I went on my annual trip to see the Christmas lights at Van Dusen Garden's Celebration of Lights. I took a short video of the dancing light show and though youtube tells me that Sony may object to the content, as the lights are set to the "Nutcracker Suite", I thought I'd share the video here while I can.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
November catch-up
Before my introduction to the “drabble”, or the project you see here, I was very keen on the idea of linked vignettes. “The Joy Luck Club” can be read as a series of linked vignettes. I like the idea because I don’t think that I have a novel in me to write – but I think that I could write a couple of related vignettes. I also like the idea of a theme being carried over the series, or where one idea is carried over between segments. Or even a concrete portion of the past segment represented in the new one.
A lot goes into being a soccer mom: carpooling, knowing where the fields are, cheering, scheduling and bringing the half time and post game snacks. As a child it’s easy to take these behind the scenes actions for granted but I know that at half time I always looked forward to oranges and after the game there would be Capri Sun juices and a granola bar. A few years ago I joined a women’s soccer team and it took me awhile to realize what was missing: half time orange slices! Refreshing and energizing, the whole team enjoyed this childhood snack.
Vancouver is a city that experiences a great deal of rain throughout the year. Considering this fact, it is not unreasonable to expect that the Vancouver Parks Board would build fields with good drainage and placement. This is not the case however, and often the fields are deemed unplayable and soccer games get cancelled. When I was a child playing soccer, games were rarely cancelled because of the weather and we played on the playing fields. Hell, we played a game in the snow – white lines are hard to see in the snow! Two games have been cancelled thus far.
The weather outside was frightful and I was outside in it. A typical Vancouver downpour: sheeting rain downward and sideways if the wind is right. My walk home took me through the dog park at Nelson and Thurlow, a nicely redesigned park with a walkway that I often frequent on my way to and from work. This particular evening I cast my gaze up and saw water droplets like stars caught underneath my umbrella. They were the size of the droplets that bejewel a spider’s web in the morning – delicate and beguiling, I didn’t notice the downpour quite so much.
Growing up as I did in Truckee, clear skies without much (any) ambient light was the norm for me. I could always see the stars shining brightly – though my constellation recognition was limited to Orion and the Big Dipper. Or maybe it was the Little Dipper? Still, I have always been able to spy Orion in the night sky. When I moved to Oregon, I took an astronomy class that took field trips for star viewing. When I moved to British Columbia, I had to range farther afield to escape the city’s artificial light. Seven stars, three points of reference.
The first time I made the drive from Truckee to Vancouver my mom came with me to help me get settled. My car, a Toyota Corolla All-trac, was filled from top to bottom – including bike and ski racks on the roof. We had just enough room for the two of us in the front and a small snack cooler under my mom’s feet. It was a masterful piece of packing on our part. We crossed state lines and international borders and as we drove along the hedge-lined mansions of Southwest Marine Drive, I felt like a small town girl. Goll-lee.
My first two years in Vancouver, I existed largely in the University bubble – I lived in residence for a year and a half of that time. It was easy not to leave campus, or only to venture out a few blocks to pick up groceries at the nearby Safeway. I dreaded driving downtown because I always got lost on the one-way streets, the traffic was fast and bus drivers scared me. For part of this time I even lived off-campus, renting a room from an older woman, but I didn’t explore much of the neighborhood. The city still overwhelmed me.
A lot goes into being a soccer mom: carpooling, knowing where the fields are, cheering, scheduling and bringing the half time and post game snacks. As a child it’s easy to take these behind the scenes actions for granted but I know that at half time I always looked forward to oranges and after the game there would be Capri Sun juices and a granola bar. A few years ago I joined a women’s soccer team and it took me awhile to realize what was missing: half time orange slices! Refreshing and energizing, the whole team enjoyed this childhood snack.
Vancouver is a city that experiences a great deal of rain throughout the year. Considering this fact, it is not unreasonable to expect that the Vancouver Parks Board would build fields with good drainage and placement. This is not the case however, and often the fields are deemed unplayable and soccer games get cancelled. When I was a child playing soccer, games were rarely cancelled because of the weather and we played on the playing fields. Hell, we played a game in the snow – white lines are hard to see in the snow! Two games have been cancelled thus far.
The weather outside was frightful and I was outside in it. A typical Vancouver downpour: sheeting rain downward and sideways if the wind is right. My walk home took me through the dog park at Nelson and Thurlow, a nicely redesigned park with a walkway that I often frequent on my way to and from work. This particular evening I cast my gaze up and saw water droplets like stars caught underneath my umbrella. They were the size of the droplets that bejewel a spider’s web in the morning – delicate and beguiling, I didn’t notice the downpour quite so much.
Growing up as I did in Truckee, clear skies without much (any) ambient light was the norm for me. I could always see the stars shining brightly – though my constellation recognition was limited to Orion and the Big Dipper. Or maybe it was the Little Dipper? Still, I have always been able to spy Orion in the night sky. When I moved to Oregon, I took an astronomy class that took field trips for star viewing. When I moved to British Columbia, I had to range farther afield to escape the city’s artificial light. Seven stars, three points of reference.
The first time I made the drive from Truckee to Vancouver my mom came with me to help me get settled. My car, a Toyota Corolla All-trac, was filled from top to bottom – including bike and ski racks on the roof. We had just enough room for the two of us in the front and a small snack cooler under my mom’s feet. It was a masterful piece of packing on our part. We crossed state lines and international borders and as we drove along the hedge-lined mansions of Southwest Marine Drive, I felt like a small town girl. Goll-lee.
My first two years in Vancouver, I existed largely in the University bubble – I lived in residence for a year and a half of that time. It was easy not to leave campus, or only to venture out a few blocks to pick up groceries at the nearby Safeway. I dreaded driving downtown because I always got lost on the one-way streets, the traffic was fast and bus drivers scared me. For part of this time I even lived off-campus, renting a room from an older woman, but I didn’t explore much of the neighborhood. The city still overwhelmed me.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
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