Another Day

I'm calling this one "After the Hockey Game." Perhaps I'll start a series called My Life: Parked.

Although when I saw this scene last night I felt very happy to be alive, I am thinking now about the family at my son's school who lost their son on Good Friday in a tragic car accident. He was in grade 11. A child embarking on manhood, never to arrive there.

I can only imagine what great pain it must be to look at a sky like this through his mother's eyes. To know your son isn't here to see it. To know you cannot share it with him or enjoy it without him.

So this is for her. I don't know her, she won't ever see this, but I send this to her as a prayer. I think what I can hope for her is this:

May one day your sorrow be lessened so that beauty is no longer too painful to behold.

Here and Now

I have been thinking so much about the here and now. These days, we are reminded so often to be present, mindful, in the now.

I meditate, not as often as I should, but I do. And the method I learned is a mindfulness one, a Buddhist meditation, so it is very much about the now.

Often, though, in my daily life, I find myself wishing I lived somewhere else than in this city of mine, or any city. I know I am most at home where the land and sky meet at the horizon, uninterrupted by strip malls and skyscrapers.

Then this happens.

Poetry, here and now. The mundane and majestic side-by-side.

And isn't this just like life on this planet? Oh yes, we compromise. This parking lot is my compromise, I can tell you. But here, in this moment, the neon signs are eclipsed by far brighter light, one that shows me the way, time and again, calling me with such patience and persistence to that which is beyond the endless asphalt.

I see now my pursuit of this deep love is my ultimate quest, and I need to be more fearless in the chase.

But for right now, until I find the road I'm looking for, I've got a great parking spot.

Gifts of Art

A post bemoaning winter was well underway. I'd gathered my glowering thoughts about the season —the gloomy monochrome landscape, the grey days piling up in my memory like the mountains of frozen slush lining the streets, the crunched-up bodies of the city folk huddled under their coats, heads down to chests as they trudge through another day.

My eyes felt parched; they were so thirsty for colour. I'd decided enough was enough. I would post some cheery pictures of a garden tour I took on Toronto’s Ward’s Island a couple of summers ago.

But wait a minute, I thought. Wasn’t it less than a month ago that I posted passionately on the beauty of  frost? Didn't I celebrate blue-shadowed trees on fields of gold-kissed snow? What happened? When did I fall so completely out of love with winter?

I guess a love like that cannot last. It’s doomed by the inevitability of spring.

I didn't finish the post. It will appear later. Instead I happened to drive by a house where winter is still welcome. On its front lawn is a gallery of snow art.  

A polar bear mama, arms out to her cubs.

A human mother with little ones clinging to her skirts.

A goofy, funny, playful dog sitting, waiting for a treat, and...a deer? A sphinx cat? I’m not sure what the last one is, but I am grateful for it.

The city is still drained of the soft green I'm yearning, but I can't deny I love the virtues of snow—it can bring out the best in us. It brings out a playfulness in young and old.

I love that this artist has shared his vision and brought magic to a somewhat bleak street-scape. (I know he's a he, because I saw him on my last drive by. I was showing my elderly mother the creations, and the sculptor himself was touching up his work — a little pat of fresh snow here and there. We stopped to compliment him. He speaks little English, and seemed surprised by our appreciation, but he waved and nodded shyly.) 

I hope he knows how grateful I am that he shares his art with the city. I felt he seemed the type that makes art because he must—art for the joy of creation, art even though it cannot possibly last for long, art for art’s sake, but also art for our sake, too.

So I will settle back into the now that is in snow. The garden will come. It always does.

Until then I will carry on making steaming mugs of hot chocolate, lighting the kitchen candles at dusk, and looking for the gifts that are in front of me instead of pining for the ones that don't exist yet. 

Winter Hangs On But Not For Long in Narnia

I was in Narnia this morning, but did not stay long. Alas, sledge parking spaces are scarce.

















I knew I was not alone. There were tracks in the snow. A deer—somewhere close.


 






And crows called to each other from atop the bluff.

But the Queen's evil dwarfs were there, too, and in quite a foul mood they were, for the warm air and weighty wet snow were undeniable signs of spring.

The nasty fellows hid in boughs sagging with heavy snow and, in their bitterness, flung great slush-balls at me from their treetop perches. They had surprising accuracy. More than once the cold wet projectiles landed with a shsloop upon my head. The cowards. I could hear them "shouting and cheering as if they'd done something brave."*

I left them, their jeering soon swallowed by the sound of a river racing itself toward a new season. Spring was coming—evident and omnipresent, but still shrouded in white.

"All round them though out of sight, there were streams, chattering, murmuring, bubbling, splashing and even (in the distance) roaring. And his heart gave a great leap (though he hardly knew why) when he realized that the frost was over."*

* From C.S. Lewis's The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe.

Now You Are One!

I can't believe it has been more than one year since my first post. Time flies. I'm looking forward to a busier year blogging here!

Literary Landscapes Part One

When I think about literary landscapes—that is, a book's fictional setting—Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea comes to mind. It is one of the most memorable "places" literature has taken me.

The slim little novel tells the story of Antoinette Cosway, the woman destined to become Jane Eyre's madwoman in the attic. The first section, told from Antoinette's POV, opens on her childhood in post-Colonial West Indies and leads to her marriage to Rochester. The second section switches to Rochester's POV, and the third is back to Antoinette, but in England now, and leads to her tragic end at Thornfield. It's brilliant. A must-read for any fans of the Brontë classic.

I was deeply affected by Rhys' use of atmosphere, and for many years I've equated the book's atmosphere specifically with setting—the old plantations of Dominica and Jamaica. But when I went back to the book, I realized that there weren't nearly as many references to the physical setting as I'd thought. They were scant, but powerful. A few paragraphs into the opening pages comes this:

"Our garden was large and beautiful as that garden in the Bible – the tree of life grew there. But it had gone wild. The paths were overgrown and a smell of dead flowers mixed with the fresh living smell. Underneath the tree ferns, tall as forest tree ferns, the light was green. Orchids flourished out of reach or for some reason not to be touched."

There are a few other spots where Rhys lingers over the setting, but my memory of her attention to this literary device was out of proportion to its use in the actual narrative.

From this I've gleaned some important lessons. First, a brilliant writer needs few words to create evocative, memorable settings. Second, setting is but one tool in the writer's toolbox. We use setting to build atmosphere, but atmosphere or mood is so much more than the physical elements. And mood, too, is just one other tool to enrich the story of the lives of the characters. 

Third is something else entirely. It is the magic of literature, it is why I love a good story. It is that alchemy that happens when an author's words are internalized by each reader of her work. No two readers will personalize a work in the same way. That is so rich! It is as though there is not one  Wide Sargasso Sea, but as many editions as there are readers of Rhys' novel. 

How powerful is that? How many lives can each of us live by reading! How wonderful and transformative.

On my first reading, I was entranced and even a little frightened by the lushness of the landscapes Rhys drew (and I mean drew). I felt the oppressive languor-inducing heat. I saw greenery growing with wild abandon, blooming audaciously, heavy scent hovering over it all. And I smelt rot, a rank smell wafting up unexpectedly through the overly sweet air. I even glimpsed the shimmer of stagnant pools through the thick jungle that crept up to a dusty path. And I saw the houses fall into decay as the slave-based economy that had propped them up was dismantled. I saw the land take back its due.

This was my personal interpretation of the setting. Someone from Dominica would have an entirely different experience of Rhys' words. Which led me to think that not only do we experience the setting of a novel through the prism of our experiences, but we do this with actual landscapes as well. Not a revelatory observation, I admit, but fascinating how we take in the world—fictional setting or not. 

Next up in Literary Landscapes Part Two, I will look at how my experience of the natural world shapes the Literary Landscapes I create.

Freedom to Read

Freedom to Read Week in Canada starts Sunday. http://www.freedomtoread.ca/ Yay!

Intellectual freedom and freedom of expression are protected under the Canadian Charter and enshrined in the International Declaration of Human Rights. 

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml

Does this not sound like a reason to celebrate?!

Read, write, express yourself, posthaste!