Saskatoon Winter in October

There is snow here in Saskatoon which is a bit of a surprise since it was about 18 degrees at home the other day. I brought almost all my shoes with me but didn't bring the right boots. Oh well.

There are many things that are surprising about Saskatoon - the river, for example with its lovely bridges. And the Mendel gallery. And my nephew's Steven's grown up life, with his beautiful wife and their baby Sonia born last year just before my dad died.

Here I am being hosted and fed by the little boy I used to babysit. He's driving me around Saskatoon in his big white Land Rover. Steven needs a Land Rover because he is doing amazingly interesting things up north. He's a senior archeologist for a company based in Calgary, and also a Ph.D. student. He travels about, flies into places, drives over bodies of water, meets with elders, dives into bear caves, and so on.

I was a happy auntie driving back from a book signing at McNally Robinson with my nephew in the white Land Rover, with white snow on the ground.

And then there was the 1997 white Westfalia with a for sale sign gleaming at us in the sun.

George and I have been talking about this lifestyle plan - the camper van plan - for months. And there it was. I said to Steven yesterday, with a wink:  "Just watch and see how this turns out!"

Today I spent a beautiful afternoon with Ray and Marie. I drove all around Saskatoon with Ray, out to the university, over the river, onto the highway and out to the farmers fields. We turned around near the polka dance hall where Ray has enjoyed many good times. Ray approved of the way I drive, and asked me who taught me. My dad, of course - and he taught me how to polka too!

Apparently no-one but Ray has ever driven this van until I happened along. They can't drive the van anymore and its a hard thing to let go of since so much joy of their later life was lived in it.

It's kinda like when we brought home the perfect toast-colored dog named Oliver.  Bringing this dog home was definitely not the most practical and well-thought out decision in the world, but yet it was one that came upon us with some force.

This van was like that.

Ray and Marie kissed my cheek with great force as we made our arrangements and plans for pick-up in March.

You just never know what's waiting for you in Saskatoon!

With Her Boots On

I have so much to do.  I have lost my way temporarily because the computer program that structures my working life is not working today.  And I'm leaving tomorrow on a book tour.

I picked up my dry cleaning on the way to court this morning because I needed my gowns for Superior Court.  And then there were the book tour clothes that I picked up at the same time - they are all still in the back of the car, with my court file in a box on top.  I didn't want to bring them in from the car until I had luggage to put them in.  I have no luggage because it has vanished with my children - the last luggage, except for one broken-zippered bag, went off delivering young lives to new places after the compulsory (and wonderful) Thanksgiving homecoming.

As a result, I have nothing to put books and / or clothes in for the book tour that has miraculously happened on its own.

Here is a secret:  I didn't book my flights, actually, until Wednesday.

And my computer is in serious trouble.  At the moment I have no calendar, except in my own mind.  I have no file lists, A-Z.  I am forced to leave the computer issue to Lisa, my fabulous and drop-dead gorgeous one-day-a-week assistant.  She was the taskmaster for Day "O" in The Camino Letters and there are stories about Lisa in there too.

For example, one day a lovely elderly woman came to the office and somehow we ended up discussing Lisa's book "With Her Boots On".  The elderly woman said:  "With Her Boots On - just like a good solider."


In The Camino Letters, Lisa's task to me was to think about the hidden seed that would grow in the right conditions.

That's the thing about Lisa - and the thing about Lisa and me in particular - is that we understand each other a bit, we both failed sandbox, and we both have our boots on, just like a good soldier.

There is no doubt that my computer will be perfect when I get back from the book tour. Thank you Lisa.

Paso por Paso - Normandy - July 1944

When I came home from Spain at the end of July, 2009, I was extremely fit.  My husband especially commented on the strength of my wrists and I responded that this was from my fifth day.

It was.  I pounded my walking poles on that day, up despised hills on a dusty path.  You'll have to read my letter to Elvira in Chapter 5 to see what that was all about.  It was a day of anger, or something beyond anger.  It was a day of very strong emotion - such that I had not experienced before or since.

At the end of my letter to Elvira, after trying to explain a lot of things, I said this:

"At one point, as I was trying to collect myself on the path, a Spanish man quietly passed me on the left and looked at me directly.  He meant to look at me, and he said, "Paso por Paso."  I didn't know what he was saying.  I now know that he was saying, kindly, "Step by Step."  This is the Camino."

I got a letter in the mail today from a man who is in his nineties.  This is part of what he said to me in five pages of beautiful script that are a gift to me to be cherished until my dying day:

"Thank you for the gift of The Camino Letters.  I enjoyed it immensely, but also felt drained by it as I shared your highs and lows.  Oddly enough it took me back to July 1944 when, with a draft of NCOs and soldiers I landed in Normandy and marched inland to somewhere in the bridgehead.  We were burdened with all our kit and had no idea how far we had to go; it was Paso por Paso indeed!  This is a book I shall keep and dip into again and again."

He ended his long letter by saying:  "I think God is indeed using you as "an instrument of his peace."

Me of little faith.

Gosh.  Life is this.  This is life.

Email from a Friend

Subject: when you come to a fork in the road...take it!

From Harald, September 2009

Buoyant

Today we got the national order from Chapters / Indigo.  How much fun is that?

Magic

An eagle flew over my car as I was talking with my friend about a particular poet in chains.  The eagle broke my listening ear and reminded me of all of the winged creatures, and the creatures who should have wings.

I've thought about that eagle all day. I've been working hard to steady my course these past few weeks - thinking about what it means to walk inside my own shoes, and what it would feel like to be an autumn spider.  Eagles are another sort of creature altogether.  Eagles don't have shoes, or webs.

Up all Night

I have a picture of a guy in a stone carving somewhere in Spain holding up time.....

I was like that stone-carved guy last night, watching the clock on the post office outside my office window.

I haven't been up all night long for a long time, but I had a big thing to finish last night and in the middle of the finishing it my brain did a huge switch.

I had to turn my argument upside down and  I think it's going to work.

“This is the true joy of life-the being used up for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; being a force of a nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clot of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.”     George Bernard Shaw

The Senior Door Greeter

I'm at the Kripalu Centre in the Berkshires, in Massechusetts, with the mountains that surround this place glowing red above a perfectly small blue lake.

This place is a magical place for me.  I've been here more than once.

Thank Goodness there is Jack, who is the "senior door greeter" at Kripalu and has been a fixture through all of my stays. He smiles at you and checks your name tag as you go to the dining room.

I think a senior door greeter like Jack is the most important person you can meet on any given day.