, master bedroom and the two bedrooms upstairs which makes me think about the oncoming efforts. Cindy would like to me her mother in this regard. But I would like Cindy to be herself and lets gain a balance between rest and relaxation and the things which need to be done.

Last weekend was nice. We took care of things and still had time to watch (or listen to) a little football and browse through the Barnes & Nobles in Jonesboro. Cindy got to extend her birthday for another weekend and we got to see my family.

I am looking forward to the new flooring in the house. I think it will make our house look nicer. However, I would like to have some time of enjoyment among the leaves and cool breezes of the Fall. I do like the Fall and the Spring. They are my favorite seasons. However, I also like the Summer and Winter. I don't really like to have to pick. There are good times to be had and remembered in every season.

I guess the main thing is to find the enjoyment in every season. To grab the sweetness of every day. To turn the everyday into the unique by keeping your eyes open and your heart available to the things we lose sight of when we lose ourselves in the business of living. That poem by Wordsworth, "The World is too much with us; late and soon" always springs to mind. I guess I always return to the Romantic poets in the end. Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, Blake. Even Shelley and Byron, although they are definitely second tier.

"THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US; LATE AND SOON"

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
The Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

By William Wordsworth, 1806.

It may be cheap to quote Wordsworth, but this poem is definitely one of my favorites, one that springs to mind quite often. And it conveys the essence of my heart this morning.

By-leman: fraternal twins

The stranger of two close connections:
The spawn of two eggs and the second place sperm
Wiggling down the canal, too late for the win
But just in time for the show.
A birth with complications,
Meaning two babies, one couple
A fully-developed family right at birth
And two little wrinkled creatures
Mewling together in the bassinet bought for one
Like puppies snuggling to their bitch.

Once upon a time that second prize
Might be considered the spawn of Satan
And, who knows, perhaps this one or that one
will show the same proclivities
Or the cloven feet, or a billy goat's laugh
They might develop so differently until they've grown
Fair and dark countenances
The good and bad seeds
Come to fruition together
The sins and virtues of their parents come to roost
But sleeping in the baby blue blanket together,
Two little brothers,
Who's to say which angel is not?

Just a passing distinction
For neighbors on a fence
Or a difference of opinion
Between removed kin.
There is so much growing still to do.

Kate the Great

My daughter's on the Dean's List. My daughter's on the Dean's List. My daughter's on the Dean's List. La La La.

I have always been very proud of my little girl. She was a perfect little baby when she was born. She didn't fuss much or cry in the middle of the night. She was a Gerber baby (not literally) but came out so perfect. A 10 on the Apgar scale.

As she got older, she was fun to be with and was very precocious (I think that is how you spell that). I used to take her around on day trips to different places and we would joke and sing in the car as we travelled. It was fun.

Now she is a pretty, bright young lady and I am sure she has a bright future ahead of her. Unfortunately, she acquired a bit of anxiety from her paternal grandmother and me that bothers her some. But that is something she could treat with exercise and relaxation tips. I am sure of it. I look forward to her graduation in May. I think she made the right choice when she decided to go to Presbyterian. She has been a leader and a voice on her campus while she has been there. She has stretched herself and still shown her sense of humor and intelligence.

A new week

Monday was so much fun. It didn't get better until the late afternoon. Even that wasn't a sure thing until I had had a chance to go to the grocery and sit down and eat supper. I had to deal with a borrower from a closing I did in 2004. Patti didn't get the taxes paid for several weeks after the closing and the tax lien was sold to a private company who put interest and penalties on top of it which the borrower didn't want to pay, since the taxes weren't paid until later. Unfortunately, we never received notice of the sale of the taxes until after it was too late and the borrower didn't pay the difference when the situation presented itself in early 2005. Of course, I didn't hear about this until much later. Then, when the borrower and I spoke he was already mad and Fulton County, who bore some responsibility for the mess, wasn't willing to do anything about the problem.

So I drove up to Chamblee and met with him. All the time, the borrower is saying that he wasn't mad at me and understood the situation, but then he called me in my car as I was driving back home to tell me that the agreement I had prepared was short $25 and he wouldn't get it to the judge unless that $25 was paid to him immediately. Twentyfive dollars!

Next up I get a call from a person I had dealt with last year who wanted to transfer title to his sister in California to avoid creditors from liening his property. We made the transfer and I told the sister that there was a good chance that the taxes could go up because of the transfer. Well, now the taxes have gone up, like everyone else's, and they are griping at me for it happening.

Finally, I had a closing last night and all during the closing the parties are talking about the terrible time they had at their first closing because of the errors in the closing documents. All the while this is happening I am remembering that I was the closing attorney on that closing. As Uncle Remus said, "Brer Rabbit, he lay low." The closing went well and everybody left happy. I was able to discuss the matter with Patti, remembering that this would have been one of the first closings Patti did when she went to work for me in Mr. Smalley's office.

The day ended with a final opportunity to talk to Andy Glenn, the insurance dude, who found insurance for us which would cover us all and cost about $400 over what we are paying for coverage for only Kate and me. That was a big victory. I came home with the desire to share this good news with Cindy and she starts griping at me about the bookcase in the living room as soon as I walk into the house.

Oh well, we ate pizza and I had salad and everything mellowed down later. It was fun. It was a mixed bag, but overall bearable.