Plus tard

'Ramène-moi, return me home'
Requests the Little Prince of his friend the snake,
for I am Hydrogen I belong to the stars.

But now is not the time.
Nor do I shun the paltry gift
this Life
I have been bestowed.

Forgive me, pardonne-moi
my trespasses against myself.
I am feeble and willful
but belong Here
for Now.

I will scratch and claw
and chew and suck
every last morsel.
I will love and despise and feel.
I will shiver with music
and sing with lust
Until I myself
Am nought but Dust.

Afterlife

I had the same family but I also had a son. Or maybe my daughter was a son. Some Indian neighbours dropped by to visit, ostensibly to connect our two young boys. More and more of them came in and soon, it was a party atmosphere. From the onset, I had felt that connecting the two boys was a ploy and that really, the mother wanted to speak with me. I was not at all surprised when she took me aside and warned me of our imminent death. They left. We got into our vehicle for what Rob and I knew was our last trip. Our daughter had returned to her gender at this point and we protected her from what we knew was to happen. We had many near accidents along the way and braced ourselves each time. At one point, I don't recall how it happened, we ended up in a large, compacting disposal skip--like at a scrap yard. Rob and I thought, "This is it," but we told Lexie that the sensors would surely recognise that we were people and would stop the machinery. Strangely enough, this is what happened. Some men did help us out and we made it to our destination. When we got there, people were so welcoming and warm. I began to notice that the sun did not set but followed us in the sky wherever we went. Finally, I accepted that we were dead. The people who had helped us out of the skip must have been paramedics removing our bodies. The machinery I had glanced outside the skip must have been stretchers. But, I had felt no break in continuity from life to death. No pain. No loss of consciousness. During our stay at that place with the warm reception, we had occasional visitors. Rob's good friend Dave would stop by. I guess he would dream of him or visit him in a quiet moment. We began to forget details of living. You have to realise that this entirely opposed to everything I've ever believed about death. I don't believe in an afterlife and certainly not one that masquerades as a holiday camp. I believe that when one dies, one's energy returns to the universe. This was so strange and yet, as dreams tend to be, so very real.

Kato: December 27, 2007 - August 7, 2014

It's too late to be awake dearest but when I close my eyes pictures of you roll down my face. It's too late for I'm sorry, I did my best. It's too late for 'could I have done more?' Clickety clackety, jingle jangle, flip and flop. It's too late for your lovely sounds. It's late now. Sleep and return from whence you came.

Doppelgänger

Today I caught a glimpse of someone I once knew. I sucked in my breath at the similarity and the weight of those few fleeting seconds. Then my heart shattered again. And again. And again.

The End is Nigh

I took Zoe to the veterinarian the other day for her semi-annual geriatric check-up. The doctor said that Zoe had a heart murmur and the lumps, which we had assumed were fatty deposits and arthritis inflammation, were in fact tumours. She said that she could biopsy them but really that she could predict the result. I told her that we had long ago decided that we would put darling Zoe through no further invasive procedure, even if it was merely diagnostic. The point is that even if she is riddled with cancerous tumours, I don't want to know. It won't affect how we treat her or what joy she brings to us all. My only concern is that she live her remaining days blissfully. Smelling the sunshine. Chasing butterflies. Grumbling irritably at the younger dog--as is the prerogative of the elderly. Pointing in beautiful position at whatever forest creatures pass behind our fence. Kissing us gently with her little 'corn-on-the-cob' nibbles that she gives to keep us and herself clean. I have increased her pain medication and she seems to be coping well. Somedays she falls or doesn't quite make an attempted jump. Her embarrassment is tangible. I see her looking at me, with that one whisker that never goes in the right direction, as if to say that it must have been a mistake and surely that it couldn't have been her fault that she fell. She's proud, my girl. My first girl, I call her. I love her so much. Zoe has brought me so much joy, comfort, and compassion. How could I repay that with a selfish desire to prolong her discomfort? I hope that she chooses her own time to die, when she's ready and when she knows that we will be okay.

RIP Dr. Kate Bride, my faerie

My thesis co-supervisor died suddenly on Sunday after a brief illness. Today was her service. Having just completed first revisions and planning to submit to the examiners next week, I feel totally surreal working on my writing knowing that Kate won't read the final product. There was a memorial service for her today and I was asked to read. Reading at funerals always makes me panicky--not because I worry about my ability to do it: as a trained actor, the reading is the easy part--it is the selection of works that causes my anxiety. I always feel that I should choose something appropriately sombre or even religious (which I am not) but instead feel a subversive urge bubbling up inside me to be irreverent, sardonic even. Always the anarchist. But thankfully, I know to trust my instincts and I went with humour. In fact, I adapted a posting from this very blog, 'Dog Love'. It was well received but most importantly, Kate would have appreciated it. My other supervisor told me that Kate, not having tenure and being on a postdoc, was not actually being paid for my supervision--that in fact she was reading my work, encouraging me, challenging me purely because she believed in the type of writing I do. I am glad that I know the truth of her not being paid. I could carry it as guilt but instead, I will hold it as a very precious gift. A memento of confidence for me in the dark hours when I doubt myself, my words, and perhaps the value of both. Kate told me not to worry about being self-indulgent when writing in my own narrative; that it is the work of heartful educators to broach personal questions in order to be critical pedagogues. She also told me when in doubt to walk the dog. I don't believe in angels but as my work is in fantasy, I do truly believe in the faerie world. When the fair folk enter a human's life, it can never be for a long time or harm will come to either the mortal or immortal world. Kate was my faerie and I thank her for the time she allotted me.

Casual Naïveté

When my childhood best friend and I were still in elementary school, we would frequent a small park. We greatly enjoyed making up stories about our fictional selves, Speed and Spice. Two huge tractor tires were stationed upright, imbedded into the earth, near the playground. We climbed daily onto those tires, who became our faithful horses, although I have traitorously forgotten their names. We went so far as to attach masking tape saddles and reins. One day, in the midst of a storyline, we noticed a man had entered our playground. He stood watching us. We looked at each other and then at him. We dismounted. He waved to us. He said something innocuous, trying to engage us in conversation. I said something back to him (perhaps it was about the time?) when Speed said loudly that it was time to go. Because our bond was almost psychic, I sensed her urgency and so, although I felt she was being a bit hasty and impolite, I left with her. She asked me later: had I not seen his penis hanging out of his pants? That was a crushing moment for me. I felt the weight of what could have been my own demise and a profound revulsion at my own innocence. Of course, we knew not to take candy nor to go anywhere with strangers, but as far as I can recollect, he merely inquired about the time. I did not look down to see if he was flashing us. I just don't look at people that way. When they speak to me, I hold their gaze. Confidence and proper etiquette could so easily have been my downfall. I had seen NOTHING. To this day, at random moments, I am filled with that same dreaded sense of creepy disgust. I have only recently realised that it is my own naïveté. Is this perhaps my instincts telling me that something is amiss? Certain aquaintances will leave me with this feeling and I find myself urgently needing to disassociate. Or am I entirely incapable of protecting myself and will I forever need a good friend and a trusty steed? There have been many, many instances like the park of my youth. Not necessarily all flashers or would-be pedophiles but other incidents where I have trusted, innocently, in the face of what others have had to explain to me. How the hell can this be? I am intelligent and generally socially adept. I am an actor, for goodness' sakes. I can read character. So why do I have such a blind spot for potentially disastrous situations? I do think it comes back to a kind of naïveté--an honesty, an openness. A sort of optimism perhaps and an inability to accept real human cruelty. It's not that I haven't suffered in my life (indeed I have--my school principal used to get me to counsel other kids on how to cope with trauma because I was so well-adjusted after facing issues of my own) but that my suffering has perhaps been somehow elite. I can't seem to grasp the real, gritty, down-in-the dirt fabric of some peoples' tragic lives. My husband occasionally rails at me that I don't notice what is going on because of my academic focus. I get so immersed into what I am doing that all else is irrelevant. The capacity for concentration despite distraction is a skill I have used to my advantage many, many times. But I sense that it--both a gift and a curse--will my ultimate downfall. I have just finished reading J.K. Rowling's novel "Casual Vacancy". The cruelty and malicious intent of the characters is indeed casual and heartbreaking. It reminded me that I am both oh-so privileged and so very at risk.

The Gross-Out II

After being reminded the other day of the Rhodesian Ridgeback, whose the cultivated gourmet palate preferred only the finest found feces of homeless Vancouverites, I must concede the 'my-dogs-are-grosser-than-yours' title. I am okay with this. Kudos to the new title holder whose disgusting deed (and ensuing regurgitation) I shall recount for many a day. It seems as though obscured in the dog's consumption and rejection of street person poo there was a veiled commentary on society's underprivileged. In other news, I recently heard that British teenagers have begun a fad of communication via message in a bottle. It seems they are placing personal ads into bottles in the hopes of finding a romantic match--offline dating sites, so to speak. The current generation of adolescents has grown up with a level of technological sophistication incomprehensible to anyone who remembers Commodore 64 or getting the neighbourhood's first microwave/VCR/CD player. The peculiar parallel between the British teens and our Ridgeback, is that in their subversive acts, both are unknowingly enacting a hegemonic defiance.

Why my heart belongs to Severus Snape

What it is, more than anything, I think, is that moment when we see him craddling her lifeless body, while not simply sobbing but actually wailing. Because it is a voice-over scene, his lament is soundless and, therefore, infinitely more powerful and tragic.

The master of a disciplined mind and of concealment reveals himself in his truest instant to be utterly devasted with grief.

In the past, his calculated frigidity has only once let slip some base level of rage, tempered with shame, at a recollection of school yard bullying, and some infrequent minor fears due to the burdensome demands of his headmaster.

When, as a theatre student in university, I had to explore the four major emotions of joy, fear, rage, and grief, I always felt my resources for the joy corner of the room were rather limited. Yet, I was full of information for grief. I, too, have often felt that I live my life behind a veil--forcing myself to be strong and to appear flawless--while concealing a fundamentally wounded core.

To live with, despite, or perhaps for a true love once glimpsed and then lost is a dank, musty, breathless tunnel. From the chasm, to live based on love seems somehow naïvely pure. Deceivingly simple in its complexity. And profoundly courageous in its honesty.

That is why my heart belongs to Severus Snape.

Life is an Onion

As a child of four years old, I was aware of what occurred around me. Not simply did I understand the words but their ulterior intentions. I could perceive irritation, manipulation, subtle messaging. Yet, I was locked within my small frame and spoken to as one unawares. Often, I wondered how long I would have to feign ignorance--until I grew up and realised that the pretense was to endure my entire life.

In my preadolescence, I tested my powers of manipulation. I laid a great trap for a friend of mine and merely observed as she ensnared herself in lies. I did not reveal myself but simply noted that all people will lie and cheat if they deem it feasible and profitable.

Existence is the multitude of rings within an onion. I am on the outermost peel, cynically observing the mid machinations. At times, I have sought to live blindly inside the onion but am always rejected by my perception of falseness. I have tried to numb myself--to overcome the sting of the onion--and to live simply, blindly. It is always in vain.

A few times, I have mastered my own consciousness and internalised my practice so profoundly that I have reached the innermost sanctum of the onion. Those points have been true sweetness: onion divinity. At those moments of nirvana, I have attained what it is for which I have striven with the least effort. It has been as though the circling has momentarily ceased and the rings have aligned into a cosmic pathway. Choices were obvious, delicious. Results were evident and glorious.

But, as with all other occasions, ultimately I have been redeposited at the external trajectory.

Today as I consider the death of Hitch, someone whose body of work speaks to me, I feel more and certain that the onion hardens and bitters. I am rejected by all but the exterior.

Rebuttal from the Other dog

I know I'm low on the family totem pole.

It's okay, though, because I'm a dog and am comfortable with hierarchy. I'm somewhere after the first dog and people but maybe before the turtles and fish. I guess in the film world, my position would be described as 'below the line'. Not a producer or director but still talent.

There's something to be said for not having a very strong brain. I can't make up my mind on things so I listen to my peoples' guidance. I adhere to every instruction given to me. My people tell me I just got too much beauty and not so much of the other stuff.

Sure, the first dog is beloved but I am obediant.

My people stuck by me when I did all kinds of stuff I wasn't supposed to do, even when I was BAD DOG. I know I'm still sometimes stinky, sloppy, and silly but my people take care of me and tell me I am GOOD DOG. Those are my happiest days.

I had a rocky start to life. I was physically unwell, mentally unstable, and instinctually-delayed. It's not fun having the canine equivalent of ADHD. The Prozac helps a lot. Now, I can concentrate and listen. I promise my people that I'll be the very best dog I can be.

And that's good enough for one dog's life.

Dog Love

I had a strange thought just now: perhaps I love this creature more than anything on earth. How can that be when I have a cherished child and a reciprocally devoted husband? Someone with a psychological background would surely advise me that I am merely projecting onto the dog. And indeed, I am.

I was born in the Year of the Dog. I have always identified with the notion of dog. I consider myself dog-like. I have even, at times, wondered longingly what it might be like to have a tail. I relate more closely to dogdom than to the realm of any other animal, except perhaps that of the elephant.

Interestingly, the elephant strikes me as very similar to the dog in its emotional makeup. Magnificently, they invest physical locations with their grief for the deceased. The don't have a fantastically functional tail but they do have an awesome trunk. The elephant maintains such a wisdom and a gentleness of spirit despite its size.

And so I truly love this dog, as if she is part of me--an extension who is independent, willful, cheeky, playful and infinitely compassionate.

A Healthy Point of View

It's funny how simply making a decision can sometimes lead to a change of mindset.

I spent most of the summer in graduate work, looking at myself as an artist and a linguist, and in deconstructing messaging in popular culture. I had promised myself that when my coursework had finished for the term, that I would spend at least a few days of my short vacation pushing my exercise book for postpartum mothers towards publication. I didn't realise, however, that my perception of normative standards of weight would so drastically have been altered.
Sure, I was always aware of media messages objectifying and distorting the female body. But it wasn't until I really took a look at my own insecurities that I discovered how greatly I too, had been indoctrinated. Not only did I rework a section in my manuscript on weight loss, but I made a rather huge decision.

If, as a junior high teacher, I hope to model healthy behaviour through my active participation in physical fitness pursuits and through my clean diet, then I must relinquish my own body image insecurities. Self-acceptance seems so obvious--how could I have missed it? Yet until I made the momentous vow to bare my legs (despite varicose veins) and to wear shorts when running (instead of roasting alive in track pants), I myself was somehow inauthentic.

I ran today, in the local park. Cellulite was visible for all who cared to see. But either no one saw or no one cared. I was comfortable. When I looked in the mirror later, the lumps and bumps that have always taunted me despite my slender frame seemed somehow less visible. How is that possible? By the fact that I simply no longer care. I actually feel good: strong, healthy, vibrant, beautiful, intelligent, successful...

It's taken me forty years to get this. I hope I can persuade some of my teenagers that body confidence really does come from within--perhaps through leading by example.

Requiem

A few months ago, my mother died.

Her existence consisted of pain and sorrow.
She was the lingering ache of a Beethoven sonata, she was the angst of Brahms; whereas my father is a Bach partita and the happy summer of Mendelssohn.

She taught me to read palms, to embroider, and to look within because spirituality provides more truth than materiality. She shared a secret with me: that the supernatural and the natural are only as distant as we permit them to be.

Through her, I suffered more than enough for one person's life. But at least I have a clarity she did not. I see beyond the mist and am not immobilised by its cloying, moist dullness. I do not regret anything that has facilitated who I am.

Mama,
In death, rest in peace, as you never did in life.

Value

I've been thinking about possessions recently. Not just material things, but also the memories and feelings with which we endow objects.

I hold onto memories the way a child grasps a blanket until it is soggy and filthy from having been dragged on the floor. I still wake up, gasping for air, at romantic blunders I made in my adolescence. In fact, I try to will those tortures away using every meditative and hokum purgative technique I can muster. But those nasties refuse to be vanquished. They maintain their rightful place beside triumphs, first kisses, and cds.

What is value? I value certain attributes of myself, of my personality. Surely, that is mere self-esteem. (I don't think I'm a narcissist...) I also value my relationships with my husband and daughter--those are not possessions; they require reciprocity. Were they,they would be stagnant and lifeless. So how then, can I use the same word 'value' to describe the way I feel about purchasing a hoodie for half-off or a deal I got one time when some meat was under-priced. (Still feel a tad guilty about that one, to be honest.)

Sometimes applying value to an object can be detrimental. Any Buddhist monk will tell you the same. We hold on beyond the usefulness of a memory. Valued possessions are only worthwhile as long as you continue to move forward. When you are bound, it's over. My body has taught me this with years of chronic aches and pains that I can isolate and connect back to particular incidents.

I am posting this message, incomplete. These were the thoughts I was having days before my parent died. I was unable to finish this draft and have decided to let it hang, still, in the ether.

First run of spring

Today, I took a moment of pure bliss to jog beside a river full from spring runoff. As the water dashed down, I heard the roar in my ears and the dull thump of my feet on the path. It was ten meditative seconds of replenishment for my soul.

That was, of course, before the searing pain in my lungs and throat.

I am a runner but you have to understand: in Newfoundland, the snow has only just melted. One cannot run outside with the winter -25C windchills. (Well, some sickos do, but there is no accounting for those weirdos who not only force themselves to breathe through balaclavas while running but also willingly negotiate ice covered sidewalks, roads narrowed by two metre-wide snow banks, and drivers who don't scrape their windows.) So, this was my first run of the year outdoors. And it's different than being on the treadmill, with no one to watch me, as my steps got narrower and narrower.

Spring in this part of Canada is about waiting for one elusive bird to sing and the masochism of the return to Standard Time. (It hurts but it feels so good.) It is also when three metre snow drifts in the backyard melt to reveal layers of near-fossilised dog poop, previously hidden by flash snow storms. And once the ground has begun to recuperate from that trauma, it is time for a jog.

The jog is a paradigm. My mind versus my body is the dichotomy. I read recently that the best way for runners to stave off shin splints, is to take smaller strides. I cling to this fact for justification when I am tempted to collapse and curl up in a ball rather than finish the last hill. Another memory that goads me on is the recollection that I ran this very same trail when I was seven months pregnant. It's been almost three years since then, surely I can do the same route now! The eternal battle intensifies as the internal wimp retorts that I am almost forty. Whew, that was a low blow.

Suddenly, I emerge from the forest near the road. Traffic whizzes past, witnessing my puffy red face and sweatline down my chest. I, huff, must, huff, not look like an idiot in front of these people.

Pathetic, isn't it, how it's vanity that ultimately pushes me to succeed?

I wish I could run with my dogs. Yes, the same ones responsible for the nauseating detritus that is my backyard. But one is from champion field trial stock and is too much of an instinctual hunter--she'd pull me off towards the ducks, swans, and squirrels. The other one is from champion show stock and is um, pretty. So, one is too smart and the other not enough. I would love the company though. Now that I say it, I wonder. Jogging, like hiking, is a spiritual experience for me. I enjoy the solitude and the opportunity to commune with nature, reflectively. Stooping to scoop would kill the flow.

I feel virtuous as I write this. I've done my exercise for the day. Thank goodness because I have a nasty headache, a vague urge to vomit, and a slight dizziness. As the battle threatens to begin anew, the addicted runner finally reemerges with a reply to the 'forty-year-old' insult, "Maybe I will feel better when I try it again tomorrow..."

The Gross-out

Why is it that one feels so liberated after having grossed someone out?



I have a theory: that this is the very notion behind the success of all horror literature and film. It feels titillatingly delicious to really crank it up, I mean, sensing when you have crossed the line with a story and then going totally overboard. Moreover, we love to be disgusted. It's naughty.



The other day, I was recounting to a colleague one of my dogs' disgusting habits. As I sensed her squirming, I found myself delving deeper and deeper into heinously unnecessary detail. I left her in a state of half-scream/half-laughter. Yet, I had to go one step further and exit the room while making sound effects relevant to the anecdote. When I heard her climactic groan, I could no longer erase the grin from my face.



I felt tremendous success and catharsis. I was now relieved of the hideous memory, having divied it up amongst other beings in the universe. I no longer have to independently carry the burden.



We may actively hunt down creepy moments to relieve our over-active imaginations, to free our stressed psyches, or to simply to feel more than we do in daily life numbed by societal pressure. Perhaps we are attempting to connect with some now-forbidden archetypal instinct. Whatever the reason, I'm sure my friend felt just as rejuvenated after hearing my story as I did after telling it.