Unexpected Moments of Grace

or in that vicinity...

Man, what a long day at work today.  Thinking that I would be taking off early to have coffee with my former boss/still current friend, Joe, I went into the office about two hours early.  I'm not an early morning kind of person in the first place but this morning was particularly drizzly and dreary.  

Then along 17th St, I noticed a rainbow flag.  Not all that unusual in this part of town (Dupont Circle).  Half a block later on the other side of the street, a restaurant had tied six huge streamers - red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple - from one point on the grill of a second story window, and then fanned them out downwards to the outer patio railing.  The result was a fantastic triangular canopy under which the diners would be able to sit.  Contrasting with the grey sky, it was even more breathtaking.  That's when it occurred to me that it's Pride Week in DC.

A partly rainy/partly sunny morning is the kind of time one would expect to see rainbows, and I saw a lot of them.

It turns out that Joe's flight was canceled, which meant traveling headaches for him and no coffee with Joe for me.  Instead, it wasn't until dusk that I left the office.  The evening walk back along 17th was very different from the morning.  For one thing, evening light is very different from morning light.  For another, many more shops and homes had put up their Pride decorations.   Rainbows burst from many a window, flagpole and railing.  Passing by the same restaurant, I realized that what I had seen this morning was an unfinished product.  Colored streamers of six hues now wove in and out of the patio railing to form a rainbow fence.  Gone was the delicate canopy, lost in the addition of more streamers and lights.  Instead of nature's rainbow, I was now thinking Disneyland.  But otoh, with the twinkly Christmas lights, it was a festive place to dine.  Certainly, the patrons seemed happy.

About a block later, I realized that other lights were twinkling as well.  Tonight, I spotted my first fireflies of the season.  Several of them, flashing bright in the growing darkness.**  No matter how many more years I live, I will never cease to be amazed by fireflies.

**Ironically, the fireflies reminded me even more of Disneyland.  Growing up in California, I did not see my first real firefly until well into adulthood, which is why I'll never take them for granted.  The only inkling I had of what a firefly was like was from the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disney.  The first time I saw a real one (and almost every time since), my first reaction was that nature reminded me of artifice.  Yes, I know it's perverse.

Literally.  There are a lot of gorges in Ithaca.  I went up this weekend to see my old boss, Joe, and his family, and their new home in Ithaca.  Everyone told me that Ithaca would be beautiful, and it was.  The surrounding farmland was not quite as idyllic as the stony green hills of Vermont/New Hampshire, imo, but it was close enough to remind me of them.  And Cornell University was beautiful as well.  Most gorgeous of all is the fact that Joe and Mary and Robert seem to be happy up there.

This appeared as a Reuters "Oddly Enough" but I thought it was quite touching. People can be kind in the most unexpected ways.  I refer to both the death row inmate, and the many strangers who delivered the pizzas.

Executed man gets last meal wish after he dies

Thu May 10, 2007 4:17PM EDT

NASHVILLE, Tennessee (Reuters) - A convicted murderer put to death in Tennessee this week got his last meal wish after he died.

Philip Workman had turned down the usual final meal of his choice traditionally offered the condemned, asking instead that a vegetarian pizza be given to a homeless person.

Prison officials refused to send out a pizza and Workman died Wednesday by lethal injection.

But news accounts of his request touched a nerve with the public.

Nashville's Union Rescue Mission received 170 pizzas. Media reports said listeners to a radio station in Minnesota also ordered pizzas sent to another organization for troubled youngsters.

Dorinda Carter, spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Correction, said, "Taxes are to be spent on specific things for the care of the inmates." But she acknowledged there was no regulation against carrying out Workman's request.

An official at the mission said "the pizzas were enjoyed greatly by our clientele."

My roommate just emailed this to me.  Hi-yah!

***

Screaming rollercoaster will kick off Bruce Lee theme park

John Harlow, Los Angeles

CHINESE government officials are planning a Bruce Lee theme park, complete with a rollercoaster that emits the martial arts actor’s signature grunts and screams on high-speed bends.

According to local reports, the park will be patrolled by Bruce Lee “mannequin robots”, radio-controlled from within a giant statue of the late star.

Although Lee was born in San Francisco and his action movies such as Enter the Dragon and Fist of Fury were banned in China, the authorities are seeking to cash in on his legacy. They are promoting Lee as the father of modern martial arts, a sport that once dismissed the 5ft 7in actor for his unconventional moves and trademark yell.

The £10m theme park will be built at Shunde, a picturesque town of canals and bamboo gardens northwest of Hong Kong, which Lee’s grandfather left in the late 19th century to start a new life in America. The actor visited briefly only once, when he was five years old.

Officials have already named a street after Lee and turned a tea shop into a museum packed with letters and photographs of uncertain provenance. They are also discussing plans for a memorial hall and a monorail to connect the town centre with the theme park.