Never Square One

We are never back to square one. It may feel that way:

 ~ frustration, 

      anger

        annoyance!

years of life and learning 

gives opportunities 

to shape new circumstances 

with well used lessons.

“In the oddity or maybe the miracle of life, the roots of something 

new frequently lie in the decaying husks of something old.”

~ Craig D. Lounsbrough, writer

Making a Plan

Making a plan 

nothing fancy 

It’s only one small room

But I don’t know what 

  and l don’t know how 

   and I don’t know if

Maybe I’ll put it off

Til I need it ~ I wonder when that will be

At least it’s not today.

When should I start?

“Don’t spin your wheels and stress. Take a deep breath, 

centre yourself and make a plan.”

~ Douglas Adams, writer

(1952 ~ 2001)

A Tiny Life

Each tiny life 

Clings

Grows

Unfurls

Becomes one

Of the many 

In the beginning 

Delicate and precious

“Life is a series of tiny miracles.”

~ Mike Greenberg, radio host

(From A-Z Quotes)

Beginning Again

Beginning Again

Spontaneous. That’s what his buddies would think when they found out. Old Mr. Johnson across the street was watering his roses. He waved to him. His neighbour just scowled at him, turned the water off and rolled up the hose. Jack was pretty sure he’d go in, tell his wife he’d seen him and mention how rude he’d been. Jack never could figure him out why his neighbour thought he was rude. He had always tried to be friendly. The old man and his wife would be watching. They watched everyone on the street and if they didn’t know for sure what people were doing, they made it up. Jack put his briefcase down. He squinted up at the sun. It was a lovely warm and calm day. Looking over at his garden, thinking of all the work they had put into their house, he picked it up again. About to go down the steps to his car, he said “No, not this time.” He looked around to see if anyone was in ear shot. Their marriage had started out idyllic and joyful. For six years it had been beautiful. She left him. Just like that. One day she was gone. After that, he just continued going to work, smiling, going out with his friends after work. So many blind dates. Jack shook his head. None of them lasted more than two dates, if at all. Eleanor had been his one and only. None of the others even were even close to her. “Maybe I shouldn’t have put her on a pedestal. No one could ever live up to that glossy image of her." Jack turned back to the front door of his ordinary house on that ordinary street. He locked the door for the last time and put the keys in the mailbox. Taking his gray suit jacket off, he put it and his wallet in the saddle bags of his bicycle, put his black helmet on. 

Jack rode away. He didn’t know where he was going or how long he’d be riding. He only knew that his life had become too rote and secluded from a world of possibility. 

“I could stay, and search for what had been home, or I could go, 

now, before the walls shifted and the ways out was shut.”

~ Tara Westover, Educated

Chapter Two, Episode Sixty-Two - It’s Only a Beginning - Situationally Theirs

It’s Only a Beginning

Dez had been getting steadily more restless. Walking the track everyday was necessary, but boring. Sometimes she’d have Brewster with her, sometimes her sister would walk with her, but most of the time she was on her own. The days that she had a companion, it did break the monotony of just going around in circles. She missed her own bed, her own walls, her own stuff. Even if it was a rented apartment. She had lost interest in her painting - still grateful that her sister had made a special trip to get it for her. Matt had been too busy to meet with her about her tiny house idea. Each time she rounded the far end of the track she had to pass the tangled old hedge where she first had the questionably brilliant idea. Her eyes and her heart tried to see that first vision. There were days when she couldn't see it at all and wondered how she could even have thought it was a good idea. 

“Miss Dez! How're you feelin’ today? I’m startin’ work on that old garage today. Want to join me? You must be gettin’ awful bored, not being able to get out as often ‘cept to walk this track.” Samuel had appeared as if out of nowhere, wheelbarrow filled with tools, garbage bags and a big push broom across it. “Samuel! You startled me. Too involved with giving Brewster her loves and ear scratches.” Dez had been able to get down to Brewster’s level and had been granted a good face wash. “Brewster! No! That’s just gross and I’ll have to go all the way back to the house to wash my face properly.” Laughing at her predicament, she stood up. Dez loved dogs, but did not love the face wash. They’d have to work on that.

“Thanks, Samuel, but I’m not dressed for garage renovations. But if you’re working on it tomorrow, I could come out all ready and have my walk too.” The clouds had parted and the winter rain had stopped. Gulls floated on high currents in the blue skies. It was almost shirt sleeve weather. For December on the Island, this kind of weather was not always usual, but was always welcomed. A reprieve from the Island’s winter darkness and rain. “Didn’t you just say you had to go the to the house to wash your face. You could get work clothes on and come on back. But if you’d rather count on the clouds to stay away…..” Samuel’s words drifted behind him. He had picked up the wheelbarrow handles and headed down the path at the end of the hedge. Dez called after him. “What will you be doing? My balance is real good now, but I won’t be doing any heavy lifting yet.” She hoped that he had heard her. Calling over his shoulder he said “Just tidying up inside before I start the heavy work. James said there used to be some boxes of Christmas things stored there. You come on if you want to…….and ask Elizabeth for a couple of sandwiches and a thermos of tea.” He disappeared behind the hedge with his load. Dez heard him struggling with one of the doors. She called out “I’ll be right back and bring you some lunch.”

~~~~~

Now that she had a purpose, it really didn’t take her long to get to the house. Cook had the lunch all ready to go. Even enough for her, as well as some fresh baking. “How did you know, Cook?!” Cook laughed. “I could see you and that old man talking, then you came up here right away. I just looked at the time and he wasn’t giving you the weather report. I’ve packed it all in your backpack. Be easier for you to carry it out there.” Work clothes on, Dez had Cook help her adjust the backpack. Settling it on her shoulders, she thanked Cook and set out. Once at the garage, she called to Samuel. “We’re back. Brewster followed me up to the house and waited outside for me. He found a patch of sun and got comfortable. Here’s our lunch. Cook had it all ready for me before I even got to the house. The two of you must have telepathy!” Dez and Samuel laughed in unison. “I don’t know about telepathy, but she’s gone and done that before.” 

Dez surveyed the garage. Cobwebs and dirt. That’s all that seemed to be there. “No lights in here yet and the back windows are so dirty that light doesn’t much get in.” Samuel was sweeping up the middle of the floor. “Just need to clear some space so we can get to the boxes over there in the corner. Then there’s that old work bench and all the drawers and boxes.” Dez squinted in the corners he had indicated and walked over to the work bench. It wasn’t until her eyes had adjusted to the light that she noticed them. “This old building is structurally safe, Samuel?” Once she got inside, she felt a little uncertain about their safety. “It’s good, Miss Dez. Wouldn’t have let  either of us in here if I wasn’t sure of it. Here, clear off a space on that workbench. We’ll have to eat standin’ up so might just as well keep workin’ at the same time.” Dez was trying to clean off the windows, just small squares of brittle glass. “Look in the wheel barrow. There’s some wet and dry rags in there, some window cleaner too.” 

The two worked in silence for the afternoon, not noticing the time until darkness hampered their work. Besides the windows and the floor, the boxes in the corner had been dusted off, Dez separating them out on the floor. She’d go through them tomorrow. Some of them were quite heavy, some light. Some rattled and some seemed packed with books. The work bench would have to wait till the next day too. She suddenly was aware of the good exhaustion she felt. “You ready to call it quits for today, Miss? I sure am and this old dog is fussin’ at me for her supper. We’ll walk you back up to the house.”

“The beginning is always today.”

~ Mary Shelley

Sky

Sunshine and cloud streak across the sky,

a kaleidoscope of colours and textures from sunrise to sunset

shaping this new beginning of mine;

a grand welcome from my growing-up place.

“Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.”

~ Terry Pratchett, A Hat Full of Sky

Back to Basics ~ 2

I don’t like this.

this blankness

this gray-white silence

like a low thick fog

settled in my mind

letting go 

of daily episodes

storied fictional lives 

necessarily set aside

has left a void, a vacuum

Beginning again

to find the other

stories, lives and loves

gently pushes me 

back to basics.

“Check your heart and make sure your 

intention steers you in the right direction.”

~ Norhafsah Hamid, Back to Basics

Cheers!! - CHEERS ~ Theme for January 2020

At the beginning of each month, I choose a new theme for my writings. I’m not always successful in capturing the theme I’ve chosen, however I always enjoy the word crafting. Each January, the theme is rather more important. 'Cheers' is the word of the day for New Year’s gatherings. It’s also a word heard at banquet tables, at bars or between friends around the kitchen table at any time of the year. I like to think that cheer is somewhat attainable for us all, especially when coming out of dark times. For some, times and situations are very dark, when hope seems to have been merely a dream. So I say 'Cheers!' to everyone for this New Year that we may all find our way, backlit by friendship, fellowship and good cheer.

Come forward……

Health and wealth……

Energy that hasn’t existed…..

Enthusiasm builds slowly……

Renewal and rest are……

Substitutions for last year’s….

“Each age has deemed the new-born year 

The fittest time for festal cheer.”
~ Sir Walter Scott

Time to Make Change

Each item has special meaning.

Naive beginnings 

begin the churning of our hearts when

we grow up and step outside the comfort and discomfort of adolescence that trails through the next years from our youthful fanfares and fun, astonishing growth and sometimes sad brokenness.

Naive beginnings, new emotional layers, never really lost,

keep our hearts astir when

we grow well past adolescence ~ 

discomforts and comforts of the several years of adult busy-ness set aside until time to make change 

for a new/old comfort zone.

“The important part of growing older was the growing part. Resisting 

change meant forever standing still, which was a sad way to live.”

~ Barbara Delinsky, Blueprints

Turning - CHANGE - Theme for November 2019

Turning

Customary clothes and coins…

Habitual steps to…….

Always a struggle…….

Naive beginnings…….

Great and simple……

Effects are not what…….

“Everyone thinks of changing the world, 

but no one thinks of changing himself.”

~ Leo Tolstoy

A Writing Saga

To write anything when

there is no beginning

obvious to my fingers

with the middle hovering 

patiently in the background

crowded with details and characters

before the ending gathers

all the wandering fragments

to tie them up with a ruffled bow of

Perfection!

Or 

That ending leaves me cold.

Or 

I wonder what happened to the characters….

“The beginning is the word and the end is silence. 

And in between are all the stories.”

~ Kate Atkinson

In-Between

The strange push pull of

letting go and moving into the new

when both are necessary….desired…

standing….rocking… in between

looking for 

   a place of resilience

    a place of comfort

finding peace and joy in these moments

of letting go into a new beginning.

“There is something special about the beauty in the unclear, 

the ambiguity, the in-between that you can’t totally recognize.”

~ Alessandro Michele

Newness ~ 1

There is always a stirring when spring is just around the corner. Here in Victoria, snowdrops blooming and daffodils in bud remind me, just in case I may have forgotten. On the prairies, spring always felt much farther away with winter winds and snow, reminding me to just be patient. 

That stirring to plant, to get my fingernails deep in the dirt, to get out in the garden or fields is not a new feeling.  Wherever I have lived, once adjusted to the climate, I have felt it's depth, the longing to be part of the earth. For many of us, living on our own, in a suite, in the middle of a city, where patios and window sills are our only gardens, it can take a good bit of creativity to respond to the coming of spring. 

I’ve accepted a challenge to avoid buying anything new for this year. Of course, this must be tempered by good judgement. Spring time does put a bit of extra pressure on this ‘avoiding newness’ challenge. But for the sake of beauty and soul satisfaction, I was willing to use some good judgement. After all flower pots and patio containers need new seed, new plants and some, a bit of new soil. Starting with these little violas for my window sill, I have bought and brought some lovely newness into my home. 

The deer had a lovely munch on the bush outside the window!

Awakening to the newness of each day opens onto many possibilities. Granted, we don’t always jump out of bed with enthusiasm. As our eyes open, our feet feel each step, we are slowly able to reshape the morning to fit our our desires. For today, my stirring to plant was satisfied by these little violas for my window sill.

“Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.”

~ George Bernard Shaw