Category Archives: Personal

Catch-up

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The industrial bleakness of Baku’s Black City (above) depresses me slightly every time I come to this blog, because it reminds me of the still gushing oil spill… But Life Must On, as they say colloquially, and here it’s time to catch up.

When I first started “Borrowing Bones” last November, I commented that I don’t “use” my children in my writing much, because they have their own lives to interpret and describe, but — it being First Son’s birthday that day — I did post a baby photo of him and remarked how glad I am to be a mother. I also said that I would follow suit with the next two when their birthdays rolled around.

Daughter’s birthday falls at the end of May, and Second Son’s in the middle of June — so it’s more than high time to keep my promise. (Any parent knows you have to be fair to each child in turn, and you have to keep your promises.) So the little snapshot above is Daughter as a baby, held by her brother. Wow, they’re so cute — wish I could go back in time for a little cuddle with each of them.

And now? — Okay, just this once. Our oldest son is an engineer. He and his wife, who works as a doula and photographer (you can see her work on her blog under my “Family and Friends” list) have four children and live in Tsawwassen, B.C. Our second son just graduated (with honours, Mother inserts) from the University of Toronto’s law school. His wife is a teacher and they live in Toronto. And, they’re expecting a baby in November! Our daughter has been working here in Winnipeg for some years as an architectural technologist and living on her own, but just moved to Vancouver. She’s going to bike the summer away, as well as hike the West Coast Trail with the brother pictured above and other assorted relatives, and then see what the fall unfolds in terms of further adventures and work.

H. and I are no longer in the middle of their hearts, and that’s how it should be, but we’re still in the middle of the country, reasonably healthy and usually happy. Yesterday I enjoyed driving to Winkler, then reading from This Hidden Thing at the Winkler Public Library. H.’s huge number of tomato plants and carrots are growing well. (Tomatoes and carrots are two of  his favourite foods). We’re thrilled with Paraguay’s advance to the next round of the World Cup.

And in between our thoughts flit east and west.

Truth and Reconciliation Commission: Day Two

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Day Two at the TRC event in Winnipeg (Thursday) was grey and rainy, a tempestuous contrast from the first day’s heat. It made no difference, it seemed, except that the women’s sharing circle was paused earlier than expected in the afternoon because of tornado warnings. (Fortunately, a tornado did not materialize.)

It was another full day. I began at the interfaith tent, which hosted a panel discussion on “Native traditional spiritualities in conversation with Christianity” and ended the day at “Writing Truth, Imagining Reconciliation” featuring a strong line-up of writers, including Basil Johnston, Beatrice Mosionier (In Search of April Raintree), and Giller Prize winner Joseph Boyden, speaking or reading from their work.

But the heart of the event is the sharing/healing circle, so once again I sat witness as best I could, first in the tent where there was a men’s circle, and then in the tent where there was a women’s.

What I was witnessing, I realized, was not only the impact of Indian residential schools, via the sharing of survivors, but a constant ministry of community support. A painted stone (painted by children) waiting on the chair of each person in the sharing circle itself, to hold while speaking. Traditional spiritual supports like opening prayers, “blessed” water to drink for participants, the smudge, eagle feathers. And more contemporary supports, like kleenex and the blue-vested “counsellor” people constantly in attendance. (Tear-soaked tissues are not garbaged but gathered to be offered on the sacred fire later in the day.) When the telling gets especially difficult, a family member (though everyone is addressed as “relatives” in the circles) might be standing behind the speaker, hand on their shoulder. Continue reading →

Defining big words

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The experience of Alaska’s coastal scenery, which was part of our recent vacation, falls very quickly into cliche, into big broad adjectives like spectacular and beautiful. These words seem good enough for short answers (“how was it?”) but don’t really communicate that much. Not to others, not to one’s own perception or memory either.

Some extra attentiveness, it seems to me, is required. For most of us, today, the default solution is to point and click the digital camera. A quick capture, that, of what’s worth capturing, with the possibility and intention of looking again and remembering. Perhaps that’s enough. Still, sometimes I sat watching with my journal open, trying to find specific words, trying to put some content into the repetitious inner “oh wow” of this mountainous, green, and blue terrain. What is the green of this particular green, the blue of this particular blue? How to describe the sound of glacial ice calving, an eagle in a tree, the sight of whales when evidence  as slight as a tail above water or a spume of spray can set a whole deck-row of folks exclaiming, clicking, and training binoculars as a kind of burrowing for more?

It’s harder work than one expects, this describing, this paying attention, when it’s — yes — simply spectacular and one wants to leave it at that, except that one knows only too well that the big disappears more quickly than the intentionally-apprehended, which is often smaller.

As for the culture of cruising, that’s hard to describe as well. When I used that expression to someone we met on ship, he asked, “What do you mean?” Good question. What did I mean? Vaguely Las Vegas says something but is also cliche, a big-word stereotype. Slow Vegas for a lot of people over 50 gets closer. Not good enough, though. What exactly? This too needs reflection, definition by detail and story. I feel like it needs analysis.  I’m a woman at the end of  my holiday, however, not a travel writer. Let’s just say it was a “great” (big word) time for now and I’m much too relaxed to work at it further at the moment! For my own future, I’ve got some photos and notes.