Shortest days

It is July, midwinter--still getting used to that. We are past the shortest day, so someday soon it will be light by 7, but not now. I went to a conference in Dunedin, a far piece south of here--almost to the bottom of the South Island--last week, and it was even darker there, and colder, but nothing like Kansas cold. It was a university town--30,000 of the 110,000 inhabitants are students--and the oldest university in New Zealand (that's not that old...maybe 100 years? maybe a bit more?). I liked it, but really didn't get to see much of it because it was dark by the time we got done with the conference every day, and I didn't really have time to linger. Emily stayed in the boarding house at her school, and enjoyed it, at least for a five-day stint. Joseph held down the fort at home, eating nothing but chicken tenders and pizza, as far as I can tell.

The day after I got back was Book Character day at Emily's school, and I realized as I dropped her off that this is the Halloween equivalent here. They barely celebrate Halloween, and not at all at school, so I'd been kind of sad she was missing out on dressing up and parading around--but then they have this day, which is the culmination of Book Week (they have some authors come and talk to them--not sure what other things go on), when they get to dress up as a character from a book, and they talk about it for weeks, and come in an array of costumes, from casual (a bow and a book, and you're Matilda) to elaborate (I saw a girl in an enormous hoop skirt and wig struggling out of a car). Emily was Robin Hood's daughter. Don't ask me what book that was.

Joseph was off long before dawn this morning to a "fixture" in Auckland--that is where all the sports teams from one school go to another school and play all of their teams. Joseph is on the chess team, and looks a little out of place with all the jocks in their school track suits...then tonight, at midnight, he and a friend are going to the opening of the last Harry Potter movie. Complex emotions. I have no idea what his are. Then, Friday morning, he leaves for Greece and Italy, with his school Classics class.

My sister Sarah is here, hanging out with Emily during the day, as Emily is on the break between terms (she has three weeks). She has been here two days and is nearly recovered from the trip, I think. She and Emily and Charlie walked to Hamilton Gardens, a big park a good walk away, between rain showers yesterday.

We've got the basics of Manford's memorial garden put in, now, and I can see it out the living room window, where he spent his last month. There is a Japanese maple in back of the Buddha, but it is just a stick right now--and the flowers are barely there, but in time I think it will be lovely. I am working on some mosaic on stones at the hospice art therapy group to add one of these days.