Journal of a Sabbatical

June 3, 2000

another day in june

Today's Bird Sightings:
West Parish Cemetery
great blue heron
house sparrow
common grackle
American robin
blue jay
northern mockingbird
my house
northern mockingbird
house sparrow
starling
blue jay
rock dove

Today's Reading: Summer: From the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau edited by H.G.O. Blake,
Uttermost Part of the Earth by E. Lucas Bridges, Reflections in Bullough's Pond by Diana Muir

Today's Starting Pitcher:
Tim Wakefield

The mockingbird is imitating Wilbur! My personal mockingbird, who sits on the light pole outside my window has been imitating robins and phoebes and redwing blackbirds and car alarms. Suddenly I hear meowing. Not just any meowing but that frantic greeting meow that Wilbur makes from the window when he sees me get out of the car and start walking toward the back door. This is not just any cat he's imitating. It's one of Wilbur's huge number of vocabulary words. As Andrea will point out to you, Wilbur can talk - he's got so many different sounds. And the mockingbird has the greeting meow down perfectly. Now if only I could teach him to say "no parking" in Russian, I'd be all set.

Today is one of those bright blue and green June days with everything in bloom. The kind of day people move here for. Everybody is outdoors. I went for a walk with Joan-east and Priscilla at the West Parish Cemetery, one of the prettiest spots in Andover in the spring. West Parish Church is having their annual yard sale, which seems to have spilled out onto the surrounding area with private yard sales all along 133. It's like it's National Yard Sale Day or something.

There was a wedding going on in the chapel (the one whose renovations I've written about in this journal - Priscilla's nephew is on the committee) and we timed our walk just right so as to see the bride on our return loop. Her train must have weighed a ton. It was covered with beadwork. Everybody looked radiant. The bride and groom posed kissing in the archway of the chapel for a romantic photo. Priscilla waved to the organist. Wait, I just realized that if the organist was in there playing for the wedding they must have finally gotten the organ working again. Must ask Priscilla about that.

June is just so June here. Yard sales. Brides. The historical society book sale. Bluets and buttercups. Great blue herons overhead. Tons of people with out of state or out of the USA accents on Main Street here for the Phillips Academy graduation (oh, darn, Patrick is graduating tomorrow and he's off to Harvard in the fall so our local poetry scene will be down one exceedingly talented voice).

None of the regulars are in Starbucks this morning when I get there. It's busy and full of people the baristas have never seen before. The manager asks me "How many people live in Andover anyway?" I tell her tourists have come from all over North America for the West Parish Yard Sale. She's too busy to laugh.