The Tilting Universe

I grew up in a small town on the edge of a forest and my friend Helen* lived on the other side of the creek from our house. We spent all our time at each other’s houses, playing hopscotch, skipping, swimming, playing with dolls and doing all the other things girls do. We went through elementary school together and we ate lunch together every day. We would often trade lunches, and I always looked forward to the days when Helen’s mother made her chocolate bar and banana sandwiches. They were delicious. We grew apart as we got into high school and found we had different interests. Helen was very athletic and involved in girl’s basketball, where I was more involved with the school choir and painting. We went our separate ways and didn’t see each other again after graduation.

Helen became a teacher and moved to another city, and I got married. After my husband died, it was necessary for me to go back to work, so I became a legal assistant with a large law firm. I worked for a senior partner and his junior assistant, a young articling student named Paul*.

Paul was a very sweet young man and everyone liked him. He was dark, attractive and sort of self-effacing, but he was a very promising articling student. However, he had made one serious mistake in his personal life, which required a formal hearing before he could become a lawyer. When the hearing concluded, it was agreed that Paul could become a lawyer and practice law, but on the condition that he move to a law firm in another city.

In the meantime, Helen had been diagnosed with a condition that required surgery. The doctor who performed the surgery botched it, leaving Helen in chronic pain. Helen sued the doctor but she lost. By coincidence, the firm representing the doctor was the same law firm where Paul now worked.

Helen was frustrated with the outcome of her case, and after exhausting all appeals she set out on a mission to take justice into her own hands. She went to the law firm that had represented the doctor, with the intent to shoot the lawyer, and she shot Paul instead and killed him. She was on her way to shoot the doctor when she was captured. After a lengthy trial, Helen was found guilty of murder.

At the time this happened, I had not yet heard of the theory of six degrees of separation. Two people whom I had known at different times in my life, had their lives intersect with each other in a way that would turn out to be devastating for them both.

That is my story of how the universe can sometimes tilt on its axis.

*The names have been changed.

Thank You To The Blogger Team

Much to my astonishment, a few days ago the Blogger team chose me as one of their "Blogs of Note". Moi? Oh, goodness! I am honored that my boring-little-blog has passed muster, as the saying goes. But more than that, I am very pleased that so many of you wonderful folks have visited me, and have posted lively, witty and intelligent comments, and have added your names to my followers. I love meeting new people, and over the next few days (weeks?) I plan to visit each one of you. In addition, I have had folks ask me if they can link to my blog, to which I reply, "Absolutely!" That is what blogging is all about.

I often think of blogging as being similar to the little Russian matryoshka nesting dolls, where inside one you will find another, and another, and another ... That is the beauty of blogging. Click on one link, and it leads to another, and another, and another ... I have found blogging to be a wonderful way to find out about other people all over the world -- their lives, their customs, their ideas, their hobbies and interests, and their likes and dislikes. The one thing I have learned is that, the more differences we have, the more we are the same. Somehow, I find that very reassuring.

Thank you all for visiting my blog, and I hope you do have the opportunity to come back again soon.

Bill, The Toaster Repairman

Several years ago I had the opportunity to take some art classes with a well-known local artist. I had always admired her work, and I jumped at the chance to study with her. We had to "audition" and show her some of our work before we were accepted. Her class consisted of 15 people and it was an interesting group, all with very different artistic styles and levels of talent. We were instructed at the beginning of the classes to introduce ourselves by first names only, and we were not to discuss anything about our private lives. The teacher wanted everyone in the class to be on a level playing field, as it were, and to bring to it only our interest in learning art.

I made a couple of friends in the class, one was a woman named Kathy and the other was an older gentleman named Bill. The three of us sat together at the same table each week and we critiqued each other's "homework". Bill grew roses and he loved doing paintings of his roses.

Over the course of several weeks we got to know each other very well, but on a first name basis only. The three of us had a lot of fun at our little table, and occasionally our paintings would cause gales of laughter. One day as we were walking home, I said to Kathy, "What do you think Bill does for a living?" She said, "Well, he wears the same beige Lacoste golf shirt every week, and he's very quiet and unassuming. I think he's a toaster repairman." "Yup," I agreed. Bill was definitely a toaster repairman, quietly sitting in the back of his shop every day, screwdriver in hand, fixing toasters. It suited him perfectly.

At the end of the sessions, the entire class had a party. The teacher brought a few bottles of wine and we had a pot-luck dinner and kicked back. We were all given permission to state our last names and to describe a bit about ourselves. There were the usual suspects, a physiotherapist, a school teacher, a nurse, me ... a few other folks. Kathy and I winked at each other. We were finally going to find out if Bill was really a toaster repairman. If I recall, we had a $5.00 bet on it.

When it came to Bill's turn, he quietly talked about his rose garden and his interest in painting, but he was hesitant to talk about what he did for a living. We felt bad that he was embarrassed to admit he was a toaster repairman, but we finally pried it out of him.

Bill, it turned out, was The Honourable Mr. Justice William Joseph Trainer, a Justice of the Supreme Court of British Columbia. Our friend Bill had presided over the Supreme Court trial deciding the disposition of the “cash for bodies” in the Clifford Olson case, Canada's most infamous mass murderer, and serial killer of children.

Never judge a man by his quiet manner or his beige Lacoste golf shirt.

Extra-Sensory Perception...?

As I have said, oh, about a million times, I am not a writer, so I probably am not able to do justice to this little story. But it is a true story, so just imagine you are sitting with me in my living room, we are having some refreshments and chatting, and I am reciting the story to you just as it happened. I must say, also, that although I was baptized in the Catholic Church, I am not a Catholic so I have no special affinity to the Pope. I am spiritual but non-religious, secular. This is my Pope story.

It was Mother’s Day, Sunday, May 10, 1981 and my daughter and I went for a two-hour walk to Jericho Beach and Spanish Banks, near where I live. When we got home my daughter settled down to do her homework, and I enjoyed the rare luxury of a Sunday afternoon nap. Just as I was waking up, I looked out the French doors in my bedroom that lead to the garden. The cherry trees were in bloom and I thought how wonderful they looked. I was wide awake. As I was looking at them I had a vision of a radio tower, similar to the RKO radio tower, and I could hear voices coming from it. The voices were speaking in various languages that I could not understand, but then I could understand the voices as they spoke in French and English. They were announcing that the Pope had been shot and was being rushed to Agostino Gemelli University Polyclinic in Rome. The voices went on to say who did it and how he did it. His name was Mehmet Ali Ağca and he was a Turkish gunman for hire. He took the train into Rome and hid his gun in a locker at the train station. He later retrieved the gun, went to St. Peter’s Square and shot the Pope.

I sat up in bed and thought, “How evil. Why would anyone shoot the Pope?” It left me feeling very unsettled and I tried not to think about it. An hour or so later, a thunderstorm passed over Vancouver and lightning struck very close to our house. The basement windows were shattered and I felt very disoriented, as if I were part of the electrical energy.

The next day, Monday, I checked the television and newspapers to see if there had been any news about the Pope being shot, but there was nothing. By Tuesday, I had put it out of my thoughts. On Wednesday morning, May 13th, as I was getting ready for work and my daughter was getting ready for school, she came into my bedroom and said, “Mother, someone has just shot the Pope.” I said, “I know” and I told her about my premonition. I said, “Wait, there’s more,” and I told her the whole story. It was met with skepticism. Two days later, the rest of the story was announced on the six o’clock news. It was just as I had predicted.

A few years later I learned the assassination attempt on the Pope took place on the anniversary of the day and the hour when the Virgin Mary first appeared to the three peasant children in Fátima, Portugal, May 13, 1917. The Virgin Mary divulged three secrets to the children, the third of which was of “a bishop clothed in white who falls to the ground, apparently dead under a burst of gunfire.” The third secret had been kept sealed for many years and had been interpreted as the assassination of a Pope. One of the three children, Lucia, became a Carmelite nun and Pope John Paul II met with her on May 13,1982, one year after the attempt on his life. He always felt that the Virgin Mary had protected him.

Three years after the assassination attempt, the Pope came to Vancouver. Everyone turned out to see him, and I was standing by the side of the road near the Burrard Bridge as he passed by in his Popemobile with the bulletproof dome. Just as he pulled beside me and he was a few feet away, he turned and looked at me and our eyes locked for a brief moment, and on his face was a look of recognition. A strange and powerful force of the universe had connected us on May 13, 1981, and had also connected us both to another extraordinary event that had taken place on May 13, 1917. However, I will never fully understand what it was.

A Pear of Pears

The pear on the left sells for about $5,800 CDN. The pear on the right sells for about 58 cents. I painted the one on the right, and I was not aware of the existence of the pear on the left when I did my little painting. They look similar, but a pear is a pear is a pear.

The pear on the left is oil on canvas and is wonderfully and masterfully painted, while the pear on the right was sketched very quickly with some pencil crayons on a piece of pink cardboard. But somehow there is a little voice deep inside my head that tells me the pear on the right is almost as good as the pear on the left. Maybe not worth $5,800 CDN, but perhaps $5.80.

Lately I have been considering going back to school, studying art and finding out whether or not I can actually be any good. I am always intimidated by talented artists, and then I think, well, what the heck, if they can do it, why can’t I? What is it they have that I don’t have? Well, the only way to find out is to actually do it, right? And there is the conundrum. I am a procrastinator. I procrastinate.

I enjoy the boring, safe little routine of my life, and I find excuses not to push the envelope. My life is on autopilot, and I am comfortable that way. Go to school? Do something different? Change my routine? Whyever would I do that?

So, I have decided 2009 is the year I am going to be daring and do things I have never done before. Maybe quitting my job (gasp) and going back to school might be one of them.

Is there anything you have always wanted to do your entire life, but have been too afraid or intimidated to do? Now’s the time to do it.

It's Friday...!

Just when I think I cannot haul my ass carcass body into work one more day, that most magic of all creations comes along, namely, Friday. This first week back after the Christmas holiday season has been particularly exhausting. We now have a full complement of nutcases staff back at work once again.

*sigh*

Everyone is more relaxed on Fridays, people are looking forward to the weekend, and things that might have been enormously serious on Mondays are now just tiny blips on the radar screen. I may even take in some chocolates, just to sweeten everyone up.

I have something to look forward to as well. Tonight I will be receiving - ta-da - my new computer! Yes I will! I can hardly wait. I can't imagine what it will be like to use a computer that actually works, and actually has a USB port. Don't laugh. The computer I have now was the original computer used to guide the Mayflower from Southampton, England to the colony of Plymouth. So this weekend I will be learning all the bells and whistles of my new computer. Be prepared to be amazed at what I can do!

Have a great weekend, everyone.

NB: My site statistics on my boring-little-blog went off the chart today, and I noticed I have been chosen a "Blog of Note". Goodness! Moi? Well, the great thing is that I get to meet all you new folks, and I am looking forward to visiting you.

A Tale Of Two Houses

I just had to share these two amazing images with you. One is a painting by Edward Hopper, and one is a photograph by my good friend Russell from Iowa Grasslands. Russell didn't realize when he took the photograph that he was almost duplicating a Hopper painting. The name of the painting is "Ryder's House" and it was painted in 1933. It now resides in the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

"Ryder's House", is described as follows: [The painting] shows a house built sometime before 1839. After several previous owners, title passed in June 1871 to Silas Ryder II. His son James, for whom nearby Ryder Beach was named, was born there. Again Hopper cues us about the long family history of the house through his title, Ryder's House. A traditional Cape Cod house-and-a-half, it was, and is, a shingled structure that retains much of its early character, in spite of subsequent additions. Rather than depicting the house from the front or the back, which would have indicated the actual size of the substantial dwelling, Hopper selected a vantage point that made the house seem small and simple. He emphasized its age by scumbling layers of gray-white pigment over one another so that it appears to be weathered stucco rather than shingle.

Russell's photograph was taken yesterday on a trip to northern Iowa. The whole area is encased in ice right now, but the brilliant sunshine on the house in his photograph is almost identical to the sunshine in Hopper's painting. Notice the chimneys and the shadows on the roof lines. And both images have an air of stark bleakness.

Now, if we could just get some history on Russell's photograph. I think these two images are wonderful...!

Books! Books! Books!

Ever since I was a little girl, I have loved books. My favorite gifts were often books, and I would disappear into my room to read them. I loved Maggie Muggins, all of the Nancy Drew series, Treasure Island, Black Beauty, Greek Mythology, Heidi, The Wind in the Willows, Alice in Wonderland, and so much more. I escaped to the worlds of all the imaginery places and characters. One moment I could be in Switzerland and the next I could be on a pirate ship in the Caribbean. I became addicted to books.

This Christmas I received three wonderful books. "Annie Liebowitz at Work", an autobiography by Annie Liebowitz, the photographer. Annie Liebowitz has lived an amazing life, in addition to being one of the world's best photographers. Who else but Annie Liebowitz would ask the Queen to remove her Crown? The Queen's reply: "What do you think this is?" I always get the impression when I see photographs of the Queen that she is just slightly ticked off about something, and is about to holler "Off with her head!" The images Annie captured of the Queen are beautiful and very human. Annie Liebowitz has led a life as interesting as many of the subjects she has photographed, and I can hardly wait to read of her adventures.

The second book I received is "The Year of Living Biblically", by A.J. Jacobs, a writer for the "New York Times" and "Esquire Magazine". A.J. Jacobs is Jewish, but he grew up in a secular home. "The Year of Living Biblically is about my quest to live the ultimate biblical life. To follow every single rule in the Bible – as literally as possible. I obey the famous ones:

The Ten Commandments.
Love thy neighbor.
Be fruitful and multiply.

But also, the hundreds of oft-ignored ones.

Do not wear clothes of mixed fibers.
Do not shave your beard.
Stone adulterers."... A.J. Jacobs

The third book I received is "Dreams from my Father" by Barack Obama. Yes, I really, really do want to like him, and I am hoping this book will do the trick. I should, however, learn to keep my opinion about him to myself. As Mark Twain says in his essay, "The Privilege of the Grave", "As an active privilege, free speech ranks with the privilege of committing murder: we may exercise it if we are willing to take the consequences."

*sigh*

I am looking forward to reading this book, because I am earnestly hoping it will change my mind about Barack Obama. Intelligent, well-read, well-informed people appear to really like him. Maybe there is something I have missed. I'm sure of it.

So, now I have three books covering all the bases - art, religion and politics. Does it even get any better than that?

We All Live In A Yellow Submarine

The “Ben Franklin” was once the largest non-military submersible in the world and it is now at the Vancouver Maritime Museum. In 1969 the “Ben Franklin” made a 30-day dive that made NASA history. The “Ben Franklin” was used as a laboratory to see how people respond to a prolonged voyage in an enclosed capsule, including sleep quality and patterns, sense of humor and behavioral shifts, physical reflexes, and the effects of a long-term routine on the crew. The lessons learned from that mission are used today in NASA’s plans to send people into deep space.

The “Ben Franklin” was purchased by a Vancouver businessman for private use, but it sat disassembled and slowly rusting, for 30 years. He donated the submersible to the Vancouver Maritime Museum. The Museum's director James Delgado, an American underwater archaeologist, realized the importance of restoring the “Ben Franklin”. He did this with the help of Vancouver businesses and volunteers. James Delgado contacted the former crewmembers of the “Ben Franklin”, and also the company who originally built the submersible. In 2002 The Vancouver Maritime Museum hosted a reunion of the original crew of the “Ben Franklin”.

The submersible is now part of the exhibit at the Museum. The interior of the sub is not open to the public yet. However, if you click on this link, you can take a virtual tour of the sub. And if you live in Vancouver, check out the Vancouver Maritime Museum. It’s full of wonderful treasures.

A New Year, A New Calendar

La Psyché
Berthe Morisot
1876

I'm not overly fond of New Year's Eve celebrations, and I celebrate the New Year by getting up early on New Year's Day and greeting the day. One of my favorite things to do is to take down the old calendar and put up the new. I look at the fresh, clean pages and wonder what the months ahead have in store. Usually - at least most of the time - we can choose how we fill those pages. Two 21st Century "buzzwords" are proactive and reactive, and we can truly be proactive as much as possible about how our days will unfold. If we proceed with inertia and sluggishness, our days will be filled reactively rather than proactively. I think we all tend to go through the "coulda, shoulda, woulda" phase occasionally, but somehow New Year's Day has the promise of "can, shall, will" - don't you think? I never make New Year's resolutions, because they usually don't last until much past noon, but I do like the fresh, clean pages of a new calendar and a new year.

My calendar this year was one of my Christmas gifts from my family, and it is a wonderful calendar of female Impressionist painters. These paintings are by Berthe Morisot, who was a friend of Edouard Manet, and in fact she married his brother, Eugène.

Grain Field
1875

I think this painting is easily as wonderful as anything painted by Vincent van Gogh, who came along later. Berthe Morisot was a member of the circle of painters in Paris who became known as the Impressionists. Undervalued for over a century, possibly because she was a woman, she is now considered among the first league of Impressionist painters. Although traditionally Manet has been related as the master and Morisot as the follower, there is evidence that their relationship was a reciprocating one.[3] Morisot had developed her own distinctive artistic style. Records of paintings show Manet's approval and appreciation of certain stylistic and compositional decisions that Morisot originated. He incorporated some of these characteristics into his own work.

... Wikipedia

You can read more about Berthe Morisot here and see more of her paintings here.

With the passing of another year, we all hear that loud ching as the clock ticks ahead. I hope you all go out and make it a wonderful new year. And remember, look ahead, not back. Last year's calendar has been filed away.