Beautiful, beautiful Salluit
Today it is so beautiful here. The air is full of little tiny snowflakes. The light is fading fast. The world here turns a wonderful white as the light fades. Then the colour brightens to a pale white blue... then as time goes on the blue deepens. I never knew there were so many shades of blue. I often sit in my dining room, looking out my windows watching the light. It is rather like looking at an aquarium... very soothing. But also it so pretty. That view is one reason why I still live here.
Painters talk about the light in Tuscany and how wonderful to paint but they have never see the light of Salluit. I have walked to th e tops of these hills to take a photo of the same scene over and over. Once a crazy bunch of us went up in the early morning so we could see the sunrise. Aran has a great story of me thinking I could use the flash on my camera, in the dark, from the top of one of these high hills, and still have the photo of the village down below turn out. There are some concepts I just don't get.
It is so different not to see a tree in this scene. I had heard of the tree line but it was only when I flew up north that I realized it appears to be a line. There are pockets of trees for 30 minutes or so once you cross the tree line..little warm eco systems. Over Christmas I am going to have one of my children teach me how to transfer my photos to this site.
I have the last house in the village. My views are all of incredible scenery. I don't over look any houses... it is all earth and sky. From the upstairs I have a great view of the bay. It is so like Digby Basin... but no trees.
On the telly this morning they showed views of the Parliament Buildings in Ottawa. A bit of snow there. Now we don't feel so alone in Salluit with all our snow
We are busy practising for the Christmas concert. We are doing Away In A Manger. Because I have a student who cannot speak we are also doing it in American sign. I don't have the best voice in the world but after singing that tune 20 times a day, I am getting better. Tomorrow one of the teachers is going to video our rehearsal. That gave me a prefect opportunity to suggest a bath to some of the boys. I sent them all home with motel soap that I have collected over the past few years. Some even got shampoo. It is a delciate subject to suggest that they bathe but with the entire class doing it , no one should feel singled out. My ususal course is to ask the gym teacher to make the suggestion to the boys.
The gym teacher is not a fan of my class. Yesterday he told me I had the worst class in the two schools. A far cry from the report last week from a supervisor that they were the best class in Nunivik. Once I received that report my class was sooooooo quiet. Miss P wrote in her journal that they were all afraid of me. It is amazing what a dirty look will do. I read the riot act and sent home lines to be done and signed by parents. No one was allowed a drink today but by mid afternoon I started to warm up. They are kids and if you don't soften up with them then they will just give up ever getting back on my good side.
The Centre-Director and I entertained the staff room today with some wild dancing. The FM was playing ole 60's tunes. What a fun recess we had. That put a spring in my step.
That's it for today.. spend some time looking out your windows... what do you see?
posted by Pearl @ 3:00 PM
2 Comments:
my window at work faces due south, so on sunny days i can't have it open - because of the computer - but i have been thinking aobut changing my cubicle around so i can look out
there is a beautiful yellow building on the right of my window view - it is alberton's old courthouse, built in 1878 and i look on the long side - 4 tall skinny windows with rounded tops.
sometimes in the summer, when the sun is in the right spot, the peak of the adjacent house casts a triangular shadow between two of the windows - it sort of looks like a face with the windows representing eyes and raised eyebrows and the shadow nose
the building the graphic works out of used to be a fishmarket - the landlord is the president of the prince county fishermen's association. so out back he has a herring net roller - it's a big plywood box with a big metal spool and a long piece of pvc piping, just sitting and rusting in our parking lot
his lobster boat, Miss Andrea Denise, takes up most of my view - she is a modern fibreglass beauty - the design, i learned during one of my stories, is called a Hutt'44. cause the hutt brothers made her and she is 44' long. actually 43'11" - that's the longest you are allowed to make a lobster boat- who knew?
if i lean forward a bit,i can see a beautiful old birch tree - he looked especially splendid yesterday when we woke up to a beautiful shiny icing of snow
church street runs behind the tree - so there are cars (mostly trucks) coming and going - not many walkers - beyond church street is a big boarded up building - dean's flooring and drapery - i hear there is an old movie theatre in there - i just saw a long line of daycare toddlers go in - i don't know - yes i am curious
down the driveway beside dean's, i can see into bruce gallant's backyard - he is one of the few men who still can fix a net - he strings them between trees in his backyard and in the summer and early fall, i get to watch as he weaves the needle in, out, around, back and forth.
on cloudy days like this, he works in his shed on lobster traps - you can tell he's there by the light and the smoke coming out the chimney.
it's a pretty good view.
From the back of the house, in my bedroom, I can look out the sliding glass door and see the Episcopelian Church on a hill four blocks away, but beyond it, in the distance, are the Juarez Mountains and the northern part of the city, Ciudad Juarez. There are hills that cut off the next town to the west of Juarez from my view, but I can see Monto Cristo Rey, the Mount of Christ the King, which sits in the middle of the Rio Grande Valley as the river passes through the rift between the Juarez Mountains to the south and the Franklin Mountains to the north. With binoculars you can see the white triangular marker that marks the point at which the states of Chihuahua, Texas, and New Mexico meet.
If I step out and walk past the pool to the rock wall at the back of my yard, I can see the point at which the Rio Grande changes from being the border between Mexico and Texas to being the border between Texas and New Mexico. Our house is at about 4,000 feet of elevation and the mountains climb to a high point of 8,200. You can see that point by stepping out the front door. To the right are the West flank of the Franklin Mountains and to the left is the Rio Grande Valley and beyond it the mesas (tables) of the Chihuahua Desert. It is so flat.
There are many trees here, but they don't grow above four feet high under natural conditions. They are mostly mesquite, creosote, sage, and various cacti. This year we have had a lot of rain, more than 12" so far. The mountains are rather green and brown. In the last seven years we have had a drought and we hadn't received more than 6" of rain per year, and then the mountains were very brown. With the rain this spring we were treated to the sight of the wild poppies blooming on the Northeast slopes of the Franklins. It was a riot of yellow and red and orange, and with no trees to interrupt the view, they went on forever.
I miss the ocean. I miss the green of New England, but there is a beauty here that is hard to give up. I have become a desert dweller.
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