Exhaustion. Up to and back from Austin to pick up Amah Mama, in the throes of her own ecstatic, diesel-driven euphoria. If visiting the Amah in Dallas doesn’t do it, then the garlic mashed potatoes on the Eastside will. We’re all a bit wiggy right now, as the rains come falling down. It’ll do us all some good.

Did I say exhaustion? Up at the crack, down way too late, double sermons and double wine. First of July: make it a holiday. Narnia is coming to an end. We will end with the Calormen. Yemaya with a big fat grin.

Mewtwo strikes back and Mr. Berryman dreams on. Spumoni melts under the blazing desperate rampant heat of his furzy lust. Blackhaired jeweled queens. So do we all dream, in our furziness, if not our desperation. Spumoni fits the bill, the pistachio in particular. After port, of gorse. Communion wine all the better. The better to shave with, all the furze.

Wet blankets and noodles, Shaolin soccer, Kung Fu master of the sweet bun. We all “come for the bun.” Intake exhaustion, preliminary fold. Manifest and waiting, the end of the line. Blue sits in the mizzen, I in the mist.

Pupal eclosings all round. Seems to me, you gonna go to the trouble of taking down the wall, you take it all the way: you don’t squabble, you don’t set conditions, you take it down and walk free and clear and naked into the open space. Well, maybe not nekkid: that might get the walls a-goin’ on the other sides. Metamorphosis indeed. Squab-hobbly, is that any way to be?

I’ll take the alabaster round, the most seemly, the least wormy. Blue, as we all know, will take the walk, if the walk’s to be had. Henry’ll take Ms. Brilliance, no?

Fort of July: impregnable, inexpugnable, imperdible [obs.], indomitable, invincible, irresistible (simply), inextinguishable, incontestable, doughty, puissant, adamantine. A stout brandy, Mr. Bones.

And the beat goes on, a renewal project, revolution down by the riverside. Splish splash, BD’s twenty minutes on a napkin.

I like that adamantine: willpower of the north-central Cameroon. If you follow me now, I will take you. Otherwise, all bets are off, my little Godwhacker. Down and out is no excuse: ask the junta, all decked out in their party hats. Everyone is invited, all will be renewed: this is the critical seasoning, from those who have.

Comes the news: goddess is demoted. Offense: traveling out of the country. Comes the further news that “retired” goddesses often end their lives in unmarried misery, as it is believed that to marry one is to die young. Ain’t no ticket to immortality. Forty bucks a month pension for the little tykes, mammothrept or not.

Took her down to the Five and Dime, stripped her of her divinity, they did. A grey day, as I remember. She was hoping for a box of juicy fruits, but felt like she was cooked into a slurry in large kettles, bottom to top.

One that almost got away, how’s that for commitment, eh? Aubrey and Maturin go down in a fiery boom, end on resurrection day. Skip over the Post-Captain, a lot of twaddle, it appears, in the main.

Weather can’t decide what to do: I say, continue on the wet side, never enough down this way. Ever ready, by turns.

Visceral, yes? Indeed. Ms. Allen duking it out with Ms. Winehouse: I would have passed, but second listen, it’s a different world, mouth the ready, mouth it black. Ten thousand a month to fritter, time to shut it up, cher. Fish bone.

Fuzzy-fog on this day of sevens. It passes me by, as do the Wimblys. No surprise, and no surprises. Rain veiled the early morn, still wrestles with day.

Boy energy in the background, a clash of clones. Clash of clowns is more like it. I’d like to be off for the Indian Ocean, but Narnia calls one last time. Actually baked potatoes call first, then Shasta and the Calormene. Saturday in South Texas. Wimbly or Wembley it ain’t.

So, puddle up, mis amigos. Puddle up and puddle on. We three and we five: whence the new two? Come a day.

Narnia has come to a close: six wonderful weeks and a wonderfully supportive class. Such an odd contrast to the wall-climbing at WSSA. I love the kids and their energy and brilliance, but what a pleasure to pose questions and have them wander peacefully about a room full of committed adults. I’ve told Rick that I’m happy to do another in the future.

In one week, we hit the road. I’m still of a mind to head out for an overnight jaunt, push it, and then rest before O’Keeffe. Out of time and space we’ll be, aside of all eternity.

I know where you are. I know where you are. Out into the day, out into the afterday, out into the netherworlds, the fashions of ivory science. Across to Bombay, the night is blue, the rivers jade, the mountains smoke. Guitar sings, the hill country calls, alexanders call the crescent moons. This is where, this is why, I know where you are. Received from those, received from plenty, received in red, I know where, I know where, I know where you are.

Standing alone, Congress and the river, Congress and I know, I know where, I know where you are.

The fuzz is back, casting windward, sunflowers in the North Pasture. Where are they, these days of forgiveness? Walk north through trees of sunbright, windmill calling its tune, high cumulus off the gulf, drifting in the new world of the foothills. I know where you are.

Walk higher, the middens call. Where were we when we weren’t? Where were we in the difference between blue and green? Ask later, ask after the day explodes. Ask when grief finds you and the stranglehold dies. I will pass. We will pass. I know where. You are. Without a dream in my heart.

Darkness of the day revealed, dark eyes shining, darkness. Hibiscus rain, the sun through the moon. Mary shines blue, truly, in the deep. Call the fires, call the hounds of hell: we are broken. Time will tell the end of. Angels fall, the suns will rise. This will be, this will be, this will be your shining star, the rogue lament. Revelation by the riverside. Natural wonder. Innocence regained, shared in you. Hallowed. Ramshackle. Visionary fissures. You to comfort, you to feel, and said that life is. The face so I won’t be, won’t need to hear. Needless needful known.

Thoreau’s birthday, and Janna’s.

A strange movie:

Man with large unwieldy suitcase on rollers walks through a crowd of odd, generally grotesque, people. As they walk together, he finds that they are extras for a horror film to be shot downtown.

Three people at the bottom of an elevator shaft that opens onto a wild tangle of trees, creek, and garbage. Brindled, weather-beaten old Boxer. Blonde woman stands at the shaft as they leave.

Women in an office, various levels of intrigue and sex. The blonde woman again.

And that ain’t the half of it: Agent Cooper’s lost another dream.

Friday the: Days away from the road. I am deep into the Aubrey/Maturin/Villiers saga. A cold one she is. This one, the best one so far, though Maturin’s time with Dil in India, during the festivals, his immersion, a wantonly landlubbing affair, was the most magical sequence of all. Jack’s journey as the bear? Well, now.

Does Diana surface again? No reason she should disappear into America for good.

Still searching for peace, and in my lazy way, rejecting its claim. I feel it now, feel its easy call. What will the red rock say, the oak creek, the canyon?

Tennis yesterday with Trio Los Panchos: they return the favor with an intro to new TexMex. These are the days.

Aubrey/Maturin continue apace: Sophie is in the wings: Diana takes flight. I find that America is by no means the end of DV, that she will surface through half the books, that Stephen will, in fact, finally land her: not briefly, but certainly conditionally. Could there be any other way with DV?

The road awaits. Early morning hours into Fort Stockton, turn north to 40 and then west to Albuquerque. Lodgings by noon, early afternoon at the latest. Maybe sooner.

Seven minutes to go, and premium flaxseed. Not what you think. Head a-fuddle, too late a-bed, groggy-ish for the day. We are packed, we have Blue to deposit, there are rumors of ice cream, I will pass and nap for the road ahead. We now aim for SF by early afternoon: see Georgia on Monday, zoom for Sedona after Tuesday breakfast. But, it’s a vacation, see? We’ll amble as we see fit.

Blue for his walk this morning: fresh rain in the air, on the streets. Crepe myrtles blooming, their abundance blooming grass and street alike. Gorgeous. Such simple beauty.

Like 4 days in one: overnight overland groove to Carlsbad: middle of nowhere gaslight at Ramon’s dead bar: quiet easy Santa Fe with Georgia: down to Bernalillo and Vargas and Abuelitas.

Aphrodite running low, as was my Shepherd prayer: the wait for gas set me squarely down in vacation mode, once the call was made. Shade, cool breeze, lizard, jackrabbit, birds galore, and a quiet wait: what’s to complain? Ray the prince: Rex the poodle: Georgia’s landscapes. And, as I say, SF was a surprisingly easy groove: why now, in all my persnicketyness? Crashed: the train barreled through: cared not.

Pumpkin pancakes to start, then off. Westing to Flagstaff. Stop for opals? Malachite? We pass. Late lunch in Holbrook: the rains break: Fresh air! Off to the Meteor Crater: a gouge, but we’re committed. Lovely to see the surrounding landscape.

Green Flagstaff, and then down the beautiful canyon. Ponderosa pines, red rock. Smell of pine thick in the air. To the Orchards, sit down on the terrace and soak in the darkening red. Errand for Tina, scope to the west, back to pool, and Walden’s triumphant “I can swim!” Oh my, and so quickly. Walk the quiet town. Home: bed.

Lazy day layabouts: a bit of morning pool, coffees, puzzles, Aubrey/Maturin, lizardy gadabouts, lunch in the orchard. This heavy dining, we decide, will never do: making groceries will.

Afternoon brings rains, thunder, lightning, and a very put-upon young lad with heart set on the pool. Rainbow comes, the sky clears, we are, again, amphibians.

Up and down 89A with Mr. Snicket and his beloved orphans, joined by the Quagmire triplets, and the usual nefarious nefarians.

Postcards to the Antonians, backgammon, a twenty minute (or so) lockout due to faulty keys. All of us fairly quickly off to Sand Land. Zzzzz.

“High on a hill, above the cinnamon town.” Cinnamon indeed: everywhere. Last night, as the sun set, clouds turned to pink, Walden’s skin looked as cinnamon as the rocks all around us.

This morning, to the vortex: Boynton Canyon Trail, a blending, it is said, of feminine and masculine energies. Out to the trailhead. Sunglasses come off: the red is too rich and soothing to be blurred by green lenses. Take the Vista Trail, round the tall cairn-like knoll. A Buddhist prayer flag hung in a low juniper bush. Yemaya blue of gorgeous scrub jays: whispers of the northern canyon.

End of a long adventure. Up canyon way today, Oak Creek through Slide Rock: a marvel. Woke to haze and clouds over the mountains: breakfast and then we were off. Beautiful drive and then left into a big slice of heaven.

We worked ourselves up the creek, past the mega-slide, to the red shelves, shade, and smaller slides: lovely pools of clear water. Walden, newfish, blazed ahead: early afternoon, he was going for the big slide, parental caution be damned. And slide and bump he did: 4 times, parents in tow, after a solo first. And then the lovely rains.

Long long drive to Artesia. Out of Sedona, in the wee quiet hours , up one last time through that gorgeous red whispering canyon. Blow past Flagstaff and on across eastern Arizona’s flat flatlands. Bad hash this time in Holbrook, on again across the yellowing high desert. Into New Mexico’s redlands, Gallup, and finally a brief lemony nap, just enough to push on, push on, through Albuquerque, and on down the Miracle Highway to Roswell and, at last, blissful home in Artesia at the Heritage Inn. Highjacked by Italian food pirates at Piccolino’s, devilishly good eggplant parmagiana, my oh my.

Down out of lovely Artesia, through Carlsbad, on to Fort Stockton, yes? Odd signs for El Paso and Las Cruces, my nose finally comes up out of Aubrey/Maturin and we are in the midst of islands in foggy mists, recumbent giants. Mary calls yet again: these are the Guadalupe Mountains and we are off course.

Or are we? These beautiful mountains call to us, calling us home, calling us further down past the Sierra Diablos, the Beach Mountains, and into Van Horn. Mesa after mesa of crow I must eat, this gorgeous west Texas land I have so arrogantly dismissed.

Dead to the world, save my son slipping in between us early morn, but of even that, only briefly aware. Unload the car, piles of laundry about, remnants of the week’s bliss. Internet is fritzing, reminder to stay gone a little longer, why hurry back? SA has been under rain, the air has (presumably) been cooler, but dear old Aunt Humidity seems to have returned just for us. Speaking of returns, Mr. Blue is ever so grateful, ever so. His Teutonic aunt will never do, never. Those Guadalupes, Sierra Diablos continue to haunt, yes, even more so than sweet Sedona.

We are breakfasting artfully, or arting breakfastfully: Mateo, Maria, the triplets will join. Still travel sluggish, grounded jet lag (car lag?), but the lazy mode will do. The lazy brain may not, but the body will oblige. Aubrey’s struggles with the Polychrest are over: we are off to see Maturin and Diana again in The Surgeon’s Mate.

Thanksgiving or Christmas in the Guadalupes? Driving down 54, I saw a small stand of ranch buildings backed up against the Sierra Diablos, the mountains looming behind, utter silence. That’s where I’d want to be, snow on the ground, fire in the hearth.

Thunder rumbling in the distance and more dark rain in this season of wet. Whither Texas drought: we do not complain. Grass is oh so green and jungly. Take it any day.

Sergio’s Equinox: constant is the rain. “As I stand here and remember, how once our hearts were one…” Who writes, who sings like that anymore? Okay, Gigi McKenzie, perhaps.

Emma Sullivan calls, one last time: she needs to speak of her mother Amanda, lost in the dark. She will.

And of what else do we speak? Triplets? Art Nazis? Oceans? The now flood outside my window? Constant is.

Morning quiet: babe is off spending the night with his broo. I like this underwater world, Aquarena Springs in the village. Last night was Greer and Joan and Bob Taylor with a nebbish Herb, and then endless rounds of double sol, or our version of it. Nodding visit to Aubrey, Maturin, and Diana, fleeing Boston with a babe in DV’s belly.

“Wooden ships, on the water, very free and easy.” I was thinking Shames, but CSN and Kantner/Slick come sailing out. It’s all the same: waterways, waterwords, waterwise. Wouldn’t have it any other way, would you? Constant is the rain.

The fog is in, and I am foggy with it. What ghosts are lurking in the trees, down the ancient highways? T and I have been without the little man, off with his amigo down in the southlands. We love the quiet and the aimless wandering, but we love him more: he’s home to us today, sad, no doubt, to leave his broo.

Challenge to the withering fires: hail the ships: sail on through the Scylla and Charydis, the tangle of webs, the boggle of bogs. Fens dank, late night, the drift down the Back Bay, the simple island nap.

Down 281 and out 90, a quicker way to the west of my youth. Crossing a random lane, I felt as if I had shifted: broke free from a map wedged deep inside, mostly hidden, mostly unbidden, far from memory and intention, but so deeply embedded as to hold me, if not willing prisoner, at least wary traveler.

Those streets are gone: where they lead are gone: who I would have been is gone.

It was not loss I felt, not mourning: it was freedom, lighting out for the territories.

White moon over a bank of cloud: blue sky calling.

In the back pew, with the Wild Man. (Wild Man is neighborhood 12/13 year old “orphan,” adopted by our youth group.) How droll of God: serve me. Only this time his little brother is there, trembling little Dickensian urchin, alternately bopped by and loved on by WM. Heartbreaking. So, through the service, we dance through gratitude, the peace, mischief, bopping of little broo, shushing, and deep appreciation of the tenor’s solo. WM leaves little broo in the pew during communion: hand in hand, little brother and I walk to the rail for our blessings. WM is most grateful. Touchingly so.

Scratch far enough beneath the surface and one Walter leads to another: Horn Island vagabond, brother strewn on a Mississippi highway. Artists both, though one kept his closer to the heart. Transformed, transmogrified, transmongreled. Wolves howling at the moon, both.

I see the museum Walter survived sister Katrina: she rained down terror upon storerooms, but left Walter alone. Gulf water Van Gogh, mad ocean drive Thoreau, cousin to the mad potter just miles down Biloxi way.

Strewn brother? I hear he was exhumed, moved closer to the heart of things, Cap’n Bones. Given a choice, I’d take the latter, too.

Breakfasted with the Twins this morning: they are decidedly better early than late. We were looking for the latest incarnation of Avalon Drugstore, Omelettry, or even the uptown House of Banana Pancakes. Bluebird Grill? The sisters were up to the challenge: their irritating little obsessive penny-pinching reminders receded behind good service and bodacious breakfast tacos. The coffee weren’t bad, neither.

So, over breakfast, I said it: I am not happy about returning back to school, after this oh so joyous summer break. Pobrecito. No tears for this Argentinean, bloated on more days off than most, just in the days remaining.