Necessary choices . . .

Tuesday, July 21, 2026. It's Tiw's day . . . In spite of moderate Northerlies, Green Country forecasts indicate record heat. Real temperatures of 102º with an index of 116º are to greet TulseyTown this afternoon. The triple digits are to extend into the late evening.

Hope isn't a mood that shows up first and convinces you to act. It's what you find growing once you’ve already stepped up. – Pete Buttigieg

Everybody wants a transformation. Nobody wants the hundred boring, thankless days it actually takes to get it. Progress feels like nothing’s happening when you're mid-journey. You only see how far you’ve come once you stop for a moment and look back. – Mark Manson.

Today is the birthdate of Nobel Prize laureate Ernest Hemingway, born in 1899, Cicero [now in Oak Park], Illinois.

Canadian television and film director and producer Norman Jewison was born today in 1926, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Among my many mentors from far, Marshall McLuhan was born on this day in 1911 Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

It's also Hart Crane's birthday. The poet was born in 1899 Garrettsville, Ohio.

The novelist and poet John Gardner was born today in 1933 Batavia, New York. He was the author ofGrendel, a retelling of Beowulf from the viewpoint of the monster.

And, poet Tess Gallagher is 83 today. She was born in 1943 Port Angeles, Washington.

Choices

I go to the mountain side

of the house to cut saplings,

and clear a view to snow

on the mountain. But when I look up,

saw in hand, I see a nest clutched in

the uppermost branches.

I don’t cut that one.

I don’t cut the others either.

Suddenly, in every tree,

an unseen nest

where a mountain

would be.

– Tess Gallagher, "Choices" from Midnight Lantern: New and Selected Poems. Graywolf Press. 2011.

Cat Stevens is 78 today.

All of us made this our choice.