What you will not find here

I won't be trying to solve the world's problems here, that's number one.  (If I can decipher the condemn-them-to-fiery-hell symbols on the knitting chart with which I seem to be locked in mortal combat, that will be victory enough thank you very much.)

Call me crazy (and you won't be the first) but most days life can be blissfully simple:  Family and friends. My cottage. Reading. Writing. Watching films. Puttering in the garden. Sitting by the ocean. Long walks. Hockey games.  Oh, I indulge in the occasional 'brainy' discussion at times -- the world, politics, things I'm reading or films I've seen.  And I fondly recall youthful nights that lasted until the early hours, discussing "the meaning of meaning" with friends, waxing as philosophical and poetic as the next guy.  But as a general rule I try not to concentrate on the bleak, the profound or the grim, nor do I pose the dense questions for which there are really no answers. (With the possible exception of obscure knitting charts.) What's the use of looking into life's face and seeing a complicated and forbidding terrain?  Maybe it's something you outgrow, but right now the faulty plumbing in the upstairs bathroom is a more immediate concern than whether or not we recognize Red China.  I'm just saying.

So ... most days I'm carefree, my mind filled with the sweet residue of everything I've read and learned. Some days not so much. But I'm here, part of the whole lovely mess. And I do love the simplicity of it all, and, yes, the messiness. Perhaps the secret is that there's really only as much trouble as you let yourself envision. (Or perhaps I've strayed over that fine line between simplicity and simpleton...?)  But really, let's hear it for those mornings when you wake up and the mocking birds are chittering by the front door, or those nights when you curl up by the fire and watch as the sun sets over the ridge at the North Burial ground, pulling the whole red and purple sky down with it as it sinks. 

Last night I called a neighbor outside so we could walk up the hill where at least two hundred Crows (Blackbirds? Ravens? Rooks?) were simultaneously circling, screeching and roosting in nearly every tree along both sides of the road.  What a glorious racket! Some migratory madness, no doubt.  And say what you will, going out in the cold to watch and listen to it all seemed like just the right thing to do.

So that's the kind of page this will be.  

Carry on.