My favourite term for an extended summer is Babye Leto (Бабье лето) – a Russian turn of phrase that translates to “Old Ladies’ Summer.”
How amazing is that? It just conjures up the bloody best imagery.
I can see it now: a gaggle of giggling grandmas, sunning their legs, sipping mimosas, adjusting their sunglasses, remarking every so often on the heat, or, you know, KIDS THESE DAYS.
And believe me when I say that out here on the West Coast of Canada the elderly babushkas have been having an absolute field day weather-wise.
Today for instance, the mercury is hovering around 20 degrees centigrade, the sky burns a deep, cerulean blue, and the trees either glow soft reds, oranges, and yellows or simmer deep purples, greens, and browns.
It is autumn perfection.
M and I have been bopping about the lower mainland, spending as much time outside as possible – going for runs, playing tennis (in shorts and t-shirts!), taking long walks down by the water, and venturing out for late night dinner dates.
Oooer.
I cannot think of a better way of spending a long weekend.
Here are some snaps from our adventures of late:
Into the woods.
Gifts.
Red head.
Date.
Down by the bay.
Sun cat.
Meditation.
I hope you all had a stunningly beautiful weekend, filled with sun, love, and laughter.
I am typing on the world’s softest keyboard. It’s like having jello fingertips.
I was reading “Skinny Legs and All” again last night. It is such a good book.
I like its definition of art as something that you can see in your head, but you know doesn’t exist in reality, so you try to make it exist.
I think this is what Robert Bateman cannot understand.
Art as imitation? That is just flattery.
Painted fangs and paper coats, a canvas of timeless snow. To make beauty and life something to look at.
I disagree with it all.
Make randomness. Find splendour in it.
Paint the pattern of your mind in the fickle sand, and know that it will blow away.
To be or not to be timeless? Infinite? Or just human?
We err, we die, we hold stiff poses against the sky – a sky that never changes. And what we make and what we shape is beautiful because it eventually ceases to obey the order we have inflicted upon it and metamorphs into something we could not ever have imagined.
And I ask myself, over and over again: where would I be if I had never met you?
A tan, bland comment from a waiter at a tea party. And I would have outlasted the winter with my ice and arctic breath.
But you and I – our pulse, our heart, together: we are not meant for trivia and sullen conversation.
The outside rules are writing themselves in rigid lines of decline, delineating the passive guests – but we, we are undressed and dressed again, an unfolding nebula of muscle, blood, and mirth, and who dares to say us wrong.
Who dares to say but sorry and thank you – these well-wishers and critics.
I see you and I’m dazed understanding. I’m iron on fire.
I’m living, I’m burning; I have stunned the artifex of my life in the shower, and these eyes – mine eyes are dancing the jive with yours.
And I’ll be here.
(kissing your eyelids shut at night).
I have a question for all of you beautiful people:
Do any of you nutters have kids?
Full disclosure: I am not with child.
I’m just curious that’s all. You see, there is a kid, currently located just outside of my kitchen window, who has been crying and screaming its absolute head off for say, the past fifteen, twenty minutes.
And this is not a baby, we’re talking about here. We are talking a legitimate, walking, talking human being – one who is weeping for all of Canada. He probably has a full set of teeth, takes trips to the loo solo, and can choose his outfits in the morning.
Having listened to him wail on and on for the last little bit, I just want to lean out of my window and holler, “WHAT’S THE PROBLEM KID? THERE’S NO CRYING IN BASEBALL! THERE. IS. NO. CRYING. IN. BASEBALL!!!11!!
AND GET OFF MY LAWN.
You whipper-snappers!
…
I mean, that’s pretty horrible of me, is it not?
I know.
I am definitely the worst.
And it is reactions of mine – like this one just described – that make me fear for the day (should I be blessed in the properly functioning uterine department) that I become a mother.
I just can’t imagine that scenario working out all too well.
For one, I have zero maternal instinct.
No, minus zero.
I have never, ever, had that “twinge” – when, after having glimpsed some beautiful scene where a glowing mother cuddles here gorgeous offspring – something inside of me says “I want that.”
To be honest, most of the time everything inside my entire being begins screaming, “DO NOT WANT. COMMENCE THROWING UTERUS IN GARBAGE DISPOSAL.”
I mean, sure, there are moments where I concede that it wouldn’t be so bad. In fact, the people I know and love who have kids make it look downright phenomenal. There are tons of great children out there, and seeing how many of the cool cats in my life love their kids is darn cool.
Plus I keep telling myself that I probably wouldn’t feel the same way about my child as I do about many of the random children I come into contact with – that being mostly terror, confusion, and incredulity.
Deep down I know I would definitely love the crap out of them.
But I still worry.
I worry for a number of reasons (above and beyond the fact that I seem to have pawned off my biological clock sometime in the early 90s for two Kitkat bars, some sour keys, and a copy of Kirby’s Dreamland for my Gameboy.)
The first and mayhaps the biggest?
I just don’t get babies.
I made it through about 4 minutes of this movie before turning it off:
Like seriously, people go absolutely bat shit CRAZY over babies. Not only that, but they go bonkers over baby paraphernalia.
WHAT THE HECK PEOPLE?
It makes me think that babies have some magical power to get you stoned. (Just think about it -marijuana gets you high, and potheads LOVE them some weed leaf stickers, Bob Marley posters, and giant decorative bongs – so I’ve come to the conclusion that it must be the same for those crazed baby-lovers.)
And if it isn’t for their ability to get you high, how else could people possibly care about a tiny pair of socks or a facecloth with a frog on it?
WHAT DO YOU PEOPLE KNOW THAT I DON’T?
And in terms of the baby itself – I too need this explained. Babies are small, foreign, angry old men or women, hell bent on breaking your ear drums, defecating mustard gas, and peeing all over every square inch of your life.
This is terrifying!
Seriously, their catchphrase could be – “BABIES: POOP GRENADES ONLY NOW WITH MORE POOP.”
And yet people think they are the bees knees.
And don’t tell me it’s because of their new baby smell.
I’ve smelled me some babies in my life and I know for a FACT that it’s not all cake and roses.
I worry that I’ll have a baby, and the baby will all be “I’m a baby SCREAM POOP PEE EAT SLEEP HAHAHAH JUST JOKING I’M NEVER GOING TO SLEEP SCREEEEAAAAAMMMMMM” to which I’ll just be like, “You, sir, are an arsehole, BUH BYE.”
I worry that I’ll have the baby, and the baby will all be, “BABY” and I’ll be like, “That’s all you got? Where the frick is the rest!? I JUST SPENT NINE MONTHS MAKING YOU – ENTERTAIN ME SPAWN!!!”
I worry that I will be the worst mother ever.
The first baby I ever held. I was sweating like crazy I was so nervous.
So what I guess I’m saying is that I worry.
I worry that I’ll give my kid the eating disorder that I struggled with for years; that I’ll give them the anxiety that I deal with on a daily basis; that I’ll make them think they need make-up to be beautiful because I too like to wear make-up; that I’ll drop them on their head the second I get home.
I worry about the unknown – what about my job? What about my relationship?
What about my body?
I worry about worrying about my body.
But throughout it all, I have one ace in the hole that makes all of these questions seem not quite so daunting.
That one person who makes me worry just a little less.
And that, of course, is Mr. M.
My freaking knight in shining armour.
Because somehow (and I have no idea how) he doesn’t have any of these doubts. He just knows. He has confidence in not only himself, but in me, and it is through him that I have started to believe, little by little, that one day, if this happens, it will be just grand.
And while I’m not necessarily at the same level of belief that he cooly-as-a-cucumber maintains, I have the belief that I will get there, eventually.
Because when I see him with children? That’s when I feel something flicker.
I imagine him and I giving piggybacks, and leaping through sprinklers; teaching small, wild haired munchkins about tidal pools and earthworms, making mud pies, and reading storybooks by flashlight.
And it gives me pause.
But who knows – maybe one day all of what I currently feel about myself, and my relationship with my yet-to-be-born babies will change. I will wake up, flick on the internet and order the newest poo grenade and pay extra for the express shipping.
But until that day, my questions remain.
As does my love.
Unlike, thank goodness, the echoes of the crying child, outside of my window.
M and I have just arrived home from four days spent out and about, bopping along the BC coast.
Here are some snaps from our travels:
Sunflowers.
Woods.
Ferry.
Docks.
Sunset.
Pond.
JUMP.
So there you have it kidlets, a brief look at the last four days spent running, hiking, boating, cooking, and building (woodsheds!).
I got some pretty serious sun on my face (M told me that I should probably stop wearing those sunglasses for the next while because it’s starting to look like I have a wicked goggle tan!), watched the meteor shower – so amazingly beautiful, and learned that a cow has six teats and that the UN General Secretary during the Cuban Missile Crisis was was U Thant (oh Trivial Pursuit…)
Now we’re watching Star Wars and eating blizzards after a simple, delicious dinner of garden grown beans, squash, and local Island gruyere cheese.
Sublime.
What did you cats get up to for the weekend? I want to hear all about it.
Rant and Roll 