January Joy

Yes, I know, it's colder than billy-be-damned but if you look there are some positives that come along with the freezing temperatures. On Sunday my son and I tried out a new trail here in the city. He took a picture of me sitting on this bench (covered with snow!).


The day was so cold, even with the sun out, that we were glad the trail was only about 15 minutes long. It will be a beautiful one in the spring as it has a long bridge over a lot of swamp and trees.

This morning I rushed out the door to make my Weight Watchers meeting and what did I find? A wonderful winter day with blue skies and trees clothed in shiny snow and ice. I wished I had time to just go walking right then but I needed more clothes on for that. As it was I took a couple of pictures outside the meeting place. Here is a tree in front. Look at the beautiful ice! Just gorgeous.


In front of the door I managed to capture this frosty fellow before I ducked in for the meeting.

And it was a good day all around, I was down another pound. That makes a total of 16.6 pounds so far. I have 13.4 pounds to go, if I keep my original goal. Happy day!

January 20, 2009: The New Age Begins

Yesterday at this time we were part of the world audience watching Barack Obama become the forty-fourth American president, an historic moment for a country with a long and proud history of them. In his speech President Obama had a difficult job to try to calm the naysayers, to enflame the courage of the American people and to lay a groundwork for understanding and cooperation among the various seats of power as outlined in the American constitution. He did not disappoint. He spoke with no notes that I could see, calmly, correctly, in an oratorical style born of long practice and an inate love and understanding of the power of words. I am hopeful. Oh, so hopeful.

The whole ceremony was interesting to this flag-waving Canadian, tied as our country is to our neighbours south of the border. The minister from California, Evangelical pastor Rick Warren, tried to be extremely inclusive with references and phrases linked to Judaism and Islam and a personal reference to his own beliefs. The excellent MC was an intelligent woman, the singer was Aretha Franklin, the group of stellar musicians performing John Williams' new composition were fabulous. Yo-Yo Ma's exultant smile lasted the whole time. In short the ceremony was well thought out and well performed. In the heat of exultation I forgot for a time the cold January day in Washington.

Of course Obama's speech was the highlight but there were many other moments, the last of which was the final prayer by the Reverend Joseph Lowery. His references to Martin Luther King were many but updated to today's world. Read the text of his prayer for an uplifting moment in history. I particulary liked his final words, and the trace of humour he added to his fervent plea,

Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get in back, when brown can stick around ... when yellow will be mellow ... when the red man can get ahead, man; and when white will embrace what is right. That all those who do justice and love mercy say Amen.

Ch-ch-ch-change!

Change is good we are told but I haven't changed my blog appearance for over a year. Today I picked a new template. How do you think it looks?

The brown really surprised me when I clicked on it, pink girl that I am.

Yesterday morning we skipped church and went for a walk while the rest of the world here was blowing snow. Of course we don't have to do that in our condo. Oh, we are so-o-o-o-o glad of that.

This fellow probably wondered what I was doing stopped in the road shooting him. Every second house had someone out blowing snow.

Another change affecting my life these days is our new grandson, born in December. His parents let us see him whenever we like and I even get to go over and look after him for a couple of hours at a time while his mother has some shopping time. Hard to say who is happiest.

Coming from a large family I am used to always having someone's baby at gatherings but nothing touches my heart quite like cuddling one of my grandchildren. We have two now, both born in 2008, Chelsea in February and Ben in December. There is such a difference in them now it's hard to believe they'll be in the same year at school when that time comes.

So here's to change! May it always be good.

Winter Wandering III

I thought I would put up the last shots from my snowy walk the other day. Didn't walk either yesterday or today--it's just too darn cold! The wind chill factor is anywhere from minus 20 to minus 28 Celsius. That's nasty. The weather channel predicts warmer weather coming in a couple of days. Here is a shot across the central park area opposite our condo.

And here the sign is completely covered with icy snow as are all the trees. Later in the day the trees were bare again.

And yet another icy shot with wisps of clouds almost covering the sky's blue in the background.

Finally I was home and took a quick shot of the mail boxes across from our place. They have actually migrated into the shelter built for them. The first time we went looking for our mail, we went to the third box and tried the key to no avail. Seems the mover of the mail boxes placed them totally out of order so now we are the first in the line, instead of the third. To me putting them in order makes sense but obviously not to the man on the tractor lifting them. One of my neighbours said he was totally confused, trying his key over and over, and even going home and telling his wife he needed a new key. Somehow he finally realized the mistake.

So this is my third and final post about winter in January, 2009. If you want some bracing air, spectacular snow shots in bright blue skies and a reason to keep moving while you're outdoors, come to bright, bold Ontario in winter.

Winter Wandering II

Here is a shot of the gazebo in the central park area of our condo group. I just loved the snowy trees cutting into the soft blue sky.
The evergreen in the foreground here is ice-covered and the walk is not shoveled. We went around instead of taking our usual path through the park.

Looking out over the distant lake I noticed many layers of colour in the sky over the apartment building where my mother lived until ten years ago. The misty quality was entrancing. If it hadn't been so cold I would have like to sit right down and bask!

In the blink of an eye almost the sky changed and clouds drifted over the sun, giving me this bright shot. Always a silver lining!

An icy piece of decorative grass still shoots bravely skyward, one of the last to remain standing in the winter weather.

Tomorrow I have a few more pics of this fabulous place where we live and which we love. See you then!

Winter Wandering in Canada

This morning I happened to glance out my back window to see sun shining, icy snow on trees and a brilliant blue sky. I put aside my novel revision plans, my washing of clothes, my planning of meals and my bathroom cleaning and slipped my camera into my coat pocket for a photo walk around the neighbourhood. This is our back deck--you can just make out the barbecue--frosty snow icing the trees.

In front of our neighbout's house the sun sparkled on the fledgling trees turning them into fairyland jewels. I had to capture this before the sun melted the snow.

A Christmas leftover got a new coat of ice.

Ah, my favorite! This is a house up the street, beautifully designed to sit on its lot, but the trees behind are the treasure. The sun just tipped the frosty tops against the vivid blue. Can winter be any better?

Here is the same house with its neighbours from my vantage point across the street. Just couldn't get enough of those trees.

I have more pics but will save them for tomorrow. Oh, the sun's out again! Bye.

Revision, Revision

No one ever told me that writing a novel would mean hours of going back over my (to me!) wonderful work and ripping it all apart, virtually starting over again. I guess I was vain enough to think that my writing was good enough that revision would be a snap. Well, what has almost snapped is my patience.

In March of 2008, I put the finishing touches on my final chapter and thought my work was done. Oh, I knew there were things I had to revisit, but really I was finished my year long project. And then I took an extreme editing course. And found out a lot about myself and more about revision.

Things I've learned:
1. Not everyone likes or is qualified to critique historical fiction,
2. The choice and understanding of point of view is subjective and dependent on a reader's experience,
3. I have hours of work revising and rethinking elements of my manuscript,
4. I have to have a lot of time to mull over others' criticism, good and bad.

I found that several people in my class gave excellent, insightful, useful suggestions for me which showed they were familiar with the genre. Others did not. My quandry in the beginning was knowing whom to believe, and I went through much soul-searching, self-flagellation, and weeks of not writing at all while I wrestled with the problem.

My reading of published authors' work for the last six months has shown me that, indeed, chapters can be written from multiple points of view as I have done. This is contrary to the advice of several criticisms I received telling me that I had to choose one point of view and tell the whole story with it. I have known and used multiple points of view--omniscient it is often called--for years. And much of my historical fiction reading has used this as well. My struggle was gaining the self-confidence to ignore these criticisms, a task which took me months. In the end I have decided to reduce the multiple points of view in the chapters where both my major characters are speaking in order to make the reading smoother and the storyline clearer.

Rereading has shown me that there are many flaws and inconsistencies in my story. What is in my head is not necessarily on paper and I must make the story flow from the words on paper. I like this challenge as it involves crafting the sentences and rethinking my word choice, studying the cadence of words and sentences and the language of each character. A big task is keeping the particular personality of each of my characters in mind as I write their dialogue. Here I am wrestling with using period dialogue or slipping into more modern language patterns. I have to say writing the way we talk today is much easier.

While others may be wondering what New Years' resolutions to keep, I know what mine is: keep going and get my novel revisions done so that I can go on with my plan to publish. One of my Christmas gifts from my son is a website titled with my novel title, to which I can add material that is pertinent. So I have that as a carrot to help me finish. For now, though, I've already revised for two hours today, written this blog, and had lunch out with my sister. The sunlight streaming in my window beckons me to bundle up and walk out my frustrations.

Finishing Up 2008 in Fine Style

Butchart Gardens on Christmas Eve. What a fairyland! We strolled through the snow with Chelsea and her parents, mesmerized by the lights, trees, Twelve Days of Christmas theme, and even some flowers. I loved this blooming tree with its liberal dusting of snow.

Victoria gets snow for Christmas about every ten years so we were glad to see it for Chelsea's first Christmas. We even stopped outside and had her touch it. Of course the snow went right into her mouth.

This the the partridge in a pear tree display at Butchart. So pretty.

All the buildings at Butchart were outlined in Christmas lights, creating a magical land of wishing and hoping for all.

On Christmas morning we opened gifts and Chelsea got to see the cloth book I made for her. Because she is far from any of her extended family, I put us all inside with a named page for everyone. Of course she took an immediate bite. At ten months old what else do you do? She also liked to laugh at her own picture. I really wonder what was in her head?

Beth has carried on the family tradition which her father and I started many years ago--she made a lovely gingerbread house, labelled it with Chelsea's name and got out the wooden mallet to smash it on Christmas Day. Chelsea got first chance but all she did was experiment with the various ways of getting the mallet into her mouth. The adults had to take over.

In the afternoon we bundled in the car and went downtown to the elegant Empress Hotel where a huge display of variously decorated Christmas trees filled hallways, stairs and entry ways. I loved the old English quartet stationed in the restaurant (where Beth and I had tea years ago) and singing beautifully. We stood and listened for awhile.

I liked the soldier tree above about as well as any, I think, although the truck tree below was pretty cute.

Finally I have to put in a picture of some of the things I've done beading in the last month: on the left, two right-angle weave bracelets, above and to the right, my own creation of a right-angle weave with Swarovski crystals bracelet, a necklace and earrings focusing on copper, and--the piece de resistance!--a right-angle weave bracelet fixing Swarovski crystals inside. Yummy.

I hope you all had a happy Christmas and that your lives are filled with love and light.