An Epiphany...Or Two

My little MoneySense rant has got me thinking.  Hmmm...maybe that's the point of those ranking lists they put out, to get us focused on the positives in our communities.  And thinking about the positives got me thinking about the things that are important in life.  And that got me thinking about my Camino. It's a trip I've been planning for two years now and it's still five months away. And that got me thinking about the late, great John Lennon who once said, "Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans."

Which got me thinking that not all Green Jar Adventures have to be of the epic variety.  It's all the little GJA's that make up the fabric of our life.  Like the play I went to a couple of weeks ago in nearby Chemainus.  See, that's another perk of where I live -- it's close to so many other great places. Chemainus is a quaint little town about an hour and a half away and it has a fantastic theatre that hosts many world class productions.  One of the first plays I ever attended, maybe even the first, was a production of Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. Definitely not one of the Bard's widely performed plays and I can't remember a single thing about it -- except for the opening scene.  It started in a steam bath and the actors were milling about wearing nothing but towels wrapped around their waists.  I'm liking it so far.  The next thing I know, they dropped the towels and set about lounging on the steam bath bleachers while Shakespearian dialogue went in one ear and out the other.  Naked Shakespeare -- did it get any better than that?!  I can remember thinking to myself, "Damn, I love live theatre!"  

But I really love musical theatre.  I've seen Cats on Broadway and The Phantom of the Opera at the Pantages in Toronto.  But the musicals I've seen in Chemainus are second to none -- Hello, Dolly!, The Pirates of Penzance, Fiddler on the Roof, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dream Coat.  So I was pretty stoked to take my 85 year old mom to see The Buddy Holly Story.  We attended a sold out weekday matinee and as I suspected would be the case, I was probably the youngest one in the theatre.  When the performance ended, I stood to lead the standing ovation. Buddy (aka Zachary Stevenson) asked if we wanted one more song, then broke into Oh, Boy, definitely my favourite Buddy Holly tune.  I was all set to stay on my feet and bop along but the geriatric set slowly reseated themselves and I felt obliged to follow suit.  I was a little disappointed until I looked around the room and had, yes, an epiphany.  Buddy Holly died in 1959 when he was 22 years old.  If the people listening to him at the time were about the same age, then they'd all be in their mid to later seventies today.  Here I was in what was in all likelihood a room full of original fans. Few pretenders like me. 

I don't think my mom was ever a Buddy Holly fan, she was always more of a Glen Miller, Frank Sinatra type.  But she declared The Buddy Holly Story the best play we've ever seen.  We bought the CD's and listened to them all the way home.

Now that's a GJA to remember.


Book Review:  If it hadn't been the March selection for my book club, I never would have slogged through the first 200 pages of The Tiger:  A True Story of Vengeance and Survival to arrive at the payoff in the last 100 pages. Set in 1997 in Far East Russia, it is the story of the hunt for a man-eating tiger.  At least it is in the final third of the book.  The first two thirds are a dry initiation into Russian politics and animal behaviour.  Reading just shouldn't feel like homework.

All Hail the Almighty Buck

I'm feeling kind of sad.  MoneySense Magazine recently anointed my community the Worst City to Live in Canada.  Yup, out of 201 cities with a population of 10,000 or greater, little old Port Alberni on Vancouver Island came dead last.  But that's not what makes me shake my head.  It's the how they reach their rankings that has me contemplating just what the hell has gone wrong with this world.  That and the fact that they feel compelled every year to go through this ritual of ranking the best and worst places to live. Who does it benefit and why the hell do they even do it?

Okay, before you go thinking I'm being overly sensitive about the old home town, let me tell you this -- it's not my home town.  I was born and raised in Toronto (#32 on the list), spent my misguided twenties in Ottawa (ranked a whooping #4), and did stints in Montreal (#169), Regina (#9) and Prince George (#148) before landing here.  The methodology they use to decide their rankings is the real head shaker. Categories like the percentage of new cars and luxury cars, the percentage of people employed in arts and recreation, how many people walk/bike/take public transit to work.  Sales tax.  Like any community has control over that. They've got weather broken down into eight different categories.  There's the usual crime rate stats and of course the all important income categories. Because it's all about money isn't it?  Well, hey...the magazine is called MoneySense after all.

But see here's where they're missing the point.  And to be honest, they do admit that they can't measure things like "the nearness of families" or "the friendliness of neighbours" or "great sunsets" and that's exactly my point. They can't measure the things that, in the end, really matter the most. Which makes me call bullshit on their whole ranking thing.

'Cause let me tell you a few things about my little town.  (Yeah, I know it's a city, but it has a small town feel to me.)  Port Alberni has hosted the summer games, the winter games, the senior games, the Special Olympics and the World U17 Hockey Tournament. The WORLD, people. We've hosted the Tall Ships Festival.  Every year we host the Salmon Festival because after all, we are Canada's Ultimate Fishing Town.  We were in the top 10 the first year of Kraft Hockeyville.  And we can do all these things because of the kind of people who live here.

We are home to the Martin Mars water bombers, the WORLD's largest aerial firefighting flying boats.  Della Falls, THE tallest water fall in Canada, is right here.  We own our own BCHL team.  This town of about 25,000 has produced NHL players, the first female prime minister (okay, maybe I shouldn't mention that), and Rick Hansen.  That's right, the Man in Motion hails from Port Alberni.

As for the weather, on which we took a beating in the ratings...well, on the first day of spring I washed my car.  There are hummingbirds at the feeder. Take that, # 4 and # 32.  Does it rain here?  Sure it does -- it's a rain forest...DUH!!  Walkability?  There are trails, trails and more trails.  It's paradise for hikers and mountain bikers.  Don't bike?  Go windsurfing.  Go kayaking.  Watch out for whales.

Yeah, I could go on...and on...and on...but I think you get my point.  There's more to life than how much money you make and what kind of car you drive. Or even how much it rains.  It's all about the kind of stuff you can't measure. And if you can't measure it, don't pretend that your ranking system means a damn thing.

Take that MoneySense.

           

I've Got A Craving

And not of the ice cream and pickles variety...oh, that's too scary to even imagine.  No, I'm craving routine.  The simple motions that we go through every day that after a while have us yearning for something -- anything -- to be different.

After damn near six weeks of the reno I can almost (not quite, but almost) declare -- I AM DONE.  Sure, there's a little bit of painting left to do, some door trim, the banister.  But that can wait.  For a day in the probably not too distant future when I need a break from my boring old routine.  There were only two constants over the past six weeks:  my thrice weekly boot camps and the daily dog walks.  My Spanish lessons?  Back burner.  Gonna have to start over.  Writing?  Other back burner.  Coffee with friends?  I'll need to reintroduce myself to those folks.

But it was soooo worth it.  'Cause let's face it -- we (okay, I) spend way more time at home than I do, well, not at home.  For me, it's worth the money to have a place that makes me want to spend time there.  And the new 55" television that I just installed doesn't hurt either.  I watch a lot of movies and a lot of hockey.  So when I settled back into my new chair to watch my Leafs on it for the first time it really felt like I was sitting right there in the ACC.  I said to the kid, "I hope I never get used to how cool this is."

But know what kept running through my head while I pulled, ripped, painted, hammered and sorted?  While I tried to keep the dog and me exercised and fed, tried to help get the kid organized for her trip?  How nice it was going to be on the Camino with nothing to accomplish except putting one foot in front of the other and finding a place to eat and sleep.

Sounds like sheer bliss.


Book Reviews:  Oh, I know what you're going to say.  'Thought you didn't have time for anything routine?'  Yeah, well, I'm never not reading a book. Even if it's only a few pages in bed.  So I've got two for you...

Defending Jacob by William Landay was a good solid court based mystery. Basically told in flashback in the first person with the present interspersed as grand jury testimony made for an interesting thread throughout the narrative. Excellent ending with a nice twist that wasn't in your face "gotcha." 

The Spectacular Now by Tim Tharpe was a pretty decent YA novel.   Main character, Sutter Keely (love a cool name), is a modern day Holden Caulfield with a more upbeat attitude.  Loved the voice of this novel and while it didn't beat you over the head with its message, it managed to come through loud and clear.