mumma yaga

June 29 i am shattered by the news this week. i cannot finish the sentences. ***** I was about to leave my writing to go and look for Rocky. K was worried, since we didn't see him after the old bridge, but here he comes (Rocky, that is), looking a little frazzled, as if he was worried too, limping a little on his right foreleg. ***** 120 kilometres to the city, five times in seven days. Twenty-five hours on the road. With the baby and, for four of the five trips, the dog. With gas $2.16 a litre. This is the down side of living in the Estrie. In Etobicoke, the vet is five minutes away and the doctor is ten minutes away. There are more stores and gas stations within five minutes of us than there are in a twenty kilometre radius from us on this hill. We have only tiny Mansonville, with its one corner store, one grocery, one gas station. There is also a bakery and a European deli. In the summertime a cantine opens beside the gas station to sell hamburgers and poutine. Living here is a ...

 June twenty Regarding Anne Tyler (see yesterday's post): In the late nineties, a dear friend had a stopoff in Toronto, and left me a book she had read on her flight. I think it was Breathing Lessons . I was not eager; I am not a big fan of "modern novels", but waded in anyway. I went on to read another handful of Tyler's novels. I learned a bit about the "modern novel" genre and began to get it. I love Tyler's work: it is full of ordinary extraordinary people. I was reviewing her works just now and I see that I have some catching up to do. The current bedside selection. There are a couple (or seven!) more ebooks open, but I like paper books, a more concrete experience, a learning and memory involving more of the senses (?), but maybe that is my age. I have not cracked the Faulkner. Poem, dated January 1998, not about the Tyler novel. modern novel so modern it's hardcover full of crisp clever writing the author should have been a poet her words cut l...

 June fifteen tiny islands, small worlds. ***** mindless, energized by sun and green, i am without word or thought, walking as the dog walks, following the paths he finds. ***** Rock and I went along the big stream, down the hill. The undergrowth is sparse just here, not sure why, probably to do with age of trees and sunlight, but it allowed us to walk off-trail by the stream. Another island. We stopped to breathe in a small naked area where there was access to the stream and stones to cross.  ***** Here, in the lower meadow, is a place for a witches' tryst. Too small for a coven meeting, but for two or three gathered together. "When shall we three meet again?" (From the play)  It is a small, sheltered clearing like empty hands held out. The cow pond has a little peninsula reaching into it. It intrigues me. Childlike, I imagine magic and undiscovered creatures live there.  I remember how, last June, I was enchanted as if by a spell, during the summer solstice, cast b...

 June 9 I am sick of cooking! On Tuesday I prepared this meal, plant-based and mostly whole foods. Pancakes made from sourdough starter and mashed chickpeas, steamed asparagus (in season now), spinach and cucumber salad. There is processed whole wheat flour in the pancakes, processed vinegar and mango juice for salad dressing, processed sweet zucchini pickle, canned cranberries (added sugar), and lime juice for the asparagus. I cooked apples and added raisins and dried cranberries (processed, sugar added?) for sweetening. I enjoyed preparing it.  Then on Wednesday I felt weighed down (burden * ) at the thought of planning and preparing one more meal. This is the sort of thought that, a few years ago, would have slithered me straight down into depression, like a snake on the snakes-and-ladders board! I put dinner on the table anyway, a less "virtuous" meal, but nutritionally adequate, and I know that this weight will lift. I just need to walk through the time, this feeling, le...

 June 5 The old witch, a hawthorn, is in bloom, looking more than ever like a jaunty, woman's hat. Confetti from a hawthorn wedding by the ridge stream: We drove home from Toronto without any arrival time in mind. We even left "late" at 11:30 am.  But, as we did on the way there, we aimed to take as long as we could to do the trip. This simple change in perspective stripped away all the stress of the drive, all concern for making "good time", all the fret of traffic hold-ups. We did have a "good time": we played a driving game, listened to comedian, Eddie Izzard, some music. We talked. We stopped at ONRoutes, and enjoyed the picnic sites, which are spacious and woodsy. Always look for them at ONRoutes; their entrance can be hidden, but they are open from Victoria Day to sometime in early fall. (I like the ONRoutes pun, so fun and funny.) In spite of our laid-back, holiday-slow pace, the drive took only nine hours and was so pleasant, a holiday indeed!...