Glimmers

 By Maryanna Gabriel

This isn't my idea, glimmers. I heard someone else do this riff, and I have no idea who to credit it to, but I pass it on as a ray of hope. Like a crystal being held to the sun, glimmers are little pieces of happiness even when something is way off. The robin that lived in my basket of petunias has flown the coop. She was a glimmer. 

It means one may still feel contentment and flashes of joy, no matter what is happening. Victor Frankl, the renouned psychoanalyst, wrote of finding beauty and kindness, even in the death camps of World War ll. The glimmers kept him going. 

Today the sky is filled with smoke. I have no idea why. It could be from Washington, it could be from Kelowna, or it could be from Strathcona Park up the island. I swim with many who are playing on floaties, eating hotdogs, and paddling along on boogie boards. The air is caught in a warm bubble and the sky is an uncanny grayish white. The ominous colour and temperature is ignored in the summer play. Set in this apocalyptic eeriness, it is a glimmer, as my body revels in a summer swim. 

Searching For Home

 By Maryanna Gabriel

PRAYERS
FOR THOSE LOSING THEIR HOMES IN THE WILDFIRES 

"And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything."

 - Shakespeare, As You Like It

"Home"
watercolour
by Maryanna Gabriel

I suppose the question of home is a pervasive one with climate change, and the world either flooding, or burning, and where people are fleeing for their lives. Not good. 

After a great deal of thought and for numerous reason, I have sold my townhome. This has certainly stirred things up. With my family scattered, and my mother gone, I find myself asking what is home and what does the idea constitute, and how does that fit into who I am now? I sleep, and dream I am returning to my roots and memories held there, then I wake up and realize there is nowhere to return to. 

So, I have been travelling many miles, in and between the fires, looking through many cities. My poor protesting back. The upshot? You can take the woman out of the coast, but you can't take the coast out of the woman. Something about water and needing to be around it seems to have won out, despite the breath-taking beauty of inland mountainous regions and plains of this gloriously beautiful country.

Soon I will have to pack. But for now, I am just going to enjoy the calm asylum I have created as I slowly narrow the geographies. 

A Major Moment In Tanner's Books

 By Maryanna Gabriel

You can't just write a book. You have to do stuff around it. As if the writing isn't enough. 

One is supposed to be promoting and it was a massive part of my training when I studied for my MFA. A never ending natter in one's mind of course, and I often wonder how much is enough.

Yesterday, I walked into Tanner's Books, in the seaside town of Sidney BC (one of my favourite places with a wonderful magazine selection) and moved to the shelf closest to my heart, travel. I was staring rather happily at the Bill Bryson section, and scanned my way past something about lemon trees in Italy, when I just about keeled over. There was my book! Not just one. A bunch!

I am not sure if I ran to the front desk but I moved very quickly in that general direction. How did they get them???? We-eeee-e-ll, came the reply, someone asked for it, and then they decided to get several, the Camino being a popular subject. 

Holy smokes. One of those moments. 

They asked would I sign. Why yes, I would. That was before I made off with a copy of Alba Donati's, Diary of a Tuscan Bookshop. It wasn't until I got home that I realized my rather prolific publisher, Lesley Choyce, was pictured above with his most recent book, Around England With A Dog.

Next time. 

John Brierly

 By Maryanna Gabriel

"Will you stay awhile and lose yourself

in the tiny grove of holm oak...?"

- John Brierly

It is with great sadness I learn that John Brierly, the author of A Pilgrim's Guide to the Camino de Santiago, The Way of Saint James, a travel guide which he updated every year, has passed away, this summer of 2023. He finally succombed to cancer. It is like losing a trusted friend.

John Brierly

Every year John revised the guide, and his book with inspirational thoughts that accompany it, have been a light for many. He was a light for me. His contribution to the Camino has been enormous.

In a podcast this year, "Behind the Scenes of the Camino", he revealed that his daughter Gemma has been working alongside him. It is looking like she will be able to carry the work forward and will be doing the publications.

It figures he lived with his family in Findhorn for a time, a spiritual community in Scotland, and a place where I once sought refuge for a broken heart. May peace be with you, John.