Trying to safe warm here and to avoid falling on ice. Also trying to avoid grumbling about the cold, so I snapped these photos of this morning’s sunrise. It is beautiful, isn’t it? (1)
So calm in that direction. Turning back into the house, I confront the pile of papers I will be marking this weekend (2). Also on the weekend’s agenda is a visit from one of our daughters, whose partner is heading off to Europe for a few days — she doesn’t get over very often and we’re excited about getting her to ourselves. (3)
We’ll start our day together though, Pater and I, with a yoga class. (4) I’m gradually getting back the range of motion in my shoulder and besides gently helping with that, yoga will remind me how to breathe. Very useful, that.
And in between yoga, marking, visiting, and breathing, I will be reading assiduously, trying to keep up with the reading I’ve assigned my students. And thinking wistfully of all the other books I want to get to. If you’re looking for something to read, you might want to scan my list of Books Read in 2013. (5) I finally got ’round to posting it on my other blog — only took me a full month of the new year! It’s much sketchier than I’d hoped, with most review/responses rather cursory, quite a few accompanied by no response at all. But still, we inveterate readers are always looking for what to read next and you might find some inspiration there.
There we are, then. I suspect I may be too busy with family and work to post much over the weekend. But I did leave you with Five Things this Friday and you might remember to breathe yourself, if you “embiggen” the photo below and gaze at the soothing shades of the horizon at sunrise. . . .
Bon weekend!
I am back at the Yoga Studio too as my neck was getting stiff. I am loving the controlled and focused breathing and the poses, except for the plank which is a real challenge, I feel so much calmer and have been sleeping much sounder as a result.
Sounds like you'll get to savour some Mother/Daughter quality time and that is priceless….enjoy.
It's really worth making time for yoga, isn't it? I'm just getting back to plank since my shoulder injury. Had even been managing a second or two of crow, but that's gone for now . . . good to have challenges, right?
Oh, the colors in those sunrise pictures, just gorgeous. Nature really knows her business.Well, I don't envy the paper marking, but do enjoy the visit with your daughter!
The marking is not bad, actually, an assignment I designed and I'm interested to see what they do with it. . . Hope your weekend goes well also.
Your seascape shots are always so calming and evocative-so appreciated (almost as much as Nola shots.) Glad to hear your shoulder is healing.
I'm glad you enjoy them — I do sometimes feel it might be a cop-out to post them, but they soothe me so. . . .
Such beautiful photographs Mater, thank you. Enjoy your weekend with your daughter.
I hope your back is feeling better. . .
Yes, beautiful. And bon courage for the grading, as we call it in Ca.
Grading seems such a tiny part of what I'm doing, really. So much feedback throughout these papers, more like a conversation with my students, really.
Beautiful calming colours in the sky and ocean. I may tackle some wall painting this weekend. Not nearly as exciting as watercolour painting, which I keep meaning to get back to.
Enjoy your time with your daughter.
Oh, me too! I just can't seem to make the time for the watercolours, but I do want to. . .
Your photos are such a treat – I am deeply envious of your beautiful position in the world, and so grateful for your sharing the beauty. I will probably embiggen them (serially) and leave them on my computer to come upon unexpectedly a few times this weekend And I am glad to hear that yoga is again becoming part of your life.
Again, so glad to hear of readers enjoying these photos — I feel so fortunate here that I do like to share. And are you a yogini yourself?
"Yogini" would be stretching it (sorry, that just came out); I practice sporadically but always return, after reproaching myself to stop expecting enough time to magically appear in my life and acting on every possible impulse to just do it when the notion occurs. I am toying with the idea of finding another class (my original superb teacher, a former editing client, selfishly went and had children and then followed more lucrative opportunities that are too far away for me to travel conveniently); perhaps just writing this to you will put another burr under my bustle. I hope so!
I suspect the writing will, indeed, get you back on the yoga track. Generally, something has to work its way up my consciousness so that I can find ways to fit it into my life. Writing is one of the last stages to making it happen. . .
Now I'm feeling guilty for using your other blog as one of my favorite book sources. Thank you for introducing me to Kate Atkinson, Kathleen Winter, Carol Matthews, Reginald Hill, and John Farrow. And for making me pull out my faded copy of Sheila Watson's The Double Hook (so much more satisfying now than when I read it as a callow undergrad!).
Marilyn! No guilt!! I'm so pleased to hear that my other blog is being read and might even be inspiring some reading . . . If you have time, as you read through some of the titles, I'd love to hear what you thought of them — even if the comments get left on old posts, I end up seeing them.
And yes, my opinion of The Double Hook has changed so much since I first read it — true of so many things, but especially of books we reread, it seems to me.
Your photos are wonderful and very soothing to look at. (As a matter of curiosity: What is the white speck on the horizon in the second picture – a building, a ship?)
I admire your relaxed/resigned attitude towards marking papers. I must confess that I hate it. I find it a waste of time which could be much better employed in designing better and more interesting classes for my students.
Have a lovely weekend!
Eleonore
The white "speck" on the horizon is, indeed, a ship — a BC Ferry to be specific, plying its way from Departure Bay here in Nanaimo all the way over to Horseshoe Bay in West Vancouver.
As for the marking, I do get into grumpy periods about it and I especially wish I could have my weekends free more than once or twice per term. But this weekend, I'm marking 4th-year students' responses to an assignment I designed, and it's been good to see how they're thinking their way through it, building on some solid analysis. Not quite as much fun as reading the latest Ian Rankin, but could be worse. . . I hope your weekend is lovely as well!
Can't I say "speck"? What word would have been better?
Oh, absolutely you can say "speck" — I was just using the quotation marks to show I was borrowing your word. That's exactly, what it looks like, a large speck on the horizon.
Gracias, profe.
I can imagine myself in one of your chairs as I visited your island long ago. To watch the seasons change in such a peaceful place is beautiful. I walked at Boundary Bay yesterday and the sea foam was frozen. Have a good time with your daughter.
Let me pull up a colourful chair for you — but you'll need your warm coat, and I'd better wrap a blanket around you — want a hot chocolate as you sit? 😉
Coming late to this. I hope your weekend went well – it certainly sounded like a full one. A visit from a daughter, a yoga class and that view must make up, just a little, for the pile of marking.
It was good. . . and with this extra day, it's not over yet. . . hope yours was good as well.