bits of a life

Dear Diary, I believe in collecting the bits. I like scraps of paper, bits of fabric, broken stuff, little ruins, old birds nests, dried seaweed, shells, rocks, postcards. Over the years I have stashed away scraps of this and that. Some are pasted into books. Sometimes they are framed. Sometimes, they are laid carefully around my house.

I have seaweed from the beach in Placentia stuck in an old jar and it is as beautiful as any sculpture. I am not a junk collector. I am very selective about the bits and ruins I keep. I usually choose them based on shape, form, or colour, and I keep the pieces sometimes for years. It is amazing how an object can remind you so well of a day you spent, or a place you have been. How a piece of birch bark can help you recall that very day you gathered it, amonst so many days that you saw a birch tree.

Souvenirs, I guess they are. Not the dime store variety but the natural kind. In my bathroom I have a beach rock from Advocate Harbour, and shells that I picked up on the beach on the Aran Islands , off the coast of Ireland. I remember that day, finding the place so beautiful, and interesting. As I picked up the little shells, “I was thinking what am I doing here?”. Even though it was a good place, I had no idea why I was there. I felt a little lost. The big, rock and the tiny shells have been a juxtaposition in my bathroom windowsill for years. One says, you belong here, the other says, you have been there. Together they remind me that I am where I belong.

In my little office at the down town studio where I write sometimes, I pin up bits and pieces everywhere, freely, madly, in a wanton way…mmmm sounds risky. I also tear down the bits and pieces and renew whats on the boards a bit . I keep a stone in the corner, that has the word “truth” on it. Heather Lawson, a local stone carver did it and I picked it up last summer. It is now written in stone that I must tell the truth. I never lied much anyway, except to my kids about what I put in the Sally Anne Bag, but I thought it was a good reminder to a writer to tell the truth.

I keep a picture of myself as a kid, a little five year old girl in hat and sunglasses to remind myself that I am her as well. I keep a picture of my good friend Lily, who won “Principal of the Year” a few years ago, and I rouged the portrait from her son’s room when I stayed with her. My sister complains I do not have a portrait of her up there. I tell her there are too many of her( sisters). She goes on a bit more, in a way that makes it clear she could care less. I have a picture of me with my father in his hey day, when I was little enough to love with out question. I have newspaper clipping of my kids. There stands my life.

These important lovely things are there amonst the trash, papers, groceries, boots, scarves, and the necessities. They stand out, and wrap their arms around me and say,”this is your little life….guard it fiercely, love it grandly.”