Prairie Cheer

Most of our city streets 

are lined with elms, 

old and graceful, while wind scatters their golden leaves

But this is a prairie town 

where trees need to be planted.

this flower 

bloomed colourful relief 

as cars, trucks, buses, service vans rushed by, stirring days end dust, road noise ignored 

by these cheery little flowers. 

“Flowers are for our souls to enjoy.”

~ Sioux proverb

At My Front Door

There is always a story

in every day 

routine and nondescript. 

Like the fellow 

who delivers my groceries ~

always a big smile, 

   a happy voice and

     a cheerful aura. 

Black hair wild and wiry.

His bulk carries my groceries

and his cheerfulness easily

~ this is a story at my door.

“We’re all stories, in the end.”

~ Steven Moffatt, 

Scottish TV writer and producer

Cheer and Charm ~ A Tiny Story

Cheer and Charm were twins. Two little guys with shiny brown curls and big twinkling brown eyes. When Cheer was caught taking cookies from the cookie jar, Charm would just smooth the way with their mom and they both got more cookies. Both of them had smiles that melted the grumpiest of people. You know, those people who’s hearts are stuffed in their back pockets. Cheer and Charm were quite a team, getting away with all the mischief that five year olds could think of. But when it came to a bird with a broken wing, a cat all scruffed up from living outside too long, anyone in need of a five year old’s hug they turned all their sweetness on them. They could find homes or shelter for any of them, by bringing them home to their mom. “She always knows what to do. You know, the phone numbers for helping.” So inside a smile and a laugh, might be someone with a soft squishy heart that dials down their excitement to help.

“You will discover that you have two hands, One is for 

helping yourself and the other is for helping others.”

~ Audrey Hepburn

Have a Good Day!!

I have depended on Transit Systems, in Victoria and now in Regina since 2017 and have appreciated all the men and women behind the wheel. Not everyone is cheerful and welcoming, but I don’t think that’s part of their job description. There are the singers, the radio listeners, the stoic quiet ones, and the cheerful ones. I don’t always know who will be behind the wheel on any given day. But I do have a favourite driver on the route I use the most often.

On my way to my appointment today, the bus was 15 minutes late. There’s lots of reasons for buses to be late, but I still get quietly annoyed. On my way home three hours later, I sat at the bus stop, hoping that the bus would be on time. I was tired with a load of groceries. I kept checking my phone for the time and the road for my bus, certain it would be late. 

My phone said I still had four minutes to wait. I looked up and there, in the distance, making the turn onto Albert street was…..you guessed it……..my bus! Early! My tiredness vanished. It had to be my favourite driver and it was. Always a big smile and a welcome. To everyone that comes on the bus....everyone. And that’s not all. Everyone that exits the bus hears her call out: "Have a Good Day!!!"

“Everyday make it a point to be the reason for someone’s smile.”

~ Trishna Damodar, author

A Bit of Cheer

Far afield for spring flowers 

I went.

everywhere beneath the snow, 

they're bent!

Blizzards swept this land of ours ~

Covering everything for hours

So weather or no, we need some cheer ~

Through my photos, digital flowers are here.

“It is deep winter with shivering cold air, 

but heart is dancing with joy and spring flowers.”

~ Debasish Mridha, American physician, philosopher and poet

My Garden Plots - Potted Pansies

When garden plots are far away,

pots filled with soil are best to grow

purple pansies rimmed in white, 

tiny yellow centres all aglow ~

cheerful greetings at the door

sweet faces upturn to say hello.

“There are always flowers for those who want to see them.”

~ Henry Matisse

Short Listed

It can’t be just me that…

forgets to write down appointment times

or doesn’t perfectly measure things right.

It can’t be just me that… 

loves plants and puppies and kittens

or feels joy in lovely black soil in the spring

It can’t be just me that…

sheds tears carefully in the dark at a movie

or sobs deeply at the loss of a loved one.

It can’t be just me that….

enjoys using an iron and ironing board

or has sadly missed out on being perfect.

“Have no fear of perfection ~ you’ll never reach it.”

~ Salvador Dali

Desk Drawer Memories

Brass keys that once opened the locks of long forgotten doors. One loose staple that strayed from its little blue box. Polished multicoloured rocks. Bits of paper ~ their purpose? A beautiful green lacquered stamp holder with delicate red flowers. Its purpose? For rolls of stamps not used for many years, it is a treasured gift. File folder labels ~ red, green, blue and yellow. A pastel turquoise tiny stapler laying on its side beside a quite stern looking brown staple remover. And a single pad of sticky notes with a nail clipper and file on top. All of this tossed and jumbled in one desk drawer. As I pulled everything out leaving an empty, dusty side drawer, Harry James Big Band was playing. The vocalist, I think it may have been Bing Crosby, sang the words ‘the album of my memory’. Well, a cluttered desk drawer is not exactly as ordered as an album, yet is still full of memories. Some of the memories, like the keys, are lost in the fog of too many moves. Why do we keep keys?!

With each drawer that I open, I find tiny slivers of memories. It may be a memory of what my intention was, like keeping my file drawers in order. Or it may be a precious gift. Then again, it may be purely utilitarian, like my stapler and staples. Whatever their original purpose or use, they wedge into the tiniest of corners and cracks, much like memories of how to peel apples or knead dough. Marie Kondo, the Japanese organizing consultant, is known to say something like, if it doesn’t bring you joy, dispose of it. I quite agree. Going through this one small drawer, was rather bitter-sweet. A saying of my own is to find the soul within the task. So, clearing and organizing this small bit of clutter, will use these principles. Memories will always stay ~ well almost always. Re-purposing those precious items unhappily relegated to messy clutter, may be a solution. The scary potential of this joy and soul finding belongs to tomorrow’s project.

“Every time I open the drawers it’s a trip down Memory 

Lane, which if you don’t turn off at the right exit, merges 

straight into the Masochistic Nostalgia Highway.”

~ Sloane Crosley, writer

Re-Minding

We all need some form of reminder. The favourite, I think, are the multicoloured sticky notes that reside on refrigerator doors, wave to us from the pages of novels and text books and chide us from our bathroom mirrors. Get bread and milk. Read that selection at book club. Remember the wisdom of that author. Do your exercises this morning. 

At Bubby’s Nosherie on Cook Street, at almost five p.m., I was just finishing up my afternoon writing project. I paused. Not really in shock, but a bit surprised. I’ve not needed a reminder to write this blog for the over eight years I’ve been writing and posting it. It has brought me joy, has asked questions and developed solutions. I’ve plumbed the depths of my ideas and many of my activities. Written badly, in silliness and rare times of ‘not bad!’.

Yesterday, I had moved my ‘reminder’. This slim copper coloured laptop I write on has had pride of place on my dining room table for the last four years. Moved yesterday, onto my desk in my spare room, I created an unconscious interruption to my morning flow! Spanish class, this morning, was just a further interruption. 

How many of us set ourselves specific time frames to get things done, these habits of years of working within or believing in the necessity of schedules. Scheduled reminders full of pressure and ‘must do’ attitudes. Rigid routines, imprinted slowly and quietly on our home lives, do have their value by keeping us able to develop some form of work/life balance. For me this afternoon, it was quite a pleasure to find that, although surprised, I did not set about beating up on myself. The personal pressure was gone. There is much cheer in that kind of calm self-esteem. 

As far as my morning routine goes, it has become time to develop a new one. One that is fluid and flexible. I still want to write and post on this blog before noon each day. Any time from eight a.m. to noon, but only because I want to. The ‘have-to’ attitude is no longer of value. Creative writing does have value for my daily life. 

“The human spirit lives on creativity and dies in conformity and routine.”

~ Vilayat Inayat Khan, 

June 1916 - June 2004

Cheerful #2

Tiny acrylic painting
 by Ruth Van Egmond
Victoria Artist

Long and tall

Not me at all!

“A person’s a person,

no matter how small.”

~ Dr Seuss

Cheerful!

Short and sweet ~

Merely a tweet!

“I love those who can smile in trouble….;”

~ Leonardo da Vinci

Bouquets

Dark curly hair topped his sweet face. ’Bye’! From the stroller navigated by his mom, he waved and smiled to the bus driver…. 

Canadians are often said to be polite and today, one little Canadian proved that some of us start young! Alighting at a signalled bus stop, most of us, men, women, teens, children ~ grumpy or cheerful ~ do say thank you or offer a ‘have a good day’.

Bus drivers are paid and have good union support. Why should we say thank you to someone for doing their job? Because, in their chosen career, they do for us what we cannot do or choose not to do. We get to our destinations safely despite the traffic of the day. Walkers, bicycles, strollers. Suitcases, shopping trolleys, umbrellas, bicycles, groceries, plants. Winter or summer. Dripping wet with rain or snow filled boots.

Do these men and women that take us hither and yon get tired, by the end of a long shift, of replying pleasantly to each and every one? It is a wonder. Today, the broad smile on the face of this morning’s bus driver told me that special ‘Bye!' was a highlight for his day.

“Everyone appreciates being appreciated”

~ Lance Greenfield

Fallow

rhythm rests

when words are trapped

like tumbleweeds hung

against stunted elm trees 

tangled in mesquite

on a dry Texas plain.

seeds of whimsy

await a fresh wind.

“We never know the worth of water till the well is dry.”

~ Thomas Fuller

The Ultimate Opportunity

In my nursing career, I frequently reminded clients that one can always get on a waiting list. Granted, in these instances, the waiting lists were related to health care, housing, or even funding. But I was presented with a similar dilemma last week as I perused the Continuing Studies @ Uvic Calendar for Jan-Aug 2020. Languishing in my so-called inbox for a couple of months, I was tempted to put it in the recycling. I was certain all the classes would be filled up. But in the spirit of following through on a personal interest, I opened it and went immediately to the Visual Arts section. Looking for writing classes, I found Chronicling the Stories of Your Life. Aha! A writing project that’s been in the works for quite sometime exactly relates to this class. Zipping over to my iPad, I looked it up. Oh, darn. It’s full. Just as I was about to close the link, I spied the words ‘Waiting List’ in the corner of the screen. I remembered those reminders to my clients ~ ‘Get on the waiting list’.

As of one week ago, I took my own advice and am now on the waiting list for Chronicling the Stories of Your Life. Writing forms a big part of every day for me. Not just this blog, but my personal journal, the occasional review for a fellow writer and the inevitable shopping list. On my blog, Standing Still Slowly, I’ve become a novice writer of book reviews and movie reviews, muses and poetry, and in general the activities of life that I’ve shared with family or friends. And then there's reading about writing. Although I 've taken several writing classes and workshops, I still wait and look for opportunities to support and improve my writing. 

We all have our own waiting lists in this life. Not all are written down though. We wait for our food to cook and do the next thing on our mental list. We mentally review our next steps while we drive to or from work. Our mental waiting lists are filed and waiting for our attention when the time is right. Waiting lists are not blank times with little to offer, but beautiful creative spaces that we can choose to fill with colourful lives, or we can just wait. While I wait for this writing class to come up, there is so much more that will fill that space with learning. Learning more about this new world in retirement, with interests from before the adult world consumed my life. Learning has always been exciting and a joy in my life. Waiting is the ultimate opportunity.

“The world is always open, 

Waiting to be discovered.”

~ Dejan Stojanovic, Circling: 1978-1987

Work Out

Gulls fishing - churning up their own water

Blue water sparkled and churned.

Multicoloured bathing suits flashed.

Multi shaded coiffures, tied up, loose or curled, 

endangered by splashes from

the energy of watery exercise,

survived intact ~ almost.

Hearty cheers and steady direction called out from a seasoned instructor lead us through a whole hour!

Singalong music, muffled by laughter,

shouts and frothing water kept us

in time to strains, stretches, and strides.

“Energy and persistence conquer all things.”

~ Benjamin Franklin

Movin' to the Beat!

Rolling rhythms and brooding blues

Satiny swinging and smooth swaying

Jumpin’ to jazz and jazzin' to jive!

“I play as I feel”

~ Oscar Peterson