21-JUL-2010
Waiting for the storm....
Weather is a great metaphor for life - sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad, and there's nothing much you can do about it but carry an umbrella and time is a storm in which we are all lost.
Lord Byron said poetically:
“Be thou the rainbow in the storms of life.
The evening beam that smiles the clouds away,
and tints tomorrow with prophetic ray.”
I’m neither a poet, nor a smart lady...
I like the wind, the dark cloud rolling over the sky like restive rams.
I like the hope of a refreshing rain ready to fight the hot army of summer.
20-JUL-2010
Splash....
The water is your friend.
You don't have to fight with water, just share the same spirit as the water, and it will help you move
Don't wait for your ship to come in - swim out to it
Live in the sunshine, swim the sea, drink the wild air.
When the earth floods from global warming, the swimmers will rule the world.
19-JUL-2010
Elvis’ walk over the roof...
Only recently I have known that this silent and nicely disquieting black cat is called Elvis.
I had been used to find him roaming over my home, coming from his mysterious abode through the roof.
He didn’t disturb, he simply came in, from the window, took a tour around with the wonderful imperturbable disdainful look which only cat have, occasionally, if he was particularly in friendly mood, approached to sniff at my hand , but obviously he could not tell me his name , which probably he ignored too.
Then once, while I was looking at him, all absorbed in his phlegmatic and noble solitary walks on the roof tiles, a neighbour told me
“Does Elvis come also inside your home?”
"A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere."
~Groucho Marx~
17-JUL-2010
Like sea anemones in the sky...
Suddenly I heard the shots, and then I smelled the smoke and then the dark veil of night was lit up like in a joyful thunderstorm.
They were so close, practically over the roof tops of my street, unexpected...
Also the people sitting at the sidewalk cafe downstairs were surprised in a delightful way and they cried merrily “OHHHHH!”
Everybody likes fireworks; they wake up the child who still exists inside every adult...
I climbed up on my windowsill in a privileged position.
“Damn, where is my camera, where is my camera...”
I thought they were like sea anemones of light swimming in the sky.
Just for the little story, they celebrated the 35th anniversary of a local rock festival
17-JUL-2010
Eulogy of idleness.
I feel like a female, Swiss contemporary version of Ilya Ilyich Oblomov.
Oblomov, as surely you know, is the main character of the most famous novel by Ivan Goncharov.
Set at the beginning of the nineteenth century, before the ideal of industrious modern man, when idleness was still looked upon by Russia's serf-owning rural gentry as a plausible and worthy goal, there was Oblomov. Indolent, inattentive, incurious, given to daydreaming and procrastination—indeed, given to any excuse to remain horizontal—Oblomov is hardly the stuff of heroes.
Yet, he is impossible not to admire.
He is forgiven for his weakness and beloved for his shining soul.
Someone has even compared Oblomov to Hamlet for answering “ No” to the fatal and famous question “ To be or not to be?”
I have not the titles to get deeper in this literary matter, but I can simply feel a deep sympathy for Oblomov, who probably had to cope with hot summers too.
All what is wise to do today is to do nothing active and to laze quietly, just daydreaming, brain don’t perspire even when it works.
14-JUL-2010
The cat who liked me too much to allow me to take a photo of her...
This cat, a lady cat, lives in a small village where we often go in the morning to buy bread (the best baker of the area!) or to have a cup of coffee and a croissant in a local easy-going cafe, which has a calm and flowered terrace.
There is not any danger for cats to stroll freely and at their pleasure in the village streets.
This one, who usually spends her happy feline life lazing philosophically on a wicker chair in front of the door of what I suppose, must be her home ( I cannot say her owners’ home, cats ,as it’s well known, have no owners, they have just human partners), for unknown reasons has an enthusiastic liking for me.
She usually doesn’t pay absolutely any attention to people, or simply avoid to be caressed by good-willing passers-by, with a disdaining and a little scornful movement.
But when she sees me she run to me to rub herself against my legs.
This display of benevolence honours me, but on the other side it prevents me from taking photos of the cat, as I’d like, because she comes immediately too close to me.
I took that this morning I could manage, because she seemed to be sleepy and I had the presumption to be quicker than her in my reaction....
No hope to have a gracious shot of an elegant cat curled up on a wicker chair among flower pots...
All what I could have, trying to be quick is a kind of snapshot of a furry bullet.
12-JUL-2010
Wind...
In the late afternoon, a little after seven, it was like if someone had suddenly opened a big window in the sky and all the energy of repressed wind could go through.
A moment before there was only the stagnant calm of a sultry hot summer day, all seemed to be motionless, as if the slighted movement could make even more difficult to breathe.
And a moment after the wind started howling and running along all the surfaces, nearly in all directions.
The birds had to change their rhythm of flight and seemed astonished.p>
The lake reacted like an old tiring horse which makes a sudden effort to gallop under a lash.
The frantic fingers of the wind ripped away from the roof all the pieces of moss and threw then into my home through the open windows, which had started slamming.
It was absolutely beautiful, noisy and wild.
12-JUL-2010
Secret garden...
"...Our house is taken in possession
By him, while he enjoys a rest.
July, with summer air and thunder-
He is our temporary guest.
July, who scatters from his pockets
The fluff of blow-balls in a cloud,
Who enters through the open window,
Who chatters to himself aloud,
Unkempt, untidy, absent-minded,
Soaked through with smell of dill and rye,
With linden-blossom, grass and beet-leaves,
The meadow-scented month July."
~Boris Pasternak~
11-JUL-2010
Sunflowers don't need any caption...
This photo doesn’t need any caption, it’s impossible to misunderstand...
It's a summer morning; this is a detail of sunflowers field.
I won’t bore anyone today with my useless lucubrations
10-JUL-2010
It's a sunrise - The sun feels hot too....
Mr. Sun felt hot, it might sound like a paradox, since the source of heat was Mr. Sun himself, I cannot explain this peculiar features of stars’ temper, they are capricious characters, I only know that even Mr. Sun felt hot and his face was all red and swollen and he really didn’t feel like getting up, he wished to keep on sleeping on the soft mattress of the night, lazy and without any responsibility.
You’ll tell me, he never sleeps in reality because while we don’t see him where we live, he’s on the other side of the earth doing his job for people who live there.
You might be right rationally, of course, but, believe me; stars often have their private life in parallel dimensions.
I can tell you for sure only what he thought when he had to make an effort to come out among the tangle of morning mist which stuck on him making his movement goofy and slow.
He was not happy at all, he felt tired and hot and he had the impression to perspire, but, being the sun, all the droplets immediately got dry and he had not this relief either.
“Would it be really so tragic if I went back to sleep right now? – He thought -They will get scared; some fanatics will start screaming nonsense about Armageddon; they’ll be upset, but tomorrow I’ll be at work as usual once again and they’ll quickly forget their temporary discomfort...”
The moon, that was nearly completely new in that very day, even though she remained very old (another astronomical paradox) heard Mr. Sun mumbling and whispered to him:
“It’s your problem, my dear, but remember that in the present economical crisis, when one has a secure job it’s sensible trying to keep it. I know a lot of unemployed stars, who would be happy to be immediately engaged at your place...”
“Ah damn! – Mr. Sun sighted – you are right!”
He tore the curtain of mist and rose.