At the pool this morning, everyone in my class was talking about the storms. Who lost windows and roofs. How many trees were down. The place looks like a war zone. But at the same time, there�s something very friendly and comfortable about the neighborhood, which is banding together to clean up the mess. People stop to talk to one another in their driveways as they are dragging debris to the street. One woman was walking around with her leaf blower, accompanied by her three-year-old son in a Batman suit and cape, blowing debris of the streets and access roads. Several residents were helping to clear out the willow and spruce branches from the ponds.

We have encountered some difficulties with our part of the cleanup, however. It seems that the tree that lost the mammoth limb is housing an enormous nest of honeybees. The bees are, quite understandably, resisting eviction (and actually, I�m on their side in this case, especially given that the last time they moved out of the tree they moved into the walls of our house). Consequently, we have yet to find an arborist interested in the job. My husband is now talking about putting AJ and I on a plane to S.C. (via Hooters Airlines, alas) and driving down to meet us after the work is done. I�m lobbying for dealing with the whole thing when we get back or possibly waiting until the nest goes dormant in the fall.

Strangely, this morning I was reminded of one of my favorite post-storm poems. About ten years ago, I conducted a contemporary choral setting of a poem by e.e. cummings. This morning I received an email who, in trying to track down a copy of the works, had come across a decade-old concert press release on some internet archive. I pulled the piece out of my cabinet and looked through it. The poem reads:

a wind has blown the rain away and blown
the sky away and all the leaves away,
and the trees stand. I think i too have known
autumn too long

(and what have you to say,
wind wind wind � did you love somebody
and have you the petal of somewhere in your heart
pinched from dumb summer?
O crazy daddy
Of death dance cruelly for us and start

the last leaf whirling in the final brain
Of air!) Let us as we have seen see
Doom�s integration�a wind has blown the rain

away and the leaves and the sky and the
trees stand:

The trees stand. The trees
suddenly wait against the moon�s face.

� � � � �

AJ and I spent the morning at his friend D�s house where the two of them, along with D�s little brother N who is desperate to be part of the action, did everything AS LOUDLY AS POSSIBLE. They were otherwise fun to watch, however. As usual, the playdate ended in a meltdown, but all the drama will be forgotten by next time.

You may have noticed a profound lack of diss discussion in these pages recently. I�ve noticed it too. Unfortunately, it reflects my work habits at the moment. I�m hoping I can do some editing in the car while AJ watches movies. But who am I kidding. I can already hear the surf pounding in my head. The wind has blown the rain away.

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