spring pops out everywhere; trees get buds and flowers, and they change colors every day, making strong fragrances throughout town, and lively combinations of pink, white, red, yellow, and every imaginable hue. and they change daily; not only is the weather extremely changeable, but the colors go along with it.

and unexplainably, i go virtually mute, not only here, but also on facebook and probably worst on my work blog which got one measly post about the tesol convention but virtually nothing else in about a month. i have a lot to put there, and here, but just haven't been able to do it. i drag. i do other stuff. maybe i'm taking a break.

in some ways, yes. the thirty-year quilt: almost done, it has to be finished in real space, not online, with real eyes, by an open window, a calm street and its corner, as i sew away. two whole corners, finished; two more have their rows done and being sewn together. pictures coming. birthday season: right in the middle of two, one son turning five, one daughter thirty-two; that's a range for ya, but they're all doing well, and expect all the hoop-la i can summon in the process. then there's me; i turn 56 soon; does this deserve reflection? or is it just a steep downhill slope looking more downhill, and more steep, all the time? the classes, in three-and-a-half hour blocks, roll by with stunning and deadening regularity though it's not as bad as it has been. graduation season creeps up; a visit to a granddaughter too. but none of this has done it.

here's what's done it. first, tons of resources, online, sitting in a disc on my desk. years of collecting, paying attention, reading, saving: it's just there, waiting and needing my attention, to put it somewhere valuable. second: the creeping awareness that one's virtual footprint is everywhere. how did i get so prolific? do i really want this? the awareness that i was so imprinted, and now relieved of it, is passing over me like a shadow. and maybe i'll tiptoe away, that much less noticed...

finally, i've been editing a book, a look at the underworld of drug-dealing, murder, the underworld life of black folks in chicago, and it's kind of like the other life-and-death stuff that passes in front of you: makes you less inclined to just ramble, say, or to just share some vacuous status, based on your whim. this is actually a true story, or true enough; it's written as you'd expect, kind of, well-written actually, but needs editing and all, and i'm a little in awe, just to be privy to horrid bone-chilling truth. i often read it right before i swim, after i've prepared a few hours; before my three-and-a-half marathon. i do that, maybe, instead of posting.

the wild onions shoot up from the grass; the weeds are full of their blood rising and getting ready to dominate. the little guy likes baseball and we play a lot; i'm getting some fresh air. the spring brought a lightning storm the other night; it was mild, but it might have had a tornado watch attached to it. this kind of stuff is usual. time to get out & turn the earth; it's not long before it's too hot, and only the tomatoes will remain out there, or maybe a pumpkin if it makes it 'round the corner. in the house, i'll grab the kids; i'm glad they're alive, that i can still hold them; they see another spring, and, what with the graduations going on, the older ones begin to make their own choices, the new baby arrives to take everyone's attention. it's what's i'd call mowing season, a time of incredible growing, busy-ness, rapid change and very loud birds at the window when you wake up early in the morning. the treetops are their facebook; whatever their status is, apparently all the other birds know it. dawn, i guess, is a status of its own.