Park Plates

Ter and I have long considered putting personal plates our vehicle. The problem is, what to put on them? She wouldn’t be any keener on DURAN E or HOK E HOS than I’d be for FOOD E or WIK N WU. We’d thought of putting JULES on Jules, but it’s good that we didn’t because Jules is no longer with us. As it was, Tiggy inherited his predecessor’s plates, which were at insurance time this year, over twenty years old.

The dilemma would have continued indefinitely had ICBC not ridden to the rescue. Earlier this year, in cooperation with BC Provincial Parks, they’ve issued a number of license plates featuring four “super, natural” vistas—mountains, lakes, forests ... and a spirit bear.

Well, shoot. Problem solved.

The bear plates have been cropping up on cars all over town. The numbering sequence started at PA000A. By the time we got our plates, so many had been sold that the sequence began with PB. “ ‘Peanut Butter’,” I said to Ter at the insurance agent’s office, where we were both required to sign the changeover from our old license number.

She glanced at me, pen in hand, and said nothing.

“Or ‘Panda Bear’,” I continued, musing.

That got a slightly better result, but still no hats and horns. Since our brains are not geared toward accepting blends of letters and numerals, it’s always helped me to use either the phonetic alphabet or make up a word association of my own. For instance, our old plates began with “JBM”, which, in the phonetic alphabet, translates to “Juliet Bravo Mike”. Thanks to my wee sister, who suggested it when I asked what she’d use, it also translated to “Jellybum.”

Anyway, we signed the papers and took our shiny new plates out to the strip mall lot, where a freshly-laundered Tiggy eagerly awaited his new tags. Getting them into the plate holders proved a tad challenging, as the holders have been bashed about but good over the past seven years, but Ter persevered and eventually they slid into place. Affixing them to the bumpers required new screws to replace the old rusted ones (our first stop on this little adventure was the hardware store), and no small skill in lining up the holes. Ter hunkered by the back bumper and spent a while doing just that, with varying degrees of success. Eye to eye with “PB” while her patience gradually thinned, she finally looked up at me and said, “We could also use ‘Pooh Bartz’.”

That did me in. I howled. “Pooh bartz” is an interjection originally coined by my older sister in lieu of a metaphor more colourful while yet residing in our parents’ house (both my sisters have an odd gift for coining words/phrases/sayings), and it’s stayed with me deep into my relationship with Ter. That she would blurt it out in relation to our prized new plates slew me right there in the parking lot.

Later, she tried to override the option with “Polar Bear”, but I fear I was ruined for anything else when it comes to remembering my new license number.

Pooh bartz.

Vive “Versailles”!

Speaking of Charles II (see Diana), his Bourbon cousins, Louis and Phillippe, figure prominently in the latest period drama to have taken over Chez Ru and Ter: a rollicking, racy, extravagantly produced series about life in the Sun King’s court, aptly titled “Versailles”.

I spied the title in the Movie Channel listings one night in July and realized it was episode three of a series in its second season. Second season?? How had we missed the first? And was it worth watching in any case? Rather than risk being completely lost by watching episode three live, we discovered the first two episodes available on demand and promptly fell under its spell. Alas, season one was not listed, neither could we order it from Amazon (it shows on the European sites, but won’t ship to Canada).

I have no idea which of the angels prompted me, but I suddenly remembered that the Greater Victoria Public Library loans DVDs of everything from popular TV series (like NCIS) to obscure European productions, all for the price of nothing! I immediately got online and to my ecstatic delight, “Versailles - Season One” was not only in the catalogue, copies were available! I renewed my library card the same morning (the central branch is across the street from my office) and Ter and I were set for marathon viewing over the next few weekends.

We’re caught up as of this writing, with two episodes to go in Season Two. I can’t gush enough about this series. Seventeenth century royalty is an obsession of mine, but honestly, this show is so well written, acted, directed and produced (they film in the palace itself, among other French locations) that it deserves to be gushed about. I did spend a good part of the first few episodes trying to place the guy who plays Louis—Ter finally Googled him and discovered he’s the same actor who played Athelstan on “Vikings” (a waste of his talent, if you ask me)—and the fellow who portrays his younger brother, Phillippe ... okay, even if he wasn’t stunningly gorgeous, he’s brought that character to life in a way that history has failed to do. By reputation, “Monsieur”, as he was called in the day, was a mean, vindictive, cretinous little man, but in this series, he comes across as vulnerable and sympathetic, if not a complete fool in love. His relationship with his brother is alternately painful and magical, as are his affair with his lover, the incorrigible Chevalier de Lorraine (brilliantly played as a baroque David Lee Roth), and his marriage of political convenience to a German princess.

The main focus is on these relationships, as well as the usual court intrigue brought about by Louis’ decree to have all the nobles in France reside where he can see them. Ninety percent of the story is allegedly based on historic record, but these days, alternate history is as prevalent as alternate fact. I’m willing to forgo some things in favour of artistic license, but really, if the outrageous antics of Louis XIV’s dissolute and devil-worshipping court is halfway accurate, I’m more than a little peeved that my beloved Charles was criticized for not keeping on top of his gang in England at the same time.

He makes an appearance at the end of the first season, by the way. The actor wasn’t tall enough, his eyes were blue, and the voice was all wrong. You can’t play fast and loose with the image of my king and come out unscathed—but that’s my only issue with this fabulous, opulent, fascinating show. Series for which I fall this hard are generally cancelled after the first year. Best news of all: Season Three began filming in April 2017!

Terry Fox

Bup-buhda-bup, bup-buhda-bup, bup-buhda-bup.

This is the sound that meets you at the start of the Terry Fox exhibit I visited at the museum last week. It’s the audio on a video of a handsome boy with a grim demeanour and a ghastly prosthetic leg, running (can you even call it “running”? It was more of an awkward, clunking hop) along the serpentine Trans-Canada Highway, uphill and down, rain or shine, utterly alone with no sound but the rhythm of his gait.

Bup-buhda-bup, bup-buhda-bup, bup-buhda-bup.

I stood at the exhibit entrance and thought, I won’t make it through this.

Well, I did make it. The exhibit is not designed to wring a tear and make you reach for your wallet. It’s simply the story of how a kid from Port Coquitlam set out to make a difference and became an unintentional hero. More than that, he became a part of our national story.

I was nineteen years old when the Marathon of Hope began. Naturally, since it didn’t concern me personally, I was only dimly aware that a boy who’d lost a leg to cancer was trying to raise money for research by running from St John’s to Victoria during the summer of 1980. The awareness only came after his solitary run had started to gain momentum and he was suddenly featured on every nightly newscast.

Prior to that, he was running pretty much by himself, with a buddy in the van behind him and his brother along for moral support (and to act as referee when he and said buddy started scrapping on the road). The sheer magnitude of what he was trying to accomplish completely escaped me until it was over and schools were being named for him. I regretted not paying more attention at the time, but thanks to his family and a dedicated team, the details of his journey are available in ways they wouldn’t have been had he lived to reach his modest goal of raising a million dollars.

The exhibit chronicles the evolution of what became the Marathon of Hope, from the initial diagnosis of Terry’s cancer (his name wasn’t even mentioned in the doctor’s report; he was referred to as “the boy”) to the marathon’s premature end in Thunder Bay, where his health finally failed and he had to fly home for more treatment. Everyone knows how the story ended, of course. That’s part of the tragedy—yet, as is so often the case, some lights burn so brightly that their lives are destined to be short. Besides, if Terry Fox had successfully emptied his jar of Atlantic Ocean into the Pacific at Mile 0, the effect may not have been so enduring. He was a remarkable young man, as compassionate as he was determined, as courageous as he must have been frightened, yet he persevered because he had watched other people suffer in the cancer ward and decided that it had to stop.

Today is the annual Terry Fox run. It happens every September and has done so for years. It’s coordinated in countless communities all across Canada. People sign up for it who weren’t even born when Terry dipped his artificial foot in the ocean off Newfoundland. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been raised to fund cancer research and will continue to be raised because of his mission to make others’ lives better.

The weather report predicted rain for today—the first rain we’ve seen all summer. My first thought was of sympathy for all those people who’ve committed to participate in the run ... then I remembered the video at the opening of the museum display.

Bup-buhda-bup, bup-buhda-bup, bup-buhda-bup.

Over and Under

We might as well face it: we’re doomed. This mortality gig is designed to try our strength of spirit, and when I really think about it, I get suspicious that being human has set me up to fail. I can’t always hear my little voice, and when I do hear something, I question whether it’s my connection to spirit or my own duplicitous intellect pretending to be spirit. I am distracted by noise, overcome by sensation, drawn into drama, goaded by fear, and occasionally wonder if no one is listening when I speak to my imaginary friends.

In short, I think too much. This despite my best efforts not to employ what the Japanese warriors in The Last Samurai refer to as “too much mind”. I try not to overthink my life, but when I want something to materialize and it ain’t happening on my timetable, it’s easy to forget my Jedi training and start wondering if I have been duped by my New Age gurus.

I watched a podcast of Professor Ekkles some months ago, in which he warned against the perils of overthinking. He suggested that one’s aim should be to underthink, which will result in greater trust of life’s process and the universe’s grand plan for each of us. More importantly, the stilling of one’s mind, the silencing of the chatter, is the way to inner peace. Inner peace opens the channel to the higher vibrational energies beyond this realm. It brings us closer to the collective force of creation and thus more in tune with our true (spirit) selves.

But how to accomplish this, when everything about our compostable container is confounding? As recently as yesterday morning, I thought, How can I possibly succeed when I’m foiled by being a carbon-based unit? Never mind that pretty much everything in my life is miraculous. I might be grateful, but I still have these annoyingly human moments.

Time for a metaphor.

Consider the mortal coil as a suit of armour. Its purpose is to house and protect you during your deployment to this alien country. At first, it’s a novelty—it has all these cool features like sensory perception and a logic processor—but the longer you wear it, the heavier it becomes. If you don’t maintain it, the showroom shine tarnishes and the joints rust out. The surface gets pockmarked and parts need replacing. It gets bogged down by the things you added to make it more impressive: plumage for the helmet, nipples on the breastplate, gold-encrusted greaves and talons on the gauntlets. For better protection, a newer, bigger shield. A longer sword. A snazzy dagger with a jewelled hilt. A newer, even bigger, shield. Yup, it looks good, but man, it weighs a ton and is harder than ever to humph around. And there’s no earpiece in the helmet, so you’re pretty much deaf to anything that isn’t right in your face—which is also all you can see because of the nifty-but-impractical visor you put on in your twenties. How did this happen? How did this thing get so cumbersome?

It’s not too late to simplify. You need the armour, but you don’t need the accoutrements. They were only acquired to impress all the other knights anyway, and the other knights were too busy trying to impress you. Lighten the burden by shedding what you don’t need—including the mental baggage that fooled you into believing the additions were what mattered. (They weren’t.) Sand off the rust and polish up your helmet; if you keep it clean and shiny, you’ll hear better when your little voice says something. And get rid of that stupid visor. Broaden your perspective. Open yourself to the true miracle of this existence. Don’t worry so much about how long it’s taking to get where you’re going; just enjoy this moment on the journey. You’ll get there when the time is right. Besides, being present helps to quiet the frantic chatter in your head. Mind is good, but too much of it—like too little—can be harmful to your sanity.

I quit overthinking as soon as I realized I was doing it. It won’t stop me from doing it again, but that’s the joy—and perhaps the point—of being human.

I’m off to polish my tinfoil suit now.

With love,

Diana

On July 1, 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales, turned thirty-six. Three months later, I was about to do the same when she was killed in the car crash that changed the world.

The news reached Ter and me at a friend’s house, where we were having dinner to celebrate my imminent occasion. Everyone immediately left the table and pounded down to the rec room, where we spent the next two hours staring in horror at CNN. Halfway down the stairs, I had the most disturbing thought: They’ve done it. They’ve gotten rid of her.

Nowadays, there are people alive who have no idea of the effect Diana had on the world, but twenty years ago, you’d have been hard-pressed to find anyone who hadn’t heard of her. In some form, by some means, she was part of the global awareness, an incandescent light so powerful that she was almost combustible. Even now, two decades later, I almost believe she had to die young. Envisioning her at my current age is impossible and, as seems to be the case with every other intensely bright spirit, her private darkness was so overwhelming that a long life was hard to imagine. I took it for granted that she would age, of course, until that fateful night when her life was cut short.

I followed her public journey with the same interest as I follow anything royal—being one of Charlie’s girls apparently set me up with an eternal fascination for the monarchy—but Ter identified with the princess as she identifies with anyone in whom she senses a kindred spirit. Like Ter, Diana was a broken but ferocious spirit, as passionate as she was compassionate, and Ter was gutted when she died.

Astonishingly, so was I.

Of course, the circumstances played a part. The woman was truly hunted to her death, and without the protection of the Crown, she was easier if no less famous prey for the paparazzi. A crazy car chase, an allegedly impaired (however mildly and I still don’t believe it) driver, and suddenly the most famous woman in the world is tragically (prematurely?) dead. That in itself was horrifying and would have been so—is so—had anyone else been in that car. I don’t remember if or for how long Ter cried that night. I only know I didn’t start until the next day, and once I started, I couldn’t stop. I felt bereft in a way I had no right to feel about a literal stranger. I did not know the Princess of Wales. Knowing of her is not the same thing, yet I wept as if we’d been sisters. And all the while, part of me was mystified as to why.

If we are all connected, then it’s simple. The grief each person felt was transmitted and amplified until the bulk of the world’s population was affected. Diana shone so fiercely that her light going out was equal to the Japanese earthquake that rocked the earth on its axis. Whether they knew it or not, everyone felt it on some level, and it stayed with us until her funeral six days later.

Ter and I got up at 1:00 a.m. to watch the procession from start to finish. We sniffled and sobbed through most of it. Neither of us will ever forget it—where we were, what we thought, how grateful we were to be together at the time.

The mystery of Diana remains as intriguing today as it was during her life. She was without doubt a star in the universal tapestry, and a threat to anyone she opposed. I’m not saying there was a conspiracy to kill her (and if there was, the royals would not be my prime suspects; rather the robber barons who make money off things like pestilence and landmines would be top of the list), but while the majority of the population mourned her passing, it’s entirely possible that a nefarious few breathed a sigh of relief. She was talented and tormented, beloved yet felt unloved, she was charismatic and caring and outspoken in defense of those who could not defend themselves. Ironically, her legacy is almost as strong as her influence in life, as her two sons strive to follow her example in all the right ways. Though hampered by the political restrictions of their social station, Princes William and Harry are somehow managing to carry on their mother’s charitable work, increasing public awareness of the human issues yet in play around the world, and standing in defence of those whom she brought to collective consciousness when her boys were still boys. Despite her personal struggles, or perhaps because of them, through her caring and her children, Diana made the world a brighter place for the rest of us.

That’s a royal legacy indeed.

Birthday Girl

Today is my birthday. I wasn’t going to blog about it, but I’m feeling particularly grateful so thought I’d post a “bonus” blog just to put it out there.

I’ve said before how birthdays act as my New Year’s Day, when I reflect on where I’ve been, where I am, and how far off track I may be from my original plan. Luckily, I don’t remember my original plan since I made it before I was born, but considering how happy I am today, I reckon I can’t have strayed too far off course.

Albert Einstein is quoted on the kitchen calendar today: “The ideals which have lighted my way, and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty and Truth.”

If ever a statement was meant for me, this might be it. I almost burst into tears because that’s exactly how I feel about my life and the people in it – so many good folks have taught me about those three vital virtues, how to act on them, to appreciate them, and to use them as the lens through which I view my life. I am deeply, truly blessed. Not so long ago, I would have denied my worthiness, but nowadays I realize, heck, I deserve all the good (and probably the not so good) I’ve experienced and will experience during my time in this phase. But really, people have featured more prominently in my progression than circumstance. My wonderful parents, my fabulous siblings, and of course my magical Ter, have all inspired and supported me through the most important lessons life has to teach me, but there are secondary characters in my personal drama, too. Friends who have come and gone, co-workers of the same temporary nature, both delightful and painful (some at the same time—now that’s a rare talent!), even people I have not met in the flesh have influenced my development. What to write, how to write, how not to write ... sometimes the most valuable lesson is how not to do something. Another favourite quote is “A wise man once said nothing.” I laughed when I read it, but humour is often based on a nugget of truth and part of life is also learning when to be silent.

I’m working on that, too. I’m working on everything, in fact, but today, I’m giving myself break. Ter and I are meeting wee sis and Boy Sister for lunch, and though Saturday is typically laundry day, the undies can wait. Episode Seven of Versailles, however, cannot. That’s on tap for this evening, after dinner and prezzies and a day of being duly celebrated.

I have never felt so loved ... or so grateful. If I can give back a fraction of the marvels life has given me, my work here will be done. Happy birthday to Ru.

With love,