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Meat Bonspiel

Curling was going to be my shot at Olympic glory.  Growing up as a kid in a small northern town, your talent on ice was always seen as your ticket out of there.  Since I was born a girl (and remain one to this day), my parents put me in figure skating.  Back in the day, girls didn’t play hockey.  They stalked hockey players.  Unfortunately, my Nordic roots did nothing for me and I was a dismal failure on ice.  My parents kept hoping that I would be a late bloomer but, after 4 years of lessons, a ton of money in skates and one disastrous fall where I took out the set of the local ice show, they resigned to the fact that their heavy set daughter was not going to get an Olympic medal in figure skating…or probably any other sport for that matter.  Instead, they rightly concluded that my ticket out was going to be via scholarships and education.  So they gave me books and I spent my days and nights studying, note-taking, and reading. 

One night, the babysitter failed to show up and so my parents were forced to take me along on their outing.  And where did we go?  To my town’s version of the Olympics.  Yes.   The Sixth Annual Bavarian Meat Bonspiel.  My dad, being the local banker, was involved in all the town’s activities.  We walked into the rink and it was magical.  One side was set up as a German meat buffet.  The other side was the rink.  Suddenly my mom’s outfit - a Bavarian short skirt, peasant top and ribbon head-dress - made sense underneath her parka.  All the curling wives were on duty as Bavarian serving wenches.  Their job was to add a classy, cultural element to the evening… and to bring meat and beer to the curlers and fans.  My mom, who had secret ambitions to be a B movie actress, loved the part - although her over the top Marlene Dietrich impersonation, along with too much meat innuendo, made the United Church Minster blush and made the other husbands stand in long lines for what she was dishing out. 

But that night was not about drinking beer and eating meat.  No.  It was about local victory, pride and the winning of more meat.  Did I forget to say that the winning team got a freezer full of meat?  Oh.  Well they did…so the stakes were high…in every meaning of the word. 

I had never seen curling before.  And, once I did, I was mesmerized.  While figure skating was a sport of athleticism, grace and co-ordination, I watched my dad’s team (and their opponents) engage in truly hard core competition.  And they played the match while smoking cigarettes, eating meat and drinking beer.  This was my kind of sport.  I instantly perked up.  These were true athletes.  Sure, Elvis Stojko and Patrick Chan can land jumps sober…but can they do it after eating five pounds of meat, drinking a flat of Molson’s and chain smoking a pack of Rothmans?  I don't think so. 

Watching the tournament, I could see myself doing this.  As a Virgo and a granddaughter of a maid, I was really good at sweeping and I could chuck snowballs with the precision of a seagull over a freshly washed car.  I was enthralled.  Even when all the teams were so obviously hammered that half the stones started going into the wrong lanes, the competition was exciting.  I clapped. I cheered.  And  I cried when my dad’s team won the freezer full of meat.  I believed that I, a nerdy, shy, unathletic gal, could finally become a world class athlete at something! 

On the ride home, I begged my parents to let me become a professional curler.  But they were firm.   “No. Your future lies in your education,” they responded.   And with that decision, my Olympic medal hopes evaporated.  To this day, I still have a soft spot for curling….and, of course, for meat and beer.  They are three of my favourite things…and I am world class at two of them. 

Stormy Weather 

I have an intense fear of my roof being ripped off by a large bird.  It happened again last night.  I was lying in bed as a severe storm passed overhead, and my heart started to beat wildly. 

When I was growing up in Burns Lake, we had nasty electrical storms.  While incredibly beautiful from a distance, the fork lightening was known to be deadly and something to be avoided.  Of course, after each storm, the local news would profile the same guy who had been hit by lightening 14 times in a row and survived.  For some reason no one thought to fully question Reggie Stanson’s affection for playing golf in turbulent weather…nor did anyone do a suicide assessment on him. 

As a young girl, the storms were terrifying.  The house would shake.  The lightening would illuminate the whole house for long periods of time.  Tree branches would break  and fires would start wherever the fork lightening hit.  

One night, in a valiant effort to calm his scared daughter, my dad thought it would be a good idea to explain thunder and lightening – you know, to apply a more rational approach to the fear.  Did I get the traditional children’s explanation such as “Oh, don’t worry.  That is God bowling.  The lightening happens when he gets a strike!”  Or, “Oh, don’t worry.  That is Mother Nature pushing a hot and a cold front together. They are fighting over space in the atmosphere just like you and your sister fight over your play area.”  No. I got this tidbit of rarely used Scandinavian folklore.

Listen, Maggie.  Thunder and lightening are nothing to worry about.  What happens is sometimes, the Norse god Thor gets upset at the world so he opens up the sky and he sends a gigantic flying eagle down to earth and it lands on the roof of the house.  Sometimes the bird flies off with the house and takes it back to Thor as a gift.  See, nothing to worry about.  Now good night, Sunshine. 

With that jaw dropping anecdote, I was tucked into bed and left to worry about the dangers of thunder and lightening, our friend Reggie (and the fact that no one in the town thought he could survive one more lighting strike)….and now a giant eagle landing on the roof of my house and possibly taking it back to some guy with a weird name as a gift! 

To this day, I am still terrified of thunder storms.  Granted, I have a much more grown up understanding of thunder and lightening now – it is caused by space aliens who are doing a laser light show for friends - but the giant eagle thing is always in the back of my mind.   It is why I own two cats.  In the event the big bird shows up, I want to be armed with as much cat power as possible. 

As a post script, Reggie survived two more hits of lightening and to the best of my knowledge is still alive and doing well.  He has no hearing in his left ear and can pick up CBC North without a receiver.  He has given up golfing in stormy weather but has taken up skydiving.  Stay tuned.

Cleaning Barriers

Most people have skeletons in their closets.  My closets are full of dirty laundry.  Not dirty laundry as in juicy family secrets.  No. literally, piles of dirty laundry. 

It happened again yesterday.  The phone rang and some friend-type person wanted to “drop by” for a visit.  That simple gesture created a frenzy of cleaning that resulted in me using a snow shovel to clear the living room.  At this point in time, I have three “emergency hide it” closets whose layers look much like an archaeological dig of visits past.  To find my pink fuzzy slippers, I had to excavate down to the “2002 surprise visit from Aunt Gretchen who was passing through town on her way to the airport” layer.

Every time it happens, I swear, it is the last time I will be caught off guard.  I promise to turn over a new leaf and keep the house so pristine that even the Pope could drop by at any time and not get his white robe covered with cat hair.  But it never happens.  I get distracted by the important things in life – eating cookies, watching TV and Googling for celebrity gossip. 

As a Virgo, I am supposed to be obsessed with cleanliness….and I guess in a certain way I am.  I love a clean house but, after much analysis done one afternoon when I was supposed to be cleaning, I now see that there are barriers in my way.  If any of the following situations exist, they create the perfect storm that can very quickly take my house from neat to nasty.

Barriers that prevent me from keeping my house clean

A dishwasher that is either full of clean or dirty dishes.  Either way, this situation does not allow me to put dirty dishes in the dishwasher, thus they pile up in the sink.  And, if they pile up in the sink, it prevents me from running the dishwasher which starts its own vicious cycle.

Fruit.  I often buy fruit with the fantasy of actually eating it.  Eventually, the fruit decomposes in the bowl and attracts a colony of flies and wine makers. 

Pets.  I love ‘em, but they are furry.  And most of that fur is on the floor, couch and walls of my house.  Once I spent 15 minutes grooming the cat only to realize it was a dust bunny. 

Laundry.  This is perhaps the biggest barrier to cleaning that I have.  It has its own sub-list.

A missing laundry basket.  Without this feature, clothes seem to enjoy frolicking in their natural habitat….the floor. 

A chair to hang gently worn clothes.  Some clothes by their nature can be worn again.  If they don’t have a chair to hang on, they end up on the floor.  This then makes them dirty, mainly because my cats will have slept on them.  Now they need to be washed.  This means more laundry.

Clean laundry that needs to be hung, folded or otherwise dealt with.  Clean laundry usually ends up on the bed when it comes out of the dryer.  At the end of the night, when I need to use the bed, the pile of clean clothes gets moved onto the floor with the promise that I will hang them tomorrow.  That promise is never fulfilled and pretty soon the clean clothes start mingling with the dirty clothes and I can’t tell which is which.  This then means I need to rewash it just to be sure.

The lack of a maid.  If I had a maid, my house would be cleaner.

Empty diet coke bottles and cans.  I drink a lot of diet coke.  I once put a days worth of empty cans out in the alley for the can guys to take and one guy said it looked like I must have had a great party.  Sadly, they were all mine.  Now I can only put out a few at a time so I don’t get a lecture on diet coke dependency from the can guys.

Napping.  I am genetically predisposed to napping.  If I had to choose between cleaning the bathroom and napping, napping would win.  You can’t fight your heritage.

Guests.  While guests coming over cause me stress, I think I don’t have enough guests over on a regular basis.  If I lived in the White House, I suspect I would be motivated to keep the house clean if George Clooney and members of the UN were dropping by daily.  I would clean for George Clooney.

So, if you are dropping by, please give me at least 24 hours notice and promise not to open any closet doors.  There is no guarantee you will be able to shut them again. 

Halloween Time

Halloween is the best day on the planet.  As a very shy kid, it was so fun to be able to transform into something that I was not for a few hours.  Plus, it was the only time of the year when my parents actively encouraged my sister and I to go out and take free candy from strangers.

When I was growing up in Burns Lake, months of Halloween costume planning was always ruined by the first major blizzard of the year.  The two events coincided religiously.   When I hear kids in my Kitsilano neighbourhood whine about having to walk up and down stairs to get treats, I twinge with the impulse to tell stories about how, when I was young, I trudged through five foot snow drifts to get a single treat sized Snickers bar… but I digress…

Despite the blizzards in Burns Lake, the people handing out the candy were always so supportive and enthusiastic. 

“Hey! What a great costume,” they would say to the hordes of kids in identical snow boots, snowsuits, mittens and balaclavas that would parade to their door asking for treats.  We looked like a casting call for an episode of South Park, but in our minds we were so different.

My costumes were never cute or scary.  They were “creative”.  While all my comrades were pirates, princesses or zombies, I would be Muriel Applebottom – Bunny Hunter Extrodinaire, or My Dad’s Box of Tangled Christmas Lights or The Lost Panel of a Bazooka Joe Comic Strip.  Needless to say, most of my costumes were not met with an “OOOO…how cute” or an “Awwww…adorable”, they were met with an “Oh, and what are you again?”  Still I wore my costumes with conviction and people gave me candy anyway, so they rocked!

My mom’s expensive, guest use only, King sized silk pillow cases were the preferred treat bag of choice but it was often hard to sneak them out of the house before she noticed.  Although, one year, I did use my cousin’s hockey duffle bag until some judgemental lady ruined my fun when she called me “greedy”. Mostly, I just used a Hefty garbage bag.  Because rippage could be a problem it was important to come prepared with backup bags and maybe a sled.

Out on the hunt, it was amazing how quickly information spread on the kid treat network.  With no twitter, facebook, or texting, to link us, we mind-melded together with the singular purpose of getting as much sugar as possible.  By remaining connected to the kid treat network, you quickly knew which houses gave out two chocolate bars instead of one, which were making you sing, which were giving out raisins….and which were giving out CANS OF POP!!!  

I know kids in here in Kits stay out collecting candy until they get tired or bored, but in Burns Lake, we stayed out until medically ordered indoors due to frostbite or hypothermia.  Hard core does not accurately describe an 8 year old Burns Lake kid on a mission for candy.

Arriving home with our loot, my parents insisted on inspecting all treats for safety concerns.  Surprisingly, there was a high ratio of tainted Aero bars and Glosette raisins (my parents’ favourites) but we were too hyped up and inexperienced in the ways of the world to realize that our own parents were stealing from us. 

The next two days began the hierarchy of snacking.  We would eat through our treat bag like layers of an archaeological dig.  Chocolate bars were eaten first.  Then Tootsie rolls Then Glosette peanuts.   And then….ugh….because there was nothing else left, jaw breakers, Pez circles and gum.  It would take two to three days of concentrated effort to consume all the sugar in those king sized pillow case bags.  But we did it!!  Once it was all done, we crashed in a sugar coma for two weeks….and woke up just in time to start dreaming of all the treats coming for Christmas!! 

Coldus Horribleous

Yesterday, I woke up with a horrible cold. It started with a faint tickle in my throat and a wave of denial in my brain. By lunch, I had gone through all of Kubler-Ross’ stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining and depression - before acceptance hit with the fact that I was indeed going to be sick. And not a normal sick. No, this was an end of the world and the start of the Apocalypse kind of sick.

When I was growing up, I loved being sick. My mom, being a rampant hypochondriac, would research every symptom my sister and I would have and come to some pretty far reaching conclusions. She never went to the doctor – no, she looked everything up in her Reader’s Digest Medical At Home Symptom Guide. The fact that it was published in 1958 really didn’t faze my mom. She felt that there were so many illnesses in the world that doctors could not possibly be trained in them all so she like to help out by doing her own diagnosing. When I was thriteen, she kept me at home because the red spots on my face were obviously a symptom of dengue fever and not acne.  My sister missed two weeks of school in grade seven because of an onset of yellow tailed monkey disease/ polio.

Still, it was fun being sick. First of all, my sister and I got to lie on the couch with our feet up smothered in quilts, hot water bottles and poultices. Secondly, we got total control of the TV remote control with viewing rights to any program that might make us feel better. Third, we got to eat Lipton’s chicken noodle soup in a tin foil package – you know, the kind that you boil in water for five minutes and it tastes like Oxo cubes with cut up bits of spaghetti in it. Finally, and this was the best, you got apple juice in a glass with a bendy straw. Even today, I still melt for a bendy straw.

Today’s sickness was very different. I went home to my house and lay in my bed. No one brought me soup. No one told me I had Asian pneumonic septicemic streptisemic flu. And worst of all, no one brought me juice. In fact, I began to realize that if I died from this cold, no one would even know until the smell hit the outside of the house. Yes, creepy thinking for sure but when you have a fever and no poultice a gal’s thoughts go to the macabre.

So here I am typing on my computer and realizing that the best cure for the common cold is a gal’s mom. And a bendy straw.