From Model T to Apple

 

I look back at my parents’ generation and marvel at the changes their world went through in their lifetime. I remember being told of my parents’ honeymoon trip from Kingston to Toronto and driving along the dirt road that stretched between the two communities at a blistering top speed of 30 mph and in the words of my Dad, “We were just flying down the road”. They went from early models of automobiles and aircraft to sleek modern cars and jet powered aircraft. From gazing at the moon and stars and the wonders of the unknown to satellites being orbited around the Earth. There were discoveries in science and medicine which took the mystery out of a lot of the unexplained and put them squarely in the place of fact.  

But now I look at the changes that have occurred during my lifetime. When put in perspective, the changes are as mind-blowing as it was for the past generation.  Previously education relied almost entirely on books. Libraries were the go-to place for learning and was really the only source of knowledge outside of teachers or professors. Now, complete world libraires are available at the touch of your fingers through the internet. There have been advancements from the earliest days of room-sized computers to microchips today that have so much more computing power than those room-sized computers. It’s common knowledge that the complete computer power contained in the capsule of the Apollo 11 moon landing mission is exceeded in a $14.00 pocket calculator available today. I was 7 when Yuri Gagarin was launched into space, the first human to have done so. Today here we are with the Curiosity Rover travelling across the surface of Mars and the drone Ingenuity flying through the sky of Mars sending video transmissions back to us. Television went from being able to watch “The Wizard of Oz” once a year at Easter to being available on video tape, then to DVD and now to streaming anytime you want, on demand.

When I compare my parents flying down the road in their car at a blistering 30 mph to the features of my car today, it is equally amazing. I don’t need to even turn the headlights or the wipers on. The car figures out if its dark and adjust the headlights accordingly and if there is any moisture forming on the windscreen, the wipers just come on. If someone asked me how to turn the wipers on, I would be at a loss. With lane assist and adaptive cruise control it is within the realm of possibility that I could lose consciousness just as I got on the 401 and have the car merrily continue along the highway with me totally unaware of my travels. As the old joke goes, I could die peacefully in my sleep unlike my wife, who as the passenger in the car, would die screaming in hysterics.

Simple time pieces have evolved from the ubiquitous Timex watch that kept on ticking through thick and thin to the technology of my wristwatch today which reminds me of among other things, of appointments, emails coming in, text messages, weather warnings and to alert everyone if I have fallen. This is seemingly very important to my loved ones due to my propensity to detach myself from ladders when doing yard work. At night, without prompting, it acts just like a Mom telling me its time for bed. Then 20 minutes later if it hasn’t detected I’m lying prone, it gives my wrist a nudge and tells me that I’m past my bedtime and I better get to bed right away or I won’t get that toy I’ve been wishing for (ok, so my watch doesn’t say that; my wife does). It makes me feel oddly warm that my watch cares so much about my health and well-being.

Thanks to all this technological development, I’ve been living through my second, no wait, my third childhood. It is not what you may expect from a guy venturing into his late 60’s. Even though by my age it is certainly expected that at some point I might start regressing into child’s play, but that is not the case here… yet.

My first childhood was made up of Erector sets, Lincoln logs, wooden blocks and the occasional hand-me-down tricycle. Being the youngest of 5, I always got the hand-me-downs. Closing off my childhood, just before I hit double-digits were G.I. Joe’s and a Man From U.N.C.L.E. briefcase (which fired ‘real’ bullets!).

My second childhood was presumably for my kids, but essentially for myself and could be boiled down to video games, LEGO’s and, “I’m Batman”.  

Now, in my third childhood, it’s the toys presumably for my grandchildren, but essentially for myself that enthrall me. The favourite around here at this time are mini flying UFO drones, complete with side pod sensors and flashing lights that sail around the room sensing when an object is near and then flying off in the opposite direction. When a group of eight are launched simultaneously around here it’s like watching a dogfight from the Second World War, albeit with UFO’s. The only danger being anyone with long hair risks getting tangled in a prop as they swoop in on you (learned the hard way).

I don’t know what the future holds, I barely know what the present holds.  But I’m sure in the same way that my parents couldn’t foresee the changes in their lifetimes, and I couldn’t have foretold you that I would have motion-sensor UFO’s swarming my living room and eating hair, that my kids and grandkids will see unfathomable changes throughout their lives as well.

A Brief Conversation With My Brain

 

One of the most fascinating aspects of the human experience is our propensity to learn. From the moment a baby’s eyes open (or even before according to some) their brain is inundated with sensory input that sets them on a path of lifetime of learning. The complexity of day-to-day life entails that we must learn to adapt and sometimes conform to the world around us. Watching children learn is truly a parent’s eye-opening experience. To see the light snap on when a child makes a thought connection and the problem that was once incomprehensible to them suddenly evolves into a solution.

I remember seeing this happening with my own children as they grew up, but perhaps I didn’t appreciate it as much because I was still in the trials of learning to be a parent. Trying to be a role model when you have no idea what you are doing can sometimes be overwhelming. Now, as a grandparent, perhaps that one degree of separation makes it all more evident to me when I see my grandkids learning so much in a short period of time. To listen to their speech pattern evolve from squeaks and giggles into well structured sentences or questions over a few short years is astounding. It is interesting to see how their thought processes maneuver through this very strange world we live in, especially through the last two years when normal socialization has been thrown out the window with the bathwater.

 An example of this was when my daughter-in-law related to me how when our 6-year-old grand-daughter was listening to the radio and Harry Nilsson’s song, “One” came on. For those unfamiliar with the song, part of the lyric is “one is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do”. When the song was over, she quizzingly looked at her Mom and said, “Why is one the loneliest number when it has zero and two to keep it company?” Pretty hard to argue against that logic. I just hope she doesn’t get exposed to America’s “A Horse With No Name” and try to make sense of the lyrics of that song. “In the desert you can remember your name, cause they’re ain’t no one for to give you no pain”. Trying to parse that one would likely make the poor girl’s head explode, like it does mine.

Learning is a lifetime thing; every new experience brings something different to the table. However, as you get older the bloom definitely comes off the rose. Its not that there is less and less to learn, it is just the brain gets picky on what should be kept and filed away and what needs to be dumped. Too much clutter slows the machine down. Time to defrag, as my wife would say.

I recently had a long conversation with my brain about the state of my learning ability when I tried to concentrate on working through an especially tangled economic report and got nowhere fast.

“Hey! Excuse me Brain, can I have a word with you about this retention thing I’m having?”

“What now? Can’t you see I’m busy keeping you alive? You think its easy getting all the organs pumpin’ and dumpin’ in harmony? One misstep and you don’t want to know…”

“No, no, no. Don’t get me wrong, I do appreciate all your efforts, especially the pumpin’ and dumpin’ part, but I’ve got to learn this bit of information and right now and for the life of me, I just can’t absorb it!”

“Are you trying to tell me how to do my job? Do you know how much stupid, useless information you’ve shoveled in here over the years? Music trivia? Plots of movies and novels? Conjugations! Why the heck would anyone want to remember how to conjugate ‘to love’ in Latin? No one speaks Latin anymore! Ever heard of delete?”

“I don’t know… It just pops right into my head, ‘amo, amas, amat, amamus, amatis amant’. Almost like a nursery rhyme. Why do I remember something I learned over 50 years ago and not the numbers I just read 2 minutes ago?”

“Mysteries of life, buddy. Listen I was just chatting with the hippocampus and we’re both a little peeved about all this data input. Take a look at yourself, you’ve practically got one foot in the grave as it is, don’t you think you’ve learned enough? I’ve got no problem with you taking stuff in, just don’t expect me to store it anywhere. I’ve run out of space. I’ve got your stupid memories up the ying-yang.”

“Come on, please? Just one more bit of data? Just this once?”

“Let me tell you something. You know that time you walked into the kitchen, and you immediately forgot what you were looking for? That was me just letting you know who’s in charge around here. You won’t like it at all if I decide to go on strike and shut everything down, and it won’t be for a noon-time nap. Capche?”

“Ok, ok. Sorry. I didn’t know. I’ll be more selective”

“You better be. By the way now that I’ve got you here, your liver wants a word with you too.”

So that’s the state of the nation. Its satisfying to watch the young learn so much in such a short period of time. Me on the other hand, not so much. It’s one thing to teach an old dog new tricks, but quite another to expect him to remember them.

 

When Covid first started to ripple across the country my youngest daughter asked me that, in my long life and apparent wisdom if I had ever undergone such a disruptive societal force. I took a moment, looked at her with the gravitas needed for these sorts of questions and replied, “Yes… Disco”.

I certainly didn’t see the dangers that lay ahead of us almost a year ago when the virus was starting to make the news. To say the year has been tumultuous is an overwhelming understatement. I certainly didn’t grasp the sweeping impact that this would have not only on our city, but our country and the world.

The sentiment that family is everything takes on a whole new meaning when regular family gatherings are cancelled or postponed. We have all missed birthdays, weddings, holidays and sadly funerals over the last while. But in the same breath, the importance of family time comes to the forefront because it’s missing. Zoom chats, phone calls and socially distanced meetings help, but nothing replaces a good long hug.

The lack of family gatherings had me thinking back to all the times when we planned these evenings without a whiff of concern. My children have never been shy about vocalizing their thoughts. This was a curse upon us when they were kids but is a wonderful way to spend an evening with young adults who have more to talk about than the latest episode of The Simpsons. No wait, they still talk about the latest episode of The Simpsons.

It is inevitable that when you get a group of people all talking over each other with words bouncing around the room like echoes in the Grand Canyon, that sometime the message does get lost in the medium. Eight people trying to make a point all at the same time, can be somewhat dizzying for old ears like mine. The brain tires quickly when trying to parse who said what to whom. Sometimes these group conversations would end up like a strange iteration of “Who’s On First” with two completely different conversations melding together and making sense in a completely absurdist manner.  The kids acknowledged the mayhem and thought that in the following get together a game might help ease the chaos.

A few weeks prior to our next holiday get-together we were each asked to think of three songs that had a lasting impact on our lives. Once we had decided on the songs, we emailed our selections to our daughters’ partner. He cataloged them all into a playlist and we were asked not to discuss our selection with anyone else in the family.

I, like many others, can pinpoint many of life’s peaks and valleys to certain songs. Music has forged societies ahead, it has calmed us, energized us and united us, made us smile and made us cry. So when this concept was suggested, we all agreed it would be a fun way to spend an evening.

When the family weekend arrived and after dinner, we all adjourned to the living room. The playlist had been set on shuffle, meaning that the songs would play randomly. If the song you chose started to play, you were not to reveal that it was your choice. Instead, you would join in the group trying to determine whose song it was. Subterfuge is always good fun in a family environment.

When the song ended each person said who they thought the song was selected by. Sometimes it was unanimous, sometimes it was not and sometimes it just elicited shrugged shoulders.  Once revealed and all of the “what?” and “really?” and the definitive “I knew it!” were blurted out, it was up to the song selector to explain why this song had such an impact on them. To me this was the most fascinating part of the game. It revealed things you did not know of the children you helped raise over the last 35 years, or the woman you have been married to for 39 years for that matter. In addition, I am also glad and relieved to say nothing was revealed of our children’s partners that would have us overly concerned.

It was an excellent way to spend an evening considering there were 24 songs, one of which was Arlo Guthrie’s “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree”, the LP version which lasted 18:34. To me, the most interesting choice was The Turtles, “So Happy Together”. My daughter selected this song, although most thought it was me. When asked why she picked this song she said it was because it showed her of the power of one word being able to change an entire perception of something. Considering that she is in marketing, this was something pretty relevant to her.

She remembered one time when she and I were driving, and this song came over the speakers. From the well of music trivia that is me, I told her that most people thought that this was a love song about a couple who are so happy together but if you listen to the first word of the lyric, the song is not about a shared love, but of unrequited love. That first word changes the whole meaning of the song? The first word of the lyric? “Imagine” as in, “Imagine me and you, I do, I think of you every night, it’s only right”.

It’s amazing how you can make a lasting influence on someone’s thinking with a small observation of one small word.

 

Wednesday Morning 3 A.M..

At three in the morning, your mind enjoys the freedom of unrestricted access to all the crooks and crannies of your brain and wanders wherever the heck it wants to wander.  Sometimes it will take on a jaunty ride through past memories, sometimes projecting itself into a future of happiness and bliss.  However, on occasion when it is feeling particularly nasty, it seeks out with  seemingly laser focus, those hidden negative thoughts and holds onto them like burrs on a wool sock.

When you are lying there, pretty well unprotected in your cozy bed, there is a certain level of trust that nothing will happen to you. You certainly don't expect something like a meteor to come crashing through your ceiling and squashing you like an ant. No, you feel safe... serene... cocooned in a warm blanket, silence all around and a soothing darkness to lull you to sleep. Well, sometimes you feel that way.

Just a while ago I was in a similar situation, in bed, a fluffy duvet keeping me toasty warm with the window cracked open a bit to let some fresh cool air in the room. The in-room humidifier was emitting a soft steady whirling sound and sending a stream of moisturized air into the room. My wife was softly breathing beside me and except for the fact I was awake at the aforementioned three a.m. everything was good. Yes, everything up to that point was good.  Then it happened.

I was just falling back to sleep when I thought I heard my wife murmur something. It certainly sounded like her voice. She has been known to talk in her sleep and even once I was awaken by her meowing like a cat.  But I love her, so you put up with that sort of thing every now and then.  Anyway, this time what she said was kind of inaudible, but I was pretty sure she said something.  I lay there straining my ears in the darkness wondering if I had just imagined the voice.

Then I heard it again. This time I was sure she said, "Ghill'em". "Ghill'em?" I repeated in my head. What the heck is ghill'em?  Then as I was trying to process this, out of the darkness I heard her again. This time slightly different but still sounding like my wife. It was more like, "Ghnow".

"Ghill'em ghnow"?  I rolled the words over and over again in my mind, changing the emphasis and the inflection.  Then suddenly, as if a light was switched on, I knew what she was saying wasn't "Ghill'em ghnow", it was "Kill him now!"

No doubt about it, she said kill him now!  What did I do that was so wrong? Sure, I haven't always been the perfect husband, but getting killed for that was a bit over the top, in my own personal opinion. Any prospect of sleep was gone now.  It is not an easy task to close your eyes with the thought that you might not ever open them again, especially if someone with murderous intent lying there not a foot away from you. I glanced to my side and in the darkness I could make out my wife seemingly sleeping, unmoving, breathing softly without even a mew emitting from her lips. 

Unsure of anything, I lay there,  my eyes clicking back and forth in their sockets, my body unmoving, but ready to evade any impending attack. As I sat pondering this situation, again out of the darkness I again heard, "Ghill'em ghnow".

I sat bolt upright in bed, my arms akimbo like an avenging Ninja. I may have let out a manly squeak or two, I'm still not sure.  And then again, "Ghill'em ghnow".  But from my new perspective of sitting upright, I found the sound came not from my wife's lips but from across the room. So using my three in the morning brain I quickly deduced it was one of two things; that either my wife had become an expert ventriloquist between the time she went to bed and three in the morning or there was a ghostly presence in the room. A ghostly presence with murderous thoughts. Surely these are the most reasonable explanations, what else could it be?

Of course, the idea that my wife's' voice as she slept was uncannily similar to the sound of the humidifier gurgling as air bubbles made their way into the reservoir didn't even register on my ragged mind. That didn't occur to me until hours later when my wife woke from her sleep and stumbled from bed to make her morning coffee. By then I was rather tired of sitting up with arms akimbo for the previous 3 hours. Six in the morning brain is a little more functional than the three in the morning brain. So it soon became clear to me that hearing the humidifier threatening me with murder when my wife wasn't even in the room might be the most logical of answers.

This isn't as rare, or as crazy as it sounds as many people can see the man in the moon where there are just shadows and light, or interpreting the lyrics of "Louie, Louie" as somewhat pornographic when they aren't or right down to detecting murderous thoughts from a humidifier impersonating your wife. But in case I do end up dead, you'll know it wasn't the heat that killed me, it was the humidity.

Stuff

I've got too much stuff.  It's funny that after years of a relentless pursuit in the acquisition of stuff, now all I want to do is get rid of it. The hang-up is, I just can't throw it away, it's good stuff, that's why I kept it in the first place. For sure, there is stuff that could go if I was a heartless human being. Children's' drawings, if you can call crayon scribbles on a 24" x 24'' piece of  kraft paper a drawing, is a prime example. These renderings haven't seen the light of day in decades, but yet, there they sit. Years of Mothers and Fathers Day hand crafted cards, notebooks from every year of public school and virtually anything that touched their hands have found their way into bins of untouched memories.  The matters only get worse when you have more than one child, in our case it was times three.  I once offered to return theses masterpieces to their creators but every one of them gave me that, 'you're not pawning them off on me' kind of glance. We did try and go through them once, but all that really accomplished was me getting all misty eyed. Not necessarily from the memories, but from the mould and dust that wafted up.

I am sure if I went back 50 years and told myself that the accumulation of stuff would become a problem in my later years, my response would be something like. "Old man, go back to the future. Can't you see I'm a carefree child of the 60's?"  I was not a very perceptive  kid back then, or now, for that matter.  But yes, the seeds of accumulating stuff were planted back then.  As an example, back in the sixties between my cousins and I, we had enough GI Joe's and related gear to fill far more than the 4 footlockers we already had.  We likely had enough troop compliments and associated equipment to serve as an actual battalion and even then, we didn't stop collecting.

I don't know why as young adults the acquisition of stuff was so important. But, it certainly seemed to be important at the time.  Perhaps it was a keeping up with the Jones' type of thing, or perhaps more likely, keeping ahead of the Jones'. "What do you mean, you don't have this stuff?" Of course, that was the era where your stuff defined who you were. Every young upward professional (affectionately known as yuppies) had to have this stuff.

To compound the problem, I am the type of person who infrequently loses things and rarely breaks things.  Even if something did break, I would think, 'well that is easy to repair. I'll just save it and fix it later'. I have a graveyard, or should I say a stuff infirmary, of slightly damaged goods piling up in the basement awaiting treatment.

As my wife never tires of pointing out, the same applies to the relentless game of keeping up with technology. Every time the latest and the greatest came out, the oldest and the lamest was delegated to the basement to begin its second career as a space occupier and dust collector. I have bins of tech stuff'; power cords, AC adapters of every possible output, floppy disks and hard drives with an astonishing capacity of 250 megabytes. The kind of things that you know, might come in handy someday. 

I wrote a story a while back, where the only technology that wasn't hackable or part of the internet of things, were all those old tech products that didn't have a backdoor built into them by the nefarious antagonist (not named Bill Gates) who felt if he could control all technology he could easily dominate the world.  The heroes of the day used all of those old computers and cell phones that were collecting dust in basements around the world  to win the day and save humanity.  Although, when I laid this scenario onto my ever skeptical wife as the reason for saving all this stuff, she was not very understanding or confident of my prognostic abilities.

If I went back in time once more to that same non-perceptive kid and asked him if he could believe that in 50 years, entrepreneurs would seize upon the populations need for accumulating stuff and would build a multi-billion dollar business from it.  To imagine that they would build utilitarian boxed buildings so people who had no room left at home for their stuff could load it all in a car or truck and move it to another place to store it. Then to top things off, people would actually pay somebody to let them save their stuff.  I am sure he wouldn't care, cause you know, he was 13 and wouldn't have a clue what an entrepreneur was and as was pointed out early, wasn't really perceptive enough to even care about things like that.

But even if an adult was asked the same question back then, I am sure they would have laughed in my face and pointed out that you can never have enough stuff.  As for paying someone to let you save stuff? Well, I'm sure they would fall back to the belief that a fool and his money would soon be parted.  Just looking at the number of storage buildings around the country today, I guess there are a lot of fools out there, me included.

Relatively Crazy

The world is a crazy place and seems to be getting crazier by the minute. It's not that the crazy train hasn't been riding the rails for years, but similar to the new normal of our weather patterns, the crazies get wilder, more extreme and more unpredictable with each advancing day. It would not particularly surprise me if it was announced that North Korea allowed their citizens access to news on American airwaves just so Kim Jong-Un could point at the American President and say, "See? It's not me who's crazy. That guy gives crazy a whole new meaning!"

Even here in Kingston some people may think the crazies have touched down. We now have everything in place to construct the third crossing. To many out-of-towners, I'm sure when they are first exposed to our constant dialogue about the Third Crossing, they must imagine some sort of historical, religious or political event that has had a profound effect on the people of our city. Once it's found to be just a bridge construction, I am sure they would be a bit disappointed. This bridge construction is something that has been poked, prodded, studied, debated, written about, argued about, vilified, glorified, cursed and praised and now it's fact. More mental energy has been wasted on this project than almost any local issue I can remember.

As Billy Joel so aptly put it in his 1989 hit, "We Didn't Start the Fire", the crazies didn't start in today's world and I'm sure if he felt inclined, he could have started his song lyrics long before 1949, the year of his birth.  I'm sure our friend Oog, that loveable caveman, thought that his buddy was, to put in today's vernacular, totally cra-cra when he started to cook meat. Crazy is all relative, but I should point out that not all relatives are crazy.

Technology has certainly lent itself to the advances of crazy. I look at the behaviour of many people today and if one were to transplant that behaviour to 20 or 30 years ago people would be looking at them and at the same time doing the cuckoo bird salute, twirling their fingers beside their temples. A lot of people seem to shut out the world, sequestering themselves in their houses. Their only link to the outside world is a computer, tablet or phone screen. Even when they venture outside, the world is shut out. The wander the sidewalks with ear buds in their ears and eyes averted downward to phones, stumbling blindly into telephone poles, traffic or other people. Perhaps, if they activated their cameras on the phone, they could watch where they are going on their screens, then update their progress on Instagram.

The relativity of things, is not new, it existed long before Einstein developed his theory, we just didn't recognize it. But that is true of many things. In absolute terms time is, at least to our current knowledge, pretty linear. A year is a year no matter which way you look at it. Just the same as a decade is 10 years and a millennium is a 1,000 years. It doesn't speed up or slow down (within reason). But what happens during those periods vary. Advances in science, society and structures have grown by leaps and bounds.

I often befuddle myself, which I may point out before anyone else does, is a fairly easy task, when I think about music and its relativity. Today's kids, be they as young as 4 or 5 into even their 30's likely all recognize and perhaps even actively listen to music from the 1950's and 1960's; the Beatles, the Stones, Elvis, Buddy Holly or any number of artists. In some cases this is reaching back as much as 60 years in some cases, but the music does seem as fresh and as innovative as ever. If I were to apply this time line to myself when I was 18 and at the height of my musical awareness and music had its strongest influence over me and I reached back even 40 -50 years in musical history, this would like groovin' to the megaphone tunes of Al Jolson or Rudy Valee and the Connecticut Yankees. Social outcast, I likely would have been. It was hard enough to even acknowledge that you listened to the Beach Boys back in the '70's.

Perhaps this can be attributed to the music from those periods being so readily available online and in pop culture. Music is so much more accessible today as compared to my day. In those days if you wanted to listen to Al Jolson you had to pray that your grandfather still had some disks for the Victrola or bang it out on the parlour room piano if you had the sheet music.  

But just as crazy is relative and music is relative, so is the rest of life.  There are always two sides to every issue, just as there are two sides to every coin. There wouldn't be one without the other. Whether this is good or bad is a whole other debate, relatively speaking.  

Lotto Love

I never thought I was a particularly lucky guy. For a someone named Patrick and with Irish heritage, you would think my cup would be runneth over with fortuitous events and whiskey. But no, my cup is bereft on luck and has been empty of whiskey for many years now. My experience with any sort of lottery certainly seems to support this. My wife and I have purchased a dream home lottery ticket or two every year for 30 years now. Nada winnings. But we get to the enjoy the fact that all the money raised through this particular lottery stays in the community and does benefit many organizations and hospitals. But to be brutally honest, I would rather have the house.  

Fate, as it is wont to do, decided to accentuate the point by gifting my son and his wife who bought a ticket for the first time last year to promptly win a cash prize of $1,000. That was very nice for them and I wished them all the congratulations that a good father does, but to be again brutally honest, I would rather it had been me.

Lotteries are a big thing not only in this country, but also world-wide. Just recently someone in South Carolina won $1.6 Billion. That's Billion with a B. The obvious question is, who needs that much money, which is equivalent to the combined GDP of a few dozen countries? Well, I can honestly say, me. I mean it is only fair, right? There I am week after week, paying a voluntary tax to the Government of Ontario by buying a tickets to any number of draws. I am pinning my dreams on something that quite proudly declares that there is only a 1 in 36,000,000 chance of winning. Even on my most optimistic days, I acknowledge that to be pretty steep odds against me. I have always thought of this as a cheap form of entertainment, which it must be, as it is certainly not a well thought out plan for retirement.

My brother-in-law has played the same lottery numbers for every draw over the last 30 years. That's a lot of draws and a lot of serious dedication to playing the odds.  He is to the point that he is mortified if he would ever, ever miss a draw. He knows that as soon as he missed a draw, his numbers would come up.  This kind of handcuffs him to eternity. I am sure he is at the point that when he checks his numbers the morning after the draw, he exclaims to no one in particular, "Oh come on! 30 years! Just throw me bone, okay?" He too, likely has some choice words for Fate.

Some people do have all the luck, with lotteries that is.  There was a Winnipeg man who won a $2 Million lottery 5 months after winning $1.5 Million lottery.  Again, an example of Fate just having some fun with me. But on the other side of the coin, countless men and women who have won lotteries have reported that their lives were ruined from their winnings. Bankruptcies, dishonest people coming out of the woodwork, divorces and destroyed relationships abound amongst some lottery winners. Which also sounds disarmingly like the members of the  House of Commons. This certainly does put an exclamation mark of caution on an already cautionary tale. But it also makes a point that if you're a bit messed up when you have no money, you'll still be a bit messed up with money. But, I wouldn't let a lottery win change me. I'll still be that same slightly irritating know-it-all I've always been.

I have read many biographies over the recent years, covering the gamut of Hollywood stars, rock musicians, entrepreneurs and scientists. In most books that I have read involving scientists or entrepreneurs, they rarely have an instances where they would need to be in the right place and right time.  There is just too much slogging through the mundane aspects of the mechanics of science or the ups and downs of establishing a new industry or product. Their good fortune usually takes the form of an experiment or concept gone wrong  that results in an experiment or concept gone right out of pure luck.

With music and entertainment stars, almost all report that they were in the right place at the right time to catch whatever the wave was that propelled them to stardom.  Harrison Ford is an example of that. He was building bookshelves in George Lucas' house when Lucas noticed him and cast him in a small role in "American Graffiti".  We all know what that led to. Graham Nash of Crosby, Stills and Nash was just another guy singing harmonies on a street corner until he caught the attention of his idols, the Everly Brothers who were on tour in England. They liked his sound and eventually so did the rest of the world.

I don't think I have ever been in the right place at the right time for anything. Well, maybe on my wedding day and of course for the conception of our children, which for the record has had a pretty lucky outcome.

I think the big secret is having the feel of what places might just happen to be the right place to be. To be honest, I'm not even sure Kingston has a right place to be at the right time for fame and riches outside of a lottery win. But I am willing to give it a go if luck wants to shine a little love on me.

Love and Marriage

I've been getting a lot of "Wow's" from younger women recently. On paper that sounds pretty impressive, but in reality I admit it is not from my youthful looks or from my killer physique. In fact, the only thing my physique is currently killing is myself.  No, the compliments come when they find out I have been married to the same woman for 37 years. Invariably, that is followed by the observation that I've been married longer than they have been alive. Younger women can sometimes be so cruel. I'm sure they didn't mean to cause any offense, but once a man gets into his 60's, his ego becomes as fragile as, well, the ego of a man in his 60's.

However, they do have a point, 37 years is a lifetime for some. It is easily more than half my lifetime that I have been married. It kind of astounds me as well that I would be with the same person I met at university in 1976. How and why did I look at her and somehow make a decision that I should get to know her better. If you reflect on what force, cosmic or otherwise, which would cause a person to look at another person and make a decision to be with them for the rest of your life is rather mind-boggling. Rather frightening as well, because I would say that 90% of the decisions made in my 20's were abysmally wrong.

There are many, many factors on which a relationship can be built. Lust has been the start of some marriages and while the fires of lust burn very brightly and passionately, generally the flames are pretty short-lived. The well of lust can be a bit shallow and likely drained rapidly if that is the only thing that feeds a relationship. Lustful attraction although alluring and somewhat blinding, can be fleeting and easily replaced by another more shiny object.

Love, besides being that of a many splendored thing, is of course a main ingredient in all marriages. But love, like other things, can be ever evolving and changing. What used to produce waves of seemingly endless love can often turn into a drone of tolerance or hateful resentment.  Love can fade away, I mean I used to love Kraft Dinner as a student, now I get shivers up my spine just thinking about it.

There are cultural and societal reasons for marriage, but often these very reasons for marriage are also the reason why many people stay, or are forced to stay, in relationships that aren't healthy to either party. Marriages of convenience are not always that convenient to all involved.

I am certainly not saying that marriages based on lust, love or societal/cultural relationships won't stand the test of time.  I'm sure there are numerous examples of each of these which have endured and will endure. In my opinion, they are just not the critical factors which makes a lasting marriage work.

Over time in all healthy relationships, I becomes we, decisions are made on the basis of how each will be affected and self-centredness gives way to understanding and empathy for the other. By the time you get to over 30's years of marriage, you might just as well through up your hands on individuality and admit you have merged into one being. In the words of the Borg (not Bjorn), you will be assimilated.

Every marriage has a series of peaks and valleys. Hopefully, there are more peaks than valleys for it to work successfully. But if the valley just seems to go on forever with no looming mountain ranges in sight, it is understandable that someone may have to find another route to happiness. My wife and I have had our valleys, that I am not denying. Not everything has been roses and sunshine. But it is a matter of how these setbacks are dealt with and the commitment to work through these difficulties that help feed our relationship and longevity.

To me, however, beyond lust, love and societal factors, the thing that makes everything work is friendship. Having respect for your partner, valuing their opinion on everything and simply being able to enjoy their presence is in my opinion,  the trait which outweighs all the others. Yes, there are all those other elements that keep things going, ebbing and flowing at different times in a relationship. However, without rock solid basis of a friendship underlying all of these influences, everything else will wash away. If a bridge spanning a river is built on a sand or clay base, it will eventually wash away with the changing currents and the bridge will crumble into the water, so too in a marriage without friendship.

To most couples, at least those with children,  there are three phases in any long term marriage. Your life before children, your life with children and your life after children. All are distinct and different from one another and all carry their own challenges in any relationship.

The value of being friends is never more pronounced than it is once your children have moved out leaving just the two of you after twenty odd years of having children always around.  In those child-rearing days there was always a buffer between you and your spouse, always a third or fourth person to talk to, complain to or more than likely, complain about. Once, they have flown the coop, it's once again just the two of you looking each other in the eye. At that point you better hope you are good friends or it could make for a very long, quiet existence. But to hedge your bets, just  make sure you have two TV sets in your home.

Dr. Google

I did something that no rational human should do. I checked Dr. Google for medical advice.  If you ever want to escalate something as simple as a pimple into a life threatening medical emergency, consult Dr Google.  It's not too surprising that I seem to be in constant touch with different pains and aches, I am getting to that point in my life where body parts are starting to wear out, so it's only natural that my body announces them to me. I am not a hypochondriac and I don't adopt new symptoms as I hear about them.  I am just aging. As I am prone to tell people, aging is a lot better than the only known alternative at this point and I'll take aging hands down over that one.

Anyway, I was feeling one of these new pains and was curious as to what it might be, so I typed in the symptoms I was having and it came back with 42,175 hits in 0.014 seconds. Of course, almost all of them had nothing to do with what I was looking for.  At any rate, I was searching for the most reasonable link to what I was looking for and came across an article that detailed the seven most common symptoms of a serious illness.  Naturally, I wanted to see what these symptoms might be, so I followed the link.  One of the things we always have to keep in mind about these on line articles is that for the most part, they are not written by medical or scientific professionals who are looking to enlighten us, but by wordsmiths trying to crank out as much content filler for websites as possible.

The first symptoms that were listed were fairly generic and really could be applied to anything at all. Among them were rapid weight loss, lack of energy, shortness of breath and anemia, but it was the seventh symptom that really stood out for me. I am sure they were saving the best for last. That of course, was having no symptoms at all.  A short statement that I am sure sent paranoid hypochondriacs into a full blown panic attack. Having no symptoms might indicate you have this very serious illness. Thank you very much, internet.

I guess it is only natural that as one ages, there is a tendency to try to stretch your time out as long as possible. When I was younger, off in the distance I could always see a shape, but it was really just a shape with no discernible features. Now that figure is coming into focus a bit more and I can definitely make out  a hooded figure with a scythe slowly moving my way.  Anything I can do to impede that progress is fair game.

To that end, I have been looking after myself far better than I ever did when I was younger. It would be safe to say that I am far healthier now than I was in my 40's. My diet has improved, I exercise regularly and all those wonderfully enjoyable habits I once had are now as faded as my eye sight.  It is not that all of these efforts don't come with some sort of cost.  Many of the aches and pains that initiated the Dr Google search in the first place are a result of something I pushed too hard to do.  I have been running for many years now, but decided that maybe I should also add some weight training to my regime to firm up my muscle mass and strengthen my core. From what I understand, this would be beneficial to my body as a whole.  I did find a 6 week routine to follow and have been fairly successful keeping up with it.  However, I might have been more successful if I found a program that was titled more like, "A 6 Week Program for 60 Year Old Men, Who Misguidedly Think They Are Still 20".  I say this because in the midst of a mighty push, I heard and felt a "pop" in my chest.  Naturally, the first thing that came into my mind was the movie, "Alien". Anything to do with chest popping can only be related to aliens making a messy chest exit and wreaking havoc. I quickly pulled up my T-shirt, half expecting to see a head sticking out of my chest, but only saw my own sorry chest and stomach. No aliens, just a few weeks of rest and the elimination of this little exercise from my routine.

Did I learn from my trying to self-diagnose on the internet? No, definitely not.  Almost every website is filled with new studies which say butter/sugar/red meat/alcohol/salt is good/bad/indifferent to your overall well-being and to stop/continue/moderate the use of it. I think the only thing we can do is take it all with a grain of salt or is that bad for you too?

 Last week I did stumble upon a paper concerning a thing called the Exploding Head Syndrome. After reading the article, I found out that I am among the 13% of the population who have it.  What really makes this a fun diagnosis to tell people is they have a tendency to stare at you for the rest of the night. Mostly, I am sure, envisioning a real Stephen King kind of outcome. However, as to the nature of the syndrome, I'll leave that to you and Dr Google to find out.

Great Expectations

If you lived your life through expectations, there is no doubt, things would never work out the way you expected it to. Life doesn't follow a path as if guided by the light of inner self determination and predestination, no matter what those late night ads on TV proclaim. Life truly is a road full of potholes, diversions and detours, some good, some wonderful and some very, very bad. It is how we deal with those roadblocks that truly define us.

But as misleading as expectations can be, our lives are inextricably tied to them. How many times have we uttered the phrase, "Well, that was not as bad as I expected.", or heard, "I expected more out of you." (I got that one a lot).  Reaching back to my school days of reading Dickens, we found that Pip was dealt repeated blows to his plans and ultimately realized that the life of a gentleman was really not that great of an expectation.  There is probably a lesson in that for all of us. I have reached out and failed a few times at various things, but as some of those aforementioned late night huskers claim; failing to reach out is failure in itself. Now please send me $24.95 in two easy payments and if you act now I'll send you a free set of steak knives.

As a child your life is seemingly a series of expectations, perhaps because there is nothing in the past to guide you along. Among them are the expectations that you will be loved and cared for, that all adults are tall, serious and old and the year is divided into two important dates; your birthday and Christmas.

Of course the reverse is also very true. As a parent, you don't know what to expect. You and your spouses' life will forever be divided between two periods; life before children and life after children.  Will it be "Married With Children" or "Ozzie and Harriett"? On second thought, "Ozzie and Harriett" is a pretty scary premise as well. "Cosby?" Oops, no. Not a good example either. But, you get my drift, whatever your life was as you knew it, it would be forever changed.

We all have expectations for ourselves and our children. As long as expectations do not devolve into disappointment, life can be, and probably is, a series of unmeet or unfulfilled expectations. There is always the sunny horizon of 'maybe' and what tomorrow might bring. Give me optimism over disappointment any time.

Of course, once you have passed through the firestorm of child rearing, the reality of becoming a grandparent smacks you in the face.  I always thought that the label of Grampa, Grandad or the ever exquisite Grandfather, would make me instantly older, greyer than the white hair I already have and somehow wiser beyond reason. My Dad, in his role as a grandparent, would always be able to string together words that would make even an infant sit back and think, 'Hmm. Now that is an interesting conceptualization of the human condition, especially from the perspective of an infant, such as I am, who cannot verbalize beyond screaming, crying and the odd gurgle or two.'

None of that happened to me, especially the wise part. My bon mots usually take the form of, "Buttons... make sound!"  But yet, it is one of the most unexpected of realities.  It really is true that being a grandparent is wonderful, yielding and bringing forth yet another life changing phase. Not only because you get to hold and gaze into the eyes of another iteration of your own genetic pool. You get see into the eyes of a new soul which reflects wonderment, trust and love.  But perhaps the most precious aspect of being a grandparent is that the child goes home with the parent at the end of the day. All the pleasures and none of the pitfalls. You can have a baby and still have sleep.

Expectations are not only present in family dynamics. They pop up in almost every facet of existence, from work to entertainment. Comedy itself,  creates a narrative that almost always ends with the unexpected. The telling of a joke sets the premise. The punch line, to be good,  has to be what was not expected. The holy trinity of comedy to me as a child were Abbott and Costello, Red Skeleton and Looney Tunes. I now know that basing your outlook on life on the comedic antics of a fat guy, a skinny guy, a clown and some animated anthropomorphic animals provides the basis for a pretty strange sense of humour, let alone what to expect out of life.

When I first heard the famous baseball sketch "Who's On First", it was a series of totally unexpected answers to simple everyday questions.  With every advancing step forward the circle of questioning fell back to the beginning. To this day, a half a century after first hearing it,  I cannot resist cracking a smile when I think about it.

Some of the most memorable movies provided that twist at the end to totally uproot our expectation of what would occur. Psycho, The Sixth Sense, Planet of the Apes and the Usual Suspects are some of the films that caught us all off guard, causing screams of 'whaaaaaat' to be bandied about movie theatres across the world. Upended expectations are the reason why these films still talked about today.

Like pulling a rabbit out of a top hat or a coin out of an ear, it is sometimes magical to watch the faces of people met by the unexpected. Surprise followed by befuddlement followed by wonderment.

Almost like life itself.

IMHO

Opinions and perceptions are the way many people colour the world we live in. How a person perceives events, people or attitudes profoundly affects their lives. Being opinionated, however, only seems to raise hackles in all those around them, but never in themselves. Most people live comfortably in their opinions. When it comes to the dangers of offering up an uninvited opinion, the only parallel I can draw is going for a leisurely stroll in a minefield while blind-folded. 

To borrow a phrase, opinions are like a nose (or fill in your choice of body parts).... everyone has one.  Quite often they have more than one and in general, people are not shy about disseminating them to anyone who wants to hear them. Sadly enough, they are also imparted to those who don't want to hear them. Many a peaceful family get together have been disrupted with a drunken opinionated rant of one kind or another.

Opinions do not have to be fact based; in fact they rarely are. They can be uninformed, uneducated, unbelievable or unwavering, but yet they are still put out on display and held up as a shiny example. On the other hand, opinions can be well thought out, unimpinged by emotional or moral convictions, well balanced and reasonable in logic for all. Of course, these opinions are about as common as fairy dust.

Even the internet has its IMHO (In My Humble Opinion) which finds its way onto newspaper comment boards and newsgroups. It appears to me that by just prefacing their comments with this acronym it allows the poster a carte blanche opportunity to opine about anything at all. If  you have read any of these, there is rarely anything humble about their opinions.

Historically, Kingston certainly has had a fair amount of raging public opinion. When our present day City Hall was constructed in the 1840's, the general opinion of the day was that it was a little too grand and a lot too expensive to build for such a small town. It was felt that the tax burden would be too much for future generations to handle. Does that sound at all familiar?

It was a huge gamble thinking that by erecting such a grandiose building that the government would decide to stay put and keep the capital here. As we all know, it was decided that Kingston was far too small, not cosmopolitan enough and didn't offer enough amenities for those political folks and off the capital went. Still, in hindsight, imagining Kingston without City Hall and its cupola would be like imagining Paris without the Eiffel Tower. If opinion would have ruled the day and the naysayers won out, then that limestone edifice might never have been constructed.

The list of conflicting opinions on past and present local issues goes on and on.... the Teron Project, Block D, the Hendon Hole, the location of the KRock Centre, the merging of high schools KCVI and QECVI, the third crossing,  right down to today's opposing opinions on high-rises in the centre core of Kingston. We never seem to be running short of expressing conflicting opinions in this town.

Worldwide events, specifically the Brexit Referendum is a perfect example of asking for public opinion, getting it and then asking what the hell were they thinking.  There are historic reasons why the general public is often referred to as the "great unwashed".  Referendums are a wonderful way for the elected politicians to be absolved of any controversial subject and declare that, "the public has spoken". Forgive me, but I thought that was the general underlying principle of elections. We elect people to make informed, educated decisions that affect our future. If every time an important decision is needed to be made and the people we elect to make decisions for us throw it back at us (and at considerable expense) then what is the whole purpose of electing these people in the first place? 

Here in Canada, do we really need the public's input by holding a referendum on changing the electoral process? I would bet the majority of Canadians don't understand or care about the entire process of today's system, let alone giving them two or three other options to chose from.  Just getting them to vote in the first place is a big enough challenge. In the case of the United Kingdom, we have to remember this is the same group of people who voted to name the Arctic research ship, "Boaty McBoatyface".  You leave the economic future of your country in these hands?

A glance south of the border only reinforces where public opinion will get you. While the Democrats have followed along on a predictable path where general opinion seems to have fallen in line with expectations of the party, the Republicans have been asking the same question as the Brits. What the hell were they thinking? The right has spoken and it seems to be in a language that the G.O.P. hasn't translated yet.

Where does this all lead? Everyone is entitled to their opinion just as everyone is free to express their opinion. As George H.W. Bush once said, "I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them". Well, if the past leader of the most powerful nation in the world can't agree with his own opinions, then where does that leave the rest of us? 

Of course you must take note, this is only IMHO.

And Time Keeps on Slippin', Slippin', Slippin'

Since my wife and I have become empty nesters, we have on more than one occasion silently looked at one another and mumbled something about, ‘what do you want to do?’ before shrugging our shoulders simultaneously and mumbling, ‘I dunno, what do you want to do?’ I am sure it is not because we are boring or even worse, bored with each other. I think it has more to do with the fact that the maelstroms, otherwise known as the children who encompassed our day to day lives for 20 odd years, are all grown up and moved away.  I mean, after playing in what seemed like a Stanley Cup final every day, it's a little hard to get excited about a game of shinny.

There is a certain elation when the last child finally leaves home and suddenly the options are there lying before you. I have written before of the plans to convert bedrooms into offices or studios or concert halls.  But after that period of elation and construction, comes the day to day living of pretty uneventful lives.  There are no real challenges now with work, neither of us are changing professions; please refer to the idiom, old dogs/new tricks. Retirement is not really on the table as that would just give us more time to shrug our shoulders at one another and ask each other what we wanted to do.

There are fleeting thoughts of shaking things up a bit, but I certainly won’t present my wife with a radical new look or lifestyle. If I did, she would probably laugh herself into an early grave. The middle aged crazies have already been there and gone and fortunately, I did not buy the T shirt.  I have focused a bit more on physical health; I have taken up running, but of course all this does is provide me more of an opportunity to hurt myself. Running on icy roads in the dark with eye sight that seems to fade on a daily basis is certainly a recipe for all sorts of new pain. I am sure I will try to elicit some level of sympathy from my wife, but I think we all know what that will get me.

We are certainly welcoming our time together, as most couples do. Over the years as children enter your family, there is less attention paid to one another as the focus of your life becomes your children. You work hard at raising them with the proper values, the proper outlook on life and respect for other people. There is no manual, there are no guidelines, just your own values that you try and instill in them and hopefully a few of those values stick and they turn out well enough that visits to the big house are not in order.

My son and his wife have recently taken this step on their own and welcomed a baby girl into our family.  I can often see the questions in their eyes as the reality hits of just how massive their responsibility is. This tiny human being relies on them for 100% of her needs; 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and one more on a leap year and will for many, many years to come. It is certainly not something that should be taken lightly and sanity is sometimes sorely tested. Perhaps that is why I’ve written so much about Thing One, Thing Two and Thing Three. It was my method to maintain some level of sanity which I am told by some, wasn’t a very successful method.

A few days ago I was trying to organize our collection of videos that had been burned onto DVD’s. With my perfect memory, I figured I would be able to remember what shows were burned to what disc without that frivolous little thing called labeling.  I forgot I didn’t have a perfect memory anymore.

As the stack of DVD’s reached the critical out-of-control stage, it suddenly dawned on my wife that this was one thing that could be done with my time, instead of thrashing around on dark icy streets. So with her encouragement I started to pop the discs in the player to decide whether or not they were worthy of labeling or tossing into the trash.

That was how we came across a disc of videos of our kids when they were very young. I had, many years ago, transferred most of the video tapes into electronic format and stored them on disc to sit unlabeled and forgotten.  We were transfixed for almost an hour just watching their antics, hearing their wild giggles and screams and seeing their young faces absolutely loving every second of their lives.  It was difficult to stop watching.

I was told so many times in the past by people older than me, that life races by and before you know it, there are a multitude of life events that happened years ago that felt like they just happened yesterday.  I just wanted to say to all the young parents out there, that those sentiments are true. It really did seem like yesterday.  Years ago in these very pages I quoted from a song by Steve Miller, “Time, keeps on slippin’ into the future”. Yes it does Steve, but now it also seems to keep slippin' into the past.

Sir Paul and I

It is always a celebration of sorts when the kids come home. Right now they are all living in the downtown core of The Big Smoke within 5 kilometers or so of each other. One would think that after all those years of sibling rivalry they would want to put as much real estate between each other as possible, but that is not the case. They have actually grown closer as the years have worn on.  Two of them, I fear are becoming urban Torontonian's, not quite Queen Street hipsters, but dangerously close. Our youngest Catherine is involved in reality television and of course Toronto is the Mecca of her industry. Stephanie is happily ensconced at the Royal Ontario Museum cataloging bones and getting excited about the dusty treasures that have laid hidden in neglected drawers and cabinets around the museum. As well, for her, the Indy music scene in Toronto is all a music fan could ask for.  John, our oldest, is working for the federal government and is the only one who envisions a move out of Toronto at some point. But I am getting away from the gist of this article.

When the kids do come home, whether it is one at a time or all together, affairs at the house accelerate exponentially.   I think most parents who have had their kids move out will sympathize with this.  It is difficult when kids leave and set out on their own course of life. No longer are you there at every turn of events to lend a hand, or offer advice or even cuddle when things look gloomy. But after a while, their empty bedrooms start to look more like the makings of a fair sized TV room, or a sewing room. The cupboards take on more of a reflection of what you and your spouse normally eat, the laundry seems to know where the hamper is and strangest of all, the TV seems to be on the shows that you actually watch and not The Simpsons (unless you want to watch The Simpsons).  As difficult as it was for you when they left, the more difficult it is again when they return for a stay.  I am certainly not saying that I don't enjoy their return home, I do. It is always full of excitement, rapid-fire news and a hurricane of activity when they do. It is just sometimes, as I age, a raging hurricane is not something I can to endure for an extended period of time.

No longer is it necessary for me to make sure that there are drinking boxes in the fridge for them like when they were kids; it is now cans and bottles of craft beer that must be laid in. On second thought there are drinking boxes in the fridge and full of grape juice, albeit slightly fermented and in 4L boxes and it wouldn't surprise me for a moment if I were to walk into the living room and find them sucking on straws stuck in the boxes.

Food has taken on a major role in all of their lives and hence a return to home is always accompanied by feasts that rival any holiday meal. One of my Zen kind of things that I enjoy is making desserts; candies, pies, cakes, it doesn't matter to me as long, as it produces the right results. My wife often looks at me standing at the stove, gently stirring for minutes, which to her seems like hours and asks me how do I have the patience for such a thing.  I just chant softly, "Ommmm" and continue to stare out the window in blissful meditative stirring peace. This sometimes disturbs her.

In hand with their appreciation of good food, a special place for them is our kitchen pantry, where they know they can find all sorts of items at the bargain basement price of free.  Stephanie has come to refer to it as the "old people" pantry. She swears this is not a slight to her ageing parents, but more towards the fact that we seem to have more than one jar, bottle or can of just about everything we would need in the pantry.  She is under the impression that this is due to two things; our preparedness and the anticipation that we may run out of an item when cooking or the Costco Effect. I haven't yet told her that both were far from the truth. The real reason that we have multiple items in our pantry is that we have forgotten that we have already purchased three jars of Skippy the last time it was on sale along with all those other items and just keep stacking them up in the cabinet.

I don't want to give the impression that the kids think we are past our best before date and that we are just content settling into a routine and boring existence. We do try and keep things lively. However, I must admit that I do read the "bred, wed and dead" column of the local paper on a more regular basis. It can be un-nerving seeing familiar names and faces looking out at you.  Whereas when we were younger those faces were in the wed part, now they have moved over to the other side of the column.

During the spring the kids asked me if there was a musical act who I have not seen live and who I would like to see. I went through a list of bands or artists I would like to see before they and myself for that matter, are dead. For one reason or another certain acts were ruled out; either they weren't touring any more or were mere imitations of the former bands with only one or two original members. It was finally whittled down to two acts, one of which I figured was impossible to find tickets for. However, determined kids, a computer and a valid credit card when combined with the right incentive can solve virtually any problem. I am so glad that they have harnessed their talents for the good of society. Hence in July, my wife and I attended a Paul McCartney concert in New York State. It was without a doubt one of the finest concerts I have ever scene and quite literally, there aren't enough words to try and describe it. As I texted the kids after the concert; Sir Paul can now die happy in the knowledge that he has been seen by me in concert.  Now, does anyone out there need a few jars of Skippy? I seem to have a few extra. 

A Light Intervention

We had an intervention of sorts here at the house at Thanksgiving. All the kids were home and it was only after serious reflection that they felt the time was right for this drastic step. Of course, it was all meant to be helpful and was only brought on by love and concern.  I didn't think anything was amiss, but apparently, the subject is always the last to be aware.  It was unanimous among the children and with my wife quietly showing support that they sat me down in the living room and surrounded me.  "Dad", the oldest began, "We don't want you to...., this is hard for all of us to say." His voice kind of petered out and then the next oldest picked up where he left off. " Dad, we know you care and you have always tried to bring light into our lives, but we just can't...." She too had trouble finishing her thought. The youngest then took a deep breath and said, "Dad.  You are not to put up the Christmas lights anymore", she blurted out before she could stop herself. "We are tired of taking bets on how many times you bounce off the ground when you fall from the ladder, tired of the Instagramed pictures of your bruised and battered body parts held up like a prized fish that you caught.  We can't let Mom take the humiliation of having our neighbours and people walking by see you hanging by your fingertips off the eavestrough or yet another December visit to the Emergency Ward. We just can't. It isn't fair on Mom, us or you".

Of course, I didn't see it in the same light. I have always viewed the hanging of Christmas lights as a delicate balance between risk and reward; a confrontation between myself and the pesky laws of physics. To me, it was a battle of man versus light, a game of one on one, mano a lighto, it was me against it.  But what I didn't see was the effect that this had on my loved ones. I guess having to deal with me shuffling along wincing with pain every time I took a step or trying to open presents with only a few working fingers, might put a hindrance on holiday celebrations. Begrudgingly, I accepted their intervention and when the time came I ceded control of my new ladder and the tangled strings of lights to my children.  If an outsider was watching through the window, they would have thought it was one of those Kumbaya moments. Everyone was holding hands, seated in a semi-circle around me with satisfied smiles on their faces, reveling in the belief that they have saved their Dad his annual bout of pain and suffering.  

In due time on a planned visit, the kids once again filled the house. This time they were aided by weeks of careful planning with a blueprint to delegate responsibilities and coordination of duties.  They consulted with all known sources of holiday ideas, gathering the best from magazines and online sites which melded with their own creative ideas. Wrapping all of this data together, they had a meticulous working theme for the house, for the tree and for the interior decorations. It wouldn't have be surprised me if they had matching outfits for all of us on Christmas morning.  

With all of this all planned out, they headed downstairs to find the boxes of the Christmas decorations. Coming back up with more boxes than I seem to remember taking down, they opened them all looking for the exterior lights.  Their faces were painted with enthusiasm as they worked together closely, singing along with Nat King Cole as he vocalized about roasting chestnuts by the open fire. The living room was soon covered by strings of red, blue and green lights as they checked all the connections and bulbs to ensure there were no faulty ones. They then bundled up and dragged the lights outside and started to work.

For once, I sat in the warmth of the house, a mug of hot chocolate in my hand and stood looking out the front window, occasionally knocking on the window to get their attention and then pointing to something that wasn't quite right.  To be honest, I knocked more than occasionally; it would seem my definition of occasional is a little more elastic than most.  However, from the look on their faces you would have thought I was knocking as much as a woodpecker on an elm tree.  I could see befuddlement crease their brows as they tried to figure out just how those light hangers worked and frustrations as they snapped in two from the cold; referring of course to the hangers and not the children.

As the sun began to set I could see what started as a display of sibling unity was devolving into a sibling rivalry so standard in most family dynamics when working together. But putting this growing frustration aside, they finished their task and tumbled into the house; noses and fingers cold, but with a satisfied look on their faces.  Eager to show off their work, we all threw on our coats and went outside. Standing out front, the lights were plugged in and the house lit up. I have to admit, they did a good job. There were no accidents, no injuries and no battle between humans and gravity. Where's the fun it that?

Pain.... and Really No Gain

Pain is just the way a body says to the brain, "Don't do that again".  George Santayana is quoted as saying, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it". I am sure you don't need a road map to tell how these two items might be related.  

After the elongated and seemingly endless winter we had, I finally took down the Christmas lights well after the time I usually do. In this case it was bordering on May. I say I took down the lights, because in most instances the lights have always taken me down. I have always had a complicated relationship when it comes to Christmas lights. I love having them up as they kind of chase away those early darkness blues that befalls us throughout the winter. To be honest, I am one of those people who have a tendency to leave lights up well after Christmas, just to have a little colour in the neighbourhood. 

Since the kids have moved out I have needed to reacquaint myself with a lot of the household chores, that parents usually assign to their kids. Chores like raking leaves, mowing the lawn, shoveling the driveway and yes, tackling the Christmas lights. This past year I was putting up the lights on a Friday night and against all the advice given to me by my wife, I decided this was a task that must be taken alone. My daughter Catherine was coming home the following day, but patience has never been a virtue with me, and apparently on that particular day, my math skills also abandoned me. 

 Mathematically, it should have been quite obvious; take a 12 foot high eavestrough, subtract a 5 foot step ladder and that leaves a 7 foot difference.  I am a shade under 5'10" which leaves a good stretch and then some to successfully put up lights.  

Even with that, things were going well. I moved along the front of the house in a steady and safe progression. Steady and safe that is, until I reached the corner of the house where there is a tangle of juniper mayhem. Still, on I forged with complete confidence. I guess if you were sitting inside the house, safe and warm and looking out upon the scene, disaster might have been easily forecasted, but when in the thick of things, the situation couldn't have been rosier. 

Granted, standing on the top step of a ladder that you are not supposed to stand on, and granted that balancing a step ladder over a tangle of branches might not have been the best of ideas. But I had that perfect balance between physics and falling; a yin and yang between success and failure. I was like a race car driver just on the edge of losing control. In hindsight and in my opinion, it was neither myself nor my physics that failed that night. It can only be attributed to an earthquake or one of those frost quakes we heard about all winter. The end result was my perfect balance was no longer perfect as the ladder and myself parted company.  

It wasn't the fall per se that did any damage, like the old saying goes, "it isn't the fall that kills you, it's the sudden stop". I was near a tree so the boughs kind of cushioned/speared me as I went by. Once I had landed among the tangle of branches, I bounced back to my feet with the same aplomb as Inspector Clouseau. I did a quick check of body parts and all seemed functional. Except looking down at my gloved hand was like looking at an over-the-counter headache remedy commercial. I had little cartoon lightning bolts radiating away from my hand.  I was quite hesitant to pull my glove off, because something did not feel right and those little lightning bolts were a dead giveaway.  

I am unsure if it was morbid curiosity or a need for confirmation, but I did pull of my glove. There was no blood, no broken skin, but it was like what happen to Wile E. Coyote when hit on the head with a frying pan and he ends up with a frying pan shaped head. Somehow, and I don't know how, but somehow, on my way down, my finger got caught in the ladder and the top part of my finger, for the lack of a better medical term, got squished. 

I sheepishly made my way indoors, trying to hide this pancake shaped finger from what I knew would be a very long, "I told you so" session.  If that made it sound like I have been through this before with my wife, then the right message was passed along, if not please refer to the opening paragraph. 

After so many years of marriage and after almost an equal amount of injuries, there was not a lot of outpouring of concern or empathy from my wife; it was replaced with a much more practical, "What did you do now?" I answered in a meek tone that once again I was dancing with the devil and once again the devil won out. This did not elicit the sympathy I was hoping for. At first I thought of going to go to Emergency, but then just decided to ice it, take some ibuprofen and wait a few hours to see what would happen. No point overburdening the healthcare system, right?  Eventually, after a few weeks, the shape did return to my finger and a nice rosy pink hue became the norm instead of the blackish, bluish yellow colour.

As mentioned, my very practical wife instead of lecturing me and trying to teach an old dog new and safer tricks instead focused on doing something to prevent history from repeating itself, as I apparently lack this ability. She surprised me the other day with a convertible ladder. This is the type of ladder that can be used as a step ladder, an extension ladder, a saw horse and everything in between. It has more positions than the Kama Sutra and is just as difficult to master. But master it, I will and the next time I dance with the devil, I'll be leading... at least that's the plan.