The Quiet Corner

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I have been in trial the last two weeks on a guy who shot his wife. He says it was an accident, we say he was criminally negligent, but either way, it's just plain sad.

But I got no sympathy for him.

He's one of those guys, he knows what time it is. You'd better not try to tell him, either. He don't like that. During the closing argument, he was sitting over there on the other end of the counsel table, his big hands balled up into fists, his arms shaking with rage, his eyes fixed on the prosecutor, his lips in a snarl.

He wanted a piece of that DA something awful.

The bailiff came over and stood near us, and I made sure I had a clear line at him, too. He wouldn't have gotten very far.

*

We listened to her dying on the 911 tape. I couldn't tell you how many times I listened to it during the investigation.

As it was playing for the jury in court and we're all silent, listening to her agonal breathing, I can see the jury is horrified but I don't feel anything at all. I could have been listening to a ball game or the news.

*


That's just how it is sometimes. You can't feel every little thing.


There's nothing wrong with that.


*


I am reading Sandburg's Lincoln.


It is four volumes, so I will probably be reading it the rest of the year.



I find it astounding.


*


Last night we watched the first episode of Wallender. Kenneth Branagh as the Swedish inspector. The thing is beautiful and moody and smart and despairing.


It's dead good.


*




In other news, I remain obsessed with Homo Neanderthalensis. 




For over three hundred thousand years they were the show. Lot longer than we've been around.


You live your whole life on this planet, you think it's always been like it is now. You know you're wrong about it, but it's hard to feel it in your bones. But when you go out into the wilds you can begin to feel it.

I feel it at the edge of the sea. That sense of deep time, of timelessness.









We are transitory creatures.









*


Namaste.



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