Robert

How did it go? Pretty good, but I'm not done. It is going to take me a couple more days, she also wants the attic vent fixed. Good, that's more work for you and I know she will be a good resource. He was there again today. REALLY, that's the third time this week. Do you think she knows he's hanging around? I have no idea and I am not going to say anything, it would probably upset her. Does he bother you? Na, he just looks in and watches me work. I wonder why he keeps coming around. He always looked after the place and most likely he is worried about her being taken advantage of. Making sure she is getting her monies worth. It just spooks me, he has been dead for almost a year now.

A Tony Hoagland poem that I like

Memory As a Hearing Aid by Tony Hoagland Somewhere, someone is asking a question, and I stand squinting at the classroom with one hand cupped behind my ear, trying to figure out where that voice is coming from. I might be already an old man, attempting to recall the night his hearing got misplaced, front-row-center at a battle of the bands, where a lot of leather-clad, second-rate musicians, amped up to dinosaur proportions, test drove their equipment through our ears. Each time the drummer threw a tantrum, the guitarist whirled and sprayed us with machine-gun riffs, as if they wished that they could knock us quite literally dead. We called that fun in 1970, when we weren’t sure our lives were worth surviving. I’m here to tell you that they were, and many of us did, despite ourselves, though the road from there to here is paved with dead brain cells, parents shocked to silence, and squad cars painting the whole neighborhood the quaking tint and texture of red jelly. Friends, we should have postmarks on our foreheads to show where we have been; we should have pointed ears, or polka-dotted skin to show what we were thinking when we hot-rodded over God’s front lawn, and Death kept blinking. But here I stand, an average-looking man staring at a room where someone blond in braids with a beautiful belief in answers is still asking questions. Through the silence in my dead ear, I can almost hear the future whisper to the past: it says that this is not a test and everybody passes.

What's that? What's that on your shirt? It's berry juice, when we picked them I didn't know they stained. What's that? What's that wrapped on your arm? It's a bandage, I scraped it on a tree branch when I was jumping down. What's that? What's the red marks on your legs? It's bug bites from our night hike. What's that? What's the bruise on your shin? It's from tripping on the rocks at the mountain top. What's that? What's with the limp in your walk? It's from not wearing my water shoes in the stream. What's that? What's that stretched across your face? It's a smile we had the best time.

After High School, I traveled first to New England and then to California, came back and went to work as a maintenance man for a Holiday inn. Quit after working a year and meeting some lifelong friends. Went to work for a car dealership at Tyson's corner. Then spent the next 14 years in the car business. A few dealerships around Northern VA and then a private shop in Leesburg. Worked at Kline Chevy for a couple years. I didn't really date at first just hung out with a group of guys and partied a lot. There were a few maybes but no real girlfriend. I lived in Herndon for a couple of years and then rented a house in Annandale, met a woman there and dated her for about a year, she moved back to the west coast and I started dating another woman and that lasted just over a year. She wanted to get married and I was not ready, so she moved back to her hometown, got married and then came back to me a while later, we had a good reunion but she stayed married. I met a woman named Thelma and started seeing her, we hit it off and ended up living together for a few years, steady for several years, then off n on. Never married but were together for almost 11 years. Took some years off and then met my wife, we dated a couple years and then got married, I was 37. Had my daughter by the time I was 40 and stayed married 15 years. Most of it very unhappy. Would have ended it a lot sooner except for my daughter. I got an instant family when I married, two stepsons 8 and 10 Colin and Elliot, I was the evil step dad then but we are good friends now. They are 24 and 26, live together with their cousin in centerville. My daughter being born was the coolest thing that ever happened to me, We did a home birth, I took all the classes, even infant CPR. Had a Midwife, I didn't catch her but did cut the cord. She was born an old wise spirit, and still is today. She is my claim to fame and the joy of my life. It didn't change me as i was already an uncle about twenty some times and was used to, good with and very comfortable around babies. But there is nothing like having your own. She is a very self confident young girl, twelve and a half. Goes to a farm school out here in the county, they take care of animals as well as triditonal education. The farm owns a handful of horses and she is a total horse nut, one of her chores at the school is to take care of them, and she gets to ride. She is also a member of a local riding school, rides and takes lessons there.

getting kids to read

I started out reading the See Spot run books in first grade but really took off with it in second. Was given Winnie The Pooh by Ms. Fansler my second grade teacher (a real chapter book) read it end to end. Was inspired to read more, went to the bookshelf in our (never had my own) bedroom. Picked out The Battle of Britain read it and never looked back. Took several years but I read every book on that shelf. Lots of history, war, westerns and spy story paperbacks. Don't know if they were put there on purpose or not. Before I started reading we used them for everything from building blocks or weights for holding whatever down. I do have fuzzy but fond memories of my dad reading "Uncle Remus" to us kids, doing the voices of each character. When I became a dad I started reading to my daughter as soon as she was old enough to listen, several books what seemed like a hundred times over. When she was young and I tired, I could get away with skimming, but very early on she would catch me and we would have to reread everything on the page. She's twelve now and would almost rather read than eat. KC PS While staying at my dad's house to care for him as he was dieing, I found both that Pooh book and the copy of The Battle of Britain. They are on my shelf now. The Circle is a Wheel

Stealing Days when we arrive the calm dark is rudely broken by generator and lamps a million details to tend to set the plates, fasten the sills take the measure run adhesive and sheet the deck build the walls and stand in place bring in the rafters tip them up and nail them down an ancient story of feet and inches fifty eight and seven sixteenths skinny short to short, three times cripples and dead-men and bents valleys and peaks and studs stopping for lunch while plotting ... sandwich in one hand plans in the other all afternoon more of the same but different... ok shut it down, tie it down pack it up out to the truck racing to Manny's pork rinds and beer down 997 toward home hat stuck to my head sweat stain-tie-dyed shirt wearing enough sawdust and dirt to..be....arrested.....for........theft.