Passionate peace . . .
Sunday, April 26, 2026. It's Sol's day . . . Strong southerlies bring clouds, upper 70's and a 20% chance of a thunderstorm to TulseyTown and Green Country this afternoon. Almost a Summer forecast. Slight storm chance extends into the overnight.
Peace, in its most fundamental form, is the connection of one human spirit to another.
The great mystics of all traditions teach us that the spiritual life is not really about consolation; it is about annihilation. – Mirabai Starr, Exquisite Risk: John of the Cross and the Transformational Power of Captivity, substack 4.21.26
Today in 1607 the first permanent English settlers in North America landed at Cape Henry, Chesapeake Bay.
Yesterday in 1945 delegates from fifty nations met in San Francisco to establish a permanent forum for international cooperation: the United Nations. – Heather Cox Richardson, in Letters From An American.
Carol Burnett is 93 today. born in 1933, San Antonio, Texas.
The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein was born on this date in 1889, Vienna, Austria.
The ornithologist and artist John James Audubon was born today in 1785 Les Cayes in what is now Haiti.
Ma Rainey was born in 1886 Columbus, Georgia. Known as the “mother of the blues” she is recognized as the first great professional blues vocalist
On this day in 1954 Kurosawa Akira's Seven Samurai was released in Japan. It is widely considered one of the greatest and most influential films ever made.
I’ll deal with Trump tomorrow.
… my continuing passion… to part the curtain, that invisible shadow that falls between people, the veil of indifference to each other’s presence, each other’s wonder, each other’s human plight. – Eudora Welty
Flying with Uncle Wiggily . . .
Saturday, April 25, 2026. It's the Satyr's day . . . Strong thunderstorms are in the forecasts for Green Country and TulseyTown, likely this afternoon, extending into the evening and ending around midnight.
To plant a garden, to create a wetland—these seem like small acts in the face of our world of concrete, our obsession with never-ending economic growth. – Ragan Sutterfield, “Hospitality on Our Earth Home,” Meditations, at The Center for Action and Meditation, 4.24.26
Lots of birthday reminders in today’s mailbox —
U.S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser is 87 today. He was born in 1939 Ames, Iowa.
It's also the birthday of Al Pacino who is 86 today. The multi-laureate-awarded actor was born in 1940, New York City.
And, novelist Padgett Powell turns 74, born in 1952 Gainesville, Florida.
Edward R. Murrow was born on this day in 1908, Greensboro, North Carolina. He was the most influential and esteemed figure in American broadcast journalism during its formative years.
It’s the birthdate of singer Ella Fitzgerald. She was born in 1917, Newport News, Virginia.
The author of the Uncle Wiggily stories, Howard R. Garis, was born in Binghamton, New York (1873). By the time he retired, he had written more than 10,000 stories about the rabbit and his silk top hat.
In 1959, one of the largest civil engineering feats ever undertaken, the St. Lawrence Seaway, officially opened, linking the Atlantic Ocean with the Great Lakes.
On this day in 1990 the Hubble Space Telescope was placed in orbit by the crew of the Space Shuttle Discovery, changing the course of modern astronomy.
Flying at Night
Above us, stars. Beneath us, constellations.
Five billion miles away, a galaxy dies
like a snowflake falling on water. Below us,
some farmer, feeling the chill of that distant death,
snaps on his yard light, drawing his sheds and barn
back into the little system of his care.
All night, the cities, like shimmering novas,
tug with bright streets at lonely lights like
his.
– Ted Kooser, From Flying at Night: Poems 1965-1985, University of Pittsburgh Press. 1980.
Rare roast? Or Pork?
Friday, April 24, 2026. It's Freya's day . . . Moderate Northerlies, mid 70's, and lots of cloudiness are in the forecasts for TulseyTown today.
The flower is always the bud’s undoing. So, let go and bloom where you are.
Michael Tilson Thomas, the American conductor, composer and pianist. died on Wednesday at his home in San Francisco. His 25-year tenure as music director of the San Francisco Symphony became a model of collegial music-making, artistic adventurousness and community engagement. He was 81.
Barbra Streisand is 84 today. She was born in 1942, Brooklyn, New York.
Shirley MacLaine is 92 born April 24, 1934, Richmond, Virginia,
Mystery novelist Sue Grafton was born on this day in 1940 Louisville, Kentucky.
Novelist, poet, and critic Robert Penn Warren—who became the first poet laureate of the United States, was born on this day in 1905 Guthrie, Kentucky.
On this day in 1904, artist Willem de Kooning, one of the leading exponents of Abstract Expressionism, was born in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
It’s unknown just how roast-like this Saturday's White House Correspondents dinner will be. Trump is attending for the first time. Some say it looks like a power move on his part. It's difficult to imagine Trump volunteering to be roasted at all, let alone by the media. – Jillian Wilson, Huff Post, 4.23.26
EpiphanyBecause I cannot conceive the whole of creation,
judging the bits, pieces and parts with
these earth-bound eyes,
has become impossible.
That said – all these parts, pieces, and bits
somehow just now united in a new light
lifting a burden unknown before knowing
I was carrying.
– jab