17 X 3 = 51. A Reflection on My Life from the Perspective of the Life-Cycle of Cicadas

Uncategorized 1 Minute
day-of-the-locust-2Download

Here is a little essay I wrote when thinking about this year’s eruption of the Brood X cicadas in the eastern United States, an event that happens every seventeen years. I’ve taken a few literary liberties here: my actual birthday is in April, and I think that was 18 or 19 years old in the first photograph.

Published by murraymcclellan

As a retired teacher who has fled the US and is now living in Spain, and as someone who has until now eschewed most forms of social media, I am belatedly beginning to create an online presence. To that end, I am using this WordPress website to archive some of my miscellaneous non-academic writing.  I hope that some of my friends and former colleagues may enjoy this collection, which consists mainly of political editorials, light-weight essays, and silly poems.  I also post here the latest version of my US History textbook, Key Moments in American History.

Published

4 thoughts on “17 X 3 = 51. A Reflection on My Life from the Perspective of the Life-Cycle of Cicadas”

  1. Thanks, Murray, for that wonderful essay. You made my morning.

    ernie

    On Thu, Mar 25, 2021 at 5:11 AM Murray C McClellan wrote:

    > murraymcclellan posted: ” day-of-the-locust-2Download Here is a little > essay I wrote when thinking about this year’s eruption of the Brood X > cicadas in the eastern United States, an event that happens every seventeen > years. I’ve taken a few literary liberties here: my actual” >

    Like

    Reply

  2. That was lovely, Murray, and quite a fabulous teen picture! We are chugging along in relentless pandemic demands of work and family and needs. Rather like swimming upstream in mud. But I am fully vaccinated and Tom gets his first next week, so that is such a relief! May yours come soon and we hope to see you someday in Spain! Right now I am planning a grip to VT to get my haircut. Those small pleasures. Love to you both, Barbara

    Like

    Reply

    1. Thanks, Barbara. I do know what you mean about swimming upstream in mud. Glad to hear that you and Tom are getting your vaccines. Not clear if and when Pam and I are going to get ours; although we are official residents of Spain, we are not on the Spanish national health system that is administering the vaccines here (we have private health insurance) and while we think that we were able to get on the notification system here in Asturias, we are still waiting to see if we will get a call when it is our turn to get vaccinated. (They are still on the over 80s here–1/4 of the province’s population is over 80, a testament to how many young people have fled the villages for jobs in the the bigger cities to the south.) In the meantime, our city-limits lockdown has ended and we are able to get out to the little late-18th-century chapel we bought last year in a charming village that is a 15-minute drive away. I’ve planted a tiny garden out there, and we are now starting to have barbeques there.

      Like

      Reply

Leave a comment