Summer 1953. Seven years old. Wearing roller skates. Not shoes with roller skates built in like you could get at the roller rink, but roller skates the way they used to be. Metal frames with wheels. They adjust to the length of your shoe. The heel of the skate straps to your ankle. The front is held on by a clamp that hooks over the edge of the sole of your shoe. The clamp adjusts with a “skate key”. The front clamp works some of the time. It doesn’t work well at all with tennis shoes. At best, it seems to work just long enough for you to get up some speed; then the next stride find yourself with one roller skate on and the other dangling from your ankle by the strap. We’re in Seal Beach. I’m next door at Marlena and Judy Prebble’s house, on the porch, on my roller skates. I ring the bell, but the doorbell button isn’t where it is supposed to be. It is several inches too low. Wearing roller skates changes my perspective. Doorbells aren’t where I expect them to be. Neither are steps and curbs. At forty I needed reading glasses. That didn’t change my perspective. I wore the glasses to read. I took them off to walk. At sixty I got a real prescription; just a little correction for distance. Not much, but enough to change my perspective. Now I have glasses I’m supposed to wear while I’m walking around. It feels like 1953. It feels like I’m several inches taller. My feet are not where they’re supposed to be. Curbs are not where they are supposed to be either. When I discovered the difference roller skates made, I had seven years experience with where my feet were supposed to be. Now I’m supposed to adjust sixty years of experience?
Basalt
I spend a fair amount of time around people speaking languages other than English (mostly Spanish). It is strange but pleasant. It’s like listening to music I don’t understand, but I like the sound.
Birds
I either solved the problem, or got lucky and all the big birds left. I took down the seed-hopper feeder (it was empty anyway), and replaced it with a tube seed feeder. The tube feeder has four small perches, and is proportioned for smaller birds. A big bird has to be a contortionist to stand on that little perch and eat seed out of the feeding port right at his feet. After the big birds left, we got a five chickadee morning, all on the feeders at once. That was nice.
Birds suck!
We put together a really good bird feeding rack and hang several feeders on it with different kinds of seed and suet. We even provide water. Then we wait. It takes a while for the little birds to get used to this new contraption in their neighborhood, but then the reward: first a few house sparrows and house finches, then they are joined by little chickadees, nuthatches and hummingbirds swarming all over it. What a delight! But then the big blackbirds, grackles, and jays descend on the feast and demolish it in a matter of minutes. The big birds scare the little birds away and when they’re through, there is nothing left for the little birds. Wait till the big birds are gone and put more food out; they weren’t really gone, they were lurking. Here they are again and it’s gone in another flash. I think we still need one more birdfeeding accessory. A pellet gun.
Basalt
I worked at the client’s all day today, so I don’t know if the pinyon jays came back or not. There was no seed in the big feeder when I got home though, so we know someone was here. The squirrel in the yard is looking a little chubby. Grackles and red-winged blackbirds are around too. They can suck up a lot of seed. Judy wasn’t here to watch the feeder either. She drove down to Louisville again for a City Council meeting for final approval of the minor subdivision we did to separate the two properties. I was wrong when I said before that we were done with the City. Turns out the Planning Commission doesn’t approve the subdivision, they just recommend to the City Council that they approve it. On the agenda for “pass on consent”. No reading or discussion unless someone asks a question. We had several people there in case anyone asked a question. It passed without discussion. We’re done. We officially own two lots just like we always thought we did.