Friday 25 May 2012

Eclipse of the Sun



I am not sure if the recent  solar eclipse had crescent-shaped shadows because I missed it, but following is a poem I wrote the last time that we saw a full eclipse (early1970's).  As the moon was moving off to the side, it was a fascinating sight to see the crescent-shaped shadows.  We don't see the shape of the shadows when we're outdoors but we happened to be inside the house that day and the shadows were on a flat floor.  We were surprised to see that the shadows were in the exact shape of what we saw of the sun! Watch for this phenomenon next time you see an eclipse the sun.


 Crescent Shadows

Crescent shadows dancing on the floor
Through the maples around my door
Cast from a disk of a crescent sun
Rays of light, demarcated view
Bits of sunlight filtering through
The maple trees with teeming leaves
Dancing in the breeze.

Above
Where the sun was sovereign king
Just a short time ago
Single, alone, in the great beyond
Unchallenged, undisputed, unrivalled.

Now the moon has invaded
The sun’s imperial domain
Blocking its regal rays
Impeding its heavenly reign
Obstructing its path of light
Declaring again
Its singular subjugation
But temporary!

Friday 18 May 2012

Ahh!!!! Wild Mushrooms!!!!

T'is the Season
I had a  call from a friend yesterday and she told me that I was missing out on a very important pastime that used to be a very important part of our life when I lived in Dauphin.    This spring ritual was mushroom picking - morels - to be exact.  Four of us  used to take off into the bush areas of the countryside and pick these special delicacies that Mother Nature provided so abundantly just for the picking.  Granted, some areas also yielded woodticks in almost disgusting abundance as well but we warded them off by wearing clothing that repelled them and the more stubborn ones, we simply  killed off.  Those mushroom expeditions  were worth any inconvenience,  any sacrifice to us!  What a delicious treat  these were, served up in a sauce of sauteed onions in rich cream, (preferably straight off the farm).  Oh the pleasures of country life.  Nothing can match it!!!! 


                                   



Sunday 13 May 2012

Letter to My Mom


Letter to my mom

I can’t believe it has been fifty five years today since I last saw your weary face, those eyes that barely could move to acknowledge our presence.  Yet how I miss you still, and even now I am wracked with feelings of guilt about wanting it all to end.  It wasn’t that I wanted you gone, Mom.  But we could not relieve your pain, could offer you no help, could not make anything even just a little easier for you.  You were suffering so terribly those last two weeks, yet still you waited – and waited – until your last baby could be at your side.  Only after John was able to come did you let go.
I know you are in a better place where you are, and I am grateful to God for relieving your pain and taking you to His Home.  Yet even now, I still miss you after all those years. We celebrated Mothers Day today and my memories took me back to that sad day when we lost you.  I still need to talk to you sometimes, because I know you would understand, would empathize with me, would rejoice with me at the good things and would cry with me about the bad.  Yet all I can hope for is another dream.  At least I get those.  They feel so real and as we go about our dream world tasks.  I feel that peace, that connection and that comfort of working alongside of you even if we are only attending to mundane tasks together.  Thanks for coming to visit me every now and then.  Good Night Mom.  See you in my dreams.

Tuesday 8 May 2012

Jackrabbit Mania

                                                My front yard in Dauphin

                                                        My backyard in Dauphin
   
                                          "That Wascally Wabbit"
I look outside my apartment window and I see our own private Easter Bunny preening himself in our courtyard four floors below.  (I am on the forth floor of our Apartment Building").  I call him "our own" because he spends alot of time in our yard.  When I first saw him, when I moved in here three years ago, I cringed.  Oh, it's not that I don't like bunnies.  I truly do.  In fact, I had some very pleasant experiences with a jackrabbit that we raised from a baby when we were on the farm. (His story is related in this blog back on January 16.)  That was a GOOD jackrabbit. It's just that I have encountered BAD jackrabbits since, so I now view these cute rascals with a wary eye.
 When I lived in Dauphin, I had a resident jackrabbit that caused me no end of frustration.  I used to plant alot of flowers around my home.  (One year I even won a prize for my beautiful flowered yard.) 
However, those flowers did not come cheap,  thanks to a resident jackrabbit that had a penchant for flowers and my petunias were his special favorite. He would eat the young plants down to the ground and I would have to replant them again – and again. One time as he sat there chewing on my painted daisies near the fence, totally oblivious to my unveiled threats, I got so angry I took a slingshot and shot at him. Of course I could not hit the broad side of a barn. The pebble zinged by between his ears and just made him look up as if to say, “What was that?” Then, unperturbed, he just went on eating, unabashedly ignoring this neurotic woman that was attempting to cause him unnecessary stress.
 As a rule, I love animals and bunnies are particularly cute, but if I could have been a better shot, I would gladly have finished that moocher off. I used tons of paprika and cayenne pepper on my plants and all it did was delay him until the next rain or heavy morning dew, though I do believe he did develop a taste for spicy   salad. He never paid room and board. He just made himself at home on my lawn between feedings, relaxing, sprawled lazily out on the grass near the flowers like it was his own private estate!
So you can understand why I didn't trust the jackrabbits here in Edmonton.  But I'm eating crow now. Alberta bunnies are GOOD bunnies.  Our gardener plants alot of flowers and in the three years I have been here, the rabbits have not touched any of them.  Are Alberta jackrabbits specially trained to be GOOD???

Monday 7 May 2012

A Dreamer's Dream


A Dreamer’s Dream

I ask not for fame and fortune
Or great mansions trimmed with gold
Give me but a hazel thicket
And a loving hand to hold.
A babbling brook outside my window
The soft whisper of a breeze
Grassy meadows all around me
And wild songbirds in the trees.
Give perfume of the roses
Wafting sweetly through the air
The droning hum of bumblebees
Sipping nectar hidden there.
Give me cobwebs mid the posies
Glistening bright in the morning dew
Morning glories day proclaiming
In deep pink and azure blue.
Give me butterflies on my daisies
Soft white clouds in the sky above
Tender arms to gently hold me
In sweet bondage of true love.
Sweet solitude I’ll treasure
Its serenity divine
In profusion, simple pleasure
That great “fortune” that’s all mine.

Tuesday 1 May 2012

Just Wondering

                                                  Can a Trick Like This Work?
This morning, I received an emailed  copy of an article from the April 30/12 issue of the Toronto Star that really made a rather painful impression on me, particularly today.  The article  stressed the need for exercise for many of  us here in North America. According to that article, we could eliminate many medications if we just exercised more.  That article certainly applies to me, I know. So far, I've been lucky so medications are not a big part of my life but I do know I would be much better off if I exercised more.    
This computer, for instance, while I consider it essential to my well-being, and as such, my best friend, is also my nemesis at the same time.  I don't have those new fangled gadgets that you carry in your breast pocket that keep you in touch with  family, friends and the outside world. Nor do I want  one of those things.
Nonetheless, my computer keeps me in my chair alot of the time.  I exercise but I don't exercise as often, or as much, as I should, or could, perhaps.  If I did, I wouldn't be feeling all these aches and pains.  I did some lawn and garden work at my daughter's yesterday and today I'm sore in spots I didn't know I had.  Granted the work I did there was not normal exercise but if I was in shape, it would not bother me outside of making me tired - not sore.  So I have to grudgingly admit that I'm in poor shape - because I hurt!
That article expounded on the many benefits of exercise and even suggested that doctors should "prescribe exercise" instead of drugs!      
The Ukrainians have a saying that translates "I don't need a priest to tell me that Sunday is a holiday".  Would a doctor's prescription really make a difference?  I wonder. I honestly don't know.