Story Species

Mr. New’s dog died. This news is given to me by George. George is our indispensable helper who comes once or twice a week. He moves snow, chops wood, cleans up my kitchen a real wonder and even repairs things. I guess we had been away over Chanukah and when George came to help us again he felt he should tell me what happened while we were gone, or I may have asked him if anything happened while we were gone and he thought he would oblige by giving me the news he had. About local things. In his world, I mean. Or maybe this part is all a dream. I do not know Mr. New so I did not know he had a dog. I thought I should say something, to express an interest like, so I asked “was it a big dog”? I don’t know why I thought of this. No, it was not very big. Then I said something even more inane: “Oh, that’s too bad” which of course made no sense at all since the death issue would have been exactly the same no matter what size of the dog.

On Wednesday I took Brenda to Espanola where Dayv picked her up and took her to Sudbury to stay with Sarah while he flew to Ottawa for a Showcase for performing artists to promote his music and maybe get some gigs for concerts. So in Espanola I did some shopping at Winkels, the Independent Grocer there and this guy with a clipboard seized upon me to offer me two (2) “gifts”, one was a $5.00 coupon for cash towards my groceries, and the second was a credit card of some sort I would get in the mail and all I had to do was fill in a form, just take a few minutes and agree to give them my auto licence #. I said I would think about it. So I went to the washroom where I had already been headed when waylaid, and I did think about it. I thought that for me to accept the $5.00 bribe would contribute to the notion that anything and anyone can be bought for few dollars. I would be joining a mass culture of creating waste, and that some of the waste would be a few minutes of my life, of paper, of plastic and that the intrusion of this man and his bribe had already cost minutes of my life. Free gifts were not being offered. Free would be sunshine, wild herbs, and so on but there is no clean water any more, and there are a lot of hungry people in the world so I am glad I thought of this and I think that we all going to have to do a lot more thinking. And thinking about all of this is not being idle any more.

Well, everyone, you live and learn so never think you won’t have any more new and transforming experiences because as long as you are conscious and leave yourself open to change you can learn to see the world anew. I used to think I was good at Buddhism having read widely and thought long about it since my mid teens. But I see now that until I was truly elderly and past my three score years and ten, I was naïve about time. Youth have a poor grasp of time and how change works. This is developmental and cannot be helped. It would not of course hurt for them to know this as a biological reality. Change is going on all the time but we cannot see it until we have enough experience. If a man of 40 thinks he is still 18 and behaves accordingly expect trouble. I am leading up to telling you that last night BJ and I got home from a dash to Toronto. We left here Thursday last. On Friday we checked into the Holiday Inn and registered for the Ontario Liberal Leadership convention at the New Maple Leaf gardens. We were both Delegates and felt obliged to go after lots of thought and some arm twisting by our candidate. We joined a very diverse and cohesive group supporting Gerrard Kennedy and for two ballots we stuck with him. But when his support did not grow he asked all of us to meet with him in a private, press-free room to discuss what to do. Now this in itself was a wonderful and inclusive experience that has not characterized my involvement with politics heretofore. He told us that his strong personal feeling was to throw his support to Kathleen Wynne.

Now you have to know that KW is a veteran politician, an expert in mediation and consensus building and a gay woman. She made all this clear in her amazing introductory speech, one of the most candid, authentic, sincere and unadorned addresses I have ever heard. BJ and I were instant fans, so when GK asked us how we felt about his thinking, we, and virtually all his 280 supporters gave our very loud and vocal support. He asked if we would go with him as a group to Kathleen Wynnes’ camp and tell her we wanted to join with her and at this point as I write, I am overcome with emotion which I have until this moment been unable to express but which I felt very strongly at that time.

For some mysterious reason her followers were like herself and as we pushed our way through the throngs of people and it became clear where we were headed, the Wynne camp let out a shout that nearly took the roof off. They were already over 700 strong and they fed and watered us; gave us the Wynne scarves off their necks and hugged us. We gave them the votes she needed to become the first female Premier of Ontario, the first openly gay Premier of Canada and possibly in the world and then, for the first time in my life I felt that I was part of a cresting wave that really felt like a social revolution, inclusive, fair and free from the “mind forged manacles” of the past. I would not have missed this experience for the world.

Today the knee jerk neo fascist Right wing is already attacking her, but if they were not I would be worrying. We broke the mold as one of our new friends there said and the Reaction of frightened people is a good sign. The snow falls thick and fast again outside but inside my heart is warm with hope of a better world to come. I have learned to see change as it is happening and that is a gift beyond price.

So as I was saying Fall ended with Chanukah and because people lit lights everywhere, actual  fire lights with candles, I don’t believe electric lights do anything but waste hydro, the days have started to get longer.  This has little to do with temperatures however and two nights ago it was minus 13 here, i.e. 13 degrees below freezing.  I went to my local butcher Max and his wife Joanne 3 days ago looking for beef, but I found out that they have not had fresh beef since they did turkeys for Christmas and then had a family holiday. By the time they sacrifice another beast and after it has aged(hung) for two weeks it could be weeks before we get fresh meat.  Well, we have been making inroads on our 3 freezers so I went on a tour of Joanne’s freezers and found lots of goodies: shank bones, pastrami, roasts, jumbo franks, ground beef, and so on. She also offered me her stewing hens, former layers, and I felt very privileged as these birds are hard to come by and make the most superb chicken stew, what I learned to call Aunt Roseanne’s chicken.  She was my first wife’s aunt and nobody made chicken like she did and she could  get great hens in New York.  This is the season of stews and soups, too cold to use the BBQ, so we think of such things and  make delicious savoury comfort food.

Now what happens here is that if we run out of Freezer space indoors, after filling 3 freezers, we have about another half acre of freezer outside.  Remember the bears have hibernated and the racoons have made themselves scarce by now.  They do the most damage and simply have no respect for boundaries at all.  Any way the outdoors being safe we can keep our ice cubes outside, the chicken soup is outside in a sealed pressure cooker, want cold white wine just sit it outside the door for 15 minutes, and just in case we keep a cooler out on the deck to protect some cooked or raw food.

I also have a part of me that is strongly tempted to hibernate.  When we lived in Haileybury I knew one or two people who actually did hibernate.  Fast Eddie who ran a permanent garage sale had fitted up his basement as a hobbit hole, the wood stove running full blast, home made schnapps always available and the whole place hot as an oven with carpets and plush textures everywhere.  Eddie was always trying to get me to join him so we could share stories, drink his pear or apple schnapps until the world went fuzzy and I had no idea how to get home from his nest in Latchford. But I only did this once or twice for I could not stand the claustrophobic heat, the fear of being burned alive and the sense of hitting the street and sleeping on the sidewalk and so freezing to death.  Is hell burning or freezing?

Have spent a lot of time recently dealing with a new Harper  inspired wave of racism and Native bashing thus bringing all the Neo nazis out of the woodwork feeling that they have been given a new licence to insult and abuse. What a disgusting display of fulminating poison.  And where oh where are my fellow Jews whose silence about all of this makes me extremely embarrassed and angry, for who should understand Native suffering if not we Jews.  I thought that every year we are supposed to celebrate that we are no longer slaves in Egypt but it sure does not say “Forget it and have fun”. Somewhere in the Passover service I feel sure we are urged to use our racial history and experience to find empathy in ourselves for other disempowered people.   I am an immigrant to Canada and I am living in someone else’s land but I am pretty certain this land does not belong to Harper, or even Mike Harris of Indian hating fame. Sure it is much nicer to be the beneficiary of someone else’s sacrifice’s but I am beginning to feel communally alone.  Should we not be saying thanks and how can we help?

Some of you will remember my Fall Diaries which dried up due to Holidays, Political Stress, Business demands, Medical tourism in Southern Ontario where all the specialists live, getting sick with what is now called Flu but we used to call a cold and adjusting to winter which I have now done, so by popular demand, I resume with Winter Diary which changes the scene and subjects. When I say “popular demand” I should to be honest and not include everybody since one relative has asked to be removed from my recipient list since I refused to preselect for her those entries that confine themselves to “family news” and withhold those that refer to my feelings and experiences about my own life interactions in my setting in Canada. Family news is part of a complex life which I am privileged to live and which I hope entertains you and maybe if I am very lucky might inform and be of use to you. But since everything human is a story and everything that is a story is human I take pleasure in sharing my story with you.

There is a remarkable movie called “Before Tomorrow” which gives a picture of the moment so to speak when Inuit Culture is poised to make first contact with Europeans who bring the first of a thousand curses with them. But what is most eloquent and informative and unique to this film is the discussion relating to stories because these people don’t write, don’t have movies or books but they have the forerunner to all of these which is story in the brain and this story making ability and memory and this way to hold and carry and transfer experience to others, to tell stories is highly valued and terribly important and they actually discuss the status that will accrue to HAVING EXPERIENCES TO TELL AS STORIES. When you get back home think about the stories you will have to tell! To be continued, I have to go to bed.

Today is Guy Fawkes.  When I was a boy we would make up a  “Guy” who was an effigy of the historic Guy who planned to blow up the Houses of Parliament and if this stuffed figure was good enough people would put money in a hat or can when they got off the bus or train.  This would help us to buy fireworks.  And help our self esteem and cement our place in the history of our culture.  For however bad the political structure was,  and however corrupt it was, it was what we had as our fragile wall against true barbarians at the gates, the Nazis, the hate filled racists, the witch hunters, the ideologues and the Inquisition, only our feeble but accountable COMMONS.  I feel the same way now on the eve of the US election.  We don’t have much,  but we have the best we can manage at this time in our history.  We still have to choose, we must vote and we always do have to choose, because despair and indifference is surrender and defeat.

Today driving home from Mindemoya I got to our road and stopped just before a gorgeous white tailed deer decided to cross the road just as i got there.  I slowed down and then stopped as it crossed the road and leapt magically over the four foot fence to the woods on the other side, launching itself like a super ballerina soft as air, no effort and no fuss  but just kinetic perfection.  I was playing SPA music on my Sirius Radio and  having stopped my car and with no traffic in sight i decided on an experiment. I turned up the volume, opened the windows and watched to see if they liked my music.  Well these four deer stayed in place, their big round ears directed to my car and did not move.  So we  sat, I playing my spa music loudly with windows open and they standing like statues with only their ears twitching and looking like they would like to leave but could not.  I had more fun and less conflict I think than if I had tried to kill them.

So why were you in Mindemoya you ask.  Well there is a major tidying up going on here at home and Sarah is helping big time.  The result is the production of many huge bags of clothing that we don’t want and things to be given away. So I was assigned to taking them to the thrift store run by the Women’s shelter in Mindemoya.  Well, while I was there I went to the grocery store and bought some beer called ORGANIC OLD DUCHY ale made in Oxfordshire with barley used in 1905. It is very delicious and made by Wychwood Brewery who make surprising beers like HOBGOBLIN, which you must try. The guy in charge of the liquors section of the store, who has always been wooden and sullen and silent before suddenly came to life on the subject of beer and claimed it was his intention to offer the most varied and diversified collection of beers in Northeastern Ontario. He may well be on his way with a fascinating collection of exotic beers.  I am a supporter. I told him that his collection was the only real distinction his store could claim, as every other store had all the same things. He seemed stunned by this thought so the conversation ended.  So ends this diary day.

So the storm has passed.  It is about 4 pm and the sky is crystal clear, pale hazy blue, no clouds and only a gentle breeze stirring the thin exposed branches of some tall trees.  Then the power goes out.  Total. 2000 customers without hydro. No word of explanation, so this is not even a news event and if we need the press to explain we will have to wait till next Wednesday when the Expositor might just have a word on it.

Fortunately the chopped liver was already made, so this helped us through till 7:30 pm when the power returned.  Chopped liver is made with chicken livers, boiled eggs, cooked onions, garlic and fresh parsley.  I used the last of our parsley and we are drying the rest because it has turned quite cold here and not even parsley would survive.

This parsley began life in the Home Hardware in Gore Bay.  I went in the spring and asked Lonnie if she had any plants for sale.  Lonnie knows more than anyone there even the owner, and she said “no, but wait a minute”  and waddled off to some dark interior place, returning after a couple of minutes with a pot and a very sad looking parsley plant in it.  She said she had tried to grow it in the store but forgot it and it was not in good shape, but it was free to a good home if I wanted to try and restore it.  I took it sceptically and brought it to Brenda whose thumb is much greener than mine and she confidently said she could save it.  So she nurtured this plant and lo and behold, it grew like Jonah’s gourd, and became the best parsley plant I have ever seen, huge,  radiant green, bushy and curly and supplied all our parsley needs for a whole season.  One plant.

So always remember, whatever your humble beginnings, and however you were neglected in your early days it is never too late to find a good home, some skillful love and someone’s faith in you and their caring to bring out the best in you.  And even when you are dried up and put in a pot you can still be useful and well remembered.

The other thing I want to say is also about healing.  According to Natasha Campbell-McBride not only is your gut your second brain, but disease of the gut is guide to your general health.  So we must heal our gut.  Fermented vegs. are an essential healing component of normal diet.  Make it at home.  Delicious, fun and feels great.  Home made Sauerkraut. I always thought I should eat SKraut but never liked it and sate here breaking shelf life records. I love the ones we are making.  Use almost any veggies. Start with cabbage and carrots.  We added green tomatoes.  Natasha says that a vegan diet is good for eliminating sexual feelings, avoiding pregnancy and not having children.  Animal fat and cholesterol are essential for overall health.  Do your own research.  Make home made soup and stock  from beef and bones .

Why would pharmaceutical companies have any interest in ending disease?  Cui Bono all over the place.

The wind is blowing leaves around like tiny ballet dancers in orange costumes. But this was written a week ago. Since this time, Sandy roared through here like a freight train with a single unwavering purpose all night and almost all the leaves are now gone. The trees stand like a forest of bare masts in huge harbour with all their sails down and put away.

Today I made dinner in our new Crock Pot starting this AM and by 7 PM when Sarah and Dayv and the kids arrived it was all done and no frantic last minute preps necessary. Hooray.

But today is also the day when the video was released showing how a troubled adolescent who threw crab apples at a postman was arrested and subjected to the most barbaric torture and violence by the Corrections System until she died and nobody in the system cared. This is the righteous colony that condemns human rights abuses in China and Syria, and a hundred other places but never here. It would be hard to find more monstrous hypocrisy than is practised in Canada. The crimes of corruption and fraud and and white collar crime go unpunished every day but a powerless girl is hounded to death by a blind and ignorant police state filled with sadists who do what they want and go free and unnoticed. Unspeakable corruption in the state apparatus. But being smug and self satisfied and whitewashing the Residential Schools systemic abuse of children seems to be fine with most Canadians. Truth and Reconciliation is a sham when there is no truth.

I am a very angry old man tonight. I am deeply grateful for what I have but furious at the complacency of white, male, churchy Canadians leaping up to yell about crime and punishment as in the very worst of British 19th Century “Justice”. Today my hero is Jonathon Swift and his “A Modest Proposal” directed to English cannibals. They are everywhere. Betholt Brecht said it clearly in the THREE PENNY OPERA: “WHAT MAKES A MAN A MAN? HE LIVES ON OTHERS. HE LIKES TO SKIN THEM FIRST AND EAT THEM WHOLE IF HE CAN. FORGETS THAT THEY’RE SUPPOSED TO BE HIS BROTHERS………………”

I cannot go to bed without saying that today we sent Rachel her chanukah gift by mail to France then strangely enough received in our mail a wonderful postcard that we found tender, caring and thoughtful and made us feel close to her. What a gift a loving grandchild is! I am grateful and delighted.

Halloween is over. I don’t pretend to understand it. I did not grow up with it, so I have no nostalgia for it. Seems to me like bad training for a healthy diet.