Archive for ◊ January, 2006 ◊

31 Jan 2006 Longsuffering Shadow
Author: Gail |  Category: Critters + Creatures, Hugh  | 10 Comments

longsuffering Shadow

Shadow, putting up with Christmas Day shenanigans. What a gentle dog.

Maybe I’m getting all wistful about having a dog because Mister Hugh has been so NAUGHTY lately. He’s good for about four days at a time, followed by several days of messes on the carpet. I’ve been going through the laundry detergent like nobody’s business because Hugh’s had accidents on the bed three days in a row. If he wasn’t such a good footwarmer and affectionate purrbox, I’d trade him in for a younger (read: not incontinent) model.*

* Of course I’d never do that, but some days I’d like to trade in Hugh’s dignity for a box of Kitty Depends (is there such a thing?).

TechnoratiTechnorati tags: , , , ,

30 Jan 2006 Hibernation
Author: Gail |  Category: House of Fielding  | 4 Comments

I’m fighting a food coma from eating too many of Helma’s potato pancakes. Her cooking is so good my digestive system can’t keep up and I want to pass out next to Hugh on the floor. (Edit: Except he just peed in his sleep — argh!) But I have to keep chipping away at the ‘To Do’ list until it reaches a more manageable size. I’ve taken more bags out to the garage and to Salvation Army today while the weather’s been on the warmer side.

weather.jpg

But after tonight the temperature will drop and I’ll be less inclined to be productive and more inclined to hibernate.

30 Jan 2006 For The Birds
Author: Gail |  Category: Critters + Creatures, Photography, Raconteurism, Videoclips  | 3 Comments

Lake Scranton
Pentax K-1000, 80-200mm

It was beautiful yesterday, so after my last drop-off at Salvation Army, I went to nearby Lake Scranton to take some wildlife photos with the zoom before it got too dark.

If there’s one thing photography teaches, it’s patience. I gripped the lens barrel for a full 10 minutes, waiting for this gull to take flight. I locked in the focus and waited. And waited. And waited. It was getting colder, and I was losing feeling in my fingers. Waiting. Finally, I had to give up my position to get circulation going again. I shifted, then the blasted bird skuttled across the ice out of the frame, and this is the best I could do to capture some wingspan.

And while I’m on the topic of birds, here’s a long overdue story of a rather nasty bird episode in Steveston (near Vancouver), from June 12. (I was in Vancouver from May 7 – August 6, waiting for my fiancée visa.) I’ll copy and paste the e-mail I sent to David: { continue reading… }

29 Jan 2006 The Great Bung-Out of 2006
Author: Gail |  Category: David  | 4 Comments

It continues. And it continues to amaze me… what with its sheer volume, and all. But I’m beginning to see the bedroom carpet again, so it looks like I’m making progress.

Some things I don’t know what to do with yet. For example, I found a largish box of Star Wars paraphernalia, with parts of R2D2 and pieces of spacecraft. But then there are the action figures — a 14-inch tall Han Solo staring at me, daring me to put him on eBay.

“Go on, sister,” in his sultry young Harrison Ford voice.

“Just try and auction me off. You know you want to keep me.”

Well, sure I do, Han. I might’ve been five years old when you hit the big screen, and you’re currently dating a woman who has to shop in the children’s department at Saks, but you’re still my favourite intergalactic character.

The box o’ Star Wars remains at one side, until further notice. { continue reading… }

29 Jan 2006 Saturday’s Shades
Author: Gail |  Category: House of Fielding, Photography  | 2 Comments

Saturday's shades

Mister Rogers would agree, it’s a beautiful day in the neighbourhood (only, he’d drop the extra Queen’s English ‘u’). Not content with more photos of my street’s power lines, I headed further up East Mountain from my house this time to capture the setting sun from higher ground. { continue reading… }

29 Jan 2006 David at 17: The Journal Assignment
Author: Gail |  Category: David at 17  | 4 Comments

Table of contents for David at 17: The Journal Assignment

  1. David at 17: The Journal Assignment
  2. David at 17: Ennui, Apathy, er, Irony
  3. David at 17: Frost
  4. David at 17: About That 55mph Speed Limit
  5. David at 17: Change, Knowledge
  6. David at 17: Leave No Hair Uncurled
  7. David at 17: Monday

[This entry sat in draft mode for a few hours -- I had an unexpected visitor!]

During my recent excavations, I made a small discovery: it appears to be a writing assignment for David’s last year of high school. It’s a bunch of writing on looseleaf paper with no headers or full dates. David’s handwriting looked the same to me, so at first I didn’t know how old it could be. After a bit of reading it became clear it was David at 17 years old, and it was an assignment… hence all the complaining. It may not be complete — all the papers in these boxes are loose — but I assembled the batches and tried to discern an order among the multiple numbering systems (this is David, after all).

I took the sheaf of papers to bed along with my books last night and read them all the way through, laughing at sections. Getting to know my husband 20 years before I met him is a bit of a revelation; it’s a glimpse into the mind of a 17-year old boy. (It’s been so long since I knew any!) It’s not a personal journal, after all, so I can’t report anything particularly scintillating or revealing, but its very mundaneness is amusing in itself. Casting my mind back to my own teenage years in comparison, I’m sure the juicy bits were few and far between, too. (I’ll have to ask Kimberly, we’d been pen pals for 7 years by then.)

David briefly mentioned a journal, but I didn’t think to try and dig it up in the days when he was too sick to read. I would’ve read it out loud to him, for laughs. I’ll include some entries here, now and again.

I like this one, for example: { continue reading… }

Next in series
27 Jan 2006 Fire in the Sky
Author: Gail |  Category: House of Fielding, Photography  | One Comment

fire in the sky

Another brilliant sunset yesterday, with more orange than purple. Today’s sunset was bright, too, but this is the best I could do from the office window. The only way to avoid the power lines in the picture is to go upstairs, but the giant magnolia tree tends to obscure the view:

from the office window upstairs

I watched this morning from the office window as the garbagemen heaved more than a dozen bags plus an assortment of boxes and odds and ends into the back of the truck. You’re probably wondering how on earth a person can accumulate that much rubbish — in fact, I was wondering that myself last night. It’s as if David kept every shred of paper in his life and threw it all in boxes to follow him around. David graduated from Penn State in 1989 and lived in three homes (not counting his mother’s) within about 45 minutes’ drive from each other, so he probably didn’t put much thought into minimising. Just imagine the volume of paper after 16 years! Especially considering how much paperwork can be collected from Civil Air Patrol alone: since it’s an auxiliary of the Air Force, you can’t sneeze without filling out reams of forms and consulting procedure binders. All of which, of course, David kept since the day he joined in 1999.

Speaking of sneezing, Hugh sneezed in my face this morning. Nothing like a spray of cat snot to start the day — there’s that much dust swirling around in this house.

Helma invited me for a fish supper, so I’ll do one more trip to Salvation Army and then I can finally have a break from the grunt work.

27 Jan 2006 Fears
Author: Gail |  Category: David, Gail at Large  | 4 Comments

Earlier today I came across this “Top 10 List” meme that David and I filled out a year ago, and I was shocked to re-read his #1 fear: { continue reading… }

26 Jan 2006 Dear David: The Basement
Author: Gail |  Category: Letters to David  | 3 Comments

Table of contents for Letters to David

  1. Dear David: Christmas Day
  2. Dear David: Your Memorial
  3. Dear David: Mister Hugh
  4. Dear David: Thanks for Helma
  5. Dear David: The Magnolia Tree
  6. Dear David: Month One
  7. Dear David: The Basement
  8. Dear David: When?
  9. Dear David: Month Two
  10. Dear David: Mister Hugh in the City
  11. Dear David: Month Three
  12. Dear David: Month Four
  13. Dear David: Month Five
  14. Dear David: Month Six
  15. Dear David: Month Seven
  16. Dear David: A Poem
  17. Dear David: Month Eight
  18. Dear David: Month Nine
  19. Dear David: Month 10
  20. Dear David: Month 11
  21. Dear David: Month 12

Dear David,

It’s garbage day tomorrow, so I channeled a rare burst of energy into cleaning the garage, and hauled many bags of rubbish to the curb. I love you madly, so I can state with impunity to the internet that you were quite slovenly, especially in your bachelor years. I was always getting on your case about being tidier, and I can just hear you now — “We have better things to do with our time than clean!” I grumbled, but you were right. All that time I’d spent cleaning, when we could’ve been doing something fun.

The middle of the kitchen floor is covered with items to take to Salvation Army tomorrow, things which I’m sure you’d forgotten but couldn’t be bothered to throw away. I pick through everything, look at your handwriting, find the occasional treasure amongst the junk — an old 45-rpm record, photo negatives, remnants from your college years. I’m organising them all, so it’s no wonder it’s taking me forever to do these simple tasks.

I might even work up the chutzpah to clean out the BASEMENT, believe it or not. You thought it more than mildly amusing that I was too chicken to go down there without you, so you’d be proud to know I’ve been down there several times in the past month without having to brace myself at the top of the stairs first. The other week I even marched right down and brought the Jenny up the stairs to Bill — he was so impressed I didn’t resort to using the cellar door — without knocking it against the beams. (Don’t worry, I know the JN-4 is your pride and joy, I was very careful. It’s safe at Bill’s place now.) The basement still gives me the heebie-jeebies, truth be told, so I daren’t blow a fuse… but I’m trying to get past this little fear.

There are a lot of things I struggle with from day to day, but I’m slowly learning to live without you by my side and to embrace life a little more. Not a day goes by without me bargaining with the universe to bring you back to me, but I keep plodding on nonetheless. I miss you all the time, but I’m surviving.

Love,
Gail

Previous in series Next in series
26 Jan 2006 Tuesday’s Hues
Author: Gail |  Category: House of Fielding, Photography  | 4 Comments

Tuesday's hues

The House of Fielding is a bit of a dust cloud these days, with all the shuffling and disturbances. But lately there have been some brilliant sunsets from the front porch, and on Tuesday one drew me away from the rubble to capture some of its hues on camera.

Now, back to work…

« Previous Entries