Thou Unnecessary Letter

Apparently this is my week for weird gendered interactions.

I'm in Stephen King country. Specifically, I'm at Indian Acres Boys' Camp, near Freyburg, Maine. I'm here to help the ever-amazing Susan de Guardiola teach a week of Titanic-era dances at an International Folk Dance camp (the dancers rent the camp from the boys' camp). It's stopped raining, and the organizing committee, who are mostly about my parents' age is bustling around putting up "etnhic" decorations and pinning people's names to their cabin doors. 

Camp starts tomorrow, but in order to save the committee some money, I travelled here yesterday with a fellow I know from the Hogtown contra dance community, who, at 54, is one of the younger members of the organizing committee. Walter is a nice-enough fellow, whom I've known well enough to dance with for about 15 years. After 10 hours in his car yesterday, I feel that I know him rather better than I did before, but I don't think I'd go so far as to say he's a friend. He is, however, the only person here so far that I've ever met before. So, when we arrived yesterday, he introduced me around, and we went out to dinner with a bunch of the other people from the camp.

Today, after breakfast, as I was cleaning up my plate, one of the older gentlemen—let's call him Marv—spoke to me. "I just want you to know," he said, "that I think you're a very nice person, and if you and Walter stay together, I hope you'll be very happy." 

I blinked, smiled, and said something like "Umm, thank you, but Walter and I just travelled down together, we're not an item." Then, to forestall any further peculiar assumptions, I said "I am actually seeing someone in Toronto."

Now, of course, I believe firmly, on no further evidence than this exchange, that Marv is carrying a torch for Walter (who, in 15 years of Saturday night dances I've never observed to have any romantic interests at all, so who knows what his orientation is?), and was trying, sweetly, if misguidedly, to be gracious in perceived defeat. 

sabotabby posted some of the spoils of our not-very-suitable-decoration phototreck. I was confident that we hadn't captured the extent of weird seasonal decorations even in our kind of boring neighbourhood, but took a break to get ready for the various festivities.

Turns out that there's more in our very neighbourhood:

Exhibit 1: The Underinflated Penguin



It's not that I'm opposed to decorations. But I do like some sort of consistency. And I really generally don't like inflated things that are not balloons. Underinflating your penguin causes it to look like it needs the services of a chiropractor, or maybe an EMT unit with a spinal board.

Exhibit 2: On Second Thought, Inflated May Be Preferable



Okay, hanging empty stockings I understand, though you're supposed to do that indoors, on the mantle of your fireplace, or, if you don't have a fireplace, wherever you can hang a stocking. I'm not sure what an empty Santa suit conveys. Are they waiting for St. Nick to fill his own suit with his jolly self? (Hint to the denizens of this house: that suit is TOO SMALL.) It looks more to me as if they killed Santa and are hanging his pelt outside their home as a trophy, or perhaps as a warning. Eep.

On Christmas day, captainmushroom and I went for a walk and hit Unsuitable Decoration Mecca.

Exhibit 3: The Upholstery Shop



Oh man, I don't even know where to begin with this place. It's just AWESOME. Here are some details:



The cadaverous zombie guy is a permanent fixture of the window, as are, I think Lisa Simpson and Robin. The tinsel headdress is seasonal.



Quilted-body Chuck Norris doesn't wait for Santa. Quilted-body Chuck Norris is Santa. You better watch out!






There's really nothing unsuitable about the Daddy Kissing Santa-Claus picture, except for the Rockwell-esque style, but somehow I think my mom would find it objectionable. No, I have no idea what Henry VIII is doing there.



You need to see the Daddy Kissing Santa picture up close to fully appreciate its delicate, nuanced portrayal of the holiday spirit.



I don't even. All I can think is that no Christmas idyll is really complete without random superheroes.

And finally, the saddest Christmas gargoyle I have ever seen:



This gargoyle is SO SAD FOR BEING A REINDEER.

This is a continuation of something I started on Facebook last night for kchew 

( Trolls vs Non-Trolls on Toronto City Council )

Gluck wrote this opera, Paride ed Elena. I've been learning one of Paride's arias, O del Mio Dolce Ardor, as a mezzo piece. In learning the piece, I betook myself to Youtube to brave the unfortunate recital videos in search of a nice professional rendition.

Like, say, this one, by Renate Tebaldi. I think she sings it in the soprano key, but whatever. I can live with transposing. Her cadenzas are great.

I'd not heard of Julia Sokolov before I found her video. So all unaware, I clicked on it. Now, I feel compelled to share it, mostly because I can't adequately describe it, other than to say "Gluck. Pennywhistle. Drapery. Drum track. Fabio-lookalike. Imagery! Reverb. Just watch!"



( For comparison )

Mayoral candidate Rocco Rossi is the sort of candidate my dad would have voted for: his proposed policies are ideologically right-of-centre, pro-business, pro-suburb.

The Empire Club apparently loves him.
( Cut because Toronto is not the centre of the universe. It's just where I happen to live. )

There's a Tim Horton's almost across the street from my house. This means that at any hour of the day or night, I can look out my kitchen window, across the laneway and the parking lot, and see a police cruiser parked across Danforth. At eight o'clock in the morning, when parents are dropping their kids off at the school across the street, there's a police car there. At three o'clock in the afternoon, when people are enjoying the sun, buying veggies, and walking their dogs, there's a police car there. At seven o'clock in the evening, when I'm making dinner, and kids are playing in the square while their parents chat on the benches, there's a police car there.

Yet strangely, there's rarely a police officer present when I want one. During the wee hours of Sunday morning, for example, when a fine upstanding member of society is discussing the things she knows about things one can do with specific parts of the male anatomy, for example, nobody comes along to remonstrate with the individual or to ask her not to break the peace.

And last night, around 9:40 p.m., there was not a police officer to be seen.

I know.  I was looking for one. I saw old men meeting for coffee, and teenagers going for ice cream, and pseudo-hipsters hitting the cafés. I saw dog walkers and families. But I did not see any officers of the law.

See, DanceMistress had taken me out for dinner to thank me for putting her up. We'd had a nice dinner, and were headed back to my place, walking along Danforth from the subway station. She needed to acquire some Canadian cash, so we stopped at a bank machine. As we left the bank, a man enquired as to how our evening had gone. Being city people, and therefore not friendly at all with random importunate strangers, we ignored him, and he walked on by. Whatever. Danforth's busy that time of evening, and apparently people cruise even on a Monday.

DanceMistress had not been able to get any money from the machine (there had been some difficulty with her card), so we went into my bank, so that I could get some cash to spot her. Our importunate stranger was lounging outside my bank as we entered, and as we emerged, he again attempted to strike up a conversation with us. We ignored him, and continued.

He followed.

He followed more closely.

We ignored.

He asked one of us if we wanted to get freaky with him.

We ignored, and walked past the patio of a pub.

He asked why we had a problem with him.

I explained, in short words, that I had not asked him to speak to us, and that he should go away, as we walked past an open café.

He asked if I cared if he smoked. I said I did not care for anything he did, and that he should go away. We continued past another pub. He continued to follow us, as we got closer to the corner where Dictionopolis is located.

So I said to DanceMistress, who was becoming visibly tense, "I believe we'll just duck into Tim's for a coffee," and she acquiesced. Our follower stayed outside, waiting outside the door of the brightly lit doughnut shop, across the street from the square that is across the street from my house.

And of course, once I was inside, I looked for a police officer. To no avail.

So we went out the side door, and looped around through the schoolyard, across Danforth, through Carrot Common, and along the path from the subway station, to come at the house from an entirely different direction. As we approached the house, I could see the corner where we'd left him staring at the fountain across the street. He'd given up—I assume he'd found someone else to harass, and I'm really hoping it wasn't the three teenaged girls who passed us, going into the Tim's as we were leaving.

I should perhaps have warned them.

So, I ask you, what on Earth is the point of having a Tim Horton's across the street, if you can't find a police officer when you're being followed home by a creepy stranger?

Dear Student Who Has Generally Been Conscientious,

When I told you last night in class that you could send your assignment in via e-mail, and I would dock only the 2 marks per day for tardiness, I did not think that you would also attempt to send me jpg files of what appear to be digital photos of the entire magazine on which you wrote your publication analysis. Yet, you surprised me.

Had I but known, I would have counselled you to use YouSendIt, or at the very least to compress your damn files.

Flooding my home e-mail inbox and putting it over its limit twice in one day does not predispose me to clemency in my marking.

Not that I would ever penalize you for dougheadedness. I shall merely send you a polite suggestion so that your next instructor does not find their inbox flooded with ginormous jpgs of an entire bloody magazine.

Sincerely,
Your ever-merciful instructor

I woke up this morning to the kind of phone call you never want to wake up to.

My brother had been calling my cellphone, which was, of course, dead and downstairs. There'd been an accident. My father is dead.

My father is dead.

It's true, but it really doesn't seem like it should be. Of course it doesn't.

I woke up this morning, and found myself in the middle of a police procedural. My brother came to get me. We went to my dad and stepmom's house, in their nice suburban neighbourhood. Where there were police cars. And police officers. And a body in the swimming pool

...

There had been a chipmunk in the pool. My dad was worried that with all the rain, it would drown. So he went out to make a ramp for the chipmunk. My stepmom was in the kitchen, and wondered what was taking him so long. She phoned his cellphone and he didn't answer, so she figured he'd gone for a walk, or shared a glass of wine with the neighbour, or something. So she went to bed.

When she woke up in the small hours, he still wasn't there, so she got worried, and went out to look for him.

She found him in the 18 inches of water in the bottom of the swimming pool. Dialed 9-1-1.

We waited, while police photographers photographed the pool and the body, while forensics officers looked around, and recorded, and measured, and did their thing. Then a sergeant came to tell us that it was very slippery in the pool, that there was no evidence of anything amiss (except for the dead person), that the funeral home would transfer the body to the morgue, that we'll hear from the coroner or maybe the police when they know anything for sure. And please if we can stay out of the back yard until they tell us we can go into it, they'd appreciate that.

Then some people took the body away, and we were left staring at each other, and at the business cards left behind on the ktichen table by coroner and police officers.

She never heard him fall. Never heard him call out. We don't know what happened. I mean, yes, my father died in a freak chipmunk-related accident, but we don't yet know how or why.

There are a zillion things to do, and we did some of them today: visit funeral home, decide on cremation, rent a casket, write the obituary. Other things, we will do tomorrow and the next day and the next. There will be a funeral service (called a "Celebration of life" for our atheistic family). We need to plan that. There will be visitation. There will be a reception at the Club where he golfed. There is a plan to deal with the ashes (it involves sneaking out to do something mildly illegal on a golf course.) There will be life insurance and the will and helping my stepmother to deal with his stuff. Once the autopsy is done and the coroner's report made, we switch from the police procedural to the boring family drama, for which we make up the script as we go along.

There's the monotony of grief and the discombobulation that comes of confronting the reality that I really should have phoned him last week and that a whole bunch of things will never happen now, and I was not ready for this at all. Nobody was. He wasn't. I mean, who dies rescuing chipmunks?

I'm okay ... inasmuch as anyone can be at a time like this. I'm tired: waking up at 06h00 in that particular way is not conducive to an overall feeling of restedness. I'm sad, of course, and bewildered, and shocky, and I don't quite know what to do, because this is the part where there's nothing anyone really can do (yes I have eaten. Yes, I will sleep). I'm fighting the kind of guilt that comes when you meant to call someone and they up and died (with, or without, chipmunks) before you did. So, I guess I'm not really okay, but I know where okay is, and I know I have to get through all this in order to be okay again.


Who dies rescuing chipmunks, I ask you?