Scraps of Joy

… I learnt the sheer luxury of daydreaming … perhaps it isn’t lost time at all, but the most valuable thing I could have done.

Roger Deakin [Notes from Walnut Tree Farm]

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Hello Friend,

It’s so good to have you back for a visit. Have you had an eventful summer?

Come, have a seat in one of these big rockers on the veranda. We’ve had a wonderful, cleansing rain and the air is fresh with it. I’ve been learning to make London Fogs, and Mom just brought up a freshly baked zucchini loaf. Would you like to try a London Fog with your slice? Butter is there on the side table if you want it.

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You may remember from our last visit that The Cowboy and I were two provinces away, where our grandson had gone through three emergency brain surgeries. It was shocking, traumatic, miraculous. That’s how our summer began. After he got home from hospital and his family began the long journey of healing, we were able to come home and begin our own journey to healing. It required rest, stillness, the comfort of home and ordinariness.

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It struck me that we don’t mark time by the hours, days, and years of the calendar; rather, we mark the times of our lives by the significance of the events we experience.

Glenn P. Booth [Them Days]

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Part of my ordinary days back at home has been to care for my gardens – flowers and vegetables alike. I’ve grown vegetables for many years, but now I’m trying to become a flower gardener as well. It’s all rather trial and error, research and learning, and we may still be in our experimental years. This is only our second year of gardening out here at The Cleft after all. But it does give me a thrill every time I pass by a flowering pot or flower bed and see the results of planning and work. The pink dahlias!! Exquisite.

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I have two little wildflower gardens too, and their delicate petals waving in soft breezes have been a restful delight this unpredictable summer.

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Speaking of breezes … they have become a part of my stillest moments. Before my words came back to me, I would sit in this rocking chair on the veranda, or at my desk in the library between the long window to my right and the smaller one behind me, and savour the gentle breeze wafting over me, past me, picking up and carrying away the heaviness of recent months little by little. What a gift a breeze is.

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He who is ready to believe the goodness of God shall always see fresh goodness to believe in.

Charles Spurgeon

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My summer reading has been varied and unusual. Unusual in that at least five of them were books I would not normally choose to read. But they arrived in once-a-month gift boxes from a favourite bookstore, and so I read them. Two of them I would not recommend – The Heart in Winter and All Fours, not because of the writing, but because of the content, which I didn’t enjoy. The fact that I finished them is a testament to the excellent skills of the authors. I love to read beautiful words put together uniquely and engagingly.

One of the books – This Earthly Globe: a Venetian Geographer and the Quest to Map the World, by Andrea di Robilant – completely surprised me, because though I wouldn’t have chosen it for myself ever, I’ve found it so interesting. It’s the true story of how one man in 1500’s Venice managed to gather and compile a collection of travelogues, journals, and classified government reports in three volumes and release them into the public domain. It was “the biggest Wikileak of the Renaissance,” and changed humanity’s geographical view of the world. It’s a book of history, but reads like a novel.

Favourite read? The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery. I return to this book every so often for the delightful hope-filled story of a young woman who steps away from the preconceived ideas of who she should be into who she really is. And also for the beautiful descriptions of nature. It’s L.M. Montgomery at her best.

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The faint laughter of winds was always about them and the colours of Mistawis, imperial and spiritual, under the changing clouds were something that cannot be expressed in mere words. Shadows, too. Clustering in the pines until a wind shook them out and pursued them over Mistawis.

L.M. Montgomery [The Blue Castle]

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Sewing has been another healer for me. It is my sanity in the best of times, but this spring I had a goal that was finally realized by the end of July: to turn three beautiful dresses, made by my mom for our three girls, into quilts for them. I painstakingly, and sometimes tearfully, took out the stitches Mom spent hours putting into these dresses and refashioned them into something Sweetie, Peaches, and Babe could continue to love. I was pleased with the results, and I think they were too.

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Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it.

L.M. Montgomery

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We ended the last weeks of August with a visit from all the grandkids and their moms. Yes, ALL the grandkids. Little Man is well, though sometimes fearful of traumatic events returning. He needs to be careful about intense activity for a while yet, but otherwise he’s healthy and strong. And that is a miracle. If you have been praying for him, thank you.

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While they were here we kept busy, and it made me chuckle to see them driving the golf cart around the yard, carrots fresh from the garden dangling from their mouths, the greens getting tossed anywhere and everywhere.

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Teach the children … Give them the fields and the woods and the possibility of the world salvaged from the lords of profit … rejoice as they learn to love this green space they live in, its sticks and leaves and then the silent, beautiful blossoms. Attention is the beginning of devotion.

Mary Oliver [Upstream]

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And here we are in September! Truth be told, I began this visit before today, but it seems appropriate to share my Summering on this very last day of summer (though not officially, of course). And what have I learned?

Life is hard.

God is good.

And summering – rest, stillness, enjoyment, love – can exist even in the midst of the hard. But it must be a choice.

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To the historian, every battlefield is different; to the philosopher, every battlefield is the same.

Anne Michaels [Held]

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I’ve shared this music before, but it’s so perfect for our visit: daydreams, London Fogs, flowers, stillness, reading, sewing, breezes, fresh carrots on golf carts, journeys to healing. Summering.

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Thank you so much for visiting today. Stay safe out there, and see you next time.

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Feature Photo by Jill Wellington of Pixabay