Sister spring, Mother summer.

In my neck of the woods, when the phone rings after 11:30 in the evening, someone is dead/has died. My phone rang at 1:33 this morning and thanks to a bout of insomnia, my response time was lightening quick. "Who died?" "No one" "Thank God" "Are you okay?" "I am okay". The call, one transpired out of boredom and general inquiry on their part turned out to be rather enlightening on my own. In a breathy jumble, I found the words I had unknowingly been searching for for the past three months. I want the comfort in knowing that love--that loving and being loved--abounds. I want to wake up and rest assured as a self-aware and confident person; I want to know that I am a trusted friend and confidante.

This evening while standing on a deck barefoot watching Will BBQ the hamburgers we whipped up just minutes before throwing them on the grill, watching James inspect the growing pools of Atlantica in the garden with a stick, watching Bram cut MDF with a miter saw for his new dark room table, watching Marky eat scattered candy off the new table, watching heads bob in excited and muted conversation over the fence in Sam's living room, I felt good.

Rocking back on my heels to get a better view of everything, I just felt good. Good to be standing barefoot in a t-shirt on a Winnipeg deck, good to be laughing with friends new and old, good to borrow a free-range egg from the neighbors eating pizza on their own sinking porch, good to smell home cooked food, good to get childishly excited at the prospect of draining the fire pit, good to be alive in Sister spring, good to think of Mother summer as something TANGIBLE.

James and I took a quick walk to Foodfare to buy some cheese for our burgers and we both agreed it was a miracle we made it out alive once again. Winnipeg winters are not for the faint of heart. I dip my head sheepishly even as I type. While I managed to escape the first flakes and coincidentally the tail end, oddly enough this one proved to be one of the most difficult winters of my young years. Depression and reclusion nearly got the best of me after the turn of the new year, but those who know me best know that I operate on a fiscal year basis. The year truly begins in Fall and turns in Spring. Thus, 'tis the season for rebirth.

They (whoever they may be) say never to let the Man get you down. The Man took on many forms this year: Discontent, friendships that had run their course and the agony that went hand-in-hand with the severance; Melancholy, coming home from Barcelona with Kit and Rabbi and feeling like a vagabond over the holiday season; Deception, the act of deceiving a dear friend and accepting the fallout as my own; Separation, being left behind by gems moving onwards and upwards; so on and so forth.

With that said, all of these travails book-ended something good and whole, delivering me through a time of perpetual trial and error to the very moment of clarity that I had today, standing barefoot on the Mansion's deck. I am back. It is not as if I learnt nothing, for I learned aplenty. My love for photography became something severe and under the guidance of Scramwell and Creme, I hope to be up and developing by week's end. My love for food and cooking has also been nurtured and inevitably fed in the past three months. It is all I think about, really. My love for writing became much more than a hobby, it became a crutch and a friend when it felt like I had lost all others. These three hobbies alone were instilled within to be shared with others. All are potential career paths and if not, who cares. Lord knows the world needs more photographers, cooks/bakers and writers.

Despite everything, I woke up this morning to something from Drex even better than a fax. A letter penned free hand into a spiral notebook, complete with sketches of a chicken and his signature penmanship, scanned into JPG format and delivered to my email. The attached post script was a drawing of a man's face in the same said spiral notebook. Sheer brilliance that man. I have felt so inspired by my peers of late.

Over dinner a few evenings ago, the topic of Interesting Acquaintances came up and it was quite something to hear who was influenced and roused by who. I know one man who can build a wheel bare bones, three people who screen print effortlessly, at least six geniuses behind the lens, three party planners extraordinaire, two people who can fix shit ally bikes like magic, two brilliant DJ's, two people in French class, three dancers that make me weep when they move, two seamstresses that put Rosaline Rempel to shame, one man who can cook a feast fit for a king with one brick of tofu and a little bit of faith, one man who can sing me to sleep and doesn't even know it, at least ten insanely talented musicians, and so on and on and on. The list is endless. I have talented friends; the neighborhood has been a Mecca for creativity lately and I am into it.

I am back and feeling good.

Respects, Frances.