you have to be there …
to be there when the bread comes
out of the oven

Interesting that the feller who is supposed to have said this, you have to be there when the bread comes out of the oven, film maker Rene Clair, also said, “The film is ready, the shooting is all that remains to be done.“

Maybe you have to be there when the bread comes out of the oven because all that remains to be done is to eat the bread.

Good to keep in mind as well that the bread only comes out of the oven once.

A microwave is quick and cheap but it isn’t fresh baked bread.

Maybe it was the clouds yesterday that put me in mind of bread out of the oven.

And you had to be there on Port Royal sound to see them.

You also had to look up.

satiny dark complete
curdly clouds striped moon silent
could hear my eyes blink

That was all the instruction I ever received: two announcements and a vision of a baseball field.

I sat on the verandah until the satiny dark was complete.

A few curdly clouds striped the moon, and it became so silent I could hear my eyes blink.

From Shoeless Joe by W. P. Kinsella, 1983, Ballantine Books.

Summer time and humidity so thick you could be under water.

Dark so deep you can feel it.

Quiet so loud, you can hear.

Life in the low country on South Carolina in June, 2023.

standing up for good?
an under-handed attempt!
need no stinkin bridges

I live in the low country of South Carolina.

I work on Hilton Head Island.

To get to work I have to cross bridges connecting the island to the mainland.

The amount of traffic to the island is growing exponentially dayly.

Like any resort community after covid, the cost of land and housing in the resort area has skyrocketed and the people who live and work and make the resort community a resort community can no longer afford to live in the resort community.

Which adds to the traffic.

The bridges are two lanes in each direction.

Along with being unable to handle the volume of traffic, the bridges are past there recommend safe to use age as well as damaged by hurricane Matthew.

As I like to say there is no truth that the bridges have been condemned.

There is no truth that the Corps of Engineers has issued UNSAFE TO USE ratings for the bridges.

It is TRUE that the Corps of Engineers have refused to to issues a SAFE TO USE rating for the bridges.

Plans are being developed to build new three lane bridges.

They have been in development since we moved here three years ago.

Once the plans are accepted, the estimate is that it will take 3 to 4 years to build the bridges.

At a recent town meeting on the subject, a local citizen’s interest group has the town council to adopt a resolution that the town recognizes a “sense of urgency” on the project.

The group, The Greater Island Council, a private group of volunteer Lowcountry residents who advance initiatives from education to parks and rec on the Island, instead of seeing action on their request, found themselves under attack.

The town council questioned the group’s IRS status.

One resident who spoke at the meeting, said the GIC’s resolution was an “under-handed” attempt by a private group to influence town policy.

All the group wants is to show that there is some sense of action in moving forward on this bridge.

I guess, in short, the group wants to show there is some sense.

But sense, common sense, is pretty uncommon on this Island.

The resolution was voted down.

“This town council is showing backbone,” said another resident.

“(It is) standing up for the greater good of the island.”

What did the town council do instead?

At Tuesday’s meeting, the town approved a request for qualifications document crafted by a citizen’s advisory committee on the U.S. 278 project. The RFQ will be used to recruit engineering firms interested in conducting a broader study of the impacts the 278 project will have on traffic, safety, and the environment on Hilton Head that extends beyond the scope of the current county-town joint study.

The approved a request for a document that will be used to recruit a firm that will then conduct a study of the impact of the new bridge.

The study is not underway.

The group conducting the study has not been hired.

But the qualifications for the group have been identified for such a time as when the recruitment of this unknown group gets underway.

I am reminded of the movie, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.

Humphrey Bogart demands to see badges when he is attacked by bandits who say there are police.

The bandit chief replies, “Badges? We ain’t got no badges. We don’t need no badges. I don’t have to show you any stinkin’ badges!”

Bridges?

We ain’t got no bridges.

We don’t need no bridges.

I don’t have to show you any stinkin’ bridges!”

It is for the greater good of the island!

civilization
on a saturday morning
the roar, the power

I live in what is called the low country of South Carolina.

It is north of the Coastal Empire of south Georgia and the Hostess City of Savannah.

The low country.

So called because it is so low.

As I write, I am about 10 feet above sea level and I am on the 2nd floor.

It is low.

It is also nicknamed the slow country.

The nickname fits for many reasons.

I am not saying we are in the back woods.

I am saying you get here once you get to the back woods.

I am not saying it is Podunk.

I am saying that to get here, you turn left, once you get to Podunk.

The low country has a lot going for it, not the least of which is its solitude.

Its peace and quiet.

At least until this morning when the peace and quiet was wiped out by the roar of civilization.

At least that part of civilization that recognizes the gas powered backpack leaf blower as a part of civilization.

I live in a little apartment complex.

There is no lawn to mow.

There is no yard work.

Still, for reasons known but to those people who make those type of decisions, the parking lot was dirty or something, and the entire complex needed to be blow dried.

Understand the grass has not started growing yet.

There was no grass to be mowed in the little places where grass can grow around here.

As a matter of fact, I don’t think there were any lawn mowers in action this morning.

No sir.

It was this small army of noise terrorists armed with these backpack leaf blowers blow drying every inch of sidewalk and parking lot.

At 8 o’clock on a Saturday morning.

It sounded like a whole bunch of chain saws had been turned loose in the woods behind us and with development of the area the way it has been that would not have surprised me.

But no, it was just the parking lot cleaning force.

It was the Holland, Michigan street cleaners on steroids.

Up and down the sidewalks.

Under and around all the cars.

The sounds of the leaf blowers changing in pitch as they were waved around.

It was so odd as I couldn’t see that it had much effect.

It has been pollen season down here in the low country.

A pollen season with pollen so thick you can see it, taste it and feel it piling up in your nose.

But it rained all day yesterday.

All the pollen has been washed away by the rain.

I guess that was it.

The sidewalk and the parking lot need to be blow dried.

Ah that roar of civilization.

Well …

It wasn’t snow blowers.

South Carolina
very beautiful but
woo intensely weird

From the article, Alex Murdaugh shines a true light on privilege in the US by Emma Brockes.

That this story unfolds in the south, cradle of the good-old-boy network of near-oligarchical governance, is no coincidence.

I happened to be in South Carolina last week and it’s very beautiful, but woo, to an outsider, it’s intensely weird.

White tour guides lead white tour groups around downtown Charleston, cheerfully pointing out where enslaved people were sold, before pulling up at the gift shop.

Plantation houses, mindful of how times have changed, invite visitors to consider a single slave dwelling on their properties, while advertising the grounds as the “most beautiful gardens in America”.

Use of the passive voice – these houses are “witness to history”, according to the marketing bumf, which is certainly one way of putting it – is rampant.

’bout all I can say is … Boy, HOWDY!