Did you have a good Christmas?

It's back to work next week after 10 days "off". "Did you have a good Christmas?" folks will ask. What shall I reply? I think I'll go with "yes thanks, how about you?" rather than the longer version. In truth I kind of went away for Christmas. I was here for small person and ooh'd and ahh'd in all of the right places.  Husband spent hours roasting a turkey, I spent hours making mince pies from scratch...including the mince meat.  Weeks of watching Tudor Monastery Farm had me convinced that chucking fruit and booze in a bowl was all that was needed. The rum and brandy helped them taste right.  Santa came a left lots of lovely gifts. Small person was very happy if a little over wrought by the build up and excitement.  On a bedroom time out by 9 am cooling off from a tantrum.  And through it all I was unwell.

The weeks leading up to Christmas were extremely stressful. Work stress, awake at 4 am and down to the sofa to fall asleep in front of the TV. Then stomach flu that became head flu which for the last 10 days has meant back pain.  Two physio massages and my back and neck hurt a lot.  A routine trip to Toronto for a mammogram, just because I'm at the age when you have those. Then a call back Christmas Eve for another mammogram and an ultrasound.  The nurse telling me that that is not unusual to be called back, as they have no previous records for me, but it got me thinking...and feeling the fear.

Usually at Christmas I plan ahead - I like planning. I don't always follow my plans but I like the order that is created, all be it superficial, by making plans. Where shall we go on holiday this year? Should we get another car once our house is sold? Should I join weight watchers? What shall we do for husbands 50th birthday?  I am distracted this year by a huge self indulgence of feeling ill and worrying that I am ill'er, if that's a word.  I think that is a symptom of being stuck indoors in 12 days of Christmas limbo.

I sent small person to day camp yesterday as I had pre planned that, worried that he'd be stir crazy by now.  He's fine but I think I'm the stir crazy one. After a brisk ( not too brisk so as to fall over ) walk in the snow, to buy essentials I cleared the drive of snow.  I was ably assisted  by three small children from up the street who came with shovels. I paid them in candy.  It's the way we do things in this street.  Then I made a healthy lunch and settled down to watch Gone With The Wind. 3 hours later I remembered how it annoys me that he left her...great film though.  I cooked Chana Dal for my dinner...having made turkey stew for the guys.  It said add 7 chillies, so on the advice of the author to half the chillies, on seeing my pale Celtic skin, I added only three.  Who knew you were supposed to take the seeds out. That's one hot Chana Dal.

So today, it's me and small person, again no car and he's out up the street throwing snow around with his friends.  They'll play old school for 20 minutes then pile in and fight over the Xbox. They have a very loud and volatile relationship.... When 2 play it's okay, when 3 it gets loud, today it sounds like 5 have turned up out there.  There will be demands to "get off my property" from small person any time soon.

My plans? Tidy up a bit, take an ibuprofen, rest, cough. Drink lots of water. Maybe get the paints out...we shall see. No point worrying - worry has no value.  And when people ask "did you have a good Christmas?" I shall say yes.

Namaste

Dunkirk Spirit

We all stood at the bus stop this morning in a very mild December ( I'm still wearing my Birkenstocks, although I look like a nutter) and the kids were very excited. The big kids were off to the rink for skating - gotta love a country where PE is ice skating. The little kids were buzzing as today was the Christmas concert. No political correctness here - it's holiday season and we talk about Christmas. That's what I love about the bus line ( translate that as queue ) it's mini Canada to me.  I did a mental roll call of the parents...we have 2 white folks with studs and dreadlocks, a grandpa from Jamaica, Russians, Bhuddists, Catholics, Muslims, Protestants, a Pastor, and us. Not sure we fit in any of those boxes but I feel an affinity with each one of them.  It is such an eclectic mix.

Small person square danced to a Christmas song, wearing a tinsel elf hat.  The kid with autism wore noise dampening headphones, that I guess cut out the volume that bothers him, so he had a great time too. It's fabulous to me all of this "so what diversity". I'm the girl who grew up in the sixties and still remembers her gran saying " if you see a black man you make a wish for good luck". I don't think she was racist, simply that she was born in 1900 and society was very linear as folks had small worlds that they never left.

I may have blogged before about childhood, I can't recall, so apologies for repetition, but I am local to stories of the 2nd World War, of my dad arriving home as a small boy to find that the Gerry's had blown the door off; stories from Grandma about carrying cans of evaporated milk in a paper bag during rationing and the bottom dropping out just as a policeman walked by; my mum telling me that during the Cuban missile crisis they really did think they'd be dead within the week; being afraid to go up to London each year with school, for fear of Irish terrorists. Ironically they blew up a local bank, so there was no need to travel for terror. It came visiting. As I look back at the journey I have made I both cringe at the things that I used to think and say about others; and am proud at the progress I have made although there is still a way to go as I still have a concious bias against Yorkshireman.

Is there a point to this ramble? Well yes...as I sit here in my warm home in Canada I connect to the world via the web, via the BBC and via Facebook.  I see my awesome friend Pauline make twice weekly trips to Calais to distribute aid, feed hungry refugees and share hugs most likely with some of the poorest people on this planet. They have fled terror, travelled miles, trying to get to UK where they think life will be good. Sadly laws, red tape, lack of political will, nimbyism, racism, selfishness and ignorance have so far condemned these people to live on a rubbish dump in Calais and Dunkirk. They may never be allowed into Britain but ignoring them is not the answer. But it gets worse because the governments of France and UK have spent a fortune on security and preventative measures to stop these people from getting to a safe, warm home.  If they were dogs or horses the British would be lobbying Govt to do something now.

My head links their horror in Dunkirk to the horror of world war 2 in that place; links them living in French mud with the First World War trenches; links our fear of them being terrorists with my fear of the Irish when I was a kid; links my grans stories of milk during rationing with Pauline and her friends helping get cans of food to these people. That's almost funny- taking food to the cuisine capital of the world.  But it's not.

Maybe the links that I make in my head are just my over charged brain working overtime but to me ignoring or arguing about these folks is wrong on every level.  After a tough ( safe western tough ) few months at work I heard myself today telling some one that we have worked really well as a team, pulled together, that we have a "Dunkirk spirit"...and there it is again.  History is rewriting what it is to have a Dunkirk spirit...it should remain as a memory of strength and togetherness and must not be allowed to become " the ability to survive squalor in a muddy field, with PTSD, whilst folks sit indoors eating turkey 20 miles away".

Silent house

Eight years ago I was in the UK, in labour, tired and scared. My husband had popped out of the hospital to get food and for reasons no one will ever understand, he stopped off on the way back at B&Q to buy light fittings.  To be fair we needed those light fittings, although likely not urgently. So I spent an hour or two, no idea how long, alone apart from the machines that go ping.  40 minutes before my 40th birthday small person arrived. Face scrunched up, with lines across his brow as if to say " what did you wake me up for, I was asleep". Within two days the nurses on the Mat ward informed me "he's got a temper!" And so it began...the journey into parenthood.

On his third birthday we had Jo Jingles sing and play, so sweet. By 4 it was super heroes with the real Spider-Man. The muscles on that guy were very pleasing to the mums at the party.  For his 5th birthday they ran screaming around Manic Monsters, slides, football and sausage and chips. Off to Canada we went, so his 6th was a Star Wars art party in Ontario, with his whole class as we tried to help him make friends. The kittens actually helped there but they came the following March. For his 7th we went to Chuck e Cheese, which was the loudest, purplest party ever. He loved it. We loved that he loved it. This year, for 8th, we took the kids to Lazer Tag on a school night. It was "awesome" but a struggle to get him up and dressed the next day, for school.

 Today, on his birthday, he went to school in his pyjamas, (they spell that pajamas!) as a celebration that the class "beat the teacher". It's like Harry Potter- they get house points for being good, quiet, kind etc. So a very excited 8 year old borded the bus today, at minus 2 degrees, in his pjs.

The house is now silent. The cats have gone to sleep, likely together as they do like a cuddle. I am off to work, back into a busy and fast changing workplace. Reorganization sees colleagues and friends leaving at the end of today. This time around I get to stay, like last time, and that is a bitter pill as you see yourself catapulted into a reality that you didn't choose. Weeks ahead of working out what your role is; lots of emotions crammed into every work day spilling out into home life unless I'm super focussed on that.  Health report back from my annual medical. Not "sick" but not "well". Too heavy, too round, lacking iron, needing exercise...no more wine, liver not happy.  Hoping the iron tablets will kick in soon...a slimmer fitter me is coming to this town soon.

Namaste

Pre Coffee Rant

Great fun at art class last night.  Its an painting free-for-all - which means you paint what you want over 3 evenings.  We chat whilst we paint with our core subjects being the Blue Jays and the school strike.  I did divert the conversation to discussing how hot the PM is but apparently that's not a key asset for a leader.  Who knew?

Blue Jays won - yay!  So we talked school.  The teachers are on a work to rule, have been for months.  The Office staff the same.  Cleaners are on all out strike.  My friend recounted how she went to pick her kid up early for a dental appointment and the Principal had to open the door as the office staff can't press a buzzer under the terms of their industrial action.  It gets better.  When she asked the office worker to call the classroom to send her daughter up, she declined "work to rule!" so they had to wait for the Principal to return to have him call ahead.

Now here's my point, for I always have a point.  This is a great, free, democratic country.  Always a socialist at heart, with a very small S,  I respect people's right to take organized action to confront hardship and tyranny.  I support action like the UK General Strike of 1926 where pay was so low people in work were starving and those out of work, back for the war, were without prospects and starving.  That was a movement to say "enough inequality, enough starvation, enough!" 

Roll forward to the Miners Strikes, where the Government closed the mines without any regeneration plans for those communities.  Not cost effective to mine coal? - fair enough, I'm a capitalist too, again small C.  But to take away work without any plans for the survivors to find new work was shameful and inhuman.  Generation grew up without work.  IMO from that came "the choice to not work" as living on the state became an option for some, whilst many had no choice but to do that.

So the point in all of this - industrial action in the face of a future human and social catastrophe or as a challenge to current hardship - GOOD.  Industrial action because you aren't getting paid as much as you wish you were - NOT GOOD.

As we enter the flu season, with the schools being filthy, they are starting to ask us to donate antiseptic wipes to clean the kids desks...but they don't ask via a note home as photocopying is not allowed under the work to rule.  So, grumpy about all this for both sides - as what is the elected leader doing to resolve this?  As Maude always used to say in the Simpsons "won't somebody please think of the children"

Off to work
Namaste

Thanksgiving Weekend

That came around super fast. Getting ready to go apple picking later once small person returns from Saturday School.  That's so that he can keep up with his Peers, as youngest boy in his year, and not a faith activity at Temple. Small person is proving to be fabulous at math, outspoken and not keen to follow instructions.  No idea where that all comes from. ha!

It's been a long and enjoyable seven days for me. Last Saturday we played at the pumpkin festival which was essentially outdoor fun with orange blobs here and there. Then an overnight flight to UK and two days walking around well tended gardens and battling thorns and stings in my own back yard.  UK house is sold and we now have a paperwork mountain prior to completion. Great karma that we have sold it to a friend who asked us 5 years ago to let her buy it. Happy for us and for her. Many weeks of reading about tax and money transfers are in my future I reckon. Maybe we will be home owners again in 2016. Dunno, all too complicated with jet lag.

I spent 2 days at work in London, catching up with friends and not catching up with family. Travelling with work is full on, and meeting up with people who are 2 to 4 hours away is impossible. I imagine folks believe it's all nights out and plush hotels when infact its in bed by 8pm, laptop on, back to work. Not complaining, but increasing surprised by how little time I have away from work.

I enjoyed walking around in the drizzley rain, the silence, the beautiful manners and friendliness of people in shops and hotels. Love those Europeans with doctorates who sell coffee in Pret as that is better than being unemployed in Portugal. Everyone I spoke to had an aunt in Toronto but know one asked if I'd met them :-)

I didn't enjoy watching the news, with the party conferences.  Hours about the rights and wrongs of having to pay 5p for a carrier bag.  What the hell? Children are drowning in the Med.  Winters coming and 800k people are living in tents in Germany.  It's gonna get bloody cold for them very soon.  I wonder what their views are on 5p carrier bags?

The news was so negative, so "problem to solve", so "defending our borders from job stealing foreigners".  Maybe as a job stealing foreigner myself I am biased, but what I love about Canada is the " expand, evolve, grow" attitude that sits beneath the news stories.  There are problems here too, no one is perfect, but it feels like people solve problems to create opportunities, not to lock things down and preserve the now.

On the C4 news they had a writer who took issue with a women in a hijab winning the Great British Bake Off.  He felt that Britishness had been and was being diluted.  Less than 5% of Europeans are Muslim, and many of those in the UK are 3rd and 4th generation.

What is "Britishness" anyway?  A friend at work shared a Ted Talk video with us last week, about who you are.  The speaker proposed that you are not "from" a country. You are from a set of experiences. You are local to those experiences.  So whilst on paper I am a temporary British foreign worker in Ontario, Canada, I do not relate to the British people I saw on the news in UK. I am local to my community today and my community I had in England, local to artist friends across the world and to a Britain in the 1970s when my Grandparents told me stories of ww1 and ww2 and I wore flares and played outside and drank from hose pipes in the garden.  I am local to the islands off Scotland where I felt a spiritual connection to the past; and to a small town in Spain where I can order my breakfast in perfect Spanish.

With a blog your supposed to end on a note that shows a purpose in the writing...not too sure what that is on this one other than I feel at home with people and not places. A friend remarked that I had posted on Facebook that I was flying home to Canada...I explained that I was in fact flying home to my husband and small person as they are my home.

Off to the apple orchard...

What have we learnt?

We have been in Canada now for two years and 2 days...I can't believe it's that long and at the same time I can't imagine living anywhere else. Our town, Bolton, which always make me chuckle as it is so not like Lancashire, holds a Fall Fair this week each year.  It's like the Lingfield and Oxted show if that were 1/20 th the size, and had no animals larger than a llama.  We went along yesterday after an hour running around town dishing out leaflets for next weekends Pumpkin Fest. Small person slid down the jumbo slide 5 times- a lover of the simple rides...we avoided a big bowl thing that was like the cage from my youth.

The best part of the show for me was meeting up and talking to people that I know...#community. The cub leaders tried again to enrol me as a leader.  "Where's you red shirt" they shouted every time I walked by. I explained "I don't like kids!" But apparently that's no barrier.  I will resist.  Inside the arena, on the skating rink ( no ice yet, phew) I met up with the community farm people and we chatted about the Fest.  I met friends whilst we watched the dog show and on the way back chatted to the ladies in the wine store about an up coming toonie sale.  When we first arrived in Canada I recall that it was hard starting conversations - not sure if it was my accent or that I was a stranger but there were many monosyllabic conversations in shops.  Now small person gets cross " stop talking to everybody mom!" Can't help it, it's what I do.

So, how to capture our time here so far...blatent copying of a cool post on Facebook that listed 30 things about Britain.  Here's 30 things about Canada...

1. It's not like America
2. Crisp are called chips
3. Chips are called fries
4. No one understand you when you say "half past three"
5. Men wear baseball caps a lot, mostly backwards
6. Milk comes in plastic bags
7. People call you "Hun" but not in a German way
8. People really do say "eh?" at the end of sentences, but not all the time and not everyone
9. No one knows what a jumper is.
10. It's not like America
11. Cars run on gas, but it's not a gas, it's a liquid. What's up with that?
12. All teenagers are beautiful human beings, with Saturday job, manners and great teeth
13. Getting a coffee at the drive through is normal. Getting out of your car to get one is the strange way
14. Most people drink bad coffee from a donut chain, but no one admits it is bad. It's a patriotism thing. They've introduce a dark roast version to give it some flavour. It's not awful.
15. Canadians are as polite as you have been told they are
16. Canadians in cars are appalling.
17. Some Canadian cars have rust holes that you could put your fist through and no one minds
18. They have a really great baseball team
19. Teachers go on strike to "protect education" but that harms the kids education. No one seems that mad about it...goes to point 15.
20. They sing the national anthem in school every day
21. The language is like syrup, everything blends and flows.  "Wad hur" comes out of taps. The second city is call "Tor-on-oh"
22. Towns are named after British towns, but pronounced literally, like folks learnt English from books.  Tottenham is pronounced Tot En Ham; Scarborough is pronounced Scar Bore Oh
23. The cheese is generally bland, ever when it proclaims itself Fort
24. You can buy a tea pot and a tent in a shop called Canadian Tire
25. Some words are spelt right but they say Pross ess for process.
26. You have to buy alcohol in government owned store. It's tied to preventing young people drinking too much. Ontario has a huge under age drinking issue. Guess that didn't work, eh?
27. People smoke pot, you can smell it everywhere
28. It's not like America
29. In two years of living in the 4th most diverse area in the the world (Greater Toronto) I have only experienced one example of racism, and that was a taxi driver who smelt of beer and had issues with Judeism. There's always one looney out there
30. It's a fabulous place to live and we love it here

Wheels within wheels

Everything feels cyclical at the moment.  I planted the allotment and now we are into harvest, eat and store.  The coriander has shot off so I'm drying bunches upside down in bags, to catch the seeds.  Some for storing, some for sowing,

Every day begins with tea, then coffee, ends with wine.  That's not healthy and whilst I am working on that I do wonder how I got here. Small person was watching Kung Fu Panda fighting bad guys the  other day and in an attempt to connect with the snarling child I asked "ooh, how does he do that, does he have magic powers?" "No mom!" He snapped.  "He is using inner peace!".  Lucky him, peace and agility, mind you he doesn't have a 7 year old moaning "I'm bored" every 15 minutes.

To be clear, small person goes to various camps throughout the summer. This is week 6 of a 10 week summer break. He has been rock climbing, scooting, played floor hockey, soccer, basket ball. He has painted a cheetah, learnt circus skills, been whale spotting.  Hardship is not on his list of things to gripe about.  He also had a week hanging out with me, unplugged and "entertain ourselves".   That's when the boredom first surfaced. I was searching for a metaphor yesterday to explain to my husband what it feels like to have a bored child complaining for days.  I think I found it...imagine you are on a 8 hour flight with a kid in the seat behind who keeps kicking your seat, nonstop except when he is eating.  That's where the tea, coffee, wine come in...although that's not his doing, that's my lack of panda inner peace at play.

So what to do? We went out for a meal last night, nothing fancy.  Small person was stroppy and octopus arms.  He knocked over a glass of wine that soaked daddy chest to crotch.  So we are  now avoiding public places.  Small person has struck a deal to have "big brother play dates" with the 4 year old son of close friends.  They played together for hours on Saturday with next to no drama, so that is looking great.  Camping? We are test driving our new tent next weekend...hopefully 24 hours without electricity will bring some calm. Plus we are camping down inToronto near the British Grocer, so we can restock the beans and Branston on the way home!

I am cutting out the wine from today, for all of August. We'll see how that works out.  Work wise, still underwater but my latest plan is foolproof...go home on time.  That way I will have time to exercise and I can spend time with the small person  (short bursts...nothing too planned). He hates me at the moment because I am mean.  Daddy and I call it parenting.  Small person calls it mean. I don't think kids should play out in the semi dark at 9.30 at night; I don't care if his friends are out running the streets. don't think that watching grand theft auto is okay for kids aged 6 to 8. I don't care if his friends play it all the time. I don't agree that the TV should be on at meal times; and our latest point of contention...if we are going out somewhere as a family, daddy and I don't want to bring street kids with us.  So all in all a lot of disagreements and "mean mum", door slamming, some bad language.  So grounded a fair bit...which...wait a minute, means he stuck in with me and boredom.  Hmmm, he has his own little cycle of life going on there.

#need 2 days alone at a spa.

Talking of circles a recommend this cool online class exploring Mandalas. It's fabulous, if a little addictive

Namaste

Day 6 at sea...

Day six and we are surviving on only 6 meals a day. There are rumours that Rennies and Tums may need to be rationed such is the quantity of food consumed ship wide and the extreme size of many of the passengers.  Absent mindedly I got in the elevator yesterday to go up one floor...embarrassed I apologies to the ladies in the lift. "It's okay dear, there is no judgement on the ship!".  Really? We have been people watching and judging since day one.  It's what we do best.

We have seen 20 Stone people eat mountains of food from the comfort of immobility scooters before rolling over everyone to get by.  People who think it is acceptable to clear their sinus' and hock up snot in any public place.  We deduce that that is a cultural thing as so many folks who look alike are doing it with no qualms.  People drinking themselves into a drunken blur with minutes of boarding the ship. Old people acting like teenagers, loud and tipsy.  Worst of all is the rudeness that some people display to the staff. Or lack of courtesy like saying thank you or acknowling people with a smile. 

I wasn't sure what to expect having never cruised before but I have found that I have a physical discomfort and guilt about having access to so much when the staff have so much less. I can't imagine how that feels, to see people indulge so much around you, and you are away from your family for 9 months. The staff are all very cheerful and professional but I can't escape the fact that if they had greater choices in life many wouldn't be doing this.  Yes, part of our affluence is because we have worked hard, but the fact that we were born into an affluent, free and stable society is a huge factor in why we are lounging about eating fresh baked cookies every afternoon contemplating "Spa or sleep?"

But we are enjoying ourselves despite my social angst.  We are pretty much busy doing nothing. Small person continues to refuse to go ashore. He stays in the fun club for every available minute. I have bearly seen him all week which is a shame as I wanted to sit and read stories together.  But that was never going to happen as he can't sit still and " reading is boring".

We check him in to the kids club after breakfast and collect him at tea time, feed him, let him chill watching Danger Mouse on the iPad then check him back in at 7pm for play until 10.30pm.  Then he demands more food ( last night he had cookies, fish fingers and nachos on the same plate ). He gets to bed around 11.30pm and falls asleep in seconds.  With the long days of sun it feels earlier as it is daylight until midnight.

We have wobbled ashore without him - to Juneau, Skagway and earlier today Ketchican I think it was called. Strange towns surviving in part on selling diamonds ( not from Alaska ), T-shirts and other souvenirs, made in China, to cruise ship passengers largely made up of Chinese people. We are reminded of Cornwall, for the weather, and the Lake District for the foliage and terrain...although no Kendle mint cake here.  Nothing much to buy that is made locally by locals. The guide who took us tree walking and zip lining described Skagway as being like Disney Land...It kind of was.  

We sail onwards, arriving in Canada tomorrow pm, in BC. Looking forward to that but we are not going ashore until after the kids theatre show at 4pm where small person and his friends ( all newly appointed junior Rangers and pirates after a week of adventures) are staging a circus show. Bless them, they have been practicing all week...it's serious stuff.

Would we cruise again? Small person - "yes, yes, yes!"; husband - "dunno"; me - if they both said yes, then yes. It's been a new experience, and a good one.  But living on the set of Walli is just a little odd.  Hey you, pass me my hover chair, I'm due an apple pie smoothie about now!

Heading West

Yay! On holiday as a family for the first time in forever. Leaving for the airport in an hour for the short hop to Seattle where we have rented a tiny house on Airbnb. We have 2 full days in Seattle over Independence Day then it's onto a cruise ship for a week of adventures - we get to visit Canada on the cruise...can't wait.  Packing is very methodical chez Fiona.  I boss everyone around and they either go with that or put up futile resistance.  I think we have packed it all but we always forget one thing which we only discover when it is too late.

I tried to pack light but I think we will visit climate changes from Scorcio to soggy. Small person gets to pick three stuffies to take on the adventure.  My money's on Georgie the Monkey who got lost last year and then arrived home like new in the post some weeks later.  Yesterday small person revealed to me that he knows is not the same Georgie " I call it Georgie 2". The innocence is ebbing away.

When I say I tried to pack light I don't include my wheely case full of wool, acrylic paint, paper and Gouache...I am allowed to take what I want...others sacrifice their weight allowance.  We are trying to go internet free but apparently we need to take a laptop and an iPad so that we can watch movies.  My plan for the cruise is rest, exercise, paint, read.  My husband will do that too, sans paint.

Small person has announced that he "just wants to hang out in the pool and relax" which sees us sighing as that will involve effort on our part too.  Hopefully the kids club will be so awesome that we get an hour or two each day to do nothing.  Small person is planning late nights as the kids clubs closes at 10.30.  He has been practicing "fancy eating" after we told him that cruises are posh.  It involves eating with his mouth closed and taking the food to his face not his face to the plate. Despite his best efforts I imagine we won't be eating in a smart restaurant...he is not public friendly at the moment...loud and wriggley.

Taxi beckons.

Happy holidays!

Shrimps eh!

We were discussing dinner earlier and agreed that we should get the shrimps out of the freezer...without hesitation or translations we both said shrimps. We are assimilating and neither of us felt the need to say Prawns.  My husband realized what had happened and tried to argue that shrimps are larger than prawns so it wasn't a language thing but a anthropological thing. Nice try but no.  We are adapting.

But it works both ways. When I dropped small person at art class yesterday the owner told me to collect him at "harf past"...ha, I called her on it " you spoke English!" She laughed and said " I know, I hoped no one noticed eh!"

Small person and his little friend are upstairs playing lego something on the Xbox.  When I was a kid we didn't need a tv to play lego, we just built with our hands. They played Just Dance earlier.  I was in the kitchen cooking but it's all open plan.  The computer spotted me and added me to the game.  I'm not a great cook but when their game ended I had won!  They were indignant.  I guess my tuna pasta beat their One Direction best song ever.

Fathers Day today so small person and I made an effigy of daddy in pancakes, with maple syrup eyes.  Full concentration, tongue out as small person crafted the hair and nose. Then after breakfast daddy went out shopping...his best treat to be free of us for a few hours.  Small person was not impressed as in his head we should be doing " a fun family thing" all together. But as we are off on holiday in 10 days we need to save our pennies so as daddy has the car we cycled to the local froghurt shop and ate mountains of watery froghurt then cycled home.  I'm hoping the effort burnt off the calories but I doubt it.

I'm off to USA tomorrow for the week ( what happened in my life to make that statement not exciting ?). I guess I grew up, a bit. Anyhow the garden needed attention unless I wanted to return to a jungle, so weed whacking and strimming took place. Small person offered to help water the plants.  I nervously agreed and told him just to use the settings of Shower or Mist. "Not jet?" No, not jet.

Then I went to the front garden to tidy that ( another assimilation thing...in Canada it's all about kerb appeal. Everyone in our street has a pristine front garden so I comply with that norm.) When I go back to the back yard the fences are dark brown and dripping, the trees are dripping and a small person stands angelic with the hose on Shower. "did you use the jet spray?" No Mom, you said no Jet!  The face of an angel...with a twinkle in his eyes that confessed "I just blasted everything!"

When daddy gets back with the car I'm off out to buy orthotics...a damaged ankle and tendons see me hobbling every morning and sitting with my foot in a bag of ice every night. Birkenstocks are in my immediate future, then clumpy lace ups.  I have agreed to complete that "couch to 5k" app and have gotten as far as downloading the app...need to get some proper shoes so that it doesn't turn into couch to wheelchair in 2 weeks.

Happy Sunday, Happy Fathers Day especially to my dad who is in the wars at the moment. Thinking of you.

May ramblings

It's bloomin' hot today. Small person, exhausted from a weekend of cub camp and a late night trip to the Hindu Mandir is on full volume. He had to do a presentation on Friday, he tells me that he "did eye contact, straight back and level 3 voice". I think we are hearing level 5 at home.  Too tired to cook we went out for dinner and he ordered Pepsi. We are paying for that now.

So since I last blogged I have weeded and planted my 1200 sq ft allotment; worked for free for 20 hours each week...sadly not voluntary work although I may do some of that this weekend as the foodbank team are planting up a new garden along side mine. Small person has settled into his extra lessons after school with medium wailing. He continues to moan about what he does not have and not see what he does have, but he is only 7 and at that age things are very black and white.  He does have super sweet moments...at cub camp a "Harry potter man" gave the Cubs some powder that the threw into the flames after speaking a gratitude.  Small person was thankful for all of the new friends that he has made.  On a school trip today to an Art gallery he told the teacher that "my mom is an artist".

Last week as I was walking to the shops some youths in a jacked up car sped up the road like they were in a computer game, almost mounting the pavement.  I told small person about it and that they had laughed at me as I got well away.  They were clearly stoned, but I didn't tell small person that part.  Small person tells me " they laughed at you because you are fat". Really? "Yes, you do no exercise, you never work out, you sit on the phone all day"... Mummy's little angel!

So in the weeks ahead we hope to get our visa approved as it runs out in 4 days #immigrants. We have another trip planned to the water park; school breaks up in 4 weeks; we cruise to Alaska in 5 weeks.  I have to go to the gym; negotiate my way out of excess work hours; have a spa day and go into the office to gain access to the shared drive, and to participate in a community service knitting bee... Weird world.

 I have set myself some goals...that I will be back to part time hours by September, having relinquished  some of my work; I will also be a stone lighter at least and  will have bought a car #freedom. Oh, and I want a printing press!

Better shared or kept in my head?

Late last year I won a gift card in an online auction. It was for some hypnosis sessions.   They were pretty cool, very relaxing and they are helping me to lose some weight and break the cycle of fat, get thin, get fat, get thin.  I get to listen to CDs each day and I settled down yesterday evening to do that. "small person, I need 30 mins of peace to listen to my tapes. Got it?"  "Yes mom!"  No going out, no one comes in...got it?  "Yes mom"

15 mins later as I drift into relaxation ..."mom, can my friend come in to play? Mom! Mom! Mom, can you hear me? Can my friend come into to play? Mom, I'm talking to you".  Hmmm

Then stomp stomp stomp up the stairs, I hear two small boys open my office door..."mom, can my friend come in?"  I say nothing...so they proceed to tickle my feet to get me to wake up.  What's the point eh?  Maybe relaxation is for other people. Cd on Pause, life back on Play.

It's been an exhausting long long week, working 12 hours a day and whilst that is horrible there is another layer to it that made it nasty.  There were no emergencies, no one was trapped in a mine shaft, no one had 46 minutes of air left...it was just that a volume of work was some how cranked to very loud. I'm reminded of that story about the frog in a pot.  If you drop it in boiling water it will notice that for sure. If you put it in cold water and warm it slowly it doesn't notice it for a long long time. I think I am the frog in that pot and the water got my attention. It's a big pot and there are lots of us in it. I worry that frog soup is the future at work.  I did some stuff to turn the heat down for me and frogs around me but weekends do see me puzzling how to break this cycle...as you are readling now.

Before my live hypno session the hypno lady asked a question from nowhere that is rattling around in my head..."do you count summers?".  " sorry I don't understand what you mean" "do you count summers, how many more summers you might have on earth? Do you understand how little time there is in a lifetime? If you understand that you will focus on enjoying life, enjoying the summers. If you don't focus on that, and live busy, just doing the everyday and you miss an opportunity to enjoy life to the full"...do I count summers?  Yes, sort of I guess. For 20 years I have known that the pursuit of wealth and status will not bring me happiness. What brings me happiness is the joy in a single day, that adds up to a joyful week that adds up to a joyful month, you get the idea.

I have tried to articulate this to people for years to help them live life to the full.  I struggle to articulate it in a way that they can see past their concern that I am a anti establishment anarchist hippy...I'm not, I'm a hardworking person whose priorities include " me and mine" in equal or greater measure to paid work.  I guess it's none of my business how other people choose to live their lives  but having "got it" 20 years ago I feel compelled to pay that knowledge forward. Live your life, have fun. Sit in the sun and do nothing regularly.

So for today's joy small person and I are off to Niagara to ride water slides...not down the Falls.  Then off to the botanical garden to buy seeds for the season ahead. Happy days

Happy days to all
Namaste

8,000 and counting

We walked to the park today and I sat in the sun for an hour as small person played soccer.  Nothing too remarkable in that, other than that yesterday we woke up to an inch of snow and he had to do his egg hunting in a parka.  He came in half way to get gloves as it was so cold. Today, no snow anywhere, sun out, sun glasses on.  Energized by that burst of vitimin D I just popped into Home Depot to get some spring colour but sadly nothing to buy.  A few more weeks before a pansy or primrose appears.

It was strangely nostalgic to be looking for spring plants. Having spent the first 16 years of my working life in horticulture Easter has pretty much been the colourful, busy start to the season. But that was an ocean away as here everything is still sleeping, ready to wake up in a few weeks for 3 days of Spring before going turbo into Summer.  But still, the environment was reassuring.  I reminisced about how much less stressful life was when I was managing a garden centre. But nostalgia isn't real, those days were no less stressful if I'm honest, it was just that I had other problems to solve back then.

I have just announced to my husband that "I am ****ing sick of problem solving at work.  Why is everything so bloody complicated?"  And as I compare now to 25 years ago I can see the same patterns.  Maybe that's what drew me to Home Depot, maybe I was looking for a familiar less complicated environment?  Back then I had mountains of work to do, limited people to do that work, new stuff arriving all of the time and the challenge was to work out what would die first (plants that is not people, although...).  The days were long, days off were spent at work, or were frowned upon as Laziness.  So roll forward 25 years, same jigsaw pieces, new stuff arriving, not enough people, nothing dying persay but having to choose what to do and, most days, what not to do.

A year ago I was micro stressing that my inbox was approaching 2000 emails, most read but many unactioned.  Last week my inbox hit 8000 emails, around 80 unread, the rest read and waiting for someone to do something.  Maybe these emails are the Pansy's and primroses, fresh and eager when they arrive then gradually they die away, unloved, untended as I frantically squirt water at a fire elsewhere.  What does any of this tell me?  It tells me that I am drawn to jobs that cannot be fully completed; where the daily chore is not mostly doing the work, but is mostly arranging the work into piles and then doing maybe 3 key things each day.  It tells me that whatever hours I put in there will always be a mountain more to do.

So as I sat in the sun, in Canada...in Canada for goodness sake!...most days I don't even recognize tht I am here.  Life in conference calls has no sense of presence.  I sat in the sun and vowed that enough is enough.  I don't want to spend every night and weekend on email.  I do want to have the energy to drag my son away from the iPad, I want to live outdoors, feel the sun everyday, not just at weekends. I am reclaiming my life from that side of my personality that works non stop.  I am a part timer and from now on I am going to deliver that dream.  Let battle commence.

Why I love Canadians - Reason #42

Saturday morning, no wait, afternoon now.  Still in bed because I have a horrible cold.  It's visiting the North West region so Fiona Land, holidaying in my sinus track although indications are that week two will be a visit to my chest via a raw sore throat. I could get up and do stuff - I spent two days at work feeling like this, but maybe a day in bed with the cats is better. They certainly seem to think so.

That's an old picture, but still a goody. They are mahoosive now and still growing. There is talk of getting the a treadmill wheel thing so that they can get more exercise...we shall see.

Second day of Spring today.  Yesterday I spent 9 hours getting home form New York.  A journey that should take less than 3 hours.  A sloppy wet blizzard hit NYC just as my flight was due to take off.  The plane arrived two hours late, but hey, it arrived.  Some people were looking at 3 days to get home.  The lucky ones boarded the plane and settled in for the 55 minute flight.  We were still there three hours later.  Plane had to be sprayed with de-icer, then they found a fault that took 2 hours to fix by which time the de-icer was useless so they had to respray us. But it took off and we got back to Toronto.  Having left Manhattan at 11.30 I walked in the door of my house at 9.30.  

So is there a point to this blog?  Yes, it's another one of those gratuitous " I love Canadians" stories.  As we sat on the runway waiting for hours, I think it was close to 4 hours in all, no one complained. No one shouted at the aircrew, no one talked loudly expressing an opinion hoping for others to start a riot.  It was very polite, very civilized, very calm.  What conversation there was was " yeah, it's annoying but better safe than sorry".  I love Canadians.

Now off to sleep to let the snow bugs travel south for their week two vacation in my chest.  

Namaste.

Friday 13th. Hmmmmm

The sun's out, snow's melting.  I can't really ask for more than that.  Today sees the start of Spring Break, so no school for a week.  Small person is brewing a snotty cold, and having spent the day at school in his PJ's as part of festivities he has come home and taken to his bed with a cuddly Ipad.  He knows that he is not allowed to watch the American MineCraft videos on YouTube because the guys curse and swear, so what does he do?  He has shut his door "so you can't hear what I am watching."  Nice!

I had the day off today which is a misnomer for a home worker in this century I think.  When your home is also your workplace I suspect the only true way to get a day off is to leave the house.  I'm not grumbling, its all in my gift to control, its more of a realisation. I spent a very quite three hours tying up some loose ends at work, then an equally quiet hour filling in immigration forms so that we can stay in Canada a little longer.  Hard to believe that we have been here for 18 months already. 

Small person and I went back to the UK last month, just to check that it is still there.  It was physically unchanged and it felt compact and bijoux.  The bank has turned into Domino's Pizza.  We deposited some cash and withdrew a medium veggie feast pizza and he gave us a free Tex Mex.  I suspect he was trying to entice us back...sucker!

We had a great time seeing friends, colleagues, colleagues who are friends.  I had a few pangs of home sickness, mostly for the countryside and landscape as Kent is very beautiful and Ontario is very flat and dull in places. but 5 days into our trip we were both missing "home".  I was increasingly grumpy about having to get out of the car to get a coffee; and not being able to park near the shops that I wanted to go to.  I missed cheery shop workers and an automatic car.  Oh that poor rental car...the gear box cried real tears.  Small person missed his dad, TVO and the cats but I'm not sure I got the order right.

Without wanting to sound like UKIP'ers, who are screaming loonies with black shirts in their closets, it did jump out at me that most people working in the shops and restaurants that I went into were from Eastern Europe. It was very noticeable, and as an immigrant myself I say good on them but it just felt very different to be in England and to hear so many different voices.  Here I take it for granted - I really hope that the UK can get to where Canada is with newcomers.  Unless I am missing something everyone seems welcomed here and comes understanding the need to, and with a willingness to, contribute and join into society.  To be fair you kind of have to work hard here because there are no social handouts or tax credits like in the UK. 

One thing I do miss here is British TV.  I miss watching John Snow read the news on C4 and I miss programs that make you think and form an opinion. I watched a few "documentaries" I think they were.  Nothing Bafta nominated - one about people living on benefits in the UK and one about Romanian Gypsies looking for a better life.  I have to be honest - if I was handing out the money those kids in Romania would be getting the cash tomorrow.  The contrast between their lives was stark...penniless in a ghetto living in one room of a burnt out building vs. living in a rent paid flat, getting cash for nothing from the ATM twice a month and spending it all on booze and upgrading your iphone.  One couple moaning that they had to pawn the XBOX to get food.  One guy said "I'm only 18, I'm too young to settle down and get a job, I want to live a bit first."

There is something very wrong with a society that lets you leave school with hardly any education; a mindset that getting a job is a life choice rather than a necessity and give you money rather than help to get on a more self sustaining track.  I guess that's easy to say from here eh?

Curly Sue moments

I wrote this, sat in O’Hare airport as the sun set on a long, long but enjoyable week. 

It started well, arrived Sunday lunchtime and spent a calm 2 hours wandering around the Art Institute.  I’d love to sound erudite but in honesty I was very tired so just tried to absorb and get inspired by just being there.  I had my “go where your gut tells you” brain on…not hugely interested in Asian ceramics I ended up there in error and thought about turning back to the main corridor, but some thing told me to keep going.  So I did and that is where I found the coolest artwork.  In the Japanese section there is a darkened room with 16 identical square pillars (can a pillar be square?  Dunno).  It was calm, quiet and it had serenity and soul.  The art was the physical and the spaces in between.  Did I stumble on it by chance? Universe at work?  Planets aligned? ... there is something in this intuitive business.

Storms raged in the East so my trip to NYC didn’t happen.  I stayed in Chicago the whole week; had a great meal out with colleagues and then 4 great meals by myself in my PJ’s.  They were room service rather than a fashion choice in a restaurant.  My need to be in NYC was for a 2 day meeting so in order to participate I ended up dialing into that from Chicago.  Two days, in a windowless room, on a conference call speaker phone.   And then a saw it…the wall of the room was a white board.  14 foot wide and 10 foot high…it had to be done.  I drew a mandala…then it got bigger, then it became a flower.  By last night it was 8 ft high and 4 feet wide, with a flower pot at the base.  Then there was an elephant next to it – a request from a colleague in another State. 

Last night I wandered back to the Art Institute to get a gift for small person, both for my being away and for his achievement at school – he was given an award for his conscientious behavior – best in his year last month.  That’s huge progress from last year when he was miserable and struggling to find his tribe.   So I surfed the gift shop and got cool museum gifts and then I wandered back to the hotel via a different route.  Looking for a tech store, but also getting some air.  I turned right on instinct and saw what looked like a tech store 300 yards ahead.  It turned out to be a men’s clothes store but right next door was the biggest most fabulous art store ever...Blick.   All tech purchases became irrelevant and I had a great hour drooling and buying sale items.  “Look how much I saved!” being my mantra.

So today, back to work – same room, no window, day three.  The white board now clean and white - much to the disappointment of the team sat outside the room.  Earlier today a young guy stopped in the doorway, wanting to see it close up!  I had thought that I was doodling in private.  We had a chat, he asked me if I was an artist and I said “yes, I am” which was cool.

Then as he walked away it occurred to me that if they could all see through the etched glass office window, to see the doodle, then most likely they could see other stuff.  Had they seen those Curly Sue moments earlier in the week when I was wearing a dress and had to keep yanking up my tights like a six year old at a birthday party?  We shall never know.