Friday Ramble - Fifteen

On Sunday morning, clocks in the little blue house in the village turned back an hour, and Daylight Saving Time waved goodbye until next year. The departure of DST also marked fifteen years of pottering about in cyberspace, fifteen long years of logging on in the morning, posting an image or two and sometimes muttering along for a few paragraphs, occasionally spilling coffee on the keyboard. There are times when I can't believe I had the cheek to set this "book of days" up in the first place, let alone do the blogging thing faithfully for fifteen years in a row. There are other times when I look at stuff I posted here years ago and am absolutely appalled. Yuck.

However lacking they are, and they are certainly that, these are my morning or artist pages, and chances are they will remain pretty much as they are in the coming year. There may be a bit of font and banner tinkering now and again, but that is all. I don't foresee any significant changes to this place, and I expect blogging life will simply go on as it has been doing so far, photos and scribblings and bits of poetry.

To say the last year has been difficult is an understatement and then some. In late November last year, my soulmate passed away after a ferocious battle with pancreatic cancer, and life without him is rough going. I can't even begin to express how much I loved the man and still do, how much I miss him. Within a few months of Irv's passing, three friends also passed away from cancer, and I miss them too. There are times when I feel as if I am just clinging to the wreckage and paddling madly to stay afloat. Thank goodness for family, for cherished friends far and near, for beautiful darling Beau. I could not have gotten here without them, without all of you.

Some times are easier than others, but every day, Beau and I ramble with notebook and camera. We wander along at our own pace, watching oak leaves rain like honey in the autumn woods and morning fogs enfold the eastern Ontario highlands. We feast our eyes on the sun going down like a ball of fire over the river, on skies alight with winter stars and lustrous moons that seem almost close enough to reach up and touch. My soulmate is always with us in spirit, resting easy in the pocket of my tatty old jacket - he loved rambling and was usually the first person out the door.

The road goes ever on, and there is magic everywhere if we have the eyes to see it, the wits to acknowledge it, to show respect and say thank you. The small adventures of our journeying will continue to make their way here and get spilled out on the computer screen mornings with a bad photo or two and a whole rucksack of wonder. The world is a beautiful place, and I am starting to realize that sometimes an image says everything that needs to be said, all by itself, no words needed from this Old Thing.

Mary Oliver says it best:

The years to come – this is a promise –
will grant you ample time

to try the difficult steps in the empire of thought
where you seek for the shining proofs you think you must have.

But nothing you ever understand will be sweeter, or more binding,
than this deep affinity between your eyes and the world.
(excerpt from Terns)

In another poem called It Was Early, she wrote that sometimes one needs only to stand wherever she is to be blessed, and that is something I try to keep in mind as Beau and I totter about. Thank you for your kind thoughts and healing energies, your comments and cards and letters, for journeying along with me this year. You are treasured more than you know, and if my fingers were working, I would write each and every one of you.