About (Not) Writing – Blame the Month of May!

(Chaucer did, so why not I?)

Distractions! One of my favourite down-to-earth poets, Geoffrey Chaucer, put it most eloquently in the prologue to his book The Legend of Good Women:  after declaring his fervent devotion to reading books, from which nothing could waylay him, he confessed in lines 34-39 [non-rhyming modernization]:

“…except, certainly, when the month of May
Has come, and I hear the birds sing,
And the flowers begin to bloom–
Farewell, my book, and my studiousness!”

Well, like many humans, I do enjoy writing, “except, certainly, when” I also succumb to Chaucer’s distractions.  But it’s not just the birds and flowers. It’s living life! Here in a nutshell, in chronological sequence, are our two main wonderful distractions of May 2014:

– A trip from southern Ontario to Florida in a 2-seater Cessna 150 airplane:  It took us four days to get there (including one day of waiting just for the rain to get out of our way). We enjoyed a week in the “Sunshine State” with some inspiring people, visited Orlando’s SeaWorld and the Kennedy Space Center, and took two days of good weather with a strong tailwind to get back home.

– Becoming grandparents for a second time:  We are thrilled that we could at last meet our one-year-old grandson, newly adopted from South Africa, and welcome him into our lives and hearts! He and his wonderful big brother will surely keep us hopping!

In finally getting this post posted, I’ll say farewell to May with this poem from my Mindset book, and a tip of the hat to Chaucer:

In lengthening sunlight, snowdrops bloomed,
then vanished with the last of snow.
Now tulips– from my plots exhumed
by squirrels– in new places grow! 

Each Spring’s return with warmth and light
has for millennia been extolled;
the scents of blossoms still excite,
the chirps of birds, the rays of gold.

Now it’s June, and I need to follow my original intentions to explore connections in life, love, faith, health, and creative expression, to live life and also “get around to” writing about it.  But first, I better go dig out the weeds in my garden…