Remember last week? When I talked about irons in the fire? Well, I’ve been busy, busy stirring the flames this past week, so much so that my planned post isn’t actually ready to go up. That’s the bad news. The good news is that said post is by my friend Rea Tarvydas, whose new book of […]
I made a list of all the projects/jobs I’ve got on the go while J. and I were camping this summer. I stopped counting at six. I didn’t include the dozen or so hats I’m hoping to knit in time for the pre-Christmas craft sales or walking the dog, making soups and generally having a life. […]
This August, J. and I returned home from our canoe trip to hear the bad news about The Pas. At the library, where I work part-time, the staff – two of whom have husbands who work at the mill – were reeling. In such a small town, when the main employer leaves, everyone is hurt. […]
J. and I have this thing we do. We move through the (sometimes) long months of the school year by breaking them down into days of the week. May and June are Friday. January and February are Wednesday. No doubt, you’ve already figured out what this means but I’ll spell it out anyway: September is […]
Last week, in the woods, I became reacquainted with my brain. I remembered who I am. The paddling was tough. Every time we hit a lake, the wind bore down like a creature, pushing two-foot waves at us, and we had long distances to cover. There were whole days of paddling, when my shoulders smarted […]
By the time you read this, I’ll be in the woods. Off the Internet, paddling the Grass River as my Blackberry battery slowly dies. Three books (a novel, a poetry collection, and a book of essays), my own ongoing poetry project and my latest knitting project (a sweater for Mo!) secure in Ziploc bags, waiting […]
Life has been busy since we got home from Scotland. We’re finishing renovations that won’t get done during the school year (we, as in J. and some hired help), I’m working a lot at the library and we’re squeezing in trips on the weekends. This past weekend a friend who lives on Rocky Lake invited […]
In Glen Affric, at the end of our third day on the trail, we stopped to camp beside the Allt Coire Ghaidhe waterfall. Since that morning, when we’d woken up in a lovely campsite overlooking Loch Beinn a’Mheadhoin (which translates to loch of hill of the middle), we’d hiked about 15 kilometres, pausing at gorgeous Dog […]
I’ve been printing maps lately. Screen grabs of the UK’s ordinance survey to help chart our way around Struy, near Inverness, site of the Clan Chisholm’s burial ground. Originally, we’d planned to visit this area and then find our way to Loch Ness and start our hike at the marked trailhead. Then, our plans changed […]
It took about two minutes of talking to a few writer friends at the Canadian Writers’ Summit last weekend before I began realizing what might be wrong with my novel. I felt like a sponge, soaking up thoughts, ideas, writerly conversations while wandering between tents and event rooms at a muggy Harbourfront Centre in downtown […]