Birders

   

I have always been fascinated by birds ever since my father came home with a huge tome of Audubon's picture plates.  I was in Kindergarten.  I would flop on the carpet and turn the pages and examine all the different birds.
                                                           
 One spectacular painting showed a snake crawling up the tree towards a target bird.  That was before TV and when we were still taught to treat any book with great respect.  Now I scribble and highlight in them, even my bible has notes all over the margins.  It took me a long time to be able to do that without guilt.  That would make my great-grandmother pass out.  Such blasphemy.  But at one time books were rare objects to own.  They were treated like the jewels they were.  I wonder where that huge Audubon tome with all the pictures/drawings is now?  We used to have a clock much like this in our back yard.  I always knew it was 5:00 and Happy Hour when the Tufted Titmouse sang.  For years I tallied the feathered visitors to our winter bird feeders for the USA's Cornell University's Ornithology Lab which collaborated on data collected with Canada Bird Studies.             
I will join again when we are settled into a more-permanent home.  But still when we are camping I keep my reference books and binoculars close by.

What set that thought in motion was some pictures sent on the Internet of my grand-daughters in Ontario.  They were out in the woods and were delighted to be able to feed the chickadees and get them to land on them. (on the hand of the youngest and head of the elder).
For years I was too interested in riding horses and ranching and food gardens but came back to birds for my old age.  It is a simple, satisfying and peaceful hobby.  I am always learning something new.

Our elder grand-daughter has been stressed about a coming trip to the dentist as she needs to have a needle.  As she loves acting like royalty and having tea parties with tiaras, I sent her these two pictures of Katherine to show what happens if you don't take care of your teeth.  I told her the other choice was to have them all pulled out and get false ones, like grandad's, that scared her last fall when he let them drop out onto his chin.  I hope these pictures don't make the problem worse.     

New background

I suddenly felt the need for a new background.  The last one seemed too much like a bloody crime scene when it came up today.  Lent means 'springtime' so I wanted something reflecting more freedom as we head toward Easter.  Doves fluttering off the top of the page works for me.  

I would like about 8 more contacts on this site.  How do I go about doing that?  Some of my contacts/folk who came over from Multiply just don't post here at Blogger, although they read my blogs and leave wee comments.  I am looking for people who are more inter-active.  Mind you, I am retired so have time to blog, although I seem to only be doing one every 5 days or so, as we are in the same spot at this B/B in a small village.  Life trundles along here and not much is new to write about.  It is easier when we are travelling and seeing new sites every day to write about my daily impressions.

Yesterday a friend and I sat on the back steps after a wee walk and had tea in the sun.  The heat felt so good and we noticed grass emerging.  I also noticed irises and daylilies and wee bulbs poking their tips up to the sun.  But today it was snowing by the afternoon and is still snowing so we may wake up to a magical fairyland in the morning.  I love watching the snow coming down under the street lamps.  I can't wait to see real daffodils in real time, not off the internet like this photo.  These spring flowers after the winter make my heart sing.  Even the photos do.

I am getting into some of the history of the area though and plan to write about the stagecoach that went through here to the Gold fields in the late 1800's soon. 


                                                                        

Ash Wednesday

Last night after the raucous feast for Shrove Tuesday, and all the western and/or Gospel music, we had a small meeting to start the study of the history of Anglicanism and the Bible.  It is being taught by an American Episcopalian theologian, and we are doing the course on-line.  It is really, really interesting for something that sounds very dull.  I had thought the King James Bible just happened after the King decreed that the common people needed a book of scriptures written in the vernacular.  I knew King James had ordered a crew of scholars to write the English version of 1611.  Actually there were hundreds of years of arguments and quibbles before that enlightenment.  The final KJV  was like a British Christmas Fruitcake, with influences in it from Geneva and Lutherans, and Jewish scholars, and the RC Vulgate scholars and the Great Bible and ...and.... and..... Don't forget Gutenburg or Queen Elizabeth 1.                                                                                                             

                                                                                                                   

 Anne Bolyne had a big influence too.  Where is her head buried?

I was amused that Humanists, who weren't even Christians necessarily, but were fantastic scholars and linguists,  helped translate from the Hebrew and Greek and Latin versions.   Cranmer would be shocked or maybe delighted at this advertisement asking for more funding for bible translations in many common languages.

 

As a child, I used to think God wrote the bible one day out in the desert of Sinai or somewhere "over there" on the other side of the world.   He was having a kind of picnic with a lot of recording/journalling, so as to tell us how to behave.  Maybe I was partly right.  It is enlightening to find out about the struggles that happened over the centuries and the influences from the rest of the world that helped to birth the KJV.   It is also liberating to realize that this great literature and precious scripture, is a living entity that grows and adapts and is by no means static.  Its' thoughts and mandates can not be boxed in forever in one spot.   They are too BIG for small minds.  OOPs time to get off of my soap box.  But I really am looking forward to more readings and discussions.  Thank you King James for your part in the long journey of scriptural awareness.

Lent did start today.  The mood in the world is quieter in our village but also friendlier, but that may have been because the sun was shining and folk were out getting an airing.  There were more handicapped out in the sunshine using the sidewalks today, and I was included.

I managed to get in 3 walks today as I also had to go over to the church for the Ash Wednesday evening gathering.  What a difference there was in the tone as compared to the raucous talking and music last night at the Fat Tuesday dinner.  I didn't manage to get all the way home without smudging my forehead cross, made of last year's burned left-overs from palm leaves given out at Palm Sunday 2012.  


The presider mixes the ashes with olive oil.

This was an evening for quiet contemplation and 'being still'.  

Lent is the season of daily

1. prayer/meditation  
2.  fasting   
3. alms-giving.  

But in these modern days fasting can take the form of even talking more softly to everybody during Lent.  As a child we gave up candy or movies, but now we try to better our relationships.  What I learned from the reflection tonight was that if you give up anything for a few minutes to spend time with God, it is a form of fasting.  If you CHOOSE to not smoke/not drink/ not e-mail/ not do a pity-party/ not order fast food or not use a sharp tongue ..... and pray instead for 3 minutes or less/more,  then that is fasting for you.  Giving up anything that distracts you during Lent is a form of fasting, even for a minute that will bring you into communion with God.  That was a new concept to me.  It can also mean supporting folk emotionally, but not necessarily giving money as in alms as we thought of Lent in the Middle Ages.  We are a diverse people that GOD created.  Lent has never been so much fun.  The fun is in the learning component.

Shrove Tuesday

Shrove Tuesday/ Mardi Gras/  Pancake Tuesday  is welcomed every year as a harbinger of Spring.  The day also makes us stop to assess where we can cut back on our own consumption and give more to others over the next 40 days.

The men were in charge of the cooking today.  It was very smoky in our valley today and yesterday.  I heard that the sawdust pile at the railroad tie-processing plant had caught on fire.  I like the smell of wood smoke but I sure met some grumblers on my walks today who didn't appreciate it.  The smell made me want to go get the RV and go camping/fishing.  Nostalgia was kicking in.  The grumblers all talk like the smoke was a personal attack, just on them.  I sometimes think inside my head, "Build a bridge and get over it."  Maybe that is unkind.   But, after all there is nothing we can do about it.

     The volunteer fire folk will be working hard to put out any fire.  Thank God for their devotion and sense of responsibility.  Say a prayer in gratitude for them.  Well that is my response to the bitchers.

I did get out for two walks of 20 minutes today and that was all I could handle.  Some of my ankle, knee and upper thigh muscles are still tight and don't want to flex properly.  But again today I felt more flexibility than yesterday.  

Old Man Watching and I walked over to the church hall for pancakes and sausages and fancy whipped butter creams and fancy syrups and fruits and.....   

The Tradition comes from clearing out your cupboards of all rich foods before Lent.  

Lent  is a time of austere eating, except on Sundays, which are considered to be feast days so we aren't supposed to fast then.  Lent begins tomorrow and I will walk over for the traditional 7:00 Ash Wednesday service tomorrow night.  I will start my Weight Watchers diet AGAIN tomorrow morning.  

It has been difficult with no way to exercise the last few months and with Christmas thrown into the middle of the healing time.  I gained back all the 6 pounds I lost last fall, before getting bucked off of the stepping stool while cleaning windows on November 30.  

Sorry for being out of touch

I have been remiss.  I have watched and responded to your lovely blogs but just couldn't find the energy to blog about my own life.  Actually my quiet winter here in this village seems so un-interesting, especially after the years of RV travelling and exploring new sites to write about.  That is strange for me.  I started a walking programme with my bum leg today.  I plan to do 2 blocks around and back to home, and then each day go another block.  Maybe I will be able to do the hills by March.

Last Sunday we were invited up the mountain to visit with Andrea and to have dinner.  Above is my favourite calico cat that they have.  I don't want the bother of looking after pets anymore but do like my friends' pets.   Andrea made a special Shepherd's Pie that I will try baking one day soon. 

We didn't leave much for her to have for left-overs.  

I just tried to talk to my grand son for his eighth birthday but after two calls we gave up...at least he knows I tried to phone him.

  

We did send a present, and card in the mail.   He just had time to say 'Thank you' before the phone connection died.  

We had our favorite Auntie here this week.  Donna is Old Man's older sister.  She is 81  and qualified for the Alberta Seniors' Winter Olympic Games for bowling.   So she was here for 5 days on her way back from a holiday in the heat of Phoenix Arizona, and then had to get back to Alberta to settle in and drive an hour over to Lethbridge, Alberta, where the games are happening.  We took her to the airport an hour away in Kamloops, and stopped for lunch with one of her grandchildren's other grandmas at a fish and chip shop.  We had a good time with Priscilla and she took Donna to the airport so we could get home before dark.   We don't like the halos on the headlights in the dark anymore.

Our oldest son and family live in Ontario.  They cope with winter well, and find ways to make it fun.

Canada is getting a winter-kicking in the east as is the northern  U. States.  When it gets this bad folk just hunker down inside and wait.  There is no sense in trying to get a car out onto the roads that the snow/blowers/graders can't even keep cleared.  Maybe that is why we are such avid readers in the woods of Canada.  There can be a true beauty though in an old-fashioned country snow fall.  I used to enjoy the weeks stuck inside under blankets reading when the children had 'snow days'.  The fires had to be stoked and animals tended, but then you jumped back into bed with some hot chocolate and a stack of Canadiana best-sellers (not Harlequins). It also seemed like good days to be stuck inside baking cinnamon buns or bread.  It is possible to enjoy it, but I am thinking I like boon-docking in the deserts of southern California/Arizona more.  I can read in the heat as easily in the cold and don't mind not having to feed pigs or chickens or cattle.  I still make a fire in the evening but it is just for something to poke and the life-style ambiance.   It is also a place to burn our paper trash.

On our western side of the country it has been so mild, I am starting to want to see daffodils.

Greetings from a lazy person...

I have been very lazy about blogging since the death and memorial for cousin Layton.  We travelled over to Lillooet and did our duty and came back to settle in for some more Canadian snow.  It came down in those large peaceful flakes that make the world go silent, for two days.  There is a definite beauty to a winter day that is hovering just below freezing, but without any blizzardy winds.



My hair had grown while I had been confined to the house with the bum leg that is still healing.  I asked Old Man Watching to trim my neck hairs with his shaver one morning.  That was a mistake.  I ended up with big chunks  of hair missing at the back of my head.  So I got my good friend, Joanne, to take me for a 'real' haircut.  The poor hairdresser just shuddered and said the only way she could fix it was to do a #2.  That is like a military haircut.  Even then there were a few chunks missing.  OH WELL in two weeks....

The Crones gathered at Crazy Anne's last weekend and poor Neal kept leaving to hide downstairs to watch sports.  He did make us pizza though.

Last night I hosted a Bon Voyage party for our lovely Crone, Genevieve, who is going to Australia for a month.  It was another fun gathering of the Crones for a few hours.  

  In the background is Janice who is so good at organizing so many of our Crone's gatherings. 

I haven't been able to travel far on the ice and bumpy ruts outside so have been exercising my game leg by pacing inside.  I have also finished 4 prayer shawls to keep myself from going bonkers watching mindless TV.  This inactive life is just not for me.  hissss  hissss  hissss  

We walked over to the church hall for Soup's On today and I just used Old Man's arm instead of the cane, and don't need crutches anymore at all.  I can see progress happening.  But it has been a slow two months.  It was thawing so there were a lot of puddles.  There were also a lot of folk we didn't know in the hall.  There were also fewer young folk and children who used to use this meal every week.  There were also fewer First Nations families there.  We will have to watch the trends and see if there are reasons.  We will not contract out a $150,000 consulting assessment though.  Only governments do that lack-of-common-sense stuff. The lunch was good and supplied by the crew from the Evangelical Free church up on the town's mesa hill.  I enjoyed their bacon and bean soup.  Others said the vegetarian soup was good too.  We always have to have one vegetarian soup to offer with the buns and salads and fruit.  The Evangelical church do all the work and clean up for a lunch every two months.  They are very friendly and compassionate people.  Afterwards, we walked around the blocks in the spring-like sunshine and went to get $ gift cards for two grandchildren's birthdays this month.  Joanne visited to chat and have tea while I started another prayer shawl.  Then tonight I walked two blocks holding on to Old Man's arm (no cane), to the Royal Legion for a home-style beef and yorkshire dinner.  The price is right ($10 a plate) and the company friendly although the building is not very fancy.