Great Fun!

It was a crowded day at the Mall.  People were jostling, bells were ringing, cash registers chinging.  The food court was FULL. The sound of hundreds of inaudible conversations was deafening. 

I had already developed that warmth that comes from wearing too many layers of clothing inside a warm and crowded building.  My feet were starting to itch inside my boots.  My parcels were feeling heavier and heavier while my bank account was getting lighter and lighter. I was fading in terms of being a careful and discreet gift buyer.  I was almost at the end of my list of 'must gets' and my bus was due to leave within the hour.  It was now or never if I was going to be able to purchase those last few 'need to buys' as I wouldn't be back into the BIG city until at least the New Year.

My eyes were starting to glaze over as I tried for the umpteenth time to somehow ignore  that itchiness in the untouchable and unreachable spot in my back that just cannot be scratched through three layers of clothing in public, when I glanced  over the railing down to the floor below and spied what I really wanted the most and had never been able to get in 60 years of Christmases.

Immediately my senses were attuned as to the situation.  I surveyed the upper deck of the Mall and found the fastest way to the escalator down to the main floor.  Itchiness, fatigue, and financial boundaries were forgotten as I focused on the goal.  With quickness and the finesse of a deer jumping over a barbed wire fence I darted through the melee of shoppers who were walking in the opposite direction until I reached my longed for desire.

 I looked at my watch and pondered the time it would take to acquire my treasure, calculated the risk of missing the bus, and saw that there wasn't even a line up, the lack of which I took to be a Sign that IT WAS MEANT TO BE.

My heart panted with excitement and Joy! Joy! Joy! I took off my jacket, threw my purse and parcels to the floor and ran over to my sought after Objet d' Amour.  

He asked me if I had been a good girl...and I had to say

NO!

It was great fun!   

.

Being Hung Out to Dry

A Cold Afternoon

This has been a cold and quiet November afternoon.

The only sound in the house is the hum of the refrigerator and the snore of the dog who  nestles against me like a burr  to a sock.

  

The chill is due to the lack of fire in the  wood stove.  I did fill it with wood but not soon enough for it to 'catch' and so instead of going through the routine of making kindling and rearranging the split wood I have opted for donning a sweater 'from a corpse'*  while  waiting for someone else to do it when they come home from work.

  

The chilliness isn't really too bad to tolerate except that my violin is probably tuning out with every passing minute due to the change in temperature causing the shrinking and cooling of strings and  the accompaning give and take of its wooden frame.  This perhaps may explain the reasoning behind the term "winter fiddle"...as in the lyric of the song that starts out with "The twists  of your heart are like the strings of  a  winter's fiddle ."*

Thinking of wooden frames and cold puts me in mind of the wooden laundry clothes dryers they had in my mother's and grandmother's day.  If a person wants to know COLD all they have to do is hang some wet sheets and laundry outside on a line on a cold winter's day to 'dry' and then in about 3 hours haul them all back in again to drape, or rather LEAN them over a wooden rack.   Thinking of carrying frozen sheets inside puts me in mind of hauling slabs of drywall into the house.  I think the biggest fear would have to be chipping off a sleeve, pant leg,  or corner of a sheet while manoevering door jams.

 I distinctly remember playing hide and seek with my sister and brother, and crawling under the rack and getting wet because  the clothes were dripping.   I was so surprised that something that hard could be dripping water. I don't think I really could grasp the logic around  the idea that  you put something wet out to dry but, ultimately, you still had to bring it in to finish the job.  

  The  wooden window sills in the house would be laden with thick edgings of ice due to  the humidity  of the 'dry thawing' of the week's laundry.

  

  No Wonder our mothers and grandmothers had arthritic hands.

No Wonder window sills rotted out. 

 No Wonder fiddles sound the way they do.

* second hand clothes from a a thrift store

... a phrase  from the book "Love in the Time of Cholera"--Gabriel Garcia Marquez

* not a real lyric to a song.. I just made it up for effect.

What's the difference between a fiddle and a Chain Saw?
You can turn a chain saw off.

Why are fiddles better than guitars?
They burn longer.

Thinking Like a Mouse

 

*Thinking Like A Mouse

 

 

Living in rural Canada for over 60 years pretty much guarantees that somewhere, sometime, and at the most unexpected places one will have come across at least 50 mice in one's lifetime--at least 50  even if you don't count what you find in the barns and bins. 

 

Not only will you come across them in one's lifetime but you also come across them in your bathtub, sofa, stove and clothes. As well as your kitchen, living room, bathroom, porch, and bed.   They can also be found in your vehicle's air conditioning (@$250 fix), the glove compartment and, of course, the trunk.

 

Some  people are mildly annoyed. Some are angered by the encroachment of these wee little beasties...and some are paralyzingly terrified.  I once had to pick my little sister up and carry her out of the house for fear that she would go hysterical when she saw a mouse scamper across the living room floor.

 

Great and fast moving 'citing scenes' still linger in my mind whenever I think about mice being in the house.

 

Some personal mouse stories:

 

1. As  mouse traps were bought and set  in lower cupboards, I confidently opened  the door of  the upper cupboards where the silverware had been placed  as a precaution. This seemed like a  fool proof good idea until one morning a few days later,   as I reached up  into the tray and a mouse ran across my hand.

 

2.  On a camping trip to Great Britain we were lying in our tents--heads at the door flap, late at night, quietly watching the stars  and talking in soft whispers when I suddenly felt something soft and furry 'flit' across my lips.

 

3.  One summer our cat brought our daughter..the designated TOP CAT of the house , 30+ mice to her bed, late at night. Sometimes they were dead and sometimes they were not.  One would hear the cat's off key yowling, and then a scream, and then a call for 'DAD", and we would know that it had happened again.  The ones that were not  quite dead and just laid down on the bed were the most annoying of course, and sometimes it took quite a bit of crashing, cursing, and banging until they were disposed of.

 

Besides the use of the obligatory and quite frankly only efficient way to control the mouse population in rural Canada , the house cat, the next best thing is having good trigger quick mouse traps. 

 

These traps of the mighty four footed miniature monster must of course be baited with the appropriate matter. 

 

Some say that cheese is best, peanut butter and bacon works pretty well for the non vegetarian mouse group. However, it was found in our house that our mice visitors preferred candied fruit and peel--the type used for festive cookies and cakes.

 

And so the scene would unfold thusly:  first there was the 'spying', then the 'crying', followed by the 'running', the 'banging', and ultimately the finding of the TRAPS.  The children were all younger than 6 when I first recall them watching with awe and admiration as their father after unsuccessfully but bravely seeking to destroy the minute intruder  using with the broomstick method, bring out the Steel and Wooden apparatus.  He would  then proceed to search to the back of the fridge to find the containers of candied peel and fruit left over from seasonal baking.  The children ,  after being warned to 'Stand Back", would stare in silence as the trap was set and baited and gingerly placed at just the correct angle, and finally , slowly and carefully walked  with the grace of a ballet to the exact spot of 'last sighting', and   in hushed silence, smoothly, oh so smoothly, placed down to await its dinner guest. 

 

That bait and trap method has worked  quite well for many years even though not one of the children ever would  even taste a crumb of   Christmas Fruit Cake full of mouse bait.

 

 

 

 

*So, many times I've said that if you want to catch a mouse, you have to think like a mouse and you have to set your traps in the places the mouse will travel.

Phone call the other day:

 Daugter: "Mommy! I thought like a mouse!"
...

 Mommy: "What?"
Daugter:  "I thought like a mouse! I set the trap where the mouse was going and I caught him!"

Now I ask you.......is it a good thing if you've taught your child to think like a mouse?

 

...Thanks to a FaceBook Friend for that little story. DW :)

 

 

I will end this mousecapade with a recitation an  elderly friend performed while attending a prairie  country school about 70 years ago.

 

 

I saw a mouse go up the wall.

I saw its tail. That's all I saw.

 

       

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Requiem

It was suggested by our Pastor in today's sermon that we should think about  our own memorial service and how we would like to be remembered, how we would be remembered, and how maybe today and all the rest of tomorrows left to us can be seen as opportunities to affect that ultimate remembrance.


Thus, these are the things I think  will sans doubt be overheard, and some are things that I hope are overheard, and also some things that I dread will be overheard during  that far off moment in time when Penny Lou Hoffman's Memorial Service will be a reality; albeit  a brief  affair, and I suspect, scantily attended.

"Did you leave the lights on in the car?  I hope you locked it.  Some of her relatives might show up."

"102 years old? Wow! The things she musta seen--dinosaurs, dial telephones,   Ford Explorers, and maybe even  daily newspapers.  Just think, she might have even held a paper book in her hand."

 
"Did he say she walked the Chilkoot Pass at the age of 65?"

"Look at all those grandchildren.  They say they were the Apple of her eye--too bad she couldn't have seen out of both."

"I just came here for the lunch.  She wasn't all that good of a neighbour.  Nope never so much as a telephone call when MY mother died."

"You would have figured after all those post retirement years teaching in the Congo she would have been able to afford a better casket than plywood , and wrapped in a Hudson Bay Blanket no less." 


"I will never forget the time she came and picked me up and took me into town when I was sick.  Dropped off a whole box full of casseroles and desserts for the freezer for our family while I was laid up."

"She certainly had a way about knowing what was right and wrong.  Sort of 'my way' or the 'highway' sort of gal--nothing wrong with that except I bet  the highway was a whole lot more friendlier than 'her' way."

"SHE gave to the World Vision fund?...Hmph ,  going by what she gave to the church one would have figured she was dirt poor and scratching for chicken feed. "

"I heard she would only shop at Value Village for the last 40 years."


"Loving wife for 57 years?  Why that poor man had to put up with more whining, complaining, and emotional turmoil than a body could stand. No wonder he  finally found himself a cute 67 year old and took off to finer climes!  Who could blame him?"

" A good communicator?  Is he talking about calling people on the telephone every afternoon, morning, or evening just to gossip and complain? Hanging around Facebook and emails commenting and  posting unsolicited statuses filling up inboxes with mundane messages. I  finally had to Block her these past few years." 

" A loving mother to four children?  Yep she was that, at least that was her goal no doubt.  Apparently not all would agree, but if intentions and preferences count, her name  would have gone down beside some of the great ones; Mother Goose, Mother McChree* , Mother Superior, as well as a bit of Ma Barker."

"A great faith and confidence in the Saving Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and ultimate Forgiveness of our sins?  Well, who would have thought THAT?  Ol'Mrs. Hold a Grudge Until Yer Teeth Fall Out Hoffman, also known as The Great Reminder of Hurts Done and Faults Discovered?  I would never have thunk it possible." 

"She never was quite 'right' after that knee surgery back in '13.  Too much anesthetic they say does that sometimes, although the wooden leg didn't seem to hinder her much."

"Why don't they mention how much she loved her RED Wine?  Boy, I could tell a few stories....".

" What is with this? Donations may be made to the Muslim, First Nation,  and/or Visible Minority Anti-Email Joke and Hate Literature Fund in lieu of flowers? Sounds almost Communistic."

"Milk and Cookie  Gang Charter Member?  What would that be? One of those fad diet groups I bet. Like Vegans, or those Nuts and Berry Eat Dirt and Be Happy Groups from the big city."

"Well that's that, nice and short.  A bit too flowery but aren't all funerals?  I see they are serving coffee at the luncheon in real cups and it's a sit down affair.  At least someone remembered how much she hated standing in line for food at a funeral..or anywhere else for that matter."  

"Well, if the line up is too long I am outa here. Not catching me being on the clean up committee. She never hung around for that so I am not either. See you at Bible Study."

 

This might be seen as a relief for some if this was to become my headstone.

I quite like the simplicity of this.

Well, clever in its way, I am not sure it holds the message of Comfort in Eternal Rest one might look for.

 

 

I like this one because there is lots of space for writing as I would like it to read:

 

Penny Lou Dixon

Wife of Irwin

Mother of Alexander, Sarah, Rachel, Heidi

 

 

I read about doing this in a book once and like the idea.

Our names forever connected.

 

 

 Mother MacChree *The fabled mother so often invoked in times of crisis. In actual fact, the phrase has its origins in Ireland, where a unique mix of Irish (Gaelic) and English languages produces this phrase. 'McCree' is a derivative of the Irish "mo chroí", literally, "my heart": this results in the whole phrase meaning "Mother of my heart".

Book Choosing

I am in the process of  Book Reading that in some ways I find almost as interesting (alas) as in the reading for some--it is the Choosing.

I walk around the house, checking the shelves in the living room, the extra bedrooms, and the den. 
I peer and pull, read the titles,  names of authors,  and reviews on the book jacket if it has one.  I sometimes choose according to my list of Good Reads which I have  downloaded from the Net. 

Sometimes I choose according to genre as in  historical fiction, mystery,  soft fantasy or self-help, or some combination thereof. 

Sometimes I just sit and read recipe books. The Bible , being a great reread,  even gets picked up upon occasion for a chapter or two.  

Other times I choose according to a repeat author, although not often, as I like to check out various writer's styles.  Mark Twain, Mauve Binchy, Agatha Christie, Ken Follet, Colleen McCullough, James Clavell ,  J. R. R. Tolkien, L. M. Montgomery,and  John Updike, ( didn't that Rabbit just need a slap on the upside of his head?) are  just a few author repeats. Some because of their quality. Some because of availability.

I avoid reading any book that someone else in the house has just read. Nor do I like someone reading a book that I have just read.  To me it is like the 'stealing'  of a good friend.   I just find it creepy that someone sitting beside me would be peering into 'my book', experiencing the same words and thoughts that 'my author' had just recently revealed to me and that person getting to react to the characters in the same manner as I, or even worse--have a different reaction.  I can't help but feel just a little jealous when I see my dear old friend sitting on the other bed stand, or being  attentively carried around and watch it being picked up, held and its pages gently turned, and  with each turn convey to someone else its adventures, ideas, and emotions. You may call it weird but that's just the way I feel about what I refer to as Copy Cat Reading.  

 Sometimes I  choose by size and even weight.  A friend is currently reading a 900 page book that he claims weighs at least five pounds.  Who would have thought that a book about Cleopatra would be that weighty? Imagine having that sitting on your chest while reading late at night or carrying it around on a bus trip?  No stashing that one in your carry on or casually laying it down on a lunch counter at a rest stop.

So after about 45 minutes of just walking around the house-- perusing, analyzing and trying to  imagine the subjects and plots ( a totally futile effort), I have finally made a choice.

It should travel well in case I do.  It should be worthy of my time and attention, which I believe it is as it is considered one of the Top 100 books of the 20th Century. I have heard of it but not enough to spoil the suspense. 

 Although I probably won't carry it in my pocket and will not likely meet anyone in Uniform while reading it, I do think it will be good company for the next few days.

1st Published 1930 .  This Pocket Edition was done 1944.  Please note the black box on the lower right hand side on the back cover.

A movie with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall was made in 1941.

Country Gal

I am the product of the prairie...born and raised.

I have driven tractor, rode  on stone boats, cleaned barns with a pitch fork,  hauled grain, slopped pigs, milked goats.  I have ridden out to  muskrat traps and watched as they were skinned and hides tanned.  I have helped with the butchering of  rabbits, sheep, goats, and steers .  I have plucked  and drawn chickens and turkeys and shorn sheep. 

 I have walked barefoot across stubble fields, dirt roads, and   cow  pastures stepping in spots that were  even softer, warmer, and stickier  in consistency than any cold rain water filled mud puddle could ever be.

I have played on 'soft' ice  on the  school damn and  I have skated on a dugout until my frozen feet itched and burned bringing tears for hours afterward. 

I have ridden horses while they were outfitted with bridles, saddles, and sometimes even harnesses; and at other times just with a rope around their  neck. I have fallen off some of these same horses,  once been knocked out, and rode home again because my leg was too sore to walk that far.

I have caught grasshoppers in a Cheese Whiz jar and held them captive  in the hot sun in July.  I have chased snakes and been chased by snakes.  I have had the smell of skunk on almost every vehicle I have owned and porcupine quills on the nose of every dog befriended.

 I have  played 'chicken' with a badger while bareback on a horse.  I have carried numerous pails  of water to gopher holes after blocking the 'escape' hole with rocks; and with garden hoe in hand attempting , sometimes successfully and not without some ruthlessness, to hit the running wet rodent  until it ran no more.

At the age of eleven I fed, watered, and  bedded 48 cattle  in March for two weeks on my own while the parents were away, in Ontario ,  on business.

I have shoveled grain in a bin while the  grain was augured in  and have also shoveled grain out of the bin while the  grain  was being augured out. I have cleaned bins of old moldy grain and mouse nests with shovel and brooms.  I have driven half tons and grain trucks without gas pedals or brakes across fields and gravel roads.   I have lifted bags of fertilizer,  dragged and spread straw bales  and unrolled round feed ones.

I have hauled the backseat out of my car to transport a lambing sheep to town. I have vaccinated, docked, dehorned, and circumcised all that
demanded such procedures.


But.. I must admit that without a doubt the strangest countrygal thing that I ever ever have done was to hold onto the head (as in the part with the eyes and ears and nose) of a male goat while a veterinarian collected goat semen from another part of its body.

And that is all I am going to say about that.

 

Remembrance

William Edgar Dixon  WW I--Grandfather

Russell Edgar Dixon WWII--Father
William Cooper        WWII--Uncle
Gordon Cooper         WWII--Uncle
Russel Cooper           WWII--Uncle

Bob Ghosh              Bosnia, Afganistan  Son -in -Law
Chris Marshall        Afganistan               Son-in- Law

Elsie May Cooper... WWII ...Mother
Marie Cooper           WWII-- Aunt

Kay Dixon, Price,Ruud/Skelton -- WWII-- Step Mother

Sarah Hoffman, Rachel Hoffman-- Daughters--Reservists Royal Canadian Army


All Served.
All Returned.
All Changed.


All Remembered

 

hai·ku

/ˈhaɪ ku/ Show Spelled [hahy-koo] Show IPA

noun, plural hai·ku for 2.

1.

a major form of Japanese verse, written in 17 syllables divided into 3 lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables, and employing highly evocative allusions and comparisons, often on the subject of nature or one of the seasons.

These are my attempts.

Drops from grey clouds fall
Like those from  sheets brought  in to
dry inside; frozen.

Dog  snores with sounds of
Spurts, gurgles, and snorting squeaks
Dreams of  birds and cats.

A squirrel running
Across the roof, runs also
Across one's mind.

A person's absence
Is only absence if the
Mind  allows it to be

A hinted for gift
Is merely something 'picked up'.
A list completed.


For the poor, having
good food choices is likely
As changing their socks.


Sunshine memories
Are washed away like dust as
Rain falls from the roof.


 

I'll Write a Letter to My Love

  I always like to see what types of writing paper I can find  in the Big City Thrift Store to spice up my letters to my pen pal. As the packages are wrapped in sealed plastic bags one has to sort of just 'guessamate' at what might be inside.  Once I thought I was buying numerous cards when in actuality I was only buying pieces of scrap booking cards...many, many, many pieces.   Another consequence of not knowing exactly what is inside each bag is that I do now have a grand array of Christmas Cards which will soon be sent out with every letter written from now until the 7th of January.

It was not until we got home this afternoon  did I have a chance to open the two bags of  cards that I had purchased on yet another stationery quest from the Thrift Shop and found that one contained  an eclectic collection of  unused

POST CARDS!

Now a Post Card to those of you who rarely get anything more than a 3rd Class piece of mail delivered along with various flyers from hardware stores, announcing that you  may have won or  have won already several thousands of dollars, if not millions, just as soon as you return an order form and credit card number for a magazine  subscription you never knew you wanted or a trip to a destination where previously you didn't know  existed; is a sort of short little 'text message' from the olden days when the written word was created by hand, without benefit of spell checkers or word completion or whatever that method is where the machine finishes the word for the writer.  

 The Post Card was primarily used by the writer to tell the receiver, "See.  This is where I am and You are NOT."   Little short notes of "Having a Wonderful Time."  "Weather is Great" and "Hope all is well this January in the far North" could be scrawled across the back with the obligatory "Ha! Ha! Ha!" at the bottom.   My mother even sent my dad a post card from her trip to California with a picture of Alcatraz with the caption "Wish You Were Here".   I did receive a lovely  post card from Paris this year and the picture of the Eiffel Tower was great.

There were upwards of fifty unused Post Cards in this collection.

There are about 20 cards from the Corporate Art Collection from the Reader's Digest of Canada.  Here are three.

Places I have actually been to.  These are all 'vintage' cards.

Saskatchewan Natural History Museum

The above are of Greenwater Provincial Park circa 1960 perhaps?

Melfort, Saskatchewan is cited on this card--obviously vintage.





 Obligatory Canadian Mountain Post Card.

 Two Vintage Cards from San Fransisco.

All of these could have been pictures taken in my back yard sometime over the last 30 years.

And now the most unusual postcards that I have ever come across.

Photographs with plastic overlaid to mime movement whenever one moves the card.

   I can understand the idea that movement would enhance these cards, but I have a bit more difficulty  understanding what would compel the designer to choose these for a 'moving' post card.

And the height of 'kitsch' I think is this--

What would one actually write on the back of this plastic card?  "Hello there. I am the one 6th from the left.  In spite of a serious discussion and one guy getting huffy and leaving(something to do with money apparantly), the meal was great. In fact it has been said that it is Everlasting--if you  can believe that!  Bread and wine seemed to be the dessert.

You should have been here to see the strange stuff  they do here involving feet and basins of water--at the table no less. 

And finally this one will be for my friend who is going to Hawaii this month.  It will be waiting in her post box upon her return home.

"Hi there. Wish I were there. I would have had a great time!"   p.

 Anyone want any of these mailed to you?  Just let me know.



Outside the Box

Christmas is creeping into my consciousness.  Not surprising considering the snow has arrived and everywhere we went yesterday in the city stores were already trimmed with festive decor in tandem with waning Hallowe'en  decorations.

I've sent the E-Mail that asks for Christmas gift suggestions...with the understanding that  'just because you ask, doesn't mean you get'.

I have spent the afternoon perusing catalogues 'in hand' and 'on line' thinking, choosing, adding, re choosing,  and dreaming of faces as presents are opened, examined, and used.  Sometimes, unfortunately, even after all the careful planning, gifts fall short of expectations, wants, needs, or even frivolous desires, but that doesn't mean that I haven't enjoyed the process. 

My DAD was the best gift giver ever--bar none!  He had a knack of sensing just what the best present would be.  He would give the thing that would 'hit the mark' or  'get the look' (1) when opened, and consequently be treasured for years to come.  I am thinking now of the gold/pearl pierced earrings he bought for all his daughters, the flashlights on another occasion, and the re bar gizmo designed to place under the back tires of a stuck car,  along with a snow shovel so I wouldn't stay in the ditch ( being the lonely spinster that I was as I travelled  alone, across the barren winter prairie). 

Other treasured gifts that I have received over the years is  an I Love Moo Cow decoration as well as a Beta Fish  and Plant from one of my children.  Measuring cups was a great choice made by another.  The embroidered angel picture from the crafty daughter is part of every Christmas decor, as well  as is the wooden Nativity garland from yet another. 

Presents sometimes give the biggest surprises not only to the the recipient but also to the giver.   

The biggest surprise to a Giver in this house was the Christmas morning when two recipients went running delightedly towards the opposite stockings filled with really interesting and surprising gifts.  Apparently Givers can get mixed up late at night, in the dark, in the quiet, after a long day of cooking, wrapping, organizing, and planning.  

As a child I had a childless woman in my life, (a distant cousin), who bought presents for the  all youngsters in the neighbourhood.  Sometimes she missed the mark horribly in terms of age appropriateness and interest.  I received a woman's glove and scarf set one year which was quite flattering as I was only eight years old.  The next year I received an orange/red heavy beaded necklace which was less than beautiful, and was considered to this then nine year old  even more hideous because I saw what a beautiful locket the neighbour girl had received from this same lady.  I mention this incident of ungratefulness on my part to point out that the process of gift getting  is as much an art form as is the process of  gift giving. 

 Sometimes even if the gift misses the mark in terms of value, usefulness, or interest on the part of the recipient, one must never loose sight of the fact that  a grand and precise process of thinking, choosing, judging, and evaluating  goes into a Giver's effort to find something that is just 'right' is the real gift.

It is the process that should be treasured no matter what you find in the box.  

I hope the recipients of my gifts will think of what has happened  'outside' the box no matter what they find inside their packages. 

..and I?  I will continue to savour the memories of Christmas' past with presents such as dark chocolate, wooden spoons, fancy coffees, wine, pillows, earrings, crystal glasses, cookbooks, games, bubble bath,  white chocolate, candles, bowls and books, gloves, ornaments, silverware, and measuring cups. 

Thank you.


(1)  The look is the look that is given from the recipient to the giver as they open the parcel which means "You listened" " You know" "You got just the right thing."  A formal Thank-you is  a redundancy after the look  has been given.  Nothing else really needs to be said but often is.  If you ever have received the look,  you are thinking of it right now....a nice feeling eh?

I got the look  when I have my Dad a Legion Pin he had been wanting and had given up ever getting; when I gave my husband a  filled stocking the first Christmas we were together; when I gave my son a copy of the Brave Little Toaster when he was 28; when  one of my daughters got an Elmo chair; when my other daughter received an axe and a  BillyBong; and when another daughter received a  milkshake maker; and, finally,  when my Mom found a crystal porcupine in the bottom of a  slow cooker one Christmas morning.




May your presents be many,

And your gifts bring them joy.

May the looks that are given,

Warm your heart with a glow,

With memories of Christmases from long, long, ago.

I AM Woman....

A week and a day in the life of something that will soon be defunct, outdated, hoarded, considered old fashioned soon to be lost in the collective memory as has the Dodo Bird, Passenger Pigeons, and Five Cent ice cream cones has been full of travel, fun, frustration, and sadness.  A Penny!--A Canadian Penny to be precise.

A week and a day ago I attended a Menopause Conference.  The venue was , of course, full of women who were alternately and intermittently, and  at times simutaneously wearing sweaters and sleeveless tops.  The mixture of gray hair, red hair, and hair of a 'certain hue' which has become quite popular in the quest for the denial of the  of loss of  hair pigment, could have  been considered the indication of the variety of needs and goals of each person in the room.

Two men were in attendance.  BRAVO to them!

The speakers were female doctors from some 'Woman's Health Centre'--each approaching their own journey of the last third of life in the feminine form.

The information was somewhat contradictory...dealing with Hormone Replacement Therapy.  Apparantly it is now OK to use HRT, which is contradictory to the research previously done in the early 2000's.  How can that big of a mistake be okay? How  then , can one be certain that the research on the research shouldn't be re-researched? 

Herbs were also mentioned, but it was determined that probably the use of a herb in terms of the upper case h, (wink,wink)would be more beneficial to the allevement of menopausal effects than anything  quasi-chemical prescribed by the medical profession.

The  revelation that loss of memory and multitasking abilities in a menopausal woman approaches that of a male human drew the most distressed reaction from the crowd by displays of tears, shudders, and utterances too colourful to write on this a 'Non Adult' content blog.

The most disturbing thing about this little meeting you query?

I would say that it was without a doubt the 20' x 30' full colour display of what  Amy  Farrah Fawcett would describe as the 'female nether region' placed squarely up on the wall above the podium for 20 minutes (after we had eaten).  Now this was not your normal 'nether region' display..it was the full, upfront, in your face, spread eagle, leave no stone unturned presentation of everything a woman --premenstrual, menstrual, menopausal or postmenopausal would never have the opportunity to otherwise view on their own person  unless they have implanted mirrors  to their inner thighs.

I am 60 years old.  I have pretty much experienced almost everything a woman was designed to experience in terms of nether region experiences, and I have done so WITHOUT looking at it!


My grading of the whole evening? C-

1.  Just because women are in the room does not mean we all buy into the idea that we need to be fixed or saved from what I consider to be a WARM and natural phase of life.
2. Just because women  of our age present a quandary when it comes to comfortable use of certain medical instruments due to low hormones, does not mean that women should have to artificially increase the hormones.  It means that it's time the medical profession research a way to perform the tests with something other than an antiquated piece of metal that has not changed its design since the early 1900's.
3. My time and money  would have been better spent with a good discussion with my own doctor about any concerns I may have.  Although I did pick up a tip regarding rushed doctors...make your appointment at the end of the day so you have time to really talk about your issues.
4.  The food was really, really bad. The first clue should have been when they had to keep sharpening the knife used to cut the rare roast beef.

Some other phrases from the panel:

 

"If you  have insomnia and wake up in the middle of the night and think you have to go to the bathroom...try to ignore it." --Now that Depends! 

 

"Placebos are just as effective as herbs and hormonal therapy in its effectiveness for relieving symptoms." --No Kidding?

 

" One of the things that occurs during menopause is memory loss and therefore, we should start writing things down."  There were other things that occur but the speaker had lost her list where she had written them.

 

 

Stay Cool! :)