So much to write, so little time!

My mind is like a partially shattered jigsaw puzzle these days. Some pieces connect, most barely dangle by their hinges. The dangling chads have nothing over my thought processes. I have lots to write and post about my recent forays to the aquarium, and reading of Rachel Carson, Muir, Thoreau, Evelyn White, and others. I've pondered a lot the distinctions, if any, between scientists and naturalist, and have experienced the joy of delving enthusiastically into disciplines long admired, but no necessarily my own-- or are they? Microbiologists, scientists in general, seem to have a lot in common with miniaturists, that deliberate focus, painting on one inch pieces of ivory, as Jane Austen may have called it, living in the intense miniature worlds of Thoreau's ant wars. Ture miniaturists devoted to scale work under magnifying glasses and microscopes, too. There world is infintisemal, and the question becomes how do all those tiny parts fit into the whole. Reading Wordsworth, Whitman, looking outside, especially at waterways with new eyes. Then feeling uncontrollable rage at how my child with special needs is being treated by our own Dist. 41, my mother's place of employ nearly 40 years, my alma mater. Boycotting band and all activites by one "Maestro" Karlyn, because he can't seem to realize that Band is about music appreication, and tolerance, and love of music, not how many haf-a___d awards the director can stuff into his merit file. I wish upon his miserable children and himself the bad treatment my child is receiving at his hands, the after effects of his immature outbursts, his bad temper, the abusive us/them atmosphere he is creating in a group of children who should be learning harmony, musical and otherwise. Dist 41, RI/M, shame on you; you violate the ADA with each blast of your foul, collective, corporate breath! Enough; I think of little ways of saving water, of recycling, of picking up the litter others throw when I can, and I do it. I tell my kids to turn over old ads and used papers and use them as notepaper, something we did in school even in the 70s, with no one telling us to. One of the architechts behind the EPA died this week, and I hope to post the obit soon. We can take a lesson from him; the evironment is not a political issue; it is a life issue. He was a moderate republican and passionate environmentalist who brought about many reforms. Still watch cooking shows passionately, but no time for now to cook or develop recipes. I hope to do more by the holidays, for there is a certain peace and spirituality for me, a connectedness, in creating my mother's recipes, or making up my own. There is indeed peace in the kitchen, ad I often forget time and miseries when I'm there.