A Liberal's achilles heal.

"Darrow wasn't a philosopher; he wasn't even an iconoclast. He was an agonist. He would argue one way; he would argue another; he just didn't want to see bigotry thrive or watch a man die. He liked to say that creeds were dope: 'No one can find life tolerable without dope. The Catholics are right, the Christian Scientists are right, the Methodists are right, the drunkards are right.' He thought his own dope was pessimism. It wasn't. His dope was compassion. He despaired for humanity mainly because he didn't meet many of his kind of addict. The problem is, you can't teach sympathy; like imagination, either you have it or you don't."

Jill Lepore writing on the life of Clarence Darrow.

Turning.

Going too fast for myself I missed

more than I think I can remember

almost everything it seems sometimes

and yet there are chances that come back

that I did not notice when they stood

where I could have reached out and touched them

this morning the black shepherd dog

still young looking up and saying

Are you ready this time

-W.S. Merwin

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I have a hard time standing idle. Being productive, being in motion, moving forward are what keep me motivated. It's what makes me feel, it's what makes me feel alive.

But in doing so, there's so much I overlook, so much I tune out...I often let my horse blinders get the best of me.

To take a second to understand my shortcomings, it might take a loved one to belittle me, it might take losing something or someone. Today it took this poem: a subtle reminder. Thank you.

-M.C.

The Tamiami Trail and US-1.

Before the infamous "Alligator Alley" there was the Tamiami Trail which connected, well, Tampa to Miami. There is one lane going north, and one lane going south cutting deep into the Everglades. Daytime speed limit: 45mph. Nightime limit: 35mph. A slow road indeed, but a road that forces you to see what truly makes up Florida--the exotic, the dangerous, and the sublime.

Once through the glades, you connect to US-1. A very different road...congested mostly, but a congestion that is skirted by 140 miles of ocean splitting thousands of small islands. Pure expanse in both directions.

Here is what I found...

Remnants of a cold war missle base. Key West.

Royal Poinciana. A dime a dozen in the keys, I know, but still perfectly majestic either way.

Key Deer. Endangered? Yes, we got lucky.

Bahia Honda state park and what's left of the Flagler railroad.

Nature's custodians or Zoroaster's minions? Vulters and an alligator meal. The Everglades.

Unidentified bug. The Everglades.

Did someone plant this or did a random seed happen to blow over from Cuba? Who knows? Very old, very tall Cuban Royal Palm deep within the glades.

M.C.-May, 2011.