Suzanne Craig-Whytock's Blog, page 19

Very Superstitious

Things have been weird lately, like, if something could go wrong, it does. From sudden expensive car repairs to Kate and my parents all getting covid, to Ken almost being rushed to the hospital after a chlorine gas incident, bad luck seems to be hounding me. The other day, I started to wash my hair and the cold tap handle disintegrated right in my hand.

Then later my wine fridge suddenly stopped working so we took it apart, cleaned the fan and tested it—still nothing. Then I forgot it was still plugged in:

Me: Do you think there’s something wrong with the motherboard?
Ken: Maybe.
Me: That wire looks loose.
Ken: Don’t touch—
Me: OWWWW!! I just got electrocuted! Why the hell am I even bothering to wear my lucky underwear?!

Yes, my lucky underwear seems to have run out of good luck—no matter how often I wear them, I can’t seem to get a break. Like two weeks ago, Ken and I were at Werq The World, a touring drag extravaganza. We’d met some of our favourite drag queens, then settled in to watch the show. Suddenly, I felt a pain in my side. I tried to ignore it but it kept getting worse, until there was no doubt. I had another kidney stone. I made it through the show, but now I’ve gone through yet another round of X-rays, ultrasounds (I have to drink HOW MUCH WATER?!) and CAT scans. And I can’t even get a specialist appointment until the 15th.

But I don’t want to sound whiny. In fact, I’ve been doing some research and I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m bringing this all on myself with a variety of bad luck symbols that I’ve been encountering lately.

1) Broken Appliances

See above. I was shocked. Literally. Stupid wine fridge.

2) The number 666

Thanks to the Wiccan healer I used to work with, we have two booths at the antique market with the number 666. And I have to regularly open them to get out spells and black candles and crystal skulls and whatnot. So maybe I’m exposing myself to curses that I’m not even aware of:

Customer: You know Satan isn’t bad, right? Like, he’s only doing his job.
Me: Kind of like me.
Customer: What?
Me: Did you want the red skull or the blue skull?
Customer: Ooh, is that a chicken foot keychain?

2) Stopped clocks

As you may remember, I have 53 clocks in my house at current count and only 16 of them work. Maybe it’s time to get rid of the broken ones. (Because it’s TIME. Get it?) Apparently, according to a “feng shui coach”, who is basically someone who comes into your house, takes your money, points at things, and claims they have bad chi, “broken things won’t bring positive energy into your life.” That’s very judgmental, KIM. I love ALL my clocks, and I’m pretty sure the charge on that wine fridge was positive.

3) Dried Flowers

I saw this on Realtor.com. The caption underneath a photo of dried flowers says, “Dried flowers will suck the life out of your home.” And wouldn’t you know, I recently cut some hydrangeas from my garden and put them in a vase to dry. Apparently, I have created an energy vacuum, which sucks (Because vacuums suck. Get it?) and also, do actual real estate agents really believe this sh*t? Like if I was selling my house, would Darla from REMAX take my hydrangeas and throw them onto the porch in a superstitious frenzy whilst stomping on them and screaming “Only live flowers in this house!!”?

4) Walking Under A Ladder

I do this all the time, because one of my booths at the antique market came with a ladder across the top to put or hang stuff on. I’m back and forth under it several times a week in order to restock my booth, which is making the ladder spirits angry, according to google.

5) A Black Cat Crossing My Path

Ilana is a tuxedo cat, so she’s mostly black with a white bib and paws. And she crosses my path continually, begging for treats and tummy rubs, which I’m happy to oblige because she’s so sweet, even though the tummy rubs usually end in her grabbing my wrist and biting me. Because she’s a cat, and that’s what they do.

6) Pointing Towards Feces

I saw this one on Wikipedia. It’s an English superstition, which doesn’t surprise me. And I actually did this a while ago, because I have to clean the bathrooms at work, and one of the toilets was super-gross, so I came out all disgusted and pointed in the direction of the bathroom/poo while exclaiming to my boss, “You don’t pay me enough to clean crap like this up!” Also, I don’t know WHY it’s bad luck—maybe people got sick of Sir Archibald Dungheap continually pointing at people’s poo and describing it, like “Pish posh, tally-ho, that’s a remarkable shade of ochre!” and then they beat him to death with broken clocks.

At any rate, it’s possible I’m looking at this the wrong way. After all, my car got fixed by our wonderful mechanic neighbour, Kate and my parents both recovered quickly, Ken didn’t have permanent lung damage, I ordered a new tap online, and I can drink lukewarm wine as easily as the cold stuff. Now if only I could pass this kidney stone quickly, that would be lucky. Knock on wood.

Take Me To Church, Lady

I’m getting frustrated with my car phone lady. The voice recognition system has no trouble with very complex names like Donna-Louise Martin, Suzanne Work, or Jeff Goldblum (yes, sometimes he texts me, and it’s really him, it really is), but when I say ‘Ken’, this inevitably happens:

Car Phone Lady: Ready.
Me: Call.
Car Phone Lady: Please say the name or number to call.
Me: Ken.
Car Phone Lady: Did you say ‘Karen’?
Me: No.
Car Phone Lady: Did you say ‘Joe’?
Me: NO! Ken. Call Ken!
Car Phone Lady: OK. Calling ‘Maria’.

So I edited my contact so that Ken’s name shows up as ‘Kenneth’, thinking that it was the one-syllable thing that was confounding her, but it made no difference. Every single goddamn time, it’s “Did you say ‘Kenneth’?” until I’m yelling “OBVIOUSLY, YOU ROBOTIC WENCH! IT’S ALWAYS KENNETH!!”

Aside from that, the only thing that happened last week was that last Tuesday, around two o’clock in the morning, Atlas woke up and started losing his sh*t, barking out the window. Ken and I woke up and Ken rushed to the window overlooking the church across the street that was recently sold and is being renovated:

Ken: It looks like someone’s trying to tip over the porta-potty from the construction site across the street!
Me: Tipping it over?! At this time of night? Are they drunk?!
Ken: I think they’re actually trying to steal it! They just loaded it onto their flatbed!
Me: Should we call the police? Wait—did you say ‘flatbed’? What kind of people drive around with a flatbed looking for porta-potties to steal?
Ken: They’re…driving it around the corner and unloading it. I think they’re just moving it.
Me: I should call the police on them just for being a-holes. Two o’clock in the morning—seriously?

Of course, the next day, I saw the guy who’s renovating the church, a very nice man, and he was shocked to learn that the company he’d hired to bring the potty, and who had already put it in the wrong spot a few days prior, had chosen the wee hours to relocate it. But this wasn’t the first time there have been shenanigans at the church across the street.

We live kitty-corner to two churches—I call them the “Platform Diving Jesus Church” and “The Other Church”. As you may guess, I don’t attend either of them. I got their names from the fact that a few years ago, the doors of the church directly across from us were painted with an angel on one side, and Jesus on the cross on the other, both in gold paint. It looks very nice up close, but from far away, it looks like Jesus is about to dive off a cliff or whatnot.

Am I right?

Anyway, from my bathroom window, I could see five men standing around a piano which was sitting on a flat cart on the church walkway. It looked like they had just unloaded it from a rather small mini-van—a feat unto itself, I would imagine. I could hear yelling, so I opened my balcony door. The men had surrounded the piano and were having a very loud discussion in what sounded like German. Were they an angry yet musical Saxon mob intent on a good sacking? After a few minutes though, it seemed like their intention was to put the piano INSIDE the church. And I say ‘seemed’ because they kept just wandering around the piano, staring at it dubiously, and talking a lot. I had nothing better to do, and it was a beautiful sunny morning, so I went out onto the balcony to watch.

After a lot more Germanic discussion, the youngest-looking guy ran over to the mini-van and brought out a long strap, which he looped around the piano. ‘Here we go,’ I thought. Nope. They all just stood back and stared at the piano again. I wanted to yell, “Just push the damn thing, for Christ’s sake!” which seemed appropriately church-y, but then the guy ran back to the mini-van. He reappeared with what looked like a gas can and at first I thought maybe they were going to set the piano on fire and claim an angel spoke to them from within it, like a ‘burning bush-type scenario’, so that they could blame God for not getting it inside the church. However, it was only a toolkit. The young guy took out a hammer and started hammering at something while the rest just stood around. One of the other men put his hood up, like he didn’t want to be recognized, and frankly I don’t blame him because I was at the point where I just wanted to march over and push the piano through the doors myself. Then the one with the hammer ran back to the mini-van and grabbed what I thought was a blanket of some kind, but it was just his coat, which he randomly donned, then he looped a harness around his shoulders and waist.

‘Aha!’ I thought. ‘He’s going to hook himself to the piano and pull it in like a team of oxen’ but again, I was disappointed. And then I was really confused because they started pushing the piano down the walkway and I had a moment where I thought they were going to take a run at the door with it, but again, NOPE. They wheeled it back towards the mini-van and I was like “What? Don’t give up Hans, Karl, Kristoff, Otto, and Gunther!” (which is what I had affectionately started to call them in my head), but then they wheeled it PAST the mini-van and kept going. Down the street. I watched until they were out of sight, then I quickly got dressed and hopped in the car to see where they went, but they, and the piano, had disappeared like some kind of biblical miracle. But then I had a terrible thought–what if I had just witnessed a crack German heist squad, not unlike the villains in Die Hard, actually ROBBING the church?! So I tried dialing 9-1-1, and the Car Phone Lady asked, “Did you say ‘Kenneth?”

The Things I’ve Seen

It’s been a quiet week, so today, I’ll simply be sharing with you the 4 weirdest things I’ve seen lately.

1) Wooden Armour For Sale

Apparently, this armour belonged to a medieval French knight who thought he was being very clever.

Knight 1: Ooh lala, I have invented zis new kind of armour for zee battle.
Knight 2: Zis new armour does not seem très practical, mon ami. ‘Ow does one get up on le cheval wearing zis gigantic wooden suit?
Knight 1: Non, non! C’est for the ground war. We line up in our wooden armour side by side, and the English cannot get through. Also, c’est parfait for the castle invasions. If you are spotted, you simply pretend that you are le furniture, a cupboard in the corner par exemple. No one will ever suspect that we are les chevalier!

At least not until someone needs to hang up their robes.

2) This is a statue that I saw for sale on Facebook Marketplace. But I have no idea what it’s a statue of. To me, it looks like the girl is being attacked by a ferocious lamb. She’s been bitten A LOT and now she’s about to faint. Although this scenario seems highly improbable, I googled “Do sheep attack?” and the answer was “a young sheep, called a lamb, is easily spooked and older sheep will attack without thought in order to protect them against a perceived threat.” There you go, Mary. You spooked the lamb and paid the price.

3) My new Facebook friend?

For some strange reason, I don’t think the person who contacted me and wants to be my friend on Facebook is REALLY Rich Bradley. I don’t know why—I just have a feeling. I mean, he LOOKS like a nice dude, but…don’t you think the heart and flowers is just a little too ‘try-hard’? Also, is he saying he’s a god? Like, a god who fears nice things? At any rate, those aren’t exactly key selling points if you’re trying to become my friend. Unless you actually are a god and can do something about all those lamb attacks.

4) At first glance, this doesn’t seem that weird. It’s a picture of a lovely little girl surrounded by pumpkins, posing for a fall photo. From a distance, (particularly the distance between the checkout counter at work and the booth across the aisle where it’s being sold as “portrait in vintage frame”) it seems like a really cute tribute to autumn. But then you zoom in on the little girl’s face and suddenly, it’s very disconcerting.

Is it just me, or does she look terrified, like she’s about to cry? And all I can think is, what did they do to this kid? Was she promised a special new doll if she posed nicely, and then they showed her the doll and it was Chucky? Was she about to be attacked by a lamb? (Seriously, this is my new fear. Sayonara, quicksand).

Who would frame a picture of their child looking like Michael Myers is the photographer? I mentioned it to the vendor who was selling it:

Vendor: Huh. You’re right. She does look unhappy. I thought it was one of those pictures that comes with the frame, but now that I see it up close, it’s not a stock photo. It’s a stalk photo. Get it? Like a pumpkin stalk. Maybe she was sitting on the pumpkin stalk.
Me: Or maybe she was being stalked. Either way, that’s one sad child.

And I have to look at her every day until someone buys that damn vintage frame.

Creative Wednesdays: Tiger Lily Book Launch!

A little while ago, I got an email from a good friend, the amazing poet Susan Richardson of Stories From The Edge Of Blindness. She had just completed a collaboration with Scottish artist Jane Cornwell, and had almost finalized a collection that featured her poetry and Jane’s art. And she wanted ME to write the foreword. I was honoured, and a little intimidated—I wanted to make sure I did justice to the book, because it’s beautiful and profound and exemplifies the highest caliber of the written word and the visual image. Fortunately, they both were happy with what I wrote, and the book was finally finalized and now the launch is only a couple of days away! So if you’d like, you can join us on Friday, August 19 at 2 pm EST, which is 7 pm GMT in the UK where they both live, and enjoy our company, participate in a Q and A about the collection, listen to Susan read some selected poems and see the artwork that Jane created, and have an opportunity to read your own poetry at the end if you’re so inclined. The link to register for the event is here: Tiger Lily Book Launch – Poetry Party Tickets, Fri 19 Aug 2022 at 19:00 | Eventbrite

I hope you can join us, no matter what time zone you’re in. (Here’s a link to a time zone converter if you’re not sure.)

I’m In The Movies

If you know anything about me at all, you’ll know that I’m a huge fan of the Alien/Predator franchise. I’ve seen all the movies, my favourite of which is Alien Vs. Predator and it’s my go-to film whenever I’m feeling down or bored. So you can imagine how thrilled I was to see a new addition to the series–the film Prey, starring Amber Midthunder. Ken and I decided to watch it on Wednesday night, and let me tell you, it was one of the most disappointing movies I’ve ever seen, for a variety of reasons. Never mind that it takes place in 1719 and in the first few minutes, the girl’s dog is caught by a metal legtrap, but instead of freaking out that there are strangers in the woods, she just calmly frees the dog and goes about her business. And I was like, is this an old school Predator using weirdly archaic weapons? But no, it was just the French. Luckily, I can read French really well, because despite the fact that the Comanches, most of whom were super-sexist, all spoke English, the French (who were also super-sexist) DID NOT, and there were no English subtitles so I was forced to translate all the French dialogue as quickly as I could for Ken. The only cool thing about the movie was that there was quicksand. Yes, quicksand. And because I grew up in the 70s, I knew exactly what the girl needed to do.

Me: Don’t struggle! Float on your back and make small movements!
Ken: I saw that on Gilligan’s Island once.
Me: I really thought based on my childhood TV viewing that I would have needed to know how to survive quicksand before now.

At any rate, the movie was dumb and if I’d been in it, I would have taken my dog and gotten the hell out of there–let all those misogynist dudes fend for themselves:

Sexist Guys: Oh save us from the alien, mydangblog!
Me: Maybe you should have thought of that before you made fun of me in front of the Chief. See ya, nerds!

I would have been great in that movie. In fact, I would have been great in a lot of movies…

The Battle Of Upper Landing

1) Let’s start with Star Wars, at the moment before the Death Star is about to be destroyed…

Obi-Wan: Mydangblog, trust your feelings.
Me: I really wish you would call me Player One.
Obi-Wan: Concentrate, Mydangblog.
Me: But all the other guys get cool nicknames! There’s Red Leader, Gold Leader, Wedge, Goose…aw, Goose just got exploded.
Obi-Wan: Goose was from Top Gun. Will you please concentrate?!
Me: Ok, I’m going into the weird tunnel. I’m gonna blow sh*t up!
Obi-Wan: Use the Force, Mydangblog.
Me: No way. Imma use this visor thing with the targeting computer in it.
Obi-Wan: LET GO!
Me: Are you Force-splaining how to destroy a Death Star to me?
Darth Vader (heavy, pervy breathing): The lunacy is strong with this one.
Obi-Wan: Mydangblog, trust me.
Me: That heavy-breathing perv just shot my robot! That’s it! Tick tock, m*therf*cker—your time is up! (*puts on theme song which is obviously Boom Boom Pow, blasts everything in sight with my laser guns, manages to hit portal, Death Star detonates*)

I know—it ends just like the real Star Wars, but it was a lot more fun.

2) The Empire Strikes Back

Scene: O ut on some glacier.

Me: Holy sh*t, it’s cold.
Obi-Wan: Mydangblog. Mydangblog.
Me: You again? I told you to call me Player One.
Obi-Wan: You will go to the Disco-Bar system and learn yoga.
Me: What the actual f*ck? Urghhhh, it’s so cold…
Han Solo: Mydangblog!! Come on, give me a sign here! There’s not much time! I’m going to cut open this Tauntaun and put you inside it to keep you warm.
Me: GROSS. I’D RATHER DIE.

So in my world, I only appear in two Star Wars movies, but I stand by my choice. Tauntaun intestines are disgusting.

3) 2001: A Space Odyssey

Opening scene:

Monkeys all screaming and having some kind of monkey war. I suddenly appear, like a strange female monolith. They stop and stare.

Me: Hey chimps! Which one of you wants to be my monkey butler?

(*One monkey tentatively walks forward. He picks up a big bone from like a Tyrannosaurus or whatnot, and advances on me.*)

Me: OK, cool. I shall name you Ralph Van Wooster.

(*Monkey shakes his head and waves the bone menacingly. More monkeys start to move towards me.*)

Me: I think I’ve misjudged this situation terribly.

(*Monkeys stop their in-fighting and attack me with their dinosaur bones. Then they, after having united against me, live in peace and harmony until the end of time.*)

4) Psycho

Shower Scene:

Me, in the bathtub, splashing around and having a dandy time. For some reason, the shower curtain is pulled closed, which I would NEVER do in real life because I need to know if someone is sneaking up on me, but let’s suspend our disbelief for a moment. There’s the silhouette of a figure approaching, knife raised. The shower curtain is suddenly pulled back. Violins screech and then stop abruptly. Norman Bates looks confused.

Norman: Why aren’t you in the SHOWER?!
Me: Showers are the devil’s cleaning system! Get out of my bathroom, you psycho! (*grabs hammer that I always keep on the bathtub ledge and breaks his kneecap as theme song, Boom Boom Pow, plays*)
Norman: I wouldn’t even harm a fly!…

Get me out of this shower!!

5) Lord of the Rings

Gandalf: OK, so you’re going to take the ring—
Me: I know, I know—to the tiptop of Mount Crumpet and there I’m going to dump it.
Gandalf: No, that’s wrong.
Me: Come on, Samwise—I need you to pull my sleigh.
Samwise: Of course, MyD–I mean Player One.
Me: Sam, I’m glad you’re with me.
Gandalf: Fly, you fools.

Cue theme song, which never gets old.

Playing With Fire

As you might remember, I recently started my own online literary magazine called DarkWinter Lit. It’s going really well, and I’m getting some incredibly good submissions, but one of the things I’m really proud of is that 99% of the images that I use to accompany each piece are original, chosen for each unique story or poem—either taken by me or Ken. I’m fortunate that I work in an antique market, where I can easily find fur coats, weird statues, and driftwood horses. Sometimes though, I need to create a specific scene that I have in mind. And last week was one of those times:

Me: I need a picture of a gold coin covered in water, with a backdrop of fire.
Ken: I don’t have anything like that.
Me: I thought you were a PHOTOGRAPHER, KEN. Do you at least have a butterfly I can use for something else?
Ken: Ooh, yes, I have lots of those!

So it was up to me to create the photo that I needed, at least for that particular story. But then it struck me—we have a burn pit in the side yard surrounded by rocks and it was full of wood. I could prop a loonie (the golden Canadian equivalent of a dollar) on one of the rocks, start a small fire, then spray it all down with water before things got out of hand. It was a terrific plan…

I brought the loonie, some newspaper, and a bbq lighter out with me, and placed the loonie in what seemed like a great position. I crumpled up the newspaper and held the lighter to it. It immediately caught fire but then started to go out, so I tossed some dead grass in there for good measure. I sat back on the dry lawn (we hadn’t had rain for weeks) and contemplated the sad state of the gardens, suffering from lack of moisture as well. When did we last have rain? I thought to myself. It seemed like it was a while ago.

Suddenly, the grass, paper, and the dry wood in the fire pit all ignited at once and I quickly found myself seated next to a raging inferno. Where the f*ck is the hose??!! I screamed silently, berating myself for having forgotten an essential part of the plan. I ran to the porch, the flames getting higher and closer to the dry lawn, and I dragged the hose over to the burn pit.

Do you know what happens when you spray a large fire with a large amount of water? It creates an even larger cloud of thick smoke, a cloud that drifts over your entire neighbourhood, terrorizing your neighbours, at least one of whom belongs to the volunteer fire department. And at this point, Ken poked his head out the door:

Ken: What are you trying to do—set the neighbourhood on fire?
Me: I just wanted a photograph of a gold coin drenched in water in front of a backdrop of fire!
Ken: Did you at least get the shot?
Me: It’s a little smoky but yes.
Ken: Well, that’s one thing. I’m sure the fire department will take it into consideration when they hand you the fine.

I managed to extinguish everything eventually, thanking the universe for the fact that our burn pit is hidden by trees and the guy who kept driving by looking for the source of the smoke couldn’t see it. But imagine the conversation:

Firefighter: So let me get this straight. You set your lawn on fire because you were (checks notes) “trying to get a photograph of a wet coin in front of a large flame”?
Me (whispers): Yes.
Firefighter: And you thought this was a good idea in a month where we’ve had very little rain?
Me (whispers): Yes.
Firefighter: Wow. You’re dumb.
Me (hangs head and whispers): I know.

The things we do for our art.

How It Started How It Ended The Final Product

In other news, you may recall that recently, I got my license renewed and faced a barrage of disturbing questions about having my skin flayed off for science right before having my photograph taken. Well, the license arrived in the mail yesterday, and here’s the reaction on my face:

Now, you may think that’s just the way I always look in driver’s license photos, but here are other examples from 2007 and 2016:

I think it’s pretty clear that I won’t be getting any speeding tickets until 2027 when I no longer look like I’ve seen horrors that no sane person can contemplate … And the worst thing is that, along with the license, there was a questionnaire asking me the same questions that the woman at the license place had asked me PUBLICLY. I could have done all of that IN PRIVATE. And looked prettier in my photo.

Image-ination; I Get Read

It’s been a hectic week and I didn’t think I had much to write about, but then I remembered that I hadn’t told you about my new tattoo. You may remember that over a year ago, I promised that I would get all my books tattooed on me, and I’d made a good start but then I got sidetracked. Until finally, three weeks ago, I finally got an appointment with my favourite tattoo guy, Nathan S. of New Rise Studio. He did what he always does—I arrive, he says “What were you thinking?” then I say, “A steampunk pocket watch with the words ‘Time’s a-ticking under it”, and he says “Okay”, then he draws something fantastic on the spot. Here’s the end result:

I’m super-happy with it, because the image commemorates Feasting Upon The Bones, my first short story collection (Potters Grove Press), featuring the character Mr. Death and his catchphrase “Time’s a-ticking.” I’ve expanded that character and he also now appears in a couple of other places, which you’ll hear more about down the road. But for now, Feasting is immortalized on the back of my calf.

I was scrolling through the pictures on my phone, looking for something interesting to go with a story that was going to be published on DarkWinter Lit (I only use original images, taken by either me or Ken, except in rare circumstances, because I like to customize a unique image to the individual story or poem), and I came across this image, which you might recognize:

Yes, it’s from WordPress and it’s the image you see when a post has no comments. I’ve seen it hundreds of times, but I only looked at it closely the other day and then I was really confused. Seriously, what the hell is it? Here are two options:

a) A girl carrying a giant tennis racket, accompanied by a boy awkwardly holding a small oar. Are they attending the world’s weirdest summer camp? I went to summer camp once, and all I remember is shooting arrows at targets and crying because I got stung by a bee in my ladyparts. Needless to say, I hate camping to this day, especially if it involves playing tennis in high heels or rowing a boat with one hand. Or bees.

b)  She’s a detective with a magnifying glass the size of a hula hoop and he’s her trusty sidekick, ready to gather evidence in his crossbody bag. Someone at the summer camp died, and now they’re looking for clues. Maybe there’s one behind that mostly invisible plant. Actually, THAT would be a summer camp I’d go to—a murder mystery adventure camp where the counsellors are all robots, and it would be called MurderCampWorld, kind of like WestWorld but without the sex, violence, misogyny, and racism. Okay, there’d be a little violence but it’s just the one murder.

Regardless of what the image actually is, I have no idea why it’s the one chosen to encourage people to post comments, and if I were customizing an image for this page, I’d encourage discussion with this cute little guy that I found on Facebook Marketplace. I’m not sure what he’s supposed to be, but I’m certain he would make people really want to open up:

In other news, I had a tarot card reading the other day on Zoom, done by my good friend and fellow blogger Willow Croft, Bringer of Nightmares and Storms at willowcroft.blog. It was fantastic and fun, and her insights have really helped me center my energy around the things that matter the most to me. I highly recommend her—she charges a small fee, but it’s completely worth it, and she can do it over Zoom, telephone or even email. If you’re interested in supporting a fellow blogger, you can contact her at croftwillow@yahoo.com for a full reading, or if you’d like to try it out, use the code mydangblog in the email subject line for a $5 USD three-card reading.

Getting Thrifty With It; Tiger Lily

I’ve always loved thrift store shopping. When I was younger, it was the only place to find the vintage clothing that my friends and I, 1980s club kids, favoured. When I got older and money got tighter, it was a cheap way to look nice. And now that Ken and I have re-instated the antiques business and I’ve opened a second booth at the antique market, thrift stores are a wonderful place to find trinkets, odds and ends and whatnot that I can resell. The other day in fact, I was at a local thrift store, Goodwill, and found some good deals–a vintage action figure for a buck, a few pieces of ironstone and a depression glass rooster candy dish for 4.50. It’s from the 1930s, in excellent condition, and worth a heck of a lot more. So imagine my excitement when one of my co-workers at the antique market mentioned that there was a Goodwill ‘outlet store’ not too far away.

Me: OUTLET, you say? A place where things are even cheaper than at the regular Goodwill?
Co-worker: Yeah, it’s pretty cool. You pay by the pound. We’ve gotten some good stuff there.
Me: Where is this mecca of good deals?! I must know!
Co-worker: Just up the highway. Here are the directions.

I was super-excited, imagining a store lined with shelves of beautiful china, glassware, and other assorted sundries, and me with a shopping cart, just filling it up with things that didn’t weigh too much. Finally, last week, after days of anticipation, I was able to go there.

AND IT WAS THE MOST TERRIFYING EXPERIENCE OF MY LIFE.

I arrived shortly after 10:30 in the morning, having followed my GPS instructions like a pirate with a treasure map. I pulled into the parking lot and the red flag should have gone up right there. It was PACKED. People were double-parked and cars were squeezed together, but luckily my car is quite tiny, and I managed to find a spot partly on the grass. I grabbed a couple of reusable shopping bags and walked through the door…into a giant open room. It was full of large, wheeled bins surrounded by people, who were going through them, tossing things up in the air, digging through to the bottom, and pulling things out. I was hesitant, and took a tentative step forward to peek into one of the bins, which was full of what looked like broken CDs. Then I noticed in the far corner, there was a line of tape on the floor, and behind the line of tape, there was a line of men, standing shoulder to shoulder, fidgeting, rocking back and forth on their heels and looking desperate and hungry. A store worker went by:

Me: Excuse me. That line-up over there—is that where I’m supposed to wait my turn or something?
Worker: Oh no. You can look in all the bins over here. Those guys are waiting for the new bins to come out. You have to stay behind the line until the new bins come to a complete stop and the back-room workers have had time to step away. Then we give a signal and you can dive right in.
Me: Maybe I’ll just watch for a bit.

After a minute, the doors to the warehouse suddenly flew open. The air bristled with anticipation and the men in line started cracking their knuckles and bouncing up and down on their toes. The bins were wheeled over to the corner and parked. A man began to move and a woman shrieked, “NOT YET!! STAY BACK!! The men muttered in frustration while the carts were positioned, and then the workers let go and backed away quickly as a whistle sounded. The line surged forward and everything became pure chaos. Arms disappeared into the bins, then reappeared holding perceived treasures. A cry went up as one man triumphantly brandished a coil of copper tubing. Two other men tussled over loose hockey cards, and another ran back to his shopping cart (I realized they all had carts lined up against the back wall) with a Coleman cooler. It was like feeding frenzy time at the shark tank, with vintage radios and glass vases as chum. Then, as quickly as it had begun, the men tossed their finds into their respective carts and ran, as a unit, to the opposite corner, where ANOTHER LINE FORMED. Apparently, the new bins were placed in alternating corners, and sure enough, a minute later, a set of full bins arrived, and a fresh round of shrieking and digging commenced.

So what did I do? What do you think? I tucked my reusable shopping bags under my arm, got the hell out of there, and drove like the wind to the calm oasis of Value Village.

In other news, I had the tremendous honour recently of being asked to write the foreword to my good friend and brilliant poet Susan Richardson’s latest compilation titled Tiger Lily, to be released on August 19. The collection is an ekphrastic collaboration between Susan and artist Jane Cornwell, and it’s just brilliant. You can pre-order it here. And here’s a sneak preview of one of my favourites, Mermaids Are Real:

In Memoriam: James Douglas Whytock

It’s been a tough week. Last Tuesday, Ken got a call from his mom that his dad, who’d been suffering from Alzheimer’s and had been in a nursing home for the last couple of years, had stopped eating. He’d been on a steady decline and if any of you know anything about Alzheimer’s disease, you’ll know that’s pretty much a signal that the end is near. And it was. Ken’s father, a lovely man, passed away peacefully on Thursday night at the age of 87, surrounded by people who loved him very much. And while the last two years of his life were incredibly sad, as we watched him drift further and further away from us, I’d like to take this opportunity to tell you a little bit about him.

James Whytock was a kind, hard-working man. He had to quit school and take over the family dairy farm at the age of 16 when his own father passed away very young. He and Ken’s mom built a good life for Ken and his siblings, and I know they all look back on their childhoods with fond memories. One of my first experiences with Jim was when Ken and I had begun dating and I would go with him to the family farm. In the morning, our chore was to feed the calves while Jim milked the cows, and he would razz me about being a ‘city girl’, even though I’d grown up in a town that really wasn’t much of a city, but to Jim, anything larger than the 1000-person town he called home was a metropolis.

He loved to tease people, but never in a mean-spirited way. He was quick with a one-liner and had a variety of sayings for all occasions. He was the skip of our family curling team, and I still laugh when I remember the time we were winning but the other team was gaining points—he leaned over to me, winked, and whispered, “Now the cheese is starting to bind!” It made me laugh so hard that I could barely sweep, but we won the tournament–and some bacon. Even once the dementia got hold of him, there were still glimmers of the old Jim—every once in a while, he’d crack a joke and it would let us know he was in there somewhere.

He was an incredibly creative person. When, at the age of 62, he and Ken’s mom sold the family farm and moved to town, he finally had more time to devote to all his favourite hobbies. He was a talented photographer (in fact, he was the photographer at our wedding and did an amazing job). He also worked with glass. He taught me how to do stained glass, and we shared ideas and designs. He had a glass kiln as well and made all kinds of things out of fused glass, including my favourite set of checkerboard “Alice In Wonderland” coasters.

He collected all kinds of things, notably coins and diecast tractors. Kate inherited his love of coin collecting, and when she was younger, they would discuss coins—she was always impressed by how knowledgeable he was. And not only did he collect tractors, he also customized his own collector vehicles, one of which sits proudly on a shelf in Ken’s office—a gift from his dad.

James Whytock leaves behind a family who loved him very much and who will miss him terribly, and an enduring legacy as a man who always saw the positive side of things—I don’t think I ever heard him say a bad word about anyone, and my last image of him this past Father’s Day was the smile on his face as he ate the chocolate that Ken’s mom brought him. Alzheimer’s is a horrible disease and I’m glad he’s finally at peace.

My favourite coasters A lamp made by Jim

Skin Game

Last week, I had to renew my health card. For those of you who don’t know what a health card is, it’s the card you show at the doctor’s or the hospital or whatnot, and then you don’t have to pay for anything. Everyone in the province gets one at birth and it’s funded through income tax paid by residents and businesses. And for some reason, it’s one of the few things that can’t be renewed online anymore, which meant I had to go into a Service Ontario office (similar to the DMV) and stand in line. I went in the afternoon, and when I walked in, there were only 5 people ahead of me, and the three at the counter were finished quickly. But the next guy in line didn’t know what his exact mailing address was and insisted on looking at Google maps and stood at the second counter calling three other people to figure out the best place to mail him something, and then the woman at the third counter just WALKED AWAY. Which left one poor woman available for the rest of us. But still, she was very efficient, and about twenty minutes later it was my turn. She looked at my health card and said, “No problem. Your driver’s license is coming due at the same time—do you want to renew it now as well?”

And that seemed like the smart thing to do since I was there anyway, so I said “Sure.”

She filled in some information on the computer and then looked me straight in the eye and said, “Do you want to be an organ donor?” And I was really taken aback, having an actual person ask me this, instead of just ticking off the box on the back of my license, and I froze.

Me: …No?
Woman: Really? Are you sure? OK.

And then I felt terribly judged and also remembered that I’d had laser eye surgery and now my eyes were pretty good and might help someone else, and also that my kidneys and liver had passed their last tests with flying colours, so I said, “Wait! I changed my mind. Yes, I’ll be an organ donor.”

She kind of sighed, and said, “It’ll take me a minute to get back to that screen. Hang on.” Then, after a few minutes, she asked this bizarre follow-up question, and my blood froze. “Do you want to donate only for life-saving procedures or also for medical research?”

MEDICAL RESEARCH?! Like I’d be one of those cadavers that medical students experiment on? Would they give me a terrible nickname like Gangrene Greta or take selfies with me? No thank you, ma’am and I told that woman the same in no uncertain terms, but while in my head I sounded determined, it came out a very whispery “Just the first one.”

Woman: OK, no medical research. Now, are you good with everything, or do you have any exceptions, for example, would you like to exempt your eyes, your lungs, your kidneys, blood plasma, your bones, or YOUR SKIN?
Me:
Woman: Great. Now I need to get a picture so stand over there and don’t smile.

Don’t SMILE? You just told me that when I die, someone is going to flay me and then steal my skin and bones. The license hasn’t come in the mail yet so I haven’t seen the picture, but I’m sure I look absolutely horrified in it. Like, imagine this scenario:

Cop: Do you know how fast you were going? Can I see your license and registration please?
Me (gives him my new license): Sorry, Officer, I—
Cop: (returns my license and backs away): I didn’t mean to add to your trauma. Have a nice day. (whispers to himself) Poor woman.

When I got home, I was really disturbed and told Ken what had happened. “I didn’t know what to say! She asked me in front of everyone and I didn’t have any time to think about it. But I don’t want them to take my skin! Don’t let them take it!”

And I know I sounded like a big baby but Ken laughed and reminded me that as my survivor, he had right of first refusal over all my body parts.

Ken: Besides, there’s no need to worry about it. You’ll be dead.
Me: YOU DON’T KNOW THAT, KEN!! And don’t forget, if you let them have my skin, you can’t have me stuffed and put me in the living room.
Ken: I wasn’t going to do that anyway.
Me: You’re so mean.
Ken: It’ll just be one small empty urn on the fireplace mantle…
Me: You better hope I die first.

In other news, 3 weeks ago, we switched from our long-term internet provider to a cheaper, faster company. And three days ago, that company’s nation-wide network went down, leaving us with no internet. I’m posting this using my phone as a personal hotspot and hoping I don’t run out of data before it goes live. Stupid Rogers. So if I don’t engage too much today, you know why…