Inconvenience in the Wilds of North Middlesex:

Here in North Middlesex, we seem obsessed with inconvenience. Take the the future of our high school; a city bigwig’s suggestion that E-learning might help the enrolment problem found few backers. Better to be inconvenienced by having your children go all the way to London apparently.  Wind turbine farms have generated more than the expected electricity: some local residents have lain down on the road to inconvenience truck drivers delivering the turbine blades. On another front, even though, as our newspaper solemnly reported, “January is a time of no mosquito issues,” concerned citizens reviewed plans to render life as inconvenient as possible for next year’s crop. Well, who can quarrel with that!

Nevertheless, for me, living in a small village means things are handy: You can go to the library and be home again in 10 minutes — and that includes checking out the books the librarian called you about when she realized that Hotmail failed to send the automated message.

Recently, one of the wardens hurriedly left church just as Communion was starting. I didn’t quite catch her explanation, but apparently she was coming back. I was last in line and tried to delay — in both kinds   — in case she returned in time, but she just missed.  However, she did partake of the final hymn and the dismissal. She had just put her house up for sale.  A Sunday morning showing was scheduled, so she had to dash home to put her cat in the car.

And things are made handy: Take the bright yellow port-a-potty behind the sign on Main St. advertising the Parkhill Area Horticultural Society (aka the Hort).  Apparently, the municipality asked the company to remove it during the last postal strike for reasons I am not clear about, but it has reappeared — like a winter aconite in a snowy garden.

A letter to the editor in the Parkhill Gazette reminded readers that our local sanitation company donated it not just for families tobogganing on the hill beside the post office but for all visitors to the town. It gets serviced weekly, has a hand sanitizer dispenser, and is available for use “no matter what time of the day or night.”

There are other washrooms, but they are at the Leisure Club, a distant stroll on the other side of Coronation Park (past the famed Royal Oak, carved to commemorate William and Kate's wedding) and, inconveniently, they don’t open until May.

Speaking of trees, had you attended the general meeting of the Hort, you would have learned something handy about landscaping. The owner of the local nursery advised against spending hundreds of dollars on a formal landscape design. Just bring your house measurements to their garden store, and she’ll draw an outline of your house and yard in the gravel driveway and place plants in it until the desired effect is reached.   Then you can spend that money on plants rather than paper!

Also, everyone knows about the convenience of mulch for the garden especially when it provides nitrogen for the soil. A lively and somewhat unexpected discussion ensued as to the nitrogen-providing benefits of human urine. Apparently, it is very handy for re-invigorating compost heaps, and if you can get urine from a male of the species, it can be used to ward off unwanted critters. This surprising information raised a few titters amongst the mostly female audience. Practically speaking, we could use some around our neck of the woods as we have been shocked by a threesome of semi-feral cats, enlivened prematurely  by the mild weather no doubt, engaging in unmentionable activity on our lawn.

But alas, there is a downside to convenience. We have been subjected to more than our share of door-to-door inquiries especially about natural gas contracts and subscriptions to the London Free Press, neither of which we want.   We accept solicitations from the Heart and Stroke Foundation, however, as their representative is also our neighbour and has used his Bobcat to clear snow from the foot of our driveway  (before we got our own beast — whereupon, as you will recall, it stopped snowing).

Anyway, the other day I was meandering around the kitchen in my dressing gown when the doorbell rang. It was only 10:00 in the morning, so much too early for the Mr. Heart and Stroke. I shrank down beside the sink until I was sure whoever it was had gone. To add insult to injury, there was another knock on the door several hours later. By this time I was properly clothed but still not convivial.  I am an introvert so for me, answering the door is like answering the phone: if it’s important, they’ll call back. 

And sure enough they did.  As I was making dinner, another knock on the door. I said to Greg who’d arrived home a few minutes before, “For goodness sake, that’s the third time today! Can’t they get the point!”  He said rather firmly, “I think you’d better answer it.” This startled me, as his attitude to unasked-for social interruptions is much like mine.  But I did as I was bidden, looked out and saw a grey van parked in the driveway. Turning to come back up the porch steps, there was the driver. He was carrying a huge bouquet of flowers. 

Yes, it was the chap from Frontier Flowers delivering my Valentine’s bouquet.

Here in North Middlesex, we seem obsessed with inconvenience. Take the the future of our high school; a city bigwig’s suggestion that E-learning might help the enrolment problem found few backers. Better to be inconvenienced by having your children go all the way to London apparently.  Wind turbine farms have generated more than the expected electricity: some local residents have lain down on the road to inconvenience truck drivers delivering the turbine blades. On another front, even though, as our newspaper solemnly reported, “January is a time of no mosquito issues,” concerned citizens reviewed plans to render life as inconvenient as possible for next year’s crop. Well, who can quarrel with that!

Nevertheless, for me, living in a small village means things are handy: You can go to the library and be home again in 10 minutes — and that includes checking out the books the librarian called you about when she realized that Hotmail failed to send the automated message.

Recently, one of the wardens hurriedly left church just as Communion was starting. I didn’t quite catch her explanation, but apparently she was coming back. I was last in line and tried to delay — in both parts   — in case she returned in time, but she just missed.  However, she did partake of the final hymn and the dismissal. She had just put her house up for sale.  A Sunday morning showing was scheduled, so she had to dash home to put her cat in the car.

And things are made handy: Take the bright yellow port-a-potty behind the sign on Main St advertising the Parkhill Area Horticultural Society (aka the Hort).  Apparently, the municipality asked the company to remove it during the last postal strike for reasons I am not clear about, but it has reappeared — like a winter aconite in a snowy garden.

A letter to the editor in the Parkhill Gazette reminded readers that our local sanitation company donated it not just for families tobogganing on the hill beside the post office but for all visitors to the town. It gets serviced weekly, has a hand sanitizer dispenser, and is available for use “no matter what time of the day or night.”

There are other washrooms, but they are at the Leisure Club, a distant stroll on the other side of Coronation Park (past the famed Royal Oak) and, inconveniently, they don’t open until May.

Speaking of trees, had you attended the general meeting of the Hort., you would have learned something handy about landscaping. The owner of the local nursery advised against spending hundreds of dollars on a formal landscape design. Just bring your house measurements to their garden store, and she’ll draw an outline of your house and yard in the gravel driveway and place plants in it until the desired effect is reached.   Then you can spend that money on plants rather than paper!

Also, everyone knows about the convenience of mulch for the garden especially when it provides nitrogen for the soil. A lively and somewhat unexpected discussion ensued as to the nitrogen-providing benefits of human urine. Apparently, it is very handy for re-invigorating compost heaps, and if you can get urine from a male of the species, it can be used to ward off unwanted critters. This surprising information raised a few titters amongst the mostly female audience. Practically speaking, we could use some around our neck of the woods as we have been shocked by a threesome of semi-feral cats, enlivened prematurely  by the mild weather no doubt, engaging in unmentionable activity on our lawn.

But alas, there is a downside to convenience. We have been subjected to more than our share of door-to-door inquiries especially about natural gas contracts and subscriptions to the London Free Press, neither of which we want.   We accept solicitations from the Heart and Stroke Foundation, however, as their representative is also our neighbour and has used his Bobcat to clear snow from the foot of our driveway  (before we got our own beast — whereupon, as you will recall, it stopped snowing).

Anyway, the other day I was meandering around the kitchen in my dressing gown when the doorbell rang. It was only 10:00 in the morning, so much too early for the Mr. Heart and Stroke. I shrank down beside the sink until I was sure whoever it was had gone. To add insult to injury, there was another knock on the door several hours later. By this time I was properly clothed but still not convivial.  I am an introvert so for me, answering the door is like answering the phone: if it’s important, they’ll call back. 

And sure enough they did.  As I was making dinner, another knock on the door. I said to Greg who’d arrived home a few minutes before, “For goodness sake, that’s the third time today! Can’t they get the point!”  He said rather firmly, “I think you’d better answer it.” This startled me, as his attitude to unasked-for social interruptions is much like mine.  But I did as I was bidden, looked out and saw a grey van parked in the driveway. Turning to come back up the porch steps, there was the driver. He was carrying a huge bouquet of flowers. 

Yes, it was the chap from Frontier Flowers delivering my Valentine’s bouquet.

Here in North Middlesex, we seem obsessed with inconvenience. Take the the future of our high school; a city bigwig’s suggestion that E-learning might help the enrolment problem found few backers. Better to be inconvenienced by having your children go all the way to London apparently.  Wind turbine farms have generated more than the expected electricity: some local residents have lain down on the road to inconvenience truck drivers delivering the turbine blades. On another front, even though, as our newspaper solemnly reported, “January is a time of no mosquito issues,” concerned citizens reviewed plans to render life as inconvenient as possible for next year’s crop. Well, who can quarrel with that!

Nevertheless, for me, living in a small village means things are handy: You can go to the library and be home again in 10 minutes — and that includes checking out the books the librarian called you about when she realized that Hotmail failed to send the automated message.

Recently, one of the wardens hurriedly left church just as Communion was starting. I didn’t quite catch her explanation, but apparently she was coming back. I was last in line and tried to delay — in both parts   — in case she returned in time, but she just missed.  However, she did partake of the final hymn and the dismissal. She had just put her house up for sale.  A Sunday morning showing was scheduled, so she had to dash home to put her cat in the car.

And things are made handy: Take the bright yellow port-a-potty behind the sign on Main St advertising the Parkhill Area Horticultural Society (aka the Hort).  Apparently, the municipality asked the company to remove it during the last postal strike for reasons I am not clear about, but it has reappeared — like a winter aconite in a snowy garden.

A letter to the editor in the Parkhill Gazette reminded readers that our local sanitation company donated it not just for families tobogganing on the hill beside the post office but for all visitors to the town. It gets serviced weekly, has a hand sanitizer dispenser, and is available for use “no matter what time of the day or night.”

There are other washrooms, but they are at the Leisure Club, a distant stroll on the other side of Coronation Park (past the famed Royal Oak) and, inconveniently, they don’t open until May.

Speaking of trees, had you attended the general meeting of the Hort., you would have learned something handy about landscaping. The owner of the local nursery advised against spending hundreds of dollars on a formal landscape design. Just bring your house measurements to their garden store, and she’ll draw an outline of your house and yard in the gravel driveway and place plants in it until the desired effect is reached.   Then you can spend that money on plants rather than paper!

Also, everyone knows about the convenience of mulch for the garden especially when it provides nitrogen for the soil. A lively and somewhat unexpected discussion ensued as to the nitrogen-providing benefits of human urine. Apparently, it is very handy for re-invigorating compost heaps, and if you can get urine from a male of the species, it can be used to ward off unwanted critters. This surprising information raised a few titters amongst the mostly female audience. Practically speaking, we could use some around our neck of the woods as we have been shocked by a threesome of semi-feral cats, enlivened prematurely  by the mild weather no doubt, engaging in unmentionable activity on our lawn.

But alas, there is a downside to convenience. We have been subjected to more than our share of door-to-door inquiries especially about natural gas contracts and subscriptions to the London Free Press, neither of which we want.   We accept solicitations from the Heart and Stroke Foundation, however, as their representative is also our neighbour and has used his Bobcat to clear snow from the foot of our driveway  (before we got our own beast — whereupon, as you will recall, it stopped snowing).

Anyway, the other day I was meandering around the kitchen in my dressing gown when the doorbell rang. It was only 10:00 in the morning, so much too early for the Mr. Heart and Stroke. I shrank down beside the sink until I was sure whoever it was had gone. To add insult to injury, there was another knock on the door several hours later. By this time I was properly clothed but still not convivial.  I am an introvert so for me, answering the door is like answering the phone: if it’s important, they’ll call back. 

And sure enough they did.  As I was making dinner, another knock on the door. I said to Greg who’d arrived home a few minutes before, “For goodness sake, that’s the third time today! Can’t they get the point!”  He said rather firmly, “I think you’d better answer it.” This startled me, as his attitude to unasked-for social interruptions is much like mine.  But I did as I was bidden, looked out and saw a grey van parked in the driveway. Turning to come back up the porch steps, there was the driver. He was carrying a huge bouquet of flowers. 

Yes, it was the chap from Frontier Flowers delivering my Valentine’s bouquet.

“Joke, Joke, Joke” - a commentary on "Most"

I was at a retreat recently. The theme was finding “God in the Dark” and we watched three films, the first of which was the award-winning Czech-language film,  Most trans. The Bridge  (2003).   The other two were As it Is in Heaven and Billy Elliot both of which and especially As It Is in Heaven, I really enjoyed. In each film the mother is absent, but that is probably a tale for a different day.

In any event, Most, annoyed me immensely. In this reaction, I was in a very distinct minority!  And I am still trying to figure out why it got under my skin instead of into my heart.  But that latter phrase, dripping with schmaltzy religiosity,  is probably a clue.

You can watch it on you-tube at  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JSXqVb8Kc4  .

While you are at it, watch an older version, The Bridge, aka The Sacrifice  (1978) on which it was likely based:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-JZ6Nc5UsY

The 1978 film short was produced and directed by Robert Hatch with screenplay by Skip Clark;  both are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In this film, the allegorical meaning predominates   and the ending is significantly different from Most. So I didn’t find it quite so reprehensible… not quite… although all that soft-spoken father-talk about a five-year old (!) needing to be responsible for Mum is a bit creepy.

Similarly in Most, the son is depicted in a role of greater responsibility than an eight-year-old should have to bear: his concern over his father’s sadness is touching, but his father doesn’t exercise the parental judgment he should.    The characters in this short (33-minte) film were both poignantly realistic and often amusing in all their faults and failings. The little boy seemed especially attuned to them. What I saw was a loving father and son enjoying silly jokes and being together.

 I am a clueless concrete thinker, so the immediate reaction of my fellow retreat participants that the film was an allegory of God the Father sacrificing his son surprised me. 

Nevertheless, in an interview in Encompass (October 2005), a newsletter published by the conservative  American Anglican Council, Most  Director Bobby Garabedian was quoted as saying he wanted to make Hollywood films  and “ in the art, to let the voice of God speak.”  He added he wanted to “provoke debate and questions.”

I had a lot of questions: why did the father take his son to a workplace which could be dangerous and then leave him by himself fishing?  He indulged the son, but also indulged his own loneliness and sadness by allowing him to come to the bridge. 

How could the heroin addict possibly know what had happened?

How many eight year old boys have to die before addicts give up their addictions? Or put another way, would a heroin addict really have the empathy needed to care about the anguish she saw on the father’s face?

The father let his son die so the trainload of people we had gotten to know remarkably well and therefore cared about, might live. But is this, despite John 3:16, what is meant by sacrifice?  

How often do we put our children in a position where we sacrifice them for the greater good – a sacrifice that we might have avoided or accepted ourselves?

But the thing which rankles most (no pun intended) is the ending of the film.  The father talks about creating a new life for himself with a new job  in a new city with new people. Then he sees the former addict, now amazingly a happy cured mother. The toddler smiles beatifically at him whereupon he throws back his head and his arms to the sky in joy. Sorry, anyone who has lost a child would not feel that way. The sense of the film suggests they should and does those labouring under both grief and guilt a huge disservice. It was sentimental goo.

Also it says nothing about the idea of willing sacrifice.  I’m not a big fan of the idea that God or anyone should sacrifice someone else than themselves.  Of course, you could argue that God being three in one could in fact do this, but I’m not about to wade into those doctrinal waters. The only willing sacrifice I saw in the film was the little boy trying to move the lever to set the bridge in motion. Not the father  who seemed to dither in the station house not knowing what to do, but the son who rapidly and  instinctively did the right thing and died as a result. His was the willing sacrifice!

There I’ve unburdened myself! Whew, feels much better. 

Blow, blow thou bitter wind

Another dispatch from the Wilds of North Middlesex — likely #10

 

Like many Canadians, even those in faraway Prince Edward Island, renowned for its winter storms, we have had an unusually mild winter so far.   In fact, some bulbs are up, and a winter aconite was on the verge of blooming a few days ago before the mercury fell again. It’s the yellow dot near the centre of this photo :

I expect many people attribute the balminess to climate change, but I know the real cause. We decided, after several years of snow shovelling and drifts as tall as I am (not that much of an exaggeration), that it was time to get a snow blower.  Since then it has snowed —feebly — twice.  

Unlike Greg, who eschews comparison shopping, I have learned a lot about snow blowers.  My enthusiasm for on-line investigation likely warmed since there was no snow to shovel, which I actually enjoy doing in moderation, and it was raining, which dampened my eagerness for taking a walk.  See raindrops in this accompanying, somewhat dreary, photo :

According to Wikipedia, snow blowers are a Canadian invention first devised in the 1870s.   For some reason, they are now called snow throwers, and they come in one- and two- stage models.   You have to both pick up and then throw the snow; a one-stage does that in one operation, whereas in the mightier  two- stage type, one mechanism draws the snow into the augur and then another blows it out the handy chute.   We bought the latter variety; I call it the Beast.

It is a wise idea to familiarize yourself with its operating ins and outs (no pun intended). This includes how to start the Beast. In this regard, Greg had a small role to play in the ongoing history of Cub Cadets in North Middlesex. The day after we bought it in early December about an inch of snow fell.  Greg hastened out to throw snow. Nothing happened except for ever saltier language , not befitting that of a man of the cloth nor my gentle readers.  I suggested the motor /engine thing might be flooded, but I was ahead of the curve. 

A quick trip back to Parkhill Outdoor Products, and problem solved. You need to prime it first.  News travels fast here, and Greg’s adventure has already entered local lore:  Over coffee at my neighbour’s later in the week, her son-in-law, a truck driver and buddy of the salesman since high school, asked if we had had any more trouble getting it to start. 

Not a good idea, we quickly learned to blow the snow too far and have it land on your neighbour’s driveway.  Your irritated neighbour may soon land on your front porch. Also, it should come as no surprise that wearing a floaty accessory like a scarf is discouraged.  No one want to channel  poor Isadora Duncan.

 And that’s not all.

Things like garden hoses, rolled-up newspapers and forgotten small  toys may lurk under a pristine blanket of snow waiting to  jam the works. Not a wise idea to unblock the augur while the machine is turned on even if it is not actually running.   The misadventure of a local doctor entered the annals of local of history many years ago.   He tried to take a jammed-up newspaper out of the scoop at the front and lost two fingers in the process.  Even though this happened in Ailsa Craig, it is still used as a cautionary tale around here.

My re-entry into normal January activities pales by comparison. Low mobility exercise class resumed a couple of weeks ago.  As we bent and stretched to the usual pre-holiday tunes.  I was rather sorry not to be doing front roly-polies and climbing over the imaginary log to Ave Maria and O Holy Night, but there is always next year.

Speaking of January, I have resolved to make better use of my skates. After trying them out over Christmas at the rink at city hall in Toronto, I decided, once we got home, to go to the holiday community skate over at the arena. 

Toronto has a reputation in these parts for big-city lawlessness. In fact, someone at cantata practice insisted to me that the murder rate in Toronto was higher than that in Detroit, but she was from Sarnia, so I expect I should cut her some slack.  Anyhow, at the rink in Toronto, skaters travelled in the same direction, did not roughhouse, did not play throwing games with hats, did not carry  their toddlers on their shoulders, nor did they pound down the ice like Moose Vasko.  I expect it was because most of the Mega-city skaters were either arthritic (like yours truly) or still learning. Note number of skaters with both feet on ice:

But herein hockey country, it was a different story and a hair-raising experience for me.  Even though Tim Horton’s sponsored the free-for-all  (in every sense of the term), I am going to pay $2 and attend the moms and tots and seniors sessions from now on. There is a two-year-old who plods straight across the rink on the blue line, but I think I can dodge him.

Doing Jigsaws on April 28

I sit on a dining room chair,

 softened by a plump cushion,

 while I do jigsaw puzzles on the lap top.

I am thus distracted,

but soon I see the world before my eyes

break into pieces:

Grain elevators, farmers’ fields, the house across the street,

the forsythia bush in the garden,

 all fracture away.

I should get outdoors:  

maybe take the dandelions to pieces in the front lawn.

But it does nothing but rain: the grey clouds themselves  are breaking in pieces.

The sky falls onto the pavement and drains away.

Still I can choose how big my  fractures are:

Cut in two? That would be you and me,

but we are severed irretrievably,

thereby giving the lie to that simplicity.

Maybe 20?  When – too young to be anything but stupid – we took

different forks on the same road and thought we could join up later.

Or why not 176? Yes, much more challenging:  

your timelessness

broken into the days I have lived

since you ceased to be.

And I think how odd it is … life smashed into death just like that…

But unlike that puzzle, which defies remaking,

 Any jigsaw on the computer will do.

For I am slow, patient and persistent

The fragments will  jump together  eventually.

The picture will reform.

But, except in my dreams, you and I don’t jump together.

When I awaken, you are gone, and

I am fat with grief and broken in pieces.

L. Harris May 2, 2011

Anniversary — turning the year

This year’s poplar leaves are falling,

and today the northwest wind

hastens them along.

One leaf  heaves and jerks

at the end of a bare branch.

It will, of course, yield to the wind’s erratic breath,

or the inevitability of its little weight

but perhaps not  today.

 All timing is so chancy.

 You felt that little off-beat in your heart

almost all your life,

that little valve fluttering hopelessly,

 as you went to ground.

 And this dark wet windy fall,

I wanted to plant spring bulbs

where they planted you

 in that glorious autumn

we all remarked on last year.

 I wanted snowdrops to come

all green and white

 next spring

out of the earth which is cherishing you.

 But the time between desire and action

was too long:

I found there were no snowdrops left on the

shelves to buy.

 

And my heart’s timing, like yours, was off again.

October 15, 2011

Carpe diem or just waste it in solipsism

Procrastination is my bête noir, my nemesis, my irritation.  Here I am writing this blog bit when I should be calling the references sent by potential contractors willing to build our much dreamed of summer cottage.  If I am ever going to get it out of my imagination and into reality, I need to bite the bullet, gird my loins, suck it up, throw caution to the winds, take a flying leap and phone a bunch of strangers for their opinions.  It does not help that for as long as I can remember — and my parents let me use it — I have hated using the telephone.

 

So far today, I have made pancakes for breakfast and reorganized my recipe binder (no more recipes for Harvest Crunch peach upside down cake, fettuccini with whole cranberries, orzo- and cherry tomato- stuffed lemons,  or gorgonzola and mint pizza).  Then I spent over an hour on the Globe and Mail crossword puzzle— thanks to Google, it is now completely filled in.

Moments ago, I cast my eye on my two jewellery boxes that badly need sorting – do I really need papier maché earrings from the 70s? And is the missing half of several others going to miraculously reappear?  Like odd socks in the laundry, highly unlikely.

Muddying the waters is the fact that the more capacious of the two was given me by my ex-husband in his favourite, but my most disliked colour — black, which might sum up in a nutshell why we are no longer together, but that is another story.

 

Greg gave me the other smaller one – a lovely wooden box made by a craftsman in the mountains of North Carolina.  Which should be the box for up-to-date stuff and which to use for old keepsakes?   I wandered out to the kitchen and cut up an apple.

My priorities need to be focussed: Perhaps taking small steps will help me on my telephonic way.  I have printed up the lists of names the builders sent us. Now I will compose a list of identical questions. Then I will phone one person from each list.  Then I will re-blog!

But first I’ll take pictures of some of the things I’ve referenced in this blog.