On We Go!

All is well in the best of all possible worlds! While I won’t suggest that I actually alighted from my virginal bed this morning - far too seraphim-like to be plausible - I can at least report that within minutes after the clock having struck the hour at 6:00 a.m., I was dressed and on my trusty Electra bicycle, happily bouncing on my balloon tires towards the Village of Appleton. The sun was barely breaking on the horizon. The cool air made the morning mists in the gullies and ditches look like winding water courses. The cows were let out already, vapidly chewing the grasses and looking stupidly in my direction as I sailed by.

Renewal

Well, that's it! Summer's over! This is the last day of the last weekend of August, and I can't see that there's any turning back. In my mind I have already begun to formulate the transformations I wish to make in my life, yet another of those new beginnings. September 1st will be the springboard of providence. The Fall I find is generally a time of refreshment anyway. It lends itself with impunity to reflection and taking stock, sitting by fires, wrapped in wool blankets, dozing and gazing out of patio windows onto cedar decks, watching the decline of life in earthen flower pots and surrounding trees as it prepares for Winter and reawakening in the Spring.

The Missing Assistant

There are many reasons one may miss one’s Assistant. Several days ago, my Assistant was pulled from her home, family and me by an urgent medical need, from which thankfully she is now recovering (though not without some unhappy consequences, namely the possible need for a kidney transplant).

Here’s to the Moose!

There really are some things in life worth repeating, and one of them is a meal at Ralph’s cabin. About a week ago we received a telephone call from Ralph inviting us to join him once again this year for a late summer luncheon at his cabin on the Indian River in the Township of Ramsay. As it turns out, the day was perfect from start to finish, complemented by invigorating weather, with clear blue skies and a fresh breeze reminiscent of the autumnal weather that is coming.

Monday Morning

I don’t know about you, but for my entire life, Monday mornings have spooked me. Having been obliged for the same period of time to go - uninterrupted I may add - to school, university or work, I can never get it out of my head that I should be preparing myself to do something constructive. Relaxing on a weekend simply doesn’t qualify in my books. So, as much as I enjoy an easy Saturday morning at the golf club for breakfast and like to imagine that I can suppress the need for the entire weekend, by Sunday evening the obsession to get back to it is pretty much galloping along at full speed. By the wee hours of Monday morning (when I invariably wake with a bit of a jolt from my honest slumber) the panic has firmly taken root. I needn’t tell you how messy those early morning thoughts can be, half-baked, disconnected and surreal as they usually are. While it’s all very well to pooh-pooh such witless preoccupation, the fact remains that the contemplation of one’s agenda for the coming week is not without its gravity.

It All Adds Up

I don’t know what it is, whether we’re just very good at what we do, or whether my capable Assistant, Miss N..., gives so much valuable and unaccustomed service, or whether after all these years I’ve finally learned how to run my office, or maybe a combination of all of the above, but whatever it is, things have gone along so swimmingly today, to the point where, after a mere five and a half hours of intensive labour, I told Miss N... that I was exhausted by it all, and that whatever we had to do could wait until tomorrow, though in fairness to my apparent laziness and avoidance, we together accomplished a good deal this morning and early afternoon, and in the process I even went so far as to tackle the essence of what awaits us on our agenda, which in itself is very relieving, an undertaking which clearly obviates the pain I might otherwise suffer in mere idle contemplation of our upcoming duties.

Walk It Off!

For one as fastidious as I, and who is seemingly intolerant of any disorder whatsoever, I find I have adjusted remarkably well to my many failings, weaknesses, short-comings, lapses and other general disappointments in life. I suppose it should come as no surprise. After all, there is no misfortune (or fortune, for that matter) in life which we have any option other than to accommodate. So much of life (indeed almost all of it) is simply beyond our control, random as some prefer to moralize. There are perhaps those who seek to resist imperfection, but we are powerless to do so in the end. This is a good thing, for recognizing the inherent lack of accomplishment in each of us (and here of course I am speaking for the miserable majority, not those very special souls who needn't bother with these singularly unhelpful observations), recognizing as I say these foibles we each have, enables us to stand taller in the morning or at the end of the day, on the heels of one source of dissatisfaction or another. After all, what profit is there is bludgeoning oneself needlessly? Pshaw! We are surely assured a far more prosperous outcome if we, like the clever oyster, coat life's rough spots with a bit of lacquer.