I awoke to an email from high school and university friend Lynne:
She: Politics – (can be) fun to argue, difficult to convert.
Me: Please, my favorite intellectual, contrast politics and religion. Religion fun to convert, difficult to argue.?? Lord God Almighty just when you think Vancouver weather is impossible – it gets worse. Wet snow and fog – that has to be the very worse thing on earth. I am in need of groceries but the store is only one block away so I shall survive.
Lynne, Bruce (who you shall hear about in a minute) and I knew one another in Edmonton, more than fifty years ago. Now Edmonton is known for its bad weather – it is damn cold. But it is sunny most of the time – when snow comes it is not this wet stuff. Give me Edmonton weather over this stuff. Rain, grey skies, wet snow with a glimpse of sun once every two weeks whether you need it or not. It is Saturday, I do not have to go to the gym, the grocery store is close, the library is only three blocks away AND I have a fireplace. I have officially stopped complaining. So there! So there! So there!
Lynne’s email is part of a thread that Bruce, Lynne and me/I are exchanging. When one objectively looks at it – it is a miracle. We date way back to the days of our late teens in Edmonton. Bruce lives in the East – with Lynne and I on the West Coast. Our EXTREMELY interesting emails concern two topics. One is politics and the other is bad art. Yes, I said it, bad art. Bad art is being exhibited in two Canadian cities. Toronto and Vancouver. Now some people may disagree and that is OK with me – but I do get to speak my mind because it is my blog. So there! So there! So there. The major topic of conversation began with Lynne’s email conversation which I forwarded to Bruce.
She: If you thought the Japanese octopus here was not quite what you expected, have you seen the article in Saturday’s G & M on the coming Kusama exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario? Octopus becomes amoeba amid other strange forms and visual illusions of infinity. Evidently the exhibit is set up as a series of small rooms and you are allowed in for 25 seconds (timed by stopwatch), to then shuffle off to wait an estimated 20 minutes to enter the next small room. Thousands of tickets sold on line! But, in an AGO first, volunteers will approach people waiting for the next room to chat and give out (scripted) information. Perhaps this could be adapted for the next blockbuster exhibit at VAG.
Then Bruce not only replied but he also sent a link to an Atlantic article about the Kusama exhibit which I read and forwarded to Lynne. Here it is. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/07/yayoi-kusamas-existential-circus/528669/
But somehow we got on the topic of Canadian politics and went back and forth with all of that. Bruce and Lynne have diverse opinions. I readily admit that I do not have a lot of opinions about Canadian politics because I admittedly do not know anything about it. Well, I have an opinion or two or three but mostly I keep my mouth closed. (Believe that or not!) None of the above would have ever happened if I did not come back to live in Canada. I am SO, SO happy to have done this, it seems like a miracle.
I am surrounded by so much caring, of such a diverse nature. I shall give examples. I was training at the Equinox with E.H. (not Hottie) and we were having a serious conversation. I said of a man: “On woman said that I tried so hard to save him from his fate but I could not. But I tried as hard as I could!” I began to weep, in pity for that man actually. E.H. put his arm around me and said that no one can save anyone from their fate. But then Irish Cream (another trainer) noticed that I was crying and ran across the entire length of the gym to hug me and hold my hand. Can you believe all of that?
The day before last I was texting A.H.B. whom I had not seen in awhile. We reconnected the the gym but I had not seen her there in weeks. She responded immediately and when I inquired about her darling daughter she sent a picture. The little girl was dressed in a Chinese coat for Chinese New Year. Her mother said that she said: oh my god, I’m Santa and she kept saying ‘hohohoho’ Is that not the most precious thing you have EVER heard? A darling little girl saying hohohoho on Chinese New Year and I get to hear about it!
I am totally into Canadian television and have recently discovered the Rick Mercer show. I absolutely die laughing at him and his antics. There is a scene of downtown Toronto with the CN Tower. (I once, in an email to Bruce, called it the CNN Tower. Bruce made fun of my Americanization of a Canadian icon). Well, I not only know the Boss of the CN Tower but he bought me dinner – lobster with two Gibsons and two glasses of Sauvignon Blanc. I always tell the truth and that is a truth. I definitely have arrived, the Boss of the CN Tower.
Now none of that would be possible if I did not return to Canada after a fifty year absence. Now I readily admit that some things have gone wrong and I have been swindled, insulted, vilified, exploited and used as well. But I have conquered evil, in so many ways and I am home in my native land bringing it positiveness. So there! So there! So there!
The video accompanying this post is a training session outside with Hottie. I am exercising my arms and as you will see, my mouth. I seem never to shut up.
