Anniversary

 July 7, 2023

Forty-seven years ago today was my heart surgery in Cleveland Clinic. That makes it a birthday of sorts. What have I accomplished since then? Something broad but not long or deep, a garden but not a road. In some ways everything began on that day. In some ways I haven’t taken a step beyond it. 

Edited D’s manuscript before he sends it off to a prospective publisher. His life was more agitated than mine, with an even greater disparity between promising beginnings and uncertain outcomes. 

Catbirds are the spirit of the garden this year. Last year it was thrashers and the year before, red-shouldered hawks. 

Just finishing what people will think is my best painting yet. I’m astonished by how much luck is involved in painting; there’s none in writing.