Campbell Street at 9.06pm

Last night I was walking home and I stopped to look a few white roses growing behind an old white picket fence. I love breathing in the sweet smell of roses, taking a step out of the world around you, and letting the petals tickle the end of your nose just as if you are five years old. When I stepped away and continued walking a beautiful thing happened... the couple walking behind me paused, and stopped to smell the roses too.

found

words for today. and the rest of my life. found here.

on getting an education

sometimes i learn the hard way. this can be VERY hard sometimes but at least i'm learning. tonight i'm taking advice from my father. advice that i've heard more than a few times now. to dust myself off (with or without your dignity intact, either will do just fine) and to get back on the bike (he's got a good story about his motorcycle that always accompanied this and today i do miss it).

grief

i am mourning. an entire city is suffering. there is an emptiness in the fallen bricks. missing people. quiet. and those found that will not share the hope still left. i know it is selfish for me to feel isolated in what has been endured. i wish i could help boil the water, sweep up the ceiling from the floor, light the lamps, comfort my little brother and find the cat. i can only give my love and a hug. over the telephone. i was not there. and i feel that.

here are some words.

I did not know what to say to him. I felt awkward and blundering. I did not how I could reach him, where I could overtake him and go hand in hand with him once more.

It is such a secret place, the land of tears.

from The Little Prince by Antoine De Saint-Exupery

hope

this is a pencil. i found it last friday in swonderful. i wanted it. and that day i needed it. happiness for two dollars and fifty cents.

     She made her life one of uncommon worth.

sharing

i would like to share one of my favorite short stories with you. i love short stories. and this one... i've read over and over again. the story is mournful, lonely, and an illustration of overwhelming sadness. and i find it moving, hopeful and beautiful.

This Is How Good the Coffee  by Denise Sammons

It's a grey day, raining and cold, yet I'm sitting, under shelter, outside. Happy. I am loving the  feeling of the clambering stopping. Then a tram full of American tourists pulls up outside the cafe and empties its cargo onto the footpath. A woman dressed in pink is telling another - who looks like a baseball on legs, all round and striped - about her problem. 'Oh,' her friend says, 'there's a product on the market for that.'

     I sit in the noise and feel a kindness, a warmth, maybe even some kind of love for these loud people. This is how good the coffee is.

     I am thinking of the French doors at home and how they will be leaking now (don't tell the real estate agent). Or do tell the real estate agent and maybe our house will never sell. Yes. I am imagining the soft plop, plop of the drops on the inside of the glass. I know you are at home with the open-mouthed boxes that are waiting to swallow our life together. You will be sitting with the cats, reassuring the ones you are taking and saying goodbye to the ones staying with me. In this moment I can almost see how it could all work out for the best. This is how good the coffee is.

     Sparrows ring the table where I am sitting. They skid towards my plate, aiming for the muffin, but then they get frightened and slide back to the edge of the table. They have no staying power. Their claws have no traction. Up close their bland commonness is transformed into beauty. The striking marking on their wings making a pleasing contrast to the soft, downy bodies. I want to hold one in my hand so some of that softness could seep into me, into my heart. I know that's impossible. I think of her. I do not smile. No coffee is that good.

from This Is How Good the Coffee Is by Denise Sammons. i found it a book given to me by my Nana. One hundred New Zealand short short stories, edited by Stephen Stratford, 2000.