Tempus Fugit

One minute we were celebrating New Year's Eve with beloved friends, the next minute it was Valentine's Day! If the level of action during the first month of 2011 is any indication, we're heading for an exciting year.

My brilliant nieces never cease to amaze me - I went to Chicago in mid-January to witness the great work of the Magical Starlight Theater team, when my talented niece Morgan danced, sang and beamed her beautiful way through six (count 'em, six - all in one weekend!) performances of the stage version of Disney's Aladdin. It was enchanting, full of beautiful voices and astonishing stagecraft. But sweetest of all to witness was the closeness of the troupe of actors and the excitement of the congratulatory crowds after the show. Morgan even got to give autographs! Weather was 25 degrees and sunny, though my little sis did have to shovel some snow. Luckily, I missed the blizzard that devastated the city the following week.

Devastating, though, was the news I got when I got home. Dick and I drove in to Tucson Medical Center for what we thought was a routine test for some heart flutters he'd been having. As I sat reading a travel book in the waiting room, Dick's doctor called me to the phone, said he had discovered a "nasty arrhythmia" and that if it was his heart, he'd have a defibrillator/pacemaker implanted. I gulped and said, "OK" - Dick was under anaesthesia - and that was that. This amazing little device keeps his heart from going too fast, or too slow - so we now call him the Bionic Man. He spent only one night in the hospital and is now playing tennis again. He's serving really great all of a sudden - maybe I need to get one of those things, too!

Then there was a trip to Boca, a meeting of the Bisbee Community Tennis Association at our house... and yesterday was pretty much a perfect day.

In the morning, we drove out to Whitewater Wildlife Preserve to witness the migration of the Sand Hill Cranes. Each year between January and March they pause their migration in this area, eating rice and corn left in the fields near Elfrida and Willcox, and enjoying the beautiful wetlands at Whitewater. The birds are very punctual - we had learned when Jim and Sara took us out here last year that they show up exactly at 11:30 AM each day.

Arriving early, we enjoyed sharing the beautiful weather with the friendly group of people gathered - from the serious birders making notes in their books and muttering to each other to voyeurs like us who enjoy the occasional reminder of nature's power and beauty. At approximately 11:29, we began to see tiny black dots in the distant sky... the dots grew and grew, as did the noise level, as thousands of cranes descended in flocks, their giant wings making "whoosh-whoosh" sounds in the crystal air, the birds gracefully landing among the hundreds already assembled, fluttering and squawking almost as excitedly as our little group of humans. These photos cannot capture the enormity of the sight, or the magic of the moment... but it's in our hearts (even bionic ones) forever.

We finally tore ourselves away from the birds and got home in time to prepare ourselves for the evening's festivities. Becaue I am devoted to the Bisbee Library, and especially to James, my writing teacher, I volunteered to serve at last night's Bisbee Chocolate Festival - our annual Library fundraiser. Local restaurants, as well as most of the culinarily-gifted ladies of Bisbee, have been dipping berries, baking brownies, mixing up ganache and whipping up truffles for the past week, and the results were overwhelming - and tasty!

My fellow servers and I handed out the goodies from giant Valentine-strewn tables on two floors of our handsome old Copper Queen Library, and I barely noticed that I was on my feet for two hours. Age and gender had no bearing on the enjoyment - everyone from kids to young couples on a valentine date to elderly gentlemen were in a kind of chocolate induced trance while trying to decide how to use the five (only five?!) Chocolate Tickets they received with their admission, while a lively Irish band played downstairs. And I didn't eat a thing - my heart was busy feasting on all those sweet faces.

Dick and his pals, who had been shooting pool and doing guy stuff, picked me up at festival's end, and we enjoyed the perfect ending to a perfect day... the West Texas Millionaires playing an impromptu concert after a wedding downtown... don't try to top this - can't be done!

High Desert Summer

As I sit here, the cool breezes waft out of the canyons, raising the window curtains and softly shaking the perfume from the jasmine just outside. My friend Sara told me that Bisbee was paradise in the summer, but having spent my high school and college years in Arizona, I was dubious to say the least. Summer? In Arizona? Paradise? Growing up in the Phoenix area, summer was closer to that other final destination... the really really hot one. But it's true - we have glorious, sunny tennis mornings here, and then, just when the A/C is about to kick in - the perfumed breezes start, and they bring the rain.

Local legends add to the color, too... at my writing class the other day I learned about Marge, the former Phelps-Dodge secretary who was awarded a job as librarian at the Copper Queen Library when the mine closed. She was a cranky old curmudgeon who knew nothing about libraries, hated hippies, and would come knocking on your door in person if you had an overdue book. Luckily for us, Marge finally retired and my lovely friend Donna, of the sweet smile and Library Science degree, has brought the library into the 21st century... book groups, writing classes, kids' programs - all free to us lucky Bisbonians.

Dick's friend Mel came for a visit last week, and we took him on a tour of the mine and other historical venues, while catching up on his latest adventures. The wackiest moment of the week came when he and Dick were accosted during their photo safari to Old Bisbee by two traveling rabbis. These Lubavitcher proselytizers proceeded to give each of the guys a second Bar Mitzvah, right there on the street. Only in Bisbee...maybe the Republicans are right, this IS a dangerous place!

Speaking of dangerous, our tennis friend Naco George (so named because he lives right on the border in Naco, Arizona, just a few miles away) was awakened by a loud, repetitive twanging sound a few nights ago. He looked out his window and discovered that some enterprising Mejicanos were sling-shotting packages of dope across the border, right over his back yard... he went back to bed, hoping this was just a bad dream... when the local gang that couldn't shoot straight came to the rescue, guns blazing, they succeeded only in making noise... the hombres, armed with slingshots, ran giggling off into the night.

Fantasyland? Adventureland? Tomorrowland? Or Frontierland? You decide. I'm having a margarita.