Today is a lovely day with bright sunlight, fall sunlight, slanted light, and a mostly blue sky. The breeze is strong and teeters on being a wind. It is raining leaves. It is 51°, the predicted high for the day. I have no errands, no reason to leave the house so I’ll do a bit of cleaning. I’m thinking vacuuming.

I’m watching The Black Scorpion, a 1957 black and white creature movie, a 1950’s B-movie. Geologists are checking out an erupting volcano in Mexico, but all the characters speak English, not Spanish. The backgrounds are painted stills. The jeep bounces on a fake road you don’t see. A film behind it provides the background and a sense of movement. The best scenes are in the village with crowds of extras. They are dressed in traditional clothes. The scenes would have been beautiful in color. The special effects of the giant scorpion are reminiscent of Harry Harryhausen, but the close ups of the scorpion’s face are silly. Only the mouth moves, and it drools. The scorpions have come out of the volcano and are ravaging the towns and eating the people and cattle. I am enjoying this movie maybe because of its flaws. My mother would have said it is right up my alley.

When I lived in Africa, my students would often visit in the early evenings. They would knock on the screen door and say caw caw or something similar. They’d leave their sandals outside. We’d sit and chat a while. One night, a student asked for my sandal. I passed it over to her. She whacked the floor. She killed a scorpion. It was my first scorpion. During training I saw my first army ants. They were mesmerizing. They traveled in a long, thick line and never stopped. I was late to class that day. I also saw centipedes near my house. I was disappointed they didn’t have 100 legs. As for common insects, during the day there were the flies while during the night, in the rainy season, there were the mosquitos, buzzing, annoying, blood sucking mosquitos.

My dance card is fairly empty this week. I have my usual uke practice and lesson but only one concert. I’m happy with a quiet week.

Today is yesterday, cloudy and chilly, but the weather report is a mix, a sort of a peek a boo game between the sun and the clouds. The high today will be 53°. That’s jacket weather.

When I was a kid, Sunday was a different sort of a day. I had to get dressed early to go to mass. I wore my Sunday church clothes, not to be confused with my school clothes or my play clothes. Most Sundays I walked to church, a short walk, as it was right beside my school. I preferred the downstairs for mass, no sermon there. I was never fond of sermons, most were dull. A bit of humor would have helped, but I guess sin and eternal flames are never funny. I always sat in the back, the best spot for a quick getaway.

My father always bought the Sunday paper. He read the Boston American. I remember he sat in the chair by the picture window to read it. He never read the funnies so I’d grab them. I’d lie on the floor to read. I remember the print would sometimes smear, and ink would get on my fingertips. The television was usually on showing the Sunday Cinema. The only movie I remember was Lassie Come Home, an old black and white film.

Sunday dinner was the special meal of the week. On the menu were always mashed potatoes and a couple of vegetables, canned vegetables. The roast varied. Sometimes it was a whole chicken, other times roast beef. We’d sit at the table. My mother, though, would often stand and eat at the counter.

Some Sundays we went to East Boston to visit my grandparents, my mother’s parents. My mother had seven siblings. She was the third born. My mother’s sisters were usually there on Sundays with their kids, the cousins. The women, including my grandmother, sat in the kitchen. The men sat upstairs watching football. On the stove was always spaghetti, enough to feed everybody. I loved that the cheese was in a chunk and had to be grated over the spaghetti.

It was dark when my father drove us home. I would sometimes fall asleep leaning against the backseat door. I do remember a white house with an oxen yoke, minus the oxen of course, over the garage. That was the sign we were almost home.

My leg is the best it has been. I believe my sloth days are the reasons. Now I need the energy to clean or blinders to ignore the dirt.