~ On Receiving a Parcel of Books ~

Do you know how it is to have chosen, with excruciating care, the next additions to your library, and to have waited for their delivery with the excitement of a child?

Do you know how it is to find a card in your mailbox advising you a parcel has arrived?

Do you know how it is to present the card at the counter and have the clerk heft a sturdy box into your expectant arms?

Do you know how it is to cradle the box with infinite tenderness, transporting it from the Post Office to the truck, from the truck to the kitchen, from the kitchen to the blessed sanctuary of the library?

Do you know how it is to catch your breath as you open the flaps, and gasp as light falls upon the covers and dustjackets cloaking the volumes within?

Do you know how it is to lift six books to your face in turn, smelling their heady perfume of paper and ink?

Do you know how it is to sit with these new books, stroking their spines with your thumb and tracing their embossed titles with your forefinger?

Do you know how it is to open each book - no more than 90º, their backs are delicate - and let the pages fall gently over one another?

Do you know how it is to close your eyes as the cool whisperbreath of inkwords kisses your face?

Do you know?

.:sigh:.

It is bliss.



Peace ~

~ Rescue ~

I have fallen in love. It is not to be wondered at, nor should anyone be surprised - I fall in love with someone/something/somewhere/somewhen daily - but this time ... this time it is different.

Oh alright, perhaps it is not different so much as it is 'here we go again.' Fine, have it your way.

Still ... who can blame me?

She is, as so many of my greatest passions have been, a rescue case. She had been condemned to what amounts to being drawn and quartered. That is to say, she was to have died a horrendous death, to have been donated to the firemen for extrication practice ... eaten, ironically, by the Jaws of Life.

By the time twenty-four hours have passed, she will have taken up residence in our back driveway.

Her looks have faded, it is true, but she has the bones of a great beauty, and I have no doubt she will respond to loving care.

She has not yet told me her name ... though I am certain I can hear her whispering ...


Peace ~

~ I Love My Country ~

Should you ever visit my country, let me tell you the Rockies are not to be missed. This country is exquisite from coast to coast to coast, but there is nothing quite like the Rockies .... although ..... close in splendour are fields of flax in full flower .... and whispering waves of wheat just before harvest .... the secret hush of dim and mossy forest .... the wild crash of water against rock down east .... the peaceful kiss of water on sand out west .... the massive silence of the north, where sky and land meet at that magical point and become one .... the sharp, severe slice of southern summer wind, as dry as old bone .... this is a beautiful land .... yeah, I love my country ....


~ Peace

Mylene
30 July, 2010

~ I Have A Letter ~

I have a letter.

“Frrrom Rrruss-ia,” I say aloud, rolling the r’s and flattening the vowels. It seems the thing to do.

The letter sits on top of the other mail on the seat beside me as I drive home from the Post Office. “Frrrom Rrruss-ia,” I say again as wait for water to boil for tea. I lay the letter on the desktop while I pay the phone bill.

It is a slim envelope bearing five stamps and three cancellation marks, resting, feather-light, in my hands. I admire the precise printing, smile at the numbers formed in penmanship typical of the part of the world from which the letter originated. I tally the cost of postage, and wonder what the conversion is to my own dollars.

I lay the letter on the table while I make supper...

...and clear the dishes...

...and watch the news.

I lean the letter against the soap dish on the counter while I have my bath...

...and check my email...

...and drink another cup of tea.

Letters have had fascinating journeys. Letters have travelled by truck, by plane, by train. Letters have gone under and over. Letters have gone through. Despite the 8,054 kilometres separating me from its sender, this letter has spent 58 days travelling from half-way around the globe. It has been a long passage, so I let it rest until it is ready to share its secrets.

It is time.

I am careful to slit the envelope neatly along the top edge. Careful, too, withdrawing the letter. I devour the words, then return to the beginning and read through again, more slowly. I smile. I sigh. I return the letter to its envelope and prop it against my tea mug.

I will read the letter again tomorrow, before slipping it into the small, worn trunk in my library - the keeper of the words that have come to me from across the globe. “Frrrom Rrruss-ia,” I will say, then fasten the latch.

Peace ~

~ A Mother Knows ~
for Scott


because you hadn’t shown for days
we knew you gone
they disagreed
they asked her what was in her gut
and she said: death
he ravine has swallowed him up
she said

a mother knows

officials think not know
so they refused to look
it will all be well they said
believing wrong everything

a mother knows

you lay dead at the bottom of it
all the while
waiting and awaiting
knowing

they found you - finally - and were sorry
of course
their contrition useless after the fact

ashes to ashes

two birds
eagles maybe or hawks
rode the wind for you

or with you

floated above the tears
pressed their wings
against the sky
against the earthly sorrow
they could not ease

we let you go
with God?
with peace?

with reluctance

we planted a tree for you
dampened the ground with our tears
we dug into the soil
and changed the face of the Earth
for you
for remembrance
and for everything
a mother knows

~ Peaches ~

I am five. It is the first year I have been allowed to go on holidays with my parents, and we have driven across four provinces to visit Grandma (whom I have missed every day since they moved from Manitoba) and Grandpa (who is sometimes cross).

We are out touring, seeing the valleys and the orchards, marvelling at the mountains. It is getting on in the day, and the light has begun to change colour. It must be ninety degrees, the grown ups have said, and isn’t it hot, they have asked one another, then murmured in agreement.

Grandma and I are sitting together on the passenger side in the back seat. The world flies past outside the car, and stands still inside it. Grandma shows me how to properly experience the peaches we bought at a roadside stand, peaches larger than both my fists together. She shows me how to brush them against my face, and feel their velvety sun-warmth before I bite through their skins. Peach juice runs down our hands, our wrists, our arms, and we lick it off ourselves and off each other's elbows. What we aren’t licking, we wipe away with Kleenex because we can’t keep up, the peaches are so juicy. We are shaking with the effort of muffling our giggles, our sight blurs with tears of silent laughter. We are being as quiet as we can be so Grandpa doesn't notice us, see the mess we are making of ourselves, and get cross.

The window is open and Grandma's hair dances around her temples. The evening light has made her cheeks the colour of our peaches. I lay my head against her chest and look up to see the slanting rays have illuminated the fine hairs on her face, creating a delicate halo.

The peaches are Grandma, Grandma is the peaches.

We are sticky and full to the top, and we smell as sweet as summertime. Grandma smiles and closes her eyes against the sun, and so do I.

This moment never, ever ends....

Peace ~

~ Apron Strings ~

Grandma wore aprons. Grandma wore hair nets with beads as well (which I thought were perfectly splendid in a mysterious, other-generational sort of way) but those don’t figure so prominently in my memory as do her aprons.

She didn’t wear hostess aprons which were more decorative than functional, and she didn’t wear little half-skirt type aprons with dainty pockets and coordinating ties. No, Grandma wore proper, full-coverage aprons with high bibs that kept splashes and garden soil off her dress, and broad straps that marched over her shoulders, crossed in the middle of her back, and buttoned to the waistband. Grandma wore serious aprons with back hems that could wipe gravel from skinned knees, sturdy aprons with pockets that could hold enough pegs for a whole line of laundry or enough peas for supper, generous aprons with skirts that could fold up to become a gentle nest for two bouquets of sweet peas and enough raspberries for desert.

Grandma played with her aprons - smoothed them over her lap, toyed with the pocket tops, fiddled with the edges. By the time I got to know her, she was grey-haired and becoming frail. By the time I got to know her, she was so set in her ways that wearing an apron over her dress and under her cardigan was what one expected to see...except when she went to church.

I loved Grandma’s aprons - loved the way they looked, loved their colours, loved their patterns. I loved the simple intricacies of their straps and buttons. I loved that there was always enough scoop to the neck to show off the brooch pinned to her dress underneath. I loved what they represented.

I still do.

Somehow, that part of it all becomes more important as the year-distance between us here on Earth grows.

I have - and use - several aprons, but none so substantial as the ones Grandma used to wear. I have a pink cotton apron (dusty rose, really, since it has been around since the 1980’s when dusty rose was fashionable) with a bib...but the bib is small, bearing two crocheted lambs (at least, we think they are lambs, sometimes they look like pigs) in the middle and a ruffle around the edge. It is stained. It is wearing thin in spots. It has no pockets. It is the apron my children tell me they equated with baking and treats...but it is not a Grandma kind of apron.

I have a Christmas apron that has been plasticised, laminated or treated to some sort of process that makes it almost resemble an oilcloth....almost. It is the apron that mostly kept small children mostly clean and mostly dry when they, um, helped me in the kitchen. It is handy and it is dandy...but it is not a Grandma kind of apron.

Treasured are two aprons given to me (indeed, made for me) by my cousin, who remembers Grandma’s aprons with as much wistful affection as I do...and that’s saying something! I know that thoughts of Grandma are attached to those made-for-me aprons, that they were cut and sewn while my cousin was thinking of the oh-so-shy woman who marked us both so strongly - we have marvelled to one another about how a woman of such quiet and gentle demeanour could have had such a powerful influence.

My cousin and I have agreed that somehow...no matter that their straps are narrow and buttonless, no matter that friendly teddies play on the bib of one, and little rose clusters are scattered across the blue ground of the other...somehow they are each, at least to my cousin and I, a Grandma kind of apron.

Peace ~

~ Seasons ~

“Name your favourite season”
she said,
and I balked ~
how do I choose between those I love so much?


Shall I choose Spring for it’s awakening?
For it’s sweet new breath and delicate green lace?
Shall I say ‘yes’ to Spring for the arrival of
blessed warmth
and the appearance of
verdant
new shoots?
Precious Spring ~ I love you best!

Shall Summer ignite my passion?
Summer, with its’ twenty-hour days
and sweaty-degree heat,
Summer of the deepest greens and brightest flowers.
Mosquito-bitten, barefoot Summer ~
you are my favourite!

Shall Autumn’s golden elegance claim my heart?
As shadows lengthen and days darken,
Autumn steals upon me
~ a secret, determined lover ~
whispering
(it’s crisp breath a thrill upon my ear)
of a slower pace.
Autumn, o gilded season ~ how I adore you!

Shall I submit to the crystal promise
Winter leaves upon my doorstep?
Severe of beauty,
fierce Winter demands respect ~
yet, in return,
presents me with a world a-glitter.
Diamond upon diamond,
I am held fast within Winter’s
fearsome thrall.
Season of Ice, you have my heart.



Peace ~

~ Footprints on Hearts ~

There are voices that whisper in the quiet moments. I hear them in my ear - gently, softly. They are the voices of my grandmothers, my parents, my teachers, friends who have loved me, friends who love me still. They are ever-present, they are as Thought and Memory, the two ravens of legend. They guide, remind and chastise me. They encourage me, and they suggest I wait. It is an inescapable fact that we are touched by others as we move through our lives.

If we are truly fortunate we will have loving influences along the way. There will be people who touch our lives in ways we cannot fully explain - people who touch our lives in ways we may never understand. My life has been full of these people, and I hear their voices as I go about my daily tasks.

Perhaps it is an overabundance of sentimentality that keeps me holding fast to the unique and specific timbre of each voice, recalling in minute detail the cadence of speech and the manner of expression of every one. Whether it is the clipped, formal accent belonging to my Grade 3 teacher (a severe Englishwoman with steel grey hair and cerise lipstick), or the eager slur of my youngest cousin (whom I adored and who adored me in return), I hear the words they spoke as clearly as when they were spoken. I may not have grasped the importance of their lessons, and I may not always attain the goals set, or the levels of being that were taught, but the words of their teaching remain unsullied.

Whenever I am tempted to cut corners on a project, my great-grandfather reminds me to “Buy the best you can afford because the cheapest will be the most expensive in the long run.” Should I find myself considering compromising my ideals, it is my mother who says (and this one really annoys me), “You do whatever you think is right.” On the rare occasions I entertain the notion of donning the backless, floor length, baby blue, satin halter dress that was made for me in 1978, my brother’s velvet voice intones, “Isn’t it a bit too...oh, I don’t know....too ABBA for you?”

It is important to remember the lesson as well as the teacher, of course, which is why the little reminders from the recesses of my brain are so welcome. I have a fantastic long-term memory but am lamentably lacking in short-term memory skills. It is for this reason I write things down, making dozens of lists that I invariably forget to take alone with me when I go out to obtain whatever it is I am after. It is impossible to say for certain how profoundly some of these people have affected me...how changed my life has been through my knowing them. I cannot measure their contributions, nor can I assign a value to the wisdom they imparted. I do know that while I am is due, in part, to each one of them...that I would have become a rather different person had any one of them been excluded from my life.

It was Flavia Weedn who said, “Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Others leave footprints on our hearts and we are never, ever the same.”

This is true.

I count myself lucky to have footprints on my heart, and whenever I need to be reminded of the important things, the voices of those I have held dear whisper in the quiet moments - father...mother...brother...grandparents...teachers...friends...and even a few enemies. Their words are important.

Please, Father, may I always listen.



Peace ~

~ The Tale of Three Drunken Bridesmaids ~

Sometimes when one is presented with a barrel of fish, the polite thing is NOT to go fishing, but to graciously decline.

Sometimes, however, the opportunity presented is so beautifully perfect it simply cannot be passed over.

Many years ago, my husband and I were guests at a wedding where the three bridesmaids (it will come as no surprise) were dressed in matching, perfectly hideous gowns. Why brides do that to the women they profess to love best in all the world, I will never understand. (shaking head sadly) I didn’t. I stepped neatly around the issue of choosing bridesmaids’ dresses by choosing my brother to stand as witness for me when I married. Clever, eh?

At any rate, when it came time to leave the wedding, we found ourselves excusing our way through the flock of inebriated bridesmaids on the hall steps. They surrounded us though, and they had hold of our clothing, so without sacrificing it to their painted and coiffured clutches, the only escape was through their maze of questions.

“We don’t know your names,” they giggled, and batted their lashes. We offered our given names. They pounced on mine like a fish tossed to three gulls.

“Mylene,” they giggled, “That’s a different name. What kind of name is it?”

“It’s a French name,” I smiled.

“A French name!” they tittered, and one of them hiccoughed delicately, “Is your family French?”

“No,” I said, “my family is Irish.”

“Irish!” they cooed, their eyelashes fluttering. “So what’s your last name?”

“It’s English,” I answered.

“English!” they laughed, and one of them clapped. There was an expectant pause. “So...what is it?”

I smiled. “It’s English.”

They frowned, blinked several times, and rustled a bit in their horrible dresses. “Yes, you said it’s English, but what IS it?”

I said, “It’s English. My last name...is...English. My name is Mylene English.”

They thought on this, they blinked, they blinked some more, then they laughed. “That’s great! Your family is Irish, your first name is French, and your last name is English.” They were greatly amused.

They turned to my husband and fluttered their lashes, “So are you an English, too?”

My husband, who was born in England, said, “No, I’m not an English, but I am English.”

The flutter of horrible dresses was stilled. The only discernible movement was the rapid blinking of their eyelids, the only sound the faint click of their mascara’d lashes.

“What?” they asked in uncomprehending unison.

My husband smiled his most charming smile and offered again, “I’m not an English, but I am English.”

We grinned brightly at the flustered, fluttering bridesmaids, clad in their horrible, phosphorescent dresses, bade them a ‘good evening’, linked arms and giggled across the parking lot to our car.

“Fish in a barrel,” laughed my Englishman, “just like fish in a barrel!”



~ Peace

~ The Phone Rang Behind Me ~

The way we locate where a sound is coming from is by calculating the difference between the time the sound waves hit each of our ears.

That’s very clever.

Also fascinating.

And helpful.

Sometimes.

This morning I finished clearing up after breakfast, grabbed the white phone, and headed off to make my bed and get ready for the day. I was standing in front of the mirror in the bathroom, putting my hair up when the phone rang behind me. I went back to the bedroom to get the white phone which I had just been holding a few seconds earlier.

The phone was not on the bed. I stood a moment, puzzled, knowing I had just had it in my hand. The phone rang behind me. I thought I must have left the phone on the dresser, so I turned around to look there.

The phone was not on the dresser. I stood a moment, puzzled, knowing I had JUST had it in my hand. The phone rang behind me. I thought I must have covered the phone over when I made the bed, so I turned around to look there, and started pulling back the quilts and blankets.

The phone was not in the bed. The phone rang behind me. I stood a moment, puzzled. I thought I must have dropped the phone into the laundry hamper, so I turned around to look there, and started flinging clothes every direction 'cause I KNEW I had JUST had the phone in my hand SECONDS earlier.

The phone was not in the laundry hamper. The phone rang behind me. I thought I must have left the phone in the bathroom after all, but because the phone had rung five times and I still hadn’t located it, I ran to a different phone, muttering to myself that I would have to find the white phone afterward.

Afterward, I found the white phone............hooked on the back pocket of my jeans.



Peace ~

~ Wint'ry Wednesday ~

Wednesday.

Snowing.

Again.

Alright, still.

.:sigh:.

Sure is pretty, though.

Won't be long before the sky is once again the colour of dresses I see on smashingly elegant creatures wearing gobs of pave jewellery but can never find for myself.

Oh....I know why that is....I have no pave diamond jewellery to wear such a dress with.

Right.

Someone told me the other day she was tired of winter, that it could be all over with now. I said, "But, we need winter, the trees are sleeping!"

She wasn't convinced.

It's true though. And if we didn't have winter, the trees couldn't sleep....we would have to get all new trees and....well....seriously....take a look around....we live in the middle of the Boreal forest....who's gonna replant millions of hectares of forest???

Exactly.

I rest my case.

Peace ~

~ The Guardians ~

(on driving into Canmore, studying the mountains with - as always - much apprehension..."It is possible," says my husband, "they fear you, too.")

they

recumbent giants

expectant sentinels

consider my arrival with

some amusement

for my fear of their

gentle

innocuous presence

envelops

i

within their ancient belly

tremble

in prayer

for safe regurgitation

swallowing stars

and

nibbling at the moon

they

chuckle as 

we

drive deeper

into their darkness

gentle behemoth

free me

release me

return me to

child

and hearth

safely bland

comfortably

same

~ Peace

~ Making a list ~

Three weeks, or thereabouts. I don’t know exactly how many shopping days that translates into, accounting for the Sunday closings and late night openings, but in the end it all amounts to three weeks.  Or thereabouts. During that time, I expect to accomplish an outrageous number of tasks, the listing of which is Herculean in order. I know this for certain because I created an actual list this year. Ordinarily I create a kind-of, sort-of, virtual list which I carry about somewhere in my head. The great thing about having a virtual list is that it can be modified with the greatest of ease. With a virtual list, I can add to, subtract from, shuffle about, and reorganise items so that the things I most enjoy doing (baking shortbread stars, wrapping presents, playing carols on the piano) become (coincidentally, of course) the items of Greatest Importance, and the tasks I am least interested in performing (cleaning the fridge, organising the back hall, not eating all the shortbread stars) become Things To Do Only If I Really Have Time.

I am a huge fan of Christmas - idyllic Ontario landscape, Norman Rockwell Christmas, with a healthy dose of Tasha Tudor thrown in for good measure. Because of this, my virtual list of Things To Do is somewhat idealistic as well. This is why keeping my list in my head is particularly beneficial. At a moment’s notice, laying the coffee table with a tray of artificial ice, studded with ivory tapers and sprinkled with gold snowflakes becomes infinitely more important than making sure the truck is filled with gas. Because I have an unfortunate tendency to get carried away (at least, that’s what my family tells me), I took a giant leap forward this year. I wrote my list out on paper.

That was a sobering exercise.

In order to make certain I would not be caught on Christmas Eve with five things left undone, I determined to make my list complete. I left nothing out, left nothing to memory. I wrote and I jotted, I noted and I scribbled. Somewhere around the middle of the fourth page I began to wonder if perhaps...perhaps I was not rather overestimating myself, my abilities, and my family’s tolerance for madness. Perhaps it all ran to excess.

Perhaps.

I finished writing my list and set it aside with plans to review it later. Like, after some piano playing and the eating of shortbread stars. Although I am very good at making shortbread stars, I am less accomplished at playing piano. My enjoyment of each, however, rivals that of the other, though I do admit shortbread stars have a marginal edge, on account of I can drink scalding tea while eating shortbread stars, but not while playing piano. Who makes the rules around here, anyway?

Well-full and fortified, I returned to the sheaf of paper which had, by this time, assumed an identity of its own. The List lay there on my dining room table, heavy, weighty, full of obligation, daring me to take up the challenge. It was, I admit, a formidable adversary. I am not ashamed to say the part of me (the part that is not overly fond of bloodshed) blanched and reached to throw in the towel, ready to concede defeat without so much as a whimper. The rest of me must be made of sterner stuff, however, for I straightened my back, set my jaw and challenged, “Bring it on!”

I must have said it more firmly than I intended, because I startled the cats from their sleep. They blinked reproachfully before burying their noses in their paws and slipping back under the blanket of slumber. Foolish cats, they had no idea the precarious position their mistress was in. There I was, face to face with an evil entity, in grave danger, squaring off with The List, and the cats (thoughtless, thankless creatures that they are) trundled blissfully back to the Land of Nod.

I was alone.

I stared at The List. The List stared back at me. Neither of us flinched, neither twitched, nor gave any tells. Cue the theme from ‘The Good, The Bad And The Ugly’. Cue any number of Harry Callaghan lines - my personal favourite (and perhaps most appropriate), “You have to ask yourself, ‘Do I feel lucky?’ Well, do you, punk?”

I did.

In merciless Dirty Harry fashion, I tackled The List, striking blow after blow, crossing off duty after duty - for duties each listed item had become, morphing (thanks to The List’s dark powers) from Something To Do in Preparation for Celebration of Christmas into Something Horribly Twisted and Fundamentally Wrong. Such is the power of the written word. As long as it had all remained distantly connected to the virtual list in my head, everything had been fine, the world had been a safe and beautiful place. When I put pen to paper and created The List, I had unwittingly loosed A Terrible Thing. Yes, I take full responsibility for it. As creator of The List, I had no choice but to be destroyer also. Swinging my pen with battlefield precision (the pen is mightier than the sword, after all), I hacked at The List, driving it back, hammering it into inky submission. It was not a pretty scene, my friends, I am glad you were not there to witness it.

At last, exhausted, I emerged the victor. The List had been vanquished. As I dragged my battle-weary carcass to the kitchen in search or restorative shortbread stars and scalding tea, the cats slept...unaware of the life-or-death drama which had played out before their closed eyes.

A mistake is not a mistake if one learns from it. I have learned from my recent folly and have determined never (not ever!) to recreate The List, or anything like it, again. I am Wiser Now and More Humble.

Apart from the obvious benefit of doing away with The List, I find there are other benefits of returning to my former habit of carrying my To Do’s in my head. Now that The List no longer dictates every moment of my life, I find I actually have less to do. There are fewer unfinished tasks hanging over my head, there is less pressure, less panic. I feel a sense of well-being, and I am enjoying the peace of the season. I have presents to give, shortbread stars to eat, and carols to play on the piano. If the lights are never hung, what of it? I have arranged my ivory and gold nativity figures on a cranberry-coloured scarf that once belonged to my grandmother, I have displayed decorations made by each of my five children, and in three weeks, or thereabouts, it will be Christmas Day. Now, without The List, I am ready.

Peace ~

~ Conversation with my son ~

I was sitting in a big chair in my husband’s den, watching him play darts when the phone rang.



Me (having looked at Caller ID): Centre of the Universe, how may I direct your call?

Son: Um, WHERE have I reached?

Me: The Centre of the Universe.

Son: Oh, then I'd like to speak with Jesus please.

Me: I'm sorry sir, Jesus is unavailable at the moment. May I take a message for Him?

Son: Yes. Tell Him the King of Egypt called and he'd like his robe back.

Me: The King of Egypt called and he'd like his robe back?

Son: Yes.

Me: Alright, and would you please tell the King of Egypt he has a hair appointment on Monday at four o'clock?

Son: Monday at four? Sweet. I'll tell him. Oh, and one more thing ma'am....

Me: Yes?

Son: Would you please tell Jesus I can't make the board meeting, that I will be in a supper meeting with the people at Clairsville?

Me: You have a supper meeting with the people at Clairsville, right.

Son: Thank you, ma'am. Have a nice evening.

Me: You're welcome sir. Have a nice evening.



I wish I had captured the expression on my husband’s face after I ended the phone call. It was one of incredulous confusion. I smiled sweetly at him. He said, “What WAS that? Translation, please?”

Translation: Son won't be home for supper, he's at Clair's house, and Mum made an appointment for a hair cut, as requested.

I love that boy’s guts!

(still laughing)

~ Half An Hour ~

Half an hour. Not a long time, really...unless you are holding your breath, then half an hour is an eternity. Einstein was right about Relativity, you know. He was right about a lot of things, that's why they have called him a genius. I don't know that he was a genius so much as he was a thinker. He thought things all the way through. Too many people don't do enough thinking.

But that's just my opinion.

Then again, my family tells me I think too much. They tell me I ask too many questions, too. They ask me why I need to know so many things. I ask them how their questioning my questioning is different from my questioning everything else. They tell me they are late for something they forgot to do...somewhere else...somewhere I am not.

.:shrug:.

I had my coat on at 7:40 this morning, was headed out the door to collect the last of the Remembrance Day wreaths and poppy trays from local businesses before tomorrow's ceremony. About halfway across the front porch, I realised that none of the places I had to collect from would be open until at least nine o'clock...and some places not until ten.

(slap to the forehead)

Right then. Now what?

Half an hour on, I had checked my email, answered my brother, sent out a request, increased my eBay bid on a silk shrug, read several news articles, and swallowed a cup of tea before it was properly cool enough to drink.

Right then. Now what?

A call from work asking if I could come in early - I would, but there is the matter of the wreaths and trays, which I can leave to collect in about half an hour. The process of collecting the final few will take, perhaps, and only because they are located in businesses clustered together in the downtown core, about half an hour.

So you see where my Fixation o' the Day has risen from...this portion, this allotment of time. It isn't even a complete measure...no. By its' own admission, it is only half of the full, and no more. There seems, though, to be some pride taken in that. Then again, perhaps it is only my imagination.

Regardless, these half hours, these thirty minute blocks, seem to have already paced off the length of my day, seem to have marched in stilted, checked strides, the fun I am to take. Half an hour. Halfanhour. One half hour following another like footprints in a muddy garden, stepping off the length of this Monday just ahead of me, in no real hurry to get there first...if at all.

Perhaps we shall arrive together at the end of the day, all these half-hours and I. Or perhaps I will come in behind them. Perhaps I shall lose them over the course of the day as they become distracted, and find something more interesting to occupy themselves with than What I Am Doing Today.

Where are they going? What will they see that I am missing? Did they, I wonder, visit Albert Einstein one moody November morning and, if so, did they accompany him the length of his day? Or did they, rather, weary of his thinking, his questioning, and wander off to see what was happening somewhere else?

The heartbeat of the clock - tick, tock, tick, tock - listen...like the sound of footfalls....it is time walking on....I think I ought to follow...

Oh, look...the writing of this piece took half an hour. Whaddya know about that, eh?

Peace ~

~ There is a Moment ~

There is a moment, driving through the blackness of pre-dawn, when stars and sky and earth become one, where my headlights, or those of my vehicle, anyway, push forward into what seems like nothingness, illuminating the momentary existence of rock and tree, then sweeping past and on, returning those things, relegating them to the void once more.  

And so I press onward, forward, and ahead, until I reach, quite suddenly, that blueing space where definition begins, where form shifts and solidifies, where the upper becomes sky, where the lower becomes earth, and where the middle takes shape, becoming more something than nothing, less nothing than something.

The colours in this place have no name - not ink, not midnight (for surely it is not that), not even dawn, for the light has yet to break.  In this nameless place, this nameless space, my breath is drawn in more measured portions, my shoulders bear no burden, and my eyes perceive only beautiful clarity.  In this nameless space, this nameless place, I find myself smiling in the presence of God.  

It is at that moment the day, The Day, begins.

Peace ~

~ The Conversion ~

My laptop is ailing. Dying, in fact. It is struggling and groaning and is, I fear, not long for this world. I lamented (yet again) the impending demise of my trusty Wordsmithing anvil the other night, and my husband asked (yet again) whether I was finally ready to shop for a new one.

Finally, I was.

My brother has been trying for years to persuade me to make the move from PC to Mac. So far, I have resisted. My husband finally convinced me to take my brother’s advice, and so we went shopping for a MacBook. Online. On my old laptop. The bitterness of such irony, eh? We sat together for hours, comparing, learning, watching the tutorials I had already watched half a dozen times (but don’t tell my husband or brother), and at last, having made my choice, I was ready to place my order. “You should call your brother first,” advised my husband before disappearing to practice darts.

I called my brother.

My brother was excited to learn I had finally seen the light and was about to make The Conversion. My brother was not, however, excited to learn I had chosen the saucy black MacBook that is a step up from the one he has. We may be 44 and 41 years old, but the competition between the engine and the caboose has not diminished in our more than four decades together. Remind me to tell you about our cameras some time. (chuckle)

Anyway, I walked through the order process with my brother, ending up with free this and bonus that, and went to bed that night a little poorer, but all together a very happy girl. I had, after all, a shiny new MacBook on the way….a saucy black MacBook, no less, of which my brother was jealous.

Some moments are too perfect not to savour.

It turns out the items in my order were all shipped separately, so I clicked the various tracking numbers thirty times a day to see where my new toys were. Kanshun, Shanghai, Anchorage, Newark, Memphis, Mississauga, Edmonton…….and…..here? No. Everything sort of stalled once it hit Alberta. Except the mouse – the mouse arrived in record time…but just the mouse, nothing more. I stood in the Post Office staring at the little white thing in my hand and, the absolute picture of dejection, said, “A mouse? Just…a mouse? What’m I gonna do with a mouse??”

It was so sad.

Two days ago I received a text message from my brother: “Has it arrived yet?”

I responded: “Well, the website says they were delivered at noon yesterday, but I don’t have them. I don’t know where they were delivered, I just have a mouse.”

Now, you know that I love a good mystery - mysteries are intriguing and fascinating - but not, I have learned, when shiny new saucy black MacBooks are involved. Mysteries under such circumstances are neither good nor interesting. They are, in fact, not very good at all.

Finally, finally, finally, today I was able to send this text message to my brother: “It is very shiny and it is very black.”

He responded: “Did you hear the angels singing when you opened it?”

When I stop laughing, I will tell him that I did, indeed, hear the angels singing…and then I heard them laughing because they know I have commitments that will keep me from introducing myself to my shiny new saucy black MacBook until the day after tomorrow.

At the earliest.

Bother!

Peace ~

~ 'Bye for now ~

My Uncle Lloyd was buried today.

At least, the part of him that most would recognise as my Uncle Lloyd was.

We know otherwise.

The man who was my Uncle Lloyd has gone on to other things, other places…and we have not. We weep, we keen, we sob until our bellies heave…and he remains gone. Will we ever run out of tears?

For as much as I understand these things, these life circles, these life cycles, I rage at them, they chafe. My aunt has lost her best friend. My mother has lost her hero. I cannot even say what I have lost the sorrow is so deep.

The kindest man, the most patient, the gentlest man, the most honest, is gone from the world. We are all poorer for it.

Thank you, Father, for the very great blessing of having such a man as an influential force in my life.

God keep you, Uncle Lloyd. In your words, the last words you said to me, “Bye for now.”

Peace ~

~ Of Diggers and Visiting Bees...and Tess ~

I am stuck. I am writing assigned pieces and I have gotten myself stuck. Can't go forward, can't go backward, I'm just sitting here, spinning my wheels, shifting gears, rocking myself deeper into the mire.

I am stuck.

What's a girl to do when she gets herself stuck? Well, if you're this girl, and you happen to have gotten yourself stuck in late spring, you go outside and dig in the dirt.

I have brand new diggers, fancy-schmancy stainless steel diggers received as a Christmas gift, diggers that came, as all diggers do, with the expectant hope of green and growing things…so…I take myself out to dig in the dirt, expectant and hopeful.

As I nestle our new lilies into the bed at the bottom of the garden, and wonder whether clover roots are knitted or crocheted (growl, scowl, frown, tug, pull, wrestle), a bee settles nearby, and a gentle commotion at the fence alerts me to the presence of Tess, our neighbour's dog.

Tess likes to visit while we garden. She leans through the small spaces between the fence boards and tells us stories, mostly about how lonesome she is and how many treats she has not had. We don't believe her for a minute (she shares her home with children), but she is so sweet and earnest that we humour her and tell her how sorry we are for the ill treatment she perceives she is subjected to.

Today, Tess pushes her nose through the fence and tells me a very sad tale of loneliness and woe. I have heard this particular story before, but I scratch her chin and try very hard to look in the direction of the visiting bee so she does not see that I am rolling my eyes.

Before long Tess’ account has ended, the lilies have been settled, the knitted (or maybe crocheted) clover has been eliminated from one corner of one bed, my diggers have been properly dirtied., and the visiting bee has moved on to someone else's garden. I scoop weeds into the barrow, slap my gloves together, pull several thistle prickles from my wrists, scrub my hands, and return to my assigned pieces, which I had abandoned in the mire an hour previously.

Curiously, the mire seems to have receded. I sit down to my assigned pieces and find that while I was out digging in the dirt, all trace of ‘stuck’ disappeared…and I write…

Peace ~