It is strange that She should have picked me up today after, first, so many years on her shelves, and more recently, on the seat next to the toilet. She bought me, perhaps, four or five years ago, recommended, if I remember correctly by a teacher or mentor, along with a series of proposed readings. Continue reading
WHITE EYE-LINER
I remember exactly where I came from, even though it was so many years ago. It was part of the chain stores in Spain called “El Corte Inglés” in the small city of Murcia. I had seen Her come in, drift by the stand where I was exhibited, take a disinterested glance at the fake jewelry display and then decidedly, as if suddenly remembering something she wanted, head for the make-up department. Continue reading
THE WALLET
The sky overhead was painfully blue as only the Madrid sky can be; not even a wisp of cloud blemished its blueness. The sun beat down on the pavement, blinding visitors and natives alike as they wandered about La Puerta del Sol, Madrid’s central square. 
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CHANGE OF PACE
I have no idea in what year I wrote the following (it is written on an electric 
typewriter therefore it’s from pre-computer times!) although I do remember that one day a silly phrase came to mind and I recalled the poem “The Jabberwocky” which I had read in junior high school.
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AS THE BIRD FLIES, SO COMETH THE SPRING
Today I found myself singing an oldie way back from 1957. Pat Boone was the crooner and the song When the Swallows Come Back to Capistrano. Boy! Does that bring back memories and fill the heart with nostalgia. All because in Salies it is time for the cranes to fly over on their migration back north and fly they did!
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REASSESSMENT
February 22nd is George Washington’s Birthday; it is also Luis Buñuel’s (the Spanish movie director) birthday. Andddddddddd it is my son’s birthday: number forty-eight. 
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SIBERIA IN SALIES
Today, the temperature finally rose above 0º C and stayed there. It even seemed warm after ten days not only below 0ºC, but sometimes as 
much as 11º below. That is the coldest I remember feeling in my whole life.
HAVING THE COCKROACH
French is entertaining sometimes especially concerning expressive phrases. If someone is really bothering you, you can say “she breaks my feet” (me casse les pieds) and when you are feeling down it is “having the cockroach” (j’ai le cafard). 
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FREE FLOATING
Strange… I was going to say rootless, but suddenly the term above came to me and it sounded much truer. It was something I realized on Sunday, when Kiwi-san and I went for lunch and a game of Scrabble to a friend’s house. Continue reading
THINKING
“You can’t let go of a stressful thought,
because you didn’t create it in the first place.
A thought just appears. You are not doing it.
You can’t let go of what you have no control over.
Once you have questioned the thought,
you don’t let go of it, it lets go of you.”
(Byron Katie, A Thousand Names for Joy)
Thinking is something we can’t help doing; it just happens; there is nothing we can do about it. Oh yes, one can meditate and apparently there are instants where thought is not, but what has happened is that we have taken our attention elsewhere and it no longer registers thought. Continue reading
Writing a life 