Cheese and Groceries

Saturday cartoons have been the only thing missing from today. An in-depth discussion with my son this morning, identified this lack so the replacement was the movie Thor: Ragnarok. Super heroes and super villains in intergalactic battles. Marvellous special effects played out in space and time with just the right amount of cheesiness. But enough of a movie review. 

Once we were all up and moving, the three of us, Jason, Corette and me (mom) set off for the Trout Lake Farmers Market - grand dogs, Eva and Percy, remained at home supervised by grand kitty, Purdy. A chance meeting with friends put a lovely shimmer on the outing. The Farmer’s Market was full of kids, grandparents, parents with strollers and friends shopping for the freshness of the fields, orchards and gardens come to town. As well as produce, there were sausages, meats, fresh farm eggs, milk and cheeses from surrounding dairies and farms. The aroma of fresh baked breads, sparkling jars of honey’s and jams were bookended by stunning pottery and beautifully finished wooden bowls. Of course, there was lemonade to be purchased, our three year old friend clearly reminded us. Two bags of produce, cheese and bread found their way home with us.

This afternoon has been dedicated to visiting and cooking, eating and visiting with no specific plans for how the rest of the day will play out. Maybe out for supper or another cheesy movie at home - maybe both. Who knows? What ever it is, the only guidelines will be nourishment of mind, body and soul - fun and silliness required ingredients. 

“Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans. 

It is lovely to be silly at the right moment.”
~ Horace

Sweetness

Short and simple:

Another train ride past

low tide and cornfields to

Vancouver with my kids and grand dogs.

A sweet bit of nourishment on my little vacation.

Good night

“The longing for sweets is really a yearning for love or ‘sweetness’.”

~ Marion Woodman

Vanishing Acts

Completing the business portion of this little get-away, I stood outside the small, completely non-threatening, brick building housing the Social Security office here in Bellingham. Do I call a taxi? Or do I walk? Because it was only 9:30 and the sky furnace had not cranked up the heat yet, walking seem preferable. I turned on cell phone’s GPS function to see if a walk would be doable. It was a bit far, but I really needed to shake off the tension of the morning. Walking has always been therapy for me - especially for shaking off tension - so away I went. 

The route that the GPS had laid out for me was through quiet residential areas. It wasn’t long before any thought of government offices and officers, applications and ID documents, vanished in the warm summer morning. Tidy, well kept homes and yards suggested comfortable middle class residents. Tomatoes planted on an east facing side of a modest home showed a much greener thumb than mine. I envisioned many pints of tomatoes from that well nourished crop. An expansive community rose garden on a corner lot, drying as the day warmed up, still had many lovely blooms despite the dry conditions. A small detour into a garden center presented an interesting water feature. Against a brick wall, galvanized steel watering cans at measured and different heights demonstrating a real trickle down effect, the water pooling in a small water trough. Then, as I got closer to my hotel, I passed a long stretch of wild and overgrown blackberries, some of them ripe enough for me to snack on as I walked past. 

Now the thermostat was reaching too warm for this amount of walking. My mind, buzzing with anxiety at 9:15a.m., by 10:00 a.m. was only longing for the cool water of the small hotel swimming pool and a big glass of cold water. I was really breaking a sweat! As far as any worries bouncing around my head yesterday? Vanished. Gone. Pool time, out for lunch, reading, taking a nap, more reading, out for coffee, listening to authors .......a gentle afternoon fading into evening.

“Sometimes it’s not the strength but gentleness that cracks the hardest shells.”

 ~ Richard Paul Evans, Lost December

Photo on Facebook page.

Travel Companions

Beginning a trek that I’ve worried about, muddled about, stewed about, and did I say worried about was started with just one phone call, another phone call, .............basically one step at a time. So when it came time to make the actual journey I built in a couple of fun things to accompany me on this fearsome journey

1.  A train ride - never ridden a train before

Well that’s a lie - did take a commuter train several years ago from New York to Connecticut - didn’t fit my image of a real train ride. In my growing up years, out the window of my bedroom knowledge of trains, was steam engines and long passenger trains that roared through the edge of our small prairie town. We counted the cars, waved at the caboose man - if that’s what he was called. But back to my worries. They’ve been accompanying me quite regularly this last few months, only fading now and then. I should have tried counting them like I counted the passenger cars on the prairies. So far there hasn’t been a caboose, so waving at some unknown tiny person has not been an option. 

2. The next thing I built in is a two night stay at a motel where someone else will make my bed, clean my room and make sure I’ve got coffee to make in the morning. My worries will rest well there, only stirring when I’m awake and out the door - in the shower, in the pool (I’m assuming there will be a pool), having my breakfast, or just walking down the hall.

3. Finally and most beautifully, once my arduous (in my mind) trek has been completed, I’ll stop for a couple of days with my three kids and my grand dogs. My worries usually vanish when I am with them because we love each other dearly. I get my face and glasses ‘washed’ by my grand dog Eva, I get a reserved hello from my grand dog Percy, I get awesome hugs from my kids, Jeffrey and the team of Jason and Corette. A perfect debriefing. (The dogs always come first and it is seldom my choice.)

I have only just tonight reached the second step in this journey. From the bus onto the ferry, the same bus to the train station then a taxi to the hotel. On the ferry in amazing sunshine, I took in a presentation by a Parks Canada employee about some of the marine life in the strait we were travelling along with the environmental benefits from them. But the train. The train was the best part of the trip for me. I felt the rocking and heard the wheels clicking over the tracks, but the best thing was being inside of the train whistle. That was a real warm fuzzy for me. Even though I did choose a hotel the farthest from the train station possible it is righ across the street from a Starbucks and does have a pool open 24/7.

So that is my story about worries. Don’t give them too much room to grow, don’t nourish them with even half of your attention. That always pushes everything and everyone away until one is alone and lost in a very muddy sea where your own personal ecosystem gets stagnant and smelly. Mine is just feeling sleepy tonight.

p.s. - I’m working on my iPad and still have not learned how to get an image attached! 

“That the birds of worry and care fly over your head, this you cannot change, 

but that they build nests in your hair, this you can prevent.”

~ Chinese Proverb

Presence

Stay where your feet are

she said

beginning to flip through all

the calendar days and weeks to next year

already out of breath, 

no concern for breakfast,

no knowledge

of who or what

holds her fragile future

only knowing

she must Be Prepared

even for amazing joys or crushing blows

and then she remembers

she hasn’t put on her shoes yet.

“Nature never rushes, yet everything gets done.”

~ Donald L. Hicks, Look into the Stillness

Sharing Summer Sun

Enchanting flowers nourished by rich soil share the energy of the summer sun with tourists who click, roam and wander happily stopping for lemonade or ice cream before wandering on to the next sight to see.

“I like tourists. I think it’s nice to live in a town

 that people come from all over to visit.”

~ David Thewlis, English actor

Standards and Staples

Standards and staples

simple things we keep in 

our minds and our cupboards ~

necessary items to use every day.

For our meals we choose our staples 

gathered while growing up

for our lives we choose our standards

learned while growing up

Some staples will change as we

learn and like new foods

some standards will alter as we

learn grown-up strengths

Spices and passion 

for our standards and staples 

add strength and pizzazz to the

necessary items we use every day.

“As if you were on fire from within.

The moon lives in the lining of your skin.”

~ Pablo Neruda