Pastoral

On the one hand, it must be fun to carve a whole new road through the hills in just one day, but on the other hand, I would rather these noisy, earth chewing beeping behemoths were in Nepal rescuing people. I realize that the logistics of this vision are probably impossible, The earthquake there has done more than bulldozers can fix, and  Mother Nature has certainly struck a blow on people who have devoted their lives to living in harmony  with her. The delicate balance that they have forged over the generations has certainly been rent asunder and my heart goes out to the people of Nepal as they struggle to come to grips with what has just happened there.

Ozzie and I were out early this morning and the mist was thick. We didn't see the scar in the earth until we came upon the newly erected fence blocking further progress. I couldn't help noticing the redwing blackbirds, perched as usual atop the bushes next to the creek, its strange metallic call almost drowned out by the approaching grinding and beeping. We  beat a hasty retreat to our quiet little Wildwood enclave.


Which turned out to have its own demons lurking in the form of a locked up/locked out computer. Two hours on the phone with "Richard" and "Andy" and a considerable amount of cash finally put that right, but not before I spent a lot of time wondering, why on earth do these smart people in Bangalore,who spend their days patiently explaining to clueless people like me how to turn their computers over to them so that they can fix the problems remotely, not just use their real names? I can't decide whether calling an intelligent, bilingual young Indian man "Richard" is demeaning to him or to me, but I'm pretty convinced that its demeaning to somebody. Anyway all is fixed now, and my apologies to those of you who got caught in the crossfire (or do I mean put on the back burner?) I'll try to catch up….