Posted on February 22, 2014 under Storytelling with no comments yet

 

 

“There’s a bad flu going around.”

Every year around this time, this tired refrain is dragged out from the closet and trumpeted for all to hear.  It seems that every second person you bump into has a head cold, a chest cold, achy bones and some combination of vomiting and diarrhea.  The emergency departments at most hospitals are overwhelmed with throngs of hacking and sneezing patients.

Is there anything worse than a sick child?  The short answer is “yes”.

I was speaking with the mother of three young children the other day.  She was the only one in the household who wasn’t sick.  Her three children were in the throes of an awful flu.  It was “coming out both ends”, as she put it.  She was so tired of making multiple trips to various bedrooms that she finally opted to lay all of their mattresses side by side in the living room right next to the bathroom.  The word “containment” comes to mind.

To add insult to injury, even the dog was under the weather and chose her bed in which to throw up.

And why hasn’t she gotten ill?  She is too busy looking after everyone else and doesn’t have time to be sick.

If you’re a parent, this is all too familiar.  Even though your children will drive you to the brink of insanity on a good day, when they are unwell you feel just a bit helpless.

And while the flu isn’t a pretty picture, there are other maladies that will challenge even the strongest woman.

The first time one of your children has croup is very scary indeed.  It’s hard to describe the sounds coming from the depths of your child’s chest.  You learn from experience that several minutes in the bathroom with the shower turned out creating lots of steam is one way to alleviate the spasms.  Or, if it’s winter, just getting them out in the cold air sometimes does the trick.

And is there anything more traumatizing for a parent than a lice infestation at school?  Your child, your perfect specimen, arrives home with a case of head lice.  Even though you know that the little critters don’t discriminate, you can’t believe this has happened. You quickly learn the lice drill.

Is there anything worse than a sick child?

Sadly, the answer is yes.  Speak to any woman and she will tell you that there is nothing more pathetic than watching a male in the throes of a “man cold”.  Most women would rather deal with three kids vomiting and with diarrhea, who also happen to have lice, than listen to their husbands moan and groan about their cold.  Nitpicking now seems like child’s play.

How can one human being be so miserable?  Just ask him and he will tell you.  Over and over again.  A “man cold” still hasn’t been adequately defined but, safe to say, it is a very serious piece of business.

My wife long ago learned to tune me out when I started to exhibit symptoms of anything.  These days I get handed the remote and she moves to the spare bed until I stop “sniveling”.  If I’m lucky she’ll make some chicken soup – the cure for anything.

If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound?  If a man complains about the flu and nobody is listening, is he really sick?  It makes me wonder.

Posted on February 20, 2014 under Thursday Tidbits with no comments yet

Schwartz Auditorium – April 24th.

We all know what it’s like to feel hungry. The odd time  ( travelling comes to mind ), you may get off schedule a bit and all of a sudden you’re ravenous. Despite all of our good fortune, there are people living amongst us who deal with hunger on a regular basis. So please, grab your coffee and read on.

There is a hot meal program that already exists in Antigonish. It happens at St. James United Church every Tuesday. There is a wonderful group of volunteers who prepare and serve the meal. On a typical day , anywhere from 50-75 take advantage of the meal.

Hungry people need to eat seven days a week so the program is going to be expanded to two days a week . Yours truly is going to roll up his sleeves and take on the responsibility for rounding up volunteers and the money required to finance the meal for the year. The second meal will take place at the John Paul Centre thanks to the generosity of the Knights of Columbus.

What I need most is seven people to raise their hands high in the air and say “ yes, I will help.” I will need a lot more than seven people but I need 7 captains who in turn will recruit a team of 5-7 people to assist them with taking responsibility for a meal every 6-7 weeks. The program will not operate in July and August. We are tentatively looking to launch the second meal in May but will only do so if and when we are completely ready to go. The captains also have to be prepared to take a one time , 3 hour, food handlers course.

Please call me if you are willing to be a captain . And no, not one of the Captains in the Captain Morgan ads! 870-1125

And how are we planning to finance the food costs? Glad you asked. There will be two ways to support this cause. When the time comes, people will be able to make a tax deductible donation. That’s an easy one.

And here’s the second plank. I have been threatening to do this for awhile. I am going to organize and host a show, tentatively scheduled for Thursday, April 24^th. called “The Week45 Express.”  The subtitle will be “Food For Thought.” Those of you who listen to CBC radio are aware of the program “The Vinyl Café.” My show will be modelled on this with readings by myself and some other well known writers, along with some fine musical talent.

A sell out should provide enough money to run the second meal for a year.

I have been talking to some writers and musicians and I can promise you that you will get your money’s worth.

So there you have it. I have issued the challenge. I will be giving you regular updates on my website.

Have a great weekend.

 

Posted on February 19, 2014 under Storytelling with no comments yet

 

 

“I thought by now you’d realize
there ain’t no way to hide your lyin’ eyes”

Lyin’ Eyes – The Eagles, 1975

Every single morning for 57 years, my day has started exactly the same way.  How many people can make that claim?  How is it possible to be that consistent?  Is it compulsive behavior?  Have I had the same alarm clock?  It is none of these things.  It can be explained very simply.

I wear glasses.

I was five when I got my first pair of glasses, and in one form or another they have been perched on my prominent nose ever since.  With a few interruptions in service.

When I look back at my class picture from grade 1, I see a few of us who look pretty dorky with big, dark rimmed glasses.  My mom, like many of her generation was a great hoarder, and she kept every class picture right up to grade 12.  She still won’t speak to me about my grad picture from university.  She never thought much of my afro.

I was a sports fanatic, which necessitated athletic glasses.  These were popularized by the Hanson brothers in the movie “Slap Shot”.  Ugly does not even begin to describe them but I was looking for functionality.  I wasn’t contemplating walking down the catwalk in Milan during that phase of my life … or any other time, come to think of it.

I tried contacts once.  If you played hockey, you know what it was like having your glasses fog up incessantly.  I had enough trouble finding the back of the net when I could see clearly, let alone peering through steamed up lenses.  Frank used to yell at me: “P.D., that shot couldn’t break an egg!”  Most people take to contacts like a duck to water.  I lasted all of half a day before returning to my old familiar friends.

Invariably, our eyesight begins a downward trajectory as we age.  First it’s bifocals or progressive lenses.  You don’t dare walk down a set of stairs in public until you get the hang of it at home, lest people think you are drunk.

In my fifties, I decided to take the plunge and have laser eye surgery.   I can assure you that this procedure wasn’t vanity rearing its head.  I was just plain tired of wearing specs and thought I would try corrective surgery.  As a golfer, I always had issues when it rained.  Having rain running off your lenses makes an already difficult game that much harder.  Golfers have an abundance of excuses for poor play.  This one was legit.

The surgery didn’t go well.  The day after, I looked in the mirror to shave and it was like the morning after doing shots of tequila.  Red eyes and blurred vision.  I will spare you the details but within days I had a collection of $2.00 reading glasses that would equal in number Imelda Marcos’s shoe collection.  I had a pair for shaving, one for cooking, one for reading, another for the computer, golf … etc. etc.

Finally, I decided to go back to my own eye doctor and was fitted with a lovely pair of trifocals.  I accessorized several years back and have a pair of prescription Bollé sunglasses.  I’m just waiting for the day that the giant magnifying glass makes an appearance when I’m doing the crossword puzzle.  I know it’s coming.

 

While the laser experience was disappointing, there was an upside.  I was forced out of golf and found a new passion: running.  I often feel thankful for how things turned out.  I probably would never have run the Boston Marathon if everything had gone according to plan.  And I would probably still be flailing away on the golf course.

Bent frames.  Broken frames.  Sore behind the ears.  Sore on the bridge of my nose.  We glasses wearers understand all of this.  And there are lots of us still around.  Our entire church choir wears glasses.  Even prayer will not give you good eyesight.

I walk to work every day.  I can no longer see clearly into car windows as they pass me.  So, I just wave at everybody, just like the politicians do at election time.

The upside is that motorists who gesture in a less than polite manner get a friendly wave in return.