Blog 2

I wrote this a few months ago on a scape piece of paper intending to put it in my blog.

It’s the evening before Mother’s Day and I have found myself riding on a bus to the old city of Salamanca. The trip is quiet and smooth as the bus moves gently under the sun’s still powerful rays. As time goes by that large ball of heat keeps it’s strength but slids down the sky like a single raindrop moving down a window pane. When the sun slowly looses it’s position in the sky, it loses the power to kill and its reign over darkness.
The bus continues to move through the hills and into the mountains of Madrid’s sierra as dusk begins to grow. My view outside the window shows me a temporal world of green. I can see that winter has finally unfolded into spring and the land has been blanketed by short stubble grass. The climate here is hot and dry, but spring is the moment when it’s temperance allows for a change from brown earth to green saud. With this in mind I know that soon summer’s heat will take away the green and again the land outside the window will be barren. But today I celebrate spring and it’s victory over a barren land.
The trip reminds me that this is the third time in four months that I have left Madrid. It feels nice to go outside the city and see things from a different angle. As I look out the window I can see that the mountains the bus has been moving through are now blurred by the clouds that cover them, hovever it may seem as though I am just looking through a foggy window. But the windows of the express bus to Salamanca are clear and clean and the landscape continues to remain alive.

Mike Caring for Carcinoid

My name is Michael Blackwood. I was born in Montague P.E.I. on May 27, 1985. I am the sixth child of my parents. I have 2 sisters and 8 brothers one of those is my identical twin Tim. I like to play the violin, the Spanish language, and Spain. My family is the community I grew up in and it is a very important part of my life.
My parents work a lot. My Dad is a family doctor. My mom is many things; she works as the office manager of my Dad's family practice and has brought up ten kids. She turned fifty, one year ago. Shortly after, she was diagnosed with carcinoid a rare form of neroendocrine cancer. She likes to play the piano.
I’m studying music and Spanish in Madrid. My twin brother Tim and I live in a working class district called “La Latina.” We rent two rooms from a woman from the Dominican Republic. The rooms don’t have heat but it's still a neat place to be. I'm thinking of returning to Spain this coming year to continue my studies.
As a young person it is easy to feel as if there is no end to life. Yet the more reality calls my name, it says that life is not meant to be ignored. My mom having carcinoid is one of those realities. The future is what will come and the present is what we have in our veins.

Mike