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Everett, age 13:
“Someday I’m going to put you in a home!”

Me:
“How old will I be?”

He:
“Fifty.”

***

"There is much I want to do today and the 'wanting to do it all' side of me is pushing against the gate waiting none too patiently to be released, but the nurturing, wiser part of me is on the other side of the fence making sure the latch remains locked.

It's Sunday. It's to be a time of reflection, contemplation and communion with the "God within," the sacred part of me. How I do that is by allowing myself this kind of time before I let the other part of myself out of the starting gate.

I don't do this enough lately. Time is scarce. But no time in silence means there is no time to hear the voice within, which holds what Bonnie refers to as my 'Sacred Instructions.' The silence holds the lessons, the words, the intentions, the learning, the direction, the recognition, the love and the wisdom of the Sacred. If I want to hear any of it I must be willing to go to the silence.

This is where I am now - quietly receiving and drinking the gift which will walk with me through the rest of the day."

~ Annette Erickson at The Write Haven.

***

I made it as far as the duck’s nest in the garden without the dog, only to discover a housecat from next door watching over the eggs. Even if the duck returns, hatchlings are unlikely to survive long.

Up higher, birds may have better luck. The European starlings in the eave outside our bathroom window start peeping excitedly every time someone steps into the room. They can’t see who’s coming, but apparently assume whoever it is has a mouthful of worms and insects. We can’t see them either, of course, and even their parents are shy. We only glimpse an adult bird (or birds) flying quickly away from the house whenever we come near, and even then it hides behind a leafy branch when it perches in a nearby tree.

***

Cameron Perry is a young woman in the Toronto area whose webpages I have followed for some time. Not only is she an excellent writer (one of her posts called How to Make the Perfect Omelette belongs in its own newspaper column), she is a talented seamstress and artist. Her business used to be (and perhaps still is) to be hired to go to parties and draw caricatures of the guests. I loved her posts about that.

I got this from her webpage:

"A quote from, of all people, Tom Hanks in this month's Esquire- 'It's binary: Either it works or it doesn't. The language of the universe is math.'
He speaks of movies and of marriages: there's no middle ground, either the project flies or it doesn't."

***

Does anybody watch Just for Laughs on CBC on Friday nights? The crew films the reactions of people to harmless jokes played on them on the streets of Montreal (maybe; it's a French-speaking town anyway, I can tell by lip-reading). Their responses are priceless.

***

We're off to Scott's nephew's grad party this afternoon so I must get a dessert whipped up and make myself presentable. But first, a walk in the grey and cold is in order. I'll have to put on my winter duds again by the look of things.

This unique vase belonged to my paternal grandmother, who was my age, 47, when she died suddenly from a heart attack in the wee hours of the morning. Unable to sleep, she'd gotten up to do some crocheting, and Grandpa found her in an armchair when he got up in the morning.

I have a number of dainty crocheted doilies she made, and her china cabinet (behind the vase you can see it) and dropleaf wooden table and four chairs, and what's left of a set of dishes she won in a curling bonspiel, and I have the heavy tapestry bag she used to keep her needles in, and apparently I look just like her. In pictures of her, I don't see this. But those who knew her do.

I love that! That we look like those who have gone before us. It only makes sense, but ... we think we are so unique, so individual ... and we are ... but physically we are carbon copies of our ancestors.

***

I have been trying for two days to sneak out without the dog so I can ogle the Canada geese goslings at the creek without fearing for their lives when the dog goes swimming after them. I escaped her for a while last night when we were out walking and she went running after a gopher far enough that I could sneak off in another direction. Usually she tracks me down by sniffing out my footprints but this time she didn't and I was rewarded by the sight of a pair of blue-winged teals that didn't fly off when I came near, and a muskrat that plopped itself off a log in the water and paddled slowly away.

I have binoculars and my bird-identification book in a shoulder bag in the porch, ready to grab and take along if the dog isn't out there waiting for me when I step onto the deck—as quietly as possible so as not to tip her off if I am so lucky that she is in the other yard.

It's tempting to tie her up so I can go alone but that would break her little doggie heart.

Yesterday I startled a mother duck off her eggs at the north end of the raspberry patch in our garden, which is as yet unworked and unsown due to the neverending rain. Now I must make sure not to go there with the dog.

When I went grocery shopping on Monday after a trip to Mallard Industries, a "sheltered workshop" in town that is quite impressive — they have business going on there that I had no idea of! — heavy industry, woodworking, shoe repair, catering, recycling, sewing — I've probably forgotten some. We were there to discuss possibilities for Emil finding productive work in this community once he finishes high school. Anyway, after that I went to the Co-op for the coming week's supply of grub.

They had a pretty good sale on canned goods, so I stocked up on beans. Garbanzo beans, brown beans, kidney beans, beans beans. Of course, our storage room being still flooded and overfull to start with, putting everything away when I got home presented a problem.

But it was soon solved. I gave the job to Everett, who attacked it with glee. He enjoyed the doing more than I would have imagined, and was exceedingly proud of the end result.

Obviously he will be most self-satisfied with work that requires organizational skills. He loved the challenge of it.

This flower bed was started in August 2004 after I'd helped our neighbour, Marilou, transplant leftover bedding plants from her commercial greenhouse to her garden and she sent me home with my choice of perennials. I call this bed Marilou's Moon.

It doesn't look like much yet but I am dreaming of the days when everything bursts into colour.

~ Great-Great Grandma with 10-day-old Kade ~

Looks like it's another gorgeous day out there.

Our basement living room is still torn apart, with the larger furniture pulled away from two walls because water still comes in when it rains. Which it seems to do every other day.

Just tearing out the Wadena News page containing three memoriam verses for Mom ... I start to cry. Joan put it so well when she said, “I miss her rotten.”

So I brought my notebook outside to the swing on the grass, where I am comforted somewhat by the beauty of nature. Kirsten, the cat we brought from Karen’s sometime this past year, has joined me on the swing and although I should throw her off so she doesn’t get in the habit and leave the cushion covered with hair, I welcome her warm weight on my thigh and the sound of her contented purr. Sara the dog lays faithfully at my feet and we are surrounded by birdsong.

It’s a beautiful day, sunny with a cooling breeze. I can hear Scott’s brother Bruce around the farmyard with the quad. He must’ve just gone past the stallion, which whinnied loudly in anticipation of food or water.

Scott spent yesterday shingling with Benny, one of our bachelor neighbours who sometimes works with him. They arrived here around suppertime and Everett brought three cold beer up from the basement fridge for we adults, who sat on lawnchairs on the deck. We were swarmed by mosquitoes although I am pleased to report that not all of them seem to bite me. They often check me out, only to bugger off. Scott was irritated enough that I hope it spurs him on to getting the deck closed in sooner rather than later. The sliding glass doors were delivered today so there is nothing stopping him now except a lack of free time.

A European starling has confiscated the sparrows' nest in the eave outside the bathroom window. I hear it scramble frantically to get out of there every time I walk into the room. It then alights on the nearest poplar tree, where I can see it.