I am grateful for a hike to Troll Falls this morning with extended family.
I am grateful for an uneventful trip home.
I am grateful to be home here on the Island. It’s nice to get away sometimes, and it’s also nice to return. Win-win!
I am grateful to be in a place that’s pretty to photograph.
I am grateful for a multi-generational baseball game this morning.
I am grateful for time spent watching my kids frolic in a waterpark with their cousins.
I am grateful for one of the most decadent meals I’ve ever eaten.
I am grateful for a few too many cucumber gimlets.
I am grateful for this bed I am in right now, with a light that will go off within ten seconds after I post this.
I am grateful to be here at a fancy pants hotel in the mountains with my family to celebrate my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary. In this blog, I usually document some of the smaller things in life that I am grateful for – the little things that make moments worthwhile. When it comes right down to it, the relationship my parents have is something I am grateful for on many, great, big levels.
For one thing, I owe my very existence to the happenstance that brought them together, but there has been a lot more than happenstance that’s kept them together over the years, and I should know. I’ve observed the way they run things from a front row seat. One thing I’ve learned through their example is that relationships take work to succeed, and they’ve both put in that work. They do that work every day.
In so doing, they’ve crafted a way of being together that makes being together look like a good idea. For that example, and for their presence in my life for as long as I can remember, I will always be grateful.
I am grateful for a full day, painting for hours at the Central Gallery, then painting for several more at the Doubletree Hilton.
I am grateful for a visit from a buddy while doing so.
I am grateful for days spent downtown again. I love going there every day.
I am grateful for dinner with my family this evening.
I am grateful it’s bedtime. I am pooped.
I am grateful for a feeling of settling in on day 2 at the Central Gallery and Doubletree Hilton. I’m looking forward to spending a lot of time painting at these two venues this month. I was today at the latter, and I was in the groove for a while there.
I am grateful for time spent listening to Farley read Hop on Pop like a champ.
I am grateful for 2 big opportunities I started in on today. I have a number of paintings up at the Central Art Gallery in Victoria Bay Centre downtown, and I am the artist in residence at the Doubletree Hilton for the month of July.
I am grateful for the BBC Walking With series, where Kenneth Branagh narrates nature documentaries about long extinct animals created with CGI and puppet creature models. The boys and I watched the first two episodes of Walking With Monsters tonight, and I enjoyed it as much as I remember doing in the mid-2000s when they came out.
I am grateful for time spent with my family, my cousin, and her girlfriend at the Drag Ball, a pride event where drag queens play baseball against drag kings. We were all decked out in our finest rainbow attire, except for Farley, who wore his baseball uniform. It was casual, family friendly, and a fun way to spend a few hours on a sunny afternoon.
I am grateful for a front yard that offers a good view of fireworks on the inner harbour. It’s easy to entice people to come to our house, even at the last minute, and we see familiar faces from our neighbourhood every year who congregate to sit on the retaining wall to watch the show. It’s a nice way to enjoy them.
I am grateful for an early morning to catch the sunrise, first at Trafalgar Park, then at Kitty Islet this morning. I was there with my camera, taking photos for a commission. It’s nice to have the reason to go and be there. Especially in the summertime when it’s so early, there’s nothing like being out there while everyone else is asleep.
I am grateful for time spent building a quick and dirty ping pong table with Coop. I am also grateful for some ping pong with Coop. We improved over the course of the 45 minutes or so that we were at it.
I am grateful for more time with Coop, at Pizza Prima Strada, out for lunch while Farley and Julie were otherwise occupied.
I am grateful for the Harbour Cats Baseball Game the 4 of us took in tonight. We came back from 4 to 2 to 10 to 5 by the end of the game, and then there were fireworks. We walked to the baseball park and then back home. It was a great night, and I am grateful for the thought Julie had to arrange this all as a Father’s Day gift.
I am grateful for time spent with Julie this evening while the boys were at Auntie J’s house. We had each planned to do our own thing, but the rec centre we thought was open was not, and the studio was inaccessible, and so we both had to settle, disappointed, for something else. Something else turned out to be a quick bite at the Fig, and then the realization that the showtime lined up for us to go see Rocketman, and it was great.
I am grateful for art, because Rocketman was just that terrific for me – the kind of movie you go to all the crappy movies to see. Once in a while, you get an experience like that one, and you feel your psyche get filled up, and it makes it all worthwhile. Same thing happens with music, literature, visual arts. Art is something to be grateful for. Not all of it, but the stuff that works for one really, really is.
I am grateful for Auntie J. She showed our kids a great time. She makes them feel special and loved.
I am grateful for time spent with both my boys at bedtime. With Farley, reading a book about hurricanes he got from the library today; and with Coop, who reassured me he knows how much I love him and how great I think he is, after I emphatically declared this to him, possibly overcompensating after having seen the cautionary tale of neglectful fatherhood in the movie tonight.
I am grateful for a fairly easy day of hanging about, with a trip to the pool with the lads where we met some of their friends.
I am grateful for family fun night: my pick. We played crokinole.