Three gray old men walking

Truth told, I never did pay much attention to Ludwig Wittkenstein, even after I’d seen Max Dugan Returns for the tenth time.  Until Sunday.  When he (not Dugan) showed up in Red and Rover and charmed my go-to-meetin’ socks off.  I still don’t know very much about him.  Read the head of the Wiki piece.  And found a treasure trove of sound bites to him attributed. I don’t usually approve of sound bites.  Context, you know, is everything.  But I am going to pass this plebeian link on to you, and supply two quotes for free, just because I love them so very much:

Never stay up on the barren heights of cleverness but come down into the green valleys of silliness.

I sit astride life like a bad rider on a horse. I only owe it to the horse’s good nature that I am not thrown off at this very moment.

I am thinking of having both of these embroidered on banners so I can wear them next time I ride in a convertible.  If I ever do.  Which I won’t, and haven’t done since my imagination grew up to include caved-in heads.

And will someone please explain to me why formatting in an HTML environment is so hair-raising?  Why do you HAVE to get a space between your lines when you do a hard return, huh????

But that is not what I meant to write about, huh?  It was the three old men.  Walking.  A story in pictures.  With captions.

The curtain rises:

Act One

But you don’t get to see act one, which concerns the difficulties faced by short, fat old men struggling to get into, and subsequently out of, a car.  I would have to take vid for that which I no longer shoot.  So you must just take my word for its dramatic value.

Act Two

Getting on the path.

This can be a complicated matter.

He stoops to conquer.  There was another picture that might have explained the interesting design on the pavement, but I elected to leave that one out.

Notice the side-long glance?  Only the person on the far side is pretending not to notice us.

ACT THREE

On the path.

It is nearly sundown, which you must have noticed.  This is symbolic.  And our three old men are being passed by young people whose concept of life at this stage includes wheels.  They carry their hopes and plans in packs on their backs.  We watch them go by and smile discretely.

We have come a long darn way.

Act Four

It is never too late to be distracted.

Hmmmm.

When you have come this far, you have the right to stop.  Headlong living is all well and good, but stopping is also good.  Dogs like stopping.  Not for the same reasons I would, perhaps.

Crossing the plains.  Or looking for something edible.  Edible resides, ultimately,  in the nose of the beholder, I think.  And you are never too old to lick your own nose.

Act Five

Reflecting on the journey.

This is the back of our house.  We have lived here pretty much 31 years.  That’s a lot of life.  Four children. Half of a cat.  Seven and a half dogs.  Or maybe only three full dogs and five half ones.  Lots of easter egg hunts and snow slides and 4th of July parties.  Sometimes it’s good to see your life from behind.

I stole this image.  These people do not belong to me.  But that’s what happens when you walk the path at sundown.  Sometimes you find children in surprising places.  Sometimes they are swinging, out of shadow into light.  Sometimes the light is the gift.

And th-th-th-th-that’s all, folks!