We went way up to the mountains of northern Alabama, to Monte Sano State Park. No elaborate rituals. No goat sacrifice. Just hanging out in…
Pronounce the dot.
Tag: Photos
Dear Persephone, You are now fifty-two months old. Our family vacation hasn’t allowed much time to sit and write, so in addition to being late,…
I was mighty excited to see the Transit of Venus this past Tuesday. I set up a tiny mirror on a tripod in our back yard, which reflected the image of the sun through our kitchen and down a short hall into my darkened office.
This is called the reflected pinhole method, which is a safe and simple way to observe solar events.
Dear Persephone, You are fifty-one months old today. It feels like it’s been an epic month in your life. But aren’t they all epic at…
Workers of the world, take a break and celebrate International Workers’ Day or as I prefer to call it: May Day. It’s a day to…
Dear Persephone, You are fifty months old today. To celebrate we counted to fifty together. The month got off to a rough start. You had…
So for the last seven months I’ve been baking bread pretty much every week. It started on Lammas, also known as the Loaf-Mass, when Persephone…
Dear Persephone,
You are four years old today. So: Happy Birthday! But also: Happy Mardi Gras! The last time Mardi Gras fell on the 21st of February was in 1950, which was not only before you were born but well before I was born. These dates will line up again in eleven years, for your 15th birthday in 2023. It happens again in 2034 and 2045, eleven year intervals. Beyond that I’m not sure; I haven’t found any calendars that calculate beyond 2050. I don’t know what’s up with the eleven year intervals either. Weird stuff.
So, how does one celebrate a birthday on Mardi Gras? We tried to tie in with the number four for obvious reasons. We thought about the four seasons and the four directions but ultimately settled on the four ancient elements. You know the elements pretty well. After all, they’re in the lyrics to one of your favorite songs:
Earth, water, fire and air
We may look bad but we don’t care
We ride the wind, we feel the fire
To love the earth is our one desire
(The astute culture critic will have no trouble identifying the origin of these sublime verses as that eco-goth trio par excellence, namely The Hex Girls, as seen in Scooby Doo and the Witch’s Ghost. Only a pedant would quibble that we’ve changed the word slightly. The actual lyric references “earth, wind, fire and air,” which of course conjures images of a certain funk-soul act from the 70s. But wind and air are pretty much the same thing, and everyone knows water was one of the four ancient elements. What’s up with this blatant anti-waterism?)
So for this Mardi Gras you masqued as Air, you mother was Fire, I was Water and your virtual uncle James was Earth. Of course reality was a little more complicated; we were joined by an additional Water, played by Catherine, not to mention your grandmother (my mother) who didn’t dress as anything particular but was a most welcome addition to the festivities.
As for this last month of your life, you’ve accomplished many firsts. You composed your first poem, drew your first representational drawing, and sent your first e-mail.
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So much more to relate, but I’m exhausted from a full day of traipsing round the city in costume. Perhaps I’ll come back and edit this later. For now good night and lots of love.
Here I am on my 20th birthday, with my mother and sister. My hair was thicker then. That was 25 years ago today. For as…
Dear Persephone, You are forty-five months old today. It seems like you’ve packed a lot of living into the last month. Especially around the holiday:…
Dear Persephone, You are forty-four months old today. I am forty-four years old. I guess that means I’m roughly twelve times as old as you.…
Equinox It’s a precise moment that happens twice a year, when the equatorial plane of the earth intersects the center of the sun. That’s the…
Dear Persephone, You are forty-three months old today. You’ve just completed your first full month of school. Every day you are coming home full of…
Yes, a month after the fact I’m still recovering from Tales of the Cocktail. Here’s my fourth and final installment. I learned some fascinating stuff…
I’d heard there was a marsh fire out east, but we didn’t smell anything until Monday morning. By the time I left for work, I…
Pistolette is quitting coffee for a couple weeks, so I thought I’d revisit the topic myself. I noted back in March that I’d started my…
Over the past year or two I’ve become increasingly interested in the idea of contemplative pedagogy. This is the notion that we can foster a…
Dear Persephone, You are three and a half years old today. Last year, on your half-birthday, I cajoled you into giving away two of your…
Today was Persephone’s first day of school ever. She’s going to a small Catholic school on the West Bank of Jefferson Parish. I never thought…