Sounded Crisp and Foggy

Happy Birthday young man.  It won’t really feel completely like my birthday until the New York Times has the date: April, 19, 2019 across the top.  In New York they still aren’t there yet.  I read the 4/18 paper.  Phase II of the Mueller report.  One suspect that this will continue on and on now for years.  I had a forecast call for a company that we’ve worked hard to make progress on and still have a long way to go.  But I needed to make sure the online sheet made sense so I spent my morning birthday hours editing and cleaning everything up.  No time for meditation, but at least the Google-sheet was clean and I had time to head to the gym. 

These iBud things are nice.  I listened to Bobby Hucherson and Harold Land playing “San Francisco” which sounded crisp and foggy somehow.  I chose it as my poor old ever reliable iTunes mix has been mothballed until I can find the source files.  I was fine to listen to the two of them during my exercise routine though at some point I began searching for what else I might immediately access that had some umph.  Chicago sounded wonderful.  Leaving the gym, I was transported to being a six-year-old with “Saturday In The Park” up in the ear holes.  Walking, walking, walking, along the fake turf of the soccer field as if I was George Jefferson.  I remember that ripe-peach teenage daughter of my parent’s friends whom I met as a six-year old.  She was so lovely and lanky and hip.  She seemed to embody that time, this song, and the image returns like predictably any time this song comes on.

Call went well.  So, did another.  Another call I usually had Friday had been cancelled.  That worked for me.  Looks like they’ll be some new business.  That takes some pressure off.  And before long it is lunch time.  My big tuna salad with leftover lamb chops and avocado before we all need to head on out to the train station.  Call the cab with 2.5 hours of lead time.  Still we spend the whole ride over wondering if it will be enough.  Beijing is as the cab drivers say “nar dou du” or wherever you are, it is congested. 

Been noticing some of the Beijing jacaranda trees in bloom in this ride.  Been noticing the speed with which the trees go from bare and black to green and oxygenated.  My day started out rather clear and bright.   The train ride is much more fun than a plane for a family of six like us.  So glad to be leaving the city, overland. 

Only three hours left to my day.  It’s 9:00PM and we’re rolling up into Shao Lin Temple.  I believe I was here once before in 1998, some twenty-one years ago.  But it is only a flash of memory and as I recall, we only drove by and didn’t explore much.  We certainly didn’t climb Mount Song.  Tomorrow we can get up and do it early.  That’s the vision, anyway.  I couldn’t be happier heading out to the Chinese countryside in the fullness of spring with my family.  The town is dark now, but we’ll see what it’s like come morning time.  For now, we all need some dinner.

Friday, 4/19/19