A long time since I've written. It's been a busy month.

La Ronge was wonderful: trees and rocks and rocks and trees and trees and rocks and rocks and trees and WATER! I was even persuaded to drive the houseboat. I also learned that my HBC fur factor grandfather worked at La Ronge in the 1930s — but clearly fur is not a factor for me! (Sorry, I had to say that.) We saw some ancient cliffs and took an interpreted hike; we also explored the lake in both a canoe and a fishing boat (on different days). All great fun.

Big ring around the moon / Gonna rain hard soon ...

But now that I'm home I'm very busy. I've been writing outlines and lesson plans all week — I thought I'd try to be a little better organized this year. All my PROW courses are running this semester, with healthy enrollments; if my English 111 course also runs, I'll be a busy little elf! This weekend I need to finish the instructor handbook because Peter wants to distribute it next week. There's so much to do before school starts!

That old dog has chained you up alright
Give you everything you need to live inside a twisted cage
Sleep beside an empty rage...

And then there's paying work. And the dread Active Voice newsletter — can't remember why I agreed to that gig. Hmm. And family and friends. My aunt is keeping a mandolin for me, I think. A mandolin is strung like a violin, but fretted, so it should be easy to learn, apart from the strumming technique. Haven't done any yoga or meditating lately; I know I should because I'm very very tired, but I have a million evasive reasons not to get around to it. Have been reading well: finished A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle and The Stone Carvers by Jane Urquhart; started The Fourth Hand by John Irving but had to return it to the library before finishing. Then I read a cute little thriller called About the Author, a playful, if somewhat over-written, first novel. Don't know what I'll read tonight...

Well, it's time to go: must have my weekly allowance of giddy laughter at humanity's latent silliness. Tomorrow is Zachary's birthday — he'll be TWELVE! Happy birthday, Zak!

the sage sag,
L

PS: Happy (belated) birthday, Mom! (Aug 14)
PPS: Happy (slightly less belated) birthday, Nicole! (Aug 21)

All these Leos! No, what I mean is, Oh, those Leos!

A wondering weekend. Another experience of watching a thing that will not be repeated. Plus ca change...

But this: someone, anyone, please explain to me how my marital status is the business of ANYBODY other than my very self?

It is sad, or perhaps terrifying, to watch ourselves age, to observe the potential of youth hewn down to the solidity of our cells. Who may I yet be? I cannot know. But the universe must know that I will cry myself hoarse before I recant who I am. I will remember that I am a grasshopper and happy, not an ugly ant milking the aphids. That my life is greater than a big house and a garden-in-a-box, three squares and a little more, all the right wines in my cellar, a screen that reflects the banality of man unkind, a thousand playthings and no joy. That my purpose is beauty, that I serve the world and not the other way around, that a thought, a dream, is the only lasting value I can possess. What shall it profit a man, after all?

... taking whatever they get — I don't want to wind up like that ...

So I will wear sandals when it pleases me. Even to the marriage of my true mind, if that be my preference. And more. I will learn to speak pirate. I will eat berries newly washed by the night as the sun rises on my morning. I will let the wind braid my hair and the sun adorn my skin. I will rave on. Bring on the windmills: I am for them. It is only utterly who I must be.

So save me from the smugness of the trust fund, the well-planned retirement, the right opportunity at the right moment. Save me from being elderly at thirty-three. Save me from the rightness of this life, for I am sure I would die of it. You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I will more willingly part withal ...

Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. I wish you well.

... looking back over my shoulder at you happy without me ...

Meanwhile ...

Now reading: Angle of Repose. Firewing. More preparatory materials. And a large bag of fine novels tempts me hourly: Byatt, Doyle, Drabble, Irving, King, Urquhart. Soon, soon.

You can already see what I like and do not like for today. What a drag, what a drag, what a drag. Hmph. Zak is in Brooks and I miss him. Many of my friends are travelling. Soon I may too. But until then I'm sitting, letting it in, letting it go, letting it in, letting it go ...

L