January.... random thoughts

 Back at the Library.  I love it, also the Librarians...and home-time is a lot more productive WITHOUT access to the Internet, go figure out THAT little phenomenon if you will.

Had a fine morning at in-town parish, contributing to our collective ministry as a distribution depot for the city Food Bank.  My role (barring emergencies) is to encourage the volunteers (who are brilliant) and do a little outreach by firing up ecclesiastical charcoal and sage (wild picked, I believe) to offer "smudge" to our visitors, come to pick up their groceries.

That was particularly joyful this morning as we had a large number of clients for whom "smudge" was part of their culture'n'customs.  Nobody seems to mind that a European-settler-type-person is fanning the smoke with a feather.  And we have mutually affirming conversations, if only about our aches and pains (or our grandchildren).

Having a very interesting time with grandchildren this winter.  In the fall I embarked upon the "extended play" version of the Ignatian spiritual exercises -- some days it's toilsome, but I'm glad I did, finding it all very stimulating.

In the meantime I continue to visit The Granddaughters on two evenings of each week, putting the elder GD units to bed in their respective households.  One particular evening the eldest of all, "Thing #1," had had an especially trying end-of-day, and without any premeditation on my part we got into a conversation about "TIRED," how we both were, in fact, and how CRANKY that made us...and I heard myself saying, "Why don't we take all your cranky, and all Grandma's cranky, and mash them together in a ball" (suiting the action to the word)"and on the way home tonight I'll roll down my car window and throw them out to bounce away into the dark???" and Thing #1 entered into the spirit of the thing immediately, and said, "And a HUGE TRUCK will come along and SQUSH them away."  

So we did that....

And at our next session, I just asked, "Is there anything you'd like Grandma to throw away for you tonight?" "Yes, all my Whining, and my Not Good Listening, and my Fighting..."

And halfway home I thought, "great suffering cats...I think that was the Ignatian Examen...almost-four-year-old version..."

So it's become a ritual, and a happy one.  We've expanded it, to include recollection of the happy parts of the day, also rolled up and left under the pillow for recall in the morning...

And here is a reference... http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/books/reviews/view/15997

the first of the snow...

In a bit of a dark spot this morning -- not on my own account but on account of, on behalf of, people that I love.  But venting and grumbling and gnashing and damning-and-blasting on their account will do them no good whatever and will waste energy I might possibly use to better purpose.  So.

SNOW has definitely fallen this morning, and has lain around, for a while, some of it, on some surfaces.  So everything is nice and soggy including eight aspen trees' worth of leaves in my back yard on the trajectory between the trunk of Harriet-the-Chariot, containing summer tires, and Tohu-bohu, the Shed of Total Disorder--where the tires ought to be.  I see a soggy, muddy, chilly chore between now and lunchtime.

In and around that reality -- quite a lot of Italian grammar (less soggy), and a bowlful of beets to a) bag for the freezer OR b) Harvardize... and five pounds of ground beef to compose into cookworthy form (it's all in a lump, unfrozen, at this point)...and a recipe of sourdough/yogurt biscuits...and a PIE, God willing.

A little time with next Sunday's readings would not come amiss either.  I've had my hour with ("Just call me...") Lopez already, and it was a productive one.

Better push the laundry forward a bit also -- and iron the clean surplice, and the communion-kit linens (so I can return the latter to the parish I "borrowed" them from).  The life of a circuit-rider is practically and ethically challenging!!

Going to have penne for lunch with mushroom-enhanced red-sauce on it -- and some salad.

Plenty to keep one from brooding unhealthily on Original Sin, anyhow.

Friday again, woo hoo, I think, anyhow...

Up and full of good resolves this morning, some of which I've even carried out.

It is a constant, repeated (I don't know whether I mean "continuous" or "continual" or both of them) business managing what I need to do, what I want to do, what I have to do, and what I can do -- not to mention "what I FEEL LIKE doing" which usually has nothing to do with any of the above.

Part of this -- I think of it as "ergonomics" in a sense -- has to do with noticing when there is energy and when there isn't -- against a backdrop in which the constant is "less energy than there was, more than there will be" -- which is disconcerting at the very least.

Part of this is learning to ask the question, "What and how much of it do I need to do today in order to feel contented when I turn in, tonight?"  because there will always, always, be more on THE LIST than can be done in one day.  Not to mention more things in the "henh" file.  I am very fond of the concept of the "henh" file. (It contains all those items which you pick up, or remember, or think of, and then say "henh" and lay them down again.)

I have letters to write.  I have nearly finished the laundry.  I have made two business-like phone-calls.  I have scheduled some deliveries.  I have done all the newspaper puzzles over my breakfast this morning -- a sign of sufficient sleep last night.

There is ironing.  There are groceries to manhandle into meal-form before dark.  There are pots to wash, books to read, carpet to vacuum, and a kitchen floor to scrub...and somewhere in there, a walk; and somewhere soon a foray to buy new bedding for a new bed, a brand-new bed, to be delivered next week--very exciting.

And there are books to shelve, papers to sort, archives to shred, garments to mend, projects to complete.

And there is a parish on the horizon--six weeks' interim supply work in last summer's venue, "Little Prairie Town Halfway to the Jumping-Off Place" as we might call it.  Long, long drives every Sunday, but I'm looking forward to it.

But the Blog Post is done.  So now that comes off the list.  It suffices.

Three, and counting

After a fair-ish night's sleep, up in good time and did a complete patrol of the house.  Part of the new daily discipline will be to go into every room of the house, every day -- and when weather allows, to walk the perimeter of the front and back yards, every day.

I am more and more aware that if I do not continue to push -- physically as well as mentally -- into the corners, the corners will draw in and the world will grow steadily smaller and smaller.  As I said to my Helping Neighbour last week -- "I have to cut my own grass just often enough to keep me from thinking 'Oh, I can't'.  Because if I start to believe that, I can't continue to live in the house."  He agreed that that made sense.  Same goes for snow-shoveling, and a degree of house repairs.  Same goes for digging in garden-space.  Push the edges, all the time.

Besides...if I don't look at the rooms, I forget what is in them.  I have too much stuff (I know I'm not alone) but the corollary to that is that one doesn't OWN what one can't FIND.  So, working on that.

Went out midday and had a long catching-up visit over coffee with a good-friend.  We were in a mall coffee shop a long way from home-base -- and still, two or three other people who knew one or both of us came by and joined in the conversation -- it's delightful.

Just before I went out, made a verbal arrangement for six weeks' pastoral and liturgical supply in the wonderful parish I served as interim last summer...will try for 6 - 8 weeks' tenure there starting in September, before the weather and travel conditions become too daunting (it's 200+ km., one way).  Looking forward to this -- looking forward to seeing the dear folks again and the lovely terrain between here and there.

Let us be candid, the "re-MEW-neration" is not unwelcome either!

Then stopped at the library on the way home and handed in TWO books and picked up Roz Chast's memoir of her parents' decline (Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant?) -- and just for frivolity, a volume of Carrie Fisher's memoirs.  So there is a lovely varied little stack of "stuff to read," here.

Had a bite of early supper and went off to ride herd on Thing Two, my junior granddaughter, while her parents did chores around the house and in the yard.  We had a fine playtime with snacks and about five books, and then I helped her Mom with bathtime.  Thing Two's sibling is due in about six weeks or two months, so it is timely and appropriate if Grandma hoists the little girl in and out of the tub...  Much enjoyment.  Son Unit and DIL Unit and I accounted for a box of Haagen-Das ice-cream bars -- so home to put the garbage out for early-morning pickup.  Chasing Shackleton on the TV.  What a story.  (What a MAN!  Whoo!)

Tomorrow, I think, at home all day and -- I hope -- working productively.  Library reading -- and I have Slow Church on the reading pile (this morning I bookmarked the videos of Stanley Hauerwas talking about SC -- looking forward to hearing his perspective also).

A good day with lovely affectionate moments to look back on -- helps with the recurrent feeling of being at odds with the ENTIRE KNOWN WORLD, which burbles up from time to time.

Moving along

Aha.  Back again at 70+1 day.  Got through a Eucharist this morning with active help from "Sound System Guy," "Musician," and "Acolyte," not to mention "Rector's Warden" and others in uncredited roles.  Preached -- about three times longer than I meant to.  I have a strong feeling the congregation was finished listening well before I was finished talking.  However they were polite, and did not retract the honorarium.  We had good coffee afterward and pleasant if desultory conversation.

One of the Rambler's birthday gifts yesterday was a set of beautiful bedsheets.  Of a size incompatible with the Rambler's current bed.  Which has been her current bed since 1967.  Indicating the impatience of her family with her SLOWTH in the replacement of worn-out furniture.

So this afternoon I must ramble forth and take advantage of a momentary mattress sale (but when are mattresses ever NOT on sale, we ask ourself), and then investigate a suitable bed-frame, like, you know, with a headboard and a footboard and side-rails, and like them.

And then grapple with the whole SEQUENCING problem -- delivery of new bedding, delivery of new bed-frame, removal of worn-out bed, possibly ripping up of worn-out bedroom carpet somewhere in the one-two-three-four of that process?

And the lovely Robot Lady at the public library has called to tell me I have a book on hold, so I should pick that up this afternoon also.

And think about some supper, and the week's doings ahead of me.

Avanti! Away I go.  No Sabbath nap this week!

A Milestone

As of today -- I have turned the corner into a new decade -- this is my seventieth birthday, and I have very little vision of what that means -- sixty-ish, yes; eighty-ish, yes; but SEVENTY??? 

Partly I want to ask, "HOW did this happen?"  but I know the answer to that one well enough.

I have enjoyed a day of almost entirely untrammeled self-indulgence (well, it's a start....) -- up and a long phone conversation, very affable, with the Father of My Children -- then rushed off to get my haircut -- home and met my neighbour between our two houses and heard him apologize that he hadn't got my lawn cut for me before I cut it myself, earlier this week (it looks a bit like a kindergartener's self-hair-cut, but hey)...then I chased down my weedkiller/fertilizer technician and made him sort out the invoices that he had put in the wrong mailboxes...then I repelled the earnest efforts of the Jehovah's Witnesses (ah, Saturdays in the summer)...then I went to the Library and played on their computers and handed in one book and took out four more, all slender and non-challenging... then I did a little reconnaissance on the dinner-venue for this evening...then stopped at a cafe for a mid-afternoon treat, came home, and in due course got myself out of the house again for supper with 2/3 of my children and 2/2 of my grandchildren, one DIL, one SIL, and the co-grandparents of one of the little granddaughters.
Dinner was Italian, in a right-sized private dining-room where the granddaughters could hoot and holler and play tag around the table when they were tired of eating (Italian food which they both like, and watching the 20-month-old smack the table and demand more OLIVES was a highlight of the evening)...so after wonderful charcuterie and wine and pizzas and pastas and -- for me -- praline gelato in a bowl about as big as the average washbasin... and lovely cards and presents ... "and so home," like Samuel Pepys...

Tomorrow I'm preaching and presiding again for the first time in a couple of months; must look out a clean black shirt etc. and make sure my vestments are packed and in the car.

Time to take one more look over the sermon notes...I feel very very "guest-preacher-ish" this evening and the sermon is perhaps somewhat idiosyncratic also... But I don't think I'll do them any harm.

a day to remember...

Well, dear all,  I would love to strew this post with picture-proof, but I am on a "borrowed device" (public library) and not sure whether I'll EVER have access to my own pictures, documents, etc., EVER AGAIN.
New computer time, in short.  Actually new computer time + 10 days.  Ah, well.
Yesterday WAS ANOTHER DAY, however.  Annie and her intrepid parents and I met at the local summer fair, which has been called all sorts of things, some of them printable, but for the moment is called "K-Days" again.  Do not ask me.  Il ne faut pas chercher a comprendre.  Just take my word for it.
Now a week or ten days ago the Notable Annie, Thing #One, spontaneously expressed an ambition to RIDE A HORSE.  After some dialogue she agreed, "Pony would be better.  Little would be better.  And a seatbelt" (the thought of which makes me helpless every time I think of it).
Are you keeping in mind, O Best Beloved, that Annie is 28 months old???
Inevitably, FATEDLY, not long after we embarked down the midway, there were RIDABLE EQUINES.  Parenthesis here to note that she and Grandma had already met the Clydesdale pair in the farm-animal display...individually in box stalls, with their heads down in the hay-box.  Until they straightened up.  I had just a glimpse of how big a Clydesdale looks to a 2-year-old.  When that big head comes up into view, it might as well be the Kraken.  But "did she tremble, did she blinch?"  She did not...took in the spectacle with utter satisfaction and aplomb.  Heart of a lion, in this little girl.
Back to the RIDABLES.  The usual panoply of pony-sized critters harnessed to a windlass-arrangement, walking solemnly in a circle.  In due course it was Annie's turn.  Her Mommy put her in the saddle and walked around with her while Daddy and Grandma cheered on the sidelines.  First round, considerable consternation on the face (but not distress); second round -- all tranquil and calm; third round, HUGE grin.
Her Mommy reported that throughout the ride, which was substantially long ("Grandma, I went ROUND AND ROUND AND ROUND"), there was a constant inner bubble of delighted laughter in that little mortal frame.
This all bodes delightfully well.  I see clearly boots and a little black velvet helmet in the future.
Oh yes -- and when it was over, and Annie was lifted off -- "Mommy, I think I jus' have to give Horse a Little Kiss"  which she did.  He took it well.
Some other time I'll tell you about the Rubber Ducky game and Annie's triumphant win of a small non-specific green/blue stuffed dog, christened "Loola."  Oh yes, and the sheep-shearing at which Annie interpreted the bleating of the patient...
And a good time was had by all!
 

Thing One and Thing Two

In my most recent post I mentioned the Granddaughters (Thing One and Thing Two) and then thought, GOOD HEAVENS, it's time for up to date pictures.  So here they are: Annie at 19 months (nearly), and Lena at 10 months (just barely)... What's that zinger about "the lines have fallen unto me in very pleasant places?"  Yes.  And among very lovely creatures, too.

Friday Five (okay, okay...)

3dogmom has given us this prompt, for this week's Friday Five:
I’ve just returned from an extended road trip, a portion of which included travel through ancestral homelands. While I was gone our son’s first child, Hunter, was born, making me mindful of the gift that our roots can offer to us as we venture through life.  That juxtaposition inspires today’s Friday Five.
At a baby shower honoring Hunter guests filled out a card full of hopes and wishes for his life. Thinking about whatever new life may be touching yours (the birth of a child, a marriage, a new call…), choose five wishes from the following and do the same. (For instance, I wrote for Hunter, “I hope you laugh at your grandfather’s jokes.)
I hope you: learn, grow, remember, laugh, get, follow, aren’t afraid, love, respect, try to, never forget, become, experience.
Bonus: what hopes did someone in your life offer to you that have stayed with and inspired you?
Let us know in the comments if you play. You can leave a link old school if you want to be fancy, or you can simply cut and paste the URL, because that works on WordPress.

My wishes and hopes are for Thing One and Thing Two (the 2012 vintage granddaughters) -- but how do I keep it down to five? All right, here goes.

I hope you learn and go on learning as long as you live.
I hope you laugh whenever you can (and only cry when you must).
I hope you respect yourselves, and each other (and if there's any left over for Grandma that would be all right too).
I hope you never forget that you are tremendously loved, and tremendously loveable (because your RevGalBlogAunties can tell you, those are SUPERPOWERS).
I hope you aren't afraid of the world or the people in it.

There.  That's about it!
And I love you very much.

Monday all day long

It's late, and I'm about to fold myself toward bed, I think.  Yesterday was "plenty" -- preached three times, one sermon at the early service and a second sermon (different readings) at the second and third services.  And I cut cake world-without-end...after the services.  Very kind things were said, and there are roses...and then Ace Brother, who had been waiting altogether patiently, whisked me away "whisk" to our favourite Sunday-brunch place, and we ate eggs with pleasant accompaniments and then reformed the constitution, the church, the nation, etc. and so forth until, in effect, they threw us out.  Back to the erstwhile workplace to pick up my own vehicle and then home through the least credible entanglement of traffic barricades and obstructions and constructions and detours...

Fell down on the couch with a blanket and slept hard for five solid hours.  Got up and "went to bed properly" and slept for another seven.

So today has been pretty productive...suffice it to say two vacuum cleaners came into play.

Number One granddaughter arrived with her accoutrements just after three o'clock.  We had a long walk all around the neighbourhood in the pleasant sunshine.  I put her hat on for her.  She took it off.  I put her hat on.  She took it off.  There was kind of a RHYTHM to it...and then on the way home we went to the PLAYGROUND, where there are SWINGS and SLIDES...she laughs aloud at the sight of them (she's not quite 15 months old) and is overjoyed to "be swung"...and fearless about coming down the slide by herself.  

What else is in the playground?  A lot of very little people...and their grandparents...so we compared notes, bragged, etc.


Came home (enjoying most of a rice cake in fragments as we went along) and then she was definitely hungry.  She practically inhaled a banana...I have never seen such an appetite in one so little... and we played.  I have a number of oversized stuffed animals, and these hit the spot... good to know!  Great hugging and cuddling and patting ... then it was supper time, with the nice things her Mama had brought for her...and her Mama arrived and was able to snatch a little supper for herself before inserting Granddaughter into her jammies and away they went home.

Absolute bliss, but oh! boy! there are reasons why we don't have babies in our sixties, and my muscles are reciting them all tonight!!!  

Tomorrow will be grass-cutting day here, weather permitting -- and a quick trip to the dentist -- and a bunch of little fiddly errands -- and then a dinner party "out."

I am in between appointments for almost the first time in three and a half years...and enjoying the freedom.  Lots and lots of projects to do but everything takes longer than it used to, and a "clear week" before me seems like inconceivable luxury.

If this is Wednesday, it must be...Wednesday.

It's morning, I'm up, I'm washed, I'm dressed, I'm reasonably groomed, I've taken my meds, I am having a pretty good skim milk latte (having made a pot of espresso earlier) and anticipating some Enhanced Oatmeal.  Decided oatmeal-every-morning would obviate weary choice-making.  But it definitely needs help/work/thought etc.  Pretty sure I want to carry on with the additional sesame seed flax seed wheat germ wheat bran cracked wheat sunflower seeds* possibly unsweetened coconut raisins or even craisins cinnamon cloves and of course salt.  The Tabasco was an interesting experiment, but.  Thinking now along the lines of crumbs of dried lemon or orange zest. Artificial bacon bits, for now, no.

"The policy here" is to assemble all these good things, plus water, in the teeny-tiny oatmeal saucepan in the evening, and apply heat upon rising.  So dried enhancements, like the lemon and orange peel, have leisure to reconstitute themselves overnight.  Thinking further on this weighty matter.

*The theme of this cereal is "let's be moving right along here," as you see. 

In other news, coming to the end of my third part-time interim post-retirement appointment, and facing forward as confidently as possible.  Meantime, granddaughters continue shedding joy in all directions...and Beloved Famblies are all well.

Wrangling together a sermon on the Dedication of the Temple and the Faithful Centurion and the Astonishing Galatians.

Family Day

It is "Family Day," soi-disant, in Prairie Province -- cynics see it as "we needed a Monday off in February" and/or "Previous political figures attempted to compensate for inadequate parenting they provided by proclaiming a holiday in honour of families."  Whatever.  It is nice to have a Monday off particularly when the weather is not outstandingly horrid.

As it is a provincial holiday, not a federal one, the Post Office works, and we GET REAL MAIL.  Including some reading matter -- Jen Hatmaker's 7, or is it SEVEN?, and various magazines.  Also donation receipts to attach to the tax return.

Cleaning house, focussing on small areas i.e. about 18" square.  As long as I can see results heading to the curb on garbage pick-up day, I'm happy.

And doing some cookery -- made bread this morning from the sourdough basic recipe, with many modifications; the usual yield is two medium loaves, but this morning I made one loaf and a speculative quantity of long rolls suitable for hot dogs etc.  Came up with 10, of varying sizes, and I think 12 would be feasible.  This is basically white bread but it is mightily enriched with veg. oil, skim milk powder, wheat germ, wheat bran, cracked wheat, and quick (small-flake) oatmeal.  Sometimes sesame seed on the bottom also.  I'm well pleased with the result.  Makes good sandwiches, makes good toast, makes good French toast, and eventually makes great croutons and/or crumbs too.

Yogurt (home made) and granola (home made) for breakfast, very tasty.  I'll take a large jar of yogurt to #1 Granddaughter tomorrow, she consumes it at a great rate which is good for Grandma's ego.

Still computing courtesy of the public library (also open, this afternoon, predictably full of young'uns)...

Did not preach or officiate or do anything liturgical this last Sunday except to garb up and adorn the chancel.  Having worn out my alb to the "borderline disgraceful" stage, I regularly wear cassock and surplice.  Turns out this suits the African constituency in the parish just fine.  A delegation informed my Excellent Boss recently that "THAT one" (i.e. me) "is PROPERLY dressed"...which he found very funny, fortunately.

Reading Umberto Eco, a slim collection of essays entitled five moral pieces.  I acquired it for the sake of the essay titled "Ur-Fascism"; in other translations it appears as "Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt," which is wittier.  But there is also a gorgeous little essay in the form of a letter to Cardinal Martini of Milan -- title approximately, "When the Other Makes an Appearance."  Wow, can this man THINK.  (So can Cardinal Martini -- not surprising that their public dialogues were a very "hot ticket" in Milan.)

I'd better make a break for home at this point, company coming for supper...

Faint, but pursuing...

A very fast post here to say, "Still alive" but not reliably connected to the internet in ANY WAY except when I can get to the public library...for a once-a-day 60-minute free session on the computers here.

It is SOME tedious, but OTOH lots of opportunity to do all those things that normally are deferred until after I've "just checked what's on Facebook etc. etc. etc." --

Lent has begun well and quietly -- renewing some resolves and taking steps to make them easier to keep.  Considering installing bear-traps all over the couch so as to preclude the "I'll just lie down here for a minute" gumption-sink.

Managed to inventory both the little freezer upstairs and the big one downstairs -- my neighbour came over to retrieve his "turducken" which he had stored with me for lack of space at his house.  Of course it had migrated to the bottom of my freezer so it could go wibble-wobble in company with my (two!? how did that happen) "famine turkeys"...by the time we had made our way down to it, there was so much food spread out around the freezer that listing it right then and there was the beloved line of least resistance.

Now to make some sensible meal plans.  Came home from the BE with all my baggage PLUS an "airplance cold."  It's gone away now, but while I was laid low the things I had cooked and frozen in January were mighty welcome.

Reading various things, Tzeporah Berman on environmental activism, some William Styron (I don't get it, or I don't get it YET), and The Best Spiritual Writing 2013, including the New Yorker article on the "C Street House" -- whoo.

Granddaughters flourish, and the eleven-month-old has learned to blow kisses.  This makes conversation with Grandma quite smacky.

OK, library time is nearly up, time to pack up here and mount an assault on the supermarket.

Peace, all.

...mit Frolocken...

It's snowing here this afternoon -- fat fluffy flakes; earlier in the day, they were smaller, and there was just enough of a breeze to toss them about in Brownian motion between our house and the house next door.  But now they're just enough heavier that they're falling almost straight down.  I'll have to shovel out tonight before I go to bed.  But it's all right -- it's not what the friends-who-are-nurses call "cardiac snow."

Shortly, however, I'm on my way to spend the evening with Delightful Grandbaby.  She is 10 months old today (less the five weeks she missed in utero).  She can sit herself up; she can crawl, she makes wonderful games out of clapping and waving and uttering funny noises.  Last Monday  we had a game with hiccups.  I patted her back; she hicc'ed.  When she hicc'ed -- I hicc'ed, just to demonstrate solidarity.  She looked at me dubiously -- she seemed to detect a certain lack of depth and authenticity about my performance.  But after half a dozen or so, she solemnly reached up and patted me on the chest.  "You pat me, Grandma, I'll pat you, we'll get the upper hand of these darn hiccups somehow."

Spent yesterday afternoon in a special kind of study on Romans 8, guided by the old Fifth Evangelist, there, at the head of the post...in the motet "Jesu meine Freude".  Singers comprising friends of my children and children of my friends -- or both.  Conductor: the Poppa of Delightful Grandbaby.   We are a very BACH family.

Does anybody else listen to Bach for the WORDS?  My gain yesterday was Frolocken.  I know that in standard orthography it's Frohlocken.  But without the "h" somehow -- it's more FROLICSOME.  And I love it.  Frolocken forever.  And more of the style of devotion, of thinking and feeling, that invites that rejoicing.

Bach does me good.  Thanks be to God and thanks be to the old Kapellmeister -- and to the young one, and to all his Musikant friends, too.

Blessed are the dumfounded...

Just home after a very happy day with the Grandbaby of my Heart (so far, the ONLY Grandbaby, though that is due to change soon), and her parents...naptimes and playtimes and feedings and bath and bedtime, and in with that delightful lunch and supper, and much good conversation.

Grandbaby is in the process of shifting her schedule of eating and sleeping.  She is being gently encouraged to move to TWO substantial naps per day, away from three or more catnaps.  Homoeostasis  being still in effect, there is resistance to this benevolent request for change.  So what with that, and with being not quite six months old, and the natural challenges of the time of day between 5 pm and 7 pm (aka "Hell Hour"), Grandbaby was becoming a bit of a small BEAR by the time supper was over. 

She didn't want to jump in the Jolly Jumper, she didn't want to sit in her high-chair, she didn't want to lie on her play-mat.  There was fussery.  There were aggrieved noises.  There were small squawks of existential ennui (I presume).

So her Papa took her over to the piano, held her in the crook of one arm, and began to play Bach, mostly with one hand; sometimes he could manage the second hand for a bar or two.

First thing was she hushed TOTALLY and stopped wiggling and struggling.  Total concentration and stillness.

And then I looked at her face.  And with small regular tilts of her head, she was looking first up at the music on the music rack, and then down at the keyboard.  Then back at the music, then back at the keyboard, at her Papa's hands and what they were doing.  Back and forth, over and over, regular as a metronome.

As I said, not six months old until mid-month (and born five weeks early at that).

I have come home feeling more than somewhat staggered.  What on earth have we here???

oh blog, poor blog, Mama hung you in the closet...

Long time no blog, over here -- not because there's nothing to blog about, au contraire.

So perhaps it's best to begin with The Best Excuse Ever Found For Not Getting Anything Much Accomplished, Such As Blogging:





Annie

AKA Annie-of-my-life, who in this picture is undoubtedly thinking, "Mama, please don't let Grandma buy me any more hats."

Annie came into our lives, as I posted, early on the morning of March 14th, early and somewhat abruptly, and was almost twenty-one inches long, which is a hell of a lot of inches over which to stretch four pounds, one ounce, of girl. A double handful of WRINKLES, is what we had, there.

BUT SHE'S A FIGHTER...and after two weeks in luxurious accommodations with amazing care, she is now home, detached from all monitoring apparatus, taking on her nourishment with entirely becoming greediness, and weighing in as a Great Hulking Amazon of five pounds, yes she IS. The wrinkles are disappearing. Muscles appear in the little face and neck (those excellent taking-on-lunch muscles).

Somewhere in the interim I believe we celebrated various things including Easter? Right? Ring any bells for anybody else? I'm sure that was Easter, there... I hope yours was holy and joyful...too!

More, later.

posterity

Time to blog seems to have gone somewhere...else -- but here to brighten your day is a glimpse of Beloved Granddaughter Unit (and Beloved Daughter Unit), and BGU is sporting the booties that her Grand-Rambler brought home from BE 5.0 (from "Southern Child" in Riverwalk Mall, to be precise).

LAISSEZ LES BONS TEMPS ROULER!!!

that is all.

bulletin...

Just to update... there are two young ladies in this picture: one of them is my beloved Daughter Unit (aka I Am Chorus), and the other one is HER beloved Daughter Unit, born on Wednesday about 6:30 in the morning, somewhat abruptly, and about a month earlier than scheduled. They are both well, and with continuing good fortune may soon be able to go home from the hospital (where they have been treated with utmost skill and tenderness in the meantime).

The thankful-to list gets longer and longer and longer -- but very prominent on it are the RevGalAunties.

And the Grand-Rambler will now totter off to divine service. There is a rumour of Simnel Cake at some point in the proceedings (not to be TOO carnally-minded about it). Then we'll go see what is what in the postpartum world.

A hiatus.

About to turn in after a different shape of day -- housecleaning as hard as I could go from breakfast time on, with minimal cyber-playing -- and then a drive to the airport, and collecting my Travelling Kinswoman.

We have had our dinner and talked ourselves to a standstill. Must try to get together oftener than every 25 years.

Tomorrow morning, back to the airport, and then the daily mixture as before.

But what a lovely break in the routine!

New

Advent One -- new church year, new season, new week -- old blogger!

Went gadding this morning -- celebrated an 11 a.m. Eucharist in a different parish -- saw a number of old friends and met some new ones. A personal treat, to celebrate according to the Book of Common Prayer, and to hear one of the city's premier organists at work.

Home with every intention of watching the National Classic this afternoon (The Grey Cup -- think Superbowl, think FA Championship, if you're in a different jurisdiction), but after a very good lunch indeed, napped all afternoon on the couch. Much appreciated by Nefertiti the Wonder Cat. Feel asleep right after the national anthem, woke up just in time for the Victory Interviews.

Already late in the evening, relatively, and not having done much to work off my lunch, I've had a bowl of jack-o'lantern soup, with various adornments -- a diced avocado, a slosh of cream, bacon bits, Thai sweet chili sauce -- and a small baked apple, and finished the latte I made before I fell asleep. Bedtime approaches rapidly.

Lots of unbloggables, of late. Too many people know who writes this blog. I was away from home to a Major Eastern Metropolis earlier this month for the semi-annual Big Palaver, and at a reception following our Major Anniversary Celebration, a complete and utter stranger walked up to me and asked, "Are you Crimson Rambler?" Signal for cookie crumbs to "go down the wrong way."

But perhaps attending to the blog daily is a useful part of the structure I am beginning to try to impose upon, or infuse into, my existence. Yes -- I know, I know -- at least every few months for the last thirty-plus years, I have determined to find/create/retrieve/obey some kind of structure, system, order, rationale ... but this is different (also a perpetual whine).

So all the domestic minutiae are coming under scrutiny...with some modest success.

And so is my theology...under the influence of old pressures removed and new pressures recognized.

Time to dismantle my "nest" on the couch, run the dishwasher, set out tomorrow's STRICTLY LIMITED task-list, and so to bed.

Catch y'all again tomorrow if we're spared.
And a happy and blessed Advent to all.