Enough to make a Sailor’s Trousers?

My Grandma used to say, look for a crack in a cloudy sky: if there’s enough blue sky to make a pair of sailor’s trousers, it would turn out to be a sunny day. Has anyone else heard this maxim? I took it far too literally of course, agonising over whether the dress pattern for the trousers would be exact size if you held it up to the sky, or to scale based on your perspective from the ground. In the end, I settled for the latter interpretation.

Sunday Blues

Sunday was a difficult day for me. As I wrote at the time, it was the 30 year anniversary of my mum’s death. And it was raining. The river was high and the current strong, as it was the night she died. A different river, a different country, but the same season and the same weather.

I took a drive into the Bohinj valley with my family. On the way I took the photograph featured above. My son and I tried to figure out if we could make a sailor’s trousers with that patch of blue. We figured probably yes. We visited a delightful church by the lake (more on this in a later post), but the rainclouds swelled and the rain fell faster. I dropped some wildflowers off the bridge and watched them being swept away by the current: the yellow standing out in all that grey-blue swirling mass of water.

Blue Sky Thinking

We came home, and there were another few breaks in the cloud through which the sunlight burst. Perhaps enough to make a rainbow: I didn’t see, as it would have formed on the far side of the house. I was feeling low. I did this meditation which I’ve recently discovered online. I managed to turn on the inner light, if only for a very short time. I went for a walk in the mizzle and saw the ever-present blue in a patch of sky if not quite big enough to make a sailor’s trousers, then at least big enough to remind me that it’s always there, beyond the clouds of my self-pity, doubt and blinkered understanding.

Today, the sky is blue again, or I should say rather that the rainclouds have cleared so I can see it. I feel positive. It’s a good day. They always come around, even if it feels as if they never will again.

May you find the inner light, even in times of seeming darkness. May you always have enough blue to stitch together a pair of sailors trousers in your mind!