James Baldwin: Collected Essays, in the fifteenth printing of the Library of America edition — a gift for Christmas from “The Kids.” At one-thirty in the morning, the sound of a raccoon climbing the fence near our bedroom window. Into the kitchen for a sip of water, the cold floor a comfort to my warm bare feet. Streetlights and a dusting of snow. December 26, 2021 . Early-Morning Streetlight For […]
Thirty-six degrees. After so many inches of rain, Goose Lake has risen and expanded by hundreds of feet all around. We have never seen it this full, or as heavily populated by ducks. The road that leads deeper into the park is submerged far and wide beneath swiftly moving water, part of the river having returned to its old channel — the area by the old black cottonwood that has […]
It took me sixty-five years to discover the joy of working barefoot in the cold winter-wet yard. All those years in socks and shoes, trying to keep warm — what next will I unlearn? December 15, 2021. Afternoon. . Whispers The old man, they say, has lost his mind. But we do not lose what we give. And it is cold where they wait to be known. It is cold […]
The world owes me nothing. It gives me everything. I can claim that I have what I have through my own effort, but it simply isn’t so. I have what I have because life is in me and I am in life. I have awareness and breath. I need nothing else. And when they leave this body, they will take that need with them. The sudden arrival of about a […]
The wind chime, practicing for winter — bare feet on the cold morning floor. November 23, 2021 . [ 1298 ]
At thirty-seven degrees in the canyon, with everything dripping, the falls roaring, and the stream running high, it didn’t take long for the soles of my bare feet and the thin foot bed of my sandals to become soaked and coated with mud. But I never felt cold. Twice, farther on, I washed them together in the swiftly moving water, which was not only cleansing and invigorating, but felt positively […]
And what of the salamander we met on the trail, skin smooth, mud-colored, orange beneath, walking on its toes, crossing in the chilly damp? And what of the woodpecker knocking unseen from above? What of the massive cleft rock in the stream? Are we to think nothing of them and pretend their existence away? Or shall we carry them with us, and make ourselves living reminders that all is not […]
Old friends, old souls — who else would care for these pages? In today’s mail I received a fall shoe catalog. It made me wonder: when was the last time I wore socks or shoes? I wish I had noted the date. A fair guess, though, would be somewhere in the neighborhood of four months. In that time my feet, ankles, and legs have gained a tremendous amount of strength. […]
Maybe I have changed. Clearing the downspouts of birch leaves in a light rain at fifty-three degrees while wearing shorts and short sleeves and being barefoot is something I have never done before. That I felt warm and completely comfortable while doing it is, I think, as good a sign as the early fall rain, which is drenching everything in fine winter style. Fifty-three, of course, is not cold. The […]
The nine-millimeter sandals are designed to keep one grounded by means of a copper plug, which makes regular contact with the earth, and a single continuous conductive lace, which hugs the foot and keeps the sandal snugly and comfortably in place for a near barefoot experience — ideal for this morning’s three-mile climb on the Perimeter Trail to Rackett Ridge and the subsequent scamper down again. The most strenuous part […]
William Michaelian 