"For Further Consideration"

It is June and today it actually feels like June! The sun is shining brightly and the birds are out and about, making their nests. One chickadee pair is nesting right on our deck in a birdhouse that has such a small hole it makes me claustrophobic just watching them crawl in there! 

This morning a little yellow-breasted bird hit our kitchen window and sat on the deck, stunned. Its mate actually came by and checked on it but then flew off. Since then, the stunned one has survived (thank goodness!) and I hope they'll be back building their nest.

These little birds remind me of the frailty of life although I don't really need another reminder as I have had plenty these months. The chickadees building their nest are a happier lot it seems, but life is always lived on the edge, and like the bird who hit the window, we are never prepared for that edge. 

I celebrated a birthday recently, and it was a significant one since this year will be my last one as a septuagenarian. With it comes the recognition more clearly, that, as Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote, 

Our little systems have their day;
They have their day and cease to be;
They are but broken lights of thee,
And thou, O Lord, art more than they.

                                                                                                            (In Memoriam, 1850)

As I wrote in my last post, May was April Fool's month because it felt more like March than May.
So I read more books in May than I normally would.

Last night I attended a book launch -- a highlight for me.The whole event seemed so hopeful in spite of the fact that the author had lost her husband in February 2021.

My friend and fellow writer, Dora Dueck, launched her book Return Stroke: essays and memoir.

I stayed up way too late reading, because I was hooked. I thought to myself: "This is her genre!
She is the author of four books of fiction, but this one, her own thoughts on various topics, is the best one of them all !" 

"How wonderful," the author writes, that our "bits of existence, no matter how ordinary, are available for further consideration--seeing patterns, facing into inevitable death, enjoying the playful circularity of then and now."

This quote (from the back cover) gives me back my equilibrium!  It helps me to see life as a whole, each part being equally significant, and worth living to the fullest!
I'm looking forward to reading more of Dora's book and then reflecting on what I've gained from it.

Return Stroke is dedicated to Dora's husband, Helmut (1951-2021).