Browsed by
Author: Anne Cassidy

Another Bronte

Another Bronte

Comments 0 Comment

It’s prime reading weather — long nights, cold days — and I recently bought an e-book to keep me company: 50 Masterpieces You Have to Read Before You Die (Volume 1). How could I resist 50 classics for two dollars?

True, I’ve already read many of them. I was an English major, after all. But I doubt I would have started The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte had it not landed on (in?) my electronic nightstand. It’s an epistolary novel, a tale told entirely in letters and journals, and a reminder of how life was lived in an earlier, calmer and difficult-to-be-anything-but-landed-white-male-gentry time.

Though I can’t say Anne has become my favorite Bronte — it would be hard to dethrone Charlotte (Jane Eyre) and Emily (Wuthering Heights) — her novel grew on me, and by the end I couldn’t put it down, so thoroughly was I rooting for Helen and Gilbert to marry and find happiness. No spoiler alerts here; you’ll have to read it yourself to find out. 

(Photo: Wikipedia)

Soon to be Gone

Soon to be Gone

Comments 0 Comment

The snow is falling as I write. It’s piling up on the deck, weighing down the potted ivy, filling in the footsteps, smothering the covered chaise. After having no snow for 24 months, two storms in a week have dumped more than a half a foot here. 

As mentioned earlier, I’m not a skier or a snow-shoer, and I tiptoe around ice. But I love to watch the white stuff coming down, to marvel at the way it clings to every branch and twig. I like the way it banishes the wanness of winter, the contrast it provides. 

As it grows lighter here, ghost trees emerge from the backyard: spindly white arms, tall dark trunks. Small birds clog the feeder, land lightly on a snow bank, fluff the flakes with their little tails.

Soon I’ll celebrate the 14th anniversary of this blog, which was conceived in snow, made possible by the week off work that snow provided. Snow was my first topic. Strange since we have so little of it anymore. Another way in which these pages celebrate not only the here-and-now but also the soon-to-be-gone.

Still a Baby

Still a Baby

Comments 0 Comment

The new year is no longer the shiny new penny that shows up from time to time in my change purse. It has dulled around the edges. But when I look at the days proportionately — 18 out of 366 — 2024 is still in its infancy. A resolution stands a chance with odds like that.

Which is why I trundled out to a yoga class at 8:30 on the coldest morning of the year yesterday. Not just for the stretching and the strengthening, but also for the meditative aspect of it. 

The trip was worth it. The class was small, and the instructor was experienced. She took us through a variety of poses and encouraged us to use our breath to get into and out of them. Studio lights were low, music was soft. When I left, the new year seemed young again. 

(Ah, to be as limber as a baby! Photo: CCC)

No Nonsense

No Nonsense

Comments 0 Comment

When I woke a little after 7, the sun had not yet begun to strike the sides of the big oaks I can see across the road. But it was light enough to assure me not all the snow had blown off trunks, limbs and branches. 

Traces of high contrast are still there, the symphony, synchrony, of black and white. The only color I see in my window-scape is the barest touch of dark green from the hollies at the fence line. But I’ll soon find more in the Great Outdoors, having somewhere to be in less than an hour. 

“Take winter as you find him,” wrote James Russell Lowell, “and he turns out to be a thoroughly honest fellow with no nonsense in him. And tolerating none in you, which is a great comfort in the long run.”

We’ll see about that. 

Finally!

Finally!

Comments 0 Comment

We woke up to five inches of the white stuff, a steady snowfall that has transformed the entire region. Often we’re poised right at the snow-rain line, or the snow-ice line, a result of our particular geography and topography — some parts of the region near the coast, others near the mountains. 

It’s been a while since we’ve had this much snow, and with temperatures in the 20s and 30s, it may even hang around more than a few hours. Right now I’m looking out my office window as the bamboo slowly loses its burden and pops back into place, freeing up more views of the yard beyond. 

I’m not a big sledder or outdoor winter sports enthusiast, just a snow appreciator. I like how white winter weather turns humdrum landscapes into other worlds. 

I’m Hooked!

I’m Hooked!

Comments 0 Comment

I noticed it as soon as I finished the project, a baby blanket. I knew then that I would have to start crocheting something else before too long. 

It’s funny how I can go for years without needlework but then it blossoms back into my life and I can’t live without it. The crochet hook between my fingers, the yarn moving through them, keeping it taut (or trying to). Seeing a skein of wool become an afghan.

Crocheting siphons off energy that would otherwise become rumination or worry. Crocheting calms and soothes. I’m due for another project. Another blanket, two colors at least. One of them pink. 

Puddle Jumper

Puddle Jumper

Comments 0 Comment

Last night’s deluge tapered off by morning, leaving plenty of puddles in its wake. They presented a small challenge to the early-morning ambler. 

Despite the burbling, hard-working storm drains and runoff ditches, water was still pooled on walkways and streets.

Some puddles were best navigated by stepping around them, partly on tufted islands in the saturated grass and partly on the slightly raised edge of the macadam path. 

Other puddles were small enough for me to jump. Luckily, there weren’t too many of those. 

Spreadsheets, Schmedsheets!

Spreadsheets, Schmedsheets!

Comments 0 Comment

I’m sure it’s psychological, just one of those quirks, but whenever I work with a spreadsheet, I have to take a deep breath. I tell myself that I’m typing characters on a keyboard just as I am when I type words, but that doesn’t help. 

I think it all goes back to the ancient typing class I took in high school. It was a last-minute elective, and still one of the most valuable classes I’ve ever taken. But for some reason (senioritis?) I dropped it when we came to the numbers section. It was my last class of the day and I didn’t need it to graduate.

It was a bad decision. With a few weeks of numbers practice — and a few missed phone calls with friends (don’t know what else I was doing after those early dismissals) — I would have been able to touch-type numbers as quickly as I do letters. 

Who knows? Staying in that class might have changed my entire career trajectory. 

But I doubt it. 

Taizé Prayer

Taizé Prayer

Comments 0 Comment

I’d heard about it for years but usually have a conflict on the night it happens. Last night I didn’t, so I drove to the church in the dark and walked into a shimmering, candlelit chapel that scarcely resembled its everyday self.

There were icons on the altar and candles flickering around the sanctuary, illuminating the rough-hewn brick walls. There were two tables of thin tapers for lighting to elevate your prayer intention. There were many in attendance, but a hush filled the room. 

Taizé is an ecumenical monastic community in France with worship services of repetitive chanted prayer. Its model has become popular around the world. 

We sang in Latin, we sang in English. We were accompanied by piano, organ, violin, oboe and clarinet. The melodies were like plainsong, and in their repetition was the music of the ages.  

Silence punctuated the service: a silent entrance, a silent exit, and a stretch of silence in the middle, time for quiet contemplation — “essential to discovering the heart of prayer,” the handout told me.

I left feeling renewed, inspired, quieted. 

(Photo: courtesy Arlington Catholic Herald.)

Double Digits

Double Digits

Comments 0 Comment

January takes its time. It does not rush. It dawdles. It sashays down the runway of months with all the model moves. The turn, the pivot, the pout, the graceful sweep. 

I don’t want to be rude, but get moving, Jan. We know your power — your winds, rain, snow and cold. We know what you can do. We know you have the days to do it in, too: a full complement of 31.At least we’re in the double digits now.

In my house the Christmas tree has come down, the decorations are boxed and shelved, the living room corner is dark and boring. 

Spring has been known to peek around the edges of February, but there’s one long month in its way. A month that feels like it should already be over. I’m talking about you, Jan.