Red Riding Hoods

Barbara: Yesterday, Deb and I fell in love. He’s a sexy beast, tall, rugged, soulful eyes. But he’s not afraid to show his soft side too: he loves to give warm kisses and lay his head on your shoulder. We won’t even mention here that his kisses are tinged with green and he sometimes shakes his head in a particularly goofy way when he gets nervous, gums all flapping and nostrils flaring (that only happened when he first met us, before he understood on a visceral level that we were meant to be the best of friends).

Our new boy-crush is none other than the tall, dark, and handsome Red.

Red!

We had the great privilege of meeting and communing with Red thanks to the lovely, kind, and sincerely sweet Mary-Jo—who you’ll know from our comments section here. Jo lives not far from us and invited us on a very special excursion to meet her new horse. She picked us up at Deb’s house, then drove us the half-hour or so to the stables where Red lives and where she visits him on a daily basis.

Mary-Jo!

The stables? Okay, more elegant and certainly cleaner than my house!! Yeah, they are that good. Jo explained to us that she met her own personal “horse whisperer” many years ago and now follows her to whichever stable she is at. I think Jo has the best of all worlds at this place. And Red too.

The stables!

He is loved here and gently guided and nurtured. For some reason, he won’t budge for many riders. But he and Jo clicked at first sight back in December of this year. You’ll see in these videos how literally “unmoved” he was with Deb and I. In fact, if you look closely, you’ll see his eyes going all soft and sleepy—like he’s enjoying a good nap while we beg and coax.

Jo was a bit embarrassed by her horse’s, um, lack of performance, but she needn’t have worried. We were in his thrall. He impressed us with his light feet and agile gait while Jo took him around the paddock. His hair is glossy, his features fine and elegant. The fact that he only wanted to nuzzle us and look deep into our eyes was icing on the cake.

Afterward, Jo took us to this adorable little café in the woods where we ate a truly delicious meal and enjoyed the clean air. While Red may have been the star in our little get-together, make no mistake, we fell in love with Jo too. As dear and sincere in real life as she is here in our virtual neighbourhood, we were thrilled to get to know her better, share stories, and relax in her lovely, loving presence.

Lunch!

Friends!

Deb: Red is my new boyfriend. I love him and I think he knows it. Wow you guys, what a lovely day we had. He is such a soulful beast and Jo is the most engaging and laidback gal. I had known her previously in a few social settings so it was lovely to see the very core of her on this day. It was one of those days that you know you are going to do again. It really made me wish I had continued my early 10-year-old horseback riding lessons. I had a really traumatic experience and it frightened me from riding. Not from horses, but from riding. But Red, sensing my need to—if you will excuse me for this—get back on the horse ... made me want to. 

Madge Comes To Town!

Barbara: In our lucky blog-world, we haven’t had just one close encounter with a blog friend, but this week we will raise that number to three! We met Madge yesterday and will meet Mary-Jo on Thursday.

Madge is a LA-based blogger/writer and you’d know her well from our comments section here. Madge set herself an incredibly ambitious and exciting agenda—and we were happy to be co-collaborators in her big plan. She decided to take a kind of Artist’s Journey of discovery, a cross-North America tour, meeting bloggers and fellow writers that she’d connected with online, but didn’t know yet in “real life”.

Madge in Cabbage Town

Deb: First thing that struck me was how much I loved Madge’s speaking voice and I told her so. It is so interesting when you are blogging back and forth with people with just the typed word to represent them.  As we always refer to it as the writers “voice”, it is so wonderful to hear that voice out loud.

In The Beaches

Barbara: Exactly! So we spent the day with her yesterday and decided to make it an “explore Toronto” kinda day. When you show a newcomer your hometown, there’s always that double-edged thing of wanting to show it off and also wanting to see things you might not always get a chance to see yourself. As luck would have it, the weather was glorious and we were able to make several lovely stops as well as having a good drive around the parameters of the city.

Deb: The day was about getting to know each other with a backdrop of Toronto. Toronto was the forth character and it rose to the occasion on this warm, sunny spring day! In movies Toronto usually plays other cities in the world, but today it was Toronto. Outside of spring construction everywhere, it did us proud.

Barbara: We picked Madge up at her west-side hotel, then drove along the lake to the east side where we had lunch in Leslieville. Then we drove down to the Beaches, where we took a relaxing walk along the beachside boardwalk and then along the boutique-filled streets of Queen East. Then we drove northeast and discovered Cabbage Town (the largest collection of Victorian-era houses in North America). From there we drove over to Yorkville, which is Toronto’s downtown high-end area (with the Chanel, Escada and Tiffany, etc, boutiques). From there we went over to Casa Loma and took pics of the beautiful castle that a devoted husband—Sir Henry Pellat—built for his wife in the early 1900s. Then we went southwest back to Madge’s hotel’s district and enjoyed a yummy dinner and drinks on a rooftop patio.

Deb: At one point we were kinda feeling guilty about not taking her to the CN Tower. Barb and I had discussed it previous to the day and had no interest in going up again as we both have a height thing.  But ever the good hostess, Barb brought it up. Madge had NO interest (thank God!) and said that what we had shown her was right up her alley, so ... whew.

Barbara: When all was said and done, we’d managed a pretty good overview tour of the city and also gotten to know each other a whole lot better. It was a beautiful day of laughter, chat, sun and sights. Thanks, Madge, for making this a great visit and a great day!

Deb: I think it is just a fantastic idea this artist journey of yours, Madge. Thank you for your warmth and generosity. So lovely to meet you. Bon Voyage. 

(Barbara: Sorry, girls, my pix sucked, so these photos are all courtesy of Madge. Thank you!)

Coffee And Kate

Deb: The best part about doing a blog is undoubtedly the connections we make. Of course we do the blog to express ourselves, but it’s the connection with the people who follow our blog that gives it its life. Otherwise we are simply talking in a vacuum. So what happens when it goes one step farther and we find ourselves connecting on another level? We already experienced it in our Skype with Shalaka and yesterday we had Coffee and Kate! Live, and in person! Kate was technically, the very first follower of The Middle Ages and as she generously said yesterday, “I immediately followed you to encourage you. If people don’t get followed, they don’t keep it up.”  And why would they? Hell, I’ve been blogging from the age of ten. It was called a diary.

Kate has her own wonderful blog which is wonderful and personal and full of charm. Kate already felt like a friend these last two years. Just a friend we’d never met. But face to face is good for a friendship right? So we set out to meet and it was lovely, lovely.  I had no trepidation at all about meeting Kate. I knew it would be easy and it was. There was no fanfare, no awkward pauses. And you really know that someone is a true friend when within five minutes of meeting them, you are talking about vaginas. And the second way you know someone is a friend is when it just feels awful to say goodbye.

Come back soon Kate!

Barbara: Yes, Kate (aka Stubblejumpin’ Gal, etc etc) is a Saskatchewan native (a beautiful Canadian prairie province) and it turned out that she had business in town. She suggested we meet for coffee and luckily our schedules allowed us to do that! It was like a lovely breath of fresh air to meet this wonderful person in real life. I know people are very often not what you expect when you only know them from their online “personas”, but—and maybe it’s because Kate is a Prairie gal—I went to coffee expecting her to be exactly as she seemed on our blog and her own. I did entertain the possibility that she might not be, but that was more a vague question about my own perceptions and expectations. I wonder if any of you have had similar experiences of meeting people you’d only known from social media and what it was like when you saw them in real life? Because there was Kate, as if we’d been meeting for coffee every week for several years! And, like Deb said, there we were talking about our most private lives like we’d just been waiting for this chance. It’s another amazing example of the world in its most intimate smallness. Thanks, Kate!

Kate: Yesterday was the first time I've met "internet friends" in person, so I did wonder whether it was possible that we would have nothing to say to each other, awkward moments, or even be just plain disappointed if each other was not as expected.

But our meeting, from my very first glimpse of a smiling Deb in front of the bagel shoppe, felt so completely warm and natural, as if I was seeing long-lost friends. There was instant recognition and affection and I enjoyed every moment of our chat. It was all so easy! and of course was over too soon.

You are both lovely, lovely people and I feel absolutely blessed.

x's and o's,

Kate