When I was a child growing up, our television displayed a test pattern when there was no programming. The area where I lived, on the frontier of North America, was quite possibly one of the last areas in Canada and the USA to get TV reception. It came to the north late in 1962 or early 1963, and by the summer of 1963, our family had a small black and white box with rabbit ears in the corner of our living room. There was only one channel, a local station that broadcast CBC along with some local programming, and the reception was inconsistent and the image was fuzzy. On weekdays, the programming didn't start until twelve noon when the news came on, and I believe that it went off the air at midnight (although I am not entirely certain, as I was not allowed to stay up that late). By the time I was old enough to babysit, the late show came on after the eleven o'clock evening news, and programming ended around 2 a.m. and resumed at 6 a.m.
If you turned on the TV during a time that there was no scheduled programming, you would see the TV test pattern. In the early years, the test pattern that I recall was a modified version (I think) of the famous Indian head test card. When the programming was about to start or just after it ended, a tone marked the transition from or to the test pattern. In the early years, aside from the transition tone, the test pattern was silent but in later years they played insipid music (the forerunner of grocery store music) during test pattern hours. When colour TV came in a few years later, CBC's test pattern image changed.
Anyways, the purpose of this post is not really to talk about television, but rather to use the analogy of a test pattern for what the mind does while at rest. What got me thinking about this was a conversation that I had with Rob a couple of weeks ago. I commented to him about the kind of music that I heard in my head. Very often, when I am not consciously thinking about something but just letting my mind wander (especially while walking, driving, or working physically) I have a tune running through my head. Sometimes it is something that I have recently heard on the radio, or it may be a song that comes into my mind suggested by a word or a phrase. Sometimes it is original music that I invent, and in those cases, if I am alone I often find myself humming, whistling, or singing, and beating out a rhythm as I go along.
Rob responded that he doesn't hear music in his head. This astonished me because I had always just assumed that everyone hears music in their heads. Rob is a person who loves to listen to music. He has a huge music collection, and is much more knowledgeable about music than I. But I have tunes running through my mind and he does not.
That made me wonder about the degree to which people's mental test patterns differ. When I talk about test patterns of the mind, I mean those images or sounds that the mind sees and hears while awake but in neutral, not really focused on anything in particular. I thought I might describe some of my visual test patterns.
Often when my eyes are closed, my mind is drifting, and I am just about to drift off to sleep, I see colours. I will see, for example, bright purple, or green, or blue, and it will start in the middle of my visual field and spread out into an abstract shape. Then another colour will start in the middle and spread out, and so on. Or sometimes the colour shapes will scroll from the top to the bottom. When I say that the colours are bright, I mean they are like the colours of the spectrum, bright and pure.
Another visual test pattern that I sometimes have are rounded blob shapes that appear, and spread, and morph together. They are a little like droplets of oil floating on water that come together into bigger rounded shapes, and break apart again into small blob shapes. Finally, sometimes, quite rarely, I see complex multicoloured abstract patterns, and these again are always in motion, smoothly changing form. I am curious; do other people see patterns like these behind their eyes?
When I am awake but at rest, with my eyes open staring at nothing, my mind invents humans or anthropomorphized animals out of the shadows, the rug pattern, or the creases of the comforter. I will see a knight with a curly beard riding an elongated horse, or a dragon with hunched shoulders, or a woman with bouffant hair turning to look behind her. I know that I have done this since I was very young. My mind turns the Rorschach ink blots supplied by the environment into humans or animals. Am I fanciful, or do others have their own typical test patterns too?
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Depression Era Legacies
Although my mother was just a small child during the years of the Great Depression, her formative experiences from 1933 to 1939 and throughout the war years shaped her beliefs and practices in ways that have lasted a lifetime. Perhaps more surprisingly, they also have had an impact on the way that I have lived my life, even though I am a baby boomer born in good economic times. The habits of thrift, of bearing up and finding ways of making do during hard times, being careful with money, working hard, and never taking good times for granted were all things I learned growing up with Mom.
Some things, like certain old family recipes, I can see in retrospect were actually substitutions for items that, during the depression, had become unavailable luxuries. I grew up eating homemade pancake syrup, made with brown sugar and water heated in a pan on the stove. I was probably in my thirties before I stopped making "syrup" this way and bought my first bottle of syrup from a store. It was another ten years after that that I splurged and began to buy real maple syrup (but only once in awhile, for a treat). Similarly, Mom used to make lettuce salad dressed with vinegar and sugar. I think it was not so much creative cookery (although my Mom is a good cook), as a way to compensate for not being able to obtain or afford salad dressing. Of course, by the time I was growing up, salad dressing was readily available in stores, and except during tight financial times for a few years when I was quite young, my parents could afford to buy salad dressing. But habits become ingrained, and beliefs and behaviours learned early often are never questioned.
One of the depression era principles was, "Make it yourself." My Mom used to make Popsicles for us when we were children. She would save the plastic moulds that the chocolate Easter bunnies came in (thrift) as well as the wooden popsicle sticks on the rare occasions that we had actual store-bought popsicles, and then freeze Kool-aid or Freshie in the moulds. All the kids in the neighbourhood would congregate at our house and enjoy giant purple bunny popsicles. She also made homemade root beer in beer bottles that she saved and sterilized. I'm sure you can picture the scene: neighbourhood children swaggering about in the backyard, sucking back root beer out of beer bottles on a hot summer day. The root beer was very popular. Mom continued making it for years, until one disastrous occasion when the caps popped off some of the bottles as the root beer was curing, and it foamed out all over the shoes in my parents' bedroom closet. (It had to be stored in a warm dark place for a few weeks to develop its flavour and fizzyness.)
In keeping with the do it yourself approach, my parents always had a vegetable garden, and Mom canned and froze the produce, which we ate throughout the winter. In particular, we had many raspberry canes, as well as other berry bushes like gooseberries and red and black currants. All summer long we helped Mom pick berries, which she made into jam and jelly, using recycled jars that she saved or was given by friends. There was always far more jam than we could eat, and my Mom would give it away to anyone who wanted some. I remember her cursing the damn berries that need to be picked already again, but out she would go to pick them and then she'd make another batch of jam. We did not need so many berries or so much jam, but my Mom simply could not waste the fruit. Waste not, want not -- another depression era principle.
Mom also was frugal with money. For several decades she kept a dime-saver in the kitchen. This was a cardboard folder with slots for fifty dimes. Whatever change was left lying around or that she retrieved from pants pockets in the laundry or from under the couch cushions, she tucked into the dime-saver. Once she had filled it, she would take the dimes out and roll them, then walk down to the bank and deposit the five dollars in a special savings account that she had opened. Even back then, a dime wasn't worth much, so as you can imagine, the savings account grew very slowly.
This frugal habit extended to household objects as well. My Mom had three pairs of scissors when I was growing up: the barber scissors used to cut my brothers' hair (thus avoiding having to pay a barber), her sewing scissors that had been her grandmother's and which we were not allowed to use in case we dulled them by cutting something other than cloth, and the kitchen scissors. The kitchen scissors were kept in the third drawer (the drawer is a story for another time), and they were wretchedly dull. The entire family used them to cut everything from twine to cardboard to wire. They were probably not of very good quality to begin with, and after a time they became next to useless, but Mom would not throw them out or replace them. Likewise, she keeps her towels until they are threadbare, and has the nice new ones she has received as gifts tucked away so they don't get ruined, or displayed on towel racks, but not actually used. Eventually the threadbare towels are recycled; she moves them to the laundry room and uses them to lay out the hand washing on, and finally they are cut up to serve as rags (thus reducing the need for paper towels).
In this time of throw-away materialism and store-bought culture, there is something to be said for the depression era approach. I certainly have continued to live by many of my Mom's depression era principles. I've made pancake syrup, salad dressing, Popsicles, root beer, and endless amounts of jelly and jam. I've saved my coins and rolled them, and I keep a cheque register and balance it every month. I recycle my towels and old tee shirts into rags, and sometimes don't get around to replacing items until they are very shabby. For example, I have a set of lamps in my living room that are 25 years old. They were cheap, not very attractive lamps to begin with, and the lampshades have been shredded by children, pets, and several moves. I have been meaning to get new lamps for....years. But somehow, it seems like a big investment and big decision, and I haven't got around to it.
I guess, for me, the interesting thing about all this is that I took for granted this way of living, and only recently made the connection that my Mom's practices arose from her depression era experiences. I wonder if I have passed onto my children some of the same beliefs and behaviours that i learned from my Mom? Looking at the bigger picture, I think it is fascinating the way we create a culture by our principles and daily details of living, and how we pass on those ways to others, sometimes across multiple generations. Another thing that I am thinking is that it is good to sometimes stop and reflect about taken for granted ways of behaving; sometimes we might find that that we are holding onto habits that are adaptations to conditions that no longer exist, like the Great Depression.
Some things, like certain old family recipes, I can see in retrospect were actually substitutions for items that, during the depression, had become unavailable luxuries. I grew up eating homemade pancake syrup, made with brown sugar and water heated in a pan on the stove. I was probably in my thirties before I stopped making "syrup" this way and bought my first bottle of syrup from a store. It was another ten years after that that I splurged and began to buy real maple syrup (but only once in awhile, for a treat). Similarly, Mom used to make lettuce salad dressed with vinegar and sugar. I think it was not so much creative cookery (although my Mom is a good cook), as a way to compensate for not being able to obtain or afford salad dressing. Of course, by the time I was growing up, salad dressing was readily available in stores, and except during tight financial times for a few years when I was quite young, my parents could afford to buy salad dressing. But habits become ingrained, and beliefs and behaviours learned early often are never questioned.
One of the depression era principles was, "Make it yourself." My Mom used to make Popsicles for us when we were children. She would save the plastic moulds that the chocolate Easter bunnies came in (thrift) as well as the wooden popsicle sticks on the rare occasions that we had actual store-bought popsicles, and then freeze Kool-aid or Freshie in the moulds. All the kids in the neighbourhood would congregate at our house and enjoy giant purple bunny popsicles. She also made homemade root beer in beer bottles that she saved and sterilized. I'm sure you can picture the scene: neighbourhood children swaggering about in the backyard, sucking back root beer out of beer bottles on a hot summer day. The root beer was very popular. Mom continued making it for years, until one disastrous occasion when the caps popped off some of the bottles as the root beer was curing, and it foamed out all over the shoes in my parents' bedroom closet. (It had to be stored in a warm dark place for a few weeks to develop its flavour and fizzyness.)
In keeping with the do it yourself approach, my parents always had a vegetable garden, and Mom canned and froze the produce, which we ate throughout the winter. In particular, we had many raspberry canes, as well as other berry bushes like gooseberries and red and black currants. All summer long we helped Mom pick berries, which she made into jam and jelly, using recycled jars that she saved or was given by friends. There was always far more jam than we could eat, and my Mom would give it away to anyone who wanted some. I remember her cursing the damn berries that need to be picked already again, but out she would go to pick them and then she'd make another batch of jam. We did not need so many berries or so much jam, but my Mom simply could not waste the fruit. Waste not, want not -- another depression era principle.
Mom also was frugal with money. For several decades she kept a dime-saver in the kitchen. This was a cardboard folder with slots for fifty dimes. Whatever change was left lying around or that she retrieved from pants pockets in the laundry or from under the couch cushions, she tucked into the dime-saver. Once she had filled it, she would take the dimes out and roll them, then walk down to the bank and deposit the five dollars in a special savings account that she had opened. Even back then, a dime wasn't worth much, so as you can imagine, the savings account grew very slowly.
This frugal habit extended to household objects as well. My Mom had three pairs of scissors when I was growing up: the barber scissors used to cut my brothers' hair (thus avoiding having to pay a barber), her sewing scissors that had been her grandmother's and which we were not allowed to use in case we dulled them by cutting something other than cloth, and the kitchen scissors. The kitchen scissors were kept in the third drawer (the drawer is a story for another time), and they were wretchedly dull. The entire family used them to cut everything from twine to cardboard to wire. They were probably not of very good quality to begin with, and after a time they became next to useless, but Mom would not throw them out or replace them. Likewise, she keeps her towels until they are threadbare, and has the nice new ones she has received as gifts tucked away so they don't get ruined, or displayed on towel racks, but not actually used. Eventually the threadbare towels are recycled; she moves them to the laundry room and uses them to lay out the hand washing on, and finally they are cut up to serve as rags (thus reducing the need for paper towels).
In this time of throw-away materialism and store-bought culture, there is something to be said for the depression era approach. I certainly have continued to live by many of my Mom's depression era principles. I've made pancake syrup, salad dressing, Popsicles, root beer, and endless amounts of jelly and jam. I've saved my coins and rolled them, and I keep a cheque register and balance it every month. I recycle my towels and old tee shirts into rags, and sometimes don't get around to replacing items until they are very shabby. For example, I have a set of lamps in my living room that are 25 years old. They were cheap, not very attractive lamps to begin with, and the lampshades have been shredded by children, pets, and several moves. I have been meaning to get new lamps for....years. But somehow, it seems like a big investment and big decision, and I haven't got around to it.
I guess, for me, the interesting thing about all this is that I took for granted this way of living, and only recently made the connection that my Mom's practices arose from her depression era experiences. I wonder if I have passed onto my children some of the same beliefs and behaviours that i learned from my Mom? Looking at the bigger picture, I think it is fascinating the way we create a culture by our principles and daily details of living, and how we pass on those ways to others, sometimes across multiple generations. Another thing that I am thinking is that it is good to sometimes stop and reflect about taken for granted ways of behaving; sometimes we might find that that we are holding onto habits that are adaptations to conditions that no longer exist, like the Great Depression.
Saturday, January 19, 2013
A Gift Not Given
Many, many years ago, I hiked the West Coast Trail. The West Coast Trail, famous among hikers, is a remote, rugged, 75 kilometer trail in the Pacific Rim National Park on the west coast of Vancouver Island, Canada, along the Pacific Ocean. There are cliffs that backpackers climb using ladders, rivers and creeks that need to be forded or crossed using a cable car, and sections of headland that can be bypassed by picking your way along the ocean's edge (after consulting tide tables so you don't get trapped by an incoming tide).
To accomplish the trip, my partner and I drove to Port Alberni, the closest community to the north access point of the trail. We left our car and everything but our backpacks there and took the train - the historic E&N Railway - south to Victoria. From Victoria, we hitchhiked along the Sooke highway southwest to Port Renfrew, the small community at the south access point to the trail. (People still hitchhiked in those days.)
We had researched the trip beforehand and purchased a West Coast Trail hiking book. This was thirty years ago, before the days of the world wide web. Our materials told us that the trip typically took seven days in total. We carried dried provisions for eight days, first aid supplies (there are no roads or settlements along the trail), clothing to keep us warm, and rain capes that covered us as well as our backpacks. It can be very rainy and cool on the coast, even in summer, and wet clothing and sleeping bags could make the trip miserable.
If my memory serves me right, on the morning of the third day, we left our camp at Carmanah Point, and headed to the Cheewhat River, which we crossed by cable car. We had already hiked some of the most rugged parts of the trail and I was stiff and sore. As well, my left hip was bothering me, no doubt because I was carrying a pack that was too heavy for my size and weight.
We were headed for the Nitinat Narrows. This is a very short tidal river or narrows that joins Nitinat Lake and the Pacific ocean. It is swift, wide and deep. The only way to get across was to wait for someone from the Nitinat (Ditidaht) First Nation to come by and ferry you across in their boat. Moreover, the crossing can only be made at or close to slack tide, as when the tide is rushing in or out through the narrows, the current is extreme and there are rapids.
After crossing the Cheewhat River, my partner was anxious to make it to the Nitinat Narrows so that we could be ferried across before the tide came in. Although hikers usually stay close their partners, especially in such a remote area, on this occasion he rushed ahead leaving me alone in the forest.
This part of the trail cut inland, away from the ocean. It was heavily treed and the ground was boggy. I was grateful for the long sections of boardwalk that enabled me to not have to walk through the mud. Although it had been raining earlier, the rain had stopped and the forest very quiet. All I could hear was the sound of my feet and my own breathing. My partner was nowhere to be seen.
I was walking along, trying to keep up a good pace but very tired and sore, when suddenly I had the eerie feeling that I was not alone. I stopped and looked around, thinking there might be a bear, but I saw and heard nothing. This is a wild remote area, and there were and still are grizzly bears and cougars in the park. I arranged my rain poncho over my pack to try to look as big as possible, and continued on, whistling and singing to make noise. I walked quickly and with confidence, trying not to limp, even though my hip was aching. If there was a bear nearby, I did not want to surprise it, and if there was a cougar stalking me, I wanted to look big and capable of defending myself (although, in fact, I was short and slight and had nothing to defend myself with except a stick that I had picked up).
I went along, perhaps another kilometer, still feeling as though something was watching me. Then, finally, I came over a ridge and was at the Nitinat Narrows, and rejoined my partner who was waiting there. It was a relief to take off the pack, stow the poncho, and rest, knowing that an animal (if there was one, and not just my imagination working overtime) would be less likely to attack two of us.
A little while later, two Nitinat men came along in their small motor boat. We paid them twenty dollars to ferry us across, and climbed into the boat. They had been out crabbing, and there were two plastic garbage cans, each half full of live crabs. It was no longer slack tide. The tide was starting to rush in and the boat engine roared as it strained against the current as we crossed the river. I sat quietly in the boat, feeling shy and awkward. As we came across into quieter waters, one of the men looked at me and said, "I like that sweater." He paused, then he said again, "Yeah, I like that sweater."
I remember the sweater that I was wearing. It was a heavy wool sweater (these were the days before technical wear and fleece). The main body of the sweater was a light brown colour with black "suspenders" with big blue buttons knitted into the pattern, and black and yellow trim on the arms and at the bottom of the sweater. I had bought it in a secondhand store, where I bought many of my clothes during this poverty-stricken time of my life. I had chosen it for this trip because wool is warm even when wet.
I wanted to give my sweater to the Nitinat man. He liked it, and I knew that he wanted it. I almost did give it to him, but I did not because we still had half of the hike ahead of us, and I did not have another warm sweater to wear.
Looking back, I wish that I had given the sweater to him. Now I understand the important meaning that gifts hold for people from many First Nations cultures. A gift from the heart would have meant much more than that twenty bucks. I was a young white woman and he was a stranger, and yet it would have been the right thing to do to have given him the sweater. As it turned out, the weather became warm and sunny after we left Nitinat Narrows and I did not need to wear the sweater for the rest of the hike.
By the way, when we got back to civilization a few days later, we heard the news that a cougar had come out of the forests near Sooke and attacked a small girl just a week before. The parents had managed to beat off the cougar and rescue the child. This occurred not that many miles away from the section of trail between Cheewhat river and Nitinat River. I have often wondered whether that same cougar had been stalking me.
To accomplish the trip, my partner and I drove to Port Alberni, the closest community to the north access point of the trail. We left our car and everything but our backpacks there and took the train - the historic E&N Railway - south to Victoria. From Victoria, we hitchhiked along the Sooke highway southwest to Port Renfrew, the small community at the south access point to the trail. (People still hitchhiked in those days.)
We had researched the trip beforehand and purchased a West Coast Trail hiking book. This was thirty years ago, before the days of the world wide web. Our materials told us that the trip typically took seven days in total. We carried dried provisions for eight days, first aid supplies (there are no roads or settlements along the trail), clothing to keep us warm, and rain capes that covered us as well as our backpacks. It can be very rainy and cool on the coast, even in summer, and wet clothing and sleeping bags could make the trip miserable.
If my memory serves me right, on the morning of the third day, we left our camp at Carmanah Point, and headed to the Cheewhat River, which we crossed by cable car. We had already hiked some of the most rugged parts of the trail and I was stiff and sore. As well, my left hip was bothering me, no doubt because I was carrying a pack that was too heavy for my size and weight.
We were headed for the Nitinat Narrows. This is a very short tidal river or narrows that joins Nitinat Lake and the Pacific ocean. It is swift, wide and deep. The only way to get across was to wait for someone from the Nitinat (Ditidaht) First Nation to come by and ferry you across in their boat. Moreover, the crossing can only be made at or close to slack tide, as when the tide is rushing in or out through the narrows, the current is extreme and there are rapids.
After crossing the Cheewhat River, my partner was anxious to make it to the Nitinat Narrows so that we could be ferried across before the tide came in. Although hikers usually stay close their partners, especially in such a remote area, on this occasion he rushed ahead leaving me alone in the forest.
This part of the trail cut inland, away from the ocean. It was heavily treed and the ground was boggy. I was grateful for the long sections of boardwalk that enabled me to not have to walk through the mud. Although it had been raining earlier, the rain had stopped and the forest very quiet. All I could hear was the sound of my feet and my own breathing. My partner was nowhere to be seen.
I was walking along, trying to keep up a good pace but very tired and sore, when suddenly I had the eerie feeling that I was not alone. I stopped and looked around, thinking there might be a bear, but I saw and heard nothing. This is a wild remote area, and there were and still are grizzly bears and cougars in the park. I arranged my rain poncho over my pack to try to look as big as possible, and continued on, whistling and singing to make noise. I walked quickly and with confidence, trying not to limp, even though my hip was aching. If there was a bear nearby, I did not want to surprise it, and if there was a cougar stalking me, I wanted to look big and capable of defending myself (although, in fact, I was short and slight and had nothing to defend myself with except a stick that I had picked up).
I went along, perhaps another kilometer, still feeling as though something was watching me. Then, finally, I came over a ridge and was at the Nitinat Narrows, and rejoined my partner who was waiting there. It was a relief to take off the pack, stow the poncho, and rest, knowing that an animal (if there was one, and not just my imagination working overtime) would be less likely to attack two of us.
A little while later, two Nitinat men came along in their small motor boat. We paid them twenty dollars to ferry us across, and climbed into the boat. They had been out crabbing, and there were two plastic garbage cans, each half full of live crabs. It was no longer slack tide. The tide was starting to rush in and the boat engine roared as it strained against the current as we crossed the river. I sat quietly in the boat, feeling shy and awkward. As we came across into quieter waters, one of the men looked at me and said, "I like that sweater." He paused, then he said again, "Yeah, I like that sweater."
I remember the sweater that I was wearing. It was a heavy wool sweater (these were the days before technical wear and fleece). The main body of the sweater was a light brown colour with black "suspenders" with big blue buttons knitted into the pattern, and black and yellow trim on the arms and at the bottom of the sweater. I had bought it in a secondhand store, where I bought many of my clothes during this poverty-stricken time of my life. I had chosen it for this trip because wool is warm even when wet.
I wanted to give my sweater to the Nitinat man. He liked it, and I knew that he wanted it. I almost did give it to him, but I did not because we still had half of the hike ahead of us, and I did not have another warm sweater to wear.
Looking back, I wish that I had given the sweater to him. Now I understand the important meaning that gifts hold for people from many First Nations cultures. A gift from the heart would have meant much more than that twenty bucks. I was a young white woman and he was a stranger, and yet it would have been the right thing to do to have given him the sweater. As it turned out, the weather became warm and sunny after we left Nitinat Narrows and I did not need to wear the sweater for the rest of the hike.
By the way, when we got back to civilization a few days later, we heard the news that a cougar had come out of the forests near Sooke and attacked a small girl just a week before. The parents had managed to beat off the cougar and rescue the child. This occurred not that many miles away from the section of trail between Cheewhat river and Nitinat River. I have often wondered whether that same cougar had been stalking me.
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Symbolic Acts
Today I have been thinking about the different ways in which a person can characterize their life. The narrative one constructs - that is, the story about your life that you tell - not only shapes and gives meaning to the past and presents a certain version of you to the world, but also gives force to the future.
For example, when I look back, my life appears to have distinct periods that have been shaped by two big factors: where I lived, and the job that I had. The geographic place is important because it relates to or stands for so many other things, such as the people in that place that I spent time with, my daily activities, and my interests and leisure pursuits. The affordances of a place allow or constrain what a person does. When I lived in a snowy place with a ski hill nearby, I skied a lot more than when I lived on the prairies. I pursued art more avidly when I lived in towns with a well- developed art community, and I gardened more when I lived in a house with a suitable yard.
Work takes up close to one third of my waking hours. Therefore much of what I actually do each day, my interactions with people, and my goals and accomplishments are deeply embedded in my work. My work is not just what I do for money. It is very much aligned with my life work and my identity. When I think about striving to have a good life, having good work that I care about certainly is an important part, for me.
Another way of thinking about a life, my life, is by life stage, such as early childhood, being a mother of young children, my first marriage, and so on. Yet another way is by thinking of the network of relationships, and how that network has shifted and expanded at various points in time. Every year when I make a valiant and usually only partly successful attempt to send out Christmas cards, I dig out old Christmas card lists from years past. Looking at those lists and flipping through my ancient address book (yes, it's black, and it hasn't yet been completely superseded by electronic contact lists) always makes me feel sad. So many people that I have moved far away from or lost touch with!
There are themes or strands within these broader kinds of life categories. For example, I could think about my various networks of work colleagues over time. Or, recently, I was thinking of the many ways in which my life has been touched by mental illness, whether of family members, friends, work colleagues, or community members.
Tonight, I was especially thinking about symbolic acts that have been highly significant in my life. Perhaps I am unusually introspective, but throughout my life, I always have been alert to key moments of insight, and have ruminated on these "aha" moments and tried to remember the lessons that have come out of them. Similarly, at life turning points, I often have initiated a symbolic act or ceremony to mark the change or decision. Some of these are the ceremonies common to our most of us in this society: those that accompany births, graduations, weddings, and deaths.
As important as these are, it was the smaller but deeply meaningful personal symbolic acts that I was thinking about. Some I only recognized as important afterwards, and others were intentional. As an example, when I was thirteen, I decided that I was no longer a child. As a child I had a favourite climbing tree. I would often stop and climb this tree on my way home from school or my friend's house. I would sit on a branch way up high in the tree and look down an the world and think about things. At age thirteen, I went to the tree and climbed it one last time. I climbed the tree to say good-bye to my childhood, and good-bye to the tree. I told myself that it would be the last time that I would ever climb that tree because I was leaving such childish things behind. I created this symbolic act as a way to mark my transition to adolescence.
Another example of a symbolic act occurred after the death of my first husband. We had a long rectangular dining room table that we used when guests came over. Typically, he would sit at the head of the table, and I would sit on his left, near the door to the kitchen. For some time, I left that seat at one end of the table empty and continued to sit in my usual spot. And then, at some point in time, I moved into that seat at the head of the table. I did so consciously. I thought: "I am the head of my family, and this is my family, and we will have a good life as a family." It was an act of agency. It shaped my future and my way of thinking about myself and my role as a parent.
As I sat in the crowded airport under dingy fluorescent lights tonight waiting for my flight, I pulled out a pencil and piece of paper and made a list of personal symbolic acts. I looked at my list and thought of the meaning represented by each act, and could see certain themes that crossed over time. The list of symbolic acts represents another kind of framework that characterizes my life.
By the way, I went back to that tree once more when I was visiting my home town in my mid-twenties and climbed it again. I climbed it to say to my thirteen-year-old self: "No, you don't have to give up your childhood passions. Hold on to them. You are never too old for life."
For example, when I look back, my life appears to have distinct periods that have been shaped by two big factors: where I lived, and the job that I had. The geographic place is important because it relates to or stands for so many other things, such as the people in that place that I spent time with, my daily activities, and my interests and leisure pursuits. The affordances of a place allow or constrain what a person does. When I lived in a snowy place with a ski hill nearby, I skied a lot more than when I lived on the prairies. I pursued art more avidly when I lived in towns with a well- developed art community, and I gardened more when I lived in a house with a suitable yard.
Work takes up close to one third of my waking hours. Therefore much of what I actually do each day, my interactions with people, and my goals and accomplishments are deeply embedded in my work. My work is not just what I do for money. It is very much aligned with my life work and my identity. When I think about striving to have a good life, having good work that I care about certainly is an important part, for me.
Another way of thinking about a life, my life, is by life stage, such as early childhood, being a mother of young children, my first marriage, and so on. Yet another way is by thinking of the network of relationships, and how that network has shifted and expanded at various points in time. Every year when I make a valiant and usually only partly successful attempt to send out Christmas cards, I dig out old Christmas card lists from years past. Looking at those lists and flipping through my ancient address book (yes, it's black, and it hasn't yet been completely superseded by electronic contact lists) always makes me feel sad. So many people that I have moved far away from or lost touch with!
There are themes or strands within these broader kinds of life categories. For example, I could think about my various networks of work colleagues over time. Or, recently, I was thinking of the many ways in which my life has been touched by mental illness, whether of family members, friends, work colleagues, or community members.
Tonight, I was especially thinking about symbolic acts that have been highly significant in my life. Perhaps I am unusually introspective, but throughout my life, I always have been alert to key moments of insight, and have ruminated on these "aha" moments and tried to remember the lessons that have come out of them. Similarly, at life turning points, I often have initiated a symbolic act or ceremony to mark the change or decision. Some of these are the ceremonies common to our most of us in this society: those that accompany births, graduations, weddings, and deaths.
As important as these are, it was the smaller but deeply meaningful personal symbolic acts that I was thinking about. Some I only recognized as important afterwards, and others were intentional. As an example, when I was thirteen, I decided that I was no longer a child. As a child I had a favourite climbing tree. I would often stop and climb this tree on my way home from school or my friend's house. I would sit on a branch way up high in the tree and look down an the world and think about things. At age thirteen, I went to the tree and climbed it one last time. I climbed the tree to say good-bye to my childhood, and good-bye to the tree. I told myself that it would be the last time that I would ever climb that tree because I was leaving such childish things behind. I created this symbolic act as a way to mark my transition to adolescence.
Another example of a symbolic act occurred after the death of my first husband. We had a long rectangular dining room table that we used when guests came over. Typically, he would sit at the head of the table, and I would sit on his left, near the door to the kitchen. For some time, I left that seat at one end of the table empty and continued to sit in my usual spot. And then, at some point in time, I moved into that seat at the head of the table. I did so consciously. I thought: "I am the head of my family, and this is my family, and we will have a good life as a family." It was an act of agency. It shaped my future and my way of thinking about myself and my role as a parent.
As I sat in the crowded airport under dingy fluorescent lights tonight waiting for my flight, I pulled out a pencil and piece of paper and made a list of personal symbolic acts. I looked at my list and thought of the meaning represented by each act, and could see certain themes that crossed over time. The list of symbolic acts represents another kind of framework that characterizes my life.
By the way, I went back to that tree once more when I was visiting my home town in my mid-twenties and climbed it again. I climbed it to say to my thirteen-year-old self: "No, you don't have to give up your childhood passions. Hold on to them. You are never too old for life."
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Coming Home
We have just returned from travelling. We made a car trip to visit friends and family for Christmas and New Years. We put 4000 kilometers on the odometer and drove over mountains and through snow storms (well, only a couple of little ones). We braved minus twenty C. temperatures.
It was a wonderful vacation. We feasted, skied (both alpine and cross-country), partied, shopped, watched movies, soaked in the hot tub, played crib, and read novels. We crossed two provinces and visited in four different cities/towns. However, the thing that made the trip wonderful was seeing our dear friends and our children, grandchildren, and other dearly loved family members. It was so good to spend time visiting people we care about and yet who live so far away. My only regret is that we didn't manage to see everyone, but there is only so much that you can pack into a two-week road trip. (Next time...)
We returned home this evening just as it was getting dark. Today's leg of the journey was 650 kilometers, and we drove it essentially nonstop, only pausing briefly for bathroom breaks and to get gas. Our bodies were vibrating and our ears buzzing as we pulled into the driveway after two days of driving from the home of our friends.
As we were driving back, I was already missing everyone, and thinking nostalgically of the fun that we had had, and how the days had zipped by so fast. It didn't seem all that great to be going home, and that the holiday was over. I was thinking grumpily that it was a bad idea to be living so far away from the people we care about. And yet, boy oh boy, when we pulled in and stepped through the door, home sure looked good.
We like our home and our city. We are happy to be together and we have a happy life here. Tomorrow we will pick up our pets from pet jail (the kennel) and home will seem even better.
What is the first thing that you do when you arrive home after a longish absence? Unpack the car, read the mail, do the laundry, buy groceries? Well yes, I do those things too. But usually the very first thing I do is walk around the house and yard, looking at my home. "I'm back, house." Back home, back to my life and usual pattern of activities. Back in this place.
Next, I typically read the mail, listen to the phone messages, unpack the car, put on a load of laundry, and then make a home-cooked meal out of whatever I can scratch together from the bare cupboards and freezer. After two weeks of delicious holiday meals, it is still very satisfying to cook a dinner and sit down together to eat it. (For the record, tonight I made made king mackerel with a korma sauce, baked yams, baby potatoes, and broccoli.)
The other rather strange thing I often do upon returning home is clean the fridge. The refrigerator is never so empty as when we have been away for a few weeks, and grubbiness is more apparent when the shelves are bare. Coming home, I see everything with fresh eyes, and am more apt to notice things that are messy or dirty. Although I am not a terrific housekeeper, on returning home after being away I am always seized with a zest to clean and tidy things (which unfortunately doesn't last long). And in any case, it just seems to make sense to clean the fridge before going out and buying a bunch of groceries to fill it up. So after dinner tonight, that is what I did. Tomorrow, we'll go get the pets, and I will tackle the laundry, the bills, and buying groceries.
Then, hi ho, hi ho, it's back to work I go.
It was a wonderful vacation. We feasted, skied (both alpine and cross-country), partied, shopped, watched movies, soaked in the hot tub, played crib, and read novels. We crossed two provinces and visited in four different cities/towns. However, the thing that made the trip wonderful was seeing our dear friends and our children, grandchildren, and other dearly loved family members. It was so good to spend time visiting people we care about and yet who live so far away. My only regret is that we didn't manage to see everyone, but there is only so much that you can pack into a two-week road trip. (Next time...)
We returned home this evening just as it was getting dark. Today's leg of the journey was 650 kilometers, and we drove it essentially nonstop, only pausing briefly for bathroom breaks and to get gas. Our bodies were vibrating and our ears buzzing as we pulled into the driveway after two days of driving from the home of our friends.
As we were driving back, I was already missing everyone, and thinking nostalgically of the fun that we had had, and how the days had zipped by so fast. It didn't seem all that great to be going home, and that the holiday was over. I was thinking grumpily that it was a bad idea to be living so far away from the people we care about. And yet, boy oh boy, when we pulled in and stepped through the door, home sure looked good.
We like our home and our city. We are happy to be together and we have a happy life here. Tomorrow we will pick up our pets from pet jail (the kennel) and home will seem even better.
What is the first thing that you do when you arrive home after a longish absence? Unpack the car, read the mail, do the laundry, buy groceries? Well yes, I do those things too. But usually the very first thing I do is walk around the house and yard, looking at my home. "I'm back, house." Back home, back to my life and usual pattern of activities. Back in this place.
Next, I typically read the mail, listen to the phone messages, unpack the car, put on a load of laundry, and then make a home-cooked meal out of whatever I can scratch together from the bare cupboards and freezer. After two weeks of delicious holiday meals, it is still very satisfying to cook a dinner and sit down together to eat it. (For the record, tonight I made made king mackerel with a korma sauce, baked yams, baby potatoes, and broccoli.)
The other rather strange thing I often do upon returning home is clean the fridge. The refrigerator is never so empty as when we have been away for a few weeks, and grubbiness is more apparent when the shelves are bare. Coming home, I see everything with fresh eyes, and am more apt to notice things that are messy or dirty. Although I am not a terrific housekeeper, on returning home after being away I am always seized with a zest to clean and tidy things (which unfortunately doesn't last long). And in any case, it just seems to make sense to clean the fridge before going out and buying a bunch of groceries to fill it up. So after dinner tonight, that is what I did. Tomorrow, we'll go get the pets, and I will tackle the laundry, the bills, and buying groceries.
Then, hi ho, hi ho, it's back to work I go.
Monday, December 17, 2012
Food is Love
I grew up in a family where food was love. Food was an important means by which we showed each other that we cared.
My paternal grandmother died when I was six. She was a short round Eastern European woman who loved to cook. The family gathered at her house for huge delectable holiday meals. There were always two or three kinds of pie. Her small, old fashioned kitchen would be full of aunts and cousins, cooking, arranging serving platters, laughing, and competing to have a turn washing dishes. In addition to these regular family dinners, Mom (along with us kids) would drop in to visit Grandma every Friday afternoon after doing the weekly grocery shopping. Grandma would bring out plates of cookies and squares, which were always delectable. "Eat! Eat! Have another cookie. Try one of these date squares." After a Friday afternoon at Grandma's house, we were sure not to have much of an appetite left for supper, which frustrated my Dad.
When I was a child, our family always sat down and ate together. My Mom was a good cook, and she strived to prepare meals that were both healthy and appealing. She also froze and canned fruits and vegetables from our big garden, and was especially well known for her jams and jellies, which she continues to make to this day. My Dad was a committed gardener, and as well as raising vegetables and berry bushes, he experimented with varieties of fruit trees that were hardy enough to grow in a northern climate. He also supplied the table with game (moose, deer, grouse), salmon, char, and trout.
You can see how it is that I have come by my enjoyment of cooking and eating well. Each of my siblings and my own three children are all interested in food and are good cooks, thus carrying on the family tradition.
I like to cook. Although it can be interesting and challenging to cook with limitations imposed by diners who are vegetarians, on a calorie restricted diet, or who are avoiding some classification of food such as wheat, it is much more fun and creative to cook unfettered. Ground pork, Japanese eggplant, onion, tomatoes, and chili oil make a tasty Szechuan dish. Pumpkin soup is more delicious with a little dollop of heavy cream, potato latkes are tastier with both apple sauce and sour cream piled on, and there is nothing quite as lovely for dessert as a Missippippi Mudpie moist chocolate cake with mocha cream icing.
As much as I enjoy the creative process of cooking, I also enjoy feeding people. It is a very basic way to please people, to give them pleasure, and to show my feelings of caring for them. I also like to eat, not just to satisfy hunger or to fuel the body, but to enjoy savouring the food. I think that for too many people, food has become an enemy, but for me it is a very satisfying part of daily life. Food brings people together in a happy, social way. Moreover, love of good food is woven into who I am, my creative process, my sense of family, and my family's way of showing caring for each other.
So, dear reader, you understand now why changing some of my habits around food to focus on heart healthy eating and cooking is such a challenge for me. Some of those bad old habits are rooted in the fundamental things in life that make me me.
My paternal grandmother died when I was six. She was a short round Eastern European woman who loved to cook. The family gathered at her house for huge delectable holiday meals. There were always two or three kinds of pie. Her small, old fashioned kitchen would be full of aunts and cousins, cooking, arranging serving platters, laughing, and competing to have a turn washing dishes. In addition to these regular family dinners, Mom (along with us kids) would drop in to visit Grandma every Friday afternoon after doing the weekly grocery shopping. Grandma would bring out plates of cookies and squares, which were always delectable. "Eat! Eat! Have another cookie. Try one of these date squares." After a Friday afternoon at Grandma's house, we were sure not to have much of an appetite left for supper, which frustrated my Dad.
When I was a child, our family always sat down and ate together. My Mom was a good cook, and she strived to prepare meals that were both healthy and appealing. She also froze and canned fruits and vegetables from our big garden, and was especially well known for her jams and jellies, which she continues to make to this day. My Dad was a committed gardener, and as well as raising vegetables and berry bushes, he experimented with varieties of fruit trees that were hardy enough to grow in a northern climate. He also supplied the table with game (moose, deer, grouse), salmon, char, and trout.
You can see how it is that I have come by my enjoyment of cooking and eating well. Each of my siblings and my own three children are all interested in food and are good cooks, thus carrying on the family tradition.
I like to cook. Although it can be interesting and challenging to cook with limitations imposed by diners who are vegetarians, on a calorie restricted diet, or who are avoiding some classification of food such as wheat, it is much more fun and creative to cook unfettered. Ground pork, Japanese eggplant, onion, tomatoes, and chili oil make a tasty Szechuan dish. Pumpkin soup is more delicious with a little dollop of heavy cream, potato latkes are tastier with both apple sauce and sour cream piled on, and there is nothing quite as lovely for dessert as a Missippippi Mudpie moist chocolate cake with mocha cream icing.
As much as I enjoy the creative process of cooking, I also enjoy feeding people. It is a very basic way to please people, to give them pleasure, and to show my feelings of caring for them. I also like to eat, not just to satisfy hunger or to fuel the body, but to enjoy savouring the food. I think that for too many people, food has become an enemy, but for me it is a very satisfying part of daily life. Food brings people together in a happy, social way. Moreover, love of good food is woven into who I am, my creative process, my sense of family, and my family's way of showing caring for each other.
So, dear reader, you understand now why changing some of my habits around food to focus on heart healthy eating and cooking is such a challenge for me. Some of those bad old habits are rooted in the fundamental things in life that make me me.
Saturday, December 8, 2012
Dairy Fat Confessions
Recently I posted on the topic of Heart Healthy Habits. Then I did a little bit of self analysis and examined some of my not so healthy habits, especially in the area of diet. Specifically, I wrote about salt and sugar, and how these sneaky ingredients in food sabotage my generally healthy attitudes and eating habits. Although one can choose not to add salt or sugar to the plate, sometimes they can be hard to avoid, for example, when eating out in restaurants. I find that restaurant meals generally are quite salty, and bakery treats and restaurant desserts tend to be very sweet and much too big.
Dairy fat is another category of food that calls for moderation. Milk itself has wonderful nutritional value. It is a great source of calcium and vitamin D, and it has protein and other good things in it. Many people don't people don't consume enough dairy. I am the opposite; I enjoy it too much. I drink at least one glass of milk everyday. One cup of low fat milk (1%) has 110 calories and 8 g of protein. That's a healthy choice. I also enjoy yoghurt, and usually choose the low fat, low calorie kind, even though the full-fat yoghurt is much more satisfying.
However, cream, whipped cream, ice cream, and butter are another story. They contain fat -- lots and lots of saturated fat. I have worked myself down from full-fat milk to 2% and then to 1%, and I think I see skim milk in my future. I put milk rather than cream in my coffee. And I only put a thin little scraping of butter on my bread. In choosing to eat butter rather than margarine, I am opting for saturated fat over trans fats. There are some softened margarines, like Becel, that have no trans fats, but butter tastes better, I think. So I eat butter, but don't slather it on. As I mentioned in the earlier post, I don't indulge in cream, whipped cream, or ice cream very often.
So why am I flagellating myself about dairy fats? Well, I can sum that up in just one word. Cheese. I love cheese, just about every kind of it. Cream cheese, cheddar cheese, feta cheese, Gouda cheese, parmesan, and wonderful creamy, full-fat Brie. Mmmmmm. For years of my life, I ate a cheese sandwich in my bag lunch almost every day and never tired of it. My favourite snack, to this day, is a few stoned wheat thin crackers and 20-30 grams of cheese. Thirty grams of the kind of cheddar in my fridge right now would provide 110 calories (I can live with that) but also 14% of my daily fat intake, and 30% of the recommended daily saturated fat intake. Whoa! That is something to think twice about.
I also like to use cheese in my cooking. Pasta, of course begs for cheese: macaroni and cheese, lasagna, fettuccini alfredo, manicotti stuffed with spinach and ricotta, or a lovely bit of grated premium Parmesan sprinkled on top of fusilli or penne. I put cheese or cheese sauce on broccoli and cauliflower, goat cheese into salads, and cream cheese icing on cakes. I would be a very unhappy gal if I was deprived of cheese.
I also like to use butter in my cooking. Although most of the time I opt for healthy oils like olive oil, there is nothing like fresh caught trout or salmon cooked in a little butter with dill or other garden herbs. I have recently taken up Indian cooking, and ghee is a necessary ingredient to get the authentic taste, and oh so yummy.
My other big dairy fat confession centers on sour cream. Sour cream is a fabulous ingredient with perogies, in chowders, in sauces, and in baking. I am making myself hungry just thinking about it. I am afraid that the dairy fat habit is going to be a very challenging one for me to break!
Dairy fat is another category of food that calls for moderation. Milk itself has wonderful nutritional value. It is a great source of calcium and vitamin D, and it has protein and other good things in it. Many people don't people don't consume enough dairy. I am the opposite; I enjoy it too much. I drink at least one glass of milk everyday. One cup of low fat milk (1%) has 110 calories and 8 g of protein. That's a healthy choice. I also enjoy yoghurt, and usually choose the low fat, low calorie kind, even though the full-fat yoghurt is much more satisfying.
However, cream, whipped cream, ice cream, and butter are another story. They contain fat -- lots and lots of saturated fat. I have worked myself down from full-fat milk to 2% and then to 1%, and I think I see skim milk in my future. I put milk rather than cream in my coffee. And I only put a thin little scraping of butter on my bread. In choosing to eat butter rather than margarine, I am opting for saturated fat over trans fats. There are some softened margarines, like Becel, that have no trans fats, but butter tastes better, I think. So I eat butter, but don't slather it on. As I mentioned in the earlier post, I don't indulge in cream, whipped cream, or ice cream very often.
So why am I flagellating myself about dairy fats? Well, I can sum that up in just one word. Cheese. I love cheese, just about every kind of it. Cream cheese, cheddar cheese, feta cheese, Gouda cheese, parmesan, and wonderful creamy, full-fat Brie. Mmmmmm. For years of my life, I ate a cheese sandwich in my bag lunch almost every day and never tired of it. My favourite snack, to this day, is a few stoned wheat thin crackers and 20-30 grams of cheese. Thirty grams of the kind of cheddar in my fridge right now would provide 110 calories (I can live with that) but also 14% of my daily fat intake, and 30% of the recommended daily saturated fat intake. Whoa! That is something to think twice about.
I also like to use cheese in my cooking. Pasta, of course begs for cheese: macaroni and cheese, lasagna, fettuccini alfredo, manicotti stuffed with spinach and ricotta, or a lovely bit of grated premium Parmesan sprinkled on top of fusilli or penne. I put cheese or cheese sauce on broccoli and cauliflower, goat cheese into salads, and cream cheese icing on cakes. I would be a very unhappy gal if I was deprived of cheese.
I also like to use butter in my cooking. Although most of the time I opt for healthy oils like olive oil, there is nothing like fresh caught trout or salmon cooked in a little butter with dill or other garden herbs. I have recently taken up Indian cooking, and ghee is a necessary ingredient to get the authentic taste, and oh so yummy.
My other big dairy fat confession centers on sour cream. Sour cream is a fabulous ingredient with perogies, in chowders, in sauces, and in baking. I am making myself hungry just thinking about it. I am afraid that the dairy fat habit is going to be a very challenging one for me to break!
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