13 May is marked - if not on my calendar, then definitely in my mind - as the day on which I will be finished with this semester. The idea of summer is vast - the months roll out ahead. Some of that time will be in DC - well, most likely two months, though I'm hoping for some day/weekend trips out of town... But it will be book-ended by travel, and I'm anticipating a glorious few months of writing poems and making things. Scribbling again.
Today is Zimbabwe's independence day, and it seems strange to think of independence under dictatorship - though this is the case with many African nations. Reading the news on the BBC website this morning I was struck by the fact that dock workers in South Africa are refusing to upload a shipment of arms from China that are destined for Zimbabwe. Will spend some time this afternoon writing on Milton, as well as reading Daniel Deronda. At either end of this planned study time I have administrative things - a writing center meeting and lunch (which, looking at my watch, I should start heading towards) and then one of our graduate program's "town hall meetings." I may actually go out tonight instead of acting the recluse as has been usual of late...
One of my 20 x 200 purchases arrived two days ago - Don Hamerman's "Mossball." It is beautiful. One day I'll be able to get it framed and look at it constantly. Happy days. Hamerman began collecting lost baseballs that he found while walking his dog, and eventually photographed them. I liked this one when I saw it, but it took some time for it to really grow on me. Now I adore it - there was another baseball that went with it. The more I look at the two images, the more I like them, but it's "Mossball" that I keep wanting to look at.
