Ooo-Mommy

Yesterday I networked to build social capital and cement my role as a thought-leader in my defined space, and to help broaden my tribe to include customers and strangers as well as those with whom I have established trust relationships.

Sorry. Too much time reading business blogs.

Really, I was a funhog: I met people for lunch and then coffee. Yes, there was talk and talk and a little more talk. Probably trust built, ideas exchanged, futures imagined, too. And all in real life, face to face, over food and drink.

The point of writing about it was that I have to say something about my lunch. It was at one of the "storefront" versions, Fox on the Run, of this place, the White Fox Inn.

And what I have to say is this: Umami.

My lunch was a meatloaf sandwich. I love meatloaf and I hardly ever make it because it never tastes as good as my mother's meatloaf tastes in my memory. My sister also makes fabulous meatloaf. And the thing about meatloaf is that it's so much better the next day as a sandwich. So why make something for the purpose of enjoying it as a leftover? I don't really get that.

In any case, yesterday someone else had gone to the trouble of making meatloaf, and there was the sandwich, so I splurged. The first bite made my tastebuds dance, and then I was speechless (and not only because my mouth was full). The building of trust and thought-leadership paused momentarily. Because topping that meatloaf was...a slice of bacon.

Yeah. Bacon: for when meatloaf just isn't enough.

Man, I love this country.

Full disclosure: The White Fox Inn is owned and operated by family members of the other tenor in the church choir (yes, I'm a "girl tenor"; I'm an easily bored low alto and enjoy a challenge). Satch and his wife are in California right now and have no idea I'm writing this. I'm pretty sure Satch doesn't know what a blog is. In any case, I get nothing for writing this. Except the chance to relive the meatloaf sandwich ad infinitum without adding it to my caloric intake in real life.

Time in Perspective

I've been trying to write about time, but all I could say about it was gloomy.

Like sometimes how it feels that time really is NOT on your side. Maybe you're lying in rubble in Haiti, hoping someone will come dig you out. Or when you have a chronic disease or condition and you receive news that it's progressing.

No, I am in neither situation, though I have a family member who faces the second. Unless, I suppose, you count living as a chronic condition, which gee, yes, I have that, thanks. Gloomy.

I can be okay with gloomy. Gloomy happens, as does bright and shiny. But I was depressing myself. So I didn't write.

I am today, however, because I came across this video: it shows a time-lapse movie of natural scenes. It's pretty long, but it is pretty, and not bad company for a few minutes.

Watching the clouds pass over the landscape helped me gain a different perspective on time. It's bigger. I'm smaller.

This morning I look out over the landscape my grandfather chose and know it's the same, even though details are different. Different kids run down to the edge of the water and throw rocks in. When it snows, different adults put on skis and tour around the property. If my grandfather could be here, he wouldn't know us--he couldn't even have predicted our presence, not really. Different.

But the rocks are the same, as are many of the trees. The water itself has soaked into the cuffs of many pant legs, evaporated, traveled the world, and finally sifted as snow into the bush, where it has melted and flowed and found its way back into the bay.

Others may find our relative impermanence to be depressing. I find it humbling but ultimately reassuring.

Little-t time isn't always on our side, but approaching a birthday ending in zero (also something a different brother is facing, as am I) doesn't have to mean taking an inventory of all that we have not yet done. It can be a time for celebrating the choices we've made in the relatively short time we've had.

And big-T Time: It passes, and as it passes, it gives us space to dance with the rocks and trees, and then we make way for others. Their dance will be different--but the same.

Timing: The Loon Socks

I hang on too long. Except when I give up too easily. But often, I hang on too long.

Nearly two decades ago, I was part of a breakfast group. I liked these four women enough to meet them for breakfast once a week (or once a month? hazy) at 7 a.m. (It seems incredible to Ms. Not-a-Morning-Person now.) We met to talk about "Plan B." I'm up to about Plan Q at this point, but I still remember our earnest belief that meeting to talk about the future helped us create said future. I still believe it.

I remember only a few things that were planned around that table. However, I do remember saying that I wanted to learn to move on when I had learned my lesson instead of hanging on long past that point.

All these years later, I don't know that I'm any better at it.

I got rid of a pair of socks this morning. My toe had poked through the end. They were lumpy and ratty and puddled at the ankle more often than not. But they were an important pair of socks. They were my loon socks. My sister gave them to me in my Christmas stocking about 15 years ago. I wore them in Colorado to remind myself that an important part of me lived up here already--that this place where I now am would be part of my life always, though I didn't quite see how.

And yeah, they kept my feet kinda warm, as was their job. Until they got lumpy and ratty. And then the hole. "But they are my loon socks," I kept thinking as I pulled them from the dryer, then paired and folded them and stuck them back into my drawer. "My loon socks!" I would think when I put them on.

Finally, last night, I looked at my toe poking through the hole and thought, "Maybe it's time to let go of these."

Maybe? Ya think?

Functionally, they've outlived their usefulness.

Emotionally--well, I've been a permanent resident for more than four years now. My husband and I are celebrating our 29th lunar-versary next week. I'm here. I'm staying. So I probably don't need those socks emotionally, either.

It's not just socks. A particular friendship--is it time to let go or should I hang on, keep trying? A relationship with a specific organization--I let it go, but I miss it; is there a boundary I can set that will let me make contact again? Parts of me that I had to set aside during the move here--are they part of my past, or should I dust them off again? Can I get rid of something I'm currently hanging onto so that there's more room for them--or even for something new?

I put my loon socks into the hamper. I'll wash and dry them again, and then I will put them with the clothing to be donated--not because anyone else wants them, but because the organization sells what it can't use and eventually the rags make their way into paper. That's better than sending them (my loon socks!) to the landfill. I've taken their picture (something I learned from watching Clean Sweep), so I can look at them as often as I want, and they're only taking up bytes.

Sometimes I do hang on too long. And sometimes I still give up too soon. But I hold out hope that I'm better at making those decisions
--thanks in part to that breakfast group, many years ago.

Drawing the Line: Me/Not Me

What is there to say about the earthquake in Haiti, really, except that it gives new meaning to the term "horror," and let's all hope it moves us all to a new personal definition of "compassion."

And then. To add to the physical and emotional suffering, Pat Robertson chose to pile on with some spiritual claptrap: obscenity, profanity, blasphemy, whatever you want to call it. I don't want to legitimize what he said with a summary or even a link. Google it if you must.

However, I do think it's important to say this: Pat Robertson does not speak for me.

Yes, we share some features:

• I, too, am a U.S. citizen.
• I was born and grew up in a state below the Mason-Dixon line, which technically makes me a southerner, as he is.
• I am named Marion. Seriously. He is apparently one of those men named Marion who (yippee) choose another name, like John Wayne, born Marion Mitchell/Robert Morrison. Whatever.

I am also affiliated with Christianity, as Pat Robertson claims to be. My relationship to the faith is difficult to define, exactly, but it includes a history of belonging to Methodist churches. I now go to a church that is part of a Christian denomination: the United Church of Canada.

I have been uncomfortable saying "I'm a Christian" for a long time, in part because of the actions committed by people who are extremely comfortable claiming to be Christian. Like Jerry Falwell. Oral Roberts. Various popes. George W. Bush (also a Methodist, sigh). And now, like Pat Robertson.

But I see, finally, that the Haiti earthquake has created a situation analogous to the political situation in the U.S. during the previous presidential administration. I have said that it's impossible to have a real discussion with conservatives because of people like Ann Coulter, whose venom masquerades as thought. She and her ilk claim to speak for Republicans and True Conservatives. Until intelligent conservatives and Republicans say, "Wait a sec, she doesn't speak for me," we have to assume that she does. Few if any of the people she purports to speak for have taken her on, and political discourse in the U.S. is the worse for it.

It means nothing for liberals and Democrats to point out flaws in her thinking. Her opponents are automatically assumed to be misguided. Not worth talking to. Not worth the air they're breathing. And ignoring her, which some prescribe as the antidote, makes her more bold and shrill.

It's up to the people who she claims as allies to force her into irrelevance. They do this by drawing the line: This stuff over here, this belongs to me. I speak to it, I answer for it. That stuff over there: No. Hers.

So that's what I'm doing in relation to Haiti. As a person-with-relationship-to-Christianity, I must say this: Pat Robertson doesn't speak for me. I can't say that he is not a Christian, but the Christ he purports to know isn't the Christ I know of. The God he claims to serve is not the God I claim.

He has a bully pulpit and a following. But he stands over there, in that space of hatred and self-righteousness. That's his.

And I stand here, without explanation or blame for a disaster such as the earthquake in Haiti, and certainly no blame for its victims. I can do little that is of concrete value to them but give money. I can, however do that. This I claim.

As a side note: I am also extra grateful, these days, for the roof over my head and the Canadian Shield beneath my feet. It's snowing today. I watch the snow drift by and wonder--how long until I have seen 100,000 snowflakes, one for each person expected to die in Haiti?

Not All Verbs are Created Equal

I'm sure you know this. But sometimes, a reminder is a good thing.

Specifically, "think" is not really as active a verb as you might imagine.

• Thinking about taking vitamins is not the same as taking vitamins.
• Thinking about going to the gym is not the same as going to the gym. Or working out when you're there.
• Thinking about all the projects you have to finish this week is not the same as working on the projects.
• Thinking about booking a plane ticket. Thinking about following up with a client. Thinking about cleaning a closet, doing a load of laundry, thawing something for supper.

"Plan" is a little more active than "think." "Research" too. But not much.

Eventually, you have to move to the action-y ones: work out, call, ask, pay, commit. Or not. I guess you don't have to do more than think. But then you'll never do more than think.

I didn't say it was a revolutionary thought. Just that a reminder is sometimes a good thing.

Things That Go Boomp

From gillies and ghosties and long-legged beasties and things that go boomp in the night: Good Lord, deliver us.

I remember this poster (about 11" X 17") from my parents' home. It hung on the door in the downstairs back bathroom. The image isn't a great photo of the collage, but you can get the idea. Grandma liked sensational images.

Family lore says that the poster really belongs in the bathroom at the "it may be a shack but it's our shack" camp. Not this particular collage, but one like it, spent time in the outhouse in the family's early days of camping. Being out in what feels like the middle of nowhere makes you more attuned to noise. Night trips to the outhouse were among the most frightening experiences of my childhood, except for Fire Prevention Day in grade school, which apparently freaked me right out of my imaginative little gourd (according to my oldest brother, who was babysitting me that night--I don't remember it myself).

I do startle easily, even though we live in a house, not a shack, and even though decades have passed since Fire Prevention Day. The other night we were sitting on the couch. My husband was napping. I was looking out into the darkness where I couldn't see the lake, wondering idly how cold it would get that night.

Then I heard something strange--a quiet kind of thud or two. It sounded a little as if someone came onto our front porch, but no one rang the doorbell. It must be something in the house, I thought (though it sure didn't sound like it). Just as I was able to convince myself that it was nothing, I heard a similar series of thuds, as of walking feet. Even my husband woke up.

Winter is a noisy season in these parts. Snow accumulates on the roof and melts a little when the sun shines on it. Sometimes a bit slides off when you're not expecting it. Sometimes the wind howls through the vent over the stove. The heater gears up in the basement and then begins to blow, and that progression of sounds is different depending on where you stand in the house. The well, pumps, and septic system make their own variety of noises--some happier to hear than others.

It's taken me awhile to get used to the noises, and sometimes I'm still not. Sometimes I still find myself alert in the middle of the night for no reason, awakened all the way by something I can't identify and dismiss. We live in an area that is something like "the country" but also a lot like a neighbourhood. I tend to forget the fact that people live near our cocoon.

The other night, it took a few seconds for us to look at each other and say, "We did hear that, right?" At first, we (meaning I) thought it might be a person--a friendly person. Perhaps someone was stranded and needed help. But we hadn't heard a car or any other sound, like a snow machine. And it was far too cold for someone to be out for a walk and decide to stop by.

When we went to the front door, which is on the land side of the house, we found the cause of the noise: a deer. It stood in silhouette, chewing away at the cedar bushes between the house and the car. Its hoofprints showed in the snow of the sidewalk. Of all the things that could have gone boomp, that was definitely the most picturesque.

It was also reassuring. If the doe was comfortable enough to walk around in our yard and chew the bushes, our neighbourhood must be pretty safe. Or at least it was that night: I slept well. (And yes, I have evacuation routes from each room of this house all planned out. I try not to think about those, though.)

Maple Syrup

Left: Hugh LeCaine, Sue (Mrs. H. C.) LeCaine, and Jeanne LeCaine in front of their home on Dufferin Street, Port Arthur, c. 1920. Perhaps the year Emily Gray came to Christmas dinner?

My mother (at right in the photo) was, among other things, a teacher. Actually, she used to say that she always knew she wanted to be two things: a teacher and a mother.

There were times I wasn't so sure how thrilled she was to be a mother. I never doubted her devotion to teaching, however.

And so, because the first week of January arrived before I was quite ready for it, I give you this. My brother discovered it in a folder of stuff he took on when we cleared out the folks' house in Oklahoma. He included it with his Christmas cards this year.

ON MAPLE SYRUP AND OTHER SMALL THINGS

A Christmas Meditation
by Jeanne Agnew (1972)

Christmas means many things, some large, some small. One thing Christmas means to me, and it may seem very small to you, is “maple syrup.” For years our children have said “Thank you” to their schoolteachers at Christmastime with a small jar of Canadian maple syrup.

But the association of maple syrup and Christmas goes back much farther, to my early childhood. Our Canadian Christmas was always an intensely family-oriented holiday season. However, my Mother always enlarged our Christmas family circle to include any solitary individual who needed a family. One such person was Emily Gray.

Emily Gray was a part of our family at one Christmas, so early in my lifetime that I have no clear memory of her. Yet, year after year, she expressed her gratitude by sending us – in the spring, when the sap ran – a gallon can of maple syrup. This was a real treat for a family in which pennies counted.

The little things in life, such as one extra place at the table, are all-important. Small acts of kindness we do, or neglect to do, have repercussions we cannot realize. At Christmastime we should especially feel the need to reach out, if only in some seemingly insignificant little way, to show genuine concern for those around us.

What if we could keep it up all year?

That's my mother. Subtle as a sledgehammer, but usually, infuriatingly, right.

The Most Recent Best

The fact that I find the date of a new year an arbitrary marking of time doesn't mean I am not susceptible to "best of" lists.

However, it does mean that I'm not really interested in going back through the list of books I've read during the past year, much less the past ten years. (I can go back to October 13, 1996. Why are you surprised at this?)

So here are the best fiction and nonfiction works I've read recently.

Fiction. Driftless, by David Rhodes. A series of vignettes that create a fully dimensional image of a community. Nothing, no image or mention of an object, is thrown away, and I never am aware of the work of the writer. (Contrast with Barbara Kingsolver.) Community members are flawed and gifted and fully human, and these aspects of their lives are shown with the greatest respect. And yes, stuff happens in this story, as it does in real communities, but it's not the stuff that happens that's important; it's the effect of the stuff on the community. I read it slowly because I didn't want it to end, and when I was finished I started again at the beginning and read it with a notebook in hand to see if it was as good as I thought it was. It was.

Nonfiction. And Baby Makes More: Known Donors, Queer Parents, and Our Unexpected Families, edited by Susan Goldberg and Chloe Brushwood Rose. The title pretty much says it all, except for all the things it doesn't say. Like the fact that the writing is really good. I was afraid there would be lots of academic back-and-forthing as family members tried to talk about things (such as family roles) for which we don't have words, but the writing is very grounded and practical. I was also impressed by the honesty -- the shifting allegiances and jealousies that most parents in "traditional" families also have but hardly ever talk about were part of (but not dominant in) the larger story. (Full disclosure: yes, I know Susan and probably would not have noticed this book without her, but that really has nothing to do with the worthiness of this book. And I also have a "nontraditional" family, though not in this exact way, so yes, I'm personally happy that people are talking about these issues. That is not the only reason I admire this book and these writers.)

During this past year I've read other good books, along with some middling ones. I've read some simply because I started them and finishing allowed me to feel virtuous.

And I want never to take for granted the abundance of books that are available to me because I live at this time in this part of the world. Sometimes I do, and I shouldn't.

Climbing off the soapbox now.

Oh, and: The best book of poetry I read in 2009 is Jeremiah, Ohio, by Adam Sol. It's also the only book of poetry I read. It's way easier for me to puzzle over mathematical equations than poems (and I was an English major who didn't really "get" integration in calculus). However, I liked this book enough to keep it on the desk or just beside the desk so that I can pick it up and dip into it when I need a break. But then, what's not to love about an Old Testament-style prophet in the 21st century?

See? All these books, available with one-click shopping, mean that I even read poetry. Perhaps the apocalypse really IS coming soon.