Savour - 2026

SAVOUR

I was inspired by something I heard in the barrage of New Year's Resolutions. That was, to forgo them and instead opt for a year guided by intention. Choose a word as a beacon for the year's intention, rather than a goal. 

At first I thought happiness would be my guide. Doing things that bring joy and mindfully opting out of screen time. Which led to the thought of enough; as in enough time for myself, recognizing when I've had enough.

After letting ideas percolate, I've decided to

SAVOUR 

Savour not only food and drink, but also the moments that bring me joy, the time with people I love. Intentionally carve out occasions and experiences to savour and the moments between to let it all deepen in appreciation. Savouring the bitter with the sweet.

Searching for illustrations yielded these graphics from an oline course about Savouring on Open.Edu

Marvelling, basking, giving thanks, luxuriating, being mindful. I think if I take this attitude cutting back on things that aren't so great for me will come naturally... so less screen time, eating better, being present will follow. Worth the experiment!

Collins / Definition of 'savour' Word forms: savours, savouring, savoured

noun
1.
the quality in a substance that is perceived by the sense of taste or smell
2
a specific taste or smell
the savour of lime
3.
a slight but distinctive quality or trace
4.
the power to excite interest
the savour of wit has been lost
5. archaic
reputation
verb
6. (intransitive; often foll by of)
to possess the taste or smell (of)
7. (intransitive; often foll by of)
to have a suggestion (of)
8. (transitive)
to give a taste to; season
9. (transitive)
to taste or smell, esp appreciatively
10. (transitive)
to relish or enjoy

New Year's Moon - January 2026

A full moon on January 3 makes it the first of the year 2026.

Headlines are calling this a Super Moon and Wolf Moon. Haven't heard many wolves calling lately but we do continue to spot the neighbourhood coyote drinking from our pond and trotting down the street.

This past month I was reading about Wu Wei and also discovered a poet from the Tang dynasty. Du Fu, or Tu Fu, who wrote thousands of verses (712-770). I want to read more about him and from him, because he seemed to embody the struggle between Tao and Confucianism.... effortless effort with nature and honouring the duties and realities of society. For now will share two translations of the same poem, Moonlit Night. Is it even the same poem, or is the title and imagery a coincidence? Translators and readers, both must take liberties.

Moonlit Night by Tu Fu Translated by Stanton Hager

Tonight, above Fu-chou, stark bright the moon;
At your bedroom window, you gaze at it alone.

Faraway, I ache for our little ones, too young
To recall Ch'ang-an or understand why I'm not at home.

I can smell your fragrant hair damped by mist,
See your jade-white arms chilled by moonlight.

When will we lean again on the same window,
Under the same radiance, all traces of our tears dried?

--Translated by Stanton Hager
in Huangshan Poems from the T'ang Dynasty
(Cape Cod: 21st Editions, 2009)

NOTE: In 756, during the bloody An Lushan Rebellion, Tu Fu lodged his wife and children in the town of Fu-chou, a safe distance from the fighting. On the way back from Fu-chou, he was captured by the rebels and imprisoned in the capital city of Ch'ang-an, where he wrote this poem..



Moonlit Night by Tu Fu Translated by Hawkes

Far off in Fuzhou she is watching the moonlight,
Watching it alone from the window of her chamber-
For our boy and girl, poor little babes,
Are too young to know where the Capital is.
Her cloudy hair is sweet with mist,
Her jade-white shoulder is cold in the moon.
...When shall we lie again, with no more tears,
Watching this bright light on our screen?


Five-character-regular-verse

notes: This poem dates from 756; Hawkes suggests that it was written at the time of the Mid-Autumn festival, when families traditionally watched the moon together.

A poem dedicated to his wife, Du Fu crafts sweet and sensory language to heighten the sense of longing between husband and wife. The focus of the poem on the moon already creates a sense of loneliness and of secrecy. Readers can infer the Du Fu is away in Chang’an while the rest of his family resides in Fuzhou, and that he and his wife had made deep memories in Chang’an before. In fact, during the An Lushan Rebellion, the two were trapped there for ten years, and naturally, shared many sorrows there together. His comparison of the naivety of his children with the painful truths of adulthood serves to further highlight his past sorrows. The poet goes on to describe the way in which the moon interacts with his wife, revealing his desire to be with her: the 香雾 (sweet-smelling fog) and 清辉 (cold clouds) could represent their relationship, with the moon seeming to substitute the way in which Du Fu would caress his wife. It is only the beautiful yet cold-hearted moon that connects the two.

2025 Theatre

Rogers vs. Rogers (Crow's) was my favourite play of the year overall. Amazing performance by Tom Rooney, directed by Chris Abraham, and adapted for the stage by Michael Healey. Abraham and Healey worked together to deliver The Master Plan. What I liked about both productions was the humour and satire in capturing relevant, local, transformative events. Some say this makes it difficult for the plays to travel to other jurisdictions, but I think the themes apply regardless. Plays like this keep me loyal to Crow's. What I also appreciate about Crow's is their use of the 'video floor/ video wall' to set the scene... it really helps with transitions and layering text, bringing an extra element.

My favourite director this year was Robert Lepage. The Far Side of the Moon (Can Stage) and Macbeth (Stratford) were both so incredibly staged. Set design is always one of my favourite elements, and his designs expand my perspective and feel like they are taking me to new dimensions.

We were lucky enough to attend a lot of theatre this year, the majority at Crow's. I can't say I always love the plays, but I do appreciate the calibre of the productions and taking creative risks with difficult subjects. I'll likely renew my subscription for the coming season.

2025

• Wights (Jan / Crow's) World Premiere
• I sat through Wights righteousness and relentless diatribes hoping things would improve. Most reviewers seemed to agree there was too much shouting and too much going on.
• 15 Dogs (Feb / Mirvish /CAA Theatre)
• I read the novel and was curious to see how the cast would pull off their canine characters. Well played. 
  
• Trident Moon (March / Crow's)
• Provocative staging of an imagined scenario taking place during Partition; it made me curious to learn more about the history of 1947.
• Did they try to save money by not using microphones and shouting a lot? I actually missed quite a bit of the dialogue as actors stepped on each others lines and some were so heavily accented. Surtitles would help.
• You Can't Take it With You (April / Scarborough Players)
• Love the dedication of amateur theatre.
• Flex (April / Crow's)
• My favourite of Crow's spring season was Flex; I was disappointed to see the theatre so empty.
• Team dynamics and a look at the added pressures of women in sport - perfectly illustrated when a player becomes pregnant.
• I wasn't sure what to expect, with basketball being played and the audience watching in the stands. Fantastic! Whether the basketball is sunk or not at the end dictates the ending, a nice twist.
• Comfort Food (June / Crow's)
• Some inter-generational conflicts around the ethics of food really became a metaphor of the relationship challenges between a single mother and her teenage son. Fresh bread gets baked during the performance, filling the theatre with a comforting aroma. At the end of the play, audience members get offered a slice of the bread, which wa a nice touch. If only there had been a stronger resolution between the two characters.
• Dangerous Liaisons (September / Stratford)
• Entertaining with the sexual intrigues and manipulations of the French court - the image of the guillotine dropping at close of the play was overwhelmingly effective. Echoes into this century.
• Macbeth (September / Stratford)
• Putting this classic into motorcycle gang rivalries and driving powerful bikes on stage effectively modernized the message. Timeless.
• Octet (October / Crow's)
• Clever musical about social media but a missed opportunity. The script could have been updated to reflect impact of Internet during Covid and recent developments in AI. Melodies themselves weren't all that hummable but it was an interesting device to have all lines sung; put a nice spin on individual voices and Greek choruses. 
• The Veil (October / Crow's)
• I actually felt a bit ripped off as there were so many great and grisly props lying about that never came to life. Expected a bit more horror in the telling, but still a great one man play.
• Far Side of the Moon (November / Can Stage)
• Wow! Amazing visual design. A bit of stage trickery made the actor really seem as if they were weightless in space. Seamless transitions & incredible set design. 
• Christmas Market (December / Crow's)
• Managed to portray predicaments of migrant workers in a way that brought deeper insight into their personal situations. Appreciated the diversity of the situations and points of view presented.
• Rogers vs Rogers (December / Crow's)
• Favourite of the year! Tom Rooney had no understudy for the entire run. I thought the play would hesitate to take risks due to fear of lawsuits, but it didn't flinch. From the program: "make no mistake, this is a satirical work of fiction - facts have been nudged, conversations invented, and reality adjusted wherever it proved inconvenient." Everything rang quite true, especially the facts shared about the Competition Bureau and falling competitiveness in Canada. Any coincidence with turning a blind eye to corporate giants' questionable tactics purely chance.

Little Free Library Divinations

In September 2023, Rob gifted me a Little Library for my birthday and it's been a source of joy and entertainment ever since.

I'm inspired by this post on the Marginalia about Little Free Library Divinations. 

One day during a challenging season of being, longing for something that would turn my spiraling mind outward, knowing that a daily creative practice has always been my best medicine and that constraint is the mightiest catalyst of creativity, I decided to try applying my bird divination process to the Little Free Library, trusting the lovely way our imagination has of surprising us and, in doing so, reminding us that even in the bleakest moments it is worth turning the page of experience because the imagination of life is always greater than that of the living.

Every day for thirty days, I took a random book from the Little Free Library, opened to a random page, and worked with the text on it, making no aesthetic judgments about the literary value of the books — self-help, airport romance novels, finance textbooks, breastfeeding guides, Lemony Snicket, Tolstoy, Ayn Rand, Harry Potter, and the Bible were all raw material on equal par.

As every creative person knows, and as Lewis Carroll so perfectly articulated in his advice on working through difficulty in math and in life, our most original and unexpected ideas arrive not when we strain the mind at the problem, but when we relax it and shift the beam of attention to something else entirely; it is then that the unconscious shines its sidewise gleam on an unexpected solution no deliberate effort could have produced.

After reading over the page, I would take a long walk to let the words float in my mind as I knelt to look at small things — pebbles, petals, leaves, feathers, and a whole lot of that great teacher in resilience, lichen — picking one thing up to take home. The words invariably arranged themselves unconsciously into the day’s… divination? koan? poem?… that always surprised me, always revealed what I myself needed to hear that some part of me already knew.

Upon returning home, I would place the found object under my microscope and take a photograph — cellular and planetary at the same time, itself an invitation to a shift in perspective — then begin laying out the text over the image.

An AI search of opening lines shows Maria Popova has borrowed the phrase
"To reach the infinite in you / awaken from your dreams of perfection" 

Song lyrics from the track "Awaken from Your Dreams" by the Canadian band Slocan Ramblers. The lyrics appear in the chorus of the song, which can be found on their 2019 album Ups and Downs. You can listen to the song or find official lyrics through music streaming services or explore their music on the Slocan Ramblers website. Turns out this is a Toronto-based bluegrass band. I love that!!

Also lines from a song titled "Wake Up" by Coeur De Pirate (Béatrice Martin), which was released in 2021 as part of the album "Perséides" [1, 2, 3]. Found the song, but the lyric phrase was not contained within when played.

When I dive deeper and try to find the songs on Spotify, can't do it! But I do like the artists this trail send me.

Moss gardening

I have long been fascinated by mosses and adored them on our visits to Japanese gardens. Planting my clover patch this past summer was an attempt to capture that feeling. 

Now I'm looking into how mosses could occupy more space in my backyard garden. Maybe I'll start with a small patch by the bonsai, maybe a container that comes inside for the winter.

Annie Martin's book Magical World of Moss Gardening is filled with inspiration and great advice on how to get started, and Joe Gardener offers a podcast with her as a guest. 

There is also the book Gathering Moss: a natural and cultural history of mosses by Robin Wall Kimmerer. A great interview with the author about her book on these green beings.5x15 stories.

Mosses are still active under the snow and can keep photosynthesizing through the winter. They were one of the first plant forms on earth. They are miniature forests and undulating coral wreaths.

Rose Moss

I am looking for moss bryophytes native to Ontario and will start in the spring by identifying mosses already present in my own backyard. I've been coaxing them along between the river stone cracks and will move other existing colonies from perimeter and fringe areas to a focal point or two.

I came across some great sites to help with identifying: Mosses of Ontario · iNaturalist Canada as well as Mosses Ontario Field Naturalists. Rose Moss/Rhodobryum Ontariense is native to Ontario and might be lurking somewhere. If not, I may be able to source at the local Moss factory.

So much to explore in this topic!

Indoor moss gardens

Moss Art walls