Gallery

Georgian Bay Connection memories

: 1985 – A Yates / Bell advent celebration

: Beast of Burden – Working the Duntroon Farm

: Prize sheep – one of Jordan’s first

: Chip and Old Block?

: Denis and Lynda

: Shauna and Gavin

: Introducing Carol Bernard – Christmas 1998

: Introducing Ryan Wark

: Jessica Bell endorses Dairy Queen

: Eating up the Camera – Jessica, Seth, Jason

: A friend with Leggo is a friend in deed – Nixon and Liana

: Liana Yates

: Liana in Haiti

: Melanie and Jason – 1 year before Haiti

: Melanie – November 1992

: Nathalie and Melanie – Pause before Grace

: Roots (at Leadership Advance)

: Timed photo

: Servant Concert – Nathalie on Drums

: Separating the Sheep from the Goats

: Sandy and Ryan

: Blue Jays Fans at the Kingdome, Seattle

: Seth and Jason

: Visions of Sugar Plums – the Marx Brothers

: At going away party

: Youth Team Reunion – First 3 teams

: Jordan – early portraiture

: Hanging on to childhood

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Saucissier qui chante Gospel

6 juillet 2015 à Festival Folk et Blues, Sherbrooke la foule est. à 1700 personnes

so I could worship

Do you know the Scripture where Jesus passes by a fig tree, somewhere near Bethany, if my memory is correct? [Matthew 21:18-22. We do fact check our blog so as not to lead the Internet-gullible astray.] There are a whole range of trees mentioned in the Bible and while many of the references are figurative, some are literal trees, like the oak or terebinth trees of Moreh (where Abram built an altar) and then his living place for a long time became the oak trees belonging to an ally, Mamre.

Nothing roots a story in history, so much as a tree. I guess it is because trees outlive the humans who live near them. If I am a Canadian who knows something about sycamore trees, it’s not only because I’ve been reading Annie Dillard, “Pilgrim at Tinker Creek”, but because, as every Sunday School kid can tell you, Zaccheus was in that kind of tree and he was destined to meet Jesus.

This infamous fig tree in Matthew 21:18-22, however, was not mentioned because of what it bore, but because it did not bear any figs. So Jesus cursed it; the disciples heard him doing this, saw the result and reported it in Scripture; and almost 2000 years later, one Saturday night, I’m Googling “fig trees” so I can make sense of the story to my grade 2-3 Sunday school class. You might say like I did, “Do we have to incorporate in our Sunday school curriculum stories like these that are placed among the difficult-sayings-of-Jesus?”. But it was right there in the middle of the lesson plan with a Sunday school moral like, “Be fruitful, or else…” attached to it. As a responsible grade 2-3 Sunday school teacher I felt I had to give the kids something more than this, so I delved into fig tree research.

I learned many things about fig trees and when they should bear fruit and all, but the thing that sticks with me that has me writing this blog today was about a particular variety of fig tree that has male and female trees or flowers or something (don’t make me do the research again) and there is this one particular type of wasp that hangs around the male tree long enough to get pollen on the feet and then flies into the female flower and dies there. The wasp gets incorporated into the fruit, the fig, and it is only by this wasp that the tree can produce figs at all. Now don’t worry, adults, I was discrete in how I passed on this VERY interesting bit of fig info along. The author who put this info on the internet made it clear that it was only one particular type of rare fig variety that had these male / female trees and associated wasps. This wasn’t something I used to explain Jesus cursing the tree as it is highly unlikely that the type of fig tree between Bethany and Jerusalem operated like that. This was treated as bonus info for a grade 2 / 3 Sunday School teacher who has a keen interest in nature but, who, unfortunately already had enough science credits in high school so he never took biology [sad, but true].

Right after the fig tree lesson we served up the name brand Christie Fig Newtons which I had splurged on since my kids deserve only the best. There was a higher than normal amount of half-finished cookies that day, which I put down at the time to “kids-these-days” but, now that I think of it, might also have been accounted for by a certain wasp-like crunchiness to that snack.

Now that I’ve raised this difficult-saying of Jesus in a blog, some of you might want to know why Jesus, indeed, did this. Was the fig tree symbolic of Israel? Maybe, but I wasn’t using that with my grade 2 / 3 kids. Don’t want no part in raising more miss-guided anti-Semitics. Here’s what I take from this story: Jesus, knowing that this would be reported in Scripture, taught in church (and even in some Sunday school curriculums), and studied by teachers, wanted to create a special “wink-of-the-eye” to me and my kin in the 21st century who would delve deeper and learn something of the intricacies of creation as it pertains to figs. I don’t write this tongue-in-cheek, as my reaction at the moment that I read about the wasps was nothing more or less than throwing up my hands to creator-God and Lord of all trees in WORSHIP. He knows my name. He knows how I hang out on my terrace garden at watering time happy that my flowers have created an urban environment for bugs and bees. He knows each tear that falls and, believe me, my tears are all about God’s goodness.

Canoeing Petawawa

I’m going to say this picture is from 1988. Gavin Wark can look up the date of our Petawawa canoe trip, but that’s my best guess based on the fashion I’m wearing:

4 items – 1) Adidas Abdul-Jabbar low-cut runners, which were likely discontinued by that time but I kept the old pairs for canoe trips like this 2) Black sweat pants with green and white stripe as a premium from Fujifilm – sent in box tops from the film cartridges or something like that. During the 1984 – 1985 youth team I shot a LOT of film – before then I would not have used 6 rolls of Fuji 35 mm film in 6 years! 3) Green neon sweatshirt. All of the 1984-1985 Ontario Youth Team bought this horrendous neon green colour as that was the year that neon was in style. The advantage of wearing a neon colour on a canoe trip in Algonquin Park is that no hunter is going to mistake you for a moose (but again, this was July, not hunting-season yet) 4) Hat is Indiana Jones style put out by Biltmore-Stetson. While I had more than one of these over the years, I probably only started buying these post-1987 when I moved back from Montreal and resided close to the factory outlet for these hats, which was in Guelph, Ontario.

Whatever I’m eating couldn’t possibly taste better as it is at the end of a long day canoeing the Petawawa River in Algonquin Park (Ontario). This is the campsite at a log chute….Just went searching for one of my Algonquin Park canoeing maps. I quote (from memory, as I didn’t find it) “The Petawawa River, from Cedar Lake to the hydro line is very dangerous and should not be attempted…”

But we did attempt it and we succeeded…on the first day past Cedar Lake, probably because the water levels were high, or maybe we portaged our way around the scarey stuff and here we are camping at the log chute (which, for sure we portaged around). The next day on a set of rapids that we decided to shoot, probably because they weren’t very long and we could see all the potential hazards like the ledge we had to drop over, we left my canoe behind in the whitewater. First we swamped and then one end of the canoe got held up by a rock and swung around toward the teenager in the middle who (THANK GOD) scrambled up on the rock before the back end of the canoe was also pinned against a rock and the current ripped a hole through the fiberglass.

We completed that trip with the 5 of us in one Bluewater canoe. I recall that we couldn’t have more than two or three of us paddling at a time as the gunnels in the now over-loaded canoe were only an inch or so above the water and couldn’t bear any rocking of the canoe. On the upside, we now had 5 guys and only one canoe to carry over the remaining day or two of our route. We took every portage – no questions asked.

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_____End of roll selfie

: Mirror-produced selfie – end of camera roll ~1983

I do not own a selfie stick…yet…but my long arms and the way that extending them gives me something to do to take my mind off the heavy responsibility of auto-portraiture means I’ve be known to have a picture of two…that I like…of me! Back in the days of film cameras I might have had a 36 exposure film in my 35 mm camera and the earliest picture might have dated from several months earlier. By the time you filled the film… So we used to do various things to fill the roll…and the selfie was invented. This is the way I looked, to me, in 1983 or 1984. By late July 1984 I bought my first SLR camera – a Canon AE-1. This is the camera previous to the AE-1 which had a viewfinder and I’m using a mono-pod (I was serious about photography) to hold it steady as I take a picture into the mirror in my bedroom. I could usually get 26 pictures out of a 24 exposure film but the last one was partly obscured by a number (50089 – I cropped this). That explains what this was – a picture of me in my coolest shirt (LCF rugby-style) sporting a moustache (which stayed with me until 1996).

Nature will succeed

…with or without my help.

Much of my garden work (serenity therapy) in the spring season involves taking the life that is already happening and arranging it so that it might have a future. So far in May / June 2015 I have moved around plenty of sweet pea and today I played God with a maple seedling which had established itself in the wrong neighbourhood. My street is lined with maples and all the cars, sidewalks and fertile soil that happens to fall under those maple branches were littered with billions (my block alone must account for millions) of maple keys. Some windy day brought keys into the in-ground planter in my back terrace that the wall-climbing vine happens to draw life from. It’s not a spot that has resources to expend on anything other than said vine, but the maple sapling that sprang into life here had already 8 fully-developed leaves balanced above its crooked trunk before I took notice of it. I imagined a future for it, but certainly not there – a mere 4 inches from the brick wall. I called into service a rather large pail, cut some drainage holes in the bottom, got a spade under the still compact root ball and introduced the maple to its new interim home.

I don’t have a history of tree-sapling transplantation, but my father, while he owned his two acres of Waterloo Township (to become South Woolwich eventually) transplanted many maples, many pines, willows, fruit trees and a black walnut tree or two. He loves elderberries and I believe he even imported a bush or two to grow at the edge of the backyard swamp, hoping that he would enjoy better access to his beloved pie-berries. I seem to remember that the elderberry bush took in the damp soil there, but no person was fortunate enough to enjoy the wild fruits as the sometimes pond / swamp neighbourhood was the delight of many birds and one or more of those species enjoyed the elderberries while they were still green. By the way, happy father’s day 2015, dad! I’ll be calling you before supper tonight and comparing my elderberry memories with yours.

This spring I’ve been transplanting like never before. It’s been 5 or 6 years since I planted my first dollar-store Life_from_a_crack packet of sweet pea seeds. Since then I’ve been reaping dividends on that investment as the vines which climb the fence bordering my planters hold their seed pods through the winter and then self-seed the following year. Last year McGill put up a huge trellised barrier between the driveway running past my garden and the little-used terrace area of the student residence. My imagination soon populated the barrier with the surplus sweet pea plants that literally sprang up out of the cracks between paving stones, but the reality that I had to overcome was that, on the McGill side, there was 12 inches of concrete at the base of the trellis and on my side there was the driveway and then 30 inches of concrete before the trellis structure began. I called into action some discarded corrugated plastic drainage pipe which I cut open and tucked one side between the top of the concrete and the bottom of the trellis. This hanging planter could hold plenty of soil for the sweet pea vines that I foresaw taking over this huge trellised square footage. The trellis panels, all greenish-yellow treated wood, were not entirely an eyesore, but the sweat peas, if they could wind their way up and eventually dominate the structure, would definitely improve upon my terrace view. I succeeded in this plan to a small extent, but the drainage-pipe planters didn’t hold up so well and soon looked shabby so I’ve decided to take a different tack this second year. It involves a bit of guerrilla gardening as I am placing small planters sitting on the 12 inches of concrete on the McGill side of the wall. I see that the sprinkler hose has been set up by McGill (not in use yet due to almost daily rain this spring) so my vines, still crouched at the bottom of the trellis wall will enjoy consistent watering through the heat of the summer. Some of the candidate sweet pea vines that I am using to conquer McGill’s wall sprang from seeds that took root between the paving stones on my garden terrace. Left alone these vines would never get to the stage where they climb the adjacent fence as when the heat of summer comes the vines would be scorched off, having very little root to draw water from. I’ve found that when I pull these plants from the cracks they have enough of a root structure that they can be transplanted into the planters which, once proven, will make their way to the base of the wall. It takes a special kind of will-to-live to spring up in a crack and I’m counting on that same vitality that nature has in spades to be put to use to improve my neighbourhood.

Chickens in the city

In Montreal, the rage in community gardens is to add a chicken coop. In a recent newspaper article, I learned that Rosemont borough is adding a coop for 5 chickens. Sometime in September they pass the birds back to the chicken farm from whence they came as the article assured readers that no chickens would be “abbatu” (killed) that are kept in these community coops. And there I was getting hungry for some local chicken.

It was my Plateau borough that started the chicken-coop-in-community-garden rage but the 5 chickens WE have don’t put out enough to provide me even with one egg per year. Do they do this sort of foolishness elsewhere or do you have to live in a really big city that is really detached from agriculture (& polticulure?) before this kind of thing makes sense? My pioneering Plateau borough had to first get the borough council together to work around existing by-laws that said “you shall not keep chickens in the city” and then they probably had to decide how many chickens they would allow to co-habitate and under what living conditions. 5 birds was likely the level where ammonia levels would not affect the health of the chickens or offend neighbours living too close to the community gardens (wouldn’t want to turn that plus into a minus).

The above pictured chicken coop is the beautiful photography of my friend, Jane Andres, in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario. Jane has been known to slip me a dozen eggs (including some cute, bluish green ones) when I make my sausage deliveries. Of course, by the time I drive 7 hours back to Montreal with my eggs (and other Niagara region treasures-in-food) they don’t have the local food group seal of approval. But to my mind, they still taste pretty good. I can only politically-incorrectly imagine what one of those hens would taste like. Mmm.

Reading through the alphabet

This is year 2 of reading through the alphabet. In 2013 I decided that instead of looking through all of the fiction bookshelves it would be more efficient to limit my search to one letter at a time. So I started with A and would look through all the A authors. Invariably I discovered authors that were new to me through this technique and putting on the blinkers in this way had me spending less time in the library searching for that “one best book”.

In 2014 I took a break from this technique and decided I would read history and biography – something that wasn’t excluded in the “reading through the alphabet series” but often came about by browsing the new books – you don’t find history (except for historical fiction) and biography in the fiction book racks.

I’ll try to fill in here by memory the authors that I read this way and give a few comments:

A – hmm let me go browse at the BANQ and I may remember

B – same – let’s sign into my Goodreads account on the internet – they should be listed there

With help from my Goodreads abcdefgh shelf

A is for Sherwood Anderson, “Winesburg, Ohio”. I bet you can find this for free on your e-book reader. Don’t rule out books because they were written in 1919.

B is for Anita Rau Badami, a Vancouver writer, whose first novel was “Tamarind Mem”

C is for Michael Crumney, a Newfoundland writer who has a book of Newfoundland-based short stories “Flesh & Blood: Stories”. Thanks to Paulette Cake who (I think) encouraged me to read this writer.

C is also for Ann Cummins, “Red Ant House: Stories” and for Roch Carrier, “La Guerre, Yes Sir! which I had the pleasure of reading “en francais”. Carrier has also written some good history. In June 2015 I finished “Montcalm & Wolfe”. Found myself cheering for the English on this one. Now I’m ready to explore the Plains of Abraham on my next Quebec (City) visit.

D is waiting for me to write a book, apparently, as I got bogged down in Stig Dalager’s “Journey in Blue: A Novel about Hans Christian Andersen” and did not finish it. At the beginning of 2016 I went to the super-library with the intention of filling in the two or three small gaps in completing the alphabet. Edwidge Danticat, an author of the Haitian diaspora (writing in English, however) filled my ‘D’ gap with ‘The Dew Breaker’, a collection of short stories connected in one way or another with the Tonton Macoutes, who terrorized Haiti under the reign of Baby Doc Duvallier.

E is for Louise Erdrich who hooked me with a title: “The Master Butchers Singing Club” and then another, “The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse”

F is for a classic “As I Lay Dying” by William Faulkner begun at Parc Lafontaine, overlooking the lake.

G is for Richard Gwyn, “John A: The Man Who Made Us”. If you have to ask who John A is, this book might not be for you. It was definitely for me. I also found Volume II on his later years and thoroughly appreciated this biography of our first prime minister

H is for Louis Hémon’s “Maria Chapdelaine”. Every Quebec student had this on the reading list, like it or not. I chose to read it (et, en français, bien sûr)

I is a Canadian author, Frances Itani “Leaning, Leaning Over Water”. Liked it and added this author to my go-to list.

J is Pete Jordan, “In the City of Bikes: The Story of the Amsterdam Cyclist”. Learned some things, but this book was too long. Skimmed the last chapters so that I could say I completed it.

K is for Ivan Klima “No Saints or Angels” fiction about a Czech dentist. I note that this author’s “My Crazy Century” a non-fiction memoir won the Czech literary prize in non-fiction in 2010. I can’t get enough from Eastern European writers, especially in history or historical-based fiction.

L is for C. S. Lewis “‘Till We Have Faces” and in 2015 I read “The Great Divorce” as well.

M is for Alister E. McGrath “C.S. Lewis: A Life: Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet”. This is, no doubt, the biography to read on C. S. Lewis.

N is for Fae Myenne Ng “Bone”. About three Chinese American daughters growing up in the author’s real childhood hometown of San Francisco Chinatown.

O is for Yury Olesha “Envy”. Though I was drawn to this thin volume I ended up skimming it to finish. Find another O author, is my advice. Ondaatje is an obvious one, but he doesn’t click with me.

P is for M. Scott Peck “In Heaven as on Earth: A Vision of the Afterlife”. Some of Peck’s images stayed with me. The Mad Men final episode at times brought to mind Peck’s Amalgamated Systems souls working in the bottom of a garbage can.

Q is for Qiu Xiaolong “Years of Red Dust”. Short stories and history from the author’s native Shanghai.

R is for David Adams Richards whose “Mercy Among the Children” I am reading again. I picked it up in Toronto for $1 recently and was part way into it when I realized that I had already read this. Reading it again with greater attention – I couldn’t believe that I didn’t recognize the characters earlier in the book. I like David Adams Richards a whole lot. Writes fiction set in the Miramichi and non-fiction set there as well. He has new books coming out to add to the 8 to 10 that I’ve already read.

R is for Mordecai Richler as well. If I was watching the movie of “Joshua Then and Now” I might not finish it. In the midst of the book this weekend. Entertaining, yes, but if I don’t finish this novel it will be because it doesn’t rise above that.

S is for J. D. Salinger’s “Catcher in the Rye”. I did not have to read this for high school English. Kept me entertained. Perhaps it was considered profane or racey for 1951. Stylistically interesting.

T is for William Makepeace Thackeray. “Vanity Fair” is a big chunk to read, a tome of 883 pages. I left unfinished an equally weighty Solzhenitsyn – part of his Red Wheel cycle of novels on the history of the Russian Revolution. Will I succeed in “Vanity” where I failed in history? Will see. I recall seeing a movie based on “Vanity Fair” as the initial scene with Rebecca throwing the dictionary out of the carriage window is rather memorable.

Done! And quite enjoyable. Laughed a lot. Though author thought of as cynical by some of his peers. he may have had more insight on his world than many. Much biting satire, but all quite believable, even though the characters are exaggerated. There was never a point in the 800 plus pages when I thought of abandoning my read.

U is for John Updike – returning to the consummate pro of short stories for “Pigeon Feathers and other stories” a collection published in 1962 (which is one of my birth years). U is also for Thrity Umrigar “The Space Between Us”. An accomplished author, this is my first read of any of her books.

V is for M. G. Vassanji, though I must confess, I don’t think I have read a novel by this writer, resident of Canada, since “The In-Between World of Vikram Lall” (in 2011). New Year’s 2016 resolution to read another Vassanji as, with X, this is my only missing letter of the alphabet. As of January 2016, I am reading an English translation of Enrique Vila Matos, called ‘Dublinesque’. I also read Miklós Vámos, “The Book of Fathers” which I picked up at the Word Bookshop on Milton Street. This author is Hungarian, so he nicely rounds out my portfolio of international authors. “The Book of Fathers” traces a family history (only interesting characters, as it is fiction) from the beginning of the 18th century until the debut of the 21st century.

W is for Andy Weir, “The Martian” (see my comments on Goodreads) and Rudy Wiebe, “Come Back”. The Rudy Wiebe is a heavy read, but it prepares you for life. I appreciate this author’s honesty about his Mennonite roots.

X – I thought I had an X author with Qiu Xiaolong, but Chinese list the family name first, so add X to my resolution found above (under V). When I finished my first reading through the alphabet I found an author who writes about girls in China. I read ‘Miss Chopsticks’ by Xinran.

Y is for Yu Hua – a Chinese author, so family name first. I read “The Seventh Day” which is about the first seven days after a Chinese man dies. It is really a review of this man’s life as he searches out those people with whom he has had meaningful relations with prior to his death. The author through this book makes satirical comments on how the Chinese culture understands death and relates the story of the life of Yang Fei. I’ve made note that Yu Hua is an acclaimed Chinese author and is known for “Brothers” and “To Live”, so I will let the benefits of discovering new authors by reading through the alphabet continue by investigating these books which seem to have established Yu Hua’s fame.

Z is for Rafia Zakaria “The Upstairs Wife: An Intimate History of Pakistan”. You have to take your more obscure letters of the alphabet when they present themselves. An intimate history of Pakistan written by a woman – reads like a novel. Excellent.

As of January 1st, 2016, I’ve now finished this project of reading through the alphabet. I’ve greatly benefited from my self-imposed program as it has introduced me to authors that were entirely new to me (Badami, Crumney, Cummins, Erdrich, Itani, Klima, Ng, Qiu, Thackeray, Yu and Zakaria). Almost all of these authors are accomplished writers with other books just waiting on the shelves at my library. The reading project has more than doubled my list of “go to” authors. Now when I enter my gi-enormous local library, le Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales du Québec I have many new friends waiting to spend time with me within.

Montreal Gospel Choir

Une de mes choses favorite dans la vie c’est chanter et socialisé (ça se dit?) dans Montreal Gospel Choir. Pendant que j’ai fait mon travail (à la maison) aujourd’hui j’ai écouté “Not by Might” une chanson écrite expresse pour Montreal Gospel Choir par Rex Verzosa avec les versets ajouté par quelques solistes, des voix extraordinaires toutes! J’en ai hâte pour la répétition ce soir avec cette avant goût des choses à venir!

I LOVE singing in Montreal Gospel Choir – so many interesting people singing together on music we love. The graphic artist who designed the poster seen here is also among our tenor section. He used his graphic skills and posted all manner of representations of his poster in unexpected places. Another one of our tenors with “mad” research skills actually found where this bus shelter is simply by using some of the visual clues found in the image. There is a whole lot of fun going on in Montreal Gospel Choir that only the members get to experience. Thanks, all you characters, singers and hangers-on for making my life so much better!

Walking

One of the best features of the winter that is now drawing to a close is that there has been a higher amount of sunlight than usual. Today, in the last hour of sunlight, I decided I needed a walk in said sun so that I could not be accused of despising it.

Moi, j’habite dans l’arrondissement Plateau Mont-Royal. Puis, quand je sors de la maison pour prends du soleil et un peu d’exercise d’ailleurs j’ai tout un choix des routes. Aujourd’hui j’ai eu comme but le Parc Lafontaine, donc j’ai suivi rue Prince-Arthur jusqu’a Carré St-Denis et après avoir mangé des steamés et des rondelles d’oignon chez Lafleur j’ai monté St-Denis un peu pour atteindre le parc par le moyen de Roy.

By this, I don’t mean that I took the King’s highway – no, there is a pleasant neighbourhood street in the lower Plateau known as Roy (say ooWah, like the famous Canadiens goaltender, Patrick Roy). If it was further advanced in the spring, I might have gone earlier to Parc Lafontaine with one of the books that I am reading and soaked in the sunshine and the book on a park bench. That day will come soon enough.

En cours de route, j’ai résolu de suivre ce route régulièrement, ça veut dire que je dois continuer d’avoir cette marche intégré dans mon quotidienne jusqu’au date quand je peux commencer de monter le montagne (Mont Royal) sur vélo. À ce moment je peux interposé les jours de vélo avec les jours de marche dans le cartier.

The walk down Prince Arthur, past St-Louis Square (home of my favourite Montreal fountain) and on to Parc Lafontaine with return by Duluth is nothing if not quirky and interesting. The laundry (fond memories of when I needed one of these) on Duluth whose window I’ve pictured below makes clever usage of the Québec term which might be translated “undies” – des bobettes. They will pick up (cueillir) and deliver (livrer) your “bobettes” (undies) via the Bobette express. Knowing the neighbourhood, this is more likely to be done by bicycle than by car. And the books in the window – de riguer – that is if the real-time social networking that came before wifi existed is having a slow day. For “buanderies” like this, their numbers aren’t going to increase, but it’s a nice reminder of a world that once was, or once might have been and still finds a way of existing in the Plateau.

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