Saturday, July 17, 2021

Crows and Snowbirds

 Early this afternoon I got an email from my friend at work (well, it wasn't to just me. She sent it to everyone...). But I take some of these 'all staff' emails personally.

Snowbirds will be taking off from Vancouver airport at 3pm – flying over hospitals to honour Healthcare workers.

 

Take Off YVR: 3:00pm  - If you can look up around then and say a prayer.

 

The flyby will be done at 1000 feet above the ground.

I popped over to the Surrey Hospital around 3, sat on my lawnchair and waited. 


























(I always have a folding chair in my vehicle. You'll never know when you need a seat in the wild.)


Also in the back of Mitzi is my basket of orange rocks...


























So I placed one. 


























My chair was facing south-west as I assumed the Snowbirds would be coming from Vancouver. 

But nope. I was very wrong. 


All of a sudden they were thundering overhead, coming in from directly behind me. 


























I heard them, looked straight up, and pointed my camera in their general direction, hoping my camera would capture what my eyes were having trouble focussing on. 





























I was surprised by my spontaneous reaction. Tears. 


What the heck. 


By the time the flyover was done (I'm guessing it took less than a second), my cheeks were soaked. 































I packed up my chair, put away my camera, and drove past the Cancer clinic where I'd logged a goodly number of hours last year. 


























I'd been with a friend earlier this week, (one of my many friends who've broken or sprained a bone in the last month) and while we were trying on hats, she told me about her mom, sister, grandma and aunt who'd all died from breast cancer.








































How did I get so lucky? 
(Also this week, I was shopping with my mom at a very lovely new home decor store, and in talking with the store owner, found out that her sister had just been diagnosed with breast cancer. Sigh. One in eight. Feel yourself.)

ANYWAYS, I drove back to my home office and read another email from Dede... 

I just had a woman come to the front door. She had been out walking and found a little dead crow in our parking lot. She asked for my help in moving it off the pavement.

 

I grabbed some paper towel and gently placed it under a bush for final resting.  The woman thanked me so much and started to cry.  Her best friend is indigenous and is right now out of province, gone to bury her daughter.    They are part of the Crow family.

I prayed a blessing and was able to pray for her and her friend.


So after work, I drove over to the office, to place a rock and say a wee prayer for the Crow family :




































































From there I drove to Abby to spend the evening with a friend from 400 years ago (and her husband who's a creative, enthusiastic cook) eating pork tenderloin and pasta and talking about our kids and wondering about our parenting abilities and chatting about our Covid year and dreaming about retirement (hers. Not mine. I'll be working til I'm 70) while sitting outside under their grapevine arbour, slapping at mosquitoes. In other words, it was a perfect summer evening.  

Just a regular day, filled with emotions and work and play and people and laughter and tears and birds and rocks. How lucky am I? 


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just saw this tweet:







Amen sir. TOUCH UP YOUR LOVED ONES.

Three things I'm thankful for:

1. Compassionate co-workers.
2. Friends from forever ago.
3. I didn't die from breast cancer. 

Be safe, wash your hands, take care
xo

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