I was standing in line at the tobacco counter the other day. I had finished some grocery shopping and throughout my travels up and down the aisles I had this recurring vision of winning a lottery. Not one to tempt fate, I decided to buy a ticket. As I stood in line, I juggled the groceries around in my arms and fished some money out of my pockets for the tickets. There were only two other people in the line in front of me so I thought the ice cream I purchased should still be frozen by the time I got to the car. However, what I didn’t count on was the guy in the line in front of me being what could only be described as a lottery professional. He had a stack of tickets about the size of a deck of cards, and each one had to be scanned by the computer to verify his winnings or as it turned out his non winnings. In my estimation, and I had lots of time to do my estimating, maybe a quarter of them were winning tickets. My first thought was why didn’t he check them at home and only bring in the winners? But then I thought maybe the scanning of the tickets is all part of the entertainment for some people. Although, to give some educational credit, I now know the French for “No prize”. It was bored into my brain with the same cadence of a Gregorian chant.
By this time my arm was growing a bit numb from the ice cream and I thought that maybe splurging 5 cents on a plastic bag wouldn’t have been such a bad idea after all. But I had renewed hopes as the cashier was finally done with the scanning and had totaled the man’s winning. Those hopes were dashed when the man began to buy more tickets with the grace and reverence of a wine connoisseur. I would not have been surprised at all if he had held them to his nose and sniffed them. As I said before, I had lots of time to think.
Finally, the next person ahead of me shuffled up to the counter and laid open a plastic folder on the counter. This was not a good sign. He had selections in Pro Line Sports, Pro Picks and Point Spread and was reeling off phrases that were as foreign to me as ordering a Timmies coffee is to an American. By this time my ice cream was about to start dripping onto the floor so when my opportunity eventually did come, I quickly bought my tickets and I scurried out the door, hoping not to leave a Chocolate Mocha trail behind me. It was then that I realized how quickly I went from being in an excellent mood into being grouchy.
I never really thought I would hit this stage, but I have become rather grouchy lately. Fortunately for all around me I haven’t quite made the leap to grumpy, but as it is, grouchy can be bad enough. I don’t become obnoxious to the people around me, it is more that I am grouchy to the rest of the world; politicians for one. I just don’t seem to have any patience for their rhetoric anymore. Conservatives, Liberals, NDP, Green it doesn’t matter what the political stripes are, I just don’t have time for their petty bickering of whose fault it is and whose fault it isn’t and whose fault it is that something isn’t being done quickly enough or whose fault it is that things are being done too quickly and recklessly. I am tired of hearing that our national troubles can be laid at the feet of a previous government 75 years ago, or 30 years ago or 2 years ago. If I was within earshot of a politician I would simply tell them to shut up, sit down, accept the responsibility of their action, their parties action and proceed accordingly. But that is about as likely to happen as a snake crawling back into its discarded skin. How is that for an apt metaphor?
When I was a bit younger, I didn’t really notice the fine line between grouchy and grumpy. As an illustration, grouchy to me is using the greatest invention of the world; the mute button on my remote control. I can sit and mumble to myself, but happy in the knowledge that I didn’t have to listen to that crap on the TV anymore. Grumpy would be leaving the sound on during the news and getting all worked up over those aforementioned politicians and telling everyone in the neighbourhood my rather unrelenting opinion, because the rest of the world is wrong and only I am aware of its inanity. In talking with my wife and children, this is a phase they are not necessarily looking forward to.
In our propensity to always categorize and sequentially rate life and death just as Dr. Kübler-Ross did with her stages of grief, I think in life, we will all progress through the Seven Stages of the Dwärves. I have made my way through Happy (the 1970's, not surprisingly), Bashful (for most of my youth), Sleepy (the child rearing phase), Sneezy (during that one particular summer of hay fever) and Dopey (although a case for the 1970's can be made here as well). Still to come, I’m sure, will be the Doc stage where I will be analyzing every medical symptom as they are presented in my friends and myself as we keep aging and the ever popular Grumpy to carry me down the stretch.
I think grouchy is kind of like a way station on the way to grumpy. It’s a place you have to get through before moving on. Like being in the Little Leagues. I don’t want to deride grumpy as a state of mind, or an undesirable place to be. God knows I will probably reach that stage soon enough and in all likelihood I will probably revel in my grumpiness.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Thursday, December 17, 2009
All is Calm, All is Bright
This column was originally published by Profile Kingston in December 1999.
On the morning of my seventh birthday in October 1961, I walked up the hall from my bedroom to my Mom's. As I approached, I saw a tin of cookies sitting outside her door, as I got closer I saw they were our whole family's favourite. The ones with candied drawings of animals on them. I had known she wasn't well and was away a lot, but now she was at home and I thought that everything would be the way it always was.
Three weeks later, while we were having breakfast, my Dad walked into the kitchen. He told us in a quiet voice that our Mother had passed away during the night. I remember the moment after he told us, the room, for that matter, the whole world fell silent. Then, just as quickly, everyone started to cry.
The funeral was held on October 31. As in many country communities, the service was held at our house. I remember all the tears that were shed. Most of all I remember my Uncle Doug, my mother's younger brother. He always had a joke or a smile for every niece and nephew. To this day he still does.
My Dad came into my room one night, he asked me if I was OK. I thought I was. But I asked him where my Mommy was. He told me that she had died and had gone away. “Forever?” I asked. “Yes son, forever.” “Where did she go?” I asked. He picked me up out of my bed and carried me over to the window of my bedroom. “Can you see the stars out there?” He asked me. “Yes,” I said. My father said, “Your Mommy is up there now, she's a star, always shining, always watching over you at night, and she'll be with you forever.” I asked is that where you go when you die. He said, yes. But I must have driven my dad crazy asking him to point out the same star every night. To an adult they all look the same; to a child they're all different.
I have reached a critical stage of my adulthood. I think more of the effect my death would have on my three children than I think of dying itself. My youngest child Catherine is a little older than I was when my mother died. I look at all my kids and wonder how I would feel if I had to leave right now. I see the promise in their eyes, I see myself reflected in their enthusiastic response to life. I want so much to be a part of that life, to watch them grow older, to help them when they make a mistake, to be there when they need me. I think of my mother. I imagine her feelings when she realized she would not see her children grow older. I imagine her helplessness when she realized she would never hold her grandchildren, never to see her own features reflected in yet another generation.
Our oldest child, John is an astute boy, very inquisitive, but he has a very difficult concept to absorb; in fact all our kids do. I remember when he was about three years old and he first became aware of a picture of my Mother, he asked me, 'Who's that, Daddy?' I told him it was my Mommy, his Granny. He looked at me and said in a kind of scolding child’s voice, 'No, no, no, that's not my Granny. My Granny's in Ottawa.'
On a cold afternoon, we all stood by her gravestone. Each child carried a single chrysanthemum to leave for their Granny, the one they never knew. Together, we brushed off the leaves that littered the surface of her grave stone and by doing so revealed the epitaph that we chose to remember her by. Just from seeing the lyric of "Silent Night", I was flooded with memories of how Christmas Eve was with my Mom. All of us singing, dressed to the nines, so Dad could get us on film. Mom in her red Christmas dress, leading us on. At that moment, I heard quite clearly, the full-bodied sound of the piano and the somewhat off kilter singing of the rest of the family gathered around it, 'Sleep in heavenly peace, sleep in heavenly peace.'
You're right guys, it says, 'sleep in heavenly peace', it's from her favourite carol. She's like all of you, she loved Christmas too. John, turned and saw a tear roll down my cheek and as he grasped my hand with concern, he asked me if I was OK. Full circle, I thought: first my father was concerned and now my son is. I smiled at him and said, “Yes, son, I am fine. I was just remembering.
Merry Christmas, Mom.
We love you.
On the morning of my seventh birthday in October 1961, I walked up the hall from my bedroom to my Mom's. As I approached, I saw a tin of cookies sitting outside her door, as I got closer I saw they were our whole family's favourite. The ones with candied drawings of animals on them. I had known she wasn't well and was away a lot, but now she was at home and I thought that everything would be the way it always was.
Three weeks later, while we were having breakfast, my Dad walked into the kitchen. He told us in a quiet voice that our Mother had passed away during the night. I remember the moment after he told us, the room, for that matter, the whole world fell silent. Then, just as quickly, everyone started to cry.
The funeral was held on October 31. As in many country communities, the service was held at our house. I remember all the tears that were shed. Most of all I remember my Uncle Doug, my mother's younger brother. He always had a joke or a smile for every niece and nephew. To this day he still does.
My Dad came into my room one night, he asked me if I was OK. I thought I was. But I asked him where my Mommy was. He told me that she had died and had gone away. “Forever?” I asked. “Yes son, forever.” “Where did she go?” I asked. He picked me up out of my bed and carried me over to the window of my bedroom. “Can you see the stars out there?” He asked me. “Yes,” I said. My father said, “Your Mommy is up there now, she's a star, always shining, always watching over you at night, and she'll be with you forever.” I asked is that where you go when you die. He said, yes. But I must have driven my dad crazy asking him to point out the same star every night. To an adult they all look the same; to a child they're all different.
I have reached a critical stage of my adulthood. I think more of the effect my death would have on my three children than I think of dying itself. My youngest child Catherine is a little older than I was when my mother died. I look at all my kids and wonder how I would feel if I had to leave right now. I see the promise in their eyes, I see myself reflected in their enthusiastic response to life. I want so much to be a part of that life, to watch them grow older, to help them when they make a mistake, to be there when they need me. I think of my mother. I imagine her feelings when she realized she would not see her children grow older. I imagine her helplessness when she realized she would never hold her grandchildren, never to see her own features reflected in yet another generation.
Our oldest child, John is an astute boy, very inquisitive, but he has a very difficult concept to absorb; in fact all our kids do. I remember when he was about three years old and he first became aware of a picture of my Mother, he asked me, 'Who's that, Daddy?' I told him it was my Mommy, his Granny. He looked at me and said in a kind of scolding child’s voice, 'No, no, no, that's not my Granny. My Granny's in Ottawa.'
On a cold afternoon, we all stood by her gravestone. Each child carried a single chrysanthemum to leave for their Granny, the one they never knew. Together, we brushed off the leaves that littered the surface of her grave stone and by doing so revealed the epitaph that we chose to remember her by. Just from seeing the lyric of "Silent Night", I was flooded with memories of how Christmas Eve was with my Mom. All of us singing, dressed to the nines, so Dad could get us on film. Mom in her red Christmas dress, leading us on. At that moment, I heard quite clearly, the full-bodied sound of the piano and the somewhat off kilter singing of the rest of the family gathered around it, 'Sleep in heavenly peace, sleep in heavenly peace.'
You're right guys, it says, 'sleep in heavenly peace', it's from her favourite carol. She's like all of you, she loved Christmas too. John, turned and saw a tear roll down my cheek and as he grasped my hand with concern, he asked me if I was OK. Full circle, I thought: first my father was concerned and now my son is. I smiled at him and said, “Yes, son, I am fine. I was just remembering.
Merry Christmas, Mom.
We love you.
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