nana

On March 13, 2014 my Nana, Valerie Joan Hunter, shuffled off this mortal coil and since I so infrequently remember to blog my husby recommended that I post the eulogy I gave at her funeral.

*          *          *

I, along with my two brothers and my sister-in-law, drove here to Halifax from Toronto to celebrate Nana’s life and we couldn’t be happier that we did.

That’s what she was to us: Nana.  But looking at all your faces and flipping through the albums at last night’s viewing, I realize I didn’t know her like you know her.

I didn’t know her as a work colleague, or an Eagle Point Drive neighbour, or a church friend, as many of you had the pleasure of knowing her.

I didn’t know her as a travel companion, or fancy-dress-party-goer, or best friend for decades.

I didn’t know her as an aunt, or a Big Sister, or a mom or a wife.

I didn’t even know her as Grandma, which was her East Coast alias.

I won’t even know her as my 2-year old son will one day know her: as Great Nana, from the stories we will tell him, and from the watercolour painting hung up in his room.

But I knew her as Nana.

Nana and Grandad’s visits to Toronto were always the happiest, fullest, most joyous memories for me.  It helped that they visited at Christmas and traveled with one suitcase exclusively dedicated to presents.  Nana was, to me, was and always will be a series of memories: pearl nail polish, putting her face on, a great laugh, “getting ogernized”, teaching me shorthand, and they way she said “Oh, Tony…”

It’s impossible to remember Nana - no matter how you knew her - without tenderness and admiration.  I think that’s because she filled every relationship, every conversation, every room with gentleness and light.

She always had something to say - an anecdote, a story, something optimistic, something helpful.
She always had something to give - like the Werther’s Originals she kept in her purse for the car drive to and from the airport.
She left something behind - when I saw the tiny hairs left on the car seat from her fur coat and remember her, or the music boxes she and Grandad gave me that played “It’s a Small World After All” which helped me when I missed them.

So that’s how I’d like to remember Nana.  By being more like her.  With always something optimistic to say, always something ready to give, and always with something to leave behind.

Crayola

Hugo hands me a new Crayola, green.  The tip is dulled by small teeth marks and its wrapping is damp.  His lips reflect displeasure and his tongue explores the end of the crayon still his mouth.

"Out," my palm waits under his chin.  "Yucky, Hugo.  Spit it out."  Hugo deposits a trail of saliva and green waxy shards in my hand and turns to leave the room.  "Hugo?"  His body forms a half-turn, his eyes search my face.  "No more eating crayons, OK?  Yuck."

"Oh, okay, mammy."

I keep Hugo's name-brand crayons in a hinged tin - the same crayon tin from my childhood.  Outside, the tin is patterned with a vintaged, royal blue floral motif and the inside, a matte silver, is the backdrop to a multitude of sticky rainbow markings.  As a little girl, once I discovered that the ends of crayons left small dots of colour just by being in the tin, I figured I could make a few embellishments of my own.

When I open the tight-fitting, hinged lid the scent is comprised of these new crayons of my son's, barely out of their pristine cardboard boxes, freshly minted and still sharply tipped (unless recently masticated) mixed somehow with the ghostly smell of my crayons from the 80s.  The fragrance of my own collection, now long gone, has been embalmed and is a deeper, mustier one.  Their generic, quatrefoil designed paper wrappings were stained and peeled by my hands, their ends blunted by "filling in" large areas of newsprint colouring pages, many of them halved, or thirded, into smaller, unwrapped pieces that would slip through my grip by the heat of my fingers.

The summer of The Incident began with that tin.  I was colouring in the backyard of my parents' first home, a butter yellow, vinyl-sided semi in Newmarket, one afternoon.  My favourite crayon had always been a silver-coloured one: it was the first to loose its paper casing, since I wanted to more closely admire the sheen of metallic specks which sparkled when I held it up to the light.  The hinged lid of my tin provided a perch for crayons to rest between uses, and there sat the naked, silver crayon, awaiting duty. Sadly, the sun's rays claimed it that hot, summer afternoon and the next time I looked up from my artistic endeavour all that was left was a shimmering dollop of putty.

All instantly available at the opening of a tin box, such is the power of scent.  I wonder if, when he opens the tin for himself in years from now, Hugo will feel the soft fragments of green, non-toxic wax, stuck between his teeth.

wifercize wednesday: crushes, part 2

Welcome to Part 2 of my discomfiting chronicle of grade school and high school crushes.  Your comments are not only appreciated but necessary to the purging process.  Don't leave me hanging.

Now, where were we?  Grade 11?

My obligatory crush on a poster boy for the 90s (long, greasy hair, wore plaid shirts, rocked out to Green Day and Nirvana) came in the form of Blair Brandon.  On Valentine's Day our school organized several "O-Grams" that students could purchase and the money benefited...something.  No doubt our swim team.  Malvern had an amazing swim team.  I was not on it.  One option was a "Stalker-O-Gram" or "Picture-O-Gram" or something equivalent - it could be purchased anonymously, and required someone to take a picture of your crush on your behalf, delivering it to you a few days later since I went to high school in the 90s and WE STILL USED FILM.  When the photo of Blair Brandon, donning his signature backwards Boston Bruins baseball cap, arrived secretly during homeroom class I swore I would never throw it out.  That was until he slow danced with my best friend at our school's video dance party later that month to Seal's Kiss From a Rose.  Which not only broke my heart but also destroyed my image of his cool, 90s charade.  Seal is so mainstream.

I was Luke Lockyer's girlfriend a total of four times.  Each time, I broke up with him.  The first time, we remained an item for the duration of history class (with Mr. Nider), geography class (with Mr. Butts - no joke), the period of 12 hours following (spent at our respective houses, sleeping), and before morning announcements I had broken up with him.  Via a letter I gave to him via a mutual friend.  The details of other three times allude me, but they were similar in cowardice.  Via his pager (remember pagers?), via the phone, etc.  We wrote bad poetry to each other.  Not bad-indecent, just bad-clumsy.  He wrote one entitled "Confusion" (no doubt due to our on-again-off-again relationship status) and I responded, appropriately, with "Confusion: The Reply".  Suddenly Melissa Etheridge's lyrics meant so much when I heard them on _____, "I don't care what they think / I don't care what they say / what do they know about this love anyway?", and when I reheard them on mix cassettes from Luke.  He went out on a limb and began writing song lyrics of his own for me and made a mix cassette of those too: "I'm walking in the snow / Like Pierre Elliot Trudeau" touched me deeply although it's impossible to say why.  We may have continued our volatile relationship had it not been for my switch to private school for my OAC year.  That, and my brothers' discovery of Luke's musical debut on tape and consequent mockery.  Which continues to this day.

Philip Holman both frustrated and intrigued me.  His marks were first in almost all our classes (I believe I beat him in English), while I couldn't shake the #2 placement, and we often sat together in alphabetized seating arrangements, Holman and Hunter.  Although his intelligence drew me in, his constant teasing (and the stubborn fact that I was a sore loser) guaranteed that the crush never fully developed.  Jerk.

A friend of mine, Charis, asked when I was going to write about the boys who crushed on me.  A valid question, and one that is mighty temping (I still have old poems and hijinxs committed to memory), but my story is the only one I can tell properly and it delves into the touchy subject of exes which I have written about previously.  Besides, the only boy who crushed on me that matters is the one who I married.

(grand)mama monday: scarves, aprons and hankies!

Sometimes, in order to understand motherhood, it's helpful to go back a generation.  To grandmamas.

I grew up quite close to my mother, who became a sister-mom to me in later years, in a way that many girls-with-only-brothers do.  Other than mom, and Dodie, I had few other close female relatives.  My paternal grandparents (along with an uncle and aunt) lived in Halifax and visited annually, another uncle and aunt, along with their kids - my first cousins - lived in London, Ontario and we didn't grow up celebrating birthdays, holidays and occasional for-no-other-reason-than-we-haven't-eaten-together-in-a-while get togethers like Andrew's Italian family.

So boys were my main point of social contact.  Boys were great.  They were funny.  They liked to build things with Lego*.  They were uncomplicated.  Well, until I hit puberty (ie: my 20s) and then boys became very complicated.  But I digress.  My Sistas From Otha Mistas will attest to my initial awkwardness towards a girl until I feel like I can jump in to girlfriendship without falling flat on my face, as with double-Dutch.  Which I was also crap at.

* Lego is, and forever will be, an uncountable noun.  Like money, cutlery or hair.  You do not "brush your hairs".  You do not "play with your Legos".  If you say this, I reserve the right to punch you.

Incidentally, this may be why I have only pictured having boys.  When I dream about a baby, it's always a baby boy.  When I think about designing about a baby's room, I think blues and greens and trains and Lego.

However, my mother's mother - grandma Grace - and I were close until her death in 1988.  And my memories with her were decidedly girly.

I am the eldest of my cousins and was eight when grandma passed away, which meant that I was lucky to have spent the most number of years with her.  But, at age eight, I didn't fully understand how much we had in common or, indeed, how much we would have in common as I matured.

Last week, I acquired a tote bag of her old things and went through it delicately, neatly, documenting each item like an archeological discovery.  The contents of the bag were scraps of my own DNA, preserved for over 20 years.

First the scarves, which (from what I can surmise) are vintage from the 50s, 60s and 70s.

Detail of one scarf.  Who puts coral, mint green, khaki and azure blue together anymore?

What surprised me was the colour scheme.  Grandma and I had the same "seasonal colour" (does anyone go by this anymore?), Spring, and, if these scarves are any indication, we also shared the same taste in patterns and tones.

Then the aprons!

COULD THESE BE ANY CUTER?!!

Finally the hankies.  O, the hankies...

One was delicately monogrammed with an "L", for Lois: my little mom's little hanky.

As I took the last photo and stared at the hankies - fine linen, lace, floral-patterned, embellished, embroidered in pinks, lilacs and spring greens - I thought about my mom's little hanky, and her mom's choice in hankies, and how much I adored them both.  I thought to myself, I'd like to pass these hankies on and tastes on.  I might even like to pass them on to a little girl.

Solomon crept up to comfort me and I took a decorative hanky to use.  A hanky that, as I brought it to my eyes, still smelled of grandma's perfume.  I felt as consoled as if grandma had offered it to me herself.  A mother who, as only mothers can, understood what it was like to wait for motherhood.

wifercize wednesday: crushes, part 1

After watching Easy A (three times in two weeks) and then Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (which is arguably the best movie ever filmed) I began to recall the angst of high school days, and high school crushes.  You know the kind: the relationships that launched, flourished, and terminated without ever materializing outside of your own contemplations.  The crushes you (still) refer to by their First and Last Names.

The tales only made tolerable through self-deprecating humour and, preferably, Emma Stone playing a quirkier, prettier, more triumphant version of your high school self.

All names used are real.  I apologize if you just now discovered that I am blogging about our fictitious romance over a decade after we went to school together through the magic and horror of Google.  But, then again, you're the one Googling yourself so we can share in the humiliation.

First came Hart Massie.  I didn't realize that his first name was effeminate or his last name derived from the famous Massie family.  I just thought he was cute.  We began "going together" (my mother's term) sometime at the end of grade eight, after our year-end trip to Québec City.  Halfway through summer holiday a friend asked me, "Hey, how's Hart?"  I had completely forgotten we were dating. I called him up and we both agreed that a forgettable relationship was one which didn't require continuation.

His best friend, Dave Foster, systematically dated each of the girls in our group of friends starting with me.  He asked me out by tucking a piece of paper into an the case of an empty permanent marker and passing it to me during class.  The note read: "Would you like to go out?" and two boxes accompanied the proposal, a YES and NO.  I checked YES.  We broke it off a week later.

Ingmar Mak was my first alterna-crush.  He was Asian, super smart, creative, hilarious and quick.  Too quick.  Once, during a class we shared, the teacher had not shown up (this detail, in retrospect, is peculiar - what teacher just doesn't show up for class?) and we were all busying ourselves by doodling on the chalkboard.  For reasons beyond comprehension, I took a piece of chalk and wrote "I ♥ INGMAR" in billboard-sized font.  BUT: I WROTE IT IN CODE.  It was a stealthy code used in many intimate high school correspondences between girls.  It was airtight.  Except that Ingmar knew the code.  And Ingmar was confident enough in his findings to summon my, and everyone else's, attention.  "Sarah, does that say I ♥ INGMAR?"  In my panic, I recanted.  "What?  No.  Did you think-?  Oh, no, not what I wrote.  You're probably thinking of the other code..."  I improvised a variation of the well-known code and wrote it up on the board for all to see.  I only discovered later that, according to my made up code, I had written "I ♥ INGQAV" which was not only a phonetic impossibility but also eerily resembled Ingmar's name.

Mack Fyfe, or Matthew Ian Fredrick Darian Fyfe, had the coolest name I had ever heard.  We were schoolmates and also performed together in musical performances at the community Beaches Arts Centre.  Our British director, Anne Butler, referred to us as "hooligans" and spent half of our precious rehearsal time telling us to pay attention.  He is one of a handful of people who can match my energy level.  In a performance of Good News!, a musical, Mack's character said of my character: "She's like a wool sweater.  Hot and drives you crazy!" and, in Jack the Ripper (again, another musical, if you can believe it) his character referred to my character as "Slaggy".  I thought it was endearing until I found out it was a British form of "skank".

Poor Tristan Ticmanis was keen to get my phone number for what seemed like the majority of grade 10. I finally acquiesced by giving him all the digits of my phone number except the last one.  I changed the last one.  That's how cunning I was.  It took him a few months and then he worked out that the phone number I gave him was not the same as the phone number all of our other friends had for me.  I pleaded insanity.

Stay tuned for Part 2 next week.  This is too good to give to you all in one dose.

wifercize wednesday: BANG

When Andrew and I go away for a week or weekend we have a friend, Matt, come to stay at our house and look after our pets.  Matt has performed this duty on many occasions, being a fan of both cats and dogs (rare) and a clean, responsible house guest (rarer still, for a bachelor). 

LADIES, MATT LOVES CATS AND DOGS AND BABIES AND IS SINGLE.  You can stalk him more efficiently on his blogs here: imattchell.tumblr.com and here: thebachelorguide.tumblr.com.

Matt quite often makes comments, via Twitter, about our house when we are away which we then read in airport gates or hotel rooms and chuckle, because they are usually about the substantial amount of pasta we keep in the pantry or the substantial number of quotes we have written on our fridge.  The last time Matt came to stay he made a quip regarding the substantial volume of hair products I collect in the upstairs bathroom.

Volume being the operative word.

Ever since I took a pair of child-safety scissors in first grade and cut off an inch-long lock of hair (they can't cut fingers but oh! how marvelously they cut hair!), which my mother found out about, and I may have denied, the details are fuzzy, but it was harder still to deny the hole I later snipped in the front of my private school pinafore, because they marvelously cut fabric too! I just had to know! and I was strictly informed to only use scissors on paper or crafts or other such constructive activities, ever since THEN I have been fascinated with the ability to change my hair.

As you will remember, my earliest memories of hair fantasy began with Princess Aurora's long, full curls.  I had straight, flat hair so it was difficult to achieve but I'm still trying.  Hence, shampoos and conditioners marching along every available ledge of our shower promising "volume", "extra volume", and "maximum volume". 

I suppose one could conduct a study in the number and type of toiletries a person collected and the corresponding lack of confidence in the area those products guarantee to cure.  Moisturizing products for the self-consciously dry.  Bronzing products for the self-consciously pale.  Smoothing products for the self-consciously rough.

For me, it's hair products.  Armies of hair products.

Last night, for date night, Andrew and I watched "High Fidelity" and it reminded me of another hair-related obsession I have struggled with, third only to volume and curls: bangs.  In honour of Rob Gordon (played brilliantly by John Cusack), I give you...

THE TOP 5 LIST OF MOVIES THAT INSPIRED ME TO CUT MY BANGS EXTREMELY SHORT:

#5:  It started innocently, with Julie Andrews in "The Sound of Music".

#4:  Then not-so-innocently, with Angelina Jolie in "Girl, Interrupted". 

#3:  Then Iben Hjejle's character in "High Fidelity".

#2:  And, always and forever, Audrey Hepburn in "Breakfast at Tiffany's".

#1:  But the most influential, most desired, and most illusive cinematic bangs, for me, were Audrey Tautou's in "Amélie".

No matter how hard I tried, my baby-fine hair wouldn't conform to the forehead fringe I saw on the silver screen.  It probably didn't help that whenever my stubborn bangs would rebel, I simply cut them shorter. 

And all this ties into Wifercize Wednesday because Andrew knew me when I had crazy bangs and crushed on me anyhow.  That's when you know you have a winner, ladies.

wifercize wednesday: princess hair

I'd like to tell you of a time before wifedom.

When I was but a wee thing, my parents would read me Disney's Sleeping Beauty before bed.  The version, published by Disney Editions, included the original 1959 illustrations:

And, yes, I was a die-hard romantic at age 4 (although I really had a thing for Snow White's Prince Charming instead, because of the whole "Prince Buckethead" thing...anyone with me?)

(click to enlarge)

And, yes, I loved the mice and the fairy godmothers and the dragon-slaying and such, but what I was really fascinated by was Princess Aurora's hair:

The big honey-coloured locks, tapered down into a finely sculpted curl.  THIS was princess hair.  I had to have it.  Problem was: I had fine, pin-straight hair that defied all curl.

I became obsessed with princess hair for a 6-8 year period after that, sketching page after page of princesses with hair that I began to call "eight curls".  This was, simply, because I drew them using figure eights:

(I'm not making any of this up)

When I was eight years old I persuaded my mother to give me a perm* and gave her the strictest of instructions: "I want it to look like princess-eight-hair." 

* Error message: do not perm your hair if you only have a bob to start with and expect it to look like long, flowing Princess Aurora hair afterwards.  It will, instead, resemble Little Orphan Annie:

While I waited a few years for my clown curls to grow out, I resigned myself to the fact that I was born to have straight hair.  Not princess hair.  Not eight curls.  Just straight, straight hair.

. . .

UNTIL MY WEDDING DAY when Melissa attacked my mane for a few hours and unloaded half a bottle of hairspray on it and I came away looking as close to Princess Aurora as I ever had previously:

It was obviously perfect timing to celebrate the fact that I had found my Prince Buckethead Charming:

Most days, I use a curling iron to keep my princess-eight-hair looking princessy:

I have been officially approved by Adelaide Hardy, age two-and-a-half, who came to our church one Sunday and pointed to me throughout the service, whispering to her parents, "Princess!  Princess!"

Thanks, Addie.  xoxo

wifercize wednesday: domestic bliss

[Note: this is a post I saved in draft form on October 7th, 2009.  It was left unfinished due to a hunt for the quote at the end of the post - a hunt that took, apparently, AN ENTIRE YEAR.  Fortunately, the post is still true today as it was a full year ago.]


Perhaps it's the change in the season, and that change signaling the long months of hibernation to come. Perhaps it's reading "A Room with a View" recently, with its cozy, early 1900s colloquialisms. Perhaps it's hormones. Perhaps it's age.

I'm just so happy being a wife. Having a home. Sleeping in the same bed, next to my fabulous husband, night after night. After night.

Not ground breaking for you homebodies, but you who suffer from wanderlust? yes, you who are already plotting your next trip? you who can't seem to settle down but rather feel that what you're searching for is Out There? This is for you.

Instead of browsing more travel porn, let me give you a piece of advice. "You may need to see the world in order to find your place in it". That was God's advice to me in 2004, as I was weighing the pros and cons of spending a year in Korea teaching English. I took it as a green light (what traveler wouldn't have?), packed my bags, and spend a fabulous year in Asia.

I spent my 25th birthday on a beach on the coast of South Korea and discovered something: no matter where I was, there I was.  The same fears haunted me, the same hopes, the same dreams, the same desires, the same frustrations.  The only difference was that, on the other side of the world, I was miles away from a hug or a coffee or a kind word with anyone I knew well.  And anyone who knew me well.

It was while in Korea that I read A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry and discovered this quote:

How can I leave that earth?  It is not good to go far from your native village.  Then you forget who you are.

The quote stuck with me, I wrote it out in my journal, it trailed behind me like a cartoon thought bubble for the rest of my time in Korea, it comforted me when I experienced re-entry difficulties back in Toronto, and it still makes me smile today.  My native village turned out to be better than I ever thought it could be.  And I know who I am.

wifersize wednesday: beard, beard, no beard?

In honour of Movember, which is fast approaching, I'd like to outline my feelings on beards.  Or, indeed, facial hair in general.

The fascination with beards began at a tender age.  I'd sit on the edge of the bathtub and observe my dad shave in the bathroom mirror.  Not completely shave, mind you, as it was the height of the 80s and my dad sported a nifty Tom Selleck:

Because he was my dad, I naturally came to the conclusion that mustaches were the embodiment of manliness. I also became acutely aware that girls did not possess the powers of facial hair, since dad's kisses were scratchy and mom's weren't.

My girl friends and I spent high school mocking the peach fuzz that began to encroach on the upper lips of our male peers.  One of my first poems, entitled "Men", was published in the yearbook, much to my delight and my mother's horror, that began with the lines:

men are weird

men grow beards

and pathetic little 'staches

that make them feel 

cool

I fancied a number a few hardly any guys before I dated Andrew, almost all of which exhibited the goatee/soul patch.  I'm not sure when or why I acquired this penchant but I know it began to dwindle at the end of university, which coincided with the height of the metrosexual era.  The equation became: smooth faced boys = desirable. 

Something odd occurred when Andrew and I began our relationship.  He had a goatee at first (which, clearly, since I was so over that I wasn't thrilled about)...and I began to like goatees.  Then he Bic™ shaved once or twice...and I switched back to preferring him clean-shaven.  In spite of my protestation, he grew a full beard to celebrate Movember a few years ago...and I ended up liking that too.  At the end of the month he shaved all but a fat, caterpillar of a mustache that not only reminded me of my dad in the 80s (see above) but also took on a personality of its own as Andrew narrated things like, "The Mustache feels like Chinese food tonight.  The Mustache would like to watch television.  The Mustache made me do it."  Imagine my terror when, at the end of a week, I EVEN LIKED THE HORRIBLE, ANIMATED 80S MUSTACHE.

My theory is this:

I don't care what it is, just as long as it's on him.

Andrew's Italian hair follicles are similar to those of a wild boar - making his smooth face turns spiky by the end of a day, which I adore and is a lovely way to exfoliate.  Plus, his cheek/chin have a lovely way of retaining his yummy scent so I generally spend a lot of time around that area.  It doesn't matter what he's doing - kissing me in return, responding to emails, doing laundry, trying to sleep...  He concedes to my endless kissing as a water buffalo accepts the bird riding on its back.

My poetry matured along with my taste in men, thankfully, and Andrew's scruff inspired one called "Barbed" early on in our dating phase:

like fresh cut grass
on bare feet
his cheek
is ticklish
and pricklish
and delish
my kisses are quick
small skips
on fresh cut grass
it’s my little field of dreams
it’s my little corner lot
it’s my little Brillo pad
more dangerous still
than sandpaper,
though,
are the days
when a razor clears the way
for thoughts too hot to hold
so soft
so smooth
so…
a little barbed wire
to protect a treasure
is not
such
a bad idea

Recently I have fallen for the latest ad campaign from French Connection featuring a handsomely coutured and bearded male model.  Imagine my delight to discover it has made an appearance on our own Bloor Street with the declaration "THIS IS THE MAN.  FEEL LIKE WOLF":

Movember marks a special season in the lives of my gentlemen friends.  They begin to sprout all manners of facial growth, from full beards to Fu Manchus to handlebar mustaches to dirty-French-lip-hair.  My own brother ended up like this last year:

Upon the discovery of PicnicFace's infamous Beard, No Beard Movember madness reached fever pitch.  The possibilities were endless: beard, beard, no beard? beard, beard, MOOOSTACHE.



For further reading, I recommend visiting The Beard Revue which features art inspired by facial hair including this desktop wallpaper and handy legend (click to see larger image):

mama monday: monsters under the bed

I was reading a post by dooce™ recently that had to do with phobias she had as a child.  What really amused me were the 56 comments left by readers answering the question:

Dare I ask — and I may very well regret this — what were you obsessive-compulsive about as a kid?

I remember a little boy I met when I stayed in Ediburgh who must have been about four or five years old.  He was cute as a button but GOONESSGRACIOUS, was he ever obsessive-compulsive.  For about two weeks he developed a habit of coughing.  Not a I'm-sick-and-need-to-remove-phlegm-in-order-to-breathe kind of cough, more of a clearing-of-the-throat kind of cough.  All.  The.  Time.  A friend of mine and I took control of the situation by having him cough into his fist, "drop" the cough into the toilet, and flush it away.  We were successful but undoubtedly unleashed countless more phobias regarding toilets.

My own quirks were reasonable enough.  I heard a story about a woman at our church who had once swallowed a chicken bone and had to have it surgically removed.  Each time we ate chicken I'd inspect each bite with my tongue thoroughly before swallowing and would panic slightly if ever I swallowed something that felt a degree sharper than rigorously masticated chicken meat.  After the meal, if I hadn't died, I figured it was safe to assume I hadn't swallowed a bone.

Other O-C tenancies I began as a child I have yet to outgrow.  I still prefer (although I am mature enough to put the preference aside for the sake of decorum) not to step on the cracks in the sidewalk.  The habit had nothing to do with breaking my mother's back, or any other superstition, but rather some sort of mathematical and rhythmic game.  How many steps could I squeeze into each sidewalk tile before having to avoid a crack?  Would avoidance of said crack slow my walking tempo?  Would a longer stride spare me the crack each time?

If I am completely, utterly alone, I still avoid the cracks even at thirty years of age.

Many of the phobias, superstitions and obsessive habits children acquire are from a well-meaning adult giving them information without proper context.  Germs are a good example of this.  Knowing that tiny, invisible organisms are on your hands at any time and have the ability to make you sick might help children to wash up before dinner, but I doubt their imaginations stop there.

I love parents who exaggerate the silliness and fantasy of scary things, empowering their kids to feel fearless instead of fearful.  My friend Melissa, who is due this week, decorated her infant son's room with monsters.  The result is a bright, colourful room that encourages him to engage in adventure because love will keep him safe.

 

What were some of your phobias growing up?  Were they easy to break out of or did they follow you past childhood?  How were some of the ways your environment inspired you to live fearfully or fearlessly?

 

foto friday: the bay

It's shocking that department stores stay in business since most furniture, appliances, clothing and electronics can now be found at other, more specialized, megastores for much less.  Still, department stores continue to be one of the last habitats that one can find elderly women grazing peacefully on weekday afternoons.

My great, great aunt Dodie, who passed away when I was 18, took me to department stores when I stayed with her.  Since she also took me to the ROM, Queen's Park, and Centre Island, I naturally assumed The Department Store belonged on a shortlist of Toronto's attractions. We'd wander down the cosmetic aisles, explore the toy department,  and visit the artificial trees displays at Christmas.  Once, only once, when I found a $20 bill on the sidewalk by sheer luck (also due to generally looking down when I walked to avoid stepping on cracks) I was granted permission to spend it.  All of it.  Thus began a long, rewarding relationship with shopping.

I set about spending this small fortune on practical items, and bought a white pair of gloves.  I'm pretty sure Dodie encouraged me to buy a pack of underwear while we were at it which can only lead me to believe that I forgot to pack more than one pair on that particular visit.  After these investments I wildly spent the rest on a chickadee ornament (made from real feathers!), a plastic toy from Wendy's, and chocolate.  There was none left.  Thus began a long, debilitating habit of guilt/reward-based shopping.

When recounting the story later to my mother, I made a point of mentioning the gloves first. 

Something old-world and glamourous still captivates me when I walk through a department store.  Maybe it's in the wide, white aisles, the complimentary lighting, the posters of famous actresses-turned-models shot with even more complimentary lighting, the offers to try the elegant new fragrance from this designer, the life-sized Barbies styled in the daring new line from that designer, or the Pavlovian effect from first tasting buyer's delight/regret.

More likely, it reminds me of Christmas and of walking hand in hand with Dodie.  When I see elderly ladies grazing peacefully on weekday afternoons, I think of her.