Let calmer heads prevail

and then this happens

The men are off to a University of Saskatchewan Huskies game tonight on campus. I put a nice venison loin steak on the barbeque and in the oven go some stuffed mushrooms I made yesterday. A small baked potato with a little homemade pesto. I sit down at my computer to edit some Saskatoon HOME articles for the upcoming spring issue….and then this happens….

How can you ignore faces like that? Gracie at front, Ed at the rear. They were like that for 20 minutes. It’s either adorable, or creepy.

On the march

Rick, Jim and I were part of the Women’s March on Washington, Saskatoon edition, on the weekend. Estimates of 500 to 800 people. It felt like a positive way to get out, talk to people, listen, and do something about feeling slightly nauseous and worried by the U.S. election. It was a big thing worldwide that left Trump wondering, “If they’re so unhappy, why didn’t they vote?”  ??  Right. We’re just “sore losers.”

Two recent articles by Andrew Coyne resonated with us (the comment section, not so much). These National Post pieces are worth a read:

Trump speech signals an America now looking inward

and

Trump takes lying to whole new dimension

Farewell, Glen

He was a little skinny eight-year-old when I first got to the farm in New Zealand in 1979. Glen, one half of the Glen and Brent twins, was a twinkly kid who loved the trolley (go kart) his Dad built, didn’t appreciate most of my attempts at cooking, laughed at all my jokes, and my “funny way to talk.” He had cystic fibrosis, and always gave me cheerful, “Thump me harder!” encouragement every day when he’d hang over the back of a chair. His daily “thumping”on his back loosened the guck that was coating his lungs. We were able to see each other a few times over the years, the last time in 2011. We got to meet his wife Donna, and his two kids. Glen was 45 when he died today, a long run for someone with CF. Should have had more time.

That’s Glen in 1980 with me in the middle and older sister Paula in back. A reenactment in 1993.

Breathe easy, Glen.

100

Today was the day! I reached 100 blood donations, and booked my appointment for 101 in April. I encourage everyone to become a donor. Go to Canadian Blood Services to find out how you can begin. It’s a pretty good feeling and you get juice! Jim likes to perform the bandaid removal every time I donate. And now I can add this nifty new pin to my collection. Blood – they say it’s in you to give.

Snow men

Well, the trip to Edmonton last week seemed like a good idea when we started out. Clear, sunny, highways hotline reported ‘seasonal winter driving conditions.’ A little drifting dry snow. Then the wind picked up. A lot. If you’re Canadian, you understand terms like wind chill and white-out. That blowing snow came from the north for awhile, then from the south, polishing the highway and buffeting our car around. Just past Innisfree, Alberta, our car decided to have a mind of its own; maybe it was a patch of black ice coupled with a nasty wind gust, but we found ourselves, after some skillful manouvering on Rick’s part, backwards in the ditch. In a snowbank. A few cars and semi units passed us, apologetic faces in the windows, but within minutes as we sat figuring out where we were so we could call CAA, a truck stopped. Two nice farm boys who just had to be hockey players jumped out with a shovel, tow rope and big smiles despite not really being dressed for the nasty cold wind and blowing snow.

For 15 minutes, our helpful snowmen Ian and Isaac helped Rick dig us out. We gave up on the tow rope (where do you hook on to a Toyota Corolla anyway?) and with them pushing, I drove us back up onto the shoulder. All the while, son Jim is mildly interested from the back seat, but not wanting to miss too much of his movie on the iPad. But with the boys’ help, we were okay.

Big handshakes turned into big hugs and I pressed my card into Ian’s hand, asking him to email us so we could thank them properly. Another hug and more smiles and they were off. To date, they haven’t emailed us but I still hope they will. The weather got worse, and our 5-hour drive took over 8 with nerve-wracking spells of zero visibility, driving with our hazard lights on, straining our eyeballs to make out taillights in front of us. The worst of the photos below were still the good spells!

Two days later, the trip home was made smoothly in clear, sunny weather. The only evidence of the nasty experience were one after another tire tracks into ditches and median where cars and trucks had ploughed blindly off the road. A car here and there, including a truck and horse trailer, were still getting towed out.

Thanks Ian and Isaac, our snow men. If you know these helpful snow angels, tell them to email us!

Father Mulcahy

When I heard the other day that actor William Christopher died, I went looking for the book he gave me when I interviewed him in 1990 about his son. He was appearing in Regina at Stage West in a production of Run for Your Wife. I found the book today, and had forgotten he’d signed the playbill, which I’d tucked inside. I see now that Tibor Fehereghazi directed and Kent Allen, whom we just enjoyed as a wonderful Scrooge in last month’s run at Persephone Theatre, also starred. Thought it was ‘small world’ convergence of Tibor, whom I interviewed years later, and Kent also in that production 27 years ago.

Mr. Christopher was a very kind and gentle man – very much like his Father Mulcahy character – and because we both had sons with a disability, it was more great visit than interview. I remember him with fondness.

Being human

Yann Martel and Alice Kuipers have a little house on Main Street, within walking distance of ours. When they first moved in, we offered perennials when we were thinning out our garden. My son Jim and I made several back alley trips, wheelbarrow laden with daylilies bobbing from chunks of earth, and stuck them in Yann and Ali’s backyard. Rewarded with cups of tea, we made these trips to the point where Jim thought Ali’s name was Back Ali. As their brood grew, they eventually moved, just down the block from us. If we throw a rock very hard from our back gate, we might just hit Yann’s writing studio. It was with such pleasure we came across this article about what Yann and Ali have done with that cute little barn-shaped house on Main Street. It is lovely that they literally opened their home to a new family, and that it happened on Main Street — something that could happen on so many quinessential Main Streets in this country. A human act, an act of Canadian kindness for another family. Gives you a bit of hope for humanity as we enter an uncertain 2017.

Happy New Year.

The new Main Street family. MCC photo by Leona Lortie. Welcome to the neighbourhood!