Traditional Differences

I've now been to three Canadian weddings, and another wedding in Canada that wasn't traditionally Canadian. Although most elements are the same in both countries--bride and groom, various family members, clothing, food--some things are different. And N.B., I mean for this to be the last post about weddings.

For one thing, Canadians take lots of pictures in the church, even when the bride comes down the aisle. I remember my first wedding (ahem), and my sister's first wedding (ahem), when the photographer could take pictures during the ceremony, but only from the balcony and with no flash. It's been long enough (ahem) since either of those U.S. weddings that policies may be different in the U.S. But I was still surprised at the shutterbugs flashing on the wedding party all during the processional.

Then, too, there's this thing called "the signing of the register." It's the wedding paperwork. In Canada, it's a photo opportunity. The bride sits and signs, the groom ditto, and both witnesses, and then the minister. Meanwhile, cameras go like crazy. In the U.S., I'm sure there's paperwork but it happens behind the scenes.

A tradition in Thunder Bay is the shag before the ceremony. It's a little different from what Austin Powers had in mind (though that goes on, too). The shag, in Thunder Bay, is a combined bachelor/bachelorette party; the name is thought to be derived from "she" and "stag." The parties likely go on elsewhere, but the name seems to be unique to the Thunder Bay area.

Anyway, sometimes the couple charges $10 or $20 for admission, booze is served (sometimes from a cash bar), there's a DJ and music and dancing, and basically people attending have the opportunity to get money to the bride and groom through various ruses and games. Many of those same games are part of wedding receptions in the U.S.--the bride is "kidnapped" and the families have to "pay ransom," the men in attendance pay to dance with the bride during a special dance, etc.

Again, weddings in Canada are another arena in which the differences between cultures show up in the little things. Enough of the traditions are the same as weddings in the U.S. that the event feels familiar--except for the few traditions that are different. It's like a little skip in an LP record, or one of those blips in a DVD where the action freezes.

At the end of the day, though, the couples are married. Everyone has a shot at happiness. What happens next is up to the couple. That's the same anywhere.

Seriously, Do Not Call Me

Today's invisible line separates sales calls from harrassing calls. Also, you will see evidence that Canadians aren't always polite. Or at least their business practices are every bit as annoying as those in the U.S.

Yesterday I received a telemarketing call. I have previously supported this organization, so it isn't unreasonable that I receive a call.

Except.

Except that in December, I wrote to the telemarketing company, asking that my name be removed from their list and explaining why. In short, here's why: They tell you they call you "every year" when they call you every six months minimum. They lie to you when you ask when they last called. They also have a very smarmy script that I find offensive, and I'm not even part of the group they're marketing for, but I didn't go into that. Anyway. I asked, in writing, to be taken off their call list.

Except that I received another telemarketing call in about March. I explained that I had asked, in writing, to be taken off this list and explained again why. The man who called said I would be.

Except that last week, I received yet another call from the telemarketing company on behalf of this same organization. I said again that I have asked to be removed from the list and, after hearing a petulant voice from the caller, simply hung up.

As you can see, I have been patient. Except for yesterday. I said that I had asked in writing to be taken off their list and had been called three times since, and that if I were called again I would sue them for harrassment.

Then I decided to check to see if I can do anything else about stopping these calls. According to the website for the Canada Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), Canada established a Do Not Call list as of 2004. However, also according to the CRTC, only in July 2007 did the process begin to select a vendor to manage the Do Not Call list. Meanwhile, each telemarketing company has been "required" to uphold certain guidelines. The guidelines include giving people the phone number and address of a person who can take the callee off their list.

I can see that next time I will have to be more patient. I will have to ask the person calling me for the name of that person and how to contact that person. Perhaps the person I have already written to is not the correct person.

And then I will patiently explain that although I live in Canada and am generally a kind and gentle American, I am still an American and therefore litigious by nature. I can only hope that Canadian telemarketing companies will return the favo(u)r and live up to their national reputation of being polite and accommodating.

Boundaries Internal

So I went to that other wedding yesterday. Mine.

It was very small--just family and a few friends on the beach at our camp, fewer than 15 people all together. It was the perfect ritual in an informal but meaningful setting with important people there.

It got me wondering where I would draw the line between "single" and "married" for me and Roy. It turns out to be one of those invisible but not imaginary lines. Yesterday's ceremony solemnized our vows in a very public way. But he and I have also been married, on the inside, for some time.

On a purely prosaic note, this morning at the gym the conversation turned to cell phone holders. I started to say, "My boyfriend has the kind..." and realized that now I say, "My husband." I enjoyed that.

In fact, I'm very happy to be officially married. I look forward to our lives together. And although this wasn't my first time to marry, it will be my last.

Geez

A columnist at Inside Higher Education today shows how difficult it is for Americans (aka "U.S. citizens") to understand Canada as a nation. The column is interesting but honestly, even bright Americans don't seem to understand that citizens of countries other than the U.S. don't have this need to shout, "I'm from [insert country here], dammit, and I'm proud."

If pressed, Canadians I know would say that Americans are brash, loud, and egotistical, except for those Americans they know well, of course. Americans would say that Canadians are polite. Both generalizations may be true, but they may be equally false. My family is as egotistical as the next set of Americans, but we're quiet and demure about it. And I've met some rude Canadians.

It's possible to talk meaningfully about the relationships between the two countries, their economies, and their policies. However, it's less meaningful to try to encapsulate a Canadian persona. After all, Uncle Sam doesn't accurately represent half the population based on his gender alone. Generalizations about either country aren't really useful. Including that one.

Ritual and Meaning

Back in Canada on Friday, I went to a wedding Saturday--that of my fiance's daughter. Some elements of the ceremony were traditional, even formal. It was at a church, the bride wore a heavy white gown and a veil over her updone hair, and they signed a certificate, which apparently is a picture-taking occasion in this country. They also had a reception, where they cut two cakes (chocolate and white).

Other elements of the ceremony were less traditional. The bride's oldest son (age 7) walked her down the aisle and did a Bible reading. The middle son, age 4, carried the box with the rings. The youngest, age 13 months, walked partway down the aisle with the bridesmatron and refused to go farther under his own power. The minister also asked the boys if they were OK with their mother getting married to this man. (They are. Everyone is--they're great together.)

Oh, and the cakes were Hot Wheels cakes. The two older boys got to pick the kind of cakes they wanted, and that's what they wanted. Vroom, vroom.

The best part of the wedding that it was exactly right for this family. It was meaningful. The silly moments and laughter didn't detract from the very sincere vows that the entire family made.

Which is not to say that large, ultra-traditional weddings, in any faith tradition, are necessarily without meaning. Many people find comfort and meaning in using the same words as their ancestors to make identical vows. It's impossible to gauge the depth of a promise from the outside, whether the bride is barefoot in a meadow or veiled in a cathedral.

I'll be at another wedding in less than a week. It will be on a beach, with just a few family members present. It, too, will be perfect for the couple. The wedding cake will be Nanaimo bars. I know, because I'll be the bride.

The Crapture

Yesterday my sister and I were sitting at a coffee shop in Oklahoma with two of my brothers, enjoying a few moments of downtime before I left for points north. After three-plus straight days of carting carefully saved garbage to the curb for pickup, we were a slap-happy group.

Somehow, the conversation turned to The Rapture, the evangelical Christian belief (which we generally don't share) that at Christ's second coming, the faithful will be brought straight to heaven. I expressed a wish that Jesus, instead of carrying people, would carry all the stuff in the house straight to heaven. My sister said it would be called The Crapture.

Which brings me to an always-invisible line, that between trash and treasure. My sister feels exultant when she's packing something and can find a packing box in her storage shed instead of having to buy one at the store, as her ex-husband insisted they do. I, on the other hand, found it liberating to cart to the curb a hundred cubic feet of boxes saved since 1967, some with other Crapture items inside and the rest too moldy and infested to recycle. But it would have been even better if my parents had junked and recycled their own stuff.

The crowning moment of the first half of the week's work was the appearance of the garbage men yesterday. We had stacked junk all along the front length of our lot. It was waist high and higher, extending back from the curb about six feet. My oldest brother had arranged with the city a once-every-six-months "moving" pickup, in which (we were told) they'd take everything at the curb, as long as loose papers were secured.

We could imagine, after three twelve-hour days of hot and sweaty work, the thrill of watching the dregs of the past disappear. In fact, during the work, it was the thought of that release that kept us going. It would be a cleansing moment, a time for us to honor our quirky parents and their capacity for retaining physical evidence of their memories. We would all move ahead with our lives, which for my brothers and sister consists of more days of throwing out stuff.

Then the doorbell rang. It was the crew foreman, explaining that they didn't have a work order for this unusual pickup so they wouldn't be able to take it. They drove off. My sister chased them down to find a phone number where my oldest brother could reach them or their boss to yell at them. She got them stopped just around the corner. They called their boss, who said "you can pick up anything that's boxed or bagged." Not what we were told. Not good enough. Not an order that would remove everything from the curb.

I'd been in another room, throwing out things I had once thought I might bring home, trying to apply the lessons of The Crapture. When I heard the news, I went charging out to the crew.

Now, most people who know me, if asked to describe me, would use words like "serious" and "quiet." I've never been accused of hogging the spotlight or engaging in Drama Queen hysterics. Calm and cool--you could even say disengaged--is my normal demeanor. But faced with the loss of our loss, this is how the scene at the curb went.

Me: THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE. YOU HAVE TO MAKE THIS RIGHT.

Then I said some other stuff just like that only less shout-y. I was completely convinced that they would take our garbage, all of it, that very morning. Like Obi-Wan Kenobi, except on estrogen.

Faced with an angry woman whose voice was breaking, the crew foreman backtracked. They took our stuff.

But this victory was secondary. Here is the lesson, my friends: If you want to accumulate treasure, lay up treasures in heaven, not on earth. Or, if you prefer other language: of the "reduce-recycle-reuse-restore" quadrilateral, focus first on "reduce," and the other actions will be easier.

If we truly devote ourselves to this lesson, we can all experience the Crapture every day, here on earth.

Who knew?

Karl Rove has a family?

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changin'

I'm in Oklahoma for part of a week to help clear out the family home. This is the second trip of three planned trips, with a fourth possible next month. When one parent is a historian, the stuff piles up and the genes reappear in the next generation. It's a challenge.

It's also strange to be in the U.S., especially Oklahoma. (Also extremely HOT.) When I started the serious move to Canada three years ago, the U.S. was much more familiar than Canada, even Thunder Bay, where I'd spent so much time over the years. The weird thing is, it's not just big things (international road signs with speed limits in kilometers), it's the little things that are hard to get used to.

For example, it took me a long time to get used to receiving so much change in coins (loonies and toonies) instead of bills. Three years later, I'm about to the point where I can predict whether I keep the wallet open for bills or open the change purse. It's not automatic but I don't have to spend time caculating.

Another wild card, when shopping, is the relative value of the loonie and the U.S. dollar. In the "good old days," the loonie was worth 60 to 70 cents. Some sales in Canada were actually great deals; besides getting the 50% or whatever off, you got an extra 1/3 off for the exchange rate.

Those days are long gone, but three years ago, the loonie was still worth 80 cents. I was still getting a deal when bringing money across the border (legally; it's called writing checks, or cheques, and waiting 30 days for them to clear so you can spend it) (I only wish I were making that up). Now, the loonie is about 95 cents. Some say the dollars will be at par by the end of 2007. Some say the loonie will be worth only 90 cents.

It's confusing. My mother would tell me to just live in the currency where I am, but my business is such that my money comes in U.S. and my expenses are mostly in Canadian. So I have to keep thinking about it.

But I like to think that being able to predict whether change will be bills or coins is a step toward bi-monetary fluency. And a vague, undefinable feeling of strangeness as I pay for my skinny mocha in U.S. money--perhaps that's another.

Or maybe it's just the heat. Makes me want to lie under the porch and pant.

Credit: The Quicksand

When I moved to Canada, I continued to use my U.S. credit cards and had the permanent address associated with those cards changed to my father's address in Oklahoma. However, I'm now a permanent resident and I'm planning to stay here for the duration. I wanted Canadian credit cards--or at least credit cards that recognized my Canadian address as my permanent residence, which my one of my major U.S. credit cards couldn't handle.

I applied for every credit card offer I received in the mail. I applied through the two Canadian banks (Bank of Montreal and RBC) where I have accounts. I even applied through the bank affiliated with Investor's Group, where I have a large balance (for me) of money invested. No deal. I have no credit history in Canada, and I'm self-employed. Basically, Canada didn't know me from Adam and nobody would take a chance on me.

That was true even for cards with branches in both the U.S. and Canada--my extensive, excellent credit in the U.S. and card with these companies might as well have been someone else's.

I could have had my partner co-sign for a card with me, but I did have one card that I could use, and besides, not everyone who moves here has a partner. What avenues would that person have?

So about 18 months ago, I finally got one of those cards where you send a check (or up here, cheque) and they let you borrow against it. I figured I would at least establish credit this way. I've been using this card for business purchases (a ream of paper here, a computer battery there) and paying it off every month (as I do all my credit cards). I have a whopping $200 credit limit. Seriously--tens of thousands in credit in the U.S, but here, $200 secured with my own money.

Meanwhile, I have a U.S. card that I've been using, still, for "real" purchases. This card has a higher limit, which is convenient, but it charges me a percentage as a service fee for each transaction in a foreign currency. It's small, but annoying.

Then my father passed away. In June, I went to close out the Canadian bank account we were joint owners of and open a new account to take care of our family property here. As part of that changeover, the bank offered me a credit card with $10,000 credit on it. It helped, I'm sure, that I have had a year of paying income taxes and income as a self-employed person. It also helped that the old account was established with this bank about 60 years ago. For whatever reason, I am finally deemed worthy of credit. I feel like a real person.

About the same time, a "membership fee" charge appeared on the other card. It seemed egregious to charge me for the privilege of using my own money, so I called to cancel the card (though I was willing to eat the membership fee). However, they bumped me up a level to a supervisor customer service rep, who said that she would waive the membership fee (and, I hastened to ask, the $2 interest that had built up) if I would keep the card open. I said fine.

Of course, I had to make a second call today to have them actually waive the fee--somehow it "didn't happen" before, and yes, they're supposed to waive the now-$4 in interest that's built up. This time, I wrote down the guy's name ("Jason") and the date of the call. We'll see if they follow through. I can call every month--it's an 800 number--if I have to. But hey, I shouldn't have to.

Canada claims to want immigrants, especially in some industries in some parts of the country. But Canadian financial services companies sure don't make it easy on the self-employed person.

Government Ads: Here to Help

Government ads are big business up here. I'm not talking about political ads, which are as nauseating here as they are anywhere (though they rarely include a flag waving in the background). I mean ads sponsored by a government agency.

The health ministry in the Province of Ontario, for example, sponsors ads about West Nile Virus. The ads look great, and the province paid for good music--boomer-era oldies like "When Will I See You Again?" Each ad focuses on one technique Joe and Jane Canadian can use to protect against West Nile.

For example, one ad shows people getting rid of standing water (in a tire swing, in a birdbath). Another features an invisible man becoming visible after going for a dip in the pool, showing what a mosquito would see. The point is that you have to reapply repellent after sweating or getting wet.

Another series of ads, about preventing drunk driving, comes in two parts. The first part shows several vehicles, at night, with a short message across the bottom of the screen: "Took her keys." "Made him stay over." The sound is the song, "Lonely," one of those 1950s-type songs. It's 15 seconds.

After this spot, they show at least one other commercial, then they show part 2. To the Peaches and Herb hit "Reunited," smiling people approach the same cars that had been "so lonely" in the previous spot. It's now morning, and because their friends cared, not one of these people drove drunk.

All of these ads are simple and focused: one message per ad. They don't have voiceovers. The actors are your basic attractive multicultural folks, but they don't speak. The point is the message, and the messages are positive even though the topics really aren't.

I don't know what the budgets are for these types of ads, but the ads sure aren't cheap. Are they effective? I know only that I paid attention and this summer actually found myself on the lookout for standing water that provides breeding grounds for mosquitoes. That's pretty amazing. I'm the kind of person who has paid attention to Gap ads for years (remember "everyone in khaki"?) without buying anything there once. And the Joe Boxer dancing guy? Never fails to bring a smile to my face, but needless to say, I don't buy a lot of boxers. So an ad that forces me to think about its message and changes my behavior is rare.

Is this the best way for the public healthcare system to spend money? Maybe yes, maybe no. The healthcare system works best when people don't get sick or injured--especially when young, otherwise healthy people stay that way. The ads are one gentle reminder of ways Canadians can take care of their health, and that of their friends. Besides, they create work for Canadian ad agencies. All together, perhaps that's enough value to justify them.

Local Ads: The Ugly is the Good

Because we get just two-and-a-half channels (CBC and CTV, the two national channels, and sometimes the provincial public channel, TVO--like sometimes "y"), we see what feels like more than our share of local ads.

The two worst local ads, hands down, feature the children of the proprietors. I won't name names, but one proprietor is a realtor and one sells the most important component in bedroom furniture. The furniture kids have taken acting classes, so the ads with them end up looking like youth group skits. The realtor kid is blond and cute enough if you like smartass and snarky, but he has no idea what he's saying and the result is a mess.

The best local ad series features a bald guy, naked except for a towel, selling saunas and equipment. He's not great-looking but calling him "ugly" is actually a stretch. He's mostly a blank slate. He doesn't speak--the only sound is a folk song played on an accordion.

The first ad shows him in a sauna (pronounced SOW-na, like COW-na), enjoying the heat and wood and ambience, and then making a snow angel outside. (For real--the guy lies down in the snow. Naked.) It ran back in the January/February timeframe, when people were still going in the sauna and searching for snow for that heart-stopping thrill. It even featured a disclaimer, that the guy in the ad was a professional sauna-enjoyer, the Finnish word for which I've forgotten. I think that was to cover the complaint calls when newbies to the sauna try the snow angel bit.

The second ad in the series is actually better. It shows the bald (presumably naked) guy getting out of a taxi in front of the sauna supply store, where he receives a towel with the company logo to wrap himself in. Then the guy checks out all the sauna accessories--thermometers, things to smack yourself on the back with, good-smelling stuff--and leaves with a wooden bucket full. The ad even shows a street sign, locating the sauna store near the intersection of Bay and Algoma, a Scandinavian neighborhood known as something of a tourist destination.

The sauna ads are great. It's partly because the ads aren't about the guy--he's not buff, he's not preening, he doesn't smile. He's single-minded about his sauna, which keeps the focus where it belongs, on the products. They're also great because the guy doesn't talk and therefore doesn't reveal whether he can (or can't) read words in a way that makes sense or act. He's just a 30-year-old Canadian enjoying the sauna.

I'm probably not a typical consumer. Ads hardly ever drive me to buy something, but they often prevent me from buying something. Thanks to the local ads, I know a realtor I'll avoid and a store where I won't be buying bedroom furniture. I'm not a sauna convert, but I could see visiting the store out of curiosity, and I certainly know where to shop for sauna-related gifts.

Local business owners, take note: others may tell you your kids are cute and talented. But are you selling cute kids?

No Sicko

I have not seen Michael Moore's Sicko and I may not. I get tired of that style of "gotcha" "journalism."

Still, living as I now do in the land of socialized medicine, I'm supposed to have an opinion about the Canadian system vs. the U.S. system. So here goes.

Both have positive and negative sides. In theory, socialized medicine provides coverage for everyone. In practice, it's not that easy. I don't have a family physician, partly because I'm healthy as a horse and haven't insisted. But they're in short supply. Wait lists for routine procedures like colonoscopies are very long. The population in Thunder Bay is aging (as is the population across most of Canada, like that of the U.S.), but the local hospital (a regional "health sciences center") is just now getting approval for equipment to conduct some basic heart diagnostic procedures. The wait lists for hip and knee replacements are also quite long.

On the up side, my soon-to-be-stepdaughter can take her three children to urgent care clinics or the hospital's ER and know they will receive care. She doesn't have to worry about how she'll pay for their care.

The primary drawback of the U.S. system is that it demands that consumers be alert, educated, and proactive in seeking care. The system itself doesn't help patients meet those demands. Many physicians are simply unable to communicate medical information in a way that nonspecialists can understand, even though it's nonspecialists' bodies at risk. Some physicians I've seen have been dismissive or disdainful about patients who research their conditions and ask questions. Physicians also rarely make the time to be truly available for patients and families, who may be struggling to comprehend shocking information, intuit long-term consequences, and rearrange their lives to fit those new circumstances.

Still, during my father's last illness in Tucson in March, I was very grateful that he was in the U.S. healthcare system. For one thing, it was somewhat familiar. My sister and my oldest brother are both experienced in dealing with physicians and hospitals, and I'm not afraid of medical information, so the three of us could operate pretty well in that environment.

But mostly, I was grateful for another reason. My father was 90 years old with a congenital heart murmur and an advanced case of chronic obstructive lung disorder. In the U.S., Medicare requires that patients be given treatment until they function at pre-illness levels, or at levels as close to pre-illness as possible. That meant that my father received rehabilitation therapy with the goal that he would be physically ready to return to his home in Oklahoma, where he lived alone without supplemental oxygen. That was the goal: it wasn't necessarily practical, even before his situation got complicated.

My father would have received excellent care in Canada, too, no doubt. But I don't know how physicians make decisions about care here. At some point, socialized systems rely on statistics to determine what care is available to whom--with the lack of heart diagnostic and surgical options in Thunder Bay a case in point. If my father had been treated up here, I would have wondered if his physicians were thinking, "Hey, he made it to 90. He really can't expect more." I wanted my father to decide when his time would come. Would healthcare workers here have been fiercely intent on taking him off the ventilator and monitoring his blood glucose so that he would have the best possible chance of recovery? I don't know. There's no way to know. But my family is very satisfied with the care my father received during his illness. His life ended well.

I am not casting aspersions on physicians in either system. Individual healthcare workers always aim to make people well. But they also operate in a system, and systems fail. The two healthcare systems support different kinds of patients. They both have gaping holes.

Which brings me back to Michael Moore. It's very easy to point out problems. It's not as easy to find solutions--real solutions, not just "isn't healthcare great in Canada and Cuba?" Let Michael Moore turn his attention to solutions, and I might go see another of his movies.

Absurd-istan: Wha?

Absurd-istan, in my world, is anything or anyone who receives an inordinate amount of media attention. For some people (any "starlet" of either gender misbehaving), any media attention is an absurd amount. In other cases, a topic enters the realm of Absurd-istan when I get sick of hearing about it. (Hey, it's my world.)

Case in point: Conrad Black. Canada apparently can't get enough of Conrad Black. Sometimes the folks up here report the stories with a bit of pissiness, possibly because he gave up his Canadian citizenship to buy a title in England. Or maybe they're envious of his success as a media mogul. Recently, Maclean's has published stories that show pity for him because those nasty Americans are persecuting him unfairly and the gazillionaire can't seem to buy a good lawyer.

Whatever, enough already. News flash: The laws apply to everyone. There. That's Conrad Black.