Lots going on, all of it irrelevant. I was in Winnipeg - Gimli, actually -trying to get a grip on layers of memories. New memories were going on as I breathed, along with the irritating pain of my torn ligaments and succumbing to weariness (pain is quite tiring), along with catching up with some dear people whom I may not see again - or they me? It's not a race.

I came home in comfort and without stress, thanks to Air Canada wheelchair service - such nice people! - and life as I know it descended again in the form of mail and messages to respond to, unpacking to do, laundry to cope with, and groceries: all the normal domestic activities, plus, of course, finally a physio therapist to help me with my damaged arm. Did I mention the balcony? It's almost summer, I hope. My balcony is my summer home and it takes a bit of effort to get it up and running, especially with one arm. I'm very slow and weak. I hired some help to lift the furniture and I used my good arm (the awkward left) to wash the winter grime off the window sills and chairs and the tarps that covered them. Now I have to do a little paint touch-up, and - big job: bring on the plants.

The blog awaits. So does my work.

So just a little more about Gimli, still thinking and remembering. My grandparents gave my mother and father a summer cottage in Gimli for their wedding present, which they used well and to which they attributed their children's escape from polio in those years long before the Salk vaccine. I spent every summer of my childhood in Gimli. It is the regret of my life that I didn't learn Icelandic then but my mother wanted to be able to gossip with her sisters and mother without restraint. What little I did learn I learned by osmosis and by asking my grandmother questions. I wish I had asked more.

Gimli was indeed very different then: it had wooden sidewalks and gravel roads and an artesian well on every other street corner. My grandparents had their own private well behind the house. I remember I had two pails small enough for me to carry to fetch water from the well. Our cottage was two doors away from the Big House (my grandparents') with an uncle and aunt in between and another uncle and aunt across the street (and some cousins down the street in other cottages originally owned by my grandfather) - with lovely big open spaces where my brother tried to dig a hole to China and, more modestly, create a tennis court in the prairie grass.

My groceries have arrived. To be continued (if anyone cares).

I may have to finish this in the morning, but the greeting stands. That´s Icelandic for good night. I am iin Gimli, Manitoba, and it´s a long story.... to be told in the morning. I have a lot to assimilate.

.May 12:: So - morning, facing east across Lake Winnipeg from my bedroom here and the sunrise was beautiful. There is still ice on the water near the shore but the lake is open; I am told that the ice just drifted/blew? in yesterday morning. Full light now and my head is bright. My arm, however (shoulders, hand, wrist, elbow), is weak and aching and the soft pressure of my fingers on the keyboard rides up my arm and gives me pain - well, discomfort. Then, too, I am taking in too many impressions and feelings, too many to sort out and write quickly.

When they married, my parents received the present of a summer cottage in Gimli from my mother's parents, a long-lasting gift. I spent every summer of my childhood in Gimli. It was a fishing village cum resort then, founded by Icelandic settlers. As you may have surmised, my maternal grandparents came from Iceland. I learned a lot. I wish I had learned more. Mother discouraged me from learning Icelandic so that she could gossip freely with her sisters. I picked up a little by osmosis: a good accent, a few sentences, taught by my grandmother, that helped me with some grammar much later in life when I began classes and tried to learn the (difficult) language. When I was sixteen, Greek was easy; at 60-something, Icelandic was not. It's a difference synapse. The slightly better news is that it's good for an older brain to learn a new language (better than Lumosity).

I give you this background because present-day Gimli is vastly different from the place I knew as a child. After we moved East I have come back so seldom that each return visit leaves me stranded between past and present, at odds with memory. I have written a semi-autobiographical novel, arranged as a series of stories set in remembered pasts. Parts of it have appeared in various publications. I must try to sell it. (Story of my life.)

My arm hurts. I'm hungry.