Marguerite, listening to stories

She belongs to a knitting group that meets weekly in a coffee shop and sometimes goes out to a movie or an art exhibit afterwards. This time the event came to them, as seven people from a local writing workshop performed excerpts of their stories in the very coffee shop where the knitters were meeting. Sue and I joined a couple of other Blippers for lunch, a very wet ramble, and the reading. I was drawn to the light in Marguerite’s hair, how it haloed her.

It seems to me that meeting with like-minded people is more important to all of us now than it has ever been. As we hear news daily of the appointment of extreme right-wingers to lead government agencies, the anxiety among us grows. The man who will be in charge of the environment doesn't believe in global warming, the man who will run commerce is against unions and a living wage, the man who will lead housing and urban development appears to be suffering from dementia, and the woman in charge of health believes medical treatment is a privilege the poor have not earned, and so it goes. It was comforting to gather with friends, to watch women knitting, and to listen to stories about coming of age, capturing a big rat, and stacking wood with a lover.