#(to remember)

-a flock of ravens and a bald eagle against the ridge line, -a cat struck dead in the street

-a miniature pony pulling a small wagon with three Amish girls peering nervously at the busy road which they share with the fury of steel.

-flocks of white birds flashing silver belly’s in a great circular dance above a pasture of slaughter cows.

-the commotion and haste that arises in the face of death. -midnight hospital transfers, weeping siblings, a doctor inquiring about the “do not resuscitate form” to my grandmother disoriented in the aftermath of a stroke

-chronic total occlusion of the artery’s, and the surgeon refusing surgery.

-holding my father tight and feeling him relieved but surprised when I do not pull away as I usually do.

-I drive to the Strong memorial Hospital in Rochester New York, will this be my last day with you? I kissed you on the forehead last night and you looked surprised. I’m not sure I’ve ever done that before. Strange how much I require physical contact from my partner, but not from my family.

-time catches up to you in an evening.

-“She’s a ticking time bomb” the overnight doctor says. (he had just been busy stitching up a skull), “We can help you prepare”, he did not elaborate on that.

-my grandmother is one of the last great American cowboys. A true iron will. Her insults and threats fill a room with laughter at their absurdity and yet terrify the face they are directed at, for she means every word and has probably done much worse in her wild and beautiful life.

-she tells me stories from the hospital bed of stealing cows from the state land up north in her yellow Subaru, and of shotgunning down Christmas trees in the night and dragging them home on a snowmobile through the quiet tree farms of December. She tells me of stealing mistreated horses to give them better lives.

She used to dynamite Silos and highways for her work before retiring, and then un-retiring and working at the corner drugstore in Ithaca for a handful of years, selling cigarettes to the crazys and learning all of the local gossip from the cooks and pedlars.

She’s always driven beaters, lemons, and she’ll lock up her brakes going 50 if you tailgate her on a back road.

She has single handily kept Marbello in business since the early 70s. Two packs a day religiously since a young teen and I do not exaggerate.

She’s what the doctors call ( and they do often call a person this) a medical anomaly. “You shouldn’t be alive” they have been saying for about 15 years, her arteries more tar than blood at this point.

JUST USE YOUR STUFF!!!

HOW HAD I NOT SEEN THIS DIALOGUE BEFORE???? Or maybe I did, and I just forgot....I feel like I did see it and just ignored it, but I find it so funny right now