Miracles

It's been unusually cold in the past few days with drizzling rains and even threats of snow flurries - wintry by Adelaide standards, late autumnal by ours but bleaker than usual; and leaves still cling bravely to branches of many trees I can see from my window. Daylight saving ends today, so it will be dark an hour earlier tomorrow and we will know that winter isn't far away. Perhaps Wendy's condition is adapting to the season and she is preparing to hibernate. She is sleeping more of the time, drowsy and dozing off after each meal. Her oxygen saturation readings have been lower lately too, in the low 90s rather than the high 90s which probably explains her drowsiness. I offer to read to her from Bill Bryson's latest book, or Alexander McCall Smith's, but she isn't interested: it requires concentration and she doesn't have any to spare. So I put on a CD of one of the Dave and Morley stories from the Vinyl Cafe, the one in which Dave finds a little sprout of green leaves of a plant growing in the mess that has accumulated on the floor of his car, nurtures it, and it grows into a tree. Morley thinks it's a sumac, but it's an ailanthus, the Tree of Heaven, and when Dave and Morley carefully transplant it to a corner of their back garden it could and probably will ultimately grow to a height of 60 feet. I want to say this is one of my favorite Vinyl Cafe Dave and Morley stories but I have so many favorites the list is longer than the handful that leave me cold. Stuart McLean is indeed worthy of the accolades he's beginning to accumulate; his latest book, just out, isn't more of the stories but a haphazard collection of remarks (many from the opening moments of his weekly radio show); and some of these are wise, funny, even occasionally profound. I thought Wendy had dozed off towards the end of the story about the tiny green leaves on the floor of his car that grew into a Tree of Heaven, but she didn't, she was listening with her eyes closed. I'm happy about that, because this story is a rather lovely celebration of the miracle of life. Even though her life is approaching it end, Wendy and I can still celebrate the miracle of life, and the miracle that brought us together 55 years ago.