Two Women in a garden, 1906
My summer happens in a minefield.
Excuse the somewhat violent analogy, but that’s how these unexpected detonations around me feel like every day.
I thought it was going to be a long and lonely summer, because my “happy chaos”, that is, my children and grandchildren, are enjoying a well-deserved vacation.
Suddenly “I turned my eyes to my own history” paraphrasing the poet Andrés Eloy Blanco, and I had flashes of myself many years ago: “finish your breakfast, brush your teeth, where is your gym shirt?, mommy, hurry up, the bus is dropping off, mommy, sign my homework, the car won’t start, I’ve left my lunch box, Leonor, the boss needs you in his office…”
Yes, definitely a well-deserved vacation, theirs and mine, my inalienable right to do nothing and, regarding this, I leave for the end a quote from my favorite philosopher.
The prospect of this lonely summer with the long days, almost midnight sun, well, worried me a little.
I always pride myself on having my loneliness tamed, the art of being alone and not feeling alone, but having lost a few years ago the “warmth of perfect company” as a poem from my distant youth says, sometimes it hurts.
Returning to the minefield, in these very long days of summer, out of nowhere, sometimes even before I get out of bed, these trepidations occurred in my spirit.
Kind gestures.
Those that conquer me forever.
Encouraging messages, calls, invitations to lunch, to share a glass of wine, to the movies, or to go for a walk, brightened my summer days.
Very soon, my happy chaos will be back. They will go back to their busy lives. I will continue doing as little as possible.
I leave you with the promised quote.
“The only problem with doing nothing,
is that you don’t know when you are done”
Winnie The Pooh
Leonor Henríquez (Caracas, Venezuela) Civil Engineer by training (UCAB 1985), writer and apprentice poet by vocation. From her time in engineering emerged her Office Stories (1997), another way of seeing the corporate world. Her latest publications include reflections on grief, Hopecrumbs (2020) (www.hopecrumbs.com) and “The Adventures of Chispita” (2021) (www.chispita.ca) an allegory of life inside Mom’s belly.
Today she shares her “impulsive meditations” from Calgary, Canada, where she lives.
leonorcanada@gmail.com