P30

There must be some old-timers here? There must by the guy with piles of inventory stacked in his yard for just-in-case and just-because. There must be that guy who remembers when, way back when he was a kid, before this stop light was put in, folks would just pull over, "there yes, just over there" onto the gravel and buy fruit from the Mexican woman. But now it's a Pub or a bike shop it's funky and fun and thank God it's not Starbucks. The feeling is so new. This is the heart of the matter. In search of the plain-old-used-to-be.

Where is the heart of the matter?

Basket weaver, arrowhead carver, salmon smoker, pellet hunter, big tree logger, paper maker, hop picker, blueberry fingers, apple farmer, pie baker, farrier.

Keyboard tapper, night club dancer, boots and feathers, fedora hats, micro-brew drinker, bicycle rider cycling through an ocean of 30.

(When I'm in the garden with soil under my nails I find the Old-timers there, I thank the Old-timers there.)

On the highway looking out the window I catch myself thinking again and again, imagine what it looked like before... even before that, you know, way back....

It's the part of me that's always homesick for "the homeland we've never seen".

Homesickness, maybe that's what really killed off the Old-timers? Another one down with a bad case of the "homesick-blues". More likely though I just need to look around, Old- timers are everywhere and always in the making.