...brings May flowers.

The weather is more consistently sunny in May, my wardrobe is a little brighter and maybe my outlook too.  Soon I'll attend the evening entertainment as daylight hours run longer, nothing game-changing but just simply pleasant.  Here are some flowers around the West End.
I've visited smaller communities surrounding Vancouver: Steveston, Fort Langley, White Rock.  Just a brief visit for an afternoon, it feels like a breath of fresh air.  Proud of their history, mellow jazz quartet in the park, farmer's market on the weekend, easy walk along the promenade.  Sometimes I think I could/should settle in a community like that, but there's not a lot of services or employment available if I can't 'get by' on selling art alone (not that I've really attempted to do so thusfar).  Idyllic and cute, but at the mercy of tourist dollars - then again, much of Vancouver is too.  Maybe it's enough just to visit.  Maybe it doesn't matter where I am, given that I carry my "home" on my back.
I've been alone and with friends.  Had conversations both light and deep with people I see either rarely or often.  Good to bounce ideas off of, so thank you all for that.

I watched the trains come along the White Rock beach.  It sounded its horn from afar, and for a brief moment I felt the urgent pang from childhood raised by the tracks, that you must CHOOSE what side of the tracks to be on for the duration of the train passing.  The side with the beach, or the side with ice cream shops?! Whichever side we don't choose, all that it offers will be unavailable! I then thought how that's such a knee-jerk trigger when my adult sensibilities know I have plenty of time to mosey across the tracks before the trains arrival, and that both sides will be an option once the train passes, and this too shall pass. I can't recall at what age this shift in attitude came, and thought on that barring any life-altering event or recognised milestone we don't really notice growing up.

I still wave at the trains as they pass, in case the engineer waves back.  There's no more caboose at the end of the trains, just an electronic eye I suppose is for safety.  I wave at that too.