Riff

Riff

Definition:
riffing. 1. talking via stream-of-consciousness thinking 2. freeform talk 3. first-derivative talking. I sat down to write you a letter and then picked up the tape ......

I do this riffing thing. Ephemeral thoughts. None of it cohesive enough to remember but I am sometimes astonished at my own brilliance. Then poof, thoughts evaporate, coalesce into something else, another bauble in the imagination, darting like dragonflies in the twilight.

I went out today for the first time since last Wednesday. Not for long. But enough to release me from that helpless invalid feeling. At my age, and so much loss behind me, there's an untold thrill on being this side of the daisies.

I was going to share a picture of my back and butt here but hey, the fact that I nearly gagged when I put up that small mirror and surveyed the damage in the big mirror? I kept thinking: that blackness all over your back could have been your head.. I'll spare you and myself the gory evidence.

I'm working on a non-fiction piece for Canada Writes, in case any of you are interested, there's the link. It's one I wrote years ago and it was published somewhere small but I can't remember where and I'm editing it down from 3,000 words to the 1,500 required. It's a funny (not at the time) account of an absolute weekend-from-hell in Winnipeg. I will share when it's all re-polished and submitted.

And I was reflecting yet again on this time of loss. I so miss my BFF and writing to her every day of the small stuff, you know? And then another friend dies in Ontario, only 63, had survived her first bout of cancer 10 years ago and then was taken to hospital with a bad flu last Wednesday as I was somersaulting down my driveway and subsequently CatScanned and she was riddled. She was dead by Saturday. She was a vibrant, well-travelled woman. And memorable for her distinctive voice and outrageous hair and kindness, she was very kind.

The ranks are thinning, my friends, we need to make the most of what's left of it.

Starting now.

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life Death

(Song on link above is courtesy of Monty Python).

I was commenting on Laura’s blog the other day on the death of Geoffrey Perkins and how sloppy and well, random, the ending of his life. A hit and run driver in his case. And I thought of the random ending of most lives.

And I pondered - morbid,I know - on what mine would be like.

The likelihood of a run in with a moose in my car here is rather high and the results can be rather messy - to all concerned in the collision. However, “Squashed by a Moose” steals much from the dignity of an obituary.

I climb with my granddaughter and the old pins can be less steady than once they waxed -but thankfully not yet waned - but one never knows. I could tumble down a mountain in front of her horrified eyes. Memorable that would be. But the darling one traumatized until she tosses off this mortal coil (“And just how did your granny die, dear?”) would be a high price to pay.

My dear, departed friends and younger extended family members have been struck with cancers, an aneurism, a car accident, infections post surgery, a sudden fatal heart attack at forty- two, suicides, alcoholism. Nothing overly dramatic amongst all of them. Just all too sad and too soon. Even the suicides were a quiet leave-taking with no dramatic notes left behind.

I then thought of the headers on the obituary I would like:

“Drowned at sea on her last solo sail at the age of ninety-two.”

“Keeled over, quite happily, at her latest book signing at the age of ninety.”

“Due to her failing eye sight, inadvertently stabbed herself with a knitting needle upon completion of her latest knitted art project at the age of one hundred and ten.”

“Laughed herself into a fatal coma at the house of friends at the age of ninety-one.”

“While in the last two miles of the Boston Marathon, the only one in her class and gender, in the tenth hour, at the age of ninety five, she lay down, exhausted, and died.”

“At the age of eighty nine, she fell off a scaffolding in her dining room while painting her ceiling a crimson red.”

Now what would yours be?

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