Does the name Yoknapatawpha County ring a bell?

Yesterday would have been my brother-in-law's 90th birthday if he hadn't died when he was 84. Two days before that would have been my mother-in-law's 114th birthday if she hadn't died when she was 79. Earlier this month would have been my step-sister's 80th birthday if she hadn't died when she was 62 (I think). I miss them all.

All I'm really saying, I think, is Time Marches On. One by one we shuffle off this mortal coil, we strut and fret our hour upon the stage and then are heard no more, to quote from a couple of Master Will's works.

To complete that last fragment, life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

I don't know whether I'm waxing eloquent or I'm mired in depression. Possibly both. But Someone Else (not Master Will) said I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish, so there's that.

This kind of rambling in blogging is the "stream of consciousness" style of writing that James Joyce was so fond of. It came almost automatically to Gertrude Stein, rose is a rose is a rose; a sparrow in the grass, alas; and so forth.

All but my most loyal readers might be put off by all this folderol, but if you come here, it goes with the territory.

More proof of my advancing decline, I suppose. I get more like the late, lamented Putz every day. Most of you don't know who I'm referring to. I don't actually know if he is late, but he is very much lamented in these parts, him with his odd spelling and innovative punctuation.

I must close now as the men in white coats are coming. I feel it in my bones. <<< >>> <<< >>>