School is in Session

Now that the garden is taken care of it’s time to take care of the brain. 18 months ago I abruptly stopped attending my OpenYale classes due to my little surprise illness.

I have now resumed my American Revolution course which is as apropos in today’s political chaos as it was 18 months ago. I enjoy listening to the lectures and applying the history into the world we are viewing today (in terms of American politics and their understanding of their own history – which in many cases surprises me). I set a pretty high standard of compression when it comes to history because I had some really excellent professors who set the bar.

I just finished the session on “Common Sense” and the takeaway from the lesson was two-fold; I know that Thomas Payne’s body is lost and that until the pamphlet was published the word “independence” was not bandied about!  Who knew that it was still hush-hush after the first congress? Or that John Adams simply abhorred the pamphlet as utter trash, having nothing to do with the reality of governing (as though he would know, hm?). Don’t get me wrong, I actually have a great deal of respect for John, Abigail and their son John Quincy but as yet he hadn’t had any experience of governing.

Feeling curiously aroused in scholarly pursuit I have also signed on to the Early Middle Ages course. I like this professor a lot, he is quietly amusing and I think I will enjoy his insights into the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. Again, I chose this one as it also aligns very well with what we see in today’s political world. So stay tuned for my “astute observations” as I gain new enlightenment (one can always hope).

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing has happened.” Winston Churchill

Handcrafts

My mother made a comment yesterday about what a shame it is that people don’t learn handwork anymore.  Mom started school at the age of 7 (no kindergarten) and even in first grade they had hand sewing while the boys did some kind of carpentry.  I have her little embroidered doily that she made when she was 7 years old, which she had done before she went to school.  Her older sisters also taught her how to knit before she went to school and she would knit clothes for her doll.  As I thought about it I did have to correct Mom by telling her that the success of Pinterest reveals that many people are still interested in handcrafts of all kinds, including embroidery, crochet and knitting.

We had mandatory home economics in grade 7 and 8 but we only had it once every 7 days for 90 minutes (2 periods of 45 minutes each).  We were put in cycles so we were lucky if we learned to cook something twice a year.  We had 6 sewing machines so the 16 girls would have to shift about for their turn to sew on the machines.  Those who were not in the kitchen or on the sewing machine basically sat around and read instructions since the teacher did not sit down with us to show us any hand stitching, not even how to baste our project.  It was quite pathetic and did not inspire me to have anything to do with home making of any sort.  Besides which my mother was such an expert at all types of handcrafts and cooking and was highly critical of both my sister’s and my efforts that both of us rapidly gave up any attempt at competing in that arena.  Once I got to high school I chose Art and French over Home Ec and said goodbye to any type of handwork until in my 30’s.  Suddenly, out of nowhere, I got very interested in cross stitching being quite addicted to it until my eyes started to give out.  I also went through a phase of crocheting in my late teens and early 20’s; I find crocheting easier than knitting but it’s limiting in a creative sense (with sweaters and tops, since crocheting is generally too loose for me).  Mom is now trying to encourage me to knit (which I did learn how to do when I was quite young).  Mom continues to knit despite severe arthritis in her hands and I am sure one of my strongest memories of my mother will always be her sitting watching TV with some knitting project in her hands. 

Handwork is soothing work so it is a pity that more people don’t do it since it would help relieve some of their stress and/or boredom. 

The Pink Dress

When I was in Grade 9 I stumbled on the book “The Pink Dress” by Anne Alexander and simply fell in love with the story.  It was one of my first teenage books from “modern” times (it was published in 1959) and the story was relatable to the current drama of a 14 year old.  In a nutshell good girl meets wild boy, rival girlfriend, The Crowd, shoplifting, vandalism and happy ending.  Flash forward some 20 odd years and I found myself wanting to read the book again so I began searching for it in used book stores to no avail.  More time passed and I forgot about it.

Wandering through my bookshelves and searching for free books on Kindle I thought “well, why not see if the book is available on Kindle”.  To my delight it was available but the cost was $9.99.  Silly me I threw caution to the wind and decided to buy it.  I shouldn’t say “silly me” because I dove into the book right away and gobbled it up in record time.  All these years later I find the book is still very current and relevant today.  Teenagers are still trying to fit in, have a boyfriend and at the same time make good choices.  It is an enjoyable read and the morality is valid as much today as it ever was. 

When I go to the teen or young adult section at the book store I am quite disturbed by how violent many of the book covers are and it is very worrying that so many of the books deal with violence, bad behavior and vampires or other supernatural creatures.  A little of that goes a long way in my opinion.

This morning I saw an article online about a Wisconsin school board having to back down from reading a book about a transgender because some parents got upset.  You really have to wonder about people being such ostriches; it’s okay for children to read about all kinds of wicked things but to actually learn about something real and relevant today is a bad thing? News flash, learning about a transgender person is not going to automatically affect your child with the same feelings.

Sometimes there is no understanding people.

Personal Story No. 2 - Heckle Island

As I got older I must have told my father about my composition agony.  I don’t know what got into him but when we moved to Winnipeg one summer my dad actually decided he was going to take his sons on a vacation.  My sister and I were in our mid teens and of course the youngest was still a baby but the 3 boys were just the right age for going on a camping trip.  Never mind that my father had never camped in his life or that he did not have any camping gear.  As was usual with him he would improvise; he brought two huge Polish sausage along as supplies.

Where did he decided to go?  He knew a man who knew a man who had gone to this great island called Heckle Island and that is where they went.  Until I started writing this story I actually thought that was what the place was called but apparently its true name is Hecla Island which is part of Hecla Grindstone Provincial Park.  The first day they only managed to get to some little place called Riverton where they stayed in a cabin.  The next day they reached the island.  Back in the day I don’t think there was much there, at least not accordingly to the sagas of my three brothers.  They met a fisherman who, for the price of one of the Polish sausages, gave them a "ride" on his fishing boat (still cabled to the dock).

More exciting for the two younger boys, who would have been about 8 and 10 at the time, were the trees.  Dead trees.  As they walked in the woods Dad accidentally leaned against a tree and it keeled right over.  The boys got excited at how strong Dad was.  The next thing they knew they were all knocking down trees, boom, boom, boom.  They had got into a dead zone of some type.  Erik got over excited and rammed into a live tree, barely retaining consciousness.  I can just imagine them knocking everything down as we were all a very active bunch of kids.

Dad found a cabin for them to stay in which turned out to be a good thing because it turned very cold that night.  It was supplied with an outhouse but as there had not been anyone on the island for 3 or 4 years it was quite the experience to go to the toilet.  When "fresh fodder" whizzed down the pipe a million flies went "whoopee" and flew up the pipe right into their you know what's!  As John said it was the quickest in and out procedure of his life.

Aside from the sausages they hadn’t brought any food with them so the next morning they drove into the village, found a café and had breakfast.  And that was enough for Dad.  They decided to go home.

Their bonding vacation lasted a day and a half.

Personal Story #1 Compositions

I have mentioned in the past that our family was not particularly well off when I was growing up.  One of the most noticeable things in my young mind that I found where I was different from my friends was my summer vacation.  Do you remember how you always had to write a “What I did on my summer vacation” story when you got into your new grade?  It was always the first “composition” we had to do and I used to agonize over it from the second year onwards because in my first year I was amazed to hear my classmates tell tales of “going away” on their vacation.  Going away?  Are you kidding me?  Some of the kids went camping with their family which wasn’t too strange but many of them went driving, far, far away, and stayed away for a week or two and sometimes more.  I couldn’t imagine.

The most exciting thing we ever did on vacation was when my mother decided to pack us a picnic lunch and told us to go find a place to have a picnic (and stay away all day).  Woot, woot.  We were on that like a tick on a deer.  She would make us peanut butter and jam sandwiches, sometimes change it up and make peanut butter and cinnamon spread sandwiches.  We’d have Freshie (the cheap version of Kool-aide) and maybe some cookies or fruit as an extra treat.  She’d give us a blanket which we could use as a fort (we lived in Ontario so we had plenty of trees to adventure through).  We also had a creek near by and of course we were forbidden to go there but we (naturally) forgot all about that and traipsed down there for our adventures.  We had every imaginable adventure, re-created from our favorite TV shows and most of the drama included screaming a lot, capturing someone and most exciting of all, torturing them.  We had a great time and always came home filthy and hungry at supper time.

That was our vacation, summer after summer.  Since I had class with the same kids year after year I didn’t know what to write about because I wasn’t creative enough to believe I could actually lie about what we did.  At this late date I have really no idea what I wrote but I do recall feelings of agony as soon as the words came out of the teacher’s mouth.

“Now, let’s start our composition class with writing about what you did this summer”. 

After the Labour Day Weekend

Do you remember your first day of school, year after year?  Besides feeling fluttery at the thought of a new teacher my one clear memory is the new clothes and new shoes that we wore on the first day of school.  My sister and I always had matching outfits until we were tweens and we never thought anything of it.  My mother was a fantastic seamstress who not only made dresses, blouses and skirts for us but trousers for my brothers and even winter coats and jackets for us.  She was really gifted.

Today I still consider the week after Labour Day as a fresh start.  For years I have considered the Labour Day weekend as the one where I start to put my yard to bed for the winter, weather permitting.  This is the week where I start my mini-resolutions such as upping the workouts, staying off the computer, doing more “meaningful” work, being “more social” and other resolutions that fade away as the weather gets colder.  This September has special meaning for me as I approach my first anniversary in retirement.  I feel as though I am running to a ribbon at the finish line and am excited to shout out “I made it without being bored once”.

And that’s the truth.  I’ve had a really terrific first year where I have accomplished so much with all the improvements around the house and grounds.  Now I look forward to a second year where I buckle down to some serious work on the writing and studying front.  Remember one of the six pieces of the retirement pie is “Mental Health” which means that we have to exercise those “little grey cells”.  I can admit that in this year of physical work and activity the grey cells have been coasting a little too much for my comfort.  While I don’t think I am quite overwhelmed, yet, by the thought of actually studying I do have some qualms about what I may discover about my abilities.

And isn’t that just a little bit like starting out on your first day of school, wondering if the teacher is going to find you a satisfactory student.  Our experiences really aren’t so far from the past as we’d like to think!

What a Wonderful World

It’s been an interesting three weeks since my last blog.  I have lived through our province’s State of Emergency feeling a riot of emotions from astonishment, disbelief, admiration, horror and relief as friends and neighbours have suffered through the Flood of the Century.  There are really no words to describe the devastation my own near town has suffered and continues to suffer but I truly admire the way Albertans have rallied around their neighbours to repair their homes and come to grip with the trauma they have been experiencing.

       I’ve also had the joy of working in my garden for the last 3 weeks which has been so wonderful and rewarding.  To see my vision of the yard come into being is beyond delightful.  Over here is the Moonlight Walk (all white flowers along the lawn border), over there is the sweetheart bed, slowly filling up with the pink bleeding hearts, deep red peonies, fire engine red begonias and petunias.  Hanging baskets echo the red begonias along with deep orange ones; pale apricot azaleas reside in black pots.  Interspersed are white marble hens and true to life green frogs.  The fish pond is still a gleam in my eye but I can picture it some weeks hence.

       Summing it all up this vacation has been a wonderful, though small, high school reunion with 12 classmates.  Extremely casual with good food, wine and talk we all made the rounds of each other for excellent catch up and getting reacquainted with each other.  It is very true that we all pick and choose what we feel is important in our lives and as I get older one of the things I feel strongly about is making connections with the people who knew me when I was young.  As part of my pre-retirement research I have read that social interaction is vital to a healthy old age and I find myself going to the next level in building those relationships.  It seems to me that the more we talk to other human beings the more we discover what a small world it really is and in the words of the late, great Louis Armstrong “What a Wonderful World”.

Reunions, Reunions

Despite being a user of social media (blogging, Facebook) I am actually not a big fan of it because of all the misuse that is apparently happening with social media.  I have a Twitter account but quite honestly I do not understand it.  It seems to me that celebrities and others tweet constantly about odd and inappropriate things.  Really, you are going to tweet your sympathies when someone dies?  Bizarre to say the least.

       On the other hand I do think that social media has also provided people with an outlet for creativity in the case of blogging and other websites.  Facebook allows people to re-connect with lost classmates and friends which I believe is a wonderful invention.  The flip side is that one can be “un-friended” or just as bad, completely ignored in that medium.  The other thing is that when you have Facebook and email it is more difficult to pick up the telephone; once you do phone instead of having a short 10-15 minute conversation one ends up being on the call for an hour or more.  That can be daunting when personal time is at a premium, as it is in my case.

       Currently I am in the midst of a phoning blitz with my former classmates and while it can be stressful in terms of time management it can also be very rewarding in having a real conversation with someone you haven’t’ spoken to in years.  There is nothing better than connecting with another human being and my belief is that high school reunions are a must for personal development alone.

Child's Play

“Back in the day” seems to be the modern way of saying “in the olden days”.  Cliches move with the times as so much that we do changes.  Today it is rare to see children playing in the yard, front or back, and I am not really sure what sort of games they play other than electronic games.  But today’s story isn’t about what’s right or wrong, it’s more about the nostalgia of play.

       Often when my brother, sister and I played together it would be very active.  We were either cowboys and Indians or we were detectives or spies.  We ran around the neighbourhood and climbed up trees and jumped over babbling creeks.  My mother could never understand how we would come home with soakers because she had no idea that we were crossing the street and going down to the creek on the other side.  In fact I am pretty sure that she was unaware for years that there even was a creek on the other side of the road.  By the time she found out about it our boundaries had gone beyond our own street so we were fairly safe in crossing the street.

       While many of our games came straight out of our fertile imagination others were based on television shows or movies that we had seen.  Sometimes we played Stagecoach or Wagon Train; sometimes we were circus performers riding white and black horses with plumes in their manes; sometimes we were the horses because that way we could run wild and do extra fantastic tricks.  I remember one day my dad came home from work and brought an antique telephone home for us to play with.  It was circa 1945, black and with a raised dial.  Man, we were in heaven.  We used to pick that phone up and slam it down just like Mannix.  None of us were thrilled with actually being Mannix though because young as we were we didn’t think much of him since he got knocked out in every single episode.  We preferred the men from U.N.C.L.E., Napoleon and Ilya.  My sister and I were happy to find role models in Honey West, Emma Peel and Daphne Dancer where we could be brilliant detectives instead of sidekicks.

       I got a laugh the other day when I was watching Bill Mahar.  They were discussing whether or not violent video games could lead people to violence and Mahar was dubious at those who objected to the premises.  He said “when a college football player can be fooled into believing he has a girlfriend via social media, I think those watching video games cannot discern games from reality”.  It does give one pause.  Hmmm?

Organizing a Reunion, or a Trip to Banff

It’s that time of year where I look anxiously towards clearing my calendar so I can get on with the next project.  This winter I took on a few extra “mini projects” at work which have really taken up a lot more time than I anticipated so I really feel as though I am behind the eight ball now.  It’s pretty sad when a person actually starts to hope for Christmas to be over!

       Looming ahead of me is the big 60^th Birthday Bash for my high school class.  I need to make some time to start telephoning classmates to get confirmation on their plans.  That’s always the biggest challenge with whatever event is coming up, getting commitment.  When it comes to buying and preparing food, no problem.  Arranging events, music, space, no problem, I’ve got it covered someway.  But ensuring that people show up, that’s a huge challenge.  Unless you say the magic words “we are going to Banff” because for some reason when that rumours flies around in our office suddenly there are people showing up in my office that I’ve never heard of before. 

“I worked for your team.” 

“Really, when?”

“In 2007, I tied Torger’s shoelaces once.” 

“Really, how tall was Torger?” 

“He was a 6 foot Norwegian.” 

“Ah, well nice try but no cigar, sweetheart.” 

I love it when I can say stuff like that.  Yeah, people come out of the woodwork when you go to Banff.  Coming to Nanton, well that’s a different kettle of fish!

Locker Room Dreams

Have you ever dreamed that you were back in school, struggling with the lock on your locker, desperately trying to get it unlocked before anyone else got into the locker room and saw you without your skirt on?  If I’ve had the dream once I’ve had it a hundred times.  I’m walking to school and suddenly realize that under my coat I am not wearing my skirt; then I panic and run through the creek, getting soakers of course, and making it into the school.  But then I can’t remember my combination.  I try, and try, and try, and I am sweating and shivering at the same time as I hear footsteps coming.  Panic.

       Then the alarm clock wakes me up and I realize I’m 40 years older and I am safe even if I am not dressed!

       I’m not sure why this happens so often because I don’t feel that I have “unresolved issues” stemming from my school days.  Perhaps it is all about control, and when I feel that things are going out of control in my life I slip into this sorry dream?  I wonder if anyone has ever really gone to school without essential clothing?  I’ve never heard of it so one has to wonder, why do so many people have this horrifying dream?

       Meanwhile, I am harkening back to some of the nice times I had in school and remembering some very good friends who are still with me now.  I was a very lucky person.

School Clothes

When we started school each year my mother would sew my sister and I a number of new outfits. Until we were almost 10 and 11 years old they were usually identical and we never thought anything of it.  My mother had always wanted to be a fashion designer so our clothes were always very well made and designed.  I was never much into clothes and accepted the status quo. It was my younger sister who became clothes conscious first and who began to object to us looking like twins.

       One outfit in particular I remember very well. When I “graduated” junior high school we had a dance where all the girls were going to wear new dresses.  I listened to all the talk and went home to my mother to tell her I needed a new dress too.  Surprisingly she agreed to make me one.  Off we went to buy paisley fabric, after all this was 1967.  What did I know about making clothes despite 2 years of home ec?  So I made no objection to the fabric.  What I ended up with was a paisley mini skirt and a store bought knit top.  It was all the rage and extremely cute but somehow I had an uneasy feeling this wasn’t the kind of new outfit I was supposed to wear to a “prom”. 

       I went to school in the outfit, very nervous and dreading being made fun of.  Instead the other girls gave me approving comments but I noticed that not one of them was wearing a skirt.  They all wore dresses but the good news was they were not extra frilly.  Of course, I did not really blend in but at least I wasn’t being made fun of.  It was one of the few parties that I actually enjoyed attending.

       Sweet memories.

Where Did We Go Wrong?

Earlier this year there was a story about a teacher in Edmonton who was suspended due to giving a student a zero on a paper even though the school board had made a policy of No Zeros to be issued.  Recently it was announced that the teacher was subsequently fired from his position.  When I listened to the news story the information was that the student in question had not turned in a paper of any kind.  How does one assign a mark to a non-existent paper with non-existent effort?  I’d just like to understand that rational.  To the best of my knowledge we are talking about an assignment, not the whole term.

       This afternoon as the train was pulling away from the final downtown station we in the train could hear a foul mouthed girl albeit well dressed shouting into her cellphone with words to this effect:

       “You are my F*&^ing teacher, you F&^*er and I want my F*&^ing assignment . . .”

       People were gasping on the train or saying “did you hear that?” or looking at each other with mouths open.  I was thinking “the fine result of no-zero policy, just curse at your university professor and expect that he will give you an Aplus because never before have you reaped consequences.”  That’s pretty much what I was thinking.

       On the weekend my mother, my sister and I were asking ourselves “who comes up with these policies and what is the basis for believing that they are a good thing”?  Examples of weirdness, besides this zero mark thing; allowing cellphones in the classroom, including exams; no penalties for lateness; no penalties for missing an inordinate amount of classes or days even; no repercussions for breaking rules such as not bringing food and beverages into a No Food or Drink zone (just have Big Daddy come in with his law degree and threaten the principal with a lawsuit if his Johnny can’t take the slurpy into the super expensive computer room and spill drinks on the equipment – big lesson there – how to be a bully).  And one wonders why there are bullies in school and why one of the kids will eventually go berserk with some type of weapon because hey, we don’t have gun laws anymore either.

       Really, for all the people out there who have always crossed on green lights only, never jay walked, always written cheques only to the amount of the dollars in your account I ask “where did we go wrong?”

High School Reunions

The other day we were watching “Romy & Michelle’s High School Reunion” and I couldn’t help laughing.  The writers capture some of the angst of high school and the residual effects of being put in pecking order.

       What I find interesting about reunions is not the comparisons on how successful persons were or how much people have changed.  Instead what I truly enjoy and find interesting is how people connect with each other.  There is the reconnection of friends who have lost touch over the years but there is also new connections of people that you knew only “in school” and who you discover are kindred spirits now.  It’s really nice to discover new friendships.  I think it is a terrible pity for those who don’t find the time to attend reunions because they really are missing something.

       I must say that I think we have been very fortunate in our classmates as I haven’t found anyone being mean or petty after all these years.  I don’t know how things were for others in school but I sure hope that no one had the experiences that we see in various movies.  I just don’t get it when people are mean and I know it can happen at any age.  I prefer to find a solution although sometimes it can be difficult when the other party avoids coming to a “meeting of the minds”.  In such a case, I simply throw up my hands and say “c’est la vie”.  We can’t win them all.

It's a Small World

I was in the coffee room this morning and chatted with a colleague.  For some reason I mentioned that I would be hosting my high school reunion next year.  She asked ‘what school’ and of course I said WPC. 

       “Get out, my ex went to that school.  I lived on Haddon Rd.” (she went to Radisson)

       Turns out we lived a mile from each other some 40 years ago, and low and behold, now we work in the same office.  How weird is that?

       It just goes to show that if you ask the right questions, the odds get smaller every year that you have some kind of connection with the person you are talking to.  The trouble is that I am not very much in to that kind of chat as I was raised in a very conservative home where you didn’t ask questions of “strangers”.  I really need to get over that as it was a lot of fun to make the discovery this morning.

       So what have you learned today?

Golden Daylight

Another gorgeous sunrise in the countryside. We are having beautiful autumn weather and about time too. It’s been years since we had a genuine fall that lasts more than a week or two. In Ontario the fall can last well into November but that has seldom happened here. It did though back in 1999 when I was back in school doing upgraded computer skills. During the lunch break I would go for walks down in the park and enjoy the crunch of leaves as I walked around the circle path getting all the fresh air and sunshine you are supposed to get to stay healthy. The air is still warm this morning, no frost overnight.

Oh my but autumn always brings back school days to me. I was one of those rare kids who actually liked school. Of course I loved the summer holidays but I enjoyed going to school too even though I often had butterflies in my stomach on the first day of school, wondering what kind of teacher I would have. Lucky for me I always had a nice teacher at last after grade 2. My grade 2 teacher was a real horror, very mean to me. I endured the humiliation of being spanked in front of the whole class (yes over her knee) I got spanked for listening. Yep, while the girl who did the talking didn’t get spanked at all. I never spoke in class again until grade 12 biology. When I answered questions the teacher had to ask me to “speak up” I was so quiet. My next 2 siblings were as quiet as me. Then along came Peter, my father’s child. My mother, who was herself a quiet woman, spoke up when Peter’s teacher asked her to make him be quiet.

“I’ve had the teachers of my three older ones tell me to have them speak up and when I finally have one that talks I will not tell him to be quiet. No.” I’m afraid Peter’s teacher didn’t like my mother much but by this time she was a seasoned parent and had had enough of unfairness with her kids. We never lied to our parents and Mom had gotten the story of peter’s little scuffle out of him before going to the interview so she stymied the teacher by asking her “did you ask the boys why they were fighting?” The teacher had to admit that she had not.

“Well I did ask my son he the other boy had stomped on his lunch bag, that’s why he was fighting with him. If it had been me, I would have put up a fight too.”

The teacher proceeded to discuss Peter’s marks. My mother asked, “and what is this mark?” Of course my mother knew what it was.

“That’s the class average.”

“That’s your mark, isn’t it? It isn’t much higher than Peter’s.”

The teacher was flummoxed and didn’t say any more. Mom walked out of the interview in triumph. Naturally Peter never knew the story until years later. It wouldn’t do for him to know that his mother had bested the teacher in his defence. But after that Peter was treated fairly.

Zeke Rakes the Leaves

Do you remember your Grade 2 Reader, when Zeke cleans up the leaves in the yard and at the end the children have a bonfire? Remember how Zeke put the potatoes under the bricks and everyone in the neighbourhood had baked potatoes after the bonfire? I just love cozy stories like that. Maybe that is one of the reasons why I enjoy yard work so much. As I’m working I reflect on old stories of how it used to be in the Olden Days, when people were neighbours to each other.

Today I think we have lost the feeling of being neighbours with our actual neighbours but we have transferred that camaraderie to our colleagues instead. People simply aren’t home long enough to become friends with their next door neighbour. Children rarely play outside so they only learn how to be friends in school. In school, like at work, there are barriers with friendships. You have to be in the same grade for example, to be friends. You have to be in the same group. If you don’t know your own group, the other groups will force you into one for you. Or worse, you will be an Outsider. At work it is not quite as harsh but I notice at luncheons or town hall meetings that the same people sit with their same group time after time.

I will be out in the yard today, putting away the last of the summer things and starting to trim up the bushes and trees. When I see the remaining dried up berries and the withered rhubarb I feel sad but I enjoy the sad feeling too. It’s more like nostalgia than sadness because I know there will be another spring and another summer. I always have hope that “next year” I will have a better garden. Last night I fell asleep thinking about how I will reap the seeds off the various flowers and wondering if I should sow them now or wait until spring. This morning I still haven’t found the answer except, sow half now and leave some for the spring in case the first sowing doesn’t take. That’s the nice thing about a big garden, there’s always enough for a Plan B.

Great Teachers

The great teachers of ancient Greece Socrates, Plato and Aristotle are foundation stones for all teachers who came after them. Roger Ascham was tutor to Elizabeth I and a notable scholar whose prose style was emulated for centuries. Einstein, Descartes, Kant, Ayn Rand, Stephen Hawkings.

What are qualities of great teachers? Caring, enthusiasm, love of learning and love of teaching are some of the qualities that make a good teacher. Engaging the students’ interest and challenging them every day, that makes for a great teacher.

Did I have a great teacher during my education? No I am afraid I didn’t though I had some good teachers. Mrs. Miller could strike terror into our hearts in Grade 3 but she also managed to knock information into the roughest head but my recollection of her does not include caring or enthusiasm. Mrs. Beattie was a caring teacher and was, indeed, my favourite teacher. She allowed us to go to the back of the classroom to get a book to read on our own whenever we finished our current tasks. After lunch she often read to us and when I think back on it now she must have loved literature herself because she chose some terrific books. I remember her reading us The Incredible Journey and she made it thrilling long before the movie came out. My next teacher was Miss Bailey, an elderly woman who taught quite a bit of religion to us. Every Friday we had a religious hour where we learned bible stories. I don’t recall them being particularly sermon like or instructive and I actually enjoyed learning about the different characters from the bible. That was grade 5. In grade 6 I got a man teacher whose name was Mr. Axon. He was a nice teacher and had great control of the class. He could be fun as I recall but he also could be a bit of a jerk. He’s the one that called me George because Mom sent me to school wearing pants.

I never had a truly inspiring teacher but my parents always said that my brother John and I had good teachers who were experienced which my other siblings didn’t have the good fortune to get. I think today the University of Lethbridge turns out some really great student teachers and I hope they all get the good luck to land in permanent positions when they graduate. I think it is a crying shame that our government doesn’t invest enough funding in education to give our children the best possible chance in life. We ought to be creating leaders, thinkers and remarkable doers for our future.

What else really matters?

September

So here we are, the first step towards autumn with the Labour Day weekend coming up in another day – and I’m not ready. It’s like the little child dragging her footsteps across the bedroom floor while Mother stands in the doorway tapping her foot. You know something bad is about to happen and you just want to delay the scolding as much as possible. That’s what the last days of August are like and the first days of September. Eventually we get accustomed to the chill in the air but even now I am resentful of the dark mornings, the nip, the browning of the lawns, leaves falling on the ground. Last night I noticed that it was dark before 9.

But, and there is always a bright side, isn’t there? But, autumn does bring the rewards of the harvest, I have a really fruitful apple tree this year. I’ve had a bumper crop of gooseberries and raspberries and my flower garden has rarely been better. I’ve got the outlines of a fall agenda in the works and I’ve reloaded the batteries on the laptop to get the writing program underway again. I’ve already made strides into the cleaning phase for the traditional Labour Day weekend and the cupboards look tidy.

September is a starting over time, even though it is no longer “school time” for us adults most of us feel like we have been on vacation and can start a new page, whether it be diet, exercise, attitude, any regime at all, now is the day! And while I am doing the old “rah rah” let me just say that I want to send out positive waves of luck to all those students heading back to school. I hope you have a fabulous year; learn lots and prosper! Carpe diem.

Fireworks in Town

It’s Sunday night of the roundup days weekend here in town and I’m sitting up late waiting for the fireworks to start. I get a grand view from my house which is fun because I can sip some wine, nibble on cheese and basically hide indoors if the wind comes up, which seems to be the case this year.

I’m not really sure why we have fireworks on this particular weekend other than the fact that it has become the traditional reunion weekend for folks here in town. I believe a great many of the small towns around Alberta do some special event on a particular weekend and this just happens to be the one for us.

I remember when I was a kid we had firecrackers going off on the Victoria Day weekend although my parents never allowed us to have any. We enjoyed hearing them go off in the night but rarely did we see any fireworks. Towns didn’t have money for those kinds of things I suppose. When I think about it WWII was only 18 years in the past when I was 10 years old. We were very fortunate to be living in Canada and just getting into the age of prosperity but there were still a lot of things that were special. Not everyone had a telephone in their home, in fact we didn’t get a telephone until I was 7 years old and we kids weren’t allowed to use. I was a teenager before I ever used the telephone to phone a friend. Can you imagine how kids would feel about that today? Amazingly I’m living proof that one does not need a cell phone to survive childhood.

In my neighbourhood we had sidewalks on both sides of the street and we also had boulevards separating the sidewalks from the road. Nowadays only one side of the street seems to get a sidewalk and boulevards seem to be a thing of the past. Both sides of houses had a side yard and it was mandatory that everyone had a driveway. There was no parking on the streets and homes only had one car, if they even had a car. Most of the families in our neighbourhood had more than two kids in the family (and they weren’t Catholics). Mothers stayed home; there were no working mothers in our neighbourhood. We hadn’t heard of divorce and everyone had a father.

It was a huge event when the area got a public swimming pool and then a skating rink. And girls actually got to skate in the rink any time they wanted to. Organized hockey for boys hadn’t evolved yet. In those days, boys played hockey on the ice on a natural pond. Parents never came around to interfere in games. We made up our own games of scrub and British Bulldog and kick-the-can. Parents weren’t referees. We didn’t want to go in the house except to sleep when it got dark.

P.S. The fireworks didn’t start until 11:00 and they were spectacular. This is my shot.