Mary Soderstrom's Blog

This is the month for shooting  off fireworks, it seems.  Canada Day, the Fouth of July, Bastille Day, and other holidays all seem to require pyrothenic displays.

 But it also is the time around here when day lilies are in bloom.  Their bursts of colour are truly gorgeous, and what's more they don't frighten animals with loud noises.

  

Been traipsing around and visited this lovely library last week.  It's the Bibliothèque Lucy-Fairs in Aylmer, QC, jus across the river from Ottawa. The Friday afternoon I was there it was full of people, obviously enjoying this replacement for a library which had been in a corner of a strip mall.

Not only is the library spacious with plenty of room for more books, it has a number of well-thought special features, like a terrace on the green-roof which offers a   wonderful view of the Ottaw river. 

Nice to see what great place being used by all sorts of people, too.,  

 

This is Evi in the little front garden, on the watch for interesting flying insects.  You'll note she's wearing a harness and on a leash.  That's because we don't want her to bother birds.

But the harness is not entirely what we'd hoped for.  I had thought I could put it on her (she learned rather quickly associate it with going outside which she really likes), attach the leash to a stake and do a little gardening.  She, however, wants to roam and she's figured out to back out of three different sorts of harnesses, including this one which is supposed to be escape-proof.

 The result is I take her outside and sit and read the papers on my phone.  Could be a worse situation, I'm sure! 

Those are gloves you see, seeming to come out of the pipes in this roadwork project.  Makes me wonder if anybody is having trouble getting all the work done.  Is this a real cry for help?

Certainly there are days when it seems that you really could use another pair of hands. Think how much faster you could wipe down kitchen cabinets (a job I've had on my to-do list for more than a week.)  I don't know that you could write that much more with four hands, since you only have one head to plan the work!

According to some studies, June is still a very popular month for weddings, along with (surprise! surprise!) October.  

 I presume the generally good weather is the origin for June's popularity, and, in the circuitous way things work aroumd,  why this lovely shrub is called Bridal Veil.  Technically, its name is spirea , which comes from the Greek and means "wreath." Aesthetically, it looks like an idealized bridal accessory, either a veil or a bouquet that a bride might carry.

 Whatever, it is in bloom here now, and is very lovely.   
 

Doesn't sound as nice as "April in Paris, Chestnuts in Blossom,"  but the chestnut trees around here look lovely nonetheless.  

The heat wave in Europe certainly must mean that the chestnuts are long past blooming in Paris this year.  Here it's been quite cool, so cool in fact that I haven't moved my hibiscus outside which I usually have done by now.

The sun is out here though, so I have hope that all will be well.
 

 

Just came in from a short walk at sunset, trailing the scent of lilacs after me.  After a cool and wet early spring, the lilacs are now out in force, spreading their parfun everywhere.

 Nice to seem them... 

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 On Saturday Doris Ingerman's friends and family had a party for her.  She died in December, just weeks short of her 97th birthday, but for various reasons the celebration of her life was saved for a time when travel would be easier.  She would have had a wonderful time...

 

This is my contribution to the memorial:

 

           Let me takeyou back about 60 years ago when Sid and my husband Lee were in graduate schoolat UC Berkeley and the day I first met Doris. Sid and Doris, Lee and I had been invited to the wedding of one of theirgraduate student colleagues..  I'm notsure I'd even met the guy, let alone his fiancée, but it sounded like it wouldbe quite a party.  Big wedding  in a  synagogue in San Francisco, with a cocktailreception and a sit down supper afterward. 

            I don'tremember too much about the wedding service itself, other than a vague memoryof the groom grinning from ear to ear, and of his bride looking verylovely.  Nor do I rememmber who we satwith during the ceremony, but it probably was with a group of other graduatestudents and their significant others. What I do remember was the crush as friends and family headed for thedoors which led from the sanctuary to an adjacent hall where the party was tobe held. 

            Okay, therewe are in a sea of merry makers, and then there was the receiving line, and shakinghands with people I didn't know, and mumbling greetings, and smiling, floatingalong on the good feeling that radiated from the bridal party.  Suddenly though  I was through that bottle neck was in the banquethall with a glass of bubbly in one hand a plate filled with little canapés inthe other.  Neither Lee nor Sid wasanywhere to be seen, but there was Doris, right next to me, also with wineglass and goodies.  We'd made it throughthe formallities in record time, and obviously we thought we could finally getdown to business.  Boy, she's  a woman after my own heart, I rememberthinkning: she knows what's important: good things to eat and drink!  What joie de vivre! I would also have thoughtif I had known French at that point.

            Yes, joiede vivre is what Doris exlempfied.  Yet ellen'avait pas sa langue dans sa poche, as they say around here. that is shedidn't keep her tongue in her pocket, she told you what she thought aboutanything and everything, frequently with humour and always withconviction.  She also was extremelygenerous and kind. Even though she didn't know us well we arrived in Montrealthe year after they did, she opened their home to us  where we stayed until we found a place of ourown. 

            Therefollowed lots of good times.  She took meNew York in the spring of 1969, we had numerous picnics and barbecues andholiday celebrations.  She drove me andthe kids down to Albany, New York--a day trip, would you believe--to see PeteSeeger perform as a protest against pollution on the Hudson.  For a couple of years we had season's ticketfor the Opéra de Montréal  together, sheenlisted me to keep her company at many swimming meets. I usually left a visitwith her energized and, often, joyous.

            Thatcontinued until the end, even though last fall it became clear that she wasdeclining.  But on Thursday December 3when I arrived for my regular bi-weekly visit she was wide awake and wanted meto do something for her.  It took alittle while for me to understand exactly what: go into her bedside stand andget some nail polish and paint her fingernails. Which I did, and which seemed to please her.  A few days later she died, with mauvefingernails, ready to party.  A womanwhose joie de vivre is sorely missed. 

 

 

 

The photo is a good 45 years old, but I love it.  The woman is my mother and the little girls are my daughter and her cousin.  Don't know what story was being read, but it must have been intriguing.  

Grandmothers are great for creating moments to remember, and what they talk about is the heart of our civilization.  Don't forget that!

 PS Wrote a book about remembering in which the role of grandparents, but particularly grandmothers, is highlighted.  Check it out: Before We Forget: How Remembering Will Get Us Through the Next 75 Years.  

 

A year ago we were in Reims, France, visiting the cathedral there, and checking out another Carnegie Library. It was closed because May 1 is a holiday in France, but the building was impressive even from the outside. It was built in the 1920s after much of the city had been badly damaged during the First World War. As a gesture of toward rebuilding civil society the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, helped finance new library buidings in three European cities which had been badly damaged during the war. Reims was one: the others were Belgrade and Leuven. Thinking of Andrew Carnegie's long reach. Compare that with what too many present-day billionaires are doing.  BTW, the trip to France was great. The guy to the right in the photo wearing the dentist-style turquoise shirt is my husband and travel companion. He likes libraries, but what he really wanted to see on the trip was cathdrals--we took four day trips out of Paris to see some on our 11 day jaunt.