Confessions: Bottomless Pit

You may have heard, there is a problem with hunger and starvation in many places in the world.

Well, I am embarrassed to admit: it's my fault.

I am 5 feet tall and I weigh 110 lbs. However, in the global rationing of foodstuffs, I eat both my portion and Ethiopia's. I kid not. It is really sad. I was reminded of this a few days ago when I went to have supper at a friend's house and while still trying to be diplomatic she commented casually on my consumption. ''Wow.. you are good to eat.. heh *awkward forced chuckle*,'' as I cleaned my plate, and Anna's and her daughter's. A shameful display.

I am reminded of a comment I received from the waitress at a truck stop once. Chris and I stopped at this same truck stop when we were still dating, 2 Saturday nights in a row. The first night I ate effortlessly and completely cleaned a full pot roast meal with rolls, salad and finished off dessert and coffee afterward. The following week I only had maybe a side salad and water, and didn't finish the hot chocolate. When she came to clear the plates she asked, ''Are you done?''
''Oh yes, thanks,'' I inattentively replied.

''Really?'' came her response, ''Cause I remember you from last week, and for a little one, you sure can put it away!''

Chris of course buckled laughing. My reputation precedes me. Great.

All my years growing up it was commonly accepted and referred to among my family and close friends that I had a hollow leg. That was the only psysiological answer they found for, ''where does she put it?''

People would refer to that Purina commercial years ago about how small dogs eat twice their weight or something, a bunch more than big dogs, and likening me of course to the small dog, that the same principle must be at work in my situation.

And it hasn't changed in adulthood. It has been excused for the last four-ish years under the clauses of pregnant and breastfeeding, but really we all know that it was no different before, and it likely won't be after weaning. My dinner plates raise the eyebrows of any unsuspecting visitor, and not because the pattern is striking: one would need GPS to locate the pattern under the mountain of food.

So Africa, India: sorry.

Autumn colors

Anna quote of the day, while all us girls were out driving together.
"When I grow up I'm gonna marry someone and I'm going to drive his car."
You go girl.

This "out driving together" was so wonderful. It was like going on vacation somewhere, but only 5 minutes down the road. The fall colours here are phenomenal. This area is known for them, and has a chunk of tourism based on them. Well, this year did not disappoint! MAN they are gorgeous! Yesterday we had rain all morning and then later in the day, we went for a drive. We saw two striking rainbows in the East, a patch of yellow trees that looked like they were spray painted they were so opaque, solid, intense yellow. No branches to be seen, nothing, just LEMON yellow! My favourite part of colours here however, are the cooler tones. When I think of autumn I tended to think of mostly orange and brown leaves. Not so here! Try FUSCHIA, purple, garnet, cranberry, salmon, coral, violet, and this neon red color that reminds me of Manic Panic. And all these fantastic colours in no small quantity!
It's like the angels had a ginormous paint ball fight.

I don't know how many of you share that frame of reference. Manic Panic is a hair dye used by punks, at least the ones at my high school. Does everyone know that brand or is it just me?

Anyway, we stopped by the beach on the way home, though it was too chilly to linger. The waves were high and rough and depositing copious burgundy seaweed onto the beach. The texture and shades of the clouds hold my attention totally rapped indefinitely. Some days they put on quite a show, and this was one of those days.

I always enjoy the perspective I find the sea gives me. I always feel in my gut this weighty sense of the profundity of God's work, of his majesty and miraculous creation. It quiets me (an accomplishment) and is like a touch of the Divine, untouchable, Infinite in a harried world.
I love it.

E-Props!

Here's a shout out to Eolaí for breaking the 8 post long, 2 month drought of comments! Thanks, Bud!

For all the lurkers, I know you are there, cause I see you on my Statcounter. You're not hiding completely. I'm left to my own conjecture however of what you leave here thinking. I of course turn it to my favor.

I choose to think you're not commenting because you are stunned speechless, in awe of my wit and wisdom. Every thought is so well laid out, so complete, self-evident and instrinsically understood to be true and universal, it leaves nothing left to add to it.

Oh, and you're all self-conscious because my coloured pencil blog banner is so much cooler than most other things on the web. That's what keeps you coming back, isn't it?I know. You just can't stop looking at my awesome creation. Who could blame you.

a day lakeside

My parents-in-law have a cabin on a lake. We went there this weekend and Anna pretended to fish.

It was beautiful. I do enjoy it there, as I do pretty much anywhere with water, I've discovered. If I was a moth, it would be my light. I am drawn to it.

Another Anna quote, from when she was colouring, and pretending to write.

"Hey Mommy, I'm writing you a message. Do you know what it says?"

"No, I don't."

She looks at me like I am crazy and answers:

"Of COURse not, ya Goose, it's just all wobbly!" Meaning, she is just scribbling, cause she doesn't know how to write yet, so how could I know what it said, since it says nothing. Silly Mommy! What were you thinking!

Grammarranter

I hate words like this.

littoral \LIH-tuh-rul\, adjective:
1. Of, relating to, or on a coastal or shore region, especially a seashore.
2. A coastal region, especially the zone between the limits of high and low tides.

Doesn't it sound lovely? Yes! Great! What a great word. Let's incorporate it into our vocabulary! NO! Because I will be the only one who does it, and then when I use it, everyone will think I'm dumb and mixing it up with literal and of course making no sense when I talk. And then I will get cross at them and they will be impatient with me and it's just not worth it. I have the same problem with consonance, which, as my high school English teacher taught, is alliteration just using consonants (assonance being alliteration with vowels). But not once in my life have I been able to use the word and had someone understand that I was not saying consonants. Spelling it out, and an extra 10 minutes of conversation to explain the one word you decided to throw out usually isn't a welcome addition to the interaction buffet, at least in my area of the world, so there's no point in knowing it. I'm stuck wanting to express myself with my colourful and specific word that is left itching inside me, trapped, unable to be unleashed and set free like the little bird it is and it causes nothing but angst and brain bruises from its poor beating wings. Excuse my overdramatism. I got caught up in the moment.

I had a similar problem that I am still bitter about when I wrote an article for an Irish magazine in Toronto, and I described someone (Paddy Canny, to be specific, if you know him, or of him) as having a snell sense of humour, which means acute, or sharp, but the editors changed it to swell without informing me and it got published that way.
I still haven't forgiven them for it.

Anna Quote of the Day

"Mommy, I smell something, and it ain't no angel mist either."

Context:
One of Anna's storybooks is about the night Jesus was born, written from the perspective of one of the shepherds. Angels come and leave angel dust on the ground and trees and angel mist, which apparently has this fantastic fragrance, that could only be angels, and all the shepherds pick up and go to Bethlehem to check it out.

This was her cute way of telling me that Niamh had pooped.

Riding the Techno Wave in Nova Scotia

We have something new, we've never had before.

What, you already have one? Well well, aren't you special.
I haven't had one in 7 years. I missed it. Old things become new again.

I was disturbed with how difficult I found it to write those names. My hand was so shaky. Gonna have to drop out of my brain surgery degree program. I was free-handing it with a sharpie on slicky curved metal, in my defense, but still, in former times I could have controlled it way better than that. Oh well. I'm sure the mail lady won't be offended.

Since I have been in Nova Scotia, we have had to drive a couple minutes down the road to pick up our mail at the gas station. Since there is no 2nd car at home for me (which I would like to say is because I am environmentally responsible and happily sacrificing my consumption for the greater good... but is more like, insurance is expensive and I often complain about not being able to consume more, to my shame), going to check the mailbox was not an option for me. We were left to wait for my in-laws t0 check for us and drop it off whenever they came.

So I am all excited now that I can check the mail everyday if I want, and I can actually MAIL LETTERS if I want! *Gasp* Which, after only having the opportunity to visit a post office maybe 4 times a year since I've been here, (you read right) access to outgoing mail is also a VERY exciting development. I don't think anyone has had a Christmas or birthday card on time in all those years. But, hey, we are in with the techno revolution now! No waiting! Ultra convenience! Woohoo!

There's no such thing!

In an attempt to soothe Anna's fear of monsters, we consistently tell her, there is no such thing.

So when Chris was leaving for work today, he and she had some exchange about why he had to go to work. He said he had to make money, she said why, and he said something to the effect of,
"I have to or the bankers will come and take our house."

Well I guess this sounded scary to Anna. Someone might come and take our house?? Surely Daddy must be kidding.

So this afternoon she was recounting this me and said, "ya, he said he has to make money so that the bankers don't take our house. But there's no such thing as bankers, right?" she said, sluffing it off with casual confidence.

And I answered, "oh yes there is."
She gasped and balked wide-eyed. "What!??!?!"
"Oh it's ok. They're not going to take our house. But yes there are bankers." And then explaining about financial systems of debt and ownership. To a four year old. That went well too as you can imagine.
Maybe I should have agreed with her. "Yep. No such thing."

Perfect Paradox

Deep Thoughts, with Jen Dandy.
Installment #2
a mere 10 months after the first episode.

I played a ceilidh last night. Mar is dual dom, I managed to omit supper from my getting-ready regimen. So I stopped at a grocery store that was on the way, and thought, I'll grab something quick. I found a little serving bottle of chocolate milk (they didn't even have the plain milk I was hoping to get), and a little insta-lunch of Stackers.

I don't usually get this kind of stuff. As much as possible, I try to not eat processed food, except for flour and dairy products. I had never had one of these Stackers things. Somehow I managed to turn it into a philosophical experience and an opportunity to pontificate.

It was so perfect. I'm not at all saying that I enjoyed it that much, rather I mean that I was amazed by this hermetically sealed, formed plastic, formed cheese, pre-prepared insta-meal. Everything was perfectly counted out; there was a perfect number of crackers to pressed meat rounds and cheeses, sitting neatly in their perfect little divided plastic sections. Not a cracker was broken, nor crumb astray. They were all formed to stack on each other in perfect little piles. There was no evidence of the stink and squawk of the turkey who gave his life for my lunch (this isn't a post about animal rights, if you were getting worried).

We also like things like this lovely shelf. I evidence this fact by the booming business of organizer products and proliferation of Neat shows on HGTV, TLC or whatever.

We have manicured lawns, impeccably mastered music recordings, tidy rows of matching boxes/baskets in our basements/closets/shelves. We all have antibacterial hand wash that so any bacteria that manages to float over and touch us will get the KO. Lets have perfection on the molecular level! Lets even program our sperm-egg combos while we're at it.

We want perfect teeth (bleach 'em, paint 'em, align 'em), perfect skin (treat it, cover it, shave it), perfect moods (we'll drug you if you're not), perfect partners (we'll divorce you if you're not).

Everything! From the font and finish of a book cover to a woman's Perfecting Concealer, everything has been thought of and somehow "improved" from its natural or former state.

And yet...

We are a bottomless pit of desperate filth on the inside and more or less content to deny our state of tarry blackness.

It reminded me of this verse, Matthew 23:27 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean.

I heard this quote, and will sum it up like this:

Isn't it ironic that at the end of the bloodiest century in the history of world, namely the 20th century, where we've seen the Holocaust of 6 million Jews, 20 million in Ukraine under Stalin, 50 million in China under Mao Zedong, 20% of Cambodian population under Pol Pot, 800,000 Tutsis in Rwanda, just to start, that you find in the universities now a denial that there is anything called evil? And still people will maintain that one doesn't need salvation, just education.

I'm gonna go out on my uneducated limb and say that I bet most of these perpetrators were educated people.

We need Jesus. Plain and simple. We are hopeless left to ourselves. We are whitewashed tombs of rot and stench with no good of our own. Our pretty facade deceives only ourselves.

God is not fooled.

If there is a moral to my story it is that.

My primary observation in writing this was the pure irony of how perfect we hope to make our immediate world, or own personal environment and situation, and yet how deathly horrid we are under our bleached teeth and ironed shirts, to the end that we have a murderous and suicidal love affair with sin, and the denial we live in about this hypocrisy.

nice hat

We went on a day trip to PEI recently, and Anna, with her very vibrant artist's taste and love of colour, chose this hat. If the bright colours weren't enough, it also has rows of sequins. I chose homemade Gouda. We all have our kryptonite.

It was great.

I love trips.

It is beautiful there. We went over on the ferry, and it might as well have been a Caribbean cruise as far as I was concerned. Beautiful water, splashing and reflecting a coral sunset... mmm. Me loves Beauty.

I have composed sooo many entries in my head lately, I am surprised when I check back and none of them are actually on the site. I might get around to it. We'll see.

Here's a crazy Anna story. We were driving on the highway, and the following conversation ensued.

"Hey Mommy, I know how we can go fast."

"Oh ya? I thought we were going fast."

"No. Not fast enough. There's fire in the trunk!"

"WHAT!?!?! *checks rear view... sees nothing* What do you mean, Anna?"

"You can't see it, but it's in there. That's how we go fast. The fire comes out of the trunk and then we go supa dupa fast."

"Is that so?"

"Yep."

Niamh hacks Mommy's Blogger account

Dear blog,

Attention babies!
Bored? I figured out how to get like 4 baths a day! Mommy wouldn't just put you in there cause you asked or point at it (she's too busy.. ya right!), but if you totally get filthier than filth, she will! Here's what I do. Take whatever you are given for you meal- oatmeal, potato salad, anything works. Grab handfuls of it, squeeze it through your fingers to start, and shmear it through your hair like shampoo. Try to get it in your ears, up your nose, up and down your arms like lotion, massage your scalp with it. I mean take mess to a whole new level. I guarantee, you will get a bath! It works for me every time!
Party in da tubby!

what I see

Incredible injustice.

I watched one of those unsanctioned bootleg online videos of the opening ceremonies in Beijing, and all I could think of the whole time, was the money, the money, the money, burning and gone with every amazing and gorgeous display of fireworks, millions more in costumes and manpower. There must have been a zillion individuals involved in performing. Then there is facilities, power consumption, you name it. All these people attending these events are not hurting for money. They are not going hungry.

Watching the huge explosions and grandeur, I could not get the picture of a small hungry child out of my mind. Blame too many Compassion infomercials if you want, but it is a reality. How many could have been fed, given medicine, shelter, education etc. with the mad money expended at this kind of stuff? Maybe this is wildly oversimplified, but picturing the laughing, indifferent affluent, partying and having a great time while another suffers hopelessly and helplessly is just desperately sad to me, and I do believe justice will be served on the other side.

and the winners are:

Nobody.
Well, nobody guessed right, but I love your attempts! Thanks for participating in my vain activity!

To end the suspense:

Why am I a toucan? Well, the answer isn't perfectly wholesome, it makes an anatomical reference to something I have two of.

Why am I a daisy? Cause I'm pretty but I stink.
I can't help that I really like Mexican food.

Such flattering terms of endearment from the ol' hubby. ☺

Two riddles

Kinda.

If I was a bird, I would be a toucan. Why?

If I was a flower, I would be a daisy. Why?

The first person with the right answer wins my uproarious laughter.

I will give answers later, but not until I have at least a couple guesses in the comments.

Here's a clue: my husband Chris has dubbed me with these attributes.

Good luck, and happy guessing!

for the record...

I thought of these first.

Brain Rain

When it's like a desert out there, rain is sooooo refreshing. It turns dust into productive soil, and a dry hole into a pool.

And when cool things happen that stimulate your mind and your artistic muse, it is similarly rejuvenating.

I played a ceilidh last night with a great fiddle player who was driven'er as they say here, and that was musically great. Some of the best playing I've done in while, which was nice, cause I was wondering if I had lost it entirely. When you get a mojo going with another musician, I am amazed and what it pulls out of you that mightn't otherwise have been there. So fun.

So that was cool. And then I noticed against the wall, an older gentleman who had Is féidir liom JIG a dhéanamh written on his t-shirt. That's Irish, by the way, and I knew those shirts are only available in the Gaeltacht in Ireland, or online, but probably this guy had at least visited a Gaeltacht, so I had to meet him. He came up to me at the break and when asked, yes, he spoke Irish, and come to find he is from Conamara (a Gaeltacht), and is familiar with the area where I stayed, has worked near there etc. We had almost 15 minutes solid of Irish conversation which was super encouraging and fun for me: encouraging that I understood him, and he me. I press on in my goal! Then after playing a tune on the tin whistle he told the crowd that one of the reasons he had come to that town was to meet me, and how impressed he was that I sound like a native! Yay me! :)

This sounds egotistical I guess, but if you know me, you know I'm just excited for affirmation, since I have done soo very much of this as an auto-didact, I'm not super confident in my pronunciations etc. sometimes.

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I have a new game I play. It's called give-the-phone-to-Anna-when-a-telemarketer-calls. Anna likes the game too. I like hearing her responses to their requests for one of her parents, and her attempts at making conversation with them.

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some of Anna's English:
covereds = cupboards
tugga four = tug of war
their chuthers = each other
high hill shoes = high heel shoes

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One of the best rains on my brain of late has been that I have been somewhat frequenting

here...

*sigh* aaaahh yes, fresh beachy watery airy goodness how I love you.

Did I mention this is 5 minutes from my house?

That is Atlantic Ocean by the way.

Did I mention that I have lived here 6 years and it was 6 years ago when I first visited this beach, then didn't see it again til this summer when I have become a bit more vocal about my wants, and I've been half a dozen times in the last month nearly. And it is love...

To All 1 Year Olds: A Notice:

FYI: Cream of Wheat is not finger food.

You have now gotten the memo.

Don't miss next week's installment: Our Friend, Gravity!

Here's a sneak peek!
He's the one who pulls the food off your spoon onto your lap when you hold it upside down!
He's the one who makes you crack your head on the floor when you walk backwards off the edge of the chair!
He's the one that pours the contents of upturned food bowls and drink cups onto the floor!
He's the one that makes balls and toys come hit you in the head when you throw them up in the air!
He's the one that makes Mommy's... uh, never mind.

Basically if it was up, and then it went or is going down, you can blame him.
He's kinda like a floor magnet.

Knowledge is half the battle!
Tune in to next week's edition for techniques on avoiding incidents thanks to this ubiquitous and pesky force!

If I were an artist...

I would paint a picture of how I feel right now.

I would use a lot of bright colours.

I am invigorated.

I just got home from a trip to Halifax, and though I could give all kinds of stats to try and quantify and validate why this was big and wonderful for me, I really don't care to, as I weary of feeling like I have to find excuse for my feelings. So in this post, they will just be as they are, unqualified.

I so loved it.

There was one image that kinda sums up the trip for me. We did a lot of walking, in beautiful Cape Cod style neighbourhoods. Through one there was a bridge running over a stream , with a series of small waterfalls on one side. At one point, because of the arrangement of boulders etc., there was a 3 ft square ish pool of water that only seemed to swirl in itself. It wasn't plugged in to the flowing fresh current of the stream over the falls. Water would run/trickle over into it, but then was kinda stuck there. It would swirl around in circles, not going anywhere, at least not at any pace more than a gradual drain, with foam on it and looking kinda murky. The rest of the water rushing over the falls was clear as glass. It looked bright and alive and on the move. It looked like it was full of diamonds.

I can really identify with that little pool of water.

I feel like I got to run in the clear water for a couple days.

Refreshing.

I got to see beautiful things, and spend time with wonderful people, especially a friend I dearly miss. I feel more impetus for life, and for being better able to embrace it.

This was the view from my hotel room. Purrty. ☺ Beauty does a body good.

G.I. Jomance

Anna's little neighbour friend has one of those foot tall G.I. Joe dolls and she brought him over to play a couple days ago. In the hands of two 3-4 year old girls, however, he loses all his macho in a big way. They even named the poor mute guy Romance, his sealed plastic lips unable to defend himself against this imposed image revamping. He was Prince Charming, and the purpose of his big muscles was merely to save Rapunzel from the tower. No shooting or wrestling or sweating. He was probably minty and/or Axe fresh when he rescued her too.
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I have apparently finally acclimated to Nova Scotia. Every year until now, I never found the summer hot. It never got as warm as Kansas City, so I was comfortably enjoying what the locals felt was sweltering. This year, everything changed, and I knew it was changing over the winter. I wore my actual winter coat, maybe twice over the whole winter, and that only while building snowmen for hours. My unlined denim jacket sufficed otherwise, plus a scarf of course, because I am a white person after all.

However, this summer, barely here, has not even reached 80 yet, and I have already begun sweating, and been borderline to complaining about "the heat," which would not have hitherto have been acknowledged as such. In former years, I was just finally taking off my sweater. I was always embarrassed to be standing behind a girl in the grocery store who was wearing shorts, a tank and flip flops, while I still had my scarf on, socks, boots, and had not yet identified where in storage my tank tops were.
Adaptation does apparently happen.
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Two cool quotes from today:
"The only way to see is to shut my eyes, to gaze on that which I cannot see."
Anna: "I wish I could hug Jesus...."
me: "Me too, Sweety."

acorns and an old doll?

Anna went on an overnight camping and fishing excursion with Nanny & Grampy this weekend. she caught a trout while fishing in a brook. She got so very excited when she caught it that she totally forgot herself and forged out into the stream, well over her boots, after that fish. When it started to take off on her, she tried to stop it with her boot! I love the visual of her big eyes, probably squealing, wildly stomping and slapping at the water trying to catch a fish with her foot.

With Grampy's help, she did end up catching it, and ate it, the WHOLE thing, for her lunch the next day. She was so proud.

Then after the fish experience, they were picking strawberries, and at one point in the picking Anna stopped and said to Nanny & Grampy, "When I was young, we didn't have strawberries. I only had some acorns and an old doll to drag around."

It is not necessary to say that everyone split themselves laughing at this tale of unknown origin. Hilarious. Great old-fashioned entertainment.