26 March 12022

♄   26 March 12022 is Make Up Your Own Holiday. Earth Hour is also observed today. Other holidays and observances include Independence Day (Bangladesh), Purple Day (Canada and United States), Prince Kuhio Day (Hawaii [US]), Martyrs’ Day (Mali), and National Day of Life, Peace and Justice (El Salvador). On various calendars in use today is JD 2459665, 23 Veadar 5782, 23 Phalguna 2078, 13 (O.S.) or 26 (N.S.) March 2022, 17 Paremhat 1738, 22 Sha’ban 1443, or 6 Farvardin 1401. The saint of the day is Richard Allen (11760–11831), who was born into slavery as “Negro Richard”, bought his way out of slavery to become a Methodist minister, and then was driven out of the denomination to found his own, the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Robert Frost, Bob Elliot, and Pierre Boulez all have birthdays today.

Yesterday when I went for a walk with my aging hound Harry we went up the little wooded trail to the park, and kind of circled around the northern end of it. Even though it was a fairly decent afternoon, only partly cloudy and warm for March, we had the place entirely to ourselves. We cut back through the tennis court to return home, and as I stared across it, empty except for autumn’s fallen leaves blowing across it, a kind of sadness seemed to pervade the scene. There would be life and activity again, I supposed, but it was bleak and empty now. Mind you, I prefer it that way; it’s just that there seems to be more hope with movement and activity. I guess it somehow suited us—the old dog and the old human being together in an otherwise empty landscape.

Well, I got back home and my roommate’s little Frenchie Rudy wanted his turn at a walk, so I got him harnessed and leashed and set out. He headed north, and then down the little wooded trail to the park as well—and when I got to the tennis court, the contrast couldn’t have been greater. A vigorous game was under way, with a small audience of friends, and even another dog. Rudy, of course, wanted to join in, and I had to steer him around the court and up through the park. There were children on the swings now, and other dogs on walks with their human counterparts, and things were generally more as I had sort of expected them to be on a decent Friday afternoon in March. It was like a scene from a different day—and yet not more than fifteen or twenty minutes could have passed, if that. Rudy was ecstatic; this definitely suited his mood and fitted his notions of what the world should be like, and it was all I could do to steer him through the park and back down our street to home.