How dark is it inside a cow’s stomach?

When I was little we summered at the cottage – a log cabin on top of a granite rock. When we would come home late in the evening from some event we would feel our way up the sloping granite, one footfall at a time, following the bouncing beam of a flashlight.

The whip-poor-wills and crickets would be raucous and the stars sparkling overhead. I would cling to my dad’s hand and he would declare: “It’s as dark as the inside of a cow’s stomach!” I used to think that was a riot – but I don’t just now.

It’s a quarter to three in the morning. Son #2 is watching Chinatown – his dad’s all time favourite movie. Son #1 is making ginger and lemon tea to soothe his strep throat. Last night they auditioned for a record label and will soon fulfill their heart’s desire as musicians. They are on their way. In exactly one month from now we won’t be chatting in the kitchen in the middle of the night – we won’t be here at all. Where we will be has yet to be determined.

Read more…

You bet. We call it irony!

Part 2 of 3

Remember the bad dream I mentioned in my last post? Well the next day I got to live it! Isn’t that ironic? I figured the car fire was, in a way, a good thing. I’d call the insurance company – they would write off the car as being too old to warrant repair and I’d get something more reliable. As it happened, the deductible was ‘way more than the repair and the repair was ‘way more than I could afford right now. So just when I thought I was catching a break – I was actually getting another smack upside the head. What was that about? Well, one thing – it wasn’t about the smack – it was about the punch to the solar plexus that was about to knock the wind out of me! Read more…

How to let go of depression and the other saboteurs of happiness.

The muses, for me, are like a child, predawn, on Christmas morning. They stand quietly near my bed and lift an eyelid and say, “Are you awake?” I roll over and try to ignore the gentle prodding and then there will be a whisper in my mind. Some image – grouping of words – an inspiration of something that might be shared. I promise myself I will remember it all in the morning. But no. It is now that the phrases begin to tumble forth and, well, I might as well swing out of bed and follow the little one in the Doctor Denton’s up the stairs. I can nap later. Read more…