Psychedelic Fever Dreams...

This past couple of days I have been ill with the worst cold/flu that I have ever had. I can't remember being this sick for ages. All I could do was sleep, and I had the strangest, feverish, delirium dreams. In one of my dreams, Queen Elizabeth was visiting me, and she asked if I had a Boots catalogue.  Boots is a pharmaceutical chain in the United Kingdom.  Anyway, for whatever reason, the Queen wanted their catalogue.

"You don't need their catalogue Ma'am, all you need is to go online and you can buy anything you want off the Internet...  Here, let me show you."

And I proceeded to set up a computer and to show the Queen how to use it.  She was amazed.  In real life, I would imagine the Queen not only knows how to use a computer, but in fact uses it on a daily basis, especially to e-mail the various members of her large family.  But dreams are not within the realm of reality, are they?  Anyway, it's always fun to spend time with the Queen.  She's actually quite a character, once you get to know her.

Today is the 13th anniversary of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, when the Mercedes in which she was riding slammed into the 13th pillar in the Pont de l'Alma road tunnel in Paris.  And no, I don't believe in conspiracy theories.  I think Diana's death was the sad ending to a sad life, an unfortunate accident when an inexperienced driver was speeding through a tunnel, driving a powerful car he was not experienced enough to handle.  If Diana had been wearing a seat belt, she would have survived.  She had been hounded by the paparazzi, but it had become almost a symbiotic relationship.  She knew they kept her in the public eye.  She loved being the most photographed woman in the world, and often tipped them off when she was going out. 

Princess Diana would be 49 years old now if she were alive. What might her life have been like if she had lived and stayed married to Prince Charles? When Diana married him, everyone thought she had caught the brass ring, but really her life would have been simply that of a Lady in Waiting ... waiting to become Queen. If the Queen lives for another 20 years, which she could possibly do, given the longevity of her mother, Diana would be 69 years old when her husband ascended the throne.  The Queen will not abdicate, nor will she skip over Charles and "appoint" Prince William as her heir.  She considers herself annointed by God, and as Prince of Wales, Charles is annointed by God as well.  Perhaps once the Queen passes on, the Monarchy will become irrelevant, but somehow I think they will be around for a while.

At least now -- thanks to me -- the Queen knows how to use a computer.

The Common Cold ~~~ Ogden Nash

Of all the darndest things, one of the doctors came to work with a cold and infected everyone else. Some folks like to share, you know? It's completely ridiculous. In our organization, we have an initiative called "Infection Control" and we are required to attend seminars on how to wash our hands. For goodness sakes, I know how to wash my hands -- use hot soapy water and count the alphabet. All thoughout our offices there are little signs on everything from elevator buttons to door knobs, "5,650 people touched this button..."

*sigh*

We recently had a meeting where the Director informed everyone that if we are sick, we must stay home.

*achoo*

Does any of it work? Of course not. People still come to work sick, and they infect each other.  I guess the attitude is ... "Well, I'm already sick, so what does it matter...?"

My throat feels as if a gang of chimney sweeps is in there, scrubbing away ... my head is throbbing, I have chills and a runny nose, and I ache in places where I didn't even know I had places.  What a waste of a perfectly good weekend.

Am I going to work tomorrow?

"Well, what the heck ... I'm already sick, so what does it matter...?

*cough*

Go hang yourself, you old M.D.!
You shall not sneer at me.
Pick up your hat and stethoscope,
Go wash your mouth with laundry soap;
I contemplate a joy exquisite
I'm not paying you for your visit.
I did not call you to be told
My malady is a common cold.

By pounding brow and swollen lip;
By fever's hot and scaly grip;
By those two red redundant eyes
That weep like woeful April skies;
By racking snuffle, snort, and sniff;
By handkerchief after handkerchief;
This cold you wave away as naught
Is the damnedest cold man ever caught! ~~~ Ogden Nash

The Life Of Contentment...

Today I attended a retirement party for one of my co-workers. She has worked for the same organization, doing exactly the same job, for 37 years. She's really a lovely woman, always smartly dressed, always pleasant -- the sort of person everyone likes. In his speech today, the Director said that he had never heard anyone say an unkind word about her, and that she had always been reliable in all the years he had known her.

In the ten years that I have known Gabrielle, she has always had the same expression on her face, and the same pleasant manner.  She is always happy, and today as I was looking at her during her retirement party, it occurred to me that Gabrielle's thermostat is permanently set at "medium" -- not too hot, not too cold -- just right.  She gives the impression that life has worked out for her just as she liked.  She's happily married, has two grown children with whom she has a perfect relationship, and she just seems to have a look of contentment all the time.  I think that's the reason folks like her -- she is always cheerful and positive, never moody.  I have not known many people like that in my life.  People are usually very complex, and Gabrielle is definitely not what anyone might call complex.  But she is content.  The question is, is Gabrielle content because life has been good to her, or has life been good to her because she is content?  How many of us are the authors of our own misfortunes, simply because we have not learned to be content?  How many of us have our thermostats turned too low, or too high?

Being satisfied with what life had to offer has served Gabrielle well.  Having a steady life not full of too many highs or lows seems to have been just the ticket for Gabrielle.  Perhaps it took a certain amount of discipline to stay the course like that.  We don't really know what someone else is thinking or feeling, and perhaps Gabrielle has been tempted many times to cut loose for parts unknown.  But she didn't, and I wonder if she realizes just how unique she is.  Perseverance is its own reward. ...

Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz ...

Here in Canada, most of our favorite television shows are American. My favorite show is Mad Men, and oddly enough, it is produced by Lionsgate Television -- which is Canadian. Who knew! The show is set in the fictional advertising agency of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, and one of their main accounts is a cigarette firm.  The advertisers have requested the advertising firm to whitewash cigarettes and make them appear safe, because studies were beginning to show they were a health hazard.  People were dying from cigarette smoking, and that would never do.  In Mad Men, everyone smokes, drinks, and generally carries on in ways that would be shockingly politically incorrect by today's standards.  Those were the days...

On this side of the border, when we watch Canadian and American television, the main differences we notice between the two countries are the advertisements. In America, the major advertisers are car companies, fast food chains and pharmaceuticals. There is almost a correlation between those three things, don't you think? In Canada, the main advertisements are beer ads, home improvement products and cleaning products. Do we have some sort of a fetish about our homes here in Canada? We also have a lot of travel and tourism advertisements, so it appears that once our houses are sparkling clean, we like to escape.

We also like to think we're the same as our American cousins to the south, but we're really quite different in many ways. Our money is in all different colours, we still spell everything the British way -- neighbour, favour, labour -- we keep changing the words to our national anthem, and we'll keep doing it until we get it right. And we have our own language.

"Please take your runners off the chesterfield while you're eating your poutine, or you won't get a Nanaimo bar for dessert, eh..."

Okay .... what did I just say...?

But mostly, we take our beer -- and our beer ads -- very seriously.  Never make fun of a Canuck, or his beer, or you'll suffer the consequences, eh...?

These Feet Were Made For Walking...

Shoes
Vincent Van Gogh
1888

I have been away from my computer for the better part of this weekend, because I have been outdoors -- walking. The weather is cooler, and is more conducive to going for long strolls. It's wonderful. My biggest problem is that I have to walk with my feet, and I have -- arguably -- the world's worst feet. Most of the people in my family have lovely, slim, dainty feet, but that particular gene skipped me.

When I was growing up on Vancouver Island, I wore shoes as little as possible. I could walk over gravel or hot coals with my bare feet, and it didn't bother me at all. But I guess eventually one pays a price for that. When I was working for law firms, I always "dressed up" and wore high heels, and fortunately I felt comfortable wearing them. When my daughter and I were in Paris, she convinced me to buy a pair of flat shoes. They were gorgeous -- a soft buttery leather with a latticework pattern and a little leather bow. When I put them on, I could hear my feet saying "Thank you...!". I have worn flat shoes ever since then, and my high heels now languish at the back of my cupboard.

Here are some interesting facts about feet -- everything you never ever wanted to know:

1. During a lifetime it is thought that a person has walked enough steps to have circled the planet more than four times, which is approximately 115,000 miles.

2. Women suffer from four times as many problems than men. This is believed to be a result of their cruel high heel shoes.

3. Women on average walk three miles farther every day than men.

4. Socrates once claimed "When our feet hurt, we hurt all over".

5. Runners hit the ground with a force of two and a half times their body weight.

6. The average foot gets two sizes longer when you stand up.

7. A 2½-inch high heel can increase the load on the forefoot by 75%.

8. Each foot produces more than a cup of perspiration per day.

9. There are 28 bones in the human foot.

In the evenings after work, I love to sit and massage cream into my feet and pamper them a little bit.  I feel that if we look after our feet, they will look after us.

Buttering Up To The Boss...

Of all the years that I have worked -- since the dinosaurs still walked the earth -- I have never gone in to the boss's office and complained about a co-worker, even though the opportunity to do so has presented itself many times.  I think I would rather be struck by lightning than to "rat" on a fellow colleague.  People are people, and that makes them human, unfortunately. But most people are mature and responsible, and I believe adults should be treated like adults. When I was a little girl, I had an older brother who was always “telling” on me, and ever since then I have developed an aversion to folks who “rat” people out. It is the lowest form of humanity, in my estimation; and I’m never sure if people do it to make other people look bad, or to make themselves look good. It’s a combination of both, I suppose. And the unfortunate thing is, they never get the story straight. They always embellish -- but a good fib is better than the truth, right? However, there will always be people who think it is their duty to mind everyone else’s business.

I have learned more than I care to know about my co-workers’ personal lives, just by overhearing their constant lengthy telephone calls. *sigh* And one afternoon I overheard one of the “temps” in our office as she recruited folks to her pyramid scheme. From 1:00 until 4:00 she convinced everyone that if they just gave her $400, their lives would be fuller, richer and better… The only thing fuller, richer and better was her bank account. All this was being done on the employer’s time – and dime.

One day I was looking through one of the directories on our H:\ drive, and I stumbled upon a cache, a veritable stockpile – a motherload, as it were -- of pornographic photographs. I telephoned the owner of the *cough* artwork (“Bob”) and advised him that he had better remove the pictures from the public drive before they were discovered by someone else who would report him. As it turned out, someone else had found the photographs at the same time that I did, and was all set to report Bob, but I headed them off at the pass before any harm could be done. Bob removed the pictures, and his secret was safe. The next day Bob sent me a little bouquet of flowers, with a note saying, “Thank you. You know what this is for…”

Well, Bob, let that be a lesson to you. You just dodged a bullet for something you should not have done.

My point is, there are two types of people in this world – people who see all and say nothing, and people who feel it is their “duty” to “inform” on their co-workers. The tiniest infraction is reported, usually with some fictional embellishments, just to make the story more interesting. And usually the “office police” are the folks who are guilty of goldbricking and slacking off more than anyone else.  This week I observed someone tell a lie about a co-worker, and it has caused that person no end of grief.

“A lie does not consist in the indirect position of words, but in the desire and intention, by false speaking, to deceive and injure your neighbour.” ~~~ Jonathan Swift

There is a special place in h*ll for people who do this sort of thing, and hopefully in that place they will end up with the Pointy-Haired Boss from Dilbert.  One can only hope...

The Ghost Of Hilda...

La Promenade (La Promenade, la femme à l'ombrelle - Woman with a Parasol)
Claude Monet
1875

Do you believe in ghosts? Ever since I was a child, I have been able to feel the spirits of people who had previously lived in a house. Occasionally I have even caught a glimpse of them. They are as clear to me as the people we see every day. They are not transparent wisps, but real people.

I have been living in my tree house for 12 years.  It is a fairly new development from sometime in the late 1980s. Prior to that, it had been an Edwardian house, built around the turn of the century. Some of the older Edwardian houses in my neighbourhood still exist, and they’re lovely old buildings, with brick fireplaces, wrap-around porches and stained glass windows. Many of them have fruit trees in the yard. I love to walk through the neighbourhood and imagine the folks who lived there and what their lives must have been like in those elegant old houses.

I have never told anyone this until now, but occasionally when I first wake up in the morning, before I am fully awake, I can see a woman in my apartment. She is visible for only a few seconds, and then she disappears. When I first saw her, I thought, “Who on earth is that woman?” After a while, I got used to her, and she just became part of the environment. She looks very pleasant, she has auburn hair and a 1950s style dress. She is quite elegant. I have just accepted her, and she doesn’t frighten me. I imagine she is someone who had lived in the house that had been on the property.

This morning I was late for work, so I took a taxi to my office. When I got into the taxi, the driver said to me, “I was born in the house that used to be on that property…” Omigosh. I have always been curious about the house that had been there before, so I asked him about it. He told me it was a three-story house, it had a large back yard with a lawn and apple trees, and his mother had planted a lovely flower garden.  He said his parents rented the top floor to a woman named Hilda. He described her as having auburn hair; she was very elegant, well-read, well-educated and loved to travel to exotic places like Africa and the Orient.  She spoke several languages.

The taxi driver told me that when he was a little boy, his mother felt he should learn more about culture and the arts than she was able to teach him, so Hilda used to take him with her to the opera and the theatre. Hilda had been married for a short while at a very young age, but her husband died, and she had no children of her own. He said he became very good friends with Hilda, and was very fond of her. She took him for walks through the neighbourhood, and to picnics and swimming at Kitsilano Beach.  She lived her life as a spinster, and she passed away in the house at the age of 90.

I described to him the woman I have seen occasionally over the years, and he said, “That’s Hilda.”

Well, I like Hilda. It sounds as if she had been a very interesting person, and I don’t mind sharing my space with her. And maybe she likes me too, and approves of sharing her space with me. At least now I know her name.

Sally The Sad Little Sunflower...

A few weeks ago I bought a gorgeous little sunflower to put on the terrace of my treehouse.  I called her Sally -- don't ask me why -- and I loved seeing her sunny little face every morning.  And then a couple of weeks ago the strata council in our building decided to have the decks power washed.  Of course, in their usual wisdom, the council decided to have the decks power washed in the middle of high summer, just as everyone's terraces were fully landscaped, everything was in bloom, folks were using their barbeques, patio tables, Adirondack chairs...

*sigh*

I think Sally became traumatized by the power washer, and ever since then she has kept her face hidden. I talk to her every day, and I water her, and I tell her everything is going to be all right, but her face remains hidden.  She was fully closed a couple of days ago, and last night I said to her, "Won't you let me see your face?" and slowly a few spikey petals opened shortly afterwards.

Okay, I'm really starting to sound looney tunes now, aren't I?  The thing is, does anyone know how I can revive Sally the Sunflower?  Or is she lost forever?

The good news is, I now have a spanking clean deck, but most of my plants didn't survive.

Sally looks very sad, doesn't she...? 

Don't Be Afraid To Say What You Really Think...

I subscribe to both the New York Times and the Huffington Post on my Facebook account, and gosh they are a lively bunch over at those two sites. They've got everything going on, and it's wonderful.  News, opinions, controversy, debate -- you name it, they've got it.  At the click of the mouse, you can find out anything that is going on in the world, but best of all, you can read everyone else's opinions.  There are no holds barred.

The Internet has changed the way news, ideas, opinions, and so much more is discussed.  And as with most issues in life there is no right or wrong, no black or white, just varying shades of grey, depending on whom you are.  But one thing I have noticed is that, with our wonderful neighbours to the south, almost every issue has become split down party lines -- Democratic or Republican.  Everything becomes politicized.  How did that happen?  Rather than discussing a topic on the merits, people quickly square off into their political parties -- and that's it.  All of a sudden something that may be a humanitarian issue, or medical, or scientific -- or whatever -- becomes political.  And then people are afraid to say what they think for fear of being called "ignorant" or "biased".  The political leaders grab hold of an issue, the talking heads on TV start shouting at each other, and any intelligent debate or discussion goes out the window.  Chris Hayes, who was guest hosting the Rachel Maddow show last night, listened to an argument about a particular issue -- with which he did not agree -- and then he said. "I just threw up in my mouth."  Oh, goodness.

There is a certain "hot button" topic being discussed at the moment (which I will not mention here...) that seems to have enraged everyone.  It's very interesting, and very sensitive, to be sure.  The President endorsed the issue, and then he backtracked.  I thought that was the most intelligent thing he had done yet, not that he had backtracked, but that he had actually given some thought to something that is extremely controversial, and he thought for himself rather than "along party lines".  He listened to the concerns of other folks.

Political correctness is not necessarily a bad thing.  Folks have come a long way in the past few decades, and things that were acceptable 20 or 30 years ago would make people blush with shame now.  That's a good thing.  And it's because of lively debate and conversation that people are able to exchange ideas and arrive at a conclusion that is acceptable to the majority.  People should never be afraid to say what they think -- even if their viewpoint is unpopular, or perhaps not currently politically correct.

The fact that anyone can log on to The New York Times, The Huffington Post, or thousands of other newspapers and magazines, and share their opinions about current issues is just amazing.  And whether folks agree with each other -- or not -- we all end up with a say about what kind of a world we want to live in, as long as we think for ourselves, and not along "party lines".

Do Overs...

The other day I was riding in an elevator, and I was slightly bored.  My mind began to wander towards the realm of the imagination... "What if...", I imagined, "at the end of my elevator ride, the door opened and I was in a different life.  I would step out of the elevator and into a whole new world, a whole different me." Oh, just think of the possibilities.  Imagine getting into an elevator, and being able to push the "Do Over" button.

When I was a little girl, I had definite ideas about how I wanted my life to be -- as most children do.   Mostly, I knew the most important thing was to have a university education.  It is the one thing no one can take away from us.  Knowledge is the key to all things, including respect from other people.  In "The Wizard of Oz", all the scarecrow wanted was a brain.

"I'd unravel every riddle for any individ'le,
In trouble or in pain.
With the thoughts you'll be thinkin'
You could be another Lincoln
If you only had a brain...

Wizard of Oz: Why, anybody can have a brain. That's a very mediocre commodity. Every pusillanimous creature that crawls on the Earth or slinks through slimy seas has a brain. Back where I come from, we have universities, seats of great learning, where men go to become great thinkers. And when they come out, they think deep thoughts and with no more brains than you have. But they have one thing you haven't got: a diploma.  Therefore, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Universitartus Committiartum E Pluribus Unum, I hereby confer upon you the honorary degree of ThD.
 
Scarecrow: The sum of the square roots of any two sides of an isosceles triangle is equal to the square root of the remaining side. Oh joy! Rapture! I got a brain! How can I ever thank you enough?

Wizard of Oz: You can't.

Some areas of my life -- specifically my job choices -- have not been at all the way I wanted them to be, because I was not fortunate enough to get a university education. Education is the class system of the 21st Century, and because I am not formally educated, I am "less than".  I am keenly aware of this fact every day, and I am made subtly aware of it in a multitude of subliminal ways.

Less than...

A university education can change our whole lifestyle -- the house we live in, our furniture, our clothing, what type of car we drive -- if we own one.  It can affect our status in the community, even our social networks, and it can otherwise have an impact on every aspect of the life we lead.  I do feel a bit like the Scarecrow at times.  He knew what he was missing.  Perhaps one day I can step into the elevator, and step out into a whole other life.  I have a feeling I wouldn't be in Kansas anymore...