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break time, and most of mine has been spent doing dishes, cooking, and going skating. yes, skating - it's the girls who love it, and would easily be out on the ice four or five hours a night, but i like it too, and have been at least going around the rink, maybe twelve laps a night. and this has been over ten nights. i'm getting a little better at it.

the rink is large, outside, free, three blocks away. we drive, the girls and i, but in fact, the parking lot is the most treacherous part. last year, before christmas, i fell in the parking lot, and at first, i was wondering why i wasn't as graceful as usual this year - turns out, i'm still recovering from that fall. yes it can take more than a year. and we've had two serious falls already, or at least, were part of two. the rink itself, i think, has had even more.

the first was a young friend of mine, about thirty, moved down here from alaska, had no problem with the winter culture, the cold, the snow, none of that. we were sitting at the rink and i explained how i was sixty-three, but i still get out there and do a few laps. in fact i'm very cautious and always sit down when i'm tired, i don't try to skate when i'm tired. the one time i did fall, i had trouble getting back up, like i say, i'm not as limber as i used to be. but she, i think, thought that if i could do it, she could do it. and next thing she knew, torn ligament. sounds painful, eh?

second one was tonight. we saw this one. people were playing tag, apparently; my daughter was among them. this woman was wearing a bright red texas tech jersey. and by some accounts she had five kids. i didn't see the kids. one guy said when she went down, she was trying not to hurt the kid, that's why she landed funny. but she landed so badly, she couldn't walk off the ice. problem with being about thirty, is, you might get a little careless. i've been slow and deliberate, the farthest from careless. i'm humbled by tonight's events. but i'm still standing.

back home, by the fire, doing haiku. my new plan is to put it in a novel. having a five-thousand haiku novel, with a whole plot, complex and all, that might establish my fame, once and for all. on the other hand, might not. i've easily written five thousand already; i doubt hardly anyone has noticed.

they say the skating's good; weather's about right. below freezing at night, and not much above fifty in the day. we're in the vacation groove - sleeping late, skating a lot, hanging out by the fire. lots of coffee, and sunsets over the white sands. my wife's knee is slowly healing; i'm taking care of some health issues i'd let slide. one is tinnitis. i'm a musician, and now i hear crickets everywhere, even in silent rooms, or in the car in the desert. think anything can be done about this? i'll find out.