All posts by sean

miscellany

Some (or one) of the squirrels has finally figured out how to reach the birdfeeder. I don’t know how he did it…must’ve scaled the outside wall of the house because it’s too far to jump from the nearest tree. The other day he was sitting in the tray under the feeder, filling his face with seed. Today he was actually sitting on the feeder itself. When I scared him, he leapt off the feeder, which is a good 20 feet up, and flew through the air, landing square on his feet on the ground. I was impressed, to say the least. Hopefully it’s just been a fluke, but I tend to think he’s probably out there spreading the word to all his squirrel buddies.

There have been a lot of nuthatches around and they’ve gotten really bossy. They flare up their wings and scare off the smaller birds. For some reason, they remind me of the Joker in Batman.

The mourning doves eat tons of seed. Right now there are four of them on top of the birdfeeder and another two sitting on the ledge. It’s ridiculous. They are also really messy eaters, but luckily the new tray catches most of what they dump out as they eat. I think they work in tandem: one sits on the feeder ledge scooping seed off the edge down to the one below that’s sitting in the tray. Actually I don’t think they’re bright enough to be doing this on purpose, but it sure seems that way.

I finally spotted a hummingbird at the feeder out front. That was exciting!

Yesterday I went for a 50 mile bike ride. I saw a deer, a groundhog, a rabbit, chipmunks, squirrels, and a lot of birds: the full roster of suburban wildlife. I have too much time on my hands, and I feel like I fritter it away. I don’t do anything productive. I sit and watch the birds or I ride my bike. I drink too much coffee. Sometimes I cook or bake. This morning I made a no-bake pie. It took about 5 minutes. I’m not dissatisfied or discontent. Or maybe I am. I don’t know. I just feel like I waste a lot of time. But I’m not sure what I could be doing that would make me feel better about how I spend my time. I guess that mostly I regret not writing more, but I’m just not motivated right now. And when you’re not motivated, nothing good comes out.

I’m glad it’s summer. I’m glad I’ve had so many opportunities to go on long rides. I wish my friends hadn’t left, but I know they’re having a great time.

I wish I knew what I should be doing with myself.

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by sean on June 20, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in birds, cycling, life

Posted by sean on June 20, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/06/20/miscellany/

monday rant

President Shrub has this to say about how to deal with the current oil/gas crisis:

“I’ve proposed to the Congress that they open up ANWR, open up the Continental Shelf, and give this country a chance to help us through this difficult period by finding more supplies of crude oil, which will take the pressure off the price of gasoline,” Bush said Monday.

Every time I think he couldn’t possibly say something even more asinine, he goes off and does just that.

This is his solution? Look for more oil?? The lack of creativity and foresight in that solution is staggering. When I think about what Planet Bush would look like, I see oil wells as far as the eye can see and nothing else. And then when the last well runs dry, we all just set on each other like a pack of hyenas, cannibalizing the last bits of life left on the planet, until finally the very last one of us chokes on a stray bone, dies, and our once green Earth dwindles forlornly around the sun for another few millenia, slowly baking into oblivion.

Meanwhile, Obama is spotted out biking with his family. So help me, I will vote for this man, if only because he rides a bike. All I ever saw Bush ride, other than the coattails of his family name, was a Segway…and he couldn’t even stay on.

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by sean on June 9, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in car culture, cycling, george w bush, oil

Posted by sean on June 9, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/06/09/monday-rant/

the dark place

I woke up last night from a dream where I was lying in bed and couldn’t breathe. There was nothing I could do or say…I just lay there silently choking to death. Sometimes things come along that can’t be shrugged off. And when they do, they trigger a flare from a deep well of banished thoughts and feelings. The urge to sabotage all that is good and pure rises up from the long-cold ashes of the last flare that burned short but fiery. Sometimes, crouching in the dim light of that flare, I want to stab the past in the eye with a pencil. But it’s eyeless and hard to pin down. And then when I stumble into the dark place I’m always still surprised to find such easily corroded materials. Is it the new air that circulates around them, setting off a new round of oxidization? Even now, so many years later, when I’ve struggled so hard to reach the center and stay there, I still have to face these rusted thoughts. Sometimes things come along and heft their weight onto your chest, pressing down on your rib cage until you finally react. And hopefully somewhere within the cracked and and bruised ribs, the wheezing breaths, the bloody foam filling your throat, there is a tiny ghost bird fighting to make it to the surface, to fix its beady black eyes on you and flap its miniature wings in disapproval. It is this…this simple gesture from the wild, apart from the ugliness and flawed brokenheartedness of humanity, that will snap you to attention, will drive you to stand and clear the blood from your throat and speak again out from behind the dirty shroud of inner weakness we all share.

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by sean on June 5, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in life, parts of the whole, temporary insanity, zen

Posted by sean on June 5, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/06/05/the-dark-place/

variation on the list a la cpz

1. Baltimore orioles (the bird, not the team) on Falls Road and in my dream.
2. Scorching 60 miles (through the rain) to Gettysburg for the bluegrass fest.
3. Long solo rides in the county.
4. Snotty cyclists in the county who don’t wave: you are a nasty festering sore on the otherwise beautiful thing that is cycling.
5. Cyclists in the county who wave: you are awesome.
6. Hanging out with B&L: I love you.
7. More sightings of the noisy but elusive catbird.
8. Summer at my house.
9. Drivers who scream at me to use the bike trail while I’m riding on Falls Road: go to hell. It is my legal right to ride on the road, and I will ride there if I damn well please.
10. Drivers in general: go to hell. And take your blasted cars with you. Seriously, I’m at the end of my rope with you people.
11. Cookies from AR.
12. Patricia Piggleton.
13. Free vegan feast from the Hare Krishnas, even if they did try to convert me.
14. Bill Monroe.
15. Thomas Merton.
16. Dear friends in Colorado.
17. Commuting on my Nishiki.
18. Every Friday Dessert Club, despite its recent hiatus.
19. My legal counsel *heart*.
20. Living the life of Scorchy McScorcherson.

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by sean on June 1, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in life, lists, parts of the whole, vitality

Posted by sean on June 1, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/06/01/variation-on-the-list-a-la-cpz/

thomas merton

I have always held a certain fascination with monks. At various times in my life, I’ve wondered if I should enter a monastery. A life of seclusion, contemplation, freedom from the burdens of modern society: it all sounds good to me. Of course, I’m not too keen on the abstinence thing, but I suppose it wouldn’t be such a special way of life if some sacrifices weren’t made. Lately I have been reading some of Trappist monk Thomas Merton’s writings and very much enjoying them. I just wanted to share a couple of quotes that resonated with me. I think Thomas and I would’ve had a few things to talk about, had we ever met.

“Technology has its own ethic of expediency and efficiency. What can be done efficiently must be done in the most efficient way—even if what is done happens, for example, to be genocide or the devastation of a country by total war. Even the long-term interests of society, or the basic needs of man himself, are not considered when they get in the way of technology. We waste natural resources, as well as those of undeveloped countries, iron, oil, etc., in order to fill our cities and roads with a congestion of traffic that is in fact largely useless, and is a symptom of the meaningless and futile agitation of our own minds.”

“The attachment of the modern American to his automobile, and the symbolic role played by his car, with its aggressive and lubric design, its useless power, its otiose gadgetry, its consumption of fuel, which is advertised as having almost supernatural power…this is where the study of American mythology should begin.

Meditation on the automobile, what it is used for, what it stands for—the automobile as weapon, as self-advertisement, as brothel, as a means of suicide, etc.—might lead us at once into the heart of all contemporary American problems: race, war, the crisis of marriage, the flight from reality into myth and fanaticism, the growing brutality and irrationality of American mores.”

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by sean on May 19, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in car culture, monks, technology, thomas merton

Posted by sean on May 19, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/05/19/thomas-merton/

and the culling song plays…

>They’ve made the first cull…the names whispered in the hallways…everyone wondering when their heads will be the next to roll. And I’m out there on the fringes of a flat plain, aloof as always, examining with a critical eye where the tracks dead-end in a patch of overgrown crabgrass. Déjà vu anticipation of a second slow-motion derailment. Panicky and unconcerned all at once. Head stuffed with bird feathers, bike grease, and unwritten words.

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by sean on May 13, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in doom and gloom, life, tension, unease

Posted by sean on May 13, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/05/13/and-the-culling-song-plays/

>restless

>With the advent of warm weather comes old familiar stirrings: leave routines behind, stay out late, seek adventure. It was a long cold hibernation and now I crave stimulation in every way. Been daydreaming about an organic farming apprenticeship at this place lately. Coming up on three years here and the three-year-itch is in full effect, I guess. [note: three-year-itch refers to my tendency to only stay in one geographical location for three years]

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by sean on May 1, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in restlessness, three-year-itch, warmth

Posted by sean on May 1, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/05/01/restless/

texas

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by sean on April 29, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in fish, nature, shadows, squirrels, texas, zen

Posted by sean on April 29, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/04/29/texas-2/

pay attention to the cracks

Cracks sometimes appear in the eggshell-thin veneer covering our inner life. She worries about her weight. He is a closet racist. That one goes home and cries at the end of every day. This one drinks himself to sleep. How far apart are our inner selves from our outer selves. But the cracks are still there for those who care to see. How well we try to hide what we fear others will look down upon us for doing or thinking. How horrifying it would be for our secrets to be broadcast to those around us. How would they react? Would they shun us? Or would they simply see themselves in us and turn away, ashamed. Few people cut through the gelatinous layer of public faces we see everyday. Who really wants to dig around and ferret out what the woman in the next cubicle over worries about. We’ve got our problems; they’ve got theirs…what use is there in taking on any more burdens than those we already carry? Well, there is a lot of use in that actually. Pain often subsides with release. Spoken words assuage. Physical touch relaxes tension. This culture we live in is so closed-off. People don’t talk to each other. My evidence is anecdotal at best, but I feel it all the same.

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by sean on April 22, 2008 • Permalink

Posted in inner life, isolation, parts of the whole

Posted by sean on April 22, 2008

https://sd-stewart.com/2008/04/22/pay-attention-to-the-cracks/