Weekly Journal 2024-05-26

There are good and bad things about this week. In the good category, it rained four out of seven days, alleviating local drought conditions. In the bad category, it rained four out of seven days, making the ground too wet to work in the garden. There is now a race to get seedlings into the ground before they get too big in their soil blocks. I plan to focus on tomatoes first.

Editing

Each time I edit my autobiography I find chapters that need work. The positive is I get further into the edit without stopping to do anything but correct typos and grammatical errors. There are clinkers, though.

I am not satisfied with the narrative about time in the military. I assembled the right quotations from my journal and papers. They can flow better. I reread them after a sound sleep and they do tell the story. The issue is I have many versions of the story of being in the military I have told and would like to tell. For my autobiography, I need to choose one.

I should be able to re-write the entire book as needed and prepare it for self-publication. If all comes together as planned, I should have a printed book by early next year.

Gardening

I’m usually finished with garden planting by the end of May. Not this year. The combination of rainy weather with increased limits on my stamina has me way behind. Even so, what was planted shows progress. Scapes are beginning to emerge from garlic plants. I got a few cabbages and kale in the ground. I weeded onions in time to save them from being dominated by weeds. The covered row is up and the seedlings under it are doing well. What is planted is growing. I just need to be closer to the finish line than I am.

Memorial Day

I did not do much this Memorial Day weekend. I have written about the holiday a lot on this blog. Here is a passage from a 2022 post: “Freedom has a cost, and there is no more salient aspect of it than the sacrifices men and women made by giving their lives in military service. Memorial Day celebrations are tempered with a feeling of loss, isolation, and sadness this year.” That seems always to be the case.

I am not aware any of my ancestors died while serving in the U.S. military. Our family is lucky in that. My maternal grandfather served in the U.S. Army and shipped out to France just before the Armistice was signed at the end of World War I. He did not see combat. Noting Memorial Day seems important nonetheless.

Memories of Summer

My summer is increasingly comprised of memories. Lately, the heat has been unbearable, drought too penetrating. I turn inward and indoors, like I did in this paragraph from a 2008 post in the first year of this blog:

I think of Ricard drunk in the non-commissioned officer’s club in Vannes on the West Coast of France. Of the overnight ride in the sleeper berth and waking in Paris to change trains. Of the trip to visit Gothic cathedrals in Amiens, Rheims, Rouen, Notre Dame, and others. Of the American cemetery at Normandy Beach. Of the landing near Calais where my backpack was stolen from a youth hostel. Of the rive gauche and Montmartre and le Big Mac. Of leaving France through Irun to see the running of the bulls in Pamplona, then swimming in the bay off San Sebastian.

Le week-end d’été, Aug. 1, 2008.

The garden occupies me and blocks other activities. Hopefully the weather will dry up long enough to finish getting it in. In the meanwhile there are plenty of memories to keep me busy indoors.