All my life's a circle ..

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As Harry Chapin said/sang:

“All my life's a circle”

Yesterday part of it went full circle, back 7 years to the start of a friendship and the start of a long walk.

It was Doug who suggested gong back to the beginning; first that meant a stop at the local Tim's.

Fortified with tea and treats we headed up to Elora to wander the gorge trails, then find a place for more tea and conversation.

With friends you slip into these times like slipping into an old glove, they just fit, no struggle no thinking involved it just happens.

It was supposed to be a photo outing but ended up more as a walk and talk outing but that's OK we enjoyed ourselves and more importantly for me it broke me free of the chains of recent months where everything seems to have been sidelined...

So it is fitting that my “Photo of the Week” be a black and white study, after all it is where I began..

So for my quotation I turn to Rumi ..

“Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love”.

The man from Bell..

No “Photo of the Week” this week not much of anything really, I have been out of commission.

So just a story to fill the void.

During the week we had a phone call, ostensibly from Bell. 

 

“We have noticed that you are having trouble with your internet connection” -Said the man from Bell

“Have I?” -said I

“Yes our servers indicate your modem drops the connection quite frequently”-Said the man from Bell

“Okaaay”-said I

This went on for several minutes and I was dubious to say the least, but I went along with it, don't ask why, the man from Bell set up a service call and said goodbye.

I looked up Bell's technical support number and called them, expecting a scam but no they really had called and there really was a problem, go figure Bell being proactive!

AND they answered the phone within seconds not minutes or hours !

So fast forward to yesterday, the man from Bell showed up and spent most of the afternoon testing stuff, rewiring outside, adding new stuff, tearing out old stuff and running wiring into the house.

He left after about 3 hours, and about 2 minutes later he was back, “I was just looking at the test results and I am not happy with what I see” - Said the man from Bell

So more ripping, tearing, rewiring and generally fiddling about (it's now supper time!) and he was satisfied.

So off he went, leaving me with a whole new view of Bell Canada.

His parting words were “ We realise that there is a lot of competition out there now and we want to hold on to our customers, so this new project, 'Project Eagle' is helping us find problems before they become problems.”

Well who would have thought !

The Joy of Seeing ..

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I was thinking about a quote from a friend this last week and realised it does sum me up.

"I think you are a man who can find interest and pleasure and be in the moment, so you only need to take Winter for a walk……the rest of us have to go to Europe.”

While I love to travel,

to see,

to explore,

to learn

and

to know

She is right; I don't have to go very far and it is oh so true, I can find pleasure in the most benign of things.

Several weeks ago I picked some fallen Milkweed; old, stark, weather beaten though they are I keep returning to them and draw and paint them trying to capture their essence.

Fascinated by their structure.

And while doing this I wonder just how many people walk right by them and if they think of them at all they regard them as 'weeds' ..

Oh but here on my desk they are beginning to reawaken, the few remaining seeds are opening, and deploying their little parachutes, waiting for a breeze to send them off on their journey, fulfilling the promise.

I see this happening before my eyes and wait for the story to unfold...

"The real voyage of discovery consists of not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." - Marcel Proust

Just once more ..

 

.. could also be "an ode to my dog" ...

Instead of a 'photo of the week' I went back to November of last year when I was able to catch Winter sleeping on the couch.

Snow !

I don't know who was more excited Winter or me.

One more time we were able to walk in a chill morning with snow underfoot, the trails silent except for Winters panting, my huffing and puffing and the occasional bird making himself known.

Through the trails, across the school yard to the pond; following the stream back around. It was then that I heard it, I think Winter did too but chose to ignore it, that unmistakable plaintiff cry of the Kildeer and then there they were, a pair circling above.

A welcome sight but another harbinger of Spring.

A Spring that we had forgotten about on this delightful winter morning...

“I talk to him when I'm lonesome like; and I'm sure he understands. When he looks at me so attentively, and gently licks my hands; then he rubs his nose on my tailored clothes, but I never say naught thereat. For the good Lord knows I can buy more clothes, but never a friend like that”. ~W. Dayton Wedgefarth