Although not everything lately has gone as swimmingly as I might have wished, undeniably today is the least worrisome I have been in a while. The combination of both medical and dental emergencies over the past four months has at last – thanks to the inestimable talent of my professional advisors – become tolerable. This afternoon, in deference to my new-found tranquility, I positioned myself on the balcony overlooking the field and upriver. When not dozing in the warm sunshine – stimulated in my dreamlike state by the squawking Canada geese which had assembled in parade lines along the river’s shores – I contemplated the summary fate of aging. Specifically I ruminated upon the narrowing reserve of one’s friends.

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PTOLEMY (2nd century) Greek astronomer and geographer. His teachings had enormous influence on medieval thought, the geocentric view of the cosmos being adopted as Christian doctrine until the late Renaissance. Ptolemy’s Geography, giving lists of places with their longitudes and latitudes, was also a standard work for centuries, despite its inaccuracies.

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The lyrics of “Some Other Time” have beguiled me for years. The melody is mesmerizing. Whenever I hear it, it instantly puts me in a state of reflective reverie and melancholy. I first listened to the song on a CD called “A Jazz Romance: A Night in With Verve” released January 1, 1998, Universal Studios Canada Ltd. The piece is beautifully performed by Diana Krall (vocal) and Mark Whitfield (guitar). To jazz enthusiasts these artists represent the top of their class. I have since discovered that the CD is a “must have” for the jazz aficionado.

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Today is indisputably a springtime day heralding the annual freshet. There are squawking geese amassing on the river and triangulating high in the sky. The snow is melting in the open farmlands and the temperatures are rising charitably above freezing. It’s late afternoon. I’m sitting on the balcony overlooking the sodden fields and churning river beyond. We’ve just returned from Oxford Mills where we lunched on mussels in a creamy parmesan sauce with an exotic side of a tiny loaf of bread individually served on a cutting board with miniature ceramic bowls of butter and olive oil.

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Introduction:

My dear Reader – I am hopeful that the following assessment by my friend HAL at ChatGPT will, if nothing else, enlarge upon what follows from my own pen. Billy

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Sitting at my desk, having exhausted my preliminary necessities of the day, I am looking upriver across the endless rolling meadows to the cerulean horizon. Nearby in the field immediately below, there are skinny Canada geese (always in pairs) waddling up and down the narrow pathways between the cornstalk stubble looking for food. Occasionally, one of the geese stops to extend its neck towards the ground, attaching its black beak to a remnant corn cob unearthed from the abandoned residuum. In this solemn atmosphere, the geese take what they can get.

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What seems to have been only days ago I marvelled at the precipitous transition from the short month of February to the long month of March. And now here we are already approaching the final day of March.  In our own springtime fashion we have joined the parade of Canada geese who purposively distinguish themselves in clamorous congregations along the shore of the Mississippi River and rampantly gliding overhead or across the distant farmlands.

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Late afternoon today in the distant fading sky are flocks of Canada geese circulating above the placid though burgeoning river below. The mirror upon the former icy gloss of the river’s face has revealed a rich blue with only a rim of pure white snow surviving on the shorelines. Today is Saturday, March 21st, the date often greeted as the first day of spring. This year the much vaunted inauguration was actually yesterday, Friday, March 20th.

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It is unclear to me when I awoke to the psychic stimulus that is shopping. Until I was 24 years of age (after graduating from law school) I was dependent upon my parents for stuff. My mother (never my father) looked after whatever I required.  I was merely a delivery destination. Frankly, during my prep school, undergraduate and graduate studies I hadn’t much but the faintest interest in shopping.  My preoccupation until then was my education. Whether my mother bought me something from Ashbury’s annual antique sales, Alyea’s Jewellers, Nordiska Kompaniet, Georg Jensen or Flesher Furs, I seldom had any part of the initial commercial transaction other than supplying the obvious details of product, colour and size.

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