Terra Cotta

They call it Mabon in the Old Religion, aka Autumnal Equinox in the Latin updated postpagan cooptation, or the First Day of Fall in good old Amerikan. Whichever way you slice it, something is Turning. I'm told that Yom Kippur, at least in part, is about turning away from something and toward toward something else. People ritually look at what is left behind and what is ahead. So I'm told.

At this point in my life, it's important for me to take stock, assess the damage, and prepare to move forward and make the same mistakes all over again. I figure you can either have the life you want (cake) or share it with someone (eat it). It's at times like this that I like to stop and take a moment to defoliate the roses.

To celebrate the Turning of the Seasons, Gven Golly and I floated the blue canoe out on Hoover Reservoir for the last couple of hours of daylight, paddled across to the east shore, up to the Sunbury Road bridge, and back down the west shore. Almost no wind and not much boat activity, a couple of pontoon boats, a small sailboat, and a few little motorboats making a mild wake. When it got dark, we went to Old Bag of Nails for a Guinness and some fish and chips.

Up to that point, it was a cloudless late summer day in the back yard working with terra cotta tiles, re-doing the walkway that leads from the gate to the patio. The patio itself is finished, at least for this year, but the walkway was in bad shape.

It was the day of the Michigan game in ought-three that I bent the formerly straight walkway to angle in toward the middle of the patio so it would be more like entering a room. My craftsmanship was somewhat less than permanent, so here I am again, shoring up the sides, smoothing out the sand and gravel, placing earthen pavers about the size of a brick but thinner a little tighter and a little flatter - for a while.

We didn't have the bonfire I'd had in mind, and we didn't drink mead and dance and drum. I did remember to plant four bulbs in a little planter box to see if they bloom. Then I planted several tiny garlic cloves in the garden under the moonlight, hoping some kind of magic happens and plants come up next spring. It's all pretty unsystematic, so who knows.