television and poetry

YouTube is television for people (like me) who don't watch television. I spent a good part of this morning watching the X Factor auditions.

I am so hooked! I love (adore) Simon Cowell. I like all the judges. Most of all, I am in awe of the talented individuals who have the vision and courage to get up in front of the judges and audience and lay it all on the line. Incredible vulnerability. For me, a morning of X Factor means more than one tissue - really. Humans can be so miraculous. I love people at their best.

As I was drifting into a nap after lunch a poem almost fully formed came to mind. Perhaps I will try to recall it later today. I do remember the last bit:

Safe harbours are for other ships
not one with spinnaker hoisted
pregnant with the wind.

Time to take Abby for a rainy day walk.

I love Fridays.

New me

Well of course, it's not really a new me - it's the same old me with short (really short) hair.

I love this new look - my "senior" look - meaning, no muss and no fuss. Gosh, when I was 30, I would get up in the morning, get out of the shower, carefully select the day's "look" from my designer wardrobe that I spent a fortune on and then stand in front of the mirror for another 30 minutes blow drying and styling my hair and artfully applying layers of very expensive makeup so as to not look "made up."

Now here I am when you would think I actually need to spend all that time getting myself ready to appear before my adoring public and I step out of the shower, run a dab of styling cream into my hair, slap some moisturizer (the cheap kind) on my face, climb into yesterday's clothes (T-shirt etc.) and that's it.

The wonderful thing about getting older - going with the beauty that is you.

Or as Anthony Robbins once said - men don't wear makeup. Why is that? Because they're inherently more beautiful? I don't think so.

So there's one more thing I no longer have to be enslaved to.

short work weeks

Will I ever get tired of this? - Of finishing work at noon on Wednesday and taking the rest of the week off? Ever?

I doubt it. I truly understand now when people say that the most precious commodity is time, not money; I understand workers who negotiate more time off rather than a big, fat raise. (of course both at the same time would be nice too.)

And so on this gorgeous sunny afternoon I took Abby for a nice long walk and came home to pick late ripening raspberries. Ahhhh.....

A further note on spiders. A couple of days ago I was eating some raspberries after dinner, gazing at my computer screen and not the bowl I was fishing them out of. Suddenly I bit into something that didn't feel or taste quite right. I peeled the "something" out of my mouth. Yes, it was a small garden spider, still alive but rather mutilated. I couldn't decide whether I was more grossed out or more sad for the poor little spider.

I consigned the spider to the compost bin and the rest of the raspberries to Abby.

Spiders

I like spiders. I also worry about spiders. This morning the world was covered with spider webs. How, I wonder, are they all going to trap enough insects so that they have enough to eat?

Sometimes I find little spiders in my house. I let them be. As long as they are not building visible webs, I don't mind having spider pets. I rationalize that they must be eating other bugs that I really don't want in my house.

I admire their industry and their persistence. You can knock down a spider's web and it will build one right back up again. There's a lesson there I think. And the dew-covered webs are pretty to boot.

Rain

The rain - can you hear the rain? In a half-doze I listened to it last night, pounding on the roof, knocking on my windows as though it was asking for permission to come in. And the wind - it is driving the rain against the walls, bending the raspberry canes in the garden so low they almost kiss the ground.

Yes, the rains are back. Oh, I know we'll get some more gloriously sunny days filled with warmth, but this relentless downpour is not a summer shower; this is the beginning of the wet season on the West Coast.

This morning when I took Abby for a walk I pulled on my rain pants and jacket, pulled the hood up, slipped into high rubber boots and pulled on wool gloves - and so it has begun.

This is the season of downloading more movies, of walking through the park more quickly with head bent, of curling up in the warmth of my little home and wishing I could hibernate. But I can't: I have a dog that needs to go out and that wants to hike all year round. So I have to thank Abby for keeping me in shape and full of energy and fresh air. I may not want to go out when I'm warm and comfy indoors but once I'm out there, I'm glad.

The Market

Even on a rainy Sunday morning, nothing beats the Cedar Farmer's Market. Today I scored 2.5 pounds of chanterelles, sourdough artisan bread, fresh eggs, organic tomatoes and carrots, newly dug potatoes and a huge stalk of brussel sprouts.

Dinner tonight? Ah - my once a year treat. All (yes all) of those chanterelles will go into two cast iron skillets with lots (lots) of sweet butter. When they're done, they go onto a huge plate and are served with generous slabs of buttered bread. Ahhhhhh - bliss!

Yup - that kinda makes my day. Oh yes - now I am going to play The Secret of Grisly Manor - you had to know I was going to succumb to a free Google app (namely game) sooner or later. I am proud to say that in my case it was sooner - I do so like to be on the leading edge.

Small Pleasures

I call them small pleasures - but are they really?

Today I had the pleasure of hiking with Abby over the top of Maple Mountain and coming down the other side. It was a full, glorious, sunny day. Oh the pleasure of feeling my body strong and sure, moving rhythmically up the tree-studded slopes; oh the pleasure of discovering sun flooded moss-carpeted forest glades; oh the delight of pausing at the top to breath in the views stretching to the Olympic Mountains in the south - and then the long, slow descent, knowing all the while that at the end of the hike is a reward of rich, dark organic chocolate. Yup - we have to have our rewards.

And there are more rewards - a nap and then uploading all the photos and playing with them in Photoshop - and a hot bubble bath and then an evening of reading and playing online bridge while eating a meal of rice and broccoli and carrots followed by fresh, ripe peaches.

Yes, they are small pleasures but I savour each one, tasting it, letting it melt into my senses.

Who needs big when small is so very good?