Evanston: fog; gale; spring
Evanston: fog; gale; spring
Fog and spring are here in Evanston; the gale in the Bay of Islands.
According to the NZ Met Service website, the severe weather that began a week before I left has continued almost uninterrupted with a series of sub-tropical lows drifting down from the northwest. Earlier this week there was a storm warning for Brett, followed by this gale.
May is the usual month for cruisers to depart New Zealand for the islands. Many were waiting for a break in the weather when I flew away. I expect that they are waiting still.
This year earlier was better than later.
I don’t know what is causing our fog. I can only dimly make out the trees across the street. It reminds me that one of the things that did not get done my last week on HAWKE was reconnecting the radar dome, which has been inconveniently in the cabin, usually on the port quarter berth, since the gimbaled back-stay mount broke while crossing the Indian Ocean in 2008, and seeing if it still works. I’ll do it when I am next aboard.
If it doesn’t work, it is gone. If it does, I’ll probably buy another mount. One way or the other, i want it out of the cabin.
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I’ve walked through the cemetery. Everyone is still there. And I’ve walked and cycled beside the lake, which is also still there.
But in the little over two months I was gone, Evanston was transformed. Early March was winter. Mid-May is spring. The trees are not bare. Tens of thousands of leaves have grown, almost miraculously when you think about it. The grass is green. Flowers are blooming. The lilacs bordering the tiny front lawn of our building are fragrant.
They caused me to look up Walt Whitman’s “When Lilacs Last in the Door-yard Bloom’d”. A fine poem, but too grim for my present mood.
Few of us are going to get out of here without suffering, but that will wait its time. I’ve agonized enough over life.
For now it is spring.
Saturday, May 22, 2010