LETTERS FROM HOME: WHEN THE SNOW FALLS AND THE HONEY FLOWS

Jan. 4, 1996

Dear Julie,

We are a vision in white this week. Communities not far away are wrapped in 8 inches of snow, but ours has no more than an opaque veil. The town is lovely as a bride.

It's cold, too, so the snow will linger for at least a few days, and soon we'll grow accustomed to the white glare, even tire of it. What once was magical becomes commonplace. Nothing's changed except us.

I watch Hank and Lucy frolic in the snow and marvel at their aliveness. Not a trace of distraction, no sign of ennui. Just chasing each other around and around the desiccated garden plot, squabbling over the ownership of a stick, licking each other's ears. Believing the world turns on the axis of this very moment.

In the free rein given their natural curiosity about the bottoms of holes in the ground, and the instantaneous expression of their desires, be it for food or affection or fresh air, they are smarter than I usually am.

They know what they want, even if they want something different 10 seconds later.

DC and I watched a TV program Joni Mitchell was on. I was smitten with her through the '70s, I told DC. Just like half our generation was smitten with her.

But though we were born in the same town in the same year, DC and I have different cultural references. Joni Mitchell did not define for her the romanticism of longing in "The Last Time I Saw Richard" or send her reeling with the sweet ache of "A Case of You."

I remember making my mom listen to the "Blue" album. Mom liked her voice but complained that one of the songs contained a profane reference.

Joni Mitchell was the sacred and the profane, an angel dancing naked on the head of a pin. I longed for her because she longed with me.

DC got a little jealous, even though I haven't listened to or bought a Joni Mitchell tape in many years. Cultural icons are only mirrors of ourselves anyway. In our hearts, we're all sensitive songwriters revealing our souls in one way or another, or at least wanting to.

Rummaging through basement boxes for Christmas decorations a few weeks ago, I came across one that contained letters and mementos from my last two years in California. It was a time of being very alone. Also a time of walking, walking walking in circles until finally finding someone I recognized.

One artifact from this period caught my eye among all the others in the box. A poem snipped from some publication.

A Taste of Manzanita Honey

(Raw -- Unfiltered)

I know I'm in trouble

when I start to identify

with the ants who keep trying

to get into the honey jar.

I've found a few

who made it,

tiny black corpses,

floating in their golden heaven.

Sighing, I scoop them out,

wipe the jar,

put it somewhere else.

They won't find it for a while.

Maybe those dead ants

are the lucky ones.

I, too, sometimes feel

I would die for a taste

of something sweet.

and so I have a drink

or go to a movie

or listen to music

or make love,

And I wonder who keeps moving

the golden dreams.

-- Jenifer Ransom

I felt that way once and do no longer. The answer to your unasked question, Jenifer, is You do.

Love, Sam

~Sam Blackwell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.