Good To Be Home
I wake each morning this week feeling unsettled. My nightly dreamscape has turned frantic, sometimes violent, with kidnapping, death threats, chase scenes that involve what seems to be every single person I've ever met. I wake exhausted, confused as to what day it is. I rise, feed the dogs, go outside, stretch, inhale, exhale, look skywards, stand still, do a couple of tai chi moves. The forest is silent now except for the chickadees and brown creepers and nuthatches. A lone blue jay sits on the fence post, resplendent, majestic in its cloak of flashing azure blue. I miss the summer sounds already but I settle into this new quiet. I still feel rattled, though. It is Thanksgiving weekend. It is the one holiday in the calendar year that can stir angst, anxiety, apprehension within me. I think back to my younger self in 1976, arriving in Canada from Glasgow, unaware of what Thanksgiving was. It would be our first holiday to celebrate in this vast, unknown, country. My family dismissed...