Traveling from one mealtime to another

The sky was this kind of blue when I was in B.C. last week.

... looking west from my porch while shoveling snow ...

The road out to Bernie Road was clean enough to walk on. Bonnie and walked in the early morning twilight.  A railroad vehicle lumbered along the path -- too wide for any car to pass it as it made its way down to the tracks.  Bonnie and I stood off to the side, our feet pushing into the snowbank as we watched the driver who acknowledged us buy only slightly lifting four of his fingers off of the steering wheel.

We knew we had been invited down to Janet and Glen's for supper that night.  Wyona was master-minding the project with frozen food from the summer that she was using while it was still good.  But that doesn't mean that Janet and Glen, or Moiya and Dave, or even the two of us didn't bring food, enough so that twenty people could have eaten -- not just the six of us who gathered around the Pilling's new oak dining room table, now expanded with extra leaves.  The chairs had been brought to the west end of the table so that those who came early could enjoy the BBQ-ed chicken wings and the greek cream cheese that was covered with Roasted Pineapple and Hananero Sauce.

I only mention this because I decided -- no more eating with these people.  I can't push myself back from the table until I am too, too full.  They are interesting conversationalist and reveal in the joy of shared conversations

But I couldn't keep that memory of hoping not to eat any more, long enough to turn down the Chinese food and the warm apple pie served the next day when I happened to dropped in at Wyona's for lunch.

I was trying to get home after my morning walk, but I wandered down to Glen's with him, still talking to him before he began work. He had come to my house to fix a wonky tap and spotted the two of us walking on the road.

What was there to do but let Bonnie go off to work and let me stop in at Moiya's on my way back home -- she being my target for early morning visiting since she gets up earlier than Wyona.  Moiya had taken me to the local fresh fruit and vegetable outlet the day before.

"No better prices than these: $6 for a 40 pound box of Macs; $8 for the Spartans and Golden Delicious."

I only bought one box.  Moiya bought two and between the time she dropped me off at night and noon the next day, she had peeled all eighty pounds of the apples and now they were sitting on her cupboard, bagged as dried apple crescents or rolled in wax paper as fruit leather.

Her kitchen was clean again.  I grabbed her hand to look at her thumbs which was the only place where there was evidence of all of the work she had done.  Dirt was deep into the cracks of the skin on her thumbs.  When I do that kind of work and it takes a few days of scrubbing with soap and water to get rid of that evidence.  But my hands were clean.  We are just going to eat all forty pounds of apples out of hand.

Sirloin steak was sizzling on the grill when I arrived for the third meal -- three days in a row and we still hadn't turned on the oven at our place.  There were friend mushrooms and baked potatoes and a beautiful salad.   I am reminded often of the articulation of wonderful moments in 2014.  Someone said, "Leisurely dinners set at long tables with loved ones.  That was my 2014 joy."

Yes to that person hitting moments of happines right on the head:  leisurely dinners, blue skies, short walks from the doors of one set of loved ones to the next set.Treasured moments.

Arta

A New Life Plan

In hopes of living to be 100 (or at the very least, to be 99 years old), I made a 25 year plan for myself in the fall.

The first five years of my plan was pretty easy -- one of the items being that I want to take a couple of film classes every semester at the university.  I couldn't be sure if I was doing this because I really wanted to, or because I want to torture Rebecca, who would like to spend the rest of her life taking film courses.

At any rate, I signed up for a class called Terrence Malik as Auteur.

image from  Terrence Malik's The New World

Sad to say, I didn't even know this director nor had I seen any of the five films he has done:  The Tree of Life (2011), Badlands, The New World (2005), Days of Heaven (1978) and The Thin Red Line.

And even worse, I didn't even find one minute to taunt Rebecca with all of the joy I was finding in the lectures and viewings.

I guess I will have to call that class a bust, though I wouldn't have missed it for anything.

Arta

Fox And Geese

First of all, I have never had a blogging month as bad as January 2015.  Thirteen posts!  I hang my head in shame.  I tried to figure out what is keeping me from typing

I blame Richard and his early morning walks with me.  We walk.  I do most of the talking.  By the time I get home, I think I have nothing left to say, which is pretty well true, having just talked my heart out for 55 minutes, got my pulse up to 140 and  and kept my face buried in my scarf at the same time.

There are lots of things I want to tell.   For example, that on a day when the snowfall had been heavy his little family joined me in our common back yard for a game of Fox And Geese.  Richard didn't know the game.  I remember it from the school play ground of my youth.  Here is a u-tube of how the Slentz Family plays the game if you want to know how to set it up yourselves.

We weren't quite as careful about getting the circle round.  We just got an outer border going with some cross paths and then invited Michael and Alice to play with us.

Too frightening, since Richard was the goose and had tucked both of his hands into his armpits and was waving his make-believe wings up and down and honking as he ran from the fox.

I was the fox and could only think of howling at the moon as I chased goose.

Michael wanted to sit on the steps.  Too much terror in joining in.

Alice tried her best but at 18 months old there is not much a little person can do in the way of running in the deep snow when they have been zipped into an airtight snow suit.

It seemed only right to switch to toboganning in the backyard since Fox and Geese wasn't a big hit. Richard grabbed the plastic top of a large square container, tied a rope to one end of it, and then put Michael on the make-believe sleigh and pulled him around the fox and geese track.

Alice waited for her turn and so the winter morning went -- Richard and I getting a lot of exercise. The kids merely watching or getting rides.

What is wrong with this picture?

Arta

curling on the porch

On the second day I was here at the Shuswap, the snow began to fall.

Not steady in the small flakes that are falling now.

That day the snow was coming down in long flat soft sheets that seemed to have clumped together somewhere in the air.

I dragged my chair up to my window.

Clasped my hands in my lap.

And watched, as though I were seeing a movie.

There had been many snowfalls.

The porch needed to be cleaned off, but the panes of glass needed to be taken out of the deck railing.


After three panes were securely tucked against the house, I began to shovel.

The temperature had hovered around zero and the snow was wet and heavy.

Too heavy to just put the shove to it.

I had to take the shovel and real off a small clump, and even that was too heavy for me to lift.

I would drag it along the porch to the opening and then give it a shove.

Only once did I loose the shovel with the shove.

At least I knew enough not to hang on and go over with it.

Bonnie grabbed a shovel and worked from the other end of the porch.

It was only near the end of the task that she thought it would be a good time to practice curling now that there was a long slick path.

One of us was crouched down low and was to "throw the rock", and then the other was to try to "sweep" to direct the rock to the opening in the railing.

...

The next day I went to visit Wyona.

As I walked up to their house I heard a noise that made me know Greg was out shovelling his porch as well.

He had been using a small shovel, and picking up just the right amount of weight and tossing it over his rail (since he could not take apart his rail).

He told me Dave had brought over a bigger shovel and told him this would be easier.


Greg said, "Yes, easier. But I still have to measure the amount of weight I am going to pick up and throw over this rail. This has been more than a one day job."

Winter is the same everywhere.

Our snow shovels and icepicks in against the house.

And we keep paths open to the car, the sidewalk, and to the homes of well-loved neighbours.

Glen came by one day and I asked him, what are you here for?

He said, "I wanted to call you on the phone, and then I thought 'hey, she is just four houses away'."

Winter couldn't be lovlier.

Arta

Mid-Winter Ice Cream

It is never too cold for ice cream. 

Naomi and Rhiannon had the day off school.  So they went on a daddy-daughter date to see "Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, Rotten, No Good Day" movie.  After, Leo took them to a Cold Stone Creamery.  You order hard ice cream and any toppings you want and they mix it by hand in front of you then put it in a cone.

When I asked Rhiannon what toppings she picked she said, "sprinkles, cookie dough, oreo cookies, and some other stuff I forget.  But I am sure I had more."

Talk about heaven.

The Merry Widow - report from Moiya

Kelli O’Hara, center, during a rehearsal. CreditSara Krulwich/The New York Times

I have been a movie junkie all day.

First, The Merry Widow. Then, Mommy.

The Merry Widow was excellent. I would go to that again.  I am just looking for an encore.

The costumes were remarkable; the set as well.

I thought I already had my money’s worth at the very beginning when we got to see the pit and the mistro. I was a little perturbed that he didn’t point down to the orchestra at the end when they all came out to bow. What was the matter with him? Does he think it is all about him?  :-)

Pat Dumeaunxeau came with me in person and Wyona came with me, virtually. Pat and I went over to see Pete at the Seniors Residence when the opera was over. We stayed for a while and then I took her home.

I went to Dairy Queen, called Bonnie Wyora and she came over to visit with me there.

She asked me if I was movie-ed out and asked if I wanted to go to the film festival at 5 PM with her.

Salmon Arm has a fabulous film festival. I was game for another show.

We went to see Mommy (2014, Xavier Dolan), -- "a widowed single mother, raising her violent son alone, finds new hope when a mysterious neighbor inserts herself into their household".

I ran the gamut of emotions today for the second show was a drama -- a lot of pain in that movie.

Moiya

PS More reviews.  Let's heat what the critics have to say about The Merry Widow.

The Merry Widow - report from Wyona

From left, Renée Fleming, Ms. Stroman and Ms. O’Hara.
CreditSara Krulwich/The New York Times

I went to The Merry Widow with my sister, Moiya, today. She went in Salmon Arm.  I went in Calgary.  We both knew we were watching together.  I too ate popcorn. It was fabulous.

I am going to the encore when it comes on Feb 28 and on March 2nd.  I only wish Glen and Janet had been there with us, wherever they were. I am sure my Mother was watching from heaven. I knew a number of the songs because my mother played that record so many times when I was young. "Vilya"..so reminds me of my childhood, being at home with my mother, Wyora.

Vilya oh Vilya
O witch of the wood
Would I not die for you, dear, if I could?

Vilya O Vilya my love and my bride
Softly and sadly he sighed.

Then I listened to a number of artists sing it on you Tube. Kimm Skota is unequaled in her version of it with Andre Rieu. I had never heard of either of them before.

Kimmy Skota...Vilya Song performing with Andre Rieu-Live

Then here is another version of the song.

Vilya oh vilya oh let me be true
My little life is a love song to you
Vilya oh vilya I've waited so long
Lonely with only a song

Neither of these versions were in the production of the Merry Widow which Moiya and I saw today. The words today were again different. I tried to learn them and I did and then I forgot them.

I am looking forward to the encore is Feb. 28 and March 2nd.

Wyona

PS  If you never tire of reading reviews, here is another from The New York Tines about this production.