In My Garden

For some reason I fail at growing fall flowers in orange and gold. I plant them, for that late blast of colour, but they die, or malinger and die, or bloom but die over the winter. Perhaps they suspect I don’t actually like those colours very much. Instead, I grow reds and some soft pink that reminds me of spring, with a few shots of blue and purple. And then I make it all up to the oranges of the world with pumpkins for Halloween.

Maureen

Writing Through Illness

I’m recovering from the longest cold I’ve ever had. It’s a good thing I work from home, because I haven’t been working, and it would be hard to explain to a boss why I needed a month off for just a cold.

My brain was too fuzzy for writing, but as I recover, I have moments of clarity. A writer and friend and valued reader suggested changing a novel I’m working on from third person to first person, as a way to add emotional intensity (which I’d asked for her advice on).

I changed the first chapter, just to see, and liked how it pulled reader-me deeper into the character’s experience. So I changed the entire story. This was the only writing I had brain enough to do – changing pronouns – although sometimes I’d hit more that needed to be reworked.

In my mostly-not-working, I’ve discovered the solution to the second-last-chapter problem, and know exactly what I need to do to reshape it. I haven’t quite the brain power to do the full rewrite, but I’m working on it, slowly, slowly.

And I’m slowly working through some other problems I wasn’t sure how to solve. As I poke along, the answers are revealing themselves.

I’ve found this before, in returning to writing after an illness. Sometimes I find a new clarity about what a story needs. I try to think of it as the gift of the illness, so I have something to appreciate.

Maureen

Fall Harvest

Friends and family helped pick apples in September. There were fewer this year because we knocked down a bunch when we were banging off snow in a wicked late summer dump. We lost some apples but saved the tree. We have more wee pears than we could possibly pick – many are too high for us – lucky squirrels. But we ran out of steam, too. There were a few apples we couldn’t reach, the most beautiful on the tree.

Now we’re making applesauce and testing pear recipes. Pear and raspberry, and pear and blueberry isn’t worth the bother of cutting up the little pears. Straight raspberry or blueberry is easier and at least as tasty.

But pear compote with rosemary? That’s a winner! Dark and full-flavoured, it would be perfect with brie, which I can’t eat, but is also just fine with feta cheese. Mild cheddar is too bland, but a strong cheddar might be heavenly. I’d like to try it as a spread in a roast beef sandwich, too.

Next up: apple sauce, and apple slices frozen for winter pies and crisp.

Maureen