Category: Uncategorized

I’m an optimistic person. I anticipate remaining so despite having had a house filled with Covid. In late October my husband tested positive, as did our daughter and her partner. In early November it was my turn.

Not going to lie, it was ugly, although we were the fortunate ones who didn’t have any hospital stays. The only remaining issue is a nagging cough for me, the rest have gone back to their usual hale and hearty lives. For the record, it’s coming up to a month out of my own life.

I missed things. Important things to me, not earthshaking for anyone else. I missed our on the in-person activities of Wordstock Sudbury although I was able to follow along with most of the presentations with their great hybrid festival. There were tears, it’s true. I promise myself to attend in person next year barring any unforeseen situations. I missed meetings with groups and online workshops, but mostly I missed the energy it takes to follow through with that stuff, I got wiped. I’m 95% but this *%@! Cough.

The back roads portion happens now. Since my husband recovered before me, he was kind enough to take me on a back road ride when I was feeling up for it. The trees and the bounce of gravel off our tires always makes my poetry nerve sing, but the ride was especially sweet for its healing calm. I’m grateful for his understanding of this need of mine.

If you’ve suffered the vid, you have my sympathy. I am filled with gratitude for the care we received. Having come through, I want to encourage everyone to mask it up. Protect yourself, no one else will,

I’ve been a Goodreads user for years. I liked that it helped me keep track of the books I read and the ratings I’d given each. I also set myself up for the Goodreads challenge every January. I was 7 books away from completing my goal for this year and the site locked me out. I used Facebook to log in and for some reason one was not speaking to the other. Must have been some fight.

I tried everything, but I couldn’t find a way to access my page. Finally, I gave up and created a new page where, just this evening, I added the last of the seven books I needed to finish the challenge. I’m something of a control freak so you have no idea how galling it is to have people think I didn’t finish. Oh well. I begin again.

The seven books I read this past while have been an eclectic mix, as is my way. Some literary fiction, some romance, some mystery, some thriller, some poetry. What’s your book blend?    

Truly, I do. Her name is not for public broadcast, but we can give her a nom de plume. She’d like that, she’s a writer. Who among us hasn’t imagined writing under an assumed name and all the things you’ve always wanted to say are said. Even better, the words come out of your character’s mouth leaving you as innocent as a lamb. See? This is a perfect example of my husband’s claim that I can’t focus. Back to my friend, Mary.

She took off on a road trip recently, car packed to the roof with everything and more that she thinks will be necessary or potentially necessary. After her first two nights on the road, she arrived at my place for lunch and chat. A rest-up before the short leg of her journey to night number three on the road. We had a stellar time. When she was ready to make tracks, she mentioned that she needed a list of directions to get back to the Trans Canada. I got the sticky notes.

Here, my husband would guffaw and point, asking who in their right mind would ask me for directions anywhere. He could be right. I do tend to get turned around. I began filling in my sticky notes and realized how convoluted it was. I suggested I lead her to the connecting road, where she would go on her way and I would wave her off and return home. I warned her about the three way stop, where, if you miss the exit, you can simply turn right and be on the proper road. No panic.

I led, she followed. Until she didn’t. I exited, she didn’t. Luckily she’d heard my instruction about the right turn/proper road thingy. I’d pulled over to wait for her when I saw that she had failed to exit with me. When she passed me, I pulled out behind her. I followed along until the place I’d mentioned where we would be two paths diverging, not in a wood, but in the city. I pulled up beside her open passenger window and yelled, keep on going Mary and you’ll get to exactly where you want to be. In that moment I saw that she had no idea I’d followed her to this point, it threw me, it really did. Days later I got an email from her. She’s fine, if she gets lost she just pulls off and asks for directions. This trip she’s on is going to last a month, I can’t imagine the adventures she will have to speak about when she returns.

This morning I was determined to clear out all the tasks that I’d been putting off. Simple, right? I mean, you’ve read about my list making abilities and how they work for me… But today I had calls to make. I made my usual list and got started. Calls one through three went well. Calls four and five took an hour each with most of the time in both spent listening to bad music in someone’s idea of how to sooth a customer. Now I’m done with those pesky tasks. Which things do you tend to put off?

I’m usually on top of calls because I’m a chatty person and I don’t find the calling onerous. My dreaded deed is filing. I detest it. I will allow all kinds of paper to accumulate, piling new atop of the last bit. When the mountain of paper finally falls to the floor from it’s own momentum, I will sometimes finally get to filing it. Not always though. You know my truth? That when it’s time to sort things out for income tax, I do the filing. Yes. A year’s worth of paper. Meh, it gets done.

Have you got a dreaded deed? If you had one and you broke the habit, I’d like to know how because mountains of paper are a curse. Income tax is months away, so you know what that means? I have not yet reached That Day…

Airport Poetry

I am happy to join the previous poets whose great work has made it to the windows of the Greater Sudbury Airport. I hope my haiku lift some spirits.

My Guest: Randell Adjei, Ontario Poet Laureate