Cactus

Today, since the cactus are in bloom around my house, I am posting three photographs I captured of them yesterday. 

The prickly pear and ball cactus (sometimes called pin cushion cactus) pictured are tough characters.  They will hurt you if you tangle with them.  But the blossoms of these plants are conspicuous and beautiful.

--Mitchell Hegman

The Pretzel Bag and the Boy across the Aisle

Less than a year ago, I learned that the snack bags given to you on an airplane have a tear-tab manufactured onto one end.  To open the bag, you simply split the bag apart at that point.

Presto!  A neatly opened bag of pretzels or peanuts.

This was quite a revelation to me—something along the lines of discovering that closing my mouth while riding a bike will prevent me from eating bugs.

Good to know, right?

Actually, that girl showed me the snack-bag trick after she watched me open a bag World War III style (with both hands and my teeth).  My pretzels exploded across the cabin on a plane bound for Seattle.

Friday, on a flight back to Montana, I asked for a bag of pretzels.  I opened them without incident.

Across the aisle from me sat a boy of about fourteen or fifteen.  His mother sat beside him.  The quickest observance of the boy revealed that he suffered from profoundly impaired cognitive and physical abilities.  I watched the boy and his mother interacting as we flew from the green side of America to the America of river-crossed basins and rocky ranges—the West.

The boy’s mother prodded the boy every so often so he would open his mouth.  She would then extend a hotdog to the boy so he could take a bite.  Lolling his head, the boy would chew and chew and chew on the hotdog until his mother reminded him that he needed to swallow.

As I munched from my gracefully opened bag of pretzels, I thought about how lucky I was to open my own bag.  I am lucky to be able to tie my own shoes.  To drive from place to place.  To whistle a three-note tune.  To call a friend and engage in mindless conversation.

Such small things, I know.  But my biggest days are really no more than a series of such small things strung together.

--Mitchell Hegman

The Severed Garden

Today, Jim Morrison, the poet:

--Mitchell Hegman

Please click on this link if the posted video fails: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJhfgybmfZQ 

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Yesterday, that girl and I drove to Cleveland.  While there, we toured the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  Lots of guitars and crazy outfits on display there.  Many videos to watch.  I really liked seeing the original lyrics for songs, sometimes scratched down on scraps of paper.  Famous Bob Dylan songs.  Beatles songs.  You name it.

I stood at the Doors exhibit for quite a while.

Jim Morrison was a shooting star, a poet.  He, Janis Joplin, and Jimi Hendrix—all died at the age of twenty-seven.

Posted is a photograph of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Jim Morrison, and the lyrics for Riders on the Storm as Jim Morrison wrote them.  The song turned out to be the last song he and the Doors recorded together.  Morrison left for Paris and died only a few weeks after recording the song.

The song is both beautiful and dark…so very much like Jim Morrison himself.

The Doors are my favorite American rock band of all time.

Don’t rest in peace, Jim Morrison.  Keep on rocking, man.

--Mitchell Hegman

Traffic

We are running in place, but we’ve got somewhere to be!

--Mitchell Hegman

Day Fifteen

I wake to the blaring of a garbage truck’s backup signal.  So incessant!  As if backing right through the second story window we left open through the night.

Yes, yes, I have so much nonsensical junk inside my head I could fill that truck.  Just the same, I am happy when the truck changes directions—the alarm dying at once—and rumbles away, gradually shrinking.

New, smaller sounds overlay the truck.  A lone dog barking below the canopy of street-side trees.  The steady whine of heavy traffic streaming toward Cleveland on a distant highway.  A single car slapping at the cracks in the paving as it passes by on the street directly below.  And, finally, a robin chipping from someplace in the tree nearest our window.

Fully awake, I peer out the window.

Look at that, will you.

Perfectly trimmed lawns.  Attractive islands of trees and flowers.  Basketball hoops.  Shiny cars.  Home after perfect home.  Beautiful in its own orderly way.

Welcome to Medina, Ohio.

We can walk to a store if we wanted.  Nearby is everything you might desire.  Furniture outlets.  Fine dining. Hardware.  Sporting events.    

But what I really want is to see a mountain with a little snow clinging to the top.

--Mitchell Hegman

17-Year Cicadas

If you really like noise, I have just the thing for you: cicadas.  We are talking over 80 decibels loud in some places—maybe over 100 decibels if you are nutty enough to hang one of the little song-makers from your ear.  Presently, one of the 17-year cicada broods is emerging from the earth in parts of Ohio.  Billions upon billions of cicadas will crawl from the earth in the Eastern United States this year and take to the skies.

Let me explain.  First, cicadas are bugs.  Almost-as-big-as-your-thumb bugs.  Several species of Cicadas exist.  Moreover, cicada “broods” appear on different cycles.  “Periodical cicadas” such as those emerging this year, emerge in either 13-year or 17-year cycles.

The life cycle of periodical cicadas begins when an adult female lays her eggs on trees.  She lays her eggs in grooves she cuts into the limbs of trees.  Upon hatching, the nymphs (juveniles) drop to the ground and burrow deep into the soil.  The slowly growing insects then spends the next 13 or 17 years in the ground (depending on the brood cycle).  They live on tree juices they steal from the roots.

When the temperature is right (as is occurring right now here in Ohio) the juveniles burrow up out of the ground and climb the nearest trees.  Clinging to the bark, they shed their nymphal skin and emerge as winged adults.

Adults have three things in mind: eating, making noise, and sex.  In this regard they are very near human.

Living for another 4 to 6 weeks as an adult, the cicadas overwhelm the countryside where they have emerged.  While all other insects and animals might feast on them, the cicadas also feast on the fluids of greenery.  Though they do not defoliate plants and trees the way a locust does, they can cause considerable damage and kill trees.  Near the end of their life-cycle, the cicadas reproduce to start the cycle anew. The cicadas may also cause considerable harm when they cut into trees to deposit their eggs. 

Yesterday, while hiking in Cuyahoga Valley National Park, I encountered a brood of 17-year cicadas in the forest there.  Consider this—when these insects first burrowed into the ground, the price of gas was about $1.20 per gallon.  Britney Spears and Ricky Martin were charting songs.  You could mail a Dear John letter for a mere 33 cents.

Now, 17 years later, the cicadas have emerged to make song.

I have posted a couple of photographs and a video I captured.

Turn up your sound and enjoy the cacophony!

--Mitchell Hegman

Sources: http://www.cicadamania.com/cicadas/the-most-interesting-17-year-cicada-facts/

Magicicada.org

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/10-scintillating-facts-about-cicadas-1.1376256