A trip to the library....

Popped into the library today to pick up some DVDs for a friend who has been secluded in the local Senior's home as a result of breaking her leg, and is beginning to get 'cabin fever'!

While there I found three books awaiting me - books that I had just ordered a few days ago, inspired by a little roving through literary type blogs one evening last week.

I was astounded at the size of 'Jonathon Strange and Mr. Norrell' (Susanna Clarke) but encouraged by the Sunday Times' blurb that claimed this large tome to be 'a fabulous book....dazzlimg....highly original and compelling'.

And so I am prepared to take it on!  It may take me all summer but the library lady checked and said it was probably good for two renewals (nine weeks).  One thousand and six pages!!! 

I am going to have to stem this Protestant Ethic I harbour that (even at ninety) every day must be productive if I am going to sleep self-satisfied and with a clear concscience. I shall ignore the ethics and put aside more time for reading.....

 I am still intriqued by Jack Miles' Biography of God as the 'protagonist of the greatest book'.  

 And his introductory essay to his latest work as editor of the Norton Anthology of World Religions - 'Why God will not Die' and I gather the answer to that  lies in the belief that 

"our ignorance still exceeds our knowledge, 

and we still have eminently good reason to fear the unknown"  

....and how we reasonably cope with the "impossibility of our ever living a perfectly rational life"..

Towards the end of the essay Miles quotes Mary Oliver - "what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"  and continues....

"We never truly know how to reply to that challenge, do we, since more knowledge - the knowledge we do not have - could always justify holding current plans in abeyance just a little longer.  But when life refuses to wait any longer and the great game  begins whether you have suited up or not, than a demand arises that religion - or some expedient no more fully rational than religion - must meet.  You're going to go with something.........science keeps revealing how much we don't know.  Yet humans seek closure."   

And I guess that's why I was at the Church doing Bulletins for tomorrow's service, changing the hangings back to Green after the Red of Pentecost, checking the candles 

and putting flowers on the altar..............

I also brought home Arthur Ransome's 'We didn't mean to Go to Sea', which should provide a little light hearted diversion from great tomes and heavy philosphical thinking!!!!!!!

Yesterday, a real treat, - Simon Rattle and Barbara Hannigan (a Nova Scotia Canadian) in a cabaret type late night performance with six instruments from the Berlin Philharmoniker....

Wonderful!

Advertised as being very British and a little naughty....

V is for Vestiges

ABC Wednesday
June 10th, 2015

The letter is V for Vestiges

The definition of 'vestiges'  - "traces of something that no longer exists"

My home is haunted by vestiges, - lurking in old trunks,
packed away in cardboard boxes,
stuffed into drawers,
carefully put away in files
and hanging in the back of closets!!!!

Happy momentos of life, family, early years and places where we live only in memory.

In a chocolate box is the ribbon from my mother's  wedding bouquet,
one dried rosebud, plus a few shredded blossoms.

In the garage, in the bottom drawer of Charles' desk, there was a sewing kit
used by his grandfather when he was in the Yukon
at the turn of the last century 

(recently given to one of his great grandsons).

Stuffed in one of my sewing machine drawers is my mother's tatting device, -

 which I could still use, I think, if I was so inclined.....

In my cedar chest is the treasured remnants of a silk and lace dust cap
that belonged to my great-grandmother ,
 along with a sweater I knitted for Charles in early days,
 sporting the replica of Indian paintings he found in the hills above his home.

I have in my own 'bottom drawer' a snall leather bag bought for me in Banff (Alberta)
and a hand tooled leather wallet made for me
by one of our very best friends....  

plus a small handkerchief sent from Scotland
when Charles interrupted his RAF training

 to have the mumps....

Old report cards, - innumerable momentos made for Mother by small, chubby hands - 

the receipt for payment of my piano, dated 1925 - 

the children's immunization records. - 

a collection of old poems 

and three or four large industrial shuttles which I will never use!!!

Out of date calendars with lovely pictures, treasured letters, ancient LPs

and a suitcase full of old sheet music.

A wedding dress and a little black number that I thought quite enticing -

plus dozens of C's ties that nobody wears any more

Well, you know how it is.  I'm sure you have your own VESTIGES lying around,

 reminders of life as it was, 

whose eventual fate niggles at the back of your mind as you get older

 and are not a 'thrower-out'...

Spend a little time with them and linger a bit in memory lane.

  Vestiges are great for that and for bringing a smile to your face....

For more interesting Vs visit here at ABC Wednesday, 

with thanks to Roger and Denise and their veritable helpers....

post script - no high heeled shoes
not even as a momento....

A little of This and a little of That, but mainly garden...

June 7th, 2015

When we moved from the Garden on the Hill I slowly abandoned my Garden Diary blog, and after a while was just posting now and then some of the new little additions to this town garden.  A few days ago my granddaughter, who now tends the hill garden and lives with that marvelous view of sky and mountains and valley, brought me a lovely bouquet of roses she had snipped from the Mr. Lincoln, the Prairie Princess and the pink arbour rose.....

At the same time the roses that crowd the gateway here were soaking up

that lovely rain we had last week and reaching the best part of their first flush....

Around the garden shed the Blaze Rose, which received a good pruning this

spring to keep it from wandering into the neighbour's yard,

has recovered quite nicely and its old familiar bloom reminds me of

the roses that covered that back wall at the farm, the ones that Charles'

mother grew at her backdoor, and the wonderful Blaze climbers we had 

when we gardened earnestly on 10th!!

The peonies have all pined away and dropped their petals round their feet

but the garden is pregnant with greenery and swelling buds, 

It will soon be the time of the Lilies and the poppies (although the Oriental ones have left, except for one lone pink one which I will try to squeeze in later....

In the last day or two the spider lily, which I saved from last year, has started a magnificent display....out in a pot by the back door, with the container of hot pink and white zinnias

When I was busy tidying up the wild violets that decided they would like

to grow side by each with the Hellebore I found some blooms that

had gone to seed, -  one empty of its seed, and another still white and fresh,

although a few days in the house found it drying quickly and popping

open to release the seeds.  I thought they were structurally very beautiful, and delicate.

 Along by the front gate the large purple clematis has gone wild,and is climbing

joyously up and over the entrance - the little violet one on the back fence is being

much more prim, but still very beautiful.

and here is Callie, who hides in the garden and watches all the neighbourhood cats pass

down the lane....

and another pretty picture of the Blaze rose and the pink poppy......

I rise early these days, since the weather turned so warm (hot)

and last thing at night wander through the evening coolness.....