Luzia, a preview

Bling from the Cirque de Soleil show, Luzia, in Calgary

I had a plan for Friday night.

I was going with Richard and Miranda’s little family. to see Luzia, the Cirque de Soleil show that is playing in Calgary

But at Thursday, midnight my hip pain was greater than my ability to keep it submerged in the back of my mind, being ever so present that I called the first ambulance of my life – at least the first one that was picking me up as a patient.

When the paramedics asked me where you are on a scale of one to nine for pain, I only found myself at a 3.

I can think of something worse than the pain I am in – like maybe if someone were torturing me by putting pins under my finger nails as well, or perhaps my arm was cut off as well.

So I have to keep that pain number low in case something else might happen and I have room to bump it up.

... a back shot of Alice's new wings ....

However, my blood pressure was way up and I told the paramedic that once we got to the hospital, I would be begging for morphine.

“You don’t have to beg,” she said, “I am giving you a shot right now. I usually give people over 65 only 2.5 mg, but I am going to double that for you.”

Well, in a few minutes the pain was gone and I thought to myself, “I should hop out of the ambulance for I am cured already.”

Then I remembered that they would be leaving with their morphine, and I wanted to stay within easy reach of it.

My plan was to go to the hospital quietly, not bothering anyone with my extra-ordinary pain load, but Mati had heard me come up the basement upstairs to check the back door.

“Leave your door unlocked and a light on for the paramedics if they are coming up through the alley,” the dispatcher had said.

So I checked that the door was unlocked.

Now for 50 years it has always been unlocked so why would it be locked tonight, but I didn’t think that out and save myself the trip.

I just was working on checking that the door was unlocked as the dispatcher had said, and it was that quiet opening and closing of the door that alerted Mati that something was just a little different in the house.

He came out to the kitchen in time to see that yellow light on the top of the ambulance flashing as it slowly rotates.

Betty, modeling the new jacket her mother made 
for her to  wear as they watch the 
Gay Pride Parade tomorrow in Calgary.

Mati has enough email addresses that he could alert some in the family that I was off on a journey on my own, so it wasn’t long until Richard was at the hospital, restless sleeper that he was that night.

“What are you doing here,” I asked Richard when I saw him, as though both of us had separate reasons to come to the hospital.

“I am fine,” I went on, “ I have slept about 4 hours here in the chair waiting for my turn to get a bed in admitting.”

“Well, that is strange,” he said, “given that you have only been here for about a half an hour.

Morphine works in mysterious ways, its wonder to behold.

I didn’t stay long at the hospital.

I had an x-ray of my hip done by 8 am, made it to the appointment with my family doctor’s locum by 9 am, had pills for more morphine by 10 am and was referred to a joint injection clinic for a steroid shot in the hip by 2:30 pm.

Look how long Betty's legs are growing.
Is it any wonder she is a meat eater?

That is about as good as it gets for same-day medical services.

Now I am in the queue to get my hip done, hopefully a little closer to the top of that line up.

I was sorry to miss the Cirque de Soleil, but the girls showed me the costumes they bought after the show, Alice, one with feathers, and Betty, one with butterfly wings.

I had gone out and seen the show on you tube a few days ago, in preparation for going to the event, getting myself ready to see what was happening, as in a cirque de soleil show, there is so much to be seen that I can’t keep it all together without a pre-preview and then a preview.

I almost feel as though I saw the show with them.

Arta

Eric’s Birthday

Today was Eric Jarvis’s birthday. Catherine told Hebe that she could pick out something in Costco for him.

The Jarvis Family have a game they do.

Everyone goes in the store, picks out something they want for supper, they only have 10 minutes to do it, home they go and that is their potluck for the evening.

Hebe’s chance to pick out something for her dad was along that line.

Ten minutes and she had to have chosen something. Hebe was fast.

She choose a new TV that was on sale, bringing the grand price down to $1,000.

Catherine told her that wouldn’t do.

So Hebe had another round of the game. That didn’t work for Catherine either. This time she got him a new I-Phone.

That didn’t work for Catherine either.

Catherine told Hebe that on her third try she had to keep the price down under $20 for the gift.

Hebe chose a box of chocolate bars for him.

Catherine played a round of the game herself and choose a package of gourmet jams for Eric to try. They put the food on his bed – breakfast in bed, they called it.

Chocolate bars, jam and a piece of toast.

What a way to start his next trip around the sun!

Pancakes and …

Alice in her work clothes,
going out to help Richard change the oil in the car.

We had pancakes this morning and savory squash cheese bread for supper tonight.

The pancakes were toasted a golden brown and served with maple syrup.

As Michael said, “Maple syrup is the usual topping for pancakes.”

He ate three.

I wanted to eat three.

 Tonight we had Savory Squash Cheese Bread. I asked Miranda if she could ever make it that good again. She said yes, but that is hard for me to believe for I was tasting something that was already a moment of perfection.

 Add to that, the 6 of us ate 6 ½ large elk steaks. I asked Richard whom he thought had eaten the most, since he was cutting it up and delivering it to people. He pointed to Alice and Betty – two big meat eaters.

 “What is so good about elk steak,” he went on, “is that the taste lingers in your mouth long after you have swallowed the meat. “

And yes, I have three little carnivores it would seem,” he said, adding Michael into the mix of the three people who went after the elk steak tonight.

Arta

The Water Pik

"How do I unravel this tube?"

When I purchased a new waterpik in the spring, the unit from Costco came with a travel pack.


I didn’t have a use for it but wondered if the kids next door might use it and get used to that feeling that usually only comes when the dentist rinses out someone’s mouth.


After my mentioning it to him, Michael has been dying to try it.

"I can hardly wait for my turn."

I didn’t have the energy yet to have water shooting at the walls and up onto the ceiling as he learned so I kept putting off the evil day of teaching him how to do it.


But it wasn’t like that at all.


This morning, after each eating a Haagen-Daz bar today we got out the waterpik to practise rinsing out our mouths.

"It looks scary to me, Grandmother."

Actually that was the afternoon treat, but we moved it up to the early morning since they are like me – if there is something really fun going to happen in the day, let it happen earlier rather than later.


Now to go back a step, in the past few days, we have been reading some poems from Free to be You and Me.

My favourite poem from the book is “Boy Meets Girl,” but the kids have been wanting me to read Shel Silverstein’s “Ladies First, Ladies First” over and over.


Even though they know how the poem is going to end, they enjoy the ending each time as though they are hearing it for the first time.

"I think this will fit between my teeth."

So to begin using the waterpik this morning I reminded Michael, ladies, first, ladies first.


He stepped right back and let the two girls at the sink, remembering that in the end, they might get eaten by tigers by going first.

"I see leaning over the sink is best."

It didn’t turn out exactly that way.

"I am afraid for when it will be my turn."

We had no tigers to face.


But there was lots to be learn on first using a water pik: how to change the 6 different choice of tips, where and how to turn the on and off switch, how and why to ramp up the speed that water enters the mouth.


A lovely time was had by all.


I shouldn't have been so reticent to bring it out.

"Now that was fun."

Arta

Studying the Rules

Alice with her Monopoly money spread before her.

I didn’t think I would be spending the late evenings of my fall studying the rules of Monopoly Rules.

I didn’t bring much of the past with me, obviously, since there doesn’t seem to be that much carry over from when I was a child until now, knowing what move to make next. as far as the way to play goes. I am sure that the rules of Monopoly haven’t changed.

They just are something that my long-term memory didn’t hang onto.

So I have been looking at what it is that lands a person in jail, how a person can get out of jail, how much houses and hotels cost and how to buy them, and as well as how to purchase properties that can lead to the development of wealth.

Rolling triple doubles can put a person in jail. How hard do you think Michael laughed when my triple doubles sent me to jail, and not let me pass Go on the way there and thus loose my earnings of $200 for the round.

"Grandmother, if you want I will just give you
this get out of jail card for free.  I know how
awful it must be for you to be in jail."

"No I will pay for it, Alice.  You don't know it, but 
down the line you are going to be needing that money."

"

Alice bailed me out. She let me buy her “get out of jail free” card.

How sweet was that!

We played all morning, until I had to leave at about 11 am.

When I went over at 9 am to ask them if they wanted to continue the Monopoly game that we had been playing at my house the day before,  Michael said, “We have to ask mom since we are in big trouble.

“What kind of trouble are you in?, I asked when I got them over to my house.

 “Oh, yesterday when you weren’t home, we went into  your house and played with Sumin and Sumarga without telling mom”

“Ah,” I said. “I knew you weren’t over at the downstairs part of my house for there was no mess that you left.”

“Well, what happened was, Betty and Alice blabbed and that is how we got busted.”

I didn’t think I wanted to know anymore.

Arta

Climbing Equipment

... Naomi sleeps over and reads at night ...

Both Chris Turnbull and Art Treleaven came to help reassemble a playground set that came to us via Art and Marcia’s backyard.

And there went a whole Saturday morning, with thanks to both of the men.

With the new equipment came a set of rules that had to be created by Richard and Miranda after seeing how the children used the new set up.

1. Michael can only use the middle swing. His body weight makes the assemblage shake too much if he is on the west end of the equipment.

... new playground equipment ...

 2 swings, hanging triangles, monkey bars,
a climbing wall, a ladder, an orange slide

2. Betty is not allowed to crawl along the top of the money key bars when Alice and Michael are using the swings below them.

3. Alice is not allowed to balance her body upright and walk along the top of the monkey bars, at least if there is an adult there who sees her try this.

4. Children who have tried all of the equipment are challenged by their dad to try to pull themselves up the climbing wall backwards, since there has to be something that is relatively safe left to do.

... playing bean bag toss  when not on the new climbing equipment ...

New rules to follow.

That is about it for a new beginning for play equipment that will be used for years to come.

Arta

A Wiggley Tooth

... and thus endeth the tooth pulling event ...

I can describe a temptation like no other. The first is to a certain kind of adult who is willing to let a child who has a loose tooth, bite his finger as hard as she wishes. Richard is that kind of adult. Alice’s tooth was so loose that it seemed as though the smallest of bites would have the tooth come out.  And so he offered her this chance of a lifetime.

The second kind of person who feels a different temptation is a six year old who, when her father tells her she can bite his finger as hard as she wishes, even though she knows it may put extra pressure on her tooth, is still willing to take the challenge of biting someone’s finger as hard as she wishes.

And then there is the third kind of person. A mom who is willing to tie a string around a tooth that is now only hanging onto a gum by something that is so small no one can see it.

And so Alice looses her second baby tooth.

Arta

The Game of All Games

Around the circle starting left to right:
Betty, Alice, David, Bonnie, Michael (all in character)

David Camps ran a D&D game for Michael, Alice and Betty this summer.

This was the game of all games for them as it came complete with the sounds from the forest that might bring fear to their hearts -- the ultimate being the sound of a crow cawing in the background.

Please, let there be a repeat of this magnificent game in 2020.

Arta

A Curious Play Team of Two

Alice doesn't really like having her picture taken.
Getting a photo of her is close to having a miracle  happen.

As Alice, Betty and I were shopping, we came across the Play Centre in the middle of the Market Mall, an area where 30 children can play as their parents watch on from the sides.

The rule of the day seems to be that everyone wears socks and there is a height restriction, which Alice didn’t meet.

“You are way over the limit,” said the woman at the entrance to Alice. “And that means there is no climbing on top of the equipment for you.”

I looked over at a child who was standing on the hood of a make-believe car.

I said to Alice that what the woman meant is that she couldn’t do what that smaller child was doing.

That was fine with Alice and both of the girls ran to find the entrance.

I noticed that Betty and Alice sat on the same toys, snuggling into just one seat and then operating the handles of whatever it was they were sitting on.

Betty flies along the hop scotch pattern at the mall.

I wondered how long it would take them to separate (or have a fight), but they mostly ran together from one large toy to another. Probably Betty was taking Alice’s lead.

Betty liked the wooden puzzles that were attached to the walls of the corral.

Alice lead her to the hop scotch, which seemed to be a game both girls knew, for their feet ran and then skipped along the lines that were painted onto the rug.

I heard an announcement telling everyone to clear the corral.

I tried to get the girls to leave. No other families seemed to be leaving.

I asked the woman in charge how long the corral would be empty until we could go back in it.

 “Oh, that is just a pre-programmed announcement that we ignore,” she said, going on, “It just helps parents whose children don’t want to leave, to get them out.”

Who knew?

We left when Michael and Miranda came to get us to go home.

I think that the play in the corral was even more fun for the girls than shopping was.

Arta

Shopping in August

... a Barbie with wings ...

I shouldn’t really say I was shopping today.

While Michael was getting his hair cut, Betty, Alice and I walked in the mall to entertain ourselves.

They didn’t even bring their purses along, so I know they had no idea of purchasing something.

I let them take the lead as so what they wanted to look at.

Apparently the fashion of choice for them is anything that has sequins, the kind of sequins that a person can run their hand over, and have the sequins change colour: reverse sequins, flip sequins or flippables as some people call them.

Alice takes the box from the shelf

This fashion can be seen on backpacks, t-shirts, shoulder purses and even on jeans.

Besides the flippables, Betty also has a fascination for hair bands and tiara’s.

She doesn’t want so much to look at herself with them on, but instead to put the bands on her hair and then have Alice look her, which Alice seems to be able to do quickly and then get back to whatever is interesting her.

... the girls look at the contents of the box on the back ....

Betty has a bit of trouble getting the band back out of her tight, curly blonde hair, but with enough wiggling she can get the bands back on the shelf.

There is no way she is going to let me give her help.

The tiaras don’t just come in rhinestones anymore.

Some have bunny ears, others have a unicorn on the tiara, or soft, red velvet roses – just about anything a person can imagine.

... Betty pretends to read from the box ...

I thought this would be the highlight of our shopping trip, but I was wrong.

The real happiness occurred in Toys R Us, in the first isle, which was filled with Barbie boxes.

Barbie now comes with long rainbow tress, and also in a package with Skipper and an even smaller doll which needs to be pottie trained, apparently, for even that accessory is in the package.

I don’t know that I would buy Barbie as a dentist, complete with a dental chair and someone in it, but there must be a market out there.

... Mermaid Barbie whose tail lights up ...

Perhaps the ultimate package was the $269 doll house – that was a package that would require a cart to get it to the check-out stand.

The girls didn’t seem to want to buy the Barbies.

They just wanted to make sure that I read the name plates under each Barbie and so I did.

We went up and down the isles experiencing such joy in touching each package and knowing what it was called.

Thus endeth my shopping fun in August.

Arta

Plenty of Half Done Jobs

I have plenty of half done jobs. Hundred’s of them to tell the truth. The reason I don’t concentrate on finishing them was underlined again for me tonight. I pulled out some of them, only to find that an unfinished job can explode into 3 or 4 more jobs, and at the end of the night, I see I am left with a larger number of things to do than before I started.

I did get a few things done. I have set of venetian blinds left over from renovations. I began to pull them out from under the stairs (a place I once made Doral sleep), and Mati helped me carry them to the garbage. “Black bin or blue”, he asked. And after my answer, “A pity to throw them out”. A big yes to that. A pity to throw out anything that seems it might be recycled. But after saving them for recycling for three years, I think I did right by getting them to the garbage.

I carried the last of the leaf and branch clipping from the lilac tree to the green cart. These had to be place in 4 foot or less lengths in a paper bag for the pick up tomorrow. That is because Richard and Miranda filled 3 carts on Sunday as they trimmed down trees that were plugging up my roof gutters. A person can’t really get a lot of clippings into a bag as compared to the green recycling bin. Still, I tried.

Michael's new haircutr

On the table is a game of Monopoly. Michael has been asking to play the game ever since it was pulled out of the garage in an attempt to get control over that area of the space I inhabit.

This is a wooden chest that has many games in one: Sorry, Cribbage, Chess, Checkers, Monopoly – all the pieces stored in a wooden drawer in the chest that holds all of the games. And so the half-played game of Monopoly is on my table tonight.

We will finish it tomorrow.

There is a plus to the game.

I notice that Michael is getting good with figuring out the money, and helping the girls read their cards – either from the Chance pile or from the Community Chest pile.

They like to pick the card up, but they are not readers yet.

The barber shop gave Michael both a lollipop and a can of pop --
 and a nice hot towel on his face after the cut.

 I have no idea how they got him to
 stay still for the hot facial moment.

Before I go to bed tonight, I am going to read the rest of the Monopoly rules.

I can’t remember this rule: you can only put houses and hotels on properties when you own everything that is the same colour.

Is this a rule we just used to ignore when I was young, or did I never just get properties that were all the same colour and so didn’t get to the higher level of playing Monopoly.


I don’t relish the moment when Alice or Betty or Michael have to drop out of the game because they are out of money.

But I think that moment is coming tomorrow.

I hope there won’t be too many tears.

Arta

Mid Afternoon Break

LtoR: Naomi, Miranda, Arta, Tonia

We are an unlikely crew.  Tonia and I stopped over at Miranda's where Naomi and Miranda are busy sewing outfits.  Tonia had dropped by the way home from the Shuswap to drop off some peaches for me.

Naomi's sewing may be finished in time to wear to Cirque de Soleil's Luiza tonight. They could get her a ticket in the row right behind theirs.

Some serendipity there!

Arta

That Never-to- Be played Monopoly Game

... at the Bow River, the cityscape in the background ...

Naomi has been with her Aunt Michelle until today when she took the Light Rail Transit (LRT) over to see us.

I met her at the Banff Trail Station where she still had her ticket in hand.

The transit security personnel were just checking the people in the car she was travelling in. She said she wondered who to give the ticket to when she bought it.

She didn’t know that having the ticket checked was just a fluke – I ride the LRT often and can hardly remember the last time someone asked to see my ticket.

We crossed the tracks and got on the train going the other way.

... waiting for the Tuscany LRT at 6th Street ...

... reading a sticky note pasted on a shelter on the LRT landing...

... the note, a stranger having a bad day, and
reaching out to anyone else having a bad day to text them ...

I wanted to walk her through a few neighbourhoods, so we got off at Sunnyside Station – what can be more interesting than the coffee shops, the clothing assignment shops, the bong shops, a health food store, more restaurants, murals painted on the side of brick buildings, two walking/cycling paths that go for miles along the river, a walk across the old 10th street bridge, the Buddhist monastery where a vegan lunch is served for under $10 every day, and an old hardware shop that I remember as a child – that shop has to be at least 70 years old.

When we got home, Naomi spent the afternoon with her cousins.

Michael has been dying to play Monopoly so they got the game set up outside but hadn’t counted on the gentle wind that blows the monopoly money away.

Even putting weights on the money didn’t help that much – Monopoly is a game that is really needs to be spread out and have hours of time invested in its outcome.

Naomi said that they played an abbreviated game – so that is still in the air – Michael playing the real Monopoly game.

Naomi and I went to a movie just as the kids were going to bed.

... Naomi and the Lama at the 10th St Bridge ...

We rode the LRT to Eau Claire Centre where we saw Lulu Wang’s film, The Farewell (2019).

The film purports to be “based on a real lie”, a good pretext for any film to be made.

I don’t think this will be a spoiler.

When the film ended, Naomi said, “Oh my gosh.I had no idea it was going to end like that!”

I agreed with her.

... pedal this machine and you can recharge your telephone ...

It is hard to have a feel good ending in a film about death. We talked about the film most of the way home.

There were plenty of scenes that were totally memorable and a lot of fun to talk about.

The kids had asked  us what film we were going to.

... setting up the Monopoly game ...
LtoR: Michael, Betty, Naomi

I told them it was one about a grandmother dying and that everyone in the film was going to be crying about that.

They wondered why which really made me laugh.

Arta

A New Used Piano

... just learning the tune ... no accompaniment for now ...

Richard and Miranda bought a piano. 

The movers tried to put it in my basement, but the piano just wouldn't turn the corner and go down the stairs.

So over to their house it went.

So far we only have one book to play from, one with folk tunes, 90% of which I don't know.

Alice and Michael were doing something else but Betty wanted to sing.

And she wanted to know what the song was about.

This one had phrases like eating sop, which required explanation. 

I sing the melody for her, give her an explanation of the song and she both sings and plays some of the keys on the top range of the piano as I do play my keys in the middle range.

Fun.

Arta

My Trap Line

There are some summer jobs that I just don’t want to do. One of them is catching mice that scurry across the floor in the late evening hours. I don't mind the ones that do it when I don't know they are there, but when they run across by bathroom floor in full sight, then I feel left with no alternative.

If I have to do this job it will not be catch and release.  And for that catch job,  I prefer the electronic devices that go into an electrical outlet.  They emit a high pitched sound that the mice don’t like but some of the humans I live with can hear that sound, so there is a big no to using those devices.

Doral likes to use the black sticky traps that glue mice to the pad as they try to run across it. I don’t like to catch my mice and still have them live when I go to take them outside.  Plus, as  you know, this year Alice got her hair caught in one of those traps.

That leaves me with the third choice, the old fashion wooden trap that gives a quick snap.

My commitment to ridding the house of mice began, but I was thinking about the traps  ($2 each at Canadian Tire) and wondering if I could use them again.

... I am trying not to look afraid here ...
What is there to be afraid of?
... a little bleach in a dish and I am ready to set the trap line again ...

Will a second mouse smell the fear of death if there is any scent of the previous mouse left on the trap?

I got on some sterile gloves and took my traps outside and sterilized them before putting them to use again.

The children followed me.

All of them wanted to try on the gloves.

None of them wanted to take the dead mice out of traps, clean the traps or reset them.

Sometimes there are jobs that only grandmothers can do.

Arta

Playing Spoons

I had been away from home all day. As I was walking into my backyard at 5 pm at saw the kids playing on their new playground structure, from Marcia Bates. I yelled over, “I am just going inside to take a long drink of water and I will be out to watch you play.”

“That’s a shame for we are going inside. We just heard thunder,” said Michael.

I hadn’t heard anything but now paying attention I could feel the first of a light rain falling. By the time I had my drink of water and was outside they were indeed headed back into their house. I followed them for a little bit of inside play.

... Betty, the drummer ...

Betty had decided to play, playing drums.

She had on a pair of pink plastic high heels, complete with a fuchsia rosette adoring the instep of her foot, and that foot was now tapping as though she were playing the cymbals.

That plastic heel clicking on the floor might have been irritating, if I had't known we were playing drums.

She had tin containers set up on the paint table and was tapping the containers with sticks, calling out, “Grandmother, you be the singer of the band.”

I took on the job using any songs I could think of.  I find myself carrying a diminishing number of titles lately and after about 10 minutes I couldn't think of another song they might like.

Alice joined us with her own make-believe set of instruments and soon Michael had some noise makers as well, one of which was a set of spoons which his mother told him he could tap but not bang on the table.

It was hard for him to know the difference.

Spoons.

That is when the idea came to my head.

Playing spoons.

All four of us came back over to my house to watch a you tube video on how to “play spoons”, musically, not the game of spoons.

Michael got really good, really fast.  He could hold the two spoons in his right hand and slide them washboard-like down the fingers of his left hand.

When the children tired of practising playing spoons with the video, we went back to their house and as I left my house again, I picked up a copy of an old folk tune book. The front and back pages are missing and there is no sign of a title or an index anywhere. Just pages 3 to 80 are left.  At the bottom of all of the pages is the copyright sign with the words Copyright 1965 Yorktown Music Press, Inc. 

The pages are only held together by a few threads. But I know most of the songs in this book, so I grabbed it to cue me into the next number I would sing.

Betty would adjust her rhythm to my voice, whatever song I choose. 

Occasionally I would give the kids a small introduction to the next song I would sing, just as though I were in a night club. I tried to keep the intro’s age appropriate, for many of the songs have come out of the the times of the underground railroad or the slave trade, times they know little of, and understand even less of.

At one point Michael stopped me and said he had to go to the bathroom for a minute, so could I just stop singing until he got back.

Oh boy.

Singing with a band.

Every grandmother’s dream job.

Arta

Elk Lasagne

... eating elk lasagne, another first for me ...

Elk Lasagne.

That is what Richard made for dinner today.

He started at 11 am and by 4 pm the last touches were finished in the kitchen and the two 8 x 11 inch Pyrex pans were in the oven. 

In the evening, I came late to the party.

The first pan of lasagne was gone. I found a spatula and wiped the pan clean of all of the wonderful bits that had been left behind. That part just looked so good. Then I took my portion from the next pan.

I was blown away by the taste. The sauce had the usual Italian spices and then he had added some fennel and some other herbs to the meaty sauce: 4 pounds of lean ground elk, some caramelized onions, some crushed tomatoes, tomato paste and then parmesan cheese, cream cheese and mozzarella cheese layered between the lasagne noodles.

Sumin was eating with me. I asked her if she had tasted lasagne like this in Italy. She said they were in the very north, close to the German border which had influence the cuisine there – so no, she hadn’t ever tasted anything like that, even in Italy.

I could feel a message in every bite, my body saying, “You should only be eating one half of this portion, it is so good. Nothing this good can be good for you.”

I asked Richard how he felt about the meal. He said it didn’t meet his expectations. I think he set the bar a little high. I have never eaten lasagne that good. He is getting a 10/10 from me. I had to turn to him every bite with a new compliment.

I was telling Kelve about my meal as I visited with him in the hospital, telling him about eating elk lasagne among other things that had happened that I thought he might be interested in hearing. On leaving I asked him what was the highlight of all of the news I had brought him today.

He said, “The elk lasagne.” That was the highlight of my day as well.

Arta

On planning for the unplanned

My current options for packing.

A post for loved ones who have had recent unplanned extended hospital visits.

My thoughts, upon hearing of your current unexpected accommodations, turn to the practical. 

If you had known you would be spending  time in a hospital, what might you have packed? 

It is a list of wants I'm after,  not necessities. 

I look through my suitcases to give myself some boundaries for this exercise. 

But what fun is that? 

We are already in fictional territory, for how can one truly plan for the unplanned? 

...

Bag of holding details in the 5th Edition Dungeon Masters Guide.

Wishing for a longer couch.

I creep up the stairs.

I reach for the well-worn pull on the antique armoire that holds the text I seek.

The hinges squeak.

The slumbering high elf's eyes snap open.

I freeze.

I had been hoping to avoid detection, not having dressed for the occasion.

I hold my breath.

I wait.

His eyes stare straight ahead, not seeming to process his surroundings, then snap back shut.

I retreat rather than risk fully awakening the rogue.

Back in the warmth of my bed it hits me.

No bag of holding needed.

No suitcase.

For there is no planning for the unplanned, by definition.

Whose Golden Lock is This?

I saw Richard trying to match a lock of hair to one of his girls and asking, “How did this lock of hair come off of your head.  And if it is not yours, whose is it."

Alice said it wasn't her hair, but then she decided it was.

She had been looking at the sticky black mouse trap, the one that snatches shoes and finger that are too close.

She leaned down and one of the locks of hair on the side of her head fell down and hit the mouse trap.

Pandora. 

A little bit of her in all of us.

Arta

Their First Trip to the Trail to Sandy Beach

This beach is so sandy that the children want to walk along it in the water,
perfect splash marks each time a foot hits the water.

This morning, just as Richard and Miranda were packing, I took their children on one last minute run along the now dusty road and down to the beach.

I was thinking about their long six hour drive home.

I didn’t know if they had seen Sandy Beach this year so I choose that as my destination.

I knew that there was a new leg of David Pilling’s Trail just a little east of Shady Beach that led down to that beach, so the four of us set out to find it.

They walk faster than I can, although I admit my run looks like a walk.

Alice has worn her swimming suit down to the water.
When it takes her more than a nano-second to take off her leggings
she just pulls them back up and gives up on a swim.

My only gift to them is to talk about what I see as we make our way along the road – this time it was about the CPR heavy machinery some of it on the road and some on the third track at Annis Siding.

“Look how lucky we are. We can walk alongside these machines.”

... standing by a CPR vehicle is nothing new to them ...

“Hardly anyone has access to the view we get here of these big gears.”

“Look at all of those railroad rail nails.” 

“How many steps is one of these tracks that are about to be laid down?”

I go on and on hoping to catch one of them in conversation.

That doesn’t work.

Michael run down to the ramp saying, “I will meet you over at Shady Beach and I will be sitting by the round table.”

I guess he thinks I might not be able to find him.

He is there, at the round table when I get there.  He has adopted a pose to make me think he has been there a long time before I have arrived.  That makes me laugh.

The path to Sandy Beach is straight ahead.

A few rocks lay along the beach.
I calculate how many trips that would take me
to move them, but I don't do that.
I have a compulsion to clean and tidy.
But here the point is to let nature take its course.

There are other trails that split off there, one going down to the other beach and the second one going over the railroad track.

I am surprised.  Someone has put three planks across the Robinson stream.

That is a new feature and a lovely one for me, since now it is much easier to cross that stream.

I am glad that I don't have to jump down into it and then take a big step out of it.

When the view through the bushes and the trees open up and the beautiful sandy beach is ahead of us the kids really run ahead.

I stop because a wasp has landed on my forefinger.

I know to let it investigate and then move on, so I am very still, hoping that will happen.

But Michael running along the beach is swinging his arms through the air.

When he grabs one to his body I am pretty sure a wasp has stung him.

“Grandmother? It hurts. I have sworn under my breath four times.”

“Which word did you use”

“Shit,” he says.

Michael  holds his arm behind his back all of the way home.

That seems to give him relief.

He is probably still whispering his 

chosen word for deep pain as well

For some reason it pops into my mind that shit was the word of choice for his great-grandmother, Bessie Johnson.

I ask Betty to stand under Moiya's peach tree.
It is laden with fruit and I know it will make a good shot.
She goes and stand beside the water pipe.
I ask her again to stand right under the p.each tree.
She doesn't comply but gives me a smile.
I take what i can get.

Moiya's tree is spectacular.  
She has to use a 2 x 4 so that the branch doesn't break

“Can I borrow one of your walking sticks so I can make it home?”

When Betty sees he has one of the walking sticks, she asks if she can have the other.

When we get home I show Michael where my tube of After Bite is although I don’t think it will help.

He confirms that it makes the wound sting a little more.

Still it seems comforting to him, so I give him the tube, thinking he might just like to have it near on the drive home.

Arta

The Streams that Cross the Property

over the stream and through the tall grasses

We have a number of streams that cross the property.

There is only one that I know that slips off of the end of my tongue easily: the little Canadian stream.

I know that stream because for over 50 years I have watched children play beside it, changing its course as it flows out of the bushes and onto the small rocks and down to the sand and the water.

Alice gingerly puts one foot forward

I wonder how many times its course has been split into three or four rivulets, or how many times there have been pools built there where little fish that have been caught, have been stored and have been let go again into the lake.

For the names of the rest of the streams, I had to ask Glen.

The second of the well known streams flows out of the woods just before Sandy Beach.

Probably few people know its name: Robinson after the people who owned the old house before Doral bought it.

Alice, thinking of crossing the creek
... I love that purse slung over her right hip ...

Campbell Spring is both where we draw our water, and the stream that crosses the corner of my lot.

Campbell Creek is the stream a little further west has been renamed at our house.  Once David and his mother stopped to watch a moose down in that creek as it was drinking water.

David was young.

He saw the moose pee during his observation that day so sometimes we call that stream Moosepee, but everyone else on the property knows it as Campbell Creek.

There are other significant features about Campbell Creek.

Betty in the forest with her gold purse

One is that over the years children who want to catch frogs go there.

On the Trans Canada Highway side of Pillings Road is a culvert that catches water that goes under the road.

The stream is easy to cross as a person walks uphill.  The water is only a few inches deep in some places, and there are even shoals of gravel to jump on, going from one to another to miss the stream. There are clumps of tall grasses and thick carpets of moss.

I could see no evidence that other people have walked there this season: no broken twigs or branches, no places where the ground is visibly trodden.

I didn’t know any of this until I was taking Michael, Alice and Betty on an adventure today.

“Let’s catch frogs,” I said.

 ... Alice handing off her binoculars to me ...

As we stood at the curve in the road, looking at the lake side of the culvert and me wondering if I should let Michael scale the steep drop to the bottom of the river bed, Connor and Kylee stopped their Delica Van and asked us what we were doing.

“Going to catch frogs.”

Connor smile at them.

“You are in the right place. This is where I used to catch frogs when I was a little boy.”

Connor and Kylee  drove on and we decided to hike up the creek, since Connor had testified – yes, indeed, frogs were in this territory.

Michael balancing on high logs in the forest

 behind a wall of small sticks

... Betty trying to go around small branches and between log pieces of deadfall ...

I hadn’t gone very far before I knew I was out of my depth on the climb.

The sides of the hill were too steep. I could feel myself walking on the sides of my runners.

Perhaps I should say I was slipping downwards toward the creek on the sides of my runners. The deadfall was too high for me to climb over.

The path upward had too many trees for me to dodge, too many dead limbs knocking my hat off, and absolutely no way for me to get the walking sticks down to feel any stability on the ground.

“Can I use one of your walking sticks,” asked Michael.

... Michael, waiting for the 3 of us to catch up ...

“No way. I need them both.”

The children ran ahead, calling back, asking me why I was so slow. “Are you always going to be the last one, Grandmother.”

“If you will just let me get ahead, I will be in the lead,” I said to them.

But there was no way for me to pass them. I was thinking, “If I get out of here without a broken bone, I will count this as one of the really lucky days of my life.”

... Betty crawling under a large log ...

Michael, Alice and Betty already spend a lot of time hanging from the modern day equivalent of monkey bars, swinging across them, or trying to balance themselves as they walk along high logs.

They were in their element, climbing under logs, pushing branches aside, and testing out logs that crossed the creek.

Michael made the first successful crossing, although at the end, he jumped down, or lost his balance, I couldn’t tell which.

Alice was more tentative as she tried the crossing.

Michael stood by her, coaching her all of the way.

When Alice’s teetering turned into a fall, she grabbed a near-by cedar branch on the way down, and Tarzan like, swung through the trees and landed gracefully, feet up on the ground near the creek.

Betty didn’t want to try the log crossing.

She just moved around, beneath and over logs, all of the time calling out, “Somebody help me. Somebody help me.”

"Grandmother?  Why are my hands sticky?"

Alice or Michael would move in her direction, but by the time they got there, she had already made it out of that piece of danger and was moving into another spot from which she would call out her fears to them.

At one point Michael called out, “Betty threw her gold purse in the creek and I am not going in to get it.”

Believing him, I made my way over to that part of the hill.

Yes, down in the creek was her purse.’

“What were you thinking, Betty?” I asked. ‘’Everything inside your purse is going to be wet.”

“I was falling grandmother, and I had to throw my purse.”

“Alright, I will go down and get it,” I said, knowing full well that I could never make it down that slope to the creek.

I started to make the descent anyway, and by that time Michael's hat had also dropped down there, but only beside the creek bank.

He told me that once down in the creek he thought, "Well, Betty can't make it down to the water.  I might as well throw it up."

I dried the bottom of her purse off on my shirt.

“Put it in her backpack,” he said.

When I told those little children that we would be going on an adventure, both girls grabbed their purses – Betty, her gold lame clutch bag with its chain link handle; Alice, her rattan shoulder bag with a furry small creature hanging from one of the straps, one of the gifts she chose for her birthday last month.

Betty using a slim dry stick to stabilize herself.
This was not a good idea.

I thought about how difficult it was for me to stay perpendicular in our frog hunt, and for how easy it was for them to fly through the forest with their extra equipment.

Michael called out that he had found a slug.

He changed that to a snail.

All of them had a chance to hold it and then they put it back in the stream.

Michael found some large mushrooms, now, seemingly fossilized.

At first he poke them with a stick and then he beat them trying to dissolve them back into the soil, but they just bounced around.

Occasionally Michael would call out for a rest break, and he would sit down.

By the time the other three of us caught up to him, he was ready to go. I think rest break translated to, I will sit here for a while so that the others of you can catch up.

Michael, laying o a log over a stream, his mom's hat on his stomach

I was ready to go home as soon as I entered the forest.

But the other three were far ahead of me by that time.

When it was time to go back Alice peppered me with, “Go faster, go faster.”

I finally told her going faster was a good idea for her and she should head home, find out of her second cousins could come out to play and that we would follow.

Whatever she went home and told her parents, Richard came out looking for us, wondering what the heck was going on.

What our group wanted was for him to come back into the forest again with us and help us make a path to the frog pond so that we could access it with more ease.

He wanted us to return home. I have never seen so little adventure in his soul.

We walked back down Pillings Road– me, quite happy to be on stable ground again.

Michael had carried a stick out of the forest.

He was swinging it as he walked.

“Keep that stick on the ground; it is not a cross bow,” said Richard.

There is no way that stick could stay on the ground.

It carried with it all of the energy of the forest walk.

... a picture at the end of our adventure ...
... by this time, Alice was already home and on her way back ...

Michael eventually lost it to his dad, which is a shame.

I told the kids they can’t go into that forest again without an adult.

Michael reminded me I am an adult.

Yes, I am, but I am more adult emeritus.

What they need is a younger adult – one who can keep up to them.

Still, the truth is, if they ask me, I will probably go back to walk up Campbell Spring to see if we can find some frogs.

Arta