Never too old . . .

New Year’s resolution, 2006, number seven?

Learn something new.

I

It has taken me a few weeks to get my mojo going, and amazingly I am learning not one, but two new things.

The first, a surprise even to myself, I am studying meteorology. Starting simple with a Great Courses program taught by a UCLA professor. I say simple, but it’s turning out to be as difficult as learning a new language.

But fascinating!

According to the bespectacled professor, Nature Abhors Extremes. Some examples:

• A place in India averages 450” of rain a year.

• In 1913 the temperature in Death Valley reached 134 degrees, a record for over a decade.

• The temperature in the Black Hills area of South Dakota rose by forty-nine degrees in just two minutes one season.

I can’t say why the curiosity about the weather. Only that my interest seems to have gone from nil to strong over the past few years.

Perhaps since I live close to the Pacific Ocean and San Diego International Airport, both of which are affected greatly by weather patterns.

Perhaps not.

  Perhaps I’ll share more tidbits from my studies of the weather and its effect on nature in the future.

For now, the Ode, my second “learn-something-new-entry” in 2026.

The workshop on writing odes implores the writer (me in this case) to “Celebrate the ordinary and the everyday through micro prose odes.”

You may remember Keat’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn" or Neruda’s "Ode to My Socks" (Love!) from high school English.

The ode is crafted to show how to look closely and pay attention to what we might love. Not just praise, the ode is a way of looking closely. Of seeing what we usually glance past.

Here’s an effort from my lessons on writing odes.

Ode to My New Shoes

You are beyond cool. An artistic blend of emerald, turquoise, and azul. The vibrant blue-green of the Mediterranean or a tropical beach or lagoon. Thanks to you, Maui memories ebb and flow in my mind. I can’t help swoon over you, my nifty purchase of one-hundred-fifty dollar Adidas sneakers, which I scooped up for fifty. Very thrifty. My size ten can be difficult to find. I am surprised and thrilled you remained on the sale rack for me to find! Like two aquamarine invitations beaconing to me personally. Take me home. I did and placed you on the dresser so I could admire your staggering countenance. In all my years, I have never had a pair of turquoise shoes. I love to think of the ways I can proudly wear your peacock-ness. Your aquamarine suede and ivory leather combo, chic. Unique. So full of mystique. Complete with two sets of laces—one contrasting teal, the other cream-colored. Your styling options are endless, my greenish-bluish foot friends. Are you for walking, cross training, pickleball, bocce ball or “dancin’ in the streets”? Certainly. But what pizzazz you would add to my date-night-outfit? Or my weekend-getaway fashion statement? You are multi-faceted, multi-purposeful, multi-toned in the blues and greens found in nature. Your color shades echo my favorite things—my jade carving, a worn-out cashmere sweater, the swimming pool outside my window, succulent plants in my garden, my coveted turquoise rings. You are my favorite color. I am in love you with you, my new low-cut sneakers, cross-painted a color somewhere between Picasso’s “blue cerulean” and Keira Knightley’s stunning green dress in Atonement. A high-octane, smash-hit hue, especially for shoes! And to think, you’re MY shoes.