"The Makers of Things"

And they said President Obama's inaugural speech had no sound bites.

It's been a long time since any politician has mentioned "the makers of things." President Obama put "the makers of things" on the plus side, in the constructive column, flagged as the good guys.

The makers of things -- as in not the paper-pushers, the number crunchers, the sales people, the MBA's, but the people who actually create something. 

The people who add to the world, who transform nothing into something, who put something before you that wasn't there before.

The makers of things imagine something and work it into reality. Maybe it's made in a factory, or a farm field; a theatre or a canvas. Maybe it's made of paper or steel. Maybe you can hold it or stand on it or sing it or read it.

More than piling up money. More valuable than money. Taking the invisible from the inside and making it a contribution to the outside.

"The Makers of Things." It's a perfect sound bite.

Starling Salon

They love the leftover water in my gutter and squish in together to get wet. In the early morning from my bed I watch my window speak like a ventriloquist. Starling squeaks and squeals mingle with their rumbling skinny feet. I'm too drowsy and sleep-eyed to get out of bed to look and can only smile at the window seeing in my mind's eye the pointy-beaked speckled comedians making a vaudevillian fuss over a puddle.

The Dark and the Light of It

I heard recently that astronauts train (used to train?) deep down in caves. Caves present that extraordinary phenomenon of complete blackness. They call it TCD: Total Cave Darkness. It's the kind of darkness astronauts encounter in outer space. Inner Earth. Outer Space. They have the same lighting, or no-lighting. When we close our eyes we see black, too. But usually not all black. I see light patterns, sometimes moving shapes, and one persistent design that has followed me my whole closed-eye life - a perfect 35mm frame of an amoeba burning in a stuck film projector. Sometimes faces fade in and out. Faces of no one I know. Sometimes carnival-like with exaggerated features. Not very friendly folk. Who are these people?

We don't usually like the dark. Maybe for sleeping. When you can't see you don't know where you are. But even so, you're right there. Being blind is not disappearing. What the blind see is the inside. Inside the cave. And outside. As large as Outer Space.

Makes you wonder where light comes from and why it decides to barge in on darkness. Is light the extrovert, dark the introvert? Light loud, dark dumb. Dusk, twilight, dawn. The wedding of the two. The romantic blending of extremes. The much more personable "grey."