The Istoriaphile’s Corner

Some people say they can tell when winter goes; it’s when their joints stop aching. Others tie the season’s change to the return of tornados or baseball games. Not me. The weather and the fortunes of my beloved Royals are too unpredictable for me. No, I know Spring has arrived when the pollen appears. First there’s nothing… It’s the oddest thing: for months, whenever I go outside, all I see are unending acres of naked branches. The days get longer but the branches stay bare. Then one morning, everything is covered with a fine, chartreuse layer of pollen (trust me, that’s not a good look on a burgundy Jeep.) The cars get washed but more pollen falls. And my nose starts running like Usain Bolt. Of course, all of this pollen happens outside. But signs of Spring follow me indoors. Because the pollen has brought Allergy Season in its wake. Seriously, the halls of my office sound like the waiting room of an ENT specialist or some old TB sanitarium. Cough, cough, hack! Cough, cough sneeze! Colleagues swap home remedies and OTC meds on their breaks. Tissues and cough drops are in everyone’s desk. We’re all trying to stay healthy…

I have an Inner Critic that goes in and out with me;
She’s known as Miss Anxiety of 1953.

I’ve got to tell you, as a dog, I love humans, but I really don’t understand them. Take Les, the female human I live with. She spends hours each day tap-tapping words onto this little screen, when she could be petting me. (That’s how I learned to use this thing, sitting in her lap and watching her tap.) Les says she wants to write books someday and tapping stories onto the screen is good practice. But she’s so slow! She’ll type forty words, then take most of them out and spends an hour rearranging the rest. Then she gets discouraged and takes a bath. That’s where she is now, soaking in the hot water and stressed cause she’s having trouble telling you about the 5k. So I figured I’d tell you about it while she’s in the tub, and then she can take a break from tapping on the screen. But I’ve got to tell you, a 5K’s just one more proof of what I’ve always known: Humans are weird. What the heck is a 5K? That’s all Les talked about for days at a time, the 5K, the 5K, the 5K. That she was going to a 5K. That…

Normally I spend hours writing these posts. But it’s late, and I’m sore from changing out yet another tire (different story) so let’s just get to the goods, shall we? I. Know. A. Great. Story. Trust me, you want to read it. Everyone else is reading and loving it right now and, for once, everyone else is right. Where the Crawdads Sing is a wonderful story about the heaven and hell of spending most of your life alone. And we’re not talking Thoreau-in-Walden voluntary solitude here. The book opens with little Kya Clark watching her mother walk out of her life. No tears, no hug, not a wave goodbye, just a door slamming in their shack on the Marsh. And, once Mama goes, Kya’s siblings follow her down the road, until there’s only a six-year old trying to survive a live of privation and her hard-drinking Daddy. Finally, there’s no one’s left in the Marsh shack but Kya.  And the child has to provide for herself. Kya grows up wise in ways of the natural world if unskilled when it comes to people.  Having no other guide, she tries to understand people in terms with the marsh beings she knows:…