Remembrance Day

I, like thousands of other good Canadians, did the right thing this morning and got out of bed and dressed in something warm and headed off to the local Cenotaph to remember those who gave their lives serving this great country. My little town has a little over 1000 dwellers and about 10% come out to the Remebrance Day services each year. To me that is not really a good number. I would like to see 500 people out for the services each year. I think then that would be a number to be proud of. Remembrance Day did not always mean so much to me. For many years I saw it as a day off from school and an opportunity to stay in bed a little longer. I hated all those long boring TV shows that show black and white pictures of men in ditches running around with guns. It had no meaning.

On the wall in my mother and father's house is an old black and white photo. It is in a lovely old frame matted with an oval. In the middle is one of the only photos of my paternal grandfather. It was taken of him in his uniform just before he went overseas in the first World War. He would have been 16 years old. He enlisted underage by lying about his age. He was born in 1901 and so that would have put the picture being taken in 1917. It is a lovely old picture of him and I have often looked at it with curiosity. You see my grandfather died when he was 54 years old of liver cancer long before I was born and so I never met him.

I read the news each day and watch what is happening in Afghanistan and I think about the soldiers that are working so hard to make the lives of people I will never see better. They are building schools and hospitals and they are watching children die that cannot fend for themselves. They are watching old people not be able to get the medical care they need. They are seeing infrastructure of a country undermined by the terror of militant groups that don't have the right to rule with fear.

We are so lucky to be able to send our children off on a bus in the morning without the worry of our daughters being raped or their faces being burnt with acid in an unwarranted attack and our sons being stolen into becoming child soldiers or forced to become suicide bombers. We are so lucky to be able to walk into a clinic and get a flu shot free if we really need it. We are so lucky to be able eat a variety of foods and not just rice. We are so lucky to turn on a tap and get a glass of water and not have to carry our water for miles in buckets hanging from our shoulders. Our children and our grandchildren may not always have the luxuries we do. Our soldiers help to make our lives the way they are.....

Now that I have volunteered to help out with the Junior Canadian Rangers I have met many military people.... I pray that they stay safe. Especially Sargeant Lionel Paculak who is preparing to head over to Afghanistan as I write. I hope all our soldiers stay safe, as they fight to help those less fortunate than us. Maybe if we help them some day that will come back.... look at the Dutch who revere the second World War Canadian soldiers who helped them in the war. They are so grateful and we can only be glad we helped.

I'm proud of my grandfather for wanting to help even though he never wanted to talk about his experiences on the battlefield. It is good to be proud of someone who is fighting for the end of terrony. Take a moment and look up the soldiers who fight for us, who fight for others. You will feel so proud.....

The Fist of Winter has Hit

That swirling cloud mass that was threatening winter has finally reached out its fist and clobbered us with our first dump of snow. The sheep are looking mournful and bedraggled as they lie in the cold. I feel like I want to go out and lead them into my nice cozy house but then it would be horribly crowded and all that poop! Just kidding, but I do wish Hubby and I had gotten their shelters finished before the snow came. This will be our first winter as shepherds and so it is all new to us. We watch diligently for signs of ill health that may be weather and cold temperature related. I watch to see if their feed is enough by looking at their bellies and judging if this one or that one is looking skinnier. I'm worse than a new mother in my nervousness. But so far so good though they do look sad and pathetic. And it hasn't even hit -30 degrees celcius yet.

I have discovered that in the shock of no longer being in October but one week into November that I need new footwear for winter. My faithful old mules just won't do anymore.... Last spring after a trip where I was expected to stay in an army barracks, I discovered the reality of athletes foot. Never go barefoot in a barracks I was told two days in to my trip. To late. The nasty fungous had set in and so after months of trying to eradicate it from my shoes I threw them all out and stuck with my trusty mules that I hadn't worn until then. With the end of the athletes foot came a reprieve. The only shoes I now owned were my dress shoes, which managed to avoid the fungous, and my mules, which I have worn pretty much non stop except when I've been sleeping. So now the crunch is on me and I am shoeless for winter since my faithful mules have disintigrated to little more than rags. Out comes the catalogues yesterday and I spent the afternoon pouring over page after page of shoes.

Since my winter boots died last year I thought to buy them as well. What I discovered was that nothing is cheap anymore. The first pair of boots that I thought would do the job was $249.99.... OUCH! Like what happened to $79.99 and $89.99 for boots. I finally settled on a pair for the equally exorbitant price of $149.99.. that was enough!

While I was at it, I found a nice winter jacket and that was a little more reasonably price. I also found a pair of snow pants! Hay... I say... it was pretty easy to spend four hundred dollars in a jiffy.

Daughter #1 and Daughter#2 both need winter jackets too. So they will come next payday..... I think Hubby could do with new winter boots. Ok..ok...ok... that fist of winter hit in more ways than one....

Christmas! Oh Groan!

I received an email a couple of days ago that gave me a bit of a shock. Hubby's sister emailed with her usual annual request for suggestions and sizing information for Christmas gifts for Daughter #1 and Daughter #2. It was a shock to me that anyone was even thinking about Christmas yet. Christmas always seems to come as a shock as it always creeps up on me and I am left standing as the preverbial but dumbfounded elf. By the way, did I mention that I am in shock over the lack of time between now and Christmas? Shock...shock...shock....

Christmas has always been a problem for me, because I absolutely hate shopping. On-line shopping has made that problem a little better but honestly, I still hate trying to figure out what to get for everyone.

Now that we live so far away from most of our family it has gotten even worse. We now buy gift cards for everyone if they live where I have to send it through the mail.... why pay for postage for a gift. I'd rather spend it on someting that people can use rather than on getting it there in the first place.

Daughter #1 and Daughter #2 are getting harder and harder to shop for too. Their tastes are either sublime or rediculous. Take Daughter #1: she has decided to become one of the horsey set and so wants cowboy boots and cowboy hat this year. First of all Hubby says point blank 'no'. He's having western issues. I think he would be more satisfied if she would ask for a pair of logans and a sou' wester' hat. Then Daughter #2 is having Peter Pan issues and just refuses to grow up.... she has asked for a stroller for her doll. Once again Hubby says no. This was met with the rebellious look of a kid on the brink of teenagerhood. I expect I will have to drag her kicking and screaming out of her childhood and into her youthhood. She is a bundle of extremes right now... How can she want a pink frilly doll stroller and give such venemous looks at us. Pink and frilly vs. venemous viper... it just doesn't jell.

Some days I just wish I could sleep through the season of light. HA! Season of light my ass. It is the darkest part of my year and I wish I could be done with it..... Ba Humbug.

Each year at this time I sit in front of my computer and come up with a Christmas poem that tells about our year all in rhyme. Then I diligently print off 30 or so copies and send them out to people who in return, buy a cheap card and just put their name on it...... Frustrating if you know what I mean. I always figure if you are just going to sign your card and not even make the effort of writing a note, why bother. Put a little effort into it I say.

Christmas is the bane of my existence. People remember others out of obligation and not really out of love. What is the point? It all seems as if some giant snowball was pushed downhill years ago and the damn thing just hasn't stopped rolling.

I'm not saying that Christmas should be banned. I just want it to have more meaning. I want to stop buying lots of gifts for under the tree and buy one really special thing that has joy written all over it. Daughter #1 is sitting here as I write this and when we talked about her Dad having Western issues she said lets just buy one family thing and go on a vacation.... oh how I wish....

Vacations are not the easiest thing at this time of the year either..... how do I leave my aging parents to get through Christmas alone. No turkey dinner, no bright Christmas morning with the grand kiddies to visit.

The pressure is just too much. Now I remember why I think Christmas! Oh groan! Oh well I better start thinking about it soon or I'll be the elf with her pants around her ankles again....

Media and Me

I thought I would listen to the radio today just because I want to hear what is happening with the U.S. election. Problem is Hubby is not at home and so the reception sucks. We have come to the conclusion that Hubby is our antenna. Every time he touches the wire antenna the reception clears and every time he moves away from the antenna the reception dies, and all we hear is a crackling mess. Right now I have managed to get it to work because our cat is sleeping peacefully in the chair by the radio and so I was able to stretch the antenna to where he is sleeping and touch it up against him.... he seems to be doing the same thing Hubby does.... must be their attractive personalities.... With any luck Puss won't move and I will hear the news all day.

Living in a rural area has given us this problem. Normal connections for media related objects becomes a luxury. We have dial up for our computer, we don't even try to get TV reception, radio reception is at best, bad, wireless is available but it is hit or miss as to whether it would work for us. We have cell service if you stand upstairs or out on our deck, and our phone works just fine. Lately Hubby and I have been trying to decide if we have other options. For $70 a month we could have a satelite connection installed and then we would have radio, T.V. with over 500 channels (why anyone would want that I don't know), high speed internet, and as much cell service as we could want. We would be connected in a way that would jettison us into "like Star Trek time" as Daughter #2 says.

Media is certainly an interesting phenomena. When I want to connect with other people I don't think of doing it in person any more. I just turn on my computer and start emailing the people I want to talk to.

I have never been a phone person and what's more is I don't do well in a group setting. I don't think quickly and so I have never been considered witty. The computer allows me to overcome that particular problem by thinking about what I write before I hit send, post, or whatever. Email has been a Godsend for me because I am able to write as slowly or as quickly as I want and think as I do so. I can also answer those I want to and ignore everything else. I can be as witty as I want within my ability when I use my computer.

I like my cell phone. I like that I can turn it off and not be a slave to it. I can still get all the calls that come in just on my time instead of on someone else's time. Hubby and I are debating if we get the satelite connection perhaps we can chuck our phone and just use the cell. What is unique is that I am beginning to regard the cell as my business connection and my computer as my personal connection. Most of my friends I stay in touch with I do so by email.... most of the businesses that I need to stay in touch in I do so with my phone. I think it is great that I can turn off the businesses....

I also like my computer. It thrills me every time I turn it on and check my email especially when there is an email from someone that I like, even if it is a joke or a good wish for the day. There is so much interesting stuff out there and there are so many interesting people out there and all I need do is google. What can be better? With a click of a button I have the world at the tip of my finger.... how cool is that?

Time Flies When You're Having Fun

Sometimes life feels like it is passing by in a blur. Take, for instance, this week. I haven't had a chance to blog here since Tuesday because I have had two trips out of town and I spent all day Thursday doing volunteer work. Time, from week to week, passes by in a never ending stream of busy-ness. I realized some years ago that this was not going to change. I kept thinking that next week would be quieter, but as time went by, and some weeks were quieter than others, they still steadily disappeared with an unerring scariness.

Friday was Halloween and Daughter #1 and Daughter #2 decided that once again they would hit the streets looking for an endless supply of candy. Livng in a rural setting, this is not the easiest task in the world since houses are separated by quite some distance. So, like any good rural dweller, we take our children (they aren't really any more) to the nearest town where they can join the frackous, and load up on goodies. We have done this for years. But being good parents and not wanting our kids killed or dragged off by some big kids, we would follow our children at a moderate pace and make sure they were ok. Till this year. Daughter #1, who is approaching 13 decided that having Mom and Dad in tow was dweebie and so she hooked up with friends and off she went. Daughter # 2 is having some difficulties right now letting go of her girlhood and so she decided not to hook up with friends as she didn't want to let go of having Mom and Dad in tow. So after school we picked her up and took her to Grandma's and Grandpa's for supper and then off into the depths of the night. We went to brave the ghosts, witches and storm troopers, not to mention the princesses, the taxi drivers and the vampires to seek the siren of the candy call.

I don't know about Daughter #2 but I was embarrassed! Hubby and I were the only parents dragging after an 11 year old kid as she went door to door. Most other parents were with 7 and younger kids. My 11 year old looks like she is about 13. It was scarier than Halloween night itself.

How does the time fly so that one Halloween you are escorting your very young daughters as their energy flags and they wear themselves out going door to door, to escorting your almost adult daughter because she can't let go of her little-girl-hood?

Finally, once my feet were soaked, I followed at a more discrete distance in the truck but Hubby didn't seem to notice that this was an issue. He, blissfully ignorant of the stigma attached to following and kid who looks big enough to be and adult, carried on with her. At one point she hooked up with a bunch of kids from her class. Hubby should have let her go and come back to the truck but did he? I'll let you answer that.

She had fun, so she says, and that is what counts, but I do have to wonder about how to get past this problem. Next year she will want to go again and I pray that she won't have to go alone, because Hubby will want to follow along again..... and that's the scariest thing about Halloween!

It is hard watching them grow up. It is hard to realize that Halloweens and Santa Claus and Easter Bunnies are a limited time offer. Your kids move on and eventually you and Hubby are left at home on Halloween night reminicing about the "good old days".

I have been thinking about how I can ease the Daughters into the next phase of their growing up, because it is not easy for them to give it up either. Next year, maybe we can have a costume party for them. Living in the country you can do that because you have the space for them to be inside and outside. We could do up the big shed dripping with scarey decorations and have a murder mystery where they have to act the part of the character they draw out of the slime bowl. We could have scarey themed witch hunts, where they have to go into the creaking woods and locate certain items in teams of two or three. But at least Hubby and I would be done with giving our kids a bad reputation! Waaaah! I want my little girls back!

Obsessive? Compulsive?..... Yes!

Wow! How did that happen... My last post was Saturday and here it is Tuesday already.... where did all that time go?

I spent my day in obsessive and compulsive behavior. I have been working on my Masters Spinners homework. Ra ra sis boom bah! I am really pleased that I am actually making an effort to get my work done but right off the batt (no pun intended) I realized that getting started was not going to be easy. The first project I started to tackle was to spin a worsted yarn from a fine fibre with a worsted preparation. Easy eh? Ah... no! I am now working on my fifth attempt to get a good sample and I am nowhere nearer to having what I think is good than I was when I first started. I could swear that I am a total beginner if I were to look at my samples. Not one of my samples will get full marks. Everyone of them sucks. Problem is I am now running out of the fibre that my instructor provided and so I am beginning to resort to trying a different fibre instead, and I don't like it nearly as much.

What is a body to do when one begins to obsess over something that should only take a short time. I could really be at this until April and still not have what I think is acceptable. And this is only the first question.... arrgghh!

I remember when I was in college, and then university, when I was right out of school (a long time ago.. well not THAT long). I would be given work to do and I never obsessed about it the way I am obsessing now. What has happened to the free wheeling, relaxed person that I was? When did I become annal over my work? And most importantly, why am I never satisfied?

I have been reflecting on this and have come to the conclusion that when I was younger I had nothing to prove. I was young and so had all the time in the world to prove myself and my abilities, but now I am looking back at the years behind me and see that too much time has past to just let things slide any longer. If I am going to make an impression, I had better get on with it now. If I am going to make a name for myself hadn't I better do it soon? I mean I am 40 something.

My grandfather's motto was, "there is no time like the present". He was absolutely right. When I decided to take up the Master Spinner program, I had been out of school for many years and all I wanted to do was be the best that I could be. I felt there was 'no time like the present". It was all about my interest and being really good at what I do. But suddenly I am possessed by the idea that I might be the next Judith MacKensie McCuin or the next Elizabeth Zimmerman. Has there been a latent desire to be a perfectionist just waiting till middle age to burst forth from me? Is that what is driving me to this mindless frenzy of perfection? Am I obsessive and compulsive?

I just want a 5 out of 5 worsted skein from a fine fibre... is that asking too much? I don't know but I'm getting sick of asking myself all these questions.... Hark! is that the call of a baggie of merino I hear? Perfect grist... perfect angle of twist... perfect balance.... there's got to be a way.....

Everything works out in the end.... I think!

Today was a busy day. Today actually started last night! Our power went off, last evening, and so we were left to make our way through the evening hours as people did years ago.... with no computer or anything else that required electricity. By 9 p.m. we all felt that bed was our best option. (No wonder they went to bed early years ago.) Hubby had informed me earlier in the day that he would be going hunting for elk and so would require a very early morning. An early bedtime seemed to be the best solution. By 9:30 p.m. we were all settled under our quilts and peacefully on our way to la la land and listening to the wind rage for another night against the solid log walls of our home. The wind raged alright, as it had for the last few days. No wonder we had lost our power, there was a tree down across the lines between here and the nearest town.... Now while our log walls might be solid enough, we do have an issue with our tin roof. It is solid enough but, as anyone who has a tin roof knows, it rattles mightily in a heavy wind. There were times when it sounded like a 737 was about to land on our roof and then the tin would rattle till it sounded like our roof might take off like a kite. Our peaceful night was turned into a wakeful, noisy, disaster. At 4 a.m. I was no longer "sleeping" but lying and waiting for the time to pass till I could get up. Hubby's intention was to leave at 6:30 and so a 5:30 wake up call was in order.

When Hubby crawled out of bed, I'll be honest, I was somewhat relieved though, I must say that I was extremely tired. I followed him downstairs and lit candles as the power had not come back on as we had hoped. I knit on my Baby Surprise Sweater (E.Z. The Opinionated Knitter) until Hubby went out the door. Then I headed back to my bed to shiver until my blankets warmed me and I gently fell asleep.

At shortly after 8 a.m. I awoke to my kids slamming out the door to feed the sheep. The wind was still raging. I was grateful that Daughter#1 and Daughter #2 had enough initiative to do my chores for me.... that was great! But I faced the day resolutely knowing that my sheep needed their fall shots and our yard needed to be winterized. The first chore was to tie down the tarp that was whipping about brutally in the wind. This was quite a feat as anyone who has handled a large tarp in hurricane winds will know. Once the ropes were secured for that I cleaned out our tent trailer (thank heavens the wind had not destroyed it). Then the girls helped me to collapse that and secure a tarp over it for the winter. Hubby was home by then as he will not hunt in the middle of the day. We had a quick lunch and then I filled all the needles for the sheep's shots.

The lambs were easy. We were able to coax them into the barn and corner them. Each one had a shot of Tasvax 8 and a shot of Ivomex. Then we entered the other paddock and started to corral the adults. They were a little more warey as they seemed to know what we were up to. Greigg, my Shetland x was most warey and most wiley. We had tried capturing him earlier in the summer and discovered that he can jump three and a half foot fences with ease. So in trying to catch him this time we weren't taking any chances. Hubby discovered how hard flipping them is once you have caught them. The needle went into the soft flesh under the fore leg and since the adults only required the one shot, it was done quickly. A quick check to make sure that general health was good and off they went. Six sheep besides the four lambs got their shots yesterday and it was my first time as doctor to the sheep.

The afternoon ended with taking down the Daughter's trampoline. A day that I approached with serious misgivings, had turned into a productive one. Even my Baby Surprise Sweater is coming along.

Days that are productive make you feel good. There is nothing better than getting things accomplished... you feel like a success. There is a list a mile long with things that need to be done. The barns are still not finished, and they will be a priority over the next few weeks. There is a cloud in the sky that is still like a fist about to deliver the first blow of winter and I expect the hammer blow is going to come soon. The forcast is calling for snow this week so we are racing against the onslaught of winter to get the shelters built for the animals. In between are obligations for other activities like chaperoning and medical trips for the aging parents, (two this week alone).
But one day of success has given me the confidence that we will make it in time..... yee haw!