Yesterday was beautiful.
Warm and spring like.
I sat on the front door step, upended my hair and let the sun warm the nape of my neck. I loved the way it dripped down my back and loosened my spine. Have you tried running your fingers through sun warmed hair? The feeling is like no other.
Today looks promising, too.
There was a sunrise over the hills.
January is done.
One month closer to spring, to summer, to warm breeze, easy breath, green, green, green everywhere.
But, strange though it may seem, I have fallen in love with the winter landscape. I never thought I would. I never thought I would care for the naked, stiffened limbs of trees and the cold seeping through everything. I still don’t care for the cold that comes for my bones with a vengeance. But the trees, the dark brown, and the beige of the earth! How they have fallen on my vision of a sudden, with a loud thump, a look at me, I can be beautiful within my bare bones, within my silence and my waiting. I can be beautiful without the light and the mollycoddling of summer.
I can be beautiful simply by being.
It has been a knock on the door, an awakening.
Yes, it is cold.
My hands and feet are a constant reminder. I am a warm weather person. Humidity does not bother me. But this cold, that is another story.
My bones ache from huddling inside my skin.
Everything feels tight and brittle and raspy.
I was never any good at the mind over matter thing. Not when there is such an ache in my body for warmth.
The sun helps, though. The brightness coming in through the window gives an illusion of warmth. I will take that and make the most of it. Thank you, dear Sun!
Starting small.
I have lost my voice for big things.
It will rise again when it is time but until then, I will start small because not writing is withering.
Fragility and hardiness with a hint of lace.
My kind of flower.
Wild. true.
With a bit of beige thrown in for good measure.
Paring down.
Simplicity.
Untangling, unraveling, smoothing out, breathe.
Living with some ruffles. Eh.
For the love of animals. Please!!
Volunteer.
What stirs my soul? Solitude.
Unhurried hours of reading.
Day dreaming. Streams of it.
Living in my head with stories. I miss that.
Go back to reading voraciously.
Set your own goals, for Pete’s sake! Whoever Pete might be.
Painting is intense joy but words come first.
Where does writing fall?
Writing is expressing what you have read. Feel.
All that has seeped into my own story. Or day dreams.
Romance, baby.
Romance is being in love with living. Madly.
Everything falls under that umbrella. The umbrella of Living.
Capital L. Yeah. Not kidding around here.
Instinct. But take a moment first.
Laugh, cry, be weird and gauche, but be real.
Be you. It’s okay. Not everyone is blessed with social graces.
I was probably slurping down smoothies when they were handing that out.
Have I mentioned kindness yet? Kindness all around?
Especially to your self though.
Your gut is raw from all the guilt you hurl at it.
Over the most extraordinarily silliest of things no less!
So you forgot to soak the beans! Get a can for Pete’s sake and call it a day.
There is that Pete again. Strange. Stranger.
Do you ever read or write a word, a regular word, and feel as though you are using it for the first time? As though you have never seen or heard it before?
Just happened to me with ‘strange’. So strange.
Speaking of strange, I like being a stranger in my own city.
Looking at everything with ‘new’ eyes. Re-discovering.
Re-reading, re-starting, re-inventing, you get the idea.
Kinda like what I am doing with this new year, re-aligning and all that jazz.
Oh I say!
Cheers to that!
It is dried out now, a mere husk.
But once, it was a living,
breathing thing. A flame of the earth.
A keeper of the bees.
Just as thrilled at the touch of the sun
as you,
& I.
Just as hardy,
& just
as fragile.
Woke up to ice one day last week.
The honeysuckle hung down in loops. So many broke away because they could not take the weight. We carried them away by the armfuls. Time will do it's trick and accept their bodies into the soil to be turned into new saplings come spring. Though nature must do it's thing, I will miss the sweep of it's arch over the driveway.
The trees looked old, grizzled, bearded, frosty.
The branches and the leaves, as though immortalized, as though they could live forever and ever under this icy glass.
It was cold, it was beautiful, it was magical.
P.S. Trying out a new format. Stay with me while I figure it out?
An unexpected gift from a friend!
Plants, books that are beloved, a plate of home made cookies, a slice or two of home baked bread, or cake, a wee bit of curry because the spices were exactly right and you HAD to share the joy of that creation, these are such infinitely precious gifts! Sweet and straight from the heart, the joy they give is unbound and timeless!
I remember receiving a tiny little money plant eons ago! I still remember that bubble of joy I felt on receiving it. So sweet and unexpected! Now that tiny plant has turned into 5 beautifully flourishing plants. And the jasmine, a parting gift from a dear neighbour! It flowers every summer and the scent is exquisite! It also reminds me of home where jasmine grows in abundance.
