Chaos (Again)

These days, I’m working on the fourth draft of a strange, new novel. It is largely plot-driven so sometimes I wake in the night with an aggravating case of “what ifs.” What if this happened… Could it? Do I dare? Yes, I do! I get up, stumble to the spare room, and reach for whatever […]

Putting Down Roots

When J. and I first moved into this house, as autumn crept into winter, we started feeding the birds and thinking about gardens. As soon as the weather cooperated, we carved out a small area of grass, ordered some soil and, as they say in England, got stuck in. We bought a selection of native […]

Doubt

It’s been a wacky couple of weeks. J. and I both sick with the cold from h, e, double hockey sticks. A lump on Mowat’s back that the vet determined to be a tumour that had to be cut out and sent for further testing (still waiting for results). Then, because he’s Mowat (the dog […]

The Only Way Out Is Through

For the past few nights I’ve been waking up at 1:13 a.m. In the spare room, I’ve kept a sort of vigil – reading, thinking, crying, making lists of things I have to do, trying to make plans. If I’m lucky, I’ll write. On Saturday night, I re-wrote the whole plot line of my current […]

Just Knit

Seven skeins of Malabrigo Rios, luxurious merino yarn, in shifting shades of indigo, copper, violet and deep greens. That’s what I bought myself for Christmas last year, with a gift certificate my sister gave me. As any knitter knows, seven skeins is a lot of yarn. It’s a sweater amount, which is what I wanted. […]