Piffle - we in Toronto got a mere 12 inches of snow yesterday, whereas parts of the Eastern seaboard got 3 times that! Still, when I read on-line last night that the express bus to Hamilton had been cancelled due to the storm, I was not happy with the weather gods. My workshop at the Hamilton Public Library was to begin at 10 a.m. this morning, and the 8.30 express bus got in at 9.15. The train would be much more complicated and longer. So I rose at 6.15 a.m. - can't remember the last time I got up so early - to get ready for the train.
Posted at 6.11 a.m.: All busses now running normally.
It was a gorgeous day - bright sun which will melt the piles of snow in no time, and then there will be floods. My host Jill met me at the bus station. Jill came every Monday recently all the way from Hamilton to my Ryerson class. She has decided to start a weekly writer's group at the library there, and asked me to run a writing workshop to help get it started. The snow deterred some, but still, 19 Hamiltonians (and one homeless woman who wandered in and out) came through the snowdrifts to sit in a sunny room for 3 hours, to talk about writing and do some on the spot. It was wonderful. One of the participants, who'd been a lively part of the workshop, came up at the end to tell me that he is 95 years old and just beginning his literary career. I'd told them about Diana Athill and the bestseller she wrote at 92 - I hope this man will top her.
The homeless woman said at one point, "So, writing - does it come from your imagination, or from, like, just from the top of your head?" Good question. "Both," was my terse reply. "What about from your heart?" she said. Oh yes. From there most of all. Thank you for pointing that out.
The participants seemed to get a lot from the day. So now I have ready a 3 hour workshop template I can run anywhere. Just ask.
The kind librarian gave me a very impressive Public Library of Hamilton notebook with matching pen. Afterwards, lunch with Jill, who works with street people and is one of the good people of the earth, and her daughter, and back to the bus. A bunch of artist friends have moved to Hamilton because life is calmer and housing much cheaper than in Toronto. The downtown has a nice vibe. But living there, I'd feel in exile, so near yet so far from the real thing - the big city.
But then, I'm a city girl.
Saturday, February 9, 2013
Friday, February 8, 2013
snow day
Wow - if there's two feet of new snow outside, this must be Canada. And it's still coming down. I have shovelled twice and my homeless friend Bill once. Bill has now disappeared, probably because he wore his scrawny body out shovelling, and also made so much money that he can afford to comfort himself at some local happy hour.
It's beautiful out there, especially the happy birds at the feeder against a backdrop of white. The city is muffled, and my friend Sam the teacher was anticipating an easy day at school with only a few kids. The cat is sleeping with her paw over her eyes and has not awakened even to eat. My son is in bed at home, still recovering from some vile bug, and my daughter and grandson are visiting friends in Saskatchewan, where it's even colder and snowier.
February in Canada: a good time to be self-employed.
Today I added up the travel agent work I did on-line yesterday, and am proud to report that I am traversing the North American continent, flying non-stop direct from Toronto to Washington to Austin to Los Angeles to Vancouver to Toronto for less than a thousand dollars. How amazing is the internet. Not to mention airbnb, that my friend Shari Ulrich told me about - I've got a big bright room in someone's Austin home for $44 a night. How did we travel before? Oh yes - people were employed in the travel agency business. A whole industry wiped out - one of many.
I spent this afternoon preparing for tomorrow's job - leading a three hour writing workshop at the Hamilton Public Library. Quite a few have registered already, but I have no idea of the final size of the crowd or the demographics, as Jill, a former student of mine who organized it, told me she was aiming at the homeless people who live around the library. So I'm getting the bus tomorrow to Hamilton with general notes about writing and writing exercises to do with - 20 or 30 miscellaneous Hamiltonians. This will be interesting.
And then Jill is taking me to a Nepalese restaurant for lunch. Great, as long as there's not too much yak's milk, I said.
I have just had a huge platter of macaroni and cheese for supper. When I had recovered from a childhood illness, my mother made macaroni and cheese. It's a dish of comfort and celebration. So please celebrate with me - we've survived the snow, we've survived everything else so far, we're alive on this Friday of February 2013, and the only word that matters is: Onward.
PS. Bruce just sent me this - a gay Conservative - Conservative! - MP's plea in British parliament for the equal right to be married. Eloquent and moving. And by the way, he's a Conservative.
http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/02/07/400-175-for-marriage-equality-in-britain-ctd/
It's beautiful out there, especially the happy birds at the feeder against a backdrop of white. The city is muffled, and my friend Sam the teacher was anticipating an easy day at school with only a few kids. The cat is sleeping with her paw over her eyes and has not awakened even to eat. My son is in bed at home, still recovering from some vile bug, and my daughter and grandson are visiting friends in Saskatchewan, where it's even colder and snowier.
February in Canada: a good time to be self-employed.
Today I added up the travel agent work I did on-line yesterday, and am proud to report that I am traversing the North American continent, flying non-stop direct from Toronto to Washington to Austin to Los Angeles to Vancouver to Toronto for less than a thousand dollars. How amazing is the internet. Not to mention airbnb, that my friend Shari Ulrich told me about - I've got a big bright room in someone's Austin home for $44 a night. How did we travel before? Oh yes - people were employed in the travel agency business. A whole industry wiped out - one of many.
I spent this afternoon preparing for tomorrow's job - leading a three hour writing workshop at the Hamilton Public Library. Quite a few have registered already, but I have no idea of the final size of the crowd or the demographics, as Jill, a former student of mine who organized it, told me she was aiming at the homeless people who live around the library. So I'm getting the bus tomorrow to Hamilton with general notes about writing and writing exercises to do with - 20 or 30 miscellaneous Hamiltonians. This will be interesting.
And then Jill is taking me to a Nepalese restaurant for lunch. Great, as long as there's not too much yak's milk, I said.
I have just had a huge platter of macaroni and cheese for supper. When I had recovered from a childhood illness, my mother made macaroni and cheese. It's a dish of comfort and celebration. So please celebrate with me - we've survived the snow, we've survived everything else so far, we're alive on this Friday of February 2013, and the only word that matters is: Onward.
PS. Bruce just sent me this - a gay Conservative - Conservative! - MP's plea in British parliament for the equal right to be married. Eloquent and moving. And by the way, he's a Conservative.
http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/02/07/400-175-for-marriage-equality-in-britain-ctd/
Thursday, February 7, 2013
travel bug
People are getting worried - four days without a post - is anything wrong? All is well, thank you for asking. Sometimes, I just cannot scour my soul for insight or even gossip and movie reviews. Time to lie fallow, not dig anything up.
The weekend in Ottawa was hard - my mother's whole life being ripped open for us to pillage. Of course, we did so lovingly - except when I was cursing her hoarding tendencies - but still, there's something brutal about it all. At one point I clutched her threadbare teddybear Donald Leonard Brown, aged 89 like my mother, and sobbed.
That was Saturday. Now it's Thursday afternoon, and there's a blizzard on the way; my class tonight may be sparse. Donald Leonard Brown is safely settled on the bedroom bookshelf beside my own British teddy bear, imaginatively named Teddy, who's a mere 62. The rest of my share of Mum's stuff is still on the floor in her spare room - I'll be back next weekend to continue sorting, piling, discarding, giving away, recycling, dividing. Until her apartment is empty, and some of her things live with my brother, and some with me.
On Monday, after my return, I went across town to see magical grandson Eli, who now wriggles across the floor like a seal. We went to Toys R Us to buy baby gates and little socks with rubber bottoms. An emporium for children - what an overwhelming place, I'd never been there. Anna wandered in a daze of desire. We'd arranged to meet her childhood friend Shani, whose first son is now 11 and who has just had another - Leo, a week old. There they were, two friends since senior kindergarten who used to play Barbies and then scream for the Backstreet Boys, now gurgling at their babies. More beautiful than ever, those girls. Keeping our planet populated.
Speaking of which - my goddaughter Jessica, Lynn and Denis's daughter, just had a baby boy, Jules, in Sydney. Now Lynn and Denis have one grandchild in Australia, three in Kathmandu, two in Dubai, and one on the way in London. Their youngest daughter lives in Africa and is not yet pregnant but undoubtedly before long ... The Blin family, populating the planet all by itself.
Yesterday, yet another medical appointment, to have yet another bit of my insides inspected. It's surreal when a male doctor greets you with a smile and then shines a flashlight straight into your nether regions. And then says, "You're beautiful inside and out." How many people can actually tell you that? What a charmer. I should have said, I bet you say that to all the girls.
The most beautiful word in the English language: "benign."
Today, as the snow falls, I have spent hours booking my April getaway - an exciting trip which involves: flying from Toronto to Washington D.C. to visit Cousin George on Dad's side and Cousins Barbara and Francey on my mother's; from Washington to Austin, Texas to visit Lynn, friend since 1967, who has come from Montpellier to spend a term there; from Austin to Los Angeles to stay with my dear screenwriter friend Suzette who has a beachfront apartment in Santa Monica; from Los Angeles to Vancouver for the opening of Chris's musical about his life; from Vancouver to Bowen Island to stay on the ocean with musician extraordinaire Shari; from Bowen to Vancouver Island to stay at an oceanfront cottage in Tofino with Patsy, friend since 1971. Back to Vancouver to say goodbye, and home. Thrilling, to be seeing so many family members and good friends, this trip.
And, even though the mild Pacific is inferior to the mighty Atlantic, I'll be overjoyed to get my fill of ocean, which, as a Halifax girl, I sorely miss. Paris? Who needs Paris?
The weekend in Ottawa was hard - my mother's whole life being ripped open for us to pillage. Of course, we did so lovingly - except when I was cursing her hoarding tendencies - but still, there's something brutal about it all. At one point I clutched her threadbare teddybear Donald Leonard Brown, aged 89 like my mother, and sobbed.
That was Saturday. Now it's Thursday afternoon, and there's a blizzard on the way; my class tonight may be sparse. Donald Leonard Brown is safely settled on the bedroom bookshelf beside my own British teddy bear, imaginatively named Teddy, who's a mere 62. The rest of my share of Mum's stuff is still on the floor in her spare room - I'll be back next weekend to continue sorting, piling, discarding, giving away, recycling, dividing. Until her apartment is empty, and some of her things live with my brother, and some with me.
On Monday, after my return, I went across town to see magical grandson Eli, who now wriggles across the floor like a seal. We went to Toys R Us to buy baby gates and little socks with rubber bottoms. An emporium for children - what an overwhelming place, I'd never been there. Anna wandered in a daze of desire. We'd arranged to meet her childhood friend Shani, whose first son is now 11 and who has just had another - Leo, a week old. There they were, two friends since senior kindergarten who used to play Barbies and then scream for the Backstreet Boys, now gurgling at their babies. More beautiful than ever, those girls. Keeping our planet populated.
Speaking of which - my goddaughter Jessica, Lynn and Denis's daughter, just had a baby boy, Jules, in Sydney. Now Lynn and Denis have one grandchild in Australia, three in Kathmandu, two in Dubai, and one on the way in London. Their youngest daughter lives in Africa and is not yet pregnant but undoubtedly before long ... The Blin family, populating the planet all by itself.
Yesterday, yet another medical appointment, to have yet another bit of my insides inspected. It's surreal when a male doctor greets you with a smile and then shines a flashlight straight into your nether regions. And then says, "You're beautiful inside and out." How many people can actually tell you that? What a charmer. I should have said, I bet you say that to all the girls.
The most beautiful word in the English language: "benign."
Today, as the snow falls, I have spent hours booking my April getaway - an exciting trip which involves: flying from Toronto to Washington D.C. to visit Cousin George on Dad's side and Cousins Barbara and Francey on my mother's; from Washington to Austin, Texas to visit Lynn, friend since 1967, who has come from Montpellier to spend a term there; from Austin to Los Angeles to stay with my dear screenwriter friend Suzette who has a beachfront apartment in Santa Monica; from Los Angeles to Vancouver for the opening of Chris's musical about his life; from Vancouver to Bowen Island to stay on the ocean with musician extraordinaire Shari; from Bowen to Vancouver Island to stay at an oceanfront cottage in Tofino with Patsy, friend since 1971. Back to Vancouver to say goodbye, and home. Thrilling, to be seeing so many family members and good friends, this trip.
And, even though the mild Pacific is inferior to the mighty Atlantic, I'll be overjoyed to get my fill of ocean, which, as a Halifax girl, I sorely miss. Paris? Who needs Paris?
Saturday, February 2, 2013
stuff
Saturday night in Ottawa, and my friend Lani and I are passing out after a second long, hard day, delving into my mother's lifetime accumulation of possessions, and trying to figure out what should go where - to me or my brother, to my kids or someone else or to Goodwill or recycling or garbage. Mountains of stuff - cupboards, drawers, boxes and bags full of stuff. It makes me want to live in a pristine, empty white room - except that somehow beside me, as I write, is a cavalcade of new possessions that at some point will make their way to Toronto and into my house. Which already is not, shall we say, pristine or empty. Or, for that matter, white.
My mum was very bright and energetic, poor in childhood, lived through the deprivation of the war, then, as women did, she married and had children and stopped work. Her work was us and my dad. When he died in 1988, all of that ambition and energy had nowhere to go. She had no job, and so her job became ... to shop, and to collect. I've already posted a list of her collections, to which today we add - eggcups, letters - every single letter ever sent to her, since the Forties, other papers, including dry cleaning reminders and ticket stubs; she collected tools, shoe shining equipment, knitting and sewing stuff, art, art books and art equipment, sheet music, pots and boxes, calendars, brooches, old English pottery - and mostly, my mother collected silver, particularly Georgian silver, mostly Georgian silver spoons. Many many spoons. When we opened the trunk today, Mike and I thought we were rich, at last - gorgeous spoons, all hidden away in cloth bags with tags telling what date and from where - Edinburgh, 1789. Beautiful fish knives, ladles, teapots and creamers, trays ... bought at antique shops and flea markets for decades, one by one, often at great expense.
Mike checked the website of a man he'd met who deals in Georgian silver, to see ONE spoon of the kind we had listed at $350. Drooling, he called. And then the dealer explained that no one is buying silver these days; that that spoon had been listed there for years; that he buys silver now by weight, not for its beauty or age. Mike has not given up - he is taking in the oldest spoons and ladles and the beautiful fish knife, in the hopes this guy will fall in love and offer the earth. But now we know better. And then I'd open another drawer and find - more spoons. More pots, more boxes, more more more.
Moral: when you are a highly intelligent and energetic widow, get a job.
Mike had brought his friend, named Mike, to help him, and I had Lani, and with the help of these two, we got through two brutal days. My brother and I have the same taste - whenever there was a choice of two similar items, we both liked the same one. So there were many toss ups, times when he gave in or I did. The important thing is that one of us always did. So in the end, though I lost some things I would have liked to own, so did he, and we both got a goodly percentage of things we coveted - a bit of furniture, a few old books, some art, a rug or two, and, yes, spoons. All of which will eventually have to go to our own poor kids. We gave some stuff to Auntie Do, who exclaimed, "A silver teapot! How lovely - I've never had one." Win/win.
Much, much more to be done - many boxes of my father's stuff still, and records, including a box of 78's, and family photo albums - endless. More weekends in Ottawa, for sure. But the worst of the choosing and distribution is over.
And now I must pay tribute to a beloved friend. Lani and I met in January 1975; she saw me in my first show in Vancouver and instantly decided I should be the other woman in a travelling theatre troupe she was putting together. We toured the Kootenay Mountains in an ancient Dodge bus with four crazy actors, and thus began one of the great friendships of my life. Lani is a sublimely eccentric, fiercely loyal, kind and loving and very short redhead; she chainsmokes and ingests many other substances, at least she used to, and considers ketchup her only vegetable. We did many more shows together, and have continued to write and talk ceaselessly through the years; she and her wonderful partner Maurice and beautiful dog Bourbon - "a borderline retriever," Lan calls him - now live in Stratford.
A few weeks ago, when it was time to consider this very difficult sojourn in Mum's condo, haggling over scores of sentimental items with a brother with whom sometimes I have not gotten along, I knew I must have someone at my side and on my side, someone sensible, hard-headed and organized. Lani was the first person who came to mind.
She volunteered immediately, and this is what that meant: getting up at dawn on Thursday to drive in a blizzard to her brother's in Mississauga; getting him to drive her to the Go train to Toronto; sitting without a cigarette for the 5 1/2 hour train ride to Ottawa with me; and then spending two solid days in a bitterly cold city helping warring siblings sort out family issues and silver spoons. She - and my brother's Mike - saved our lives. I have no doubt that though my bro and I had both resolved to be level-headed and fair, the minute we were at an impasse, we would have jumped back 50 years and been at each other's throats. Instead, we bartered and teased like grown-ups all the way through, the work got done, and we are still friends. Thanks to our friends.
I can never repay Lani for this gift. She says all she wants as payment is for me to do the same for someone else one day, as friends helped her after her mother and then sister Charley and then her father died.
So I will. But not in the near future. Please, please do not ask. I would cry.
My mum was very bright and energetic, poor in childhood, lived through the deprivation of the war, then, as women did, she married and had children and stopped work. Her work was us and my dad. When he died in 1988, all of that ambition and energy had nowhere to go. She had no job, and so her job became ... to shop, and to collect. I've already posted a list of her collections, to which today we add - eggcups, letters - every single letter ever sent to her, since the Forties, other papers, including dry cleaning reminders and ticket stubs; she collected tools, shoe shining equipment, knitting and sewing stuff, art, art books and art equipment, sheet music, pots and boxes, calendars, brooches, old English pottery - and mostly, my mother collected silver, particularly Georgian silver, mostly Georgian silver spoons. Many many spoons. When we opened the trunk today, Mike and I thought we were rich, at last - gorgeous spoons, all hidden away in cloth bags with tags telling what date and from where - Edinburgh, 1789. Beautiful fish knives, ladles, teapots and creamers, trays ... bought at antique shops and flea markets for decades, one by one, often at great expense.
Mike checked the website of a man he'd met who deals in Georgian silver, to see ONE spoon of the kind we had listed at $350. Drooling, he called. And then the dealer explained that no one is buying silver these days; that that spoon had been listed there for years; that he buys silver now by weight, not for its beauty or age. Mike has not given up - he is taking in the oldest spoons and ladles and the beautiful fish knife, in the hopes this guy will fall in love and offer the earth. But now we know better. And then I'd open another drawer and find - more spoons. More pots, more boxes, more more more.
Moral: when you are a highly intelligent and energetic widow, get a job.
Mike had brought his friend, named Mike, to help him, and I had Lani, and with the help of these two, we got through two brutal days. My brother and I have the same taste - whenever there was a choice of two similar items, we both liked the same one. So there were many toss ups, times when he gave in or I did. The important thing is that one of us always did. So in the end, though I lost some things I would have liked to own, so did he, and we both got a goodly percentage of things we coveted - a bit of furniture, a few old books, some art, a rug or two, and, yes, spoons. All of which will eventually have to go to our own poor kids. We gave some stuff to Auntie Do, who exclaimed, "A silver teapot! How lovely - I've never had one." Win/win.
Much, much more to be done - many boxes of my father's stuff still, and records, including a box of 78's, and family photo albums - endless. More weekends in Ottawa, for sure. But the worst of the choosing and distribution is over.
And now I must pay tribute to a beloved friend. Lani and I met in January 1975; she saw me in my first show in Vancouver and instantly decided I should be the other woman in a travelling theatre troupe she was putting together. We toured the Kootenay Mountains in an ancient Dodge bus with four crazy actors, and thus began one of the great friendships of my life. Lani is a sublimely eccentric, fiercely loyal, kind and loving and very short redhead; she chainsmokes and ingests many other substances, at least she used to, and considers ketchup her only vegetable. We did many more shows together, and have continued to write and talk ceaselessly through the years; she and her wonderful partner Maurice and beautiful dog Bourbon - "a borderline retriever," Lan calls him - now live in Stratford.
A few weeks ago, when it was time to consider this very difficult sojourn in Mum's condo, haggling over scores of sentimental items with a brother with whom sometimes I have not gotten along, I knew I must have someone at my side and on my side, someone sensible, hard-headed and organized. Lani was the first person who came to mind.
She volunteered immediately, and this is what that meant: getting up at dawn on Thursday to drive in a blizzard to her brother's in Mississauga; getting him to drive her to the Go train to Toronto; sitting without a cigarette for the 5 1/2 hour train ride to Ottawa with me; and then spending two solid days in a bitterly cold city helping warring siblings sort out family issues and silver spoons. She - and my brother's Mike - saved our lives. I have no doubt that though my bro and I had both resolved to be level-headed and fair, the minute we were at an impasse, we would have jumped back 50 years and been at each other's throats. Instead, we bartered and teased like grown-ups all the way through, the work got done, and we are still friends. Thanks to our friends.
I can never repay Lani for this gift. She says all she wants as payment is for me to do the same for someone else one day, as friends helped her after her mother and then sister Charley and then her father died.
So I will. But not in the near future. Please, please do not ask. I would cry.
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