Welcome to Far and Wee

Life just keeps getting more interesting. And to me, that means it’s getting better. Sure, it may all collapse under its own weight one of these days, but that’s part of the deal; nothing lasts forever nor, in my opinion, should it.

I’m at least halfway through my life now, and it has been quite a ride so far. Four marriages, two beautiful children, homes across the country, friends as far as the eye can see. Never a dull moment, for sure. But that’s what keeps it interesting. And interesting, my friends, is the name of the game.

Take this blog. It’s named after a poem about Spring, by e.e. cummings, that goes like this:

in Just-
spring      when the world is mud-
Iuscious the little
lame balloonman

whistles far      and      wee

and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it’s
spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it’s
Spring
and

the

goat-footed

balloonMan           whistles
far
and
wee

–Chansons Innocentes: 1 (1920)

As a little child hearing that poem read aloud every Spring, I learned that life is playful and musical and mysterious and maybe just a little crazy. And it stuck. So this blog is my whistle in Spring, in honor of balloonmen everywhere, and most especially the one who read me that poem so many times.

Pictures? Sure. Here’s me getting married the last and final time, only a few days ago.

And here’s the shawl I’m knitting for my daughter who heads off to college in September, and the sweater I made for my 15-year old son who’s off at boarding school.

And the soup and bread that are my staff of life.

And here are Uther the dog (welcoming you with a sock) and Alcibiades the cat.

That pretty much sums it up. Except for the being a nurse and a bit of a radical leftist and a Quaker and a big believer in community and eating plants and being content with what is.

I hope you come back and see me, and I hope I have something interesting to offer you every time you do. Please comment freely; you may be the one to open my eyes to something I never realized before!