Bartow, FL-Naples, FL 11/8 130 driving miles; 8 walking miles

Sometimes the news is so slow, you just have to make stuff up, but just like the Republicans in the race for the President, the reality is harder to believe than the fiction. The reality is David and Donna ushered us out the door today like poor, ignorant white trash after Ed threw his tantrum. It all started when Donna wouldn't turn the TV to the NASCAR station. She said the incessant roar disturbed her meditation. Ed went into a myopic rant, yelling, "But Donna, it's all about me!" The next thing I IMAGINE, Ed and Donna transcended into a massive power struggle, reminiscent, I suppose, of the illusory Mission days. Behaving just like a brother and sister arguing about how long a shower actually should be, they started to rumble like an approaching gulf storm. David and I, who were out in the studio painting at the time, heard the rumble, but we thought it was a late afternoon squall. Then Crack! Boom! Suddenly, the futon came flying out the porch slider like a flabby cotton frisbie. There was wailing, a strong rush of wind, and simultaneously the skies opened up with lightning and rain, or so we thought. David and I rushed back into the house, wet acrylic paint dripping from our smocks only to find the futon frame shattered, Donna brandishing a kitchen knife, jabbering Sicilian expletives at Ed who held the cat in one hand and a chair in the other. He was babbling incoherently, "Really, Donna, it's all about me!" To that she flicked her nose with one finger, and threw the knife at him like Jim Bowie. Luckily for Ed, the knife impaled itself in the underside of the chair, and even luckier for Ed, David used his considerable skill as a therapist to calm his wife's ire. He asked, "Sweetie, what do you hope to gain from this behavior?" She mumbled a bunch of words I didn't understand, but suddenly slumped onto one of the kitchen stools. David turned his attention  to Ed who stood in a daze, chanting, " Me, Me, Me." David calmy said, "Ed, give me the cat, put the chair down and sit in it." Like a patient in a hypnotic trance, Ed did just as he was told. David's ability was magical. In two deft movements, he killed the monstrous anger that had overtaken the two former JVC volunteers. It was really impressive, maybe more impressive than Bill Clinton's record as President. I don't really know what happened between Donna and Ed, or which old Mission memory set them off, but without David, I believe the coroner may have been called. What I do know is that carnage lay in its wake: a ruined futon, a traumatized cat, and a stabbed chair. What I also know is that this morning Donna and David kicked us out of their home like Northern white trash right after they made us coffee, cooked us breakfast, took us on a nature walk, and fixed us a lunch to go. I mean really, it's no fantasy. Life IS good, especially today.

Was it something he said?

The storm begins

Perhaps, the final straw.

Inexplicable.

Art shot of day: The artist as mediator.