Bling and zing

India is known for its gold.  That's all I know.  So when I see mountains of beautiful gold dripping off the ladies, I want it.  I found it in a more delicate form...Mom, you would be proud of my power shop (Sara needed to stop at the ATM, I needed to zip into the jewelery store, Dez needed to pop in her head to inquire "browsing or buying?" to be told that it was "Already bought.")  We are cut from the same sari.

That was on our way to the spice farm.  Top three most  valuable spices?  Saffron, then vanilla, then cardamom.  Got a tour and a feed...and a stop at the spice shop.

 Curry Leaves

Finally, the elephant...Lord Ganesh in person (animal).  See kids, I wasn't making it up!

Nothing like this

"Miss! Miss! Good day. How are you? What's your name? You come look in my shop. Looking is free! Come inside. You like? You want pashmina? Jewelery? Blanket? You don't have one like this. I'll give you a good price. Maybe tomorrow? Promise?"

We are in the midst of maxing and relaxing.  Goa beach could be Mexico beach, Hawaii beach.  Nothing "scary India" about it.  In fact, we have come to realize that travelling in India is a lot easier than anticipated, both logistically and mentally.  Where are the piles of @*it# and rats?  They're there, but not running across our feet or blocking our path.  That would be the cows.  City, village, eating from garbage, strolling the roads or lying on the beach.  Cows abound. 

If anything were to be classified as scary to date, it would have to be our day with our hired driver.  India 500 on narrow roads.  A honk being the only thing separating you from the car around the bend.  Jesus on the dashboard protect us now.  We offer you marigolds.

A few more days of the beach life.  Cooking class had today with the son and wife of our proprieter (day off from being anywhere near a vehicle), tomorrow to the spice farm.

 
Happy Birthday, Dad!  Try cardamom and cashews in your rice pudding the next time around (there's cardamom in my spice cupboard, if you need).

Happy Christmas from India with love

Christmas 2010: India, Maher (meaning mother's womb) orphanage and woman's shelter.  I don't think I've ever said "Happy Christmas" so much on one day.  Or smiled so much (my smile muscles felt frozen into place while the rest of me was melting on the spot.  Heat and love.)  We were treated like royalty, shook hands with everyone (is this why the Queen wears gloves?), given tea and water, cakes and dals.

Witnessed a naming ceremony.  With flowers, candles, passing the baby over and under the crib three times before settling him into it, blessing with the red dye.

Another ceremony was taking place today as we drove through the streets of Pune in our rickshaw.  A funeral procession.  Men walking 8 wide, bearing above their heads the white-wrapped body adorned with flowers.  As Dez said, it was straight out of "A Fine Balance" or "City of Gods".

Swirls and fleur-ls for girls

The window at yesterday's Mocha Bar...chai masala, mango and orange juice and "esoteric conversation" amongst the hipsters. 
 

Yesterday's quest: FabIndia.  Fabrics, fabrics, fabrics.  Our carefully packed bags now include stoles, dupatas, circle skirts, tunics and blouses.  Bring on the heat!

Rickshaw Ride

Rickshaw is the way to get around.  Up to 3 people in the back seat, whipping up a breeze, surrounded by honks.  Long, short, repetitive, a thumb-trigger reaction.  I love how close the other vehicles, bikers and pedestrians get.  People's reaction times seem a lot faster as they weave in and out of lanes.  We got to practice crossing the road today.  Look both ways, edge out...and run.  It's truly survival of the fittest.

We're all safe, sound, sated and tired.  I love butter chicken.  Ripping naan bread with one hand is an interesting task, however.

With love,
meg

ps.  Having a lot of diffiulty uploading video...will try some other time.  I want you to see and hear!

Heart and Eyes of a Child

 "We must infuse our lives with art." - Maya Angelou

Courtesy of my husband, the photographer.

At one of the first art workshops I attended, I heard the following story:

A teacher asks a class of kindergarteners, "Who here is an artist?  Who can draw, who can paint?"  The whole class raised their hands.  The same teacher asked the same questions of a class of Grade 5ers.  "Who here is an artist?  Who can draw, who can paint?"  One or two hands raised into the air.

At some point, and I know it was the same for me, a lot of people get the attitude or impression that they can't draw, they aren't an artist, they aren't creative in an output kind of way.  That attitude stays with them and keeps them from expressing themselves in a "visual" way, definitely from sharing them with others.  I always thought my drawings were clumsy, bent and pinched in the wrong places.  They were nowhere near as good as my sister's, some friends'...

I distinctly remember starting to draw again, doodling in my notebooks, journals, beginning in high school and moving on through university.  I can picture specific images: heart-faced girls, loons and wolves, eyes, trees and swirls.  But what a gap, or a waste, until that time.  I think part of my job as a teacher is to instil the confidence in my students to pick up a pencil, to doodle, draw and share.  Their creations are unique and to be celebrated.  Worthy of display.  Time to regain the assurance and pride of a kindergartener.  

Stick that on your fridge and show it.

"I can paint like a master in quite a short time, but I need to spend my life learning to paint like a child." - Picasso

Self-portrait, Meaghan in the sky

Flying Fall

I think this year, I actually look older in my school picture.  Steve says it's the same (forced) smile, same eyes, same look, year after year.  Just the hair changes.  I think of Deuce and her 1000 different looks, beautiful or apish (this is a loving compliment if you know her cross-eyed monkey face), and think it would be nice to pull off something different.  But that's the thing with formal photographs.  You are expected to look into the camera and smile.  The photographer prompts the kids to say "Slimy Monkey"and then changes it to "Money" or "Payday" for the adults.  Ooh.  I'm smiling now.

I'll include said photos later.  They're at home and I'm in Winnipeg.  It takes a trip away to get me to write a new post.  That's cause fall is flying and we're sort of keeping up.  We've been exchanging emails and house plans with a draftsman in Winnipeg.  There's a December deadline hovering over our heads as draftsman flies south for the winter.  So we're drawing and thinking, looking things up on the Internet, eyeballing every house we pass and learning to stop talking when the other person says "I don't like it." to your heartfelt "I love it."  Go stir the soup, someone will come up with a new idea.

 FYI, this is not what we are doing.  Call it my Cro-Magnon plan.

And as October winds down, I'm thinking about Halloween costumes, report cards and the fact that there is less than 2 months before we fly to India.  There is a paper star made in India, full of swirls and vibrant colours, hanging in my classroom.  It's my reminder that I'll be heading there soon.  I have the urge to henna up my kids one day, but henna is a fairly permanent dye (a week-2).  I don't think our learning experience has to stretch itself that far.  (Parents, breathe a sigh of relief right now.)

In a silly way, I spend a lot of time being excited about packing my new backpack for the trip.  It is small and a sophistiqué grey-green.  I will wear one set of clothes and carry another.  This is a thrilling idea for a girl who chooses her clothing according to her morning moods.  And then has to change due to the morning weather.

Speaking of morning weather, here's a glimpse of the evening sky up here, early October.  Retirement Row is the place to be.

 Steve's Sunset Photo # no-where-near-as-many-as-Judy-has

Be then patient, young grasshopper.  In the quiet, in the dew, in the mixing and swirling of the stew, you will see things you did not realize were possible, you will recognize some answers were in front of you all along.

"When you follow your bliss...doors will open where you would not have thought there would be doors; and where there wouldn't be a door for anyone else." Joseph Campbell 1904-1987

a blessed day

September 5th, September long, it's the new fad.

I'd like to showcase, with some photos, the newest, bestest Me(a)ghan and husband to wed on this blessed day.  And the ones who did it last year.

Meghan and Reid McDonald.

Bagpipe reels as table markers.  Fitting, non?  The face that only mother (and wife) could love, the look that father perfected (I see you, Don).

Dashing, oui?  Parks.  Steve Parks.

And lucky me.  Got to drool over Meghan's self-knit shawl made of lavender seaweed-wool.  She handed it over for me to wear during breakfast as soon as I started exclaiming over it.  Just another talent of the new Mrs. McDonald.

paper the first

This is for the moms.

Well, I guess, this one's really for me.  I love these shoes.

Also, a thought:  Roses have never appealed to me.  Maybe because their perfume is too heady and sophisticated.  These roses were made perfect, though, when they were delivered to our room along with the chocolate truffles and sparkling wine.  Perfect only because we plucked them, a petal at a time, not just to scatter the bed (cliche!  cliche!) in blooms, but to take each petal as a moment to thank the other.  To love each other.  Not x-rated, people, but out loud declarations of what we hold dearest about the other.  "I love that...I love when...I love your...I love you..."

We fell asleep (in the deep, dark hours after the Windsor Hotel's open blues night) on our bed of roses.

Evening stroll, night on the town.

Morning run, the "We love Winnipeg" appreciation route.  Follow the river, cross the bridges, circle Louis (naked and not).

It's been a year!

something new

Recently, one of our friends told us, "When I turned 30, I learned how to ride a bike.  I started trying the things I was always afraid of doing.  If it don't do them now, when will I?"

I could totally relate.  I have a feeling this "Why the hell not?" attitude extends to many.  Maybe you don't have to turn 30, but at some point you want to experience the things you've denied yourself, out of fear, out of apathy.

 

I turned 30.  2 months later, I ran the Opasquayak Indian Days race.  The last time I lined up for that run was 15 years ago.  It was a great run.  Hard and fast.  I may have even run it better than I did at 15.  I spent half the race next to a girl whose name I love (Samantha Caribou).  I did not run it last year, when my sister did.  I don't know if I'd race against her.  Run with her, yeah, but race?  Who knows, maybe my attitude will change when I'm 31.  Or 40.

I turned 30.  One month later, I had my knees up to my chin, feet strapped to a board.  Wakeboarding.  My excitement jittered over my nerves, ruled over the scared.  Darc and Jord laughed, disbelieving, as I cut back and forth over the wake, dipsy-doodling, changing direction.  After that first run, too dumb to know that I did it well, I was hooked.  Two weeks later, I pulled Steve up.  Summer romance blossomed.  Hopefully that loving feeling returns next year.

"I will drink life to the lees/ (...) Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough/ Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades/ For ever and for ever when I move. / How dull it is to pause, to make an end, / To rust unburnished, not to shine in use! / As though to breathe were life. (...) Come my friends, / 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. (...)"                                            -Ulysses, Alfred Lord Tennyson

August Long

Four days later, after hours of cleaning berries, Mom and Dad stand on the dock, a colander and cloth at their feet.  Dad holds the bucket of remaining berries and says "We'll do these the Finnish way."

"With water?" I ask, thinking, "I've done that before, it doesn't work that well."

"No, with wind."  He tips the bucket three feet above the colander and the berries spill out.  As they do, the wind whips away leaves and twigs.  Magic.  One day, I'll try this myself and make it look like I've always done it.

I watch him and Mom from a distance, through the leaves of Mountain Ash and poplar.  It's so windy I can't hear a thing above the steady rush of waves hitting the shore.  I wonder why Dad knows about this "Finnish way"; tricks picked up from his in-laws?  Mom figures it was from his days at camp, out on Wabegischik, when the old Finnish guy would pick and clean his berries at the boat landing.  Dad would watch.  The scene stamped into his memory for a lifetime.  

Blueberry picking became a worthwhile endeavour this year, with Dad's purchase of berry pickers from Lee Valley.  Red boxes with metal tongs comb through the plants, gathering the berries and allowing leaves and twigs to fall between the tines.  This year's harvest:  20 litres in 2.5 hours.  This is a far cry from the meagre amount Jen and I painstakingly gathered last fall.  

The berries are still small, but sweet.  The experience is soul-lifting.  You're crouched in a clearcut (they have their own beauty, I promise), listening to the crunch of your shoes on dried slash, fingertips slowly covered in a thick, purple dye.  The smell and feel of heat hits your nose, your cheeks, at the same time: waves of soil, leaves and wood.  We are 20 kms down the Sherridon road and can still see a smoky haze in the air, a reminder that the forest fires still burn somewhere "near".

After an hour and a half, our backs sore and heads starting to spin, we met back at the truck for a break.  Compared booty (I had more, but picked dirtier), had a beer.  Headed out again, but didn't last as long...we were winding down.

Post-pick, we stopped at a bridge on the way out to the highway.  Wandered downstream in our bathing suits, climbed over rocks, manoeuvred our way into the deeper waters.  Steve did his otter routine, London swam furiously to save him and I dunked and got out of there (unknown waters could harbour leeches).  We lounged like boreal merpeople, stretching our backs and muscles while perched on glacier-moved river boulders.  Dates don't get any better than this.

Long August

"Where's Steve?"

"Under the house."

                                       "Hiiiiiii!"

"He's not coming out 'til he has to."

To fix a foundation, get an opinion.  And another one.  Throw in a different angle, a surprise reveal of information, return to original neighbourhood experts for a new take on the situation.  Let simmer for a couple of months.

Collect jacks of all sizes, meant for all trades.  Bottle jacks, 2 ton hydraulic jack from the trunk of the Datsun (in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit...), jacks to lift the house from a 6 inch slump to a level footing.  Send Steve to wriggle around, army worm style, under the kitchen.  Raise, block, release.  Raise, block, release.

Then dig.  30" wide by 15" deep.  Choose a day where the sun will bake the dirt to your skin, creating a delicious looking mess, and where loose cotton shorts slap against your thighs, heavy with sweat.  It is helpful to have a father or father-in-law who matches or surpasses you, shovel for shovel.  He will call at 8 in the morning and be at your door within the hour.  Remember that you are living the dream, not experiencing Hades, and jump in the lake.

Chain gang.

Build forms, borrow a laser level and get eagle-eyed Laser Girl to holler out orders as she hovers over the bubble of air;  "Up a quarter inch."  Pry with steel bar, block with rock.  "Down an inch."  Pound on stake.  "Again."  Again.  "More."  Again.

Repeat before rebar is placed on chairs, hung from wires.  Even when patience is thin, mosquitos are whining and neighbours keep stopping by to see how things are shaping up.  Remember, you asked for their advice.

Past:  Here be ants.

Present:  Here were ants

Negotiate the pouring date, time and quantity with the local concrete personality.  Diamond information can be found in the rough.  Listen and learn.

Call on friends and favours come pouring day.  Fill the 70s flowered carafe with coffee, pull out the sweets for the sweet teeth, the savoury for the unsavoury.  Put the beer in the fridge.  Your yard will fill with wheelbarrows, the barrows will be filled with sludge.  Pour into forms, tap, stab, push and screed.  Wait.  Trowel.  Wait.  Trowel.

Sign your piece of art, piece of history.  Savour your peace of mind.

Meaghan:  Love lives here.

Steve: House of Love.

The God of Small Things

The joys of home ownership, renos, demos, ohnos.

I neglected to mention that when the office was torn down, one lone piece of roof made a final protest at being removed.  Swung soundly into one of the living room windows.  Voila the result.  Steve only got one gash and, after a couple weeks of looking at poly, installed a window that mom and dad had in their garage, almost a perfect fit.  Good for now.

Turning your attention to the finer, major details of home construction, may I present to you our foundation?  Proudly supporting our house and the wood addiction of local carpenter ants.  We've bought the lumber to begin The Job.  Or One Of the Summer's Jobs.  In Dad's new book of Wisdom, some famous guy says, "I've known this all along: Don't ask the experts."  And so we are going ahead with the installation of beams, replacing of pony walls and pouring of foundation ourselves.  Consult enough of the Snake Island crew and you have all the expertise you need, minus a few beers.

I just have to say that, despite the fact that it causes the collapse of our house, I have always loved the trails made from ants eating wood.  I used to find the logs along the ski chalet hills riddled with passages and think that I had discovered ancient languages, characters of the forest...warriors?  Gods?  Fairies and elves.  Dwellers.  I would decipher them, but I can't tell you what they said.  Then I'd have to kill you.

Portraits of a lady

It's been a while...

Spring brought more excursions for getting wood (Steve), piling and splitting...every time I swing the axe I am very mindful of my shins.  I think of the story of the guy who brought the axe down into his leg.  Local story.  Or rural myth?

Tough.

Stubborn.

My 30th birthday, champagne birthday instructions were to wear a party dress, boys follow suit.  Any excuse to doll up.  And the perfect excuse to wear Annie's fuschia flash, her first runner up for her Enchantment Under the Sea fundraiser social, also an event to celebrate her 30th birthday.  Fitting, non?

Classy.

Silly.

Steve and I have been planning on buying a painting by Laird Goulet.  He is a native painter from Saskatchewan.  His aunt and uncle own Indian Heart Creeations, in Flin Flon.  His paintings are often from a bird's eye view or coming straight at you.  They are swirling, vibrant masterpieces with dots of gold or other colours, so represent the beadwork used in native handicrafts.  Steve recently made a trip to Flin Flon and "found my birthday present".  I tried to feign excitement all the while dreading unwrapping a garden cart from Canadian Tire.  Nothing wrong with a garden cart, and there's a specific one there that is all the rage (n'est-ce pas, Dave and Jord?), but it's my 30th!

Steve's gift came wrapped in a brown paper bag.  Too small for a garden cart.  Inside was this beautiful woman, musher, girl from the north.  I'm in love (with him, with her). 

Beautiful.

Wild.

Time to call it a night.  Need to get London home, hopefully await a phone call that can get the ball rolling on fixing our foundation (there are more and more surprises as we go).  This last photo was kept because it reminded me of A Series of Unfortunate Events.  Good for a giggle-fest every time.  This is the second Jim Carey movie I'm endorsing.

Mysterious.

Ridiculous.

The big bang theory

After a month of jet-setting, it seemed like there was a lack of events to write about.  Where has the month gone?  What have we been doing?

Oh yeah, destruction.  If you're going to clean up, you've first got to make a mess.  If you want to create something grandiose, you better be prepared for the chaos that comes with it. You look at people with their beautiful houses and forget the ugly, dirty months of work that it took to get there.  You see families with their wide-eyed, waving babies and can ignore the fact that a body had to change beyond recognition to get there, sleep had to be lost to maintain.

So here's the plan:

1. Finish the deck on the sauna, laying flooring in the changeroom, painting the outside.  "Small" jobs that will create a safe haven while the house is lifted from its ashes nearby.
2. Finish demolishing the office.  The only spot in the house that we had painted, layed flooring.  My bright, creative space that had frost piling up in the corners during the winter as the draft coming up from the floor whistled into the house.  Steve happily took the sledghammer and reciprocating saw to it yesterday...the "pimple" on our house.
3. Break for lunch.
4. Lift the whole (remaining) house, pour a ribbon foundation under the kitchen and where the future addition will go (clothesline side).  The kitchen is currently sitting on rotting, untreated 2x6.  Ignorance was bliss and made for a happy sales transaction four years ago.
5. Consult those people wiser and more experienced than us to ok our house plans.  We've come to a consensus on many ideas, many drafts of drawings.  Now we need people to make sure we stay realistic.  Fortunately, retirement row and the town of The Pas is full of them.

I leave you with Holmsian wisdom.  "Make it right."
ps.  Steve's arm muscles keep getting bigger.

Moab Mecca

Wind-swept, water-beaten, these rocks are shapeshifting sandstone wonders.  I have stealthily filled (Steve's) pockets with tiny red stone shards.  Not in hopes of death by drowning.  Instead, as samples for my kids and Mireille (beautiful friend and rocks and minerals coveter).

We scrambled up a couple trails in Utah's Arches National Park today, hopping from solid footing to solid footing, digging the tips of our fingers into crevices to help pull ourselves up.  And taking photos.  Many, many, many photos.  The digital camera is a blessing and a curse.  Fast, easy, convenience.  Too fast, too easy, too much.  I found myself wanting to go through my photos and tackle the task of deleting some at the Moab Brewery after dinner.  Not exactly food for conversation.  I refrained.

Some sights we saw:  the Devil's Gardens, which I would call the Devil's Playground.  Too much fun.  The courthouse with its trio of judicial looking towering columns.  The Delicate Arch, where we were assaulted by a very less than delicate wind (parents, hold tight to your children, waifs beware).

We are exhausted.  And off again tomorrow.

Morning Meditation

 

My morning walks are energy-renewers and sanity-keepers.  If the sky is clear, they often take me to Hugo's Bay, site of morning sunrises, evening sunsets, inspired kisses and official proposals.  The silence, the light, the cold air and the sight of vast expanses of water or snow fill my eyes, my ears, my lungs and satisfy, well, my soul.  

London the wonderdog is my constant companion.  If our schedules coincide, Steve and I will go out together.  It is a routine: morning walk after London eats, evening walk after London eats.  As if the walk is more important for London than it is for us.  Morning walk before Meaghan runs around with a class of 24 kids, evening walk after Meaghan has run around with a class of 24 kids.

I've been thinking a lot about meditation and the ability to have a peaceful mind and spirit even when everything else is hectic and chaotic.  I've had lots of good talks, emails and reads about this.  I like that meditation is not solely done with legs crossed, palms turned up.  It can take many forms, such as during my morning walks:  being aware of the layers of light from the sunrise casting tints and shades across ice and trees, listening to my boots crunching the snow and then the surprising sound of my own voice as I start a conversation with the dog that has just cut me off at the knees as he streaks down the path.  

Amen.

Smile, it's your birthday!

Steven, it's your birthday

We're going to party like it's your birthday

Twirl spaghetti like it's your birthday

Eat some cheesecake and rhubarb cause it's your birthday!

This was last night's desert, provided by Tamsin and Kurt.  Decorating skills honed in front of the televison.  Tonight we'll be dining on Steve's favourites.  Cheesecake has been his birthday desert of choice for as long as he can remember.  His mom used to make it for him and now, once a year, I do it, too.  We set the alarm for 6 a.m. so that I could whip it up.  (Sleep must be sacrificed when you're celebrating a new year...)  Steve will be making the spaghetti sauce and meatballs in our new crockpot (won at our curling windup).  If you want something done, sometimes you've got to do it yourself...even if you're the bouncing birthday boy!

Texan Vietnamese Tra-la-la

It's amazing where you can get after 27 hours in a car.  Texas.  No cactus.  Surprisingly like Portage la Prairie.  The landscape rolling by was hilly fields protected by buffers of trees along the highway.  Hills and bluffs in the Iowa distance made me think of Where the Red Fern Grows...a perfect place for exploring and adventures whether you're young, old or canine.  Watch out for cougars.  And the golden arches. 

The roadtrip gang, 5 determined friends, was off to be with Andrew and Mai at their wedding.  Did it ever pay off.  The ceremonies were largely held in Vietnamese, the food and culture was as far from North American as possible (minus the Corona at the tea ceremony, thanks Nu!), but some things are universal and are not subject to language barriers.  Do you?  I do.  Rings exchanged, tea drank in communion, an uncle wishing many babies with a pregnant gesture.  I understand it all.

I felt much more than a simple witness to it all.  We were given corsages!  (I felt special immediately.)  Andrew's kilted Scottish cousins led the parade to Mai's family home bearing a pig, followed by the rest of his family and us, his friends, carrying domed trays covered in red embroidered and sparkling velvet; gifts of frankincense and mirh, or ladyfingers and Irish Cream.

The bride was beautiful, both in her traditional vietnamese wedding outfit or the well-known white wedding dress.  A sight well worth the trip.  So cheers to texan vietnamese tra-la-las, to cross-continental adventures, overloaded senses and emotions, safe drivers, good friends and New York unions made in love, in Texas.