With Family

STORYLAND VALLEY ZOO
Nice shot, isn't it? I took it during a raptor demonstration at the zoo, on a magical day with daughters Rose & Laura, Rose's sweetie Ze'ev, and grandbabies Kaliana & Kai. Here's another one:

So proud to be riding on a pony!

A whole family life greeted me in Edmonton, in August, including days at the lake with Rose, Laura, and the two little 'Ks.' I got my nails done, got my hair done, and SCHOOL began to happen big time! (Is it obvious that I'm trying to catch up on my blog posts?) Meetings, home visits, watching with admiration as the WESE worker-women scrape and paint, saw and hammer, scrape and sew and transform three ordinary old classrooms into Waldorf places of wonder. Lesson planning, you may wonder? Mmm . . . I'm well behind in that department. And then, last weekend, a glorious mother/daughter retreat with my beloved singing sisters at Labyrinth Lake Lodge. (Oh! I didn't go as a grandmother, or even as a mother--I went as a DAUGHTER, with Kay as my other mother!) I was honoured with a ceremony (surprise!) recognizing my year away and my role in launching this new Waldorf program into the world.

My new students came to school yesterday afternoon to check out our new classroom, in preparation for their Big Day on Wednesday--so wonderful to see the classroom come alive with children!

Hey, today is watermelon day, in the French Republican Calendar--reminds me to be sure and enjoy summer's last juicy treats during these last few days of August!

This week Rudolf Steiner tells us:

I feel strange power, bearing fruit
And gaining strength to give myself to me.
I sense the seed maturing
And expectation, light-filled, weaving
Within me on my selfhood's power.

Good-bye, Keene!

I went for a good morning, good-bye walk to delightful Robin Hood Park this morning, placing my unfired clay modeling assignments in strategic locations, to quietly dissolve into the landscape. New England autumns are celebrated, and so should be the New England springs--this one was early and splendiferous, with blossoms bursting open like smiles on tree branches, on bushes, and in the grass everywhere.

After whining, in my last post, about being sick so much, I became sick again--so tired and discouraged with getting sick all the time, that I tended to focus on navigating through each day, rather than on my imminent joyful homecoming. But now my boarding passes are printed, my jumbo suitcase is packed to the point of zipper strain, and the rest of my belongings are question marks surrounding my smaller suitcase, open on my bed (will this fit in? will this, too?). I had to slide my big suitcase down the stairs on its belly--tip will be a must, for the taxi driver who will come for me in the morning! Bank account is closed; refund of the cell phone deposit is negotiated; public library and university library books are returned. Books and clothes are in the mail.

Yesterday 'my' Grade Fours gave me gifts, a book of hand-drawn pictures and handwritten greetings, and their individual thank-yous and wishes for me and my own students, to come. Wonderful children, and I learned so much from them and from their teacher! It was perfect to have Rose and Ze'ev visit me in Keene, this past weekend. We ate in restaurants (what novelty!), got caught in the rain on Pack Monadnock, visited the Horatio Colony Nature Preserve, and I couldn't stop talking--Rose and Ze'ev didn't seem to mind! They packed some of my boxes to the lovely house in Wilton that will be my home for three weeks in July, and carried another box to Ottawa, to mail to Edmonton for me. Thanks Rose! Thanks Ze'ev!

Rose and Ze'ev arrived in Keene on Friday, in time to join my classmates and me in a year-end pot-luck celebration--I was thrilled to be able to introduce them to my wonderful classmates, who were kind enough to say all kinds of nice things to my dear daughter and her partner, my dear friend! I'm very glad I will be able to spend three more weeks with my companions-in-learning, in July.

After I publish this post I will cut myself off from the world by packing away this computer. Tomorrow will be spent in that peculiar vacuum of airports and planes that seems to displace the traveler's connections to time and location. I will go heavily armed with novels and knitting (I've decided to take my chances with a pair of short, almost toy-like bamboo knitting needles), so that I can read and knit furiously to distract myself from the noise and hubbub of air travel. I'm expecting a painless but long day, with a big prize at the end of it all--my own husband's smiling face, and a ride in my own car to my own home in Edmonton! The very prospect feels downright magical!

Will I ever visit Keene again?

Today join the French Republicans in a moment of contemplation of the edible herb borage, with its lovely star-like blue flowers, fuzzy leaves, cucumbery taste, and its boundless energy for showing up in your garden year after year, after you first choose to plant it.

For your soul:

There has arisen from its narrow limits
My self and finds itself
as revelation of all worlds
Within the sway of time and space;
The world, as archetype divine,
displays to me at every turn
the truth of my own likeness.