Tag: blessed

Canadian Pacific Railroad Holiday Train.

The CP Holiday Train came to my part of the world today so I went to see. There are actually two trains – the Canadian train and the US train. This was the US train; on Monday it will begin making stops in the States.

This is the 21st year the train has made its journey to collect food and funds for local food banks. So of course I donated some food and money to our local food bank. The hook to draw people to the event is that a musical performer performs a short free concert at each stop. The performer(s) on this years’ US train is Alan Doyle (of Great Big Sea fame) and his Beautiful Band. The weather was not bad for the end of November – overcast, a light breeze, temperature about 33F or 1C.

I was fortunate to see the show, and fortunate to be in a position to donate for people in need.

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A tree for Achilles.

You may remember that we let go of Achilles, aka Chili Dog, earlier this year.

Our vet clinic is in a network which gives people who let go of a pet, buy and plant a tree in the pets’ memory. So there’s been an informal ceremony every October since the year 2000. The municipality generously allows this to happen in a public park. We’ve planted trees for BoJo, Kendal, and Stella. So of course we bought a tree for Achilles. I put in a request for specific species, a Red Oak (Quercus rubra), which is native to both Texas (where he and I came from) and Ontario.

The ceremony was today and it’s a fine October day – mostly sunny, cool, and breezy. I was very, very pleased to find a healthy Red Oak sapling tagged with Chili’s name. So we planted it. It was no trouble at all, just like Achilles was. It’s near Stella’s and Kendal’s trees.

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I may not live long enough to sit in its shade. That’s fine.

A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. -Greek proverb