A Glorious Afternoon in the Park!

I have been impatient for Spring but now, as with everyone, I am impatient for news about the demise of this virus. 

Sunday began unusually. The cats did not come into the bedroom as soon as they saw a light go on. I wondered where they were until, eventually, they emerged from the loft. I was relieved to see them and set off to the woodshed for wood with which to light the fire.

As I worked on the fire, I saw them starting in the same direction. I looked to where they were looking but saw nothing and went back to work on the fire. Then I smelled smoke in the room and wondered how it had escaped from the firebox and spent time searching for a leak in the seal of the box.

When I was done, the cats were still staring in the same direction. I looked again and saw my huge Rajasthani wall hanging on fire—not much of it, but still…. The cats had been, I assume, playing with my directional light in the night and it had fallen against the fabric and when I turned it on, as I do every morning, it ignited my precious tapestry.

I quickly put out the little fire, but what a close call. 

Costin and Marina had their baby on Friday at eight-thirty am. He weighed four kilos and his name is Theo Alto Andrei. Costin wrote: “And what Marina endured! Over 30 hours of labour, morphine, Oxycontin, epidural and still for all to end with an emergency c-section.” Poor Marina! But what a trooper she is. I’m so happy for them!

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I upgraded my computer operating system yesterday. When it was done, there was a folder on my desktop in which there were files deemed incompatible with the new system. There were complicated instructions about what to do with them, but instead I chose to delete them all and it turned out I deleted just under ninety thousand files; I wondered if this machine would ever work again.

I stopped the deletion and restarted hoping it would still work. Since then, it has. However, I did have to upgrade my MS Word and now all my Adobe products are totally dead and they’re too expensive to upgrade.

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The good news at Pinecone Park is that Sheba’s foot has completely healed and it continued to look good after a long walk in the morning and lots of playtime with her favourite canine friends in the afternoon.

This afternoon’s dog walk was the nicest time I’ve had outdoors since early last Autumn. It was 14° and Gunther, Anna and I sat for over an hour in the sunshine while the dogs played, and lovely scents of Spring filled my lungs and we didn’t mention the virus. It was just too, too nice a day to spoil with any negative talk.

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I’ went shopping this morning and the one store we have is out of bread, frozen vegetables, eggs and many, many other things and they are having trouble getting more stock. 

What a time we are living in. My generation has never known anything like this—no world war, no dreadful economic depression, no famine, so this is our first experience with worldwide trauma, and I feel the anxiety that so many do, being over seventy, having HIV and asthma. At least I chose to live in relative isolation here on Gabriola long before this epidemic. I’m very glad I’m out of the city.

My bread-making and pasta-making skills are going to be much better after this epidemic!