Rain

I fell asleep to the sound of (what I believe was) a nest of baby grackles in the tree outside my bedroom window. I woke up to the sound of rain. 

Rain. Music to my ears. I quietly wished for and envisioned a long, soaking rain on the wildfires burning in our province. Please let the wind blow these rain clouds where they are needed the most.

I wrote my morning pages while looking out the window and listening to the rain. Next to the sound of a purring cat, there is nothing quite like listening to rain to lower one's feelings of angst. 

The rain slowed, then eventually stopped. Two birds hopped on the fence within my view. They simply sat there and enjoyed the view. They had the body language of mourning doves. 

In my limited experience, grackles swoop, dive and don't light in one spot for long. 

Robins walk around a lot. I love watching robins running around. They are always on the move. The robins who hang around here seem to spend a lot of time walking and their flights seem short. 

Mourning doves seem to spend a lot of time in one spot, watchful of what's around them but rather sedative in their movements compared to their counterparts who frequent my yard. 

One morning I was taking out the compost and the presence of two mourning doves just on the other side of the fence, a few feet from where I stood, captured my interest. Opening and shutting the lid of the compost didn't deter them. They stayed on their side of the fence, I stayed on mine. I'm sure they were aware of my presence but they lingered, even when I moved around a bit. I would have loved to have found a spiritual story to explain their presence but I decided it was more likely I was close to a nest and they were on guard for any danger.

This morning, a mourning dove caught my attention as it hung out near a puddle left by the rain. 

I watched it for a while (mourning doves can be pretty boring as they really don't do much) and eventually it flew onto the fence. I followed the movement and found a flurry of activity going on:

I don't profess to know a lot about birds, but it is my guess there could be another nest of mourning dove babies in the near future.

Just some quiet, morning thoughts to start the day. May you find a piece of serenity within your day today.

Lost Days

I wasted a day. Though I could pinpoint a handful of meaningful things I did with the day yesterday, I allowed most of the day to slip through my fingertips like water. 

I woke up this morning to find the door unlocked and the dehumidifier running in the basement. On one hand, I didn't have any unexpected company drop in and the basement isn't as humid as I thought it was as the water did not reach the maximum shut-off level. On the other hand, where was my head?

The luxury of my Daybed Room with a TV, canister of chips and ready access to everything I need is I can wander upstairs and not bother coming back downstairs to lock up at the end of the day.

My new ROKU TV has a Little House on the Prairie channel. It runs absolutely nothing by Little House, 24/7.  That series takes me back to a simpler time - both the time period it depicts, the age I was when it first aired and a time when I watched reruns before I went to work. It is a show that simply lowers ones stress levels, blood pressure and (unfortunately) ambition levels.

I have this niggling thought in the back of my mind that I could/should/may end up working more than four days a week. Between summer holidays, changes at work and what is best for the office, I am almost certain I could work five days a week while I long for a three day work week.

The thought of giving up that bonus day contributed to my state of mind yesterday. Mostly? I blame the TV. Days when I turn on the TV first thing in the morning usually end up being lost days.

This weekend? If I do nothing more than keep the TV off until after supper it will be enough.

Thoughtless Thursday

It is almost 11:00 am on my most treasured day of the week. A weekday I get to stay home. What in the world have I done with my time so far?

I have not a lot to show for my day. Yet. I have played around with my financial spreadsheet and analyzed my spending, past and future. I have made a call to Revenue Canada to confirm a few things. I have caught up on Sullivan's Crossing and eaten the better part of a bag of chips.

Where does one go from here?

I was hoping for a semi-productive puttering kind of day. I would like to lose myself to fine tuning the "stuff" within my Daybed Room. I'd like to declutter the basement. I may pull some weeds.

Words feel sparse, ambition even less so. Thoughts of where things will go from here waft lightly through my head. 

Oh, Thursday, where have you gone. And where are you going? I may just fall down a few rabbit holes...

How To Make Hummingbird ENDLESS Water Fountain

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHd_9D_6x6o&ab_channel=RobbieandGaryGardeningEasy

Displaced

Minutes before the end of my workday yesterday, three people walked into the office looking for information about the location of an evacuee centre in our community.

Two of the three had been evacuated from their home a week ago and the last update they heard, the wildfire was one kilometer away from their home. They were with someone they knew from our town but looking for alternative accommodations as the unknowns continue to mount.

One can only imagine what it feels like to flee your home, not knowing if it will be standing when you return. A devastating situation.

I wonder about the wildlife, hoping their natural instincts tell them what they need to know. 

As I walked home, I considered the idea of a situation which would place untold numbers of people looking for a "port in the storm". What if my community was called upon to open their homes temporarily?

I thought of my simple little life which includes a home, spare sleeping quarters, some back up supplies and thought of how quickly one would go through their supplies if there were five people to house.

At this moment, I am one of the lucky ones. Fortunate enough to consider how I could come to the aid of someone in need. 

Life can change in a New York Minute. What if I was one of those people wandering into a place of business looking for shelter in an unthinkable time?

My cousin, spouse and three young children lost everything in a wildfire five years ago. It could happen to anyone. And does.

I hear Smokey the Bear's voice saying, "Only you can prevent forest fires". Human-kind, we are our own worst enemies. To think of the origins of any one of these fires. I don't know the answer to how these raging fires began. I fear humans are not without blame.

Stay safe out there.

Memory Games

Hand writing three, 8 1/2" x 11" morning pages on a daily basis has been an interesting exercise in exorcising my morning meanderings.

I have written almost 400 pages and my desire to go back and reread any of them is nil. The most I may do before I shred them is scan the margins to see how many of the tasks I've written down have been left unattended.

One purpose of these pages is to reveal one's inner creative self. I think I may have used up my creativity years ago, as my pages haven't revealed much beyond the fact that I find my thoughts pretty tedious and boring.

Recently, when the words aren't coming, I have been trying to recall events of my life. Years, dates, events and so on. This morning's thoughts began with wondering how much I remember before I started blogging.

I started listing the people I worked with when I moved here in 1988, names of a group of co-workers from 1990. Then, the sequence of events one life altering day in 2023. Recalling one event led to another, another and another. I used no resource other than my own head, assisted with the ability to write things down as I recalled them. 

These are the games Mom used to play. Testing her memory without assistance of any kind. If she couldn't sleep, she would think of poems from her childhood and a myriad of things to hone her memory skills. I am convinced this mental gymnastics contributed to her sharp thinking and overall brain health. Her memory, combined with her curiosity and desire to learn are tools I think are good for all of us.

As I came up with memories I thought I had forgotten, I even made a comment to Mom in my morning pages. I thought she may be pleased I was taking a page from her book.

Now, I have to hone the skill of hanging onto those memories without writing them down. Mental math is a skill I've lost. 

I'll keep playing my memory games and hope for the best. 

A Guest Room I Don't Want to Share

They say you should sleep in your guest room to ensure it is comfortable and your guests have what they need to enjoy their stay. Well? I've gone a step beyond that.

Even before "my room" was my bedroom, I commented it was the perfect guest room. It has an en-suite bathroom, queen sized bed and the room is cozy and a comfortable size. A guest could get up any time they wished and have everything they need to extend their time alone before needing to be social. Plus, they wouldn't have to go down the not-to-code stairs if they needed the bathroom in the middle of the night.

Let the record show I already knew my room was the best guest bedroom.

Then I moved into my room and the guest bedroom became a pet project of mine. I knew a daybed would be ideal for that room because the air register is by the wall, under the bed. And I found the daybed of my dreams:

Then the writing desk of course. I cannot say enough about my writing desk by the window but I will try.

I was searching for just the right kind of cabinet which would mostly serve the purpose of holding stationary, writing and office supplies but could double as a dresser if required. Plus, I wanted another smaller cabinet for the closet. Due to the fact this cozy little room is carpeted, I was looking for furniture on wheels. 

Closet cabinet

Then came the pièce de ré·sis·tance. The final touch.

After a great deal of thought, research and test runs, I decided a TV for this cozy little spot would be my little treat. A place to watch TV at night, when my sensitive neck cannot relax on my comfy-looking-couch in the living room. 

While the living room windows were under construction, I moved the TV up into this cozy little room and I loved, loved, loved ending my days in this most-comfortable-spot steps away from my bedroom. A little TV watching and I'm literally 12 steps from my bed. Twelve steps on the same level. Not 13 steps up, then 10 steps to the right. Twelve steps.

 

I brought home my new TV yesterday afternoon and couldn't wait to set it up. It is the perfect size, perfect fit and perfect-for-me ROKU TV with access to more channels than I'll ever need:

A small fridge and microwave and this room would have everything I need.

I have created a guest room so cozy, comfortable and ideal that I don't want to share it. I'm just glad I already proclaimed my bedroom as the ideal guest room. So I guess that makes everyone happy.

Dad

The gift of living near and visiting a sibling regularly is sharing the same core memories. It is common for us to find a thread of Mom woven throughout our conversations. We have a lot of "Mom" in us, she lived for 89 years and though it has been close to eight years since she died, thoughts and memories still feel fresh.

Dad, on the other hand, was young when we last had the dad we knew. His massive heart attack, days before his 58th birthday, was the end of Dad living his life. We had fewer years to collect Dad memories and it has been 42 years since that fateful day. 

So when a "Dad memory" arises, it touches a part of me that hasn't been touched for a while. It feels rather special.

When my son built a shed for me and I commented I couldn't wait to roll my tires into their seasonal storage spot and not have to stack them, it stopped him in his tracks for a minute. He quickly commented he'd build something for tire storage, since the walls of the aluminum shed wouldn't withstand the weight. He came up with this:

It was made completely out of leftover wood that was lying around. It cost nothing but his time. It was a very "Dad" thing of him to do. When I showed this shelving unit to my sister, she immediately commented, "This is Dad. This is something Dad would make." Yes. Yes, it was.

Cool little memory to store inside the shed along with the tires and other miscellanea.

Yesterday, I was commenting on my ability to hang a picture. Except when I looked at the back of the picture I wanted to hang, it was missing the picture wire. Two loops to string it into, but no wire. When I mentioned this to my sister, she perked up and said she had some.

She ran downstairs and came up with her picture wire storage container:

"Dad!" I exclaimed. That is Dad's, right? Yes. Yes it was. 

Dad used tobacco tins to store nuts, bolts, screws and many numbers of things in the garage. Seeing that tobacco tin was an immediate callback to my memory of Dad. No, rolling cigarettes is quite possibly the last thing he may want to be remembered by, but the tins. The resourcefulness of not letting anything go to waste. "That" was Dad.

I wistfully asked my sister if she minded leaving that tin to me in her will. Just a little thing. I loved the way I felt when suddenly I felt the memory of Dad wash through me. She said she could do one better. She ran downstairs and found its twin. Now we each have a little memory of Dad in our storage collections.

Dad. I love being reminded of you. Your essence. Your work ethic. Who you were. I love when a brand new, never-been-recently-recalled memory flashes through my mind. Most of all, I cherish having a sibling who shares that exact same memory of who you were and the ways which we still see you in your children and grandchildren.