WHERE WERE YOU IN ’72?

It’s post Christmas.  There are only a few more days of 2022 left to go, all of the eating, drinking, and being merry days have been observed.  The tightness of my waistband now has me thinking about a New Years resolution.  In no time at all I will be leafing through garden catalogues and dreaming of spring; that is the rhythm of my life.

There is one more day – a personal one – that is mine alone to reflect on, though.  I normally keep my thoughts to myself about it, but this year marks a significant anniversary and I feel that letting it slip by unacknowledged cheats history (well, my history at least) of remembrance and honor.

This week - Friday, to be exact – marks my 50^th wedding anniversary. 

I know.  I know.  Besides being totally preposterous, it’s also nigh on to impossible.  No one as young as I am (26, as a matter of fact) can have been married that long.  But in a world where most people do chronological math 50 years have elapsed since a ridiculously young girl and her Prince Charming spoke their vows and happily departed a small country church believing in ‘happily ever after’.

It was a pretty wedding.  My bridesmaids carried bouquets consisting of a lit candle surrounded by holly, and wore dresses of red.  My mother designed and sewed my wedding gown.  My cousin drove all the way from Calgary to be an usher and then drove back the next day because he had a date with his own sweetheart for New Year’s Eve.  Because it was winter and right after Christmas there were several people who couldn’t come; I remember phone calls of well wishes interrupting all the preparations, and the feeling of being swept along in more tradition and ritual than I had known existed.  

And, possibly feeling like I was in a little over my head? 

From my position of age (still 26) and wisdom, here in 2022, I’m going to speculate that this is all pretty normal wedding day reaction to the momentous step a girl is about to take when she puts on her wedding dress.  It’s overwhelming – just sayin’.

Of course, what no one knew that day, or what no one knows on any given day, is that ‘happily ever after’ has different expiration dates for different people.  Ours was two weeks short of six years.

It is all so long ago now.  So much water in the river of my life has flowed under that bridge that if there weren’t two children born during those years it would be easy to think it didn’t happen at all.  I refer to that period as ‘in my former lifetime’ because that is how distant and dreamlike it seems to me now.

You can say everything happens for a reason, or you can just say that shit happens – both are true.  I’ve refined it to “there’s something to be learned from everything that happens”. 

I had little choice but to learn and grow.  I had kids to raise and life to figure out.  Some friends dropped away and others appeared out of nowhere.  Eventually I got to the point where I could believe in happily ever after again so when Prince Charming 2.0 came along I was willing to take that chance.  In February he and I will mark 40 years – apparently our expiration date was meant to be much longer.

I didn’t write this to trigger sympathy.  It’s not a time for long ago condolences or focussing on the sadness of events we can’t control.  I just wanted to share my reminiscing of a day that probably only I observe. 

If you were there too, dig into your memories and enjoy a slice of that time and place.  If you weren’t, go back and visit your own wedding day - have some fun with it.  You never know when your time is up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MAKING A LIST …..

Here I am, ten days out from Christmas, and duly procrastinating my precious time away.  That’s what I do, and I’m darned good at it. 

I’m not sure if this is a natural, inherited ability or the years of practise I’ve put in.  I suppose it could be both.

At any rate, let’s set the stage: Like I said ten days till Christmas Eve – in our family that is the day of the big gathering and the most food.  Kids and grandkids begin arriving on the 23^rd – the decibel level will go from Grandpa’s-TV-is-too-loud to five-over-excited-kids-the-day-before-Christmas-loud and stay there until mid Boxing Day when they all head home again.  It also means three large dogs hopefully tiring each other out and sleeping a lot.

I am hosting the family feast this year – only 23 people on the guest list so we may only need two tables … note to self – need to pick up the extra table.  I have the menu mostly nailed down … note to self – need to request pickles, Carols’s barley salad, and desserts for the folks who don’t like Christmas pudding.  My first batches of cookies have already disappeared so that needs done again.  I froze and hid the tarts so they make it till the big day.  We also require a third batch of poppycock.

It's also been requested that we test the airbed to make sure it holds air this time.  Some people are so fussy!

Of course, in order to stay on top of all this I rely on my secret weapon … I make a list.  Well, actually, I make several lists because I can’t always find the one I started with.  In searching for something else in my desk clutter this afternoon I found my original and got to cross a couple things off.  The rush of accomplishment was so great I decided I could take time off to write an entry in my blog so I added that to the list and shelved my hunt for the letter from Revenue Canada.  What could possibly go wrong with putting that off?  On second thought, better add that letter to my list.

Lists are tricky things, but they are necessary; take my current situation – my goal is to be ready to host Christmas but my list keeps me on track on how I’m going to accomplish that readiness.  I started it in November because I knew there was a lot to do and I’m aware of how easily I can be side-tracked when the next thing on the list is ‘clean out the fridge’. 

I also succumb to the illusion that merely writing a task down means the job is half done … or that ‘cleaning the porch’ means that ‘decorating the porch’ will magically happen by elves in the middle of the night.  I washed the floor two days ago, the banister still has no holly or tinsel, and the floor is dirty again.

And then there are the jobs that weren’t even on my Christmas radar.  I know that we were waiting for the butcher to call and say the beef is ready but when the call came this morning suddenly that meant we had to clean out and rearrange our storage capacity to fit it all in.  I’ve let the over-zealous food provider I’m married to deal with it for the time being.  Hopefully the weather stays really cold till the kids can take their share home after the holidays.

My scribbled up and scratched out list still says I have beds to make up, air bed to test, totes to store downstairs, a whole forest of house plants to put into suspended animation so there is room for humans in this house, one more gift to wrap when it arrives, and more baking to do.  Oh yeah, and a fridge to cleanse.

And meanwhile, here I am, writing a blog that wasn’t even on my list.  Procrastination is an art form.

 

WHOLE CLOTH

A church is a good place for meditation, even a former church.  In fact, I don’t know that you can actually take the ‘church’ out of a building.  I was at the decommissioning of Knox United, I know that the formalities of ‘unchurching’ were done, but between the architecture and my memories it will always be a place of sunny meditation, favourite hymns, and the warmth of sharing that space with others in an aura of fellowship.

And so, I found myself meditating on Saturday afternoon in the sunshine of those south-facing windows, under that vaulted roof, and singing songs that I love.  We were there to honour and bid farewell to a well-loved lady, and the diverse crowd assembled showed just how far-ranging Dosy’s inspiration had been over her 90 years.  In her homily Michelle spoke of how we are to use our talents throughout our lives and then went on to list the many ways everyone present had benefited from Dosy’s life.  I know I did; she was my co-worker, then my boss, but most of all she was my friend.

My meditation didn’t stop with Dosy though, it opened the door to thinking about the many others in our little hometown who have also shared their time and talents to expand and enhance the community we enjoy.  There are many.

I’m a hometown girl.  I’ve lived all but six years of my life here.  In a world where most young people leave to seek their fortunes elsewhere my choice was to stay.  I don’t know if it’s just the way my brain works, or because I am here to witness it, but sometimes, when I’m talking to classmates or other friends who did move away, I feel like a local historian.  Not the specific, detailed historian who would remember dates, but the type who wants credit to go to the unsung heroes who have earned it.

The terms ‘warp’ and ‘woof’ come to mind.  For those unfamiliar, these words pertain to weaving cloth.  In order to form a piece of cloth you have to set up a loom with threads going up and down (warp) so that the horizontal threads (woof) can be woven in.  They are the foundation, they hold it together, they give strength and endurance – take them away and all you have is a tangled pile of fluff.  Our community is a stretch of whole cloth, we are the warp and woof.

If you look at a piece of cloth you see the whole thing, not the individual threads that hold it together, even though they are the most important part.  What about the people, almost invisible, in the background giving their time and talents?  Things that are unlikely to ever be documented?   

I was going to try to name them – or at least the ones I could think of – but the list is too long, and I would feel terrible if I missed someone.  Besides, my list would be from my life perspective.  We are all unique so your list would be different than mine, but every bit as valid.

So I’m challenging you, no matter where you’re from, to form your own list.  Every community has their own heroes: the guy who refills little kid’s sandboxes every spring for free, the lady who spearheaded publishing your local history book, the folks tending flower gardens and watering trees in your public green spaces, teachers who made a difference in your life, 4-H and scout leaders, ‘Santa’s Helpers’ (even though they can’t be named due to the nature of their work).  The list goes on and on. 

Think of them, and thank them.  Let them know their threads are appreciated. 

I’m back to meditating, or at least thinking about, the metaphor of us all being a part of the whole cloth of our communities.  It’s easy to associate different textures and colours of thread to the individuals – past/present/future – whose time and talents have gone/are going/will go into making our fabric unique, and I catch myself wondering if Dosy’s thread would be silver like her hair?

 

IT’S ALL COMING BACK TO ME

It’s all coming back to me now.  I’ve been here before. 

The no energy days, the scratchy throat, the runny nose: yep – this is what an every day, everybody gets them, run of the mill head cold feels like.  Funny how those two years of masks and isolation kept them out of our house too.  I didn’t miss them one bit.

This is not me comparing a head cold to the other options out there - there are much, much worse things to have – it’s just how soon we forget what a head filled with mucus feels like.  Two days ago my sinuses were so full and enflamed that my teeth actually hurt.  That’s something I forgot could happen.   I didn’t miss it one bit.

I had also forgotten how colds can sneak up on you.  Tuesday you’re feeling fine but seem to be sneezing a lot.  Wednesday morning you have a tickle in your throat but it goes away after breakfast.  Thursday is a lazy day because that big job you had planned seems like way too much work now, and you don’t have the energy … besides, you’re retired and it can wait.

And then, voila! Friday your head hurts and the Kleenex box becomes your best friend.

Maybe, if I had been paying attention and not so out of practise at recognizing the symptoms I could have thrown a bunch of vitamin C at it.  I could have gotten more sleep.  I could have made a big pot of chicken soup.  But no, I paid no attention to the warning signs and now, here I am in full-blown head cold mode. 

I can only breathe through one nostril at a time.  If I’m lucky.

I know where the throat lozenges are but I’m not so desperate that I’ve had to use them.  Yet.  (I hate them almost as much as Buckley’s)

I discovered that during the Covid years they have made print much smaller on medication packages.  I literally cannot read them in the middle of the night without my glasses on.  Imagine my surprise the next morning when I realized that the package should have been thrown out BEFORE Covid because it was that far past its expiration date.  The print size could not be blamed on newer packaging, but possibly on older eyes.

A couple of questions here:  Is it possible for the entire package to shrink due to old age?  You know, like a block of cheese if you let it dry out?  I’m sure I was able to read those words when I bought it.

Also, does past due sinus medication get stronger as it ages?  Or lose its potency?  I did live to see another day so it’s not deadly.  And I found a newer package for the next time – with my glasses on and in broad daylight.

I am now at my husband’s favourite part of any cold I’ve ever had.  I have lost my voice.  He likely has two days of peace and quiet to look forward to

So, I am preparing for the next step on this well-travelled path: we live in the same house, we share the same space … almost certainly he will take my regular cold germs and morph them into a raging case of Man Cold.

I’ve got the vitamin C out, a pot of soup on the go, and have restocked the Kleenex boxes in every room. 

Like I said, it’s all coming back to me now.

 

 

 

THE NEXT FEW MONTHS

And so it has begun.  Winter 2022-23 roared in on the back of a blizzard on Sunday afternoon and every online site from Facebook to Twitter exploded with “OMG”s as people realized they were somewhere that the didn’t want to be and immediately hit the road to get somewhere else.

Almost immediately hitting the ditch, or getting stuck in zero visibility behind a semi where they stayed until all traffic ground to a halt.

Being totally predictable they then dug out their phones (because, of course, they weren’t texting while driving) and began to demand where the snow plows were, and ask when did they close the highways down, and how bad is it the other side of Swift Current (like they still plan to get there). 

I wonder how many appointments to get their winter tires on were made from vehicles situated on #1 Highway in the last 24 hours?  It’s not like they had anything else on their agenda besides staying warm.

Although I have played the-roads-can’t-be-that-bad game a time or two, this time I am at home and feeling quite smug about getting my fall garden work done – all of one row of carrots and three dozen garlic heads.  The remainder of the garden of 2022 was a disaster and was tilled under at the end of July. The rest of the summer was very laid-back affair and something I think I could get used to, but with all that extra time to till and fertilize and remediate the soil … let’s just say my farmer has big plans.  I did enjoy the slow pace and other’s garden charity while I had it.

I had a pot of home-made soup brewing as the storm blew in, and Wednesday, the last nice day I washed all the bedding and hung it outside for that glorious, fresh, outdoor scent.  We also spent some money last week and had the furnace duct cleaners in to do their thing.  I don’t know if it counts as an accomplishment or not, but I like the idea that any dust circulating in this house this winter is brand new stuff. 

The next thing on the annual odyssey is Hallowe’en.  We are right on target for having purchased our first box of treats at the beginning of the month, eating them all, and buying two more packages to keep us going.  There’s only one more week to go so we should be okay … especially since we live way out in the country and haven’t had trick-or-treaters in almost a decade.   

I will probably buy one more box, just in case.

Then it will be on to Christmas.  Not too sure how much time, effort, or money I plan to sink into the decorating endeavor this year.  About half of my lights died and were placed directly into the dumpster when I undecorated last spring.  The outdoor tree just keeps getting bigger and bigger – and I just keep getting older and older.  I think there needs to be a new design.  I also think I should have thought of it before this storm.  Decorating is way easier on dry ground that isn’t frozen yet.  This epiphany has me feeling a lot less smug at the moment: finished gardening smugness being cancelled out by undone Christmas decorating.  I should have known better … isn’t smugness one of the seven deadly sins?

And Christmas prep doesn’t stop there.  There is baking to do, and of course, there are gifts to buy.  I’m already behind the eight ball because almost half of the grandchildren live in Australia.  I only need gift ideas for things tiny and weightless that will thrill a 20 year old young woman, 17 year old twins and their 14 year old brother.  Let me know what you come up with.  The sooner the better.

Assuming that another plague doesn’t take us down and Putin doesn’t manage to blow us up we will land safely in 2023, probably a few more blizzards under our belts and scanning the horizon for signs of spring.  The days will lengthen out, we will plant seeds, and the snow birds will return home.

We’ll know we made it when the Easter chocolates hit the market.  There will probably be only a couple blizzards left to go by then.

 

MY ADVICE

Just when a person thinks they are on top of things something comes along to knock them off their safety perch.  That was me two weeks ago. 

It’s all good now.  Besides my nerves being rankled and the huge chunk of Humble Pie I’ve had to digest there was no harm done.  But I feel like I can’t lay it completely to rest without telling my story.  Hopefully it will save others a similar experience.

I was hacked.

Not the almost every day occurrence of a Facebook friend request from someone I’m already friends with.  I know how to respond to that one – delete the bogus request and private message them (I can do that because we are already friends) to give them a heads-up to change their password.

Neither was it one of the countless emails from “Costco” wanting to give me a big, juicy coupon, or “Sasktel” or “Sask Power” saying my bill isn’t paid, or “Canada Post” saying they are unable to deliver my parcel until I pay a fee.  I know about all of those scams and I delete them immediately.  Knowledge is power - to click on any of those links invites thieves into your computer and your life.  I have fantasised about there being software that allows the target (me) to send code back to the originating computer and have it blow up in the hacker’s face, but as to yet I don’t think it’s been invented.

The one that got me was more sophisticated than that, although hardly uncommon.  When you sit down with your banking representative and say the words ‘microsoft scam’ and she leafs through a stack of papers until she comes up with one entitled Microsoft Scam, you know you’re not the first one to come to her in a panic.  Knowing that you are not alone eases some of your embarrassment at being duped.  Seeing them take charge with what has to be done next is also very reassuring.

It all began with me clicking on what I thought was a news story.  Something about palaeontology, fossilized bones, scientific research – I’m interested in that kind of stuff.  The news story was the bait, and I bit.

SUDDENLY there were a stack of pop up screens in front of me with the top one expanding and contracting rapidly while a woman’s voice LOUDLY warned me that my computer had been compromised.  This was the one and only time they were honest – the pop up warning was indeed compromising my computer.  Everything after that was a lie, starting with the warning “If you shut down your computer you will lose everything on it.”

But with the never-ending loud warning, the spazzing pop up that I couldn’t click away, and the threat of losing everything on my computer, panic set in.  My only hope seemed to be the offered toll free phone number for the trusted name “Microsoft”.  A rational brain would have taken time to think about this but they had me at an emotional level … I called the number.

From there a very professional-sounding guy asked me questions, assured me he could help, and instructed me to check my online banking to see if anything was amiss.  It wasn’t, of course, there was nothing the thieves could do until I revealed my information to them … which I did because I trusted that I was the only one who could see what I was looking at.  He had me do some Windows diagnostic tests to make it look legit.  He told me not to talk about it to anyone until he called back and a whole bunch of other crap I should have known better than to believe.  On the call back he escalated the panic by saying the only way to protect my money was to change it over to a digital wallet (which he was going to be very helpful to set up for me – only I suspect that it wouldn’t have been in my name). 

Long story short, I decided to talk to somebody I trusted and they reaffirmed all the warning bells that were going on in the back of my mind.  Even though the “Microsoft” guy and his associate “CIBC” guy he had forwarded my case file on to had both warned me not to talk to my personal banker that’s exactly what I did … and as soon as she heard the word “Microsoft” she said “identity theft” and we began the clean up.  It wasn’t her first rodeo.  I sure as heck hope it’s my last.

So now, what have I learned from this?  That it’s just another hack to be aware of and that being fore-warned is to be fore-armed.

Since this happened I have taken the time to ask Google about the “Microsoft Scam” and was shown a video on how to shut the pop up down.  I would advise everyone to check it out now so there is no hesitation when confronted with the nasty lady shouting at you when the pop up appears (and you can shut her up by just turning down the volume on your computer – it will help you think clearly).  I’ve also been told that you don’t have to shut your computer down, just unplug your Internet.  What you need is time to think things through.

DO talk about it with others.

DO keep your computer virus scans up to date (although I thought mine was)

DO go immediately to your bank if you get sucked into this evil vortex – they are ready to help you.

And, if you get the chance, create the software needed to trace evil back to the hacker who started it – and have the whole thing blow up in his face.

 

LOUIS

Sad news this morning: Louis is gone.

It’s not that we weren’t expecting it, he was very ill.  It is good to think that his suffering is over, but those of us who loved him must now shift into a new, unwelcome reality.  Mourning his loss with be felt in different degrees – from Robert’s acute pain in the loss of his life partner, the love of his life, to the long-distance sad absence of a friend and brother-in-law for me, plus the multitude of people in between – friends, colleagues, neighbours, parishioners – he touched so many people in his 67 years.

I spent the waning hours of Louis’ life reflecting on how he has enriched mine.  If he were to hear me say that he would no doubt down-play my words, but I also hope that he would take the praise to heart.  The honesty he lived in his life forced me to grow as a person too.  I owe him.

We met when we were just kids, classmates in grade six I think, growing up in rural Saskatchewan in the ‘60s and ‘70s.  You’d be hard pressed to find a more mundane, ordinary existence … school work, family life, daydreaming about future plans.  We lived in the insulated bubble of ‘normal’ our parents provided us by keeping awkward topics out of daily discourse, creating a rose-coloured-glasses type of world which neatly sorted people into ‘natural’ and ‘taboo’.  I can’t imagine what it felt like to grow up ‘taboo’.

Almost certainly though, it caused Louis’ growth as a human being to far outstrip mine.  He grew to be an intelligent, caring, sensitive, giving adult.  Conversations with him challenged me to think much deeper than I normally would.  Meals he hosted were delicious and fun.  I loved his sharp sense of humor.  Long before he told us he was gay he had established who he really was – a warm and wonderful human being.  I was so comfortable with these truths that his coming out left me to reconcile what society said about ‘taboo’ people and what I could see with my own eyes.  I had some growing of my own to do.

Not that it was easy.  Societal inuendo, self-proclaimed comfort zones, and outright public fear-mongering left me bouncing between shame, anger and self-righteousness, but I always seemed to end up asking myself “If it’s this bad for me, an observer, what was it like for him to live it?”  With this question in mind it was impossible not to grow.  He was a person of kindness and integrity, of intelligence and education, someone whose voice and laughter sounded just like his mother’s.  This latest piece of information about him didn’t alter any of these well-established qualities.  In the end I realized it was much more beneficial to accept and learn from others than to stand back and judge them.  I have Louis to thank for that.

He lived a full, happy life.  He travelled in his career as an air steward, seeing much of the world.  He even arranged to be in Beijing when we were so that he could buy us supper.  His first career choice was the priesthood and he fulfilled that dream too, serving his God and his parish in his community in Nova Scotia.  But, the happiest, most precious thing in his life was to find Robert and have the solid, loving, mutual support relationship that all human beings long for – and deserve.

All day long I’ve been reading and rereading the tributes sent to Robert and the rest of the family.  One of them came close to what I’ve been trying to say here – that Louis and Robert’s relationship had forced the writer out of her pre-conceived notions and into growth and an awareness she had lacked before.  It’s strange to use the word ‘force’ when speaking of Louis, he was a gentle soul and led by simple example.  In another way, though, his quiet resolve was indeed a force to be reckoned with.

R.I.P. Louis.  We are better people for having known you.

 

SEPTEMBER BLUE

As the kids get ready to go back to school and the combines roar to life the natural world slips quietly into another gear too.  Plants, having fulfilled their destiny to grow, flower, and bear fruit are now letting themselves dry up and wither away (except for cucumbers which are into some crazy kind of overdrive).  Birds gather for massive conventions to discuss their route south and departure date.  There is the scent of completeness in the air – everything is mature, ripe, and well seasoned.  The sky goes from the dazzling bright blue of summer to the soft, powdery, cornflower blue of September.  It’s my favorite.

I don’t know how it happens so fast, but the sun’s bedtime is now earlier than mine again.  How does it take so long for the days to lengthen out between December and June, but the reverse happens in the blink of an eye.

It has been a wonky, crazy busy summer for me - caring for an elderly family member and having grandchildren stay with us while their family was moving.  Thankfully in both cases I wasn’t the only one on the job but it was a real eye opener into being in the middle of the ‘sandwich generation’.  The kids are back with their parents now and we are nearing the end of moving Grandma out of her home and into Long Term Care.  Life is bound to slow down pretty soon.  I hope.

I apologize to my fellow volunteers at Tourism for my absence throughout August.  I know I have been Missing in Action.  It’s not that the place can’t run without me - in fact the things I do can be done by anyone – but I wasn’t there to pitch in as much as I usually am.  By the looks of things everything is running smoothly, proving that I am dispensable.  We are close to the end of the season now and I will be there for the close-up jobs unless something drastic happens.

This might sound crazy but the best thing that happened this summer is that my vegetable garden was a complete failure.  The spring was so late and wet that I didn’t get it planted till the middle of June.  And, even though it had been worked several times the soil was the consistency of muddy bricks.  The potatoes struggled to get through the surface.  I got the other seeds in but then we had another deluge.  It stayed so cold that germination was dismal … until the heat turned up and every seed out there exploded with life.  92% of them were weed seeds. 

By the third week of July the corn was only a foot tall, stunted peas weren’t even in bloom yet and only a few yellow beans had made an appearance, the green beans hadn’t bothered to germinate at all.  I found enough beets and carrots to keep, but instructed the guy with the tractor and tiller to “make the rest just go away!”  I also put in an order for a substantial soil remediation project with straw and manure to be worked in and weed control tillage to be performed on a regular basis.  If it’s successful I may regret my request.  My 2023 garden might end up being a bumper crop and I’ve kind of liked the ease and luxury of just getting garden charity this year.  Oh well, I will worry about that when the time comes.

I’ve checked the long-range forecast – if it’s true there are no frost warnings in the foreseeable future.  There are a lot of farmers out there breathing a sigh of relief for their late crops, but my interest was to see if it was worth fertilizing my deck planters one more time.  They got one more dose.  Hopefully I will have blooms to enjoy for a few more weeks.  There is no better place to sit in the cool of the evening and watch the hummingbirds fight over sugar water.  They will be gone before the flowers are – we have gone from 10 to 7 to 3 this past week.  One morning in the near future there will be none and summer will be officially over.

But, while it lasts, I am going to try to soak in the softer September sun, listen to the crickets while I hang out the laundry a few more times, and enjoy that the grass is still green and soft enough to walk in bare feet.

 

LIFE. AND DEATH. AND SOMEWHERE IN BETWEEN

I’ve had a lot of time lately to sit quietly and think.  That’s what you do when visiting a very elderly lady in the hospital.  Sometimes she is awake and up to visiting, but a lot of the time she drifts off to sleep, and I stay a bit longer and think about things.  Like life.  And death.  And where she is … somewhere in between.  Well, in reality we are all somewhere in between, but at almost 102 she is much closer to the end than most of us.

Over the past year or so, as her health and strength went into decline, we have had many conversations.  The ones I liked best were the rare occasions she would tell me stories I hadn’t heard before.  She was born in 1920 and came to this area to teach in the early ‘40’s, marrying my husband’s father in 1945.  I would have loved to hear more about this period of her history but conversations never seemed to go that way, as if that time was so long ago it wasn’t important any more.

Instead, I would get snippets like “I enjoyed raising my family.” Or “Larry was a happy baby.”  Sometimes I could steer her into a few more minutes on the subject, but not often.  Her comments were just little windows into the fleeting memories going through her mind.

One beautiful warm day this spring I offered to take her for a wheel chair ride around the block and for once she actually said ‘yes’.  Her hearing is very poor but her eyesight is phenomenal.  She spotted some lilacs so I took her over and we picked some.  She wondered what on earth all those pink birds were doing in someone’s yard so I explained about the “You’ve been flocked” fundraiser going on in town.  I wasn’t sure, between her poor hearing and the out-of-the-ordinary concept of the fundraiser, whether she understood what I told her but when she spotted another flamingo covered lawn on the next block, she pointed to it and said “There’s some more of those pink birds.  They must be making lots of money!”  She could be sharp as a tack one minute and quite lost the next, though.  We were on the street where she had lived for 30 years yet she didn’t recognize it. Going around that one block was all she was up to even though she was in a wheel chair.

The high point of that adventure was stopping for a few minutes to watch the school kids at their track and field day.  “I used to really like that day.” the former school teacher said, her voice wistful.  Times gone by; another brief window into her soul.

She has been strong and fiercely independent but it’s obvious with this hospitalization the days of living on her own are over, she will be going into respite until a permanent placement is available.  This was not in her plan.  Her most fervent wish is to ‘fall asleep and not wake up’.  She is angry and disappointed that this is not happening for her.

I am reminded, as I sit and watch her sleep, of a time when I railed at the unfairness of Death’s timing.  My first husband died in a car accident on the same day that an elderly gentleman with dementia wandered out into the winter cold in only his pyjamas.  There was no rhyme or reason, no justice, and no sense to a young husband and father dying while a sick old man was found and brought to safety. It wasn’t fair! 

She is experiencing the same frustration from the other side.  She doesn’t want to be here any more.  Why is she stuck in this failing body and now being sent off to unfamiliar surroundings?  This is just as unfair.

Many years ago I read a story that compared our lives to a tapestry … the colors, the textures, the flaws, and the worn bits all signifying the joys and sorrows, the struggles and triumphs, the bad choices and subsequent recoveries - all merging to portray our individual life spans as works of art.  I think of this from time to time and hope that my scene is full of bright colours and worthy texture, and that many of my threads are tied into other’s tapestries connecting me to the people I love.

Today I visited with my mother-in-law and thought about her tapestry.  Our conversation this afternoon was me encouraging her, trying to help her see that her life may just become more interesting because she won’t be isolated in her own home any more.  There will be people around her, she will have her own space for privacy but meals will be a time of community.  That we will come to see her.

 I may have gotten through to her because she gave me a smile as I left.

At almost 102 we all know that her tapestry is almost finished. She can’t have too many threads left to tie off.  I sincerely hope that the ones she has remaining are the color of love and as light as gossamer.

 

 FUN BETWEEN THE RAINS

Being the fickle human being that I am, I want all this rain to go away so that I can mow grass and pull weeds.  Last year I was asking for more rain so that my grass would grow lush and green and the sun wouldn’t bake my garden to brick because that makes pulling weeds too hard.  This year I wander my yard in rubber boots and pull only the weeds closest to the edges of my flower beds because stepping in any farther would mean losing those boots.  Oh, the irony of it all. 

Gardening season this year appears to be a disaster; germination of vegetable seeds is dismal, germination of weeds seeds exponential.  The trees we planted and watered faithfully last summer are probably now drowned out.  It’s so depressing I don’t even want to go out and check on them anymore.  I would love to mow the lawn but I would need an amphibious mower at this point.

Luckily this past week or so I have had a welcome distraction – a family reunion. 

The decision to have one was made three years ago, but it didn’t come together. Then again two years ago, but you know, Covid.  We came even closer last summer but couldn’t find a campground big enough to let us socially distance.  Finally, right after Christmas I was commissioned to write an invitation e-mail and we set the wheels in motion.  Come July 1^st weekend 2022 we were gathering in the old home town and catching up on a whole pandemic’s worth of family time.

The months rolled along and from time to time there was chatter within our messenger group about who was able to make it and when they would be arriving and leaving.  The excitement began to build.

Then there were only a few weeks to go.  I was put in charge of fine tuning the reservations at the campground.  One would think that the chairman of the Tourism Board would be able to handle this job but, no, there was a mix up and it was all my fault.  Maybe catching Covid was a contributing factor, who knows, but I squeezed that in too, just for the fun of it. 

Thankfully the double-booking dilemma ended up resolving itself, and maybe my family has learned to put someone more qualified in charge of camping reservations next time.

The last week of preparations got more intense each day.  There was firewood to gather and load, house guests to prepare for because not everyone has a camper, and multiple day’s worth of food to get ready ahead of time so I could visit when they arrived.  Also, I had my afore-mentioned side gig of Chairman of Tourism going on … fireworks, kid’s crafts, parade details.  Never a dull moment.

Ready or not Thursday arrived, people started rolling in, and the fun began.

The weekend itself is a blur of too much food, not enough sleep, the right number of cold beverages, more food, lots and lots of visiting, missing the ones who couldn’t make it, not enough sunscreen, snacks and treats between meals, a fair bit of reminiscing about the last time we had all been together, and all kinds of advice for the young couple about to become parents for the first time (no need to thank us, we were glad to help out, lol).  Oh, and did I mention, way too much food?

Some played ball.  Some Played golf.  Some rode their bikes and some went for pie and ice cream.  There were dogs to walk and runs to the grocery store to make sure no one starved to death between snacks.  There was even the redneck run out to the farm to view baby piggies, after all a proper host has to give those city kids the full rural experience … and by ‘kids’ we are talking ages in the 20 to 30 year range.

The weekend is over now and the travellers are all home, safe and sound.  I’ve even managed to use up my leftover food, and if it would ever quit raining I could do laundry and hang all that bedding out on the line.  It was super gracious of Mother Nature not to rain on our parade … or the fireworks … or the ball tournament … or the campers.  I appreciate it from the bottom of my heart.

Now I just wish she could manage another dry spell so I could get some yard work done.

 

 

MY WEEK, SO FAR

I guess my week’s adventure probably started on Saturday night, but I was unaware at the time.  So unaware.

Since it has finally quit blizzarding, and raining, and hailing, I’ve been pretty darned busy out in my yard and gardens.  My bedding plants needed transplanting, the grass needed mowing, the weeds needed to die, plus there were tree replacements to get in the ground at the campground and a yard sale to prepare for.  It’s just been one day after another, getting stuff done - all work and no play. 

So, when I was invited out to a community event on Saturday night I thought “why not?”  I could use a break so I accepted.

Sunday dawned – the day I had vowed I would get my vegetable garden planted.  The soil had been tilled many times but it was so wet that conditions were not good – instead of soft, fluffy dirt I had the equivalent of broken bricks to work with. But, time was ticking by and the seeds had to go into the ground.  It was a long exhausting day but I got the job done.  As I texted to my Farmer …. Halle-le-freaking-lu-yah!  I put my tools away and called it a day.

Monday’s jobs were taking care of some business things in town in the morning and mowing grass in the afternoon.  I had some serious sneezing spells late in the day but blamed it on the poplar fluff.

Tuesday I woke up aching from head to toe.  What did I expect? Sunday’s gardening had been a long and grueling day.  Ignore it and it will go away.  I had weeding to do in my flower beds.  Keep on trucking, old girl: there’s work to do!

Except that I just couldn’t.  It was warm out but I needed a jacket.  I actually lay down to watch the noon news and fell asleep.  You have no idea how rare this is – like the ‘never’ kind of rare.  When I got back up I decided I would take it easy for the afternoon and just do some computer work.  I had to give that up eventually because I was shivering so bad I couldn’t type.  What the heck was going on?

I decided to check my temperature and dug out the never-been-out-of-the-box digital thermometer I had bought in March of 2020 – you know, in case we needed it, but we never did.  It still didn’t click what I was likely dealing with.  My temperature was only slightly up, but it occurred to me that I did have another test at my disposal.  Why not do a Covid test too? 

I did the test, watched one line appear, congratulated myself on being negative, and lay down for a second nap on the same day!  I awoke to a second line and the truth an hour later.  I had the plague, after all.

I mustered what strength I could, wiped down all the common surfaces I could think of, dug out the masks, moved myself to a different bedroom, and changed pillow cases for the Farmer.  They are not done seeding and he does not have time to be sick (or so I’ve been told).  I went to bed with my new best friend Advill.

Wednesday is a blur.  More Advill.  More naps.  Sleeping fully clothed with extra blankets.  Coughing.  Coughing.  Coughing.

Thursday: I made it to 10:30 before I required Advill and I did manage to vacuum the house, do a load of laundry, and get something into the slow cooker for supper so I’d have to say things were on the upswing. Also, a dear friend delivered soup and buns to my deck table – she probably saved my life.

Even so, it was off to bed with Advill and a new box of Kleenex by 8:30.  When I’m done, I’m done.

Friday dawned clear and bright.  So far I only require a light jacket to keep from shivering.  I haven’t taken an Advill all day (it’s noon).  Not only that, I’ve finally mustered the oomph to bring in two water jugs from the car (coffee is an amazing incentive) and I’ve wandered around my gardens to see which of the weeds pose the biggest threat of taking over my world.  I don’t have the energy to do anything about it so far, but I want to be prepared.

 I do believe I’m going to pull through.

I can’t imagine what It would have been like without being fully vaccinated – oh wait, maybe I can … I would have ended up in the hospital and maybe on a ventilator, if not worse.  As it is I stayed home, required no medical intervention, made a new best friend in Advill, and it only took three bad days. I still have to shake this cough so I’m giving it a few more days before I declare it’s really over, but I think I’ve got this beat.

The jury is still out on if I need a nap today, or not.

 

FORWARD MOMENTUM

I woke up this morning and lay there reluctant to move.  Last week was full of places to be, volunteer missions to accomplish, and consulting and planning to get Tourism’s summer season off to a start so that I could dedicate this week to my own season opener work.  There is so much to do this time of year and the weather conditions have not been making it easy.

But, there is no use wimping about it – if I want to relax in the midst of pretty lawns and gardens during the summer I have to put in the work in the spring.  I had invested heavily (this sounds more responsible that saying ‘went wild and crazy’) at more than just one local greenhouse and all these pretty things needed to get outside where they could grow and flourish or my money would be wasted.  Thursday morning I got up, fortified myself with high octane caffeine wonder liquid, and dug in.  This is not a figurative term – in the past two days there has been a lot of digging going on.

I got a lot done that day.  It’s good to build up momentum while your muscles are unaware of how far you are going to push them.  For starters I finished filling my deck planters – that sounds simple but there is a lot of heavy lifting, soil mixing and walking involved with that job.  When my Fitbit informed me that I had already reached 10,000 steps by 10:00 in the morning I reconsidered my choice that it was wasteful to use the quad for all those little trips.  I didn’t know how many steps I actually had in me.

Besides, by that time I had tripped in a gopher hole while delivering a part to the field across the road – there were no immediate ill effects but at my age I know how that goes.  Walking back to the house I pondered which injury was going to cause me the most pain; the hip/knee fall or where I hit my hand with the hammer driving in a stake to mark my row of tomatoes. So far, it’s a tie.

After an early lunch I tackled the lawn.  So far this year it’s not a big job – a good portion of it is under water.  But it did take long enough to prove that sunscreen would have been a really good idea.  I have to relearn that lesson every single year. 

By this time my body started to complain, as I knew it would. I eased off on the physical stuff and instead stood in my greenhouse trying to imagine where all these bedding plants would do the best.  Deciding ‘the plan’ literally takes as much time and effort as planting does, but at least I could do it standing still.  Which, of course, was a mistake – standing still robbed me of any momentum I had left.  If the walk back to the house had been up hill I don’t think I would have made it.

Bravely I turned down the temptation of a glass of wine (the exact opposite of high octane morning go juice) and got supper in the oven.  There were still a few more things I had to do before dark … feed the heifers, pick asparagus, do a little bit of push mowing, and see if my little tiller could stir up the mud in my lower flower bed.  I made the animals happy, gathered asparagus, and prayed that neither the mower or tiller would start.  It’s a cruel world – they did.

The rest of the day is a blur; we ate and went to bed.  The fresh asparagus was delicious.

Day two was all about putting out bedding plants, hand tilling places that can’t be done any other way, kneeling, standing, walking, forgetting what you were going for, remembering when you get back, going again, and being sent off to town for a part again (My apologies for anyone who witnessed me in my gardening attire.  There was a time when I would have changed for a 15 minute town run; this rule no longer stands.)  I didn’t reach 10,000 steps until 1:33, obviously I had slowed down considerably but quitting is not an option.  The rest of the day was spent plodding forward and texting with my sister, comparing gardening progress and making sure we were both still upright.  We both got done what we wanted to before the rain – yay us!

There’s till more to do … veggie garden if it ever dries up enough to get out there, and back to volunteer Tourism stuff … more flowers and trees and painting … but that won’t be today.

As I mentioned, this morning I spent some time assessing aches and pains before actually moving.  My husband tells me that it’s easier to count the things that don’t hurt rather than listing the things that do.  So far today – 10:21 – and I’ve only made 1,072 steps.  Considering that my body has informed me that it’s on strike, I’m doing fine!

 

 

SIGNS OF A DESPERATE WOMAN

To the guy who drove by yesterday and witnessed me shovelling off the trampoline – don’t worry about me.  I’m fine. Really. I realize not everyone shovels off their trampoline but I needed an outside job that was doable. I figured I could handle an approximately 250 square foot surface so I grabbed a shovel and went to work.  At this point I will do anything just to be outside and accomplishing something.

I was wrong, by the way. It wasn’t doable – not in one go, anyway.  That snow weighs a ton and a wet trampoline is pretty slippery.

This time of year I am supposed to be sun burned or wind burned or both, having spent several days out cleaning up the yard and checking for asparagus and other perennials.  On any other year my Fitbit would be patting me on the back for all the steps I had racked up back and forth to my greenhouse and around the yard.  This year I do find myself pacing an indoor circuit, wandering from window to window, staring out at the never-ending winter and sighing in frustration.  My Fitbit languishes on the dresser, having given up the will to live.

By the way, in doing this I have discovered that all of my windows are dirty but I’m not that desperate for something to do.

Today I ventured out to take down the one last Christmas bow Mother Nature couldn’t rip from the house in her last hissy fit, and then went around picking up the ones she did manage to wreck.  From there I went on to annoy the dog and hauled his winter collection of bones over to the Loraas bin.  On my way back I re-opened the river channel that runs through our yard.  Spring runoff #2 is building pressure and the weather gal is promising a fast melt in the coming days.  There is a raft out there somewhere, under a snowbank where it was parked at the end of First Spring.

I’m contemplating filling the hummingbird feeders.  It’s hard to believe that they have shown up this early other years.  On the one hand I can’t picture them here as the same time as we have snow.  On the other hand, if they were to arrive this week they would be in great need of sugar water.  That would be a first – taking down Christmas decorations and putting up the bird feeders on the same day.

Not that all of the Christmas lights are down, but access to some of them is through water higher than my rubber boots.  They can wait.

I did take in the reflective markers off the edge of the driveway.  Surely there won’t be another storm where the guy clearing the snow needs to know where the road ends and the lawn starts? 

I know.  I know.  I probably jinxed it.

I just thought of another outside job that needs done.  I’m going to wash the windows on my car.  Just the windows though.  I literally can’t see out the side windows when I come to a corner. Given the mud situation out there to wash the whole vehicle is pointless, but it would be nice not to die at an intersection.

Maybe the guy who saw me shovelling the trampoline will spot me doing something a little more sensible today and take me off his Crazy Lady list.

 IS THAT ALL YOU GOT?

 

I sit here, the morning of April 22, 2022, awaiting yet another winter storm.  This has been going on for so long that my sense of reality is starting to slip.  I know that people around the world perceive Canada as the land of perpetual winter, but up until recently I thought I knew better.  We DO have distinct other seasons!  We DO have spring!  We DO have summer!  And we DO have my very favourite, autumn!  Winter is just one of four.

This year though, it seems that Mother Nature has other ideas. 

Did she just realize that all those prayers to fill up the dugouts were on back order and needed to be taken care of?  Is green not the ‘in’ colour for 2022?  Is she testing the survival instincts of all the poor birds who flew north expecting warm temperatures and available food?  Was the internet running short of stuck tractor pictures? Did Old Man Winter dare her to do it one more time?  Is she off her meds?

 I’m not sure that this eternal winter would be so painful if my Facebook memories weren’t full of years when April actually featured spring-like conditions.  Apparently six years ago I was installing a rock pathway/border around a flower bed and we were putting metal roofing on the quonset.   On numerous years the snow banks – even the ones in the trees – were gone.  Regular spring jobs were getting done: the lawnmower was being serviced, gardens were being tilled, outdoor Christmas decorations were being put away.

So far in 2022 none of these things have happened.  Not only are the snow banks still here, but they are being refurbished on a regular basis.  There was a short period of time when some of my gardens were visible, but only in the form of frozen mud.  The driveway has had to be cleared twice since we thought winter was over – and in all probability it will need it again once Mother Nature is over this next hissy fit.

I know this is slightly out of character for me, but I’m crying “uncle” here.  I want this nonsense to stop.  This is me saying ‘enough already!’

Prairie people are a little weather crazy.  We are not ones to shy away from the forces of nature.  We know our skies are big, our spaces immense, our weather extreme.  We bond over weather stories.  It’s the first topic of conversation when we meet each other.  I would wager that we possess, consult, and rely on more weather apps than anyone else on the planet.  Our whole mentality is to know how to survive (and then brag about) all weather adversity.  We are the ones who shake our fists at the sky after a hail storm flattens our crops and gardens and yell “Is that all you got?”  (I did mention we were crazy, didn’t I?)

This time though, Mother Nature seems to be using a new tactic.  We have proved we can handle the flash-in-the-pan power of summer storms, the crazy trampoline-wrecking winds, the baseball sized hail, and the stay-off-the-roads blizzards, so she has decided to wear us down with boring repetition.  How many spring blizzards is this in a row?  I’ve lost count.

I’ve even noticed that the weather forecasters, people known for their enthusiasm and hype of storm systems, are down-playing this next one.  Except for slightly warmer temperatures and therefore a higher potential for rain in some areas, this storm is every bit as bad as the last one – worse considering the winds are supposed to be higher – and yet instead of billing it as the once-in-30-years storm their comments are all low key.  It’s like they’ve heard what happens to the messenger and are trying to distance themselves.

But, the storm is headed this way all the same, and there’s really nothing to do.  We can’t stop it and all the preparations we did last week are all still in place. 

We are left with a “Bring it on!” attitude and the sincere hope that this one will get winter out of her system.

 TO SOOTHE MY FRAZZLED NERVES

Sooooo, the last time we talked I was waiting for my new computer to arrive.  As you might recall I was mourning having to lay the old girl to rest and feeling some trepidation about my future.  At the time I anticipated the transition was going to take place the very next day but it was a full week later before it arrived and I had the time to make the big change over.  First it didn’t get delivered when and how I expected, and then I had grandkids here all weekend.  I’m a one-thing-at-a-time kind of girl.  The ten-year-old grandson sure wanted to get right down to business and set everything up for me; in retrospect maybe I should have gone that route.

But, I didn’t.  I waited until Monday morning, and armed with an extra strong mug of coffee, made my way to my office to do one final check through what I had saved to external drives to make sure I had everything ready to move over from the old gal to the shiny new one.  It was a ‘go’.

I’m going to take a moment here to speak of my ancestral heritage.  I’m mostly Scottish.  The many things that this entails are: I have fair skin and blue eyes, I’m comfortable in a cooler climate, I love the sound of bagpipes, and I’m not one to throw my money around willy-nilly.  On the one hand, I will buy what I need and not scrimp on the basics; on the other hand, I’m pretty particulars what these basics are.

Hence, I purchased only the tower, mouse, and keyboard.  I didn’t need a new monitor.  My old one was just fine, thank you very much.

Except, when I hooked the new 2022 computer to the 2010 (or earlier, who knows?) monitor they would say “hi” to each other and then shut down.  No matter how many times I wiggled the plugs and double checked the ports it kept happening. Call #1 to someone who knows more than me resulted in the advice to “go buy a new monitor Jocelyn”.  So I did.

You know what?  They really don’t cost that much.  Their price is really minor … and I found out that the new ones are much easier on the eyes.  I wish I would have known that last year; I could have saved myself some serious eyestrain.  Maybe I don’t need new glasses after all.

Home I went with my new piece of the computer puzzle and hooked it up … to have the same thing happen all over again.  The computer and the monitor would acknowledge each other and shut down.  What did this mean?  Was my new computer a dud?  Time to place call #2 to someone else who knows more than me.  Luckily he was on a day off and happily said “Do you want me to come out to the farm, Mom?” His father (who knows zero about computers) just laughed when he saw the car pull into the yard and said “You had to call in the big guns, eh?”  No matter, he works for food.

And he was barely here long enough to rate a plain hamburger.  He took one look at the power bar, asked me what century it was from, plugged the computer into a different circuit than the monitor and we were instantly in business.  They would actually converse with each other … but the power bar still seemed to disapprove of what it was being asked to do.  It sounded like there was a switch that kept trying to flip.  I was told “Turn that sucker off and go get a new one!”  So I did.

I wish I could say that this cured all my woes, but no, it only solved that problem.

Once I had that new piece of the puzzle installed everything worked perfectly … until I tried to get my email.  The computer struggled to find Sasktel and dragged its feet to retrieve anything for me.  Of course everything about this computer looks different so I’m not even sure I’m doing things right.  Is it me?  Is it the computer?  Or, is it the Internet? Call #3 goes to yet another person who knows more than me – Sasktel troubleshooting.  I feel kind of sheepish about this one.  Somewhere in the past I have been given the same instructions: “Unplug your modem and wait 5 minutes, then plug it back in again.”  He tells me that a person should do this maybe twice per year … some kind of reset … maybe now that I’ve written it down I will remember.

So, that’s it, right?  Nothing else can go wrong, right?  Not so fast.

Remember when I said I had everything I wanted saved to memory sticks?  Well, I thought I did.  All my pictures are there.  Two large single files are there.  But, two other multiple files show up as empty.  I need them.  I want them on this computer.  I know where they are – they are on the old computer.  I merely have to unhook the new computer/mouse/keyboard and hook up the old computer/mouse/keyboard and retrieve them … and then reverse the hook up again.  Minor inconvenience, right?  I don’t even have to call anyone, I can do this on my own.

But, to tell you the truth, I’m feeling a bit stressed.  All I want to do is something relaxing.  Something that just feels natural to me, so I’m writing.  The keyboard feels different, the screen is doing strange new things, and I have no idea how I’m going to save this to copy and paste on my blog page, but that is my next challenge.

If you’re reading this it all turned out fine.  If you’re not I’ve got a date with a wine bottle

 

TECHNICAL TREPIDATION

I sit here today – a quiet Sunday afternoon – and worry about what tomorrow will bring.

I don’t mean to make light of other people’s problems; there are some truly awful things happening in this world right now and by no means are my worries anywhere close t theirs.  I have a roof over my head, a predictable food source, safe water to drink, and have never heard an air raid siren except on TV.  My life is blessed in these ways.

Neither do I, or anyone close to me, have a deadly disease.  The sun is shining and the sky is blue.  I even have the menu planned for supper ... I tell you, life is good.

And yet, tomorrow has me worried.

You see the computer I am writing on, my old friend and colleague, has been telling me in not-so-subtle terms lately that she is ready for retirement.  I hate to say she is getting balky about doing her work, but she certainly resists the tasks I ask her to do.  She drags her feet through even the simplest things like opening up my email.  Sometimes I have to ask her multiple times, and just when I think I will never get email again she relents and comes across with what I’ve requested. 

We go way back - I think nine or ten years, which let’s face it, in computer years is significant.  I’d like to say that we’ve learned much together but of course that’s not the way it works.  She came out of her box knowing everything she’s programmed for.  I, on the other hand, have learned about 50% of her capabilities over the decade we’ve known each other.  Oh, who am I kidding? I’d be stretching it to claim 33%.  Gotta say though, what I have figured out I’m pretty darned proud of.

I have taken better care of her than any of the previous models I’ve owned.  I know the trauma of facing the Blue Screen of Death.  I learned the hard way the importance of keeping virus and spyware detection up to date.  That’s not this gal’s problem; she just says “enough is enough” and wants to quit.  She has been laying down lots of hints since last summer, insisting I ask too much of her.  The final straw was when I tried to watch a live stream event in January and she just up and quit.  On the one hand, I am very proud I managed to get her up and running again all by myself (with a little bit of help from Google) but to say that I wasn’t shaken by the episode would be an outright lie.  I purchased some memory sticks and did some serious saving after that scare.

The writing was on the wall though.  I had to start thinking about what to do next.  It might have been ten years since I had to get my head around a new computer but the trauma of that time was still with me - I don’t adjust well to change.  Apparently, neither does this computer.

I’ve begun receiving notifications that there is a Windows update I need.  Now, at first I thought that this was going to be my savior.  That’s what the problem was!  All I needed was a free update and we’d be off to the races again.  Sadly, the opposite was true; the needed update WAS the problem.  When I tried to install it I immediately got a message that “This computer cannot support this update.”  I understand that you can’t teach old dogs new tricks but who knew that computers don’t have unlimited new trick capacity?

So, the matter was put in the hands of my computer guru son-in-law and a new tower/mouse/keyboard was purchased.  Due to computer chip availability I have had a full month to get used to the idea but I now have multiple emails from DELL and Canada Post saying I will have to step up my game tomorrow. 

I’ve been promised all kinds of technical support to get it all hooked up and any glitches worked out.  I’ve been at this computer thing for almost 30 years so my anxiety level isn’t as high as it once was, but I can’t say I’m looking forward to the next few weeks either. 

Meanwhile, this afternoon, my old friend and I are saying goodbye.  Her files are overflowing with stories, news articles, letters and eulogies we’ve composed together. We’ve written and published one book together and have a first draft of a novel to our names as well.  If the gods are with me this new model will sport the kinds of bells and whistles that make a writer’s life easier.

Wish me luck.

 

HOUSEBOUND

Okay, this is an apology for the whining I did six weeks ago.  The beginning of February is always a low point in the year for me and I couldn’t help myself.  I succumbed to the dreariness of endless, drab winter days and long, featureless nights.  Menu planning offered no excitement, food preparation lacked lustre, even going to town for groceries seemed more trouble that it was worth.  I ask you: why can’t we be a species who hibernates?  Think of the food bill savings!  And, I would wake up skinny!  Talk about win/win.

At any rate, that was six weeks ago.  Now, here I sit ... inside my house ... listening to the wind howl ... knowing that the roads are absolutely blocked because I barely made it home yesterday before this latest gale blew in ... fondly recalling the quaint days when winter had just arrived at its ‘boring’ stage.  Since then there have been all kinds of positive steps toward spring: we have noticeably gained more daylight, the Tourism committee has managed to find enough faith in spring to believe having a meeting is worth it, and I got a seed catalogue in the mail.  One would think things are looking up, but no, it still feels like winter will never end.

My Facebook memories page  greets me every morning with pictures of the past two years when I was already BBQing suppers on a sunny deck and the snow was down to a few patches scattered around the yard.  This was sending me into serious depression until this morning when the aftermath of the 2017 storm showed up and reminded me how fickle the month of March really is.  It’s given me the will to go on for a day or two more.

I tell myself that life is better now that it’s light out while we eat breakfast and supper.  I tell myself how much cheaper it is on gas when there is no grass to mow.  I tell myself that with all this snow we won’t have to worry about water shortages this year.  I see that the temperature in my greenhouse is plus 18 on the sunny days and I tell myself to go out there and soak up some of that sun.  Myself immediately tells me “Forget that! We dug our way out there in January and you can’t even tell where that trail was!” She’s right of course, the snow is up past the door knob at the back of the house. Myself is a pretty smart gal.

Besides, if I was going to tunnel anywhere it would be out to my clothesline so I could hang socks and face cloths out there.  Nothing else would fit between the snow and the line.

I’ve done all the winter things I usually do – even the tax books are ready to go.  I pretty much follow the pets around with my vacuum cleaner because their way to greet spring is to cover everything in hair.  I’ve even started some cuttings to fill my planters this summer.  It feels wonderful to see the color green in my window.  I’m even psyched to go weeding because at least that means being outside in the sunshine.  Myself tells me that will wear off, she knows me so well.

Heck I’ve even finished round one on a book I’ve been writing.

All I’ve got left is watching TV but these past days I’ve been struggling with that.  The scenes from Ukraine are humbling me, and breaking me, and leaving me sick at heart.  How I wish I could transplant some of those forlorn women and children to my big, rambling farm house. 

As much as I want my winter doldrums to be over, as I do every year, watching this horror unfold shrinks my petty wants and needs to nothing.  Being housebound is suddenly a luxury.

 

 

Cause, Courage, and Consequences

February 24, 2022 I found myself sitting in the dentist’s chair enduring that period of anxiety between when they give you the freezing needle and when you get to find out for sure that it worked.  It’s time spent alone to think your own thoughts and listen to the high pitched whine of drills being used on other patients. The dentist’s chair is not my happy place.

But this morning there was lots to think about.  Putin was on the move. His plans of war had been put into motion during the night. Cities full of people were being bombed; hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians were on the run. By nightfall, how many innocent people would be dead because of this evil man’s ego? And this was only day one; wars don’t end in one day.

The office where I sat was warm and safe; Garth Brooks sang The Dance on the music system. Soon that nasty cavity would be a thing of my past and I could go have lunch and visit with a good friend; plans we made weeks ago.  And yet I couldn’t get the news video of almost deadlocked traffic trying to escape Kyiv out of my mind.  Those poor people had made plans for February 24 as well ... every day things like dentist appointments, dance lessons for their little girls, soccer for their boys after school ... and now, here they were crowded into their cars with everything they could squeeze in, not knowing where they were headed, watching their gas gauges go down and distressing about being able to buy more. 

My generation is acquainted with war ... or I should say stories of war.  We have heard about our grandfather’s Great War (although I’ve never felt that any war should be given the designation ‘great’), we’ve watched countless movies of the second world war, and our window into the Korean War was the show M*A*S*H  on TV.   We see war through the safety of a camera lens.  We don’t know the smell of death in the streets.  We don’t know the terror of running for bomb shelters or the sick feeling of living through the attack to find our house is nothing but rubble when we try to go home.  We can’t imagine what it would be like to be stopped by soldiers and asked for proof of who we are, knowing that this man has the power to decide if we live or die.

Tonight one of the news stories is not of Ukrainians fleeing but of Russians protesting against their government, against Putin himself, for starting this war. Imagine that. Standing up and saying “NO” to a man who poisons and imprisons and murders anyone he sees as an obstacle to his plans. They know that being arrested – even a Russian arrest – would be the lightest penalty they could hope for.  And yet they came and marched and sang their anthem in an effort to stop the war and save both Russian and Ukrainian lives.  The stakes couldn’t be higher.

Their cause is larger than just themselves, they show great courage in the face of real peril, the consequences of their actions could well be fatal, and yet they make their stand.

These are people who recognize they have a responsibility to humanity to stand up for what is right.  They want Putin to stop and they want the world to know that they don’t support his actions. As I sit in my safe dentist chair on the other side of the world I feel humbled by their sacrifice and pray that some good will come of it.