Haibun

Haibun

#610 – October 2026

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While at the coast, I met Tommy. Tommy is a black lab.

I also met Ted, Tommy’s friend. They were on the beach and Ted was throwing a ball with one of those ball launchers. The other arm was in a sling, one that I recognized. It was similar to a sling I had worn when I had shoulder surgery.

Ted mentioned that he had shoulder surgery, but had chosen not to get his bicep tendon reattached. He took off his sling to show me his detached bicep. I noticed a sadness in his voice when he talked about this. He opened up because I had told him about my own tendon repair and how it took nine months to recover.

During our conversation, Tommy was running around the beach, in and out of the water, losing the ball, finding the ball. All the while our conversation went from Labradors to shoulders, to biceps, to what lay ahead.

I mentioned that Melissa and I were going to visit our grandkids in a couple of weeks. He brightened and said he had chosen not to have the tendon reattached so he could recover quickly and hold his grandkids sooner.

Color photograph of a starfish tangle is seaweed on the sand. It is cropped we see only part of the starfish
Sand: Day 4
entangled/tossed by the waves/a flower blooms

#610 – October 2026 View/comment on post

Haibun

#608 – October 2026

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On the third day of our trip to the Oregon Coast, Melissa, my in-laws, and I paid a visit to Pacific City. We’d come here to do some grocery shopping and get a bite to eat. It was between the grocery shopping and lunch that we decided to walk down and check out the tide pools.

Walking through the parking lot on our way to the beach, my eye was caught by a small dog on a leash tethered to the handle of a car. Behind the car, a couple was firing up a Coleman stove on the car’s trunk. The dog looked very much like a toy Pomeranian. This, of course, reminded me of our Pomeranian and good friend for 17 years, Pepsie.

I wandered over to say hello. During our conversation, I found out they were from the Seattle area. When I said I was from Pullman, Washington, one of them mentioned they had grown up in Pullman, a wonderful connection. We also bonded over the joy of Pomeranians.

The conversation turned toward how good it is being on the coast. This always seems to come up in conversations with people I meet on the coast. I find it difficult to put words to the salty air, the waves, fog rolling in and rolling out, and the gulls.

Constant motion. One can’t put a finger on it: the air, the waves, the fog, and the gulls. It is always in motion. No room for a pause and yet there you are.

As I was talking to the couple and pondering this, there was their toy Pomeranian, spinning, jumping on my shins, always in motion with a smile and that Pomeranian energy. The ocean is like this, constantly expressing itself, in each moment, woven into all that is happening in our lives.

Seaweed spread across horizontally in long thin vertical lines by the ocean waves as the tide goes out. The sand dry. The long verticle line are like Japanese music written for shakuachi.
Sand: Day 3
across the sea-/a melody's soft breath/written by the tide!

#608 – October 2026 View/comment on post

Haibun

#599 – September 2026

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Morning Stillness

I went for a walk early this morning. My first early morning walk in quite a long time, and I have missed them.

I headed out in the twilight, looking forward to what I had always thought of as a quiet time.

What I noticed this morning was that within this quiet time, there was a bit of action. Each time I turned my gaze toward the sky, there was a different view of the clouds — a different shape, a different color.

Bare hills of the Palouse after harvest surrounded me as cars passed by. At the nursery, a semi truck was running its engine. And in a large bush, the magpies were making quite a commotion.

And yet, within, a stillness.

color photograph of a creek meandering through grasses, flowing from the top to the bottom of the photograph with fog from a field rolling over the creek. There are a few pine needles from the tree out of focus in the upper left.
scent of morning fog/rolls off the field –chirp/of a dark-eyed junco

#599 – September 2026 View/comment on post

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#596 – September 2026

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When driving home in the early evening from Moscow to Pullman, I prefer to take the airport road. It is a slower drive than the main highway. I take my time driving the 35 mph speed limit with the local airport on one side and the Palouse hills on the other. This evening while coming around a  corner, I saw her appear in the review mirror bathed in light and shadow. Arriving home, I  grabbed my binoculars and tripod to get a closer look. From the driveway, I gazed at the filtered light on her surface. In the silence, I wondered why no one was out looking at this celestial wonder when from the darkness came a neighbor’s voice, “Beautiful, isn’t it?“

Color photograph of an eclipse of the moon, the moon shadow is red shading most of the moon. The photo is taken through binoculars with on side curved to black, the other fades to black. There are a few stars and the silhouette of the tip of a pine tree.
who stands between/from the moon's point of view/eclipse of the sun

#596 – September 2026 View/comment on post

Haibun

#579 – July 2026

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On a recent paddleboard trip, my plan was to be off the lake by 11 AM, before the afternoon wind picked up. After a paddle on Chatcolet  Lake and Round Lake, we headed toward the park at Rocky Point. By then the wind had come up, and crossing the open water became a struggle. I checked my watch. We had been on the lake for 2 1/2 hours and were only halfway through with the trip.

I imagine my days at home are much like this. I wake each morning with a list already taking shape, certain I know how much I can fit into a day. Then come the delays, interruptions, and unexpected turns. By noon I’m behind the schedule I imagined.

Color photograph of a broken off wooden pole in the middle of a lake in breeze driven waves. From it grows a sprout of green Marsh Cutweed.

#579 – July 2026 View/comment on post

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