Okay. First off – Ann is fine. If you happen to know her very well and speak to her by phone or email in the next few days , just be aware that whatever she may say or type is heavily influenced by the presence of liquid narcotics mixed with many medicines that have been shaped into pill form – all prescribed – and some of which she takes on a regular basis even when she isn’t lying prone in a designer hospital room. Secondly – her hospital room is bigger than several of the apartments we have lived in over the years. She is being cared for by a slew of highly trained doctors and nurses with a medical staff that includes a pain team, a comfort team and even a concierge. I’m not kidding. She validated my parking garage ticket. The concierge, not Ann. I’ve gone from being very thankful and impressed to wishing there was an actual parking valet. Mount Sinai is a fabulous hospital. They have a Starbucks in the lobby. They have room service. There is a chef. The menu is four pages long. Anyways – Ann is due to come home next Monday but has decided to stay for at least another week or until she has eaten her way through the pasta selections – whichever comes first. By the way – I think there may also be a spa. Which means she won’t be home for at least a month. So the good news is the surgery went extremely well and the bad news is visiting hours extend from now until Thanksgiving. I will say this – the hours you spend alone waiting for the one you love to come out of surgery are – perhaps – the definition of being alone. You wait with a forced feeling of calm and maybe a magazine or three and once you’ve gotten past the first two hours and a gaggle of People pictures featuring trout-pouted celebrities, Sports Illustrated’s NFL Preview Issue and fifteen overly-clever New Yorker cartoons – one of which contains a pit bull wearing lipstick and a hockey mom reference - an itchy little panic begins to grow in the back of your mind and you give up the half-assed reading and start to wonder just exactly what the hell is going on. But every single staff person you can find has the exact same piece of information: Still in the O.R. So the itch becomes an urge beneath an angst that begins to mulch into an ulcer of worry and fretful pacing. You pace and sit and fidget and pace. And then – she arrives. Bruised and sleepy – but there. I was never happier to see her face. My love. My wife. I’m not big on prayer – but I said many hopeful ones during those empty hours and several more in gratitude on my way back from the spa to the apartment.

Hi all, I'm still in the hospital, but back to the blogging board. Thanks to all of my virtual best friends who sent the encouraging emails and comments. I can't believe how fondly I've come to think of you all, though most of you I've never met. Thanks for the very kind thoughts and prayers.

Speaking of kindness, I have to say that nurses are a rare and beautiful breed. I devoted a whole chapter in my book, An Innocent, A Broad to singing their praises, but feel that praise is not enough for these overworked, underpaid (no matter how much they're getting paid, it's not enough in my mind) men and women. I was in the recovery room for several hours, and was quite awake and alert, and I had the privilege of witnessing the patience, kindness and empathy of two nurses/superheroes named Brenda and Nicole. Now I wish I could remember their last names but I was not at my best. Anyway, they each had several post-op patients to attend to. Their patients were suffering. Some cried, cursed, demanded more medication, sometimes insisted they see a doctor NOW, and Brenda and Nicole never lost their patience. They spoke to their patients kindly, acknowledged their pain, and worked hard to stop it. At one point, Brenda was simultaneously writing something on my chart, tapping the toes of the man next to me whom she worried was overly sedated, and answering a doctor's questions about a child who had just been brought in. The reason I remember all this is because I had an epidural in addition to general anesthesia, so when I came to, I was relatively pain free and alert and got to see all the goings on.

Now, perhaps I'm biased because my life has been somewhat in their hands the past few days, but in the looks department, the staff at Mt. Sinai puts any television hospital drama staff to shame. These people are gorgeous. If any of you are single and in your twenties or early thirties and ready to settle down, here's what you must do. Get hurt. Not too bad. Just bad enough to get you admitted to this hospital. You will feel like a kid in a candy shop. I just had Noam Kurtis, the head of the "pain team" in here to remove my epidural and found myself blushing and flirting like a schoolgirl because the man looks more like a movie star than most of our friends who are real movie stars!

Okay, now I'm exhausted and must stop typing and go back to watching bad TV for awhile. Oh, and thanks, honey, for the guest blog!

Due to my schedule, I've had to broadcast reruns of IN HOUSE the past two Saturdays, but tomorrow, tune in for an all-new IN HOUSE interview with my guest, the brilliant and wildly eccentric dancer/choreographer Moses Pendleton, who directs the word-famous dance company, MOMIX

I got to sit in on a few rehearsals of Botanica, Momix's exciting new show and I used the music from the show throughout the interview, making it, I think, one of the most enjoyable shows I've done. Well, Moses made it enjoyable too, of course. If you're into gardening, New England, the environment, dance, Van Gogh, sex, love, skiing, John Keats, bees, the psychological effects of color on mood, music or the creative process - if one or all of these things appeals to you - you'll love tomorrow's show.

And, on another, equally exciting note, I'm going home today. I don't know if it's a HIPA violation to name your physician, but I'll risk it in order to thank my surgeon Dr. Jamal Rahaman and his wonderful team of residents here at Mt. Sinai hospital. I'm told the surgeons don't always have great bedside manner, but that's not the case with Dr. Rahaman, who is not just a great doctor, but also a great man.

Also, at the risk of forgetting some names (I'm sure I will) I'd like to thank the nursing and support staff on my floor who include Michael Quizon, Mary "Jennie" Del Prabo, Cheryl Parks, Debbie Johnson, Lucy Jumelez, Antoinette De Los Reyes ...oh, I know I'm forgetting names. Some of the most helpful people helped me when I was least lucid, but if you're a nurse, I thank you, on behalf of all patients everywhere, for the work you do. Listening to the way some patients here talk to hospital staff makes me think that the word "patient" when describing somebody under nursing care, is an almost laughable misnomer. The nurses I've met this week have taught me much about patience, compassion, tolerance and grace under pressure.

I've been laid up a little. Brought an infection home from the hospital with me that had me feverish and slightly insane and now it has cleared and I feel so much better. Feel that I've neglected blog but have nothing to blog about. Devin borrowed my camera yesterday to take some photos and I asked if I can use one. I chose this:

I believe this leaf was on our porch. When it dried and shriveled it left its image behind. I've been reading poems, because my attention span is so short, but the leaf reminded me of a Neruda poem called "Here I Love You."

Here is part of the poem - the last part:

HERE I LOVE YOU
Pablo Neruda

Here I love you and the horizon hides you in vain.
I love you still among these cold things.
Sometimes my kisses go on those heavy vessels
that cross the sea towards no arrival.
I see myself forgotton like those old anchors.
The piers sadden when the afternoon moors there.
My life grows tired, hungry to no purpose.
I love what I do not have. You are so far.
My loathing wrestles with the slow twilights.
But night comes and starts to sing to me.
The moon turns its clockwork dream.
The biggest stars look at me with your eyes.
And as I love you, the pines in the wind
want to sing your name with their leaves of wire.

I’ve not been able to see my horses, except from a distance, since my surgery. I can walk to the top of the hill, and then I’m tired and must walk back to the house. But I’m told we need a new cat. The mice have taken over the barn, now that Sneakers has departed. They’ve been in the house too, the filthy buggers, skitting about our countertops, leaving their black scornful droppings everywhere. When we trap them now, I have no mercy – I used to feel sorry for them. Once, Coco, our resident elf, got caught on a sticky trap, the poor thing, so now we leave the traps under the stove. The spring traps just don’t work. Seriously, if you’re one of the mouse-rights people, please don’t email me. Their spongy paws skip across my silverware, their beady little eyes are probably watching me now. They don’t need your help.

But I won’t have a housecat because I’m allergic. And I’m not really a cat person. So I must find one of these agencies that places semi-feral cats to people with barns. I’m told the mice are climbing the walls of the barn. They’re gorging themselves on grain and then some of them commit suicide in the horse’s water buckets. We have a heated room with a kitty door. We have horses who are very fond of cats, and dogs who have been trained to have a fearful reverence. So, I’m a little excited to get well enough to drive so I can go cat hunting. If any of you know of an agency that places barn cats, please let me know. Most rescue organizations won’t place cats in homes where they won’t be living indoors. We want a cat who doesn’t want to live indoors. Like our old Sneakers. Sneakers would only come down to the house on weekends when we overslept. He had a loud meow that sounded like a human “Hello.” More like “Relloooooooooooowwwwwwww?” “RELLOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWW?”
He would say this over and over again until I came staggering out in my pajamas.
We decided that the other barn animals sent him down as an envoy – a sort of emissary, since he had managed to master an English sounding word (and was the only one not fenced in). Once he woke me, he would swagger up to the barn at my heel, just in case I had any ideas of stalling. He would never come in the house but whenever I got the vent going above our stove he’d appear on my windowsill and I would serve him piles of bacon or grilled cheese or whatever I was grilling and he would purr and gobble simultaneously and then he would just stay there for awhile, sunning himself, his eyes heavy lidded, his belly full. I’m not a cat person, but he was some cat. You miss a cat like that.

Not much to report today, except that I'm engrossed in Yesterday's Weather, a collection of stories by Anne Enright. She's a beautiful writer. She's Irish and writes of Ireland. I just can't stop reading it. So if you're looking for something great to read, run out and get "Yesterday's Weather."

Isn't that a beautiful cover? My publishers just sent me a copy of the cover they'd like to use for the paperback version of Outtakes From A Marriage. I'm not sure I'm supposed to do this, but I'm going to post it here to see what you all think. It's common for the publishers to go with another cover for the paperback, if the hardcover wasn't a bestseller, which, alas, mine has not been.

Well, here it is. What do you think? I wish they could make it less girlie and show some humor, but I guess that doesn't sell books.

Here's a wonderful animation of a Billy Collins poem about what happens as we enter our dotage. Several months ago, my friend Helena sent me a great Billy Collins poem about a dog and I've been scouring the internet looking for it, and found this, which I know Helena will enjoy, and hopefully, she will not be as forgetful as me and will email me the name of the dog poem again.

.

Okay, It's Billy Collins Day here. Helena sent me the dog poem which is called Dharma. Here it is:

The way the dog trots out the front door
every morning
without a hat or an umbrella,
without any money
or the keys to her doghouse
never fails to fill the saucer of my heart
with milky admiration.

If only she did not shove the cat aside
every morning
and eat all his food
what a model of self-containment she
would be,
what a paragon of earthly detachment.
If only she were not so eager
for a rub behind the ears,
so acrobatic in her welcomes,
if only I were not her god.

And heres another animation of a poem of his. It's called The Dead. I love it:

I hope you guys like this animated poetry as much as I do. I just had to post this final Billy Collins poem. I mentioned a few days ago that we have a serious mouse situation. If you do too, check this out:

Okay, I'm pretty confident that nobody from my publisher reads my blog, since nobody has complained about my revealing the paperback cover version the other day. So I am now going to show you another attempt at a cover for the paperback edition of my book. Outtakes From a Marriage. Be honest. I'm really making you part of the process here, because you are the readers. Which book would you be more likely to buy? This:

Or this:

Well, now I've been home from the hospital for a week, and since Denis had to go back to work, I have had a nurse to offer me comfort and support. Here's a photo of her when I first arrived home from the hospital. She took up her place upon my bed to keep a careful watch.

Here she is on Tuesday, urging me not to pick up the laptop again. She prescribes lots of sensory stimulation as a healing therapy. She thinks that stroking a soft underbelly is just the the medicine for me.

She is really unbelievably loyal. It's squirrel season here and they're running around like maniacs gathering their stores for winter and every now and then Daphne sits bolt upright in bed as she sees her cohort Lulu streaking past the window in hot pursuit of their quarry, but when I let her out she just takes a little walk and then asks to come right back in to be by my side.

Of course the elf

has been doing her part - walking along my incision, begging for treats. She's thrilled to have me laid up, but her dream is to spend all day in bed snuggling with somebody, so it's no real sacrifice for her. Daphne is a hunter by nature, but now she's devoted her days to my care.

Here she is this morning at about 2:00. I couldn't sleep and I woke her up, the poor thing. I love her.

Thanks to all who offered their opinions on book jackets. Today, I received a comment from "destini" that suggested a photo of Denis and me on a red carpet, but in a way that you really can't see our heads. Which made me think that this might be the perfect cover:

They could just crop out Denis's face.

I think I'd buy that book. Wish I could write in a scene that would make it work.

Not that anybody was asking, but here's a link to a Vanity Fair interview Denis did with George Wayne about his forthcoming book, Why We Suck.

It's in the November issue.

Okay, it's official. I'm spending WAY too much time on the internet. Must put laptop AWAY!

So, I'm working on a book and I have to determine how many generations there are between a person born in the 1680s and a person born in the 1970s. Don't worry, I'm not writing a long, drawn out family saga, but I've just run into this logistical snag. How many generations are there in roughly three hunded years? I decided that a generation might average out to about twenty years, since people used to marry and have children in their late teens and now, statistically wait until their mid-to-late twenties. So I divided 300 by 20 and came up with 15. Is that right? If, so, then our nation became independent only 11 generations ago? I'm hopeless at math so I thought I'd fact check with you, all my smart readers and commenters. I feel like I've skipped a step in my calculations.

It's hard to imagine that our country could have achieved such greatness, become so powerful, so soon after its inception. I remember being raised on stories of our country's might - we were taught them in school. I lived in the midwest when I was a little girl and remember being taught the stories of Paul Bunyan and his mighty ox, Babe. Of course, I instantly fell in love with both Paul Bunyan (huge, powerful father figure) and Babe (fur+hooves=love, for me, always), and I see now how my most nostalgic feelings about America come from my childhood in frontier states. Paul Bunyan didn't become huge, He was born huge. Oxen had to pull his baby carriage. He didn't become mighty through hard work or exercise or anything. He was born mighty. And his might had nothing to do with intelligence - just brute strength. He was given a pet ox named Babe, and Babe was also a giant and together they logged the states of Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin. There were legends about the size of the trees that Bunyan cut, and the length of his beard.

I wonder if kids are still taught about Paul Bunyan in school. I wonder why we were.

For some reason, everywhere I turn, somebody is mentioning Best Friends Animal Society to me. I've been laid up so have been watching Dogtown on National Geographic Channel, which features the Best Friends sanctuary (my friend Juliet is the producer of Dogtown). A woman from my town recently gave me a pamphlet about Best Friends. Several of my blog readers have emailed me about it - one, dear Lisa, even made a donation in memory of Pongo and Sneakers. So today I went on the Best Friends website with the idea of making a donation and perhaps finding a barn cat as well.

Unfortunately, I cannot visit the site of any rescue organization without checking out the dogs. I don't mean to blow my own horn here, but I have an uncanny eye for a good dog, even online. I found our Lulu at a rescue organization in Louisiana and just based on her pictures and some careful questions to her caretakers, I knew she would be a perfect dog for us, and she has been. I've also helped friends find great dogs.

So today, I decided to do an "Ann's Picks" of the dozens of adoptable dogs featured at "Best friends." If I could have another dog, it would be one of these. First, allow me to introduce Queenie:

I almost can't bear to report to you that poor Queenie was kept chained in somebody's yard until Katrina hit and she was rescued and has been in shelters ever since. She's supposed to have a nice temperment, but, of course wary. I would say only if you have no kids for this one.

Okay, brace yourself. This is gorgeous Kenicke!

Unfortunately he's older and has some health issues. But wouldn't you like to spend his last few years with him, if only to admire his movie star looks?

And here's my pick of the day. Meet Debo. He was hit by a semi-truck. And he's fine, except for a slightly curved spine. I love a muscle dog and this guy takes the cake. He's supposed to be super friendly, but he's a Staffordshire (Pitbull) terrier and shouldn't be anywhere near cats. This dog looks like he has a lot of energy to burn and unless you need a running companion to help you train for a marathon, I wouldn't keep him in an apartment. You could sleep quite well at night with a guy like Debo protecting the house.

And, after looking at the cats I determined that I'll try to find our barncats a little closer to home. But this is exactly the kind of cat I'm looking for. His name is Bogart. He looks like a character.

Cats are so freaky. I really am a dog person. Here's "Mrs Crinkles." Is it me, or is that a weird cat?

And finally, this hefty guy just made me so sad because he reminds me of our Sneakers:

I hope you're not all getting sick of the Billy Collins animated poetry. I LOVE each and every one. Today, I am featuring, "The Best Cigarette," and I hope my husband watches it because we're all trying to get him to quit smoking. I smoked years ago, and remember how stimulating it was, how impossible it was to imagine writing or creating or even thinking without the steady supply of nicotine to my brain. It just made me feel smarter. Well, I was smarter. I was young. Anyway, I present, "The Best Cigarette," by Billy Collins.

We're having such a beautiful fall in New England. The trees have never been more brilliant, everybody around here agrees. Was planning to go out and take some photos for my blog but realize that nobody wants to see another foliage shot. So I decided, instead to post John Keats', Ode to Autumn, which I learned recently was the last poem he ever wrote. It's a beautiful poem, and maybe because when I read it this time, knowing he was soon to die, it seemed to be a little sad and foreboding. There's all this abundance and ripe beauty, but the gathering swallows give me a chill.

We have had such wicked wildness these past few nights from our neighboring coyotes. The screeching and howling and yipping have driven my dogs nearly out of their minds. They're out there now barking into the woods. Our dogs have an underground electric fence and the coyotes know exactly where the boundaries are and pace and sometimes sit just out of reach which makes the dogs insane with rage. I've seen this. Of course the elf is confined to a small fenced in area next to the house. The coyotes know she's there and would gobble her up in an instant if they could. I love the sounds of the coyotes at night, Denis, the kids and I all do. It's just so primitive and we love the way that one will start up with a thin wail and then what sounds like hundreds of others join in. And then they will carry on with all sorts of playful yips and yikes.

I found this great coyote soundboard online. Here's what they sound like, except, often it sounds like they're right under our window. Click on "Coyote Group" that's what was going on last night, times 10.

Sometimes you just hear one vocalizing and it sounds like #3. I always imagine a Salem puritan hearing this noise and imagine it's Goody Whatsherface from the neighboring farm, having a bit of mischief. It's no wonder Halloween is in autumn. It's so spooky in the country this time of year. Last fall, I took my horse to Steep Rock every day that it didn't rain and the way the light changes so suddenly and the wind whips things out of nowhere had my horse and me both a little spooked, and we also kind of thrilled at the spookiness. And we kept coming across odd characters. With the leaves off the trees, everything sounds different and the river is high in the fall and sometimes you imagine you hear somebody right behind you, but when you turn, nobody's there. Real "Legend of Sleepy Hollow" stuff. I love it.

So here's Keats' poem, Ode to Autumn:

SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease;
For Summer has o'erbrimm'd their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twinèd flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barrèd clouds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river-sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

I posted the first line of this ee cummings poem when my son went off to college. Here is the poem in its entirety. I suspect that cummings meant it for a lover, but to me, it is the most beautiful expression of a parent's love for a child. I dedicate it to all parents, everywhere, but especially to those who have children with special needs:

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

ee cummings

VS.

Okay, the coyotes are starting to get on my nerves. The dogs have had me up all night with their barking and whining. Lulu has threatened to hurl herself through my bedroom window at the sound of the coyotes deliberately playing and fighting and mating right on our front lawn. The thing that bothers me about the dogs vs. coyotes thing is that the dogs are reduced to cartoonish levels of stupidity. The coyotes appear to be mocking them for their very amusement. I will try to get a photo of one large male who likes to sit atop a stone wall and grin at Daphne and Lulu who run back and forth along their invisible fence-line, hackles and tails raised to the heavens, barking until they're hoarse. The coyote yawns and stares off into the distance and then gazes passively at the dogs, who become weak with their own hatred and remonstrative snarling and barking. Sometimes a coyote will trot though our horse field in the late afternoon, knowing that's within the dogs' territory, just to see the dogs streak across the field after it. Of course the coyote lopes back across the invisible fence, and then turns to watch the dogs completely lose their minds with frustration.

In domesticating our animals, so many thousands of years ago, we couldn't help but diminish their intelligence. Their intelligence is all about hunting and acquiring food really. That's why predators/carnivores are such better problem solvers than herbivores. A horse or deer has his food at his feet, in the wild, and has very little problem solving capacity. Hunters, especially pack hunters like dogs, must have a highly developed capacity to think ahead, to communicate, and to solve puzzles. Just watching my dogs try to deal with the coyotes makes me see how we have bred a certain amount of cunning and wit out of them, probably just by providing them their food in a bowl every day. I suppose I wouldn't want a dog that has the cruel sense of humor of our local coyotes, but I'd take a couple that understand the words, "Shut up!" when I yell them at three in the morning.

But back to the herbivore/carnivore thing, I have toyed with, but always resisted the urge to become a vegetarian as I'm convinced that being one notch higher on the food chain makes me smarter somehow (I'll take anything, these days, to make me feel less of a dullard). But, often, when I've just finished a ham sandwich and then go up to the barn, I will pop a mint, because I think the smell of meat on my breath must repulse the horses, who have sweet breath, always. It makes me feel vulgar eating meat around horses, who, though they tolerate dogs, really think they're quite disgusting. Our horse Gabriel won't touch a water trough after a dog has drunk our of it. It's clear that he finds dogs filthy and repulsive, yet he'll carefully step around a lively puppy so as not to harm it.

Heather, a regular blog reader, said that she'd like to hear more spooky stories about our house and places where I ride. So today I will share something that happened to me last fall around this time. I was riding at Steep Rock every day because I was keeping a journal for a book that I am now working on. Every day after I rode, I would load my horse Mark into his trailer, and then I would sit for a few moments in the truck and write notes about who and what I saw. I was basically just trying to keep track of the season - when the leaves usually start to change color, etc. I have blogged about Steep Rock already a few times.

Anyway, a few words about Mark, about whom I have also blogged. Mark is not really a horse. We're not sure what he is but sometimes we think he might be part dog. Often, because he and I share so many character traits, I think he might possess a human soul, somehow, and that we are soulmates. Like me, he is sometimes funny on purpose, but more often it is by accident. He is vain, yet insecure. He is full of bravado but is a complete coward at heart. He loves attention, but is not sure why. Basically, he is an egomaniac with an inferiority complex - just like me!

Anyway, the above photo always makes me laugh. It was taken a few years ago during a shoot for Instyle Magazine. They wanted us to stand in front of the house and we stood down in a field where we sometimes let the horses graze. Well, the horses were out but they were panicked by the cameras and crew and had galloped up to the barn. All, that is, except for Mark. Mark, somehow, had an intuitive understanding that something very important was going on. He wanted to be part of the magic, the delicious limelight, but he didn't want to be too obvious about it. He didn't want anyone to think he really cared about whether he was in a silly magazine or not. So he casually grazed his way over to where we were standing. He would take a few bites of grass, then take few steps closer. A few bites, a few steps, until finally, he was standing right behind us. Then, he proceeded to strike what he seemed to think were very regal poses. You can see he has no halter or lead - it was all his idea. In shot after shot he stood with his attempt at a noble gaze. That's another thing about Mark. He is under the impression that he is a very, very handsome horse. Anyway, he did grace the front page of the magazine spread. Those photos are always so funny, because they try to make it look so candid. As if Denis and I are in the habit of standing around leaning on our horses and gazing lovingly at each other. Okay, well, now I've rambled on so long that I don't have time to tell a spooky story. Tune in tomorrow!

Okay, as I started to explain in my previous blog, I often ride my horse Mark in a local land preserve called Steep Rock. For more on Steep Rock, just look at the right hand side of this page and under "Categories" click on "Steep Rock Diaries". Not everything there is about Steep Rock, but it's all about local stuff.

Anyway, one of my posts was about the tunnel in Steep Rock, which was blasted out of a small mountain so that a train could pass through, many years ago. The train has long since stopped running and there is a great riding trail where the tracks used to be, and you can ride through the tunnel or not, because there are plenty of other trails to ride. I usually choose not to ride through the tunnel, as I'm claustrophobic and it's really scary to me. This is what it looks like from a distance.

The picture above was taken on a beautiful spring day. It's spookier on a gray, cold fall day like the one I am about to descibe. This is the entrance to the tunnel:

When I took that photo, there was nobody around, but later, when I loaded the pictures onto the computer, that ghostly human figure with the small animal was in the shot!

Just kidding. That's my daughter and the elf about to enter the tunnel.

Okay, but seriously, what I am about to tell you DID really happen. Let me just preface this by saying that I live in a very small community and like to think I know most people, and am especially aware of the odd or unusual ones. Last fall, I tried to ride in Steep Rock every day and I came to know, at least by sight, all the "regulars" who routinely walked their dogs or hiked or rode on the trails.

So it was a weekday morning, and I loaded Mark in his trailer and hauled him off to Steep Rock. Normally, in the fall, there are at least one or two other horse trailers in the parking area, but that day there were none. There were actually no cars either. It was a gloomy, cold day that threatened rain, so that is probably why.

I unloaded Mark, mounted and we set off down the trail. Usually, Mark strides out with great confidence on the trail but that day he was nervous and actually attempted to turn back towards the trailer a few times. Everything looked different - we had had a windy night and a lot of the trees were bare and the lighting was different. Horses really notice stuff like that. There was not a soul on the trails. Once we reached the old railroad bed, I asked Mark to canter a little and was almost unseated when a plastic bag flew up in front of us, causing Mark to leap to one side and spin back towards the trailer again.

Anyway, finally we arrived at the tunnel and for some reason I decided we would go through. We had done it before, but always with other horses and riders. I just thought we'd go through the tunnel and then ride back and call it a day. When we arrived at the mouth of the tunnel, Mark balked. He refused to go in. Mark actually shakes when he's afraid, shakes and grinds his teeth, which often makes me shake and grind my teeth. But that day I was determined to exude calm, assertive energy. I clucked and urged him forward with little kicks, but he wasn't going in. So I dismounted and led him through, and once we were inside, all the calm assertive energy was sucked right out of me. We walked along, Mark and I, both literally quaking with fear. Mark seemed to think that the only safe spot to place each foot was exactly where I was placing mine, so he managed to step on my feet several times, causing me to curse and swat at him, which, of course made him more anxious and determined to cling to me for safety. Actually, it seemed like he thought it would be best if I carried him. At one point I panicked at the idea that it was so dark I couldn’t see my horse’s head and then realized that I was looking up into the brim of my helmet. Finally, we reached the other side. I mounted, we rode a little further, and then we rode back through the tunnel. I stayed on this time, knowing Mark wouldn't refuse to walk through the tunnel heading back to the trailer. But Mark wanted to bolt through and it took all my strength to keep him at a frantic jog. We reached the other side but on the whole ride back, we were both so unnerved by the tunnel and the stillness in the woods, that we kept spooking each other.. I heard a branch break and held my breath for a moment, which caused Mark to stop dead in his tracks and shake, which caused me to sweat, which caused him to jig frantically. Mark had it in his mind that the best thing to do would be to gallop at breakneck speed back to where the trailer was parked and I had to really work at keeping him at a wildly jigging prance.

FINALLY, we arrived back at the trailer, both of us drenched in sweat, despite the 50 degree temp, and there were still no cars. Just our trailer, but as I loaded Mark I saw an old man off in the distance with two fat Labrador Retrievers walking lazily along next to him off leash. He seemed to be looking at us so I shouted hello but he just stared at me. I figured he couldn’t hear me because, like I said, he was old, and pretty far away.

I loaded Mark, and fussed around in the trailer. When I was finished, I jumped down out of the trailer and almost screamed when I found myself TWO INCHES from the man I had just seen off in the distance. We were face to face and he was staring eerily off into the space above my head with two bright, bright red eyes caked with crust.

“You’ll have to forgive me,” he said in a deep, formal tone, his eyes now scanning the tops of their sockets, “but I can’t see you. I’m having problems with my vision.”

I stammered something like, “What, really? Something wrong with your eyes?"

His eyes were so inflamed, I'm not kidding, they were like embers. His skin was dreadfully white. He was about 6’4 and was very thin, but he wore the ageless, timeless uniform of the preppy. He wore a crisp pair of khakis, and crew-neck Brooks Brother's sweater and those docksider shoes with no socks. His labradors, two fat, amiable gals, one chocolate, the other yellow, swished past me, tails sweeping the air slowly, noses to the ground.

“I wanted to thank you for greeting us so cordially,” the man continued. His speech had the tone and affect of an old-fashioned theatrical actor. “Many people aren’t very welcoming to dogs here.”

It’s true that many people freak about unleashed dogs at Steep Rock, so I said, "I know, but horse people usually like dogs, don't you find?" Suddenly I wondered if he even knew that I had a horse with me. The smell of fresh manure wafted from behind us and I wondered if he thought the smell was coming from me.

“On the contrary,” he said. “I find that horse people usually take the most objection. So I thank you.”

Then, he actually bowed his head to me! I told him that he was quite welcome and then scuttled off into my truck and drove off as fast as I could. I told many people about the man, and nobody in town seemed to have ever encountered him. The man was COMPLETELY blind. He didn't really know where I was when he was talking to me, yet he managed to walk to (and presumably from) Steep Rock without a cane. And those portly labs were no seeing eye dogs.

Okay, now reading back over this, I feel that I built the story up too much and it's not really THAT scary. But later that day I reread "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," which I remembered involved a man on horseback on a dark, scary autumn road, who was trying not to let his fearful imagination get the better of him. So this is my "Legend of Steep Rock" story. I hope you'll be able to sleep tonight!

It's time for this week's "Ann's Picks" from the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary in Utah. I received a nice email from the Best Friends people last week, to thank me for featuring their dogs and to also ask me to remind people to check your local shelters as well for adoptable pets.

I'm featuring Best Friends dogs again, mainly because Devin has fallen in love with Big Buddy, and wants somebody else to fall for this handsome fellow and take him home. I think he has some hip issues - but who doesn't? Supplements and meds do wonders.

Here is sweet Buddha. Sorry to report that her owners moved ... and left her behind. She's used to being with a family and must be very confused right now. I can just see her curled up next to your feet on a cold winter's night.

Here's Lassy who is the spitting image of my childhood dog Gus. I can't help but think she'd be just as fun for your kids as Gus was for us.

And here's my pick of the week. It's taking every fiber, every cell in my body to resist the temptation to call Best Friends this instant and ask how I can get Starsky from Utah to Connecticut. This dog ROCKS!

Starsky, baby, we were meant to be together, but alas, I am committed to my present pack of females who might not appreciate your rugged good looks the way I do. Live long, Starsky. If only we had met at another time, in another place .....

Okay, another Billy Collins poem but this is not animated, it is read by the Poet Laureate himself. It's short, but do take the time to watch and if you're a mom, or ever had a mom, I suspect you'll laugh and then you might shed a tear.

Tammy and others have been kind enough to ask how I am recovering from my surgery and I'm doing great. I really have no pain anymore and feel so much better than I did before the surgery that I am just thrilled to have it over with. Now that I can drive, I feel much more like myself. Am going into the city today for a doctor's appointment. I think the reason I've been doing so much posting of other people's poems and adoptable dogs is because I am FINALLY making some headway with this new book I'm writing. I actually feel like it's writing itself at this point and there doesn't seem to be enough time in the day.

I've posted here before that It's set in a small New England town and the main character is a descendent of one of the accused witches in Salem so I've been doing all sorts of research about Cotton and Increase Mather and women with first names like Deliverance. I'll never get over my fascination with this subject. The way the villagers saw certain aspects of nature as the workings of the devil. Also, how easy it is to breed fear into a populace, as is happening now, I believe, in our country, in so many ways. So that's what I'm up to. Maybe as I come across some interesting tidbits in my research I'll share them here. I read something last night about "white magic" which our colonists learned from their European ancestors, and which was done in the name of God, vs. "black magic", which was the work of the devil. One Salem woman, Goody Somebody, baked a "witch cake." She sprinkled the urine of three girls "afflicted" by the evil spells of local accused witches and fed the cake to a dog. When the dog ate the cake, the witch was supposed to scream in agony because it was believed that she had passed particles of her wicked being into the girls and that she would suffer when the dog consumed them. "White Magic" wasn't condoned by the church, but I'm just fascinated by the way these women, who were so busy, worked so hard, day in and day out, still had time to gather and share these ideas about godliness and wickedness and how it all related back to their own bodies and the bodies of young girls and the fertility of their livestock and nature in general. So that's what I've been up to, sitting in my little office with the wind whipping leaves against my windows and the sounds of a tree branch scratching my roof like a witch's claw.

I love to be scared, but if you don't, I advise you not to click on this video. I found this ages ago on youtube. I was looking for "ghost" videos." One thing I learned when I moved up here from New York, is that EVERYBODY believes in ghost, and many have seen them in their own homes. In New York, you can ask just about anybody if they believe in ghosts and they'll likely laugh at you. Here in CT, you can ask anybody, no matter how learned or intelligent; you can ask a nuclearphysicist if he believes in ghosts and he'll tell you about the one that strides through his hallway every night at exactly eleven. I've mentioned before that we have a ghost in our house that everybody can see or "sense" but me, which really irks me because I like to think of myself as very sensitive and not quite of this world, myself. Denis sees our ghost regularly and describes her clothing and everything, even the way she moves. I am snubbed by this entity. She won't reveal herself to me, and that hurts a little.

So one night I wondered if I could get Denis to videotape our ghost and then I went on youtube to see if anybody has ever successfully taped a ghost. I saw some hilarious hoaxes, and then came across this, which scared me.

I think this video has been around the block a few times so I apologize if you've already seen it.

During recent days,, I have found it difficult to carry on with my blog, as if everything in my life is as usual. I don’t use my blog as a platform to discuss political or controversial issues in any way. It’s just meant to be entertaining and enjoyable, hopefully.

This past week I have received countless emails from people who are not regular blog readers, but who are very angry and upset about something that was excerpted from my husband’s forthcoming book. Denis doesn’t have a website, so I guess when people Googled him, they found my website and decided to reach out to him through me.

I have read and responded to each and every one of these emails, except for the few that were actually threatening and excessively hostile. I also forwarded every email to Denis. I have to say that the vast majority of the people who have emailed me have been very respectful and considerate and many apologized for using me as an avenue to reach my husband. Many people wrote long and beautifully articulate descriptions of their children (and in some cases grandchildren, nephews and nieces) who have received the very real and often devastating diagnosis of autism .

The prevailing tone of these emails is just utter exasperation, rather than outright anger. These are people who come up against one roadblock after another when trying to receive the services that their kids so desperately need in order to progress. Regular people who have to fight every day for adequate therapy and education for their children in the hopes that they may someday lead a life that most of us just take for granted. I received one such email just a few minutes ago. I would never post a private email on my blog, but trust me when I tell you that this was a man whose intention was not to bully or harass, but to offer a glimpse into what appears to be an alternate universe that people suddenly find themselves in, in astoundingly increasing numbers, through no fault or choice of their own.

Years ago, I read this article on Salon.com, and I never forgot it. I encourage anybody who wants a glimpse of what it’s like to live with autism to read this eye-opening piece written by the father of preteen with autism.

Denis believes his words were taken out of context and has also been responding to emails. His email address is: denisleary41@yahoo.com. Please feel free to email him with your reactions to what you have read about his book.

In the meantime, if you have any ideas about how I might be able to use my website to spread awareness about Aspergers/Autism, please feel free to comment or email me.

My thoughts and prayers to those who struggle everyday with this very devastating disorder.

For more than a decade, the Learys have pursued patient and honorable efforts to defend ourselves against our enemies - The Mice - without war. In those years we have used various nonviolent efforts to reinforce our boundaries, while sending clear and indisputable signals that we will not tolerate their threats of invasion. These efforts have included completely reinforcing our basement walls and packing steel wool into every hole we could find, no matter how small. These nonviolent efforts to disable the rodent forces have failed again and again - because we are not dealing with a peaceful, God-fearing species. We are dealing with vermin.

Our boundaries are very clear. The mice get the whole outdoors. The only areas off limits to them are the indoors of our house and barn, both of which are the indisputable territory of the Learys. Our rights to this territory are spelled out in a document that we hold sacred. A document know as the Title of Ownership that proclaims the house to be under exclusive ownership of the Learys (and our allies, Wachovia Bank).

We never provoked the mice, but on the occasion that a renegade ran under our stove, it would be killed in a trap. This was meant to be a deterrent. We never attacked ALL the mice. We never tried to topple their entire empire.

Unfortunately, intelligence gathered this week has proven to us, beyond any doubt, that the Mice are intent upon destroying the Learys as a people. It was brought to our attention that heat hasn't been working in the kids' bedrooms and our furnace is only a couple of years old. So we called in an elite heating squad. After the specialist examined the furnace, he was debriefed. This man has served honorably in his field for many years, but he was visibly shaken. The mice had chewed through cables attached to the control panel on the furnace. The result was that they allowed a small amount of gas to leak. In addition they had shorted out the power switch so the thing kept trying to ignite every few minutes, sending off little sparks, right into this little stream of gas! The mice almost blew up our house.

In addition, the mice have been covertly engaged in germ warfare for months. They enter our kitchen under the stealth of night and plant little hanta-virus laden bombs in the form of their droppings, all over our kitchen.

The danger is clear: using biological or explosive weapons, the mice/terrorists could someday achieve their aim and destroy all Learys.

I will not divulge our tactics here, as I don't want to compromise our intelligence. Although we appreciate all efforts to support our objective of eradicating the mice, we will not tolerate vigilantism. Reports that a mouse was slain and then placed on my bed last night are true. We are confident that we know the perpetrator of this lawless and reckless act and she will be reprimanded.

My fellow Learys, the dangers to our home and our way of life will be overcome. We will pass through this time of peril and carry on the work of peace (and defending things that some of us wrote and which were printed out of context in tabloids). We will defend our freedom. And we will prevail.

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I've owned dogs all my life, have read stacks upon stacks of books on the behavior, care and training of this, my most beloved species. But today, I learned something new. If your dog eats an entire cooked chicken, or anything toxic, you should induce vomiting by filling a turkey baster with hydrogen peroxide and then forcing it down the poor beast's throat. My friend Leah, who called right after Daphne jumped up on our counter and devoured every last bit of a rotisserie chicken that we had only half eaten, told me to do that and then my vet, Dr. Ferris Gorra, verified. And so I did, and thank God because the poor thing produced the entire chicken - all the fat and sharp bones and gunk that would have made her very ill indeed. For a dog that I cherish and often describe as the best dog who has ever lived on earth, she's been a little bit naughty these past few days. Placing the mouse on my bed while I slept was disgusting, but I forgave her because she actually believed she was presenting me with an offering of sorts. She knows, however, that food is never to be stolen and that she is never to jump up onto our kitchen counters and she actually carried the chicken into my dark office to devour it there, so that she wouldn't be caught. Well, she learned her lesson, unfortunately, by having her gut basted with hydrogen peroxide. Another thing I learned recently is that grapes and raisins are HIGHLY toxic to dogs! I had no idea. I think of all the raisins my kids dropped around my house when they were little and wonder how my dogs survived.

Here she is being snuggled by my daughter (who doesn't like to be shown on my blog as much as my animals do).

As I was cleaning it up, of course, she was trying to have another go at it and I recalled a line that is either a psalm or is from Shakespeare, that reads, "As a dog returns to his vomit, so a fool returns to his folly."

It's a rainy, gloomy day and I thought it might be a good day for one of those fascinatingly creepy poetry animations made from photos of the poets that I have posted here in the past. Here's one of W.H. Auden:

In my search for another good one, I came across this actual footage of Anne Sexton reading her poems. I guess it was part of a documentary about her. I was quite obsessed with Anne Sexton poetry for a time, when I was in high school. Yes, I thought I was as deep and dark and dangerously troubled as she. How is it that I never knew how GORGEOUS she was? I had only ever seen still photos of her, and of course, to me at the time, she looked rather old. Now she looks so, so young.

And I am bewitched by the poem she is reading, as I'm quite preoccupied by witches lately, as some of you know. Not the old ones. The exact type that Sexton is describing. How awful that her therapist let the biographer publish his records of their sessions after she was dead. So cruel and greedy.

For some reason I haven't taken any photos this fall and it's been a beautiful fall up here. So I looked in my photo file and came across some pictures I took last winter. I was still driving my daughter back and forth to school at the time and her school is almost a half hour away, so I spent a lot of time, once winter set in, driving along, looking at a sometimes bleak horizon.

Sometimes there would be a new snow and there was nothing but whiteness all around:

In the country, during those months, little glimpse