CURIOSITY

may have killed the cat; more likely
the cat was just unlucky, or else curious
to see what death was like, having no cause
to go on licking paws, or fathering
litter on litter of kittens, predictably.

Nevertheless, to be curious
is dangerous enough. To distrust
what is always said, what seems,
to ask old questions, interfere in dreams,
leave home, smell rats, have hunches
do not endear cats to those doggy circles
where well-smelt baskets, suitable wives, good lunches
are the order of things, and where prevails
much wagging of incurious heads and tails.

Face it. Curiosity
will not cause us to die-
only lack of it will.
Never to want to see
the other side of the hill
or that improbable country
where living is an idyll
(although a probably hell)
would kill us all.
Only the curious
have, if they live, a tale
worth telling at all.

Dogs say cats love too much, are irresponsible,
are changeable, marry too many wives,
desert their children, chill all dinner tables
with tales of their nine lives.
Well, they are lucky. Let them be
nine-lived and contradictory,
curious enough to change, prepared to pay
the cat price, which is to die
and die again and again,
each time with no less pain.
A cat minority of one
is all that can be counted on
to tell the truth. And what cats have to tell
on each return from hell
is this: that dying is what the living do,
that dying is what the loving do,
and that dead dogs are those who do not know
that dying is what, to live, each has to do.

 - by Alastair Reid  (1926-)

5:12:25 PM     

"You have another little drink, and I’ll have another little drink,
and maybe we can work up some real family feeling here."   --Irving Ravetch

"Family values are a little like family vacations—subject to changeable weather and remembered more fondly with the passage of time. Though it rained all week at the beach,it’s often the momentary rainbows that we remember."  --Leslie Dreyfous

"It’s a family joke that when I was a tiny child I turned from the window out of which I was watching a snowstorm, and hopefully asked, ‘Momma, do we believe in winter?" --Philip Roth

1:19:01 PM     

The Unseen Gulf War

Reality check:
Haunting Gulf War images by Peter Turnley

1:12:51 PM     

Icon's Story

Even icons can have a bad day..... Icon's Story
via...The Presurfer 

1:02:29 PM     

Wildflowers of Castle Country

An online reproduction of the book, Wildflowers of Castle Country, by Max and Vera Finley..."For someone learning about wildflowers and ordinary walk can be filled with exciting discoveries."  Page after page is filled with beautiful flowers they have photographed over the years in Utah.    via....wood s lot

12:52:02 PM