Yes, We Discarded The Spoon

Looking out the back window yesterday, I saw something small and pink and translucent lying on the step. Something fleshy, the size of my toe. Something fetal.

At first, I assumed it was dead, but then it stretched it's brittle limbs, craned it's oversized head and its black blind eyes towards the sun. It thrashed, then lay still, then thrashed again. I think that's when I started to cry.

S and I talked about what needed to be done. I can't crush it, I just can't, I know that's the humane thing to do but I can't. Not when it so much wants to live. Not when the mother sparrow hovers above us, distressed, hopping along the gutter and flapping her wings.

So he went out with a spoon, and lifted it up from the hot concrete, and placed it in the shade while he went to get a ladder. He checked the two nests: the one above the kitchen window, and the one above the back door, and decided to go with the door, because it was empty and cool and shady, and it was from this nest that the sparrows have been flying back and forth for the last few days.

He set up the ladder, and lifted up the wriggling, stretching, living pinkness with the spoon, and tipped it back inside. I watched at the window, holding LittleZ. When he came back down, I mouthed the words through the window: You're. My. Hero.

Later, I expected to find it again, pushed out of the nest, rejected by its mother because of the human stink upon it, but no. The sparrows continue to come and go, carrying food, cheeping. I'm cautiously optimistic that a spoon and a ladder and a thoughtful man might have saved it -- really, it's not a happy ending, because hopefully, it isn't an ending.

Fingernails That Smell Like Flowers

Sometimes, I get a little stressed out.

Last night was one of those times.

As always, it took a while for me to recognize the signs: the clenched jaw, the fretting, the pacing, the persnicketiness. Stress creeps up like a jaguar, silent and stealthy, and sinks its teeth into me and overwhelms me before I even know it's there. Stressed, I am a misery to be around.

So, for the good of all, it was into a hot bath with lots of bubbles. There followed a self-administered foot massage, a mud mask, a much-needed manicure. Candles, candles, candles everywhere. The cosmetics were flying, and a host of little bottles covered every horizontal surface, and the dizzying scents of lavender, peppermint, gardinia, moonflower, satsuma, tea tree, and eucalyptus filled the air.

After the bath, blissfully wrapped in a fluffy pink bathrobe, massaging some sort of waxy balm into my cuticles (for what purpose, I don't actually know, but it was in a cute little container and that's all I was prepared to care about), I pondered the world of cosmetics and the eternal quest for beauty. I used to pooh-pooh the whole schmoo. I used to think that beauty products were all a massive waste of time and money, and I didn't want to be a tool of the cosmetics industry, and in my twenties, I raged against it, stomping around in my black leather boots and ripped jeans, rejecting anything that smacked of fashion.

Of course, armed with the bloom of youth, everyone looks good -- in your twenties, you could wear a macrame poncho and a pair of tissue boxes on your feet, and still look vivacious and lovely.

What struck me, as I restrospectively dealt with my cuticles, was this: I may have rebelled against what I saw as modern and patriarchical and oppressive and objectifying, but the ritual of cosmetics boasts a long and fascinating history, and ties women together across the ages. With Mr.Peabody's help, we could fling ourselves back two thousand years through time, and find an Egyptian woman performing the same fingernail routine as me, and she might even have the same shallow reason as me for doing it. Honest to Isis, I don't know what this does, but I like the little carved marble container.

And maybe it isn't always about looking good for other people, but about feeling good, and only for yourself. After an hour of indulging and relaxing and blissfully putting aside all thoughts of the day's responsibilites, I felt like myself again. I suspect I was much more pleasant company. It had nothing to do with beauty, and everything with being happy. And happiness, in my opinion, far outweighs vanity anyday.

Plus, I smelt like peppermint, which is never a bad thing.

M-Day Highlights

(1) Mimosa and croissants for breakfast.
(2) Afternoon nap.
(3) Cuddling on the couch together, watching "The Blue Planet", while eating popcorn -- or, as Little Z calls it, "PO-kern".
(4) The love, the love, the love.



*Can I just add, I vote that we start every day with a complimentary mimosa. So civilized, so delightful. It provides one with a cheerfulness that ordinary orange juice simply can not.

A Rant, then Alphabet Foods

Look, down at the bottom of the post.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

So, did you see it? A RATING SYSTEM. It just APPEARED, and I don't know why. Why me? Why now?!?! WHHHHYYYYYY????? This is going to give me nasty bout of blogging performance anxiety. I don't need this kind of pressure. I figure, if a particular entry resonates with you, you'll reply -- if you dispise it, you'll either tell me, or never return. I don't need five stinking little stars to hammer home my (in)competence. Your actions are enough for me. So why has a little rating system appeared? It just clogs up the clean lines of this blog's stark white design.

I feel better.

The lists continue.

I'm not on a DIET, per se, but I'm restricting my calories and exercising more (and yes, it's paying off, thanks for asking). Consequently, all I can think about is food. So today's list is a tally of my favorite gastronomical experiences. Bon appetit, mes amis!

Asparagus
Branston Pickle and cheshire cheese sandwiches
Chile Relleno ~ For me, this is the benchmark of any Mexican restaurant. If they can make a decent chile relleno, then I will return.
Dates
Enchiladas
Fennel Root ~ sliced thinly, baked in milk with salt and pepper.
Gruyere
Horseradish ~ as a vegetarian, I don't get nearly enough opportunities to eat horseradish as I would prefer, so I tend to smear it on sandwiches, where it happily overpowers any other flavor. I ought to save time and money, and leave out the sandwich filling, and just use horseradish.
Ice Cream ~ flavor of choice: licorice and orange tiger.
Juniper Berry Tea ~ I also love gin.
Kumquats
Lu Little Schoolboy Chocolate Cookies
Mater Paneer and....
Naan Bread ~ Shawn makes the best mater paneer and naan in the universe.
Olives, any colour.
Portobello Mushroom Burger with garlic and asiago cheese, a la Templeton Restaurant on Granville Street. ~ does the Templeton still make this meal? It was heaven. Plus, the restaurant is nestled between porn cinemas, leather shops and XXX video stores, which makes for an interesting clientelle.
Quiche, with mushrooms
Raspberries, fresh off the cane
Sticky Toffee Pudding
Trifle
Ugli Fruit ~ okay, I admit, I was lacking a U so I put this down without ever having eaten it, but I WANT to try it, if I can get my hands on one.
Vegan Banana Bread
Waffles with strawberries and whipped cream
Xocolatl ~ Hot chocolate with chilies and cinnamon, Aztec-style!
Yorkshire pudding ~ my all-time favorite food. No gravy, no butter. Just pure, warm, comforting blandness. Mmmmm.
Zucchini, cheese & onion pancakes

Go on, share with me your favorite food. Make me drool.

Update, Thursday AM - Now, it seems as if the rating system has vanished, again of its own accord. Will it return? Confound it, I am mystified!

I am a Palimpsest

The book has seeped into all facets of my life and, consequently, I have not been blogging. I've gone into seculsion, if not physically, then mentally. I think about the book the book the book, and sometimes the darkness and the blood and the murder gets me down, and sometimes the characters lift me up, but always, it's there in my mind.

Yesterday, sitting in the dentist's chair, I am thinking about the curve of the intestines and the color of the liver and how it's touch feels on the naked hand, but the hygenist keeps chatting and Regis & Whatsherface is on the television mounted in the ceiling and I can't turn away or shut off my ears or think quietly to myself and I realize this is what Hell must be like. And maybe I should think about happy things for a minute or two, like bunnies and pink erasers and martini olives. Or maybe I should talk to the hygenist, because she seems very cheerful and pleasant. Maybe I should just put the murder thoughts aside for a day. Just a day without murder. Wouldn't that be healthy? Yes, I think so too.

It has been pointed out to me that I'm wearing a perpetual scowl: a thoughtful, furrowed-brow, brooding expression. When I look at the world, I don't necessarily see it as it is now, but how it was then. On my run this morning, I stopped at the crossroads and just looked back through the years to see the behemothic Union Hotel and the surgery office and the colliery mine office as they were in 1898, freshly painted and new, not as they are: two crooked old buildings and a smattering of little houses where the majestic hotel once stood. If I squinted back through the century, I could envision the frontier architecture, I could hear the jingle of mule bridles and the smell the sour coal dust on the still air. And then *snap* I was here again, standing and staring at the intersection, looking catatonic.

This book pulls me in and out of time. Most of my other work has taken place in present day or in worlds of my own devising -- writing historical fiction gives me vertigo. I'm 47,000 words into the first draft, rounding the curve and heading for the finish line. Some parts aren't quite working yet, and some scenes need vast amounts of polishing before they're ready for critical eyes, but when the first draft is done, I'll return to the present day. For a holiday.

pal·imp·sest /ˈpælɪmpˌsɛst/
noun a parchment or the like from which writing has been partially or completely erased to make room for another text. [Origin: 1655–65; < L palimpséstus < Gk palímpséstos rubbed again (pálin again + pséstós scraped, rubbed, verbid of psân to rub smooth)]

Found It.

I've been laid low by a nasty flu bug, and have spent the last three days coughing, feverish, and sequestered in bed, but during my hours in quarantine, I read through my old travel journals and flipped through some old photo albums, and found the name and artist for whom I'd been looking: the painting is called "Judith", and the artist was Pierre Puvis de Chavannes. Despite being admired by such young upstarts as Gauguin and Seurat, Puvis de Chavannes has fallen into comparative obscurity, which is rather sad. It's proven impossible to find a picture of "Judith" on the internet, and even the selection of common images is slim -- but here's one, which he painted in 1863. (Thanks, Wikipedia!)


La Travail, by Pierre Puvis de Chavannes

He took his inspiration from the frescos of the ancient Romans and Etruscians, and created heavily symbolic pictures in a flat, washed-out style, transplanting Biblical stories into the Acadian paradise of wheat fields, sea shores and naked shepherds holding fuzzy lambs. There is a dreamlike sense of whimsy to his work, a gentle pastoral quality to his settings, and a languidity to the movement of his characters, that seems to have fallen out of fashion. I can't imagine Puvis de Chavannes was a man in a hurry. His paintings are introspective and quiet.


The Poor Fisherman, by Pierre Puvis de Chavannes

There's a similarity between Puvis de Chavannes' paintings and the pictures of Jamie Wyeth and Andrew Wyeth. I haven't yet put my finger on it: the stillness, perhaps? The thickness in the air? I don't know. I like them all, and when I look at Puvis de Chavannes' work, I think of both Wyeths, father and son, but I'm not sure why. I think of Andrew Wyeth's paintings as harkening back to a simple, pastoral landscape, containing that perfect naturalism which often slips through modern fingers, while Jamie Wyeth's paintings are infused with a sense of anticipation. Something is going to happen. His paintings aren't peaceful, but static. They resonate with desolation and solitude, like the cry of a bird on a hot August afternoon. They capture a moment tipping towards action, and the audience is left to wonder what happens next.

Girls Versus Boys

"Judith was left alone in the tent, with Holofernes stretched out on the bed, for he was overcome with wine (Judith 13,2)... She went up to the post at the end of the bed, above Holofernes' head, and took down his sword that hung there. She came close to the bed and took hold of the hair of his head, and said: "Give me strength this day, O Lord God of Israel!". And she struck his neck twice with all her might, and severed his head from his body (Judith 13,6-8)... After a moment she went out and gave Holofernes' head to her maid (Judith 13, 9)".

When it comes to the mechanics of dialogue, I find myself wondering what words were exchanged between maidservant and mistress when Judith slipped under the tent flap into the night and plopped a bloody head into the woman's outstretched hands. "Here, get rid of it," I imagine she said, "And here, wash my apron while you're at it. Maybe some baking soda will do the trick."

I'm not here to discuss the Old Testament, although it's rather fun to explore, what with all the gore and the debauchery and the turning people into pillars of salt -- truly a moment of inspired creative thinking in the field of retribution. Rather, I mention Judith and her maid because I've been comparing two paintings, and I wanted to share them with you, and because I'm looking for a third painting, and I can't find it anywhere, and maybe you'll know of it.


Judith Beheading Holofernes, by Caravaggio

If you ask me, Caravaggio's Judith looks a bit prissy, hanging back to keep her crisp white frock out of the path of the spray. She looks hesitant, delicate, and unsure, while the maid at her elbow (a haggard old woman with sack in hand) seems to be urging her on. Holofernes looks startled, surprised, and shaken, but come on -- look at those bright, comprehensive eyes. He could knock the sword out of Judith's hand, if he just gathered his wits together. The picture, with it's soft light and gentle death, bugs me. Caravaggio had skill, I'm not arguing that, but there's a romance to the painting that grates on me. Holofernes doesn't seem true to character, Judith looks like she's slicing through a stick of butter, and the maid waits patiently for everyone to finish up so she can go home.


Judith Slaying Holofernes, by Gentileschi

Meanwhile, Gentileschi has portrayed Judith as a get-things-done sort of girl, throwing her back into the job, and using a little elbow grease to slaughter Holofernes. It's savage butchery. The maid isn't hanging back, passively watching; she's holding the victim down. These girls know, you don't kill a man at arms' length; you've got to get your hands dirty. Holofernes doesn't look as afraid as he ought to, but who knows -- he was drunk, and maybe he's pretty much dead by this point. The effort portrayed in this version is wonderful, and apparently a poor restoration job smoothed out the wrinkles on Judith's head, meaning that the original painting's face held even more strain, emotion and violence.

Gentileschi created "Judith Slaying Holofernes" while undergoing her trial against Tassi for his rape of her in 1612. Court records show that Gentileschi was required to give her testimony voluntarily under extreme torture, for the prevaling attitude of the time was, if you could make the same accusation in agony as you did in good health, then it must be true. Imagine, testifying against your rapist while your thumbs are being crushed, then coming home and painting -- yes, I think a little eesy-weesy tiny bit of your rage might leak onto the canvas.

It's interesting to compare the maids, who are reprented quite differently, and yet who (in the Old Testament) are not present at all for the murder. Caravaggio uses his maid to juxtapose Judith's youth and beauty, and the old woman becomes a passive reflection of mortality cast alongside Holoferne's dying gasps. Gentileschi, however, uses her maid as a comrade-in-arms, equally young and strong, equally determined, equally embroiled in the drama. Caravaggio's maid would have said something like, "Now, you give me the head, dearie, and I'll take care of it, and I'll make you a cup of tea afterwards," while Gentileschi's maid would have said, "C'mon, let's feed the bastard's brains to the dogs."

Never let it be said that art is boring. People who think art is boring are just looking at the wrong pictures.

All of this has come about because I'm trying to find a particular version of 'Judith and Holofernes' which I saw many years ago, and which I thought had been painted by Nicolas Poussin. However, all of my searches for it have proved fruitless. (Nicolas Poussin, you might recognize if you're a grail-fan like myself, painted Et In Arcadia Ego ... but we'll discuss the conspiracy-laden pseudohistorical symbolism of that painting at another time. This post is already long enough.) If Poussin didn't paint the picture I'm looking for, then who did? It portrayed Judith and her maid, head in hand, fleeing from a garrison of Roman soldiers. That isn't much of a description to go on, but I'm determined to find it, even if it means writing a letter in Dutch to the gallery where I first saw it.

I will conclude with one more painting: here is Gustav Klimt's version of the beheading, which I adore. How many people look at this, and see only the come-hither smile of a seductress, instead of the severed head gripped in her fingers?

A Different Kind of Earth Day

When I was in Grade 12, our school hosted an Earth Day celebration in which students could attend different lectures, field trips, group projects or film screenings, all based on earth-friendly topics. Students signed up for the events previous to Earth Day, and then, during the course of the celebration, they attended whatever they had chosen. I clearly remember signing up for an afternoon bird-watching trip to the estuary, not so much for the joy of birding, but because it meant a chance to leave school grounds.

After lunch I headed to the school parking lot with camera and binoculars in hand, and boarded the bus that was waiting. I know an opportunity to stroll around a marsh isn't every teenagers' idea of fun, but the bus was remarkably deserted; only two or three people were there, and that included the teacher. The driver closed the doors, the bus rumbled to a start, and we were away.

But...wait.... We were away, but in the wrong direction.

I moved to the seat behind the teacher. "Um..." I began, trying very hard to sound casual and cool and knowledgable, "Isn't the estuary that way?"

"This isn't the bus to the estuary," the teacher replied, "That field trip didn't leave until one."

"Oh..." and, after a moment, I added, "So where is THIS bus going?"

"You're on the trip to the sewage treatment plant."

I may have felt a moment of disappointment, but the teacher was happy to have one more statistic to add to this apparently-unpopular field trip selection, and the driver wasn't going to turn around. I found myself shanghai'd, on my way to the regional district's waste management and processing facility. Suddenly, my binoculars and camera didn't seem all that useful.

But, I have to admit, it was one of the most interesting field trips I've ever been on, and this is coming from a kid who was taken into almost every manufacturing plant, hydroelectric dam, factory or mine on the west coast of North America. Other families go to Disneyland -- we went to Boeing and Western Star and Revelstoke Hydroelectic Dam and SunRipe. (Okay, I admit, we went to Disneyland too, but I also recall touring a number of nut farms and ore mines on the way there.) The sewage treatment plant didn't smell as bad as I thought it might, and we were shown an exhibition of all the strange things they pull out of the filters (like silverware!). Did you know that, on evenings when Hockey Night in Canada plays, the plant workers can tell when there's been a commercial break? Everyone flushes together. At the tour's grand finale, we were taken to a massive mountain of black soil, and learned that the processed waste is used in city parks as fertilizer.

The sheer size of that mountain was impressive. I mean, I know everybody poops, but when you see it all together like that? It takes your breath away, in many more ways that one.

In the last few years, the city has now begun selling this fertilizer, under the catchy title of 'Skyrocket'. They make no effort to hide what it is -- you can buy your own processed poop to spread in your garden. Yesterday, a little pile was delivered to my home, and I spent this evening spreading it around my lady's mantle and iris plants... and yes, I wore gloves. They say it's perfectly safe, but I kept thinking about cholera, just the same. It does smell a bit odd; the perfume is faintly reminiscent of a public washroom. If I hadn't witnessed with my own eyes the process this soil has undergone, I might be more wary about it.

Still, the question remains: will I use the rest of the pile in my vegetable garden?

The Forest Holds Its Secrets Tightly

Saturday was beautiful, sunny and warm. It seemed like the perfect day for a little on-the-foot research.

The novel I'm writing takes place in and around the mines of this town during it's heyday, circa 1898, and I needed to get out and look at the locations, to recapture a sense of distance, setting and atmosphere. So we enlisted the help of a local historian (who also happens to be my dad), put on our hiking shoes, and wandered around the overgrown trails behind Chinatown, looking for the last remains of Number Two, the second mine to produce coal for the Union Colliery.

Number One and Number Two were both slope mines, cutting tunnels into the hillside to reach the seams, but both were boarded up and in disuse by the time my novel takes place. There's little physical evidence left, now, of the slopes; they caved in years ago. We looked at the hillside, kicked at the coal chunks still poking through the dirt. Dad pointed out locations in the clearing: here's where the trip of cars would have been brought up, powered by a steam hoist. Here's where a vegetable farm was, to provide food for the Chinese workers. This portion of swamp had been drained and used to keep pigs. He talked, and I took copious notes. I asked questions like, "Where do you think would be a good place to hide a body?"

(It's a murder mystery, you know.)

"I'm not sure," he said thoughtfully, "I've never been asked that on a tour before." Then, he said, "Here, follow me."



Our little band begin trekking through the woods. All of the ancient cedars were cut down, 120 years ago, to provide timber for the mines, but the second-growth has risen up around the old stumps and has reclaimed the serene feel of an old forest. The branches are garlanded with witch moss, the ground is carpeted with ferns. We crossed the deep, placid creek on a narrow foot bridge, jumped out of the way as a few mountain bikers pedaled by, and eventually stopped at a bend in the trail.

Dad looked around, up the steep slope of the hill. "It's here somewhere... there."

And he pointed out this:



These may be the last ruins of Number Two Mine, but they are a good distance away from the site of the slopes, and have been swallowed up by the advancing forest. The purpose of this structure has been lost, so we walked around it (as best as we can, as it's off-trail and choked with salal, requiring one to dip under huckleberry bushes and clamor over fallen branches), discussing its possible uses. Water? Fire? What were these strange little portholes for? From the front, it looks like a series of bread ovens, but with rusted pipes and wheels, poking out of the loam. People have their theories, but no one knows for sure.



It's easy to miss. From the trail, it looks like rubble, like stones that have fallen down the hill centuries ago. Turn around twice, and you might have trouble finding your way back to civilization. The trees may look placid and calm and friendly, but they have an amazing ability to obfuscate directions, and turn what was once a bustling enterprise into a curious mystery.