Guelph Jazz Festival

Wow! I'd forgotten how wonderful live music is, especially when it is free, under the stars and in community. I almost stayed home, despite the nearly full moon and perfect clarity of a September evening. We went to the Free Tent on Wyndham Street, and happened upon Mike Essoudry's Mash Potato Mashers a most marvelous conglomeration of brass instruments and percussion, combining New Orleans, Klesmer and Jazz - ending by parading off the stage, down the aisle and out of the tent while playing. Joyful. I drank in the delight this spectacle with a motley group; babes in arms through to grannies bounced and smiled to the happy beat.

It took awhile for the next group to set up, but it was well worth waiting for
Rebel Rhythm with Jane Bunnett & Larry Cramer - an irresistable Latin sound that got me and most of the tent up and dancing. I am sore, but full, replete, satisfied, happier than when I started out. And isn't that why we need the arts? To pull us out of ourselves and connect us with the larger body of humanity. This is good food for the soul.

Obama - a year and some later

Well, he certainly is in a wasp's nest! All those testy Republicans bound and determined to bring him down. I don't really understand their arrogance - how can they possibly imagine that the American population will be fooled for long by their partisan politics? Eventually, their voter base will get fed up with their petulance and punish them like the spoiled children they are impersonating.

A sad result of the Republican Party's virulence is that it will probably force Obama to ditch the bipartisan approach he had hoped to take. How many times does the door have to slam in your face before you stop opening it?

I am very happy for my friends and relatives still living in America that they now have at least some semblance of universal medicare. It's only civilized. I can only hope, for the sake of the poor and sick, that the bid made by certain state governors to reject Medicare will fail.

We do live in interesting times...

Ambivalence, Chinese New Year and my new Job

Well, that about says it all today for me on this planet earth, new Chinese year that it is. Year of the Ox, or so I've been told. I'm a Boar, or so I've been told by many who know me well. But I don't follow that sort of thing, perhaps for obvious reasons. My self esteem can only handle so much abuse - between being catalogued as either a crab or a boar, or if you follow both systems, a crab AND a boar, what else is left to me but to turn my back on the whole thing and look elsewhere for my identity.

Well, that isn't the ONLY reason I became a Christian. In fact, it really wasn't the reason at all. Not that that's what I'm blogging about here. Just an aside.

Actually, I'm not really sure what I want to write about, hence the title. I was hoping to entertain the few who follow my ramblings with some amusing chatter about this and that. I've just started a new job - cool, eh? In these bleak economic times, a job is nothing to sniff at. However, I've been so used to minding my own business, being retired / unemployed / self-employed, that minding someone else's might prove challenging.

Still, I'm thrilled that I can contribute to an organization whose focus is on sustainable housing. It is interesting that, after I lost my last "job" (or rather had it whipped unceremoniously out from under me by my boss - some how "lost" is too tepid a way to describe the event) two years ago, my oldest child ordered me to create a Personal Mission Statement, in no uncertain terms.

It took me about six months to do so, and, although I've stored the working copies in an all-too-safe location, I do remember the gist of it - to contribute my skills and experience to an organization committed to improving the environment. For a year I searched for just such a job, volunteering for several local "green" groups to build some credibility in the community and involving myself with vermicomposting as a local representative for The Worm Factory.

The result of all this activity was the discovery that what I really wanted to do was write! So, I am busily pursuing a career as a freelance writer with the support of a small business course and grant from our wonderful provincial government. However, daughter number two sat me down and, as gently as possible, informed me that freelance writing would likely NOT generate enough cash to support a goldfish. She spoke from the experience of freelance writer friends who regularly contributed to such bastions of North American jornalism as The New York Times.

As expert as I am at denial, even I could not avoid an impending sense of insolvancy. So, when one of the many organizations I had applied to before I knew I wanted to write, invited me to apply for a job, I did so. Lo and behold, they actually offered me the job! It is half time, so will fit marvelously well into my scheme to be a writer! Or so I imagine.

I will have to exercise my emerging boundary setting skills to make sure it doesn't become a 3/4 or full time job due to the organization's need and my commitment to their objectives.

Since I am at heart a snappish, lazy, cowardly slob (see first paragraph above), this will prove a challenge.

Obama

For the first time in my life I feel proud of America. I am a dual citizen of Canada and the USA. I voted for Obama. I feel deeply moved by the ascension of this man to the highest position in the world. Four years ago, a story about a man named Barack Husein Obama becoming the president of the United States of America, would have been published in a science fiction magazine not the world press.

Today, I see a joyful man stepping into a wasps' nest of trouble, rolling up his sleeves and beckoning the rest of us to come and give him a hand, promising hard times, hard work and hard-earned self respect. The funny thing is, thousands, no millions, are lining up to join him!

Today, I see a nation, roused from it's slumber of cynicism and fear, energized with a new belief in the ability to impact and change things for the better.

Today, I see a world, watching and hopeful, waiting to see if this man really will restore America's reputation on the international stage, really will lead America to be a force for good in the earth.

Today, I see myself, overcome with emotion and something strange to me - hope and optimism. Not a foolish hope either, not an "oh, I really hope so" sort of hope that really is closer to despair and last ditch efforts than it is to true hopefulness. Oddly, this newcomer to my heart is neither blindly trusting nor worshipful of the man in front. It simply believes that he can do the job. Maybe not perfectly, but with humility and grace and the ability to engage the help of others.

Early on in the race to the presidency, I chose to support Obama, not because he was a black man, nor later because he was a Democrat, but because I saw in him, during the debates, a man full of grace for his opponents who refused to respond in kind to personal attacks, who stood firmly on his convictions, who relied on the support of "everyman", who entrusted his campaign to the "little people" - the local workers.

Character is exposed in times of stress, and Obama's character held up throughout. We all know to play our best card in public, but to do so under attack is impossible without slip ups revealing our darker sides. Obama passed muster - he did not falter, his character came through loudly, clearly and consistently. This is why, I have confidence in him.

So, Obama, I trust you to get the job done, and I will be praying for you, your family and your administration. Hail to the Chief!

Twitter and Photos

Seems I am snowballing into communicating via the internet as I have just finished signing up for Twitter and have posted photos from my new digital camera.

Twitter is an instant internet chat option where you constantly update what you are doing so any "followers" you might have can instantly know all about you. Likewise, you can instantly know about them by "following" them, should you wish. Smacks of information overload to me, but then my brain is on the down side of the bell curve for capacity and speed. Still, I'm a sucker for saying yes when invited and curiosity often gets the best of me. Apparently, you can gain quite a following for whatever you want to promote, whether it is yourself, or some service, product or idea. As I am planning to make a living out of my writing, this could be good avenue for promotions - though I'm not sure how as yet.

Re: the photos - daughter number two gifted me with a digital camera which I am tentatively exploring, rather like I did my first child when she was a newborn. I remember bringing her home from the hospital (home births were not yet de rigeuer in the birthing world) in the dead of winter. Her father and I set her down carefully on the kitchen table - an alert little face watched us out of a seriously padded winter bunting bag. We looked at each other with an excitement made up of equal parts trepidation and anticipation. I think it didn't dawn on us until that moment the enormity of what we had done together by bringing a new little person into the world, or the impact she would have on our lives.

As I said, owning this digital camera feels a little bit the same. I am cautious - a little afraid that I might somehow break it, intimidated by its potential and aware of my complete lack of knowledge. New technologies, new gadgets, new machines all create stress for me - a good stress no doubt as they cause me to grow - but I find I have to gird my loins so to speak to plunge in and explore. Also, I realize I do not like reading the instructions and use them only to figure out how to turn it on, and what the buttons do. Then I play with the thing until I hit a brick wall, at which point I resort to checking the instructions.

So, today I played with my camera, taking photos of a squirrel maurading the bird feeder. I think of the bit I just heard on the radio about chic restaurants serving squirrel as the new fashion meat and wonder if I could maybe make a bit of extra cash off of the now very plump on bird seed rodents I see through the view finder:

PING!

Just finished reading a newsletter from Vision Ministries Canada. No, not for any noble purpose, but only out of self-interest - to see the small article I'd written for them in print...that does give me a warm inner glow. Along with the glow came that little "ping" when two seemingly disparate ideas collide in what goes for my brain. What better thing to do with a ping than write about it in my blog (both are four letter words after all, like love and luck and lose, among others).

Colliding idea # 1: Last night I was hanging out with some people I know - they were sharing encouragement and stories about this and that. One involved a couple who were trying to sell their house. A potential buyer's Realtor was trying to get them to lower their price by citing the poor economy to which the husband replied, "I do not belong to this economy! I belong to God's economy and that doesn't change!" The result was that the buyer accepted their price! Hmm, very interesting I thought to myself and filed it in my "back burner" folder - you know the one with all those intriguing tidbits you don't really know how to categorize and haven't really made up your mind about.

Fast forward to me reading VMC's newsletter: First the glow - ummm, nice, yes, thank you...Then, idle curiosity prompts a quick scan of the other articles (http://www.vision-ministries.org/media/NEWSLETTER_DEC.08.pdf). Oh, one challenging people to give a portion of their Christmas spending towards solving the world's clean water issue. Hmm...PING!

When the writer used the word, "opulence", I was reminded of Old Testament prophets who warned about the consequences of letting the orphans starve and disenfranchising the widows. Consequences that included loss of property, enslavement, and forced emigration. This judgment was meted out to a nation by a God who tired of the greed and injustice of those who should have known better because they had clear instructions about how to treat each other and the weak. Western civilization, based on Judeo-Christian principles, knows better. Yet most of the world's peoples barely eke out a living, often under the threat of war and the oppression of multinational corporations, while the kings of western civilization, live in relative opulence, 20% of the world's population using 80% of the world's resources. Based on the tenet, "might makes right", we even feel entitled to rape and pillage our "mother" earth in the process. How long can this inequity last without judgment? Or, if you are a materialist, how long can the earth's natural systems endure this imbalance.

If this is indeed the case, then we Westerners need to do more than think about selling our stocks and bonds or pulling back on our spending, we need to think about doing things in an entirely different way. We need to repent. To change direction. To spend our time, money and intelligence, not on the idle pleasures of the wealthy, but on finding ways to redistribute the wealth, to share the opulence, to live more modestly and generously upon the breast of the mother God created to nurture and keep us.

As I complete this blog, I realize that Margaret Atwood in "Payback" (http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/nov/02/payback-margaret-atwood)
has said much the same thing, and in a far more erudite way, as I am sure, have others.

Crumbs

Just thought I'd riff on the word "Crumbs" for a change.

Crumbs - small pieces of stuff, often edible, like the crumbs Hansel and Gretel dropped behind them hoping to be able to find their way home after their stepmother sent them off to pick berries in a fit of pique because they knocked over a jub of milk while dancing. Not too bright since the birds ate them up. Also, if they were starving, where did the crumbs come from? I actually, kind of understand where the step mother was coming from - how many times have I raged at my own children for just such indiscretions? Thankfully the consequences were a lot less harsh in my case.

Fairy tales can teach us a lot about the human psyche as well as being cautionary tales. A modern rendition of H & G could be that the harshness of their stepmother towards them made them feel rejected and drove them from the home at a too early age, leaving them vulnerable to pimps and drug dealers, not quite witches, but destructive and predatory nonetheless. Ok, Ok, being turned into drug addicts and prostitutes isn't quite the same as being turned into gingerbread men, but you must admit, all will eventually be consumed. Also, being an addict means yielding up your will to dependency on an innanimate object which sucks the humanity right out of you and you end up walking around like a soulless ghost of a person or a gingerbread man. Sort of.

As a youth, many, many, many, many years ago, we used to use "Crumbs" or "Crumbo" or "Crumb" as a second rate expletive. Also, in the same vein, "crumby", has the meaning of being cheap or poorly made or worthless. I wonder if that is because it might disintegrate into crumbs shortly after purchase thereby proving its lack of quality. Hmm???

Then there's the use of "crumbs" to signify an amount of a gift or raise that is far below what we think we deserve and verges on being an insult. As in, "that !@#@$# gave me mere crumbs - I'm tempted to throw all it back in his face!"

I actually value crumbs, if they are not in my bed, because I feed them to the birds. Or try to feed them to the birds. The squirrels often whip in before the birds even notice them and snatch them up in their greedy little gobs.

Well, this is all pretty uninspired, perhaps not even worth posting, but I'll probably go ahead and post it anyway.

No silent nights for me

Home again, home again jiggety-jig. Or so the nursery rhyme goes. I was wondering why I felt so unmotivated to clear out the Christmas clutter after returning from my trip south of the border to visit relatives. The lights went on after I'd finished relating my activities pre / post Christmas to a friend. Three days with daughter number one, her partner, half brother, neighbor and grandchildren five; four days with sisters and their families - ten persons including moi and daughter number two; one day hosting Christmas dinner for ten - separated husband, daughter number two, sons one and two, one friend, and four sundry relatives. Four days traveling roughly 4500 kilometers. I feel like I should have my own version of the twelve days of Christmas.

While I absolutely adore my family members, interacting with 28 different people with whom I have intimate relationships over a twelve day period is rather intense. Considering that two of those people also were felled with mystery illnesses during my visit south added an anxiety level not experienced since the year my oldest son brought a virulent 48 hour intestinal flu to which all twenty visitors at my sister's house succumbed. It proved an interesting experiment in epidemiology as the last to get sick had a much weaker version of the illness than those of us who had had it first. Of course, they didn't get off easy since they had to nurse us all as one by one we fell to the dread disease. I remember two things in vivid detail: my brother in law intoning "bring out your dead, bring out your dead" as he went from room to room carrying ginger ale to the suffering and the panicky feeling that I might not get to one of the two bathrooms in time. It was a bonding experience we all remember almost fondly.

I have a personality quirk that makes overcoming difficult or humiliating circumstances among my favourite stories to tell. This year was no different. The trip south started auspiciously enough. Daughter number two and I were well provided with treats and amusements to last the eight to ten hours we expected the trip to last. We did not however expect to be parked on the 401 highway for two hours while a tractor trailer cab fitfully burned out a few kilometers ahead of us. Minutes before we slowed, then crawled, then stopped, I had started to look for service centres as I needed to pee. At first I tried to wait it out, but after the first emergency vehicles sirened their way along the shoulder, I figured I'd better look for alternatives and made a visual recognizance of the available spots.

Despite the fact that the only cover was 60 meters away, down a ditch through thigh deep snow, up the opposite side, and over a barbed wire fence, I decided I couldn't stand it any longer and made a break for it. After a first attempt in which I floundered in thigh deep snow, I figured that by stomping on the snow I could pack it down enough so that it would support my weight. It took me, oh, about 30 minutes to make a path to the fence. Meanwhile, my daughter, who had sunk as deeply as she could out of sight in the passenger seat, observed that my activities had attracted the notice of many of our fellow stranded travelers, luring them out of their vehicles to watch my slow but steady progress with curiosity. When I climbed the fence and disappeared into the bush, they all seemed to at last understand the reason behind my bizarre behaviour. I had actually expected that others would use my path to relief after I returned, but no one, to my disappointment, did.

Although an over zealous guilty conscience kicks in whenever I'm faced with uniformed people, crossing the border is normally not a problem. However, minutes before hitting the border we realized that my daughter and I were traveling on passports from different countries. The guard might pull us aside to extract an explanation causing unwanted further delays. So my daughter, the world traveler, admonished me: "What ever you do, don't tell them we are related or that we have food". Of course the very first questions the guard asks me are, "what is your relationship?" and "do you have any food items?". Unable to lie, without adequate preparation, I blurted out, "She's my daughter" and "Yes, we brought a lunch". Despite these faux pas, either the Force was with us or profiling worked to my advantage once again, because the guard waved us through without further ado. If I were so inclined, I could make a lucrative income smuggling since most border guards are willing to suspend suspicion for we middle aged women.

The rest of that trip was uneventful weather wise, except for the last two hours during which we had to travel through dense fog, feeling joyful deliverance when visibility rose to 50% - most of the time it hovered between 5 - 10%. Once we emerged from the fog, my daughter who had driven through it collapsed, exhausted, and I drove the last fifteen minutes. A wonderful welcome awaited us - my sister had prepared h'or d'oeuvres and Jambalaya for us. We feasted on great food, wonderful company and agonized with my other sister over her dreadfully ill son, who, as it turned out had an abscessed tonsil (!). Before we left another nephew became violently ill with what turned out to be appendicitis, requiring immediate surgery. Was it something I said?

All's well that ends well, and both young men are on the road to recovery. My second daughter made it back to Berlin in one piece, and I am safely back home in Canada. So ends my twelve days of Christmas and so begins the look forward into a new year.

Christmas adventures

Well, here we are on the cusp of Christmas. I have not posted since last Wednesday because I was out of town, visiting family - my daughter and her family. The threat of a snow storm meant I had to return 12 hours before intended, but not too soon to experience the joys and excitements of living in the country. Prior excitements at the farm included a new born calf that refused to suckle, slaughtering a cow, and building a chicken coop. All of them rather tame in comparison to this trip's entertainment.

My son and law and grandson, eager to get home after a harrowing drive through a snow storm, mistook the culvert's open area between two snow banks for his driveway, and, before his son could warn him drove his car part way into the only open water in kilometers. Both exited the vehicle in a prompt manner while the nose of the car sunk into the swamp water, car bottom resting on the culvert. car rear hiked up indecently at a 45 degree angle.

It is amazing how the creative juices flow when the threat of humiliation looms. When the tow truck refused to come due to weather conditions, my son-in-law realized that, unless he took matters into his own hands, the car would likely freeze into the swamp and be there 'till spring. Not only would they lose the use of the car, but, more significantly, he would be the laughing stock of the county. So, armed with a tipsy neighbour and said neighbour's truck he attacked the problem, only to have the neighbour's truck end up in a ditch (not the swamp). Undaunted, he hauled out a sort of winch thingame, called a "come along" (??? a dubious name at best), which, he used to drag the truck out of the ditch using only human muscle power.

Miraculously, they pulled the car out of the swamp using the truck and the "come along", then pushed the car down the road, entering via the correct driveway, and finally coming to rest in the workshop where it is currently being thawed and dried out.

Hesitant to risk such mistakes myself, being hideously unequiped (no "come along" in the trunk), I decided once the storm abated and before the next one descended, to high tail it back to the relative safety and placidity of the city so I could relate this tale to my faithful readers, all 1.734 of them.

Paper - Use and Reuse

Paper has invaded my thinking today. From starting the fire with newspaper to reading a blog on which books ended up in the discount bin (Everything Must Go) there was some kernel of meaning in it all. The transitory nature of material things? Multiple uses of newspaper?

"Not worth the paper it's printed on!" How many times have I read that comment? Now that we are facing a global environmental crisis, we might need to take that paradigm a little more to heart. Trees may well become a rarer commodity than wise or clever sayings and we will be admonished to save our valuable paper for only the noblest, best written, most important ideas, information and stories. All other words to be disseminated by the internet.

Until this takes place, we will still be innundated with paper - newspaper and its inserts - what to do with it once it has been read? Nothing is older than yesterday's news, or sales, for that matter. Once read, can we afford to just toss it out? Of course it is being recycled in increasing amounts by many communities, for the rest of us, here are some other uses for it:

• Gardening: newspaper makes great mulch. My neighbour who sports a magnificent garden uses it to kill grass, reclaiming lawn space for more engaging plant life than grass. Several layers (10?) of newsprint placed over your lawn will effectively kill the grass beneath.
• Composting: If you vermicompost, as I do, the worms need a constant supply of bedding materials, that they also digest. Shredded newspaper (black inks, preferably vegetable, are better for them, the coloured inks have more poisonous chemicals) is well tolerated by the voracious red wigglers that eat my garbage.
• Starting fires: I have discovered an effective fire starter using bunched up newspaper and paper bags. Ever since I started insisting that all my packaging be paper, rather than plastic, I have accumulated LOTS of paper bags. I use them (after removing the glued strip) to drain bacon on, to spread butter in pans for cooking and for wrapping packages to send through the mail. To start a fire, I put several bunched up pieces of newspaper into the bag and then put kindling on top of one or two bags. The bag keeps the paper close enough together to generate a focused heat and ignites the kindling quite nicely.

I know, I know, I probably shouldn't be burning wood. Although it is a sustainable resource, if logged appropriately. I do buy my wood from a "green" logger. Still there is the environmental cost with the carbon dioxide that gets thrown into the atmosphere when I burn it. My carbon footprint is not zero, but I am trying to do what I can to reduce unneeded waste. Not perfect yet, by any means, but working at improving.

Ms Fixit

Well, I finally have dealt with the dripping faucet and the burnt electrical plug on the vacuum cleaner.

I no longer have to shrivel up with guilt every time I go to the bathroom and hear potable water drip, drip, dripping away, forever lost to the thirsty of the world. I belong to several environmental organizations, including Wellington Water Watchers. Although I did do a lot of water watching while pondering the hows, whys and wherefores of my dripping faucet, that's not quite what they had in mind. While my water was pointlessly vacating the aquafer beneath us, Nestle was (and still is) avidly bottling up this same water to sell back to us a few kilometers down the road. While I do not agree with this practice, at least they weren't just wasting it!

Actually, it's not quite true that I "fixed" the faucet. I did try, but was unable to figure out how to replace the washer, basically because I couldn't get to the washer. So, instead I did what I should've done in the first place - turned off the valve underneath the sink. No hot water in the bathroom sink, but I don't mind brushing my teeth in cold water. Really, it couldn't have been easier.

Fixing the vacuum cleaner plug was more time consuming, but pretty straight forward. I bought a new plug at the hardware store, cut off the burnt ends of the wire, sliced away the insulating plastic cover exposing the copper wire(s). Then I had to carefully twist one wire around one screw and the other around the other screw, making sure there was no contact between them. And, you know what? It worked. I finishd vacuuming the living room. Although I could think of more exciting ways to reward myself for the exchange.

This was hardly an inspired blog - sorry to all one of you out there that may or may not be reading this.

The Way of Failure

For most of my life I have run away from any and all awareness of personal failure. At times this has included burning bridges, that is, turning my back on the people and projects that were the context for my failures.

As I have aged, this has become more difficult to do. Many of my failures have been as a parent and even I am not prepared to leave relationships with my grown children to avoid facing up to the ways I have injured them.

Seeing the hardships my failures have caused my children is exquisitely painful and the tempation is there continually to shrink away from the spotlight of truth. Holidays seem to be a good time for stirring up these issues.

So, I found myself this morning, cowering under the weight of all this - a weight, as I have said before, I often want to run away from. Of late I have adopted the practice each morning of asking Jesus to be "yoked" with Him. I imagine Jesus and I being harnessed together, and this morning I realized that the weight of my failure was something that Jesus was willing to help me bear. Of course, if I chose not to bear it by not acknowledging it, then Jesus would not help me carry it.

I felt God informing me that my failures were not excluded from the "things" in "God works all things together for good" and that owning them before God demonstrated my love and trust of God and thereby freed Him up to work even my failures out for good in the lives of those I have injured. This seemed too good to be true! Much of the gospel is - it isn't called the "good news" for nothing.

Further, I wondered if, from God's perspective, our failures are really any different than our successes. Although we feel much better about our successes in life, it is often our failures that being us closer to God, more dependent on God's grace and mercy. Is this maybe what Paul meant when he said, "when I am weak, then I am strong"?

So, while I do not welcome failure, I am called not to fear it. This should make me able to risk hoping for the future. As well, when I do fail, as is inevitable, I must walk through my failures, in fact, there is no other way around them.

The dog, the car and the Logos

Today I woke up before the crack of dawn in a state of anxiety. Besides the usual Christmas crazies yesterday brought a new set of complexities (aka troubles) into my life. The dog and the car.

My elderly mutt, Hobbes, is a long suffering fellow and had been clicking around the house on the canine equivalent of stiletto heels. Yesterday, as a pre-Christmas gift to the old fella, I took him in to the vet to have his toenails clipped. "Oh, and by the way," says I to the vet, "what is that swelling just under his eye?"

No, thankfully, it was not cancer, just a broken tooth and infected bone, requiring dental surgery, "Let me give you a quote on that," says he. Which is how I discover that Hobbes' mouth will cost more than all the Christmas presents and the turkey with the trimmings combined. "OK," says I, "can I get back to you on that?"

Try as I might, I cannot think of an alternative to immediate oral surgery for Hobbes, so, I will call the vet today to book it and worry about the cost later (me and the auto industry, eh? I'd ask the government for a bail-out, but...there really is no Santa Claus - for individuals at least)

Later on, after a busy day of entertaining and decorating, I decided to attend a Christmas drop-in hosted by some friends - that ought to cheer me up! Lo and behold my car protested loudly when I tried to leave later that night - screeching like a banshee it appeared that the parking brake on the right hand side would not release. The car mechanic is not open on Saturdays, so I will have to wait until Monday to find out how much it will cost to repair. Our host drove me home.

Finally, cozy in my bed, I tried to complete my nightly routine of writing up the day in my journal - oops, my glasses, yep, you guessed it - left on the dashboard of the car...hmm - thankfully, I have a few out-dated spares kicking around the house - one of those rare times I can pat myself on the back for being a pack rat.

So, no wonder I'm feeling a little pressed this morning - although, as I review my list of woes, I realize that I am truly blessed that they are so relatively benign - no foreclosures, no earthquakes, no dislocations due to war, no famine.

Still, wussy North American that I am, they do drag me down. As is my habit, I pray in the morning, "casting my cares upon the Lord" so God gets an earful of my angst. Generally I read the Psalms while breakfasting, and found this in Psalm 138: 7-8 "Though I walk in the midst of trouble, thou wilt revive me; Thou wilt stretch forth thy hand against the wrath of mine enemies, And thy right hand will save me. Jehovah will perfect that which concerneth me: Thy lovingkindness, O Jehovah, endureth for ever; Forsake not the works of thine own hands." I put down my spoon and suddenly notice the poinsetta on my kitchen table - the colours of the leaves and petals are so richly nuanced!

I believe that this is one of God's daily miracles - that those words were specifically meant for me. Somehow in the eternal now the Logos of God, in love, aimed those words at me, to be read on this morning, to speak to these circumstances. And I am encouraged. If God cares for me and my foolish little woes, how much more must He care for those with greater woes. I pray that God will meet those who are suffering in the midst of their greater woes with love and hope.

Green Christmas Caroling

As Christmas approaches and the dread spirit begins to haunt my steps, I look around for ways to bless my family, enjoy my friends and honour the humble, meek and lowly Jesus without damaging the environment or my diminishing income.

"Those who bless the poor will themselves find blessing" (Good King Winceslas): Organizations like World Vision and Heifer International offer ways to purchase gifts for third world families such as a flock of chickens or an agricultural package including tools and seed. Donations to local food banks or the Salvation Army will help support those who have less in your area.

"Let earth receive her king" (Joy to the World): Bless the earth by buying a living Christmas tree that you could plant after a couple of years. Or an artificial tree. I'm trying something new this year - I bought an upside down cone about three feet high which I plan to decorate with cedar and pine boughs that I will harvest from the trees in my yard.

The spirit of the season and how to avoid it

No political commentary today, no, not even any environmental concerns. No, today I want to talk about the "spirit of the season". And by that, I do not mean Jesus, the Holy Spirit, the angel Gabriel or Santa Claus. What I mean is that oppressive sense of panic descending on or around the first of December, crushing the very "warm coziness" it dangles in front of us to lure us into its vortex of buy, buy, buy and busy, busy, busy. Then, if we can't afford to buy, buy, buy or have no one to be busy, busy, busy with or when the actual day does not deliver on the promised "magic" of warmth / family / intimacy we are heaped with such a sense of loss that many despair. Social agencies and emergency hot lines beef up their services over Christmas and New Years to try to avert the human tragedies brought on by this same spirit - self-destructive behaviours that trip over into suicide.



Isn't this always the way? The dark trying to co-opt the light, trying to blight the generosity and genuine good will shown by so many during this time of year. Trying to draw attention away from the dirty stable where Jesus' was born - redolent with animal smells and the worship of shepherds. Instead, we get stuck in Herod's palace with the cloying sweetness of expensive perfumes and an inordinate drive to "get what is mine". What else could have been driving those hordes of people in the USA who broke through the doors of a Walmart and trampled an employee to death. Yes, the ads put out by WalMart pumped people up with expectations of yet more Christmas goodies for an even cheaper price. But why did that advertising work?

Well, I am trying to lay low myself. Malls do it for me - that is, once I am in one, all reserve and self-control go out the window. Oh, wait, I forgot, there aren't any windows in a mall - just like there aren't any clocks or any logical layout of the stores...I figure they are designed that way intentionally - it is to the vendors' advantage that you lose your way and your sense of time and any awareness that a reality outside of the mall exists.

Lest I sound like Scrooge - I do love Christmas and all the trappings. Its just that I find it so easy to get focused on the trappings and forget the content. Some ways around that are to focus on the poor, on making your own gifts, on spending time (instead of money) with those you love and on look for ways to be kind and civil to others as you trudge through the pitfalls and blessings of this season.

Towards Sustainable Future, circa 1972

Tired of doom and gloom? Well, who isn't. Want an outline of what can be done? Of course you do. Thirty-six years ago A Blueprint for Survival was published 1972 in "The Ecologist", then later in book form by Penguin. Written by Edward Goldsmith, editor of "The Ecologist" and Robert Allen, it paints a predicament, not unlike the one we face now, and, more importantly, proposes a strategy to deal with it. I loved it when I first read it, so I did what I always do with great books - insist that my friends read them, hence, my library suffers - Thank God for the internet! For I have now rediscovered this marvelous little text, conveniently archived!

To give you a flavour of the book itself, and perhaps tempt you to read it for yourselves here is the first paragraph from the introduction:

The principal defect of the industrial way of life with its ethos of expansion is that it is not sustainable. Its termination within the lifetime of someone born today is inevitable-unless it continues to be sustained for a while longer by an entrenched minority at the cost of imposing great suffering on the rest of mankind. We can be certain, however, that sooner or later it will end (only the precise time and circumstances are in doubt), and that it will do so in one of two ways: either against our will, in a succession of famines, epidemics, social crises and wars; or because we want it to-because we wish to create a society which will not impose hardship and cruelty upon our children-in a succession of thoughtful, humane and measured changes. We believe that a growing number of people are aware of this choice, and are more interested in our proposals for creating a sustainable society than in yet another recitation of the reasons why this should be done. We will therefore consider these reasons only briefly, reserving a fuller analysis for the four appendices which follow the Blueprint proper.

This book, written over thirty years ago, raised an alarm that has largely been ignored. Within its first pages is a likely reason why - the demand for environmental resources grows exponentially but, by the time it is actually noticed, it may be too late to change. They quote a Professor Forrestor who says,

"Exponential growth is treacherous and misleading. A system variable can continue through many doubling intervals without seeming to reach significant size. But then in one or two more doubling periods, still following the same law of exponential growth, it suddenly seems to become overwhelming."

Let's hope that it isn't too late for us to turn the tide, and perhaps this little book will provide some answers as to how it can be done.

Canada's dead, Conspiracy theories and Debt

Well, three more Canadian soldiers were killed yesterday in Afghanistan, bringing the toll up to 100. My heart goes out to their families, friends and colleagues. I think about my own sons, both of military age, and cannot fathom the depth of sorrow I would face at loosing either of them.

Occasionally I tune into the CBC on a Thursday at 11:30 and catch "Afghanada", the excellent radio drama about our troops in Afghanistan and the kind of challenges they face. It is very well done, well scripted, well acted. I think we owe it to our troops in the field to listen to this program as a way of keeping them in our minds and prayers.

Perhaps it was the combination of thinking about the war, Margaret Atwood's "Payback" and my sons that led me this morning to investigate one of my sons' interest in conspiracy theories. The trail led me to an article in the Pakistan Daily which reported on a group of American scientists and ex-military who are challenging the standard take on the 9/11 bombings - they have a website and call themselves the Scholars for 9/11 Truth and Justice. It is hard to know what to believe in this day and age, but I do think this group, with its analytical approach, poses some distressing / compelling / intriguing questions.

I know that many with sons and daughters overseas fighting and peacekeeping for Canada may dismiss such musings as disrespectful to the sacrifice their loved ones are making, and down right ungrateful to boot. Nothing of the sort is intended. With no disrespect due to those who have already died, shouldn't we think about what we are asking our soldiers to risk their lives for? The courage, and self-sacrifice of those who have already died is a debt that we who live on will never be able to repay. Do we want to increase that debt by sending others to die too, if it can be avoided?

Considering the high cost, both personal and as a nation, that we Canadians are paying to be involved in the "war on terror" launched in response to the global horror of the 9/11 bombings, it would be a good thing to sort out, once and for all, the facts behind them and who is responsible.

Proroguing the fall out...

I took the time to read my local newspaper last night. No, it wasn't the Globe and Mail or the New York Times, just a lowly, local rag. There was good news and bad news. The good news is that finally, Canadians are passionate about Canadian politics - this truly is new considering we had the lowest voter turn out ever in our last elections! The letters to the editor took up two whole pages and dealt exclusively with the political situation.

The bad news is that once you get Canadians passionate about anything (and, believe me, our passion threshold is pretty high - it takes a lot to override the calm, civilized, diffident, hey, let's be frank, boring, demeanour, we are noted for, eh?), whether it is hockey, NFL football, a great bargain, or, in this case, politics, rationality seems to flit conveniently out the window. Perhaps we are so unused to passion that we aren't that good at tempering it with reason.

Actually, let me amend that slightly, and I am trying my hardest to be fair about this, but those who wrote in to the newspaper opposed to the coalition and pro Stephen Harper, were vitriolic in their prose, failing to back it up with much - it seemed like they had swallowed Stephen Harper's rhetoric, hook, line and sinker, and were churning it back out with a lot of emotion but not much thought. Most distressing was one writer who obliquely threatened armed revolt if the coalition went through!

On the other sides, and there were at least two, some semblance of basing your statements on facts did come into play. There was middle ground, covered by the professor of political science who explained that, within our constitution, a coalition government was not illegal, nor was it undemocratic as those participating were duly elected and represented more than half of the electors. On the side of the coalition, the tone was much more of a, "come and let us reason together". Equally adamant about their stance, but without the divisive bitterness and much more conciliatory.

Almost as distressing as the angry tone of the letters, was the obvious ignorance about our parliamentary system of government. Many pro-Harperites seemed to believe that a coalition government was "undemocratic" because Stephen Harper had been elected Prime Minister in the recent elections! This is flat out incorrect - wrong, wrong, wrong. They are seeing Canadian politics through an American Presidential election filter. The way it works, my friends, is that we the people elect those we want to represent us. The party with the most MPs gets to "form a government", but in order to rule, it must negotiate with those other MPs, of a different political stripe, who also have the right to be there, make decisions, and rule. It's all about sharing power - especially when the Prime Minister's party did NOT win a majority of the seats in parliament, as is the case with the Conservatives.

Most disturbing of all, was the divisiveness that came across in the pro-Harper letters, they reflected what I had heard in Stephen Harper's speeches. There was no room for negotiation, no admission of any failure on Harper's part to engage the opposition parties. It went so quickly to an us/them mentality that is frightening. It does not bode well for the hard times ahead where we will need everyone on board if we are to survive with our civilization, not to mention our civility, in tact.

And let us not take these things lightly. Before the horrors of Naziism, Germany was considered a highly civilized society, but the hard times of the depression and the punitive measures imposed after World War I created a breeding ground for vile thoughts later birthed as even more vile deeds. An atmosphere of us / them, of blame and of finger pointing and fear prevailed.

When the leader of our country vilifies one part of the country he is supposed to be leading, this can increase divisiveness. When SH points at the Bloc and says outright that they are unCanadian, that the coalition is setting the stage for Canada's destruction, that it will pull all the money from the West and pour it into Quebec, he is setting the stage for the kind of divisiveness, and suspicion that precedes outright hatred. Is he purposefully playing into the Quebec and / or Western separatists' / sovreignists' hands? What more evidence is needed by the majority of Quebecers who voted for the Bloc that the rest of Canada does not want to hear them, that they have no voice in Canada?

Now that Harper has been given his "get out of jail free" card, let's hope he puts the time to good use and tries to undo some of the damage he has done to Canadian unity.

Prorogue - Professional Rogue or???

A new word for me - no, it is not a professional scamp or scoundrel. Originated in 14th century it is a word you will never find being used in American politics. It refers to the request to discontinue a session of parliament. In Canada, this request can be made by the prime minister to the Governor General, Queen Elizabeth II's representative in Canada. Her name is Michaelle Jean and today, Stephen Harper, our beleaguered Prime Minister will ask her to "prorogue" parliament for him.

It is a little like the "get out of jail free" card in Monopoly. Stephen Harper has led his party and his country into a corner and now he wants to buy time to figure a way out of it. Truthfully, I feel very angry at the man. He won a minority government two years ago, one of his campaign promises at the time was to limit the frequency of elections to no less than every four years. Within two years he has called another election himself.

Why would Stephen Harper go back on his promise like that? Well, I think he has an agenda and he wants free rein to implement it. I fear that he wants to change the face of Canada. And he doesn't want any pesky opposition parties to stop him. So, he took a chance on an election, hoping the timing of it, shortly after a poll showing Canadians thought him the best leader among the parties, would catapult him into a majority government. It did not. So, after spending $30 million of Canadian tax payers' money, he still does not get the message that Canadians do not want to give him a majority.

Now he is tossing around all sorts of vile accusations that will only hurt Canada, the Conservative party and ultimately him, that is if people see through it. S.H. claims that Canada's relative stability in this time of economic recession, is because of his government's good policies. Yet his government had only been in office for eighteen months, so the good policies are probably more a result of the many years of prior Liberal government.

He claims it is "undemocratic" for the opposition parties to form a coalition government, because the people did not vote for Stephan Dion. No, and they did not vote for Stephen Harper either - they voted for a party. This is not the USA, although I suspect Harper's agenda is to move Canada closer to an American form of government - perhaps in his own mind he's already there.

Clearly, Canadians gave Harper a mandate to govern with the other parties - that's what a minority government is supposed to do. This is not Harper's strong suit. Instead of trying to work with them, he vilifies them. He has said that by making agreements with the Bloc Quebecois, Dion and Layton (the NDP party leader) are threatening the security of the country! How must Quebec voters feel to hear their prime minister essentially accuse their duly elected representatives of being threats to Canada? If this is his attitude towards the representatives of Quebec in parliament, how can he work with them at all? He has no confidence in them, and quite rightly, they have no reason to have confidence in him.

Harper has gotten himself into this mess, first by calling an election so soon after he formed a government. Then, by not taking seriously the message given him by the Canadian people that we want him to work with the other parties that we also elected. We did not give him a mandate to govern with a majority. Now he wants to have the parliament, he went to such great lengths to change, prorogued until he can figure out another way to slip his agenda through.

I was willing to give him a chance to lead Canada, although I did not vote for him, I did think he had the potential to lead. However, he does not have what a truly great democratic leader needs, the ability to listen and to negotiate. I fear that Harper's inner attitude, exposed by the current turn of events, is that of dictator - my way or the highway - and his manoeuverings make me nervous. I feel he is using all in his power to stay in power, so that he can impose his vision of Canada on us unhindered by the pesky demands of his fellow legislators who, let's face it, represent more of the country than his party does.

I am beginning to fear that Harper is a dangerous opportunist, guilty of the very accusations he hurls at those daring to oppose him with this coalition government. I do hope that G.G. Jean will refuse to grant him his request. Perhaps it is a professional scoundrel we are dealing with here in PM Harper.

Crazy Idea #5 - Housing in Hard Times

I woke up this morning with another Crazy Idea. It had to do with my house. As small as it is, the mortgage may prove too much for me and I have been worrying about whether or not to sell it.

Rousing out of sleep, my paradigm shifted to an older one I once held. My mother grew up during the Great Depression. She garnered this piece of wisdom from those hard times: "if you are in financial trouble, don't go to the rich, the poor will always help you, because they know what it feels like." Later, when I became a Christian, I heard echoes of her statement in Jesus' own words "It is harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven than for a camel to get through the eye of the needle."

The point? "By your love for each other the world will know you are mine" John quotes Jesus as saying. In his letter, James elaborates by asserting that love goes beyond praying for people at church, it requires sharing material wealth where needed - a nuts and bolts involvement in each others' lives that our life styles make almost impossible. Our North American cultural obsession with material independence creates walls between people made up of a lack of time and energy. These walls, though not ill intended, are as difficult to penetrate as any castle fortification.

Well, the economy that allows us the luxury of material independence is wavering; those walls may be crumbling. Is that such a bad thing? Take my house for example. What if, instead of selling it and moving into a condo so that I can maintain my own material independence, I open it up and invite others, without homes, to live with me?

Such a radical move requires a level of faith, hope and love, I do not currently have. I fear losing my independence, my freedom, and yes, even my property. On the other hand, look at what I might gain - a more intimate relationship with others, a sense of community and belonging, shared responsibilities, and support for myself in times of need, not to mention the increased dependency on Jesus for His moment by moment grace.

Bottom line, do I want this? No, but, I am willing to be made willing. And Jesus has changed my heart before. What about you?