Black Plumes

Today is yet another day of having to stay at home to work. I want to have adventures, but stories and chapters need writing, student papers need grading, and I have correspondence with editors to attend to.



And London very courteously shows me a sight that I would not see in Eugene, Oregon. As I sat working in my front room, I heard the clop-clop-clopping of hooves. I looked up to see a horse-drawn hearse passing by at the front of a funeral procession, driven by a man in black wearing a top hat. The horses wore black plumes on their heads. The four sides of the hearse were glass, with gilt decorations on the top. It looked like a giant music box on wheels, except that instead of a spiked cylinder for playing music, it contained a coffin.

And that is today's news from Wrentham Avenue. Now I must get back to work.