flown by

"well," says my daughter, "just so you know: i would be very hurt and totally insulted if you didn't post something special on my birthday."
i sigh. i've had a very long day. after rummaging through box after box of family
photos, i climb the stairs and knock on his door.
"how would you feel if i didn't put a birthday piece up on the site today?" i ask.
"relieved," he answers.
*
but i'm a mother. i couldn't not.
happy 25th, thijs..
may this year be filled with fineness!

that's all it took

the tin-toy-store appeared here a while back, and the butterfly houses over at rachel's.
some subjects are so simple and so sweet that a revisit is inevitable.

crimson and clover

my life's sentimental journey has unfolded, gracefully, to its own eclectic soundtrack:
the songs i wasn't asked to dance to in high school, the songs that crackled into my darkened bedroom when i should have been sleeping, the chips-and-gravy
songs on the individual jukeboxes in the cosy grill, the first-time-tipsy songs and the first-time-high songs, the only-living-girl-in-vancouver songs, the songs interrupted by numbing news - kennedy, kennedy, martin luther king, john lennon: a collection of recollections, so to speak.
i would so like these strains - my personal symphony - sidling through my little white earhones, but alas: i may be canadian, but i don't live in canada, and i am only permitted downloads from the dutch iTunes store.
i did try. tommy james & the shondells: huh? leslie west, thunderclap newman: wha?
the ronettes: some numbers, okay, but not "be my baby", and "be my baby" is, as far as i can see, the whole point.
i am dodging the potholes pitting my particular memory lane, and i am mystified by iTunes' refusal - paid, nota bene - to fill them.
this is the internet, the world-wide web.
we should be able to sing, and dance, and reminisce, together.

hit the lights

every saga harbours a worst-case scenario, and ours involved an unsellable home: months on the market (imagine!) but - endless washed windows and walloped doormats later - not a single prospective buyer among the cast of characters.
happily, our screenwriter opted for a happier ending, at least for this episode...
the first viewers were smitten, it seems, and our house was sold the very next day.
we can sit back, and nibble popcorn, and anticipate june.

why they call it the blues

"these," said my lovely daughter, shuffling through the dozen squares, "feel almost like winter warming into spring."
i'll cross my fingers that she's right - but i won't take off my gloves just yet.

by chance, by choice

"friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another, 'what! you too? i thought i was the only one!'" 
- c.s. lewis (british scholar and novelist, 1898-1963)

indeed.