river dreams

Today is overcast and cool, such a change from August’s heat. I heard a climate analyst talking on the radio a few weeks ago and she said we should remember this as the coolest summer of the rest of our lives. It hit hard. I already knew the hardiness zones in Canada have been updated. And as someone who has lived in the same place for more than 40 years, I’ve seen this shift in what’s reliable, what isn’t. As I look out my study window, I see a few more dead cedars in the woods. The old ones are surviving, with some distress during the droughts, but the young ones are dying.

I am dreaming of rivers, their waters, their meanings. In late October, we are travelling to Portugal so I can explore some of the paleolithic art in the Côa Valley. We’ll stay in Vila Nova de Foz Côa and visit the 4 sites (out of 90! But most aren’t accessible to the public) I’ve been reading about for the past year. If you visit this site regularly, you might know that I’ve been weighing and pondering the possibility of returning to university to do the degree I was planning as a very young woman: anthropology. I was sidetracked in my early years because the courses I took were taught by guys who weren’t very welcoming somehow and my English and Classics classrooms were the ones I felt most comfortable in. This year I have been dreaming about the road not taken or maybe the river not navigated, as so many of the places I’m interested in are located on rivers or in river valleys: the Côa, which is a tributary of the Douro; and the Vézère, which is a tributary of the Dordogne. So yes, I’ve weighed and pondered and I came to the conclusion that it’s too late for more formal education. I don’t want to leave home for extended periods and I don’t have the confidence that a classroom is the right place for me. At least not right now. I’m open to change! But I’ve been sourcing many of the textbooks I’d be studying and I’ve been reading monographs on specific areas, on timing, and I am quietly excited about this whole pursuit.

Oddly, it fits with other work I’ve been doing, though I would find it difficult to explain exactly how and why. I set up an informal dye space on an unused partly-covered deck earlier in summer.

I don’t begin a dye project with an end result in mind. I am interested most of all in the process, of immersing my own thinking in the dye pot as I place prepared fabric in rose madder or indigo or — tomorrow!– marigold. What will I learn? About colour, about the body of imagery and symbology I carry in my consciousness as surely as I carry memory, DNA, and even hope? Often what I find myself seeing in the results are rivers, grasses, the interior of abalone, though to be honest, would I have noticed that myself if my friend Amy hadn’t looked at 5 meters of indigo-dyed linen spread out on our guest bed and told me that was what I’d produced? I don’t know.

As the strands of planning come together (still in the early stages, though a flight is booked, an International Driving Permit ordered), I am dreaming of rivers, the Côa, the Ribeira de Piscos, the Douro, dreaming in indigo, rose madder, marigold. O Rio que me Leva, the river that takes me away.