hen party

The adventures never stop around here. Fresh off the heels of my last house-sit, I was asked by a friend of I would house-sit for her, for a month and a half, at her house which is a 45-min drive from my work. I'd have to take care of chickens, a rabbit and a cat, as well as use a woodstove to heat the house.

Of course, I jumped at the chance. "Yes!" I wrote back as soon as I got her email.

Oh and I have to use the Englishtown Ferry to get to and from work, every day. (This is it the other night, when I was waiting on the Englishtown side for it to come back over. I loved how the lights were reflecting off the water, and the evening was coming on.)

This is the view from my new bedroom. The Cape Breton Highlands in the background, still covered in snow. Mm hmm.

Eggs wait by the front door. Every morning I collect between four and six eggs, and I let them pile up before I wash them.

When going to the barn to check on the chickens, you've got to unhook this latch.

There's just something about latches, isn't there?

 In Australia they call them "chooks". Wait, that might be the chicks. I don't know. Anyway, I love their clucking sounds.

 Doing dishes, I put down this dishcloth to put drying dishes on. More chickens!

 

 

Four to six eggs a day adds up pretty fast, especially when I'm away all day working and get back in the evenings and just eat toast and yogurt, and go to bed so I can do it all again the next day. Come the weekend, it's time to wash eggs, and I find myself with two dozen. There's just something about the shape of eggs, isn't there? So beautiful, especially in the grey winter light coming in the window over the sink.

i heart

I'm probably the "Dwight Schrute" of snow shovelling. In other words, I'm a big dork about it. I have a "strategy" for how best and most efficiently to shovel. I time myself. I don't take my water bottle with me, thinking of myself as a sort of survivalist snow shoveller who sustains herself by eating... snow. I have a whole get-up: my new Helly Hansen long underwear, a pair of cheap splash pants (that conveniently have buttons down the sides so if I'm in the middle of a heavy session I can just rip them off - very "athletic"), a sports bra, and my usual workout gear on top.

And thankfully, we've been getting some snow to shovel. December was all about rain and it was really dreary. Now there is snow on the ground, snow storms on the forecast and snow shovels at the ready - well, actually a big snow scoop, which I find a lot easier on the back and neck.

On top there is a heart made of buttons. We've been purging our house of excess stuff, which coincides nicely with the New Year. (As a symbol, it's one of my favorites.) I found a squirrely stash of the little baggies you get with a new shirt, the ones that have a button and a piece of thread in them, that I'd been keeping for several years. Since I just got rid of a lot of clothes, too, and since I've never once had to turn to this stash to replace a button, I figured it was time to free the buttons from their baggies. It's also time for them to join the bigger stash of buttons in the sewing basket. First, though, I arranged them in a heart shape. Because as shapes go, it's one of my favorites.

Plus: one month from today is Valentine's Day!

(Where is the year going?)

view

 

 

These photos were all taken within a 30 meter radius of each other.

The top one was taken yesterday morning or perhaps the morning before. I arrived at work with a few minutes to spare, and parked facing the lake. The cold morning was warming up, and there was mist rising off the lake. I don't know if you can really see it here or not, but it was there. It was cold - I've already said that, but that's OK. The sun was rising just behind the island, across the little harbour from the marina. The sky and the light in it was clear. I stood and watched it, taking pictures, just watching the mists slowly moving across the surface of the water. So often I just rush right into work - it was nice to just stand and watch.

The middle one I took just a few minutes ago. I'm sitting in the library, looking out at the same harbour, which is now grey and has snow softly falling into it. I really liked the pattern that the tire tracks made in the snow in the parking lot down below. They make parts of circles, intersecting. Lines. It looks like someone with a big piece of paper just playing with form - making wide arcs with charcoal, or something. A looseness about them.

I'm taking the day to sit in the library, and catch up on stuff. I'm rather excited about it. It feels good to catch up - catch up with your own life. "OK you, slow down, let me catch you, let me do some maintenance. Then you can go running off again." I'm hidden behind some stacks, I can hear when people come in the library and chat with the librarian, and I can hear their voices and try and guess who they are. But I'm sitting alone by the window, looking out at the snow.

(That's the third photo - inside the library. The old wooden tables and chairs. Haphazard comfort.)

There was a little boy here earlier, whose mother I know. They came down back to look around the children's area and take some books home. He's three years old. He ran over to me and picked up the jar of raisins, dried cranberries and sunflower seeds that I took with me for a snack.

"What's THIS?" He asked.

"Oh, that's my snack." I said. "Do you have snacks sometimes?"

"Yeah. But not now."

Later he came back down. "I think I'm going to have some," he said. "Of the snack."

His mother, at the front of the library, could hear him. "David, it's not nice to ask people for things. Wait until you're offered."

"You can have some," I said, after checking with her. I handed him a raisin, and a cranberry. He handed the cranberry back, "I don't like cranberries." But his eyes grew wide at the raisin.

"David, where's your manners?" His mother called.

"Thank you," he said.

"You're welcome, dear," I said, calling him "dear" automatically. The Maritimes make me call people dear, hon, buddy. He was twenty feet away already - kids move so fast. He turned around.

"What did you call me?"

"Dear!"

He giggled and ran away. I could hear him say to his mother, "Do you know what that girl said to me?"

"What did she say?"

"You're welcome, dear!" and he laughed.

"You ARE a dear," his mother said.

I think trading a raisin for that is a good bargain.

comfort and joy

This is an ornament that my grandmother sent us in the mail. Mum hung it on the banister by the stairs, next to the only Christmas lights we have up so far (and possibly the only ones we WILL have - it seems we're all too busy and/or burned out to get the whole "tree" thing happening). I really like the way it reflects the lights. And I like this shot above, even though it's blurry. Maybe even because it's blurry. Life's not perfect. It's far from it. It's messy and hard and uncontrollable. Yet here we are.

Also, after spending a few minutes photographing it last night, I realized it looks a bit like an angel - the rays coming out from the candle like the wings.

There was a huge rain-and-wind storm earlier this week. The middle of the country got a dump of snow, and we got a dump of rain, and winds about as strong as when Hurricane Earl blew through in September. The power went out and so Tuesday morning I got to make my breakfast by the light of a kerosene lamp.

This is the pot of oatmeal simmering away on the propane stove. That blue light, so comforting.

Another day - it may have been Sunday - I was outside. Taking pictures of the birdfeeder. I stood still long enough that the birds starting coming around me. THRUP. THRUP. The constant "thrupping" of their wings as they moved from branch to branch, getting ever closer to the bird feeder and to me, was so loud! I felt surrounded by the birds, the sound of them moving, their little chirps and "chick-a-dee-dee"s. None of the pictures were amazing, crystal-clear or centered, but I liked this one. Lifting off the branch, flying.

I love a light dusting of snow.

This was my car this morning - the frost patterns on the roof. So beautiful. It would take a person so long to draw something this intricate, yet it just happened. Water meets cold.

the time I almost moved, then didn't

Well, I'm well-rested right now. I had a great night's sleep and the world feels like a solid place again. But that wasn't the case yesterday. I was exhausted.

All night, I'd lain in my bed, not sleeping, turning onto one side or the other, hoping that side would be the magic bullet that would help me turn my head off and go to sleep. It wouldn't, so I'd lie there trying to calm my breathing, then turn onto my other side. The anxiety was there the whole time - thoughts running through my brain. Fears. I'm going to move, and I'll lose all my money and be broke. How will I afford it? All my neighbours will watch my every move. I'll have no privacy in this small town. There are houses all around me. I won't be able to walk outside and just sit and look up at the stars. Or go outside wearing my bathrobe. Or or or...

And so on. Over and over, a cycle without end.

I'd been planning to move. I had an apartment lined up, accounts with the power and phone companies started, friends agreeing on a date to lend trucks and hands to move my furniture. It felt a bit sudden, but not, at the same time. This was an apartment I'd had my eye on for a year or so. The person living in it was having a house built, and these things take a while. The landlord got in touch a few weeks ago to tell me the tenant was moving out soon. I mulled it, I added and subtracted numbers on paper. I figured - I can do it. It'll be a bit tight, but I can do it. I've been wanting to move, so dammit, I will!

The emotions started coming right away. Guilt at leaving my family when we were all kind of getting used to living with each other, sadness at leaving my comfortable home - and my cats! Good lord, I was goig to miss my cats. The apartment wouldn't allow pets and anyway it wouldn't be fair to take a country, outdoor kitty and move her into town. When I wouldn't be home all day. Also, there was excitement - my own place! my own space! a bathtub! and nervousness.

And as it was when I was in university, the anxiety manifested at night. I'd lie down to go to sleep and couldn't. And of course, lying there, thinking: I can't sleep and ohmigod I'm going to be so tired tomorrow, I'll be tired at work, I'll lose my job - it feeds itself. It's hard to make it stop. Make the thoughts lie down, be peaceful.

I took some melatonin. It worked some nights. But I'd feel groggy the next day. And other nights it didn't work, and then I'd lie there terrified. I have no defense against this. Even the pills didn't work. I have to just lie here and take it.

Night before last was the worst. My world felt shrunken down, scary. I felt like I was losing it - tired and out of it. What if I lose my job because I'm too tired? What if I lose myself, again? There is nothing the doctors can really do besides prescribe medication. Not being able to sleep is not something they can operate on. It's entirely internal.

Finally the moment came when I admitted it to myself. This is too much. I'm so not willing to put myself through this. I value myself and my sanity more than showing other people I'm so-called "independent". I value my job too much to sabotage my health.

So, when the morning came, I made some phone calls. I admitted my anxiousness, made myself vulnerable. To my family, with whom I usually set strict boundaries so I don't feel so much like a kid, I admitted I was scared. They said they loved me and they would support me no matter what I did. "Welcome home," they said, though I hadn't packed a single box yet.

I made food that was exactly what I wanted to eat - a toasted cheese and cucumber sandwich. Later, a frozen chicken pot pie, baked and warm, with beet pickles. I took a long walk along a dirt road with freshly fallen snow, hands in my pockets. (I remember reading somewhere, some time ago, that if you walk with your hands in your pockets, it is because you are in a thoughtful mood.) I played card games with my brother, who was also home sick from work. We watched The Office, some of season three. I talked to some girlfriends, who told me, "This is a GOOD thing. You're listening to yourself. Respecting yourself."

Last night, I slept well. I sunk into sleep like a rock into water. And just two days later - two days that feel like they held a whole week - I'm back at work. Taking it one day, one breath at a time. Working on trusting life, trusting that it holds all kinds of good things, and that they'll come along as I'm ready for them.

"it's coming on Christmas, they're cutting down trees"

Flossie and I decorated the marina store for Christmas. A mixture of old decorations (like this bell with lights) and new ones that I got at Home Hardware. I realized as I was getting them that I've never actually bought Christmas decorations before. My family has only ever used ones we've had - it feels like - forever.

This is the front of the store. At 4:30 PM. Our artificial tree - which, in the dark, looks just as good as a real one. I kind of get why people use artificial trees, now.

Last weekend I had to go to Iona for a meeting. (I'm a member of the Board of Directors for the Bras D'Or Lakes Stewardship Society.) Of course I took my camera along. Above: the Little Narrows ferry.

After the meeting, which was in a boardroom at the Highland Village, I jumped a fence and went walking around the musuem. It's a recreated village from the 1800's, built on a hill overlooking one of the Bras d'Or Lakes. The sun was just setting.

The church, by the way, used to be in a community across the lake called Malagawatch. I remember being in Australia a hundred years ago - OK, maybe it was just seven - and reading an international news item about a church being brought on a float along a lake, and it turned out to be home in Cape Breton. And now it sits on top of the hill looking out.

Driving back I went over Washabuck mountain. The road is falling apart, it's more patches than original pavement. It was getting dark and I felt lonely. I saw driveways to summer homes that are empty at this time of year. I saw houses with people in them but wondered - are they all old people? Where are the young people? It feels, sometimes, like everyone here is just one decision away from pulling up roots and heading out West. Then the whole island would be a relic, a historical museum.

Then, last week I started taking a walk on my lunch break. Around Water Street and then up by the Co-Op. I take my camera with me then, too. Partly so I can keep track of the time, and partly to take random pictures. Above: the lighthouse and Beinn Bhreagh mountain behind it. (That's where Alexander Graham Bell used to live.)

This is taken from pretty much the same place, just looking more to the left. This is the wee village of Baddeck. At least, the waterfront portion of it.

Wood and lines. A piece of driftwood up against a building. Telephone wire and a pole, and trees. And a close-up of another telephone pole. I like the texture of the wood, the staples, the rusty nail. The colors - bleached white, browns, dark brown. The knot. Even in a town that goes to some lengths to appear smooth and quaint and perfect, there is texture, age, lines. Rot and change and industry. And that's OK too.

real life vs. the movies

OK, how is this even possible?

At Christmas-time, I cut out George Clooney's head from a newspaper. I affixed it to paper with glue. Then I wrote on it, "Have a gorgeous holiday!" (See above.)

It's still up on the wall, underneath the Christmas wreath that is also still up. The other day someone pointed out to me - thinking it was already clear to me and done on purpose - that it's a pun. George + gorgeous = George-ous? BUT IT WAS NOT ON PURPOSE.

How did I MISS THAT? Oh Em Gee.

I'm torn between being impressed about my swift subconscious and embarrassed about my not-so-swift conscious mind. Oh dear.

***

We're still having seriously mild weather around here. And I'm still seriously interested in your thoughts and feelings on the issue. (See last post.)

Secondary roads are being closed early this year. They're closed in the spring to heavy trucks, and this year they're being closed three or four weeks earlier than they would normally be.

I'm enjoying the mild weather, somewhat. I'm not enjoying the feelings of "Oh dear god, is this how it starts?"

***

I've been sick all this week. And so I've been watching more movies than usual. It's making me think about real life vs. the movies. I jotted down some thoughts in my writing journal and I will share them with you here.

Scenes with music: In movies, most scenes have some sort of musical score. In real life, we have to play our own music. Sometimes the music is weirdly wrong. Have you ever started making out with someone only to realize that the music is ridiculous, or strange, or in some way detracting from your intimate moment? And you both lie there awkwardly until the person whose room it is gets up to change the music? We're so used to movies using music to "lubricate" a scene, as it were, that we supply it in our own lives. A lot of the time I feel dependent on the musical background. Go to my bedroom to hang out, and the first thing I do is pick music. Get in my car to go somewhere, same thing.

Happy endings: Or endings at all. In real life there are no endings. The credits never roll. If something does end, like a person's life or a phase of our lives, you're still in it, still in your own life. Exam time used to be so irritating this way. Nothing was ever finished. The end of term didn't end in a big bang, a finish worthy of a movie. It kind of petered out, faded slowly. Nothing conveniently wraps up, because even if one thing does, the "camera" of life keeps on rolling. Always. Constantly. This is why romantic comedies, for all their charm, drive me NUTS. Because romance and getting together with someone happens to be very little like the big-screen version.

Re-takes and awkwardness: There are no re-takes in real life! Sometimes I say something and wish fervently that I hadn't said it, that I could have a do-over. But no - I never get that chance and neither do you. Awkwardness's true home is in real life. Any bits of awkwardness in movies is actually a clever distraction, and not awkward at all. This is because we all get to share in it, laugh at it, and feel good about how other people can be as awkward as we can. Real awkwardness is nothing like this. It's, well, it's awkward.

Anyway - those are my thoughts on that, for now. Back to the soup, the Kleenex box, and the couch. Sniff.

Do you have any go-to cinematic classics and/or cheesy flix that make you feel better/distracted when you're home sick? Do share.

winter, weather and worries

We've been having a mild winter in Cape Breton, this year. At least, parts of the island are. People tell me that in the Highlands and the areas just on the edges of them, there is plenty of snow, and the snowmobilers are happy. But here in the lowlands, the temperature hovers around the freezing mark. Some days water is liquid, other days ice. Most days, slush. There is some snow in the woods, but not enough to make it worthwhile to put your snowshoes on (in other words, not over a foot). The ice on Baddeck Bay only goes partway out of the bay, enough that the ice fishermen have something to sit on, but not enough to fly a plane on, like last year.

This warm and mild weather worries me.

My brain wants to "figure it out," make a logical plan of steps to follow. Something like: 1) research climate studies of Maritimes. 2) Read studies to determine if this IS an anomaly, or if mild winters come along every so often in Maritime weather history. If it is an anomaly, determine what is causing this weather. 3) Solve worries in my head; know what to do.

But then real life takes over and I get distracted. It's time to make my lunch for work tomorrow, or to plan the weekend, or talk to one of my best friends or my boyfriend. Or figure out my finances and figure out where all my money's going to go this week. Or it's time to go to work. But it seems you can't completely ignore the weather, because it will always crop up again - I'll be at work, sitting at the circulation desk, talking to patrons, and someone will mention the weather. It happens once an hour on average, I'd guess.

Most of the people I talk to are happy about how mild and snowless it's been. I go back and forth on how I respond to that - some days I want to say, "Are you crazy? Doesn't it kind of take the fun out of wearing a lighter jacket to think that this might be climate change and our world might be about to change in ways we don't even know about?" And when I'm feeling like this I'll make some comment about how I miss winter, how much I love snowshoeing and the cold weather. Other times I'm not up for the effort of disagreeing, however politely and non-confrontationally I do so, and I'll smile, nod, and agree that it is certainly nice to have this mild weather. Aren't we lucky. Oh my goodness.

Then I get distracted again, and several days will go by, and then I'll be reminded of it again, of my worries about what this weather might mean. Distraction, reminder, distraction, reminder. Frustration and worry.


The problem - of climate change - is so big that it feels absolutely overwhelming. And yet our rational minds want to "figure it out," solve the problem. There's got to be a logical plan of steps to follow! (Right??!) Yet all the "little things" that various articles and activists tell us to do, which we would put in such a plan, don't fare well in a cause-and-effect experiment. Turn off the lights when you leave a room, save the world. However, I've been turning off the lights like an electricity evangelist and the world is nowhere near saved. Does this mean the little things don't work?

I don't know. I wish I could end this on a positive note and say, "Well, we've got to do those little things anyway, because we'll never know, and these things could have an effect." They certainly could. They're definitely having an effect on something, like my house's energy bill, and the amount of electricity this one household draws from NS Power on a given day. NS Power gets its energy mostly from coal-fired plants, so my turning a light switch on or off does make an impact on those plants. How big that impact is, or how small, is impossible to know, especially when factoring in all the other houses and businesses and how much or little they're drawing.

Having a talk about this with a friend usually ends up here: the point where we both agree that climate change is huge, and that we feel powerless to do anything about it. That we do what we can, but we live in this society and it's impossible to completely change everything about our consumptive lives. Some days you feel great because you eat a totally-locally grown meal. Other days you're stressed and out of time and you buy a fast food meal on the run, which you eat in your car as you drive somewhere.

Some days you think about the worrying mild weather, and other days you don't because there are 632 other things to think about in the run of a day. (Exact amount unknown, but you get my drift.)

Rational, logical-plan brain won't give up. "OK," it says, "We've come this far. We've got the problem and we just haven't found a solution yet." So I take my brain for a walk. I lace up my hiking boots (made in China, shipped across the oceans, trucked to my town - but bought in a local shop, even though it's more expensive, because I want to support local businesses and not big-box stores) and head out. It's a mild evening. There's a feeling of spring in the air. (It's Cape Breton in February, there shouldn't be a feeling of spring in the air. But still, it feels nice.) Part of the road is slushy snow, and other patches and dark brown, bare earth. The air is slightly misty and the sky is pinky blue.

I walk and I think: Here I am, here, now. In this time, this day, this minute, unable to jump twenty years ahead or go twenty years backward. Weighted down and held in place by limitations beyond my control. For a while, the last three years, one of those limitations was not having a vehicle of my own. Plenty of times that was frustrating, so irritating that I'd take myself for a walk. Get my head out, away from the problem, walk and realize that it was OK to have this limitation, because I could still walk. Still breathe outside air, still vent my frustrations to the snowbanks and trees.

Coming to terms with those limitations isn't the same thing as finding a solution. But in a weird, roundabout, emotional and not-quantifiable way, it IS the necessary step before finding your way to a place where you can figure out how to live with the limitations, and still get around them. At least, I think so.

Beyond that? I don't know.

It goes without saying, really, but it's true each time I post. And especially for this one: I'd really like to hear your thoughts.

ice time

It's been a busy week! And I find myself blogging on my supper break at work, looking through recent photos to see if anything inspires me. I like these shots that I took a week ago - or was it two? I can't remember. Yikes.

Anyway, up until a week ago, we'd been having unseasonable warm weather and rain. We usually have big chunks of ice sitting on the deck, from where they've been formed in buckets. (It's a cheap way to have ice sculpture. I think. Actually, I'm not entirely sure why we do this.) This one had "calved" or broken off a piece of itself, like a glacier births icebergs. Then, the rain fell continuously on the "mama" piece, from a drip in the gutter, and the ice surface became smooth. I think it looks like a chair, don't you?


I really love taking close-up photos of things. I like revealing the detail that you can't see unless you get really close. Plus, small and tiny details become extraordinary when you see them large. They can end up looking like abstract art. These are air bubbles in that piece of ice.


Here is the piece that had calved off the bigger piece, also smoothed by warm weather and rain. The boards of the deck form the background. I love the light's quality, the silvers and whites, and the texture of the wood grain and the water frozen as ice.

So the weather was warm and wet, but last weekend it turned back around. Snow fell and was shovelled, winds blew it around, and the mercury has dropped back below zero. All is white again. I'm glad - I like enjoying the outdoors, and in winter there is nothing more depressing than snow-less woods and fields.

***

This week has been the second "GO/venture" week over at Kal's and Elise's blogs. They pick a different word prompt for each day and challenge each other to create original art every 24 hours. I've used the words as mental lozenges, if you will: something to mentally suck on and turn around and around, slowly releasing the medicinal properties. If the mood struck me I'd write in my two-dollar, drugstore notebook, which is where I do any writing exercises.

The words are:

Monday: WANDER
Tuesday: INVISIBLE
Wednesday: COINCIDENCE
Thursday: PERMANENT
Friday: WHOLE

I'd love to know what these words spark in you. Or what you do, in general, to spark your creativity.

***

I just took a short break from writing this, and put on my coat and scarf and went for a short walk. It was snowing and I hadn't been outside since I started work at noon. I like taking little walks around the village; especially at night, you can see snapshots of people's lives in their windows. A mum and daughter at a kitchen table. A cozy hallway lit by a red lamp throwing stained-glass shadows on the wall.

I didn't always like it here. When I was younger, I felt excluded and ashamed, not part of Baddeck. Not part of the "in crowd". I thought, the second I can get out of here, I will. And, for a time, I did leave. I travelled, I went away. But slowly things have shifted. Now I'm considering living right in the village, and I truly feel that this is my town. These are my people. I say hello to so many folks just in a walk down the main street, that I feel a little silly - like I'm playing the role of "stereotypical small town gal" or something. But I'm not playing a role. This is where my life has taken me, this is genuine, this is who I am.

***

Also: There are plans afoot, and while I can't reveal all right now, let me just say that it looks likely that I'll soon have an item that I've been wanting for a long time, all to myself, and that it may or may not have four wheels. I'll post more about if and when I can. In the meantime: eeee!!

Christmas is coming!

The other day I was going through the newspaper, and I happened upon an article about George Clooney that was accompanied by a photograph. Something about the photo of his head just begged to be cut out and put on a hand-drawn body, so that's what I did. Then I taped my creation under the wreath by the kitchen table, so that we might have a Clooney-rific Christmas. Five minutes with a sharpie and a pair of scissors, and a lifetime of Christmas magic.


A few days later, I was over on the West side of the island. My friend and I were driving along, marvelling at the high winds and the whipped waves. We stopped the truck and I got out to take some photos. "Don't be offended if I don't get out there with you!" said he. "Don't worry, I'm not!" Then I got out of the truck and blew away - I mean, nearly blew away. And took the shot above, of the ocean and the snow and all the wild whiteness.



Yesterday, after a hiccup or two, my Christmas cards arrived! I was so happy when Kal Barteski offered these for sale last month. And, they're even better in person. The cardstock is nice and firm, the colors are gorgeous, and the fonts are to sigh for. Beautiful, just beautiful. So now I'm hopping to it, addressing and stamping and writing out these babies, to get them back in the mail and hopefully out to their recipients by Christmas.

(But, not stressing too much about that. I've been trying to be realistic about things lately - when I get stressed about something like, say, getting my Christmas cards to the people they're going to by December 25th, I stop and think: wait a sec, why is it SO important? It's not, really. If they get them at all, it's good.)

Just in case you wanted a gander at some of her beautiful designs and entertaining blog - that's where to go.

This time next week, I'll be posting from Montreal! Keep your eyes peeled in the meantime, I might just be doing some random posts between now and then.

monday musings

Hard to believe this was just a little over a week ago! I was at a beach over on the West Side. I took my boots off to cross a little brook, and kept them off to feel the sand on my toes. And now, there is something like one or two feet of snow on the ground.

This is a mid-week post, just because. Sometimes I find myself reading other blogs (like the daily Love Life blog of Winnipeg) and getting inspired to post each day. Of course, trying to actually keep up with that would probably drive me nuts - and, I'd soon run out of things to say, because I don't want to be as open about my life as she is. (And, I haven't got any babies to provide constant cute material.)

So instead I settle for random, in-between-Thursdays-posts.

My weekend was good. I got to see other parts of the island, and drive through snowy weather in a big truck that I actually felt safe in. On Sunday, after a huge snow dump (two feet literally fell overnight), and after some shovelling, I set out for a snowshoe through fresh powder. It was quite the workout for my legs, and it was also really good to get outside. Being outside by myself, for a long walk or a long snowshoe, is like taking all the furniture out of my brain, dusting it off, and putting it all back in, clean and with a new perspective.

I dropped in on some neighbours and we talked for a while. My sweat had cooled and I was getting chilly by the time I was going to set out again. So the wife of the two said, "I'll take you on the bike!" Meaning, the bright green Arctic Cat four-wheeler. This woman is an inspiration. She's tough as nails but you can see her heart melt when she talked about her grandkids. She goes hunting right along with her husband, has her own ATV and snowmobile, and talks rapturously about being out in the woods, cross-country-skiiing on a day with heavy snowfall. Being outside is her "bottle of pills," as she says. But when you meet her outside, she's also likely to have a fresh coat of lipstick, and her long nails painted pink. She's fierce and I'm glad she's on my "team."

We bungee-corded my snowshoes to the front, and I jumped up behind her. We whizzed along the dirt road - still unplowed after a whole day! - towards my house.

"Don't you wear a hat?" I leaned in close to her ear to yell this.

"I like to feel the wind!" she shouted back.

oh the weather outside is frightful

After all, it's not like we have any choice. So, let it snow.

Besides, it's beautiful. It lightens the dark November days, we can make snowballs with it, and it makes everything seem more like Christmas. (Which, like all dates this year, is flying towards us with heart-stopping speed. Fifteen more days! What the !?!?)

Soon, soon, I'll be getting on a train to Montreal. I'll be spending Christmas with some dear French-Canadian family. It's funny how life works: four years ago, I was dating a guy who lived in Montreal. We were happily making plans for me to spend Christmas with him in the city, but then life happened and we ended up breaking up. Four years later - after life sent me down other paths - I'm getting my Christmas in Montreal.

What is it about Christmas in a city that gets us going? At least, a city with old buildings and snow, a sense of history and a sense of fabulous interiors. I think it has something to do with our imaginations, with picturesque scenes in our heads of snowy streets and big Christmas trees in squares. I'll go and see, and report back, shall I?

*******

In other news, a family friend died suddenly on Tuesday. Jeremy Frith was a farmer, a poet, a father, a husband, a friend. He was larger than life and certainly a good candidate, as Bill said the other day, to live forever. I kind of thought he was going to.

The news has been shocking. How could someone like that just be gone?

Just like that, I guess. And we're left to make sense of it, or at least to make sense of our feelings, which are stormy in the wake.

To read more about Jeremy, go to Susan Zettell's blog.

Winter's not over yet.

(This photo is of a statue in Sydney, which had been decked out in fine knitwear to promote a library event, "The CBRL Knit-a-Thon.")