April, 2011

La bête humaine, originally uploaded by Pir.

When Franklin was a younger he was obsessed with trains. Thomas became a regular in our house and we joke about the largest plastic bin we own that is filled with the wooden tracks and trains that will very likely become our retirement fund. Thank-you grandparents.

When I was traveling through Europe, one of the books I picked up in a bookstore was Emile Zola’s La Bête humaine. I had no idea that it was made into a movie. In fact, many of the books I’ve read I’m discovering have been made into a movie. It never used to be this way. I haven’t really decided whether I like this or not. Of course, it’s totally my decision to log on to IMDb and ruin the images for myself.

Of course, I do it every time.

Anyway, this movie has an opening scene that is totally mesmerizing:

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No kidding, eh?

However, what I once thought was a toy left behind has been picked up with renewed fervor by Eliza. We are reading the books again, setting up the tracks and getting to know all the trains – both diesels and steamies. As our two children are so different in personality, there isn’t really much chance to compare them at similar stages. In fact, this is one of the first times I can remember certain things that Franklin did that are definitely different than Eliza and not a result of memory loss or a consequence of our new family dynamics once she was born.

Of course, I’m not going to get on the internet and tell you the differences. As strange as it may seem to those who don’t write about their families online, I’m not really all that fond of directly comparing or defining my children in public. From the very start of my pregnancy, these two have been so different… and yet, very much the same. The last thing I want to do is label them as “the meticulous one” , “the mysterious one” or “the imaginative one” because don’t we all have these traits at one time or another?

I come from a large family and even if my parents did or didn’t compare, the rest of the world seemed to give me and my siblings specific definitions. I didn’t realize how ingrained these definitions were until I received an Alice in Wonderland chess set from my parents.

A chess set?

Could this mean that I possibly had a brain that could handle chess? This meant I wasn’t just a girl but I had some of that elusive intelligence everyone seemed to attribute to my brainy older brother?!?
I sat on my bed and had a happy cry about that one.

Sigh. Oh the drama of being a tween.

selfport, originally uploaded by seven-ten.

A few years ago… oh God. How can I say that?
Billions and billions of years ago, it seems… yes, that is more accurate.

Billions and Billions of years ago, I traveled Europe with a friend of mine. We got into a few messes that I wasn’t sure we would survive and saw a few things I will never forget. It was a wonderful experience and something I’m not sure will be possible for my children but I hope they will travel on their own someday. Somewhere they don’t know the language, where they have to keep calm in stressful situations and where they will find a friend like the one I had with me.

Jen and I traveled through a few countries and read quite a large number of books along the way. We both enjoyed quietly strolling through bookstores and museums and she and I became connected in a way that two naive kids traveling through a war torn Serbia only could be.

One of my favourite things about Jen was that she was, unapologetically, a huge fan of reading in bed. It is also one of my favourite things to do – one that I have always felt guilty about and would only do in the wee hours of the morning.

Last night (in the wee hours of the morning), I finished The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It was really good. I’m not normally a mystery reader but anything that takes place in Europe where people seem to put on a pot of coffee every two hours is my kind of book. It was like Milan Kundera with the sexism turned down about 500 notches. Nice.

I’m currently bouncing around the idea of moving closer to family and to a more affordable place in the world. Gas has gone up 18% in the last year. Food prices? 33%. It’s getting stupid. The average food budget for a family of four in Victoria is already higher than average but now it’s getting crazy.

So, like all social networking dorks, I’m having this discussion on facebook. From this discussion I find that my bed reading friend is also considering a move to the same city. Too brilliant for words. Family, my sister having a baby, already a good friend living there and another potentially coming back, snow (I love snow) and still a chance for a master’s degree… There just seems to be more pulling me away from this place so many call paradise, than keeping me here.

Now to talk to my husband… who loves it here. He’s going to talk me out of this. I just know it.

Odocoileus hemionus sitkensis, originally uploaded by quaelin.

Last weekend I went to the Swan Lake Native Plant Sale with a few friends and watched them pick up some glorious plants while I sulked in the fern section because our back area is completely shaded. Native plants are really all I have for options, really. Ferns and Hostas – and a few Lily of the Valley and Solomon Seal. However, everything but the ferns are eaten by the deer so really? I plant things that grow naturally 6 feet away in the wooded area behind our home. Good thing the money goes to a good cause.

tiny forest, originally uploaded by merwing✿little dear.

Someone once told me that potatoes are the thing to grow in a patch of land that is poor in nutrients and rocky. Of course, now that I’ve come home and checked the internet, I find no evidence of that.

Typical.
The internet ruins everything.

Anyway, armed with this apparent misinformation, I decided to plant potatoes in the spot that never seemed to grow anything but tuber flowers and artichoke. As I pulled out the artichoke, I was impressed with the root structure. Talk about strong. Of course, it is a massive plant so I’m not sure why the logic of large plant, large root didn’t click, but lets skip over my lazy brain thoughts and get to the insignificant and irrelevant, shall we?

Isn’t that what blogs are for, really?
I mean it, actually.
I think I’m on to something here…

Anyway, I’m thinking the only way potatoes are actually good for your soil is because you have to dig so bloody low that you see what’s actually going on. All that talk about investment in the land versus the regular perception of investment in the building above has shown me that if my garden were a home, that particular area would be condemned. (At this point I would have inserted a bunch of marginally amusing metaphors about soil and house structure but as I’ve never owned a home, I haven’t the faintest idea about what constitutes a condemned house. Termites? I actually have nothing but worms so that’s not appropriate, really.)

What did I find? Rocks. Big rocks and small rocks. And some rust fringed clay. It was like some construction company took a shit on my garden back in the day and I’ve been diligently baking apple pie and lighting incense to try and make the smell go away.

Pulling out the large rocks and as much of the small rocks as I could, I added a 5 lb bag of cow manure and plopped the spuds into the ground. If I was childless and jobless, I would have stayed to do the job properly but I am neither one of those things. As a result, I’m saying, “Screw You, Internet” and hoping that whomever told me potatoes were the rescue remedy for crappy land was right.

Whatever. It’s my last summer here. I thought about going out with a bang but really, that would feel even more tragic so I’m going to be one of those boyfriends who treats you like crap hoping you’ll break up with him so he doesn’t feel bad about doing it himself.

Sorry, garden.
It’s not you. It’s me.

three is a magic number, originally uploaded by Dan Rybicky.

You know that School House Rock Song? Sometimes we play it in our home. Usually through youtube or the Jack Johnston Curious George soundtrack. Never through Blind Melon. I didn’t actually know they did a version, actually – until I googled the video.

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Regardless, Eliza loves the song. She knows she’s 3. She loves being 3. She also has all of us pretty convinced that three is a magic number because everything these does right now seem more and more marvelous.

The other day at daycare she started a painting with another girl. One of her teachers watched her concentration and reaction to the process (they were painting with bamboo leaves) and wrote it all down. The other morning, I was given the account and it was such a special moment. It was wonderful to see Franklin and Eliza’s faces as they listened to me read it out loud.

Eliza has some remarkable dexterity. She also has a high level of concentration. Both of these things have resulted in some pretty extraordinary art processes. However, it’s one thing to tell your child and that you can see their enjoyment in their activity but it’s quite another to hear someone outside your family describe what they observe.

The teacher has asked me to tell her more about Eliza’s activities at home in regards to her art. There are so many things to say. She loves big projects as well as the little bitty note pads Dickson makes for her at work. Even at 1 year old, she was particular to use all the colours she could find and also to use the entire paper she was given. She also is a careful artist. She thinks for a little bit before she puts brush, marker, crayon or stamp to paper. It really is fun to watch her.

We are so fortunate to have such loving people in our lives taking care of our children. The time this woman put into setting up the project and then writing it all down really touched not only me but both Franklin and Eliza. Franklin remarked that he feels nice when he goes to Eliza’s centre. I think this is one of the best reviews our daycare can get, really.

Cleaning up my plot and grabbing a few broccoli and jersusalem artichoke for dinner, originally uploaded by Ada I dirtyolive.

A while ago, the community garden that I belong to at the university was informed that once our memorandum of understanding ran out this coming fall, our space would no longer be renewed. We were told a variety of things were planned for the site but that really, they knew nothing definite except that the land was designated as a future building site and we were not considered a building.

Cue in arguments made about our relevance with the university, our length of stay there, our belief that the site had as much investment as any other traditional building on campus.

Also, cue in articles written, letters of protests sent, advocates gathered, advice sought and an ongoing collection of all the university community gardens in Canada to form a collective alliance.

Of course, never forget the wringing of hands and the groans of frustration as people who did not garden made decisions based on politically correct hippie protests and sheltered ivory towered food security academics – both of which have a legitimate voice in the garden but both of which are too easily dismissed as “fringe, minority interests”.

It has almost come to a conclusion. We have temporarily been given an alternate piece of land that is three times larger than what we have now. We have secured funding from the student body to hire someone to manage this larger garden. We have been assured that the university will not only fence the land, but provide water and perhaps even power to the site. Lastly, we have had a wonderful landscape designer, Christian Barnard, design the site.

It still doesn’t seem real to me yet. We pass this future land everyday on our way to school and as I think about the amount of work ahead of us, I panic a little bit. I think about my garden plot that I’m currently planting now and feeling sad that it will soon become, what they last told us, a parking lot. There is so much more to this move than I am writing about – things that perhaps should remain off the internet and things that are frankly, too complicated to attempt to explain at this hour of the night – after steaming a metric butt load of over-wintered kale from my plot, cleaning the kitchen and collecting all the moon sand from the couch, chair, floor, table and lunch kit.

It’s all so overwhelming. My thoughts around the move, this work to be done and the opportunities we’ve been given. Talking with others in North America, to have a garden site on campus supported by the university is rare so I understand how lucky we are to have this kind of communication. Yet, given the choice to move (with the funding, the support and the space) or stay… I just really want to stay where we are now – even with all the work we’ve done to ensure a place for the garden.

I suppose it would be best to ask me this summer what I would choose – when we are in the thick of setting up the new space. I’m hoping things will be more inspiring than tiring at that point in the process. It must, right?

We are so lucky.