Equality

Romance author Nora Roberts will host a Valentine's Book Signing on Saturday, February 18, 2012 from 12-2pm EST at Turn The Page Bookstore, 18 North Main Street in Boonsboro, Maryland.

I will be signing my book UNION.  Nora Roberts / J D Robb , Mary Burton,  Mary Kay McComas , Donna Kauffman & Sarah Wendell and Mary Alice Baumgardner  will be signing their latest books.

Free, limited tickets are available the morning of the event. For information, go to www.ttpbooks.com or call 301-432-4588. 

Today’s post is a journal entry that was not on the UNION blog, but is included in the book. If you would like to order the book online, please visit the TurnThePage online store.

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Journal Entry: Wilderness, Virginia; February 9, 1861

Equality. This winter, around the fireplaces, there is hot debate in the high houses and the lowlands about equality.  Who shall have it; who is unworthy.  After all, the firebrands say, man was given dominion over the lesser animals.

When I was a boy, once a month, my father, brothers, and I took the wagon thirteen miles to Fredericksburg for supplies.  While there we would take the Rappahannock Bridge to visit my aunt across the river near the ferry farm. On one winter crossing, we heard a crashing and splashing from below the bridge; a horse had bolted, turning a wagon, its dry goods, and its driver into the icy river.  I turned to my father, but he was already out of our wagon and running to the river. He jumped in the frigid water to pull out whatever life was struggling there.  He did not weigh the merits of the man or the equality.  Whether the drowning there was a man, woman, light, dark, two-legged, or four, life was leaving and my father was there to pull it back.  I am convinced the firebrands would let a majority drown without a second thought on the matter, but where I was raised, life, all life was precious and was not ours to rule or roll over.

Where I was raised, everyone works hard; the man and boy, the woman and girl, the draft horse, the bee, the bird in the wood; all have equal worth.  At day’s end, we all eat and sleep, appreciated for our contribution. Not one is thought to be the lesser being.

If man was given dominion over all animals, no one told the crows.

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Valentine Time

French Pail Birdhouse

Even before dawn, in the treetops, unseen, the Carolina wren and the tufted titmouse are awake, singing beautiful Valentine songs. On sky, high above, the crow joins in with his raspy caw; it's not about perfect pitch, it's simply love, and that is all.

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Every time I say Valentine, my daughter corrects me, insisting it is Valentime.

 "Happy Valentine's Day."

"Time."

 "Valentine."

"Time."

"Valentine time?"

"Valentime Day."

"I love you all the Valentime."
"I love YOU all the Valentime."

The Isle of Circ

The Isle of Circ (an imaginary land) by Michael Douglas Jones

Journal entry No.03/30  On the Island. I have abandoned my airship and now, on foot, move deeper toward the center of the Isle of Circ, my map showing the concentric rings that mark its depth. I can’t help but feel like it takes a leap of faith to move to each inner ring; each ring a smaller and smaller circle, until I reach a point where I am either spinning or perfectly still.

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For the full story of the expedition to the Isle of Circ:

http://mjonesstudio.com/circ_journal.htm

Leaving, Returning

Leaving, Returning. Prints and cards available here.

We live, we learn, we leave, return;

 fly south and north, the back and forth,

 the fifth, the sixth, the palimpsest.

Our journal faded, overwritten,

never lost;

forgot;

forgiven.

We meet, we sleep, we meet again;

again

again

again

again

.

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Restricted View

    The modifications to this blog post are in accordance with proposed guidelines for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), also known as House Bill 3261. In all manner of art and speech,  the government  reserves the right to remove any inappropriate matter which contains offensive material such as nudity, words, or colors that are not beige.

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As an artist, of course, I'm against Web Piracy, but when lazy lawmakers write vague laws hoping the Supreme Court can sort out the details, we have to call them out. 

Leaving You at Sundown

one small stone in a riverbed of stones; day15

Sunset on Sundown Road, Laytonsville, Maryland. January 15

Leaving; riding beside the split-rail toward the sundown road. In the crisp winter air, the smell of oak wood smoke fades; the warmth of your whisper still wrapped like wool around me.

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On The Dock of This Day

one small stone in a riverbed of stones; day13

On the dock of this day, 1928

Eastern horizon quickening, lightening; sea of sun rising, readying, raising the mainsail of morning; dawn’s winter wind roars like stevedores on the dock of this day. Swaying ship masts of high hill pines creak and caution, as icy hatch hinges slam and shudder; flags snap and shiver. The crew of crows comes aboard from the valley, cawing commands; all is ready before the mast, this day may get under way. Day breaks cold against my face charting a northwest course; with the western moon over my left shoulder. I turn and face into this fine adventure.

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