chemicals

in a hayfield up on the hill behind the cowboy's house yesterday afternoon

The girls, Miss D and Piper Belle, and I slopped through the wet hay fields behind his house just as the sun was sinking behind the rough edge of the forest. A perfect clear blue evening sky and the first few stars had just arrived along with the moon white and round and nearly full.

It's funny because it's not so long ago, just after that fateful meeting in the park, that I would occasionally find myself driving by the cowboy's house on my way to or from somewhere. I would always slow down, my breath held and a thrill in my belly, for perhaps I might catch a glimpse of the silver haired man with the tall moustache, the man who took a piece of my heart that day with his tears of grief and love, his boyish grin and his brown puppy Bess. Now the girls and I turn in his lane, we crunch the teal coloured Ford Escort wagon up his gravel driveway and park beside his old black pick up truck with such familiarity it's bewildering ... to all of us.

Each morning as I sit here at the teak topped desk, coffee in hand about to write this new days post and I tell myself. Enough about this love thing, enough about this cowboy and his brown hound. Every day I do mean to speak of something else and then... every day it feels like this is the thing I want to speak of.

I will tell you that my Creative Empire is busting at the seams - I don't think I've ever had so many projects on the go and all at the same time- yikes !! and me with my creative energy flag flying at half mast. It's completely overwhelming and I am hanging precariously from the dreaded deadline thread. My abilities to concentrate have been drastically impaired. I'm exhausted yet I can't sleep. I'm completely distracted in the most lovely way. In a fog. But Hey There !! Sister !! this big ol' Empire's not gonna build itself so ... Snap out of It !! Please !!
(I am allowed to speak those words to myself).

I'm up an hour early this morning. Coffee and archived phone love at 4:15 the perfect jump start to what I hope will be a kick ass day of blinding productivity. Today I will Rock On !!

Dopamine, Seratonin and Adrenaline won't ya be my friends, Please.






scenes from the cowboy's home

5 days in november ...

harbour mirror - more summery photos from les archives

and early December

You realize of course that all of this this means I'm not leaving here. This place that I love so much. My first and only home. I'm not leaving this old brick house, at least not until the cowboy and I decide that it's time. Our plan is to sell his house (which is completely restored and renovated with love, care and expertise) in the spring when the real estate market in this coastal haven begins to hum. Meanwhile Mr. retired (but must have a gazillion projects on the go at any given time) will begin the restoration of this old house. I will continue to build and grow my Creative Empire, he will fix this beautiful brick ship up and we will build our new home together and decide where it is, we both, would like to live.

The day before he and the beautiful brown hound Bess left I took him outside and we walked around this geezley, big, giant, overgrown and wild jungle of a property. He stood in the back garden in a big puddle of fallen golden leaves, looked all around, up and down and sideways and then looked at me with that handsome cowboy face, shrugged his shoulders in that "no biggie" way and said. Pffffffft ! it's a perfect winter project for me. I looked back at him, beaming and said Can I make you some chocolate mousse my love?

We're like Chip and Dale. Can I shower you now please with every tiny bit of love and caring that I have been saving up all these years ? I ask and he replies No, please .... let me shower you first ... No ! I insist adamantly... me first !!! .... and so it goes. We finally agree to some mutual, synchronized, ongoing heavy showering. Seems we've both been savin' up for a very long time.

5 days* and countin'

*Blue Rodeo - favourite Canadian band scroll down for the song that started it all

with a plank

prescience perhaps ... interesting ... that darn sailboat - A Tiny Life No.2


To love is so startling it leaves little time for anything else.

Emily Dickinson

Uh Huh ! I soooooo hear ya talking girlfriend.

It's as if I'm being constantly smacked up side the head (as we say here in rural Nova Scotia) with a gigantic sponge (Nerf like), red, pink and very sweet, 2x6 plank. Just as I get to my feet again, whap ! another smack of that darn love plank. I know, I know ... you'd think this drastic and totally fabulous about face in my demeanour, my life, my existence here on this planet would have me skipping around ta-doo-ta-doo, not a care in the world, and hence super alive and tres productive - a Madam Invincible is here for a long stay so Watch Out ! roll and y'all better get yourself out of our way ! You'd think. But ... alas

Uh Uh ! Pas

Seems extreme emotion (of any flavour) is never my friend. Doesn't seem to make a difference if it's good, bad or sad. Extreme of any sort gets in my way, it keeps jumping up in front of me, taunting me and slowing me down as I try to keep up with all of my big, well thought out plans and commitments. Seems Mama's forgotten how to live in neutral or maybe I've never really known how and actually come to think of it - I'm just not much of a neutral kinda girl. I'm an All or nothin' and sadly, quite proud of it. That said, neutral, in this old brick house, is where stuff gets done, it's where the darn magic happens.

Remember that giant ship load of good things I told you about, projects, previous (and now getting old & very tired) promises- with a big ol' wink to B. Shamu if she'll still have me, new exciting jobs, renewed relationships with all time favourite customers, seasonal design freebie favours ('cause that is who I wish to be) plus the cleaning out of this old brick house making room for that darn cowboy and the beautiful brown hound, and more, and on ... and on. So much good, so much to do, so much promise and endless possibilities that I sit and spin my wheels in beautiful overwhelm (very distant cousin to sad and desperate overwhelm but their resemblance to each other is remarkable).

Please, I beg of you ... no Snap out of It ! requests. There's no Snappin' out of This and don't ya think I might have already tried that ?? I'm just about to make the big geezley list, the must do, have to do, 7 day, like a big time slot jig saw puzzle - list. I will, I promise put my nose to that darn teak topped desk.

I promise I will visit your blogs and I will comment once again, I will add photos of the much loved yet tres neglected Piper Belle, handsome and soft as can be Oliver, the Fussy Bastard - Gus and the big, fat, weird, black velvet chicelet Bleet to my sidebar. I will once again speak of other topics, I will post parcels, I will mail cards in hopes that they might reach their far away destinations by Christmas (good luck girlfriend). I will, I will....

I will return ... I think ...
I hope.
Merci for your patience

truth

springtime in Paris - from les photo archives

Tell the Repo man
And the stars above
That you’re the one I love

We can twist and shout
Do the turtle dove
And you’re the one I love
You’re the one I love
The one I love

David Gray The One I Love

The cowboy's coming home early. We're hoping that the weather will cooperate. Winter weather has begun in Canada and in sudden, often unexpected, spurts and squalls. His long drive from the bald prairies into the endless boreal forest that hug the shores of the giant lakes, like oceans - is both desolate and stunningly beautiful. He's driving a well equipped new pony with super road gripping winter tires and he has the beautiful brown hound Bess as both navigator and most excellent traveling companion. He hopes to be home a week from today.

You see, we've realized that we can't live without each other, not another minute, or an hour, or another day of our lives. This is as big a love as they come. Big and true and perfect. I know there may be a few lurking naysayers among you ... and I totally get your doubts, I have them too. How could this be ? Where did this come from ? the ol' If it seems to good to be true ... and the Ooh, I'd be careful if I were you ... gang. Said of course with deepest concern (my own sister Sandra hangs out here with this tres protective crowd). He could be one of those serial Casanova types, you know - the oh so charming love 'em and leave 'em with a sexually transmitted disease kind - she saw proof of his existence just recently on Oprah. (Sandra, my younger sister who's always been so much more a mother, than my mother ever was. Cautiousness rules her world).

I know with every breath I take, with every beat of my heart, and with every ounce of my extremely analytical and obsessively pondering brain that this is real - the truest kind of love.

This blog is about my life, it's a record, both visual and written of my daily life in tiny chunks. Of course it's never a complete representation of all of my life and actually it's most often just a glimpse. But it is a glimpse of my truth, a glimpse always of the heart of my life. Good, bad, sad, or desperate. I chose from the beginning to write as I would speak - always my unabashed truth or at least the most important bit of my truth. It really is the thing I love the most about this blog - that I can and do speak my truth here ... always. I speak it and then it's set free, to float away like the beautiful glowing lanterns MLou shared with us from the Thai Loy Kratong Festival.

Each truth that floats away from me then frees up space for another brand new truth.

This person, this handsome and kind, dog loving cowboy, has affected my life in so many profound and wonderful ways, has touched so many of the chapters, already, in this big fat volume that is, and has been, my life - I still can't comprehend it ... and truthfully I've had to make myself stop trying. The old broken me keeps trying to make sense of it all, keeps trying to pick it apart and study it, keeps looking for the evidence that it will surely vanish in a blink - like a beautiful dream that I once loved. I've been hunting for the flaws and defects, where is that darn catch ? because she (who was broken) believes that there must be one.

but I can't find it and I'm realizing I'm wasting time looking.

He is the one I love.

blessed

Miss Winnie Dixon - I love her more than I could ever say

When I saw you
I was afraid to meet you ...
When I met you
I was afraid to kiss you ...
When I kissed you
I was afraid to love you ...
Now that I love you
I'm afraid I'll lose you ....

Anonymous

I am still very afraid at times - it is my demon to battle. Fear- the boss man of Ache & Sadness.

But that darn cowboy just keeps washing away my fears, gently and constantly with a fat , soft steaming face cloth of love and comfort ... daily ... and from 4000kms away. I love him, I need him, I want him and how is it I ever lived without him ?

Blessed am I - and in so many ways.

4,289 and countin'

hard frost

Well I'm sitting here alone tonight and I'm thinking about you.
Wondering if it's wrong or right to be dreaming about you oh.
You took my heart, you took my heart from me.
You took my heart, you took my heart from me.

Chris Isaak - You Took My Heart

A recent itunes download to my big, beautiful imac. Randy Travis - Hard Rock Bottom of your Heart - just a tiny bit country and I have the tunes cranked here this early morning - 6:01, bubbles a pourin', Les Girls - Piper Belle and Missy D have both just come in from their adventures outside in darkness - in our freshly bushwhacked gigantic fenced in dog yard. The weather has been, and continues to be, freakishly mild & perfect, windows wide open warm. We do have hard frost many mornings but as soon as the sun is up the frost is gone and the balmy temperature prevail. Love it ! And I have a ton of fantastic, thrilling and seemingly endless work lined up here at the teak topped desk plus I am madly in love with the most wonderful man I could ever have conjured up.

Hey Madam Universe ! here's my list of 89 essential qualities required for my big love, best cohort, and/or partner in crime (simple things like No Hunters please and no driving like a freakin' maniac). She calls back almost immediately to tell me she's completely out of 89's but she just happens to have a gently used 4,289+ (essential compatibilities and loving qualities) plus he has a tall silver moustache, is totally crazy about dogs and has a PhD (remember in this gal's world really, really smart is the new handsome). Shut Up !!! and Where do I sign?

Now I joke and kid about this new big love of mine, of ours and I joke because I don't know how else to explain it. It is so breathtakingly meant-to-be it stuns me ... in the sweetest way.

Now the B. Shamu alluded (and not at all subtly) yesterday in a comment that les Petite golden coyote, otherwise known as PB or Sunny Bunny has received a bit of a short shift (seeing as she is the other new big thing around here at 29 Black Street) and yes! Uh Huh !! Guilty as charged but ... in my defense I will tell you that she and Missy D have formed a new and tres tight dog club and they leave me out of their stuff much of the time. I've pretty much been relegated to door opener - open to their fantastic gigantic fenced in dog yard. And when the beautiful brown hound Bess makes it a pack of three - well the cowboy and I seem to become invisible. I haven't seen Miss D this happy since her days hangin' with the big red hero dog. And PB's nick name is Sunny Bunny - need I say more.

Piper Belle - Hey Missy D let's go out in the yard and work a bit on the big dig

Missy D - Hey PB I hear some people coming down the street walking their dogs. Hey !! Lets go out in the yard and stand by the gate and bark our faces off. Hey !! Whatta ya think ?

Piper Belle - Missy D !! Alert !!! I hear the propane guys trying to deliver a new tank - You cover the front door I'll go upstairs to the sunny hallway look out chair. Let's see if we can't scare those bastards !! OK ?? sounds like fun.

Off I go to enjoy my second cup of coffee ... and with a little archived love.

fearless

a tres rare, miniature, golden, wire haired coyote - Piper Belle (answers also to Sunny Bunny)

much loved sister to Miss Winnie Dixon and the brown velvet Bess

I have been sneezing ... a million, zillion sneezes every day for last few days. This morning my bath is filled with mint, rosemary & eucalyptus bubbles. I will take big doses of Vitamin C and I'll eat as many sweet clementines as is sensible (between 8-10 per day). I think Mama's fighting a wee cold.

I feel so safe, secure and loved beyond my wildest dreams.
Not very long ago I felt afraid of every thing ... and suddenly I'm not afraid of anything.

Merci, merci ... thank you

For it was not into my ear
you whispered,
but into my heart.
It was not my lips you kissed,
but my soul

Judy Garland

3 stages of love

blue eyes, wild red hair, a favourite scarf and a big thick fleece sweater - ahhh

My favourite everyday work attire. Les Uniform. This is old house gets quite chilly, often it's colder inside than it is outside and Mama is always tres cheap with the furnace oil and I turn the heat on only in the direst of circumstances and there is something I find very comforting about a giant faux turtle neck. This black and white Nordic number is my fav and lovingly hunted for and found at our local and famous second hand clothing spot Francois.

This week I'm drawing sweet baby animals, tiny historic lockets and a new jewellery project for this company - Brighton. Hooray !! A company that I worked for for 4 years in the beginning of my Hey ! I own my own design business business - It was, by a landslide, the most amazing 4 years of freelancing this designer gal could ask for. I think he (the boss man) always thought I'd want to move to LA and work with his team there - and he, being born and brought up in LaLa Land, and having never experienced life in a tiny Nova Scotia village - could not understand why on earth this designer gal would want to stay here - in this 2 bit place where, there appears to the unenlightened, to be nothing - ahhh but we know that's not true and it's our secret. I am thrilled to pieces to be working again with him, with Brighton. The most generous boss man, wide open creative license is always encouraged and the products that they make are both very beautiful and top, top craftsmanship. I know I went to China with that big gang and toured all of their amazing factories - not to mention 3 or 4 days in and around beautiful Hong Kong with way too many stars for this country girl to count. Merci Jerry !

I watched Babettes Feast last night for the very first time - I know, I know How is it possible that I hadn't watched it ever before ? And yes it was lovely - lovely. I especially enjoyed the wonderfully muted and dull colours everywhere. The cowboy made me a small stack of movies to watch from his petite movie collection. Fargo, The Thin Red Line and Working Girl are three others that I've brought home with me (the cowboy thinks that my voice is much like Melanie Griffiths, and he thinks that's a good thing, I can't decide if I'm flattered or maybe eek !). And by my bedside is the book Zen and the Art of Motorcylce Maintenance a book the cowboy read twice this past summer and now I'm going to read it. Please see below Self Revelation.

When I went to NSCAD for all those many years trying to decide between a BFA or a BDComm I eventually threw in the Wow ! there are just way too many great courses I want to take towel and ending up graduating with both degrees. To accomplish this I did have to take my fair share of academic courses which I mostly loaded up with a steady stream of amazing & wonderful art history classes. However I did venture out to Dalhousie one summer to take one of those 6 week, meet everyday, full credit course done in blink - Psychology 101. Something that has always stuck with me from that text and course are the 3 Stages of Love - now I've been googling around lately and those darn stages seem to have evolved somewhat since my lazy summer afternoons in a big auditorium at Dal. When I first learned about les Stages they were described as follows.

No. 1 Attraction - based almost entirely on a physical sense of the person, their physical features, maybe the way they dress, the way they carry themselves, their voice, the make and model of the pick up truck they're driving. How 'bout the tallest silver moustache ? or boyish good looks? a well loved canine sidekick ? A huge big grin? eyes that twinkle ? Oh ! Oh ! - stop me quick - I am about to go on and on and on....

No.2 Self Revelation - ahhhhh - the blissful chitter chatter, the endlessly talking and revealing of more and more and more about each other - to each other. The past, the present and the dreams of the future. Finding out so many obscure and wonderful details of a life, of their life. Like the description of the one and only sandwich (the making of and les ingredients) that my new true love took to work every single day for 32 years. Or the model airplane that he built when he was 5 out of balsa wood and won a prize for, or the white navy dress uniform he wore to a prom with his lobster red and sunburned face from a day of fishing with his Dad. Oh, I ache wishing that I knew him then. Knew that boy, that young man- but if I knew him then - would I, could I ... know him now? Scratch that wish and tell me more please ... and more and more.

No. 3 Interdependence - I wonder can I spend an hour not in his presence ? and how much will I miss him. Someone reminds me that I had another life, just weeks ago without him in it. Shut Up !! I say That cannot be true ... for now I have absolutely no recollection of any such life. My life, this life, began that Friday afternoon in the park with Winnie, Piper Belle, the cowboy and his brown hound Bess.

or maybe it really all began this fateful afternoon.

a little faith

the cowboy and the beautiful brown hound Bess

And why did I not take a billion, zillion photos of the cowboy before he left ? Oh, how I wish I had. Missy D and Piper Belle sure are missing their brown velvet sister - sweet Bess.

Weekend goodness

Tramp bubbles • a hot & steaming facecloth • 19 archived messages of this big love (to listen to over & over again as is required) • perfect coffee • unseasonable warm temperatures = open windows in this old brick house • fresh fall air everywhere • a long chat yesterday with the much adored nephew Michael (& mac genuis) - sweet • and two live chats with my handsome cowboy
a morning visit to the cowboy's house - he gave me the key to his heart (and house) around day 5 of this big love and yesterday and I went there so that I could breath in the scent of him. I watered his plants, I clutched the pillows from his bed tight to me, I inhaled as slowly and deeply as is possible and I felt weak and incredibly strong all at that same time. I stood in the upstairs bathroom window and gazed out toward the golden hay fields and upon that beautiful boathouse. I'll go again today, this time the girls will come too, and we'll all race and zoom in the fields behind his house, we'll sit in his kitchen and I'll have a cup of tea and we'll keep counting the days until his return - until their return • I'll have my weekly catch up chat with my one and only sister Sandra and I'll have another tres productive day of Creative Empire building here at the TTD* all the while listening, over and over, to the 33 songs from Cowboy's road trip CD's No. 1 & 2 while I conjure up the play lists for Volumes 3 & 4, 5, 6, and 7 ........

An' when your secret heart
Cannot speak so easily
Come here darlin' from a whisper start
Have a little faith in me

John Hiatt - Track 10 Cowboy CD No. 1

TTD* teak topped desk

trust

red berries in golden early morning sun

I will give you everything
That you've ever wanted
With this promise
I will bring you home again

Skydiggers - Track 5 Cowboy CD No. 2

I feel so grateful I feel like my heart will surely burst.

I'm feeling completely overwhelmed yet again - but oh my, this feeling is so different - after weeks, months, years of feeling so incredibly overwhelmed by Sadness, Ache, Grief and Loneliness - of feeling so Broken and irrevocably Damaged - How did I land here in this place ? Questions I'm trying so hard to not ask myself - Where did all of this come from ? Do I deserve so much goodness ? Am I worthy of this? Don't answer - I know that all of you aren't asking questions, just like MLou who's smiling and nodding at me from far, far away in Thailand and saying with a big, wide smirk Uh Huh ! See ... told ya so.

I believed (for much of this blogs life) that my good life was over but that best girl kept holding me up, kept standing there with me, making sure that I wouldn't sink completely in the thick, dark muck I believed to be all around me. She kept trying to show me who I really was and she never gave up. She showed me big, huge love when I truly believed it was gone from my life forever. I am crying as I write this. I have needed to cry. Some tears are essential and cleansing. My life has been turned completely upside down, inside out and sideways and only in the most amazing way(s). If I stop to think about it, about this, for too long I feel like I might just dissolve into a pile of dust.

Don't be afraid, have courage ... trust in love. Trust in love

Thank you Madam Universe ... thank you

I'm weak in the knees for you,
but I'll stand if you want me to.

Serena Ryder - Track 6 Cowboy CD No. 2

thrilling

a poster I did this week for our local shelter's big annual fundraising telethon

The shelter where almost all my kids were adopted from - Jake in '95, Missy D in 2000, Gus & Oliver as sweet baby kittens in 2006 and our newest addition Miss Piper Belle.

blessed, blest, blissful, blithe, can't complain, captivated, cheerful, chipper, chirpy, content, contented, convivial, delighted, ecstatic, elated, exultant, flying high, gay, glad, gleeful, gratified, intoxicated, jolly, joyful, joyous, jubilant, laughing, light, lively, looking good, merry, mirthful, on cloud none, overjoyed, peaceful, peppy, perky, playful, pleasant, pleased, sparkling, sunny, thrilled, tickled, tickled pink, up, upbeat, walking on air ...

I wake now, each early morning, thrilled. I am so wonderfully happy I can hardly stand it. In my social travels around this little village - to the grocery store, to the fantastic new hairdresser or to the dentist for a filling - I've been noticing lately everyone seems to be responding to me in a new and bigger way. I've always considered myself to be a fairly well liked, friendly, dare I even say an out going gal about town but lately it's as if I've been tattooed with happiness. It's written on my face, I'm glowing with a strange and beckoning aura. I'll admit I have to stop myself when asked How are you Susan ? or So ... what's new with you ? from doing cartwheels and jumping up and down and singing. Spinning & twirling and smiling like my best girl Missy D. Rejoicing.
But ... no calisthenics appear needed - it's like people can see through to my big, beautiful secret when they look at me, when they speak to me. They beam and smile and laugh at me -
everyone seems to sense my thrilling.

I've got it bad.

I start the day, each early morning (5:15 am) with my big cream coloured favourite Starbuck's mug filled with perfectly brewed coffee (triple milk and half a sugar if it were a Timmie's order) in my bed tucked in with my cordless phone where I listen to the (too many to count) archived messages from my cowboy. It seems I add one new sweet message daily to the growing pile of recorded love and he and I, thankfully, have at least one long live chat daily.

Yesterday that girl phoned me from Thailand - Hooray ! she who I love with all my heart. It's the first time she and I have talked since all this goodness began. She's been keeping up with my crazy new life by reading les blog. I said to her You are going to love him ! and she replied instantly I already do.

I'm super, super busy here at the TTD - M. Universe is testing me, I know it. She is saying to herself I wonder, just how much goodness can that designer gal stand ?

Bring it on ! I reply.
Merci, Merci, Merci !!

pas de coup (for now)

cover collage illustration for HOW magazine avec dummied in (by me) cover lines

Disappointments are to the soul
what the thunder storm is to the air

Friedrich von Schiller

Do you remember this big good announcement awhile back - not only had I been chosen to be featured in an article on hand lettering in this big design magazine but ... Hello ! I was asked to illustrate the cover of the big (most important) double sized, design annual, issue. An assignment that thrilled me right off of my desk chair.

Bad news has arrived. They've changed their minds, they are not using my cover illustration although they are paying me (shut up ! I get paid for this ??) in full and have assured me that they believe my illustration to be beautiful but the focus of that issue has changed and my whack-a-doo collage (I know it is a bit kooky and wild - but my art direction was to please make it tres rich and full O' texture) is no longer appropriate. Here's the thing ... I love my cover. I feel more than happy with how it turned out - I actually think it's the strongest and best piece I've done to date. Yes, it would have been fantastic exposure for my Creative Empire to have this cover - a creative coup no question. I was fantasizing of collage typography assignments winging their way to the TTD from all corners of this world. Hey this girl can dream can't she - and BIG. But ... que sera, sera. How much goodness can one designer gal stand ??

I'm thinkin' ... I'm just gonna Rock On ! here at the Teak Topped Desk.

You didn't think I'd go a day without mentioning Mr. Has Changed my Life Forever did you ? Sigh. He makes me feel so completely & wonderfully loved I cannot really believe it. I'm living life in a Love's Savage Fury novel - lucky me. Counting the days until his return.

ps - petite delay with M&S - the new design company, although I did speak at great length last evening with my partner in crime - the much loved nephew and computer (especially mac) savant Mike. We're working on our logo, identity and setting up a gmail account so that any query's you may have re- blogs, photos, banners, illustration etc ... can be directed there and we can reply tout suite with a time frame and a price. And please remember all monies go toward building this young man's brilliant future. Wink.

questions ??? la M&S email
mandscompany@gmail.com

I got you

I got you to hold my hand
I got you to understand
I got you to walk with me
I got you to talk with me
I got you to kiss goodnight
I got you to hold me tight
I got you, I won't let go
I got you to love me so

Sonny & Cher I Got You Babe

from the cowboy's soundtrack for this big love

I know, I know .... I'm crazy, crazed. What am I doing posting photos of my freckled face tangled up with that beautiful tall moustache ? All I can say, in my defense is ... Hey ! I'm a visual person. I love photography, as you all know, and these photos ... today. Well, oh my ... they say it all don't they ?
I spoke with him last night, twice. I lay curled up and burrowed deep in the nest of down and flannel with the cordless phone sleeping soundly beside me because I knew that he'd call. He called from a gas station at the side of the road, from the lands of rugged rocky coasts, endless Boreal forest and lakes like oceans wide and the brown velvet hound is missing her sisters.
Oh and Hey ! Stay tuned tomorrow for the introduction of M&S - need help with your blog ? Larger photos ? a new banner perhaps ? you've just switched from a PC to a Mac and the transition is getting on your last frayed nerve ? need a spot illustration ? a logo ? some hand drawn type maybe ? Michael, my best loved nephew and computer/designer savant, and I are starting a little side business - Realize the blog you've always dreamed of and help a struggling student pay for university at the same time. Super affordable and amazing results - guaranteed !

beautiful poison

does this cloud look to you like a lean and greying cowboy ...

forever
- 23 days
________
an eternity

Ever has it been known that love knows not
it's own depth until the hour of separation

Kahil Gibran

Yesterday as the cowboy and the beautiful brown hound climbed into their vehicle and pulled away from the curb in front of this old brick house I felt sick to my stomach. The big ache had begun. How on earth will I survive 23 days without him and the brown velvet Bess ?

The cowboy with his big, huge smile and eyes that twinkle at me when he laughs, and he laughs a lot. With arms that fold around me and hold me tighter than I've ever wanted. The man with the tall moustache and boyish silver bangs that flop down over his forehead. A man so handsome my knees are permanently weakened. A man so kind and sweet, so funny and so deliciously complicated that I can't breath properly anymore.

Thank goodness I have 13 archived phone messages. I'll talk to him again Wednesday, tomorrow. He doesn't have a cell phone - of course he doesn't. Why didn't I say call me collect from a phone booth ? Will I ? Can I ? survive 24 hrs without hearing his voice - his real, live voice ?

I would wish to sleep for 23 days like a Snow White awakened upon his return, finally, with the sweetest kiss. But Hey ! Alas ! ... I have a million, billion things that I want to get done, that I must get done. The teak topped desk is yelling at me. If only I could take the cowboy and all my swirling, racing thoughts about him and us and put them gently in a cupboard in this old brick house, tucked away - even for a few hours so that I might be able to think again in a clear, straight and productive manner. Deepest sigh.

I have been beautifully poisoned ...




last night's walk - Winnie Dixon, Piper Belle & me

boat house

the beautiful boat house

Dance if you want to and I'll sit and watch you
Show me the steps that you know
Jump high and swing low and dance all night

Drive if you want to and I'll sit beside you
When there's a road to choose from
We'll choose the right one and we'll drive all night

And play if you want to and I'll listen when you do
And when you sing a tune, I'll sing along with you
And we'll play all night

Rose Cousins - Dance if you want to

Track 14 CD No. 2

mixed tape

scenes from yesterday's first road trip

I said I wanna touch the earth
I wanna break it in my hands
I wanna grow something wild and unruly

I wanna sleep on the hard ground
In the comfort of your arms
On a pillow of bluebonnets
In a blanket made of stars

I wanna walk and not run
I wanna skip and not fall
I wanna look at the horizon
And not see a building standing tall

I wanna be the only one
For miles and miles
Except for maybe you
And your simple smile

Cowboy take me away
Fly this girl as high as you can
Into the wild blue
Set me free oh I pray
Closer to heaven above and
Closer to you closer to you

Dixie Chicks - Cowboy Take Me Away

The cowboy and the beautiful brown hound Bess leave tomorrow morning on a previously planned 4000 km, 3 week road trip back to where he came from. I've made him 2 music CD's - 33 songs to take with him. The proverbial mixed tape. Songs that I love, have loved and songs that suddenly seem meant for this - for us. A big beautiful soundtrack to this new life that has knocked me over. I can't even imagine him being gone, this wonderful man who's taken over my every thought and consideration. We'll talk on the phone at least once each day, we'll send emailed thoughts and promises and as soon as he & Bess arrive at their destination he will parcel up one of his books, a survey of Canadian history and mail it me express post and I will relish it. I will count the days until they return - as will Piper Belle and Miss D.

My Creative Empire is, has been, busting at the seams - Good Things continue to rush at me fast & furious. I am dizzy with Goodness. I will spend these cowboyless days here at the teak topped desk - building. I will spend time also freeing space and room in this old brick house for him and his things. Suddenly it's easy for me to let go of things that have tormented me for ever. I will miss him ... but Goodness ... I need to catch my breath.

ps to Chez Caesar the Steve Earle song Fearless Heart is a new favourite of mine and is track 7 on CD No. 1 - merci !!