

### FRESHET

Mid-Life Renewal on the Middle Arm of the Fraser River

By Eva Nilsson

Copyright 2014 Eva Nilsson

Illustrations by Jay Luchsinger

For my parents who taught me not to fear the unknown

Published by Eva Nilsson at Smashwords

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### Contents

Haul Out

Voyage

Into the Middle

Old School Meets New School

For the Record

Minoru Park en Plein Air

Dulce Domum

Silver Loogie

Up-River Wandering

Laundry Day

Lions at the Gate

Sidewalks

It`s Fun to Dream at the YMCA

Thyme Scented Hills

International Dining

Still Life

On Sons and Daughters

What We Give Away

It`s 3 a.m. and I Must Be Lonely

School Chair Travellers

Eros and Ares

The Fraser Masterpiece

Games People Play

Eye of the Storm

Grocery Carts of Richmond

True Grit

On Clouds at MacLeod`s

Enter With Fanfare

It`s Not Over Til the Fat Lady Sings Carols

Mother and Child Reunion

Travelling Christmas Chaos Roadshow

Heavy New Year

Down and Out in Vancouver and Richmond

Here on the Flight Path

Gung Hay Fat Choy

When in Roeme

Pyramids of the Delta

The Happiest Words in the World

The Fire

Study Your Dreams

Skating on Thin Ice

Hallowed Ground

The Foggy Dew

Tony Orlando Breakdown

Coal Harbour Spectacle

Elin Passes Go

Japanese Surrealism

O Socrates, This Train is for Waterfront

Water Lanterns of Steveston

Best Seller List Circa 1 B.C.

Rebirth of Retail for all the Sentient Beings in the Dharma

Slapshot!

April Fools

The Kindness of Strangers

Women of the World, Wake Up!

Freshet

Funeral Oration for Denny

Valuables at the Village

The Restless Flow

Sacred Geometry

Odyssey

Bibliography

Acknowledgements

About the Author

About the Illustrator

1. Haul Out

A colour explosion of hanging baskets draws your eye down the walkway from the riverside gazebo where I sit at our marina, to the boat yard where the Singoalla is sitting up on blocks with a fresh coat of coal black bottom paint on her keel and a brightly polished blue stripe at the waterline. She looks great and I am sure she feels like she has just had a pedicure. I reflect sadly though, that her hull will be beneath the water tomorrow morning, where I won't see the justification for my aching shoulders and arms and the stubborn black paint around my fingernails. No gain without pain, as the saying goes and I have learned the importance of a complete scrubbing, and a fresh coat of paint, for myself as well as the boat, even if the rest of the world doesn't notice the change.

This morning, the TravelLift, a crane with straps that are positioned beneath the boat while still in the water, had gently cradled her somewhat slimy hull and hauled her out of the water and up to the parking lot where it was pressure washed to reveal a number of chipped spots exposing colourful bits of old bottom paint. Over the last year, the fresh water of the river has killed off the few barnacles and mussels missed by two of our boys a year ago when they had donned diving gear and scraped the hull while the boat had sat at the marina in Comox Bay on Vancouver Island. John, our eldest son, had done most of his diving in the tepid waters off Honduras and had to wear a suit belonging to one of his younger, but larger, brothers – in April. Not a lover of the cold, he had gasped with feeling when the first trickles of refreshing Pacific water leaked into his loose suit after plunging in.

After the boat was set in place and began to dry in the scorching July sunshine, I had cleaned and polished the transom, which is hard to get at when the boat is in the water, while my husband, Jerry, busied himself with Bondo and a gouge in the keel. He replaced the zinc on the prop shaft where it will sacrifice itself to corrosion by electrolysis thereby saving valuable fittings and the propulsion equipment. Then he poured some of the precious, $140 per can, paint into the pan and begun rolling it on while I used a brush to get at the hard to roll parts around the props for the blocks, the cradle chain and the rudder. The work proceeded quickly and we took an early dinner break while the first coat dried.

I had black paint all over my hands and face so waited in the car while Jerry went in to grab a food fair Thai combo and ice tea at the nearest mall. We returned to finish the polishing and apply the second coat of paint. The sun was beginning to descend behind the trees across the river on Sea Island and in the warm glow of evening, we peeled back the edging tape and were thrilled to see the difference a coat of paint could make. We have been so busy for the last six years since we bought our boat. Maintenance has been reactive in the main and we both feel guilty because of it. Our lovely little means of escape deserves better and now, I promise, like some delinquent husband, she will get what she deserves. I plan to make new covers for the hatch and winches and stitch a new bright blue sail cover. Over the next week, Jerry and I can work around the hull from the dinghy, cleaning and polishing the rest of the hull. There's special epoxy paint for fibreglass that we intend to try out for the deck which is badly damaged from the sun. Jerry has already begun work on the interior, sanding and varnishing the wood. Eventually, the sooty looking head liner will be replaced and the well worn foam for the cushions will be retired. I'm just trying to decide whether I should change the fabric covers. I really like the heavy chenille with earth-toned stripes we chose to recover the old cushions with when we bought the boat. I am reminded again of the truth in the now almost cliched words of Ratty, that "there really is nothing like messing around in boats ...." (Grahame) Once started, it is difficult to stop.

While Jerry makes arrangements for getting Singoalla back in the water tomorrow so that we can head out for a holiday in the Gulf Islands, I have a moment to sit and mull over the events that brought us to this unique place on the Fraser River. It all seems so far off now. September, not even a year ago, flares into my memory like a comet– the time when my life had taken a u-turn because of a decision to return to school after a twenty-three year gap. The Singoalla had been my home then and not just our means to a floating vacation. I suppose you might see it as my personal haul out year.

2. Voyage

So, there we were last September, motoring at about two knots up the river to my new home for the next eight months, a marina on the middle arm of the Fraser. The delta of this mighty river, backbone of British Columbia, spreads broadly over the lower mainland, embracing Sea Island, where the Vancouver airport is located and further south, Lulu Island, which is within the city of Richmond, now home to a large Asian, mostly Chinese, immigrant population. Between these islands, on a shallow, truncated branch of the Fraser's north arm, there are a few marinas, one of which was our destination, the only available, convenient spot we could find in the Vancouver area, all others having long waiting lists or no live-aboard space.

Rising 250 feet above us on the left bank at the mouth of the river, were the heavily forested bluffs of the University of British Columbia endowment lands and behind us, at the meeting with the Pacific, was Wreck Beach, where those who prefer an all-over tan acquired under the watchful gaze of strangers, can do so legally. The land to the right was wide and flat, so unlike what we were used to, the coast of BC being mostly mountainous. The banks of the river, fringed with beach grass and sandy dunes, were scattered with logs that had washed up in storms or broken away from one of the booms that are hauled to mills further upstream. Many of these booms were tethered here, awaiting transport and a boom boat operator sorted logs with his tractor like vessel while a man nimbly scrambled along the bobbing logs to direct him. We passed a tug idling, perhaps waiting for the tide to change. Once in a while a seal would poke its head above the surface to survey his surroundings.

People walked dogs or jogged along the lonely stretches of beach here while overhead, plane traffic roared steadily. The YVR, second busiest airport in Canada, has more than 20,000 arrivals per day. That day, I knew that one of the planes taking off carried our friends to London for the start of a three month holiday in Europe. I waved just in case this was the one.

As we moved closer to the city, houses began to appear in neighbourhoods built on Musqueam First Nations land, and on Sea Island there is a well camouflaged sewage treatment station before a public park with a boat ramp. A sunny sky with puffs of cloud, the broad low lands and watery reflections combined to give the impression that we were travelling through a Dutch landscape. A few motor boats heading out with sports fishermen or returning from sea passed us, their owners proffering the kindly nautical wave.

It was the first day of school but I was already playing hookey because stormy weather had forced us to spend an extra night at Gibsons on our way down the coast. We had enjoyed a day wandering around the pretty little town, fictional location of _Molly's Reach_ in the _Beachcombers_ a TV show filmed there in the seventies and eighties. We had a pub dinner wharf-side before setting out early in the morning to sail, if there was a bit of wind, but mostly to motor, across Howe Sound, crossing the route of the Horseshoe Bay ferry and then south, past the mouth of English Bay where freighters, tankers and container ships rode at anchor waiting for their turn to unload at one of the piers in the Port of Vancouver. Jerry had offered to drop me off in downtown Vancouver so I could take the bus to college and meet him later at the marina but I didn't want to miss this trip up river because it was a new experience for me and still felt like a holiday.

We had left Comox four days earlier under sunny skies. As we were waving from the bay to John, who was to take our vehicle back home, we realized that the keys were still in my husband's pocket. Not a good sign for the voyage, I thought after Jerry called him to see if could get his friend to drive him home for the spare set.

Soon we had passed Goose Spit and were headed east for the mainland, anticipating the excitement of the adventure over gin and tonics when suddenly the boat juddered and Jerry sprang out of the cockpit to the bow. We had slid into the long sandbar that extends southward from Goose Spit and suddenly I was employed to lean as heavily as I could on the boom while Jerry cranked over the tiller as best he could to bring us to starboard and out of the sand. After a panicky struggle, and the fervent realization, that unlike Lord Tennyson, I was not ready to "meet my Pilot face to face when I had crost the bar" , the hull bobbed freely again and we were off. Hmm, I considered, that made two incidents and we were barely an hour from our slip.

The rest of the day went well though. We dropped anchor in Scotty Bay on Lasqueti Island and the wind that blew up in the night had Jerry on watch in the cockpit for much of the time as it was crowded and we couldn't get a strong hold for our anchor. The wind turned raucous the next day, making us stay put until the following morning when we left under very light winds, jibing between there and Texada Island and then across to the gas dock at Secret Cove on the mainland. The wind disappeared so we motored slowly for the rest of the long day, doing about five knots per hour down the coast. Finally, nearly at midnight, we entered the harbour at Gibsons and not having a completely reliable reverse gear on the engine yet, pulled straight in to the end of the Coast Guard's dock for the night – and then, for a second night, moved into a slip while a storm raged, delaying our trip up the Fraser for a day.

As we finally approached Richmond on the river, I looked ahead to the first of the four bridges that we would have to sail under to get to our berth that night. The first two, the Arthur Laing on the north arm and the Middle Arm Bridge which carries the SkyTrain to the airport, were both a breeze. The third however, the Sea Island Connector, has an allowance of 15 metres at low tide and we would have to get through soon, before the river rose anymore. Immediately after that, the fourth, an old swing bridge, the Moray, would have to be opened for us and this involved phoning the operator who would have to stop the traffic before running the antique equipment which slides open the central section. We tied up temporarily at the River Rock casino dock, where the Fraser's middle arm separates from the north arm, to phone the bridge operator.

All set, we pulled away and our engine promptly cut out. Minor panic ensued as we were being blown back toward the luxury yachts lining the dock. Jerry tried to restart the engine hoping for the best while I moved to the leeward side in hopes of pushing us away from an expensive collision. The engine chugged to life and we were on the move again, out of the moorage basin and into the river. As we approached the third bridge, the engine sputtered again and Jerry shouted to grab the anchor and be ready to drop it in case we lost power completely. The water here swirled with the outgoing tide and we were being pushed around like a cork. He did some frantic fiddling with the throttle thinking that there was just more residual gunk in the line that needed to blow out. I felt sick with horror that we had come so far only to be rammed against the concrete pilings of the bridge within sight of our destination – we definitely weren't boating in home waters anymore. Air and vehicle traffic zoomed above and around us and the modern high rises of Richmond, shone in the distance.

What were we doing here? Immediately, the open, silver sequined waters of Georgia Strait dotted with islands of rocky, heat soaked shores and beaches and the dry crunch underfoot of arbutus groves sprang to mind. I thought of days spent far from vehicles and buildings, often not even encountering another person and the only sounds, those made by the wind and waves, gulls and ravens. Why on earth had I chosen to go to college in a big city?

Suddenly, the engine revved again, we breathed a cautious sigh of relief and moved under the bridge so close to its underside that the mast head antenna, twanged as it bounced against each of the under girders. Motoring toward the swing bridge, we couldn't understand why it wasn't opening. Jerry called and the operator said he couldn't get it to work but that he'd try again. We began circling in the boat, hoping that the engine would keep going as drifting onto the rocks at the waters edge could be disastrous. Again we called and again he repeated that he would try for the third time. When our ritualistic, circling water dance in the entry waters of the middle arm finally bore results and the bridge opened for us, I considered where I was now and knew that I would have _Jiao_ , ancient Chinese dragon god of good fortune to propitiate. We cruised through, with a thank-you wave to the operator. Our marina beckoned to us in the twilight.

Like much of our voyage through life, we had acted on a silly idea we had thrown around, sceptical about results but willing to play awhile. We pulled into our slip and couldn't believe that we were there. Time would tell if we had made a mistake.

3. Into the Middle

The experimental adventure had begun. I had successfully crawled out of my box. People automatically assume that doing something unexpected when you are over fifty, especially if it involves leaving your spouse temporarily, is a midlife crisis or empty nest syndrome – the speculation flies thick and fast. But for me, it was simple. I had wanted to go back to school for a long time and my husband was supportive of my choice.

My twelve year, part time job at the library was not terribly interesting since giving up story time programming for the under five set, as this task, as well as others previously done by branch assistants had been taken over by newly hired librarians. Ironically, because automation was taking over many tedious aspects of the job, the range of work had become more boring as there were fewer tasks which were repeated more often, usually with less staff.

Although my adult twin boys would be living at home for the fall, they didn't welcome active parenting anymore. One of them, Alastair, was working with my husband until mid October anyway, helping him finish his yearly contractual obligations in Strathcona Park. I figured that it would be a good chance for my husband to bond with the lads without their mother fussing about the details of their lives when I wasn't being entertained by the endless cycles of laundry, cleaning and meal preparation. The two older kids had been out of the house for awhile, John pursuing an eclectic mix of school, work and travel and our first child Liz, who had returned to university in Victoria, was also working part time as a reporter for a radio station. They had already mastered the art of conveying facts about their lives to their parents on a need-to-know-only basis.

The time seemed right for me to set out as I was just so bored. So bored with the dinners I had been cooking for twenty-five years, so bored with the household chores, so bored with work, so bored with the beautiful valley we live in.... how could that be? Really, I came to realize, I was bored with the person I had become. I was in the middle of my life, between motherhood and grannie-hood, between adult children who didn't need me and ageing parents who would need me soon, between a convenient job that was no longer enjoyable and the ability to choose to use my last working years in the pursuit of a new career.

Because it had been such a long time since I had finished my degree, I was hesitant about going back to school. Could I write anything anymore? An essay seemed a stretch. And what about computer skills? All I had been doing for years was using the ubiquitous new verbs: emailing and Googling. Could I concentrate hard enough to learn and remember something when I was having difficulty getting through the instructions for my first cell phone?

As there was the possibility of failure, I decided that university tuition was too rich a gamble for me and that it would be too distracting to be at the same school as my daughter – and who knows, she might try to steal my friends. So I had started looking at colleges. I chose Langara because it got me away from home and had a good transfer rate to UBC where I figured that there had to be some Masters program that would suit me eventually. One of our nieces had been to Langara and liked it and the campus was near my sister's home so there was a cup of tea, a box of tissues and a shoulder to cry on nearby should I need it.

The next problem was where to live. Rent in Vancouver was prohibitive but I had my sister, a sister-in-law and a brother-in-law and his wife all of whom would probably give me a good deal on a room at their places if I had asked. As much as I love them all, what I needed was total distraction-less solitude at least for awhile if I was going to kick start my brain. Our boat had been sitting at the local marina for a few years now, waiting engine repairs and for us to organize time to take a trip. How perfect, I thought, if we could move it to a marina in Vancouver, as we had to pay moorage fees anyway, and I could live aboard there. My husband agreed that it might work but that it did involve our finally getting the engine fixed and a foray to the big city in search of a new marina. For a great deal of fuss and for many more dollars than we thought we would have to pay, the engine was finally running, albeit with a dickey reverse gear, the day before we had to leave. Earlier in the spring we had found the marina.

One of the first things I did when my floating home was settled and Jerry had returned to Vancouver Island to finish work was to explore downtown Richmond. When I came across the art gallery at the civic centre, I toured through. The current show, _Waterscapes_ , by Gu Xiong, was a multi-media exhibition about the Fraser and Yangtze Rivers connecting migrants and their histories. A river of white paper boats suspended from wires ran the length of the gallery. There I was, full of rivery musings, engrossed in his fascinating photographs when I realized I was also in the middle of cultures: my parents were immigrants from Sweden, I was raised in three Canadian provinces where my heritage was practically invisible but now, I was in this city where about 45% of the population were Chinese and many more were from other Asian cultures. My children were second generation Canadian on my side and many generations on my husband's. I was the only first generation Canadian in my family, living now as a visible minority. What a peculiar role I had found myself in.

For Xiong, the tributaries that flow together to create the Fraser and Yangtze represent the confluence of cultures. His words had an effect on me as they articulated an idea that had been gathering itself in my head for some time: how should my heritage and my Canadian identity define the person I wanted to be? "How can I bring the two main rivers in my life together? ... I have to become like a river myself – a river of migration, a river of transcultural identities, a river of change and uncertainty..." (Gu Xiong) I wondered if I might feel more at home in Richmond than I had anywhere else.

4. Old School Meets New School

It was the moment I had been waiting for ... actually, twenty-four hours after the moment I had been waiting for. Jerry had walked me the two blocks to the Aberdeen SkyTrain station like a fretful parent and I had gone on alone to take the ten minute, trip to 49th Avenue where the campus of Langara College has sat since 1970. Two-car SkyTrains run regularly, mostly on elevated guideways, in Vancouver's network of automated, driverless mass rapid transit. The Canada Line, which runs to the airport and Richmond, had been completed the previous year and would carry me on elevated tracks from this side of the Fraser, over the river on the longest mass transit only bridge, and then go underground beneath Cambie Street to downtown Vancouver although I got off at the second stop before it did so.

I ascended the stairs from the 49th Avenue station where newspapers were handed out at a frantic pace by one or two distributors of those short form dailies with local headlines, condensed world news and sports highlights and often, a strangely fascinating tidbit like the posting on _eBay_ of the _Octomom's_ underwear. Over the year, I looked forward to the friendly smile and nod from the man who usually stood sentry at this exit. I wondered what he thought of all the commuters who rushed by him as if he wasn't there.

I would do the daily crossword later so I stuffed the paper into my silky, mahogany leather book bag, picked up the previous year in Florence. My choice of which computer to buy for school was based solely on what would fit in this bag and so, it now held a new, white, _Asus_ notebook. I was as thrilled as my daughter had been twenty-one years ago, starting grade one with a new pack of Crayola pencil crayons.

I forced myself to walk bravely to Building B where all my classes were to take place, feeling like a lost mother from a kitchen in the suburbs. A girl stopped to ask me about classes and I realized that she thought I was a professor. She looked surprised when I told her I was a new student too and then felt vaguely like one for the first time.

I had chosen to enrol in subjects that always interested me but for one reason or another, I hadn't taken while at university or since: first year Art History, Greek and Roman Classic studies, Latin (which I hoped would help me with those crosswords) and survey courses of Western and Eastern Religions. I had registered for a Philosophy of Logic course too but dropped it, logically, having decided earlier to drop whichever of the five seemed least appealing after the first week. Four courses was all that I thought I'd be able to handle.

My plan had been that I'd do my classes and then enjoy the rest of my time in Vancouver as a sort of tourist. When I was handed printed sheets of course expectations and picked up my text books, it dawned on me that it wasn't going to be a lark unless I wanted to embarrass myself with lack lustre grades, repeating my academic results at University where I had mostly wasted time in my youth.

I had two professors that I loved immediately -- both were women, both somewhere in the ball park of my own age. They had been teaching for a long time and presented well developed and organized outlines. Right away, I was gobbling up the material in my Art History and Greek studies classes, eagerly doing all the reading. The Latin class was going to be a challenge. Class mates dropped out steadily in the first week, one of whom was the only other older student and my potential study pal. Grasping at straws however, I formed an immediate bond with young Quintus of the Apulian countryside. Loosely based on the poet Horace, Quintus was our fictional guide through the Oxford Latin Course text. Gwyneth Lewis, who also taught the Greek Classics course, sparked up her Latin classes with amusing anecdotes and segues.

The Religions of the West course met only once a week for a three hour stretch and I was very interested to see how it would pan out as a variety of nationalities and religions were represented in class. Religious debate is not for the faint hearted. I wasn't too keen on the "discuss in groups" approach taken in this class, as I felt like the ageing auntie, always treated politely when I added my five cents worth. Over the weeks though, I was to discover that the more I crept out of my comfort zone, the more I came to respect most of my fellow students and really enjoy their company. I knew next to nothing about Islam and nothing at all about Eastern Religions so looked forward to hearing what some of the students would add to the classwork.

When I had attended the University of Victoria in the late seventies and early eighties, the student body was drawn mainly from the white middle classes. They were almost all freshly out of high school and worried mostly about where the next party was. I found the college population at Langara included many young, working adults, more worried about paying the bills and getting value out of their time at college. Also, almost every ethnicity was represented, Asian mostly, and what particularly intrigued me was that many of them were also first generation Canadians, navigating the rocky waters between the old country and the new. On this unique level, I felt I belonged. I had never been in a class with the variety of names that comprised the roll call for my Latin class, everything from Attila to Zhuang.

I found that in lecture, it was easier for me to grasp general concepts and connect the new information with other, older data but when it came to listening, after twenty plus years of parenting and working with the public, I had developed an uncanny ability to appear as if I was listening while only taking in a word here and there. As a result, I felt like my hearing was delayed now, absorbing each sentence only when the instructor had moved onto the next one which got tricky when called upon to comment. I'm sure that occasionally, the waiting questioner guessed that the poor, old dear was too embarrassed to say that she didn't know. Usually, I did know, having done more than the required homework but my _brown-noser_ gene was just taking awhile to kick into high gear.

After that first day though, having overdosed on new information, I walked the couple of blocks to the train station with books weighing heavily in my bag, my head processing the data in its own time, and felt, officially, like a student.

5. For the Record

Later that week, I found myself in the line of students snaking itself through the Student Union building waiting to get my mugshot for a Student card and bus pass. Obviously the only person over thirty in line, perhaps I worried too much about this photo that would have to be presented on numerous occasions for examination throughout the following year. Going by the black and white snap of my not enough sleep, cold sore recovery, escapee from an Eastern Bloc country face that graced my current passport, I had cause for concern.

Why oh why, had I not lost more weight last summer? Thank God, I had at least got myself tanned, very tanned - Ricardo Montalban tanned. Not really my fault as I tan easily and had picked up some great travel writing to read whilst lying about in the backyard and at the local beach, barely putting in any hours at work, husbanding my energy for the school year ahead. I allowed these self absorbed, non-academic thoughts to pollute my mind with their bad karma.

The young guy who joined the line behind me said something. It took me a moment to realize that he was speaking to me and when I did, he repeated his question. "How long have you been waiting?" I said not long and commented on the number of people who had already moved ahead for photos. I asked if it was his first year here and soon we were chatting about school and college. He told me about his Iranian family, his sisters and father who had returned to Tehran. How bizarre, I thought, that this kid from half a world away, should find himself a student at a small college on the coast of Canada, bridging a cultural divide fraught with the kind of differences that wars are made of. This boy, a year younger than my youngest kids, who had already experienced so much of all the bad that life throws at you, was probably happy to chat with a non-threatening mom-type on his first day of school. I tried to reassure him that it would work out well.

Before I knew it, I was called to step up to a camera and suddenly, I didn't care about the photo. I was lucky enough to be able to take on this adventure right here in my homeland, lucky enough to be a citizen in a war free zone that welcomed female students.

My daughter said my photo looked weird, like a grinning, bronze statue.

6. Minoru Park en Plein Air

My husband had stayed for a day or two until I was comfortable living alone at the marina but had to get back to work, the idea being that we would visit back and forth when we could until the New Year, when he would join me. One of my first weekends alone found me at loose ends. I decided to take the SkyTrain to Richmond city centre for an orientation tour. I wanted to find the library so that I could hook up the card I had already set up at the remarkable, downtown branch of the Vancouver Public Library. Built in 1995, this pseudo coliseum like, nine storey structure, has roughly eight to ten times the traffic of the library I had been working in. I was interested to see the what the Richmond library was like.

I had explored the City of Richmond website in the summer and acquainted myself with the names of some of the buildings and parks in the area. Minoru Park was on my list of places to check out. It was located where there had been a racetrack in the early part of the last century, and was named after a thoroughbred racehorse owned by King Edward VII, winner of the Epsom Derby

The contour of the lower mainland on a map looks to me like an elf in profile, his big smile being the south arm of the Fraser, his upturned nose, the ivory tower of UBC and the Point Grey area, his eye is False Creek, and his brow, Stanley Park. His cheek, where I lived, was Lulu Island, named for the "chaste and beautiful" (Ross) Lulu Sweet, American entertainer of the late 1800's who had so captivated Colonel Moody of the Royal Engineers that he had been induced to honour the yet unnamed island in her memory. The low lying Lulu is the product of three million tons of silt carried down the Fraser every year for the last ten thousand years and is mostly between four and six and a half feet above sea level. Consequently, only a steady process of ditching and dyke building has made the island fit for the erection of buildings. Even so, a big quake or Tsunami would wipe out the island – a tenuous place for life, maybe seen as only one more hazard in the adventure for newcomers.

Originally Musqueam band territory, Lulu Island was cleared for pastureland by European settlers beginning in the 1860's. Lulu, along with Sea Island, became the Corporation of Richmond in 1879 and over the next century, evolved into a sort of country suburb of Vancouver. Because of its proximity to the airport, and some say the attraction of the word "rich" in the city's name, Richmond's immigration rate from China grew by about 44% in this century. The 2010 Winter Olympics put Richmond on the map as it was here that the _Oval_ , venue for speed skating was built.

I took the train two stops to the end of the line, Richmond Brighouse station, named after pioneer Samuel Brighouse, who was responsible for planting what are now the huge oaks that line River Road just up a few blocks from where I lived. I joined the other commuters pouring down the stairs of the airy, glass and steel building. Many were headed across the street to the Richmond Centre, the largest mall here, whose many billboards grace the train stop platforms titillating the wealthy to fill their bags with merchandise. I examined the station map and got thoroughly mixed up so decided to walk up No. 3 Road to see where it took me.

I passed an inviting store in one of those 1970's strip malls, _Memories Thrift Shop_ and considered going in but resisted as I didn't want to carry anything yet. I crossed at the intersection of No. 3 with Granville Avenue, not to be confused with Granville Street in downtown Vancouver, and was pleasantly surprised to discover that I was now at the new City Hall. This attractive, modern building stands in contrast to the stone Celtic cross out front which memorializes the war dead, mostly local farm boys at the time, I suppose. I strolled on, marvelling at the stepped water garden and fountain along the side of the civic area and passed a planted stand of rustling leaved, whippet like birches.

I was surprised at the neatness and openness of what was obviously an area of high density housing and business. I came to the bronze statue of the horse named Minoru, read the marker but carried on to the Richmond Cultural Centre where the library is located along with the Art Gallery and Museum.

I got my card sorted at the library and bought a book bag printed with a cute Japanese cartoon character and outside, noticed the bins for returning books: adult books, kids books and Chinese books. I was now on the opposite side of the mall away from the train stop. I thought I had somehow missed the park so asked the next pedestrian for directions and she informed me that I was almost there, to turn left at the trail past the many storied, 70's apartment blocks.

The long feeder path to the park is lined by a chain link fence clotted with stunted blackberry vines, looking city tired and not entirely safe on a dark night but I marched down it until it connected to the park trails. All of sudden, here was a treed and flowered haven, complete with lawn bowling pitch and ponds, ducks and rabbits. The park reminded me of Beacon Hill Park in Victoria, with its faded fin de siecle atmosphere.

I began to see the scenes of the park unfold like a series of impressionist paintings. The invention of the paint tube is what finally enabled artists to dab their colours into captured moments of the world outside. I became the _flaneur_ , spotting an elderly couple holding hands while sitting on a bench overlooking the rose garden and children squealing whilst running around broad planted beds in a landscaped lawn, their parents enjoying a private kiss amongst trailing willow branches at the pond's edge. I felt a creeping loneliness so stopped to rest on a sunny bench to text Jerry. Luckily he had his phone with him and we had a short misspelled conversation after which I felt much better when I texted, "gd by xox."

I took myself where the paths led and along the way, came to a charming little chapel, bright white and picketed. The door was open so I went in to look around. It was peaceful, the bone dry panelling and pews gave the antique surroundings a redolent air. A series of stained glass windows, donated by pioneers of the area, depicted local industry and religious homily, here within the Dominion's tamed borders. A minister appeared from the small room behind me and asked if I was passing through or if I required help. I admired the church and he pointed out the highlights and gave me a historical snapshot. The building had been moved here in 1967 from the area now asphalt and scrub that is crossed and bisected by roads and bridges where No. 3 road meets River Road. I thanked him for the chat and left as he had to do a quick vacuum between two of the many weddings at which he officiates on most weekends. Outside, there was a Chinese wedding party gathering, excited and nervously trying to be comfortable in their fancy clothes.

I strolled up to the fields edged in ancient trees where there are soccer pitches, tennis courts and an oval track. I passed a flock of plump, preening Canadian geese, then crossed the field to pick out a route between kids, parents and coaches. Past the bleachers, my way connected back to the Cultural Centre and what I realized now was also a seniors centre and a sports centre with skating rinks and pools. This was a whole different world to me where you could live and walk to every amenity you needed. At home, this convenience is traded for a need to drive everywhere, the price for country living. When I had four kids to get to music and swim lessons, 4-H club, St. John's Ambulance, rugby practice, confirmation classes, a downtown library and friends with homes equally remote as ours, logistics were a definite consideration when planning any day's activities.

I retraced my way back to the second hand store I had seen and went in for a browse. Halleluiah – it was 50 percent off day. I too could join the crowds making their way to the train stop burdened by obvious tokens of consumerism. I went nuts and spent $3.50, coming home very pleased with my purchases: a teapot, cutting board, art note cards and a t-shirt. The joys of city living.

7. Dulce Domum

Cleaning day on the boat. I had spent the morning procrastinating in bed reading one of my fluff books, brought aboard for distraction from more scholarly pursuits. I ate the last of the leftover soup for lunch and cleaned out the small bar fridge that was almost empty anyway, trying to work my way into housework. I had to remind myself how easy the job would be now, I had already cleaned quite thoroughly a couple of times in September, organizing and getting rid of built up dirt in forgotten corners and mold spots picked up while sitting in harbour, unused for a few years. I considered what my job had been reduced to, comparing the 30 x 5 feet of surfaces facing the onslaught of my broom, rag and duster to the almost exactly 20 times larger surface at home. I wondered if my boys were being as thorough with their cleaning as I hoped.

It was a day of glorious October sunshine so with hatches open, I dragged out all the bedding and cushions from the V berth at the bow of the boat. The tiny bathroom, or _head_ in nautical lingo separates the bow and the saloon with a folding door. The saloon, being the widest part of the Singoalla, is comprised of two, three seater benches facing each other with a table between which is attached to the base of the mast, allowing it to be turned out of the way. Above the seats, are shelves, one of which can be folded down to create another bunk. On the right shelf, I had books, some small bins for assorted storage and my bar which consisted of half a bottle of Shiraz and about a half an inch of gin. On the port hand shelf, which was wider, I had filled two large and two smaller clear plastic bins with clothing. Hammocks filled with extra sheets and rolled fleece blankets hang on either side, above the shelves.

I brought the saloon cushions up to the deck to air out too, covering almost all available surfaces. Topsides looked like a hurricane had whipped through that morning to drape every line, winch and the boom with hanging bedding, airing carpets and scattered cushions.

Below again, I swept nooks and crannies with a hand broom before moving on to give all the shelves and rails a wipe with something soapy while listening to the taped story of brother Anthony and his wayward donkey in Latin – at least that was my guess.

The kitchen area, or _galley_ , is a two inch step up from the saloon and covers a floor space of about 8 square feet. Facing the stern, there is a small sink beside the little ladder of steps up to the cockpit. To the right of the sink there is a counter surrounded by useful dish storage nooks and enclosed shelves. A chunk of the counter can be lifted to reveal the food locker. As this must be kept cool with ice, which we only used when sailing, I used it now to store a variety of non-perishable food supplies. With dockside power, we could plug in a bar fridge that we had moved onto the boat. It sat on the other side of the staircase as we wouldn't be needing to access the storage area that ran behind it to the stern, filled now with sailing gear.

Facing inward, at the end of the counter, there was a gimballed stove, powered by a tank of propane gas kept out in the cockpit. The line which which ran from the tank, needed to be opened at the tank and then with a switch in the galley before lighting the elements with a match or lighter. Because of the age of the stove, we decided that I shouldn't use the oven – the door had a tendency to fall off and was currently held closed with duct tape. This limited my cooking to the stove top only and I was already finding ways to improvise any recipes that involved baking.

To the left of the stairs, across from the fridge, there was a chart table separated from the saloon by a wall where there is a barometer, clock and the electric panels of switches, one above and one below a narrow shelf where I kept keys, flashlights, pencils and notepaper. The table was covered in piles of school work, a bowl of fruit and an orchid that I had received for Mother's Day and was trying, unsuccessfully, to keep alive. I knew that it hadn't stood a chance at home. I tidied the desk, throwing some junk papers into the red plastic garbage bag holder attached to the side of the desk.A vigorous burst of galley cleaning, followed by a quick scrub of sink, mirror in the head and token window buffings were completed in forty minutes. Finally, I got the ocean friendly soap out from the storage area beneath one of the bench seats and sprayed and wiped all the floors – it is amazing how much debris collects on a small floor space, even from just one person. I lifted the panel in the saloon floor to check that the level of water in the bilge was low, indicating that the pump was in working order.

In less than an hour, everything was looking almost the same but emanating a much cleaner aura, at least in my eyes. I went above to squeeze myself in amongst the airing furnishings to enjoy a glass of wine in the sun and watch for the sculls of rowers that I had heard calling practise manoeuvres on the river earlier. The UBC boathouse was just down river and eager students often sped by with Olympian enthusiasm, their coaches in motor boats nearby, loud-hailing instructions.

From further up the marina drifted the music and laughter that signalled the beginning of an on-board party or cruise up the river. A breeze ruffled the water, shattering the sun into jostling fragments and flapping the blankets hanging on the boom. Then that wonderful smell drifted under my nose. One of the restaurants up on No. 3 Road was cooking their garlic prawn dish again. This aroma had fuelled eating dreams for the last couple of weeks. But now suddenly, the thought that I could cook some myself popped into my head. I had noticed on a previous shopping trip that the Superstore up the road had small inexpensive packages of prawns on offer. I grabbed my backpack and wallet, slid the hatch cover over the stairs, fitted in the hatch door, locked it with a padlock, hurried down the wharf, up the gangway, and through the locked gate to the parking lot.

I took the route along the dyke which lines the river, about five feet higher than the road. I scuffed my way through the drifts of crunchy oak leaves littering the path, passed the Richmond Yacht club with its rather non-ostentatious fleet of crafts bobbing below the locked gate and crossed the road to march through an industrial parking lot, by the homeless person's bolthole in the shrubbery, across the overgrown railway tracks, over the trickle of stream choked with garbage, and through the back lot of the Superstore to my own personal mecca, the seafood department for the coveted prawns. With the addition of a few other groceries and a fresh garlic bulb, I reversed the route and within minutes, had melting butter in the frying pan over one of the elements and rice bubbling away on another.

I guiltlessly gorged myself on a pile of steaming butter-garlicky prawns, thinking of fellow citizens on the dock, covetously smelling my dinner and had another glass of wine for dessert. Light clouds moved in, covering the sun on its descent and the temperature dropped, reminding me that cold weather was only a couple of weeks away. I brought in the fresh bedding, remade the bed and put the cushions together again for the saloon couches. I donned my flannel nightie, brushed my teeth and climbed into my fresh smelling nest with Huston Smith's, _Religions of the World_ for an assigned reading on the Pentateuch for the next religious studies class. Reading complete, and drifting off to sleep, I felt like Moses bobbing in his wicker basket, dreaming of the promised land.

8. Silver Loogie

"At the giant silver loogie turn right," I would tell visitors to our little home on the water. Then I would have to explain my unkind description of the sculpture which graces our part of the dyke trail. More than a dozen feet tall, this elongated, metallic, organic shape represents a drop of water or mercury, but I was hard pressed to see it. To me, maybe because I have three sons, that globular, drooping shape looked uncannily like something expectorated, enlarged and metallized. At first, when I squinted, it kind of looked like an impressionistic, flying goose. This statue and many others around Vancouver were part of the 2009 Biennale Public Art Exhibition. There were some really compelling rolling mask faces under the Canada Line tracks at the Lansdowne Mall a few blocks away and a massive shiny head of Lenin with a tiny Miss Mao balancing on top, at the corner of Elmbridge and Alderbridge Roads nearer downtown Richmond. I love public sculpture and think that there should be more but I could not make my peace with the one nearest our marina.

One evening when I walked home from a late night of work at the campus library, my eyes drank in the magnificent sky. It was one of those times when the overshadowing cloud cover is suddenly lit up by an almost eerie last burst of hidden sun casting everything in a lovely mauve and gray wash. I hurried across the crosswalk then raised my head as I climbed the wide, low staircase that led to the dyke path and there, before me was the exquisite sight of Jun Ren's, Water #10, hovering like some silvery space angel, a holy apparition bathed in an opalescent light. The stage seemed to be set for a crack of lightening or the toll of a bell.

With my eyes riveted to the vision, I almost ran into a man who was taking photos of the phenomenon. "This is the first time that I've really enjoyed the sight of that thing," I commented. He nodded his head, "I know what you mean. And aren't we lucky to be here at just the right time?" It was so stunning that I had to have another look from out on the water when I boarded the boat.

I wondered how I could have been so blind, so crass. I thought of my first trip to this neighbourhood and how ugly it had seemed when most of what I noticed were the abandoned lots and broken fences, the hideous sign of the closed _XOX Lounge_ and the graffiti tagged walls. Since then, I had gazed deeper, grown accustomed to a different viewpoint and observed separately from the usual signs of urban decay, the unique beauty in a community redefining itself.

I have a new respect for _Water #10_ ; it's all about the right time for everything – although it's still the silver loogie to me most days.

9. Up-River Wandering

One sunny Saturday, I decided to take a walk up-river to the area past the Oak Street bridge where the north arm of the Fraser flows around Mitchell Island. I started out with a small pack on my back and no particular schedule. Up River Road, there is a path where the road breaks, to allow for the rush of traffic off the ramp of the Moray bridge before popping up again further along. When you cross this busy road, there is another path, strewn with empty bottles, litter and the very odd type of cast off, like one red canvas sneaker ( there has to be a story there), through thick tangles of dusty blackberry and stunted willow shrubs to the road that leads to the River Rock Casino. Then suddenly, one block from the cast off sneaker, the neighbourhood gets posh with valets at the brass handled casino doors, imposing, mock-classical urns of flowers, and gamblers dressed in finery parading up the red carpets to the opulent rooms waiting to awe them while relieving them of their money.

With no interest in gambling, I strolled on, past a marine repair dock, under the SkyTrain bridge that links to Cambie Street, by the substation and continued through the outskirts of the light industrial neighbourhood. I followed a path that led me back to the river's edge and a wide tree-lined trail, reminiscent of those well travelled paths in old European parks. The riverside vista opened to an up close view of the working Fraser and the industries across the water on Mitchell Island. Tugs haul log booms to mills here and there are other working boats too, the Coast Guard river boat passes by on occasion and salvagers search for stray logs.

I looked behind me to catch sight of a SkyTrain crossing the river on the high arc of the bridge - one of the ones in which I rode to school. While jostling for space in the crowded jumble of early morning commuters, most with a hand held electronic device or earbuds or deeply ensconced in the newspaper, I had often looked down enviously at a lone hiker on this trail, thinking that if I were to cut classes, a stroll here would make it worthwhile. This day, it was warm and clear-skyed -- a gift. I met a few people along the way, all happy to be out of doors for a few more stolen summery moments.

At the end of the trail there is a float with tug boats tied alongside and their accompanying business offices. From there, I rejoined River Road, uncluttered by work day vehicles and passed a seafood packing warehouse that announced itself by smell before becoming visible. Then, the Isabella Winery, temptingly open for tastings but I knew that I would want to buy a bottle and then be forced to add it to the weight of my pack to carry all the way back in the heat. I meandered along the road as it passed all sorts of businesses. It always amazes me that people can start from scratch and be successful in business. All that market predicting, budgeting, overheads and staffing baffles me completely. I think that people who engage their working lives in the stuff of commerce seem to have a handle on their lives, have such self assurance that if they diligently work the dough of the market economy, its yeast is sure to keep them rising. And where would the rest of us we be without them? Dreaming and arguing in crude huts by campfires, I guess.

I came to a hole in the wall cafe and bought a cool drink, strolled a bit further; I was almost at the Knight Street bridge when I came across a narrow park that followed a stream, reduced to a trickle now. I decided to switch directions and return back through the area so entered this park that led away from the Fraser. I kept going until it crossed railway tracks which I then walked along. It was so quiet and grassy, with not a person in sight, and my curiosity about the variety of businesses based here had me busy peeking into their backyards. I almost preferred this urban exploration to a walk in one of the scenic parks of Vancouver that I knew would be too full of people madly recreating.

Alone in my thoughts, I contemplated what I knew was turning into a momentous year for me even if I failed to do well in school. I considered the worst case scenario: unable to focus on new topics, no ability for essay writing anymore, memory shot for exams, lonely on boat, driven home by fear and homesickness. Maybe some people would commiserate politely but nevertheless with an implied "I told you so". Or, they may even gloat at my failure but I had a hard time thinking of anyone. Most people I had talked to were very supportive or at least interested. And I realized that in the grand scheme of things, nobody really cared whether I succeeded or not except me. So, I reaffirmed that I would not place any unreasonable expectations on myself, that I would take each day, each assignment as it came. This was an experiment to see if I wanted to return to school and the outcome mattered to no one but me. I would try to be a successful student but without the pressure of starting a lifetime career. If I did well, great, and if I failed, oh well, lesson learned. I had a home and job that I could move back to in order to rethink plans for the fifteen years before retirement age. In fact, I could take as long as I wanted as the Boomer generation is prophesied to break the rules about retirement.

A wander through a couple more streets brought me back to the tugs and breezy, leafy trail. The sun was on its downward journey and the light golden, reflecting in giant slants of light in windows across the river. The mood was so unusual and quiet, that an almost mythical quality seemed to enfold time and this grove of trees. I wouldn't have been surprised to see Pan step out of the woods. There was a photographer where the trail ended and I mentioned that it was a perfect time and place to take pictures and regretted not having brought my camera. He agreed with an enigmatic smile and we parted, both content to be in this lonely and strangely beautiful city setting.

I retraced my way back to the marina, stopping to buy a bottle of wine to share with Jerry when he came the next day. But until then, I had some Latin exercises to catch up on.

10. Laundry Day

I usually chose to wash my clothes on Monday or Tuesday because I had many chapters of reading to do for class on Wednesday and the bright lights in the nice, new laundry room were perfect for the consumption of dry literature while the machines swished, spun and tumbled.

Before proceeding from our boat, I would check that along with dirty laundry, I had my soap, dryer sheets, keys, tokens, phone and homework. All this I would pack into a large Sketchers carry bag. Then off I would trundle down the wharves to the facilities building. Because the marina is on a river, the wharf could only grow lengthwise along the bank and not outward as it would block water traffic. Consequently, the wharf is very long with a couple of ramps leading up to different parts of the parking lot which also spreads lengthwise, along the dyke, between the river and the road .

In the late afternoon when I usually set out there would be one or two people to greet as I plodded to my destination. The riverside ducks would be entertaining along the way, and sometimes another type of bird would try to join in their conversational groups, usually a grebe or some geese and once, some swans. I examined other boats and house boats along the way, wondering what their stories were. At times, the damp wood of the wharves got a bit frosty as the sun set and the thermometer dropped. Depending on whether or not the tide was low, the steel mesh ramp at the end of the dock could be sitting anywhere between a 75 degree vertical climb or practically horizontal. After that, there were only the few yards past the office, usually closed by then, and a short walk along the cheerful row of hanging baskets still struggling to produce a few late flowers, past the bathrooms, and finally, opposite a gazebo with a few chairs and a table overlooking the busy river and bridges, was the laundry room where I'd set up camp for the next hour and a half.

Usually, I was the only one there but once or twice, somebody was just finishing their load, or filling a bucket with water because their water lines had frozen. I don't think anyone ever arrived with laundry at the same time I was there. I loaded a machine, or two every second week, shoved in my tokens and pulled myself up onto the counter opposite to read. It was much easier to read the fascinating reportage of that ancient gossip, Suetonius or the excessively confusing differences between branches of Buddhism or to study the first through third declensions of neuter nouns in Latin in a room where the only distraction was the left-behind thong someone had thoughtfully hung on one of the hooks on the wall. But this was only when the weather had turned from the balmy days of early fall.

In warmer weather, one could sit out at the gazebo where there were countless things to snatch your attention from the textbook. The Moray Bridge spans the river quite close so there is a constant rush of vehicles and a number of emergency ones with their sirens blaring. The next marina along has an interesting group of houseboats and it was always fascinating to discover how people made these homes so .... homey. Across the river, the Delta Inn has a waterfront deck for summer dining and another marina attached – this one with some very pricey looking yachts. There is usually some boat traffic to watch on the river too, rowers and speedboats or bouncy log salvagers and occasionally, a glistening seal head would pop up looking around like a lost tourist. In the distance, there is Mt. Seymour, Grouse Mountain and Cypress Bowl, the lights on their ski-runs twinkling as the evening got darker. Out here, reading abandoned, the coolness of the air eventually drove me back indoors.

If the whirring of the spin cycle was making me sleepy or if the reading was getting bogged down, I'd stop and text someone, hoping for a response. Also, there was the intermission between washing and drying for dragging me away from my textbooks. The second half of the laundry session was when I buckled down as there was a goal and a deadline: try to finish so many pages before the dryer finishes. At the sound of the buzzer, reading ceased and all attention turned to the perfect folding and packing of clean clothes. A quick check to see that I had all items I left the boat with and I would once more plunge into the chilly night for the stroll home.

One night about half way down the dock, I saw a strange point leaving a wide wake in the water near the bank. I stood still to watch as this was something I hadn't seen yet. The marina was very quiet and the evening lit by only a few stars. Intrigued, I watched a creature come up almost beside my part of the wharf and then, splash, slap - a huge beaver sounded the alarm to whomever else may have been hanging out and plunged beneath the water. I was thrilled. I had first noticed the beaver at the river's edge, foraging amongst the bulrushes when walking along the dyke early one morning in September. Never having seen a beaver in the wild before, I was surprised at his size, much bigger than a cat. I had hoped to see him swimming.

I proceeded to my watery home and he, to his. I hoped that we would meet again.

11. Lions at the Gate

I headed back to Vancouver Island one weekend and was enjoying the view from the bus as we were travelling across the Lions Gate Bridge to the ferry terminal at Horseshoe Bay. The history of this Vancouver icon makes interesting reading. When completed in 1938, financed by British investment, it was the longest suspension bridge in the Empire. The lion, symbol of the Empire, had also found a place in the hearts of the dwellers of the very young city of Vancouver as across the inlet, to the northwest, twin mountain peaks towered, named the Lions, their gaze taking in the whole of the lower mainland. (D'acres and Luxton)

I particularly love the Art Deco lion sculptures at the south entrance of the bridge. The artist, Charles Marega, died just months after they were completed after having lived in Vancouver since 1909. His work can be seen in a number of locations in the city like the decoration on the Burrard Bridge and some of the motifs on the uber-decorated Marine Building. There are another pair of lions, in granite, in front of the Art Gallery, created by John Bruce in 1910 but they appear unsure and dishevelled, perhaps reflecting Vancouver as the twenty-four year old it was then. Marega's lions, created just after the city turned fifty, have a sphinx like solidity and dignity.

I had seen lots of Shishi, or stone lions, in Richmond too. To the Chinese, pairs of lions bring protection at doorways or gates. There is a travel agency less than a block from our boat with a set of these lions at their entrance. I wondered if the Shishi at the bridge were meant to protect the British Properties on the north side from the immigrants who were originally denied the right to own property there.

Lion gates have been built in many places and in many forms for thousands of years. In my art history class, we had learned about the one built around 1400 BC by Hittites at Boghazkov, Turkey, the right hand lion, still recognizably roaring although so battle weary. In Greece too, one hundred years or so later, the incredibly wealthy Mycenaeans built a gate of huge stones where, above the lintel, two lions confront each other with their forelegs positioned on a raised pedestal at the base of a column. All through human civilization, lions have inspired sculpture. I think my favourites are the New York Public Library mascots, named _Patience_ and _Fortitude_. Sculpted in marble, they have stood outside the library since 1911. Maybe we should nickname our bridge lions too, perhaps Taylor and Point – after A.J.T. Taylor, the dynamo behind the bridge project and Steven Point, B.C.'s first Native Lieutenant General – after all, most of the land acquired for the bridge was expropriated from the local bands.

12. Sidewalks

The interminable sidewalk ... how many times did I trudge its cracked and sagging path from the 49th Avenue train stop to the utilitarian concrete blocks of the college? Rain, slush, snow, wind – all elements were braved for the sake of higher education. As I slogged along in various forms of weariness, excitement, nervousness, or contrariness, I was nurtured by the bright promise that ahead was, at the very least, a warm and dry room in which to sit.

Occasionally, I overheard snippets of the argot of youth. It was heartening to learn that my young fellow students could still communicate in person in the real world albeit some of their observations were less clear than others. One day, I heard a budding philosopher tell his friend that, "some things you just learned and could easily forget – but other things you, like, harsh learned," and I could only surmise that these were the necessary facts such as elementary math equations and required reading skills. So, that set me to thinking of what harsh learning I had annexed to the academic in my wide experience. I knew that the rent or mortgage was paid or you had no roof over your head. I also knew that children must eat, often more than you can afford and that therefore the ground beef could be stretched. I knew that friendship must be cared for or lost and that most things in life were really privileges no matter what the revolutionaries shouted. Always, you can be sure, someone pays.

Some mornings, where the sidewalk ended, there was a lesson waiting that was pure magic. A transport back in time, a rich vein of imagining, art that impacted or literature that moved. I soaked up these moments and joyfully hied to the library later for more reading or video on the subject. The best times were when two or more classes overlapped – classical art of Greece and the accompanying history, or art and religion of early Christianity, or history of Augustinian Rome and Latin speeches covering the same period. I think there is a benefit to being an older student, an enriched quality that is mixed into new lessons like the coins in a Christmas pudding.

Other mornings, but not many, nothing was right. I had a philosophy lecturer who didn't like to philosophize or the declension of Latin pronouns was impossible to grasp. Some of my lectures in comparative religion sounded like they had been written thirty years ago and repeated ever since. Even then though, there was the hope of coffee and a matrimonial square at the Student Union cafe with a friendly classmate before going home or retiring to the library to work.

The conclusion of the school day blossomed with hope of something unusual on the way home to the marina; maybe a cruise through the Japanese dollar store, Daiso, or a brisk scuttle along the dyke to the Olympic Oval. Some afternoons, I took the bus further down 49th to my sister's home for a cup of tea and an hour or two of conversation. Because we have a wide variety of similar interests, plus our families in common, our talks covered everything from politics to religion to media to history to family matters. We had some of the most intellectually stimulating chit chats that I've ever had. Our personalities are very different even though we share the same birthday, eight years apart, but somehow that makes our relationship one of those yin and yang kind of things. We hadn't lived in the same city since we were kids so it was a joy to have her near for a bike ride, an impromptu hair cut or the gift of a care package as she still worried about me surviving on my own. She is easy for me to love.

I enjoyed the fringe benefits of Elin's family too. When there were line ups for the printers at the library, she offered me the use of hers. Sometimes, I stayed for a family dinner or watched a bit of TV.

Now and then we took her dog, Bart, for a pound around the sidewalks of her leafy neighbourhood. Vancouver is a very well treed city because almost everything grows on the coast. Although not like the incandescent Eastern autumn forest, trees here, everything from the Norway Maple to the Eastern Dogwood, to the Smoke tree, provide golden yellows to reds to purples. Ancient Chestnuts or Oaks line many streets, providing endless sniffing and marking opportunities for city dogs. Bart became my surrogate pet as it was the first time in thirty-three years that I was without one in everyday life and there is nothing like a game of chase with an incredibly happy dog to cheer you up. I was also missing my sons but lucky for me, my long suffering nephew was often there after his classes at UBC and, joy of joys, willing to help me with my technological problems. God bless the dogs and nephews of the world!

Rarely, I would return to the college library for more work after these restful visits. More often though, I would return to the marina, my mind at peace with the world and my place in it as I made my way back along the rain drenched, littered sidewalks from the Aberdeen station to the Singoalla.

13. It's Fun to Dream at the YMCA

I peeked out the window when I came to the galley to flip the switch on my mini coffee maker. The water outside glittered with shattered sunshine, reflecting colour from the hulls in our bay of the wharf. It reminded me of a few days of October one year ago. My husband and I had been mesmerized by that unbelievable city, Venice – the endless roads of quicksilver water.

On the wall above the little sink in the head, I had taped up a couple of postcards from friends who were currently travelling in Italy. In one, undulating sun kissed fields were viewed from the approaches to a Tuscan hilltop town. Did they know how often I gazed at this postcard and remembered moments of my own trip to Italy, full of the flavours and impressions that still spiced up my day dreams? I couldn't wait for the section of my Art History course that covered the Italian masters as I had lost myself in so much of their outstanding art. Visits to the Uffizi and Borghesi Galleries had left me speechless and incapable of choosing a postcard. But, in Venice, the city was the art form. There, all the cliches about light and water prove themselves true. In a raw, North American way, my river presented its own art form.

I threw on some clothes and grabbed the first cup of my two coffees and made sure I had everything I needed for a shower before school and some fruit and a sandwich for lunch. It was going to be a long day on campus, studying after class because mid-terms were coming up.

Although there was a shower in the marina building, I did not use it often. It was coin operated and I could never get the knack of running water long enough in the sink (for free) until it ran hot and then zipping into the shower with coins and then getting myself clean before my six minutes, or three if I was short, ran out. So on the first day of class, I had joined the YMCA beside the college at student rates. This way, I could enjoy a nice, long, hot shower and maybe swim a few lengths of the pool or take in an exercise class and best of all, I could soak up the swirly heat of the hot tub, something I really missed from home. I did go to a couple of yoga classes where I was made painfully aware of how inflexible I had become and I knew that it would be a battle to get _planking_ on any sort of regular basis. The super-fit, ping pong playing seniors down the hall eventually shamed me into trying some half-hearted aquacise and strength training too.

The hot whirl pool though – how sweet to soak out any sort of classroom stress or warm up and then dry myself thoroughly after a chilly morning wharf-side or a trudge through the rain to school. Because of the Y's location in the South Vancouver neighbourhood, there are many Indo-Canadian and Chinese members. Sometimes, sitting in the steam surrounded by ladies and gents chatting away in Cantonese or perhaps making room for ladies with dress-like coverings over their bathing suits, arms clinking with 18 karat gold bracelets, I felt like I could have been anywhere on the Asian continent, palms and bamboo swaying on the other side of the wall.

There was a bit of polite jockeying for the strongest jet at the end of pool though. Usually, people would enjoy its therapeutic massage for a few minutes and then move on to one of the other jets. But one man in particular, parked himself in front of it for the duration of his visit making me quite furious because the hydro back massage was not to be missed for my session.

As many of the Y's users did not speak English, the Y posted signs written in Hindi and Chinese. Some of the cultural differences had forced the production of signs reminding members not to spit or shave in the steam room or rather humorously one day, a sign informing us that the hair dryers were for "head hair only".

Public baths were not a _Part of Our Canadian Heritage_. I thought of those sanitized, cultural commercials that are forced into our TV viewing like little vitamins of nationalism. It was those so-called dirty foreigners that brought with them the civilized idea of communal relaxation and pore cleansing - the therapeutic spas of continental Europe and the holy waters of the Ganges were in daily use at a time when an Englishman wouldn't bathe for fear of getting sick. Although I wasn't used to sharing my hot water with strangers – at home, I would dash across the patio in the dark, hoping not to step in the remains of a mouse left by our cat and take a quick look around our heavily forested property for any inquisitive Sasquatches before sinking into the steamy pool alone to gaze at the panoply of twinkling constellations above. Sometimes Jerry would join me, bearing wine in plastic goblets, my personal Dionysus. The highly populated hot pools have their own charms too, you might find yourself talking to some very fascinating people, the only stars visible, those in their eyes. Or conversely, you might find yourself seated next to someone who bears a striking resemblance to a Sasquatch.

The enormous baths of the Roman emperor Caracalla were a thirty-three acre complex that included gardens and libraries. And in the countryside, local _thermae_ or hot springs, must have soaked out all that garlic and onion from the pores of the Italian peasant. On our trip there, we had visited the springs at Saturnia on our way from Orvieto to the coast. Families, couples, old folks and tourists had splashed and gambolled for free along the lime covered pools, soaking up healthy minerals and purging toxins in the sun soaked dell. What a dream ... I closed my eyes to the fluorescent light and windows streaming with cold rain and moved nearer the massage of the water jet at my back. I was willing to pretend for awhile.

14. Thyme Scented Hills

Oh, how the rain did pour. It took the promise of white beaches being lapped by azure seas to get me off the boat, onto the train and to the unfamiliar bus stop for connecting transport to a lecture at the Greek Cultural Centre by a member of the Hellenism Society. I had almost talked myself out of going because of ceaseless rainfall but because it was free and the thought of spending a miserable night alone on the boat wasn't particularly attractive, I took the plunge.

Vancouver has many vital, ethnic communities besides the huge Asian ones. There are Scandinavian folk dancers, Italian bocce players and French conversational groups. One weekend Jerry and I had gone to the Croatian Centre for a fund raising garage sale which was full of fascinating stuff but ultimately ended in huge disappointment as I had longed for a feast of smokies, sauerkraut and perogies all week only to be faced with a choice of hot dog or hamburger and fries.

The Hellenic community have St. George's Greek Orthodox cathedral with its attached Hellenic community centre that contains a gym, lecture theatre and offices. People who gathered there for the evening's talk on archaeological work came from a variety of backgrounds although most were, I think, from the academic world.

I had gotten off the bus a stop too early so ended up hurrying along in the rain for an extra soaking. Once inside, I shook off the rain and sat back to immerse myself in the hot and sunny field of Mediterranean Archaeology. The escapism was exquisite.

Hector Williams spoke about his years working at sites around as well as in the Mediterranean – on shipwrecks. The slides of hot, dry locations, ancient stones and the bluest skies watched in the dim theatre lulled me into speculation that I hadn't entertained for a long time. The _what if_ projections made me long for adventures not taken and opportunities lost. We can't do it all though, I told myself. What exactly would I be willing to give up in the road I had taken? Where do I want the road to go from here? The Greeks took to sea when the going got tough and enriched their civilization by doing so. I suppose that I had set sail myself.

15. International Dining

One day in downtown Vancouver when the road, buildings and bare trees all contributed their gray tones to a feeling of twenty first century angst, I decided to brighten my day by purchasing a smokie for dinner at the food cart parked in front of the Art Gallery, the neoclassical, marble building that was formerly the Provincial Courthouse which incidentally, also looked gray.

The cart man offered me a dazzling selection of mustards, in fact, more than I had ever seen before. I adore mustard, so this was a difficult choice requiring concentration. He helped me select my perfect match with a few well chosen descriptors. "From the Ukraine," he answered when I asked where he had got them all. He said that every year he made a trip back to the old country to visit relatives left behind, not being a part of that world anymore and not quite completely Canadian yet either. Lucky for us, he remembered to buy mustard.

I thought of my own parents, and all the other immigrants like them, arriving in a new country, intent on making their way here, usually without support from family left behind in a poorer nation. How brave. When my mother found she was pregnant with me during their first winter in downtown Toronto, she wasn't as thrilled as she might have been. Her first three kids had just recovered from all the childhood sicknesses that their quiet life in rural Sweden had not yet exposed them to and she was having her own battle with anaemia. Although everyone was learning English and Dad was working, another child had not been in the cards, but there I was, born against the odds, my mother having been extremely ill with me and told that I might not make it. I was the first Canadian in our line, my big, healthy self helped into the sweltering Toronto summer by another immigrant, an Italian obstetrician.

It took a few years to get enough money in the bank to buy a house for the growing family but Toronto was booming in the sixties and my Dad was a skilled finishing carpenter and mother, frugality itself. However, travel was expensive in those days and rarely did people whisk back to the motherland for a look at what they had left behind, especially with kids in tow. One of my grandmothers visited once when I was about five but she couldn't speak English and I think was suffering from culture shock. I remember that another grandmother (I had three – long story), sent us a Christmas parcel. In it she had enclosed a package of those thin ginger cookies called pepperkakor which my mother doled out carefully to us over the holidays. (How thrilled was I when _Ikea_ started selling them by the ton? One of the perks of my new location was its proximity to an _Ikea_ store. Guess what I buy?)

When I was little, I regretted that we had no relatives at all in Canada. Our first house was in a neighbourhood of extended Italian families, uncles and grandmothers all over. I had a make believe Grandmother that I visited who I modelled on the old Nona next door. I finally got to meet relatives when my parents took us back for their first visit to the old country, almost a dozen years after arriving in the new one with only a suitcase each. Although the trip was interesting and educational for us kids, we had North American ideas about class snobbery, manners and a large variety of food at the grocery store. For my parents, the trip was bittersweet. They knew that they had made the right decision leaving, having been reminded of the reasons why they had left and longed to return to their adopted homeland, filled with opportunity, openness and the shameless pursuit of happiness.

As I licked the excess mustard from my fingers, I wondered how long this Ukrainian smokie seller would keep up his trans-Atlantic, trans-cultural crossings.

16. Still Life

Hallowe'en approached and I hunkered down for my first essay in twenty-three years. Rather than chisel it into stone tablets, I decided to embrace the new technology and type directly into a document on my nifty little notebook computer. This was advantageous because due to my inability to guess, even remotely, how much of the information that I had gathered was needed to complete my 2,500 words or so, I could constantly do an electronic word count and adjust each point I was trying to make accordingly. I think the more years you gather, the more you are able to express yourself about any topic in the universe, whether or not you are even slightly qualified. At least that was my experience as I began to write. Constantly, I found that I had to pare my marvellous insights about the architecture of the Colosseum and the Theatre at Epidaurus into mere nuggets. Surrounded by piles of books and scraps of paper with scribbled notes, the heater at my knees and an essay writing manual to help with occasional lapses in confidence, I laboured away in the saloon of the Singoalla.

A few days earlier, one of my neighbours had invited me to a party on his large motor yacht. I thought that it would be nice to meet some other wharf rats, so around ten o'clock, I quit working for awhile, grabbed the last of the bottle of gin and joined the fun. The party was in full swing when I got there, witches, pirates, Elvis and Hugh Hefner greeted me as I boarded, costumed only as a student. Soon I was getting to know a few of them in a beery kind of way. A few of them had spent their whole lives in Richmond. When the scent of weed from the top deck began to float down, I decided it was time to get back to my essay.

On the way out, I stopped to chat with the first mate after I thanked her for the hospitality. I had only nodded a hello in the past when I had seen her on the wharf but now, in more relaxed surroundings, I found that we had something in common and talked about how we had made big changes in our lifestyles and how she had quit her good job to come live on her partner's boat and start working at a local dollar store for minimum wage. I told her about my fear of failure at college after so many years.

We talked about our kids' shock and horror when their mothers had moved out of their historic context and then she told me that one of her sons had died in a car crash because he had been drinking. Suddenly the party noise faded out and my focus became riveted on an apparent still life painting, _Buffet Table with Leftover Dip and Mini Quiche_ \-- a reaction to the slap of information that embarrasses you with its ability to immediately put everything else into perspective. What possible consequence could there be for her, good or bad, that would matter in the scheme of her life when her son's death had already brought her the worst possible blow?

I looked up at the moon on my stroll home and remembered the night just over a month earlier when I had gone to bed early, having had a busy day. The usual, soothing rise and fall in my berth became more agitated and I realized that a group of talkative people were gathering out on the wharf, their walking around increasing the turbulence of the water. One of the nearest boats had Chinese owners, and it sounded like a party, including excited children, was being hosted as the laughter and conversation picked up momentum. I discovered later that they had been celebrating Mid-Autumn Day, a type of harvest festival which occurs when the moon is at its fullest in the eighth month of the lunar calendar. This is the only time when the moon goddess, Chang'e, and her husband can visit.

Chang'e is believed to live on the moon in solitude forever after having swallowed the immortality elixir meant for her husband, the archer Hou Yi. In one version of the myth, Hou Yi's punishment was mortality, having shot nine of the Emperor's ten sons out of the sky after they had turned to suns and were scorching the earth. But in another telling of the story, Chang'e is saving her husband by taking on immortality. So, is immortality a punishment -- or is it only when we can't be with the ones we love? Then is mortality really a punishment? Or does it just add fuel to our desire to live while we can?

I returned to my work that night, completely sure that however my first essay turned out, it would have no real bearing on what mattered to me. While the music from the UBC boat house party throbbed up the river and fireworks exploded intermittently into the black night, I fervently wished that the curtain between the spirit world and ours would open a crack that night for bereaved people everywhere. I decided to group-text my kids for sure the next day, All Saints Day. How lucky I was to be able to.

17. On Sons and Daughters

I had already written two essays. I overextended the research for both and had to cut lots of fascinating information to get the word count to work. My second essay, for the religions course, was challenging to get my head around as it was about the rise of Christianity in China and required that I quickly learned a lot about Chinese history which then had to be condensed. I had been intrigued that among the temples and mosques of Richmond, there were also a number of Christian churches offering services in Asian languages, full of worshippers spilling into the streets on Sundays. It is an ironic phenomenon that there is dramatic decline in church populations across the Fraser, where historically, the pioneer WASP communities of Vancouver filled the pews. The result is that many beautiful, old churches are being redefined as theatres or community halls.

By the time I started on my third and last essay for the term, for the Greek Civilization course, I was feeling more confident having received good marks on the others, but was wary about doing more research as I knew I would go overboard again. I decided to write about Greek literature as this would be something I already a knew a little about and required no extra research beyond notes that I'd already taken in class and a rereading of the Iliad with a mind to picking up quotable fragments that I could mould to support my own flippant generalizations about the Greeks.

So one night in early November when I could no longer procrastinate, I armed myself with a beer, a bag of old fashioned Cheezies and heater on high under my table tent to keep the blood circulating in my lower extremities. Glenn Isaak, the instructor for the literature portion of the course, exuded genuine enthusiasm for the writing of the ancients and it had been contagious because books that I had relegated to the sow-buggy corners of my bookshelves twenty years ago began to tempt me again. I looked forward to examining the splintery hearts of Achilles, Hector and Agamemnon. I opened a fresh document on my laptop and began to expostulate on the forms of love amongst Trojans, pointing out that there is a reason that hearts and flowers aren't what comes to mind when the word, _Trojan_ , is mentioned these days.

The strongest love by far, at least celebrated by the Greek bards, was that between fighting men, I surmised, but coming in a close second was that of parent and child -- more specifically, parent and son. Mothers beseech the gods on behalf of their sons, kings subject themselves to humiliation in pursuit of the honour their sons deserve. Sadly, daughters don't seem to warrant the same dramatic gestures – Agamemnon sacrifices his daughter to Artemis for fair winds on the way to the war. Thank heavens that some things have changed.

In addition, the parent/child bond has become stronger in modern times, it seems, or at least inclusive of daughters. In fact, it has become a problem for my generation of baby-boomer parents. Our relationship to grown children is in a state of chaos, requiring books to be written in order to help us rework the dynamic when about half of our adult kids still live at home and most don't begin to support themselves and have families until they are in their thirties. It's hard to send a 25 year old to the naughty stair never mind try to spank them.

Parents (and grandparents) sacrifice almost anything to help or promote their children. Besides the necessities, many provide any amount of money and unending support, both personal and professional. I've heard of grandparents selling and moving from their retirement homes in order to help their adult, incapable children raise the next generation. Or there are the parents who will cover for their kids when they've done something illegal, like killing or raping under the influence of drugs or alcohol. And then there are the sensational pulp stories of people killing for their children, like the Texas mom who murdered in an attempt to secure her daughter a spot on the cheer leading squad. There is a scary rise of hyper-parenting that is way past crazy.

I was trying to take a step back from the lives of my children. Luckily, our four were quite independent already but I felt they were still desperately in need of my advice even though they didn't realize it. However, I was learning to obey the eleventh commandment proclaimed by Jane Isay that is, "Thou shalt not give your adult children advice," (Isay) and my tongue bore the marks of much biting.

By November, at the family home, my husband was down to the company of only our youngest son who was still healing from a hand injury that although bad, was bearable as he had closely escaped death. The fact that he survived has set me up with prayers of thanksgiving for the rest of my life. When he arrived in Vancouver with Jerry for a post surgical follow up visit to the Dive company he was working for when injured, we decided to take a chilly walk down the dyke and across the Dinsmore bridge to a pub on Sea Island at the south end of the airport. Thomas had just turned 19 so we wanted to buy him a birthday dinner and he could enjoy one of his first _legal_ drinks with us. I had my brother-in-law to thank for introducing me to the _Flying Beaver's_ welcoming hospitality and picturesque location at the river's edge where it shares a building with the _Harbour Air Seaplanes_ terminal. Early in September he had proudly shown off his _Frequent Beaver_ card which qualifies the bearer to a free meal after filling your card with stamps for so many meals purchased. Now I had my own card to fill.

Thomas is a big boy, a rugby player, a raconteur like few others who smiles like he has a huge and happy secret. The previous spring he had graduated as a commercial diver and already had worked on an oil rig, a variety of vessels and a freighter in Hong Kong harbour. He has had more injuries and stitches than most kids his age so that when he starts a conversation with, "I hope you're in a good mood, Mom...," I know to brace myself.

One night , the previous summer -- 3 am on Saturday, August the 14th, to be exact, I was awakened by a call from Hong Kong. "Hey, Mom, I'm in the hospital here," at this point I suddenly woke up as my heart went into overdrive. "Oh?" I answered in what I thought was a calm tone, at least he could still speak, I thought. "Yeah, I messed my hand up a bit," he continued, "I got thrown against the prop of the freighter we were working on and cut five of the tendons in my hand and severed a nerve in my finger. But I'm good now," his voice perked up knowing my grunt at the other end of the line indicated that I was still there and conscious. "They got me into surgery right away and it only took them four hours or so to sort it out," he continued. Choking back tears, I listened intently to the details of his story, hoping to pick up on anything he wasn't telling me.

Here he was now, only three months later, chomping down his bison burger and cheesecake with a pint of beer, full of optimistic conversation as always and keen to get back to work, albeit with less mobility in his left hand. Demeter, the corn goddess, allowed famine to stalk the land while she searched the world over in grief at the loss of her daughter, Persephone. And the proud King of Troy, Priam, humbled himself before his son's murderer if only to stop the desecration of his corpse. I was shocked when I realized how far I would go to protect my own child from further harm.

18. What We Give Away

It was the first anniversary of our nephew's suicide. When a few family members visited Vancouver, we made the melancholy trip together, across the waters of the Burrard Inlet on the Seabus for a visit to my sister-in-law's home to offer some support. The autumn skies were gloomy, rain clouds shrouded the mountain sides which rise almost straight up on the North Shore, their lower reaches covered with up-scale neighbourhoods. My sister-in-law had lived here for a couple of years since her divorce, her closest friends being other Japanese women who had been in Canada too long to consider moving back. She is a talented cook, so we anticipated a delicious meal and stuck to this and other cheery topics when she met us at the Lonsdale Quay terminal for the drive back to her place.

My nephew's funeral was the saddest I had ever had to attend, the grief stricken family not having any religious support to fall back on. There were no encouraging words about meeting again on the other side, just the most final of good-byes to a talented young man who should have been embarking on a very promising adulthood. Catullus' elegiac poem 101, written for a brother that died in a foreign land, reflects the same spiritual finality in its haunting ending, "And for eternity, Brother, _ave atque vale_ \-- hail and farewell." It was telling that the power of this short line, when discussed in class, could reach through the centuries to stop two of my instructors, on separate occasions, and force them to take a moment to compose themselves.

I had been thinking of famous suicides like that of Dido, in the Aeneid, who we had just been reading about. When Aeneas loves her and leaves her at Carthage, she burns on a funeral pyre made of weapons, having killed herself with a sword, an act echoed by the Indian act of Sati. Cleopatra too, decided it was better to die alone than live under Roman rule without her lover but the Egyptians were obsessed with the afterlife, their mania influencing much of their art and architecture. Men, like Brutus or Judas and King Saul, were more inclined to use suicide to speed up the process that would lead to inevitable death or disgrace. Although suicide was common in the ancient world, Socrates was condemned to death before he brought the cup of hemlock to his lips, not being a believer in suicide. The Greeks and Romans had no belief in an afterlife, only a vague concept of a shadowy underworld.

In the modern world we try to focus on the living but suicide is more common than we are led to believe. I remembered an uncle and my husband's cousin, who had also taken their lives. The despair that drives someone from simple sadness, which is a part of life, to self destruction is a slippery slope, I think. Depression and other mental illness can be so devastating as the outward signs are not easily recognizable. So often, we can sense the train wreck about to happen but are stymied as to what to do. That final act of self destruction becomes a vortex of guilt into which everyone else is dragged. I know other family members and friends who suffer from depression and I wondered how many people I passed every day who may be contemplating the worst. I try to be more aware these days and reach out, a least with a kind word, whenever I can.

Life must go on for those touched by suicide. Maybe the gift the departed leave behind is a heightened sense of the precious value of our own lives and a renewed commitment to make them matter.
19. It's 3 a.m. and I Must Be Lonely

There was a soothing patter of rain on the deck but I couldn't sleep. There were bloated doubts about the future floating around my head like zeppelins and yes, the incessant rain was getting me down.

It was too late to phone anyone so my nostalgia brain worm was coaxing me into self pity by leading me on a sentimental journey through days gone by; a hike out to Salmon Point in full sunshine, or the day the kids performed on the front lawn, John with a knight's helmet and sword rescuing the princess played by our dog, who with mournful eyes, did her best to hobble around in the dress that I had worn to my sister's wedding the day I turned sixteen. Why on earth was I here, chilling on this bit of fibreglass and teak in a place that couldn't even imagine the sparkle flecked, deep brown-green of the Tsolum River swimming hole we used to visit in the summer, or a full day of pickling, the bathtub full of ice and cucumbers, or an impromptu concert where a determined, young girl with a violin lead her band of little brothers in a rendition of _Twinkle, Twinke Little Star_?

Sleep is a reluctant visitor some nights but would eventually come, I knew. I put the phone down, not able to think of someone who might be awake on the other side of the world. Instead, I resigned myself to a roll call of ancient generations of the lonely -- on the Roman frontiers, in dungeons for their religious beliefs, painting for days in isolated garrets and decorating calligraphic letters on vellum for meditative hours with mind blowing complexity. I considered all the lonely and isolated today, struggling to accomplish a thankless task, suffering in prison, cut off from others in sickness, or pursuing lonely dreams. I started a prayer recitation for absolutely everyone I could think of -- a process which usually, embarrassingly, puts me to sleep quickly.

Some people never seek out solitude, or maybe they feel most alone in a crowd. I am one of the herd that needs to be alone to get anything serious accomplished. And then it is so joyful to be in company again, to just forget all the important matters and speak in silly voices, make up a new recipe, or do a ridiculous dance, all best shared with someone else.

I got up for a drink of water. This involved extricating myself from the covers, walking my feet along the shelf rail on the starboard side of the berth, and then the dividing wall, turning my body so that my feet can pull up and then propel my body so that it faces the stern of the boat. Then, I could grab the teak divider that separates my pillow from the head, and jump down the six inches to the floor in order to make my way back to the galley. There, I flipped the switch for the water pump, slid the panel of smoked plexiglass that conceals a small cupboard, grabbed an acrylic glass, filled it, drank it, and returned to bed. Just as I got perfectly adjusted in the blankets and pillows, I heard the thumping of the water pump go on, trying to re-pressurize the galley water system – shit, not again! I repeated my struggle out of bed and returned to the galley to switch it off and then fought my way between the bulkhead and blankets again – more wide awake and now, angry too.

I calmed down and found a productive topic to occupy my wakeful brain with, the conjugation for the verb _bellum_ _gerere_ , to wage war, an exercise I would never dream of focusing on if I had company. Thank heavens for three a.m. -- it was only a couple of hours until I had to get up.

20. School Chair Travellers

The miserable weather continued but one gloomy day in November, fellow Latin scholar, Davinder, came to class with a bulging plastic bag of Asian travel swag. "Where'd ya get all that?" I inquired curiously. "The travel fair over in the main hall. Didn't you know about it? There's tons of stuff," he replied with the look of one who has just found the golden ticket. The gleam in his eye during class gave away the fact that he wasn't thinking about which Latin prepositions take the accusative.

After class, he asked if I was headed to the train as we often chatted on the way there as we took the same route. "I think that I'll check out the travel fair, see ya," I answered, hoping for a free snack of something. "Oh, I'll come too," he responded immediately. I pointed out that he had been already but he assured me that he wanted to go again. " I just love collecting stuff at travel fairs," he said with a kind of dreamy lilt. So we hied to the main hall where there were booths set up for a multitude of exotic, Eastern travel destinations – all actually _west_ of Vancouver. And hallelujah, there was food sampling.

We moved from booth to booth, Davinder eager to point out the best things to try and what to avoid. It was all delicious to me; from gyoza to coconut balls to spring rolls, I chomped happily as I feigned interest in places for which I had no travel interest by gathering pamphlets and posters. Outside was the gray and dismal look of fungus growth while here were fantasies of equatorial heat and colour and spice. There were fine pens and notebooks from the Thai kiosk. I remembered that Elin was planning a trip to India, so stocked up on some maps for her and at the Korean booth, there were richly coloured posters of stylized, traditional warriors. I chose a predominantly red one for a great addition to the decor on the boat and rolled it up carefully. If I came back to school the next year, I decided that I'd like to study the Art History of Asia.

As we walked to the train stop, I asked Davinder about his family visits to India. "It was pretty rural," he answered glumly," mostly, I remember the chickens." Obviously, not a hot spot for a teenage boy whose main pursuit in quiet hours was Play Station 3. His favourite travel destination so far had been Las Vegas.

Ours was an unusual friendship. I remember waiting at the platform for my train to come whooshing up in my second week of school, I think, when this friendly faced, Indo-Canadian guy had walked up to me and said, "Hi, I think you're in my Latin class." I didn't recognize him. Mainly because in my terrified, new student state, I had been too shy to turn around from my front of the class position to study all those youthful faces in the seats behind me. I was in agonies that the only other older student had quit coming after the first week of class. Who knew what sniggery little remarks this so very young body of students would share at my expense if I made myself too visible?

And yet, here was this young man, somewhere in age between my eldest and younger sons, striking up a conversation. Maybe my daughter was right when she reassured me that she and her buddies exhibited no ageism at college, "we all talked to the old students." Barely fifty, thank-you very much, madam.

Davinder, I was to discover, was Mr. Conversation, itself. On our many walks between classes or to the train station, we covered many topics -- nothing of huge importance but we shared a lot of laughs. A few times I pointed out that certain other female students seemed to be paying him large amounts of attention and maybe he should consider going on a date with something other than his computer. He was always broke, he answered and did not think that he wanted to borrow more money from his Dad for a date. At this point, I launched into employment counsellor mode. He listened politely and usually countered with some reason why he couldn't follow up on each job idea I had. I even suggested Vancouver's Bollywood scene the day that cameras and film crews had taken over part of Langara's campus. But he didn't think he had the right stuff. I assured him that he could always take a few dance lessons.

Travel, though, occupied his thoughts for much of the day. And, quite honestly, most of my daydream time too. Davinder was always relating the latest travel deal he had found on the internet. Later in the year, he revealed his intention of travelling to Uzbekistan where he could live on twenty dollars a month. "I hope you like potatoes," I commented cynically, then brightened as a thought occurred to me, "and you could afford to go on a date there!" He smiled indulgently, probably thinking, "you mothers are all the same."

### 21. Eros and Ares

The year was confusing when it came to relationships. My kids had a field day telling their friends that their parents had separated and watching for their shocked reactions. A friend had called home only to be informed by Jerry that I wasn't living there anymore – silence, and then, "how long has this been?" asked very tentatively. After all, we had just celebrated our 28th anniversary and hadn't shown any symptoms of marital break down even though I had just discovered that according to the Chinese Zodiac, we were completely incompatible.

It was fulfilling for me to be actively engaged in following through with long held plans and I found myself far too busy with school and interested in my new surroundings to be homesick for more than an hour or two. But poor Jer had been left behind in his same job, dealing with all the regular household stuff on his own now. He missed the kitchen smells I produced when home and the ready supply of clean underwear and socks. I was loving the fact that I only had a quick wash load of clothes per week and didn't need to cook a thing if I didn't want to.

So, Jerry visited every three weeks or so and became the _weekend boyfriend_. We had lots of fun when he came over because it was more enjoyable exploring the area with someone else and because a boat always makes you happy somehow. His plans to move onto the boat with me and just find casual work in the New Year hadn't changed. But for the fall, while he finished up business at home, we had this distant relationship that could be quite romantic.

It was around this time, I found out about three couples of friends and family that were on the verge of separating. It was depressing to hear that even long term relationships could disintegrate so completely, that communication had ceased or that one of the partners changed the game plan or, in one case, alcoholism had become the problem.

On the Singoalla one night, I had dinner and a conversation with a friend who was going through a terrible time. There's not much you can do when these disasters happen except try to help with the mop up but I was feeling angry too and ready to cast blame on my friend's husband completely. How could a person be so negligent about the rare find of a long term marriage with such a caring person? I managed to keep my mouth shut while she vented. Getting a bit chilly on the boat (she hadn't adopted my bulky, multi-layered style of dressing), we went for a short walk along the dyke trail to the sound sculpture playground where she experimented with her big voice making us both laugh. It could be the perfect place for marriage counselling. It was getting late when we walked back and downcast again, she left for home, probably just as perplexed as when she had arrived, I was sure.

The Sacrament of Holy Matrimony seems old fashioned now that less than half of modern marriages stand a chance of success. But the vows of marriage are meant to keep the commitment going even when the thrill is gone. I thought of sex and religion – it's amazing how these two topics can usually be grouped together although etiquette suggests otherwise. The Greeks were very modern in their approach. Their gods had a wonderful time sexually romping, plotting and fighting through the ups and downs of mythology. Kind of an antique version of Jersey Shore, which my daughter forced me to watch once, for philosophical reasons. Sanctuaries, temples, libations, all had their place but what the Greeks were really making holy, were all the aspects of human nature. They were very practical in their acceptance of people as they were, subject to the whim of one god or another but still in control of their reactions. And if things went pear shaped, oh well, sometimes thunderbolts happen ...

I returned to the boat, contemplating what makes a marriage work. I believe it comes down to a willingness to respond to what your partner is concerned with, whether it involves you or not, whether or not you even understand what they are telling you. Like Latin, when the translation defeats you, keep asking for help. The important thing is to show that you're willing to try to find out or change, or at least talk. There was a funny mistranslation incident by one of the Chinese students who had written about the sacrifice of children in ancient Greece, precipitating the prof's explanation of the proper meaning of the word _kid_ in English and the sacrifice of baby goats. Miscommunication can wreak havoc in a relationship. You can never stop asking questions until you get it right.

As an outsider though, you never know the whole story. What makes a connection between two people is nuanced by a thousand things that no one else is privy to. I said a quiet prayer for my friends and made a note to remember to text a good-night across the Salish Sea to my special someone.

22. The Fraser Masterpiece

The play of light on the water of the Fraser is a never ending entertainment. Every day while strolling along the dyke which lines its bank to keep the road from inundation, I marvelled at the vast canvas of a changing painting, something Dutch and full of sky with a thin ribbon of earth below and always, the omnipresence of water somewhere. They say that the light in Greece is like nowhere else, a presence that defines all things Greek. Well, here it was in Richmond too, defining my mood for the day and establishing itself as a master artist developing a theme. I thought of it immediately in my art class when our professor, Ann Christiansen, described Monet's reasons for painting the south face of the cathedral at Rouen again and again. One day my river view would be gray, flat, quiet – so motionless, unearthly even, that it made you wonder if the world had stopped while on another, the wind whipping a light chop on the water's surface, and whirling the trees on the opposite shore into an ecstatic African dance, the clouds flowing by like accelerated icebergs would make you catch your breath.

Jerry and I walked up the path some evenings past the Dinsmore Bridge toward the No.2 Road Bridge, the last crossing of the Fraser before it spreads out to the sea, watching the sun set in a full range of vibrant glory. Sometimes the explosion was golden and rosy like an over-decorated Venetian palace and other times, the purples, reds and orange made you think of an Indian bazaar and made me wonder why the decorator's palette of _natural colours_ contained only varieties of beige.

We crossed the bridge, suddenly much colder, buffeted by the wind whipping up the open river and the rush of traffic by our side. If you looked back up the river you might see a boat bobbing on the green golden water, lights twinkling on far mountains like cast off diamond bracelets or a skein of geese, in silhouette, slipping in late.

On the far bank, there is a trail, while going back up river, that winds its way through some mixed deciduous forest and waterside undergrowth that always reminded me of forest in Ontario, probably because of the slim, white birch, gathered like a choir dressed in surplices there. Wildlife here is abundant – the odd mix of sea life and freshwater dwellers included gulls, herons, swans, beaver and occasionally a seal swimming so far up.

If you continue downriver on the trail, the brush thins out as you travel up a slight rise to open ground. Here you are near the south airport terminal, with traffic streaming past and the huge hangers of independent airlines on your right. On the river, during the day, the float planes land and take off with bee-like efficiency. The flat land of Sea Island exposes you, depending on the season, to the full glare of the sun or to all the breezes that blow so that fifteen minutes of marching down the path always culminates in delight – for either a cold beer or a warm, boozy coffee at the _Flying Beaver_.

I had a confident feeling that I could navigate a meaningful route for the years ahead and that even if the prize at the end was only a small libation, it would confer hints of the sacred because the journey had been rich with an artistry I was learning to observe.

23. The Games People Play

I sat at the window counter table at _Max's Deli_ on Oak Street, waiting for my sister to arrive for a coffee visit. I was completing a quick game session of _Tetris_ on my phone, a new way I had found of wasting time and zoning out when I became burnt out from too many hours spent in the library studying -- perfect substitute for TV which I didn't watch anymore. Jerry currently held the high score and I was determined to beat it before he visited again. Our other competition was in Spider Solitaire on our laptops, where I was the current champ, much to his chagrin.

Elin entered and I put my phone away. We carefully made a delectable choice of bakery treats and ordered coffees. Max's provides an outstanding array of deli choices and lunch favourites too, so ordering becomes a intensely focused activity.

We settled into comfortable conversation during which I gave her an update on my religious studies class. Religion was in the news as Blair and Hitchens were scheduled to debate, "be it resolved, that religion is a force for good in the world." Although we are Christians, our mother has two Jewish grandfathers, she believes, one for sure and maybe a Jewish grandmother too, her father's ancestry being shrouded in mystery and a bit of scandal. I believe this genetic contribution has made my migratory compass always point me in the direction of a deli although not necessarily Jewish. The finest deli food I have eaten was once, a pile of lox and cream cheese on a bagel at a deli on Spadina, in Toronto, and once, potato pancake and applesauce at a deli in Palm Springs. Both were unforgettable eating experiences.

Some people don't get the idea of grown-ups arguing for the fun of it but debate makes us clarify our assumptions. I had loved being a member of the exceedingly nerdy Debating Club in high school which had taught us to think about both sides of any question. And religion is food for thought. Those who never consider the spiritual centre of their lives or even deny it exists, are starving themselves. There is a buffet out there to sample so why not belly up to the bar? After all, no one is suggesting you eat everything.
24. Eye of the Storm

I sipped at a mug of hot tea while I reviewed my course notes on Greek Civilization for the final assignment which was to write a type of journal, commenting on some aspect of each section of the course. I was working in my usual spot at the table on Singoalla, with the heater at my knees and a couple of fleece throws over my shoulders. I tried to imagine myself in the sun drenched countryside of Greece, dripping, honeyed forkfuls of baklava, a bouzouki strumming in the distance and the blue, blue Mediterranean lapping at white sands.

I contemplated what an astonishing accomplishment it was to learn the technical skills required to build massive structures like the Parthenon, or achieve the acoustic excellence in theatre design and what an enormous impact the Greek column has had on Western architecture. (I have a friend with a hard foam decorative column upon which she rests her remote control – I wonder what Iktinos and Kallikrates, architects of the Parthenon, would think of that!) In downtown Vancouver, and most big North American cities, for that matter, there is a lesson in temple construction on most street corners but instead of housing gods of wisdom, the hunt or the sea, we store money. Bank architecture in our capitalist, consumer culture has adopted the elements of Greek temple architecture as a way of nurturing our respect for the all mighty dollar – people even speak in a reverent tone of voice in these structures. But gods often tumble from their pedestals and are replaced by new ones, subject to the needs of mankind.

There was a wind storm that night and the boat was shuddering violently when each blast strained the lines which held her to the wharf. The halyards slapped wildly against the mast, their metallic pinging noise punctuating my reverie. I hoped that the tarp lashed on deck wouldn't break free and allow for the break through of more leaks. Jerry had spent a few hours that fall caulking around every attachment on deck but still, water would find a way to sneak in. I regularly changed newspapers on the shelf beside the port hand side of the V berth bunk where they soaked up the drips from some pernicious source.

I'd been living on a boat for two and a half months now and thinking about the river always rushing away beneath me while I just floated on the surface, tethered to land by a bit of wood and rope. If I cast off the lines, I could move in any direction, follow the river to the sea and sail to Mexico, had I desired.

I think this watery mobility was the seminal force in the development of Greek civilization. Dry, rocky hillsides and very little farmland allowed for only a tenuous grip on the land. Greeks lived with perpetual threat of invasion by land, crop failure, natural disaster and plague. Shallow roots were easily transplanted across the sea and so people were ready to set sail when they needed to. There were no boundaries in the sea which became the Greek refuge and route to the future, their culture constantly learning from those they encountered. Also, I think that an innate wanderlust was key to their development of the travel writing genre, Homer having started it all.

My daughter's friend, Rance, tells me that the words _feng shui_ mean wind and water, the essentials for living and that in Chinese culture, the presence of the mountains behind you and water before you is the best place to live. There is evidence of seafaring voyagers from Asia reaching our coast long before Europeans did. I wonder why they didn't stay or if perhaps, they just weren't ready to take root in North American soil, were still en route to another destination. Perhaps now, the precarious nature of civilization on the delta, under threat of earthquake and inundation will bring about a fantastic flowering of culture in Richmond as it did in the Grecian model.

Where should I set down my roots? I had lived in two other provinces before moving to Vancouver Island where I had lived for almost forty years now, grown up and raised my own family there but now, just across the Strait of Georgia, I had encountered a new, urban culture that I hadn't expected to like so much. I still had so many places where I wanted to live for awhile. Did I even need to have a physical place to call home? I stopped to think about what one's roots really are. Are they physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual? I decided that I could live anywhere, as long as it wasn't too difficult to visit my kids, wherever they may end up. I hoped that they would eventually come to their senses and welcome my hands-on help and advice. In the mean time, I would try to absorb everything I was learning, not just at college, but nurture this tender garden of new experiences and perhaps, one day, reap a richer harvest.I walked along the wharf the next morning, noticing how windblown everything looked but the post storm calmness and clarity set me pondering the broad sweep of change. Even though the great concrete mass of Vancouver is omnipresent and the futuristic swoosh of the SkyTrain hovers nearby, the natural world putters along as ever on the riverbank: ducks, grebes, swans and the local beaver forage for food and tend to their fur and feathers. Blown out bulrushes and stunted alder - there is such a profusion of life, even in the commercial wasteland. Under the great, man made glories of the Acropolis, the Greeks still took time to examine their lives in order to strive, with all other living things, on those barren, Aegean rocks, for a life, lived fully. I think that the melding of sky and sea into an ethereal unknown, fostered in the Greeks, as it did for me, contemplation of the world at large and inversely, the world within.

25. Grocery Carts of Richmond

Never have I seen a _Superstore_ (environs of the frugal shopper such as myself) parking lot so full of luxury vehicles. It was about a month before Christmas when I finally observed this, so made it into a carol: In the first line of parking, my eyes revealed to me: five black Mercedes, four golden Lexus, three high end Audis; two Porsche Carreras and a silver Maserati. There is a lot of money in my new neighbourhood so when we showed up with our 25 year old Toyota, that my son had found for us on Craig's list for $900, I just know that my fellow shoppers sighed and thought, "there goes the neighbourhood."

One day Jerry saw while on his way to the recyclers with a bag of empties, parked around the corner from us, two Lamborghinis, two Ferraris, a Maserati, a Porsche and a Bentley and their owners standing around, discussing where to go. He was amused to hear that with over a million bucks in vehicles to carry them there, they decided to meet at the _Tim Horton's_ down the road. They might be rich but they aren't snobbish.

We had planned to make a foray to the _Ikea_ , venue for cheap but decent cafeteria meals, but came to our senses when we realized that it was a Saturday and chose not to take risks with our lives. Weekends at this showroom of the last word in inexpensive, urban design becomes a mecca for the upwardly mobile masses of the city so that from the playroom to the check out, there is a bumper to bumper obstacle course of the likes of _Ekby Bjarnums_ , _skubbs_ and _inredas_ creating a hazard to physical and emotional safety. We opted for a shopping trip closer to home.

The two smaller grocery stores about a block or two away from the marina cater to a mostly Asian clientele. I often went to the _T and T Supermarket_ , near the train station. You could buy only two kinds of cheese there, both processed, as it isn't a big item in the Chinese diet but on the up side, I regularly found that cheese at great sale prices. (By the same principle, if you are an average to large sized, North American woman, Richmond is the place to get the season's left over clothes on sale as the average Asian lady is a petite size 8 or less.)

Interesting to the non-Asian shopper, is the meat selection as it includes so much sea food and also, frogs piled on their backs in rows liked so many science lab specimens, and turtles, their long necks hanging limply across the ice. One day, I was offered an unrecognizable food sample, odd brown in colour but as the woman couldn't describe it in English, I couldn't bring myself to try it.

I enjoyed browsing the aisles of foreign packaging, usually picking out something new to try. I had discovered some delicious bakery goods, coconut and taro breads, and tried to always buy my sandwich bread there. The produce selection is always better than at the regular suburban grocery store with all types of greens augmenting the usual fare. Another interesting find here when looking for a can of regular ground coffee one day, was a can of New Orleans', Cafe du Monde, coffee and chicory blend. I had to buy it, even if only for the can with its picture of the famous, old, French market cafe where Jerry and I had once devoured a delicately sugar powdered plate of their equally famous, beignets.

Back at the _Superstore_ though, we trailed through the usual pre-Christmas shopping mayhem to locate a few groceries that I couldn't get at the T and T. Also, I wanted to send Christmas cards but didn't like the standard selection available. We returned to the car and drove to the local Marine store where we had to pick up a few items for the boat and by serendipitous coincidence, I found the perfect cards -- Santa sailing happily in a boat with a peppermint striped sail.

26. True Grit

Jerry had joined me for a week in late November when the temperature began to drop into the single digits. It was so very cold on board that in the evenings when we found ourselves finished necessary chores but not quite ready to hunker down with the hot water bottle we went out to enjoy the benefits of a warm mall, library or pool. On an earlier excursion we had found to our great joy, that the theatre at the Richmond Centre had a cheap-ticket-Tuesday.

Well, here it was, Tuesday, and after consuming a hot dinner at the food fair and wandering like two Dickensian waifs through the over the top Christmas commercialism in the mall, we found ourselves at the theatre and decided to splurge on a movie, mainly for a return to warmth and comfort. So, with about five other audience members we watched the remake of the western, _True Grit_. It was an added benefit that the story takes place in a hot, dry climate.

Reluctantly, we left the theatre after the final credits rolled. We exited on the side of the mall furthest from the train station, into the hush of heavily falling snow. The empty parking lot was almost beautiful with the glow of the sodium lights and a white blanket covering all the unsightly paraphernalia at the back of the mall. In shoes, but almost dressed warmly enough, we carefully picked our way through the thickening snowflakes, sliding down the off ramp of the parkade, the city in silent shock all around us.

The two block scamper from the station was enough to chill to the bone and the wharves were bitterly cold and deadly with slippery frost. We scooted below quickly and conserving our energy, carried out our nightly routine without a word. Not waiting long enough to let the hot water bottle perform its little miracle, Jerry braved the initial assault with a short battle cry when he hopped between the icy covers and I followed with the cure – two steaming mugs of hot, honey-lemon brandies.

By morning, eight inches of snow was providing insulation and we were quite cozy. The bright, white light filtered through the miniature drifts at our portholes and window. There was a struggle when Jerry had to wrestle the sliding hatch cover back under the weight of the snow and dig us off the boat. He did his part out on the finger of our wharf too, shovelling a path along to its junction with the main dock. Cheering him on, was my part.

I decided to try to get to school just to see if I could. Transportation was terribly backed up because the trains were having a tough time getting over the bridge. Throngs of riders were packed into buses laid on to take us over the vehicle bridge instead while they cleared the exposed rail tracks. The atmosphere was almost festive as commuters compared horror stories now that all hope of getting to work or school on time was lost. One girl told us that she had been travelling for almost three hours from the outskirts of Vancouver and been on the train for the trial run over the bridge. A transit worker had tried rocking the train backwards and forwards on the tracks and then actually gotten out of the train to see if he could clear up the tracks. No luck though, the west coast just isn't able to cope with a big snowfall – we don't expect them here.

I finally trudged into my first class, just five minutes before it concluded, the guest speaker that I had been so eager to hear hadn't made it in at all. I went to my other classes and returned home to the boat where the low light through thick cloud cast a sombre pallor to the hard, gray river, brittle edged with winter.

27. On Clouds at MacLeod's

Used bookstores are my favourite shopping venues so when my friend, Leta, told me about _McLeod's_ on the corner of Richards and West Pender, I couldn't wait to go. Floor to ceiling shelves, stacks, and tumbles of books, on two floors constitutes their version of printed heaven. You could get lost in a corner of this warren and never be found again. And now, I was living only a quick train ride away. Due to the budget though, I had to severely limit the number of my visits. I sanctioned a trip near Christmas, had to shop for gifts anyway, why not books?

I collect some categories of books: children's classics, local history, art books, books with woodcut prints, travel writing, good editions of literary favourites – well, quite a few books interest me and now here was this whole new category of Greek and Roman classics. I knew that I was in for a long visit as I fairly skipped to the door. But then, I _was_ buying gifts. I found three likely wrapable keepers quickly then moved on for a wee browse for myself – oh, joy.

I had stocked the boat with lots of books from home that I thought might come in useful for my studies and many had already gotten a work-out. There was dear, old Edith Hamilton's _The Greek Way_ , so highly readable and informative. I had also brought a few quick paperback reads for when I needed a complete diversion; some tattered Lillian Beckwiths I had found lying around, humorous tales about her adventures on the Scottish islands, had filled the need along with Thoreau's, Walden, which I had never read before. Two or three guidebooks to walks and parks in Vancouver and area lined the shelf beside Jerry's side of the V-berth. Eventually, I was to find that there was just too much dampness from the daily newspaper _diaper_ I lined up beneath the leak further down on his side and this mouldering collection had to go to the garbage. My side too, after the frosts of winter, would begin to suffer and wound up discarded. I hate throwing out books so had added some more plastic protection to the better quality bunch in the saloon.

I ran my fingers down the leather spine of a pocket sized edition of the old classic, _The Last Days of Pompeii_ , by Edward Bulwer-Lytton. I could easily justify its purchase as study material. As I perused the classical Greek section, I began to wonder about what is a classic and how the meaning of the word had changed over time, or had it? Was it something that stood out, bore the test of time? The _classic_ Greek period was being renamed by those who now felt that it is an unfair label, making the period sound more important than any others.

Many literary classics arouse nothing but a sneer or yawn now. It takes too much effort to plow through the complicated language construction and the philosophical back waters, never mind having to translate anything from the Latin – most people would rather stick pins in their eyes. Now when someone says, "that's classic," it usually means that its value, is instantly recognizable – most often though, in a satirical way. But that's not the way it always was. Mind you, there are the classic satires of Juvenal. Some aver that this is the only genre of writing that was created by the Romans.

Archaeologists have dug up scads of fragments with the poetry of Sappho, such as her evocative line in fragment #47, "Love, shakes my heart like the wind rushing down on, the mountain oaks." Her popularity in the ancient world can be compared to that of Shakespeare. But today, how many people do you know who read Shakespeare or poetry? I've worked in libraries for years and the most popular books going out the door are those of the Danielle Steels and Stuart Woods of the fiction mongers – hardly Shakespeare, nor poetry, nor philosophy. Will future archaeologists base their understanding of our times on sex and crime pulp fiction? Hey wait – that might be a pretty accurate interpretation.

There is a sad lack of poetical pursuit in the world today, avid readers seem to be mostly drawn from the student body. I wonder if the growth of free verse killed the marching stanzas of poetry that in less sophisticated times, rallied people to the flag or into battle, or went to the heart of human matters in memorable verse patterns. The whole of the Iliad and Odyssey began as oral verse, not written down until Homer took on the project. Children rarely have to memorize poems in school anymore or reams of Bible verses in Sunday school. Too bad when we now know how important rhythm is to learning to speak and poetic analogy is to brain development. Or maybe, songs are mainstream poetry now – pity that the lyrics are usually simplistic.

My favourite author (I've never had one until this century, and I'm blushing as I write this in fan-like awe), is Alexander McCall-Smith, who occasionally uses poetry. His combination of the quirky everyday and deeper, philosophical reflection is so appealing to me. In fact, I think his books all make the same profound point: the most important thing is to ponder the events in your life and what they mean in the wider, human community. Wasting precious time posting and reading the everyday minutiae of humdrum lives on social media networks distracts us from the act of mulling over the effects of how we make our way in world, and coming to the conclusions that are actually worth sharing with others. The difference is between reporting and analyzing and when I make this connection, I mean that there are unfortunately too few events reported worth analysis and too many ridiculous things reported – recall the _Octomom's_ underwear sale on eBay.

McCall-Smith would definitely be in my dream book-club, along with Sue Townsend, Henning Mankell, Paul Theroux, P.D. James, Amy Tan, John Mortimer, Farley Mowatt, Joanne Harris .... My dream book-club of dead authors would include: Virgil, Dickens, Tolstoy, George Eliot, H.E. Bates, Patrick Lee Fermor, Agatha Christie, John Steinbeck, C.S. Lewis, either Durrell brother, Dora Saint, Saint John, Emily Carr, Washington Irving and Beatrix Potter – to name a few; there would be a substitute list that included dozens more. Just think of the lively conversations you could have about Danielle Steel's latest book! But, I digress.

For the present, I will have to be content to read all the wonderful authors' musings that make up western civilization's literary body. Luckily, at _MacLeod's_ , the wisdom of the ages is available to anyone with an interest and a couple of bucks.

28. Enter With Fanfare

Soaring cathedral arches and glorious music make for the perfect setting in which to meditate on the richness of traditions, religious and otherwise. Thus, I found myself while attending the Christmas Brass Concert at St. John's Church with my sister, in the heart of Vancouver's very wealthy, Shaughnessy neighbourhood. Feeling festively cozy in a red, wooly sweater, my ears filled with the clarion rich sounds of the musicians' instruments at the front of the church, my mind ranged over topics from whether or not I had remembered to turn off the water pump on the boat to my Art History final.

We had just completed the study of cathedral architecture and I had learned so much that would have enhanced my appreciation of the many visits I had made to these Bibles in stone all over Europe. Although not a cathedral, St. John's is a large church and contains many of the elements that attempt to create the sacred space that Gothic church designers strove for in the 12th to 16th centuries. In this brutal time, colourless and without ornament for the great unwashed, a visit to church was like a preview of the heavenly world to come. Interiors that rose to the realms of angels, lit by a holy, coloured light filtering through stained glass windows, the altars, choir stalls and reliquaries decorated with magnificent gems and wood carving, the scent of incense and the melodious sounds of chant and song successfully awed the pilgrims into a state of obedient surrender, at least to the church hierarchy, if not God.

I think that the most gorgeous church interior I have ever entered is the palace chapel on Ile de la Cite, Paris - La Sainte-Chapelle. More than three quarters of its wall space consists of 49 foot high, stained glass windows making you feel as if you were in a jewel box. Built for the pious King Louis IX to house his collection of Passion relics which supposedly included the Crown of Thorns, the chapel itself is like a reliquary – interesting when you think of the physical contents now being us mere mortals.

I hadn't realized that the rise of pilgrimage was due to the relief people felt having survived the year one thousand when many thought the world would end. The pursuit of miracles, by throngs of penitents, from the sacred bones of martyrs drove the architectural changes that made the cathedrals along the pilgrim route, so enormous. I suppose that now, in the age of science, the current post millennial pilgrimage is to our hospitals for hope of salvation. Funny too, that in front of the emergency entrance to Richmond hospital, there is a row of palm trees, symbol of the martyr.

I brought myself back to the present musical offering, announcing the coming of our Saviour, "the reason for the season," as those trite billboards put it. I had almost finished my first semester, successfully, I felt. But I was tired – could I make it through another one? Suddenly too, I was very homesick, I longed for the familiar. I wanted to bake and decorate. The two foot branch of fir that I had brought from home in November to decorate as a tree for the boat had already started to look tatty. I couldn't wait to unpack our trunk of Christmasy accoutrements. And there was my small, social season of events: staff Christmas party; family reunion pub luncheon; maybe a craft fair tea; carol concert and Christmas Eve service.

I feel sorry for people who didn't grow up with seasonal ceremonies -- in some ways it makes your life so much easier as you don't have to keep thinking up things to do. These traditions, so insignificant on their own, string themselves together into the garland of your memory. It is so easy to start a new one with a willing friend or two if you feel a need in your life; and they don't have to last forever. Like the old string of lights, there might be a few burnt out bulbs but the comforting glow is still there.

29. It's Not Over Til the Fat Lady Sings Carols

I was possessed by the all-consuming demon of study panic. I had four finals ahead and only eleven days over which they were spread. The playful academic competition texts that I had been sending to my daughter over the fall (hey got anthr A this wk, and u?) had morphed into something alien and a bit neurotic (will nevr evr evr brag about marks again if I can only rmbr dates of grk wars until thur. Will u still be my frnd if i fail 2?) My head hadn't been so crammed full of information since I was a toddler. I had to formulate a plan so that I could progress in orderly fashion. My first exam, Art History, was almost right away so I had to focus exclusively on that topic until then. This was a good thing because I felt most comfortable with the material having loved every minute of the course. The next exams would be more work, so I divided the left over time according to their order and how much review I needed for each.

A strategy I had adopted during mid-terms was the pre-exam coffee and matrimonial square. My goal was to rev up my otherwise lethargic state with a hit of sugar and caffeine that would fire up my synaptic rate to a big kahuna of academic regurgitation. Maybe it was a placebo effect, but I still swear by it.

I tested pens to see which I could write with the fastest, made up flash cards, recited a catechism of dates and historical events as I nodded off to sleep or if I awoke in the middle of the night. I was so far past the "setting reasonable expectations for myself" period of self counsel that I could have bottled and sold my competitive madness. My mind lunged from the assault of one academic peak to another like Edmund Hilary on speed, or strayed over dangerous waterfalls of alternate theories of true gnosis.

One cold, wet morning I found myself at the train station listening to the calm voice on the speaker system asking us, for the millionth time, to please step back from the platform edge. This seems to be stating the obvious but on mornings like this one, is really an attempt at mass crisis intervention. Most train related deaths were by suicide although just a couple of months ago there had been the near death accident of Palm, the guide dog who had become separated from his owner in a crowd of commuters and subsequently been dragged twenty feet by the train on the end of his leash.

I steadied my nerves by forcing myself into my usual pattern, i.e. catching up on my news during these minutes before the train arrived by reading the overhead screen for Translink's top three attention getters. An item on the board had started me contemplating, in pre-exam edginess, the Nobel prize and what it was about countries of the cold northern hemisphere that made them so serious and sanctimonious. The image of being a deep thinker is a thin mask for grumpiness. Conferring prizes is just a way to while away the winter months and focus some attention on your own country when anyone with any sense is cavorting on a hot beach somewhere.

I was never grumpy while in Italy the previous year. In fact there wasn't a moment that I wasn't deliciously happy, except maybe the time that my life flashed before my eyes while driving on the _Autostrada_. If I could, I would rearrange the globe as there aren't enough of the blessed, sunny places, like Italy. In fact, I'd make a lot more Italies – have them all in a row like the best boot shop ever. Then you wouldn't get the crowds that can sometimes ruin a great place. I would replace Ontario with another BC. And Ontario? I know, put it right in the middle of Africa and maybe they could help out there as they think they are so good at solving the problems of huge and disparate regions. Also, I would give India a BC as they need more room and deserve a beautiful place. China, I think I would break into about ten parts and scatter them through the world to even populations out and then put a laid back Jamaica in the middle of every one of the pieces. I think I'd put a bunch of Hawaiian islands where China had been – there really aren't enough and maybe a Greece or two. France, for fun and infinitely entertaining headlines, I would plant in the American heartland. Siberia would get a great, big, happy Australia. Oh yeah, Sweden? I think another Italy would fit well there.

The train pulled up, packed with the standing room only rush of morning commuters. I pushed my way inside, saturated with exam facts, and grumpiness. The pressure had begun to get to me. I spitefully sized up an apparently perfect woman my age. She may have been dressed in the latest, expensive winter wear, have her make-up and hair done to highlighted perfection, have a wallet bulging with unused credit cards but I had the requisite knowledge to write the Beginner's Latin exam – so there! I gave her a superior glance. I half tripped, half fell out at my stop, pack sack, book bag, carry all in tow, clothed in the bulky layers of a Russian peasant, _Zeller's_ booted, and with all the other tense students, quick marched up the stairs to 49th.

When I had settled in my seat for each of the exams, I took a big breath, thought about how important the next couple of hours would be in twenty years, then focused my mind on the subject at hand. When the order was given to start, I read over the questions slowly and carefully and then began jotting down notes that had any bearing on the topic, in any order, just so that I wouldn't forget to use any of the points. I ordered them then, and began to write steadily, adding ideas as I went. For the exams where we knew the questions ahead of time, I furiously wrote out my memorized answers. For translations, I pieced them out word for word, then tried to make sense of the material before writing my final answer. I used all my time and didn't ever stop for a break but reread, edited, or thought out a better guess at something.

When my last exam was finished, I headed for the train, joyful, triumphant and singing in exultation.

30. Mother and Child Reunion

Finally, come what may, the term had ended and I was ready to head home for some rapid Christmas preparations and a couple of shifts of work which I anticipated would feel like a moon landing. But first, I had a visit to make near Victoria where one of my dearest friends lives. We had planned a sleepover that included our daughters who had been born only a few weeks apart and have kept in touch over the years even though they've lived in different cities for most of the time. I said "so long" to the Singoalla and left on my journey to the Tsawwassen ferry to Sidney where I boarded the local bus to get to Maria's home in Central Saanich.

She cooked us a delicious meal which went largely unnoticed as all four of us talked non-stop, dwelling for awhile on the details of Maria's daughter, Kelly's marriage which was scheduled for April. She told us how her boyfriend had proposed to her by the fountain at the world famous Butchart Gardens, near here, where she was employed. We decided to take her up on the offer of a night time, Christmas light tour of the gardens – I had never been in the winter. The snowy gardens with tableaux of elves, reindeer, toys and all things festive, lit by tens of thousands of lights, were stunning.

We strolled through the meandering paths, talking and laughing over recalled memories that went back almost forty years. Our conversation included sad events too, and we shed a few tears together without embarrassment. When the generation gap became apparent, the girls would tease us and we would respond in kind. But I know that Maria was thinking what I was, that these beautiful, intelligent, young women were our link to the future, that they held the promise of carrying forward all that we felt was good and worth preserving.

Liz took a couple of pictures of us with her phone, grinning like idiots in the oversized wreath near the entrance. We returned to Maria's place for more drinks and conversation until we couldn't keep our eyes open any longer. We hugged each other, hugged our girls, and expressed our hope to make the mother/daughter sleepover a new tradition.

31. Travelling Christmas Chaos Roadshow

"What had I been thinking?" I asked myself as I searched madly in my daughter's shared kitchen for a couple of spoons of flour so that I could finish making the gravy for our turkey dinner. "Of course she doesn't own anything as prosaic as a bag of flour." There were Chlorella tablets, fish sauce, philosopher's tea and three types of nuts in her food cupboard but not flour of any kind, nor cornstarch.

I had spent the last couple of days at home packing everything, and I mean everything: from the elements of a turkey dinner, gifts, decorations, candles, crackers, trifle, cookies, snacks and drinks, to some Swedish extras. I had supposed that everyone owned a handful of flour but here we were on Christmas Day facing no gravy. My mind grasped for substitute ideas like bran or shredded toilet paper or maybe fish sauce would be okay .... "Oh, here Mum, Claire has some spelt flour in her cupboard," Liz announced, digging in one of her roommates' food caches.

We had had to relocate Christmas festivities to Victoria because my mother-in-law, Peggy, who suffers from dementia, could no longer make the confusing trip and overnight visit to our home up island. Normally, Jerry's sister, Sue, would host her and their bachelor brother for alternate years with me but this year, she would be out of town. She had offered her house but I thought it would be fun to celebrate at my daughter's place.

Jerry and the boys were in the living room with Uncle Ian who entertained them with his latest batch of corny jokes, and Peggy, who kept asking whose house this was while one of the Star Wars movies played in the background. We had managed to cobble together a table that we could all sit at by pushing a couple of unmatched, and rickety small ones together and covering all with the tablecloth that I had brought. Liz had set the table and found enough chairs to go around. Now with the gravy on its way, all was in readiness – I couldn't believe it.

I went to the living room to announce the happy news, pleased to see Peg hugging the three foot long, stuffed tiger that we had given her for Christmas. Her more recent years had reignited her love of stuffed animals and tigers in particular so when I spotted this enormous critter at the Superstore a couple of weeks earlier, I figured it would give her something cuddly to hold in the new setting for holiday festivities. "Whose is this lovely animal?" she asked for the tenth time. "Yours Gran, do you like him?" Alastair asked. "I can't believe that he's mine," she purred, stroking his stripey back. Funnily enough, I was to discover in the new year that we were at the end of the Year of Tiger, in the Chinese zodiac.

Eagerly, we eight gathered to indulge in the biggest pig-out of the year. John carried in the turkey and our paterfamilias set himself up to carve at the over-crowded sideboard, of sorts. I looked up at the smiling faces of my family framed against the scraggly fir tree we had cut down on our property a couple of weeks ago and sent here with a bag of old, expendable decorations by way of one of our sons. I had arrived to find that the strings of mini-lights weren't on the tree and been assured by the kids that none had been sent. I knew better, so looked through the junk at the front door where the hall was overflowing with huge sneakers. Aha! - there were the lights still in their bag. I gave them to Thomas asking that he put them on the tree and before I could explain that it wouldn't take long to remove the few baubles, he had chucked the strings at the tree, letting them fall where they may and plugged them in before the tree had stopped tottering. We all laughed and left it, the tree was an original already. Not possessing a tree topper, my daughter had made a paper cone angel gown, cut out John's big, drooling face from a baby photo she had and stuck it on adorned with a gold, ribbon halo. The effect had frightened her roommates every time they entered the room. So when Peg, who doesn't see well either, had entered the room that afternoon and exclaimed, "Oh, what a beautiful tree," with breathy praise, we couldn't keep our faces straight.

I listened to the silly repartee, while plates were passed around to be filled at each of the veggie stations, looked at the faces I loved, our new tiger friend included, and I knew that Santa had found us here, so far from our home.

32. Heavy New Year

Not only had I had survived the battle with a whole term of post secondary education but I had come through with flying colours. I felt ready to take on the next phase, although the second term's courses didn't interest me as much as the first's had. Nonetheless, I would don my shield and buckler to sally forth.

Many of the same students were also returning to my Art History class to study everything from Byzantine to Modern art. Ditto for Classical Studies, this time to hurl ourselves into Ancient Rome. Religious Studies was the dark horse: new prof, many new students, and new material, for me anyway.

In second term Latin, only the fighting few remained, our class having shrunk to almost one half its size in the fall. By now though, it being such a small class, many of us were on friendly terms and able to help each other. We also clung to Ms. Lewis, our shelter in the maelstrom of Latin grammar. Besides Davinder, I had made friends with a student in her early twenties. Chelsea was from a middle class, Canadian family with an Italian grandmother. She was one of those people that seemed to have it all - she was good at sports, music, academic studies and was pretty and upbeat. In addition to full time school, she held down a full time job. I marvelled at her energy.

Just before Christmas, on our way for a coffee at the cafeteria, we had wandered by the themed decorations that design classes were displaying in the halls. Chelsea had told me about her step-mother's themed Christmas trees. I was horrified to hear that when this woman had moved into the home where Chelsea lived with her Dad and sister, she had taken it upon herself, that very Christmas, to throw out the family decorations. I thought of all the lovingly preserved, tacky and torn Christmas objets d'art that my children had made over the years. These precious creations tied all our shared holidays together with a big, velvet bow. How sad little Chelsea had been under the perfectly themed Christmas tree that year as even now, the memory took the tinsel off her holiday.

After Latin, on the first day back at college, I asked how her last Christmas had panned out and was glad to hear that she had had a good time, seen her boyfriend who was studying in another city and was looking forward to a holiday in the sun, a gift from her mother. She asked if I could take notes for her while she was away. What an honour, I thought, not only was I a student but I was trusted to take notes for a bright, young mind. We speculated on the fate of Quintus, who by this time was walking to Ancient Rome in order to study under the tutelage of his magister, Orbilius. Soon, we would be translating some of the simpler tracts of Latin that he was learning.

We started our religious studies with Hinduism which I think Davinder thought would be a walk in the park. I believe he soon regretted not attending temple more often with his mother. We were placed in small groups for this class where some of the more profound ideas were to be discussed like, "describe Brahma in one word." In my group for this portion of the course, there was a rather flashy, obviously wealthy, Chinese student who was consistently late for class, a teenaged, shy Taiwanese student and a young, divorced father who ran a gardening business when he was not trying to advance his education. (Coincidentally, he asked me to take notes for him while he went to a hot, Caribbean country to attend a wedding. No problem – that's what I do now.)

In Art History, we had finally hit pay dirt -- the Renaissance in all its phases: proto, early, high and northern. Attending class was like watching a slide show of Jerry's and my traipse through the museums of Italy. Our prof was very good at augmenting what the textbook had to say and summing up the historical events that led to subtle changes in what blossomed for successive eras. In the darkened classroom with slides of masterpieces projected before us, it was easy to ignore the miserable sleet out the window and let memory flow - the sprinkle of gold dust on a carnival mask, the flavours of nougat gelato and Chianti, the cool breeze blowing through a hilltop town, the smell of a dusty olive grove beside a Cinque Terre trail, the toll of distant monastery bells ....

But – the light snapped on and I was reminded that there was a full calendar of school work for the next three and a half months. I had three more essays to write, five mid-terms, countless quizzes, many long translations and four more finals to write. I hoped that I wouldn't run out of steam or be too distracted now that I had a room mate on the boat.

33. Down and Out in Vancouver and Richmond

Up until the New Year, my husband had visited a few times and I had returned home a couple of times. But now, with his seasonal work obligations completed and time on his hands, he decided to join me, full time on the Singoalla. Our son had recuperated well enough from his injury to return to work and now all four children were spreading their tiny wings in Victoria. So, he shut the house up, dropped our cat off with our daughter and dog, who had joined her in the fall, and came to Vancouver.

At first I worried because he had no real plan, just a general idea to look around for some part time work until his contract started up again in April. Although I really looked forward to having him around, I feared a type of _Retired Husband Syndrome_ , wherein the suddenly idle husband sticks a bit too closely to the wife for care and entertainment. (This is a condition actually documented in Japan. In her book, _Reinventing Retirement_ , Miriam Goodman informs us that, " according to reports, Japanese women are showing physical signs of stress as husbands retire and are home all the time." ) (Goodman) He was moving out of his comfort zone too but I didn't think that I had the strength or time to think up plan of action for him and I really feared falling back into the role I had abandoned. I knew that I would have to focus on my goals for the year. He had been supportive from the get-go but a move into my new urban sphere might prove to be too much change. To some extent, our relationship hung in the balance.

We had a 'honeymoon' phase where it was just fun to go explore further afield as we had the car now or hang out at the local pub, for me to come home to a cooked meal or go for long walks in new directions, when we would toss around ideas for the decade or so ahead, before we would be ready for some type of retirement. Right away though, Jerry was thinking hard about ways to fill his time and we did need to have a small income soon.

He used the recreational centre in Richmond for its sauna, and the library to borrow DVDs that we could watch on his laptop back on the boat. There is nothing like snuggling into a pile of blankets in the V berth with a bottle of wine, some snacks and Jeremy Brett's brilliant portrayal of Sherlock Holmes solving crimes of Victorian London while a storm rages outside. (Jerry's guilty little secret is his love of all things _Sherlock_ \- he's read all the cases, with annotations. Surprisingly, he had been mortified when I insisted that he pose for a photo with the _Watson_ actor provided at 221b Baker Street on a previous visit to London.)

The deep heat of the sauna came with a whole new social experience. The large ethnic community in Richmond were heavy users of this unique social forum. Jerry drew a few stares when he joined the cedar benches as the only Caucasian, although there was, on one occasion, one Italian immigrant as well. Usually, there were between ten and twenty steamy fellow occupants and their conversation in Cantonese could rise to a feverish pitch depending on the subjects cast out for a general chewing over on any particular day.

As the new school term was just kicking into gear, there was only a trickle of assignments and easy reading, so I had a number of free hours to spend with Jerry. However, I knew that in a few short weeks the work load would change dramatically, forcing me to spend long days at the college library. One morning he drove me to school and we happened to pass a Labour Unlimited outlet. I asked if he had thought of seeing what they offered in the way of casual employment, thinking that maybe he could babysit the front desk of a hotel for a couple of hours a week, or something equally cushy that kept him warm and dry.

A day or two later, he told me that he had checked the place out and that they hired day labourers on the spot, for minimal pay if you showed up around 5 a.m. with work boots and a hard hat. Luckily, he had left safety gear in the trunk of our car from the summer and managed to get an almost new pair of steel toed boots at the _Value Village_ , so off he went to try out the life of the temporarily employed. I was a bit suspicious of his joining the work-for-beer-money social set but kept my concerns to myself.

He came home elated a few hours later. He had joined the crowd and was picked to go unload a truck in a warehouse near Steveston and because they were boxes of cookies, they were able to finish in twenty minutes and still be paid for the mandatory four hour period, and because he drove his fellow worker, he got an extra ten dollars. Easy money, he thought, one of the best paid half hours of his life. He returned to the _L.U_. office for another go after a quick lunch with me and his luck ran out when he hauled up at the hospital to unload 250 pound doors for the next seven hours. A testament to the miracles of modern medicine was that twenty-five years earlier, he had been fighting for his life, post kidney transplant surgery at the same hospital.

His luck was to ebb and flow over the next couple of months as labour was entirely dependent on what was demanded in the market place. Some days were a breeze and there were others which left him a broken man in desperate need of a hot shower and a fortifying brandy. He would take a day off to recuperate and then rejoin the throng again.

He described the labour collective in Steinbeckian terms with men lining up for inspection and somewhat arbitrary selection. In spite of his age (most of the men were young) he had the advantage of owning a vehicle with which he could transport himself and fellow workers to job sites that were sometimes off the main transportation routes or might be time sensitive. Also weighing heavily in his favour, were the facts that he wasn't picky, was prepared, and could communicate with others, an advantage of having worked in management.

Through the cold months of January, February and some of March, he went on to shingle roofs, deconstruct an old folks home, unload everything from coal to lentils at locations all over town, clean and sort concrete forms, dig fill, and most interestingly, help to set up the enormous, horse/circus production, _Cavalia_ , where he installed 2,000 chairs. Luckily, he could work when he chose to and punctuate days of heavy labour with ones puttering around on the boat, reading and visiting with the sauna gang or doing a light labour job. Sometimes he worked like a dog for minimum pay but occasionally, he scored a cushy gig.

I questioned this way of working at first – he has a long history of specialized job skills, but because he is so sociable and likes to see what the rest of the world gets up to, he found the whole experience highly educational. It was interesting to learn how goods are moved through the city, what preparations are needed for various urban projects and to observe first hand, the social dynamic of the working poor.

_Labour Unlimited_ provided a type of credit card system for these, mostly men, who often did not have bank accounts and lived from week to week on what they made doing piece work. Some of his fellow workers had never had a full time job, an adult home of their own, a vehicle or an advocate in life. There are those who love the drama and irresponsibility of being "a man of means by no means," kings of their own particular roads but the majority were those who had spent a lifetime slipping through all the cracks, alone and undiscovered in their need for a helping hand.

We observed the difference between boys like ours who are raised in families where there is always someone who can help out on the road to financial independence and who care enough to make sure that young men are not left to live in unhealthy or unsafe circumstances. In spite of social programming, free health care and accommodation for the poor, if there isn't a real friend who will go to bat for you and love you unconditionally, disaster is an ever present companion.

34. Here on the Flight Path

We had attended an Agatha Christie murder mystery play at the Metro Theatre in the fall with my sister and her husband. It was a good production but what we really enjoyed was the theatre itself. Nestled beside the on-ramp for the Arthur Laing Bridge, this old dear had seen close to fifty seasons when we first visited. The theatre's non-profit cooperative offers a season of mystery, drama, comedy and Christmas pantomime that makes up a year of traditional, British-style live theatre.

Up a crooked flight of stairs, there is a lounge of lumpy, red velvet couches, local art on display and a senior gentleman serving intermission drinks. The ambiance is definitely West End, old theatre. Jerry and I had seen The _Woman in Black_ , when we were in London the previous year, at the Fortune Theatre, one of the smallest of the West End venues, and the struggle between floors, on narrow steps between the lounge crowd and exits, for the bathroom had been indicative of the speed with which things are modernized in that old theatre town. It was ridiculously pleasing to find a building in the young city of Vancouver that similarly hadn't felt the intrusion of a make-over.

In the dark days of January, we decided to go to a play again. The Norm Foster comedy, _Here on the Flight Path_ , seemed particularly appropriate to our domestic circumstances, where regularly, we were forced to suspend conversation until an overhead plane had passed. The night was freezing cold so I had a creative scramble to make my warmest clothing look presentable for a theatre date. Reluctantly, we stepped out onto the creaking wharf, beneath the frosty glitter of stars. Even the moon looked frozen into a sharp sliver.

Live theatre is an art form that is here to stay, part of the appeal being the hope or fear of the unexpected, either fantastic or fatal. We'll never forget the Christmas pageant when our eldest son, as Joseph, lobbed baby Jesus, in doll form, about ten feet across the stage to land perfectly in the manger, presaging his interest in football at a later date. The house lights dimmed but flared up on stage and I thought of how the magic of lighting had influenced the visual art world. Toulouse-Lautrec and Degas had both been quite smitten with the combination of artificial light and the world of entertainment \- of revealing snippets of truth obscured by the spectacle of the stage.

The play, about a man's relationships with three women who "arrive and take-off" from the apartment next door, was slightly dated, but interesting in terms of the idea of permanence. I thought about proximity being the catalyst of most of our friendships and love affairs, and how the internet is changing this. I know of three people who have married partners that they have met on the internet, and surprisingly, have all been successful at staying together. These days there aren't the strong connections to place that there were in the old days when people worked locally, attended church socials and local fairs, and joined activity groups and societies that linked them to neighbourhood social webs.

These days, few people get to know their neighbours or co-workers. Electronic social networks have their uses but there is a whole segment of society disenfranchised due to a lack of access to technology or the skills required to navigate their complicated webs. At the library where I work, I often meet people that can't properly address an envelope, who are required, but fail, to fill out electronic forms for aid of one sort or another. Even I, college student that I was, often had a frustrating time trying to access information on a computer.

With the right skill set though, we can jump from task to task with a fluidity made easy by Google, email, texting, tweeting, downloading and electronically shop for anything at all. Affordable travel has shrunk the globe, making remote relationships close. But, I think, we have lost something when our closest community connections are through the safety of a firewall, when it becomes a reckless act to talk to the person beside you on a bench, to invite the new neighbour over for a meal or pitch in with the volunteers at the community centre.

On the drive home, I looked out to Sea Island where the beacons blinked their signals to air traffic and the runway lights blazed in organized lines. Some people choose not to travel, completely content to spend their lives with the familiar. But planeloads are always arriving and taking off all over the planet, full of those venturing out for new experiences. The trips each of us chooses to take is a subject rich in hours of reflection. You need to crave the unknown to be a traveller as things will never be exactly as you had imagined. Most of my travelling had been as a sort of pilgrimage to the European culture I had come from, but I think, at least some, future travels will be to more mysterious locations – a discovery of the totally alien. There is nothing like the excitement of strapping yourself into your seat, while placing it in the upright position, as the jet engines roar to life on the runway.

We picked our way carefully along the icy wharves, our breath appearing in cloud puffs. The second, knee high light along the rail from the bottom of the ramp characteristically switched off as we approached, a victim of some wiring glitch. Down our finger of the wharf, the white hull and deck of the Singoalla had begun to look grubby, a result of the carbon fallout from plane exhaust but nevertheless, she was welcoming, offering refuge from the strange, new world theatre we lived in.

35. Gung Hay Fat Choy

Just when we had begun to recover from Christmas and get into the swing of things at school again, the atmosphere perked up in Richmond. First, I started to notice rabbits popping up here and there and wondered why Easter decorations were being hauled out at the end of January. Marketing had really gone too far, I fumed. But then, I started seeing red, literally – everywhere. Lucky red banners, lanterns and tons of bunting type decor, and those rabbits kept coming. I finally connected the two; the year of the rabbit in the Chinese zodiac was about to begin. The rabbit likes an easy, good time, and apparently, gives sensible advice but is commitment shy. Our gardens at home proved that rabbits like an easy, good time but there is nothing shy about their commitment to eat anything that the deer leave behind and as far as giving advice goes, I'm sure they've let all their friends know to come over for the feast, that our dog is too lazy to chase them anymore.

The grocery stores were lavishly decorated – much more than western Christmas decor. Our local Yaohan had pulled out all the stops. I had to make extra shopping trips just to scope out the variety and over-the-top exuberance of this holiday. I longed to be a Chinese kid.

The weather maintained its unrelenting icy grip so if Jerry and I could find something free to attend, at an indoor venue, we were all over it. When news of the dance of the Chinese dragons at the Aberdeen Mall came to our notice, we skedaddled. All the store entrances in the mall were festooned with heads of lettuce to feed the dragons and thereby, attract their luck. To the Chinese, the dragon is a deity with control over water and therefore, is revered for its life-giving properties – rain, rivers, clouds and ocean, perfectly symbolic of the west coast. Like most gods, the dragon has a dark side too, manifesting itself in thunder, typhoons and tsunamis.

There was an enormous, colourful, air-filled, nylon figure display near the fountain in the atrium of the mall which included bears, rabbits and anything that a kid might be attracted to, thereby attracting a cash flow from the parents' pockets to the mall vendors. A constant stream of families posed for pictures in front of the display. There were kids in red or dressed in adorable Chinese brocade suits. I followed a little girl through the crowds trying to find out where she got her intriguing dragon marionette. "Taiwan," her dad told me with a chuckle when she looked at me askance, well prepared not to engage with strangers.

We watched from a second floor window as the grand event began in the outer courtyard: the competition of the gorgeous dragons, each of which appeared to be sponsored by a civic group or business. Local dignitaries were on hand to provide the introductions and give out the prizes. The dragons danced in undulating, sinuous movements, controlled by athletic young men underneath their vibrant red, gold, purple, blue and black and yellow backs. Huge drums beat out the rhythm which suited perfectly, the idea of a dragon dancing. Thousands of firecrackers popped and their smoke wafted up like the incense of dragon breath.

Dragons bring good luck in China because they chase out the evil spirits. The new year starts with a clean house, all the bad luck having been thrown out. A good idea, I think, and I wish we could just do a memory dump at the end of the year of all the things that bring us down and follow it with a healthy lettuce of forgiveness.
36. When in Roeme

It's all about boundaries. Ten shots were heard on February 5, not many miles from the college -- another gang shooting that had left a young male in the hospital. There are many gang related deaths in the lower mainland and too many of them are young men. It seems ridiculous in the twenty-first century, in a free country that men are willing to fight and die over territorial boundaries.

I suppose that all war is about the shifting and establishment of boundaries, that nations are basically tribes who agree that their sphere of influence is worth defending with their lives. Similarly, each person has their circle of space from which they will repel invaders. My daughter, who was one of those kids who began pushing away when a cuddle restrained her for more than a few moments, has what I call her bubble, an imaginary no-go zone which surrounds her. Sometimes, I pretend to knock on it if I want to come near for a hug. I tease her but know that there is nothing abnormal in the protection of personal space. The Gauls set the sacred geese at the Temple of Juno on the Capitoline Hill honking out a warning to the Romans holed up in the citadel there.

We all have sensors that go off at a certain proximity to another being. The problem comes when the invading party doesn't respect the warning signs. There comes a time when you face your aggressor and say so far -- but no further. A line is drawn in the sand. There are particular ideals, hallowed objects or rights that we are prepared to defend. From Motherhood to the Koran to Old Glory to rights for hamsters (which I once heard championed from the soap box at Speaker's Corner in Hyde Park), eventually something claims our allegiance.

Jerry drove us east on Marine Drive one day just for a change of scenery. We crossed Boundary Road which runs north to south, dividing Vancouver from Burnaby. The northern end feeds onto the Second Narrows Bridge, now named the Ironworkers Memorial Bridge in honour of the nineteen men who died there in 1958 due to an engineering mistake. We mourn the loss of these poor hardworking men but perhaps it is the lack of glory in their death that determined thirty-five years would pass before their sacrifice was memorialized. Mankind seems to prefer death in the throes of battle be it either by army or gang.

Why do males need to mark their turf? I have on occasion witnessed my sons licking something on offer on a platter in order to mark it as theirs. Disgusting yes, but it seems to do the trick. And then there is the constant wrestling which had me pulling my hair out when the boys were still under our roof. Finally my husband, one of five brothers, let me know that this is how boys play. It seems that men are constantly testing boundaries that they are cautioned not to cross; that they are genetically programmed to actively provoke a reaction from another party all the time. They need to engage in physical battle and it is just too bad that guns have made the battle so deadly.

When a visiting prof brought replicas of Roman armour to class, there was a hush of excitement among the alpha-males in the class. The air crackled with anticipation of the invitation that they knew was coming. So when it came, a few eager troops came forward to try on the heavy greaves, helmet and mail. A heroic mystique was evident in their smiles.

The sacred boundary of Romulus and Remus is an early example of the turf war. Twin foundlings, suckled by a she-wolf, they went on to be the first settlers on two of the seven hills that cluster beside the Tiber. Remus had the audacity to leap over the wall marking Romulus' territory and for his transgression was killed. (By the way, did I mention that they were sired by Mars, god of war?) And thus, in about 750 BC, tradition records the founding of Rome and not Reme.

37. Pyramids of the Delta

One of the pleasures of living in a city is the great variety of interesting sights there are to take in when going for a walk. At home, we usually take the same remote hike through the forest on a loop made by a logging road in the managed wood lot across from our property. The dog goes nuts, although he is free to go alone whenever he chooses, but doesn't. We watch the changing of the seasons in the natural world, come across horse, deer, and bear spoor, listen to the ravens clatter in fifty foot high firs, have a brief conversation with the itinerant salal picker and return home content. But within walking distance of our boat home, there were endless possibilities for unusual sights and contemplations.

Doug Coupland has Richmond wrong in his book, _City of Glass_ , you can see mountains from Richmond, including the majestic and volcanic, Mount Baker. I do like his idea about Baker being a metaphor for Canadians about the United States,"(Coupland)...seductive but distant, powerful and at least temporarily benign." From out at the end of Lulu Island, on a clear day, you can also see the mountains of Vancouver Island. But he is right about earthquakes, if there is one, and it could be anytime, Richmond will sink into the sea – there is wisdom in living on a boat here.

Moving westward along the bank-side dykes of the Fraser, there is incessant change in the cityscape. World class architecture, river craft, mammoth construction projects involving seismic upgrading techniques, air traffic on Sea Island and spectacular, broad sky vistas. Because the delta of the Fraser is the main wintering locale for waterfowl in Canada, there are endless opportunities for bird watching. Huge flocks of lesser Canada geese flew overhead on our first walk down to Terra Nova Park on the seaward side of Richmond, their thousands of wings stirring the autumn air into a pentecostal wind. Near the UBC boathouse one evening, we watched as hundreds of ducks gathered on the liquid gold surface of the water, dashing about and squabbling like the final day at a family reunion.

The innovative John M.S. Lecky boathouse, sits out over the water, a ramp connecting it to the bank. Its upper storey houses offices and a function room, while below, the rowing shells, amongst other boats are stored. Jutting out into the river there are the attached docks where we often saw rowers preparing for a practice session or, a couple of times, many teams readying for a regatta. In high school, Jerry was the practise coxswain for the UBC rowing team when they met at the clubhouse shared by the Vancouver Rowing and Burrard Yacht Clubs in Coal Harbour at Stanley Park. He was on the Sentinel High School team in 1971 that won the B.C. Championship, breaking the strangle hold that Shawnigan Lake School had had on the title for many years. They had gone on to St. Catherine's to compete in the Canadian Henley Regatta. He eagerly explained how the sport worked, reliving his glory days. I just pondered what it was that made some people love being on the water so much.

Near here, there is a small, gated, privately owned float where we noticed one day that one of the mooring lines had broken on a sailboat there and it was perpendicular to the dock, being pulled by the current. Jerry had called the Coast Guard Auxiliary and we assumed that the owner would be found so didn't hang around but continued our journey. Obviously he had been because, months later, there was the same boat, half sunk because a wooden palette which must have been carried by the river had jammed itself under the end of the dock against the piling, so that as the tide went out, one end of the dock got hung up on the palette which was now resting on the bottom. Somehow, a line from the boat must have been caught under the dock because as the tide came in, the port side was stuck beneath it and filling with water.

Jerry had called for help again and it must have worked because the unlucky boat appeared yet again, on our next walk, bobbing safely, dockside. The Fraser carries a startling array of junk downstream, we often had logs caught between fingers at our marina, and once, a slipper that I spent fifteen minutes bringing dockside with a pole, to see if there was a foot in it - more shoes with dismembered feet having been washed up on the coast lately. That day though, I hoped that the owner realized that if it wasn't for the kindness of strangers, it could have ended badly and that he or she, will do the same for someone else. From this spot on the dyke, we kept walking west, toward the Olympic Oval which from a distance, looks like a glacier on the river's edge.

This amazing building, the 2010 Olympic venue for speed skating, is now used as a community sports centre, its interior divided into a skating rink, basketball and volleyball courts, amongst other things. The nearly 100 metre interior roof is made using pine wood destroyed by the mountain pine beetle. This wood has a lustrous, bluish colour in its milled form. We were stunned by the building's size – our television screen had not done it justice. The arena is set in a vast public area enhanced with compelling art and ponds. Downspouts done in concrete are cast to look like riverbeds in which salmon swim up. Well done, I thought, glad to have had some of my tax dollars go into the project, and finally, I had a proud Olympic moment – not being much of a competitive sports fan.

Richmond is pleasing this way, some really excellent architecture and not much sign of urban decay anywhere. There are lots of typical light industrial complexes and some mundane neighbourhoods but for the most part, a very clean, modern feel pervades. The City Hall, inland from the river, probably kicked it off in 2002 with its bright architectural emergence and striking water gardens/staircase fountain that give off a zen feel, probably a good idea with all those heated political debates on site.

Here and there, all over the city, there are plots of land being prepared for new buildings. Many cranes rise into the skyline looking like prehistoric shorebirds. What I thought were new pyramids being built with concrete Lego-type blocks were really only the bulwark for tons of fill trucked in to firm up a site before the weight of any construction began. Eventually as the fill stops sinking, the site stabilizes and the blocks and sand are removed.

The curvy and colourful space age look of the Aberdeen Mall, built in 2004, drew me inside for many a trip to _Daiso_ , a Japanese version of a dollar store. Shopping was always made entertaining by reading the rather comical English translations on some of the goods. Ironically, the dollar store's neighbouring shopfront is the Lamborghini store where I was too shy to ask how much even the key chains were. This mall, which has at least two stores selling only Ginseng, is obviously not your average mall. The central feature, a large fountain, was synchronized to perform one day when I was there, the water sprays dancing and swaying to music played over the speaker system.

Eventually, our local perambulations would bring us to one of the Canada Line SkyTrain stations, built with space age overtones in glass, concrete and timber. At my local station, I could watch through the glass walls while I waited for my train, the complicated preliminaries taking place for the construction of a massive building next door. And it's not just the humans who were busy here \- later in the spring, from the same window, I watched the equally complicated architectural business of a pair of nesting blackbirds in the stark, metal structure of a sign tower, heedless of the noise of trains and pile driving – so far from their country cousins. Yuppie birds, I guess.

38. The Happiest Words in the World

There was a Valentine scene on the train one evening when I was riding home. I was tired but had to stand as there weren't any seats. I had been mulling over Juvenal's misogynistic satire Against Women that we had been examining that day with Mr. Isaak's apologies about the poor timing. As usual, I eyed up the other passengers which included the regular mix of commuters and students. But the seat beside me was occupied by a young couple, maybe just out of high school, or drop outs. Their clothes were the typical, distressed chic that is popular with that age group but not quite the right label, too shabby somehow, not laundry fresh.

The girl was growing out her badly dyed, orange-blonde hair, there was an unsuccessful attempt to disguise the dark brown new hair growth. Her nose and eyebrow piercings added nothing to the effect of dark eyeliner and pale lipstick but rather emphasized a sprinkling of blemishes on her forehead and nose. She was pretty though, or could have been, if her expression was more confident or her body language wasn't so wilted. She looked brittle.

Her boyfriend on the other hand looked upbeat, full of hope, his body moving freely as he spoke to her, gently touching her arm and cheek with the arm he had laid protectively over her shoulders. His eyes were dark shadowed, his hair neither thick or shiny, his skin pale with a few acne scars. I noticed that he had a couple of self inscribed tattoos on his hands, the kind you make in juvenile lock-up. From where I stood, I could smell whiffs of gingivitis from years of poor dental health laced with nicotine.

"What should we do? Go to your place?" the girl asked quietly.

"I don't know. You mean so much to me, baby. I love you so much," he gently reassured her, touching her hair, brushing her cheek with his lips.

"Maybe go downtown first."

"We will always be together. It will be so great. I'll get a job and take care of you. Just you and me, together," he kept to his theme. "Never part, baby. We've found each other. We're so lucky. None of that shit will mess us up. I will never let you down."

She smiled a shy response, held his hand.

"That's it. My girl ... my girl."

I almost missed my stop I was so engrossed in this tender drama.

The day before I had watched a Chinese girl, dressed in very expensive clothes and boots, beautifully made up, her hair glossy and thick, get on the train carrying a plastic stick with a heart-shaped foil balloon printed with teddy bears that said "I love you". She didn't look like she needed anything but she didn't look very happy either. I wondered what Valentine's Day meant to her, if the corny balloon had been given to her or was for her boyfriend. There was a group of younger, less sophisticated, Chinese girls further down the train and I noticed that their giggling chatter was occasionally broken by a surreptitious peek at the balloon girl, then followed by a hair adjustment or skirt straightening. Love was in the air and here in Richmond, new styles and expectations were being set to rituals as old as time.

I thought of the young train lovers while I walked to the marina and wondered if they stood a chance. I don't think they had anything going for them except their youth. I hoped that the young man would come through with his promises and that his girl would continue to be encouraged.

I like to tell people that I met my husband at a school for the mentally handicapped – which explains a lot. He was working as a teacher's aide for a former sister-in-law of mine, at whose house I was living for my first year of university. It wasn't love at first sight but his sense of humour was addictive and he still makes me laugh thirty years later and I've come to appreciate that quality more and more.

Our old romance isn't the teddy bear balloon type anymore but one of Jerry's unique romantic gestures was when he peed a huge heart in the snow with our initials in it, then proudly got me to look out the upstairs window. He's not the only husband who refuses to succumb to consumerism based on emotional blackmail. My neighbour has declared February 15th to be his wife's Valentine's Day. She'll be sure to get a much nicer bouquet of roses that way, for half the cost.

Jerry was in Victoria visiting his mother who had been admitted to the hospital with an infection. So this year, we texted "I luv u," to each other and felt very 21st century.

39. The Fire

I was really enjoying school once again after I had gotten into the swing of things and so when I began to feel the effects of some of the nasty germs making the rounds of the student body, I very reluctantly decided to stay aboard and try to sleep them off.

I lay, bundled in more than my usual three layers, watching the ice drops on the underside of the hull above my head begin to melt a little. From time to time, I tried to unclog my congested sinuses but they were still at the throbbing stage. I was just trying to garner the energy to get up and take another pain reliever when I noticed how many sirens I could hear – not unusual, there were always emergency vehicles crossing back and forth over the bridges near the marina but this was unrelenting and as they got closer, they seemed to stop.

I wriggled my wooled and flannelled body out of the fleecy cocoon of blankets and looked out the tiny window above the sink in the head and saw what appeared to be flashing lights above the dyke. It suddenly dawned on me that the emergency must be right here at the marina and that I could hear more sirens approaching. I hurried to the stern to look out the larger window in the hatch door and did a double take.

Approximately sixty feet kitty-corner from our slip, across the water, the entire boathouse on the next finger and everything in it was ablaze. Already, there were a couple of firemen on the wharf trying to deal with the cabin-sized, melting aluminium and wood framed structure. As I watched, stunned, there were explosions as gas tanks on the burning fishing boat ignited. More firemen were scrambling down the wharf, hauling hoses -- I imagined their straining biceps. The boathouse adjacent to the burning one began to flame up too and the firemen were dousing it and the motor cruiser moored inside.

You wouldn't think that with all the water around a fire would be serious in a marina but the opposite is true. Fibreglass is so highly flammable and with tanks of propane, diesel, gas and containers of oil everywhere, explosions can throw sparks across a stretch of water. The ramifications of the worst outcome finally hit me and I prepared for immediate evacuation. Sadly, I was equally appalled at the thought of one of those hunky fireman seeing me in my enormous, cobalt blue sweater, over purple, star-patterned fleece pants, layered with the tattered ends of an old nightie and on my feet, over-sized wooly socks over which I wore my pom-pommed slippers that had duct tape grip strips on the bottom. Vanity, thy name is woman.

It took me about three minutes to strip, don something more presentable and grab my most valued possessions – in this case, my laptop with all my assignments and my purse with phone and wallet.

I scrambled out to the wharf where a few others had gathered to watch in horror as the coast guard boat came to drag the burnt out hulks of not one, but two boats over to the haul out area. The insurance representatives would be visiting in the next week to assess the damage. I could see that we would have a better view of the silver loogie when the last of the burnt timbers came down. More fire engines were arriving to add to the two already there, in addition to the police cars, rescue vehicle and three ambulances.

They say that Nero fiddled while Rome burned and then accused the bothersome Christians of starting it, punishing them by burning them on crosses for torches at night. There is something that attracts us to the wild consumption of flames, makes us think of destruction and rebirth, themes that present themselves constantly in human history. I had recently learned about the Hindu god, Shiva, dancing to destroy the old universe, inside a hoop of flames that represents the world's energy, and by this dance, preparing the way for the next cosmic creation. I watched the flames die down across the water and wondered what the effects of this savage, fiery dance would have on my fellow boat owners, if they would find renewal somehow.

Black clouds of smoke hung low in the freezing air and the gray sky looked about to shower us with something cold. I could stand and shiver or I could escape to the nearest heated building that would let me stay with less than three dollars in my wallet. I scurried to the _Tim Horton's_ a block away to text the exciting news to my friends and let Jerry, who was working on the other side of town, know that I, at least was safe, as the fire might be reported on the local news.

40. Study Your Dreams

''Live the dream!" it said. The poster I was standing before in the hallway outside my Art History class was commanding me to live the dream, not just think about it. My mouth hung open in awe as my eyes ran salaciously over every marble curve in the picture of the Fountain of Neptune in the Piazza Navona; I could hear the water splashing. How I longed, would consider breaking laws, just to return to the sunny hills of Italy. And now, here was this study abroad poster positively demanding that I live the dream.

I was being invited to spend a month in Italy and actually earn credits in Art History. There it was, two weeks in Florence and two weeks in Rome, all organized for me to do maximum learning in a paradisaical setting. Only a crazy person would say, "no." Especially someone standing in four layers of socks and constantly wiping her nose with an increasingly gluier ball of tissue should never say, "no, I won't go."

My mind wandered to warm, fall evenings in the golden glow of Italian light and la dolce vita. Just over a year ago, I had been exactly there, a bit further down the piazza, eating pasta at a restaurant by Bernini's magnificent Fountain of the Four Rivers. Strolling back to our hotel along ancient cobbles, watching the bustle of Romans venturing out to mingle with the tourists for their evening pasegiatas, then dropping into bed, happily exhausted from the day's sightseeing and the rewards of restaurant and wine bottle.

But then my eyes scrolled down to the bottom line of the poster where the price was printed. Somewhere in the range of three thousand plus dollars. I couldn't be exact as it was too difficult to see through the tears welling up in my puffy eyes. I could, I tried to cheer myself up, remember so much of the trip still and my courses were constantly referring to things that I had seen, and sometimes touched, so recently. One day I would return, full of new information, prepared with a whole new list of sights to see. I forced myself to look at my year of school as pre-travel preparation, on a large scale.

But for now, it was time to hit the books at the library for awhile, learn what Plutarch had to say about Caesar and Pericles. Rome would have to wait.

41. Skating on Thin Ice

The chilly, dark mornings and evenings were getting me down by the end of February. My courses were more difficult to dig into and Latin grammar was threatening to ruin me. So, for a break one day, we decided to go to see what was on at the Art Gallery downtown. When we got there, we found that the entry fee was far too expensive on our budget and decided to have a free wander around instead.

Vancouver's answer to Rockefeller Center's seasonal skating rink, is the rink under the dome at Robson Square. We strolled by and stopped to watch what looked like a group of foreign exchange students take to the ice – by the looks of things, probably for the first time. Helmeted and mittened, they moved in that rigid, shaky half walk of the terrified novice. We both grew up in skating provinces and have skated since we were young, usually down the road at a frozen pond. It is still such a surprise to meet adults who can't skate but very rarely in BC's lower mainland is there a patch of ice large and strong enough to hold anyone. Sometimes, some nostalgic Easterner floods a field or back yard if there is a real cold snap.

We went into a book store nearby to warm up and browse. I leafed through Jack Hodgins' latest book and told Jerry about the time in high school when he asked my creative writing class for words that girls used to describe good looking, young men – I think he was still writing his first book then and fed his family by teaching hormonal adolescents in Nanaimo. He had been offered so much more than what he was expecting that he had given us a rather frightened, but gentlemanly, 'thank-you'. I was lucky to have him teach a fiction work shop that I took at University too. Can-Lit fame had not gone to his head and he was still a kind gentleman. Little did I know then that I was to end up living in the same small Vancouver Island community in which he had grown up and we had poked fun of in class. I was pleased to see that he was still writing.

I had written occasionally, mostly bits and pieces over the years, and briefly for work at a local college but not with any purpose. The thought struck me then that I might want to write about this unique year one day and decided to start making a few notes so that I wouldn't forget all the details. But right now, I had the first of my three essays to write. Also, another Religious studies exam was approaching and there were chapters of reading and complicated Latin exercises to do.

I knew the time was imminent when I would finally succumb to the cold I was fighting which had been pulling more fellow students from class each day now. Jerry wasn't feeling very healthy either and because of the immune suppressant drugs he takes, once sick, it often takes a long time for him to get better. We dragged our feet back to the marina for bed and hot honey-lemon brandies – Jerry's cure-all, and discussed spending the money to go home for complete rest and warmth. The next day, when I awoke in the frigid air with my head pounding and nose running, my breath condensing on the bulkhead above me, I knew the time had come to visit the lares and penates – Roman gods of home and hearth. I took a Tylenol and went to the college, but only to find out what I would be missing for the next week, which happened to be the only good time to be absent. I returned to the boat where Jerry had also returned, feeling worse and we packed up all the books I needed, the laptop and the laundry and headed for the ferry.

With the sight of our house in the wintery woods after driving up island through the snowy landscape, we became Dr. Zhivago and Lara escaping to our dacha. When we arrived, Jerry immediately got both the wood-stove and the fireplace going and I rustled up some soup. It was marvellous to be home again but strangely quiet with no pets or kids around. Catlike, I took up what was to be my position everyday that week, beside the crackling fire, wrapped in blankets, books at my side. That first night back was just what the doctor ordered, warmed to the bone and medicated, we spread out under the duvet in our big bed for a very long, deep sleep.

I was starting to feel better a couple of days later. I had organized a dinner and drinks evening for the weekend with three couples that we meet with, usually to share travel stories and photos – two couples had been in Europe that fall and Sue and Ron had recently returned from New Zealand. I began to get carried away with meal planning for our social evening because it was such a relief to forget about school for awhile. I was only halfheartedly catching up with homework now.

I had started to ease my way into an essay for Art History which was to compare two pictures of Christ crucified; the first, _Holy Trinity_ , by Masaccio from the early Italian Renaissance and the second, from the later, Northern European Renaissance, Grunewald's _Crucifixion_ , from the Isenheim altarpiece. The two artists approached their faith and art in radically different ways, one emphasizing the abilities of man created in God's image and the other, focusing on the blessing of an accessible, comforting Saviour. I mulled over my current reading on the variety of Buddhist sects, and considered the many streams in most religions and who knows by what peregrinations of the soul a person is brought to spiritual peace. Art speaks to each of us in a similar, multi-faceted way, every image is interpreted by the viewer through their own lens of understanding.

Before leaving for college, I had printed out two elegant, Agnes Miller Parker woodcut prints to take with me which I realized now, were my personal 'Masaccio and Grunewald'. The first, to remind me of the value of hard work, was of the feckless, Aesop grasshopper, who, unlike the ant, and Masaccio, failed to use his talents and ability. As a consequence of wasting time playing, he learned his lesson the hard way when winter came. The second, of two birds diligently attending to the needs of their nestful of offspring, I had wanted to remind me of my faith and family which would sustain me through any rough patches ahead. Even if I failed as a pupil, I could find comfort, like Grunewald, back at the nest.

I rethought my time-consuming plans for the dinner party and decided it would be a meagre poor man's potluck with me providing only the soup which I could throw together on that morning. Luckily, our friends were interested enough in hearing about our crazy life that they agreed to bring the rest. With the weekend set as a deadline now, I hunkered down with a determination to finish my essay, study harder for the Buddhism exam and to conquer pronouns in Latin, both personal and demonstrative.

42. Hallowed Ground

Health restored and back on the mainland with my feet luxuriously cossetted by possum socks from New Zealand, I walked through the grounds of southeast False Creek, thinking about the hobo jungle that existed near here, less than eighty years ago. Jerry was working to help set up the lavish horse show production, _Cavalia_ and he had forgotten to bring a form he needed with him, so I had brought it along after school. Hundreds of labourers were required at the site to do everything from setting up tents and bleachers to shovelling sand and moving horses.

In the dirty thirties, one of Vancouver's four hobo shanty towns had been built with discarded chunks of lumber, corrugated iron, boxes or any available or pilfered scraps. Many of the unemployed who rode the rails chose the west coast for the winter because of the warmer climate. Some days, Andrew Roddan, from First United Church down on Hastings, and his soup kitchen volunteers, fed over a thousand men. Estimates say that he served 50,000 meals in the winter of 1930/31. He describes in his book, _God in the Jungles_ , how every day, hundreds were provided with some of the necessities like clothes, shoes, soap and blankets – everything given to where the need was greatest. Most of these men had come from good jobs and homes and were actively seeking employment. A few were perpetual wanderers and a few were drunks but all got lumped together in the jungle where death and disease soon took up residence. Men, and sometimes boys, in desperate circumstances, tried to keep themselves healthy and clean, keep out of trouble and not lose hope, not cross the line to crime. (Roddan)

Vancouver still has a large population of the down and out living mainly in the East End, infamous for drug use, petty crime and despair. Bart Campbell, in his book, The Door is Open, talks about the proliferation of help agencies in this modern jungle, mostly Christian charities that have operated in the area, some without recognition, for decades. The notoriety of East Hastings has brought a certain cachet to helping here and there are groups less motivated by a true desire to help than by the advertisement of their presence in the community. (Campbell) There are tragedies played out every day here and legions of ghosts searching for rest.

These days though, I think that the men and women who work for day rates at labour agencies, or take their chances at nabbing a day's work by appearing at street corners where there is construction in progress, are the true heirs of the hobo. The man with a few dollars of earned money in his pocket has the pride of independence when he can afford to buy a couple of beer at the end of day and show the world that he isn't a bum. The long term goal of saving up for something substantial, like a car or college course or even a TV, is too difficult when immediate gratification is on offer, at a small price. Campbell comments on the terms for monthly rental of a TV that will never be owned – cheap month to month but ridiculously expensive in the long run.

I think that charity is misguided if its aim is to provide stuff when the real need is for people who will care enough to donate time teaching someone how to fill out a form on-line, how to make cheap, healthy meals, or how to mend a broken bike. Campbell tells the story of Brother Tim, giving away one of the last blankets at his charity only to find it in a puddle at the side of the road the next day and the recipient returning for another that night.

But of course, the whole story is complicated and the bottom line is simply that some things will never change. It was Christ who pointed out that, " the poor will always be with you," - there are some folks for whom we must always provide, they exist as a kind of omen to remind us always to tithe when we can because each of us are only a catastrophe away from being the beggar tomorrow.

I watched the myriad of tasks being attended to for _Cavalia_ and wondered how many of the workers would be able to afford tickets to the high priced production and how these few days of employment might affect their lives, if any of them would get ahead at all. Eventually, the circus packs up and leaves town and the magic disappears. I pondered how many more years it would be before a shanty town might return.

43. The Foggy Dew

There is so much choice when it comes to eating out on the lower mainland that, suffice it say, whatever you want, Vancouver's got it. We limited ourselves most of the time because of our budget, but a few times, we did splash out. When we first arrived in Richmond in September, we had gone to a local, authentic Chinese restaurant, making every head turn when we entered, being the only non-Asians there. The delicious meal wasn't anything like the ubiquitous North American, sweet and sour chicken balls and chow mein, and the price reflected the difference.

We had also visited an upscale Mexican restaurant with relatives and I had happily gorged myself at a Greek place over in Kitsilano, the neighbourhood on this side of English Bay at a nephew's birthday. My sister has a weakness for stuffed crepes so had brought me along as a reason to enjoy another sampling of the fare at _Trixi's Crepe and Coffeehaus_ , one of her regular haunts and a link in the chain that bonded us together over food .

Usually, a meal out for us meant the meatball special at Ikea or a Food Fair fill-up at the mall. Sometimes, I would stop at the sunny cafeteria on the second storey of the Aberdeen Mall with its great views over Richmond to sip tea, maybe have a snack and enjoy people watching.

_The Foggy Dew_ is an Irish-style hotel pub near the centre of Richmond. We accidentally discovered the delicious and generous nacho platter with all the 'fixins' one day after a particularly long ramble all over the neighbourhood. Sipping our Guinness in the casual and cozy, wood and leather surroundings, with a real fireplace to warm us up, had been such a satisfying, homey ending to our day. Our stroll back to the boat with autumn mist rising off the river and the far off sound of a foghorn had sealed the Foggy Dew into our hearts. So, when Jerry was offered a steady, well paid job, we decided to return for a couple of celebratory beers and to relive the whole nacho experience.

He had reapplied at a crew boat company where he had missed getting a job earlier in the year because a neighbour at our marina had beat him to the office by fifteen minutes. Unfortunately, this man had a cocaine habit that impaired his work and eventually, got him fired. Jerry had timed his return well and was hired to take shifts driving a water taxi from Granville Island in False Creek, to Bowen Island just across from Horseshoe Bay. The aluminium crew boat, carried up to a dozen passengers right downtown, saving them the long wait for the ferry which services the island. A few times, he ran buyers up the Fraser and out to shop for logs among the booms in the strait. This was a job he loved having spent most of his life in some type of boat or other. Getting paid for it was just gravy.

The folks at the _Labour Unlimited_ office missed him, I guess, because they kept calling for awhile when there was a job that required someone who owned a car. I can't say that he was glad to finish with the casual labour pool because it was such an interesting experience but the early mornings and low pay made the parting easier. I liked to call it his L.U. Graduation.

One night when I was busy with homework, Jerry had gone to the pub to watch the final game of the Superbowl. Our elder twin, Alastair, who was backing the Steelers, had been texting back and forth with Jerry all evening, mainly trading insults with his dad, the Packers fan. Because he couldn't stand the tension any longer, Jerry left about five minutes before the game was over. He arrived home rather gloomy as Al had texted him on his way home to commiserate on his poor choice of teams and to tell him that he wasn't in a hurry to collect his bet money. It wasn't until the next morning, on his way to work that Jer had looked at a newspaper and seen that Green Bay had actually won. I won't repeat his final texts to his fellow football fan, who's bet was duly collected.

At home, we have to drive to get to a pub which means that one of us can't have more than one drink. With his bump in pay, Jer could afford to treat us to slightly grander dining experiences than those at our temporary _local_ , but they were very few as there was a kind of nostalgic comfort that seemed to be missing.

44. Tony Orlando Breakdown

In big cities, breakdowns are common. You see them everywhere - from cars to escalators, from computer systems to nervous systems. Sometimes though, there is something other-worldly in the air. You sense that there are sprites hiding nearby, that anything could happen. Like the time I happened to be riding the SkyTrain downtown after school.

I first sensed a change in the atmosphere when things grew quiet in the seats around me and a voice rose above the distant chatter in hearty invitational repartee. "Come on in," it welcomed "find a seat. Oakridge station...welcome aboard!" I looked up and there between the sets of doors, hand loosely gripping the central pole, stood a well dressed businessman. He was average height, around fifty-something years old, carrying a bit of extra weight around the middle and keeping up a friendly conversational stream with the passengers. "Come on in and join us," he spoke a bit louder as new passengers entered the coach, " there's lots of room."

People looked amused and slightly wary. Somehow, the man's _mein host_ demeanour was not entirely reassuring. When the doors closed and train started toward the next station, they kept their eyes on him just in case he got too friendly.

He didn't stand still or pay particular attention to any of the new arrivals but seemed lost in his own world, stepping around the pole, looking up at the advertisement above the door, then down to the floor, swinging his briefcase a little. "Lots of places to be. Room for everyone ..." he continued to speak out loud. And then, he broke into song. "Oh, tie a yellow ribbon 'round the old oak tree," he warbled in a kind of tuneful rendition of Tony Orlando's big hit, "yes...tie a yellow ribbon." Okay, so he wasn' t going to sing the exact song but he made at least me feel that this song was second nature to him. We approached the next stop and I hoped that he wasn't looking for oak trees as we were far underground but he only returned to entry host duty.

"Come on in, find a seat. Plenty of room for one and all." More looks and smirks from battle weary commuters, some of them already texting the unfolding scene to friends needing a laugh. "Go one stop, two stops, all the way downtown.... Oh, tie a yellow ribbon.." he began again, oblivious to the entertainment he was providing. He didn't look like he had just spent three years in prison – was he really seeking signs that he was still loved after long separation?

Vancouver has its share of crazies, like the one inhabiting the body of a dear, little granny who had marched down the sidewalk across the street from the bus stop on Georgia and shouted obscenities to us in the well ordered queue, but this guy wasn't a common type. He looked like he had just finished consulting with a new client and was on his way back to HQ to share the good news. Something must have happened on the way, I imagined. Maybe he had just received a call not to bother coming back because his desk was cleared out already, or maybe he had just seen his wife of twenty-five years kissing a young Goth or perhaps this was just the day he couldn't cope anymore, took something chemical to blunt the pain and turned into this music man of the SkyTrain. I was transfixed.

Is there any warning, I wondered, when things are about to get a bit surreal for you? Are any of us more than one bad vibe away from a behavioural faux-pas of the grand order? I thought of how I had had to control myself when issued the first "D" I had ever received in my life, on the three minute quiz given us by a visiting professor in my Greek classics class. Every sensory node in my brain had flashed into code red and "abort current calm" mode. With unbelievable speed, I had already come up with a couple of ways of hiding his body and covering my tracks. It took an enormous amount of self control to turn my attention to taking notes on the lesson the class had already moved well into. What would it take for me to go too far? I didn't want to guess and so I forced myself to mentally whistle a happy tune. "Tie a yellow ribbon 'round ...." At least I thought it was in my head.

45. Coal Harbour Spectacle

Our Roman History class had been covering the decline of the Empire and the rise of spectacle to subdue the masses - "bread and circuses," as Juvenal had named it. Rome had become a seething mass of unemployed, ex-soldiers, displaced farmers and immigrants from all over the Empire, all dependent on the handouts of bread from the government and the free entertainment of races, the horrors of the Colosseum and the occasional triumphal parade. The hinterlands of the Empire had been nearly bankrupted financing the Roman show for years.

Vancouver, although no Rome, had its own spectacle in 2010 when the world arrived for the Winter Olympics. The city had been spiffed up and lavishly staged to sell. The downtown waterfront now had a second convention centre and the area around Coal Harbour to Stanley Park was beautified with winding walkways, art installations and new, gleaming, luxury apartment towers. We trotted quickly along the walkway one afternoon in the cold, thin sunlight of late February. Everyone seemed to be out trying to tap into the first stirrings of spring after the hard (for West Coasters) winter.

The harbour is always busy with boats and float planes; cruise ships too, dock below the Pan Pacific's sails. Multimillion dollar yachts are moored here and a trio of adorable house boats. The backdrop of Burrard inlet and the North Shore mountains is truly spectacular.

Our hurried pace brought us to the green-designed, fabulously trendy, new convention centre, media centre for about 10,000 journalists during the Olympics. We strolled around Jack Poole Plaza where the Cauldron is now set up and tried to get into the elite, Olympic vibe.

I recalled our Frankensteinian, Olympic mascots, Miga, Quatchi and Sumi, who were the toasts of the town in those days. With their orca-finned, Thunderbird-winged, Sasquatch and morphing whale/bear, hybrid bodies, they were meant to capitalize on cuteness and cover representation for every animal or mythical creature of our province. I am ashamed when I imagine what Zeus would have thought in 776 BC if he had heard the story of the 2010 mascots. If we must rob the ancient games of their dignity with a mascot, why can't it be something real that has some connection to Greece where the idea originated.

The friendly porpoise, seen often in local waters, has a long history, with dolphins, fellow members of the order Cetacea, in Greek history. Murals, coins and many stories depict these friendly, gambolling creatures, revered by the Greeks. I feel quite confident that Perseus the porpoise and his pod of performing pals paddling from the Peloponnese to the Pacific, would sell to kids too - and at least they could enjoy the sight of a real one in in its natural habitat one day, Sasquatch sightings being so thin on the ground.

The Empire might not be declining but it could be changing hands on the coast and that is sure to be a controversial topic. I'm nostalgic for fallen Empires but not opposed to new ones, as long as they allow for personal freedom and the voice of creativity.

The Olympics are over but the hoopla goes on and Vancouverites are a breed that have no shame when it comes to rubbing the rest of the world's noses in their geographical luck. I'm sure most Canadians east of the Rockies secretly hope the coast is shaken to humility by a big earthquake in their lifetimes. On Vancouver island, we suffer the same pride as our urban dwellers – we just don't advertise it as much because, really, we're much luckier, spectacle-wise.

46. Elin Passes Go

When property prices started to go through the roof in their neighbourhood, my sister and her husband couldn't afford not to sell their comfortable 1920's house, knowing that it would probably be torn down to make room for a much larger, modern home. So, they put it on the market at an unbelievable price. They had only lived in it for four years but stood to almost double the money they had paid for it.

Their realtor, a Chinese woman who lived in the same neighbourhood, brought them gifts every once in awhile: an orchid, a special type of pork jerky, blueberry muffins, brandied cherry cordial and to increase luck –a vase of lemons, the idea being that the house would sell before they went bad. When they sold after only four months, she thoughtfully gave them a water colour picture of their home, a perfect souvenir of what was about to disappear forever.

Right away, the house had nearly sold to an overseas Chinese buyer who had pulled out when he discovered that the property was not big enough to build the size of house which he wanted. The final purchasers, never having even seen the house, bought it for close to the asking price. One of the items requested to be included in the sale was the garage opener. As there was no garage in the house, my brother in law searched around for an old remote control on which he could write "garage opener." The number of foreign home buyers in Vancouver is remarkable and accounts for the steady climb of property value in some neighbourhoods.

When a nice electronic bottom line appeared in their bank statement, my brother-in-law wished he could just hold the cash it represented, or even see what that amount of money looked like. But it wasn't to be.

What followed can only be described as a real life game of Monopoly as my sister and her husband scrambled to find a new place nearby, that wasn't outrageously priced, in which to live as Bob still worked at UBC. They hoped to find a property that could eventually become their retirement home on one of the Gulf islands and an investment property that my parents could use, at least for awhile, as the time had come for them to move into smaller, more convenient accommodation, and their own house wasn't selling. The realty shopping spree was totally engrossing for me, made frighteningly easy with the internet and a fax machine.

Then there was the process of packing and going through years of acquired junk that you can't avoid when you have kids and can't part with easily when they grow up. One of the basic differences between my sister and me is the speed at which we make decisions. I am hard pressed to wait two minutes before I'm ready to weigh in and she needs at least one night to sleep on anything. She knew to enlist my help when it came to decluttering. No problem, just as long as it isn't my own stuff.

I came over one afternoon and after she gave me a haircut out on her back deck, we began sorting. We laughed about the crap we keep, like kid's art projects that are barely identifiable or the super comfortable but hideous clothes we wouldn't be caught dead in. Then of course, there are the special collections that only have value in some dusty corner of our brains – I have a large collection of outdated maps. There are all the things we would normally give away or chuck out, but don't because maybe one of the kids could use it in the near future and then there are all those cables and wires, mysterious tools and chunks of wood that our husbands could never part with. We have piles of fabric and files that will most likely never be opened again and objects we've inherited because they are too special to leave the confines of the family – usually, because no one else would have them. In spite of all these obstacles, Elin and I managed to move a couple of boxes out her front door to share with the world at large.

Our families have moved many times, hers more than mine. This was the first time Elin would be moving without one of her young adult kids. Also, she knew that the home where her family had shared their lives and made memories for the last of her kids' teen years would be demolished. It would be a forever good-bye when the moving van pulled out of the driveway.

The exciting changes that a move brings about are often more than just about location but there is always that sense of being pushed along before you are quite ready – the fear that you'll forget something important, a feeling of loss for you're not sure what.

47. Japanese Surrealism

March 11, 2011: the history of the Pacific Rim changed drastically. The earthquake and accompanying tsunami that struck Japan riveted all the world to their news screens, especially here in western Canada where the subject of earthquakes is a hot topic and where there is a large population of Japanese expats. The press reported one tragic story after another, many of them accompanied by appalling video footage. It reminded us that natural disaster is ready to decimate all of our lives.

My Roman civilization class had been studying Pompeii's horrible end in 79 AD when Mt. Vesuvius erupted, covering the city in lava. It prompted me to remember my visit to the site the year before -- an eerie experience. After witnessing the vibrancy of modern life amidst all the ancient monuments of Rome, I found myself standing in the ruins of Pompeii where the contrast couldn't be greater. The site is excavated so well that you feel swept into a time warp as you stroll through the silent remains of the large city, caught unexpectedly mid-life. I found almost obscene, the displays of the casts made of dead people that were as lifelike as the tourist beside you. They made me think of those shadow people made by thermal rays in Hiroshima – another Japanese tragedy. Wandering through Pompeii wasn't so much a museum city as the shocking record of one day in Italian history.

And now, here I was in Vancouver, watching surreal images of a similar catastrophe unfold on my computer screen: parking lots of floating vehicles bumping together like bathtub toys, neighbourhoods torn into matchsticks and ships plonked down on grassy fields. Many of the students at Langara had family or friends affected by the earthquake, including me. Jerry's brother had just returned to Tokyo where he works. He described watching the buildings sway outside his office window as some of the aftershocks worked their way out of the earth the next day.

When the Canadian Embassy issued a statement that Canadians travelling in Japan should consider heading home, we emailed Peter to see if he was planning a return. By this time, the news of meltdowns at the reactors at the Fukishima Power plant had also been reported.Peter, always the optimist, replied that he wasn't planning to return and reassured us all on this side of the ocean that everything was okay, the embassies were reporting everything was under control – that it was only a triple catastrophe. I know a single catastrophe would have been enough to send me to the airport.

The Shinto religion, unique to Japan, venerates kami, or spirit powers, of all types – in nature, in heroes, and in ancestors. When approaching a shrine, marked by a post and lintel gate called a torii, one crosses a bridge, passing over running water, which is representative of purity - mouths and hands are washed before entering the sacred space. I wondered if the Japanese were able, somehow, on a level far above the human and material disaster, to think of the tsunami in terms of cleansing water, and spiritual renewal, as their stoicism and grace in the weeks that followed amazed the rest of the world.

48. O Socrates, This Train is for Waterfront

There are two train stations between Aberdeen, where I stepped on, and 49th Avenue, where I exited. These are Bridgeport where the RiverRock casino is and Marine Drive, across the river. This short trip is interlaced with memories of the kaleidoscope of commuters coming from or going to work or school in the mornings and also for the excellent view over the river where you could usually see some water traffic or, if you were lucky, a fantastic sunset.

I liked to observe people and imagine what type of lives they led. Often the train carried mothers and their children, to daycare, shopping, home, for a visit -- I came up with all sorts of possibilities. These city kids were interesting to study as my own were all raised in the country where public transport was seen as a novelty – we don't even have an escalator in the Comox Valley. City children might complain about the ride taking too long but most of the little ones anyway, still found being at the front of the train exciting as the wide window looked directly out at the tracks.

There are advantages for these young urban dwellers as they get older; they don't ever need to bother their parents for a ride. Vancouver's efficient transport system provides excellent access to all the shopping and entertainment that a big city offers. I was surprised to see kids with their snowboards on the train until I realized that they could probably connect with buses right up to one of the ski hills on the North Shore. Also, there is an enormous, entry level job market, Vancouver having thousands of fast food spots, retail outlets and grocery stores. I had often driven my eight year old son on his paper route because the distance between houses was so great and somehow, the eight cent reward per paper wasn't worth riding his bike for hours in the rain.

There is a daycare at the Langara campus with a wonderful playground, all safely fenced. Sometimes I watched the harried parents dropping their kids off, after a full morning of cleaning, dressing and feeding their offspring. I thought of them diligently returning in the late afternoon, after a day of school or work, and the work they had ahead, reversing the morning's routine. The stamina required to keep up this pace of activity is truly heroic. I liked to watch the play on the other side of the fence, and sometimes, the child minders would take a crocodile of kids out to walk, or play a game on the campus grounds.

One morning, a young mother boarded the train at the Marine stop in that ubiquitous Lululemon exercise wear, pushing a buggy with a toddler safely strapped in. She stood just inside the door with the child facing away from her and proceeded to pull out her phone and begin texting. The little boy initiated a baby talk conversation, probably about the vagaries of modern life but Mum didn't appear interested in engaging. I noticed then that she couldn't hear him because she had her earbuds in. For all we know, he could have been a young Socrates, forming his theories about living in a shadow world. I waited, hoping that she might give him some small encouragement but it didn't happen. The child listened instead to the disembodied SkyTrain voice letting us know where we were going. Texting continued until I got off at 49th.

I could see that the daycare might be a stimulating alternative to a day with Mum. It made me sad thinking about this poor child who couldn't compete with modern technology for his mother's attention. Maybe when he is old enough to get his own Blackberry, she can "like" him on facebook.

49. Water Lanterns of Steveston

On the southwest end of Lulu Island, at the mouth of the south arm of the Fraser, lies Steveston, an area settled by the Steeves family in the late 1800's, when farming was the main pursuit here. However, the invention of the tin can was about to bring about change. The Fraser is host to more salmon than any river in the world at spawning time with roughly 10 million returning annually. Consequently, the area at the river's mouth grew into an immense salmon canning centre - in the decade that followed the opening of the first cannery in 1882, there were 45 more built.

Many Japanese fishermen emigrated to take part in the B.C. fishing boom, usually sending money back home to their families. They came to comprise almost half the fishing fleet in the next century. The Chinese too, many of whom had come to B.C. earlier to work on the railways and in the mines, were hired in units, by contract, at wages much lower than the Canadian norm. After the attack on Pearl Harbour, the Japanese were sent to internment camps, forced to sell their boats for a pittance or not at all. It wasn't until 1988 that they received a formal apology from our government and a token financial compensation.

In the fall, Jerry had picked up an old bike for himself at the local SPCA Thrift store so that he could join me, on a bike borrowed from my sister, for a ride along the dyke and across Terra Nova Park at the west end of Lulu Island facing the ocean, and then back toward Steveston. The weather was perfect for riding that day, clear and slightly breezy. After dragging out all the bedding and cushions to air out on the boat, we wheeled our bikes up the ramp to the dyke.

The bike I was riding was a smooth, old Raleigh; one pedal push and I would coast comfortably for half a block. When I turned to look back to see what was keeping Jerry, I burst out laughing. He looked like a circus bear, madly pumping the pedals of his thrift store find, the seat unable to be raised any further, placing him in a sort of shoulder hunched, biker position. I slowed down and he resolutely pedalled the long route, trailing behind. We made a number of stops along the way to rest, watch the boat traffic and wonder at the huge flocks of migrating birds out over Sturgeon Banks. The augurs of ancient Rome studied flights of birds in order to interpret what the future held and no important decision was made before conferring with them. As another plane touched down over on Sea Island, I understood that these immense waves of feathered visitors had been sending messages all along.

We browsed through the stalls of the farmer's market at Steveston and then crunched through fish and chips out on the wharf. We reluctantly headed for home, but took the direct route north, up Railway Avenue, across the island. When we arrived back on board the Singoalla, Jerry, who could barely walk due to complete numbness in his undercarriage, headed straight for an alcoholic restorative. Except for quick sorties to the closest shops, his bike was never used again.

One weekend in March, with clear blue skies above, we decided to return to Steveston. This time though, we took the car and parked at Gary Point Park. Although the town's last cannery closed in 1979, it still maintains a fishing fleet and the historic town centre has a superb, interactive, cannery museum. We strolled along the waterfront, past the town centre and on to the area where some of the old cannery buildings and bunkhouses still stand, to take the historic walking tour.

Later, we walked back, joining lots of other people out enjoying the spring weather on the well developed paths and boardwalks. I was curious when I saw a young woman apparently gliding through a crowd but then saw that she was on a skateboard being pulled along by her jogging British Bulldog at the end of the leash. Every minute or so, she would give the board a push with her foot on the concrete walkway and straighten out the route in which her dog was diligently moving. They reminded me of the difference in expended energy on our bike ride that day in the fall. The boarder and her dog looked so natural though, like they did it all the time, this urban form of dog mushing.

I am glad that so many Asians chose to stay in Richmond, in spite of the discrimination they suffered in Canada's early days. In fact, they make it the fascinating city it is today. Traditional Japanese belief is that humans come from water and return there. In the Toro Nagashi ceremony, lanterns are floated down a river to guide spirits of the departed back to their watery origins. I thought of a bobbing sea of lanterns, where the Fraser meets the sea, and I imagined them floating west with the sun, bridging the gap between the continents.

### 50. Best Seller List Circa I B.C.

" _Quintus valde miser erat; domum redire cupiebat." (Quintus was very miserable; he wanted to return home.) - Oxford Latin Course_

Working at the public library, we are often asked for book suggestions from Oprah's list. I have nothing against her, I think that she does good work, but when it comes to TV superstars telling us what to read, I draw the line. It's better to read what the arts editor of a newspaper thinks is worth reading but better still, to grab ten random selections off the shelves, try them and make up your own mind about what has literary value. This is a tactic I resort to if I'm between books or just want to try something new. Often, it's the obscure, forgotten book that grabs your attention and makes you enjoy reading in a new way.

The classics of literature can be hard going, especially if the translation isn't very good. But I enjoyed all the selections we covered in our Roman Civilization class, finding that the key to enjoyment of these ancient scribblers is a quick introduction to the time in which they wrote by someone who believes that their work still has impact. We were lucky to have the super-enthusiastic Glenn Isaak again to connect the likes of Juvenal to Frank Zappa.

Ovid's love poetry and extra-marital advice made the best seller list in Caesar Augustus' day. His insincere retelling of the origins of gods, amusing as it is, probably rankled the emperor when the government agenda was to create a founding myth for Rome - enter Virgil's _Aeneid_. Augustus was imposing a return to family values and the simple attributes of the _mores maiorum_ , or values of the "sturdy, peasant farmer" from which Roman society had sprung. Eventually, because of the mysterious "poem and a mistake," Ovid got himself banned for the rest of his life to the shores of the Black Sea. We are more subtle these days when academia just closes ranks on writers that they don't want upsetting the apple cart.

In Latin class, we had done some work on Cicero, famous orator of the Roman Senate, and fatherly guide to young Quintus in our text. And, for a few bonus marks, we could translate some very long and daunting passages by famous Latin authors. I chose to ignore these until the last possible day when I spent seven hours straight at a carrell in the library, cobbling together the worst translations imaginable, lulled by the haunting sound of the building's high tech wind towers pulling air through the building. Because Latin is a highly inflected language, word order doesn't really factor into sentence construction, but you really have to be exact in your word endings which convey the meaning - I did a lot of drill toward the end of the term but felt that I was losing the battle. Some of my exercises were being returned with so many corrections that the original answers were difficult to read. Like Quintus , dejectedly learning Greek, I really would rather have gone home.

I sat at one of the computer stations that are arranged in pods of four at the college library. I had been trolling through the Oxford Latin practise website, ineffectually trying to slay the declension monster when one of my classmates approached to ask me a question about one of the assignments. Tony, a twenty-something man of Chinese heritage, is employed as a programmer in the electronic game business and wears the coolest set of blue lensed glasses - it was all I could do to keep myself from asking if I could try them on. When he had started getting bored with work, he had decided to take a few Classics courses.

We were into our second hour of discussing famous Roman writers, and then Roman history in general. When we moved on to the intricacies of law regarding Roman soldiers on the borders of the empire, I realized that it was going to be a long conversation. Tony's eyes lit up and his hands began to gesture – this was a topic that he knew and loved; I could picture him in a purple trimmed toga, addressing his fellow senators – Langara's heir to the ancient historian, Tacitus.

I love it when people get all fired up about something, they become a one-person show, demonstrating the importance of topics that have engaged them. Too many of us gather dust at our desks, reading over material we could care less about, or something that someone else has told us is important. It would be great if we could only get a job that we could defend with passionate argument. I'm pretty sure Isaak had already found his forum and I hope that Tony does too.

51. Rebirth of Retail for all the Sentient Beings in the Dharma

If there's one thing Richmond knows how to do, it is shop. And isn't it interesting that ghosts of the monumental arch of Ancient Rome are most glimpsed in the entrances to malls? They don't announce the triumph of emperors these days but that of consumerism. The bazaars of Richmond offer everything from high heels to grand pianos, from Mercedes cars to healthy massage, from won tons to the herbal cure. On the block around the corner from the marina, you can sell your car for cash, take violin lessons, rent an erotic film, eat garlic prawns or invest in a new condo development. Stores, casinos and restaurants bustle with eager spenders with more than enough to spread around. Unfortunately, I wasn't one of them and could only observe jealously, the highly primped and heavily boutique bag laden ladies at the mall who sped off in their luxury vehicles to equally upscale apartments with commanding views of the whole lower mainland. _The Rebirth of Retail_ , slogan of the improvement and expansion program at the Richmond Centre Mall, weighed heavily on my mind as I slogged through the rainy parking lot weighed down by my book bag and a sack of bargain produce from the market at the far side of the mall.

If I had been working, I could have at least peeked without guilt, into a shop or two at the dresses for the new spring collections that were popping up already. I could pretend that I was shopping for someone else as most of the selection was in the impossibly small 0-5 size range. As it was, I always felt like I had the lingering eau de boat hanging about me, a sort of heady mix of bilge, gas and mold. And then there was my look, the latest in wharf side haute couture: worn out cords, T shirt, sweater and a decidedly grubby, but blessedly waterproof anorak. I trudged on elevating my thoughts to loftier goals: the improvement of my mind; enriched relationships with fellow travellers; new spiritual depths.

How fortuitous to be studying religions of the world just blocks from the _Road to Heaven_. Richmond is home to an unbelievable variety of sacred architecture, much of it very beautiful. The eclectic assortment along No. 5 Road has given it the heavenly title as you can find there: Hindu temples; both Shia and Sunni mosques; Buddhist temple, monastery and retreat centres; Sikh gurdwara; Hebrew school; and Christian school and churches. With such a jumbled and cross cultural mix of people and religion, it amazes me that there aren't more violent clashes. According to Douglas Cameron Aitken in his book, _Three Faces of Vancouver_ , even religions such as Zoroastrian, Jainism, and Cao Dai have joined the ranks of more obscure congregations with the already well-established Coptic Christian sects of Egypt, Armenia and Ethiopia. Whoever said God was dead, obviously, wasn't from Richmond.

We had been studying the different varieties of Buddhism and I was noticing how mathematical it appeared: the 10 evil deeds; the eightfold path; the 5 disobediences; the 4 noble truths; the 3 universal truths; the 3 jewels; and the 3 baskets called the _tipitaka_. It all added up to many takes on Siddhartha Gautama's big ideas, religion-wise. I decided to visit one of the temples, so chose the Ling Yen Mountain Temple where Pure Land Buddhism is practised. Although, this form of Buddhism began in China and spread to Japan in about the 13th century, the Ling Yen Mountain Temple is an offshoot of a temple in Taiwan. The central figure is a bodhisattva, or being on the road to Buddha-hood, known as Amida Buddha. It is believed that his compassion led him to take a vow that anyone calling on his name when they died, would be reborn in the Pure Land, or place in which everyone will easily follow the teachings of Buddha and reach nirvana, the moment of enlightenment.

The temple complex includes a large, red-columned, pagoda-roofed temple, with a set of Shishi on guard at the base of the staircase. There is a table for offerings at the top of the stairs where incense burns languidly. A nun wearing a maroon robe, her head shorn and smiling face bespectacled, greeted me and indicated that I was to go in if I wished and showed me where to place my shoes. I sat cross legged on a double cushion, in a row with other congregants, inside the temple, awed by the immense, carved wooden dais were huge golden Buddhas sat enjoying nirvana. Another nun, at the back of the room, chanted continuously while playing a percussive instrument, to the Amida Buddha.

I paid my respects and prayed that my jealous God wouldn't send me a thunderbolt, then continued to tour the complex with a woman named Janice who had come to Canada a few years previously with her two sons, one of whom was running around a little too boisterously for another nun's taste. Surrounded in the peaceful courtyard by two monastery buildings and what looked like another temple, I felt transported to the Orient. The other temple is a Recitation Hall that I could peek into but not enter. Here, a woman named Tina explained how the sangha, or community of nuns, spent their entire lives running the complex, teaching and worshipping.

I was invited to partake of a variety of free meals the centre offers and given a copy of the _Sweet Dew I_ , dharma teachings of the Venerable Master Miao Lien who advises that we can only be happy by being content with what we have. I shook hands all round and took a photo of the first nun, much to her amusement. They had been very hospitable and friendly, practically dripping with the _Sweet Dew_.

I looked out the window of the bus on my home, thinking that double lucky Richmond truly offered it all - if you couldn't find something or someone to worship here, where most of the world's religions have found a home, you could at least be swept up by the Rebirth of Retail, over at the mall.

52. Slapshot!

In March, the professors at Vancouver Island University, in Nanaimo, had been on strike for four weeks leaving students there scrambling to figure out how to salvage their semesters and job prospects. At Langara, the professors went out of their way to make things workable for the students. They staged a job action that lasted from ten to one on a Friday at the end of the month. Our Latin teacher fussed over us like a new mother, afraid to leave us until sure that we had all of our end-of-term readings and exercises lined up in her absence.

I used some of my time on the _RateMyProfessors.com_ website to read what comments former students had left. How embarrassing for unpopular profs. I was amused to find that there was also a _hottie_ rating considering that most professors aren't hired for their looks but I suppose, a little eye candy can make even a Statistics course come alive. My Art History instructor apparently rated a chili pepper – as she was about my age, I hope she was thrilled.

Jerry picked me up outside the library where I had just picked up a paper towel end-of-the-roll in the bathroom where the cleaners left them, for use on the boat – one of my small economies. With some spare time on our hands, we decided to check out the fancy liquor store on Cambie to see if there were any scotch tasting seminars coming up. Unfortunately, we had missed another one by a few days but consoled ourselves with a stroll through the shelves looking for a tasty wine. At the back of the store there was a beer promotion going on and shoppers were being invited to try shooting a hockey puck into the net they had set up. I lined up to give it a shot while Jerry rolled his eyes at me and went to hide over at the Australian wine section. I slammed my second puck into the net and claimed my prize proudly. We paid for our wine selection and left. When we were back in the car, he insisted that I remove "that ridiculous Molson ball cap" before we left the parking lot. He just couldn't cope with the weirdness – not only do I never wear hats, but sports aren't really my thing.

Talk of unusual events triggered a memory of Langara's opening day in the fall. I had eagerly lined up for my free hot dog and commented on the exuberance of the college's bright orange colour scheme with a fellow student. I had even discussed the curious period after the Langara. sign up on the side of the main building. But as I was leaving, I stopped to see what was on stage in the big tent set up on the lawn. An acapella group comprised of young Asian men dressed in attractive suits were singing _Tell Her About It_. There are no young male singing groups anywhere where I came from – and certainly not any that would sing a Billy Joel song. The scene was just so far removed from my expectation periphery. They were doing a fine job with the song but I just couldn't wrap my head around it. I moved on.

I supposed Jerry was just _telling me about it_ , telling me what he really felt about me in the cap, as the lyrical Joel advised. Even though I was revelling in the pride of an Olympian athlete in a crown of laurel, I tossed my trophy hat into the back seat. There are certain things, like _hottie_ ratings, that you just don't need to get used to.

53. April Fools

We decided to text our kids with some April Fool's hijinks to see if they actually read what we sent them. So, I sent our sons the news that we had adopted a Chinese orphan after visiting a information booth at the local mall and that they could be expecting their little sister in a few months time. Jerry suggested we let our daughter know that we were entering the 50-somethings, couples, body building contest for free passes to the facilities at the Oval and that we had two months to get up to speed. She is a reporter for a radio station so we said that part of the prize was an interview by the local media and asked if her station was also covering the contest.

Almost immediately, Thomas texted his, "whaaat?" We giggled at our juvenile prank and left him hanging and then got on with our day. We just assumed that the other kids saw through our tricks.

Months later, I asked Liz what she thought of our ruse. She looked at me blankly and said, "that was a joke?" I chuckled and expressed disbelief at her gullibility. "Look, Mum," she answered, "nothing you two do surprises me anymore. No one believed it when I said that my mother had left home, moved to a boat on the Fraser and was taking Latin."

I hadn't registered it as being that odd. Then a friend related that her son was equally shocked when he learned that his mother wasn't kidding when she told him what I was doing because she had been considering a return to school too. "They just see us as Old People," she had lamented, "we are just frozen in time to them." I suppose that the real joke is on us; the generation that made youth a god is getting old, whether we like it or not. Oh well, better an old fool than old, period.

54. The Kindness of Strangers

In mid-April, my sister invited me to go with her to listen to Heather Bellamy, an aid development worker who had been living in an Afghani village for 18 years. I gladly joined her as I had been contemplating some type of aid work oversees myself, since visiting _Mission Fest_ downtown at the convention centre earlier in the year.

Elin introduced me to a few friends, and we joined the assembling group of attendees in her church's hall. Heather was a fine speaker, who related anecdotes about her life in the highlands of Afghanistan, a country where poverty and medieval village rules can bankrupt a person's family without recourse to justice, leaving them living in deserted ruins, as pariahs. She also told us about her mid-life romance with a man who had died from the sudden onset of cancer as a result of the 9/11 attack, just before they were to be married. She had picked herself up and went back to help her village in Afghanistan build a community restaurant and garden, a luxuriant oasis in an area decimated by the effects of constant violence.

Missionaries have been given a bad rap lately in light of all the nightmarish stories coming out from the victims of residential schools, after the misguided attempt to _civilize_ and convert the native inhabitants of Canada in the early part of the last century. The monstrous abuse many of these children lived through at the hands of these wolves in sheep's clothing has unfairly stigmatized the whole flock. Largely forgotten, are the thousands who toiled to bring hospitals and education to people in far off lands who hungered for a better life, often suffering illness or death in the process. I was amazed to see, at _Mission Fest_ , how many organizations still carry on with a wide variety of community development, in every part of the globe.

I ran into the parents of a boy my daughter graduated with who are doing work in Romania to help the large population of single mothers, many of whom were orphans of alcoholics, and eventually found themselves married, abused and then left, by alcoholics. The innovative program that they were representing was engaged in training these women, many with low IQs, to help senior widows, who have also been cast adrift in their society, and in the process, create a new type of family unit.

One-third of retirees are still doing some kind of work for pay, indicating that the lure of the golf course and porch swing isn't for everyone. (Although I do recall treasured lunch hours sitting on a sunny bench on campus which overlooks the golf course ... time flew, really!) A growing trend in the boomer community is that toward doing charitable works. Elin helps with a school for the deaf in Mumbai. I often hear of people who go to build orphanages or schools in poor countries, or get involved with Habitat projects at home. There is a generation of retirees who have a lot of energy, skills from every type of occupation, and a willingness to give something back to society, besides money. This gray resource could power a revolution in how we evaluate our retirement years. And in the meantime, just look around, kindness will blossom whenever we have the courage to voice or to fill a need.

55. Women of the World, Wake Up!

My rolling meander down the wharf one morning brought me to a pretty sight. A female mallard cut a perfectly incised v through the sage green water with a male diligently following in her wake. I like to see men following a woman's lead; maybe if they did more often, the world would be as peaceful as this quiet backwater of the river. I think my husband was glad that he had followed me to Vancouver; he appeared to be having his own little adventure.

Jerry and I had made our way further afield for hikes now that the weather was better. One afternoon we decided to hike out through the woods to the lighthouse at Point Atkinson, in West Vancouver. The view was incredible from the point that marks the entrance of Burrard Inlet, spanning the islands in the Strait of Georgia, south to the entrance of the Fraser and in toward the Lion's Gate Bridge. Sitting on a sun-warmed, granite outcropping, we made a few sailing plans for the summer.

Final exams were coming up and I resolved not to live and breathe study facts. I took to being more of a tourist, between study sessions, forcing myself into the real world so as not to get caught up in the competitive _hamartia_ (the hero's fatal flaw in ancient Greek – Dido's was being a woman) I had taken on at exam time in December (based on decem or ten in Latin, also slang for perfect, as in excellent grade). Whatever ... walking seemed to help.

My sister and I had sauntered along the beaches at Spanish Banks and Jericho on the south shores of English Bay where the highrises of Vancouver and the North Shore mountains provide an impressive backdrop. A couple of times, we had sashayed down the gardened paths at Queen Elizabeth Park, sniffing the new blooms and enjoying the views out over the city to the busy port of Vancouver.

One of my most enjoyable walks though, was the trail around the periphery of the Langara golf course, right beside the college. A friend named Katje joined me a couple of times. We had met in our Classics class and often compared or took notes for each other. She was a kind, young mother of two children, the younger with learning difficulties. I shared a few parenting insights with which I hoped to ease her worries and she shared her hopes of picking up a new career now that her children were older. When I listened to her, I thought of the tender mother and child moments captured by Mary Cassatt in her paintings. I believe motherhood is the finest occupation for a woman but luckily, it allows room for one to explore other endeavours too.

We had seen women in the history of art as Odalisques, mothers of the revolution, mothers of God, goddesses, whores, Ophelias, dancers and fleshpots of the voyeurs. But finally, in the last century, women began to enter the mainstream as artists in their own right, interpreting the world through a unique lens. Women such as Kathe Kollwitz redefined the Pieta, or image of Mary with the dead Christ, with her portrayal of utter devastation in her painting of a mother cradling her dead child in, _Woman with Dead Child_. Judy Chicago memorialized women's achievements in her feminist piece, _The Dinner Party_ , perhaps following in the rich vein of "wimmin' gettin' 'er done," started by Artemisia Gentileschi in her painting, _Judith Slaying Holofernes_ from the early 17th century – a warning like none other to men not to become complacent in their estimation of women.

In British Columbia, we can be proud of native daughter Emily Carr, who bravely worked her paints into post impressionistic masterpieces that went largely unacknowledged in her time. I enjoy her books equally because they are such frank journals of changing times in the early part of the 20th century. Like the best female success stories, she isn't insistent that she be recognized because she is a woman artist, but because she is an artist.

I have found that too many women limit themselves for fear of criticism instead of embracing their creative urges and following wherever they may lead. Surely, in this day and age, no woman has an excuse to bow out of any activity because of her sex, except perhaps, caber tossing. Having claimed our equality with men, we have a responsibility to contribute to society's management and creativity. I enjoyed hearing Katje's plans; she didn't see her motherhood as an impediment to her professionalism but as an integral part of the skill set that she would be bringing to the marketplace.

Before exams, I took a quick promenade around the golf course in an attempt to take my mind off testing, enjoy the scenery and think about scholarly progress in general. I had trouble forcing myself into a zen like calm when all those A pluses were up for grabs. I had to remind myself that Hannibal's inspiring words to his troops, "to gain this rich reward, hasten, then, and seize your arms, with the favour of the gods," ultimately ended in dead elephants and retreat. Even though I made a point of being less competitive I did repeat my caffeine and sugar combo before exams for the same reason that I sat beside Chelsea for the Latin final, even though she had moved to the other side of the class from where we normally sat, because to change a routine at this important time might bring bad luck as I doubted that I had been feeding my dragon enough lettuce.

56. Freshet

In the late spring, the snow pack begins to melt in the mountains, causing approximately one quarter of the province to drain into the Fraser. Up to 7,000 cubic metres of water per second force their way out the flood plain to the sea each year, building up the rich farmland of the delta. This increase in the river's water level creates what is called the _freshet_. (Woodward)

The dykes that protect most of Richmond were doing their best to hold back the waters. The river had taken on a milky look from all the silt and rushed powerfully like a mammoth green sea serpent beneath Singoalla, making her lines strain at the dock. At high tide, only the tips of the scraggly bulrushes on the banks were visible above the water. The ramp to the dyke from the wharf was almost level.

The air was much warmer and the days noticeably longer as the thin, wintery sun had begun to put on weight. We were comfortable on the boat again and even unplugged the vents we had stuffed with paper to prevent some of our precious heat from escaping. I had brought a couple of pots of primroses on board to cheer up the saloon.

There were pots and pots of daffodils and a bridge in the recreated garden inside the Richmond Centre. The superabundance of spring was peeking out at the corners of my neighbourhood in tender green grass stalks and the conversational chatter, honk and quack of birds. Teens appeared dressed in shorts and flip flops – ahh, the west coast. My mood was buoyant – I had only a couple of exams to go and I knew that I would make it.

My mind was brimming like never before with a cornucopia of facts historical, artistic, religious and even some in a dead language. I was primed to hold forth brilliantly at any party I should be invited to – or to become the biggest bore. There was also a pocketful of practical information that I had picked up just by living as I had for the last eight months. By attending college with the next generation, my faith had been confirmed that they had at least as much sense as the generations before them. I had found enough confidence to continue to study at university, or to return to my old life with a renewed interest in writing. I knew that I had to travel again, hopefully to Greece. And finally, I felt that I could live anywhere that I needed to. My own spring freshet had started all the intrepid and creative energies that had been frozen in the back of my brain, flowing again.

57. Funeral Oration for Denny

" _It is greatness of soul alone that never grows old, nor is it wealth that delights in the latter stage of life, as some give out, so much as honour."- Pericles_

Just when buds began to open on the ornamental cherry trees and the salmon, huckle and black berry tangles came to life again, I attended a memorial service for a man who never married or had children, had no wild romance that anyone knew about, had no high flown career, wasn't rich and hadn't travelled far. I had only met him a couple of times, but I knew I had to go.

The service took place at the community hall in the old Imperial Oil Company town up Burrard inlet. The 85 acre parcel where the town sits was bought in 1913 for $175,000 from a man with the stupendous name Alvo von Alvensleben, who had paid $2,000 for it the previous year, probably setting the precedent for the realty market on the lower mainland. (Thirkell and Scullion) It's called Ioco for short and is populated with those who have always lived there and some new country-living hopefuls.

I arrived a bit late as the public transit out had taken an hour and a half and then, because the local bus wasn't due for awhile, I had tried unsuccessfully to hitch-hike but was finally forced to stomp about two kilometres to the hall. The place was packed with standing room only and as I was there in a mere supporting role, I hovered near the doorway with a few other late arrivals. My sister-in-law, Jina, had put together a power point retrospective of her uncle's life and it was noticeable that he rarely appeared alone in photos. Always, there were friends and family surrounding him and almost always, he smiled in a kind "ain't life interesting" sort of way.

At age 25, he had happily assumed the mantle of father for Jina and her siblings when their father had died unexpectedly. He didn't claim exemption due to youth, or that he had his own troubles to work out but did what needed to be done. He was enough of a kid still to do fun things with the young ones and mature enough to offer counsel to the older ones. His sister and her brood needed help and he was there immediately, without being asked.

I thought about his life as I strolled back down the road afterwards, enjoying the warm sunshine and the smell of healthy muck and skunk cabbages growing. How I hoped to live my last decades as the same sort of person he was, deriving joy from other people's successes, helping them with their plans and encouraging their hopes. Often the solution to our despair, listlessness and disappointment is in forgetting ourselves and just responding to the needs of others.

Denny Sherk was everything that people say they admire - kind, loyal, supportive, sociable, community-minded, a friend, a listener, selfless.... I had heard the same adjectives used again and again as mourners rose to say a few words. It was obvious that this man's legacy was to live on in the hearts and minds of so many people he had touched as cheerleader, comforter, source of practical help, entertainer... there is no direct blood line to carry on but the _effects_ he made will be enough. Ripples in samsara, as my Eastern Religions prof would have it.

All along the riverbank there was a profusion of new life now. The bulrushes and horsetails were sprouting while nesting birds rustled in their shadowy depths. The low creeping vines of those tiny, wild blackberries had greened, graced with snowflake blossoms and along the railway tracks a jungle of new undergrowth was covering all of the trash. My time in Vancouver was coming to an end, and I felt a low grade mourning coming on. My fifty-first birthday approached, reminding me that I was definitely on the other side of the hill, loss in its many forms hovered on the horizon. I could cling tenaciously to my health, never go to bed without reminding myself of the impermanence of life in this plane, or I could live life as Denny had, measuring each day's worth by the smiles I had left on the faces of others.

The always changing river moved beneath me like life itself. Lying in my berth on the boat, I was rocked by the waves of a passing boat. I went over the idea of reincarnation for the paper on Buddhism that I was writing, and the idea of dependant origination -- that everything was the result of another thing. The cause of my rocking sensation, built on the cause of a boat in the night, travelling because of another cause.... My body rolled gently with the undulation of the water, like a baby waiting to be born.

Maybe, I considered, Denny is with us again ...

58. Valuables at the Village

As the days clicked by to my last exam and the end of my stay on the Singoalla, I started to think about acquiring a souvenir of my time in Richmond. The reason people like me are such pack rats is that somehow, we don't commit too much of the day-to-day to memory but when we run across an object, years later, it will often evoke complete recall of a time or place. And that is why it is so hard to declutter – we feel like we are throwing our memories away. I've been told to take photos but you can't smell or touch the objects in them.

I wanted to find something interesting, that had associated meanings for me but it had to be cheap, so one day, after my final exam, I took the bus to the _Value Village_ thrift store up on Victoria Drive. I had visited this bazaar earlier in the year when Jerry was hunting for work boots. I had found a set of heavy bottomed Denby mugs in perfect condition for $6, perfect for not falling over if the boat was rocking.

I wandered through the aisles of bric a brac, thinking about topics I had studied like statuary, both Greek and Roman, masterpieces through the ages, religious icons and Latin texts. I thought it would be neat to find a knock-off bust of one of the many famous people I had read about. What immediately caught my eye though was a small figurine of a Chinese fisherman, sitting on a bank with his fish basket and conical straw hat beside him. I was reminded of the walks we had taken along the Fraser where the observation of someone silently pursuing this timeless occupation was a common sight. I remembered our trips to Steveston and the part Asians had played in the fishing history of B.C. and suddenly recalled also, Gu Xiong's show at the gallery and the river of paper boats. I held the piece and felt it was right.

With the figurine in my basket, I went over to the clothing racks to make a quick search for something to wear to Kelly's formal wedding in April. I brought a bundle of potential dress purchases and summer shirts to the change room where I discovered that none of the dresses were just right. As I was hanging up the rejected items on the rack outside the dressing room, I noticed a pseudo-flapper style dress in my size so took it to try on. It was perfect, except that it was black – hardly a wedding colour. I decided that it would be okay, if I dressed it up with pretty accessories. I already owned some pink, ballerina style shoes that I was dying to wear.

I began to browse through the scarf racks nearby and was pleasantly surprised by the wide assortment of gorgeous, East Indian scarves. But of course, I reasoned, South Vancouver has a huge Indian population and Richmond too is home to many Indo-Canadians. The scarves were every colour under the sun in diaphanous tulles to heavy brocades - some in pastels, some in intense shades, some with over-the-top gaudy embroidery and sequins and some with the simplest of designs. I was overcome with a desire to have them all, even just to look at. Then I realized that at three to six dollars apiece, they were a bargain. I chose a cross section of colours and designs, not having a clue what I would do with them back home but knowing that I wouldn't regret the purchase. Amongst the collection, I spotted a beautiful soft pink, silk scarf with delicate gold beading and cream embroidery and was certain that this was the item that would transform my black dress. I remembered that I had picked up a string of small, pink jade beads at a _Salvation Army_ thrift store a couple of years ago. I was set for the ball.

While I waited for the bus, I realized that I had hadn't picked up a souvenir that related to the courses I had laboured through. I thought of my Asian scarves and fisherman and that maybe the important learning had been done in the time that I wasn't actually reading and writing. Unexpectedly, I had forged a link to the immigrant community of Vancouver. I knew then that I wouldn't have felt as at home living in the more upscale, False Creek marina that we had looked at.

I don't really believe in the multi-cultural dream as glorified by the engineers of social progress but I do believe that people are the same everywhere. Our basic desire is for a safe environment where we can get on with the business of living a happy life, and because of this, I believe that most immigrants are willing to build on the democratic structures that made Canada so appealing to them. There is lots of room here in Canada still, and having cooked thousands of meals, I know that a bit of Asian spice perks up everybody's appetite.

It was only a couple of days later that I was heading for the the ramp to the parking lot at the marina when I happened to look up at the river bank. There, seated comfortably in folding chairs, were an old, Chinese couple with fishing rods, trying their luck in our part of the river.

59. The Restless Flow

What is it about rivers that draws out a poetic mystique in most cultures? The Sweete Thames flows gently, the Ganges became a holy goddess, the muddy Mississippi keeps rollin', the Rhine attracts sirens and the Nile is mother to one of the oldest civilizations on earth. It isn't just a source of water, there are others, it isn't just easy transportation, or a source of food. But I think that what appeals to our philosophical natures is the endless flow of this living element from somewhere far away and older than time to a new place, equally far away. Our lives, too, follow this continuum filled with treacherous falls, tumbling rapids, stagnant backwaters, dark mysterious pools and babbling rills. The poetic emperor Marcus Aurelius put it this way: "Time is a river, the restless flow of all created things. One thing no sooner comes in sight that it is hurried past and another is borne along, only to be swept away in its turn."

When I moved to my home on the river, I began to think about these things. The fact that I was on the middle arm of three possible outflows of a mighty river, about how near I was to the end of the Fraser's journey. My life too seemed to be in the middle of everything, grown up enough to have experienced some of the best and worst that life has to offer but hopefully, with almost as much time ahead of me.

How does a North American tail-end Boomer define herself in the second half of life? I did some research and found that there was a burgeoning body of literature out there on this very subject. In the book _The Coming Age Revolution_ , by Reginald Stackhouse, he identifies the three reasons that people will work longer than previous generations: pensions will not be enough; work is fulfilling; and that there will not be enough young people to fill the jobs. He informs us that in Canada, by 2015, there will be as many people over 65 as there will be under 16. (Stackhouse) We're living much longer than previous generations and our quality of life expectations are much higher than anything our grandmothers dreamt of. After raising their families, women go on nowadays to start careers, volunteer abroad, have unconventional adventures, and sometimes, adopt a whole new set of kids to raise.

What should I do? I was glad to have made the leap to a year of school away from home – it certainly distracted me from worrying about what my grown children were getting up to. I was getting used to more Jane Isay advice: "keep your mouth shut and your door open." I soaked up my long desired study time and had received surprisingly good grades but still wasn't sure that more school was what I wanted. My library job awaited me back home where I could start earning to pay a few bills, but I knew that I didn't want to stay in the job for much longer. Jerry was loving the job he had now although he knew it wouldn't last, he would have to get back to his work on the island for the summer. If we could sell our property, there was a possibility that we could make Vancouver our home after what we thought would be the last year of Jerry's contract for B.C. Parks. Or, we could volunteer abroad or find a place where our skill set could help our local community but either way, we needed to keep working part time, at least, for a few more years.

For the time being, I had no choice but to return home – the house had been empty for months now except for some mice that appeared to be squatting. It needed some TLC and a new "for sale" sign. Most of the park was still under snow so Jerry would stay on the Singoalla working on the water taxi until he was able to get at the trails. Paper work for the contract could be done on his laptop.

As I dug around the boat packing up my things I ran across the huge eraser that had _for BIG mistakes_ printed on it that my friend, Heidi, had given me with some other humorous school supplies. Our travel gang had had a fiftieth birthday/going away party for me the previous summer which included a bon voyage send-off for the two couples who were about to take trips. At the time I worried that the eraser may be an omen. I rummaged some more and found the song that another friend had written in my honour to the tune of _Up on the Roof_ which she had named, _Upon the Boat_. A gifted musician and singer, Sue, had strummed her guitar through lyrics that included, "and when of studying she's had her fill, we're told there's a casino up the hill." I never did visit the casino but I remembered the conversation I had had on the SkyTrain with an elderly woman who explained with great animation, the joys of spending a few hours on a boring Saturday playing games of chance. I knew what she meant; hadn't I rolled the dice this year? Good old Sue, I thought, she had known what a risk I was taking. I began to get excited about picking up the social connections we had built with friends back home that I had been missing for awhile now. Although we had all traded email addresses when classes ended, I knew that there wasn't quite enough common ground for long term friendships with my new, young Vancouver friends.

I dreamed of spreading out in the house again, having all my projects everywhere, cooking in large amounts, watching some TV and repatriating the pets. But when all my school stuff, clothes, and bits and pieces were loaded in the car and I looked back down the wharf to the Singoalla bobbing on the sequined water, my eyes filled up. I could just hear the SkyTrain voice announce the next train for Waterfront and I remembered my first ride to school the previous September, full of anticipation. When we drove away to take the ferry back to Vancouver Island, that part of my life would become a memory only. A time which I realized was like that middle arm of the river, full of interest and tucked away from the hurly burly of the business arms of the north and south.

And time would have a hand in directing what happened next – it isn't always a matter of choice; sometimes the river just carries you along. In the meantime, I needed to catch my breath, explore the options and sort out the immediate future. I thought of my mother's metaphorical trip on the river toward the sea, her lifetime of ups and downs, through war and deprivation, my own journey in a new country at peace, and I thought of my daughter, still splashing down from the mountains, treading in the gathering current, her strong young body beginning her particular journey on an ancient river, nothing like that of my mother's or mine. I had learned that I will always be torn between hurrying and waiting – I will grasp at the roots my mother carries so far ahead, almost out of sight, and in the far distance, keep searching for my daughter, travelling on her own schedule. I will long to stop here on the middle arm and wait for her to catch up but there will always be a stronger pull – that of my own calling that drags me on and pushes me back into the current.

60. Sacred Geometry

My friend's daughter, Kelly, entered Christ Church Cathedral in Victoria, on her father's arm, a picture of bridal glamour, and behind the bridesmaids, began her stately walk up the aisle to where her groom waited.

Jerry and I had been married here, almost twenty-nine years earlier. When I had entered the church, my dress train had caught on the edge of the door, yanking me back slightly. My Dad, who I think was more nervous than I, thought that I was changing my mind and yanked me forward – no chance for a last minute escape with him, the groom and I had already been living in sin. Luckily, there was a tourist in the narthex who identified the problem and quickly unhooked me. Poor Jerry had been instructed by the Dean that he was not to look back at the bride, that this was very crass, but that he should wait in dignified sureness that she would join him presently. Good thing he hadn't looked because he would have laughed at the expressions on Dad's and my faces.

Jerry and his brothers had been choir boys here, and his mother had put in hundreds of hours in the kitchen for church functions, afterwards, bringing leftovers to the street people of Victoria. I remembered the idea, in art history, of the sacred geometry of God and thought of this circular time trip we had made back to this church. I had also made a spiritual journey back to confirm my Christian faith, having taken an exploratory pilgrimage to the holy precepts of other religions, and coming to the conclusion that mine made the most philosophical sense, to me anyway, and that the historical record bore up well.

Kelly and Justin exchanged vows and left the church joyously, strengthened by their union for whatever the future held. The rest of the bridal party followed, our daughter included as she was the maid of honour. This had been her third, and she decided, final, foray up the aisle in less than the starring role. I tried to imagine how it would feel to be the mother of the bride.

When the families congregated on the stairs outside for photos, Jerry and I stood aside and reminisced. We had been photographed in matrimonial shock here too and then returned two years later to have our daughter christened. Now, she was the same age that Jerry had been when we married.

I've found that as you get older, you live to see the truth of nearly every cliche – time had flown, love does conquer all. And using my new found Latin, Carpe Diem – we must seize the day or nothing changes. When we don't try things for fear of failure, there is no chance of success either. Even I hadn't thought that our marriage would last as long as it has, Jerry having found out, mere months before the event about his kidney failure. But that news, and the subsequent surgery, were actually motivational because it drove home for us the need to get on with things, to try to focus on each day's joys and not worry about tomorrow's troubles. I am pleased that we took the plunge and hoped that the newlyweds would enjoy as long a run as we have.

David Yount astutely points out that wedding vows are designs for living too, not just an exchange between spouses. In his book, _Celebrating the Rest of Your Life_ , he says, "since the moment of our birth we have been wedded to our own lives. If we remain faithful to ourselves and steadfast with those for whom we care, we can look forward to traversing the final seasons of our lives with grace and satisfaction."(Yount) I was satisfied that the same philosophy had spurred me on to using last year as an experiment, an experience that proved to be life-changing.

The groom's Chinese family assembled on the steps with the couple and I thought of the wedding party that I had seen at Minoru Park all those months ago. Victoria, although it has a longstanding Chinese community, doesn't have anywhere near the proportion of Asian immigration that Vancouver has and still maintains its very colonial image. This wedding, I realized, would have never happened here one hundred years ago. This very 21st century multicultural couple had also met on the internet.

At the reception, we ate and drank and danced the night away, feeling that all was right with the world. The bride's relatives, who had arrived from England, Germany and the Ukraine in the last couple of generations, partied animatedly with the groom's, arrivals from China over the same time period. I was proud to be born in this wonderfully rich country and time that had made it all possible.

I had a moment of epiphany at college when all of my courses had reached a confluence, where art, language and religion had met with the dying Roman Empire and had brought a neat conclusion to my academic year. But, coursework aside, I had learned a lesson, something that I had always known but had been reluctant to accept. Buddhists are followers of the Eightfold Path, also called the _Middle Way_. The ideal is to live a life that avoids decadent living but also doesn't indulge in self denial. Sound advice for the material world, I think, but there can be no middle way in the spiritual or philosophical path you choose to take: decisions must be made, or remade sincerely. Your inner world cannot be sacrificed to please others or you will be left without one. Socrates had it exactly when he said, "The unexamined life is not worth living." To really live, you can't stand still, safe and dry beside the river, you need to jump in and start swimming. But also, it is imperative, as a conscious being, to touch bottom occasionally so as to adjust your compass.

61. Odyssey

The TravelLift is lowering our freshly painted boat into the Fraser. In a few moments we will be on our way out to the sea for a holiday in the Gulf Islands. All we need is a following wind and a glad heart for the next ten days to rise above the usual procession of time. Most of our provisions are safely stowed and our plan, once out of the river, is to sail south to Point Roberts today where we will meet Jerry's brother and his wife who moor their boat there. Then, depending on the wind, maybe Lopez Island the next day. I've never been there and am primed with that adventurous feeling that yearns for a bit of fun, is ready for a smidgeon of danger and has empty canvasses that need to be filled with something new.

Our small odyssey might reward us with a few travel tales to share. Certainly not involving Poseidon steering us into cyclops, giant and siren territory but there are equally frightful possibilities in the modern world. In fact, there are ghosts of the past infiltrating every aspect of our lives and I believe that one's awareness of their presence is proportionate to the enrichment of our experience.

One day at Langara, Chelsea had come to class and related how angry a cab driver had made her when after telling him that she studied the Classical world, he had asked what good that was and that he thought it a waste of time. She had launched into a spiel about Western civilization and it's foundations – the rich vein of literature, science and art that the ancients had left us. How much we have learned and are still learning from civilizations who may not have had our technology but were able to produce analog computers for calculating astronomical positions like the Antikythera mechanism found in a shipwreck in the Aegean.

In this world of modern marvels it is too easy to dismiss the importance of the past when it requires effort to understand. Only in recent years have we started to question our mass consumerism and thought seriously about conservation and preservation. Our sense of value is clearly askew if we think we must always make room for the latest and greatest to the detriment of the tried and true.

For instance, I once met a Librarian who said she owned no books. She said all she needed was to download a book on her electronic device or pick it up at the library. But what about the book as an aesthetically pleasing object or an item of comfort? There are some books that I like to flip through whenever the mood strikes me just to feel their pages or read a well loved passage. Or what about the book as an ancient work of art? Monks felt that the meditative act of manuscript illumination, the painting of those marvellous interlacings with anthropomorphic figures was an act of worship – that to copy out the Bible was to worship the word of God. Certainly, use the new technology if it suits you but don't relegate the whole historical Book to a museum. More and more, old gems that have gone out of print or worn out from steady use, are disappearing from our libraries and not even reappearing in the virtual world. But enough.

It is time to board Singoalla, knowing that our ancestors have set sail for millenia; for war, for exploration, for trade, for safety and for adventure. History is behind us and before us, and art is all around us. There is nothing new in the world except our way of seeing it.

62. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Aitken, Douglas Cameron

Three Faces of Vancouver: A guide to First Nations, European and Asian Vancouver. Vancouver: Lions Gate Road Publishing, 2009.

Balme, Maurice; Morwood, James

Oxford Latin Course. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997.

Brissendon, Connie; Heinl, Russ

Vancouver and the Lower Mainland from the Air. Vancouver: Whitecap Books, 1999.

Campbell, Bart

The Door is Always Open. Vancouver: Anvil Press, 2001.

Coupland, Douglas

City of Glass. Vancouver: Douglas and McIntyre, 2009.

D'Acres, Lilia; Luxton, Donald

Lions Gate. Burnaby: Talon Books, 1999.

Fisher, Leonard Everett

The Gods and Godesses of Ancient China. New York: Holiday House, 2003.

Goodman, Miriam

Reinventing Retirement. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2008.

Isay, Jane

Walking on Eggshells. New York: Doubleday – Flying Dolphin Press, 2007.

Murphy, Michael; Wong, Vicki

Miga, Quatchi and/et Sumi, the Story of the Vancouver 2010 Mascots. Vancouver: Vanoc, 2007.

Roddan, Andrew; (introduction by Todd McCallam)

Vancouver's Hoboes. (originally published under title: God in the Jungles) Vancouver: Subway Books, 2005.

Ross, Leslie J.

Richmond, Child of the Fraser. Richmond: Richmond '79 Centennial Society, 1979.

Stackhouse, Reginald

The Coming Age Revolution. Toronto: Warwick Publishing, 2005.

Thirkell, Fred; Scullion, Bob

Places Remembered, Greater Vancouver and New Westminster and the Fraser Valley. Surrey, BC: Heritage House Publishing Co. Ltd., 1997.

Woodward, Meredith Bain

Along the Inside Passage. Victoria: Altitude Publishing, 2004.

Xiong, Gu

Waterscapes. Richmond: Richmond Art Gallery, 2010.

Yount, David

Celebrating the Rest of Your Life. Minneapolis: Augsburg Books, 2005.

### Acknowledgements

A river of gratitude to my partner in e-publishing, Laurie Zavitz, without whose patience and determination this story would not have been produced. Also big thanks to her husband, James Marsh for his technical support and help with the cover. I extend hearty applause to illustrator, Jay Luchsinger for translating what were only photos to the inner realm of artful memory.

To my fellow writers Leta Luchsinger, Pauline MacDougall and Laurie Zavitz, thanks for the editing and I can't wait to return the favour. Thanks to author, Nicola Furlong whose guidance prepared us for the e-publishing world.

Bravo to Gwyneth Lewis, Glen Isaak and Ann Christiansen, whose knowledge and love for their subjects shines through their teaching, a flame lighting the way for others to follow.

And finally, huge hugs to all the family members whose stories paint my life's canvas and much love to my husband, Jeremy McArthur who has always steered a steady course.
About the Author

Eva Nilsson lives in the Comox Valley on Vancouver Island where between working and raising a crop of kids with her husband she sporadically jotted down snippets of prose but never wrote seriously until working on this account of her time returning to school in Vancouver when experience and time were finally present together.

She has a BFA in Creative Writing from the University of Victoria and has written professionally only occasionally but hopes the fan the flames with this project and her new book, "Eurotripper." Please visit her blog at: <http://evanilssonwrites.wordpress.com/>

About the Illustrator

Jay Luchsinger studied commercial art in Ashland, Oregon in the 1970's. Not long after that he moved to Canada where he has been able to use his artistic skills in many different occupations. Now that he is retired, he enjoys painting watercolours and making art in Comox, B.C., where he lives with his wife.
