Good-by to All That…

Posted on March 28, 2012 by J. F. Booth
English: Hawthorn blossom. Dazzlingly coloured...

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For the last eleven years, late March or early April brought a special thrill to my morning walks – the blossoming of the six English Hawthorn trees outside the U.S. Naval Academy‘s Main Gate.

Among the trees a modest marker and bronze plaque announces these trees as a gift from Captain John Smith. I silently thank Captain Smith for this thoughtful gift.

The Hawthorns’ blooms are always among the  first to appear, right along with the daffodils and forsythia. Their stark grey trunks don heady bouquets of dazzling pink and white blossoms that glow in the morning light. Their brilliant bouquets exude a halo of fragrance, fresh and slightly sweet.  I catch their aroma from around the corner, before I see the rosy petals against the Academy’s white, brick wall.

The awakening of the English Hawthorn has been an event I looked forward to each spring.  

But, these six, trees were more than just pretty faces. Their identities, like our own, were complex and intriguing.  

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Don’t Fence Me In!

Posted on March 20, 2012 by J. F. Booth

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“Good fences make good neighbors.” I’ve heard that line quoted so often –  usually with an undertone of moral rectitude – “I know what is best here, where the line should be drawn.”

But there’s an ironic twist to our affection for this handy adage: The line comes from Robert Frost’s 1914 poem, “Mending Wall.”  The irony is that the poem argues for the opposite view ; fences do not make good neighbors – neither in our own back yards nor in the world .

The second half of the poem contains the heart of the matter:

Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offense.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That wants it down…

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Simple Pleasures

Posted on March 11, 2012 by J. F. Booth

Paul McCartney

Let me begin my blog with music.  Have you heard Paul McCartney‘s version of the 1935 show tune, “I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter” ?

In addition to the pleasures of  his singular voice, instrumentation and phrasing, McCartney infuses the old ballad with gentle humor, something he might not have done in his youth. Here’s how:

The song’s speaker is writing a love letter to himself in the style of his lost beloved.  A line in the original  lyric says, “A lot of kisses at the bottom.”  [XOXOXO]  McCartney has a bit of fun rephrasing that line to lighten the tone. He switches the preposition and the line becomes, “A lot of kisses on the bottom.”  This silly, light innuendo lifts the song and leaves me chuckling.  There’s a little wink between McCartney and his audience.

That wink, that simple pleasure is what I want to share with you here and in future musings.

Listen for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_Z8_HBJcnM&feature=player_embedded

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