A Wet Day

Friday was wet. I chose not to walk with our friends. I was not up for wet forest walking, and so Sheba and I went for a short walk close by and I came home to continue working on the huge box of ‘memories.’ Although it is not without some concern, I discarded photos that have meant a great deal to me in the past. Disenchanted with Françoise as well as Don and Connie, I chose to delegate souvenirs of their lives to the bin.

I was greatly affected by the death of a friend a zillion years ago whose estate I was part of settling. All his photos went into the bin, and it seemed so incredibly sad to see them in the garbage. I’m on a slow course of action to ensure that everything non-essential is gone from Pinecone Park. I’m collecting all that I want gone in the studio, and later this year I will call Gabriola Disposal and have it all taken away.

Throwing out all my ‘precious memories’ was an interesting experience. All my reviews of shows, articles about me in the press, over a hundred photographs, tapes, diplomas, and so, so many things about the Tyrell, York and Loranger families that once meant so much to me but that now evoke little emotion. Some things I saved, but the mementos that remain are now in a very small box.

I worked on sorting things from the huge box all morning. I put some things in envelopes to send to friends who are featured in the article or photographs, and I’m going through everything again soon to sort things for Steve to see when he comes in the Summer, in case he wants to keep some of them.

I’d been on the go all day, so when lunchtime came, I fed everyone and then settled onto the chaise to read for a while. I loved being still. It rained all day, but it wasn’t super heavy rain, so I went out to the cistern again after lunch and saw clearly that it is slowly filling. I had a regulator put on my pump; it ensures that the pump stays on for only 10 minutes per hour, otherwise, it would empty the well and the pump would burn out. Filling the cistern will take three days or more.

We went into the village to shop, and then we went for a walk in the rain. I got some new shoes, that’s why my bone spurs have been hurting. So, I soaked the back of my left shoe in water and did some bending of it before we went, and it made a huge difference. 

It rained all day, and in the afternoon low, low cloud obscured the treetops and gave a ghostly, bluish hue to the visible part of the forest. But it was warm, and I loved the eeriness in the forest. I am extremely happy here, and a big part of that is living in nature, in the forest. If only I’d known at a younger age.

Last night was the usual.

It’s going to be a dull and damp day today. We shall go into the village to go to the post office and to pick up some groceries, and then I’ll read and do more sorting of things and rearranging my storage of souvenirs and clothes. I enjoy doing the very practical chores I’ve been doing. I love getting rid of unnecessary things. 

Cistern Crisis Averted

I saw a mouse flee Fred’s curiosity and go into my hall cupboard. That led to me removing the stuff on the floor so Fred and Ethel could do what is natural for them, and one of the things I removed was a very large box with “Memories” written on it in felt pen.

The box was the repository of souvenirs from my life. Programs from both visual art shows and performing arts events that I conceived of and produced, and lots and lots of photographs. I found a promissory note from asshole Iqbal Grewal who stole $4,280 of grant money from a project I’d hired him to help me with many, many years ago. He has never paid a cent back.

I also found a postcard that I sent to my beloved Aunt Audrey from here. I wrote it when Don and Connie and I came here to stay when I was a very young whippersnapper. The front is a lovely pencil drawing of Surf Lodge where we were staying and where I go to eat quite often. And I found tons of stuff pertaining to my search for information about my birth parents. 

I threw most everything away as I have no children to give it to. It was sad to discard it all, but everything has been in that box for decades and I never go into it, so why keep it. I’m on a mission to get rid of everything not essential. One thing I could not discard was a photocopy of a note Françoise, my birth mother, had written to the orphanage I was in. 

I went to the orphanage when I was about 25 years old. That’s when I was given the letter and it thrilled me to see the handwriting of my true mother. But they had redacted it. There were a couple of black bars through things in the letter that the orphanage did not want me to know, the fuckers. Within days of receiving the photocopy, all the words had faded away and only the black bars remain. I find it to be a very poignant souvenir of the absurdity and unfairness of adoption practices back in the day.

I abandoned my work on the box to take Her Highness on our morning walk on a very beautiful morning. We were too late to hear the dawn chorus, but we had a long and wonderful walk together, and then we came home. I puttered until lunchtime, fed the brood and got on the chaise to do some reading. But I didn’t last long staying indoors on so beautiful a day.

And what a fucking miracle it was that I found my mojo for garden work. I got off the chaise and went out to work on the Raspberry bed. It felt very good to be outside and working on the gardens. There are weeks of work ahead on the beds, and I will have to order wood for next season soon.

I put up eight heavy rebar rods in the bed and then used twine to create a soft fence that would help to keep the canes upright. And when I was done, I did an hour of work on tidying and cleaning up the shed. The shed was messier than it has ever been, but now it looks much better. I’ve more to do, but I’ll get to it soon. I am now in outdoor mode when it is not raining.

There were a lot of empty cardboard boxes in the shed, so I decided to burn them and to burn some of the deadheaded detritus that was in the yard. So, I uncovered my burn barrel and lit my lighter. And I am eternally grateful that I decided to use the barrel. As I worked on loading it up, I heard water trickling into my cistern, and it didn’t sound right.

I went out to the cistern and was shocked to see that it was practically empty. It sounded like a child was pissing into it. I fetched the ladder and climbed up onto the cistern and discovered that the lever controlling the water flow was stuck. As soon as I freed it up, a thick stream of water started flowing. I was very relieved that the problem was so easily solved because I feared having to bring in the heavy artillery.

I’m going to have to do more work on it. I will spray the lever with WD40, but I left that to do on the next sunny day. For now, I just want to get the cistern filled. I am so glad that I worked outside yesterday and noticed the problem. I am profoundly grateful for my love of being outdoors on fine days. I discovered the problem just in time. Just a couple more showers and I would have been out of water.

Totally chuffed about getting started on my outdoor season, I quit at 15:30 and took Her Highness for a walk. I’d earned my right to a trail walk and then some reading time. Crisis averted.

The evening was like just about every evening of the past five months. But I read more in the evening because I am seriously enjoying my first (of six) Kate Atkinson detective mystery. I’m loving it. The best part of my evening was hearing from Eoin and François. We are going to the Surf for dinner together on Sunday night. Woo hoo.

Today is going to be wet, but man-oh-man is it lovely and warm. When I got up, I was out in the dark checking on the cistern, and it is very slowly filling up. And thank God! We’ll walk this morning with our friends—well, some of them. Friday is a day when several often bail. Later today, I’ll read more of the book that I’m loving, and we’ll have a nice lazy day.

Cakemaker

Wednesday morning, we walked our dogs in very light rain. We were a small group as Regina had a visitor, Meryl is in Wales, and Denise is only a spotty attender. When we got back home, the skies had lightened and the drizzle had stopped. I puttered until lunchtime, and then I read until it was time to Zoom with Aidan.

Zooming with Aidan was short and sweet. Afterwards, Her Highness and I went shopping and then for a walk. All afternoon was gorgeous, sunny and lovely and warm, so I went and bought my first supplies for garden work. I got rebar and cord so that I can make a good support system for my raspberries.

When I got home, there was an email from Dana. She is the woman who donated the use of her stunning hillside home for Ali’s birthday last Summer. Ali asked me to bake a cake for 50 people!!! And my cake made me the hit of the party. Dana wrote yesterday to ask me to bake her two cakes in July. I’ve a bit of a reputation here as a baker (only semi-deserved and unwanted). I’m only modestly talented, but I will enjoy baking these cakes for her.

The evening was the usual.

It’s lovely and bright this morning. If the good weather holds, I may busy myself with the materials I bought yesterday to create a support system for my Raspberry canes. I’m taking a break from the database work that I’m doing for SPACE.

Ethel Has a Fit

I moved to Nice to learn French when I was in my early twenties. It was the best year of my life, and I remember what joy I felt when I awoke one morning and realized that I had dreamt of myself speaking in French. I can’t remember how far into my year that it was when I had the dream, but next month I will hit the ten-year mark of living with a severe speech disorder and yet I have never had a dream wherein I was stuttering.

Last night I had a dream in which I was speaking fluently. Perhaps the reason that stuttering hasn’t become part of my language of dreaming is because I didn’t seek to stutter and I don’t want to stutter, but I was a passionate learner of French. An agenda item for Dr. Shoja and me.

Although it had rained in the night, it had stopped by the time I rose for another day in wonderland yeseterday. I was glad to be able to walk with Her Highness on a long trail. The dawn chorus was a symphony yesterday morning. A Barred Owl, woodpeckers, Jays, Robins, Thrushes; it was a cacophony of sounds, and it was glorious.

When we were done, we returned home for the day. I, to putter until lunchtime, Her Highness to sleep until lunch. I checked out our community Facebook page and was thrilled to discover that a fellow who runs a delivery service between Gabe and Nanaimo is starting a Saturday food pick-up and delivery service.

He’s arranged with an East Indian Curry restaurant, a Chinese food restaurant, and a sushi restaurant, to work with him. Every second Saturday he’ll fetch orders we place at the curry restaurants; the alternate Saturdays will be Chinese food. During the Summer, he’ll switch to sushi because the lineups for the ferry get so long, he won’t be able to keep food warm. I love this plan, and I plan to become a supporter.  

I missed the sun all day yesterday, but the morning was much warmer than it has been for a long time. There’s a lot of rain in the forecast for the coming week. Sigh. But it didn’t rain all day yesterday so even our afternoon walk was dry. The change in the weather makes it easier to work on my taxes and do chores, as I am not inclined to go on three walks or long walks; I like staying close to the fire.

I washed my bed linen. It’s a big job because I must wash the large duvet cover separately from my sheets and pillowcases, and then I wash the bedspread on which Sheba sleeps and sometimes drools. It takes forever to wash it all, and then to put the bed together, but I did it and I could hardly wait to get into it when it was done.

I took some stuff to the shed, when I came back inside, the bed was covered, absolutely covered in little bits of something. I had to spend a good half-hour getting the little pieces of stuff off the bedspread that is velvet and holds onto tiny strands of crap. As I cleaned, I realized what had happened. Colleen opened our friendship gate in the fence and Sheba had been sleeping in a massive pile of sawdust in Colleen’s yard. She is rebuilding her bunky. 

The kitchen, part of the living room and the bed required cleaning. There was sawdust and wood chips everywhere. This, after having cleaned the bed and vacuumed everywhere. I was pooped when I was done, so pooped that I kept getting dizzy when I was Zooming with Steve who’s just back from a month in Australia/New Zealand. After the call, I knew I was not going to do any SPACE work. I got on the couch to read until our afternoon walk. And then I read some more until dinnertime.

•

It scares me how much I love Sheba. We are always together. She sleeps on my bed. She’s big; one of her parents was an enormous Bernese Mountain Dog. She comes by her heft honestly, and she is wonderful to hug. She’s so big, it’s like hugging a person. And that’s what she feels like to me, a person. She is my partner and I know her well. 

Awareness of this makes me fear the day when …. I have Dr. Shoja to help me, and I have Fred and Ethel who will undoubtedly outlive Sheba. Fred, particularly, will be of great help because he is so rich with character. He talks to me all the time. He’s constantly in my face, and I’ve come to love his complexity. 

I love Ethel too, of course. She is a classic feline. She is far more private than Fred. She has, though, learned to talk from Fred. She now calls to me when she wants something. I absolutely adore her because she likes to be near me a lot. They are all so different, but we are family. 

It thrilled me the other day to watch Fred standing in front of Sheba who was lying on her side on the kitchen floor. Fred was right in Sheba’s face, howling at Sheba the way he often howls at me. I call it his command howl, but Sheba was non-responsive. There has never been any trouble between us except for when I first got Fred and Ethel. They hated each other, or Fred was freaked by her, and Ethel was forced to defend herself. The latter is more likely. I did what I was advised to do by the breeder and the vet; I put them in the guest bathroom and closed the door. They fought for two days, but then things turned and soon we were a cautious unit.

Late evening we had a very depressing time because dear Ethel had her fourth epileptic seizure. Her seizures are violent and very, very scary. When she seizes, I slip into a dreadful state because there is naught that I can do and my fear and powerlessness make me a bundle of shakes, jerks and tremors. She is fine this morning. She always makes a full recovery, but I lack confidence with each one that her recovery will be complete.

We will walk this morning in lovely mild temperatures but under a dark overcast sky. I’ll Zoom with Aidan and I’ll read. Here are some shots I took yesterday:

Above: Six Butterbut blooms. Below: One weird bloom.

My small Cemellia tree.

My Hellebores are blooming beautifully. 

My many Primroses are blooming.

My Croci are blooming in many places in the yard.

I don't know that this is called, but it looks like
Forget Me Nots, but it's a large plant.

Snowdrops.

Daffs.

This is Sweet Boxwood. You can hardly see the tiny
blossoms, but the entire yard smells fabulously due
to them, It smells like Jasmine.