On the road again...

I am sure that this sketch of a Mandela had a deeper meaning of life as a journey when I created it several years ago, but it also fits with my physical  journeys: the moves…travels…vacations  etc. that earned me the reputation to be labeled with the theme song, “On the Road Again”, by Willie Nelson http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TD_pSeNelU

Lately, my frequent travels for work have started me thinking about the roadmap of my life. In my current job, Bearskin Airlines transports me to remote, northern Ontario communities, road trips keep me on the road and away from my home base sometimes for weeks at a time, and very often I find myself heading to Toronto to be filled with new knowledge to take to the field on future journeys. Such is the case today, as I pack for a 5 day Toronto trip. The experiences I have gained in these travels far outweigh the sacrifice of being away from home. I have been immersed in and learned from diverse cultures, I have friends and colleagues in all regions of the province,and my spirit has been comforted by the view of endless miles of rivers, lakes and wilderness, shown to me from the sky and from the roadways of Ontario. Common crows, hawks and eagles are my constant companions when I drive for hours with no sign of civilization, and once in a while I am blessed by a deer wandering safely at a distance.

                                                                      

    

Although I lived in the same city for most of my life, you could say I have become a professional mover, as a result of frequent moves from one neighbourhood to another. At one point I figured that I had moved an average of once every 2 years. As a result, I have experienced the cultures of many neighbourhoods  and townships in Sault Ste. Marie. And everyone has been different. The most significant difference was my experience living in Prince Township. A rural setting dotted with small farms and populated by families with a long, rich history in the area. Although the homes were far apart and situated on large acreages, neighbours would stop by to help when driving by and noticing a need for assistance. It wasn’t uncommon, even as a new resident, to have strangers drop by to grab a hammer and help shingle the roof, or to add some muscle to push a car out of a snow filled driveway. This had not been my experience in the city, as people were busier and the seemed to be attempting to carve out a sense of privacy and serenity on their small city lots…that is until now. Living in an east end suburban neighbourhood we have found a sense of community, sharing and happiness. Children safely play in the front yards providing the gift of laughter and amusement to all who watch them. Neighbours share gardening tips and tools, and can be seen admiring the beauty and bounty in each garden. There is always a smile and a wave…sometimes stopping to share a story or experience with one another.

Journeys did take me to other parts of North America. At 5 years old we relocated to Springfield, Massachusetts where I lived for one year. This is where I started school. Grade 1 at Sacred Heart School, we used to march in to class to the piped in March music of John Philip Sousa.  I remember starting our day with the pledge of allegiance, different than all my other school years in Canada, where we started our day singing God Save the Queen. All good…just different!

Then there are the tugboat journeys, the Algoma Central Railway journeys, canoe trips. Over the next while, I will share funny, harrowing, and sometimes poignant stories about these adventures. There have been journeys of learning, journeys of love, journeys of sorrow, journeys of hardship and journeys of resilience. All of the journeys have been journeys of the heart…journeys of the spirit, and so I plan to develop many stories around the theme of journeys, and I wish everyone enlightening and safe travels on your journeys too. 

Re-member

   My dad, Joseph Daniel and his brothers.
My dad  is 3rd from left, back row.

My grandmother, Agnes Lelievre had 13 children, 9 boys and 3 girls. The older boys were drafted into the Second World War and thankfully they all returned home alive and physically in once piece. My dad lost a finger…a visual reminder of the war.  But there were more serious dismemberments. Emotions and spirits were dismembered by those experiences. Families, communities and countries were dismembered by the trauma of the Second World War. In the late 1940’s there was no counseling for post traumatic stress disorder.  As he aged, my dad, vulnerable from a couple of drinks, would weep openly as he recalled his war experiences.

My mother and her sister served in the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War, and my aunt died at the age of 24, while in service to her country. My grandparents and my mom and her siblings never totally recovered from her loss. I never knew my Aunty Rita…and yet I knew her more than others who lived. I knew her from her picture framed and hung over my grandmother’s sofa. I knew her from the stories they told me…how she used to brush my mother’s hair, how she used to sing with her sisters, how she was so full of love, how she joined the Air Force to forget a forbidden romance with her one true love who was of a different religion.



Aunty Rita's name in Book of Memories



 

At a conference I attended recently, one of the speakers said that trauma dis-members the whole person. We can also say that trauma dis-members groups, communities, countries even the world? War is traumatic for the soldiers young and old, for their families, for their communities…for the world! It is even traumatic for us at home, to “witness” the daily war occurrences brought into our living rooms almost daily.

To heal is to re-member! “The truth will set you free!”  My hope is that remembering the wrath of war, will help us to heal the pain and suffering for those who sacrificed their mental, physical and spiritual well-being as well as honour all who fought and those who lost their lives for our freedom. By remembering the horrible effects of war, by remembering how to live together in peace and love we can build a world where war only exists in our distant memories, and battles are negotiated with words, not with weapons.

In November we remember all who have fought for our freedom. In November, I remember my

mother and my father who both passed in the 11^th month but several years apart. On her death bed, the words my mother Claire said to me were, “All there is…is love Robin, All there is…is love!”  I love and miss Danny and Claire, as I remember them today and share their lessons to me about love and war.

Joseph Daniel

Claire Gabriel

Storm Girl – All in a name

I learned about spirit names from my Aboriginal friends and teachers, and thought it time to set the record straight and change my legal name, Roberta, to my spirit name, Robin. I think everyone has a spirit name, that name that came to their parents in a dream, from the spirit of a relative living or past, from the spirit of a character in a book or movie, from the spirit of the calendar or nature, or even like in my case from the spirit of a nurse.

My mother told me the story of my naming many times while I was growing up. Because my birth was such a stormy process for her and because of the October gales blowing the night I was born, my parents decided to call me Gayle. In hindsight that name choice seemed to foretell of the many storms this life would travel through always finding safe harbor in the end. But it wasn’t to be, and Great Spirit told this to my parents through the Spirit of a young Scottish Nurse who cared for me. Everytime she brought me to my mother for feeding, she would say, “Here comes the little Robin”,  my tiny mouth resembled that of a baby robin searching for it’s next meal. The name stuck and I was brought home as Robin. The next Sunday in church the very passionate monsignor in his sermon, stated clearly that it was time for people to stop naming their children after birds, flowers, months etc. I would guess he was looking for strong biblical names, and so it was, my legal name on my birth certificate was Roberta Claire. Claire is my mother’s name and I carry it proudly as a sign that I am the perfect balance of femininity and masculinity for me, with the strength of character that comes with that harmony. Roberta has always been shortened to Robin, and was only an small annoyance when it had to appear on my social insurance number or when a manager at work would pick up on it from employment docs and call me Roberta to get a reaction…Of course they did. More recently, I went through the process of getting an enhanced drivers license to use as identification in place of a passport, and found that all my government I.D needed to be changed to show Roberta as my given name. I am being paged at airports as Roberta...When I go to the doctor I'm Roberta...I feel like I am in the middle of an identity crisis and now it has become a problem…a small storm to go through…and believe me I have been storming.  Here I am 61 years later, setting the record straight, and legally reclaiming my spirit name as my legal name.  I am Robin…I am Robin Claire…I am Robin Claire, the storm girl who always finds safe harbor!

Introductory Post

The days keep getting shorter, a reminder that my time here is growing shorter with every passing season. I have known 241 season changes and I have vivid memories of the excitement of each transformation. Spring breakup with the ice moving out of the rivers and lakes, water trickling through the leftover winter salt and sand accumulated along the sides of the roads, the fresh aroma of newly exposed soil and rotted foliage in the woods, and most of all the earlier mornings heralded in by the wake-up call of thousands of returning  song birds. It is always so exciting to see the first robin, the first crocus, and new moms walking their winter babies when the magic of spring thaws the ground and warms the air. At times in our part of the world, the shift from spring to summer is less obvious, and definitely not defined by a specific date. It is defined by the day on the Sand River, when a late spring snow and cold temperatures give way to sunshine and warm winds turn to scorching heat by afternoon. It is when you can be wearing mittens one day and shorts the next. What I treasure most is the feel of the warm sun on my arms and the gift of seeing and smelling the seasonal arrival of many summer flowers. I am always amazed that every shrub of a particular plant family bloom on the same day. Summer leaves me in awe of nature!  Sixty autumns…what can I say? My eyes have seen billions of brilliant orange, brown, yellow and crimson leaves. I have heard the Canada geese in the sky as they move south for the winter, and my yard has been busy with squirrels and chipmunks gathering provisions before the ground is covered with snow. Evenings become longer with more time to reflect and write. Just as I think I can’t take the darkness any more, nature provides a gift of light through a blanket of snow reflected by the moon or sun to bring me alive once more. This is why for many years as the first snowflakes would flutter to the ground, I would put on happy Christmas music and call my best friend to share our excitement about the light. So here I am, 61 autumns, 60 springs, 60 summers and 60 winters, and I ask myself how I have recorded those times and the simultaneous life experiences and events I lived through. How will I record the many more to come? That will be the nature of this blog:  Looking back and forward through pictures, sketches, doodles, essays, and poems. Hope to see you here.