Game Night

Ever since I can remember we have been a family of games.  Whether it was playing cards while camping, playing board games with friends or inventing new games outside when we were young, it was a great way to pass the time and stretch our mental limits.

I think I was seven when my aunt had first taught me to shuffle a deck of cards, not in the clumsy kids’ way, but rather the cards bent with your thumb on top of the rectangle kind of way.  It sounds like when kids put playing cards in the spokes of bikes to make them sound “cool”.  It took a lot of patience on my aunts part, and a lot of practice on my part but eventually I impressed the local kids with my card savvy.  They clamored around me to have their turn with the new card guru.

Mum taught us Marbles in the back yard, and we spent our allowance money on bags of the clear round shooters that had intrigued my mother in her youth.  I loved the way she would describe the tournaments she and her friends would have and how when describing a certain large bowler in her collection she would get this smile on her face and glazed eyes while remembering.  She would tell us how she would hit the other marbles out of the ring and emerge the victor collecting the other kid’s marbles as her prize.  Her grin was large when she got down on all fours to show us how it was done, and when she did, it was like I had somehow stepped back in time and I could see her there as she would have been in her youth.

The most popular games with my family were Monopoly, Sorry, Uno, Gin Rummy, Solitaire, Crazy Eights, Chess, Chinese Checkers, Mind Trap, Mastermind, Trivia Games, and Scrabble and more recently Pictionary, and Cranium have joined the top ranks as well.

Now as we are much older, and have families of our own we delight in coming together to visit over dinner, and once the dishes have been washed and the remaining food put away, game night begins.  We break into teams—almost always it is boys against girls—and there are times when I am sure our laughter is heard all the way down the street. 

Games have taught me many things over the years, sportsmanship, respect, expanding my intellect, rising to a challenge, patience, problem solving, and how to laugh at myself.  More importantly they have taught me more about humanity, how to respect and accept our differences, and how to work through whatever faces us.  Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but it all boils down to how much fun you had.

A Lesson in Appreciation

When in an accident one year, I had been knocked around pretty good: whiplash, a knee the size of a grapefruit from where the keys had gone into the actual joint, and lower back pain that had resulted in the difference of opinion between spine cracking forces of physics and my seatbelt keeping its promise.

Recovery from such an incident was long and painful, the first week I was bedridden only getting up to use the bathroom.  There was no television or computer in the bedroom so I was forced to contemplate my demise, read or sleep.  I couldn’t write because sitting up was painful and laying on the bed on my stomach seemed to inflame things as well. 

Mostly I had long conversations with myself in my head about all the things I could be doing at that moment if I had not been in the accident.  I thought about plot lines,  I tried to envision what my characters were up to in their make believe worlds, and not to think about how much fun my friends and family were having at that moment.  Then came thoughts of the fragility of life, and how lucky I was to be at home recuperating rather than at the hospital in traction.  Really I had nothing to complain about.  I was still breathing wasn’t I?  Enough moping. 

I began thinking and making lists, things I wanted to do in my life.  What had I not experienced?  What had I experienced and liked but hadn’t done for a while?  This cheered me up and gave me a goal to work towards when I had to go through physiotherapy and procedures that were painful. 

These promised events would also help when I was feeling down about how hard it was to do the simple tasks in life like laundry.  It was an excruciating chore to go down the two flights of stairs in the apartment building and grab the laundry out of the machine then lug it back up stair by stair which left me exhausted and sweating profusely.  I had always been an active person, and to have to slow down to this level of movement was frustrating. 

I didn’t give up, day by day things got better, some days held victories, in others there were setbacks.  Some held more tears then others.  I held on to the fact that time was my best ally, that it would be the salve to heal my wounds.  Eventually I was walking faster, longer and then pain free, years later I could run again.  This would at times aggravate the back or the knee but it would settle down with use and with proper icing.  I have to be careful gardening that I don’t twist on my knee wrong, or that I don’t kneel for too long or it is apt to swell, but it is holding up just fine none the less.

What stayed with me is the appreciation of my body, and all it allows me to do, the knowledge that my life and its routines could change in an instant, and that even though things looked bleak at the time, with determination, strong will and patience, I can get through the hard times. 

The Agreement

One night when I was sixteen and had just finished getting ready to go out with friends my father took me aside and said, “If you ever get into trouble out there on your own you can call me, no matter what the time, or the situation.  There will be no questions asked no punishment given.  I just want to make sure you are safe no matter what, ok?”

I looked at him.  I saw serious concern on his face.  I wondered what kind of trouble he was thinking of, boys, alcohol or drugs no doubt.  As if to echo what I had been thinking he said, “You have never given me any reason to be concerned on your part of things, but as you get older, you are going to face more challenging situations, and some of these things might catch you off guard.  I know you have a good head on your shoulders, so I know you won’t get into a car with someone who has been drinking, but I want you to know that if that happens that you can call me and I will come and pick you up no matter what.  Ok?” 

Then I knew what had prompted this, it was a week ago when the news of another three teens died at the hands of a teen who had been drunk at the wheel was on the local news.  They were boys who went to my school and were supposed to graduate in a month.  I smiled at my father and the worry lines furrowing his brow eased.  “I can’t promise I won’t get into some situation where I should have known better Dad, but I can promise you that I will call you the minute it gets out of hand.”  I said being sincere in my promise. 

My father had always been an understanding man; we were more like good friends then father and daughter.  He taught my brother and I life lessons with compassion, understanding and respect rather than harsh judgments and a heavy hand. 

Who knew a week later I would be in a situation just like that my father seemed to have had some foreboding about. 

My friends and I were going out to meet some guys we knew at a local lake that evening, we packed up our suits and a change of clothes and anything else we needed and headed out to meet up with them at sunset.  When we got there we saw that the guys had brought beer with them and they offered some to us.  To my amazement my friend who had been driving said “We don’t need any, we brought our own.”  I just gaped at her.  To my knowledge she didn’t drink, and I wondered where she had gotten the two cases of coolers she had brought.  When she offered me one, everyone was looking at me expectantly so I took one.  I was curious; I had only tried sips of wine on special occasions, like Christmas and even then it was only under tight supervision.  Never on my own with friends, I figured one couldn’t hurt. 

The sun went down and we went swimming, but I wasn’t in for long because although I had only had half of one cooler I was not feeling my regular self, and didn’t trust myself in the water.  The others goofed off in the water a bit then came out again.  We started a fire and dried off and changed.  Then continued to drink and talk again.   I must have been on my third cooler when I looked at the time.  I was going to miss my curfew.  I looked over at my friend who had driven us over; she was in no condition to drive.  She was slurring her words and could barely walk straight let alone drive.  I wondered what I was going to sound like when I called my Dad.   Oh man, what was he going to think?  He had said that there would be no questions and there would be no punishments.  I tried to think about other ways out of the situation, if perhaps I could wait for my friend to sober up and just go home late.  No way I could do that, she had just opened another cooler as I sat there contemplating the problem.  There was no way I would get into the car with my friend, and there was no way I could let my other friends get in with her or let them drive either.  If something happened to them and I didn’t do something I would be haunted for the rest of my life.  So I did the only thing I could.  I told them I was going to call my father to check in and I would be right back, then I went to the payphone and called my Dad.  I told him about the situation because this was going to involve driving my friends home as well as myself due to their inebriation and my fear of them driving.  He told me it was alright and to hold tight because he was on his way.  I went back to the beach and waited, wondering how I was going to get my friends to go with my Dad when he showed up.  I just hoped they weren’t going to be mad at me.

When he did show up I went to go and meet him and told him of my fears and how I thought they would be upset.  He told me he knew that I would know how to handle the situation and if I was just honest with my feelings that they would see things as I did, and if they didn’t well I had done all I could.  So back to the beach I went and told them that my Dad was there and that he would drive us home.  My friends were shocked and then mad because they thought my father was going to call their parents.  I told them of the agreement my father and I had and that he was bound by it not to tell or I wouldn’t trust him again.  Then I told them that they should come with me because I didn’t want to have to go to their funeral like the other kids that had just died so recently.  That if we were “adult” enough to drink that we should be adult enough to do the right thing too.  Then I waited.  I watched them look at the ground, then each other, then back at my Dad’s car. 

Then one of my friends said “I’m sorry I got mad at you, you were only trying to do the right thing.”  Then she looked over at the car we had come in, her parent’s car.  “How am I going to get the car home?”

“I told my Dad about the situation, he talked my Mum into coming to drive your parent’s car home.” I said, suddenly so proud that I had such cool parents that loved me enough to go to such lengths.  Right then and there in this one act, they had instilled in me a determination to be just as kind, compassionate and understanding of others.  I never wanted to be a disappointment to them, and I would do whatever it took to make them proud of me.

So we piled in the cars, and went to my friend’s houses to drop them and the other car off and then home again.  True to their words, not another word was spoken of the incident.  In their act that night and the following silence, no words they could have said would have resonated louder, or with more meaning.   

Gardening Love

Over the ages food has always been a way to express love, or to get your loved ones to come together so love can be expressed. 

In my house growing up it was no different.  Both my parents were firm believers that the key to a successful family was to gather around the table over food.  These would be the times where over mushroom pork chops, mashed potatoes, and peas we would get to know each other as people.

Our lives were often busy.  For my parents life was full of work and life’s responsibilities, and for my brother and I it was school, friends and the responsibilities of being kids.  Soccer practice, swim club or other activities sometimes swayed the timing of our daily gatherings, but my parents always seemed to pull off delicious wholesome meals, while finding out about what was going on in our lives. 

My parents also thought that gardens were a great idea.  They taught us that vegetables didn’t actually magically appear in the supermarket and that a lot of time and work goes into cultivating a garden, again this was family time well spent while learning responsibility and developing life skills.

One day when we were quite young, I can remember my brother working in the garden.   I was laying out on the grass sun tanning with a friend so I wasn’t paying him much attention.  I couldn’t really see what he was doing, just that he was picking out some little bits here and there and throwing them to the back part of the garden.  I figured he was weeding so I went back to my Archie comic. 

After half an hour of this, I noticed that he began to pick things out of the garden, take them to the house and then go back to the garden and repeat the trip several times.  Over and over again he did this, and my friend and I were trying to guess what he was doing. 

“I wonder if he is getting worms to scare your mum with.”  My friend said.

“That would be funny, but look he is carrying plants from the garden, he is probably just gathering the things that needed to be picked.”  I said trying to convince myself more than my friend. 

I put my head down and thought no more of it.

The next thing I knew I heard my mum yelling from the top deck.  My friend and I raced over to see what was wrong. 

When we got to the deck we were shocked by what we saw.  Little carrots were stacked neatly to one side, then the romaine lettuce next to that, the peas, beans and tomatoes piled up with care, and my brother stood beside them with a big smile on his face. 

“Look mum, I saved them all!” He said with pride.

“What have you done?” My mum asked with exasperation.  “Why did you pull all of these out of the garden?”

“The garden was shrinking so I pulled them out to save them for you.” He explained, the smile replaced by confusion.

“Shrinking?”

“Yes there were so many carrots yesterday, and now there are many missing.  I had to pull them out before they all went underground again!”  He pointed to the garden to make his point.

My mum put a hand to her temple and looked at her son.  “The garden is not shrinking, your dad pulled out some of the carrots to make more space for the little ones to grow.  It is called thinning out the garden honey, the vegetables weren’t disappearing. “

My brother looked down at his toes.  “I’m sorry mum.  I’ll go put them back.”

“That is a nice thought, but I don’t think that is going to work.  It’s ok you were only trying to save the vegetables, I didn’t know you liked them so much.” She smiled and tousled his hair.  “I know you were just trying to help out, come and help me carry all of this into the kitchen and I will figure out something to do with all of it.”

We all grabbed handfuls of the vegetables and carried them inside, then helped mum wash, peel and slice them up for vegetable soup, which we enjoyed in the weeks to come.

The Laced Up Confessionals Part Six

No two injuries are ever the same.  ~~ Anonymous runner

You might be thinking that running or walking long distances might be a fun thing to do, but you have sustained some sort of injury over the course of your days that makes you wonder if some of your body parts would be up to the challenge, the biggest culprit being the knees.

I too have gone through such thoughts.  My knees have become quite banged up and bruised over the years, but the biggest injury came in the year 2000 when I was living in Calgary. 

I had been living in the city for a couple of years by this point and coming from the west coast of Canada I was no novice to driving in the snow.  I was however new to the blizzard conditions that would blow in and dump massive amounts of snow.

On one particular night we left work early because of one of these said storms.  Instead of following my regular route, a co-worker schooled me on a better way to get to my side of the city.  Why I would follow his advice when it would be a wiser choice to stick to my familiar route in such bad weather, is a question I still ask myself today. 

For whatever reason I took his advice and listened to the echoes of his directions in my mind while ticking off the left and right turns on streets whose names were quickly becoming buried in white flakes.

I surprised myself when I was almost home and on familiar territory once again; I had not become lost, my car was still on the road while others littered the sides, and I had avoided the freeway.  Only ten more minutes and I would be warm and cozy and I could forget about the -29 temperature outside.

Five minutes away from home I began to relax my white knuckle grip on the steering wheel, my confidence returning, but let it be said here and now that I never let my guard down.

I approached the last intersection on my trip, and as I am about half a kilometer away from it and the light is green for all cars going my way, so I don’t tap the brakes at all.

I watched in complete horror as a black sports car in the oncoming left hand turning lane starts to move into the intersection.  “No!” I breathe incredulous to how this person could think that they would have enough time to cross my path and make it to the other side of the intersection before I came through. 

This is where things start to slow down visually for me, yet in my mind my thoughts begin to take on a rapid fire machine gun like quality and somehow they seem louder as they fight for control. 

I first try to pump the brakes to slow the impact.  I can’t stop it, that would take an act of God at this point, but I did slow it some.  While I was managing that I was cursing this person I didn’t know for their sheer stupidity.  Then when I saw the other car spinning its wheels as the driver became aware the inevitable, the curses turned to a brief anger at the unfairness of it all.  I wanted my warm apartment, not a hospital bed that it looked like I was in for if I was lucky.

I remember saying, “Oh shit, this is going to hurt.” as my acceptance of the situation settled in.  Then at about 68 kilometers per hour, I t-boned the black sports car.  I spun around in the intersection 3 times and crashed again into a Mercedes Benz and a cab.

Things after that were shards of time for me.  I seemed to be in and out of things.  Not totally unconscious but not completely there all the time either.  Suddenly I was aware of a man behind me in my car holding my head and on the phone telling what I supposed were the paramedics where we were.  Then he was on the phone again telling someone he was at ground zero and would be late.  Ground zero?  Who used lingo like that?  And how did he get into my car?  I began to fear I had really rattled my brain.  I could feel something warm running down my leg, I could hardly breathe and I was shivering violently.

“I am so cold.” I told him, this stranger in my car with his hands about my neck.  I wondered if he was a soldier or a cop, who else would say ground zero? 

“I know Hon, they are on their way, just sit tight.  Is there anyone you want to call?”  I gave him my home number and he informed my partner about what had happened and what hospital I would probably be transferred to.  In the distance I could hear sirens.  The biting cold was like needles jabbing into me with no remorse.  I tried to focus on the man behind me and the puzzle of who he could be for a distraction.  I no longer thought he was a soldier, I didn’t think Hon was in a soldier’s vocabulary, and it would be a bit of a stretch for a cop too.

“Is the other driver ok?” I asked.

“I think so.”  Came his reply, “There are people with that driver now.”

“I’m sorry about your car.”  I said.

“Luckily you didn’t hit me, but you did a number on someone’s Mercedes, the other one was a cab, everyone looks ok there too.”

I was relieved, but I continued to shiver and those siren cowboys could not come quickly enough!

“What is taking them so long?” I asked.

“They have to weave through the backed up traffic the accident caused.”  He answered.  What a political answer I thought.  He didn’t say the accident you caused, which led me to believe he was married and knew something about women and how they react, or he understood the impact of his words in general and was in some sort of a management position.  Either way he was becoming more of an enigma as the moments passed. 

Finally the flashing lights of the medic wagon drew near, and I was never happier to see them.  Those lights meant I could get out of this freezing steel mash that had a vague resemblance to a vehicle, and perhaps I would not lose my fingers and toes to frostbite.  I just prayed it would not be my ex-boyfriend who would be tending to me, because just like injuries, no two break-ups are the same.  I would definitely be feeling the sting if any needles were needed.

When they came to take over the situation, the man in the back told them what happened and how I was doing, then he was going to leave and become a shadow in the blizzard, but I called him back while the medics assessed my injuries. 

“I need to know why you said ground zero before.”  He was a handsome man with glasses and a goatee.

“Oh that,” he smiled, “I am a reporter with the Calgary Herald, guess you could call it geek speak.”  Then he tossed me a little wave and turned to the cop who wanted to question him.

Well that mystery is solved I thought as the medics and firemen put a brace about my neck and put me on a backboard as gently as they could.  I tried not to shriek in pain, but I was sure they had heard it all before.  It was uncomfortable at first but after a couple minutes it was excruciating.  The hardness of the board bit into the back of my skull, but just on one point where the two made contact, so it was like a pressure point of pain.  I have since only experienced one thing worse, which was labor for thirty one hours, but that in itself is another story.

Once they got me rigged into the back of the ambulance we head out with sirens blazing.  I am not impressed as this does nothing for my headache, but I am too happy about getting some warmth and the pain in my knee is quickly becoming more of a concern. 

“What is wrong with my knee?” I ask the guy beside me.  I feel rude not looking in his eyes while asking, but I am strapped to the board and the choice is taken from me. 

He puts down the chart he is writing in, “Right or left?” he asks.

“Right.”

He cuts up my pant leg with a pair of blunt bent scissors and I grimace because I can’t remember if I shaved my legs the night before. 

“Which side was the ignition on in your car?”  He asks.

I had to think about it a second, “On the same side.  Why?”

“I think your keys punctured your knee.”  He told me, “I would bet money on it.”

Immediately I know I am going to have to lay up the running shoes for a while.  I wondered how bad it was really going to be at the end of it all.  After we got to the hospital and the various tests and x-rays were seen to and analyzed, they finally un-strapped me from the board and I found that I no longer had any feeling in the back of my skull.   

Good news though, only soft tissue damage throughout my neck, back and knee and after some stitches and being fixed up with some crutches I am released. 

It took over seven months of physiotherapy and medical procedures to get my knee, which after the accident was the size of a small cantaloupe, to regain its normal size again and for me to walk without a limp.  It was much longer to regain the freedom of lacing up regularly without the knee swelling again, and that is something I still have to be careful of today when I rise from a crouched position. 

I am so grateful to be out there on the roads still plugging away and logging more kilometers under my soles.  Perhaps next time I will tell you what happened to my other knee.  After all no two injuries are ever the same but some can be quite funny.

Spring Awakenings

March is a time of awakening.  It seems that the earth yawns and stretches while shaking off its shroud of winter, and dons the shawl of spring. 

Spring means different things to different people.  To some, spring means pints of green beer in celebration of St Patrick’s Day, to others it is the official time change that extends the daylight hours.  It could be the official Spring Equinox, the sight of virgin buds springing forth into leaf, or Daffodils stretching their yellowed heads heavenward. 

For me as an Islander on the West Coast of Canada, spring arrives with the Herring Run.  For two weeks annually, the waters around Vancouver Island turn a milky turquoise from the spawning of thousands of herring. 

The changing seasons sing to me with the cries of the gathering gulls and Eagles, the barking Seal and herds of Sea Lion.  I see spring in the buoyant fishing vessels sitting in the turquoise sea, pulling silver bounty from the water. 

I find the rolling briny waves, pregnant with the Herring Roe foam, to be the signal that warmer weather is on its way.  It is when I know that the rebirth of plants and new sightings of my favorite animals and birds are just around the corner.

Every year you can find me down at the water’s edge, snapping photos of this natural wonder as it unfolds.  This year was no exception and the animals didn’t disappoint.  

On one visit down to the water’s edge I counted seven Eagles, sitting in one tree alone.  They would take off from their pine vantage point and swoop down over the water, plucking fish up with ease as though the fish were merely motionless.  Their high pitched whistles almost sounded overjoyed as they spent their days chasing each other then rising slowly on the thermals.  At other times challenging each other for dominance of the skies and best nesting sites. 

The resident Blue Heron let me get close enough to watch and snap photos of its fishing practices.  I have been trying all winter to get close to enough to get a decent photo, and I guess my perseverance and slow steps combined with the promise of an easy meal was enough to do the trick.  Just out of the range of the edge of this photo were a couple of seals keeping an eye on her and her catch. 

Although this year was wetter than last year for the two week period that the Herring Run usually lasts, there was a lot to see on the ocean’s surface and above.  It is a great time for nature lovers, and families to explore our local beaches and become enamored with all that we are spoiled with out here on the coast of Vancouver Island.