Life is so Daily

Training wheels and blossoms

Posted on by Joy / 6 Comments

My neighbours are out for their walk again. Every day, since they moved in 5 years ago, I’ve watched Dad or Mom or Grandma take the baby and the dog for a walk. First it was a stroller with one of those sturdy hooded baby seats fastened on, then it was front facing, then the walk slowed down to a halting creep as the adult hovered over a toddler who wanted to walk by herself. The other day I saw the five-year-old on a wobbly pink bike with training wheels. 

Nothing like watching a little one grow up to remind you that time is marching forward.

What never changes on these walks, however, is the stately black dog and … the cat. It’s remarkable! And it’s also quite obvious that, while the child and the dog are being taken for a walk, the mottled cat has decided to go along. It doesn’t walk with its family; it trots along behind, making side dashes here and there to check out a smell or a movement in the grass. It can, of course, because unlike the dog or even the child, it is not leashed. Not tethered in any way to anyone else in the family except, maybe, by love?

I’m tempted to think it’s just curiosity.

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Our own Sweet Thing tries out her training wheels.

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The snowy apple blossoms have bloomed and faded for another year, but oh how they flourished! Even on the day our city was cloaked in smoke from the forest fires up north, the blossoms shimmered with a magical glow.

Now the lilacs are in full bloom. I love to bring a few inside for a couple of days. They fill the whole house with their joyful scent of Spring. I do so at risk, though, since The Cowboy can’t stand the smell of them. Sure enough, as soon as he walked through the door today he looked at me, alarmed. “What stinks?”

At the moment, these beauties will welcome you at our front door.

Interesting how our noses interpret things so differently from one another. What smells heavenly to one person turns another off completely. To me, there is nothing remotely sweet to the smell of sweet peas, delicately pretty though they be.

Image by _Alicja_ from Pixabay 

Maybe that’s why God made such a variety of blossoms, so that each of us would have at least one fragrant beauty to get the joy bubbles bobbing in our soul.

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The coolest thing I saw this week was this live stream of earth from the International Space Station. You can listen to pretty music as you circle the earth from space, in live time. Very cool. Thanks to Steven Skoczen of inkandfeet.com for passing on that info.

Life is so Daily

Fine tuning

Posted on by Joy / 2 Comments

Our neighbourhood is full of noise and big trucks, orange caution fences and signs that say ROAD CLOSED. Main gas lines are being replaced – a very big job. There is a large hole in our back yard next to the house, where the gas workers have prepped for the change. It is covered with a piece of plywood and encircled with barriers and orange plastic fencing. 

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Right now there is a massive truck in the middle of the cul-de-sac that has unfolded a long long green arm over the houses and into someone’s back yard, channeling concrete from a big concrete mixer truck, also in the middle of the cul-de-sac, its drum rotating. Gears grind. Motors grumble and roar. Back up alarms beep incessantly. And a “concrete specialist” stands guard on the truck, pushing buttons on a handheld wand.

It will be an obstacle course for anyone wanting to leave their driveway today.

My imagination conjures up four little grandsons sitting on the thickly padded iron bench I keep in the bay window, watching, pointing, grunting. BIG is a favourite word in Bright’s and Sunny’s limited vocabulary. They love to say it, over and over.

All that noise. And yet …

If I tune my ears to the back garden I can still make out the birds warbling to their heart’s content. No roads closed in their winged world. Man-made noise and God-made noise, blending into a modern day symphony.  This is life in my little corner today.

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Image by PublicDomainImages from Pixabay 

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The best thing I read all week was an excerpt from Margaret Atwood’s poem, UP:

Now here’s a good one:

you’re lying on your deathbed.

You have one hour to live.

Who is it, exactly, you have needed

all these years to forgive?

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Grandparenting

Boys

Posted on by Joy / 3 Comments

I know girls. I raised three of them into strong independent women. As they grew up I was involved with their friends, through school, birthday parties, dance, drama, basketball, soccer, hockey. You name it, I was there. Watching girls be girls. 

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I am pleasantly baffled by boys. Perhaps I shouldn’t be, having grown up with three brothers. But when you’re a child you take everything in stride. It’s not the same as being an adult, observing and caring for them. 

The Cowboy and I just spent 10 days looking after Little Man, Bright, and Sunny. Three very busy little boys. Every day spent with them was a new wonder. Intriguing. Bewildering. Enchanting. Exhausting.

I don’t know, are all boys enthralled with potty humour? Even the two-year-olds erupt in laughter as their five-year-old brother shifts his hips to the left and lets out a howling “toot”. 

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Of all the animals, the boy is the most unmanageable.

Plato

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The novel I am writing is told from the perspective of a five-year-old girl. As I write from her viewpoint I need to be aware of how much language she carries. So, one of my goals this visit was to closely observe Little Man’s language and the way he processes life.

Surprise, surprise! What I discovered was that Little Man speaks like a five-year-old boy. His language includes a lot of grunts and sound effects and other noises that make him giggle with glee.

I don’t remember this being true of little girls. They giggle about other things.

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A boy is a magical creature. You can lock him out of your workshop, but you can’t lock him out of your heart.

Allan Beck

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So this new phenomenon is an education, and I’m enjoying every minute of it.

Grandparenting little boys is like experiencing the sun and the wind, the rain and the sasquatch all coming out on the same day. It is a dazzling torrential delight.

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The best thing I saw all week (besides the faces of my grandchildren) was … These Canada Geese walking across an almost thawed ditch. The ice creaked and squelched and squerumped beneath them as they gingerly took step after cautious step.

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Favourites

Hello, Friend

Posted on by Joy / 5 Comments


What a difference a friend makes!

Earlier this week, 5-year-old Little Man face-timed to show me the gap where his two bottom teeth belong. They’d actually been wiggly and loose for close to a month! But he’d refused to let anyone touch them. Then, he was play-fighting with his best buddy when both teeth got knocked out. One was found. One wasn’t. We will leave it to the tooth fairy to decide what to do about THAT!   



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A friend is a gift you give yourself.

Robert Louis Stevenson

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Recently, the Cowboy and I were on holiday where we met new friends, from England, who introduced us to teatime. 

Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay

Of course, we know the English love their tea, but my goodness, I had no idea how enchanting the ritual of teatime could be. 

I have never been a big fan of tea, but I am now on a quest to learn all things tea. Stay tuned as I continue this adventure. 

Hmm … maybe I’m trying too hard?

And, if by some miracle of cyber magic, Lin & Dave, Kate & Russ are reading this, let me say again how much we enjoyed your company. Part of the reason our holiday was so enjoyable is because of the dinner companions we looked forward to every evening.

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Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light.

Helen Keller

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The deepest of friendships call for the deepest kind of sharing, in good times and in bad. My little cache of treasured friends, who have walked with me through deep and muddy waters, who are there to pray when I have no prayers left, who by their very presence bring life back to my soul … those friends who turn up when life is not pretty, bring a rare beauty to the world.

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What a difference a friend makes. Old friends, new friends, treasured friends. I hope you have a few.

And, if you’ve found me, here in this big virtual world of overwhelming words, I hope you know … you’ve found a friend.

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The best thing I heard all week went something like this:

3-year-old to her Daddy: Daddy, when I grow up I will be an astronaut.

Daddy: Honey, if you want to be an astronaut you will have to go to college, study hard, get a job, and stay physically fit.

3-year-old: That’s just four things.

Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay 

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