both Beth and I missed our fathers today. Beth felt her father's presence close by, not sure in what way, why. I just thought Pop Concert on the Esplanade in Boston. my father liked the Pops, would catch cheap matinees and rehearsals whoa 70 years ago. the last few years, I would watch with him, tho I'm not so much a fan. a way to be with him. I even, most latterly, kind of insisted that he watch, elsewise he'd mechanically go to bed at 7:00. so Beth and I went out, on a fine warmish summer day, Hawthorne's birthday. 1st to the carnival in the town I grew up in. we blenched at the idea of paying a buck entrance fee. I mean, carnivals are largely gross as it is, I was just going for the ghosts. the entrance fee, and the requirement of being searched just warn't like the old days. the music was wrong, "celebrate good times c'mon," and thump thump thump. it's just a grim money dynamo after all, which exhausted charm if it had any at all. so we had the excuse to keep riding. thru Lexington's brand new and solidified crassness, thru Arlington (where Creeley was born), past the house in Cambridge where my father was born, past Mt Auburn Cemetery where Creeley is buried, into Watertown and towards Newton. Newton where Jack Kimball's little restaurant exists. we ate and hung out with the Great Poet just last friday. ah friday, day of traffic! as with friday, today we had a late lunch or linner, crepes and panini (saving room for nutricious air-popped popcorn at home). today Jack was not in, but the joint hopped natheless. homeward the country route. we passed Walden which, for some reason, was closing for 90 minutes. maybe some important PBS documentary was being filmed, or maybe oil rights (I almost spelled that rites) were being auction. I took 150 pictures. are you ready to see them all now???