It would have been my friend Lisa’s birthday today, and after cooking a traditional family breakfast for the kids before they headed off to school, I went down to Carlton Beach for a reflective walk around the river mouth. It was a beautiful day and I recalled some occasions we’d shared in this lovely spot, but, […]
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Dramatis persona*
Helen Chick
I've always wanted a bumper sticker that said "I'm a female, LDS/Mormon, Scout leading, geocaching, piano-playing, bicycling, mathematics educator with a PhD in maths ... and I VOTE"! I think this makes me a minority group of cardinality 1! * Since there's only one of me and "personae" is plural (I think), I've gone with dramatis persona. Visits since May 2016 |
It’s a little hard to believe that it has been a year since my friend Lisa’s death and since her children came to live with me. There have been some things to figure out, but I think we’ve been doing okay, and out of what were—and still are—sad circumstances, they have brought additional joy into my […] One of my cousins is a very talented jeweller/metalsmith and one day on his Facebook page I saw one of his creations that just leapt out of the screen and appealed to me. After a little thought I decided perhaps it could be an early self-gifted birthday present, and here it is … Isn’t […] [I actually wrote this blog post in September, nearly six months after I first thought of writing it, but I’m placing it in the collection where I had intended it to be, in April, and writing it as if I had written it then … although I now know what the months after April look like.] The […] It has taken a while. I bought the shed kit back in July, tried get a concrete slab organised a bit later but had trouble connecting with contractors, had the unmade plans interrupted when the neighbour arranged to replace the ageing side fence (and then those contractors were delayed), and then had a bit more trouble connecting […] As is traditional in Tasmania, students have a dinner at the end of Grade 10 since Grades 11 and 12 often take place at secondary colleges that are separate from the high schools. It is customary on such occasions for folk to dress up for the occasion, and so, about a month ago, we went in […] I think Christmas traditions are important, and they mattered to Lisa as well. So, this year Josh and Imogen and I amalgamated our traditions, with the result that, as per their tradition, Imogen was decorated as well as the tree, and Christmas stockings were hung in my house for the first time, alongside the nativity set […] With the youngsters visiting extended family for the school holidays, I took some leave and my APs and headed up the East Coast for a few days of R&R. On the first full day we headed north from Bicheno, visiting just about every beach that it was possible to pop into. They are all very pretty beaches, […] A couple of days before what would have been Lisa’s 45th birthday* some of her family and friends gathered down at Carlton Beach for an informal farewell. We chatted and had soup around a couple of fire drums in the late afternoon, glad that the weather was being kind to us at this time of year. Around sunset, […] You may have noticed, in the post about my friend Lisa’s funeral on the 12th, that I mentioned her two teenage children. While Lisa was in hospital they came and stayed at my place (a) because they couldn’t really stay at their home alone and (b) because I live much closer to town than they do, […] |
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