So awhile back I got into doing them again and signed up for the daily puzzle via email, and doing the puzzle each morning has become a habit for me, something I do as I sip my morning apple juice. When I finish I check my time against the average time it takes fellow puzzlers to complete it, though I’m not really in a hurry.  For me, it’s more of a zen thing; I just enjoy the process.

I was musing yesterday about the process I go through to solve these puzzles; I like completing all the edges first, then putting into place the pieces I know will fit right away. I can’t tell where the rest of the pieces go at that point, but I try a few here and a few there as I go along, and eventually I can see clearly where the remaining pieces go. I know all the pieces will fall into place, it’s only a matter of time.

I thought about this in regard to my life. There are some changes coming up that will be challenging for me, and although I have a plan, I can’t see where all the pieces will fit yet or how they will come together. But I know they will eventually, and I feel confident that all will turn out as it should, however that will be. I think of that now when I complete one of these small puzzles, so in addition to being a diversion, it’s a comforting reminder, too.

So take a few minutes and try one of these puzzles today on me; I’ve used one of my own photos for a 67-piece cut. Enjoy!

Some of the comments I’ve seen referring to this unfortunate event stated, “This is why I’d never go on a cruise.” I can understand that attitude, but as someone who still plans to go on a cruise someday, all I can do is hope all goes well with my own trip; this would not deter me from going (though I’d choose a different cruise line, given this cruise line’s history of accidents and incidents).

I was thinking of the stories of some of the passengers; there were couples celebrating anniversaries and on honeymoons, a couple on their first cruise as a gift for their many years of volunteer service, people celebrating birthdays, so many happy occasions. The accident happened just a few hours into the trip when many were having dinner or enjoying a show. There were some injuries, but most survived; the unfortunate ones who did not were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I thought about this, and how I’ve been lucky enough to escape death or serious injury in the past, such as when I was hit by a car at age 12. A woman ran a red light as I hurried across the street to catch a bus; I was flipped up and over her car and fortunately escaped with only a few bumps and bruises. But had I been one more step in front of the car, I likely would not be writing this blog entry. I’ve had other close shaves, such as many of us have probably had, being very close to a lightning strike, stepping on a snake and thinking it was a hose, driving and skidding out of control on a patch of ice, for example.

It’s just luck or serendipity that we survive these incidents, but when I read of tragedies such as this and other horrifying events in the news each day, I am thankful to be alive but also cognizant of the fact that life is so very short. I feel a sense of urgency to get on with things I’ve planned to do, but also to create something worth leaving behind when I’m gone, before my chance to do it is snuffed out.

The British often admonish one another to “get on with it,” and in light of this realization that time is precious, that’s what I’m telling myself today.

My divorce was finally final (it was supposed to have been final several times since last summer, but there were snafus along the way, mostly clerical errors) last Tuesday. I didn’t know this until I called the courthouse on Friday to find out how things were coming along, and it was then I received the good news that everything was final at last.

Relieved, I sat for a moment taking it in, then made a phone call and then informed my now-ex-husband that we were now officially divorced. Then I went back to my work. But as I sat there working a slow feeling of pleasure began to build, and the sense of freedom and the knowledge that I was truly myself again, my own person with my own given name, was making me happier than even I thought it would.

It’s not that I think divorce per se is a cause for celebration and rejoicing; it seldom is, I feel. But that quiet satisfaction (and yes, a little inner rejoicing) that something that needed to be taken care of was now completed, was over, at long last, was very gratifying indeed.

As soon as I could I set about changing my name around the web, but it’ll take some time to change it where it counts, for official business, so to speak. No matter; I have it now, and that’s all I wanted. Me. Myself. I. Older, but made new again, starting over, and happy to be doing it. Life is good!

But there’s one resolution I thought seriously about making this year; blogging daily. I was inspired by the WordPress Project 365 idea (366 this year, being a leap year). I read this article last week and have been weighing it in my mind ever since. The idea is to blog daily about one thing for the entire year. Could I do that? What could I say of interest on a daily basis, and what topic would remain interesting enough to me to keep blogging about it? What about photos? I had considered a daily photo with a bit of written elaboration, a common but effective blogging technique. I’m also painfully aware that I post so irregularly and so seldom that it’s hard to maintain a following of readers, and I wanted to improve my blogging habits.

But Project 365 is more of a bite than I care to chew right now. I have several other things I want to work on, and I can see as I get busier that my posts will likely become more infrequent and less interesting each day. So I’ve amended Project 365 to Project 52 — much more manageable. For the next year I will post something each Sunday throughout 2012. I may post other things at irregular intervals, but the Sunday post will be a given.

2012 seems a year of hope; I’m looking forward to whatever challenges and pleasures it brings. May this new year bring hope to all of us.

I decided to put some of them together in a video, rather than posting the pictures individually. The first half contains pictures taken in Southwest Portland a couple of weeks ago, and the second half contains pictures taken last weekend at Mount Tabor Park on the east side of Portland.  Mount Tabor Park sits atop the volcano of the same name; the cinder cone is extinct, and is part of the Boring Lava Field, upon which Portland was built.

Anyway, the fall colors here never cease to amaze me. Watch and enjoy!

I’ve spent a fair amount of time in all four quadrants, but had only traveled to North Portland once, in the evening, so this area was pretty unfamiliar to me. However, last Sunday, on returning from the airport, my daughter and I took a series of wrong turns and found we were on our way to NoPo. We decided to go with that; I had long wanted to see the St. John’s Bridge in person, so we chose to cross it as we continued to wend our way home.

On the way to the bridge we traveled through the center of the St. John’s neighborhood and were charmed by it, and we decided to return soon to have a better look around.

So yesterday we spent the afternoon in St. John’s, walking about the neighborhood center, enjoying people enjoying their Saturday. The children were being treated to an early trick-or-treat afternoon by local businesses and the streets were happy and cheerful.

We stopped in at Starbucks, where it was busy; the tables and counters were crowded, with everyone using a laptop or netbook, plus there were trick-or-treaters dancing in and out. As I carried my bag with an apple fritter and started out the door, a tiny boy came through the door first and demanded of me, “Trick or Treat!” I smiled at him and told him I didn’t have anything for him, but there was a big basket of candy just over there on the counter, and his face lit up as he smiled back.

We walked across the street to the park; no sooner had we sat down when we noticed a parrot walking on the low wall behind our bench. I got up to take his picture, but he kept sidling away:

I followed him a bit and then stepped around in front of him and asked, “Would you hold still a minute while I take your picture?” He stood very still for about 15 seconds:

I snapped the picture and said, “Thank you!” and a moment later he began screeching loudly, “HELP! HELP!” I told him I just took his picture, it was nothing to get excited about, and soon his owner, who had been conversing with a group of people nearby, came over, told him he was all right, and the bird gratefully hopped up on his shoulder. I watched as they walked away, the man continually talking to his parrot, who seemed enthralled with everything his owner had to say.

At that moment I turned around and saw a good view of the bridge from the park. Yesterday’s fog had never lifted completely, and though the day was sunny, the hills across the river were misty, and the bridge, rumored to be haunted by the ghost of a 15-year-old girl who was murdered there, looked eerily mystical:

(do click on this picture to enlarge it)

With that, we worked our way back to the car, stopping into a bookstore and a market/cafe along the way, then drove down the east side of Portland and back home through downtown. It was a nice afternoon, and it reminded me that of Portland’s 95 designated neighborhoods, there were still probably 40-45 I hadn’t yet visited, but those are for other weekends to come…

These are the last tomatoes that were still on the vines; they ripened up nicely, particularly in the warm, dry weather we’ve been having.  I harvested them this afternoon, and then tidied up the container garden for autumn, emptying pots and stacking them and getting the deck swept just before I felt the first few light sprinkles of rain.

I realize there are crops I could have started in late summer, but I haven’t had enough time to give this garden the attention it deserves. Well, let’s just say my priorities had changed and unfortunately the garden is what got short shrift. In spite of my spotty attentiveness, however, most of the plants did quite well and I consider this experiment a success. I’m not sure what I’ll do next spring, though; I’m leaning towards doing  just herbs in containers. Several of the vegetable seeds I planted needed much more space than I could give them; if I have more space one day, I’ll likely try again.

Anyway, soon the fall rains will be here in the Pacific Northwest, and I was glad to be able to get everything emptied and cleaned up. I love the rainy season here, but the deck would have turned into a puddly, muddy mess otherwise.

It’s been so warm here that it hasn’t felt like fall yet, though that should change tonight. Some of the leaves have begun to turn, but the extremely dry weather has just made them look brown and tired. I’m hoping the rain this week will help perk up the rest of the leaves and that we’ll have a beautiful autumn like last year.

As I swept the deck and the accumulated dust and dirt swirled around me, I stopped now and then to appreciate the cool breeze that promised change was in the air. The sky was changing, too, from the bright summer blue of earlier today to a mixture of layered clouds and patches of pale blue as the sun was getting ready to set. It’s a time of transition, and for me it reflects the transitions in my own life, changes that this time last year I couldn’t have imagined. So there’s a particular sense of satisfaction, and closure, in watching summer give way to fall this time around.

I hope all are appreciating the change of seasons…

Aren’t they beautiful? They’re pomodoros, of course–Italian tomatoes, good for salads. Then I sliced them:

The flavor is very good indeed, a little better than those I’ve bought at the store (am I prejudiced or what?); how satisfying eating tomatoes from one’s own plants!

I would like to take credit for having grown them, but actually they’ve grown more in spite of me than because of me. I haven’t always watered the garden or tended it as I should lately, but things seem to have grown out of sheer stubbornness anyway, which makes it seem all the more miraculous to me.

Just amazing!

We saw this young cat on the stairwell outside, and my daughter urged me to put food and water out for him. He ate and drank ravenously and then made himself at home on our patio, napping behind the broom in the corner. He stayed most of the rest of that day, and when we fed him again, he purred and nuzzled our hands and expressed an interest in coming inside our apartment. It didn’t take long for us to decide to invite him to stay, but a bath and a trip to the vet were in order first. The kitten that looked tan and brown before a bath was actually white and grey, and despite his cheerful demeanor was quite ill, infested with four types of worms and possibly feline AIDS.  Thankfully the AIDS test was negative, and a round of antibiotics and deworming medicine, plus a special nutrient-rich diet, improved his status considerably. The vet said without treatment she’d have given him maybe 2-4 months to live, so he now had a new lease on life. She also said he was about 9 months old, so counting backwards would have placed his birth date sometime in October of 1998.

Now that he was well, he began living life with a vengeance. Always ready to play, always ready to eat, his energy level was exhausting. He was full of fun and while he was too active to be a lap cat, he sometimes stopped long enough to cuddle next to us and purr for short intervals. Unfortunately, his being active and endlessly curious nearly caused us to lose him again.

While bringing in groceries one bright breezy winter day, the door to the apartment had not been closed firmly and a strong breeze blew it ajar. From the window I could see Kittle poking his head outside, and called to another family member to close the door, but it was too late. He darted away and we ran after him, calling and coaxing, but the sense of freedom after living in the small apartment was too tempting. He ran and ran until we couldn’t see him anymore, though we looked everywhere we could think of for hours afterward. When it got too dark to see, we gave up and were sad about the loss of our Kittle, and planned to look again the next day.

Later that night he appeared outside the front door, but when we put out food and water for him he scampered away. We were encouraged that at least he remembered where we lived and that maybe he’d return again. We didn’t see him the next day, but the next night I saw a paw reach up and scratch at the screened window, and when I opened the front door, he meowed and came inside. We gave him a bath, over his loud protests, and he never again tried to run away. We also made sure all doors were closed securely from then on.

He seemed deliriously happy to be home, but over the following months, and particularly when we moved to a new house in a quiet neighborhood, he began to brood and spent long hours perched on the picnic table on the screened porch, staring at the woods out back. He seemed perfectly well, but it occurred to us he might be lonely. My daughter acquired a new kitten from a litter at her boyfriend’s family’s home, and Kittle perked up immediately, making it his job to show her the ropes and also give her a hard time, all in fun, of course.

Over the ensuing years, because we had plenty of room and rather soft hearts (and heads), we acquired more pets; first another abandoned kitten, then a puppy, then a pet store kitten, then two tiny puppies, bringing our total to 7. The Kittle was our elder statesman who presided over all, and the rest of the pets always appeared to respect his status in the household. He was happy and healthy and active and very much loved.

However, after years of good health, he developed a growth in his mouth, which seemed to come and go at first, but then it stayed, and because he didn’t show any symptoms of illness and didn’t complain about this growth which surely must have been bothering him, we didn’t even notice it until one day we were playing with him on his back, and as he opened his mouth to play-bite, there it was. How long had it been there? And then it would go away again. We were getting ready to move across the country and we would have the vet see him there. When we did, the news was grim. The treatment, even if we could have afforded it, would only prolong the inevitable. He had oral cancer, to which cats usually succumb quickly. We grieved at that time, but were determined to make his life as happy as possible for as long as possible. So for the past year, he has still been king of the household, still playful, with a good appetite, still affectionate and did his best to keep himself clean, though it was getting harder as the growth began to bleed regularly.

We read that when it’s time to make the decision to help a cat pass on peacefully, he’ll let you know.  In the past few weeks our Kittle has slowed down considerably. He eats very little now and no longer feels like playing. He spends most of his time lying in a corner nest of boxes, which affords him some privacy and a quiet place to rest. The other cats and our dogs sense it’s best to leave him alone. He has lost a considerable amount of weight, and his quality of life is now very poor. It’s time.

So I called last Friday to make an appointment for him with our kindly vet. At 11:30 today my daughter will be taking him to the vet for the last time. He’s been such an important part of our family for such a long time; he will be greatly missed. May our dear Kittle rest in peace…