Parallel Universes

If any parallel universes exist where all sorts of laws of nature and behavioral patterns are reversed, do you suppose we might chance up one where the children are scurrying all over the place with pictures of missing milk cartons printed on their clothing?

--Mitchell Hegman

Objections

One man shouting out his litany of objections in the wilderness is not a political movement, but it is certainly annoying if you are out there trying to sleep.

--Mitchell Hegman

Effort

So long as your intent is noble, there is no such thing as wasted effort.  Even in failing to accomplish a noble gesture—say, turning around your automobile to help someone changing a tire alongside the road only to find that someone else has stopped to do the same—will at least have the result of uplifting you.

--Mitchell Hegman

Skiffs Gather

A recent cold snap refroze Lake Helena and then delivered a scattering of fairy-dust snow.  As I drove alongside Lake Helena on my way home last night, the patterns of skiffs gathered on the ice of the east shore caught my attention.  Posted below are two photographs I snapped of the skiffs.

--Mitchell Hegman 

Open Lakes Eat the Falling Snow; Mountains Eat the Falling Sun

I sit here with my 40 pounds of housecat and nary a thought worth having.

Not much to report.

Only this: Open lakes eat the falling snow; mountains eat the falling Sun.

-Mitchell Hegman

Keys and Wine Bottles

As a young boy, I spent a fair amount of time rooting around the weediest yards of my neighborhood.  Typically, I was looking for interesting bugs or just about anything shiny that I might carry away in my pocket.  Immediately beyond our neighborhood, back in a mostly undeveloped place that we called “the grove,” Grover Jones lived in squalor.  I liked his yard best of all.

Cottonwood suckers and current bushes had volunteered right next to Grover’s paint-peel home.  Horseradish and rhubarb grew unchecked.  Best of all, for probably the last thirty years of his life, Grover Jones stopped hauling his garbage to the local dump.  Instead, he flung everything he discarded out the front and side door.  I used to go there mostly to collect the “keys” from discarded sardine cans.  Grover Jones ate an inordinate amount of sardines.  The keys were used to peel the cans open in the days before the invention of flip-top cans.   I collected all manner of keys, including those.

 Photo thanks to: You’ll Eat & Like It

As I dug through the heaps of garbage that Grover had thrown from his home, I was most stuck by the number of wine bottles.  Grover Jones drank a lot of wine.  I could not fathom all of that as I waded through the bottles.

Yesterday, as I looked at my old face in the mirror, I thought about how heavy with beer and wine bottles my trash liner was when I pulled it from the can under my sink in the morning.  The clinking of the bottles reminded me of those days outside Grover’s house.  And for the first time in my life I felt I understood Grover Jones.

--Mitchell Hegman

Mostly Illegible Notes on a Scrap of Cardboard

For some reason, while roughly half-way through his third Red Stripe beer last night, Kevin thought we might be well served to document on paper anything of interest that came up during our conversation.  Seemed reasonable to me.  Unable to readily locate a decent-sized piece of paper, I grabbed a chunk of cardboard and a pen.  We drank.  We talked.  We wrote.

I woke late this morning to fresh snow outside, Kevin sprawled across my sofa (fully clothed, thank you), my 40 pounds of cat sniveling, and the scrap of cardboard on my kitchen countertop.

Here are a few selections from our writings—all standing as written:

·         Who is keeping score on the other side?

·         Mitchal His a punctu (illegible scribbles)

·         DID HEMMINGWAY AND TEDDY ROOSEVELT DRAW MOOSES IN THE PARK?

·         No, we are not watching porn, we are listening to porn.  (porn = music?)

·         Watch out for that trout.

·         (Illegible) song (illegible) powerful.

In the light of a new day, our idea of jotting down our thoughts seems a bit less brilliant than we first suspected.   Here is a photo of the cardboard:

--Mitchell Hegman