Ectopistes migratorius

“Martha, the last known passenger pigeon [Ectopistes migratorius], died in 1914 in the Cincinnati Zoo.”

Sometimes I wish humans would just disappear and the Earth reclaim the locales we have so meticulously manicured, like in Alan Weisman’s book The World Without Us. Or like in I am Legend, which was surprisingly awesome until computer generated zombies started laying traps for Will Smith and the religious discourse kicked in.

Empty and abandoned places are always sort of interesting. I’ve had some weird dreams on the topic. The recurring one is very spooky – based on something that really happened to me which was warped by my unconscious – and I’m trying, rather ineptly, to turn into a short story. The other was a one-timer: me in a black vacuum (outer space?), sparks start jetting out of my abdomen, and I realize that this is probably what dying is.

I was going to talk more about my history of dreaming and the legacy of how things come to artists in dreams, but it was sounding pretty New Age and self indulgent.

Not sure how I rambled my way to this point, actually, so I’ll conclude with the fact that I ate a delicious ice cream sandwich for the first time in several years tonight.

:: Bibliography ::

• “Passenger pigeon”. (2006). In Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Retrieved July 22, 2008, from http://www.credoreference.com/entry/6723645.

Uncanny occurances

Nature never ceases to amaze me. Yesterday, as I was returning home from a mind-numbing shift at the library, I walked along the old rock wall on Parkman Ave. Now, this structure is a haven for animals; birds and bunnies nest in it. Interest piqued by rustling in the growth between the sidewalk and wall, I examined the rock surface for signs of life. Sure enough, something was alive and moving. It was snakes. Small, grayish-brown on the top, snowy white on the bottom snakes. I couldn’t believe the way they were just spilling out of a waist-high seam in the masonry. There were probably about fifteen or twenty in all, and I watched the diaspora, transfixed. (This morning I saw one dead in the street. Poor thing.)

The creepy-crawlies came tumbling out of this rock wall along Parkman Ave.

After gawking at the snakes for a good ten minutes I went on my merry way… Only to be bombarded a bit further down the road by a shower of blackberries! The sidewalk was littered with them, some stepped on, some whole. Looking up, I saw that a blackberry bush atop the wall that had grown out and over the ledge — laden with ripe berries — some twenty feet above my head.

This locked gate and stairwell are only feet from the blackberry “tree”.

Later, near the terminus of Schenely Farms Terrace at Bigelow, I came across another carpet of smashed and whole blackberries. However, this time I could not locate an aerial shrub. Where those berries came from is still a mystery.

I should be finishing a PowerPoint…

…but instead I’m watching installment after installment of Herping with Dylan (while staying toasty under my electric blanket).

For the uninitiated, herping is a slang term derived from herpetology, the study of reptiles and amphibians. Dylan, unlike yours truly, is willing to go all out when scouting for specimens. Rain, midnight, mud–none of it seems to phase him. I was like that back in the day, when I would go herping in the creeks near Armstrong Park and near my grandparents’ house in Upstate New York. However, now you’ll find me inching around Panther Hollow Lake with a face warped by disgust.

So my interaction with creepy crawlies is now mediated by a computer monitor. Goodbye nature, hello House of Slime.