(SCROLL DOWN PAST THIS BLOG FOR TODAY’S POEM)
Well, today was a truly great day. I had a job interview and it went really well. It is for a job that pays much less than what I am getting, but I am very excited about it because I think it can take me places I would really like to go. The job will be working for the Edmonton Schizophrenia Society giving talks about mental health awareness and I will be able to sell my books in the places I go for the talks. There is some training involved but I think I will do okay. Once again I have to thank my wonderful Dad for putting me in Air Cadets because the Cadets put me through an entire Toastmasters Course plus I have other public speaking experience.
Other than that, I just kind of feel great to be alive. I have been getting out and meeting people, working a fair bit and I seem to have a lot of friends. This weekend I will be headed up with my good friend Tommy to Northwestern British Columbia to deliver a truckload of books to a property he has up there. It means loading the truck all day today and driving all day tomorrow, but I am really looking forward to it.
I don’t know if it has anything to do with it, but a few days back I went to YouTube and typed in ‘anger management’ and came up with a video by a very fascinating person. He was talking about how ‘angry’ people will go out, have something happen to them, place the blame on the person that did it and get angry. What he was trying to get across was that no one really controls their actions or interactions with others. Even if a person comes up to rob you, if you looked into what brought them to this position you might not hold it against them. Say the person was violently abused by someone and the only way they could escape their pain was through drugs and they were desperate to get any money before they needed their fix. Or you could also think that, what if this person had a daughter and some guy was holding a gun to her head and said, “rob the next person you see and give me the money or I will kill your daughter”. These are extreme examples, but quite often if one tries to find ways to not blame or get angry with people for their actions, eventually you go into a mode of doing that for everything. Anyhow, I will explore this topic in further blog entries. I am posting above a couple of photos of my last trip to Northwestern BC for your enjoyment. As a note, the ‘fishing’ video I made was also made on this last trip, as well as the picture on the cover page of my poetry book, “First White of Winter Poems”. Enjoy, and don’t forget to check out my book pages!
Edmonton
A part of me always flies away
Each year when the north winds blow
That part of me longs for warmer climes
With the impending threat of snow
It isn’t at all that I don’t love this land
And all she gives to me
I just want to feel the gentle hand
Of warm west winds and the sea
And so each year I save and save
And it is truly worth each sacrifice
Then for a few precious weeks I leave my cave
For the wide Pacific for a lofty price
There really is nowhere like Hawaii
With her surrounding deep blue waters
I hope those islands last a million more years
And is there for all our sons and daughters
But once one has left this frozen rolling plain
For some reason they dream only of returning
There is something that always makes me come back again
Some deep kind of loneliness and yearning
Perhaps it is the crystal sky and stars
A thousand million out each night
Shining, pulsing Venus and Mars
Undulating sheets of northern lights
Either way I can’t leave my home for long
Even for my beloved deep blue ocean
At least I return renewed, refreshed
From a little travelling motion
It’s hard to say what keeps me here
When the tropics treat me so well
Maybe I am doomed to serve
In this summer paradise; winter hell
Leif Gregersen
November 7, 2014
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