June 4, 2008
Springing
“April is the cruelest month, T.S. Eliot wrote, by which I think he meant (among other things) that springtime makes people crazy. We expect too much, the world burgeons with promises it can’t keep, all passion is really a setup, and we’re doomed to get our hearts broken yet again. I agree, and would further add: Who cares? Every spring I go there anyway, around the bend, unconditionally. I’m a soul on ice flung out on a rock in the sun, where the needles that pierced me begin to melt all as one.” –Barbara Kingsolver, Animal Vegetable Miracle
A table full of wonderful things, brought back from our first trip to the new Bloor Borden Farmer’s Market.
May 25, 2008
Life in a Tree
It pleases me to no end that this is the view from my door. Made all the more significant by the fact that I live right in the middle of a very large and busy city, but out here on our deck, we could be anywhere. We bought a table and chairs yesterday, and this morning I was sitting out with a cup of tea and a paper, listening to birdsong and drinking up the sun. We’ve been barbequing regularly for the last month, but last evening was first when it was warm enough to be outside. The last two weekends have been full of friends, fun and potato salad, and luckily, it seems, time enough for everything.
April 20, 2008
The whole world is out of doors
Though the weekend’s weather has been nothing short of summer, I’ve felt no desire to sit out on a restaurant patio. Mostly because I’ve got case of beer in my fridge, and my own deck just outside my door– such luxury! I’ve never known this before, and we can also open up the double doors into our kitchen and the whole world is out of doors. There’s been plenty of barbeque.
This weekend I picked up Lois Lowry’s The Giver for a quarter at a yard sale. We were in the mood for a walk and got to Type Books, where I picked up The Emily Valentine Poems. I finished reading The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, which was amazing. I like well enough every Bronte that I’ve ever met, but the characters here were dead ringers for people I know, 150 years later. This is disturbing for my sake, but quite an astounding literary achievement and certainly qualifies as “timelessness, so far”. I am so pleased to have followed this bookish recommendation.
April 6, 2008
Have a seat
Welcome to our new living room. I apologize for not offering the sofa, but I had to sit on it to take this picture, as I wanted a shot of the fireplace, and our huge windows (there are three, which have blinds now! How exciting). We are officially unpacked, and have been entertaining friends all weekend– friends who’ve dropped by with flowers, baked goods, cupcakes, a strawberry slicer, and cheese. Clearly we are very lucky people. Real life has also returned, which is splendid. As has spring– unbelievable. People in this city don’t miss a beat with that spring thing– today people were out riding bikes, drinking on patios, smiling, walking, looking startled and pleased by their good fortune. We did our part tonight by having the first barbeque of the season, christening our new deck and paving the way for a marvelous summer ahead.
April 4, 2008
Springwatch 2008
Even if you’ve never wondered how I get so much reading done, I will go ahead and tell you part of how. That when I finished grad school and was forced into servitude, I decided to forsake lunches out with my colleagues and devote that hour a day to reading instead. By now my colleagues have gotten over being offended, and this hour is the anchor of my working day, and now it is entirely monumental for me to note that today for the first time since (I think?) October, I read my book outside. In my coat and scarf, and my fingers were cold, but the sunshine was glorious. I’ve written before about how much my reading is connected to the natural world, and so it was a pleasure to return to the elements.
March 21, 2008
Remembering Days
The book I’m reading at the moment, which I’m absolutely in love with, contains that quotation, “We do not remember days, we remember moments.” Which I don’t buy actually, and I never have, because like Albert from Behind the Scenes at the Museum, I “collect good days the way other people collected coins or sets of postcards.” I can remember so many glorious ones, right down to very details, and though today wasn’t exactly glorious, it was definitely very fine.
The finest thing about today being happiness arriving in the post the very week I decide to stop looking for it there. And isn’t there something about a surprise package when you’re expecting nothing? The surprise turned out to be from Sayaka (who has a blog, by the way). She’s our friend from Japan, she stayed with us for a few marvelous days last summer, and now she’s seen fit to surprise me with a gift that blends two of my favourite things: tea and Miffy. Indeed, I do miss living in a land where Miffy kitchenware was so easy to to come by, but it’s nice of Sayaka to ease my yearning. How positively splendid.
In other fortune, another friend gave us our wedding present a few weeks ago, nearly three years late but perfectly on time actually, as it was an HBC giftcard, and I have to buy wares for our new apartment. So I spent the early part of this evening buying new towels and bathroom accessories, and it was fun to spend spend spend (though not so fun to carry the bags home). And then I spent two hours with Rebecca, which is some of the best company I know.
The list goes on: that work has been good of late, but that today I left early, we move in a week and a half and a farmer’s market is starting up in our new neighbourhood, our Easter treats from our English Mum and Dad, going home for the weekend to the Canadian ones, that tomorrow we’re doing nothing at all, the stack of good books to be read, the one that I’m reading, that March sunshine, and that all I want at the moment is a cheese sandwich, and in a matter of moments I will have one.
March 20, 2008
Spring Watch 2008
Spotted this morning: Turdus migratorius, budding green shoots, and precipitation that wasn’t frozen.
March 19, 2008
Spring Resolutions
I love making resolutions in the spring– they’re so easy. It was this time last year when I vowed to become less of a miserable, venomous cowy bitch, and the new me caught on so well. But now I realize that I just had spring on my side, because I’ve well lapsed back into cowiness as this winter has progressed. So it had nothing much to do with will after all, though at least I have a forthcoming pleasant disposition to count on. Because my disposition has been quite unpleasant of late, due in part to a small run of disappointments. So small, of course– the kind I’m almost grateful for because I’m otherwise so lucky, and therefore can add to my “not likely to be hit by a bus” karma account. But only almost grateful– lately we’ve been doing melodramatic despair like a dance craze. Enough of that though. My resolution– stop seeking happiness in the postbox. And with spring around the corner, this one is sure to be a success.
March 12, 2008
Lately
Everyone I know is in a rage lately. For some of us it’s because we keep reading reader comments in the Globe & Mail, and we should probably stop, but the fact is that lately I’ve been identifying with Marian McAlpin, which is a bad bad sign.
