Seeds of change

I have always loved apples, devouring them as a child, never letting them spoil in the bottom drawer of the refrigerator or in the fruit basket on the sunny counter. Not every apple mind you, I never really developed an appreciation for Spartans, something about the texture; or Red Delicious either - too mushy I think. Golden Delicious, that's a better apple for my money, or Granny Smith with its puckering tartness - now that's a sensation! But nothing ever compared to a BC MacIntosh for me, its subtle green and red outer skin seemingly caught somewhere between both colours, its bright white juicy interior filled with sweetness and crisp, clear notes... that's an apple for me.

I've been away from writing a bit - busy in life I suppose, working on projects that have involved more time and mental energy, that somehow have left less of both for the important things in personal and mental growth. Those damned migraines have resurfaced anew lately as well, stealing away what energy and stamina was left, until the days blended together into weeks into almost a month.

Summer returned to brighten our spirits and fill our days with more ideas of how to stay even busier - and we allow ourselves to be seduced by the glossy ads of ideal yards and the longing for something more relaxing than where we find ourselves right now. So we plant and weed, and mow and trim, paint and stain and scrub and cut and haul away loads of yesterday's ideas and plans, making room for today's and tomorrow's and the tomorrow's after that.

The neighbours trees, bright green branches reaching higher into the sky, became a blizzard of blossoms in the wind this week, littering the back yard with an aerial assault of summer's promise. With the heat of last week, we filled the pool in anticipation of continued hot days and clear sunny skies, only to be rewarded with cool greys and the pool skimmer net and unlimited opportunity to use it.

Apple blossoms blowing into the yard must be to blame, a cosmic karmic debt of sorts, for the other time-consuming aspect of this past month: visits to Apple Store(s) and our successive returns home with sleekly designed white boxes, and the treasures they contained: a macbook pro for Karen started us off, followed by an iPad on our trip to Minneapolis mid-month ahead of the launch in Canada tomorrow, and then last weekend after running out of patience with the waiting ritual of the PC start up, a new iMac for my desk. So, yes, I've been distracted, and converted.

In for a penny in for a pound.

Of Apples that is.

Changes

My desk is a disaster.

And I'm okay with that. On some level. On another level I must not be 'okay with that' or I would not have chosen the word disaster, right? Let's just agree that I've come to terms with my desk and the way its kept, and the season-like tendency I have to renew its contents, only to have destiny invite a different crop of clutter to the party.

Tax time is a good excuse to clear your desk, it helps to have that vast openness upon which to de- clutter your files as you progress through the tax forms and software. Though if my experience is any indicator, the desk looks alot more like it did before tax time again, rather than that vast openness. Might have something to do with the stack of tax related folders and forms still on my desk...

Organizational gurus continue to send me productivity emails that I signed up for in some stupor of righteous office orderliness - God only knows why after all these years of working this way I'd think it would be easy to change - but maybe thats the point, thinking you CAN change is what keeps you moving forward, open to new possibilities and experiences. So wanting to change; recognizing that what you currently do or where you currently are, could stand to be improved upon in some fashion is a noble thought.

Spring is all about change, and renewal, at least here where we are blessed with four distinct seasons, as the grass is once again green (thanks to the past week of rain) and the flowers are up and about, and the fruit trees seem ready to burst into that fragrant colourful bloom any day now - just like those damn dandelions... The shovels have been stowed for another 6 months, and rakes and lawn mowers are fertilizer spreaders and weed whackers are now again in vogue. Change is good, it keeps you moving; prevents complacency, broadens your horizons.

This week is the one year anniversary of a dramatic change for me personally, having lost that battle with the table saw this time last year, and most days it seems very minor really. Like nothing much has changed, when in reality its obvious that something indeed has changed. People still look, and I can tell those that want to ask but don't - and that's just fine. For those that do ask, it lets me make more connections with them, and hopefully helps them deal with their perceptions of loss and it helps keep me grounded. From a productivity and life standpoint, its all really the same as it was, though I have learned to take more time to be grateful for what I have around me. That change has been worth its weight in gold.

On the house project front there is little change to report. Other than I've called the surveyors to poke around and measure the house and provide us with a Building Location Certificate - we never got one done when we bought he house, we just used the original from 1962. But I'm in the mood for a fight, should it come to that, so I'm applying for that variance to the by-law regarding parking spaces and driveways and garage conversions, and I'll need this $500 certificate as part of that application. And with that decision behind us, I guess we've also decided to slow down the reno plans until we know which way we're able to proceed. For now, it's a wait and see approach, with our eyes fixed on garage expansion.

Karen's the new owner of an 13" Apple macbook pro this week, and she's adjusting to that change and learning how to deal with the new and different ways of computing on it's quick platform, versus her old HP laptop. Everything in her life has now moved down a notch in importance since this new "baby" arrived home on Sunday - so I'm even further down the list behind her car, the cat and the boy. Some changes take more time getting used to - others you've seen coming for years!

With her old laptop now in the process of being cast aside for being slower, it needs to be said that it still has alot of useful life left - an idea that pleases the boy to no end! Seems he feels entitled to claim the old laptop since he has been without for so very long in his very short life, and so his world will change shortly too, as will ours with him and the entire cyberworld as his fingertips.

Remind me when we find that he's been surfing to questionable sites, that I said change was good.

It is, it really is. We're just so stubbornly opposed to change sometimes that we're frozen, clinging to past ideas, thoughts, beliefs and patterns of behavior. That reminds me, my desk is a disaster...