Camp NaNoWriMo word count: 42,051 by Sunday morning, 28 April 2019

The New York Times reports on longterm plans for Guantanamo Bay where prisoners include a man who had been “confined to a box the size of a coffin while held at a secret C.I.A. site and waterboarded 83 times to break him” and is expected to age and die there.

“Unless America’s policy changes, at some point we’ll be doing some sort of end of life care here,” the commander of the detention center, Rear Adm. John C. Ring, said during a discussion with reporters that highlighted the kinds of questions the prison is asking Pentagon policymakers to decide.

This in a prison in a country we do not talk to and where we are not wanted.

We got a short walk on Saturday morning, then we went out again later. Agates and shells, no glass, and later, trash.

We tried to watch the newer Oscar Wilde film but it was too sad and pathetic. The new Avengers film seemed silly even for a cartoon, the theater smelled of vomit, and the loud giggling and hysterical laughter nearby was annoying. (We accurately predicted who would die.) We lasted less than an hour. I can’t help thinking that the loss of a significant portion of the world’s human population might do the world nothing some good. (Clearly not “half of all life” gone—the trees and whales were doing just fine—which evidently happened in the last episode that we did not see.) Very sad, of course, for those left behind, but overpopulation needs some sort of solution and is the greatest threat to Earth today. The villainous Thanos may have been on to something. 

One of the poetry assignments I used to give my students from the Kim Addonizio and Dorianne Laux  book, The Poet’s Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry, was a creedo. It is a list of beliefs and includes “ridiculous” or unlikely beliefs. When I wrote this with my students I invariably listed having more than two children is a sin. It was one thing I did not share, not wanting to hurt anyone’s feelings. 

Among the things I “would never do” was eat raw chicken. 

Among the things I believe: creativity keeps me sane, I can trust my husband, and no one “deserves” a terrible death.

I spent some time weaving. I considered submitting to a writing contest, but didn’t.

A male California quail wandered into our front yard. And that was charming.