It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.
~ Lewis Carroll
(Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland)
Contrariwise, if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.
~ Lewis Carroll
(Through the Looking Glass)
“We lost the chestnut tree.”
My sister delivered the most important news first. On Sunday we had last talked on our cell phones, and she let me know then that they had lost power at our father’s house, courtesy of the freak Halloween Nor’easter that caught Connecticut by surprise this past weekend, dumping over a foot of heavy wet snow on most of the state. Dad had a cold, and they had the wood stove going trying to keep him warm. Then her cell phone went dead and I heard nothing further.
This afternoon, two days later, she finally was able to make it down to her office and call me from work. They have their power back now, but still no land line or cell phone service. Beverly says I won’t believe the damage up there, although I am seeing many news reports on TV. Apparently the state lost more trees in this storm than we did during Hurricane Irene. With the wood stove they were able to keep Dad’s room at 70°F (21°C), although like many elderly ones, he doesn’t feel comfortable until the temperature is about 80°F (27°C).
When my father was a young man – he is now 89 years old – he found the chestnut sapling in Pennsylvania and brought it home with him, transplanted it in Connecticut soil, and nurtured it to a full-grown, gorgeous tree. When his short-term memory started disappearing several years ago, he would tell me the story over and over, every time I went up for a visit, which used to be several times a week. He looked forward to seeing it outside his window every morning, and was very attached to it, his special tree.
In June of 2010 it bloomed! A lovely scent filled the air. I’ll never forget it.
We used to decorate it with flower garlands for Midsummer.
And now the Halloween Nor’easter of 2011 has uprooted it. Beverly reports that when Dad discovered what had happened he simply said, “This is demoralizing.” I cried when she told me. The storm also took the tops off several oak trees and the yard and the roads are a mess. Poor trees. They’ve taken such a beating this year…
We have all of us eaten the pomegranate seed of language, and we are its Persephones in its ways of structuring our experience of ourselves and the world.
~ John Moriarty
(Turtle Was Gone a Long Time)
They weren’t true stories; they were better than that.
~ Alice Hoffman
(The Story Sisters)
Memory is the way we keep telling ourselves our stories – and telling other people a somewhat different version of our stories. We can hardly manage our lives without a powerful on-going narrative.
~ Alice Munro
(Sport & Memory in North America)
The world is shaped by two things – stories told and the memories they leave behind.
~ Vera Nazarian
(Dreams of the Compass Rose)
The holiest of all holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence and apart;
The secret anniversaries of the heart.
~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Many thanks to Tracy at Seasons Flow, for permission to use the above photograph, found on the Late Nesters post of October 1, 2001. When I first saw this touching picture of a mother mourning dove and her squab it warmed my heart and filled me with joy. Today I have a perfect opportunity to use it – in memory of my mother, who would have been eighty years old today. I miss her still.
The vegan adventure continues, although it’s been challenging not being able to chop vegetables or lift heavy pots and pans while my hand is on the mend. And it turns out that I also cracked a rib when I fell two weeks ago… (Finally decided to check things out with a doctor.) Six more weeks expected for everything to heal…
We had an encouraging surprise from Tim’s brother, the one who just had a heart attack in September. After doing some of his own research he’s also decided to become a vegetarian, so we may get a meat-free Thanksgiving after all!
And this weekend we found a local Asian cuisine restaurant. Tim had the Vegetable Delight with steamed tofu, and he ate it, all of it. I wasn’t sure I could believe my eyes!
Under the harvest moon,
When the soft silver
Drips shimmering
Over the garden nights,
Death, the gray mocker,
Comes and whispers to you
As a beautiful friend
Who remembers.
Under the summer roses
When the flagrant crimson
Lurks in the dusk
Of the wild red leaves,
Love, with little hands,
Comes and touches you
With a thousand memories,
And asks you
Beautiful, unanswerable questions.
~ Carl Sandburg
(Under the Harvest Moon)
These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God to-day. There is no time in them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. Before a leaf-bud has burst, its whole life acts; in the full-blown flower there is no more; in the leafless root there is no less. Its nature is satisfied, and it satisfies nature, in all moments alike. But man postpones or remembers; he does not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the past, or, heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on tiptoe to foresee the future. He cannot be happy and strong until he too lives with nature in the present above time.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
(Self-Reliance)
Things need not have happened to be true. Tales and dreams are the shadow-truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes, and forgot.
~ William Shakespeare
(A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
Gain knowledge, brothers! Think and read,
And to your neighbors’ gifts pay heed,
Yet do not thus neglect your own.
Sadly I weep when I recall
The unforgotten deeds of all
Our ancestors: their toilsome deeds!
Could I forget their pangs and needs,
I, as my price, would then suppress
Half of my own life’s happiness…
~ Taras Shevchenko
(My Friendly Epistle)
It has turned into a three-day weekend for me! Friday Janet and I got together to create pysanky – Ukrainian Easter eggs. While visiting her I was introduced to Maggie, a very sweet twelve-year-old shelter dog with arthritis who is a pit bull or mostly pit bull. She barked for a while after I arrived – Janet explained she had anxiety issues. So Maggie and I had something in common and soon relaxed around each other. Maggie kept Janet and me company as we worked on our eggs, and then the three of us took a nice long walk along the rural roads surrounding Janet’s home. It was a bright, warm-in-the-sunshine, cool-in-the-shade, day. On my way out Janet gave me some venison and a recipe for it to try out on Tim. Thanks to the GPS, I successfully navigated my way home!
Tim was working off and on this weekend, but we did get out a little on Saturday, stopping by the grocery store to get some more ingredients for the venison stew. It was very windy and we were amazed to see the flag over the grocery store flying straight out. Storm clouds were gathering, but I managed to get a picture of the chionodoxa popping up through the periwinkle and dead leaves in my garden. Tim returned to working, from home, and I watched a couple of other versions of Jane Eyre from Netflix. The rain came down hard overnight, but this day dawned bright and sunny again, a bit warmer than it was Friday.
Is it so small a thing
To have enjoyed the sun,
To have lived light in the spring,
To have loved, to have thought, to have done?
~ Matthew Arnold
(Seasons)
Today was a slow cooker day. The recipe Janet gave me for the venison stew was given to her by Erik, Janet and Tim’s stepdad, who died in 2008. He was a fantastic cook! When I first read through the recipe, I noted with a smile that it was from an out-of-print cookbook Erik had, called Glorious Stew by Dorothy Ivens. This brought back a pleasant memory. Many years ago Tim had enjoyed a stew Erik had prepared so much that he wanted the recipe. When Erik showed him the cookbook Tim decided he had to have one, too, but it was already out of print. So Tim asked the Book Barn to set aside a used copy for him, if one ever came into the store. A used copy did show up after what seemed like a very long time, so Tim was thrilled to finally have his own copy! 🙂
So… I modified the recipe a bit for the slow cooker and it smelled so good cooking away all day. Being a morning person, I love slow cookers because I can prepare something yummy early in the morning when I’m fresh and alert and then have something wonderful to eat in the evening, when I’m too tired, cranky and overwhelmed to cook. When Tim got a break this afternoon, we went out for a walk around Olde Mistick Village and when we arrived back home the stew smelled tangy and very tempting. It was delicious!
I took some pictures of the ducks and shops on our walk. Yes, today we have enjoyed the sun…
