Always Discovering

I am reassured that, regardless of wherever I may find myself, who with, or what doing, I will never stop making learning things and making new discoveries. Here are some of this weeks:

1. this touching little note from the artist Georgia O'Keefe to her husband that makes me get more than a little choked up: 'fix your pillows nicely...'
2. A rediscovery of this song - it leaves me with goosebumps every time

3. The knowledge that no matter what, and in their own particular ways - whether it be my mum's garrulous hugs or my dad's silent arm round my shoulders - my parents truly are awesome.
4. That sometimes kittens are the only way to go.

5. Happy knowledge that Hilary Mantel isn't just stopping the story at Wolf Hall: we get to follow this through to the bitter, bloody end.

6. The story behind Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath: one of my favourite authors, sadly neglected in my bookshelves for too long, and the incidents that shaped a book. Which, in turn, had far more impact on me than Orwell's Animal Farm ever did.

7. Had you ever realised that the beech is the only tree to produce leaves that are leaf-shaped? As in child's-drawing leaf shaped? I hadn't until it was pointed out to me recently. I'm now staring at all trees to test the theory.

8. That my hair is now nearly long enough to plait and coil over the top of my head.

9. A book that keeps flagging up a major disaster about to befall its main characters will find itself placed firmly on the Top Shelf (where I keep the ghost stories, stories that make me weep and those I can't bear to read to the end of), and I'll root my copy of Jane Eyre out of the Teen's room to comfort read my way through the next couple of days.

So, I may not be American but these are the things I am thankful for. Oh, and the farm shop that sold plate-sized samosas thus solving my Friday afternoon "what the feck are we going to have for dinner tonight" panic.