Friday, January 1, 2010

12 grapes


We went to a New Year party last night. It was hosted by Juanco who prepared a large piella. I met several lovely people. Bonita was a particular delight. After supper she accompanied the three guitar players on her accordion. Maria and Aina sang. I was amazed to hear Aina sing in Swedish, Spanish, German and French! I joined in the few English songs I knew. At midnight we each ate 12 grapes, one at each chime of the clock. In the end I had 5 grapes left. Almost no one ate all their grapes so we are expecting a certain amount of bad luck to follow us into 2010.
Mae Sarton awoke to "a perfect morning on which to start fresh." She also confessed "the edge of my mind is not as sharp as it should be." Yesterday she had gone to a movie with friend Annella to see Dustin Hoffman in "Tootsie".
Hickman urges us to "honor and trust the processes of grief and healing." Perhaps we can all acknowledge ourselves part of "the sisterhood of loss... where everything brushes against the raw wound of grief... as beads on a necklace of loss transmutes... into a thread of treasured memories." Such treasures are so uniquely our own.
Perhaps in 2010 we will "wander off the grid and be liberated" as Jenkinson along the Little Missouri River when he camped with his mother Mil.
Mary O tells us, "What I know I could put into a pack as if it were bread and cheese and carry it on one shoulder, important and honorable, but so small."
At 9:30 AM I saw a narrow-chested sun dog sitting in the south just above the dark bare trees.

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