Christopher Donahue

The Holidays are suppose to be a happy time of year. But for many people it is a time of sadness because of the burdens under which they labor.

The other day I was walking down Mass Ave, in the South End of Boston,  when I saw a guy laboring under a terrible burden. He had lashed  two shopping carts together and had a remarkable pile of junk teetering on top of the makeshift cart. It looked to be one of the biggest, one-man-movable, piles of crap I had ever seen. And the guy was pushing it down the street!

What was he doing? Was he getting paid to cart junk away from some lot? Where was he going?  Had he simply lost his mind? Because the latter was a distinct possibility, I decided not to ask him. Worse, he might ask me to help push the heap down the street and I had to get back to work.

Jumping on the Orange Line a few blocks later, I saw someone laboring under a different burden: A young music student carrying a cello on her back that was almost as big as she was.

Different people. Different burdens.

May your burdens be light and journey be merry this Christmas and Holiday Season!

copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

Thanksgiving has just passed, and November is quickly drawing to a close.

Over the years, the Thanksgiving to Christmas season has come along with angst or anticipation; sometimes both. This year, I am content to get the season started by giving thanks for my loved ones, my family and friends, and my cats.  In short, all the good people and  things that are easy to take for granted.

And I’m thankful that I got some pictures of some beautiful deer even if I didn’t get a bear on the bear-cam!

Happy Thanksgiving!

copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

It is Halloween. Ghost and goblins are coming to the door. October is the second anniversary of this blog, and continues to be a  month of surprises.

Tonight, I’m surprised our house didn’t get egged by disgruntled trick-or-treaters. And that’s because my wife decided we would give out pretzels for trick-or-treat. Pretzels! Now, granted they come in bat and jack-lantern shapes, and were packaged in spooky little bags, but pretzels?!?! I thought for sure no kids would want pretzels for trick-or-treat but they were a big hit. Next year we should give out potato chips.

And now, the biggest October surprise of them all.

We drove up to Vermont. It had been three weeks since we last checked on the bear-cam.  I took the memory chip out and went inside to see if we had got a picture of the elusive bear. As it turned out, I didn’t see a bear. I saw a bare-ass!

Some teenage-prankster mooned the bear-cam!

Happy Halloween!

copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

October has been full of surprises.

I was walking down the street the other evening on the way to see a lecture by a Pulitzer  Prize-winning author at the local library.  I was about ten feet behind an older woman who was walking ahead of me. Imagine my surprise when suddenly she ripped off a string of farts that would have made truck driver proud. Luckily, I was far enough behind  to avoid  injury.  Being a gentleman,  I nonchalantly  walked past  her, not giving the slightest acknowledgment that I was aware of  her noxious outburst.

In front of the library, I met my wife and told her of my unpleasant experience. We were waiting for the doors to open so we could go in to the lecture. I finished off a bottle of soda and was looking around for a recycle bin where I could depose of the bottle without wasting the 5-cent deposit. Imagine my surprise when I saw a homeless guy pushing a shopping cart full of returnable bottles up the sidewalk.  What luck! I ran over and gave the guy the empty soda bottle. He was really happy and  thanked me profusely! Another surprise!

Later, at the lecture, imagine my surprise when I realized…

The farting woman from the street was the Pulitzer-Prize winning author!

copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

After two weeks of breathless anticipation, the bear cam results are in:

Several relatives, a number of unintentional selfies, two blue jays, a possible ghost, a landscaper, and a nighttime shot of a doe eating apples.

Yes deer. No bear.

I’ll check again in a few weeks and see if we get a bruin!

copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

Magnus toils by day as a lawyer. Sitting in the overly warm court room,  waiting for his case to be called, he listens to the stultifying drone of the judge, defense attorneys,  and district attorneys  processing cases after case. The cases meld together into an ongoing murmur. Another drinking and driving case. Yet another punch in the nose.

His imagination floats out the top of his head and exits directly through the ceiling, upward through the roof of the building. It pirouettes over the court house,  get its bearings, then turns and heads out and away from the city.

At the speed of thought it rushes over the forests and hills toward the Green Mountains looming purple in the distance. Closing now, the mountains do indeed appear green. Crossing a wooded ridge, his imagination spirals down  through the clouds toward an old farm house with some nearby apple trees. His imagination swoops down to a particular old apple tree with a motion-activated camera attached to it.

A few weeks ago, a Vermont neighbor said he had seen a bear eating apples under that old apple tree near the old farm house. This gave Magnus the great idea of attaching a motion activated camera to the tree to see if any bears were indeed eating the apples when no one is around.

Back at work, far away,  in an overly warm court room, Magnus wonders if the bear-cam has captured pictures of any furry visitors….

copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

How to make a million dollars a year?

I pondered that question while enjoying a view of Boston Harbor on a magnificent summer day. It was lunch time and I was watching the various boats make their way around the harbor. I thought if I made a million dollars a year, I wouldn’t have to go back to work. And,  I  probably would have my own sail boat to spend all my spare time on too.  It was a nice thought.

It also occurred to me that nowadays, the boats in the harbor were all of  really the trivial sort. Tourist boats, pleasure craft, sail boats and ferries. Not even a fishing boat. Back in the age of sail, ships sailed the world from Boston. Iron Men in wooden ships braved storm and sea to make their fortunes. They would leave Boston with to trade for beaver pelts with Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest. It was a 13,000 mile journey around the Cape Horn.  If they survived that trip, they then crossed the Pacific and traded the pelts in China for the luxuries of the Orient. After that , they continued home across the Indian Ocean, then around the tip of Africa and Cape of Good Hope to the Atlantic. A lot of them didn’t make it. They made their fortunes but it was a dangerous and hard way to make their millions.

Next week, I ponder the question of how to make an easy million dollars a year.

Copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

continued from ….Borges, Asimov, Ice Cream and Thai Rolls Part I (June 19, 2014)…

I picked up the book and started thumbing through it, wondering if I would recognize some of the stories and whether they would have the same magic as they had when I read them in college. All the stories were familiar except the last one which was entitled, In the House of  Ice Cream and Thai Food. I was intrigued by the title so I read on. The story was about a man named Angus Conceivo who worked in an office in Buenos Aries.

One afternoon, Angus was feeling ill so he left work early. On the way home he bought some Thai-takeout for his wife. He didn’t want any Thai food himself because his stomach was upset. Instead, he ate a stomach soothing bowl of vanilla ice cream as soon as he got home. And a bite of a Thai roll to top it off.

Then the pain started. Sudden and sharp, it escalated quickly to severe and throbbing. He doubled over in agony. His wife and neighbor rushed him to the emergency room where he was diagnosed as having a gall-bladder attack.

I was shocked when I read this because this was exactly what had happened to me. I had just come home from a stay in the hospital for a vanilla ice cream and a Thai roll induced gall-bladder attack, and there I was reading a short story that was an exact parallel to what had happened to me. A short story that was written seventy years earlier! It was incredible.

But what was also strange about this whole thing, was that I didn’t recall reading this particular story when back in college.  How did I miss this story when it was the last one in the book?

It was so incredible I decided to call an old friend from college. He was a bigger Borges aficionado than I. Undoubtedly, he would have a copy of this collection of short stories  and would have read this story.

So, I called my old college friend…to be continued…

Copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito

It is hard to beat a lazy, rainy, Sunday morning in July.

The Seventh Day of the week came along again  and I woke up to a gentle, pleasant rain. The weather had been so perfect recently, I was perversely happy it wasn’t sunny.

I went out on the back porch and sat in a wicker chair with the Sunday Paper and a big cup of coffee. My journal and a trusty tobacco pipe were also part of my setup. No phone or cell phone.

It was blessedly quiet. The only sound was the rain coming down. It reminded me of Sunday mornings at the old, funky farmhouse I lived in back in college- and how much things have changed…and how they haven’t changed that much.

copyright 2014 Magnus Incognito