Woodland Walk

Today, I wore my Mama's hat,

Her bright autumnal titfer (tat).

We walked among the ferns all drippy,

We walked the old familiar way,

Down to the river, down to the pond,

Down by the way of the loon's clear song.

An acorn at my feet I found,

Then lichen, moss and bark and flower,

And soon my arms were full of fall

Of dripping earth and autumn's call.

So homeward bound with all we'd found,

To share with friends

And nourish all!

Swallows and Amazons

I have always wanted to put my childhood memories, which are legion, into a book of memoires, but I think I don't have to anymore. It has already been done! Or rather, this is what seems to be.
I have recently started to read a series of 12 books written by Arthur Ransome, the first of which is 'Swallows and Amazons', first published in 1930. Perhaps you, like countless children since, have read this series, and your lives have been dramatically influenced by it. In the first book, we are introduced to the Walker children: John, Susan, Titty, Roger, Vicky and their Mother.
As children, my four siblings and I, deprived of television and video games, spent our days captivated in one adventure after another. As soon as one mystery was solved, off we'd go on another adventure, which often involved pirates and smugglers and kings and princes, (especially those imprisoned in towers!), murderers and body-snatchers (we lived right next door to the village graveyard)! Our imaginations ran wild, and nobody seemed to think this was detrimental to our growth, except, perhaps, with the exception of when we kidnapped John Innes, who was 4 at the time, tied him up and left him in my chapel to think about his dreadful crimes. It was hours later that his sister, Jessica, came looking for him, and we remembered with horror where we'd left him.
I'm sure that such naughtiness was never displayed in the Walker children, but this book, and in fact, the whole series comes highly recommended, especially if you missed it in your youth.
Beautifully written, this book would be a welcome change to any Book Discussion Club!
Well, I think I shall saunter down to the dock at Houseboat Bay, tackle up the able-bodied catboat Swallow, and tack on over to Wild Cat Island, where I'll no doubt encounter the two intrepid Amazons, Nancy and Peggy Blackett!

Her Rings

Today, I wore my Mother's rings.
They fit so well. They suit me well.
I wore them as I pulled the beans.
I wore them as I watched the scenes
Of Gustav hurtling into land.
I wore the everlasting band,
I wore the red, I wore the gold,
The love within these rings I hold
Within my heart which loudly sings.
Today I wore my Mother's rings.

Home again, home again, Jiggerty jig!

It certainly has been a topsy turvy week and some. Mama Sonia has packed her bags, according to Sonia Elizabeth, and has winged her flight to heaven to join Papa Roger, who has been calling her now for some months. It is a great comfort to me to know that they are together again, to part no more. Sonia told me that at one point, a couple of days before she died, she was talking to someone, instructing them to please make sure that her golf bag was packed, and that it should be packed just so on the bottom...this was very important! Must be that Daddio had organized a tee time! We all flew down to Winter Park to see her off, and to comfort and console each other. It was a good time for that, but as Father Walsh said, this is the end of that era, and that is very hard to swallow. Gone are the days of Mama Sonia's fantastic gourmet dinners. Gone are those dreadful political discussions which became more and more volatile by the second! Just the kind of debate on which the Wall family fed, well, some of them, anyway! I remember Uncle Chente sounding off like a machine gun, then Mama Sonia, totally undaunted, joining in the fray. Papa Roger would screw up his face in disgust, and tell everyone they were nuts! They were able to spew away at each other, and within moments, slap each other on the back, and with mirth and love filling the room, turn their attention to other matters. Gone are the lunch dates, the dinner dates, the museum dates, the art gallery dates, the play dates, and saddest of all: the shopping dates! Thank~you, sweet lady, for all the memories. Thank~you for adopting me as your daughter, and introducing me thus. Thank~you for accepting me for who I am. Thank~you for coming canoeing with me up at Kidney Pond, and keeping your cool, well, almost keeping your cool, when the moose swam out to check us out while circling around our canoe! Phew, with me extremely pregnant with Hannah, that was a little hair-raising! Thank~you for spoiling my children with all those amazing trips to DisneyWorld, Epcot, SeaWorld etc. and their shopping trips. We came to bid you farewell this past week. Did you know that? We were all so sad. You looked so pretty in your periwinkle suit, and your hands crossed just so. Vinny and Lucy poured their hearts out and made us all cry. Jerry honoured Patricia, and thanked her profusely for all her unselfish attention to your every need in the last months. Larrito applied some of that wonderful love~glue on his brothers and brought a semblance of reconciliation between them: for understandably, emotions have run high, and it's been difficult to come to terms. Father Walsh came up trumps! You would have been pleased. But you were millions and trillions of miles away, having a picnic with Papa Roger under a heavenly willow tree, which definitely was not weeping, enjoying the love that still holds you two together, and will, while eternity rolls along!

Hic, haec, hoc

Hic haec hoc
Huius huius huius
Huic huic huic
Hunc hanc hoc
Hoc hac hoc

Hi hae haec
Horum harum horum
His his his
Hos has haec
His his his

Do you old Latin buffs out there remember these paradigms, and having to chant them each morning?? Well, Charlie was so excited about his newly acquired passion for the Latin language that when, on arriving in Dodge City with his friends, they came upon a mysterious old inscription nailed to a hitching post, he was excited to try his hand at translation. This is what the sign read:
TOTI
EMUL
ESTO
O.K. This should be easy, thought he. It looks like the newly learned dative case of totus + emul, like simul, simultaneously? + some form of sum, es, est, the exotic future imperative, perhaps? Unfortunately for Charlie, it was one of his friends who pointed out that the old post simply said: TO TIE MULES TO!!

...and yet another limerick

There was a young maid from Newport,
Who may not have lived as she ought.
She claimed 'twould be fun
To become a good nun
And fly over the town of Newport.

Oh the pranks that this young nun got into!
As Reverend Mother was sucking her Minto
She espied flying high
In the evening sky
The newly arrived nun from Newport.

Her whistle she blew loud and clear
As the young novice flew through the air,
Loop de loops and a dive
Completed by five
Which finished the young nun's career!

Moss

We've had plenty of rain for the past month or so, which, for some of us, has been lovely. The rain makes everything so green and vibrant and drippy. The ferns on the edge of our woods have never looked so radiant, and when the sun comes out in the evening it heightens the effect. Of course, the moss is thick and rich and covers every square inch that never sees the light of day. There's a place down by the river where trees have long ago fallen, tree on tree, as if in a tornado; and there they've lain, year on year, for decades. They are simply dripping with moss, and I wonder at the amazing life-forms they harbour.
So, I looked up this old word "moss' in the dictionary, and certainly wasn't surprised to read that it is 'any of various green, usually small, non-vascular plants of the class Musci of the division Bryophyta.' All very interesting, no doubt, but my eyes slid down the column and landed on 'mossback', and was absolutely fascinated to learn that a mossback is '1. an old shellfish or turtle(!) with a growth of algae on its back, and 2. an old, large, or sluggish fish, and 3. one extremely conservative or old-fashioned.' It was as if I was standing in front of a watery mirror! This is exactly how I've been feeling for at least a week: old, large and sluggish! I even mentioned to My Best Friend the possibility that I'd been bitten by the African tsetse fly which, by way of the infamous trypanosome, causes, among other nasty diseases, sleeping sickness. But this is not so at all. I am merely feeling the effect of all this rain, and have turned into a dear old mossback! What a relief!