August 7, 2014

Well it looks like I've been away from the blog for quite some time.  I am still writing, just not posting it here.  

I went to Venice this year to Seduce My Writing Muse.  It was an exceptional week.

I hope to visit the blog more often and post comments on my writing.

September 29th 2010

There are dates that we remember.  Good dates like birthdays, weddings, graduation and retirement.  Bad dates like loss of loved ones, natural disasters.  We all remember where we were on Sept 11^th, some of us even remember where we were when we heard that President Kennedy had been assassinated.

For me, September 29^th 2010 will always be etched in my memory.  It was the day I lost it, the day I fell into the well of depression, the day that everything changed.

The first thing I lost was my ability to write and read creatively.  Suddenly, the thing that kept me sane was lost to me, just when I needed it the most.

My psychologist suggested I try to replace the writing with something else for the meantime.  “dabble” he said, “try something different”.

So I started with stained glass.  The classes were held in a damp basement of a stained glass store.  There were eight students.  I decided on a bird pattern. It was hard to concentrate on the pattern and when I went to grind the glass I dropped it on the floor.  My bird now had a wounded wing.  When the teacher offered to fix it, I told her it was ok for the bird to have a wounded wing, for the bird was me.

Then I moved to Hot Glass.  It was hot alright, with a 4,000 degree oven.  I created two paper weights.

After that my next foray was pottery.  I enjoyed this more.  The wet clay had an earthy smell that was familiar to me.  It was a powerful moment even though I can’t remember where the connection was.  I made several pieces and returned to paint and then glaze the pottery.

Using a piece of macaroni shaped like a snowflake, I transformed the inside of a bowl into a work of art.

My last art class was Mosaic.  I think this may be my favourite.  I have a historic connection to this medium, since I trace my heritage to Venice.  My first mosaic piece tried to capture the essence of Venice.  The art of Mosaic requires precision and a lot of patience.

All these classes carried me through the period of my writing desert.  In the end, I discovered that I did have artistic creativity other than my writing.

The House

I never would have purchased the house if I’d known that it was haunted. Haunted yes, but not in the traditional way, with the ghost of a jilted lover or a murder victim lurking in the halls outside my bedroom. This house is haunted with old actors and actresses acting out their most famous roles.

The first day I woke up in my new home, I put my housecoat and slippers on and descended to the kitchen to prepare some breakfast. You can imagine my surprise, when seated at the table were James Cagney and a blonde actress who’s name escapes me. They were playing out the scene in The Public Enemy where Cagney takes the grapefruit he is eating and promptly rubs her face with it. I stood in the doorway dumbfounded, but just couldn’t contain a chuckle. That scene always did make me laugh.

I headed to the sink and put on a pot of coffee. When I turned around Cagney and the blonde were gone, replaced with Marlon Brando and Vivien Leigh acting out a scene from A Streetcar Named Desire. I sat down with my coffee, juice and toast and watched the two of them go at it. I suddenly felt an urge for popcorn. This was crazy, why were these people hanging out in my house?

I went back upstairs and showered, walking into my bedroom just as Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton started in on each other, in a scene from Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf? If I had to have ghosts, couldn’t they at least be from MGM musicals instead of dramas.

I seemed to be able to determine the movie genre, because when I dressed for work and descended to the first floor, I was almost knocked over by Gene Kelly, Debbie Reynolds and Donald O’Connor singing and dancing to “Good Morning” from Singing in the Rain. Well, this was an improvement over the drama. I picked up an umbrella, just in case, and headed out into the morning air.

It all started to make sense now. No wonder the previous owner had been in a hurry to sell the place. Probably wasn’t a movie buff. I passed away the hours at work, wondering what would greet me when I returned that evening. MGM musicals were a favourite but so were all those romantic movies. I tried to put it out of my mind and returned to the work at hand.

It was a long day and I was glad to see it end. I stopped at the local grocery store to pick up a few things and then wearily walked up the steps to the front door of my house. I turned the key in the lock and gingerly opened the door. No dancers in the hall, I guess they were out having dinner or maybe rehearsing their lines. I hung up my trench coat and placed the umbrella back in the stand. I turned in the direction of the hall to the kitchen and almost walked into Errol Flynn. My, he was a good looking man! He walked right through me into the arms of Olivia De Havilland. Ah, yes, it must be Robin Hood and Maid Marian. I continued to the kitchen and started preparing myself some dinner. I was jolted back to reality by the sound of moaning. I turned to find Sir Laurence Olivier with his head bent down crying. He looked inconsolable and I stopped for a moment stumped. Then Merle Oberon walked into the room in a fancy ball gown and I knew where we were. It was Catherine and Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights. I sat down, mixing spoon in hand to watch their performance and almost burned my dinner. This was getting out of control!

For weeks this went on, every night another performance, every night a surprise or two before I could get to sleep. How long would this go on for? Would we eventually run out of movie titles? Would I ever get a peaceful night’s sleep without worrying about who I might find in my bathroom in the morning?

Today had been a terrible day. Work was crazy and then to top it off I locked my keys in the car just as it started to pour. By the time I got home, I was in no mood for movies, of any genre. Thankfully, I was able to make and eat my dinner in blissful silence. After washing the dishes, I decided that a quiet evening reading in bed was just what I needed to get past this day. I changed into my pyjamas and slipped into bed. No sign of actors or actresses of any stripe. Fine by me, I was feeling worn out by all the drama.

I awoke with a start to find Harpo Marx sitting on my bed, honking his incessant horn. Not the Marx Brothers! Sure enough Groucho, Chico and Zeppo were not far behind and soon my bed looked like a scene from A Night at the Opera when all of them crammed into an ocean liner stateroom and then started ordering room service. That was it, the last straw; I screamed out “Uncle” and pulled the bedcovers over my head.

That’s why tomorrow I’m setting it on fire.

Benina's Magic

Catherine Anne hobbled up the street with her head hanging down, so that her blonde hair almost touched her knees. She had just had the most miserable day of her eleven year life. If the sidewalk would just open up and swallow her, she’d consider that an improvement.

It was so terribly hot, had been for the whole summer. The magnolia trees looked parched and all the yards were the colour of wheat. Even the birds didn’t seem to want to sing anymore. If only it would rain, then maybe everyone would get back to normal. Maybe then, the kids at school would be in a better mood and would just ignore her like before. They had decided to make Catherine Anne’s torture their summer project. Every day when school let out, they’d be waiting for her and mocking the way she walked with a limp. They’d laugh and she would turn beet red. Try as she would, there was no way to get away from them any faster, given her hobbled leg.

She was thinking about what it would be like to be invisible. Now that would definitely be better than this, when she was suddenly startled by a voice.

“Where you be gettin there, Miss Catherine Anne? Is you OK? You look a might peaked from here. Why don’t you come up on the veranda and rest a spell?”

Catherine Anne turned and saw old Miss Benina Washington stand up from her rocking chair and lean on the railing of her veranda. She had never addressed Catherine Anne before; she didn’t even realize the woman knew her name.

“You git up here and sit a spell Miss Catherine Anne, I made some lemonade.”

Catherine Anne was just about to politely refuse the offer, but the vision of cool lemonade was too overpowering.

“Thank you kindly, Miss Washington, I believe I could come sit for a while”

Catherine Anne slowly hobbled up to the stairs and gingerly climbed them. Then she walked over to a rocking chair next to the old woman and sat down. The exertion of just climbing those stairs had produced enough sweat that it now was streaming down her face and sliding down her neck. She could smell the strong scent of magnolia and it almost made her feel faint.

“Drink this Miss Catherine Anne and you’ll feel much better. It’s Benina’s magic lemonade. It has pixie dust in it and lots of secret powers.”

Catherine Anne laughed and snorted some of the lemonade out through her nose. She hadn’t laughed in a long time.

“What kind of powers does the lemonade have?” she asked while wiping her face.

She saw Benina lean back in her rocking chair and wipe the sweat from her brow with her apron.

“Well, I believe it can cure the miseries, if you happen to be suffering from them. Also been known to grow hair back on a bald man, so they say. You have anything particular that needs curing, Miss Catherine Anne?

“Well my leg needs curing. I can’t walk without a limp. Don’t suppose the lemonade can cure that?”

“Seems to me that what’s ailing you is not your leg, but what other folks think of your leg. Why do you care what other folks think of your leg?

“The kids at school make fun of the way I walk”, Catherine Anne hung her head down thinking of the endless humiliation.

“You lift up that head of yours missy, ain’t nobody got the power to give you the miseries if you don’t let them. I think what you need is a magic walking stick. You sit here a spell, while I go find it.”

Benina opened the creaky old screen door and disappeared into the house. Catherine Anne sat back enjoying the lemonade, hoping that the secret powers in it would make her invisible. She had almost fallen asleep when Benina returned.

“Took a while but I finally found it. I think this will do you just fine.”

Catherine Anne took the cane from Benina and turned it over in her hands. It was beautiful. It was made of lacquered wood that had been painted with pink flowers and green leaves. Benina took the cane back and showed Catherine Anne how to walk with it to balance her hobbled leg. Catherine Anne got up and tried to walk and suddenly felt like an elegant lady.

“That’s it Miss Catherine Anne, you’ve got the power now. Ain’t no one can take the power from you long as you have that magic stick.”

“Thank you so much, Miss Washington”, she leaned over and hugged the old woman.

Catherine Anne finished her lemonade and then said goodbye. She walked up the street towards her house with her head up and feeling absolutely elegant.

From that day on, Catherine Anne would stop each day on her way home to show Benina how her walking was improving. They would talk about everything, and laugh and sometimes even cry, if one of them had the miseries.

She was young then and couldn’t possibly know it, but she would need Benina’s magic to help her get through the dark days ahead.

Nonna Anastasia

It is 1941 and Anastasia doesn’t have time to rest. She has seven mouths to feed and no money. Her husband is dead and the war is raging. There are Nazi soldiers in the streets of her town and fear hangs like a fog in the morning air. She bundles herself in an old knit shawl and leaves the warmth of her home, to walk across the fields to the farms in the distance.

As she reaches the farmhouse she knocks on the door. In each case, she will offer her services; to clean, cook, sew, any work that needs to be done, all in exchange for a meal and perhaps some food to bring home to her children. When there is no work available, she simply begs for a handout of food to get through another day.

A few days ago the edict came from Il Duce. Mussolini commands that all the women of Italy donate their wedding rings to the Fascist cause. The gold is needed for the failing war effort. Anastasia thinks long and hard, her wedding band is one of the few reminders she has of her beloved husband, Antonio. She hides her wedding ring and replaces it on her finger with another band. To defy the Fascists can mean death, but Anastasia will not be moved.

When she dies at age 101, my nonna Anastasia will be wearing her wedding ring.

Five Pairs of Shoes and a Bag of Bananas

My dad is almost 84 years old and bent from degenerative disc disease in his back, the legacy of years working as a bricklayer. He suffers from renal failure and must undergo dialysis three times a week in order to continue living. Added to that, the patches of skin cancer on his head and back and his prostrate cancer, I’m sometimes amazed that he is still with us.

My dad is a quiet, introspective man, which is where I get those qualities from. He is also an extremely stubborn man, a trait I hope I have not inherited.

My dad immigrated to Canada in the early 50’s in search of a better life for his small family. Sometimes, out of the blue, he will regale us with stories of the war and of his life.

Before my parents married, dad worked in France in a steel foundry for almost two years. The work was hard but the pay was very good and so dad stayed. Dad tells the story of how, up until that point, he had only ever owned one pair of shoes. The shoes had been bought new but were too tight on his feet from the very beginning. After the soles wore out, he had them resoled, a process that made them even tighter. He wondered whether shoes were just supposed to be this uncomfortable. After all, these were the only pair of shoes he had ever owned. So when he was in France, and earning more money than he had ever seen before, he decided to buy some new shoes. Maybe, he thought, one could actually have shoes that didn’t hurt your feet. So he bought some shoes and they felt divine, so he kept buying, until he had bought five pairs of shoes. Each pair was a different style and colour.

In Italy, there were many fruits that he had seen in store windows but could not afford to buy. In France dad ate his first banana and by all accounts was quite impressed with the taste. After he broke his wrist on the job, he decided to spend some of his disability time back home. He took the train back to Italy to visit his family and of course his fiancée. He must have looked like quite the sight at the train station with his five pairs of shoes and a large bag of bananas. Dad would bring my mother gifts of chocolate and fragrant French soap. She claims to still have a bar of the soap, some 60 years later.

I treasure these stories that dad tells us because they are part of our legacy, to be passed on to newer generations. Some stories, like the ones of the shoes and the bananas, are funny. Others of the war and the resistance movement are frightening and heart breaking.

Dad still loves bananas, but unfortunately now that he can afford as many as he likes, he’s not allowed to eat them because of their high potassium content. In case you were wondering, he still has more shoes that the rest of us and they fit just fine.


Happy Father’s Day Papa

My Aunt Dorothy

My Aunt Akiko Dorothy Nakamachi passed away a few weeks ago. She wasn’t really my aunt, but 40 years ago my best friend Koji generously shared his aunt with me.

Over the years I grew to love and admire this woman. She was intelligent, witty and in the words of my younger brother, “really cool”. Paolo considered her cool because as a single woman she had travelled all over the world, twice going to Africa. That alone made her cool in Paolo’s eyes.

Aunt Dorothy’s life was one worthy of an epic novel. Born and raised in Vancouver, she fought Japanese racism to graduate as a registered nurse from St. Paul’s Hospital, after the Bishop interceded to get her admitted. Shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbour, she was interned in the B.C. interior at Greenwood internment camp, where she was the only nurse treating over 4,000 Japanese detainees. Many of the detainees had contracted T.B. and eventually so did Aunt Dorothy. She was transferred to a hospital and had a lung removed.

After the war the Japanese were not allowed to return to B.C. so she moved to Toronto. She entered the University of Toronto, where she earned an additional nursing degree and then worked as a Public Health nurse until her retirement.

Years later when the conservative government formally apologized to the Japanese who were interned, each of them was awarded $21,000 as a redress settlement. My Aunt Dorothy took that money and promptly bought herself a full length mink coat and hat.

Aunt Dorothy never married but I learned that she remained ever the romantic. I discovered that she and I shared a love for Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre and Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. It gave me joy to be able to gift her with BBC videos of both, which I know she treasured.

In her last year she sent me a gift via Koji. It was a lovely damascene brooch she bought on one of her many trips to Japan. The brooch, made of iron or steel with interlacings of silver and gold, depicts a pagoda and the ever present Mount Fuji. I wore it over my heart at her funeral.

Since her passing, Koji has been going through Aunt Dorothy’s things and distributing them to family members. He gave me 16 English bone china tea cups and saucers that speak to me of my Aunt Dorothy’s grace and elegance, and of course of her love of tea. He also asked if I would like a statue of the Virgin Mary that St Paul’s hospital gave her at her graduation in 1940. I told him I would be honoured to receive it and to find a suitable place for it in my home office.

My Aunt Dorothy passed away in her sleep, just short of her 92nd birthday. I hope when I grow up that I’ll be just like her; intelligent, witty, strong, romantic and of course “really cool”.