Category Archives: journal

April – May 2003

April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
The Waste Land
T.S. Eliot

This year, April seems to be full of death. Here in Toronto, the SARS outbreak is causing anxiety. People are dying from it, at a lower rate than first feared, but still, each individual is a person likely to be missed. Statistics don’t reflect true loss.

And overseas bombs are dropping, people are fleeing, aid isn’t reaching those who need it most. In some cities, anti-war protests are turning into pro-Iraq/anti-Semitic rallies. Intolerance is running high and individuals are dying from it. I encourage people to express their opinions, but no one should have to die for what they believe. In the back of my head I keep repeating the line from an old CeeDees song, I hope the world doesn’t blow up tomorrow. A form of prayer.

april 12Spring is my favourite time of year, but this year it’s overshadowed by CBC news broadcasts. The first bombs were dropped just hours before I got on the train to embark on the Milds of New Brunswick mini-tour. Under the circumstances, I was relieved I’d decided to go by train rather than air. In transit, there was no news and I liked that, a blissful silence, a let’s pretend world where I didn’t know what was going on. Through the night we travelled endless miles of snowy white flats, wet-iced streams and trees black-shadowed against a wasted grey sky.

But the television in the Moncton train station was tuned to CNN. When Kathy Mac came to pick me up, she found me glued to the American propaganda station, shaking my head in disbelief. The first words out of her mouth were, “You don’t need to be watching that.” It was three days before I realized Kathy doesn’t have a TV. Smart woman. I listened to the CBC radio news a few times, but found I wanted to be thinking about other things.

The reading at the Attic Owl Book Shop in Moncton was a great success. April 13We had a very attentive audience who enjoyed the reading and chatted with us afterwards. Next time you’re in Moncton, you really should check out Ed and Elaine’s store at 885 Main St. It’s one of the largest, friendliest, best organized, mostly used bookstores I’ve ever been in. Kathy drove us back to Fredericton that night. I tried to stay awake, to be an extra pair of eyes watching for moose on the road, but ended up passing out for a while.

We got off to a slow start on Saturday, but still made it to St. John early enough to have a look around and a quick dinner before reading. St. John is hilly with narrow streets and a wild system of elevated roadways entering and exiting town, so it’s virtually impossible to see that it’s nearly surrounded by water. The St. John Arts Centre is a great space used for performances and art exhibits. In all, there were five readers and a good-sized crowd. Another successful evening.

April 14Sunday we were off to St. Andrews, Canada’s oldest seaside resort, and the weather was nasty. We were barely out of Fredericton when it started to rain, then sleet, then snow, then rain torrentially, which it kept up for the rest of the day. I could see that St. Andrews would be a really lovely place in the summer and I’m sure their seasonal population is widely variable. We read at the Sunbury Shores Arts & Nature Centre as planned, but the rain made for a small audience. We then drove up to the Algonquin, a resort hotel privately built in 1889 and later purchased by CP rail. The exterior is Tudor-esque and castle-like; the interior was reputedly used by Stanley Kubrick in filming The Shining. The drive home was somewhat less treacherous, as it was only raining and still daylight. I was glad of a hot shower when we got back though.

The travelling part of the tour over, we remained in Fredericton Monday and Tuesday. On Monday I delivered a lecture to Dr. McConnell’s Women Writers class at St. Thomas University. Although initially a bit intimidating, ultimately it was a very gratifying experience. The topic was my own novel, Swimming in the Ocean, and I was talking to a group of about forty people, all of whom had read it. At the end of the lecture, there was a steady stream of students asking me to sign their books. It was a marvelous experience and one I hope to repeat. That evening, I did a solo public reading to a small, but attentive audience, also at St. Thomas University.

I spent a good part of Tuesday taking a slow meditative wander through downtown Fredericton. Kathy had suggested I check out the walking trail that borders the St. John River. I scrambled up snow-packed stairs onto the footbridge that leads over the highway to the trail, but there was no trail. There was snow. It’d been melting at a furious rate, but was still at seat-level on the park benches. I gave up on the idea and, after exploring various shops and historic buildings, went back to the apartment. I usually go to galleries and museums when I’m in new cities, but I just wasn’t in the mood. I was feeling a strange agitation, perhaps the war I was trying to ignore, perhaps the need for spring air.

Tuesday night Kathy Mac and I did a one-hour live radio interview with Joe Blades of Broken Jaw Press. It was a relaxed event with chat and readings interspersed.

Even though Kathy and I have known each other for many, many years, this was the first time we’d toured in tandem. I’m hopeful we’ll find opportunities to do future events together, sometime, somewhere.

Wednesday morning I caught the bus back to Moncton, April 15where I had a few hours to wander around before boarding the train home. Once aboard, I found I was tired and retired to my single room early, opened the bed, turned out the light and watched small towns emerge from vast expanses of wilderness until I fell into restless sleep.

photos by Catherine Jenkins

©Catherine Jenkins 2003

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March – April 2004

I don’t know about you, but for me, it’s been a difficult winter. The past few months have been full of heavy psycho-emotional challenges, severe enough that at times they’ve led to physical and financial challenges. Not a fun time. I’m very relieved to see signs of spring.

Through this, I’ve been thinking a lot about normalcy; what it is, why we’re encouraged to fit into it, how we feel when we don’t. Right from the time we enter our first institution, school, we’re encouraged to abide by a norm as prescribed by others and punished when we don’t. I spent a memorable portion of the second grade in the corner or occasionally in the hall. It’s not that I was a bad kid; I just didn’t see the rationale behind the rules I was expected to follow. Like, why should my verbal communication be suspended just because the teacher’s talking? It took me a long time to relearn that what I have to say is just as valid, that I’m just as entitled as the next person to say what I’m thinking. But it’s not something we’re encouraged to do.

Although I learned to play the school game okay, the only way I got through it was by keeping overstimulated with extracurricular activities; writing, music, theatre, art. If I’d been stuck with nothing but classes, I wouldn’t have survived. I’m just not built that way. Not that I’m abnormal, you understand, just easily bored. Personally, I was quite ecstatic the first time someone told me I was “eccentric,” but depending on the circumstance, I might not always be so pleased.

I suppose by now, I’m either supposed to have settled into a business career or given birth to two point three children. Having done neither, having no desire to do either, isn’t “normal.” Some people think that by my age, I should’ve outgrown any childish whims of an arts career. I recently overheard my mother say to my uncle that I don’t work a steady day job because I “don’t like the nine to five.” No mention that in the last ten years every steady day job I’ve had has led to clinical depression and that the last one gave me chronic lung infections and IBS to boot. Some of us just don’t function well in steady state; some of us are all-or-nothing workers. Hence my penchant for creative and freelance work. I have no qualms about doing twenty hour days, as long as I see some relevance, some point, to the work.

To quote a Douglas Coupland title, “All Families are Psychotic.” Well, to put it more politely, let’s just say that “normal” seems to have a very broad range in its application to the family project. For instance, when middle-aged children start saying their parents are suffering from dementia, how is that state defined? What is normal to the natural decline of the aging process and what constitutes an abnormality, a problem? And where can we draw the line between what the aging parent is experiencing and our perception of that? How can we know where our judgement is valid and when it’s a reaction to our own fears of aging, our own mortality? Who’s to decide what normal is, when we’re all in the same boat and facing similar anxieties?

A close friend of mine has experienced a variety of medications intended to create a chemically induced version of “normal” for individuals whose brain chemistry isn’t considered such by the medical profession. Generally, the meds make him lethargic, zombielike. Is that normal? Decidedly not and it certainly isn’t his normal. Whose idea of normal is created by playing with brain chemistry? Arguably, if someone is causing themselves or others harm, some version of chemical control may be desirable, so society can sleep at night, so we know our loved ones aren’t in the bathroom slashing their wrists. But when an individual isn’t exhibiting these actions, what’s to be gained by making them feel controlled if they don’t want to be?

As I said, it’s been a difficult winter. But my twenty-year-old cat, the one I didn’t think was going to see another spring, has. On our most recent visit to the vet, I noticed tulips breaking the surface of the cold ground and daffodils blooming. I quietly celebrated, congratulating him, telling him that soon he’d be able to enjoy the sun on the balcony again.

What’s sustained me through the winter has been kids TV shows. The world is much brighter, simpler and easier to take, when I start the day with “Tractor Tom” or “Yoko, Jakomoko, Toto” along with my morning coffee. This behaviour might indeed be perceived as eccentric and I doubt I’m the “normal” demographic, but five or ten minutes of something funny or poignant, and often quite insightful with regard to human emotion, certainly isn’t harming anyone.

I moved my geraniums out onto the balcony on the weekend and have plans to put in vibrantly colourful flowers this year. I still have lots of work on my plate, but at least I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and am beginning to think about summer plans. I did some vocal practice last night for the first time in a long time and man, did that feel good! I need to get my time reorganized, so I can get back to working out again and playing piano regularly. I’ve been so swamped with paying work and family matters, that I’ve gotten very little writing done. I have to remedy that. I have projects mounting up and too little time and energy to complete them. Years ago a palm reader informed me that this would a breakthrough year for me. I plan on making that true. Happy spring!

© Catherine Jenkins, 2004

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Jan – Feb 2004

A few days after Christmas, I made the trudge to the grocery store to restock essentials. Halfway there, I heard a man shout, “Somebody call the police!” As I continued down the block, I saw four men beside the church, two standing, arms crossed, while two others scuffled on the sidewalk. Again, the cry, “Somebody call the police!” came from one of the men on the ground. I quickened my pace, mentally locating the closest pay phone. As I came closer, that I realized the two large men watching wore badges on their vests and were store security, that of the two on the ground, the one on top, the one using excessive force, was plainclothes security, and that the man I couldn’t see clearly, the one whose face was being pushed into the concrete, the one yelling for the police, was presumably a shoplifter.

I continued into the grocery store, not sure what to do. Should I ask the store to call the police? Surely they’d already heard the man’s cries. Then it dawned on me that, given the proximity, the security crew was probably from the grocery store.

One of the cashiers loudly bragged that she’d alerted security. Apparently this rather rough-looking individual had come in, looked suspicious, picked up a box of crackers, considered paying for them, than bolted out the door. The cashier laughed and self-righteously stated, “Theft is theft.”

And me, I’m thinking, this doesn’t sound like the act of a career shoplifter. I said to the cashier, “He must’ve been pretty desperate.” My reaction caught her off guard. She hadn’t considered need. I added, “It’s a shame, because there’s a food bank a block away,” which she turned into, “So, there’s really no excuse.” And all I can think is that she’s never gone hungry. Motivation for the crime? Desperation, possibly mental imbalance, possibly desire to be caught to get in out of the cold (remember that short story?).

As I leave the store, I notice six police cars have arrived to arrest the fugitive. They’re parked at odd angles in every direction, like something out of a Hollywood movie. Good to know that if you holler for the cops in this city, they’ll come. But all this because a street person stole a box of crackers?

In the commercial extravagance of the season, we shouldn’t forget that it’s also a time of charity. And just because Christmas has passed, doesn’t mean we should forget. People less fortunate than ourselves exist year-round, even when we don’t want to acknowledge them. I was raised to believe that our society takes care of those who, for whatever reason, aren’t capable of taking care of themselves. But when I see the numbers of people on the street, many with mental or physical illnesses, I know it’s not true, because it takes so much money.

I check the weather and see that for another night, the temperature’s dropping below –20C. Any morning I expect the first news report of the homeless freezing to death in the night. And yet, I’m inside my warm apartment, and from my balcony, I can see the lights glowing through the dark in the empty, heated buildings of the financial district. Surely we can all do a little better, help a little more, not just at Christmas, but throughout the year.

© Catherine Jenkins, 2004

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Nov – Dec 2003

I’m writing this as the Santa Claus Parade is going by a block away. I can hear Mums and Dads hooting their horns as they jockey for parking positions. It would seem the holiday season is almost upon us. Not sure how that happened. This year seems to have passed exceedingly quickly. Yet, at the same time, it’s been a year of major upheavals and catastrophes, so in some respects, it’ll be a good year to have over and done with. Time to start making holiday plans, baking and perhaps buying gifts for friends and family. Looking for a good book? Here are some of my recent finds.

The most exiting writer I stumbled upon this year, was British author Kate Atkinson. As so often happens, someone else found her first. My friend Peter bought me a copy of Emotionally Weird and told me I had to read it. It’s the wittiest, most intelligent, most intriguing, most closely observed book I’ve read in a very long time. I’ve since read Human Croquet, which I didn’t think was quite as good. I have yet to read Behind the Scenes at the Museum, her Whitbread Award winning first novel. The “Wonderful Unofficial Kate Atkinson Website” is available at: www.geocities.com/kateatkinson14/ Click on Texts to find blurbs on all her books or get a taste of her work by following the links to Not the End of the World, her new short story collection, and read “Tunnel of Fish.” Even her titles give you some sense of what she’s playing with.

Of course I also read the new Tom Robbins, Villa Incognito, with great pleasure. Although I think it’s his strongest work to date in many ways, this book got mixed reviews. Notably, Canadian critics loved it, while some American critics were really harsh. Mr. Robbins has always been one to speak his mind in his work and here, the gloves are definitely off. He’s pushed a lot of buttons in the American consciousness and I’m sure made a lot of people very uncomfortable. As I said to someone after reading it, he’s probably got the CIA or FBI or somebody camped on his doorstep. But we figured he’s probably used to that by now. Authentic writers say what they need to say, what they feel compelled to say, and damn the consequences (which is why we need organizations like PEN). Mr. Robbins is completely authentic, gutsy and incredible fun! He gets my deepest respect and loudest laughs every time.

I recently had the pleasure of being selected to do a reading along with Andrew Pyper. I was taken with the whole idea of The Trade Mission (cyber-nerds meet harsh reality in the Amazon jungle). It’s near the top of my reading pile and I’m hoping to get to it during the holiday lull.

In poetry, I highly recommend sub rosa, the new collection by Stan Rogal, with full colour graphics by Jacquie Jacobs. A multi-layered marriage of word and image, this book is a creative, evocative hybrid, which washes over the reader. A very successful experiment!

On the children’s book front, I recently picked up Neil Gaiman’s Coraline, a book about a little girl who enters an alternative universe with an alternative Mum and Dad. How to find her way back to her own reality when this set of parents wants to keep her in their universe? I have a feeling it’s going to have very interesting psychological overtones. Neil Gaiman, of Sandman comic fame, has been writing novels for the past few years, some more successful than others. My favourite is still Bad Omens, the project he undertook with Terry Pratchet (of Discworld fame). It’s a cheery little book about the end of the world. I first read it when I was feeling somewhat depressed and found it utterly uplifting. It’s one of those rare books that can radically adjust one’s perspective.

I’m also looking forward to The Morning Star, the third installment of Nick Bantock’s Gryphon & Sabine trilogy. His work never fails to intrigue me. It’s such an amazing synthesis of imagination, visual invention and compilation of artifacts from around the world. Transporting in a way that most picture books don’t manage.

With the plethora of books that are written and published each year, I’m sure there are many more out there that I’d really enjoy, that I’ve missed. They’ll find their way to me if and when they’re meant to and I’ll get to them as time allows. Please support your local independent bookstore throughout the year.

Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah, Bodhi Gaya, Eid ul-Fitr, Lux Mundi, Saturnalia, Mother Night, Winter Solstice, Yule, Kwanzaa, (sorry if I missed your holiday of choice) or quiet day off in your jammies and fuzzy slippers to read a good book. Wishing you safe travel, much joy and peace. I think we’ve earned it this year.

© Catherine Jenkins, 2003

 

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August 2003

As hoped, I have taken time off this summer to do some different things. Nothing major, just a day here or there.

On July 30, I joined half a million (or so) of my closest friends and went to see The Rolling Stones at the SARS Benefit in Toronto’s Downsview Park. I got tied up with work so missed the afternoon show, however, I made it in time for the evening acts, which were of more interest to me anyway.

There were an awful lot of people. I reckon the demographic was almost as broad as for the Pope when he was here, although there may not have been much overlap between the two crowds. I could see Mick Jagger, onstage some quarter of a mile away. I couldn’t make out his face or anything, but I could match the movement and clothing colour to what was on the screen and thereby confirm who I was seeing.

We are so Canadian (I mean that in a good way!). Security wasn’t anything like what we’d been threatened. The police turned a blind eye to the dope smokers and dealers. The crowd was well ordered and well behaved. We didn’t rush the stage when we were asked not to. It was possible to travel through the crowd along rivulets of moving people, easing their way around stationary spectators. Beyond doubt, it’s the biggest crowd I’ve ever been part of, so I was glad for its calmness. An interesting experience.

August 14 presented another interesting experience. An electrical power outage blackened most of Ontario and the northeastern US. Personally, I found it quite liberating. Everyone opened their windows, so the sounds of other humans were apparent in the night. The Native drummers down the street started up before sunset and continued until after dark. It felt like a celebration of the natural state overtaking our constructed one.

From my balcony, I watched pedestrians with flashlights walking home and cars trying to navigate the streets, somehow disoriented without overhead or traffic lights. The only illumination was from a few airline warning beacons on tall structures and the Bay Street towers with their own generators. I could see stars and the milky way like I’d never seen them in downtown Toronto. I wondered how different we looked from space at that moment.

I was pleased to discover how well equipped I was, having candles, a flashlight, and a battery-operated radio (although stations kept disappearing into silence). I was quite proud of myself when, craving a comforting cup of tea, I figured out how to boil water using my stainless steel fondue pot and its methyl alcohol burner.

Somehow, it all felt very World War II, but much more placid. There were no planes flying overhead. There were sirens however, lots of them. Shortly after dark, a huge orange-red moon, just past full, rose over the darkened buildings.

In my neighbourhood (probably on the same power grid as several hospitals) the power was reinstated at 10:30 that night, so it was only out for about six hours. At the first indication of light, a joyous hooting and hollering rose from the street, like when the home team wins the Stanley Cup or something. I have to admit I was a little disappointed. I was enjoying the adventure. Many people had time off work the following day, sort of like a snow day in August. It took a full week for the system to stabilize and run normally, but now, once again, planes are flying high though the buttermilk sky.

Arguably, this disruption was in part the doing of the nearness of Mars to Earth. I’ve been tracking the red planet’s progress from my balcony and it’s quite stunning to see it so large in the night sky. When it was closest (August 27), I was in Niagara-on-the-Lake.

Last spring, verging on a state of exhaustion, I got tickets to see The Royal Family and Happy End, so I’d have something fun to look forward to in the summer, before things got too busy again in the fall. I enjoyed both shows enormously. It was my first visit to The Shaw Festival, but it certainly won’t be my last. Maybe next time I’ll actually take in something by GBS himself!

I also treated myself to dinner at the Peller Estates Winery, where I could sit outside overlooking the vineyards, watching swallows flit as the sun set. I had the Vegetable Pavé with Crème Brûllée for desert. It was the kind of dinner one admires before tasting, initially hesitant to disrupt its symmetry, then flavour overcoming the visual aesthetic, with chaos rapidly ensuing until the plate is clean. I also enjoyed a couple of glasses of Peller Estate’s Chardonnay, having intentionally left the car parked at my B&B. I figured the chances of being charged with reckless endangerment while walking were minimal. After dinner, I felt deeply satisfied, relaxed and happier than I had for quite some time.

Walking out into the night, I went in search of a clear view of Mars. Niagara-on-the-Lake is an old town, its streets lined with wonderfully huge trees, which unfortunately make it difficult to get an unobstructed view of the horizon. I finally found Mars by walking out onto the golf course. I figured it was safe; who plays golf at night? It was an odd feeling though, walking on a golf course in the dark, watchful for flags and variations in ground shading where the greens and sand traps lie. The Niagara-on-the-Lake Golf Club is North American’s oldest, having been established around 1875. It’s trees are enormous and majestic, but there’s open space between them. I finally had my meditation on the nearness of Mars with my back to a large and ancient oak, accompanied by the sounds of crickets and a stiff breeze.

Nearing the edge of the embankment to the Niagara River, I listened to the rhythmic thunder. This is serious and powerful water, not to be trifled with, and that always seems scarier at night. This water powers huge Hydro generators that still supply a high percentage of Ontario’s electricity. I could see a few clearly defined lights offshore and in the distance, the sickly orange glow of Toronto.

I stayed at a lovely B&B, The Doctor’s House, c. 1824. It’s right downtown, easy walking distance to the theatres and everything else. It’s a lovely old sprawling house with talkative pinewood floors. Two of my reasons for selecting this particular B&B were Bill and Fred, the friendly long-haired resident cats. I had a wonderful night’s sleep and a delightful breakfast in the company of the owner and a Rochester, NY couple.

I enjoyed a wander around Niagara-on-the-Lake in the morning. I’m not sure what George Bernard Shaw (a strict vegetarian) would’ve thought of his life-sized bronze likeness situated in the fountain in front of the Shaw Leather Village, leather and fur shop. No doubt he would’ve found exactly the right thing to say.

©Catherine Jenkins 2003

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