Tanka challenge 4/30/11 (written out of town)

In my rustic hut
Warm blankets and tea beckon
Comfort before bed.
Yet I lie awake to gaze
A bit longer at the stars.

Thanks to all for playing. The Tanka Challenge will return.

House of Cheerful Monkeys celebrating こどもの日(Children's Day)

OK, I've been living in this kingdom since, what, 2002? I've been driving to the sheep ranch in Cloverdale via 101 North since 2003 and the stretch through Santa Rosa has been in a perpetual state of incomplete construction as far back as I can remember. ( Cut because I care )

Hm.

No champagne. No flag waving. No chest thumping. Not here.

Not when I watched the Towers burn from my office window. Not when I spent a day trying to track down my father because he was walking the length of Manhattan to try to get home. Not when I stayed online shooting hopeful, comforting emails to a friend of a friend who couldn't locate a loved one. Not when one of my best friends went to the City and spent the night feeding and watering rescue workers who had no one to rescue and could not bear to shower when he got home right away because the ash on his skin was people. Not when I got on a United flight from Newark to San Francisco, glanced out the window on takeoff at the changed skyline and realized the flight was on had been re-numbered.

The hydra has many heads. Al Qaeda is more than one man. The only thing that would surprise me would be if there were NO backlash.