Posted on March 8, 2021 under Monday Morning Musings with no comments yet

Food for thought or thoughts of food?

 

What are you thinking about at this exact moment?

What was your first thought when you woke this morning?

How about your last thought last night before you nodded off?

Lately, I have had a preoccupation with the human brain. I’m sure many of you wonder what’s going on beneath my skull… if anything! You see, as a grade 6 teacher, I am required to teach all subjects including art. For those of you familiar with my stick figures when I play Pictionary, you must shudder at the thought of me giving art lessons. You needn’t worry. I steal ideas from other teachers and then just stand back and turn my students loose. They are very creative and don’t need me to tell them what to do.

One of the required courses is called PSD which stands for Personal and Social Development. It covers a wide swath of topics including the human body. The past few weeks, we have been discussing the human brain. One of my colleagues, Torie, a great gal from Saskatchewan, team teaches this course with me. Rather than get too technical right out of the gates, Torie did an exercise with my students. She handed each of them a sheet of paper with a diagram of the human brain without any of the parts labelled. She then asked a simple question. “What do you think about?” She went to the smart board and started to make a list. Food was a popular item as were friends, family, sports, and hunting. A few of them were brave enough to mention school. She then asked them to look at the brain and try and identify how much of each activity occupies their brains at any particular time. Then they colored in each of the activities.

I found the exercise really interesting, so interesting that I did one myself and I am throwing down the gauntlet and asking you to do the same. Find an image of a brain on the internet and print it out. I think you will be surprised when you see your results.

What DO you think about most of your waking hours? Yes. I realize that it depends on any given day but over time, what are the big things that fill your brains with thoughts? For many of us, our family would represent a decent chunk of space. For the past year, Covid has been on everyone’s mind. I mentioned the challenges of teaching, my writing, relationships, finances, and gratitude. I am probably not alone when I put down uncertainty about the future as a significant piece of the puzzle. Sadly, for some people loneliness and boredom occupy some of this precious space.

I am happy to report that I never think about the former President of the United States anymore.

I plan to hold onto my chart and redo it again in 6 months and a year.

Last week, we did a more formal exercise where we looked at the brain and what parts control certain activities. If you need a refresher, take a look at the image at the top of the page.

Speaking of refreshers, I feel like I’m back in school. Duh, Len, you are back in school or has the part of your brain that controls memory suddenly atrophied. I’m not talking about teaching. I’m referring to learning. In order to teach all subjects, I am constantly looking at material that I learned back in the 50s and 60s. Once again, it amazes me that the brain recalls with shocking clarity the sights, sounds and smells… and knowledge from over a half a century ago.

I was reminiscing the other day about the storm of the century in Montreal on March 4^th, 1971. A few of us traveled to Montreal to watch the Habs play and got caught in this incredible storm. Here’s my account of that event fifty years ago: https://www.week45.com/the-habs-and-the-hab-nots/

Finally (mercifully), I watched a lot of golf on the weekend. The Bay Hill Invitational is played in Orlando on a property owned by the late legendary golfer, Arnold Palmer. A number of years ago Peter and I spent a few days at this tournament as spectators. Lots of great memories. Here is one of Palmer’s famous quotes which I believe says it all: “The road to success is always under construction.”

Have a great week. Things will look much brighter (especially in the evening) later this week when the clocks go ahead one hour.

P.S. Drum roll. Not really but this post is a bit of a milestone. This is my 1200^th post on my website. Thanks to many of you who have been with me from the start.

Posted on March 4, 2021 under Thursday Tidbits with 6 comments

 

 

“Take another shot of courage.” Tequila Sunrise. The Eagles

 

“Why, yes. I could start my day without coffee. But I like being able to remember things like how to say words and put on my pants.” (Source unknown)

Oxygen. Water. Coffee.

With apologies to you hard core tea drinkers out there, most people recognize the necessities of life. Without oxygen, we wouldn’t be able to breath. Without water, we would certainly shrivel up and die. Without coffee, most of us would be a royal pain in the arse.

I realize coffee is an addiction and that it has all sorts of deleterious side effects like increased heart rate, quickness of speech, agitated movements, insomnia, digestive issues, muscle breakdown, high blood pressure, and fatigue. But the side effects of not having one’s morning java are even worse like being an intolerable, miserable excuse of a human being.

Why have I chosen March 4^th specifically to discuss this important topic? There is no reason. I never need a reason to write about nothing. You already know this.

I usually start seriously thinking about my first cup of coffee around 2:00 a.m. Now you might be thinking that the reason for this is that I drink too much coffee during the day causing insomnia. Wrong. My daily intake is fairly modest. I have one cup, usually around 6:00 a.m. and then I take a thermos to school which lasts all days. Now, before you go speculating, this is not one of those humungous thermoses that a carpenter might take to the job site. No. Mine is a modest 2 cupper. I start sipping on it around 7:30 when I head to school and usually finish it off in the afternoon. If I’m having a really bad day, it will be gone by 10:00.

Like most of you, I am a creature of habit, especially bad habits. Can you say “sweets, wine, and binge watching Netflix – something that I haven’t been able to do for 8 long months because of spotty (I’m being charitable) internet?

Getting up to pee in the middle of the night is not a habit. At my age, it is absolutely essential unless I opt for Depends. That will come soon enough. Let’s not go there. Invariably, when I stagger out of bed at this ungodly hour, the first thing I think about is my morning coffee and raisin toast. I can almost smell and taste it. Black coffee and raisin toast. Hardly legendary cuisine to start the day but I know that until I have this early morning fix, I will not be fit to be seen in public.

I will quit breathing and drinking water before I quit drinking coffee.

We had a bit of a cold spell last weekend when the thermometer dipped to -57 Saturday evening. On Sunday, things moderated, and it was only -50 when I received a message from my principal and her friend wondering if I would like to complete the Hero (Fools) Challenge and walk the airport loop. (7km). At the time, I was stretched out on the couch watching golf. I couldn’t have possibly felt lazier. The thought of stepping outside, let alone going for a long walk, didn’t even enter my consciousness that day. What crazy person would want to be out in this kind of weather?

Maritimers have a weird streak in them. Threaten them with shame and embarrassment and they will flash their fangs and fight to the death. “Of course, I would love to go out and get a dose of frostbite,” was my inner thought but I cheerfully agreed and 15 minutes later, we were on our way. Every millimeter of me was covered. I was wearing googles to cover my large nose and the area around my eyes. Have you ever had frozen eyeballs? The walk takes about 1:30. Fifteen minutes into the walk, my goggles had completely iced up making vision impossible. I was wearing a neck warmer and a balaclava. I stopped just long enough to pull the neck warmer under the balaclava and up over my face. The neck warmer is black. For the remainder of the walk, I had to walk closely on the heels of my walking companions as I couldn’t see more than a foot in front of me. Maritimers are both weird and stubborn. As my late brother Tom would have said “got ‘er done”.

“There are strange things done in the midnight sun…” (First person to identify this line gets a free book and a cup of coffee!!!). See. I’m not strange at all. Well grounded.

Have a great weekend.

P.S. I’m off to Victoria, B.C. for spring break in early April. Yeah, yeah, I know all about ‘essential travel’. I’ve been up north since August 1^st. It’s -57. It’s essential!

 

Posted on March 1, 2021 under Monday Morning Musings with no comments yet

 

Bob Dylan. Easy Chair

 

“I look at the world and I notice it’s turning,

While my guitar gently weeps,

With every mistake, we must surely be learning,

Still my guitar gently weeps.”

While My Guitar Gently Weeps – The Beatles

Pleased to meet you. My name is Washburn. I have six strings, a sleek neck, and a body that has brought many people joy, principally its owner, who doesn’t fret about much these days.

Len has owned three guitars since he started playing back in the mid- 70s so I guess one could say that I’m the third generation who has suffered at his torturous hands. Actually, that’s a bit unfair. He’s an ok player – a strummer and not a picker, and in all these years, he has never spilled a beer on my wooden body.

He bought my grandfather, Yamaha when he first learned to play. Grandpa had seen lot of years before Len acquired him. His strings were a mile off the neck requiring extreme force to make a chord. In the early stages, Len drew blood regularly trying to master his first set of songs from Gordon Lightfoot’s “Gord’s Gold”. Reminds me of the Bryan Adamas song – “Played it ‘til my fingers bled, was the summer of ‘69”.

In the early going, he had the temerity to actually offer his school students guitar lessons. Talk about the blind leading the blind. One of his guitar students became a very accomplished musician as did his student’s daughter.

Len only taught for three years in Alberta before lugging me back to Nova Scotia. He had built up the princely sum of $975 in his teacher’s pension plan and decided to cash it out, never imagining that he would be a school teacher again. He made his way to the Halifax Folklore Centre, that wonderful emporium of guitars and other musical instruments. He traded grandpa for my father, Martin, a D-18, 1970 model in mint condition. Len had no illusions about becoming a great guitar player. That was never in the chords! He was just tired of having bloody fingers from pressing the bejeezus out of Yamaha’s strings. Many years later, he would add the offspring of Martin, a cut down Martin traveling guitar.

Over the years, a guitar has rarely left Len’s side. He has played in a number of musical groups. He has played at weddings, wakes and funerals. He has performed at variety shows, concerts and in pubs and family gatherings too numerous to count. Speaking of wakes, a party to end all parties occurred at Len’s mom’s house the night after Melvin Hibbs (my late niece’s husband) died tragically in a plane crash. He and Martin played non-stop in the kitchen for 5 hours with half of Newfoundland in attendance. The old floor shifted under the weight of so many grieving people in one small place.

Len’s son, Peter became an outstanding guitar player and many moons ago, Len gave Martin to Pete in exchange for me. A Martin guitar played by someone who actually knows how to play, is a wonderful thing. Sadly, after playing at a gig in Halifax one night, his bandmates’ car was broken into and Martin was found smashed to smithereens on a sidewalk. At the time, this vintage guitar was valued at about $4,000.

It was my good fortune , for around this time, Len got itchy feet and started to see the world, always bringing me along for the ride.

There are a lot of stories embedded in my wooden body. In Edinburgh, Scotland, he was attending a conference hosted by Standard Life. At the closing dinner at Edinburgh castle, a formal affair, he went from table to table (dressed in his kilt, of course) and regaled those in attendance. The president of Standard Life was a wonderful singer, and no one enjoyed it more. It should be noted that Len was NOT an official musician at the event. Some day he might share the full store. You may not be surprised but wine was involved!

On a golf trip to Ireland with his brother and a gaggle of lawyers from Vancouver, he played me in a wonderful Irish pub called O’Flaherty’s (my mother’s maiden name).

Len tells me that one of his greatest joys was performing at International Women’s Day in India with 15 young girls studying to become sisters. They sang The Beatles tune, “Let it Be”.

Barbados, Bermuda and Florida. He played me in some hot countries and cool places.

In 2019, I was heartbroken when Len sat me down to tell me that he wouldn’t be taking me to Spain to walk the Camino. Walking over 700 kilometers on blistered feet with a guitar strapped on his back didn’t sound like much fun. When he came home, he told me that there was always a guitar hanging around the alburgues (hostels) and he was never shy to pick it up and start a singsong.

Speaking of cool places, Len has shown me a part of Canada that I’ve never seen before. He took me to the norther village of Kangiqsujuaq, Quebec in November of 2019.  Talk about cool places. It is positively frigid in the winter. One day last year, the temperature hit -53. Most of the time he keeps me in his classroom where he plays for his students on a regular basis. Occasionally, he wanders the hallways singing and playing. Recently he was asked to join a group of young singers, drummers and throat singers as their guitarist. He took me to the local FM radio station a few days ago where the group played live for an hour. Sharing music with young people is one of his greatest joys.

Sharing his music with old people (like himself!) has also given him much happiness. A few years ago, he was hired by a nursing home in his hometown to provide music for the residents. Often small concerts were held in common areas in the home and the rest of the time was spent in rooms with people who were bedridden. Privately, Len tells me that of all the music he has performed in his life, none was more gratifying than playing at the bedsides of the elderly who were dying. He would take me and sit near the person, singing softly. Many times, family members would request a song or two that the soon to be departed loved. All solemnity was tossed aside as we heartily sang Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash or Charley Pride.

There are not many days that Len hasn’t picked me up. He goes to the school quite early in the morning and will take me out of my case to sing a few tunes before starting his workday. He tells me that it puts him in a positive mood.

Music has been a huge part of Len’s life and I have been happy to be his companion.

Have a great week.

Washburn.