Orysia Dawydiak

It’s Sunday night and my first week has passed – quickly!  My photos are from Battery Point, and the view from my window.  Because I’m mostly indoors and writing, of course.

Walking home from Salamanca markets.

Passing by Princes Park

And the view from my picture windows changes constantly.

From this……

to this.

On Friday I signed up for 10 fitness classes at The Studio in Salamanca.  I took the first one that afternoon, a brutal barre workout.  I was lucky I could walk home unassisted!  I stopped for a late lunch at a highly recommended tea room, had a lovely chickpea coconut soup and brought home a piece of carrot cake for later.  This cake was a little different from what I’m used to – a very thick coconut cream layer on top, and the carrots were raw as far as I could tell.  I ate a few bites later in the evening, but something didn’t agree with me and/or I caught a bug (heard that a nasty flu had been going around).  But by morning I didn’t feel too bad, so I joined a couple driving to Launceston, about 200 km on the north side of Tasmania, to attend a poetry festival for the day.  The poetry was great – entertaining and beautiful, but the hall was freezing and I ended up wearing my jacket plus the driver’s jacket, I just couldn’t warm up.  During the lunch break I returned to the car and took a warm nap on the back seat – I could barely keep my eyes open.  They woke me up for the afternoon program, also fun, and we headed back to Hobart.

Today is Sunday – it’s Thanksgiving weekend back in Canada.  I celebrated by joining a group of local writers at Gina Mercer’s home, all women as it turned out.  We sat out on her sunny deck and between nibbling on all the delicious treats provided by the group, we read poetry for dessert.  What an amazing variety of readings – about mothers and inheritance, childhood memories, visits to forests, human fertilization, looking back at Brexit from 37,000 feet in the air, potato varieties and pondering a glittery nasturtium.  I returned to my nest glowing, sated and ready to dig in to my project.  I also have a tentative date to visit Port Arthur with 2 or more chauffeurs.  And soon I’d better head off to bed for my 7 AM pilates workout Monday morning – I was signed up for barre, but decided to go with the stretch class instead.