Dreams, ghost and palettes

dispatch #83

Monday . . .

I wandered down the road and into the woods – a place we are now allowed to go again – with Bella and my pal, Sherri. I love to be in the woods, breathing the sweet air, taking in all those good things trees send us mammals because they want us to be happy. Why do they care if we (the moose and mice and men) are happy? Because then we’ll keep coming to the woods and we’ll pick up burrs and cones and seeds and move them around so the forest can grow. Or so it believes. Has the mycelium alerted the trees that growing is getting sort of difficult? That maybe they shouldn’t be encouraging one form of mammals in any way, as they will be the doom of all?

I wonder about this deal with the trees. Does it mean that even every bit of life is transactional? That even the trees and the flowers and the birds and the bees won’t do anything except as it directly or indirectly serves them? Is that why when we see any animals or birds doing things that seem like pure play – nothing but fun – our hearts warm? Or mine does, doesn’t yours?

When I was out walking in the woods, the fella went into the kitchen to make more coffee and interrupted a mouse en route from under the stove to the dog dish. Now he is out in the kitchen banging around cleaning up all the lower drawers and under the stove. Gah. Mice do lead to cleanliness in our homes at any rate. That is why when we had an infestation during the same period that COVID broke out I felt like Lady Macbeth – only not just my hands but everything. I’m just a teeny bit OCD so that was enough to make me mad as a hatter.

Tuesday . . .

Yesterday I had a drifty day. I walked the gal (see above) and did my exercises and made an appointment to see my friend about designing the book and cover today, but nothing too strenuous. I did get out to my studio and spent a luxurious hour scraping my palette. This might sound like a boring task to you but I assure you that I find it contemplative and very satisfying. I like that there are some bits of my artist life that cannot be fudged or passed on. Me and Van Gogh have to scrape down our palettes and clean our brushes. Obviously with lots of running water and so on, I have an easier job of it than my friend Vincent, but none the less, it must be done. Then I tried a painting that I had in mind but it was so hideous I scraped it all off. This is okay. I don’t mind it one bit. While I was at these tasks and pleasures I could hear my fella and step-son working on the boat trailer. This seems to be a Sisyphean task that has been taking up all my fella’s free time of late. They simply want to get the sailboat in the water once this year. The trailer will only allow them to take it across the road to our neighbours’ put in, but that will do. That is because boat trailers need to be registered and so on to be allowed on the real road. I like hearing father and son talking while they work – the low tones of my fella, and the sharper higher tones of the son, laughing, going back and forth. He was most tired when he finally came in. I made a most excellent dish – caramelized pork on rice with cukes and green onions and carrot sticks – all somewhat Vietnamese in flavour. I’ve never made it before and it is really easy and looks and tastes complicated and yummy.

A dream I had ~

A little girl in a small rural community has wandered off. Two sets of rescuers go forth. They converge on the little girl in a field, but the two gangs argue about who got there first or were the real rescuers. While they argue the little girl wanders off again.

It is time to get dressed to take the dog out for a shorter stroll today and then I’m off to see Phil, the personal trainer. It has been a number of weeks (I was indisposed and then he was off on holidays). Should be interesting. I feel I’ve been making progress. Haven’t missed more than a day usually, and can now do things better or longer or with heavier weights. And I feel it in my body, not just outward signs. I remember this from so long ago when I took ballet classes as a young adult. (remember, Bob? I’d meet up with you and Dennis afterwards at The Nozzle to hear some music and drink some drinks?) The feeling is that the stronger your muscles get, the more you want to work them, so you become one of those boring types that is always flexing and stretching and generally being a pain in the ass. But it does feel good so I don’t give a care. I want to be strong for the end of the world. It seems like a good idea.

Wednesday . . .

I’m later getting to my writing today. No Gwen today – she has gone out to a little house down the shore for a few days and I haven’t been writing these days anyway – the fella is still doing his copy edit of Butter and Snow and I don’t feel like incorporating the changes until he is done. I met with my friend who is doing both the book design and the cover design. That was fun and we came up with a good idea – I won’t share it until I know if it is going to work. We also went through all the bits and bobs I need to attend to before it is printed up. Next week I talk to a friend who is guiding me through the printing and distributing world. Self-publishing, like aging, is not for sissies – but as my Daddio used to say ‘if you want a job done right, do it yourself’. Only it isn’t really by myself is it? I’ve had this wonderful editor who worked for weeks on getting it in shape, and the fella, and my graphic designer pal, and the man who pushed me onto this path and is helping me with the printing do-dah. Lots more before I’m done I know. I guess the part that is doing it myself is choosing those who help and making the final decisions on all of it.

Yesterday I went to see Phil and I did two sets of five push-ups! Oh my giddy aunt but I thought someone should have made me a lemon meringue pie, or fashioned a crown out of barberry branches, or something completely festive and weird. I was known in my youth as skinnamarink, or thermometer (tall, skinny, red hair), or Twig, or boney jaboney or, my favourite from my Aunt Grace – Spindles. I was a ninety-pound weakling and for sure if I’d been a guy other guys would’ve kicked sand in my face, or whatever they are known to do. But now! Just like the ads in the back of comic books for Charles Atlas body-building I am a force to be reckoned with. No longer will my elderly neighbours inquire if I need help taking the garbage to the street! I will not have to wake Ron up to open up a jar for me in the middle of the night when I want a pickle! Why I can even get up off the couch without the use of my arms. That is important. I might not always have my arms with me. I might become unarmed! Then I’ll be happy I worked on my core strength. Phil is always miming what may befall an old weak lady like myself if I fall down when I’m in Paris. How will I get up? I wanted to tell him that probably the same thing that happened when I fell down in Montreal many years ago – I had copious numbers of people wanting to help me up and call a doctor and carry me to a restaurant and get me a wet facecloth for my vapours. But who knows what people are like in Paris? I could fall down and somehow not be able to use my arms and have to lie there while everyone went by, dropping croissant crumbs on my poor supine form, while I whisper ‘excuse-a-moi, je suis tombe!’

Thursday . . .

Last night was the dress-rehearsal for the Ghost Walk on the weekend. My sole part in the acting component of this event is to greet the crowds and tell them a bit of what they are into. For this rehearsal all the guides and shadows gathered plus some of the crew so they could be audience members. After my introduction the four guides and their shadows each set off on their distinct routes. There are nine stops to make – six story tellers on route at various spots, and the guides tell three sets of stories or maybe more depending on how the dance around the village goes. It is, as they say, complicated. It meant that I was left alone in the park for two hours with the occasional group coming through, and with one of the story tellers across the road from me so I could hear her tale four times. It was pleasant sitting in the park with the moon rising over the cove. Prospect, for those who haven’t had the pleasure, is an old town that may have two hundred folk in it now. Once there were a thousand, an active church, a couple of small stores, and, extremely weirdly – a bowling alley that was right across the road from where I sat, jutting out over the cove. Prospect is ideal for ghostly enterprises – it is so pretty with its old homes and one church, its wharves and fish sheds. While I sat there, occasionally getting up to take a photo of the waxing moon, I heard a strange ghostly sound, something moving on the road without a light. It was a deer! And it went down the cove road towards one of the story tellers. I loved seeing its golden form swiftly moving down the road. Nowhere to go down there but deer never mind swimming.

another dream ~

That image may have triggered the very odd dream I had. I dreamt I was watching a horse race when one of the horses leapt over the railing and up into the grandstand. It ran along the rows of seats and startled the onlookers before coming back down to the raceway. It didn’t appear to be hurt – I have no idea about the jockey – not even in the dream. It was startling and beautiful to witness.

I will take my two dreams to a friend I share dreams with and we’ll see what we come up with.

As I post this, it is almost what would’ve been my mum’s 109^th birthday. How utterly bizarre. September is also the month my darlingest Kerol was born. Both of them were true autumn lovers. How I miss them both. Nothing to be done about it but go through it. Sure can’t go over or under or around it.

With all the parts of publishing Butter and Snow nearly completed, and smaller projects like the Ghost Walk coming to fruition, I will be turning my attention to Steadfast and beginning to do some serious actions in regards to politics local, national and international. I simply had to put my head down if I was going to get through self-publishing, but I’ve been quietly fomenting plans.

Hope you are all hanging in during these desperate times. See you at the barricade.

Dear readers – if there was any part of this duck soup that satisfied, intrigued or even enraged you, do let me know here. Or just hit my love button!