Queen Faraday goes barefoot

Some time ago, I bought princess glasses at Cracker Barrel. They're pink , with an attached tiara (with rhinestones & a rather strangely-orange "gem" at the top) & rose-colored lenses. Across the base of the tiara they say, "Queen for a Day." (So why don't I call them queen glasses? Princess glasses, I'm sure you'll agree, has a much better ring to it.)

Queen For a Day morphed itself, in my mind & mouth, into Queen Faraday, so I looked up Michael Faraday on wikipedia (go ahead, I'll wait) & read about his splendificy. There was so much I hadn't known about Faraday, that he was almost completely self-educated, bad at math, member of a strict religious sect (the Sandemanians) & one of the most important scientists of his (or any) generation.

Queen Faraday needed a first name, & I chose Emilia, for Emily Dickinson & Amelia Earhart--who they would have been if they'd been in a transporter accident. (Normally, I would set that phrase off with parentheses, but--for Ms. Dickinson--I used a dash.)

Her middle name? Blake of course, after William, poet & philosopher & artist & mystic. I like to keep the Tygers burning bright, in the forests of the night & elsewhere.

I tell you of this now because I am reading a biography of Michael Faraday. I believe William Blake will be next. I've already read a biography of Amelia Earhart, after I'd sold Growing Wings & the editor wanted quotes about wings or flying at the beginning of each paragraph. I also read the complete poems of Emily Dickinson at that time. I do look forward to her biography.

Blog alternative:

215. Create an alter-ego from admired heroes. Hat-shep-sut Da Vinci? (middle name Babe, from Ruth &/or Didrickson?)

The ghost of summer past loses her tan & buys school shoes

I have found June--or, rather, I have not, but she has been seen with August. August, that rascal, that rogue. He who drives the ice cream truck past the children while they are shopping for school shoes, wiggling his own bare toes. "I am still summer," he whispers in every ear. "Listen to me. Turn out your pockets & try to buy these warm days. Keep them in a jar & open them in November--or, better yet, February."

I won't even hope you didn't listen, for I know you did. Like you did last year. Like you will next. Even though the jar will be empty when you twist the lid off. Summer does not keep. Never has, never will.

But, if you are like me, you were immune to the blandishments of August, for I am a child of the transitional seasons. Spring & fall, when my favorite temperature (63 degrees) is more & more likely to occur, even if only in passing. That is why I like living in the mountains. (Here's a picture of a mountain cloudburst spilling over the gutters at my parents' house in Nye, Montana, where my love of mountains formed.)

I drove to Montana in August & attended my niece's wedding & a family reunion & played many a good card game with my parents. I stopped in the saloons of Meeteetse, Wyoming, on the way up, a secret favor to a street musician I know who is writing a book based on dreams of a sporting woman's life. The favor is still a secret, for I have not yet happened upon my friend & her guitar. Soon, I hope.

Oh, there will be more news in sweet September. Creations of all kinds. (Including the Pearcumber Chardonnay Smoothie!) I sent a photo & 2 poems & 2 stories & 1 essay to the Artist's & Writer's Quarterly. Also entered 3 photographs in a juried show that required the artist's hand to be directly involved. I did watercolor details. Will know soon if my photos were accepted for the show, but I had SO much doing the detailing that the price of admission was already well spent.

So what did you do during your summer vacation? Get out the blue-lined paper & the number 2 pencil. A perfect segue into the

Blog alternative:

214. Write about some summer. Perhaps this one that has just passed. Perhaps one from your childhood (or your second childhood...) or a summer yet to come. Write a summer you wish you'd had. Rewrite a summer that wasn't to your taste. There will be no grades, no red marginal notes, no gold stars. This is your summer, & what anyone else thinks is irrelevant.