Friday, October 26, 2007

Matt and Marianne's Book Launch


Hey guys, mark your calendars now and come join us!

~ Marianne

Thursday, October 25, 2007

FULL MOON

It was time to take Simon for his bedtime walk. I put on a sweater and a jacket. It's rather cold outside. At night when I am tired, I feel it more. I step out, with Simon, start to walk, look around, No Simon behind me. I look back and he sits on the stoop with that stubborn look at his face which translates into: “I'm not going.”
“OK”, I mumble, we're not going then, fine, I didn't want to in the first place.”

The fresh air felt nice, though. It wasn't as cold as I had expected. The wind seemed down. I looked up, and WOW!!! The full moon, bold and bright was speeding by. Or so it seemed. Better no traffic cop look up, I thought, this moon is in for a speeding ticket!!! But how can this be?

Then I saw the clouds, long stringy clouds, that seemed not to move, that made the moon look like it moved, but really it was those clouds racing by, in a continuous motion. Never ending clouds. The moon stood still. Why are the clouds racing like that? (They still are, while I am writing this.) There is hardly any wind. What makes those clouds move? I have never ever seen the likes of it before. I phoned Nigel. And he was looking at it too, and was just as puzzled.

But it is a beautiful moon, and an interesting phenomena. I stood looking at it for a long time. Simon watched me watch it, and sighed a deep sigh when I finally came in. He was ready for bed. No howling at the moon for him!

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

PET PEEVES

It's October! Only the 23d. Not even Halloween yet. Although you couldn't tell by store decorations. In Malls Halloween is all around you. But, maybe that's close enough, Although it already started last month. That's definitely too early in my humble option. (Can an option be humble? Oh well, sneak that literary fracture in, on account that it sounds good to me. OK, OK, make it opinion then, sjee!!)

I needed some eating stuff for supper. So I enter the mall across the street. THE GREAT CANADIAN SUPER STORE!!! ( Yeah right!!!)

It took a while before I clued in. I almost started humming along with the piped in music. Oh, it was soft, and not throughout the store yet. Just greeting you at the entrance where displays of fire logs, with warm flames showing on the boxes, are stacked in seating fashion and all kinds of huggable ( the computer speller doesn't like that word.) teddy bears, and other woolly stuffies sit around at them, cozily, inviting...

What? What is that music I'm starting to hum to? Oh no!!! CHRISTMAS SONGS!!! Not CHRISTMAS!!! Groan!

I though maybe I should complain. How do you complain? Well, you can obtain a survey sheet, to record how “WE ARE DOING.” Where can you obtain that? The sign by the door tells you in very small print that you go to customer service. CUSTOMER SERVICE? That's where there are always long line ups. 'cause they not only take in complaints, exchange non satisfactory items, make up for boo boos that were made at the cash register, they also rent out equipment people have to sign for, and they also sell lottery tickets. And mostly only one person is there to take care of it, and mostly that is a person who is clued out about procedures and has to call in for help, when you insist...

Oh, forget it. Let them play Christmas music in spring, I'll plug my ears and try to get out as fast as I can. (Quite a feat when you figure how large the store is, how far everything away, how badly things are priced, and how badly the shelves are stacked...)

Can we go back to corner stores ? They may close Sundays. If you really are in need, you may knock on the back door and your friendly neighbour who lives behind the store, doesn't mind to reach you what you ask for. Tomorrow, or the next time you're in the store, you can pay for it. It doesn't break church or Sunday laws that way. And if that doesn't work, you pick up a pitcher or cup, and find another next door neighbour and borrow some sugar or vinegar, or so. Why not? Some essential neighbourhood gossip is exchanged for free.

Wild Thing​

Monday, October 22, 2007

ABOUT READING & WRITING

Wow, where am I?

This is the first time in a very long time that I was so caught up in a book that I could not stop reading, and everything else fell by the wayside. It's like living in an other world, and your own reality world is the stranger. That's the place where you are sleepwalking, being there, but not really. This day is a marvelous day, an Indian Summer day, to sit in the sun, feel the gentle warmth, smell the spicy aroma's of maturing nature, and just be carried away into the other world, but still a compatible world, a world where you feel familiar, but where you learn about, and from, others and therefore more about yourself too.

And I wonder again. Why, often I read books, where the subject matter interests me, where I want to keep on reading, but they really do not hold my attention without forcing myself. I think of other things to do, I make many pauses, I fall asleep, I am bored in a way, but still want to know...

So many rows of books in book stores, in libraries. How few that really, really capture you into that other world, that really is your own at the same time.

Are some books good, but badly written? Like good grammar and so, but without lure? Are there stories that are forced? Like not really coming from the depths of a soul? Sort of like someone playing the piano, faultless but not stirring you in any way? Whereas someone playing the piano with stumbles and maybe even wrong notes, sill stirs you, makes you feel all soft and excited inside and you listen with fascination, understanding love?

I can make room for books that may be well written from the heart, but bring story that lies outside my experience. If you have nothing to tie it too, you cannot make it your own in any way. It maybe for example, outside your cultural experience.

I still think that not everyone who writes poems, is a poet. Not everyone who writes story, is a born storyteller. Not everyone who paints, draws pictures, is a true artist. There is a difference, isn't there?

The book I just finished reading and had me under its spell, is,

The Day My Mother Left, by James Prosek. It's a novel, based on th author's own experiences. He's also an artist and loves the natural world.

Of course that may be an indication why his story telling grabs me so much.

Wild Thing

Friday, October 19, 2007

Mystery

I inhale deeply. This cool autumn morning smells spicy. Can you smell colour? It is overcast. Sometimes the colours seem more intense then. There is something mysterious about the feel, the smell, and the look of this kind of fall day. Again I inhale deeply. Doing so my Mother is with me. Some things you never forget.

I can see her with her auburn hair, in a cheery, printed dress, smiling. We, the family, are biking along trails, through woods and fields. Warm sunshine. The smell of wild flowers, grass, and woodsy floors. “Breathe in deeply,' mom would say, “expand your lungs. This is the best medicine. The air is healthy.”

My mom loved nature. She would have liked not to live in Amsterdam. She always longed for a home in the country. She always hoped that after the war, maybe that wish could be full filled. My dad was a city man. Amsterdam was fine with him. But I believe, had they lived, when things turned better after the war, that he would have found her such a place, maybe not too, too far from the city.

It stayed a dream. After troubled times, after working hard, after caring for others, they lost their health, would not find their reward on Earth. They are no more. But still they are. They are in me at such times, when I inhale deeply, expand my lungs, and drink in that healthy air. And not only that. In so many things I do, my parents and other people I lost, live on in me. That is the mystery of life.

Wild Thing (The Lone Blogger)

Monday, October 15, 2007

NO QUOTE TODAY

Hey
O do not know a quote today
Not today
Nay

Should I then write something
To entertain the blogger bunch,
Like what I had for lunch
To munch on? Not!

I write old fashioned style.
With capitals, and comma's,
And periods and all that stuff,
And rhymes, but without reason.

My fountains run, my candles burn.
I'm not burning them
On both sides, though.
I'm not that dumb.

But surely this poem is.
At only 4 o'clock , I'm out of energy,
And used up all my inspiration,
Imagine that.

Day is falling,
Leafs are falling,
Rain is falling,
And I am falling ... short.

No quote today.

Wild & Corny Thing