Belated Thanksgivings

Thanksgiving weekend recedes into memory, and I wonder whether even to bother trying to pen (as it were) a belated thankfulness post. However, since I've been pondering the topic off and on for a week and a half already, I'm going to try to put a few thoughts out there. I hate to waste ponders after all. And there is a saying: "Better late than never."

When I was thinking about thankfulness at the time of the Celebration of the Turkey, of course, Cuppa was at the top of my list, with kids and grands not too very far behind. But I'm not a listy kind of guy, and rather than continue to itemize, I soon realized that it was okay to come to the general conclusion that my life has been good.

Because I do feel very fortunate. I really appreciate and enjoy my life, and it seems just as worthwhile for me to put it in that summarizing sort of way than to try to list many specific items. Sometimes, I think that I have been lucky in life, luckier than many. Family has been great, and despite my minor physical limitations (eg back problems), my general health has been remarkably good. It must be a lot harder to enjoy living if you don't feel good, and I can only imagine how difficult it must be to be forced to face each day feeling punky or a whole lot worse.

One might opine that it's easy to love life when it's been so good to me, and it has certainly seemed that way in many respects, but it's also been a very ordinary life, the kind of life that might have left many fellow sojourners dissatisfied. There are those who might even feel dissatisfied and hard-done-by over the same lot in life that leaves me feeling privileged, so, it comes down, at least partly, to attitude. I seem to be able to move on more easily than some. If it wasn't for that almost innate ability, I might be a less content sort of guy because, by many measurements such as wealth, for example, I have not been particularly fortunate. I haven't exactly been rolling in clover all of my life.

However, when I say that the ability to accept and move on is somewhat innate, I must also mention that making the choice to be happy is rather important. Indeed, I was fortunate enough to discover quite some time ago, after a somewhat bleak period, that happiness is a choice. It sounds facile, but, for me, it's almost been that simple. However, although I've also been breathing oxygen long enough to be able to comprehend that it's harder, less natural, for many to make that same choice, I can't see a viable alternative to choosing that outlook.

Oh, I confess to doing my share of stewing when life goes sour, but I try to let it go sooner rather than later. Having written that, I cross my fingers in the hope that the universe decides not to put me to the test with a slew of Job-like trials because I'm afraid that I might fail, and I'd like to keep on enjoying in the decade or two, give or take, that remain.

But really, despite the slight but related tangent that I have taken, I just want to say that I'm thankful that, so far, life has been so good.

I hope that I can say that again next year ... and for many after that.

The Grands

I haven't posted much about the grands lately, so especially for family, here is a little video. Zach and his getting up and down are featured in part 1, while Nikki Dee has a solitary tea party in part 2. It's pretty funny when she demands more water (for her tea) from Buppa who is really just an innocent bystander working in the kitchen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjJzMDnPMa0

Feeling Punky

AC is feeling punky today and has for the past several, as a matter of fact. No, I'm not going to paint my scalp orange and try to spike my side tresses as the modern usage of the word might imply. Rather, as I use punky in this context, I am referring to the way my father used to employ the word. I had forgotten about it until it edged its way into my consciousness this morning.

You see, Dad would say he was feeling punky when he wasn't feeling up to par. He didn't feel very good: maybe not sick, but not great either. Webster's Online defines punky as being an adjective deriving from the word punk or punkie which in 1872, apparently referred to the state of being soft or rotten. I don't know if that relates to Dad's use of the word, but I would think that it could.

I have never heard this usage from any source other than Dad, something like his Dan to Beersheba saying which I blogged about almost five years ago. I had come across that saying in Bill Bryson's history of the English language, Mother Tongue and had also encountered what, for me, was a strange use of the word, toboggan. Rather than repeat that post, I'll leave it to you to click through if you are so inclined.

This entry was going to take a different direction: more in line with thankfulness, which I should have posted about a week ago, at Thanksgiving if you please. I was going to say something like, "Despite feeling punky today, I am thankful for ..." Perhaps I'll get around to the thankful aspect in another post, but since this entry took a different direction that intended, I think I'll leave it here.

In the meantime, I am appreciative of recalling this fairly unique saying from Dad. It kind of gives me a warm feeling for some reason, and I would like to try to keep the word alive in my own lexicon if I can.

I know; I'm strange.

Put it down to the fact that I'm feeling a little punky today.

Autumn Colours at Thanksgiving

I took my old DSLR out of storage on the weekend and have uploaded a slew of photos to Flickr (slideshow below). These were all (but one) taken at or near Riverwood. We saw many great scenes on the trips to and from, but there's seldom a place to stop, so I just try to enjoy as I drive. Cuppa did snap some from the moving car and has and will be posting some on her blog; part 1 is here.

It's still best to watch the slideshow larger, but the smaller version is embedded below.

Here I Go Again

And so it begins ...

We're back home from a long weekend away at the cottage. We consumed our turkey, saw lots of autumn colour, and enjoyed our first snowfall. Actually, we didn't enjoy the actual fall because we were asleep at the time, but it was there greeting us in the morning. Now, I'm okay with snow; it has its place — but not on October 13th. No, not then.

We took life pretty easy over the weekend: watched season three of Dexter, all twelve episodes, and two movies: Benjamin Button and Revolutionary Road. My often faulty memory informs me that they were both hot movies last year, but my reviews are so-so. I'll go along with Rev Road, which was really well acted and well done IMO: my totally ill-informed and worthless opinion. It's outlook was rather bleak, or is that black, but it held me. However, B Button was weird for me. Perhaps, I had heard too many good things and expected too much, but I really found it draggy. And the premise was ridiculous.

Oh, I don't really mean the main premise of being born old and becoming younger until death takes Benjamin — mercifully ends — cue credits and turn the video player off. What I mean is that you can't have Bennie Boy being a little baby twice. If his life is to be the reverse of normal, he can't both begin it and end it as a baby, the first time old and the second time young. Somehow, he either has to enter the world large, or end it as a big baby. We're only babies once, blast it all, so they have to pick at which end it will be. Duh.

Dexter was great though. even season three kept me on edge. I keep cheering for that sweet, little serial killer and body dismemberer. I'm like that.

But I'm not really writing at almost one o'clock in the morning to either kill time (so to speak) or to review movies.

No, I'm here to moan, groan and generally complain like the pathetic person that I am. So help me Rhonda, I just want to sleep. Since I didn't get much last night and drove for hours today, it doesn't seem too much to ask, but alas ... the sweet and tender arms of Morpheus elude me. I have even been listening to that incredibly boring book, The Hour I First Believed. Sorry Wally, but it does go on, especially the aural version because one can't revert to speedily scanning the more tiresome parts — of which there are many. Whatever! As plodding as it gets, it doesn't put me to sleep. Not tonight anyway. Sigh.

Except for last night, however, I did sleep well enough at the cottage. I get no credit for that though because I took sleeping pills. They're not all that strong, but they help. But at home, I refuse to rely on them on a consistent basis ...

... so here I am ... whining and whinging to you ... in the wee hours.

Maybe I'll write a post about being thankful sometime. It seems like the proper thing to do after Thanksgiving weekend here in The Great White North. I do have a lot to be thankful for. I know that; I really do. I'm just not feeling it tonight though.

So, I'll just sit here and continue my Pity Party.

But I do have one question: why am I more cramped in our queen size bed at home than the double at the cottage? It's crazy, but I am. And it's not just down to sleeping pills either.

It's nuts I tell ya.

Oui ou non?

I thought it might just be me, so in some trepidation I asked the ever-lovely Cuppa: Do you ever search for now but with an old picture in your mind?

I had just looked in the basement for the little heater that we keep in the bathroom in winter. We use it when we step out of the nice, warm shower into what would normally be a cold room. It's just not a nice feeling to step into the cold, so we try to remember to warm up the room a little ahead of time.

Anyway ... when I was in the basement, I found that my old brain wasn't looking for our current heater but my seeing on my mental screen the one that we used to have but relinquished about seven years ago now. I'm thankful to say that my feeble mind readjusted itself just a soon as it saw the current model and trust that means I'm not too far gone.

Similarly, for one of our recent trips, Cuppa sent me downstairs to fetch (good dog that I am) our suitcases. Instinctively, I began thinking of the big brown one that we passed to Goodwill at least a decade ago.

Finally, just yesterday (hopefully several days ago by the time you read this, assuming Google and I can get together on post-dating this time), when I was out torturing my leg muscles in the garden, I came in looking for our orange weed whacker. The trouble with that is that our whacker is yellow, as was our previous one. It was the one before that one that was orange. It's been gone for probably two decades now. Sheesh!

Thankfully in answer to my question (see paragraph one), Cuppa agreed that it had happened to her, and I felt better. Or maybe she was just being nice.

How about you? Oui ou non? If you're of an age, I surely hope that it's a oui because misery and/or brain cramps love(s) company.

Down and Up, Up and Down

This is what my eight month old grandson will do for hours at a time, or so it seems. He must have legs of steel. After suffering from gardening-induced, very very very stiff legs, maybe I should start doing this too.

Down, Up, Down, Up ... on and on and ...