Posted on July 26, 2021 under Monday Morning Musings with no comments yet

Still crazy after all these years

 

“And we talked about some old times,

And we drank ourselves some beers,

Still crazy after all these years,

Still crazy after all these years.”

Still Crazy After all These Years – Paul Simon

 

Addictions.

“Ooh, Len. Too heavy a topic for Monday.”

I’m always curious why otherwise sensible people (you know who you are) continue to read my posts. I asked an old friend this very question last week. She and her husband taught at the same school as I did some 45 years ago. She might well remember the staff Halloween party at the STM gym when a half dozen teachers from the Maritimes, affectionately known as “The Wise Men From the East” paraded through the streets of Fairview, Alberta as a six pack of Schooner beer. Crazy then and still crazy after all these years.

There are well known addictions such as alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, and Boston cream donuts from Tim’s. With the exception of the last one, all of the above wreak havoc with one’s health and family life and are a terrible scourge.

There are other addictions that are a bit more subtle like salt and sugar, which, used to excess, can cause multiple health problems.

There is another long list of food products and activities which can seem excessive, but really, is it possible to eat too much chocolate or play too many games of cribbage?

So, why does my friend read my posts?

The answer to the above question to my friend stopped me in my tracks. “I’m addicted to your humour.”

Long pause. Let that one sink in.

When one considers all the vices that the world can dish up, I don’t think an excessive amount of humour could possibly cause a person any harm. Laughter IS the best medicine or possibly a glass of merlot. I have done my best throughout my life to surround myself with people smarter than myself (that was an easy one) and people who don’t take themselves too seriously. Serious people are a drag and will drag you down with them. This quote pretty well sums it up: “Stay away from negative people. They have a problem for every solution.” Being in good cheer is a choice. If you wake up on the wrong side of the bed, might I suggest you move over to the other side and go back to sleep.

Let’s face it. It’s not possible to be in good cheer all the time. Poor health, tragedies and the like will quickly wipe the smile off even the most upbeat person, but that is life as we know it. Rudyard Kipling said it best. “If you can meet with triumph and disaster and treat those two imposters just the same.” Easy to say. Hard to do.

Another one of my faithful readers opined that I perhaps dwell a little too much on my advancing age. I do mention it frequently but most times it’s tongue in cheek. In my head, I feel much like I did 50 years ago. My body tells a different story. A few of you are lucky. You are not deranged, going on 40km walks just for shits and giggles. You have treated your bodies as temples and are finely tuned machines, well into your 70s and 80s with nary an ache or pain. We hate you. Not really. The rest of us are a bag of creaking bones and joints.

Unless you have conveniently skipped my last three or four posts, the rest of you know that I am going to do two of those deranged walks on August 9/10 to mark my 70^th birthday. In conjunction with the walk, I’m hoping to raise some money for a Youth Day to be held in my northern community of Kangiqsujuaq. You can send me an e-transfer at lenpdmacdonald@gmail.com or stop by the Bergengren Credit Union and tell them you want to contribute to Len’s Walk.

Besides my long walk around the Cape, how do I plan to acknowledge this milestone (millstone!)? Among the possibilities are a nose job, a second tattoo or perhaps a piercing. All three might evoke some strange looks and a call to my doctor.

There are many things that I will probably have to give up in the years to come but I hope to never relinquish my sense of humour.

“He who laughs last, laughs best”. Nietzche.

Have a great week.

P.S. I want to welcome two colleagues from Montreal, Chad and Emma. Hope you enjoy your stay in “Canada’s Ocean Playground”.

 

Posted on July 19, 2021 under Monday Morning Musings with 2 comments

 

Leah’s Beach Treasures

 

“Roll out those lazy, crazy, hazy days of summer,

Those days of soda, and pretzels and beer,

Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer,

Dust off the sun and moon and sing a song of cheer”.

Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer – Nat King Cole

What does one do on a lazy, hazy day in the summertime?

Last week, I had the pleasure of spending mornings with my two young granddaughters. In truth, I didn’t have to do a whole lot because, as we grandparents know, it is much easier looking after two children than one. No explanation required. They did arts and crafts, spent some time on their electronic devices, and hung out at local playgrounds. In the middle of the week, one of them had to go away with her mom for a few days leaving me to amuse an 8-year-old.

Now, as fate would have it, the first day of one on one child care coincided with the British Open golf tournament. I used to play a lot of golf and thoroughly enjoy watching the four “Majors”. I particularly enjoy the British Open because of the time difference. The golf comes on early in the morning Atlantic time (in the middle of the night for you west coasters) and winds up early in the evening. If you are masochistic (and single), you can get away with watching approximately 14 hours of coverage.

I started watching the first round at 6:30 a.m., two hours before the arrival of my granddaughter. It was one of those lazy, hazy days of summer. It was warm and breezy but overcast. She asked me if she could start off her morning with some screen time. I barely blinked. She settled in with her iPad and I continued to watch golf. I daresay that both of us would have, in all likelihood, been quite content to rot for the entire morning doing nothing but gazing at a screen.

After one hour, my Catholic guilt got the better of me. While it wasn’t an ideal beach day, it looked like a perfect day for beach combing. Our quest? Beach glass. Believe it or not, in Nova Scotia, Canada’s Ocean Playground, there is a Facebook page (Halifax Adventure) highlighting the best beaches in the province for finding beach glass.

We drove to the public beach at Bayfield. Not surprisingly, the parking lot was virtually empty at this time of the day, especially on an overcast day. We crossed the boardwalk and made our way to the beach. Our toes had scarcely touched the warm sand when my granddaughter excitedly called me over to where she was standing. “Look what I found?” Instead of a smooth piece of green glass, she was holding two nickels which she had found in the sand. I knew we wouldn’t return home empty handed!

The quest began. We had the beach to ourselves. The only other living things were two extremely bored lifeguards and one highly annoying horse fly. I realize that a horse fly fits somewhere into the food chain but as far as I can tell, God made horse flies to test a human’s sanity.

The weather was ideal for this activity. There was no hot sun beating down. The waves gently rolled in, and a warm wind embraced us, keeping all but one, pesky insects away from us.

I hadn’t been beachcombing in a long time, but it became evident that there are two essentials to finding beach glass: you need very good eyesight, and you need the ability to get close to the ground. On both scores, I rated a big fat zero. I was more or less reduced to being the bucket carrier. Yes, I could easily identify rotted out crab shells and stones but trying to spot small pieces of beach glass was virtually impossible.

As it turns out, the pickings were slim. My granddaughter, down on her haunches, was able to find 14 small pieces of glass. She also found many interesting stones and shells which were added to the bucket. For more than an hour, we inched our way along the shoreline, slowly and methodically. If you find life rushed, may I suggest that you go beachcombing with a young child. It is the perfect activity to slow you down.

It was peaceful and pure bliss. The only sounds were the waves and the odd seagull passing overhead. The smell of salty ocean air was divine.

One cannot end a day at the beach without ice cream. We drove over to the wharf but sadly, the ice cream stand wasn’t open, which was perfectly understandable. When we returned to town, we visited an ice cream stand a few hundred yards away from my apartment.

Summer is about many things but spending time with a young child at the beach is one of those things that is priceless.

It is a chance to bond and to relive your youth.

It doesn’t get much better than this. As long as you don’t have to bend down!

Have a great week.

Posted on July 12, 2021 under Monday Morning Musings with no comments yet

Tranquility Trail

 

“I see trees of green,

Red roses too,

I see them bloom,

For me and you,

And I think to myself,

What a wonderful world.”

What a Wonderful World – Louis Armstrong

Life is truly wonderful in all of its complexity and simplicity.

Last Thursday, I launched a fundraiser to help support youth in my adopted home of Kangiqsujuaq, Quebec. https://www.week45.com/thursday-tidbits-285/

After posting the story and having breakfast, I headed out for my morning walk. It was such a glorious morning. The air was fresh and clear. The sun was shining, and the birds were singing. Part of my walk took me through the cross -country running trail on the campus of St.F.X. University. It reminds me a bit of a similar pathway (the chip trail) on the campus of the University of Victoria that my brother Tom and I walked many times.

I rarely take my cell phone with me but on this morning, it was a necessity as I was awaiting a call from the X-ray department at the hospital for an appointment.

As I wended me way through the trail, with the sun reflecting off the leaves on the trees and the delectable odor of wild roses filling the air, my phone started pinging. Our cell phones have telltale rings. We know what’s a text, an e-mail, a Messenger message etc.

A huge grin came on my face.

You see (once you’ve read my last post), I had offered a prize of a set of my 6 books to the first person who donated $100. There were two e-mails containing e-transfers. The first donation was from friends in Labrador who happened to be driving across Newfoundland. The second donation was at the opposite end of the country from a friend in Victoria. It was the first $100 donation. I looked at my phone and deduced that it was 4:30 a.m. out west. Now, I’m quite certain that my friend hadn’t set her alarm early to win this fabulous prize. She’s an early bird like me. The first two donations at opposite ends of the country. How good is that? Thanks, MG. Your books are in the mail.

It was at this precise moment that I started to think about life and how wonderful it can be. Despite all of the bad things going on in the world, along with rampant cynicism and mistrust for institutions, it is still a wonderful world.

Now, I am not about to chronicle every donation but the 3^rd one (while I was still on the trail) was from a friend in Amherst. In addition to her donation, she said that she would walk virtually (10 km) with me on Day 1 of my 75 km walk around The Cape. That got me thinking which is always a dangerous and troubling pastime for yours truly. I wondered aloud, to the amusement of the birds, if I could cajole others to walk a few kilometers on August 9^th and 10^th. Keeping with the 75- kilometer theme, I wondered if it would be possible if we could amass 750 kilometers in two days. I realize that not everyone is a walker so I will add cyclists, runners, roller bladers, skateboarders, and hikers to the list. Sorry. No motor vehicles. What do you think? Can we do it?

I know for sure that I will walk 75 kilometers. My friend, Brenda Gould, the affable proprietress of Elm Gardens has agreed to walk the entire 40 km on Day I. She is also collecting donations at the store so if you happen to stop by her flower shop after she completes her walk, please extend condolences to her for putting up with me for 8-9 hours! It is safe to say that we now have 115 km (75+40+10) already in the bank. I will remind you about this closer to the date. Maybe you could message me after the walk and tell me your total. This might also be a good opportunity as you are walking (hiking etc.) to reflect on Indigenous issues in the news these days.

One can never drink enough of “the milk of human kindness”.

Canada has a new Governor-General. Mary Simon is a distinguished Inuk woman, and I am proud to say that she grew up in the Nunavik region of Quebec where I worked the last two years. https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/who-is-mary-simon-canada-s-first-indigenous-governor-general-1.5498435. Her opening remarks upon her appointment were in Inuktitut, a language that I have grown to love but sadly can’t speak. I can sing a handful of songs in Inuktitut. Mary has vast diplomatic experience, and she will need to muster all of her considerable skills to navigate the complex waters ahead of her. It must be a thrill for the Inuit people to see one of their own achieve such lofty heights.

Very often it is the simplest things in life that give us the greatest pleasure. A few days ago, I was sitting out back reading a book about Leonardo Da Vinci. He is best known as a painter, but he is much more. The author describes him best as a “relentlessly curious explorer”. I digress. A friend from Victoria called and she wanted to talk about writing. I was thrilled to hear from her, and we had a lovely chat. Thanks, JM. It was the highlight of my day.

“And I think to myself,

What a wonderful world”.

Have a great week.

P.S. I will continue to accept donation for Len’s Walk up to and including the walk on August 9^th and 10^th. You can send me an e-transfer at lenpdmacdonald@gmail.com or make a donation at the East Coast Credit Union (Bergengren ). Any excess donations will be given to The Family House in Kangiqsujuaq, a place where families can go in times of difficulty.