Sharing My World 35

Oops….not those words….

SHARE YOUR WORLD – 2015 WEEK 42

Sunday seems like a perfect day to share my wacky words and world of wondrous-ness even though the questions are already a week old and probably no one cares what the answers are anymore.  The alternative is to simply post this cartoon and leave it at that, so consider this extra blather your little Sunday bonus.

Are you usually late, early, or right on time?

When I was MUCH younger and working as a medical receptionist for an ophthalmologist who performed cataract surgery, most of our patients were older at that time than the age I’m now.  So OLD.  Old people are early for everything.  The record for that office was a couple who showed up for an appointment 24 hours early.  They explained that they were doing a trial run to see where the office was and how long it would take them to get there.  They were thrilled that their calculations were so bang on and happily left promising to be back tomorrow.  Now I understand that perfectly.  We are going to do a trial run to the hospital where W will have his surgery, once we know the time, because then we can factor in traffic.  Do we have entirely too much time on our hands?  You betcha.  But I can’t remember the last time we were late for anything.  W likes to arrive right on time.  I like to be ridiculously early.  Especially at airports.

If you were or are a writer do you prefer writing short stories, poems or novels?

I fancy myself a writer of sorts.  Doesn’t every blogger think that way?  My novel-writing dreams are unlikely to ever come true now that I am older and wiser and have figured out how much work is involved in the novel-writing process.  I have written short stories.  And stuff that I call poetry.  But mostly I’m happy to stick with blog posts.  There’s certainly enough words recorded on this blog to fill a novel.  That should count for something.

Where did you live at age ten? Is it the same place or town you live now?

I lived on a farm near Port Elgin, Ontario, but the name has been changed to Saugeen Shores.  That’s where I went to high school, although that old high school is now a shopping centre.  And the barn where we lived has been torn down, and now I think maybe the house has been demolished as well.  Look at that – you leave and suddenly there’s no going back.  There’s still lots of family to visit in the area but I haven’t lived there for going on 50 years.

Would you rather be able to fly or breathe under water?

Even if I had the ability to breathe under water I would still die if you put me there.  That’s how freaked out I get even thinking about going down where scary water creatures dwell.  And if I could fly I would like to be like a hovercraft or a low flying humming-bird.  No extreme heights or speed.  Whoever is granting me this wish will now no doubt tell me to just carry on walking and riding in cars.

Sharing My World 16

Share Your World 2015 Week 4

Where did you live at age five?  Is it the same place or town you live now?

The year I was five we moved from one farm to another one.  Of the first farm I have relatively few memories, except that it was close to grandmas, it was a very long walk from the house to the barn and I was not allowed to go there on my own, and in the house we could run around in a big circle from the kitchen, past the stairs, through the living room and back to the kitchen.  There was a hand pump for water in the kitchen and a dark shed (where the dog lived) attached to the back door.

The new farm, to my five-year-old mind, was utopia in comparison.  The run in circles was twice as long, through the dining room, past the stairs, through the living room and into the kitchen, past the basement stairs and back to the dining room.  We could also run up the front stairs and down the back ones, and from the front lawn to the side lawn to the back lawn, across the driveway and another side lawn and back to the front.  Obviously, running around in circles at this stage in my life was extremely important to me.

A lot of family still lives in that area so I go back to visit frequently, but I haven’t lived there, or in that province, for over 40 years.

Did you grow up in a small or big town? Did you like it?

Our farm was in the midst of many small-town Ontario towns, but I consider the one where I went to high school as my home town.  It was on the shores of Lake Huron, had amazing sunsets, and filled up with beach-going tourists in the summer.  I liked it just fine.

As a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Hey, I still haven’t decided.  I was very good at running, with all that practice, and won lots of races in elementary school, so being an Olympic runner crossed my mind.  Then I became a lazy teenager who ran one relay race at one track and field meet (we came in second) and my ambitions shifted to obtaining my driver’s license and getting the hell off the farm.  After that, my plans were always rather vague.  University, teachers college, meeting interesting men, going to parties.  (I wonder for priorities sake if I should have put all that in reverse order.)

You are invited to a party that will be attended by many fascinating people you never met.  Would you attend this party if you were to go by yourself?

Sure.  I will be one of those fascinating people in attendance.  Just hopefully no one asks me what I want to be when I grow up.

Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

I am grateful for our amazing weather, pretty much unheard of for here in a normal January.  I know there’s a lot more winter to come, but this has been a lovely little break in the middle.  A long cold month which usually drags on forever has turned out to be pleasantly quick in passing by.

Next week I’m going to see an audiologist.  All that running around in circles as a child probably damaged my ear drums somehow,  and I’m paying for it now.  I think I can hear just fine until people mumble at me on the phone, or garble some strange nonsense from another room, or when I decide I can’t understand what people in movies are saying without subtitles across the bottom of the screen.  Yep, it’s time.

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Jazzy Does 100 Days of Happiness 48

Happiness is a trip back to your home town, where everything changes, and yet everything stays the same.

My Hometown

I grew up on a farm near what is now called Saugeen Shores, (Port Elgin, Southampton and Saugeen Township amalgamated.) My highschool was in Port Elgin, so I suppose I can claim that town as my own, even though it doesn’t exist exactly as that anymore – the town or the building. It’s weird to see the shopping centre where I used to go to school.

The sunsets are still incredible, and the beaches along the shores of Lake Huron are still gorgeous, no matter how built up and touristy they try to make them. There are maple trees and cottages everywhere and the population more or less doubles every summer. It’s sort of famous now for its Pumpkin-Fest weekend in October as well.

I’ve still got lots of family there, and that’s why I go back. It’s hard to get all nostalgic about things when they’re forever changing and I don’t recognize them anymore. When I was quite small one of my aunts took me inside the car of a passenger train because I was dying of curiosity to know what it looked like in there. Now the train station is gone, the trains and the tracks are gone, and I’ve walked along the ‘rail trail’ like a tourist trying to remember how it used to be.

When mom and dad left the farm they lived in a little white house right beside the rail trail and the changes just kept happening. A little grocery store where they liked to shop closed down, forced to do so by the opening of a giant chain. They lived on Victoria street, but when the two towns joined the street name was changed to Arlington because there was already a Victoria street in the adjoining town. Mom was quite put out. To her ” the Arlington” was the name of a not so classy hotel on main street known for carousing and drunken revelry. Plus she had to send out change of address notices when she hadn’t even moved anywhere.

Every visit there’s something new, the old things disappear, people change, things get better, or things get turned upside down – its hard to keep up. Nothing ever stays the same, but then why would you want it to? It’s a great way to annoy the next generation, remeniscing about how things used to be.