Brown-eyed Susans blooming all over the hills.
Some wind.
The ticking of my clock on the table.
The floor heater going, warming the cold house I woke to this morning.

It's my last week here in this basement suite. Boxes are beginning to gather, books coming down, leaving the shelves empty. Everything looks so much nicer now that I am leaving. The apple trees down the hill are starting to open. Soon they will be blooming. But I won't be here. I'll be running down Abott Street, past rows and rows of old brick houses with vines climbing around the doors.

I was talking to a friend of mine the other day. I was telling her how glad I was to be moving somewhere flat. I said "Running is practically my favorite spiritual practice. It's been so hard to tune out with all these hills."

The next morning I remembered this and thought, Did I miss the lesson? Did I miss a great gift by failing to surrender to this place? Was I supposed to learn to love those hills? Was I supposed to have gotten some great wisdom from them instead of longing for something else?

But maybe life is just like that. Maybe sometimes the only lesson is that you have to keep showing up for your life. Keep showing up even when you don't like where you are, or how hard it feels. And finally, to change what needs changing.

We move into the new place on Sunday. When I'm downtown, I drive past and there are flowers blooming all over the yard.

I've been rushing around lately. Whenever I do this, I start to get clutzy. I burn myself, I spill things. There is a big splash mark across the side of my (black) car because the other day I left my teacup on the top again and drove off. The cup didn't even break. I'm getting good at this.

Then today I went out for a few groceries, and got distracted at the check-out, filling out a ballot form to win a trip. When I got home, Craig said, "The store called. You forgot your groceries."

(An image I found in an old book in my grandmother's attic)


It rained today. It feels like the kind of rain that washes away the last bits of winter.

I had a slow morning yesterday by the window with tea and quiet dripping outside. I turned on CBC Radio to the nice surprise of Sarah Harmer & The Weakerthans sharing a live show.

A solo show at The Laughing Moon on Friday night. Sincere thanks to those of you who put $20 bills in the hat. You make life worth living!

Finally found a house on Friday. Such a relief after weeks of searching through the papers. It's a little old house with hard wood floors and windowsills, a deck off the side and lots of sunlight. There's daffodils growing in the flowerbeds already.

The landlord said I could plant a small vegetable garden in the back yard. I don't know why some people think gardening is cheesy. There's is nothing like walking barefoot out to the garden and picking lettuce and cucumbers for a salad and eating it 3 minutes later.

The house is in an old, pretty neighborhood with tall trees and big houses with vines growing up the walls. It's a 5 minute walk from the beach, which I've just now decided, is where I'll be all summer long when I'm not away. Toes burried in the sand and sunshine on my shoulders, as the old John Denver song goes.

Life has been quite busy with administrative details surrouding the CD. I'm not sure I would have done it had I known. It bores me to tears. Lots of mailing out packages and sending out copies for reviews. The good news recently, is that CBC Radio has approved Little Grey House for their music library, which means it will be distribued to 30 stations across Canada. Hopefully this will mean more than having it shoved into a litte tiny dark room to collect dust. Hopefull it will mean that they will play me and get me some shows.

We'll keep our fingers crossed.

It's raining again. There's nothing more to tell. I'm off...