Small moments...

Hibiscus Orange in Our Front Yard

Cello looked up at me, his eyes that other worldly blue, but still with intent. He walks very carefully next to me these days as I struggle with balance but he never deserts his unsteady friend of almost 16 years. That glance from  small creature to old woman caught my heart. Such an old story, this rush of gratitude to another species who does not turn away, but today, Cello brought me to language. Everything around me of beauty, of kindness, of shared endeavor, of color and wind, is a word to my heart.

Walking with Debolina and Oishik 

Friends, some I have known the whole time I have sojourned here like Beth and Pattie and Leslie and Louise and Daniel and others, new and deep, brought to me on the waves of La Professoressa's engagement with students, like Debolina and Oishik who must return to Calcutta very soon, deep new younger friends, like Maddee and Maddy, sitting with me, talking, living thoughts, my glimpses of the future. Michelle, like me, a traveler here, an old friend who too soon will return to her other home in the cobbled streets of Cambridge, coming and going, carrying intimacies. Maria and Maureen too soon to leave for the streets of London and the Welsh mountains.  I will stay put now. Too tired to bridge the oceans and because of this, every word, every touch of shared life, every talk into the night, opens the heavens to me. Every shoulder I rest upon is like Cello's gaze.

La Professoressa, the Gardener, the Bringer of Life

And the woman who for all these years in this new land of mine has held me in her arms, in the joy of life, looks down at me and says, "You will not leave me until you have too,"

Walking with Cello With My Mountain Climbing Sticks with Cezanne and Zola in My Heart

Thank you, Dovey and Libby, for Capturing Cello and Me in Action, March 2016

     Walking the Anglesea beaches in the early winter days of April here, with stratas of time watching the finite way of an old woman, so happy with the possibility once again of walking, with the Antarctic Sea bathing the shore with its cold and so unknown waters. Grateful to the thin strong walking sticks that give me the security to step out, that keep me anchored in the firm sands. Walking without the fear of falling is like running with the wind for me. If like me, you have fallen several times and fear it happening again, try these supports that breath adventure. I walk mountains, flat mountains, but always stunning new terrains, even in my home.

Today I turned over the 9 boxes of the Australian Jewish Democratic Society, the oldest progressive Jewish group in Australia. that I had prepared for their lives as an archival source to Sivan and Larry. Here on these new shores I have used my LHA honed grassroots archives skills for three collections: that of the first published Yiddish poet here in Australia, Pinchus Goldhar; the AJDS collection going back to the 1980s and the Women in Black Melbourne Archives, to be given, hopefully, to the  State Library. The day closed with meeting wonderful young scholars and activists, Max and Jordy. All expressions of the other Jewish community,the anti occupation Jewish voices. My time here has been enriched by these pieces of paper bearing testimonies of persistent struggles against Fascism. All kinds of histories hold me up here, of the land and of the  inclusive human spirit struggling for change.

Reading all I can about the friendship between Cezanne and Zola, their comradeship of the exiled. I have an opera in mind--The Home of the Refused. Vastness of thought, of how to counter the growing violence, on the streets, in the human heart, the unacceptable once again exploding into our social worlds. The bohemian spirit grows in its tenderness amidst struggle and its dedication to telling human stories.

Vastness of My Vistas Here, Now. The Mermaid Pool, a Swimming Spot Formed by the Tides