Sad news about our boxer, Rubin

My family's wonderful, sweet dog, Rubin, died a few days ago. Below, my brother Justin's thoughts from this past Friday:

It is with a heavy heart that I report to you that our beloved family dog, Rubin "Hurricane" Friedman, has passed on to the Great Doggy Beyond. Rubin was nine years young. For a Boxer, he lived a long and active life.

Rubin had been afflicted with "malignant masses" (a polite way of saying cancer), but it barely slowed him down. Even over the last few days, he was going on walks in the woods and did a little swimming in the creek near my parents' house. Rubin was actually scheduled for surgery today, but he didn't make it through the night.

As a puppy, Rubin quickly outgrew our full-grown Bichon Frise, Clyde, and was known to bully him regularly. (Clyde, by the way, is nearly 12 and is thriving with Samantha in Little Rock.) It wasn't until my parents adopted Duncan (also doing quite well and living with my parents in Bethesda) that Rubin became the tame being that you will remember. Duncan, although smaller, had a knack for herding the other dogs and he soon became the alpha male.

Rubin was a happy, pampered dog. He almost never whined, other than when he would mosey up to the pantry where we kept the milk bones and whimper until he got one. Milk bones were his weakness, and this routine would happen anywhere from 3-10 times per day. Sometimes he would go back to the pantry immediately upon finishing his treat. He usually got what he wanted.

Rubin loved Hanukkah, when there would always be a bag of treats or a toy gift-wrapped for him. As soon as we lit the candles, he would tear into his gift, unwrapping it with his teeth. If it was edible, he usually devoured the entire package before we even noticed he had opened it.

We will miss Rubin. For those of you who knew him, I hope you will take a moment to think about all the great memories. As one friend once observed, "If Rubin could talk, he would be a complete gentleman."

That's my Governor!

A little shout out to the boss -- link to Governor Beebe campaign video below:

http://www.youtube.com/mikebeebe4governor

Don't forget the blue laws

Must. Get. To. Wine. Store. Before. Sunday...

If I want to rebel against the blue laws and consume wine at dinner. This is a Bible Belt phenomenon I'm never going to get used to.

Shabbat Shalom

Continuing the theme of poetry from earlier this week, and as Shabbat settles upon us -- hopefully bringing with it some small reprieve from the record-setting heat that has smothered Arkansas this week -- I thought it only appropriate to share a couple pieces from my dear friend Naomi Stone:

The Sabbath

Today do nothing as

you usually do. Time is pooling

open. No sorrow in this blue

breathing air. Do not touch

the light; do not brush your hair;

do not even speak

of what binds you in the week..

You have come here to

learn to be like us, or

not. For now we each inhale our sweet

share of sky. We will not release it until

sundown.

Outside of Time

During the Sabbath you are in other time. You carry nothing

but your continuing

breath. Enter here, where

time is not

time, inside an alignment of the heavenly

and earthly worlds. The same happens when two bodies

join: the worlds rowing under each

skin climb into a zygote. Birth. And then no-time again

when the ram's horn

possesses your walled village. The men

blow the horn on each day of rest --

when you hear it, you stop

your breath and wish.

Listen. Your breath

held.

And those stars

behind the stars you recognize,

they stay.

Both can be found in Nomi's first book of poetry, Stranger's Notebook, published under the name Nomi Stone (TriQuarterly Books, 2008).

NYT shout-outs to Arkansas

This week, Arkansas tourist attractions made the NYT twice!

Unbeknownst to me, a 13th-century-style "Ozark medieval fortress" is being built in Northwest Arkansas.

http://travel.nytimes.com/2010/08/01/travel/01headsup.html?scp=1&sq=arkansas%20medieval%20castle&st=cse

Landscape artist extraordinaire P. Allen Smith gets good press as the "Martha Stewart of the South" in the Home and Garden section. Visiting his estate outside Little Rock is on my list of Arkansas things I have yet to do.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/05/garden/05smith.html?scp=1&sq=allen%20smith&st=cse

Yesterday was hot and heavy

Forgive me, in my heat-induced stupor yesterday, I almost forgot to post this gem I took of my dashboard. Please note the time at top left. Kind of would have thought the temp would have started to have gone down by early evening, right?

Greg Brownderville of Pumpkin Bend

I have tried to like poetry. It seems the literary, sophisticated thing to do.

But thus far, I haven't encountered much that I feel I can sit down and soak up, enraptured for any actual length of time.

Greg Brownderville, on the other hand, is one poet/folktale teller I have come to like. The young writer from the tiny Arkansas town of Pumpkin Bend -- it's in Woodruff County, I looked it up -- conveys life in the Delta with language so rich you can almost taste his words.

Two of my favorite lines come from separate parts of his poem, "Mystery":

"It's nice to know a passage of the world by heart."

And

"Everything that shatters, everything that scatters, everything that matters is a mystery."

I first fell in love with Greg...I mean Greg's poetry...when I heard him read some of his work at the yearly Arkansas Literary Festival soon after I'd moved here. I think all that's required to begin adoring a good writer is to hear him read his work aloud. Greg's velvety phrases are like verbal molasses, slowly dripping over you until you're enveloped by the sweet, Southern rhythms.

To whet your appetite, here's the poem with which he closes Deep Down in the Delta (The Doodlum Brothers Press, 2005):

Reasons

An utterly unlabored thought

That takes away the sting,

Like an unexpected crystal rock,

Polished by a spring;

The day that dawns when nights are swarming,

Like sun on the blade of a knife;

Your breathing in my bed this morning:

Reasons men have clung to life.

GO FIND HIM. Most recently, he published an essay, "Squirrel Soul," in the August Little Rock Soiree.

http://www.inarkansas.com/19178/squirrel-soul