Friday Photo Shootout, with 59 minutes to go.

The photo on the left shows the  Rocksalt Anthology group, who read their poems at the Poetry Gabriola Festival last week. I borrowed (?) the picture from Facebook, where Kim Goldberg (that's she at the front of the photo) had posted it. Such happy faces. This week's topic, Faces and Smiles, was suggested by Sarah.  For more Friday Photo Shootout posts, just click on the big camera in my sidebar.

And the 59 minutes? That's how long I have to wait before my ferry leaves. I came went to Vancouver today - on the 8:30 a.m. ferry) to visit my son, this being his day off, but I wanted to get back to Nanaimo in time to do WordStorm (remember WordStorm?) We decided I would have to catch the 3 pm ferry, which would get into Nanaimo at 4:35, lots of time to go home and have supper and then go to WordStorm for 6:30. However, by time I came by ferry to Horseshoe Bay, caught the bus downtown, and then caught another bus to where my son lives, we only had an hour and a half to spend together before I had to do the route in reverse. I could live with that. We went  to a Thai restaurant for lunch and spent an hour catching up on each other's lives, but then it turned out that the bus going back downtown was re-routed due to construction, so I got to the connecting bus stop three minutes too late to make my 2:07 connection to Horseshoe Bay. The next bus (the 2:20) was five minutes late, and in the end I got to the ferry terminal at precisely 3:00 p.m., ten minutes too late to catch the ferry (they cut off ticket sales 10 minutes before sailing.) So here I sit, enjoying an Americano at the Blenz coffee shop, watching for my 5 o'clock ferry to come in, reading Margaret Atwood, trying not to be too annoyed about being here when I could just as easily have hung around with my son for a couple of hours more. Okay, an hour more.

I sent a Facebook message to David Fraser, my connection at WordStorm, explaining my situation and asking whether, if I don't get to the theatre until 7 o'clock, I might still take part in the open mic (which doesn't actually start until then). Then I scrolled down a little on his page and saw that on the 22nd, he was sending messages from Mazatlan. Hmmmm. So I sent a p.s. that read "Never Mind." If he has returned to Nanaimo, I hope he'll find my message before he goes to WordStorm. If not, I'll just have to take my chances. I do have the poem in my bag, so I can have Robin pick me up at the ferry and drop me off at the theatre without going home first.

All this is to let those of you who don't live on islands know that once in a while, the situation is less than idyllic. ;>) - especially if you don't organize very well.


Oh, and this means I'll be having ferry food for dinner, folks. Pray for me.

Later:  Well, the boat ran half an hour late, so I didn't get to read my poem, but I did tell my sad story to the emcee, who suggested that I get on the list for January, as there will be no WordStorm in December. I told her I would be in Hawaii in January, so we settled on February. Then I sat down and listened to the poets and musicians  - first, the open mic folks, and then the three featured performers. They were all very good, all very different. Speaking of faces and smiles -This is Dinah D,the last of the featured performers, who made me laugh so hard that my stomach hurt. She lives on Gabriola Island. I think I have to move to Gabriola.