tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30788222024-03-12T16:04:43.186-07:00RubbleThe original. Since 2001, a growing pile of refuse: a heap of photography, writing, and other such scraps of nothing.A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.comBlogger929125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-44298697557101065982022-04-26T09:54:00.001-07:002022-04-26T09:55:40.309-07:00Vernonia Mill<h2 style="text-align: center;">
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<h2 style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/irCRkyYOzC4" width="480"></iframe></h2><div style="text-align: justify;">For most of 2020, I sat out the lockdowns right across the street from this place. I've got a lot of my own content to post up eventually, but that's all down on the task list a bit... Until then, this is a pretty decent video of the old Vernonia mill, aside from where he calls a holly bush mistletoe! Ha! Fair enough, we all oops some times!</div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08252023452497075805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-84487516163588193602022-04-26T07:56:00.006-07:002022-04-26T09:01:35.590-07:00Car Cougars<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVvHr_rft7PJbapNPkwdgxMzh-cxa4kPb8TnCBInD4bd6U-3eVwPwqnAQVV-e5XfLtLVKCOSF_YuahWDaabyUvbiUoRK6etATicLNG-gF9ClyJVXMit7Gpk2RIhDwxTmhBLwViXG4qmxSt3LGlGWRlEbkUNn_EOV8s3CDBM7wv5qyZexji6_0/s902/car%20cougar.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="902" data-original-width="526" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVvHr_rft7PJbapNPkwdgxMzh-cxa4kPb8TnCBInD4bd6U-3eVwPwqnAQVV-e5XfLtLVKCOSF_YuahWDaabyUvbiUoRK6etATicLNG-gF9ClyJVXMit7Gpk2RIhDwxTmhBLwViXG4qmxSt3LGlGWRlEbkUNn_EOV8s3CDBM7wv5qyZexji6_0/w374-h640/car%20cougar.jpg" width="374" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 15px; text-align: start;">Back in high school, I was walking through a Pay-n-Save parking lot, looked over, and saw a cougar looking out a truck window at me. It was chained to something, just chilling and waiting in the driver's seat, and guarding the open can of Budweiser sitting in the cup holder. Got pics, but the prints are, sadly, long gone...</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><br /></span></div><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 15px; text-align: start;"><div style="text-align: justify;">There was a small private zoo in town, and I think it lived there.</div></span></div><br /><p></p>A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08252023452497075805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-20608729529057171612021-10-14T05:54:00.012-07:002022-04-26T07:57:50.374-07:00A preview of The General: A Tale of the Dead Wind<p style="text-align: center;"><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitKfsJrWK0b-kO0t0jEU2251Gn8wVrT6tvLI6fNnb-pZOCLiuzpfgQ651YHCOqy9ETiFJr7A2NtDQ6it4HRr1_9TmVOUf4RW1GxMCGHdPT1qhaNs63lIl3SQNO40Zp7yPmYjbcXQ/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1272" data-original-width="2048" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitKfsJrWK0b-kO0t0jEU2251Gn8wVrT6tvLI6fNnb-pZOCLiuzpfgQ651YHCOqy9ETiFJr7A2NtDQ6it4HRr1_9TmVOUf4RW1GxMCGHdPT1qhaNs63lIl3SQNO40Zp7yPmYjbcXQ/w575-h358/Mont.+Bay+-+Hakewill%252C_A_Picturesque_Tour_of_the_Island_of_Jamaica%252C_Plate_18.jpg" width="575" /></a></b></div><b><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b>4. Samuel</b></div></b><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>Middletown, Connecticut</b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><b>April 1, 1827</b></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p>“So how was the old church? Looks like they spared you the tar and feathers!” Edward called from his chair on the porch as Samuel rode up to the old homestead.</p><p>“Barely!” Samuel laughed, tying his horse to the hitching rail in front of the old house. “From the looks of those folks, they just might have strung me up if I’d stepped into the church itself!”</p><p>He took a seat next to his younger brother and started rolling a cigarette.</p><p>“Silk and tea coming into Middletown, ginseng going out to China,” Edward said. “Oh, the scandal!”</p><p>“I wouldn’t laugh too much, Ed. You were pretty young when Dad died, too young to really know. The gossip around the church and the town was horrible. I think that almost broke mother as much as, well, you know.”</p><p>“Anyway, how’s our kin?” Edward asked, taking his brother’s cue, changing the subject.</p><p>“Healthy and handsome as always.”</p><p>Glancing at Edward, though, Samuel wished he could say the same about his brother. While his little brother was eight years younger, he looked shrunken, shriveled, and aged well beyond both of their years. Before leaving Canton, Edward had turned yellow and the color, while fading, still had not completely left his skin. He’d lost a quarter of his weight before leaving China and all of his strength, needing to be carried to the ship bringing them home. </p><p>While he wasn’t certain, he strongly suspected that Edward had been poisoned by one of the Hongs trying to gain advantage in the competitive Cantonese market’s foreign trade against his friend and mentor, Howqua. By the time they arrived back in Middletown, Edward had at least regained the ability to stand on his own, though he had still needed assistance walking.</p><p>Off the ship and safely back at home, Edward’s condition improved quickly and he was soon back on his feet, though still lacking the endurance he had before. In hindsight, Samuel was surprised that the voyage didn’t kill his brother, but the fact that he improved on the ship only added to his suspicion of poison.</p><p>Once Edward was out of bed, Samuel made sure that he stayed on the homestead, out of sight. The rumors about their enterprises in China were bad enough already.</p><p>At least there hadn’t been a ruby involved, Samuel thought. If there had been, his brother would be dead and everything Samuel had spent his life building would have been doomed.</p><p> After lighting his cigarette, he said, “George will be coming out soon, it’s time we bring him more into the fold, especially if you are convinced on abandoning me for New York.”</p><p>“Speaking of, I received another frantic letter from Elizabeth yesterday demanding that I return at once upon pain of death.”</p><p>“You married a fiery woman, I’ll say.”</p><p>“Aside from me missing her, as well, Sam, I’d best not keep Douglas waiting much longer. I keep telling you, he’s made me a very attractive offer should I see fit to return.”</p><p>“Insurance? I still don’t get it. Seems rather dour after all that we’ve built with Russell and Company. That’s your name there as well as mine.”</p><p>“All you’ve built. Canton almost killed me, and I’ll be more than happy leaving those midnight Huangpu runs to Sheldon. He has a flair and a lust for such adventure that I lack.”</p><p>“Even Jay is tired of that nonsense. While you were ill, I put him in command of one of the Turkish vessels. He’s young but he’s proven himself, I believe. But that is all the way around the world from here. I wouldn’t let you go back to Canton if you wanted to, but I could use you here. George is a good man, but you know the business better than he ever will after the last couple years.”</p><p>Edward laughed.</p><p>“Elizabeth would leave me before giving up the city for Middletown! We’ve discussed all of this too many times already. It’s been fun, and profitable, but I have no interest in making my fortune riding on your coattails. I’ll stay here until your ship sails in a couple weeks, but then I must make my way home.”</p><p>“Middletown is our home.”</p><p>“But Elizabeth is in New York.”</p><p>“Fine.”</p><p>Samuel extinguished his cigarette and started rolling a new one. </p><p>“Roll one for me, will you?”</p><p>“Sure, but don’t let Frances catch you, she’ll have my hide and you might be on your way back to the city quicker than you think. She is certain that tobacco is toxic to those with weak dispositions.”</p><p>“I don’t have a weak disposition. If I did, I’d be dead.”</p><p>“Well, explain that to the one who was nursing you back to life the last few weeks.”</p><p>Samuel rolled out the two cigarettes and they sat smoking in silence, looking out over the overgrown yard that, Samuel, at least, had spent precious little time playing in when he was a kid. While the town had moved in closer since their Great-Great-Great Grandfather settled here back in 1688 after being ordained as the second pastor of Middletown’s 1st Congregational Church, the property still retained the feeling of being deep in the country. Over the next century, the family had built that initial spartan homestead up into a solid, working farm with a large, two-story house that generations of Russells grew up in.</p><p>For the homestead, though, things took a turn for the worse when their Great Uncle came of age and took his divinity degree from Yale while his father still remained hale and healthy behind the pulpit of the church. Accepting ordination elsewhere, never to return, the farm passed down to Samuel and Edward’s Grandfather, who decided to pursue his fate and fortune on a ship instead of in a church.</p><p>While eventually rising to the point where he was the captain of his own vessel, their Grandfather was rarely home, and rarely sent back more than a meager few coin from his travels while his wife and children desperately tried to keep the farm running just to keep from starving.</p><p>The situation only took a darker turn when Samuel and Edward’s father, John, swayed by the largely fictional tales he'd heard from his father on his few visits home decided to follow in his father’s footsteps. While John quickly achieved command of his own ship, after landing in port with a particularly lucrative cargo then gambling all his earnings away, he came home one last time to see his increasingly desperate family before hanging himself in the barn.</p><p>Through the years that the old homestead had been in Samuel and Edward’s line, it had fallen to pieces. The livestock was long gone, the expansive gardens became overgrown, reverting back to a forest once again, and the once grand house was near the point of collapse by the time Samuel had earned enough to begin paying for repairs on it.</p><p>As if to prove the point, Sally, the mare Samuel had ridden into town that morning, neighed and pulled against the hitching rail, trying to reach a tuft of grass growing just out of her reach. As she leaned hard into her tethers, the posts cracked loudly and the whole rail took on a new and troubling slant. </p><p>“Ed,” Samuel said calmly. “If I forget, remind me to have Hubbard take care of that when he comes out this afternoon to work with Frances on the new house. The yard too, and soon. It would be nice to sit here for the next couple weeks not having to look at all of this mess, to get some real landscaping work done out here.”</p><p>“Sure enough,” Edward said, puffing at his cigarette. “Wetmore’s coming too, don’t forget about that. You have a full afternoon. George, Samuel Hubbard, Samuel Wetmore, Samuel Russell. Too many Sams in one house for me. I’ll pay my respects to Wetmore and then go for a ride, I think. I think it’s time to get back in a saddle.”</p><p>“Hubbard is no bother, he’ll mostly be working out the details on the new house with Mary, and Wetmore can fuck all the way off back to New York, for all I care. He only came here to hound me about relocating our Middletown operations down there or to Boston to save on costs, but our ships are helping keep this town afloat and I won’t do it.”</p><p>“I know you don’t forget, but Wetmore was like a father to me for a lot of years when you first left. Raised me like his own son, in his own house, and you, Sam, wouldn’t be worth a dime if he didn’t help get you started with Carrington.”</p><p>“I don’t forget. That is why I still put up with him.”</p><p>One of the farmhands Samuel hired wandered into the yard from behind the house. Seeing Sally tied to the rail, he called out, “Should I get her squared away, Mr. Sam?”</p><p>Samuel just nodded, flicking his cigarette butt into a spittoon next to him. He started rolling a new one as the boy led the mare away to the recently refurbished barn.</p><p>“George is taking his time. I don’t like it,” he said. “As you pointed out, I have a busy afternoon.”</p><p>“You know, you could always just stay here,” Edward suggested. “Things are solid in Canton. Cushing is more than capable of handling the details of the merger with Perkins.”</p><p>“Ed, if it were only that, I’d stay here and never look back. Unfortunately, there are some aspects to our business with Howqua that I must resolve before I’ll be free to return permanently. Aspects that you are glad you are unaware of and that you should forget I ever mentioned. Until then, there will be no restful retirement for me.”</p><p>The front door swung open and Frances came out, glaring at them playfully.</p><p>“Look at you two, sitting out here like a couple of tramps while I’m in there fending off assaults from both your mother and your boys!”</p><p>While his own wife was very attractive, Edward couldn’t help but to admire his brother’s wife’s unique beauty, even while looking haggard from dealing with his mother’s difficult needs and his rambunctious nephews all morning. Frances was in her early thirties, with long, curly red hair that she left flowing around her long neck and shoulders, piercing green eyes, and a fit and firm figure. She had an ageless air around her. Like her husband, she looked much younger than her age but, also like Samuel, she had the same faint lines around her eyes that betrayed her actual age, and she carried herself with the experience and wisdom of a woman much older than her years.</p><p>She was the younger sister of Samuel’s first wife, another remarkable beauty. After they married, the three of them took up residence in the old homestead with Edward and Samuel’s troubled, aging mother, Abigail. Originally, everyone figured that Frances would soon find a husband of her own, but when her sister died while giving birth to her second son, John, in 1819, just months after Samuel first departed for China, she’d stayed on to raise her nephews and to look after their grandmother.</p><p>A couple years before, the last time Samuel had returned from China for a visit and a break, he and Frances married. It was done with the utmost discretion so as not to further enflame the lingering rumors drifting about the town of a possibly unnatural relationship occurring at the old homestead before Samuel had first departed for Canton.</p><p>Frances and her sister had always been close, being orphaned young when both of their parents died under mysterious circumstances in Jamaica. While not technically orphans themselves, both Samuel and Edward felt great sympathy for the sisters since, when they lost their father, they essentially lost their mother, as well. Even before her sister’s death, the two of them had been so busy with the first baby, taking care of Abigail, and trying to get the dilapidated house and farm rebuilt that Frances had little interest in courting, contributing to the town’s seemingly unbridled lust for scandalous rumors.</p><p>Even Edward himself, one night after putting down a bottle of rum with his brother, couldn’t help but to jokingly pry into the subject.</p><p>“You know what the stories are about you three.”</p><p>“Of course, let them wonder. We’ve been through these things before. It will blow over in time.”</p><p>“Of course, but... Well?”</p><p>Samuel let out a sly chuckle.</p><p>“I will go to my grave before I ever validate that question with an answer.”</p><p>While Edward felt a little chided by the response, he still noted that his brother did not deny the accusations.</p><p>Frances pulled a stool over to join the brothers and pulled the cigarette out of her husband’s hand, taking a long, satisfying drag from it. Realizing that she wasn’t giving it back, Samuel started rolling a new one for himself.</p><p>“Oh, no you don’t,” Frances cheerfully scolded. “Put your pouch away, I’m taking a break. You’re the one who gave Harriet a few weeks off after Ed quit loafing around in bed, saying you wanted to spend some time being a father and a son, so get in there and get to it. I’ve been stuck here on my own all morning! Abigail’s been asking for you, so Ed, go find your nephews and do some uncle stuff with them.”</p><p>“Remember Frances,” Samuel said with a sly look in his eye. “Duties are ours, events are God’s.”</p><p>“And your duties, not mine, Sam, are upstairs with your mother.”</p><p>As they were walking into the house, Edward chuckled, “I wasn’t the only one who married a firebrand!”</p><p>“What was that, Ed?” Frances asked, winking at her brother-in-law.</p><p>“I love you, Fran,” he called back as the brothers escaped into the house and went about their duties.</p><p style="text-align: center;"> ***</p><p>Upstairs, in the room she’d slept in for all the years she’d been married into the Russell clan, Abigail sat in her rocking chair, trying to figure out who the stranger was who’d just walked in and sat on the foot of her bed. Then she felt like a silly young girl, wondering how she could be so confused.</p><p>“John, you are home!” she happily exclaimed. “I wasn’t expecting you at all! I’ve missed you so, come over and kiss me and tell me all about, oh, where was it this time? London?”</p><p>“No, Mother,” Samuel said sadly. “I’m Samuel. Your son, Samuel.”</p><p>Abigail’s excited look changed to one of relieved gratitude.</p><p>“Oh, Samuel. It is so good to see you. Eddie has been such a handful. I just can’t keep up with him anymore now that Sam’s left us. It feels wrong for me, but I am so grateful that he can stay with you. Just for awhile until I am feeling more myself. I feel like just a little rest is all I need, then Eddie will be home again, and we’ll be right back to where we need to be. But I do worry about his brother. He’s got the same bug that plagued both John and his father, but he does seem much more sensible than the two of them ever did. He’s started a big firm in China, you know? Imagine that, little Sam being such a big man all the way over there in China!”</p><p>Samuel was concerned. While she had never been mentally well, her growing senility had settled in even deeper since his last trip home, and where she used to have long periods of lucidity between spells, since he returned, she yad yet to recognize him once. Even worse, as her mind drifted through her memories from year to year, her recollection of the past was becoming even more jumbled and disoriented. Edward had moved out on his own from Wetmore’s years before the start of Russell and Company in Canton.</p><p>He rose from the bed and knelt down at his mother’s feet, wrapping her frail hand in both of his own and looking deep into her eyes.</p><p>“Mother, I am Sam, not Mr. Wetmore. Eddie is here too, down with your grandchildren. We’re all together here, for now, all of us back home.”</p><p>His mother just stared down at him with sad, uncomprehending eyes. After some time, it was more than he could take. He rose, kissed her gently on the forehead, and retuned to his seat on the edge of her bed. At least she wasn’t suck in the barn. Too often, her mind carried her back to that horrible moment of discovery and the dark days that followed.</p><p>“All right, Ma,” he said. “Tell me, what is new and exciting in your life right now?”</p><p>A sly look came over her face.</p><p>“On the way home from church yesterday, I saw the most handsome boy. I know it is not entirely proper, but I made up my mind to go introduce myself to him. I’d never seen him in church before, never seen him anywhere at all, and I would have remembered. Mother stopped me though. She was aghast, and said, ‘I won’t have it, not with that scoundrel John Russell.’</p><p>“But, oh my, that just made my heart flutter even more. How exciting, he was a scoundrel!”</p><p>“Yes, Abigail. I believe he was. In fact, I am sure of it.”</p><p>There was a quiet knock at the door and Frances stuck her head in.</p><p>“Both your cousin and Mr. Wetmore have arrived. They are waiting for you downstairs. Edward is going to take the boys riding with him, so I can sit with her for a while. She’ll be ready for her nap soon enough. There’s some fresh coffee and sandwiches in the kitchen, if anyone will have them.”</p><p>Down in the parlor, the two men were sitting on the sofa as Samuel came down the stairs and as Edward was ushering the boys out to the door.</p><p>Samuel waved his cousin over. </p><p>“Boys, this is another Russell, our cousin George!”</p><p>“Really,” his oldest boy said, eyes wide. “My name is George too!”</p><p>George laughed and shook his hand while Samuel knelt down and fake whispered in the boy’s ear, “You know, I’ll tell you a secret, only the finest of men are named George!”</p><p>John gasped, “But what about men named John!”</p><p>Samuel winked at him, “Johns have a bit more to prove.”</p><p>“Dad!” the boy groaned, realizing that his father was pulling his leg.</p><p>Laughing at the whole exchange, George announced that all he saw was two of the finest boys ever, who were sure to grow up into very great men, if they were anything like their father.</p><p>“Now, off with you, go have an adventure,” Samuel said, pushing them toward the door. “And Edward, do me a favor, stick to the river road. It wouldn’t do to have you seen in town right now.”</p><p>“Don’t worry about that. I moved away a long time ago. You are the one who wants to move back here, not I.”</p><p>As Edward followed the boys out the front door, Samuel turned to his cousin and said, “Speaking of fine young men, William sure has grown up. Aiming for West Point, is he?”</p><p>George sniffed somewhat dismissively.</p><p>“I’m not sure that he’s sure about much of anything yet, but he has taken well to the Academy.”</p><p>“He’s come a long way from since I saw him at our wedding in New York all those years ago.”</p><p>“That he has, for sure.”</p><p>“It’s your call, but as far as I am concerned, we’ll always have a position open for him, if he is looking for a place to land after he graduates.”</p><p>Samuel beckoned for Wetmore to join them and led them to the dining room.</p><p>“Since all of our business today is the same business, let’s sit down together in the dining room. I believe that Frances has prepared a bite to eat for us if either of you are hungry. As for myself, I am famished.”</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-29874644229827546492021-08-08T13:50:00.015-07:002021-11-16T10:04:28.178-08:00A Low Fire in the Night: An Episodic Novel by A. F. Litt (Me!) on Kindle Vella<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizIivofAwgOLPhs-fxVsiZ6iyagQnAYc3_aW2MRba4nLUZdBpP2oO1jWuC0DU51pbByNoQq0hBeqPdCyRKtAWERoMLkGTzB9ysNPSHJCTw8Faw36bS35YfFdp6me9_aYNKN7LhHw/s960/220424935_10215981872498637_455242244634616547_n.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="960" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizIivofAwgOLPhs-fxVsiZ6iyagQnAYc3_aW2MRba4nLUZdBpP2oO1jWuC0DU51pbByNoQq0hBeqPdCyRKtAWERoMLkGTzB9ysNPSHJCTw8Faw36bS35YfFdp6me9_aYNKN7LhHw/w640-h480/220424935_10215981872498637_455242244634616547_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo by A. F. Litt</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p></p><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;">For the last few years, I've been so buried in other projects that I really haven't had the time to keep up on this blog much.</div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;">As some of these projects start coming to fruition, though, it's time to re-up my blogging game. <a href="https://jasonrobertsonline.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Jason Roberts</a> and I, a collaborator <a href="https://jasonrobertsonline.com/books/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #43507b; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">on several books</a> recently released, with more coming in the fall, recently declared the rest of the summer to be "Heavy Content Summer" for both of us, so here I go!</div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">hot girl summer is over it's time for the fall of society</p>— maura quint (@behindyourback) <a href="https://twitter.com/behindyourback/status/1424139752039763970?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 7, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><br />For this first update in far too long, I'd like to share <a href="https://amzn.to/2U7YSAE" target="_blank">my new project on Kindle Vella</a>. This is a new service by Amazon that works around the episodic posting of chapters of longer works. <br /><br />For me, this project is mostly about playing around with the new service and getting to know it. Also, it is kind of fun! I'll be writing it in "real time," one or two chapters at a time before it goes live, a way to get a book out in bite-sized chunks for me, with at least one new episode a week coming out from now until it is done. While I am not currently lacking for writing or editing work, this side-project does accomplish something very important for me, it's getting a story set in the world that I've been building for years and decades out into the public.<br /><br />It is a prequel to both <a href="https://rubble.blogspot.com/2019/11/nanowrimo-2019-properties-of-dust.html" target="_blank"><i>The Properties of Dust </i>novel from NaNoWriMo 2019</a> and to <a href="https://rubble.blogspot.com/2012/12/december-is-cruel-month.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><i>Against the Dying of the Light</i> from NaNoWriMo 2012!</a> Now, this probably begs an important question, why start a completely new novel when you have a rough draft of <i>Dust</i> and 3/4 of a draft of <i>Against</i> already in the can!?! 2012, dude! That one's been sitting around for almost a full decade?</div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;">There are many complex answers to those questions, one of them being, in fact, dude, that one has been sitting around for almost a full decade! And I haven't read it front to back, well, ever! While <i>Properties</i> is newer, in a sense, and already more of a third or fourth draft as opposed to <i>Against</i>, being the third incarnation of a novel that I've been working on in one form or another since the 1990s, it also suffers from having just a bit too much time collecting on it's dusty pages. </div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;">The lead time on getting either of those projects back up and running was too much for the nature of the project I was looking to start with Vella. Those are both very complex novels that will take a lot of work to start up and to complete. For this first story on Vella, I was looking for something I could crank into quickly that was a bit less complex, though still fun to read. <br /><br />Also, this is a completely new service from Amazon that I am completely unfamiliar with, as it is for everyone else reading and writing there right now. I wanted to hedge my bet with a more, um, disposable novel before getting locked in there with other manuscripts that I've been working on for years and years.<br /><br />If this experiment goes well, perhaps the first drafts of those next books in this series will debut on Vella. Or not. We'll see how things go.<br /><br />Finally, and this was the biggest motivation for me on starting a new story instead of picking up one of the old ones... I am not sure if you noticed, but the over the years since 2019 and, wow, since 2012, a lot has happened in the world.<br /><br /><i>Against the Dying of the Light </i>was set about 50 to 75 years out from <i>2012's future</i>, as best as I could predict for my fictional purposes then. It was set after a soft-apocalypse in a community making some decisions that would decide whether it survived and rebuild or collapse further into darkness.<br /><br /><i>The Properties of Dust</i> was set about 30 years from <i>2019's future</i> in an increasingly dystopian America, just before the events that eventually kicked the U.S., at least, over the brink into the world we see in <i>Against</i>.</div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;">While it's only been a little less than two years since my last go at the <i>Dust</i> manuscript, what a two years it has been!<br /> <br />More than anything, for me, <i>A Low Fire in the Night </i>is a chance for me to reset this series in a world based on where we are now in 2021 without having to rework a lot of elements in those other manuscripts, then having to deal with all the continuity issues that would be brought up by those revisions. To put it bluntly, those houses were pretty solid, but their foundations were destroyed by the events of the last few years. Sometimes it is better just to start with a completely new house.<br /><br />Those books are still on my "production calendar" for a little further down the line. Before then, I also have another novel I've been working on, my main project right now, in fact, that should be meeting the world this autumn, set in <a href="https://amzn.to/37vj3eF" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Jason Robert's <i>Dead Wind</i> universe</a>, then there are two projects I'm editing for Jason that are his "break" projects before his third book in the main <i>Dead Wind</i> trilogy, and after all that, of course, there will be third <i>Dead Wind </i>trilogy novel, which will be as massive of a project as <a href="https://jasonrobertsonline.com/books/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><i>The Yellow Painted Man</i> and <i>Tres Castillos</i></a>, starting up for both of us, for me as story editor, this winter after our "break" projects are finished up.</div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;">Aside from all of that, there's over a year's worth of updates due on the <a href="https://sites.google.com/view/recreatingthecrh/home" target="_blank"><i>Recreating the Columbia River Highway</i> website</a> that need to be done. A lot of folks have been doing some amazing research on that subject while I've been off editing and writing fiction, and I very likely will be sneaking out a book relating to that content sometime next spring (big knock on wood, there, and not the big book that those folks have been waiting for, not quite just yet). Early drafts of that may be another Vella project or something I manage through <a href="https://www.patreon.com/aflitt?fan_landing=true" target="_blank">Patreon</a>.<br /><br />So there is a lot of very exciting stuff in the works, and a lot of exciting stuff has happened since the last real post on this blog. <br /><br />Stay tuned! <br /><br />A big part of Jason and I's agenda for the next couple months is closing out the season with that "Heavy Content Summer" theme, and I've got a couple new posts in mind for here that will be much more interesting than <a href="https://rubble.blogspot.com/search/label/Self%20Indulgent%20Navel%20Gazing" target="_blank">this sort of self-indulgent naval gazing</a>, but actually exploring some interesting stories and what not from history and this strange world we live in!<br /><br />Finishing up for today, if this is your first time visiting <i>Rubble</i>, while I do stick this sort of project update post in here from time to time, this blog is really devoted to actual content, a smorgasbord, really, from weird dives into old sci-fi and some creative writing, to my <a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger" target="_blank">2016-2017 National Parks Project</a> (also coming back soon in a revamped form, focusing more generally on public lands) and just all sorts of history and exploration of interesting stuff locally in the Northwest and around the country. It's called <i>Rubble</i> for a reason! <br /><br />Click on some of those links or tags over on the right (if you're on a computer, at least) and dive in!</div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><h1 style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Links</span></h1><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;">A Low Fire In the Night: <a href="https://amzn.to/3Aj0k2g">https://amzn.to/3Aj0k2g</a></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><b>The Dead Wind Series by Jason Roberts (edited by A. F. Litt):</b><br /><br /><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;">Wolpertinger:</span><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl py34i1dx gpro0wi8" href="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fjasonrobertsonline.com%2Fthe-wolpertinger%3Ffbclid%3DIwAR22BFDPVCUSRNd6twBDibNRDRHk9M6N_DADEyaFFI2ExSs95k0Z0TI4q9Y&h=AT3GYxvJb53UaROKB_4UEzydZBO56hsmvVFsgAqHIIHMbDPP_DzT2JIv0wSYHuX0JHLw8QkyDTYNBkXlwtyBkOZpCdwvGHgpbHIn-axsh9XBUCgx92Ix2CFubTWcvTnwX9D3aoTU9QZ2ECtl5Q&__tn__=-UK*F" rel="nofollow noopener" role="link" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: transparent; border-color: initial; border-style: initial; border-width: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0" target="_blank">https://jasonrobertsonline.com/the-wolpertinger</a></span><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"> (Free to read online)</span><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;">The Yellow Painted Man (2nd Edition):</span><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl py34i1dx gpro0wi8" href="https://amzn.to/3670o8v?fbclid=IwAR3qbiuQZaBUw7-cgaT8Lwqy_jFXC6CSPENONU-vJwI5-C6ynn-BCh5qSUw" rel="nofollow noopener" role="link" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: transparent; border-color: initial; border-style: initial; border-width: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0" target="_blank">https://amzn.to/3670o8v</a></span><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"> (Kindle, Audio Book)</span><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl py34i1dx gpro0wi8" href="https://amzn.to/3weUywr?fbclid=IwAR1aC2vOn3EgKqS90sKDLk5L8GJEoos3gc1mHscejp4QpxePb9fLk4HiKT0" rel="nofollow noopener" role="link" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: transparent; border-color: initial; border-style: initial; border-width: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0" target="_blank">https://amzn.to/3weUywr</a></span><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"> (Hardcover, Paperback)</span><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;">Tres Castillos:</span><br style="color: #050505; font-family: "Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;" /><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl py34i1dx gpro0wi8" href="https://amzn.to/3hb9vLu?fbclid=IwAR3-0I8H_2zwPAGV_y99hcuCYiZQ8EpLojqcwdwxrnSWNvOLASAuDGodjmI" rel="nofollow noopener" role="link" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: transparent; border-color: initial; border-style: initial; border-width: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0" target="_blank">https://amzn.to/3hb9vLu</a></span><span face=""Segoe UI Historic", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"> (Kindle, Hardcover, Paperback)</span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br /></div>A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08252023452497075805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-44200782793965490372020-04-28T08:23:00.001-07:002022-04-26T09:12:24.961-07:00Ocean Falls, BC<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="270" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Sqn-QmoXK4M" width="480"></iframe></div>A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08252023452497075805noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-84906050373697937442020-02-20T10:17:00.004-08:002020-02-20T10:19:16.746-08:002020 Fundraiser: Rebuilding the Columbia River Highway Website<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvgQRfEEbmIRO7ymDCwfbew9_0uGkGO2iFFE0KQL6Nse2vGly1JgK4FzwplE0CPrm6N8tnpIjZSkfG_l3u4ZIMZn3HZBrJiaMblbq6DV7x1TKfc8mL99H0el2aVmo-QlJSeJd3/s1600/11406980_10203009043826028_1401575180788224578_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="640" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvgQRfEEbmIRO7ymDCwfbew9_0uGkGO2iFFE0KQL6Nse2vGly1JgK4FzwplE0CPrm6N8tnpIjZSkfG_l3u4ZIMZn3HZBrJiaMblbq6DV7x1TKfc8mL99H0el2aVmo-QlJSeJd3/s640/11406980_10203009043826028_1401575180788224578_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption"><abbr data-shorten="1" data-utime="1434504071" style="border-bottom: none;" title="Tuesday, June 16, 2015 at 6:21 PM"><span class="timestampContent"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Elowah Falls, June 16, 2015</span><br /><span style="font-family: inherit;">Filming for </span>#recreatingthehcrh</span></abbr></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<h3>
To help rebuild the website, please visit: <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/recreatingthehcrh">https://www.gofundme.com/f/recreatingthehcrh</a></h3>
<div>
<br /></div>
<b><u>Originally published on <a href="https://recreatingthehcrh.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Recreating The Historic Columbia River Highway: The Blog</a></u></b><br />
<br />
With new construction of the State Trail on the horizon, and the new research coming in from Kirk Poole's awesome Past and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/483015922488601">Present Views Along the Columbia River Highway Facebook Group</a>, it is time to return this much appreciated resource to a usable state.<br />
<br />
<div>
Originally, I built this site while I was a stay-at-home father and had a lot of time to work on it, but now it is a very part time job and, at the current rate, documenting new research and repairing the old pages, it will take about two years to complete this work.</div>
<div>
<br />
Because of this, I've decided to try a bit of crowdfunding to speed the job up. My day job work is very slow right now, and this would be an ideal time for me to work full time on the website for several weeks. </div>
<div>
<br />
<br />
So, my fundraiser is going to be for covering time and expenses for full time work on the website, and to help fund some new research. How much I can get done and how quickly will depend on the response to the campaign. </div>
<div>
<br />
If fully funded, I plan on getting the site fully restored by the end of March. However, any contributions will help. </div>
<div>
<br />
Overall, this project has been a seven-year labor of love and I have resisted seeking donations in the past, but as circumstances change, I am realizing that I need some help to get this work done. <br />
<br />
Once the site is rebuilt, I will also be able to focus more on research and video production, on new content instead of just repairing old content. While I am not sure if a feature length documentary and book are still in the works, time will tell, I do want to resume producing video shorts and fleshing out the history of the highway in more detail on the website.</div>
<div>
<br />
If you have appreciated the content on the website, the associated <a href="https://www.facebook.com/RecreatingTheHCRH">Facebook Page</a> (<a href="https://www.facebook.com/RecreatingTheHCRH">https://www.facebook.com/RecreatingTheHCRH</a>), and the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCK4nLVdL1RigL6WV_rmTNJg">YouTube Channel</a> in the past, I'd ask you to consider contributing to this fundraiser. Any amount will help, and I thank you for taking the time to consider helping with this cause.</div>
<div>
<br />
One way or the other, work will continue on the site and I look forwards to continue sharing the history of the highway with everyone!<br />
<br />
<h3>
To help rebuild the website, please visit: <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/recreatingthehcrh">https://www.gofundme.com/f/recreatingthehcrh</a></h3>
</div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-92191038589070362462020-01-18T19:56:00.003-08:002020-01-18T19:57:25.246-08:00Hello 2020: Work on Recreating the HCRH Resumes!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4kVRpFPhe3aFnBdZ4tnxGcJP-Q1RGn_lgu-5kJ5QNION1dTSk2ihVgujuA8UwfNcupmKYTWzrt7-v0tEENuUl2qeUsxoXRJaqi1bEne1xln8k4FzQWulRfKSmKp4hfONwC0RU/s1600/1276795_173037709556513_1375779043_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1061" data-original-width="1600" height="424" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4kVRpFPhe3aFnBdZ4tnxGcJP-Q1RGn_lgu-5kJ5QNION1dTSk2ihVgujuA8UwfNcupmKYTWzrt7-v0tEENuUl2qeUsxoXRJaqi1bEne1xln8k4FzQWulRfKSmKp4hfONwC0RU/s640/1276795_173037709556513_1375779043_o.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption">Columbia River West to Ruthton Point<br />
<span style="font-size: 12.8px;">Ruthton Park. Hood River, Oregon.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 12.8px;">April 25, 2013</span></td></tr>
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<br />
<b>Originally posted on the <a href="https://recreatingthehcrh.blogspot.com/2020/01/hello-2020-work-on-recreating-hcrh.html" target="_blank">Recreating the HCRH blog</a>:</b><br />
<br />
It's Saturday, I've been down with the flu for a week and a half, and I've got a lot on my plate that I want to accomplish today with the HCRH project, but before diving in I wanted to do a quick overall project update (mostly to help sort out my own thoughts on how to move ahead).<br />
<br />
Looking back at the videos from 2015 (a half-decade ago!), you'll see that there were ambitions for this project that were clearly never met. Without going into detail, let's just say a lot of life happened right as I was gearing up for production on the feature-length documentary in late 2015 and those next few years were difficult years, to say the least...<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/d1ooowDwUuQ/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/d1ooowDwUuQ?feature=player_embedded" width="320"></iframe></div>
<br />
Very little creative work on anything was possible during that time, and there were a lot of setbacks involving the work already completed on the film. Data loss on the <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" target="_blank">website</a>, requiring the rebuild I am currently working on, lost footage and stills, which may be recovered in the future, the fate of those hard drives is still undetermined... Heartbreaking, since a lot of that material is irreplaceable due to construction of the HCRH State Trail in the Gorge and to the general passage of time. There was also a significant loss of gear and equipment that made further progress on the film impossible at the time...<br />
<br />
Anyway, life is much better now and, while I was unable to meet the 2016 goal for the movie and the 2018 goal for a book, <a href="https://g.co/kgs/1hgexb" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">I did get a book out in 2019!</a> It just had nothing to do with the highway, was fiction, and was written by someone else! That work took almost all of 2019 to complete, further delaying this project, but it is work that I am very proud of.<br />
<br />
Upon publication of <a href="https://g.co/kgs/1hgexb" rel="nofollow" style="font-style: italic;" target="_blank">The Yellow Painted Man</a><i> </i>last year, after a brief break, it is now time to return to the highway. This return has been further motivated by the excellent work Kirk J. Pool and several other folks have been doing recently documenting the Lower Highway (including the first decent explorations of the Bagby Loops that I know of!). Their work can be followed on the <i><a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/483015922488601/" target="_blank">US 30 Remnants from Astoria to Eastern Oregon</a> </i>group on Facebook (<a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/483015922488601/">https://www.facebook.com/groups/483015922488601</a>). It is an excellent group and definitely worth joining if you enjoy the exploring the history of the highway.<br />
<br />
So, now it is 2020 and I've started rebuilding <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" target="_blank">the <span id="goog_759693847"></span>website</a>. For now, that is going to be my primary goal. Movies, books, whatever... It all needs to start with getting <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" target="_blank">the site</a> back up and running, so that is all that I am going to worry about at the moment. After that, we'll see what life holds.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixZlA3Vns4asTXZCLYtN4X9-5Hlk84lCEbmsmaW05DVVIaOXHE3ygxapWDXhyphenhyphen0QQuHgaBaN8StJ5TXWsBNL71KxqcX1Q45y0uXMcO_SsgsyIWuPV2QV7gZYMkuYSmT5Y88SbR7/s1600/20200118+blog+image+1.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="612" data-original-width="1305" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixZlA3Vns4asTXZCLYtN4X9-5Hlk84lCEbmsmaW05DVVIaOXHE3ygxapWDXhyphenhyphen0QQuHgaBaN8StJ5TXWsBNL71KxqcX1Q45y0uXMcO_SsgsyIWuPV2QV7gZYMkuYSmT5Y88SbR7/s400/20200118+blog+image+1.PNG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Recreating the HCRH: "New" Website<br />
<span style="font-size: 12.8px;">January 18, 2020</span><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" style="font-size: 12.8px;" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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I will say, this project started with researching a planned short film on the original route of the highway (filming on that was mostly completed by the end of 2015), and I really do hope that is where this leads in the end. Whether or not that happens may depend on if the old footage is recovered along with several other factors. Losing that footage is not necessarily a deal breaker, though. Any hesitation I have at this point in declaring the film alive (or, at least, undead) really comes from being a bit gun shy after the setbacks a few years ago.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/4QwxpTMJM_8/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4QwxpTMJM_8?feature=player_embedded" width="320"></iframe></div>
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As for a book, well, that might actually come before the movie now. We'll see how things go. But, as I said, first things first: it all starts with rebuilding the <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" target="_blank">website</a>, a pretty significant project all on its own.<br />
<br />
The first stage will be reformatting for the new platform while rebuilding the dead photo links. That, in and of itself, will be a fairly sizable project. I had to do that once before and it took about six weeks of eight hour days to complete. Today, <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" target="_blank">the site</a> is much larger and more complex than it was then and my "free" time to work on this labor of love is much reduced, so just completing this stage of the work may take months.<br />
<br />
While rebuilding, I will also be updating <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" target="_blank">the site</a> with new material as it comes up, so there will be some forward motion this year, it all won't just be rebuilding what's been lost.<br />
<br />
The second stage, surely occurring, to some degree, concurrently with the first step, will be filling in gaps in my research and "completing" <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/recreatingthehcrh/home" target="_blank">the site</a> per my original goals for it.<br />
<br />
After that, we'll find out what seems to be the best way to proceed.<br />
<br />
This project has always been a fun adventure, and I look forward to moving ahead with it, whatever the future may hold!A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-63141899316478779512019-11-10T17:20:00.002-08:002019-11-10T17:21:54.353-08:00NaNoWriMo 2019: The Properties of Dust<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipy-Cz58TkIpCDB5UZ9nF4mI-Xu630en8o57uvLrLuMEFX6Gp3kZNnaKurqDxqfmesczmGrTWNMrroEUvX-nJEZAhGsVhI6kpn_W77Ads4szMGMUJJluFuQKZiTH2fFHeB_8JMqQ/s1600/Cover+2+mockup.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1575" data-original-width="1087" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipy-Cz58TkIpCDB5UZ9nF4mI-Xu630en8o57uvLrLuMEFX6Gp3kZNnaKurqDxqfmesczmGrTWNMrroEUvX-nJEZAhGsVhI6kpn_W77Ads4szMGMUJJluFuQKZiTH2fFHeB_8JMqQ/s400/Cover+2+mockup.jpg" width="275" /></a></div>
Not the poetry book, this is something "new", if you can call reworking a bunch of stories and two novel manuscript fragments written over the course of 30 years new, but it is what it is.<br /><br />I'll write more on it later... But this is looking like a solid NaNo win this year, already close to 50k words on the current draft, but a long way from finishing the damn book, which is my goal for the month.A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-2492782754622322812019-11-03T18:03:00.001-08:002019-11-03T18:14:04.547-08:00The Yellow Painted Man is Done!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxLY0NjjrtU3dSd7R5e1aG7e9F0RLbJSo7_PWatxwC2c3K3M-6wmLexudvJ8d6CyoU2H_Mk7-8vpWrBJuMTqAiJlLrytuWF3YI804EBbV9hVNby-fwXFTZcglYUjoaYlkZQpNbSQ/s1600/41Dy49UGAUL.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="313" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxLY0NjjrtU3dSd7R5e1aG7e9F0RLbJSo7_PWatxwC2c3K3M-6wmLexudvJ8d6CyoU2H_Mk7-8vpWrBJuMTqAiJlLrytuWF3YI804EBbV9hVNby-fwXFTZcglYUjoaYlkZQpNbSQ/s1600/41Dy49UGAUL.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
So, the book we were slaving away on is out! I am very excited about this! I hope folks enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed helping Jason out with it.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-top: 1em;">
The boo<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: inherit;">k description:</span></div>
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<div style="font-family: inherit; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
In 1863, as war rages in Mexico and the United States, another millennia old conflict is escalating. Fueled by the whims of an eldritch intelligence, all of mankind is subject to its sway. Samuel Sheldon is a chosen heir of the Trust, an enigmatic and gold obsessed cabal with origins seeped in the secret history of the world. When his prisoner, Mangas Coloradas, is murdered on Sheldon's first assignment, an unpredictable series of events threaten to upset the Trust's flawless designs. Determined to prove his worth, Sheldon is tasked with recovering a vast horde of missing gold; an endeavor that swiftly spirals into a supernatural odyssey of violence sprawling from the siege of Richmond to the wastelands of Mexico. Obstructed by treachery and confronted with the strange secrets of his employers, Sheldon must decide if the rewards of power are worth the price.</div>
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KINDLE: <a data-ft="{"tn":"-U"}" data-lynx-mode="async" data-lynx-uri="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fgp%2Fproduct%2FB07ZPLS1Q2%2Fref%3Ddbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p1_i0%3Ffbclid%3DIwAR1mias-_D9eYTinzd2z2fVmbY7XqD7tGMoQlkrBCQOQW03mq17J8N9X4iA&h=AT0DH-gFD6tiQy-60UHSGSsk7IAZPlSU8YzqiK9essLK74K3BeAQDNUenJpCPMqPHNVhRdvAtHdTkKlxv6D5SiXWnak8xS9rAY7ZohgvTec8L3j7NnFbhLUDp65USOKrpPTwKEwBWLugJ3JmJDR7Io1A6252_kuDBLELb2emy37uWf_qc3uD8q81F9Z4CTbXH5w4pFR6jeJvqHTh_pySZYQr0bzJ-DpeZFAaDR9IPfAU_AkrYDvJ8WQoIRohki-WpbIpIXTHk6Me0ij-cWB6aUWByUaWRlF3y54Yjhz_MzHSeRcGBxhXyuZ3-Rzswuxy0YUpoLj0Unlkux0e_3B_PWHLWLm-AYZfejjtckbi1LFyHhueP-Cp94llY28NyueMUS7MwDNKCRqfMojy-UqxHQDUwFqcFksppEjsq4sjgwzUXt5MW-UO20iF8_cGL13UinfjxT6P5kB4vSaHsp-3S5XkNLe2iHbbyCMMQqCSD-4lDjnp8Jvt0rZ6jN46zQpXGc3To5mspnc0X003z1ynrAb2PwnNGfBzwBK6ydJ0UHo7V5CnaiwPVT5iCHESKTtGg3lHQcjE9E1XZ85Bkes66Qda8XOL3KQqK68Tx2LeyN59P8Yhz3r3h5gbFimf8htRLTdmLmt941ytd2vNev3KzbrckkP3EGXBqi6dM6PPjqmLb3svhuX87DISjDXDGuD5CSSCCSqmC942ui5ObflsW5OHQ2uYVLbQCOkNMQsPgHu6X52HjdmJ7vo_rhoEZVmtdm4qI4qxVLyvlb_VT-2uW1CWSR_56BmrPaYbHI_4AGrzB2JQO3K5926nmK_envyYqfTx-cq1QBaoqmInvdtwLdFrfWU-XIeohqeXdQ" href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ZPLS1Q2/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p1_i0?fbclid=IwAR1mias-_D9eYTinzd2z2fVmbY7XqD7tGMoQlkrBCQOQW03mq17J8N9X4iA" rel="noopener nofollow" style="color: #385898; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://www.amazon.com/…/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p…</a></div>
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PAPERBACK:<br />
<a data-ft="{"tn":"-U"}" data-lynx-mode="async" data-lynx-uri="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fgp%2Fproduct%2F1701938405%2Fref%3Ddbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p1_i1%3Ffbclid%3DIwAR0Dncw075DW32HKBogLJ6ur9q7Q9ntlA_j7S-kOhoJ-qx8C7l2eZP87Lrw&h=AT0KmbkQpG8qz3CyJkJi4tpp2nHBlMk6iaaFiSObK3NPbD6F4I21ZH674u2MfsbKenZJIZ4LJzn5coBscDMr21yp0k3o4zb2f9jkRAs3YgRDMEgI-UcOCs8BgBPy9cv9dACGcsaX1aJDP4JTmCJUnCDKgDiWO7sFMlukuifpuv9mIlnr-TUBPN1d9gIJleXsZAQFAzTp23B-BE4wUNqR0nFj5xPEHP8r8mFF6tq3Q6anYsv-9OoPtjPHUdDamTVmwKymxfoGIz5d46b3Lpp2uv_dB1ZrKCAWG85PqquBvlkXWO7-MbFHTjoh4tF0HU7hylGdMPK-yn5LpDWIb-VZvvkokCzpcjBFxDAo92myfFRB2H6wGyJfm6YzVk2GKuT2kQhDIC-nO_PrbXQTIDKaa29vlpG0CDJBux2ctx8DN4ckGpRGnWlyo0EvwWKt4nt140RlztFGlS4wF1p1lM96vZ4b_8T6z9CPa2Ditd9nQktqakz3OKG5BwsYg5qupLflvTN6dHDkQS4uGtOzMlLuK1GgZVZJWmhZF3FI7b6DC4YJSJpQSRkKZHOlXAeNaumMYRAA3oQ6UCUAoVcpE_WniK55jYKIFVaSTFj7vhFnfuLeARACKvQr4HcEQoa5W4qGQRJidwIGDmbdJ9YY_T8_bWmfcoU1b6XPSmddQfz8Mz7sAVsx20ysbey3nvfnoTS-DswZ-bbgZu8MdKLq0nlnyl1L3e8CjETKbY11zt0nbLXuvCjjp5WI1qpI3ll7_3uvlVCB2KI4sASM3fm--PVNQAWha1pcOVvyh2IcXbh3XIHphN3Fc0M3Cinhw2NuVm3rCpOYz1d4uC3ldnKEefnScZIt08R3G4N0goA3lQ" href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1701938405/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p1_i1?fbclid=IwAR0Dncw075DW32HKBogLJ6ur9q7Q9ntlA_j7S-kOhoJ-qx8C7l2eZP87Lrw" rel="noopener nofollow" style="color: #385898; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://www.amazon.com/…/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p…</a></div>
<div style="font-family: inherit; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
From Jason Roberts:</div>
<div style="font-family: inherit; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
The time is nigh! I promised a big announcement this week and so I shall deliver! Today I announce the publication of my first novel, The Yellow Painted Man, now available for sale on kindle, print, and soon to be audible! It’s been a difficult but rewarding process, filled with humbling but educational experiences. I have to give a shout out to A.F. Litt Creative for the dogged determination to see this project through and to my wife Kim for her encouragement along the way.</div>
<div style="font-family: inherit; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em;">
See my author page here:<br />
<a data-ft="{"tn":"-U"}" data-lynx-mode="async" data-lynx-uri="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fkindle-dbs%2Fentity%2Fauthor%2FB07ZQMYSW1%3Ffbclid%3DIwAR2ftZDGLBxVlL8LMFkOybQM95IfnM-LAyxIiwyxwTmpg0ASjlTBvqWG8AA&h=AT1gbhtXqvi2T2MPmqIDRuFNcpFh5oeXytzm7bjAzfkfd8LRlpeUrL_-5PH4uPNnVZdYke9LyQ0KylXjX3iiU0aLyAIFZWkZfwUGcXXrAcbhHBNB-6iaea5hjNNJQvY1n-X7kJN1MQC_E9sZRehSwk7JyUahg2lGXHSUEADv_NXdRQB6Nre7SvdDY_qTyz-H6OfgZs2A5_tq_uHOYIIqcyiMYqGp3OiwaLtWJORN4LepKc0xZhniSipThRNe6UnY_oAShyq5jWKoQjCPGW6TM4NcHAECDw4PH9ncsn05KwLRcVqcLlMdBABkd-G4SeiPtLo01X_2kTXiHrFwvElGdfRx6_GGn03N6Me0_ElB-nvOMbpqCnSLG6io7sZ-K7lrZAhA_w0HUAuye4ZYtiFTvi-VHJ3hOqroitgwttyahxRdzV8acGINT62fXPNXDSWMZ93sMjeCJ7mNBgxp6vOam-3-jmKbRSLAP4u51JQSXgknaPXzQy0uYIx9M8GUTGW9zVUpurpuz8NsUJBbHv-1J_7-Mwzd2NOBhl1ScqzguIgOs9zlxD2L49zSushXyVRcqlaAjPQGUJKKN75cY6H4aEjFTXSnD_fkZdlTXYSvMn3k69K4XsPzGz3mSf9H_PRBWVK8uhAtKEniP3DiQ9YXFOVyuJlt69yUiHSDF9C1pIr0bC2hXkphKqpHesWAnHDpSpWiXK25umt5EDJ1AdN5FpFP3XzFFNkfnBqu3yhGHocgwIzJhV7Zhp00Tc-h9wQ73gPsnzUoJa4VkEDTa91EKnnwAbt4XTrMeGdMJn62xTRv9Y65XXfh5ESH243RQx93SO1SNq_Yc3HEKaWt93DVblkre-KF_CnFU6KQag" href="https://www.amazon.com/kindle-dbs/entity/author/B07ZQMYSW1?fbclid=IwAR2ftZDGLBxVlL8LMFkOybQM95IfnM-LAyxIiwyxwTmpg0ASjlTBvqWG8AA" rel="noopener nofollow" style="color: #385898; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://www.amazon.com/kindle-dbs/entity/author/B07ZQMYSW1</a>…</div>
<div style="font-family: inherit; margin-top: 1em;">
Or my website here:<br />
<a data-ft="{"tn":"-U"}" data-lynx-mode="async" href="https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.jasonrobertsonline.com%2F%3Ffbclid%3DIwAR3lPsGgKDSdSHC6_59rE-jYeQ8WPaLrqjCcBe5sLlaMe3xHilnQj1zYWkU&h=AT3QYMYU4sJB9W8km6l9MVa6uwatIzyiWA5z2Q1X6BKEnGONdMqlXgEvoaylsMu0faWK2rbue3j17VokvlMg7OZOgGpNw-agXNhUhowYfDD0OjkNIJ8ehsL1lSxQGfRYZUtsNGmQ7usp99796aFgHV6CqLHIc1CGCvh1G9qFYDGAxzXi8DJXFz3xnS3tczokM0siAurL2ooRWW8H4dJtgbskHs1wt57B62Jhq8k_Z2TAawVpQvm4seI22xxQyCQWwtFlZw7DSXr5OGqjXdEQuTrXu8V9jjnHeQUVzJ-2XR9waQ6mo6vQweXtkjuI_P4dbW6JUYSuvWZQ76pcu7PUeDTct1HZC7WFeX0vDnVTxDFdntAdzjm6N1r6gpxFZCFdbPxrfuct9Aism5wADZCkywxOhUXpW1Uffc_-KQTJaf5W-c7DhHTP5Pov4kNuwVpOkslkESxyiRo_DA8KLG3RIuYmsMoznxYtPD-pJG_uNa9Ip0fpFx0TTgTNKHHtzgAWARzywbW07yVO72UIy_nwOTy6vWuIDPL4t_QZHC3YFIeg8PiUnkv6QMbaQU9f0kw_pxY_tqHF3_x9X54J8JxLsPOnE7hhaC0n90bP03akjC6uVg7inL4cyuF9oIuZ4AW8Vlj81VuMzoBTAtPHB-bEp-Hofp4FvkxDuXgLV8NKvF-YBs0vTTtPJ5qsv3KXvCBSomQGfZC4NLZDg5BoXCZLPHHwY3pLuQ2IFO2ssoUf78m50YDvvLLYxlmJeSEZHi-nEjQ0ZIO2gOAi8C9gfpgVuG4EsEKNXbJiyYEQxuWq9IfpQPZgGQ0hBSmqs1D7Co6b2UI0X-rHoaOF-QLYTJou8Cdet4SpOhe2Bo52bQ" rel="noopener nofollow" style="color: #385898; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">http://www.jasonrobertsonline.com</a></div>
</div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-35634626763508416952019-09-17T11:14:00.001-07:002019-11-03T18:14:19.931-08:00Almost Done!<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiwrFlHnIPyr4SiWJit5c745D5S2HBfAkjdbJf8p5IWG7IVsEjqusyGjvWOsg7IsVkD5FYRw3GeQp1ZtkdSUMZNh8LzG-8h462rZF0HRJ3GwCRKXRLCoE2xYUc85PIQiUmrV7sPA/s1600/67213756_10211456766453814_7379020909954203648_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiwrFlHnIPyr4SiWJit5c745D5S2HBfAkjdbJf8p5IWG7IVsEjqusyGjvWOsg7IsVkD5FYRw3GeQp1ZtkdSUMZNh8LzG-8h462rZF0HRJ3GwCRKXRLCoE2xYUc85PIQiUmrV7sPA/s400/67213756_10211456766453814_7379020909954203648_o.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo: A. F. Litt, 2019</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<div style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px;">
I've been pretty quiet here, especially when it comes to creative content, because I've been busy working hard all year editing a novel for a client.</div>
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The good news is that we are almost done, in the final stages of editing, and should be hatching that bad boy out into the world pretty soon!</div>
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It's been a lot of hard work, but I am so excited to share my client's writing with everyone in the coming weeks. It's a hell of a story he's told, and I hope everyone will enjoy it as <span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: inherit;">much as I have!</span></div>
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More details to follow as they become available!</div>
</div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-56413017395090772442019-03-30T11:04:00.005-07:002019-07-11T16:42:20.985-07:00Preparation for the Next<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj40uY4lQua9wXwh_0dxZyTbhyphenhyphen5SHx0pSkB6RNGX7llFh6uN3d1fgNQql6n32ZQw_nRONJ1Zz1ciC4LB7J4v_Y7aetFw9A1s6MbKVdJeMPRpNNez5dBR80cvdLn9yStKQxCXn6_TA/s1600/dsxaoupzjtzscsr2d9n6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="768" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj40uY4lQua9wXwh_0dxZyTbhyphenhyphen5SHx0pSkB6RNGX7llFh6uN3d1fgNQql6n32ZQw_nRONJ1Zz1ciC4LB7J4v_Y7aetFw9A1s6MbKVdJeMPRpNNez5dBR80cvdLn9yStKQxCXn6_TA/s400/dsxaoupzjtzscsr2d9n6.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Preparation for the Next - September 12, 2017 </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Originally posted on Patreon: </b><a href="https://www.patreon.com/posts/preparation-for-25740525" target="_blank">https://www.patreon.com/posts/preparation-for-25740525</a><br />
<br />
Considering that I shot and titled this photo a year and a half ago, and that the title feels as relevant today as it did then, it would be easy for me to feel like not much has happened over the past year, but it has. Life has been busy and crazy and full of peaks and valleys (unfortunately, not enough literal peaks and valleys, but so it goes)...<br />
<br />
Creatively, things have been in a bit of a lull, however, which is one of the reasons why I haven't been posting here. There just hasn't been much to share and there has been nothing to support. I will not be asking for Patreons while I am producing little new content.<br />
<br />
And it might be a few more months before my next projects start taking shape...<br />
<br />
This is not to say that I've been completely idle. For the last few months, I've been working on editing a long and complex novel for a client. In fact, the plan for 2019 is to focus more on literary projects than photography and video work.<br />
<br />
Once I am done with this editing gig, the plan is to return to work on finishing the novel I started back in 2011 while doing some prep work on a second novel that has been germinating for about a year now...<br />
<br />
Also, I will be taking another look at the movie on the Historic Columbia River Highway and evaluating the next steps for the public lands project, making a decision on which to tackle first. As for the former, I do hope to rebuild the crashed out website by the end of the summer, at the very least.<br />
<br />
So, there are a lot of "if this, then thats" in my world right now, plus the day job keeping my creative efforts in a very part time mode right now, but I am looking forward to a lot of great, new work lying ahead, just over the horizon!A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-53850212844889518772019-01-01T18:07:00.000-08:002019-01-02T17:14:51.947-08:00The New Year, Chiricahua National Monument, and Fort Bowie National Historic Site<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYk6QWwfThBi2-2F32ezxFreTXVvKd3xR5vnymkJ9Lhsz1WkUnESJAYrfaNXIdTuq3bsb3B4ZuYwDRhLZCKXQTlnZkK8ykNZdCeNqPh0geDFjE37xdCFgOBFEHkHF_GxwT8AhElQ/s1600/Chiricahua_balanced_rock.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYk6QWwfThBi2-2F32ezxFreTXVvKd3xR5vnymkJ9Lhsz1WkUnESJAYrfaNXIdTuq3bsb3B4ZuYwDRhLZCKXQTlnZkK8ykNZdCeNqPh0geDFjE37xdCFgOBFEHkHF_GxwT8AhElQ/s640/Chiricahua_balanced_rock.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Balanced rock in Chiricahua National Monument<br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">Photo by </span>Pretzelpaws, August 11, 2003<br />
<span style="background-color: white; text-align: start;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px;">Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported</span></span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; text-align: start;"><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Chiricahua_balanced_rock.jpg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Chiricahua_balanced_rock.jpg</a></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTd5DA_Ns55O1MrefZ-YAlpR2Yv3O03y6O4L_uL6FuZXxEop7-26hY9hkfpG72PUnbnbSWWSNBZgZqYuTNik4aTncDHL0vGt9ubsW5WXchzuL5v9noS20fGtvCXRTDaC1wSO4qSA/s1600/ApachePassAZ.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1228" data-original-width="1600" height="490" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTd5DA_Ns55O1MrefZ-YAlpR2Yv3O03y6O4L_uL6FuZXxEop7-26hY9hkfpG72PUnbnbSWWSNBZgZqYuTNik4aTncDHL0vGt9ubsW5WXchzuL5v9noS20fGtvCXRTDaC1wSO4qSA/s640/ApachePassAZ.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Apache Pass, Arizona, as viewed from Fort Bowie facing north<br />
Fort Bowie National Historic Site, Arizona<br />
Photo by <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Wilson44691" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13.3px; text-align: start;" target="_blank" title="User:Wilson44691">Wilson44691</a>, March 11, 2009<br />
Public Domain<br />
<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ApachePassAZ.JPG" target="_blank">https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ApachePassAZ.JPG</a></td></tr>
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<h2 style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 22px; margin: 0px; position: relative;">
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" rel="" style="color: #757575;" target="_blank">National Parks and Monuments in Distress</a></h2>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" style="background-color: white; color: #757575; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home</a><br />
<br />
<b>Chiricahua National Monument</b><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/chiricahua-national-monument" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/chiricahua-national-monument</a><br />
<br />
<b>Fort Bowie National Historic Site</b><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/fort-bowie-national-historic-site" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/fort-bowie-national-historic-site</a><br />
<br /></div>
<br />
In some ways it is hard to believe that it has been 15 months since my last public lands project post (National Parks & Monuments in Distress still feels like a working title to me), but in most ways, it almost feels like it has been much longer.<br />
<br />
Life has been crazy and chaotic through all of those long months, but two things, in particular, took me away from this project. A little over a year ago, I went through some painful health issues which were resolved by surgery, but until the surgery, I wasn't able to focus on much of anything for awhile. Then, once I recovered from the surgery, new day jobs took over my life and I fell into a work, eat, sleep, repeat tunnel for most of the year.<br />
<br />
Over the last couple months, there's been a lot of change in my life. Some good and some bad, but the result is that the pace of my life has slowed down a bit, my living situation has become more secure and stable, and suddenly I find myself ready to get back to work on this project, beyond the occasional Facebook post (<a href="https://www.facebook.com/NationalMonumentsInDanger" target="_blank">https://www.facebook.com/NationalMonumentsInDanger</a>), for the first time in a long time.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately, there were some set backs in my life the last few months, and because of those, I lost my website containing my photos from the parks that I've taken over the last decade, I still don't have access to my hard drives with those images, and it might be a couple months before I can get my good work computer up and running to rebuild. So, moving ahead, for a couple months, at least, I will be using other folk's images instead of my own, other folk's videos, instead of my own, and there are some dead links on the <a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" target="_blank">project's website</a>. Luckily, this project was not as affected by these data losses as my project on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/RecreatingTheHistoricColumbiaRiverHighway" target="_blank">Oregon's Columbia River Highway</a> was... That website was almost completely destroyed.<br />
<br />
However, the set backs led to some positive changes, too. Not only has my living and work environment improved, but I also picked up a job editing a novel set, largely, in the Apache Wars. Fact checking the novel led me to the discovery of Chiricahua National Monument and Fort Bowie National Historic Site, which contain locations, like Apache Pass, that appear in the book. I needed a place to stash some links, and of course, I have a place for National Park Service links all set up and ready to go!<br />
<br />
This, coupled with the negative impacts of the government shutdown, fired me up on this project again. This hasn't necessarily benefited my work editing, but it has been nice ramping back up to speed here, and I think, in the long term, it will serve both the editing and my work here well...<br />
<br />
For now, this must remain a side project of mine. I still need to work day jobs to make ends meet, and I will need to pick up a new, full time day job soon. But I would like to do some writing once or twice a week, clean up and rebuild the <a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" target="_blank">website</a>, and start adding more photos and videos from my own travels as soon as I can. Plus, I should be updating daily on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/NationalMonumentsInDanger/" target="_blank">Facebook</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/A_F_Litt" target="_blank">Twitter</a>.<br />
<br />
The real goal, however, is to aim towards shifting over to making this more of a full time project by the end of 2019 and hitting the road, traveling the country and reporting first hand from these magnificent and fascinating places.<br />
<br />
There is a lot of hard work to be done between now and then, and that will limit my time writing and researching more than I would like, but the end result will be worth it, and I hope a heck of a lot of fun to follow!<br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEji-liL-5BEzHddyiLs2LomTBMIZGK-bwuVgkYGFcwzF6CTCeVBOh3V2LYu_nLbN-xzg224ZbIlMguCQTyh9zerlVcgWoLuU7hv3s0CBXMbHF9hLVLNz02HMF4LiTPD8DUAqWaXhw/s1600/Taghdeem_be_doostam_Pastoral.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1458" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEji-liL-5BEzHddyiLs2LomTBMIZGK-bwuVgkYGFcwzF6CTCeVBOh3V2LYu_nLbN-xzg224ZbIlMguCQTyh9zerlVcgWoLuU7hv3s0CBXMbHF9hLVLNz02HMF4LiTPD8DUAqWaXhw/s400/Taghdeem_be_doostam_Pastoral.JPG" width="362" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;"><ul class="mw-mmv-image-links" style="background-color: #f8f9fa; list-style-image: url("data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg xmlns=%22http://www.w3.org/2000/svg%22 width=%225%22 height=%2213%22%3E %3Ccircle cx=%222.5%22 cy=%229.5%22 r=%222.5%22 fill=%22%2300528c%22/%3E %3C/svg%3E"); margin: 0px 20px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;">
<li class="mw-mmv-license-li cc-license" style="color: #3f4040; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 0.85em; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 0.1em; text-align: center;">Chiricahua National Monument, entrance roadway</li>
<li class="mw-mmv-license-li cc-license" style="color: #3f4040; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 0.85em; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 0.1em; text-align: center;">Photo by <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Zereshk" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: none; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; color: #0b0080; font-size: 13.3px; text-align: start; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank" title="User:Zereshk">Zereshk</a></li>
<li class="mw-mmv-license-li cc-license" style="color: #3f4040; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 0.85em; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 0.1em; text-align: center;"><a class="mw-mmv-license" href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0" style="background: none; color: #0b0080; text-align: right; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">CC BY-SA 3.0</a></li>
<li class="mw-mmv-license-li cc-license" style="list-style: none; margin-bottom: 0.1em; text-align: center;"><span style="color: #3f4040; font-family: sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13.6px;"><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Taghdeem_be_doostam_Pastoral.JPG" target="_blank">https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Taghdeem_be_doostam_Pastoral.JPG</a></span></span></li>
</ul>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
As for these two parks, obviously I have not visited them in person, and I really haven't had that much time to research them outside of setting up their pages on the site and learning what I needed to learn for my editing job. They are east of Tuscon, Arizona and I am regretting not visiting them on my trips there in 2016.<br />
<br />
Fortunately for them, they fell under my radar because, outside of system wide issues, there have been no specific threats to these units that I've learned of.<br />
<br />
But the more we learn about the parks, the more we care about them. That is a huge motivation for me with this project. So here are some photos, and click through the links to the website where there is more information.<br />
<br />
Happy New Years, everyone! Let's make it a better one! #RESIST<br />
<br />
<a data-flickr-embed="true" data-footer="true" data-header="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/fortbowienhs/25771138142/in/dateposted/" title="51 Geronimo's camp with a sentinel standing guard. -1886"><img alt="51 Geronimo's camp with a sentinel standing guard. -1886" height="364" src="https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1580/25771138142_70d27c6957_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script><br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHaXbQAWm5IJORCx7TOAzbMMr9fq3hcbZH4AvnceZnjhBipED8tx6Frrr3P7H68fCui-QClllLaHfPcf7kn_bmGsVDKNi1wHbl3XZcnU1gV6VCaWEORw64cpVE4qZWWM1bLmed0w/s1600/A089%252C_Chiricahua_National_Monument%252C_Arizona%252C_USA%252C_2004.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><i><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="500" height="425" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHaXbQAWm5IJORCx7TOAzbMMr9fq3hcbZH4AvnceZnjhBipED8tx6Frrr3P7H68fCui-QClllLaHfPcf7kn_bmGsVDKNi1wHbl3XZcnU1gV6VCaWEORw64cpVE4qZWWM1bLmed0w/s640/A089%252C_Chiricahua_National_Monument%252C_Arizona%252C_USA%252C_2004.jpg" width="640" /></i></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Pinnacle Balanced Rock<span style="color: #222222;"><br /></span>Chiricahua National Monument<span style="background-color: #f8f9fa; color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13.3px;">, Arizona<br />Photo by </span><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Brian_W._Schaller" style="background: none rgb(248, 249, 250); color: #0b0080; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13.3px;" title="User:Brian W. Schaller">Brian W. Schaller</a>, 2004<br />
<span style="background-color: #f8f8f8; color: #222222; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: -webkit-left;">Creative Commons ‘Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0’</span><br />
<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A089,_Chiricahua_National_Monument,_Arizona,_USA,_2004.jpg" target="_blank">https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A089,_Chiricahua_National_Monument,_Arizona,_USA,_2004.jpg</a></td></tr>
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<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br />
<b> Chiricahua National Monument</b><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/chiricahua-national-monument" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/chiricahua-national-monument</a><br />
<br />
<b>Fort Bowie National Historic Site</b><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/fort-bowie-national-historic-site" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/fort-bowie-national-historic-site</a><br />
<br />
<br />
<h2 style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 22px; margin: 0px; position: relative; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" rel="" style="color: #757575;" target="_blank">National Parks and Monuments in Distress</a></h2>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" style="background-color: white; color: #757575; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home</a></div>
</div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-60604925964141821382017-12-01T11:34:00.000-08:002017-12-01T11:34:08.297-08:00The Properties of Dust: Love Poems<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4AeowEWLT_7aDZtMMrlqID0UaFmjMQrlRdYfoQADCOdRLIUDNaA3XmQ6wFD-UmXL1XmIiJcLCuK2EteJSw_hLzKvKWscnoQIzkWFpwG3Y1ZJ6txrJESiDb1wp8g0kLb1v4dWd2g/s1600/IMG_8796.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1280" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4AeowEWLT_7aDZtMMrlqID0UaFmjMQrlRdYfoQADCOdRLIUDNaA3XmQ6wFD-UmXL1XmIiJcLCuK2EteJSw_hLzKvKWscnoQIzkWFpwG3Y1ZJ6txrJESiDb1wp8g0kLb1v4dWd2g/s640/IMG_8796.jpg" width="512" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Crepuscular Rays. Eleven Mile Overlook. Deschutes National Forest. Oregon. August 18, 2012.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
All my poems are love poems<br />
scribbled on damp,<br />
whiskey stained paper<br />
in one dive bar or another<br />
<br />
On cocktail napkins<br />
or coasters, pulled<br />
from underneath my third glass,<br />
<br />
Floating in a lost hour<br />
found somewhere on<br />
the long drive towards<br />
my empty home.<br />
<br />
And I should be there<br />
or there or there<br />
again, but I stop again<br />
on the way home,<br />
<br />
Climbing slippery stone steps to<br />
the top of the castle-like tower,<br />
smelling the rain, feeling<br />
the cold winter kiss<br />
<br />
Blown by the constant freezing wind<br />
to my skin.<br />
<br />
Under the tower, a dead volcano<br />
thrusts us up, exposed, into the storm<br />
but I pull that soggy napkin<br />
from my pocket anyway<br />
<br />
And I try to write another verse<br />
before my paper is ruined<br />
by the weather.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0Vg4cR1YlfNUsRxsWFxhtawn4AusmFSNJrvX50Z1ZH27h5naTHDO0FncrrrMxXZ5HeyM997-7GT2JBx9SAo3mxYPfcX0Y3WmjmlZtdyRcYV8LCb_UqMTeGpJ5d5iVm0TGD6d4FA/s1600/2012-02-16.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="592" data-original-width="400" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0Vg4cR1YlfNUsRxsWFxhtawn4AusmFSNJrvX50Z1ZH27h5naTHDO0FncrrrMxXZ5HeyM997-7GT2JBx9SAo3mxYPfcX0Y3WmjmlZtdyRcYV8LCb_UqMTeGpJ5d5iVm0TGD6d4FA/s400/2012-02-16.jpg" width="270" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Rocky Butte. Portland, Oregon. c.2008</td></tr>
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<b style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "Droid Serif", Georgia, Times, serif; font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;">The Properties of Dust</b><br />
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Properties of Dust </span><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span></div>
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1.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">The Well</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Orienteering</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Tides</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">The Properties of Dust</a></div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Storm</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Oncology</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Upon the Ruin</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/golgotha.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Golgotha</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/demolition.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Demolition</a></div>
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3.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/watching-a-woman-from-across-the-room" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Watching a Woman From Across the Room</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moonrise" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Moonrise</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-first-snow.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">First Snow</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/antarctic-whispers" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Antarctic Whispers</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/lines-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Lines</a></div>
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<a href="http://poets.media/bedtime-prayer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Bedtime Prayer</a></div>
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4.</div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-red-car.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">The Red Car</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/something-lost" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Something Lost</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/slough" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Slough</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-properties-of-dust-home.html" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Home</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-properties-of-dust-after-war.html" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">After the War</a></div>
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5.</div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/12/the-properties-of-dust-lair.html" target="_blank">Lair</a></div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwEPCeJpgthftCi_2HIHXRZaGoPV6eIcHywOoUDAzhGCXWu_wAjXakfDQZCVqu3xB1wssqXq6EefKiJwosdw8HfIjUZ_GT3iIIjlOKptVK36OLEma4CSfSk5TDNAAg6-_Rx8IVTQ/s1600/IMG_8537.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="1600" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwEPCeJpgthftCi_2HIHXRZaGoPV6eIcHywOoUDAzhGCXWu_wAjXakfDQZCVqu3xB1wssqXq6EefKiJwosdw8HfIjUZ_GT3iIIjlOKptVK36OLEma4CSfSk5TDNAAg6-_Rx8IVTQ/s640/IMG_8537.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Paulina Peak & Camper. Newberry National Volcanic Monument. Oregon. August 17, 2012.</td></tr>
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A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-49839859606310915302017-12-01T10:16:00.002-08:002017-12-01T10:21:43.532-08:00The Properties of Dust: Lair<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwe_X9BTgpRUofnVbjgCIY27hogxPkanyNdDlNl-3pj01mTGKM7qKoqPzw-iboprIwhPIQzAWLVJz-ZyXgaQc0P5fa7GTDZptBB4lJccL_Wo09fQ248UvDM5S1Ok00Z4MXKi3-oA/s1600/2012-09-03.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwe_X9BTgpRUofnVbjgCIY27hogxPkanyNdDlNl-3pj01mTGKM7qKoqPzw-iboprIwhPIQzAWLVJz-ZyXgaQc0P5fa7GTDZptBB4lJccL_Wo09fQ248UvDM5S1Ok00Z4MXKi3-oA/s640/2012-09-03.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fremont Troll. Seattle, Washington. August 13, 2012.</td></tr>
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Now we are in the lair,</div>
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the den, the bed</div>
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where darkness lies down to rest</div>
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unseen,</div>
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<br /></div>
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Where the strange exhaust of unnatural</div>
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pores lingers in the shadows</div>
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unseen...</div>
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<br /></div>
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To breathe the air here,</div>
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to take inside that bitterness,</div>
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is to fill up and clog arteries</div>
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with a hundred twisted desires,</div>
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with a thousand warped urges.</div>
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<br /></div>
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With the sounds of traffic overhead,</div>
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our hearts beat and our minds bend</div>
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to that slow madness.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;">
Here, where even billy goats</div>
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smell fear and run away,</div>
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we recognize the troll</div>
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sleeping in concrete</div>
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behind us.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; letter-spacing: normal; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVkn8xFq7ovA04BEMbaxaWiFgrqFlI8UjWoe6nQQ6mgxzD5xmHJLnop256XaBe4xWbHFggrjG1BfRPEdzUOTOPrCPagqTOcJ4jl_KsvQhe6Au9Kss0-8ebicZBSWTBjFNarNP9cg/s1600/2011-10-26.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1007" data-original-width="1600" height="401" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVkn8xFq7ovA04BEMbaxaWiFgrqFlI8UjWoe6nQQ6mgxzD5xmHJLnop256XaBe4xWbHFggrjG1BfRPEdzUOTOPrCPagqTOcJ4jl_KsvQhe6Au9Kss0-8ebicZBSWTBjFNarNP9cg/s640/2011-10-26.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Under the Burnside Bridge. Portland, Oregon. October 6, 2011</td></tr>
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</div>
<b><br />The Properties of Dust</b></div>
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<b><br />
</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Properties of Dust </span><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span></div>
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<b style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; letter-spacing: normal;"><i><br />
</i></b></div>
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</div>
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1.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">The Well</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Orienteering</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Tides</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">The Properties of Dust</a></div>
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</div>
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<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /></div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Storm</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Oncology</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Upon the Ruin</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/golgotha.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Golgotha</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/demolition.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Demolition</a></div>
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</div>
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<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /></div>
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3.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/watching-a-woman-from-across-the-room" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Watching a Woman From Across the Room</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moonrise" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Moonrise</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-first-snow.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">First Snow</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/antarctic-whispers" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Antarctic Whispers</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/lines-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Lines</a></div>
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<a href="http://poets.media/bedtime-prayer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Bedtime Prayer</a></div>
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</div>
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<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /></div>
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4.</div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-red-car.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">The Red Car</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/something-lost" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Something Lost</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/slough" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Slough</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-properties-of-dust-home.html" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Home</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-properties-of-dust-after-war.html" target="_blank">After the War</a></div>
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</div>
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5.</div>
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Lair</div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA0kyYaio_NY6pw14Lrw6uaVZA6toQvKwX0hOIHG5C1Nc3DWHYEPrhJmdN_QW1-bmIt0_2F2ZQOTN570JUkz28izfiTIaXeTNlJMif2F1M2euabd17jj6xQAoY-vNI-J-5KGKsow/s1600/562778_3095152116754_599702636_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="960" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA0kyYaio_NY6pw14Lrw6uaVZA6toQvKwX0hOIHG5C1Nc3DWHYEPrhJmdN_QW1-bmIt0_2F2ZQOTN570JUkz28izfiTIaXeTNlJMif2F1M2euabd17jj6xQAoY-vNI-J-5KGKsow/s400/562778_3095152116754_599702636_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Fremont Troll. Seattle, Washington. August 13, 2012.</td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you appreciate posts like this, please consider becoming a monthly subscriber through Patreon!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Visit my Patreon page (<a href="https://www.patreon.com/aflitt" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;">https://www.patreon.com/aflitt</a>) for more information.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif";"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>A. F. Litt on vocal.media
</b><a href="https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;">https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt</a></span></span></div>
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7jZgAy6_GMNTwSNKeNWm-P5whAwqm9AmjtfZO8iB_6hfR5vxGU3FLfMAN5Lyc_62NlJfDN0_ijATMPx7vT2Cm067AuC6PN1mQ8S9AG5kT6WbtBpid36sdvQD_jq8Mty66cIhDsg/s1600/2011-10-27.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1419" data-original-width="1137" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7jZgAy6_GMNTwSNKeNWm-P5whAwqm9AmjtfZO8iB_6hfR5vxGU3FLfMAN5Lyc_62NlJfDN0_ijATMPx7vT2Cm067AuC6PN1mQ8S9AG5kT6WbtBpid36sdvQD_jq8Mty66cIhDsg/s640/2011-10-27.jpg" width="512" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Fred G. Redmon Memorial Bridge, I-82. Near Selah, Washington. May 2008</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCK5LVrtyhfG5cAEqpiI1xxEgEcGK_LcNI9bYwHriScLq4G9Qb4na3R4BEeW1VJCtXkprUJPAKfIoofw0sQRr8YnfUZhTomtyTJvLCK_uNKgMlANe4rj66ZgtWMgbSQxkTwhHp4g/s1600/1455156_606098132785544_1438395473_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="960" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCK5LVrtyhfG5cAEqpiI1xxEgEcGK_LcNI9bYwHriScLq4G9Qb4na3R4BEeW1VJCtXkprUJPAKfIoofw0sQRr8YnfUZhTomtyTJvLCK_uNKgMlANe4rj66ZgtWMgbSQxkTwhHp4g/s640/1455156_606098132785544_1438395473_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption">Trees Under The Bridge - Fremont Bridge. Portland, Oregon. April 2, 2012.<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; text-align: left;"> </span></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1TrVhrLwGxMD7AtG1nuc5Bj77gUwwvUVCDP8OEIVUWfmVLqZOPl1J0o3rcQc3_FDIi58nUSupN04yG0zCRBqF-NLG-tS8oLMH5C-p7fRA7z4CWBvMIKg8gY_hGNhBTFrjnAYtGQ/s1600/2011-09-27.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1TrVhrLwGxMD7AtG1nuc5Bj77gUwwvUVCDP8OEIVUWfmVLqZOPl1J0o3rcQc3_FDIi58nUSupN04yG0zCRBqF-NLG-tS8oLMH5C-p7fRA7z4CWBvMIKg8gY_hGNhBTFrjnAYtGQ/s400/2011-09-27.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Cape Perpetua, Yachats, Oregon. July 2, 2011</td></tr>
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A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-35341623134846558852017-11-29T16:55:00.001-08:002017-12-01T10:21:43.520-08:00The Properties of Dust: After the War<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMXLsoeB9NnP_I13-XIxXMZ1tGzE0d1qXP5R5-TF1NkInr2etkMCkhjvu14IIJ0IQScA4CYNU1eg2Whn_sZLkt_d1vkSiI0Vu3xfB4MrulqaupzHjUkgItBKBw9qLMQIsr8JmMcQ/s1600/13177473_10204672581373427_6829076986698172512_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="960" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMXLsoeB9NnP_I13-XIxXMZ1tGzE0d1qXP5R5-TF1NkInr2etkMCkhjvu14IIJ0IQScA4CYNU1eg2Whn_sZLkt_d1vkSiI0Vu3xfB4MrulqaupzHjUkgItBKBw9qLMQIsr8JmMcQ/s640/13177473_10204672581373427_6829076986698172512_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mesa Verde National Park. Colorado. May 10, 2016 - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/mesaverdenp" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com/mesaverdenp</a></td></tr>
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We were always at our best</div>
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when staring into the abyss together,</div>
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And we drank wine and ate bread</div>
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for the last time together;</div>
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laughing a little,</div>
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crying a little</div>
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as the kettles were overturned</div>
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against us,</div>
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as our statues were pulled</div>
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to the ground.</div>
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We did not fear</div>
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the burning red skies,</div>
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lit by a thousand fires,</div>
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as the kettles became drums</div>
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beating out fresh charges</div>
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against us.</div>
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We did not feel fear,</div>
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but I do remember our pride…</div>
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We knew them as children,</div>
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they know us now as men.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjshMhr8avbl0fT73vXtaC8TZkPz6h33zB3QRSSrFStqNhBXUmDyMl2ABgAyfBCKHEV21mHZEki3dim5KwwOsvrEOYPvp49ARQLoSMA9WkPYWanqWCqCwN6AU36snIZPzpjog28gQ/s1600/24129845_10208094973011079_1456866914735417050_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="393" data-original-width="672" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjshMhr8avbl0fT73vXtaC8TZkPz6h33zB3QRSSrFStqNhBXUmDyMl2ABgAyfBCKHEV21mHZEki3dim5KwwOsvrEOYPvp49ARQLoSMA9WkPYWanqWCqCwN6AU36snIZPzpjog28gQ/s320/24129845_10208094973011079_1456866914735417050_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b>The Properties of Dust</b></div>
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<b><br />
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Properties of Dust </span><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span></div>
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<b style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; letter-spacing: normal;"><i><br />
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1.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">The Well</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Orienteering</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Tides</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">The Properties of Dust</a></div>
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</div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Storm</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Oncology</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Upon the Ruin</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/golgotha.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Golgotha</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/demolition.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Demolition</a></div>
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</div>
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3.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/watching-a-woman-from-across-the-room" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Watching a Woman From Across the Room</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moonrise" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Moonrise</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-first-snow.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">First Snow</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/antarctic-whispers" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Antarctic Whispers</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/lines-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Lines</a></div>
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<a href="http://poets.media/bedtime-prayer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Bedtime Prayer</a></div>
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</div>
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4.</div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-red-car.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">The Red Car</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/something-lost" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;">Something Lost</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/slough" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Slough</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-properties-of-dust-home.html" target="_blank">Home</a></div>
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After the War</div>
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</div>
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5.</div>
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Lair</div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmLhYbJh3tmLfcmJfUXVVtTQ_onh9v31Yiw0KYrSt0mQ-tvSXHThHdUmo5YjbxnvNZ1n3SOzvO8-JddZqPpV6TKr9P7X2vENJKsVmiQGcBRdQdMkb_mJDfQM1USgxbB-uCjUFbPQ/s1600/IMG_2835.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1600" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmLhYbJh3tmLfcmJfUXVVtTQ_onh9v31Yiw0KYrSt0mQ-tvSXHThHdUmo5YjbxnvNZ1n3SOzvO8-JddZqPpV6TKr9P7X2vENJKsVmiQGcBRdQdMkb_mJDfQM1USgxbB-uCjUFbPQ/s640/IMG_2835.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Balcony House. Mesa Verde National Park. Colorado. May 10, 2016 - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/mesaverdenp" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com/mesaverdenp</a></td></tr>
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A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-46033913248790104112017-11-29T11:17:00.001-08:002017-11-29T13:37:05.853-08:00The Properties of Dust: Home<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimavreOX662uooS9k4ELNALNepq1rkgerrFsRo5NXjyKJXu0aHASlShlbfbkacEIpyM8p9LeGd_h1mJYEBHTtY8frzOgDUCS6bOfWOivGENjhlNP7Vd70gzSoG8J4losgh-izRMA/s1600/2011-04-03+%25281%2529.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="961" data-original-width="1600" height="384" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimavreOX662uooS9k4ELNALNepq1rkgerrFsRo5NXjyKJXu0aHASlShlbfbkacEIpyM8p9LeGd_h1mJYEBHTtY8frzOgDUCS6bOfWOivGENjhlNP7Vd70gzSoG8J4losgh-izRMA/s640/2011-04-03+%25281%2529.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Portland After the Storm - April 2, 2011 - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Can you hold on for a moment? Let me run up and make sure the key still works before I drag my crap out into this soup.”</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“No problem,” the driver said as John opened the door and let himself out into the rain. It was really coming down; an unusual mid-summer downpour and the clouds held their burden until the cab pulled up to the house, of course.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fortunately, the keys still worked and shortly the suitcases were hauled inside, the driver was paid off, and John found himself dripping on the living room’s hardwood floor, wondering what came next. He looked around and found that the room looked the same, minus a few knickknacks whose absence he was thankful for. He sniffed the air and found it to smell fresh and clean. Somehow he expected it to be musty and dusty and... </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Neglected? But it wasn’t.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">His eyes landed on the answering machine sitting on an end table next to its phone, under the lamp that he’d inherited from his grandmother years before. On a whim, he wandered over to it. He knew it was too soon to expect any messages on this machine, but he also knew that its indicator light quit working years before, so he pressed the button... Just in case... </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Of course, the tape was blank.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">He pressed the machine’s outgoing message button, but no voice was to be heard, just some clicks. He opened up the lid and saw that the message tape was gone. He tried to remember what the missing tape announced, but he couldn’t. He made a mental note to pick up a new micro-cassette and then promptly forgot about the machine and the missing tape entirely, sucking in a deep breath and moving on. </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Not knowing what to expect, he ventured around the corner into the kitchen. Though he knew that there had to be items missing, he couldn’t place what was gone. All the appliances, mostly wedding gifts, were still on the shelves. His mother’s china still lived in the cupboards along side a few older, battered pots and pans. He opened up the fridge and it was empty except for a strange stain in the crisper. The pantry proved to be barren as well.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">So be it, he thought. There’s a grocery store right up the block and he didn’t expect to be cooking much anyway.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Retrieving his bags from the living room, he ventured upstairs to the bedrooms. He dropped his things at the top of the stairs; the junction of three doorways. Seeing that, as expected, Katie’s room was completely empty, he drug his bags into the master bedroom. A couple blank spots on the walls in there, otherwise it was the same. Exactly the same, but maybe a little less cluttered. Like the rest of the house, it was too clean. It felt more like a hotel room than home.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Opening up the closet, he found it almost empty. Some old clothes of his, mostly stuff he hadn’t worn since college, stuff he hadn’t bothered packing... But the smell in there, that brought back memories. Though there were no shoes left on the floor, the scent of leather lingered, along with the faint scent of perfume... </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">John turned away and left the room, wandered past the stairs and into the bathroom. Same curtain blocking off the tub. The same fuzzy covers warming the cold porcelain of the toilet. But the counter around the sink looked naked, his toiletries still packed, the rest gone... Worse was the institutional smell of bleach masking any lingering hints of the fancy soaps and oils that used to live there. There were no human smells. Just the smell of cleansing and the smell of rain...</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The small window in the corner was left open. Suddenly, in that room that had been so completely sterilized that the air was barely breathable, John found himself suffocating, desperate for the fresh, rain-washed air outside. Kneeling down before the open window, gulping in many long, slow breaths, listening to the gentle drips from the overtaxed gutters, rocking gently as if countering the rolling lullaby of waves, he really knew for the first time, truly, that it wasn’t just knickknacks, clothes, pictures, and scents missing from the house. It was missing all that came before...</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">After a few minutes, feeling the cold air against his face, he opened his eyes. He opened his eyes and saw the row of sea glass lying on the windowsill. The glass that they used to look for on their long walks at the ocean, clinging to each other, whispering of the future... How many years had it been since their lives had seemed so uncomplicated? Before the house, before the vows, before Katie... Katie, who as far as they could tell, was made in that very room.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But those were bad thoughts. Instead, John just stared at that line of little unformed blobs of color on the sill and tried not to think of what was lost. It was then that he noticed that one of the carefully arranged artifacts was missing. A screen secured the window, so it couldn’t have fallen out, no... There it was, down in the corner, next to his right knee, next to a plain, gold ring. It was his ring.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It was their worst fight ever. It was their last fight ever. How did it start? Who knows? After all, it didn’t really start; it was just another flare-up in their long battle... But that time, it was more. It went too far.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">John remembered tearing the ring off of his finger and throwing it. He remembered saying words that, usually, he only half felt and barely meant, but that night all the daggers were sharpened and the words cut too deep.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">He never wondered where his ring landed until he found it abandoned in the corner, the only dusty corner in a sterilized room. Intentionally left behind, he could see how carefully she cleaned around the space the ring occupied, leaving it undisturbed.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The rain moved on and the skies cleared. The air was clean, rinsed of the dust and the exhaust of the city. The sky became bright and the sun filled the house with light. John unpacked his bags and then sat in Katie’s room for a long time, thinking of the time he’d spent there with his daughter.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Eventually he got hungry and soon he found himself standing out on the sidewalk in front of the house, clutching a small bag that held a can of soup, a box of crackers, a bottle of whiskey and a bottle of soda. He found himself standing in front of the house staring at its familiar structure and its overgrown yard.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">That yard... She’d loved gardens but had no green thumb. He’d promised her a castle surrounded by a garden paradise. After he left, that paradise had gone to seed.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">John dropped his purchases on the stoop and wandered through the gate at the side of the house to find a brown wasteland in the back yard. Where the front yard had been watered and allowed to remain green and to grow, the back had been abandoned, left to die under the summer sun. The rains earlier that day arrived too late. Everything back there was dead.</span></div>
<span id="docs-internal-guid-17c889e6-0924-e5b3-f192-a1801b06d35d"></span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Opening up the small tool shed in the back corner of the yard, brushing away the spider webs, he found a shovel. Starting in that rear corner and not stopping until long past dawn, John spent the night turning the dead stalks of the old garden under the earth. Not stopping until all the waste had been cleared away, and the bare earth was ready and waiting to be planted again.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigTWCGB1i079ZWRQP0-j1WtE0atR2dGl7_5RY85NNoJAkdJvvqVr2-yWao635jH0wgYY6b4KmE3I4naVsY26nLKb0fCB2JY3ar8_x0igOfXK5H8waUd1LCyjqx6kCoQOAScikUtg/s1600/2011-02-15.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1067" data-original-width="1600" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigTWCGB1i079ZWRQP0-j1WtE0atR2dGl7_5RY85NNoJAkdJvvqVr2-yWao635jH0wgYY6b4KmE3I4naVsY26nLKb0fCB2JY3ar8_x0igOfXK5H8waUd1LCyjqx6kCoQOAScikUtg/s640/2011-02-15.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kali, 2008 - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Properties of Dust</span></div>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Properties of Dust </span><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif"; font-size: 14pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span></div>
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1.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">The Well</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Orienteering</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Tides</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">The Properties of Dust</a></div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Storm</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Oncology</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Upon the Ruin</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/golgotha.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Golgotha</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/demolition.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Demolition</a></div>
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</div>
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3.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/watching-a-woman-from-across-the-room" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Watching a Woman From Across the Room</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moonrise" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Moonrise</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-first-snow.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">First Snow</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/antarctic-whispers" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Antarctic Whispers</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/lines-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Lines</a></div>
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<a href="http://poets.media/bedtime-prayer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Bedtime Prayer</a></div>
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4.</div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-red-car.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">The Red Car</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/something-lost" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;">Something Lost</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/slough" target="_blank">Slough</a></div>
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Home</div>
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After the War</div>
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5.</div>
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Lair</div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh4gjzzx5nKu7K6ffyUhpfXEkWxIZUvrkoQJKRal_Mdo3ptLSL4c0vYZm_cfthb85NDAvYTNBWRK47HOZi5f_UNL3UrqiknI6e118IpmqVU9yt9DdG__iAinPUDFLdJDx0Rtrwrg/s1600/24174222_10208094819367238_5468809652074861676_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="720" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh4gjzzx5nKu7K6ffyUhpfXEkWxIZUvrkoQJKRal_Mdo3ptLSL4c0vYZm_cfthb85NDAvYTNBWRK47HOZi5f_UNL3UrqiknI6e118IpmqVU9yt9DdG__iAinPUDFLdJDx0Rtrwrg/s400/24174222_10208094819367238_5468809652074861676_n.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Kissed by the first caress of winter... Gresham, Oregon. - November 14, 2017 - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
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A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-66579810739805174762017-11-22T09:35:00.000-08:002017-11-29T09:35:51.909-08:00NaNoWriMo 2017: Finding Victory in an Inevitable Defeat<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The terror of the blank "page"<br />
November 13, 2017</td></tr>
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How to lose National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)? Start late, do little prep work in October, change your plan in the first week, and, finally, be sidelined by uncomfortable health issues that make it impossible to focus on much, let alone write, for days on end. <br />
<br />
I don't mean to sound like I am giving up, but, oh... I am giving up. But only on reaching 50,000 words by the end of the month. I will continue (uh, start?) working on my novel this month and it will be interesting to see where my final word count for the month lands, though I truly doubt it will be anywhere close to a "win."<br />
<br />
Of course, giving up when it is the 22nd and I have less than 500 words written is something of a misnomer. There really isn't a path to victory left at this point.<br />
<br />
I first sat down to write this post on the 14th, but I have not had the headspace to even finish writing these words since then. At that point, a win was still technically possible. I would have needed to average 2,700 words per day for the rest of the month, but that was not far off from my 2012 average. However, it would also have required doing little but writing for the rest of the month, which would not have been possible even if I was healthy, especially if I was healthy, so I was already prepared to claim my defeat for 2017 at that point in time.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">NaNoWriMo 2017</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">NaNoWriMo 2012</td></tr>
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I knew that completing 50,000 words this year would be a challenge heading in, so my initial goals were very much the same as 2013, which was to get back into the habit of making creative writing a regular and integral part of my creative process and routine. That year, the goal was to work towards finishing the 2012 novel, but this year I started off with the plan to bang out a simpler novel by the seat of my pants.<br />
<br />
A couple things happened this year creatively on the way to NaNoWriMo "failure," though. First, the health issues took me out of the game entirely after the first weekend. This was the primary roadblock this year. But very close behind those issues were the lack of prep, the lack of "October work," heading into the book.<br />
<br />
I very quickly found that a vague idea for a starting point for the novel was not quite enough to inspire the large daily word counts I enjoyed in 2012. Sure, this was meant to be a seat of the pants project from the get go, but I very quickly found that I needed more than a vague starting point to really get the story rolling. I needed to identify a few characters, I needed a solid hook for the opening chapter, and I needed a better sense of where the plot was heading beyond "a stranger comes to town and takes the protagonist on a journey."<br />
<br />
Being a sequel to the 2012 novel, I did know "the stranger" well and the world was fully built before diving in, and I looked forward to learning about the new protagonist as I rode the story out by the seat of my pants, but it just wasn't enough to really get the ball rolling, to get to the point where the story was alive enough in my mind to write itself through physical discomfort and pain, to inspire me to find extra time to write instead of needing to talk myself into sitting down to write anything at all...<br />
<br />
The idea was strong, but it was still only just an idea, it was not a living story in my mind yet.<br />
<br />
Through this, I've gained a ton of appreciation for the thorough prep work I did in 2012, before starting in on the first draft. I had long character sketches for all of the major and minor characters so they were "alive" to me long before they were ever introduced on the page, and I had detailed, scene by scene outlines for the first half of the novel and a more open, chapter by chapter outline for the latter half, which was getting filled in to the scene level long before I reached those later points in the story.<br />
<br />
Because of all of that work, the story was so real in my head that the actual writing often felt more like I was just typing up the fully formed scenes in my head rather than wrestling through the match word by word... Of course, there was still room for spontaneity and new ideas, but they all served the outline, for the most part, rather than being creative farts blowing me down dead end rabbit trails.<br />
<br />
In some ways, it was like reading a book after seeing the film. I knew what was going to happen, for the most part, but it was fascinating to see how the vision became realized on the page, to learn all the little nuances and details passed over in the movie...<br />
<br />
For all of the benefits that come from this very structured approach to writing, I still miss the days where I would sit down with a vague idea, pull out a notebook, and follow the words one by one through a story. Of course, that works better for simpler, shorter stories. I still think that the new novel would be a good candidate for this sort of writing, but I still need to have a little more put together than I have so far.<br />
<br />
Finally, diving in a few weeks ago, because of the lack of prep work, I turned to the earlier novel to "brush up" as I was starting in on the new book. The good news is that I fell in love all over again with the older story. This was also the bad news, and quickly I decided to work on both at once, to go rebel in 2017, with a goal of writing 50,000 words and finishing at least one of the books. I needed to re-read the old book before working on it, but I figured I could make a solid start on the new book while this was happening.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately, almost immediately I became so physically miserable that I was unable to muster the concentration for any of it. For close reading the old book, for hauling the new book out of the dust and rubble of creation...<br />
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<a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BbAtzBggPXX/" style="color: black; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;" target="_blank">First words... A likely futile attempt at NaNoWriMo 2017 #nanowrimo</a></div>
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A post shared by A. F. Litt (@aflitt) on <time datetime="2017-11-02T23:24:04+00:00" style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px;">Nov 2, 2017 at 4:24pm PDT</time></div>
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So, with all of this failure with NaNoWriMo 2017, how can I find any victory here? Well, easily. I am thinking about writing in a very real way again, and regardless of my November setbacks, these novels are not going back on the shelf to collect another year or two's worth of dust. I am fired up to finish the 2012 novel and to write the 2017 one, more so than I have been in years. I did complete enough prep work on the new one to get started (though I want to rewrite the few paltry words I did complete), and I am solidly reacquainting myself with the world the novels are set in.<br />
<br />
I've been going through something of a creative slump for the last year or more due to some complicated life issues, and writing is where I've decided restart. The projects that have occupied so much of my time for the last several years, and the other photo / video work... These endeavours are not going away completely, but for right now, writing is the best fit for me logistically and creatively due to some huge life transitions going on right now. The reset button has been hit on my life, and as I start rebuilding, I find myself wanting to start with the neglected loose ends, which definitely means finishing up the oldest loose end first.<br />
<br />
I am very excited about the future, and I expect great things to come out of the next few years, knocking down these books, completing the non-fiction project on the Historic Columbia River Highway, and continuing work on the National Parks and Monuments project, which is still in a phase of early development, really.<br />
<br />
NaNoWriMo 2017 has been the start of this process. While I may end up accomplishing little during the month itself, I did start something, and I plan on sticking with it through to the end. By this time next year, the 2012 book will be done, and the 2017 book, I hope, will have, at a minimum, a solid first draft.<br />
<br />
Starting over, this is where I choose to dive in and to devote the bulk of my creative time and energy. I am very excited by this, and cannot see the inspiration provided by NaNoWriMo as anything but a victory as it lifted me back on my creative feet, ready and willing to move ahead once again.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Well, barely...</td></tr>
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<br />A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-70150611707648733482017-10-07T16:31:00.001-07:002017-10-07T16:33:26.724-07:00Glen Canyon NRA: Getting Rid of the Damned Dam?<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZRBfYM5bDOt5XHgmmpPptL97dcZM8J8YE7QeVKeC2UnrcemFRRTK2iGTS9HGvSwQvP_DRu-rF5Q6o9enPXX704yiEVhnovWetIcUVyPr1y6qbQjIKPBhQ98IJ93Y5gX7F63YpFA/s1600/22282005_10207818640742945_1435884610391182820_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="494" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZRBfYM5bDOt5XHgmmpPptL97dcZM8J8YE7QeVKeC2UnrcemFRRTK2iGTS9HGvSwQvP_DRu-rF5Q6o9enPXX704yiEVhnovWetIcUVyPr1y6qbQjIKPBhQ98IJ93Y5gX7F63YpFA/s400/22282005_10207818640742945_1435884610391182820_n.jpg" width="205" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lake Powell empty at Hite Overlook<br />Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. Utah. May 14, 2016.<br /><a href="http://www.aflitt.com/glencanyonnra" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com/glencanyonnra</a><br /><a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/glen-canyon-national-recreation-area" rel="" target="_blank">National Parks & Monuments In Distress: Glen Canyon</a></td></tr>
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<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" rel="" style="color: #757575;" target="_blank">National Parks and Monuments in Distress</a></h2>
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<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" style="background-color: white; color: #757575; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home</a></div>
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</b> <b>Nevada legislature takes serious look at tearing down Lake Powell’s Glen Canyon Dam (June 3. 2017)</b><br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>"In no uncertain terms, the Glen Canyon Dam is one of the most environmentally destructive projects in our nation's history," said Eric Belken, executive director of the Institute.</i> </blockquote>
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</i><i>Belken cited harms to native species, destruction of a unique natural and cultural landscape, and the disruption of the natural cycle of erosion and replenishment of soil downstream in the Grand Canyon.</i></blockquote>
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<a href="http://fox13now.com/2017/06/02/nevada-legislature-takes-serious-look-at-tearing-down-glen-canyon-dam" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://fox13now.com/2017/06/02/nevada-legislature-takes-serious-look-at-tearing-down-glen-canyon-dam</a><br />
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<b>For more information on <a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/glen-canyon-national-recreation-area" target="_blank">Glen Canyon National Recreation Area</a>:</b><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/glen-canyon-national-recreation-area">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/glen-canyon-national-recreation-area</a><br />
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<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" rel="" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">National Parks and Monuments in Distress</a></h2>
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<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" style="background-color: white; color: #757575; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home</a></div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-78974136610780447732017-09-23T12:22:00.003-07:002022-04-26T09:02:53.125-07:00What's up with the Honey Badgers?<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4r7wHMg5Yjg" width="560"></iframe>A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-58425293561521925032017-09-14T17:28:00.002-07:002017-09-14T17:28:28.332-07:00The Properties of Dust: The Red Car<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTBAjCgb4AK5L1z1ClPx_OPqhNmMhpEuHZZ8_WX83733dBkRrNrpPosVDdtoRhtdMjpqoeqMMSFtV5Qh-NmJCJJApERYKDkSV8s55EqR1wH7b-bCl8l17gFiXH8T604MYuunGhDA/s1600/1918355_1076363928311_528253_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="592" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTBAjCgb4AK5L1z1ClPx_OPqhNmMhpEuHZZ8_WX83733dBkRrNrpPosVDdtoRhtdMjpqoeqMMSFtV5Qh-NmJCJJApERYKDkSV8s55EqR1wH7b-bCl8l17gFiXH8T604MYuunGhDA/s1600/1918355_1076363928311_528253_n.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mt. Hood, Oregon - Spring 2004 - www.aflitt.com</td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 18.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;"><i>Apologies to Bill²</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 18.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;">
So much depends
upon</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 18.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;">
the red car</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 18.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;">
dusted with mountain ash
damp with morning dew</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 18.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;">
the door too slippery
for one son</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 18.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;">
while the younger laughs
and climbs up
into his car seat.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 18.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;"><b><br /></b></span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNQjcEkOEhEXgNMnc9QVFwwcmnH7wIJUH8oEGdGHgKb5xb7tcLowpAHniHXgqYMuTr9WXOMk5crMiTDaxnT3Y-HPD3o_3V9J3DJwwWSgdMn9JdQ4X4vqmjDKydqqWLaXVicnhPsw/s1600/1918355_1076364088315_1926275_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="592" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNQjcEkOEhEXgNMnc9QVFwwcmnH7wIJUH8oEGdGHgKb5xb7tcLowpAHniHXgqYMuTr9WXOMk5crMiTDaxnT3Y-HPD3o_3V9J3DJwwWSgdMn9JdQ4X4vqmjDKydqqWLaXVicnhPsw/s1600/1918355_1076364088315_1926275_n.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mt. Hood, Oregon - Spring 2004 - www.aflitt.com</td></tr>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: 'Droid Serif'; font-size: 13.999999999999998pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Properties of Dust</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: 'Droid Serif'; font-size: 13.999999999999998pt; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Properties of Dust </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: 'Droid Serif'; font-size: 13.999999999999998pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span></div>
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1.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">The Well</a> </div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Orienteering</a> </div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Tides</a> </div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">The Properties of Dust</a> </div>
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</div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Storm</a> </div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Oncology</a> </div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Upon the Ruin</a> </div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/golgotha.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Golgotha</a> </div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/demolition.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Demolition</a> </div>
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</div>
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3.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/watching-a-woman-from-across-the-room" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Watching a Woman From Across the Room</a> </div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moonrise" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Moonrise</a> </div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-properties-of-dust-first-snow.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">First Snow </a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/antarctic-whispers" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Antarctic Whispers</a> </div>
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1.1rem; letter-spacing: 0.01em;"><a href="https://poets.media/lines-1" target="_blank">Lines</a></span></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/bedtime-prayer" target="_blank">Bedtime Prayer</a></div>
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</div>
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4.</div>
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The Red Car</div>
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Something Lost</div>
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Slough</div>
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Home</div>
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After the War</div>
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5.</div>
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Lair</div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP9Amel38tm-PzwdJccgbi7XD5bj_liowh4WmbNt7jQs5rmDeTY1UCVPx-9jiQoXbs-XXE1wvQwcLTGvxAP4WrtC-fSj-SECr_L2NuFqjRO0jNJbMZDO5HS9N-J94rrZrdClGxmg/s1600/1918510_1068160883240_6336029_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="592" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP9Amel38tm-PzwdJccgbi7XD5bj_liowh4WmbNt7jQs5rmDeTY1UCVPx-9jiQoXbs-XXE1wvQwcLTGvxAP4WrtC-fSj-SECr_L2NuFqjRO0jNJbMZDO5HS9N-J94rrZrdClGxmg/s1600/1918510_1068160883240_6336029_n.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lassen Volcanic National Park, California - July 2004 - www.aflitt.com</td></tr>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "Droid Serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you appreciate posts like this, please consider becoming a monthly subscriber through Patreon!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "Droid Serif"; font-size: 14pt; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Visit my Patreon page (<a href="https://www.patreon.com/aflitt">https://www.patreon.com/aflitt</a>) for more information.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: Droid Serif;"><span style="font-size: 18.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>A. F. Litt on vocal.media
</b><a href="https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt">https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt</a></span></span></div>
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A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-80947856129259363072017-09-08T12:13:00.000-07:002017-09-08T12:13:48.727-07:00The Properties of Dust: First Snow<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1fowXOTFVUcZfBTKks96OG6745RiYpnv8cmvU0XnbQsOmlmJ-A4yHG3H3doxlow4sYjDZy2DVjzSOIjnYCOCKmr0BGVc8iBRzeBZHcIF-mPmLvVojcyLtrDACK8lwkNRrcMTSOg/s1600/DSC_0156.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1060" data-original-width="1600" height="422" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1fowXOTFVUcZfBTKks96OG6745RiYpnv8cmvU0XnbQsOmlmJ-A4yHG3H3doxlow4sYjDZy2DVjzSOIjnYCOCKmr0BGVc8iBRzeBZHcIF-mPmLvVojcyLtrDACK8lwkNRrcMTSOg/s640/DSC_0156.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Scenic Traffic Corridor<br />Historic Columbia River Highway. Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area. Oregon. January 3, 2014<br />Copyright © 2014 A. F. Litt, All Rights Reserved<br /><a href="http://www.aflitt.com/columbiarivergorgensa" target="_blank">http://www.aflitt.com/columbiarivergorgensa</a></td></tr>
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<br /><br /><div>
I.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The frost is thick upon the once dark ground as I look out the misty window. My reflection stares back at me from those panes and it looks different than the face held tight in my mind. Perhaps it is just that the glass is clouded and that the frost is too heavy on the earth outside. There is an uncertainty in my heart that leads me from the window to the lavatory’s mirror. The mirror shows me the same face as the window. It is mine but it is not mine, so I go back to my seat. I return to the window.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
II.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
“So, how do you think it went?”</div>
<div>
“Hmm?”</div>
<div>
“With your Mom. How do you think it, you know?”</div>
<div>
“Fine.”</div>
<div>
“Just fine? That doesn’t sound so good.”</div>
<div>
“I’m reading. Can we talk later?”</div>
<div>
“Later? Like, after you’re done reading? Or later when we get home? Or do you mean some time that never happens?”</div>
<div>
“Just not here now... When we’re alone.”</div>
<div>
“No one’s listening. If they are, who cares? It’s not like... Whatever, just keep reading.”</div>
<div>
“I will.”</div>
<div>
“I don’t see how you can do that without getting sick. I couldn’t do that without getting sick. I couldn’t, not with all the rocking, the clacking, all the shaking.”</div>
<div>
“That’s you, not me.”</div>
<div>
“I know. Of course.”</div>
<div>
“Later. I promise.”</div>
<div>
“What’s so interesting in there anyway?”</div>
<div>
“Portfolio Diversification in the Post-Boom Economy.”</div>
<div>
“Fascinating.”</div>
<div>
“It pays our bills. Helps secure our future.”</div>
<div>
“You could just let me know what she said to you last night.”</div>
<div>
“Said?”</div>
<div>
“I know she said something.”</div>
<div>
“Huh?”</div>
<div>
“You didn’t tell her, did you?”</div>
<div>
“No.”</div>
<div>
“It wasn’t that she didn’t say anything. I know how she is like that. I’ve learned where you get that from. But I knew it didn’t happen. You didn’t tell her. I didn’t expect you to, really.”</div>
<div>
“It just... It wasn’t the right time.”</div>
<div>
“She’ll find out. She’ll see me again at Christmas. She’ll be able to tell by then.”</div>
<div>
<div>
“Then we’ll tell her. Then, if not by then.”</div>
<div>
“Or she’ll just look at me and know. Shit. It must have been classic.”</div>
<div>
“What’s that?”</div>
<div>
“What she said.”</div>
<div>
“She... It wasn’t like that. No. She just needs more time to get to know you, that’s all.”</div>
<div>
“Am I still... Fuck it. Nevermind.”</div>
<div>
“I told you that she apologized for saying that.”</div>
<div>
“It doesn’t matter anyway.”</div>
<div>
“Of course it does.”</div>
<div>
“I’d just like to get it over with... Whatever. Sorry. It’s been a long week.”</div>
<div>
“It has.”</div>
<div>
“Look out there. The snow. It’s really coming down now.”</div>
<div>
“I know. It’s so early. It’s too early for that.”</div>
<div>
“It isn’t, though. Not really.”</div>
<div>
“It just seems that way to me.”</div>
<div>
“I saw that picture of you. In the pilgrim outfit, playing in the snow? What were you, about six or seven then?”</div>
<div>
“Seven. But that was a long time ago, before Dad moved us out here. I can’t remember snow this early here. Lots of storms, though. Wind and rain. Eating cold leftovers around the fire, after the power blew down. But no snow.”</div>
<div>
“That sounds nice.”</div>
<div>
“I guess so. Maybe later we should light a fire. Sit around with some candles?”</div>
<div>
“I’d like that. We can talk then, when no one is around to listen.”</div>
<div>
“Not about Mom, though. There’s nothing to say about her, anyway.”</div>
<div>
“She didn’t say anything, did she? I was just being... Wasn’t I?”</div>
<div>
“No. Not as such... She has a ways to go. She’ll be fine, though. We’ll be fine. We should just forget her.</div>
<div>
“That’s what I try to do.”</div>
<div>
“We’re almost home.</div>
<div>
“That sounds perfect. I just want to lay here and hold you until we get there.”</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
III.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As she snuggled in against me, I stared out the window, watching the large blank flakes blowing past us. I tapped the magazine against my leg but I knew I was done reading for the trip, trying to think of nothing until we were home and I was holding her tight before the fire, forgetting everything in the world except for the silent void, momentary and brief, spent watching a random flake sticking to the glass and melting.</div>
</div>
<br /><div>
<br /></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEir8l8FGIcfgaR3CFxMXHovkInavk1ffdKWZzQ4qQEuljLn2lcbWkbSs6PSIW9W2CW_Ku2-DFlppiSw6hAH-bdXOmX0izrKSUsGc6Ub_6j2tdjLpx8eT1Ap5RUkpSkN_Ty3FGU24A/s1600/602546_395019210560105_69662110_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="578" data-original-width="960" height="385" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEir8l8FGIcfgaR3CFxMXHovkInavk1ffdKWZzQ4qQEuljLn2lcbWkbSs6PSIW9W2CW_Ku2-DFlppiSw6hAH-bdXOmX0izrKSUsGc6Ub_6j2tdjLpx8eT1Ap5RUkpSkN_Ty3FGU24A/s640/602546_395019210560105_69662110_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Seattle, 1996<br /><a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><i>The Properties of Dust</i> was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span><br /><div style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif", georgia, "times new roman", times, serif; font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;">
<span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;">1.</span></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">The Well</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Orienteering</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Tides</a></div>
<div style="background-color: #f7f7f7; box-sizing: border-box; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid serif", georgia, "times new roman", times, serif; font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px; margin-bottom: 1em;">
<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">The Properties of Dust</a></div>
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</div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Storm</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Oncology</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Upon the Ruin</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/golgotha.html" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Golgotha</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/demolition.html" target="_blank">Demolition</a></div>
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</div>
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3.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/watching-a-woman-from-across-the-room" target="_blank">Watching a Woman From Across the Room</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moonrise" target="_blank">Moonrise</a></div>
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First Snow</div>
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Antarctic Whispers</div>
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Lines</div>
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Bedtime Prayer</div>
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</div>
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4.</div>
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The Red Car</div>
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Something Lost</div>
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Slough</div>
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Home</div>
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After the War</div>
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</div>
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5.</div>
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Lair</div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a;"><span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><b>A. F. Litt on vocal.media</b></span></span></div>
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">Website</span></div>
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A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-47310976164966830822017-09-06T16:10:00.003-07:002020-02-20T10:34:40.565-08:00Canyonlands National Park: The 1936 Version of Escalante National Monument<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5dcOzV3qyy21Kt-cBugTMI1l45Sc2kzdYyUI7pV-PpB_NivR1gaaEjrMSPNnwgfQddpPQh5k6QWhh21sc5x02F4JBrBjPKhNUwnL-KxC2BVwtQjB4RprZakd79zDNuJMMFUJEjA/s1600/DImk1_4UEAMAuJq.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="568" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5dcOzV3qyy21Kt-cBugTMI1l45Sc2kzdYyUI7pV-PpB_NivR1gaaEjrMSPNnwgfQddpPQh5k6QWhh21sc5x02F4JBrBjPKhNUwnL-KxC2BVwtQjB4RprZakd79zDNuJMMFUJEjA/s1600/DImk1_4UEAMAuJq.jpg" /></a></div>
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<h2 style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 22px; margin: 0px; position: relative;">
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" rel="" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">National Parks and Monuments in Distress</a></h2>
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" style="background-color: white; color: #757575; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home</a><br />
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<br />
The original proposal for the monument would have included most of what is now Canyonlands National Park and Bears Ears National Monument... This kills the idea that there has been no debate on the creation of Bears Ears. There has been debate on the protection of these lands for many, many decades.<br />
<br />
Many of the issues around Bears Ears were also being debated during the creation of Canyonlands. See the links below for a look at these debates.<br />
<br />
The timeline of the creation of Canyonlands National Park from the National Park Service's (NPS) <i>From Controversy to Compromise to Cooperation: The Administrative History of Canyonlands National Park</i>:<br />
<br />
1935: First National Park Service survey of “Escalante” region, including Glen Canyon, Cataract Canyon, Canyonlands basin,Waterpocket Fold and San Juan River Canyon.<br />
<br />
1936: First Escalante National Monument concept introduced that covered more than 6,000 square miles and included the entire Greater Canyonlands region; plan harshly criticized in Utah.<br />
<br />
1936: The Wilderness Society designated 8.8 million acre “Colorado River Canyons” region extending from Glen Canyon to Book Cliffs as largest roadless tract in continental United States.<br />
<br />
1938: Second Escalante National Monument concept introduced that covered 2,450 square miles region along narrow swath surrounding Colorado River; revised plan severely criticized.<br />
<br />
1940: Second Escalante concept repackaged as a “recreation area” by the NPS and Interior Secretary<br />
Harold Ickes; bills died in Congressional committees before reaching floor for vote.<br />
<br />
1942–43: Escalante surveys continued with more emphasis placed on the Canyonlands basin as a region distinct from the rest of the Greater Canyonlands region.<br />
<br />
1944: Proposal for “Grandview National Park” circulated internally at National Park Service regional and
national offices; plan never released to general public.<br />
<br />
1952: National Geographic Magazine article on southeast Utah published which focused on the Canyonlands basin had the first color photos of the region to appear in a national magazine.<br />
<br />
1956: National Park Service and Bureau of Land Management agreed to first of several memorandums of understanding regarding management of the Canyonlands region.<br />
<br />
1957: Needles and Grandview Recreation Area concepts discussed at National Park Service as either<br />
stand-alone park units or extensions of the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.<br />
<br />
1959: First National Park Service survey of Canyonlands region focused on the Needles area.<br />
<br />
1960: Senator Wallace Bennett (R-Utah) introduced first “park” bill for Canyonlands region which designated a Needles National Recreation Area.<br />
<br />
1960: NPS Planner Leo Diederich conceived basin-wide park concept in Canyonlands region.<br />
<br />
1961: Udall led political and media junket to the Canyonlands basin in July, then announced plan for a “Canyon Lands National Park” as part of a “Golden Circle” of tourist destinations.<br />
<br />
1961: Udall withdrew one million acres of the Canyonlands region from entry.<br />
<br />
1962: First Canyonlands park bill introduced by Utah Democratic Senator Frank Moss that encompassed approximately 330,000 acres.<br />
<br />
1964: Canyonlands National Park bill encompassing 257,400 acres passed after three-year political tussle; signed into law on September 12 by President Lyndon Johnson.<br />
<br />
1964: Bates Wilson named superintendent of Canyonlands National Park in October while remaining<br />
superintendent of Arches N. M. and Natural Bridges N. M.; the three park units administratively<br />
encompassed what was called thereafter the “Canyonlands Complex.”<br />
<br />
1965: Canyonlands staff set up residences/offices in January at Squaw Flat and Willow Flat.<br />
<br />
1965: Master Plan for Canyonlands completed in September that included large visitor centers, hotels, marinas, paved roads and an “amphithorium” at Grandview Point.<br />
<br />
1968: Bates Wilson and others at the National Park Service expressed reservations about the Canyonlands
Master Plan and began to recommend scaling back park development plans.<br />
<br />
1971: Canyonlands National Park enlarged by 87,000 acres that included the Maze and Land of Standing
Rocks, Davis and Lavender Canyons, creating a park totaling 337,540 acres.<br />
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<h2>
Links</h2>
<b><br /></b>
<b>Utah Historical Quarterly: The Canyonlands National Park Controversy (1991)</b><br />
<a href="https://heritage.utah.gov/history/uhg-canyonlands-park-controversy" target="_blank">https://heritage.utah.gov/history/uhg-canyonlands-park-controversy</a><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>National Park Service - From Controversy to Compromise to Cooperation : The Administrative History of Canyonlands National Park (2008)</b><br />
<a href="https://www.nps.gov/cany/planyourvisit/upload/CanyAdminHistory_forweb.pdf" target="_blank">https://www.nps.gov/cany/planyourvisit/upload/CanyAdminHistory_forweb.pdf</a><br />
<br />
<b>Bears Ears National Monument</b><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/the-27-monuments/bears-ears" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/the-27-monuments/bears-ears</a><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Canyonlands National Park</b><br />
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/canyonlands-national-park" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/nps/canyonlands-national-park</a><br />
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<h2 style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 22px; margin: 0px; position: relative; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" rel="" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">National Parks and Monuments in Distress</a></h2>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home" style="background-color: white; color: #757575; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://sites.google.com/view/nationalmonumentsindanger/home</a></div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-37255333167827320742017-08-29T11:48:00.000-07:002017-08-29T12:23:31.161-07:00Drought<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiraw1wsrIqv6HfGDhGjPokrp1l0MgsqYipawVfTXAmjKJTEoc-z_te6DWqlwqRyQVErbrCBFROMcrORfgvMujub9oesJmqtLXeY9yUyiACcK4mubURWg8zMr3OWlHtXGTeN-lWyA/s1600/21077639_1551378231590858_3917677081926836504_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="714" data-original-width="960" height="476" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiraw1wsrIqv6HfGDhGjPokrp1l0MgsqYipawVfTXAmjKJTEoc-z_te6DWqlwqRyQVErbrCBFROMcrORfgvMujub9oesJmqtLXeY9yUyiACcK4mubURWg8zMr3OWlHtXGTeN-lWyA/s640/21077639_1551378231590858_3917677081926836504_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Drying Leaves - Gresham, Oregon. August 28, 2017 - www.aflitt.com</td></tr>
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<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>There is an interesting editor at vocal.media today, and all of my posts are being rejected due to length or due to "content that makes direct or indirect assertions or implications about personal attributes and/or beliefs such as race, ethnic origin, religion, beliefs, sexual orientation, or gender identity."</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>With some of the shorter poems, adding the additional content - index of the old book, a paragraph about the old book - seemed to make the shorter poems acceptable. Yes, the poem wasn't 100 words, but the post was, but today? No.</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>This poem, however, was rejected due to the sort of objectionable content mentioned above. Really? </b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Maybe the poetry editor on staff today just doesn't like my writing? Fair enough. </b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Anyway, life is too busy to be bashing away at these over and over, so unless there is a clear and easy fix, once content is rejected there, I'm just going to post it on Rubble. Already today, it's taken me four times as long as usual to get through my "quick" daily post due to these issues...</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<br />
<h2>
<b>Drought</b></h2>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
The stone I am sitting on<br />
<br />
is becoming difficult and<br />
<br />
uncomfortable.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
But there is shade here,<br />
<br />
For now... For a moment...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Sanctuary from the hot sun,<br />
<br />
the day too hot,<br />
<br />
the months too dry;<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
A bleak summer of desolation,<br />
<br />
not done yet...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Uncomfortable, unpleasant tasks<br />
<br />
wait for me, back at a home<br />
<br />
that is no home,<br />
<br />
no more...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Soon, the hard work begins,<br />
<br />
preparing for the cold times ahead,<br />
<br />
the lonely times,<br />
<br />
the hungry times,<br />
<br />
The times when the fears<br />
<br />
of empty fields grip<br />
<br />
my cowardly heart,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Times when the dark<br />
<br />
fills my eyes with<br />
<br />
imagined visions of death.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
The death...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Of hopes<br />
<br />
Of dreams<br />
<br />
Of others...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Others...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Who I so imperfectly<br />
<br />
sacrificed,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Sacrificed for...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Sacrificed...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
For not enough.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
My throne, alone,<br />
<br />
in the shade,<br />
<br />
out of the glare of a summer sun<br />
<br />
too hot, too blunt, too severe,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
For any of us-<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Uncomfortable refuge from an<br />
<br />
uncomfortable season, an<br />
<br />
uncomfortable day, hour, minute, an<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Uncomfortable moment...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
A second in time<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Where hope lives for only one<br />
<br />
random moment,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Where death pardons life for one<br />
<br />
fleeting second,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Where life does not suffer futility,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
For one moment.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
A tiny moment.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
One small refuge<br />
<br />
away, so far,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
From the brutality<br />
<br />
of a lonely season,<br />
<br />
away from the<br />
<br />
lonely season ahead...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Living life not as a hunter,<br />
<br />
not as a gatherer,<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
But only as prey...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
In this moment, I raise<br />
<br />
a quiet prayer to<br />
<br />
a quiet God...<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
I ask-<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Can eternity exist<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
In a moment such<br />
<br />
as this?<br />
<b><br /></b>
<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b></b><br />
<i>August 28, 2017</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i><br /></i>
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Visit my Patreon page (<a href="https://www.patreon.com/aflitt" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://www.patreon.com/aflitt</a>) for more information.</div>
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<div style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; margin-bottom: 1em;">
<span style="color: #1a1a1a;"><span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><b>A. F. Litt on vocal.media</b></span></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; margin-bottom: 1em;">
<span style="color: #1a1a1a;"><span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><a href="https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt</a></span></span></div>
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">Website</span></div>
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<a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-57613164796438804052017-08-29T11:16:00.001-07:002017-08-29T11:34:05.779-07:00The Properties of Dust: Demolition<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMjdGJnAZx2zvPbqX1IGu9GyhAz4mFlHBVv3Gt6yIL7rBUdGmp53KjgPxy_RNQI3kcVy1unsrge5If50x0SwNSmHDsvWFJ59oRMZs1CtJCChk1LRX2PiMLgKAkotZnaQw-26tCqA/s1600/2011-10-23.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="527" data-original-width="841" height="401" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMjdGJnAZx2zvPbqX1IGu9GyhAz4mFlHBVv3Gt6yIL7rBUdGmp53KjgPxy_RNQI3kcVy1unsrge5If50x0SwNSmHDsvWFJ59oRMZs1CtJCChk1LRX2PiMLgKAkotZnaQw-26tCqA/s640/2011-10-23.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">Clearing the tracks after the implosion of the Kingdome. Seattle, Washington. - March 26, 2000 -</span><span style="font-size: 12.8px;"> </span><a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" style="font-size: 12.8px;" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<h2 style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 22px; margin: 0px; position: relative;">
From <i>The Properties of Dust</i></h2>
<br style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><i>Too short for vocal.media, this one gets to live on Rubble...</i></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span> <span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span> <span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">He stands at the edge-</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">Tangled rubble,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">entwined chaos,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">a whole block</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">plucked out;</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">Opening a womb</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">in the ground.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">He tosses a half-smoked</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">cigarette into the</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">pit, curses,</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">and shuffles back</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.4px;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;">to work.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br />
</span></span> <br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiN_Lcb3LL9KcPYnI0PlYYnWM82fIBxqmOmBzLjKqmIKeHhnznRJBUrT_YzqkhMMvuLUhBgjE6q7nDE6H8CgxF3t_uYrYUx5gXx92TlpSsYLcYg_BVvjttkjycslwMwSn8epeEdQw/s1600/21055054_10207598202112117_5915477320291997214_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1060" data-original-width="1600" height="422" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiN_Lcb3LL9KcPYnI0PlYYnWM82fIBxqmOmBzLjKqmIKeHhnznRJBUrT_YzqkhMMvuLUhBgjE6q7nDE6H8CgxF3t_uYrYUx5gXx92TlpSsYLcYg_BVvjttkjycslwMwSn8epeEdQw/s640/21055054_10207598202112117_5915477320291997214_o.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Great Kiva and Sleeping Ute - Lowry Pueblo. Canyons of the Ancients National Monument. Colorado. May 8, 2016. -<span style="font-size: 12.8px;"> </span><a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" style="font-size: 12.8px;" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "tahoma" , "helvetica" , "freesans" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15.4px;"><br /><br />
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<div style="background-color: #f7f7f7; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 15.4px; margin-bottom: 1em;">
<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><i>The Properties of Dust</i> was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;">1.</span></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">The Well</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Orienteering</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Tides</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">The Properties of Dust</a></div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #757575; cursor: pointer; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Storm</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Oncology</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Upon the Ruin</a></div>
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<a href="http://rubble.blogspot.com/2017/08/golgotha.html" target="_blank">Golgotha</a></div>
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Demolition</div>
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</div>
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3.</div>
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Watching a Woman From Across the Room</div>
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Moonrise</div>
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First Snow</div>
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Antarctic Whispers</div>
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Lines</div>
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Bedtime Prayer</div>
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4.</div>
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The Red Car</div>
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Something Lost</div>
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Slough</div>
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Home</div>
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After the War</div>
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5.</div>
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Lair</div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizwjreyXxlqqaIahtgSsgwINRBE7JFjx0TrK1CH7gGpS6dQcloqNHPTGVY6e4XLQoLFX03NIzJTlId7sR0XDzmKsgbJoEawuWNeaunWxhfzB8YqcCZQuD6OeRUp42jPksUYQXT8g/s1600/2011-03-09.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="934" data-original-width="1215" height="490" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizwjreyXxlqqaIahtgSsgwINRBE7JFjx0TrK1CH7gGpS6dQcloqNHPTGVY6e4XLQoLFX03NIzJTlId7sR0XDzmKsgbJoEawuWNeaunWxhfzB8YqcCZQuD6OeRUp42jPksUYQXT8g/s640/2011-03-09.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I-90, Seattle, Washington. 1987 - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">If you appreciate posts like this, please consider becoming a monthly subscriber through Patreon!</span></div>
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Visit my Patreon page (<a href="https://www.patreon.com/aflitt" target="_blank">https://www.patreon.com/aflitt</a>) for more information.</div>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a;"><span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><b>A. F. Litt on vocal.media</b></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a;"><span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><a href="https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt" style="color: #757575; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://vocal.media/authors/a-f-litt</a></span></span></div>
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">Website</span></div>
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<a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></div>
A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3078822.post-45522841172278606432017-08-29T10:17:00.001-07:002017-08-29T11:34:05.771-07:00The Properties of Dust: Golgotha<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVRgIrpjmL4m15dO783hQCLGec64f4F2xcC3gCH0_Q4Dh1BK_d19_10HYSdQkT3-hWLOw1FEGWV2QsxyhDj1wofI0JbExHGwPf_nZnD60ZzOBUS8Z1pv3kb8SpZsJDs2JaA7OE2g/s1600/306796_394997970562229_957990957_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="592" data-original-width="400" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVRgIrpjmL4m15dO783hQCLGec64f4F2xcC3gCH0_Q4Dh1BK_d19_10HYSdQkT3-hWLOw1FEGWV2QsxyhDj1wofI0JbExHGwPf_nZnD60ZzOBUS8Z1pv3kb8SpZsJDs2JaA7OE2g/s400/306796_394997970562229_957990957_n.jpg" width="270" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mt. Calvary Cemetery, Portland, Oregon. April 2, 2005. - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
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From <i>The Properties of Dust</i></h2>
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Too "controversial" for vocal.media, this one gets to live on Rubble...<br />
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On display for all to see</div>
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A dying man, ages past</div>
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Martyred upon the blasted, burning heights</div>
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Of Golgotha.</div>
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Sorrows drain from the taut man’s eyes</div>
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As carrion creatures pull at his muscles</div>
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As insects burrow into his fingernails</div>
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As birds shit on his limp figure</div>
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As dogs watch, awaiting his revival</div>
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As serene sirens tempt others to</div>
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Believe.</div>
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I wash my hands.</div>
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Upon death’s playground, bodies rot;</div>
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Skulls dry and a man dies,</div>
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His tears falling upon the thirsty dust</div>
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Of ancient monuments and bones,</div>
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To be carried by a low</div>
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And shifting wind towards</div>
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Eternity.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmd6hyphenhyphenwYs4PwL8S3jAlztjAZmDYQPwgdL9JGP_rIWreTmBNUjqsZVXu3c-Q00dvvcc1_rI8wVzMhWQjzUBjRuQAgCtiGFXgm40ko2mgFSNMOc55sz4OulLEcnIl5RLONpTm2yg4Q/s1600/21077746_10207598092029365_4505916551882033264_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="653" data-original-width="941" height="444" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmd6hyphenhyphenwYs4PwL8S3jAlztjAZmDYQPwgdL9JGP_rIWreTmBNUjqsZVXu3c-Q00dvvcc1_rI8wVzMhWQjzUBjRuQAgCtiGFXgm40ko2mgFSNMOc55sz4OulLEcnIl5RLONpTm2yg4Q/s640/21077746_10207598092029365_4505916551882033264_n.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">On the Last Day - Orient, Oregon - August 26, 2017 - www.aflitt.com</td></tr>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid" serif , "georgia" , "times new roman" , "times" , serif; font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;">The Properties of Dust was a small book I put together in 2005 for a desktop publishing class at Portland State University. Many of these pieces were written specifically for the book project, and the rest date back to as early as 1990. The pieces were accompanied by a photo or two in the original book, but, in most cases, I am using different, more recent, photos with this series of posts.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;">1.</span></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-well" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">The Well</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/moreh" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Moreh</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/orienteering" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Orienteering</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/tides" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Tides</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/the-properties-of-dust" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">The Properties of Dust</a></div>
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2.</div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/storm-1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer;" target="_blank">Storm</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/oncology" target="_blank">Oncology</a></div>
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<a href="https://poets.media/upon-the-ruin" target="_blank">Upon the Ruin</a></div>
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Golgotha</div>
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Demolition</div>
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3.</div>
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Watching a Woman From Across the Room</div>
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Moonrise</div>
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First Snow</div>
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Antarctic Whispers</div>
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Lines</div>
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Bedtime Prayer</div>
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4.</div>
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The Red Car</div>
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Something Lost</div>
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Slough</div>
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Home</div>
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After the War</div>
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5.</div>
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Lair</div>
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Love Poems</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwEw2frL61fuZfkGSxrUir6nA9ki9zS5f-Hrdfgb44z9YmkQIl3fSO896p7B2lJSe43yG-kxoEmWGmPFmAdfsDc00_jKf1TNmSmW9wBfUOY3Pn27j__e8wzyVxhqMJMMlr5ybSoA/s1600/266002_451635968231762_1752456383_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1278" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwEw2frL61fuZfkGSxrUir6nA9ki9zS5f-Hrdfgb44z9YmkQIl3fSO896p7B2lJSe43yG-kxoEmWGmPFmAdfsDc00_jKf1TNmSmW9wBfUOY3Pn27j__e8wzyVxhqMJMMlr5ybSoA/s640/266002_451635968231762_1752456383_o.jpg" width="511" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Portland, Oregon. 11.11.11 - <a href="http://www.aflitt.com/" target="_blank">www.aflitt.com</a></td></tr>
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<span style="color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "droid" serif , "georgia" , "times" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 18.7px; letter-spacing: 0.187px;"><b>A. F. Litt on vocal.media</b></span></span></div>
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A. F. Litthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01180976216827593008noreply@blogger.com0