Don’t get me wrong. I always loved “long weekends” when I was working. That extra day at the beginning or end of the weekend was always magical, and quite often there was a party, or fireworks, or special get-togethers added to the mix. A picnic at the lake! Time to laugh, often a great excuse to enjoy our favourite alcoholic beverage….. and even an extra sleep-in if you have a hang-over! An extra night to stay up late and enjoy special occasions more than we usually do! In the summer, vacation cottages are being opened for the long, hot weather ahead, boats are taken out of winter storage to get them ready for adventures on favourite waterways. These are the delights associated with “long-weekends” for much of the working population around the world. So - who doesn’t like a long-weekend?

Doctors, Nurses, Firefighters, Search and Rescue, and Trauma teams, the people in these professions, that’s who. These people know better than anyone that a long weekend will find them scrambling to keep the local hospital waiting room from exploding. Statistics from the American National Highway Traffic Safety Association back up reports that fatal car crashes increase by nearly 14% during major holiday periods. They state that on “Non-Holiday Days” there is an average of 108 fatalities per day. But when there are holiday events involved, the number jumps to 123 fatalities per day. That is a significant jump. Canadian statistics show that collisions spike sharply during long weekends, with an increase of 18% more than on regular weekends. These statistics, however, are linked solely to traffic fatalities. There are many, many more fatalities on waterways with boat crashes in rivers, lakes, creeks and oceans. There are always drownings, hiking, and biking accidents. One of the major reasons there are so many more fatalities is undoubtedly connected to consumption of alcohol and drugs, usage of substances spikes dramatically when there are holiday events happening.

I was in my late twenties when I became a Real Estate Agent for Century 21. It was a great job for me; I loved being sociable and meeting new people, and I quickly came to consider many of the other agents in my office like family. Of course, like a real family, there are times when you don’t get along with everybody, and navigating the undercurrents of a busy office of approximately 15 realtors, all of whom are trying to become the most successful, were stressful. For the most part, though, we had a remarkably kind and courteous work family.

This was undoubtedly due to the charming, outgoing personality of the Owner/Broker, Neil, whose “gift of the gab” was legendary, and also one of the biggest reasons our office was frequently recognized with awards of merit by the Real Estate Board. His lovely wife, Marilyn, was the Office Manager, and kept everything organized for those of us out there who were trying to capture our respective markets. To complete the “family feel”, their daughter, Karey spent any spare time she had working as our Receptionist. Karey was warmly embraced by the Century 21 staff. At 19 years of age, she was already studying to become a Physician. She was beautiful, had a captivating personality, and was always kind. Neil and Marilyn were incredibly proud of her, frequently boasting about how smart she was, which embarrassed her to no end. She was a big-sister to her 11 year old brother, a carbon-copy of his dad, and to her 8 year-old sister, Erin, who possessed a 1,000 watt smile. They came regularly to the office after school, waiting for one of their parents or Karey to take them home, infusing the office with giggles and mischief.

Neil loved to host office parties, usually to celebrate top performers in the office, inspiring some good, old-fashioned competition between staff, and to revel in the financial successes and accolades. In the summer, he and Marilyn would occasionally take us all out on his beautiful, sleek white speed-boat. He loved to show off the immense power, especially when there was water skiing involved. He was rich and successful, and everyone who knew him, knew that. On this particular July 1st long weekend, he asked everyone to come out on his boat for some waterskiing.

I was never a water-skiing fan. I enjoyed watching people who could pull it off and look good doing it; I could do neither! My heart was always in a canoe, paddling through the reeds and streams that branched off the Rideau River in Ottawa. I was glad to relax and contemplate life in peace, so when plans were being made for Neil and a few of the other agents to celebrate the July long-weekend, I planned my canoe trip with my sister.

It was early Saturday evening when I received a phone call from one of the other agents. I at first I thought it might be an obscene phone call; for a long moment after I said “hello”I could only hear deep breathing, punctuated by deep, twisted moans. It took me a moment to realize the voice belonged to Gayle, one of the agents that I had become friendly with at the firm. My brain recognized that she was speaking, but I struggled to understand what she was saying between heavy sobs. My heart dropped out of my chest, writhing on the floor in agony before I even heard the words. Something truly awful, something unbearably tragic had happened.

“Gayle! Please! What’s happened! Tell me!” I was almost shouting, trying to cut through her sobs.

It took a while for her to speak, the words tumbling out of her mouth in wet stutters, her lips, no doubt, twisted in the agony of sharing the news. It was Karey. Beautiful, young, smart, sweet, kind - Karey. There was an accident on the boat. After she got the worst words out, Gayle finally exhaled, her words dropping like trauma-bombs, filling my eardrums with shock and sorrow. Karey was dead.

Neil’s entire family, and a few colleagues from the agency, including Gayle, were out on the lake to celebrate our beautiful country’s birthday on the water. Everyone had taken their turns on the ski’s, everyone smiling and laughing, and although it was time to head for home, Karey’s little sister, Erin, wanted one more turn, begging her dad for just one more turn. At first, he said no, but she was very skilled at manipulating her doting father. The sun was sinking low in the sky, the water sparkling in the last of the golden light. Rolling his eyes at how hard it was to resist his young daughter, Neil heaved a sigh and said: “Okay! One last time!”

Karey no doubt was smiling to herself as she watched her sister jump into the water and get the ski’s on, clapping and hooting loudly for Erin to show them how it was done. A young girl in the prime of her life, living and loving life with her family, her future a sparkling star on the horizon, just waiting for her to pluck it out of the sky. Nobody was sure why she decided to stand up in the boat just as Neil gunned the engine with a powerful thrust to get Erin up and out of the water. In that one, single, fateful split second of time, this family’s life was changed forever. The big, powerful boat lunged up out of the water, a hungry, mechanical shark unleashed. It all happened so quickly, Gayle said, that it was impossible for her to remember how the nightmare unfolded. All she knew was that one moment, Karey was laughing and cheering her little sister on, and next, the sound of Neil gunning the boat engine. Then the horrified screams of family and friends as Karey lurched backwards, falling directly into the water, right where the voracious engine was thrashing the beautiful blue lake water into a foaming sea of white bubbles. But now, the bubbles were red. Very red. And the sound of the engine had changed from a powerful roar to the sickening sound of an enormous blender that had been fed something it should never have encountered.

Gayle could not give me more details, nor did I really want any. My imagination was working overtime, my brain conjuring up nightmarish images of this unspeakable tragedy and it was absolutely unbearable.

That one day in July marked the end of Neil’s Century 21 Real Estate Brokerage. He and his wife, Marilyn, were torn to shreds, and those of us in the office could not help them in any way. The office closed down in the following months, and we all took jobs at different agencies, each of us processing the loss and sadness in different ways.

One day, probably about a year later after this terrible event, I came across Marilyn and Erin at the local shopping mall. I had popped in to grab something and was on my way out when I spotted two familiar faces walking towards me. I suddenly froze, not knowing what I should do. Should I hug them and say hello? Should I pretend I didn’t see them and save us all from a horribly awkward situation? What if they started crying? What if I started crying? I have to admit, I almost panicked. But as they drew closer to me, I could see that it wasn’t going to be a decision for me to make. It is said that our eyes are the windows to our souls, but in this case, their windows had disappeared. They had erected doors instead, doors that had been closed to the world, doors that were sealed so tightly that not even the faintest glimmer of light could get through. They walked straight ahead, as if they were in a trance. Erin in particular presented a particularly sorrowful countenance, and I can only imagine what images and memories were seared into her young soul from that fateful day. I believe there is no doubt that she must face the reality that she had begged for that one last chance to waterski, that Karey might still be alive if she hadnt pushed her father to let her go. I held my breath and slowed down my pace, just in case they looked up and saw me. I did not want them to think I was rushing past so I didn’t have to speak to them.

We passed each other close enough to reach out and touch, but they just looked straight ahead, as if each step forward was just a task to complete to get them through the day. Even in my semi-panicked state, I could see that the lovely mother and daughter I once knew were gone. They were two honey bees trapped in their own nectar, drowning inside their world of sorrow, thinking of what might have been if they hadn’t gone out that fateful day in July. My heart was sick, and to tell you the truth, a part of it remains sore and wounded all these many years later. I can still see Karey’s pretty face and warm smile the last time I said goodbye to her at the office. My stomach is sick just remembering these events in order tell the sad story. I will never feel completely whole again.

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Fast forward about ten years, and my life had changed significantly. I had moved to Vancouver, BC, Canada, and was working as an Office Manager at one of the largest Mental Health and Substance Use teams in the downtown core. Similar to the office politics and vibe of the real estate brokerage I had worked at, my employees and colleagues, affectionately referred to as “teamies” were, for the most part, wonderful to work with. Having just now retired in mid-June of 2026, I can confirm my original belief, which was formed early on in my career, that people who take jobs in the field of Mental Health and Addiction are, for the most part, amazingly kind and caring people. While some of them fall into their jobs by chance, as I did, so many of them are in this particularly difficult field of work because they are drawn to it because they have experienced mental illness themselves, or have relatives or friends who are struggling to survive diagnoses like Clinical Depression, Schizophrenia, or Bipolar Mood Disorder. The “professional” component of these teams, the Physicians, Psychiatrists, Nurses, Social Workers, Rehab and Occupational Therapists, have dedicated years and significant money on education so they can get a position working with the population they care the most about.

I first met Debbie W. when she was hired into our Adult Mental Health Team. She had recently arrived in Vancouver from Montreal, where her family lived, and she had two children, a young daughter and a son. I felt an instant kinship with her because that is exactly how I arrived in Vancouver, albeit without the child component. When I arrived, I had exactly one single friend who invited me to live with her in her one-bedroom apartment in downtown Vancouver. It didn’t take me long to get comfortable and find new friends, but I remembered how starting over in a new city so far from home was quite a challenge.

A few days before she formally started, Debbie came in to meet her new colleagues, and brought her two children with her so they could see where she would be working. I caught only a glimpse of them because Debbie was focused on meeting her new Team and seeing her office. Her children were excited, her daughter a carbon copy of her mom with mischievous brown eyes framed by a halo of uncontrolled dark curls. Her parents had also come along to see where their beloved daughter would be working, and meet some of her colleagues as well. I remember the sparkly giggles of her children and their excitement at seeing where their mom would work. I remember waving goodbye to them all and telling Debbie I’d see her Monday morning for her first day; it was so nice meeting the children!

As the Office Manager, it was my job to get her settled at the team with everything she might need, and on the following Monday, her first day, we made a list of supplies I needed to order for her. We chatted, getting to know each other as we re-organized her small office. We had both left our families behind in Ontario when our marriages began to disintegrate, choosing Vancouver as a destination to build something fresh and new. She was “starting over”, just like I had done ten years earlier. Meeting me, someone who had already walked a similar path, minus the children, was a sign to her, she said, a form of “kismet”. After their brief visit to see what would soon be their new home, her children had returned to Ontario with their grandparents. Right now, she was focusing on getting settled so they could join her in early fall, in time to begin school in their new surroundings.

I remember that day well, watching her arrange a few personal items on her desk, making her space feel immediately homey. I noticed how lovingly she handled a framed photograph, placing it right beside her computer screen - in easy view for an immediate escape from a stressful situation. She was sitting beside an athletic young man; they were holding hands as they sat on an immense, moss-covered tree stump. They were flanked on each side by her smiling children, obviously enjoying their time together. A wide, shallow river sparkled in the background, the water an intense, milky, turquoise blue, characteristic of water sourced from glacial melt. I recognized the setting immediately; I had a similar photo of myself sitting on perhaps the very same moss-covered log when my husband had taken me to Whistler-Blackcomb Mountains before we were even married.

She found the perfect spot for it, and was immensely pleased when I told her how much her daughter looked like her, with her big, sparkling smile and crazy curls. She took the opportunity to confess, with a shy smile, that she had already met someone here, the fellow in the photograph. She actually blushed a little as she explained that she had already moved in with him. She was just a tad on the defensive, saying that she recognized she was moving very quickly, and although many people would advise against doing this, she felt strongly that it was the right thing to do for herself. Craig, the man in question, was a psychiatrist who worked at one of the other Mental Health Teams, and once again Debbie used the word “kismet”. She said she’d literally bumped into him when she was dropping her hire paperwork at Central Office. He asked her to go for coffee, and she said yes - and the connection was immediate and powerful. A date for that very weekend was arranged and ……… bam! She was in love. So, it appeared, was he. She was thrilled when he told her a few weeks later that he would love it if she and her children would move in with him. Of course, she was over the moon and didn’t hesitate to say yes. Now, with summer flying by so quickly, they were rushing to have the house ready for the arrival of her children, just in time to begin the school year. Debbie said that this all felt magical, and certainly serendipitous, and I had to agree. It certainly did seem like everything was “clicking into place” and setting the scene for a positive future for her and her children.

The long, hot days of summer dazzled by, with the brilliant heat of a hot, summer sun teasing us all to get out and enjoy nature in the pristine forests, thundering waterfalls, and icy lakes just waiting to welcome an adventurous soul for a swim. With this magical tableau at hand, it was impossible for a young woman, deep in the throes of new love, to turn down Craig’s invitation to hike up to a plateau on Mt. Seymour on this very warm July day. Sizzling temperatures in the mid 30’s made the idea of a cooling, forest hike very appealing.

On that Friday of the August long-weekend, I popped by Debbie’s office to wish her a good weekend with Craig. She had told me of his plans and was looking forward to the hike, accompanied by his two large poodles, and hopefully having a picnic along the way. The popular Mt. Seymour Trail could take anywhere from 5 to 10 hours to complete, depending on the experience of the hikers. Of critical importance, though, was the understanding that even in July and August, the hottest months of the year in BC, these mountain trails can still have large patches of icy snow-pack. One stretch can be grassy and sun-dappled, and proper shoes can grip the terrain firmly and safely. But just around the next corner, you can find the trail covered with slippery, icy sludge. If you happen to be rounding the curve where signs indicate “Caution, Slippery Terrain” or “Danger, Steep Slope”, the experience can take a terrifying turn for the worse.

In the weeks that followed, my shell-shocked brain attempted to process the tragic events that took my new friend’s life, but the random cruelty that took her from us was too much for me to deal with. A loving mother of two small children. A beloved daughter. A professional nurse, dedicating her life to helping elderly patients with serious and chronic mental illnesses. A kind person with what should have been her whole life ahead of her. Gone. In the weeks that followed the tragic event, many people shared their thoughts and beliefs about how she came to lose her footing and slide down the steep, icy embankment to her death. Some sought to lay blame with her boyfriend for taking her on what many claimed was a dangerous hike suitable for experienced hikers only. Every time I closed my eyes, I could see her panicked face, her arms flailing, desperately grabbing for bushes or branches as she began the slide that turned into the terrifying descent over the edge of a rocky, 40-foot cliff. Some said that they had heard the couple arguing as they were making their way up the trail; they said it appeared that Debbie was frightened and did not want to continue the hike. There were claims that her shoes were not sturdy or appropriate for the conditions, and she was afraid, wanting to turn back. Others said that the dogs had seen something on the trail up ahead and taken chase, distracting both Craig and Debbie just long enough for her to lose her footing. All I do know is that in one absolutely horrific moment in time, everything changed. For Debbie, her children, her family, for Craig, for their future together, all was lost in one panicked second as she scrambled to regain her footing. But there was nothing, and no-one, to save her. Screaming and sliding sideways, Debbie’s hands found no purchase and she went at a sickening and unstoppable speed over the side of the cliff.

It is said that she survived the 40-foot drop over the edge, breaking her back on the ragged rocks and boulders that spilled down the ravine. It is said that she was able to speak to those who were calling to her as she lay in the ice, unable to move, panicked and terrified beyond belief. It is said that once the Helicopter Rescue Team arrived, she was still conscious, though terribly hurt, a tiny, fragile bird who did not have wings to save her. It is said that as the Team transferred her to a lift board dangling from the helicopter, she had a heart attack, and by the time she was in the helicopter, it was simply too late.

I’ve never really recovered from the grief of this loss, nor do I suspect I ever will. That first Monday after her death I went into the office early. I had to clean out her office sooner than later, and her boyfriend had called and left a message that he would be coming by to pick up her things. I stepped into the quiet room, my eyes filling with tears. Her Daytimer Journal was open on her desk with her appointments for the day pencilled in, names and phone numbers of her new clients neatly listed. I thought of her just a few days earlier, making her notes and plans, never knowing she would not be alive to keep them. I picked up the framed photograph she had placed beside her computer screen, glancing one last time at her sparkling eyes and the happiness and love that shone from all of them in that moment, as they looked forward to their future togeher. I hugged it to my chest and wiped the last of my tears before tucking it safely into a corner of the box. Someone came to find me; Craig had arrived at the office to collect her things. Neither of us spoke; his tear-stained face and bowed shoulders spoke of the intensity of his grief and all I was able to do was give him a long hug before handing him the box. There were just no words.

Decades have passed. Those gentle, broken souls she left behind picked up the pieces of their shattered lives and moved on. I pay my respects to her memory by mentioning her to friends and colleagues who once knew her, by keeping her name alive, the same as I do with my memories of Karey. And I hope that by bringing the sad stories of their deaths to the attention of others who are seeking to enjoy their lives out in this big, beautiful world, I can perhaps save one single person who thinks twice before doing something even remotely dangerous that could end in tragedy.

Grief is powerful. It “re-forms” our usual mindset and hijacks the core of our very essence. Our brains begin to subconsciously form a new identity, one that we don’t recognise, one that is suddenly impossible to separate ourselves from. The innocent, happy, flesh-and-blood shells we were gifted with at birth are gone, and though eventually we may achieve peace as we work our way through the grieving process, the damage is done. The intense shock has formed an invisible scar in our psyche. Just because we can’t see it doesn’t mean it isn’t there. It is. A hard, sharp little nugget of sorrow that remains ready to pop back into our consciousness when memories are triggered. A child’s laugh. A song. A flower. A specific colour. A scent.

I am no stranger to grief, sorrow or trauma. Like a stalactite that was once a tiny, calcified drop on the roof of a cave, my original shell has morphed with each loss I have suffered, each teardrop gradually hardening, to transform who I once was into who I am now. Many times an individual will attempt to reassemble their life, continue their routines and activities to fool themselves that the person they have lost is still there, that their dreams and plans can stay the same as yesterday, last week, last month, so that their life feels “normal”, as it was before the tragedy. There is no doubt that some of us will never regain the strength, understanding, and acceptance necessary to pick up the pieces. We are transformed into a person we cannot even recognise. Some of us will become bitter, unable to remember who we used to be. The loss feels incredibly harsh, and we often feel it is “unjust”. Some of us turn inwards; we focus on the sorrow, asking: “Why did this happen to me”? “What did I do to deserve this?” There is, of course, no answer to be had, because one could just as easily ask: “Why shouldn’t this happen to me? Why should I be so special that grief should not be visited upon my shoulders?” There would still be no answer. We are all human beings, made of flesh and blood, exposed to the vagaries of the universe, good luck, bad luck, good genes, bad genes, positive circumstances and negative incidents. Some are born to wise, kind and compassionate parents, fortunate to be introduced to beauty, grace and intellect as children. Some are born to broken souls, angry and hateful, disillusioned with their lives, they find sick pleasure in abusing their children, both physically and mentally. These children are kicked unceremoniously to the curb of life, where they must learn to survive with nothing but the kindness (or cruelty) of others to help or hinder their journey. We all know that life is not fair. It is what we do with the new, ever-changing mantle that hardens around us that dictates how we continue to live out our time here on earth.

I would argue that the accumulation of wisdom is only possible when a human is subjected to the misery of loss, the shock of grief, and the trials of tragedy. Yes, wisdom comes at a great price.

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My journey through grief and sadness has been well documented already here on Substack; if you are reading this now, I hope you might have come by to read my early posts where I sought to introduce you to my life, my circumstances, my “self”. This post will share a little bit more about who I became after the early years of sadness, tragedy and loss, and how I have ended up here, talking to my Deer Family who visit me each day, like a modern-day female Dr. Doolittle.

The Journey

My family, in my opinion, has been plagued by an inordinate amount of “bad luck” taking the form of sickness and disease. My mother and my eldest brother are the only ones who managed to stay healthy into their 80’s, with my mother passing away in her late eighties from Alzheimer’s. I’m pretty certain that my family’s misfortune had a lot to do with my father’s genealogy and the unhealthy lifestyle of his family, who were farmers, when he was growing up. Strangely enough, disease also took aim at my sister’s husband (the wasting of Muscular Dystrophy) and now, my brother’s wife (ALS).

My dad was one of 11 children who grew up on a farm in Ontario, Canada. My father and 9 of his siblings passed away before they were 60 years old; curiously, the eldest brother lasted well into his 90’s. For the most part, it appears that heart attacks claimed most of them, my father included. I’m sure they all smoked like chimneys, not a good idea for anyone, ever, but especially if everyone in your family is dropping dead from heart attacks. As a child, I went to so many funerals for my aunts and uncles that it seemed strange when I hadn’t been to one in 12 months.

Frequent visits to the graveyard to “visit” the dead were a somewhat regular event for my mom and I. First, we would visit the side of the cemetery that cradled my grandmother, grandfather, and some of my aunts and uncles. A bouquet of flowers, purchased from a vendor at the gates to the cemetery, would be lovingly placed beside the headstone. Mom would then tell me the stories that she had heard growing up about her aunts and uncles. I knew them all by heart, but I always loved to hear my mom tell a story, and I know it made her feel reconnected to those she had lost.

Then we would make our way to the other side of the large, park-like cemetery grounds where my immediate family was laid to rest. My mom would duly recite a few prayers, dab at her eyes with a white handkerchief, and place her hand upon the gravestone, as though the words she uttered would break through our worldly universe, floating through up through the vault of heaven where those we loved and lost would be waiting eagerly to hear them. Sometimes she would get on her knees, somehow retaining her dignity and elegance, and would tell a short story to anyone who might be listening, above or below the ground, and then would gently pat the grass over the grave, like one pats a friend on the back when they are greeting them for the first time in a long time. I was always relieved that the pat was sufficient for my mother; I often worried a bit that she might try to embrace the headstone itself. She probably would have if they were small enough to get her arms around. My mother’s hugs were magical, they were somehow suffused with love and peace, the intangible warmth of kindness and compassion lingering upon your shoulders long after the hug was over. If anyone could have reached through a gravestone to hug a loved one on the other side, it would have been her.

Once the scourge of disease was done wiping out my parent’s generation, it turned its efforts to creeping into the lives of their children and grandchildren. My generation, those of the Labelle lineage, began to grow up, marry and have children.

The sad series of events that affected my family directly began to unfold when my father passed away in 1981. That’s when I first came to fully understand the meaning of grief and trauma. Our unfortunate events are loosely chronicled as per below.

1981

• My father passes away after a lifetime of heart problems, as did his other 9 siblings. (The oldest of the 11 siblings lived well into his 90’s, figure that one out!)

1985

• I am diagnosed with severe Ulcerative Colitis in 1985, which has me in the hospital multiple times a year due to uncontrolled bleeding in my intestines.

• I have a miscarriage, which affects me greatly. I quit my job and sell my house to move in with my mother who can assist in caring for me when my Ulcerative Colitis spikes.

1985 to 1987

• My sister’s husband is diagnosed with a rare form of Muscular Dystrophy called “Ataxia”. Within a year he is in an electric wheelchair/scooter and suffers from extreme choking episodes and seizures. His prognosis for a long life is not good and my sister & family are very upset.

• My brother and his wife, already parents to Nathalie, my first niece in 1974, and Philippe, my first nephew, in 1976 decide to have another child. We are excited to hear they would be having identical twins! About halfway through the pregnancy, however, we are devastated to find out that one of the twins has died in the womb. The surviving twin, our adorable Valerie, is born as a preemie.

  Sadly, as time passes, it becomes apparent that Valerie is not meeting many of the normal milestones even for a premature baby. Examinations confirm that Valerie has Cerebral Palsy. Valerie will not be able to walk, talk, or feed herself. My brother and his family devote their lives to caring for her and ensuring she has the best life possible.

1988/1991

• My sister is diagnosed with aggressive Breast Cancer, which devastates me to my core. My mother and I take turns being with her as often as possible, while also providing support and comfort to her husband. Before long, he can only get around in an electric scooter, and his quality of life is quickly getting worse. This places a huge, additional strain on my sister.

• My sister subsequently passes away in 1991. My brother-in-law is left with no partner to be there with him as his disease progresses. My family and I step in to help him out and ensure he remains an important part of the family.

• Around this time, my second-oldest brother, Brian, begins having severe “Cluster Headaches”, a particularly severe form of Migraines, and frequent episodes of Vertigo. A few years later, he is diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, which he is still battling to this day.

1996

• My Ulcerative Colitis becomes uncontrollable, and I need to have multiple emergency surgeries to stop the internal bleeding. I am in the hospital for weeks, sometimes months at a time.

2008/2011

• My beloved mother begins showing signs of dementia, and we must place her in a care home. She is devastated; she has to give up her little dog Dusty, who was her beloved soulmate for many years. In 2011, she passes away from Alzheimers.

2017

• My brother-in-law passes away from complications of Ataxia/Muscular Dystrophy.

2023

• My eldest niece, Nathalie (Valerie’s older sister) is diagnosed with Stage IV Ovarian Cancer and begins chemo treatments in August of 2023. She is 51 years old.

• My darling niece, Valerie, passes away after severe complications from her Cerebral Palsy, also in August of 2023. The sisters are both in the same ward at the same time. She was only 46 years old.

2024

• My 2nd brother’s wife, Kathy, is shockingly diagnosed with ALS. There is no way to judge how long she may have to live. Only one year into her diagnosis she is already using a cane and an electric scooter to get around, has suffered from falls, is having some difficulty speaking, and is frequently very fatigued during the day.

• Because of all the surgeries I have undergone, my intestines again begin to adhere to other organs in my abdominal area. CT Scans, MRI’s and Ultrasounds are done to confirm the need for surgery to remove the adhesions, accidentally finding a large tumour on my pelvis. Further investigations show that I have Ovarian Cancer, just like my niece. Surgeons decide to perform two major surgeries at the same time, one to remove the adhesions and the other to remove the cancerous tumours. Unfortunately, they cannot remove much of the cancer because it is attached to my pelvic wall, and my intestines are wrapped around my uterus and one of my ovaries. It is deemed “inoperable” cancer.

• Genetic testing confirms that my niece and I both have the BRCA1 Mutation Gene, which means it was passed on to us from one of our parents - in our case, paternal. She is now having a second round of Chemotherapy because the cancer is beginning to spread. We are all scared and sad for her and hope this treatment will set the cancer back.

• I continue my battle, now suffering from more adhesions on my intestines and the presence of three hernias in my stomach. It is deemed too dangerous to put me through any more surgeries.

If you have persevered reading through this article (congratulations and thank you!) you are now fully up to date with the sad story of the Labelle Clan. It is late May of 2026, and I am still here, but I must admit that I am quite frequently puzzled and sometimes caught off guard by how I must now live my life in this new reality. Nothing is “like it used to be”. What I thought of as my “normal life” is no longer. The 3-hour commutes to my office in Downtown Vancouver - gone. I don’t miss the 5:30 alarms and taking smelly buses and unreliable commuter train service, but it is STILL a loss. 33 years of working in public service at a Mental Health & Addictions Team in Vancouver, B.C. Canada meant that I formed dozens of friendships and relationships, from the nice lady on the commuter bus I took to get to the train station 5 days a week, to the group of women I sat with on the train. After years of spending an hour, five days a week with these ladies made me come to love them like family. I miss the in-depth relationships I formed with colleagues at work, and in my case, the bonds I formed with many of the patients we treated. I miss them. I miss them all. Another level of loss.

When I talk about grief and trauma I have suffered, as detailed in my list above, I am not even touching upon my diagnosis of inoperable cancer. This is definitely a new layer for me to navigate. I would be remiss not to mention the stress this has put on my husband and our relationship. I try not to be a burden, but most of the time it’s not really a choice. I believe all the doctor’s appointments, lab tests, all the running around one is required to do when they have a terminal diagnosis such as mine is, I believe, actually more stressful for the person who is supporting the patient. For caregivers who haven’t had to deal with a lot of trauma or loss in their lives (yet), this role will be one of the most difficult and traumatic of all.

As I write this article, all the trauma I have experienced through the years has been brought to the forefront of my memory bank - it’s like I havejust watched a sad movie, the kind that makes you cry. To this very day I stay away from sad movies. As I told my husband 34 years ago, I don’t need to watch other people suffering and crying. I’ve done enough of it myself. I remember making the mistake of watching “Terms of Endearment” at the cinema when it first came out. It crushed me. The worst part was that my sister was with me. She was halfway through her cancer journey. She told me at the time that it didn’t bother her, but I don’t believe that could be true. At that point in my life, I had really only gone through the death of my father, so I can safely say that I had no idea what real trauma or loss was in those days. Now I am much wiser and stick to the comedies or Sci-Fi.

Have you suffered through trauma? How did you cope with your loss at the time? How do you deal with the overwhelming sadness we suffer when life deals us the fateful card of death or sorrow? I’d love to hear from you and hear your story. Please share with us in the Comments.

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Some days just start off better than others, don’t you think? I believe we can all agree that being jolted out of a deep sleep by the blaring shriek of an alarm, then hitting the snooze, falling back asleep and having to go through it all again in 15 minutes is right up there as one of the most horrible ways to begin a day. Having a cat celebrating life at 4:00 AM by flying through the house and landing on your head is a close second. To be honest, just having to wake up any earlier than 10:00 AM is automatically a shitty way to wake up in my opinion. But I certainly have many ways that I love to wake up, and every now and then I’d like to show you what they are. I’m sure you all have your own versions, and I’d like to hear about them if you are reading this! Leave me a comment!!!

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My all-time favourites mostly revolve around themes of nature, beauty, sunshine, and warm breezes. This specific version takes place in Barbados at the “Ginger Bay”, a sweet, small hotel perched on the top of a cliff that is home to the “Booty Grotto”, a small cave, one of many that dot the island. The sliding glass doors of the bedroom are open wide to welcome the steady wind, the white, gauzy netting surrounding the bed whispering over my body like a gentle kiss. The ocean on this side of the island is violent, the waves crashing endlessly upon the rocky shoreline in an endless, tireless rhythm. The last land mass these waves would have seen would have been Africa, and the country of Senegal.

As I awaken, rising layer-by-layer to join the land of the living, the pounding surf permeates my consciousness; it is a perfect way to both fall asleep and wake up. My bare legs are tangled in the softest of sheets; my pillows are that beautiful mix of satiny smoothness with just enough firmness so that you don’t wake up with a stiff neck. An immense Frangipani tree just outside the bedroom window is dripping with creamy white and yellow blossoms, the rich scent permeating the bedroom and infusing the linens with a dreamy scent of sweet almonds and mandarin orange. You are floating in a soft cocoon. You think you just might be in heaven.

Suddenly, the wind changes from a delicate breeze to more of an insistent gust, now it carries a unique blend of salt and spices that the wind has picked up along the way. She has inhaled the fragrance of the universe as she rises with the sun, extending her long, rose-tinted fingers to pull back the delicate fabric of stars, pulling at the seams until the floor of heaven dissolves into a canvas of gold and crimson. She gasps at the beauty she has created, a sharp inhalation that gathers the salty mist of the ocean spray, melding it with the heady perfume of the Frangipani blossoms, whose creamy white and yellow blossoms quiver as bees and butterflies stop by to slake their thirst. Then, she exhales, releasing the fragrant potpourri to enchant my nostrils.

The eternal passion of the wind has chiselled and shaped this rocky shoreline for centuries, creating ragged caves and caverns, perfect for marauding pirates who once ruled the seas. Many pirates stashed their plundered treasures deep inside the jagged crevices, hoping it will not be found before they return to collect it. Booty Grotto was one of these caves, and although it is not large, it has many cracks and crevices inside, making it a perfect hiding spot. There is a short path to walk from the hotel that leads to Booty Grotto, and once you exit the cave you are directly on the white sand of Ginger Bay Beach, where the turquoise water invites you for a refreshing dip, although caution is recommended because of the fierce undertow. I learned this the hard way and felt lucky to make it back to shore, albeit without half of my bathing suit!

After a simple breakfast of toast with cinnamon sugar, a tall glass of freshly squeezed orange juice, and a mug of steaming, black coffee enjoyed on my ocean-view balcony, I will go to explore the beach and search for more caves. I will dip my toes in the frothing surf, being careful not to go past my knees. I will close my eyes and focus on the incredible, endless sound of the crashing surf, which can be soothing from a distance, but a little terrifying when you are beside it, and even more so when you are in it!

I don’t think I could ever imagine such a perfect way to begin my day. On gray and rainy days back home, I feel incredibly lucky that I was able to experience this enchanting part of the world, and that I can now recall the best moments any time I choose. What a gift!

Do you have a beautiful memory of awakening somewhere special? Please let me know where it is, and what made it so special!!

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I’m not sure if any of you are like me, but I am a sucker for a huge, terrifyingly loud and fearsome thunderstorm. There is nothing quite like the visceral fear that grips your body when huge, jagged bolts stitch the sky together in flashes of blinding light, especially when the lightning and thunder combine as one - right over your head. In these rarefied instances, it is possible to feel every single hair on your body rise up into the air, as if being summoned by the demon in the sky. I have had a few close encounters with thunderstorms in my life, and I will never forget the weak-kneed terror I experienced, even as I remained enthralled.

Undoubtedly, one of the reasons fierce storms like this are so terrifying is the fact that they cannot be controlled by anyone or anything. They are called a “Force of Nature” for a reason, and Nature cannot be cajoled, persuaded or dictated to. I’m assuming that the popularity of movies, documentaries, and series about tornadoes, hurricanes, and “Storm Chasers” means that I am not alone in my fascination, even when we know that what is happening in front of our eyes can kill us in less time than it takes to say “Oh oh!!!….. Shit!” That being said, I have to admit that I have never been in close vicinity to a tornado, nor do I ever wish to. My stomach feels sick watching coverage of them on the news, the huge, rolling, sucking vortex pulling up swathes of anything unfortunate enough to be in its path. I always wonder how many cows are sucked up there, and what they must think as they become airborne. And of course, where do they land? In Tornado Alley, do they regularly find dead cows littering the countryside after a tornado? Has a flying cow ever landed on someone on the ground and killed them? These are the kinds of things that often cross my mind as I watch footage of tornado devastation.

My absolute favorite book as a child was The Wizard of Oz. I loved the idea of Dorothy being swept up and into a faraway land where she met new friends and characters, learned about good and evil, courage and sadness, and, strangely enough to think of it right now, with the current insanity happening in the White House, how a tiny, little man could pull strings and wreak havoc with other’s lives from behind a curtain of ignorance, with the help of enablers. Say no more, or this thread will hijack my post.

As a little girl, I would regularly have “Tornado Nights” where I would pretend a big storm was coming. I, of course, was Dorothy, and I would have to make sure all my dolls and stuffed animals were safe in bed with me. I had a LOT of dolls and stuffies, so when my parents would come to tuck me in, they would have a hard time finding me under the blankets surrounded by all of them. My dad’s job was to make sure that all of us, not just me, were safely covered underneath an enormous quilt that my mother had made. It had magical protective powers, of course, and would keep all of us safe until the tornado passed.

Part of my preoccupation with storms was because of the Wizard of Oz, that’s true, but Ottawa, Ontario, where I grew up, gets some pretty insane thunderstorms that can often border on hurricane-status. In the summer, the “heat bugs” would begin their droning early in the morning, the temperatures slowly but steadily rising into triple-digit fahrenheit territory. Soon the droning would change, somehow, sounding heavier, somehow gloppy, like syrup that has thickened and hangs like a wet pendulum in the air as you try to empty the bottle. As the wind would begin to howl, and dark, angry clouds would scuttle overhead, I would sneak out the back door to dance and twirl, like a Whirling Dervish, as if I was a battery that needed to be charged. I craved the adrenaline rush, the thrill of the thunder reverberating beneath my feet, my nostrils quivering under the assault of the raw, distinctive rush of ozone as the raindrops would begin, the wetness mixing with the dryness of the earth, the grass, the plants, the seeds, releasing that beautifully unique chemical reaction that smells unlike anything else. Of course, my mom would be at the window: “Deborah! Get inside!”

Often, the intensity of cicada song indicated just how extreme an upcoming weather event might be, and sometimes promised a truly spectacular thunderstorm later in the day. Usually, the bugs would reach a fever pitch in late afternoons, and my mom and I would head up to their bedroom, where we could watch through the big windows yet still feel “safe”. I always wanted the drapes open to witness the awe-inspiring, jagged tears of lightning that might light up the sky; I could never quite understand my mother’s logic that if the drapes were drawn tightly enough, we would be safe. I think I came to the young-adult conclusion that occasionally mother’s have strange beliefs, and often they are not worth spending the time to question them. Much to my mother’s chagrin, my preoccupation and fascination with storms meant I took more chances than I should have playing outside during a storm as a child.

As I got older, my childish, bad choices around going outside in storms didn’t improve until one almost killed me when I was 19. At least I felt at the time that I had had a close call, and never willingly took a chance on going out in a storm after that.

I have a very real, very profound memory of making a bad decision to take my two dogs, Smokey and Bandit, for a nice walk in a park near my house. “Smokey & Bandit” were their names (Burt Reynolds in the movie “Smokey and The Bandit” ruled the 90’s, hence their names). Smokey was the super-highly strung Dalmation, and Bandit was a sweet, shy Doberman. They were my fur-babies, and we enjoyed long walks together every day. As I put their harnesses on and attached their leashes, I noticed a distinct ledge of cumulonimbus clouds beginning to build on the horizon. Anyone with respect for the weather and paying attention would have made a different decision than I and stayed inside, just in case. However, as you now know, that was not me. I was still living at home with my mom at that time, so I yelled to her, letting her know we were going out for a walk. I heard her reply: “Maybe you should wait! The sky is getting dark!” but of course I put it down to her usual mom-apprehension and said we wouldn’t be gone long. Off we went without a care in the world. There was a slight, hot-summer afternoon breeze beginning to pick up, sending playful gusts of leaves and dust from the school-yard next to our house into my face. Annoying, but not worrisome, I thought.

Please keep in mind - cell phones were not common in the early 1990s, and I certainly didn’t have one. Hard to believe, but true. Out by yourself? You were On Your Own.

The three of us were enjoying the hot August sun and had just reached the far side of the huge, grassy field that the Ottawa City Council had the nerve to call a park when I heard that first warning rumble. I had just brought out the frisbee; the dogs were very excited for their playtime. There were no trees anywhere in the “park”, and I was the tallest thing in the immediate area, always a good thing when there could be lightning strikes. That’s when I heard a second distinctive rumble. The wind had ramped up a little, and when I looked back towards my house, and what should have been a cautionary horizon if I’d paid any attention, the clouds looked distinctively closer. And bigger. Some of them had turned that purple-black shade that screams “Danger Will Robinson!” I was only about ten minutes from my front door, but I made my first smart decision of the day and decided we should head back now.

I’m not sure if I underestimated the force of the wind to begin with, or if the storm just decided to have some fun with us, but before we could get back to within one block of my house, it hit like a semi-trailer going sideways through a traffic light. It was like a massive barn door flying shut on my face, and the rain hit at the same moment as the bolt of lightning, making the hair on my body stand up, the thunder reverberating in my ears. I was drenched immediately, the rain coming at me sideways until I couldn’t even keep my eyes open. It felt insane and unreal. From a gentle breeze one moment to drenching terror. I could feel my dogs straining at the leash in panic, and if they decided to take off, I would be dragged behind them like a stuffed doll. I tried to rein them in, tried to reassure them, but when I opened my mouth to try to speak to them, the wind actually snatched the air right out of my mouth. I literally could not speak, in fact, breathing was difficult. Hunkering low as I could, I put one foot in front of the other, heading in what I hoped was the right direction, since I couldn’t really see. Thankfully, my dogs followed along with each step.

I remembered then that on the corner of my block, there was a house under construction; most of it was done, but it might provide me with a bit of shelter to catch my breath. Slowly, shivering and shaking and wanting to cry, we kept going. When I managed to get my eyes open for a moment, like a Holy Grail, the house was right in front of us. The front entrance had a portico that protected the front door, and with a mixture of a gasp and a cry, I half-fell into the entrance. We sat on the ground, my back against the front door, the dogs huddled against me, shivering and shaking. I tried to reassure them, but I was quite literally sobbing. It was terrifying. Another bolt of lightning struck on the far side of the field, where we had just come from. The thunder boomed again. I could see small bushes and branches flying by the side of the house where we had been walking, and felt thankful that we had this shelter. But it was then that I realized something very problematic. My mother would be terrified. She would realize I was out in this. And she would come looking for me. She was in her mid-60s and weighed about 90 lbs. I couldn’t take a chance that she would come out in this. It was not a choice to stay here.

Taking a deep breath, I reassured Smokey and Bandit as best I could, and pulled their trembling bodies along, leaving the shelter of the portico and placing us fully back in the howling wind. It was slow, but we went step, by step, by step. Branches flew past my head, barely missing me. I could see my house up ahead. Huge. Solid. Brick. Safe. We kept going. We reached the side of my house, which had an immense, six-foot-tall wooden fence that surrounded the backyard. I heard a sickening, rending sound and looked up just in time to see the wind rip an entire portion of heavy, wooden fencing free, sending it sailing up into the air just a few feet away from us. It flew like it was made of balsa wood, landing and skidding in the school parking lot. If it had hit us, it would have certainly killed my dogs, perhaps even me. We kept going, giving as wide a berth as possible to the fence, watching pieces of it collapse and become airborne, like matchsticks being hurled by a giant.

Just as I rounded the corner to my house, I could see the front door opening. My tiny little mom, with a coat and boots on, was about to make her way out to look for me, just as I knew she would. I yelled to her to go back in. Even through the rain and the burning tears in my eyes, I could see the immense relief on her face to see us back. The wind was now at my back, almost blowing me into a mad dash for the final few yards. We made it to the front door, all of us crashing through onto the tiled entrance, me on my butt, the dogs sliding sideways. Somehow, my mom managed to get the front door closed. I heard her click the lock, and then she slid down to join us on the floor. The storm was still raging outside, but the relative silence around us felt like we’d been given shelter in the strong, safe arms of a deep forest. For a moment, we all just sat there, looking at each other, and then I burst into tears, feeling the hot liquid scalding my cheeks. I could hear Smokey’s tail thumping on the floor beside me; he always knew when I was upset and would always try to get close to me and lick my face to help me feel better, which he was now trying to do. Bandit huddled up against my mom, her little stump of a tail waggling in relief. My mom just shook her head in her usual no-nonsense way. She was not one for theatrics. She stood up, reaching down to grab my hand, doing her best with her tiny body to pull me up to a standing position. “Go grab some towels to dry yourselves off!” she said briskly. “I’m going to make us a nice cup of tea.”

Dreaming of the Dead

In the one, single “good” photo I have of my entire family unit, the only ones still alive are my two brothers, Brian and Gary. For those of you who have lost family members along the way, you no doubt feel the same tug of sadness when you see what you have lost, although for many, like myself, sorrow is tempered by the gratitude that we had these people in our lives at all, even though they were taken away too soon.

Long after my beloved sister, Gloria, passed away, I was haunted each night by an unrelenting nightmare that spun a dark, crepuscular web over my mind’s eye; an enormous black spider of grief, creeping slowly and methodically, gathering each tear that slid from the corners of my eyes to form a damp, heavy sheath that clung to my face and nose, each breath a labor. In. Out. In. Out.

In the dank shadows of my nighttime prison, my sister, mother and I were in our family home, but the rooms had taken on a sepulchral tone; the ceilings lower and somehow menacing, trembling like a foul wind had somehow tunneled from the deep earth to the rafters, threatening to snap down and flatten us at any moment. The windows had also shrunk, they were thick and narrow, the kind you see in castles and forts, used for bows and arrows during assaults. I could not see my sister, or my mother, but I could hear their voices. My sister was crying, a heavy sob on repeat, my mom was wailing with sorrow and calling to her. I walked with a shuffled gait, my legs feeling weak with fear, to where our long, gaily decorated rectangular kitchen was supposed to be, but it had changed. The cupboards on the left side were gone, replaced by a long, narrow ramp leading upstairs. Walls had given way, and as I made my reluctant ascent, the ramp made a sharp turn, continuing up even further to a non-existent third floor. I was scared. I felt sick. I knew it wasn’t real, but that didn’t help; I was powerless to change anything. Thus is the power of a true nightmare brought on by circumstances or events that have affected your emotions so deeply that they have traumatized your psyche well beyond your ability to reason.

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I could hear a wind coming up, whistling and rattling further up the ramp, up into the unknown. As I continued my ascent, I recognized dim shadows of familiar household items piled on the sides of the ramp. A stereo cabinet with a record player, the record spinning on the turntable, with only the sound of static. My sister’s voice ahead, further up in the vast unknown. “Help!” My mom, sobbing in agony up ahead. I kept on, pushing past a laundry basket with my sister’s favorite, sequined top glittering atop a pile of socks and dresses. My sister needed me. I needed to save her. I needed to find my mother so we could find her together. But the further I ascended, the more ramps kept appearing. The turns were now sharp and immediate. Now my sister’s cries were echoing, like she had reached a room somewhere, her cries making my stomach turn in upon itself, making me want to vomit and retch. Each ramp led only to more empty rooms with dank walls, wet with dank liquid and mold. And always the wailing and the cries, just enough to keep me searching. Sometimes…. sometimes I would come tantalizingly close. I think that is what kept these nightmares returning with such frequency for so long.

I found it shocking that, some nights, the nightmare would be so detailed I could see my sister’s legs up ahead of me as I tried to grasp her and pull her to safety. I would say her name, I could hear the relief in my voice even as I knew I was in this dream world. As I would reach out to grasp her feet, I could see she would always be wearing her favorite pair of black and white Saddle Shoes that were so popular when she was young. I could see the fine detail on the stitching. It felt like if I could touch the leather, I would be able to grab her ankle, to let her know I was there, trying to save her. But it was impossible. The ramp would start to narrow with every corner, then double back. I knew we were going to become irretrievably stuck, buried alive in this macabre mutation of our beloved family home. The presence of my mother would have disappeared by then; it was just my sister and I, frozen in a hellscape from which I would eventually awaken myself, exhausted, sometimes screaming aloud to her that I was coming.

It took almost two years for this horrid, repetitive nightmare to finally disappear. I still fear that it will return one day.

When we have experiences like these nightmares, especially after we have recently lost people in our lives, many people believe that it could be their loved one’s spirit, still trying to communicate and stay in our lives before they move on to the next phase of “being”. While I would dearly love to say that I believe in this, my own school of thought favors my pragmatic side, a belief that once we close our eyes, we are gone into the vast universe, never to return.

On extremely rare occasions, life can occasionally present us with something that we cannot explain or quantify. From what I can glean, these are very few and far between, events or moments where something inexplicable, and dare we use the term “magical”, seems to happen. Our mind grabs - no, it clutches desperately onto the possibility that we may have just been presented with something greater than our current, grim view of life.

I know that for a year, perhaps longer, after my sister died, during the same period of time I was having these nightmares, I was able to convince myself that she might be trying to connect with me by using electricity. I know. Sounds so ridiculous now. But, at the time, it really felt like it could be happening. She and I had talked about the “afterlife” a lot while she was dying. We read a book called “The Case for Reincarnation” together, which we both found fascinating and, at the time, felt therapeutic because neither of us could bear the thought of being without the other. She wrote a letter to me before she died, which I will eventually publish here on Substack, as a further way of processing my grief and also keeping her “voice” alive. In it, she promised that if there was any way at all she could find to make contact with me once she had passed, she would. She just asked me to make sure I kept an open mind. And I did. And for the first few weeks - beginning the day after she passed, strange things did seem to happen. I had no idea how she might be able to communicate with me. Things just started happening with lights. I would turn the lamp on beside my bed, and the bulb would just blow. Pffffft. I had to replace it, it actually burned out. The same day, at least one or two more lights blew or flickered off and on, off and on.

On the day of her funeral, my mother and I were in a car with her husband, on our way to the funeral home. None of us had eaten anything, and we had decided to go to an Arby’s Drive-Through, just so we had something in us. As we sat with the window open, looking at the order board, deciding what we wanted, all the lights on the board went out. It went completely dead. The girl taking our order couldn’t believe this had happened. It flickered a few times, and then eventually came back on. In conjuntion with what had happened with the lights at home though, I had a strange feeling in my bones. Another very strange event happened, that very same day, on our way home from the funeral home. It was November, and it was a dark and very wet night. Just as we began crossing a very large, four-lane bridge, all the street lights went out, one by one, by one. The just flickered out in a series. The bridge went dark.

I am going to leave this story right here, right now, because so many more events like this happened, and I’d like to share them with you as a separate post. Even though I don’t really believe anymore. Even though I’ve talked myself out of “stranger things” and “life after death” and have become the heart-of-stone pragmatist that I am now. I still want to talk about it and hear your thoughts, Substack peeps. So stay tuned!

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I began this post way back at the beginning of March….. and I was SO excited and motivated because April is just about my favorite month of the year, and we are getting SO close! That being said, I’ve not been doing well health-wise and sheer exhaustion from chemo meds has drastically been affecting my ability to concentrate and write. However, I am trying to rally - the “Dreaded Feb” is now solidly in the rear-view mirror, taking the bitter chill and dead leaves with it. And today, March has decided to work with us, kindly sticking a toe in the door to allow the softer, almost-warmish air to find a way in. Who knows what tomorrow will bring, but I insist I am already in a better frame of mind and can now take a deep breath and luxuriously ponder what topics I might share with you to get you to join me and Subscribe to The Wistful Neo-Druid. I very recently - broke the 200 Subscribers milestone, which for me is hugely exciting and very motivating. Thank you everyone!!

I have been writing on Substack for just a little over a year now. I have made peace with the fact that I am not going to amass thousands of Followers, Likes, or Hearts, or Comments, or whatever measuring stick is currently being used for social media, no matter how hard I try. After 9 years as an online travel “influencer” from 2011 to 2020, I’ve “Been There Done That”, as they say. It was a huge amount of work to gain an audience, requiring a significant portion of my daily life be dedicated to social media and connecting with followers almost continuously. I also had to write with precision and focus on specific travel-related subjects, brands, and experiences which, although I loved, effectively shut down much of my personal creativity and “whimsy”. I don’t miss that at all. Now, with Substack, I am choosing to write about subjects I love, hoping my stories will resonate on a different level with a caring audience. It is nice to have the option to engage with my followers with authenticity and build my connections slowly and meaningfully. I want to get to know all of you, why you are drawn to my work, and who you really are.

The purpose of my very first post on January 13, 2025, was to find new meaning in my life after being diagnosed with inoperable Ovarian Cancer. I needed to shove aside the shocking news that seared my heart and soul, terrified and blindsided my husband of 32 years, and threatened to take me somewhere I was not, and am not (yet) prepared to go. So when I wrote “An Introduction” (link below) I felt I didn’t really know what I was doing, or why anyone might be curious enough to hear from me. Now, at just over 200 Subscribers, I feel honored to receive your time, your attention, especially the good old-fashioned “RA RA RA!” some of your shower upon me! Thank you for being here.

165 Hunt Club Place

I was recently inspired to write this post about my childhood home after reading “Leaving the House That Held My Memories”, written by one of my very favorite authors here on Substack, Marcia Abboud. Reading her poignant recollection of how she felt her childhood home knew “all the history and essence of who she once was” really touched my heart. While my childhood home story is different in many ways, it is also similar because of the emotional depth both Marcia and I felt for our homes. It is a remarkable piece, and I would urge you to read it yourself. Please find the link here: Leaving the House That Held My Memories

The hearts and souls of my two older brothers and one sister, 18 years, 16 years, and 13 years old respectively when I was born, had a deep love for this house. With the exception of my oldest brother, Gary, who was born during the war and spent his first few years living with my mom and grandparents, my other brother and my sister were born and raised watching my father and mother build our home themselves, from the basement up. They didn’t do it all alone, though; my father was French Canadian, and generally speaking, most had very large families. Having 9 children at least was not unusual, and having 15 or 16 children was not unheard of.

Back in the 1600’s, my father’s ancestors were farmers in the South of France when they were offered tracts of agriculturally rich land in Eastern Canada in exchange for establishing farming communities. The LaBelle’s were one of the very first families to settle here and work the land. Fast forward to the 1920’s, when my father was one of 11 children born into the LaBelle family. We had cousins, aunts, and uncles scattered all around Ottawa, Ontario, and Montreal, Quebec. Some of them ended up marrying Americans just across the border in Detroit, but we still saw them often. The typical bonds between French-Canadian family members were, and still are, I assume, very strong and supportive. From what I can remember personally about my LaBelle aunt’s and uncles, they were exceedingly emotional - think buckets of tears when they would see you for the first time in a while, almost being smothered in kisses and hugs, and a kindness and love for everyone in the family. For my parents, this meant that when it came time to build their homes and settle down in Ottawa, there was already a full, supportive family network in place.

When the war finally ended, and my dad and his brothers returned home, building their homes was their first priority. My dad was a Stationery Engineer, so upon his return, he secured a job at the Ottawa Airport (also known as the Uplands Air Force Base), supervising and maintaining the immense heating/air conditioning grid. My parents were able to purchase a large parcel of land close by, and my grandparents bought a lot right beside ours so we could look after them as they aged. Then my uncle and auntie bought the lot next to my grandparent’s, setting the stage for a safe and nurturing neighbourhood.

First, they built a small cottage at the back of the property, so that they could work on the main house easily in their spare time. In those days, it was common to see miniature-size family homes that were identified as “War Time Housing” built by the Canadian Government to accommodate the many Service Men and Women returning from WWII. They built about 46,000 small, prefabricated homes from 1941 to 1947 across Canada, some of them no doubt still standing today. Luckily, though, because my mother worked doing translation services throughout the war while my dad was overseas and my father had been carefully saving and planning from the day he met my mother, when the time came they were somewhat prepared to build their very own home.

My father was one of those people that could pretty much build anything and everything from scratch. He could design something that didn’t yet exist, simply because he knew what he needed and how to get it. He would come up with solutions to problems you might not even know you had. You certainly don’t hear about people like this much anymore, because the world has changed in so many ways. Almost every essential life skill now is easy to “hire” or procure from someone who has gone to school and has become an expert.

Of course, they had to hire some specific trades to get the necessary building permits that would ensure the house could be safely occupied, such as electricians and plumbers, but my father and my mother somehow knew what they were doing. And they did an absolutely grand job.

I don’t know how long it took my parents to finish all the construction; I’m sure it was years before they felt they were really done, as evenings and weekends went by in a flurry of sawing, hammering and dripping paint brushes. My father was always tinkering, adding, making changes to the house that made it even better for my mom. He also had a tendency to move - or remove walls in the house. If he decided the stairwell leading to the 2nd floor was too dark or cramped, out would come his equipment, and by bedtime it was completely changed. Mom would be right behind him with the vacuum cleaner and a rubbish bin. When the newest home decor magazine came out and my mom showed him that the latest home fad was creating a more open floor plan, I came home to find the wall between the dining room and the front entrance had been cut in half, allowing the light from the dining room windows to spill into the rest of the house. My mom would contribute her decorating ideas - in this instance finishing the half-wall using “wainscotting”. I have to say it was rather exciting to never know for sure if your house would look different when you came home from school.

I believe this house was special from the day my parents moved everyone in. It was not grand, but it was a home that hugged you the moment you walked in the front door. It was much more spacious inside than it appeared from the outside. When I joined the family unit in 1961, the “modern theme” for homes of the day was all about blending with nature…… Our floors were all made of beautiful dark hardwood, which my mother spent much of her time waxing - and then stripping - and then waxing again. For some reason, she thought that Mustard Yellow would be a good colour for the living room carpet. Aaack…….. Fridge and stove were Harvest Gold or Avocado Green. Even our bathtub, sink and toilet did not escape the “nature” theme - they were a strange colour of aqua blue.

The house wasn’t huge, but it was just right for our family, especially after my oldest brother moved out when I was about 10 years old. There were three bedrooms on the top floor, with a huge roof deck off my parent’s large bedroom. There was a smaller room that had no real windows, but had 2 attics, and that was my room. I wasn’t old enough to complain that I didn’t have any windows, and my parents made a huge effort to decorate it so beautifully for me that I never really missed having one. All our upstairs rooms had sloping roofs, giving the bedrooms an unusual and quaint look. In my room, one attic faced the front of the house and had a tiny, ornamental window that let in a bit of light. This is where the ceiling slanted sharply down to meet the wall, where there was one small door you could crawl through to access the long, low attic space. If necessary, you could open the door, almost like something from Alice in Wonderland, and proceed on hands and knees to find whatever it was you were looking for. The other attic was situated way up high on the side of the room, bordering the ceiling. You could only get up there with a ladder, and I rarely saw it open, which was fine with me. I spent many, many evenings staring up at that door in abject terror, because, of course, everyone knows that attics can hide some very terrifying things. Old ladies chained up in rocking chairs, waiting to spit at you if you opened that door. Snarling rats. Bugs as big as your big toe. Ghosts rattling around, upset at being up there with the old lady in the rocking chair and not allowed to join us down below. I’m sure there was also a large collection of doll heads from hell somewhere in there, ready to come alive at the strike of midnight and prey upon the sleeping family members. And then there was “Jimmy”. I feel I really have to add this last bit about my bedroom.

My Uncle Victor, a kindly but strange bachelor who lived with my grandmother until she moved in with us in her 80’s, seemed to get a thrill by telling me that there was a boy named “Jimmy” living in my specific attic. If that’s not enough to scar a child for life, I don’t know what is. Sometimes when he was visiting, he would call up to Jimmy in the ceiling, asking him how he was doing. “Hey Jimmy! Whatcha doin’ up there?” I would stand with my heart in my throat, waiting for some kind of response. It made my skin literally crawl. I’m not sure if Uncle Vic realized how terrifying that story was to me. Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt and say he just thought I would find it funny? But, um, no. Not funny. At all. I mean, who the heck was Jimmy? Why did he live up there? Where were his parents? Who fed Jimmy??? Did he come down sometimes to use the bathroom, or had my father built him one up there when I wasn’t looking? Did Jimmy go to school or have friends? Well, I never did find out, but if I could speak to my uncle just one more time, I’d get him to spill the beans on why he thought this story was something I should hear.

My sister was lucky enough to get the bedroom with the big windows looking out over the side of our beautiful property, which had been planted with all kinds of trees and flowering bushes. My favorite trees were the big McIntosh Apples. In the spring the branches of these trees would begin groaning with the beauty of thousands of delicate pink and white blossoms quivering under the dangling toes of yellow-striped honeybees that took their pollen-spreading work very seriously, buzzing and gyrating in an almost psychotic dance of worship. And if we left her window wide open, the blossoms would take it as an invitation to come in for a visit, releasing their heavenly aroma to waft throughout the entire top floor. In the fall, when the tree had done all it’s hard work, it would fairly sag with the weight of the ruddy, golden pink apples, and we could reach out and pick the best ones, right outside her window. Biting into the perfectly sweet/tart flesh was a taste sensation like no other, and in the 60 years that have passed by since then, I have never experienced apples this delicious.

There was another special secret that lay in my sister’s bedroom. She also had a strange, secret “attic”, located where the ceiling sloped sharply to the floor, hidden behind a long, large closet door the length of the room itself. This was where all her very cool 1960’s clothes were kept, complete with feathery boa scarves, sequined mini-dresses, capri-style pants and SHOES. So. Many. Shoes. My favorite? A bright yellow pair of sling-backs that perfectly matched the dress she would be wearing to Prom. I wanted those shoes so badly. Sometimes I would wait until she went out on a date, and I would sneak into the closet, grab her shoes, and parade around the house in them (more like stumble). I felt extremely important and chic in those shoes. And that’s when I found the really hidden attic - located at the very back of the closet. It felt like this attic must be the most important one, as no doubt it held some very special items to be hidden away so carefully. I remember I was reading “The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe” at that time, and having this secret room to explore was so incredibly exciting. Sadly, the only items I ever found in there were the boxes of clothing and shoes destined for the Salvation Army….. but I always wondered if Jimmy might have a little tunnel in there somewhere - maybe he was able to get into this attic from his. Whenever that thought would occur to me I would quickly back out of there, just in case!!

The 4th bedroom was on the main floor, and belonged to my brother, Brian. It looked out over a large, screened back verandah where we would sip lemonade and spend hot summer evenings with a fan or two on high. We could look out over our tree-filled backyard, complete with a small fish pond and a chicken-coop, from which we could harvest fresh eggs. Unfortunately for my family, I am, and always have been, a walking disaster, and regularly dropped as many eggs as I was able to deliver safely to my mother’s kitchen. Often, I would make it all the way into the kitchen, carefully cradling these fragile treasures in my little hands, only to drop them right in front of the counter. To my memory, my mother never, ever was angry with me when this happened. She was too full of love and joy to upset me over breaking something. How lucky was I!

My brother, Brian, loved all kinds of animals and reptiles, and as his little sister, it was my job to drive him crazy by leaving the tops off any cages or tanks containing them, leading to hours and hours of searching for whatever unlucky creature had formerly been in residence. Unfortunately, much of the time, a few months later they would be found halfway down the heating vent, all shriveled up, which would then make me cry because I had effectively murdered them. There was also the time my brother decided to get a Siamese Fighting Fish, buying an enormous, round fish bowl for him, with a mirror that he stared into, fascinated by his own intense, turquoise glittery beauty. I was absolutely fascinated, especially when he would stare at his own reflection in the fishbowl and flare out all the fins around his head, wondering why he was so angry at himself. Sadly, I was not able to come to the fairly simple conclusion that it regarded other Fighting Fish as enemies, and I thought perhaps he’d be happier if he had some company. The next day, my brother came home to find two beautiful Siamese Fighting Fish floating upside down after an unfortunate fight to the death.

As the rest of my siblings married and moved out, my dad decided to make a few more additions to our family home. He had always loved gardening and flowers, and decided to build his own greenhouse. This soon became my favourite part of our house. In the eyes of a child, this large, humid room of glass, filled with rich black earth, clay pots, and bags of strange-looking tubers, bulbs, and seeds was sheer magic, and my father was the magician. In the spring, evenings would be warm and tender, and my father would lift me up onto the potting tables, fragrant dirt slipping through my fingers as I separated tiny seeds, pressing their delicate essence into the warm, rich earth. Zinnia’s and Marigolds, Dahlia’s and Sunflowers. The exquisite scent of each flower’s promise wafted into my head, finding a permanent home in my hippocampus, my brain even then somehow understanding that this time and place, this yearly ritual, was something of great value that I must never forget. Watching my father work, his hands covered in damp, dark soil, the light of his cornflower blue eyes twinkling as he shared his love of gardening, the knowledge so carefully stored in his brain, made me feel that everything was right with the world.

My father had one more surprise for the family one day in the mid 1970’s. He decided he would build us a “breakfast nook” at the back of the house off the kitchen. Our backyard was beautiful, and he wanted us to be able to look out over the yard and trees, over and across the fence to the grounds of the Ottawa Hunt and Golf Club. Out came all his saws and hammers, and within a few months the new room had taken shape. He hand-carved a special round table from a single, immense piece of wood, which could be rotated, sort of like a huge Lazy Susan. Once again, it was not a huge, room, but it was enormous in heart and soul.

In the summertime, this is where we would all squeeze in on weekend mornings, while mom filled our plates with her amazing pancakes drizzled with fresh Maple Syrup and mounds of fresh whipped cream. We would stare out over the beautiful yard where squirrels hung from the branches of the tall trees my parents had planted so many years ago, and Chickadees, Bluejays and Nuthatches would peep and call to each other amongst the greenery. In the fall, mom would serve savory sausages and scrambled eggs as we watched the spectacularly coloured leaves float slowly from the trees to the ground, the ground becoming a mosaic of scarlet red, burnt orange and rich, deep yellows. Then, as winter would claim the landscape, the beauty would morph once again into a winter wonderland of sparkling white, with foot-long long icicles hanging from the eaves of our breakfast nook. Mom would string up the Christmas cards we would receive from friends and family around the world, the kind wishes and love being sent across the miles was always endearing to our hearts. Most winters if dad was feeling well enough, he would flood the backyard with a hose and make us our very own skating rink, something my brothers especially enjoyed. Then, suddenly it would be Spring! April would welcome the warm showers, releasing the scent of the rich soil where dad’s garden had been put to bed all those months before. In a delirium of happiness, my dad and I would head out to the greenhouse, me with my little pails and buckets, he with his magician’s trunk of seeds and tubers and soil. The magical glass doors would open, and the rush of perfumed humidity, damp, spicey soil would fill my nose with absolute delight. And the magic would begin all over again.

Our house was, indeed, a very, very, very fine house.

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When days last rays

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Upon a slope of fairy grass

What choice do we have

But to stop and witness

That soft exhale

What is past now passed

My husband and I have never been “collectors” of physical items, unless you count the corks we’ve collected from many, many bottles of wine from all over the world. We have traveled the world together for over 32 years, and if we had brought home souvenirs from every place we’d visited, we would need a mansion to house them. The reality is that, for us, the most important souvenirs we bring home from our travels are the photographs and videos we take along the way.

I cannot begin to describe how important these are to me, and how appreciative I am to be able to take out my phone or tablet and be instantly transported through time and space to specific moments that captured our imaginations, our creativity, our love, and lust for life. I have over 15,000 photos and about 800 videos on my iPhone, and I must admit that I scroll through them daily. Even before my cancer diagnosis in 2024, my photo library was my magic “happy bullet”. Now I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have them to turn to, the images on the screen morphing the hours of chemo drips, endless waits in doctors’ offices and emergency departments into something manageable. With a few taps, I am transported back to a time when it was easy to smile, laugh, and be goofy.

Each photo is a magical time capsule, bringing back the most precious moments of my life. Each country we visited during our world travels, every gathering with friends and family, all the sweet moments with our fur-babies over the years. Even if the photo is unflattering, or too dark and grainy, or even blurry, to my husband’s dismay, I keep them all. These are my beloved souvenirs.

I bring this up because, along with the unpleasant knowledge that I have reached my “Best Before” date (see my early post of the same name), I have come to realize that I need to get rid of things that I have dragged around with me for the past 50+ years or so. The reality is, just because our partners and families love us very much, there is little chance that they want to wade through leather-bound diaries, cards and photographs from our high school days once we are gone. It is only fair to free them from having to deal with the boring minutiae of who we had a crush on in Grade 10, unless we know for a fact that they have a vested interest or desire in this. I would guess that, unless you are blessed with children who have always wanted to know everything about you when you were young, having to purge through these types of documents could be stressful.

While I bring up the words “blessed with children” here, I feel I need to address my feelings on children out in the open before continuing with the real purpose of this post. When I made my original decision not to have children at the age of 33, I knew that although it was the right decision for me, I was going to regret not having a child in my life. Don’t get me wrong. It was the right decision, and I stand by it. But that doesn’t mean I don’t wish it could have been different, wish that I could have a loving daughter to spend time with and cherish, or a son to champion and celebrate. And yes, I am jealous when I speak with friends who have children and grandchildren. But having a family would never have been a good idea for me. I choose not to go through the reasons here in this post because I have already written about them in earlier posts (see my series “The 2nd Daughter”). Suffice to know that it was not an easy decision, and it was not made casually.

I knew I had to throw these books, these memories away. Even my husband would not have the slightest interest in these chapters of my life, just as I would not have wanted to go through his adolescent past.

And so last week I decided to go through a large box overflowing with beautiful childhood memories. Glittery cards from my mom, dad, and siblings with sweet birthday greetings. “Just because I Love You” cards from my beloved sister 13 years my senior, whom I lost to cancer back in 1991 when she was just 42 years old. The photo album my mom put together for me, done for each of her children, complete with a lock of hair and the Birth Announcement from the hospital. On the bottom of the box, my thick, black-leather volumes of diaries that I began writing when I was about 10 years old, filled with large, loopy handwriting, plenty of sparkly hearts and some very terrible drawings. And high school yearbooks - oh my God. Isn’t that a trip down Memory Lane. Crammed front to back with comments, complete with speed bumps and potholes, those faces of our past who were actually once people who mattered to us in one way or another. Good, bad, sad, ugly, poignant, beautiful; we spent so many of our formative years building friendships, and learning hard lessons about the human condition. Perhaps the hardest lesson of all that we learned? That sadly, not everyone we trusted with our fragile hearts and souls during those formative years showed or shared their true selves with us.

The first few steps down memory lane are slow and leisurely. I flip the pages, pausing to scour for familiar faces from my first year at Brookfield High in Ottawa, Ontario. I cringe at the tiny, thumbnail photo of myself, my hesitant 14 year-old smile. There were no second chances at a better photo in those days. No “Healing” tool to improve our pimply skin, no “Glamourize” option to show your seductive side! You walked into the gym, sat on a stool in front of a plain screen background and - click. You couldn’t see how you looked until the photos were developed. If it was completely awful, which was almost always the case, that was just too bad. Other girls always looked better in their yearbook photos, that’s for sure, and that’s what I believed.

Here I am in my absolutely worst-ever yearbook photo. I have to look away! Squinting my way through the pages of Grade 9ers, I spot one of my friends. Serena, a pretty girl with a wide face framed by long, straight blond hair, the kind of hair I prayed for every single night. Her smile always seemed to be pasted on her face, though, never quite reaching her eyes, and I often wondered what the shadows were behind them. Then there is Tammy. A perfect, tall, athletic specimen oozing with the kind of confidence you have when you are the star player on the girls’ basketball team. It didn’t hurt that she had three older, very cool, protective brothers, also tall, also athletic and also with names starting with T. Todd, Trent, and Trevor (all very good looking too, of course) had the same striking blonde hair and blue eyes, each possessing a swagger born of good genes and confidence, causing every girl they walked by to almost swoon. I never did find out why their parents had a thing for the letter T. They even had a white poodle called Teacup. Dad was a Psychiatrist, and they had a library that would shame some Community Libraries. Tammy would often invite me to her popular “sleepover” parties for some reason. I found it strange because I really didn’t fit in with the family image of white privilege, which in the 1970’s was not even something people talked about. I suspect my rather famous penchant for exploding into contagious giggles may have been the draw. There were usually six or seven of us; after Tammy’s ridiculously beautiful mother served us a five-course meal with Baked Alaska for dessert (of course), we would all curl up in sleeping bags beside a roaring fireplace in their enormous rec-room, shrieking hysterically while listening to ghost stories, and playing Truth or Dare. I remember the painful crush I had on Trent, a senior who, of course, was the star quarterback on the football team, tall and lean, with ice blue eyes that could pierce a young girl’s heart and kill her just with a glance. Luckily, I don’t think he ever saw me, even when I was in his house making a complete fool of myself.

A few more pages and I come across Roddy (top right photo below) with his prized possession, a guitar. A lonely, long-haired, nerdy boy, Roddy insisted on carrying my heavy textbooks from the bus stop to my house every day after school, even though his house was in a completely different direction. Roddy knew that I was a soft touch and would never be mean to him, and if anyone understood the word mean, it was Roddy. He and his older brother, Darren, carried the haunted, panicked look of boys from a home that was so broken by alcohol, ignorance, and blind rage that even his shadow quivered with fear when he left my house. He had a shy smile and a wicked wit, and he could play a banjo like he came out of the vagina strumming one.

To this day, I am certain that his interest in me had more to do with the kindness of my parents, and the fact that my gentle, soft-spoken dad also played the guitar - well, pretty much any stringed instrument he could find. As Roddy would place my heavy armful of textbooks on the dining room table, my mom would be busy gathering some chocolate chip cookies for him to take home with him, and I could see him glancing around, hoping he would catch sight of my dad. My dad had a “Dobro”, a guitar featuring a cone-shaped, steel resonator giving it a unique sound, an instrument favored in Bluegrass and Blues music. My dad seldom disappointed Roddy. Many nights they would often spend an hour or so talking about guitars, and he would always let Roddy play the Dobro, his pride and joy, I think it made him feel good to share this love of music.

Unfortunately, I had developed a bit of a crush on his older brother, Darren for a while, a tall, dark-haired daredevil with mischievous eyes and a disarming smile, and so NOT nerdy. Sadly, Darren’s only real talent was being a daredevil, and I’m afraid my fascination with him was crushed after he lost an arm one weekend when he decided hitching a ride on the back of a garbage truck on his skateboard would be a fun idea. I always found it strange that, for some reason, they did not remove his arm. He had to wear it in a sling every day, but it was dead and over time began to atrophy, causing him to walk with one shoulder lower than the other with an awkward gait. It was just so sad, and if he is still around today, I hope he was able to have it properly dealt with.

I pause as I flip the pages slowly. There was Richard Hemphill, a quiet, shy boy who amazed me with his ability to draw. He would often gift me with doodles on the back of study notes and in my Year Books. His talent made me envious, and I wonder to this day if he was ever able to find a way to use his artistry.

I pause at one name specifically and stare momentarily at the round, smiling face of Deirdre (Sami) L. She was my absolute best friend during the last two years of high school; she was hysterically funny, and once one of us started laughing, the other could not help but join in. Friends and teachers called us “the broken blender” because we could not stop laughing once we started. She was a heavy-set girl and did not care for fashion or makeup, but her personality, easy-going nature, and quirkiness made her appealing to boys. As far as I knew, I was the only female friend she had. She preferred the company of the male persuasion, and made that clear by being nasty to most of the girls I knew. I turned the page quickly, not wanting to unpack the memory of how our friendship ended. After being best friends for more than 17 years, she took advantage of my trust by attempting to steal my husband away from me, or at the very least, sow jealousy and distrust between us. To be honest, I was aware that she had this dark side to her; I had seen her go after the boyfriends and husbands of other girls and women many times, but I defended her in my mind, choosing to believe that the relationship she was breaking up must not have been good to begin with, and she just took fair advantage. But when it happened to me, it was different. One day, I will write about this very sad chapter in my life, how what was once such a treasured friendship ended, but it will have to wait.

And so I continued to turn the pages, flipping through memories of people I’d known 50 years ago. I read the silly inscriptions that friends and teachers had written inside the front and back covers and smiled at so many of them. Seeing the small, rectangular faces of old class-mates and reading their comments catapulted me back in time. By the time I’d reached the last page of the last yearbook, all that was left was a series of photo’s on my phone. Only pages that meant anything to me got snapped. The books were gently sealed inside the garbage bag, off to the great yearbook grave in the sky. It felt so weird to see them fall, four years of my life thudding to the bottom of the trash, sinking beneath the discarded egg carton, paper towels, and tissue boxes.

There are many more memories that will need to go into the trash, words and pictures from other iterations of my life. When the time comes for me, I don’t want my husband of now 32 years to have to comb through the years of my life before he met me. So as strange as it felt to let all those years fall through my fingers, it also felt like the right thing to do.

What will you do with all your old books and cards and letters? I understand keeping them if you have any family who might want to keep your memory - and your memories - alive, but if not - will you try to simplify life for your partner by paring down the physical objects? Let me know in your comments!

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It’s mid-February, and I’m neck deep in my dedicated hatred of this, the longest shortest month of the year. February feels like a damp shroud wrapped around my face, pushing my anxious breath back against my nostrils, a cold fabric of mist and malaise. It is not quite dawn; the sky is breaching the hold of night and manifesting a sad tableau of sodden-teabag clouds. Mother Nature has found a way to push every one of my dread-buttons, as she does each year without fail. Even here, in my new home in the gorgeous wine-country oasis of the Okanagan Valley of British Columbia, Canada, where we have seen exactly three days of snow so far, and only a handful of days that have been in the double-digit negatives, I feel petulant and annoyed to have to spend whatever life I may have left shivering and shuddering and staying inside. I can tell you now, when you have cancer and have been told there is nothing but maintenance drugs to hold the advance, the restraints put upon my ability to live life and celebrate each day to the fullest seem extra cruel, those precious seconds of each hour ticking by with no regard for my anguished state of mind.

A hot cup of tea in hand, I stare through the sliding door to my front deck, taking in the sullen view. I am feeling impatient, aching, and antsy, and it occurs to me that to survive the rest of this season, I must toss a Winter Survival Tool Kit up into the universe and conjure a New Day.

The images begin to coalesce, a sudden, sweet wind ruffles my hair. The bitter ochre sky becomes blue, with just enough chubby clouds floating by to paint a picture in my mind, a young lady in a billowing white gown, perhaps, reclining against the buttermilk nebula, her face in soft profile, hair streaming down her back, her arms raised in …… supplication? Celebration? Better…..much better, but what else?

I want to see the deep sapphire-blue surface of Okanagan Lake glimmer in the near distance, sewn, as it is, to the russet foothills of the Cascade Mountain Range, a canvas stretched so smooth and tight that the blocks of vineyards and orchards dotting the sage slopes are reflected without flaw and the tawny pastels wash and mingle with the dappling blues.

Show me softly, in the distance, the bone-white feathers of Trumpeter Swans as they whisper across the sunset-ripple of the lake, impossibly long necks undulating in a tableau of stardust and splendour. Later, the heads of thousands of small black Mud Ducks will appear, bobbing and dipping, retracing the arc of the swans, painting the blue with long, squiggly lines before forming into dense balls of black, peeping beaks and feathers, their tight bond their only protection as the night draws in. Their day has come to a soft close; they have done what ducks are made to do, their purpose, their “raison d’etre” never questioned as they repeat their daily ritual of survival. But this begs the question I ponder so often now. You know, since the diagnosis.

Back in my February kitchen, the sun has continued her reluctant rise, although it is clear that she does not like this month any more than I, and wishes to stay hidden, burrowed into the dark hatch of night, resting her face upon the furry thatched slope of the Silver Star Foothills, sleeping for another few weeks. It brings me some small comfort that February is an abomination for her as well. I look through the sliding patio door out to my front deck once again, sigh, and step into my fuzzy slippers. I pull my dressing gown closer, tighter, and step outside.

Lifting my head, I inhale, wincing at the chill, but determined to speak, as though on a grand stage about to begin a soliloquy. I speak out, facing the irresolute sky that alternately seeks to depress or beguile me, depending on the whim of the sun herself. “Write me a New Day!” I say aloud, in a pitch and tone as if I am casting a spell in Hogwarth’s. “And make it a good one” I add. There is no reply, but I feel emboldened.

Every New Day should begin with deer and sunrises, in that order. On a New Day, my glance out the window will show a bevy of white-tailed beauties balanced on the ridge of a slope by my house, a silhouette of long legs and twitching ears etched against a pale, pre-dawn, slumbering light, their huge, brown eyes capturing every move I make, willing me to venture out with my pail of deer food. They run down the slope as one, bounding hoofs and wet noses, unable to stand the excitement. They line up along my garden wall, shuffling for the best spot, some gentle jostling amongst the does, some angry, huffing chortles on the part of the older bucks. Send me the two little ones, Feefo and Jinx, who still nuzzle and preen by their mamas, their eyes so wide and excited to see me that it seems they might jump up and down with joy.

Next, send me a Mischief of Magpies to careen through the treetops, chattering and quarrelling with each other, their curiosity and social skills setting them high above the intelligence levels of most other birds, some say the level of a five-year-old child. Let me see them dip and dive, their long, turqoise-blue and mauve-plumed tailfeathers steadying them in acrobatic tumbles and soaring wind-borne theatrics, clever enough to keep guards posted in trees and rooftops to ensure flock safety. One day I will set out a blanket and some toys to see if they will take an interest!

As my beautiful New Day slowly morphs from morning to afternoon, send a covey of Quails to visit. They will mumble and peep as they run from bush to bush, chortling and pecking, one after the other, always one more left to run behind and join the group, seldom giving in to flight, their tiny little quilled hat feathers jostling to and fro as they race to keep up. As spring begins to warm the soil, they will suddenly resemble small children’s toys loaded with fresh batteries and no off-button as they jump, toss, turn, dig, peck and roll in my small garden, their antics appearing to serve no other purpose than play, They jump upon each other, roll over upside down and play dead, only to surprise each other when they jump back to life. They appear to be here only to enjoy and celebrate their small, fluttering lives.

My New Day is winding down, now; there is not so much more that I will need before I rest my head on my pillow and sink into my dreams, to reflect on the beauty I have experienced here on my little postage-stamp home in the Okanagan Valley. Before I sleep, I step out onto my back patio, the better to hear the rhythmic pulse of the crickets, and beyond, the hushed hooting of our local Great Horned Owl as he perches on our roof, awaiting movement and the snack to follow as mice scamper deep in the vast folds of golden-grass hillsides. Then, I feel something touch me on my arm; I look down. A Praying Mantis has decided to anoint me as a Person of Interest, and I enjoy his company for a few moments before he realizes I can do nothing for him but offer a safe resting spot and moves on. I feel privileged by his short visit.

The sky is a honeypot of crimson, gold and purple now, and as the astounding hues deepen, I realise what a perfect day it has been. I breathe in. Breathe out. One more time, take a deep pull of the arid night heat of summer into my lungs, even if, for now, it is only in my mind. It is only when I look back one last time to witness the spectacle of this staggering sunset that I see something truly enchanting. There, nestled on the slope, a baby deer has chosen to sleep here, near us, for the night. I feel like a little bit of magic just happened.

We knew we’d had enough of the traditional Las Vegas experience one day when we were very nearly swallowed by an enormously loud, rude group of men walking towards us on the Strip. There were easily 15 or 20 of them, their red, perspiring faces leaving puddles behind as they lurched toward us, their jelly-legs bulging as they carried jugs of alcohol so large and so heavy that they were using shoulder holsters to support them. Yes. It’s true. For those who wish to have a steady, uninterrupted stream of alcohol running through their veins, this genius design permits individuals to walk (stagger) and shop while they get drunk. Why waste valuable time sitting down to drink when you can kill two birds with one holster? After this harrowing, near-trampelling experience, we decided we couldn’t spend the rest of our week in the casinos. We needed to try something else. We needed to head out into the Mojave Desert.

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Many travellers forget that the glittering, ostentatious “City of Excess” is a man-made anomaly; a sparkling jewel of pulsating lights and thriving tropical foliage that really shouldn’t exist. It certainly would never have been born, nor would it survive, without the manipulations of men who had too much money to spend and whose avarice for more brought about the creation of the Casino, “where dreams are made, and bank accounts disappear”; men who somehow came up with a vision to turn a burning stretch of sand into a glittering paradise dubbed “Sin City”, filled to the brim with anything a man could desire, as much and as often as he desired it. The completion of the “Hoover Dam” was the jewel in the Desert Crown, providing essential access to water, power, and electricity to keep on building bigger, better, more awe-inspiring hotels and Casinos, and attracting some of the wealthiest people on earth to visit, and, better yet, voluntarily leave much of their money behind.

Encapsulated by the cacophony & confusion of the buzzing strip, the average tourist has no idea of the fragility of this ecosystem, how deathly dangerous this desolate, sub-tropical desert really is. To the West, the San Andreas Fault slumbers deep below the mountains that it once created, the Tehachapi, San Gabriel and San Bernardino mountain ranges. The Mojave Desert also hosts the Mojave National Preserve, Joshua Tree National Park, and the hottest place in North America: Death Valley, where the temperature can hover around 120F in late July and early August, and receives less than 6 inches of rain in a year.

Putting aside any apprehension one may have about voluntarily entering an area that can easily kill you if you do not respect the dangerous terrain and climate, renting a car and driving away from the strip is to gain a new appreciation for this soundless, surreal-looking desert landscape. We always rent a convertible, we love the hot wind in our hair while the desert sun shines down – the air conditioner blasting our overheated bodies just enough to make it pleasant. Sometimes, though, closing the roof and putting on the AC is the only way to keep going without getting dangerously hot.

The highway unwinds like a gleaming rattlesnake before you, and the immense mega-hotels of the strip recede in the rear-view mirror until the skyline resembles a cardboard cut-out from a pop-up book. The still, silent landscape of the Mojave Desert bakes under a relentless sun, an enormous sandbox dotted sparsely with Nevada Bluegrass, Sagebrush, Wolfberry, and scraggly cacti. It is almost impossible to see any sign of life around here; the creatures who have made their homes in this scorching landscape have been perfecting the art of survival for millions of years. That being said, Roadrunners exist here, and although it is a relatively rare occurrence for a tourist, the sight of this chicken-sized member of the cuckoo family streaking across the sand as it tries to nab a moisture-rich snake or small creature is quite memorable and almost as comedic as the cartoon character itself.

Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area is also home to a population of small burros. They are half the size of a horse and survive on grasses and small bushes, but are difficult for the average traveller to see as they are most active in the cooler hours at sunrise and sunset. Coyotes, rabbits, rattlesnakes, mice, bats… depending on the time of day, you never know what you may see here.

In the distance lies the Las Vegas Range; Spring Mountain in the West, the peaks and valleys of the Muddy Mountains, and Sunrise-Frenchman Mountains stitching a long, rugged ribbon of rock to a cerulean sky.

A sign on the side of the highway indicates the turn off for Red Rock Canyon, and soon you see the first signs of this preternatural marvel of nature. The outskirts begin gently, gradually, the smooth, winding black-top pulling you in, seducing you with sweeps of soft red sandstone curled into and upon itself, as if the rocks themselves are flowers, curling and folding into impossibly intricate designs. The Red Rocks themselves are scattered to begin with, an orange-red boulder here, a mottled brick colored slab there, seemingly having fallen in abandon from the cloudless sky. Then scatterings of ruddy pebbles appear from nowhere. Then….. THEN! A curve or two of the smooth blacktop brings you to your first real view of Red Rock Canyon, and you truly will have to catch your breath at the sight. It is actually best to pull over to the side of the road so you can properly and safely absorb this pure magic.

You are suddenly winding your way through ruddy, steep escarpments of soft, sandstone rocks; borne of Mother Nature and weathered by the hallowed hands of Father Time. The escarpments and cliffs have been lovingly sculpted by the breath of desert winds into odd shapes, some rounded like beehives, others with large holes that form a colourful frame for the panorama beyond. Furrows, crevices, and gullies collect the meagre allotment of moisture visited upon the Mojave Desert, just enough dampness for stubborn scrub brush, tortured cacti, Joshua trees, and needlegrass to grasp a tenuous hold, each struggling dot of verdant green surprising the eye against the toasted desert sandscape.

Bringing a picnic lunch with us is somewhat of a ritual. We look for the perfect, quiet ledge on which to lay our picnic blanket and unpack our chilled champagne, sandwiches and chips. Hiking into a canyon is preferable; we love to hear nothing but the hot desert wind shaping the rocks around us, and the chittering of white-throated swifts as they dart for the insects that gather around pooling water. The keening cry of red-tailed hawks and golden eagles pierce the silence of these canyons as they ride the cooling currents high above, their existence proved only by the charcoal outline of their soaring wings against a pure blue sky. Their survival is only possible by feeding on the moisture-rich bodies of the small creatures they hunt on the desert floor.

We find a rocky promontory that provides a breathtaking view of the Calico Hills. Unwrapping our sandwiches and popping open a bag of potato chips seems to be an invitation to share our lunch. Small, feisty chipmunks who have adapted to life with a bare minimum of water appear from the depths of the rocky crevices and cracks, hoping for a handout, but caution is urged. Feeding wildlife in the desert could result in a death sentence; the extremely limited supply of water means the amount and types of food a tourist shares can kill with kindness. Still, their bold approach and the touch of their little paws on your knee as you kneel to see them really touches your heart and brings you closer to the stunning diversity of the creatures & plants who call the desert home.

We sip our champagne and ponder the beauty and wonder of the canyon. The warm wind that has been rustling the dry, desert grass dies. It is here that I fully understand “The Sound of Silence”. The pumping of my heart seems like a drum as it propels the blood through my veins. There is nothing else. It is so intense and infinite that my eardrums ache.

Suddenly, a sound shatters the stillness, making me jump. The chatter of cactus wrens erupts, cracking the silence of the desert air open with a pop as they guard their football-sized nests from any suspected intruders. Carefully constructed amongst the torturous thorns of cactus, they have survived the eons by using plant stems and flower stalks as their only protection.

The Mojave Desert is an incredible place to discover, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel fear while we were out there. The danger it poses to your life is real. If you are not prepared for what could happen, your car breaks down, you twist an ankle while exploring a slippery canyon floor and cannot call for help, you can die, and quickly. But as long as you are prepared and careful, the unique perspective on life and death that is presented to you is one that will stay with you long after you have left your footsteps in the sand.

As the heat shimmers off the russet rocks, we pop the cork on our champagne and raise the bubbles to the endlessly blue sky above, thankful and richer for this experience.

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If my soul was naked
Would you feast your eyes? 
Would you tremble with shock, 
Or writhe in shame?

If my soul slipped
Liquid and unrepentant
Prisoner no more 
Of bones, blood, and water

Would you watch? 

If it lay quivering 
Petal soft on satin sheets?

If it streamed 
In honey-slick rivulets 
Abandoning 
All that is human
 
If it fluttered
On awkward, charcoaled wings 
Scorched to bitter embers 
Plummeting
 
Would you bear witness to the fall? 

Roaming eyes, rest your gaze 
On Imperfect Flesh 
Fierce Protector
Of my silken cocoon

I see you flinch

Do I ask so much? 
To seek, not just your gaze 
But halcyon focus 

No more a trick of mirrors 
Or billowing smoke

My Naked Soul in Flux 
Once captive, now uncaged 
Essence Mine 

Once sweet & murmuring
Fluttering on pouted lips 
Quivering on razor’s edge

Now quiescent on silken palm
 
My shimmering essence
Elusive as the Shadow of Venus 
On a forest floor

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The Bad & The Ugly

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The very first Vegas hotel we stayed at was The Flamingo, which was one of the earliest casinos to be built, before there was even a formal “Strip”. It was built by famous Mob Boss “Bugsy Seigel”, opening it’s doors in 1946 with not much else around it except miles of sand and scrub brush. Unfortunately, Bugsy wasn’t able to enjoy his new luxury digs for very long; in 1947 he was the victim of a mafia hit, which I understand is not an uncommon ending for mob bosses in those days. This served to make The Flamingo even more famous though, attracting the attention of wealthy travellers who came to stay and play, with top entertainers from around the world being hired to keep them happily occupied. Perhaps the most famous of them all were “The Rat Pack” who began performing there in the late 1950’s and eary 1960’s. Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., and Frank Sinatra were a huge draw; thrilling audiences in standing-room only venues. They continued to perform right up into the late 1980’s, when health matters began interfering with performances.

In the early 1990’s,“The Strip” was considerably less colorful and exciting than it is now, but for someone who had never stepped foot in a casino before, it was mind-boggling, like being in the first row of a fireworks display. What I had never anticipated, however, was the fiercely horrific stench inside every single casino. The buildup of cigarette and cigar smoke inside a casino becomes a physical thing when you have thousands of people puffing away, night and day. I quickly learned that one of the best ways to assess the age of a casino was the degree of stench. All casinos in the 90’s allowed smoking, and it was nauseatingly apparent that architects had no idea what an air-exchanger was. Nor did they care. Walking into an old casino, and there were many of them, was like physically walking into a brick wall. Decades of smoke, sweat, and cheap perfume made the oxygen feel viscous, almost like a syrupy glop that entered the respiratory system with each breath, lodging in your lungs like a lump of coal. If that wasn’t enough to contend with, there was another noxious odour that was as bad as, if not worse than, the smoke. It was a deodorizing spray dispersed through internal air vents, some heavy-duty chemical agent designed in a sad attempt to mask the stench. Guess what? It didn’t work. Whatever it was, it would settle right into the nostril-hairs and take up permanent residence for days, so that even when you were outside in the desert air you could still smell it. I’m pretty sure it had embalming fluid in it, which would explain why all the gamblers chain-smoking at the slot machines resembled wrinkled corpses.

All these years later, I can clearly recall the feeling of revulsion that would come over me for the first few minutes inside a casino. My eyes would water, my nose and eyes would burn, and I would feel nauseous for the first ten or fifteen minutes. I remember the first time I tried to go into Caesar’s Palace, an all-around Vegas “classic”. The first few times, I could not go inside. I would walk in through the revolving door, hit that solid wall of poison, and keep on revolving until I was outside again. Eventually, I discovered that if I took a deep breath just before entering a casino, and held it as long as possible, I could make it far enough inside so that running back to the exit (if you could find it again, that is) would be just as problematic as staying, so I would stay.

Once your olfactory senses adjusted and your eyes stopped watering, the seductive warbling of slot machines would tantalize your eardrums, like a siren call, with a backdrop of clanging bells and whistles that your brain interprets as the “sound of winning”, causing a titillating rush of dopamine to flood your brain. The mere chance that you might win became an all-encompassing possibility. Other people were winning! You could hear them! Why not you? Next, the visual seduction would kick in. Glittering, half-naked women wearing derriere-baring thongs, high heels, and thigh-high black boots, and occasionally feathers or boas of some sort, would strut by: “What would you like to drink, honey?”

You sit down at a slot machine and fish for some pocket change. Remember, it was the 90’s; slot machines consumed a steady diet of coins and paper money only. You would grab one of the massive plastic cups stacked at the end of each bank of slot machines and plunk your quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies into it. You needed to stay in the same area that the attendant took your drink order so that she could find you again. So you would settle in, plugging handfuls of change into the slots, hoping you would win something while waiting for your free drink. Every few minutes, your machine would reward you with $5.00 or $10.00, occasionally maybe even $20.00, and you knew, you absolutely knew, that a bigger prize was coming. Soon. And as your fingers began to burn from the grit and metallic stink from handling all the change, you still don’t want to leave. Nope. Not yet. I have to say that then, when you were a “winner”, the clinking, clanking rush of all the coins tumbling out, and the accompanying theatrics of bells and whistles blowing was so much more satisfying than what happens now; a tiny paper receipt being printed out for you to take to the Cashier. It simply doesn’t provide the same kind of rush.

I remember sipping my “free” drinks, hearing shrieks from out of nowhere, “OMG! I’ve won! I’ve won!” and watching people crowd around the winning machine, the strobe light flashing brightly, a sign for the casino attendant to come and verify the win and pay them out. I wanted that to happen to me! Surely the next spin would pay off. You redirect your gaze back to the “Spin” button that jeers at you. The sound of clapping, cheers and drunken laughter tangle up with the background sounds: “Wheel! Of! Fortune!”. My recklessness responds, plunking in more quarters. You watch the lucky winner of the “jackpot” collect her bounty. She is glowing. People have gathered around the area; they want to play on the same machine she just won on. It was a “Lucky Machine”. But alas. The Attendant pays her out,, but she doesn’t leave. You watch her begin plunking all the money she just won right back into the flashing neon mouth in front of her.

When you are gambling, when you’ve had a win, even a small amount, enough is never enough. You want to turn that $20 into $50! $50 into $100! $100 into $10,000! As you plunk the last of your change into the machine, you realize you’ve just spent $50.00 while waiting for your free drink.

Women in short dresses and knee-high hooker boots strut by, wearing too much makeup and carrying young children through the thick, acrid air like sacks of potatoes. It doesn’t matter to them what time of day or night it is. In the 90’s, children were strictly forbidden in gambling zones, and casinos had not yet discovered the genius of creating playrooms and children’s “fun-zones” where parents can drop their kids off for the evening. And many mothers were not willing to stay home or pay for a babysitter. Then, a creative (and in my opinion, unfit) mother discovered a built-in option. The immense casino washrooms always have at least one or two attendants to clean the stalls, replace paper towels, and tidy sinks and counters. It probably took just one single mother to start leaving the kids in the bathroom for the night before the practice spread through the gambling community like wildfire. While there were no flashing signs advertising “Parents! Leave your children in our bathrooms!”, it became a tacit, unspoken agreement on the part of the casinos that janitorial staff would watch your babies while you happily gamble away their college money and in some cases, their futures.

I was actually sickened to witness this on Christmas Eve one year. Christmas EVE. While other children were getting gingerbread cookies and milk ready for Santa’s visit later that night, these children were abandoned in a Las Vegas casino for hours. I remember seeing children left against the walls in pedestrian corridors near the bathrooms even.

Perhaps all the spare areas inside the bathrooms were already full. From a duffel bag, mothers removed blankets, stuffed toys, coloring books, and crayons. They sat their beloved children in a corner, usually near paper towel dispensers, and added a few bags of cookies and chips to the pile, along with a juice box. These women did not know the meaning of the word “shame” and were adept at ignoring the horrified faces of ladies walking in and out. The machines were calling to them with their siren songs and must be obeyed. “Stay here and color until mommy comes back.” A bathroom attendant, wiping down the sinks and faucets, looks over, resigned. They now have a second job. Babysitter. The mothers would sometimes grab a few dollar bills out of their handbags and hand them to the Attendant. “Keep an eye on them”, she says. It is not a request.

Back at the Blackjack table, the women toss back Red Wine and Gin Tonics like they’re drinking lemonade, stuff another cigarette in their puffy, bloated lips, their faces reflecting their addiction. Gambling can be as dangerous as Crystal Meth, but you won’t find any guardrails in place, except for some posters near the exits with a 1-800 Gambling Addiction hotline. I’m doubtful that those who have just lost their cars, their houses, their wedding ring, indeed their financial lives, will find any solace in speaking to someone on the phone. The overly-bright eyes of addicted gamblers gleam, but they laugh too loudly, the corners of their smiles tremble, and, if you look carefully, you can watch a life unravelling. If every dollar that was lost at these tables became a drop of water on the casino floor, gamblers would be drowning in a sea of sorrow.

There are many women here, young, old, in-between. Every type of garment is represented - some sport feathers, others wear boas. They proudly showcase rings in belly buttons, studs in tongues, glittering gems in noses. Nipple rings push out from immense, engineered breasts. Plunging cleavage is everywhere, tatoos here, there, everywhere. Getting married in Vegas is also a very popular thing to do. Whether through a “Drive-Thru Chapel” or booking an Elvis-themed wedding, many of the newly married couples spend their first evening as husband and wife gambling.

Neck and finger tatoos, full-arm “sleeves”, and women’s chests and feet are now so popular that their bodies are moving, sweating canvases. Thigh-high boots, cigarette smoke and high heels, leather and lace. You never really know what you will find in a Las Vegas Casino.

Finally, in a casino haze, you stumble upon one of the famously hidden exits. You stagger through the revolving door to the Strip. You’ve forgotten it is still day, and it takes a moment or two to orient yourself. An enormous, man-made volcano is erupting at The Mirage, the deep rumbling shaking your eardrums, smoke belching into the furnace of the desert air, flames shooting up into the solid, uninterrupted blue sky. It’s about 120 degrees F on the Strip; you can feel the heat of the sidewalks burning through the bottom of your shoes. It’s time to go back inside.

Our aching feet take us inside an old casino haunted by the ghosts of Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. Over the ringing, clanging, and buzzing, we can hear live music and make our way towards it. The catchy vocals of “Blue Suede Shoes” float in the viscous air. In the back corner, we find Elvis. “Big Elvis”, that is, holding court, while old ladies who’ve had a few too many glasses of alcohol gyrate unbecomingly and ask to pose with him for a photo. Well, at least they’re having fun.

Further back in the corner, slot junkies stare, never looking away from the revolving 7’s, feeding the machines that tease and hook them. The lights are low, and the casino is packed, the glittering drink hostess pauses beside you. You really should have just one - or maybe two. You watch someone leave a slot machine that has just paid out; you hurry over to claim the seat before someone else snags it. It’s obviously a lucky machine, and surely the next spin will be an even bigger prize. You look down the row of fellow gamblers. Makeup congeals in deep trenches on women who look probably at least twice their age, their eyes glazed, nicotine-stained fingers pressing the Spin buttons. Again. Again. Again. The woman beside me has her eyes closed as she keeps the wheel spinning. She could be asleep, praying, or dead, who knows.

We search for the exit, passing posters advertising steaks the size of dinner plates, all-you-can-eat Buffets for $3.00, Prime Rib dinners for $2.99, double-lobster tails with garlic butter for $4.99, including dessert, and you get 5 free Keno plays so you can gamble while you eat. I was surprised that they didn’t have Keno machines in the bathroom stalls so you could play as you pee.

We pass through the hotel lobby with long lines of people checking in. I notice a family of four, parents and a young girl and boy. Their clothes were in garbage bags. I felt sad.

This is a place that teases and taunts, makes you happy, exhilarated, manic, and sleepless. It is also a place that can take advantage of any careless moment, rob you of any caution you might usually reserve for risk-taking, and empty your bank account, with no apologies.

Go at your own risk!

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The Good Part

Bette Midler once said: “Las Vegas is a carnival for adults”, and if you’ll forgive the quip, she was “right on the money”. Our first trip to Las Vegas was in the early 1990’s, not long after my husband and I met. Back then, neither of us had done much traveling, so Las Vegas was a real eye-opener on many fronts. I found it absolutely exhilarating, and exactly like Bette Midler described. A carnival. I remember hearing rumours at the time that they pumped pure oxygen into the casinos to keep visitors wide awake - think inhaling espresso through your nostrils with each breath. Although it has long been proven a myth, at the time I was inclined to believe it. I seldom felt tired in Vegas, in fact, I often felt like I wanted to stay up all night, in fact I sometimes did. I always wanted one more pull on the slot machine, one more free drink. There is a whole science behind the construction and operation of a casino, from stimulation of the senses - bright, flashing neon lights, the loud clanging and ringing of the slot machines, keeping temperatures too cool to feel drowsy. There is also the offer of limitless, free alcohol as soon as you sit down at a slot machine. And last, but not least, the carefully hidden exits. If you want to get out, you’ll have a more difficult time than you might guess. Exiting is only achieved after passing through multiple banks of slot machines that seem to keep you going in circles, chortling, pulsing, ringing and chiming, reclaiming your attention and causing you to stop to make “just one more spin”. Brilliant.

The glamour of the Las Vegas Strip is especially impressive at night, when the deep, dark blue velvet sky is the perfect backdrop for the pulsating, neon lights of the casinos, whose efforts to attract crowds know no bounds. No matter where you look, your brain is bedazzled and your eardrums assailed by a cacophony of competing music punctuated by the foofaraw of street buskers and the call of street hustlers who shove cards showing naked girls (Strippers) available to visit you right in your room if you like. There are so many of these cards handed out that when you walk down the strip during the day, hundreds, if not thousands, of nude images stare up at you, littering the sidewalks like pornographic confetti.

Over the years, we began staying at some of the new luxury hotels that were sprouting up along the Strip. The Wynn quickly became one of our favourite places to stay. Although it is located at the far end of the strip and away from much of “the action”, and a much longer walk (or a short taxi ride) than most of the popular hotels, coming back to your room is such a pleasure. After walking the Strip in the intense heat all day, or being jostled inside noisy, crowded casinos, the vast atrium-style lobby felt like a lavish oasis. Hundreds of lush trees reached for the glass ceiling, sparkling with tiny fairy lights; the beauty magnified by hundreds of gigantic flower balls hanging from the branches.

The Bellagio was also a favourite. It’s always an amazing experience checking-in beneath the famous $10 million dollar, hand-blown glass flower ceiling. Bellagio also attracts thousands of people with the glorious Atrium displays, which change with each season. Each enchanting tableau is constructed entirely out of flowers, branches, moss and greenery. Although it is not a large area, it is easy to spend at least half an hour strolling amongst the lavish floral designs, which cannot be adequately described. A picture is worth a thousand words, so I will let the photos below do the talking.

The Bellagio also has some of the most beautiful penthouses. As frequent guests, we would often receive a complimentary upgrade at check-in. One of the suites we stayed in was so large that I only discovered a 5th bathroom on the day we were leaving.

The famous dancing fountains at Bellagio are a spectacle not to be missed, whether from the Strip itself or from a Fountain View room. Over a thousand jets of water stretch across a length of 1,000 feet, and are carefully choreographed to dance with some of the most iconic tunes you know. Rocketing up into the air to heights of 460 feet, it was always a dramatic sight that I never tired of watching. Views from the penthouses are outstanding, and if you’re lucky enough to get one on the right side of the hotel, you can watch the incredible fountain performances with the soundtrack playing through your television. It’s a very special experience watching the dramatic display from the comfort of your air-conditioned suite.

Mandalay Bay also appealed to us. Situated at the other end of the Strip, it is close to the airport, but like The Wynn, it is a long walk to get to the centre of the Strip and other attractions. Rooms have incredible views of the pulsating neon river, from the dazzling strobes and immense pyramid shape of the Luxor piercing the sky, down past the Excalibur and the MGM, to the twinkling lights of the Eiffel Tower at the Paris Hotel, and further on, past the turquoise blue pools and canals of the Venetian Hotel.

By the mid-2000’s, new building techniques and pollution laws made Las Vegas casinos more comfortable. The stench was not as much of an issue, with air exchangers mitigating the worst of the smoke. Some casinos even introduced “No Smoking” areas. You can’t honestly say that casino air is in any way “good”, after all, smoke doesn’t obey any rules, but at least now you don’t feel like you might pass out when you pass through their revolving doors.

The overall vibe of the “new” Las Vegas speaks of luxury and excess, attracting some of the wealthiest people in the world. The hotels compete for their presence and their money, and provide massive incentives to keep their loyalty.

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Las Vegas is all about entertainment, the biggest names in music and dance, and shows like Cirque du Soleil cannot be seen in better venues anywhere else. Just strolling through the top hotels can have you oooohing and aaaaahing over the sights and sounds. Massive balls of flowers hanging from ceilings, fantastical landscapes made completely out of flowers inside vast atriums, tattooed brides in wedding gowns and new husbands in suits with no socks wander through the banks of slot machines, hoping to make their first evening as spouses even more memorable with a big win.

A mini-Venice flaunts sleek Gondolas floating down meandering canals that wind through the immense shopping mall and exit to a vast network of turquoise canals; striped-shirt Gondoliers sing “O Solo Mio”, their voices echoing into the hot desert air as people dine on the outdoor patios, taking in the view. Other hotels offer vast walls of aquariums with complete ecosystems, vibrant schools of fish dart in and out of their hiding spots, and tiny sea-horses hold tightly to brightly colored corals.

Walking down the strip, it is impossible not to stop and watch the action at Treasure Island, their gigantic pirate ship aglow as Pirates with cutlasses swing from ropes across gigantic pools as canons explode, and women in belly-button and cleavage-baring Pirate Girl outfits run to-and-fro, apparently needing to be saved.

Vegas is a place where you really must rent a car to enjoy everything it has to offer. We did stay once or twice without one, but most of the hotel properties are extremely large, and walking to the hotel next to you can easily take 20 to 30 minutes, usually in temperatures well over 100 degrees F. Also, sometimes the crowds are so heavy you can barely walk at all. Crossing from one side of the Strip to the other can easily take up to 10 minutes as the Strip is very wide, and some people walk very slowly.

The other reason to have a car is the unique experience of “driving the Strip”. Although you are sometimes stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic, you don’t really mind. This is where you can see the unique panorama of all the Casinos, especially beautiful at night, with the frenetic, pulsing of neon signs and the drama of erupting volcanos, dancing fountains, a twinkling Eiffel Tower, a giant Ferris Wheel, and an enormous Roller Coaster filling the air with terrified screams and laughter. Cruising the Strip at any time is a form of entertainment in itself. Teenagers hang out of car windows, screaming and laughing, exotic cars rumble by with eardrum-rattling music blasting. Don’t be surprised to see a naked bum or two flash you from limousines full of partying teenagers.

One of our favourite ways to enjoy a trip to Vegas was to spend a day away from the casinos, to catch our breath and feel the earth beneath our feet. Driving out to the vast, incredible sandscape of the Mojave Desert is an experience you will never forget; a thousand shades of cinnamon and sorral, russet and ginger, stretch into infinity and beyond, from the eye-boggling drama of Red Rock Canyon, to the surreal landscape of Valley of Fire, with swirls and curls of red sandstone shaped by a millenia of a restless earth’s wanderings. But that is for my next Chapter of The Other Me: Chapter 4. I hope you come over to read about “The Mojave Desert Experience” publishing later this week!

Above: The Invisible Highway of the Accidentally Deleted (Text to Image Created by AI)

It was the eve of my 63rd birthday, a little over six months ago, when I stretched out on my lounger on the back deck of my townhouse, flipped my laptop open, and settled my glass of cold, bubbling Prosecco within reach. I was taking a break from packing the last of our boxes; in just a little over a week, we would be moving to the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia, about a seven-hour drive from Vancouver. Our house in Maple Ridge had been our home for the past 16 years, a record for us, as we historically become bored with neighborhoods and feel the urge for new sights and neighborhoods after just a few years. But, on that fine day in June, I knew we were going to miss this house more than any of the others. There were many reasons why we stayed there for so long.

One of those reasons was the view from our deck, looking out over our backyard, a lush strip of protected greenbelt, and further, down a steep slope to where a protected salmon-spawning creek flowed, lined on both sides by centuries-old Chestnut trees. The dense vegetation meant that wildlife felt relatively safe here, and we loved the frequent visitors, furry or feathered, that wandered through our yard.

Above: My backyard view from my upper deck (Video by Author)

On that day, I remember opening Substack and preparing to write. It was going to be a simple “Note” to start with, just a collection of thoughts and observations. Something quick and easy to hopefully blow a hole in the months-long writer’s block I’d been suffering from. I was blaming my illness, the fact that my life was being consumed by medical appointments and blood-work, CT scans and MRI’s, and of course, packing and planning for our upcoming move. So while I knew I wouldn’t have the time, energy, or enthusiasm necessary to write a proper Post, I started a Note, the literary equivalent of a shrug, a limp body with no particular shape, just something to jump-start my comatose pre-fontal cortex.

I placed my fingertips on the keyboard with trepidation, part of me waiting for the usual reaction, a complete, creative shut down, even as I was lowering any expectations. I felt that just a paragraph or two would be a relief, an amazing accomplishment. I let my eyes return to the landscape before me, opening my ears to tease out the sounds you never hear if you don’t make an effort. Birds tweeting and calling. A woodpecker drilling. The hum of a bee flitting past, heading for the blossoms on the rhododendrons below. Chickadees peeping as they busily went about building a nest in the little bird house I had put up for them in my pear tree.

Above: A Chickadee building his nest in my pear tree! (Video by Author)

I sipped my Prosecco, felt the bubbles pleasantly tickling my nose. I could hear the soothing murmur of the creek in the distance, a relaxing backdrop to the peeps and chatters. At this time of year, it slowed to a trickle, just enough for the animals to drink from, a far cry from early spring, when snowmelt from the surrounding Golden Ears Mountains rush through, turning it into a miniscule Niagara Falls. In mid-June though, it trickled over mossy stones, inviting wildlife to pause for a sip after nibbling on the berries and tasty insects living along its steep banks.

I sighed, tearing my eyes away from the annoying, blinking curser, focusing on the surroundings. I remember hearing the startling, raucous screech of a Great Blue Heron lifting off from the creek, disturbed by the barks of a neighborhood dog, and suddenly, at that exact, precise moment, a feeling I can only describe as “magical” came over me. If you are a writer or an artist, you may know exactly what I mean. I suppose it is what some would call a Muse. I typed a few words, and suddenly, everything gelled. Words started coming at me, faster than I could get them down. My fingers were a blur as I tried to capture the rushing, creative overload. I distinctly remember the feeling of euphoria when what I had thought would be a short note was turning into a marathon-long keyboard carnival, a finger-fest of fertility. And it wasn’t going to stop soon.

I was going strong into hour two, and, fantastically, I was at the critical point of finessing my prose, that painstaking process where each sentence is carefully stroked and polished. My writer’s block had exploded, blown into ashes. I was SO excited. Mere hours ago, I had been on a deserted island, dying of word-thirst, and now a 747 had done a flyover and dropped a full cargo of cleverness and creativity right onto my lap. I took another sip. The draught was over!

Then the doorbell rang.

“Oh my God! How amazing to see you! Please come in!” A kind friend, popping by for a quick hello. “How are you doing? Of course, you must stay for some Prosecco! We need to catch up on life. You have to see these photos!”

My finger swiped the iPad screen without hesitation, iPhoto opened and off we went down memory lane. I noticed my Substack Note disappearing as well, but I was confident that it would find safe haven in the vast cosmos. I would retrieve it later in the day, continue the polish, the shine, and publish it. It might actually be the best post EVER!

A few hours later, after all the catching up was done and the Prosecco finished, I waved goodbye to my friend and returned to my tablet. I had a post to finish! It was only then that I realized disaster had struck. My Note was gone. Disappeared. Vanished. Evaporated, without a trace, into the vast ether of the internet, swept along into infinity with the billions of other letters, words, and thoughts that would never see the light of day. Gone. Down the invisible Highway of The Accidentally Deleted.

Above: The Invisible Highway Video (Text to Video by Author/AI)

And so, here I am now, almost seven months later, trying to recreate the “Best Post I’ve Ever Written”. This time, though, it’s going in as a New Post. That was a hard lesson to learn. I like to think I will never do that again.

Although the text itself disappeared that day, the purpose and the images I wrote about are still, somehow, in my grey matter, waiting to be teased out and written down once again. I know that the purpose of the Post, which I wanted so much to share, was that although I was looking forward to my new life, it didn’t mean I no longer loved what I had. There was such a bittersweet component to this decision. My husband and I both felt like somehow, we were turning our backs on 16 years of love, laughter, pride, joy, and delight. We had gone from our mid 50’s and into our mid 60’s in this house, we had changed a lot and learned a lot here.

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Memories make a house a home, and this home was overflowing with them. My beloved Maltipoo, Cosmo, was with us when we moved into this house; I have memories of him running up and down the stairs, dragging his stuffed Polar Bear wherever he went, and cuddling with me under the blankets in bed on rainy days. Two years after we moved in, at 15 1/2 years, he crossed the Rainbow Bridge, and my heart has still not mended. Our first cat, George, found us in this house, camping out at our front door for months until the weather got cold and we gave in, adopting our first-ever cat. Because of George, we fell in love with felines, and once he passed away, we missed him so much that we adopted a Ragdoll kitten, who we named Gucci. Two years later, we decided he might like a friend, so we got another Ragdoll, who we named Fendi. They were the first kittens we’d ever had in our lives, and they made the house ring with sheer laughter and joy at their antics.

There were, however, many reasons that we wanted to leave. One, undoubtedly, was pure boredom with the community of Maple Ridge, where we lived. It was a beautiful part of Greater Vancouver, but it bore no resemblance to a true “community”. Sixteen years after we moved in there, the town itself had hardly changed. It remained stunted in growth, personality, and diversity, with absolutely no charm, nor even a decent infrastructure for residents. There were also no signs that it would be improving, at least within our lifetimes.

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Then there was our little complex, the “Copperstone Ridge” Townhouse Community. It wasn’t really much of a community, at least not for us. We lived alongside many of the same neighbors for 16 years, and never spoke to many of them. Most of them never even waved when you drove by them on your way to your house. We did know one couple whom we quite disliked. They were negligent dog owners. They had three Huskies who were seldom allowed in their house. They would leave them out on their small balcony morning, noon, and night, in the rain, snow, and extreme heat. Their balcony overlooked their fenced yard, but the dogs were not allowed in it. These poor animals had to stand and sit on a balcony, trying to avoid their own excrement, every day. My calls to Animal Control never changed a thing; they gave them a “warning”, but nothing happened. No change in behaviour at all. We felt traumatised from years of listening to those poor dogs yowl, cry, howl, and bark incessantly.

I was also traumatised by another abrasive neighbor, just a few doors down. Almost every day, after getting home from work, the mom would enter the house and immediately begin screaming at her small daughter at the top of her lungs. She took out all her misery, her unhappiness with her own life, onto her little girl, where it then, doubtlessly, congealed into an ugly mass in her tiny, broken heart. I am sure the ugliness lives there, a small, bubbling volcano. It will erupt one day, sending tears of hot lava to course through her veins, the vitriol it has absorbed scarring her for the rest of her life.

But then there were the other kinds of things that you know you will miss. The good kind.

You know that in early spring, your heart will thrill to the sound of the songbirds in the neighbors 200 year-old fir trees, just beyond your bedroom window, when even the sun itself has yet to fully awake. We don’t know their language, but it is crystal clear that they are sharing their joy of the coming spring, their jubilation that the dreary, dark days of winter are lessening, being chased away by a strengthening, golden sun that carries the light for a few more minutes every single day. They sound truly delirious with happiness, their notes spiraling, swelling, surging, and for them, hopefully poetic enough to attract a suitably beautiful mate.

Above: A beautiful new day dawns over Golden Ears Mountains, BC (Video by Author)

You know that soon the spring rains, not to be confused with the winter rains, will begin, softer and somehow gentler and warmer, and that this will be the cue for the delicate Snowdrops and the powdery blue Crocus to thrust up out of the ground, eager to see what they have been waiting all their lives for. And, further down, nestled under the warming soil in the garden, Tulips, Iris, and Daffodil bulbs will sense the warmth of a burgeoning sun, sending tiny green shoots up to test the temperature before the stars of the garden, the flowers, are allowed to make an appearance. Deeper still, sensing the garden awakening, the Dahlias and Phlox will begin gathering what they need to erupt out of the soil and reach for the summer skies, a visual equivalent of a stirring symphony.

Above: a summer rain promising flowers and sunshine ahead (Video by Author)

You know that once the snow melt is over, the creek will once again become a haven for the wildlife that call this area their home. The riverbanks will quiver and stir with the flutters of the Varied Thrush, their orange and black feathers will look like flowers against the veridian leaves of the blackberry bushes, and the bright flash of yellow-beaked goldfinches will catch your eye as they flitter and swoop for bugs and berries. Tiny, fluttering chickadees will pop from branch to branch, and tiny Pacific Wrens no bigger than your thumb, will visit your small garden, darting to and fro, hungry and cautious. In the tall, swaying trees, countless birds will share happy conversations about the fresh, fat worms and delicious butterflies they have found.

Above: The lush forest on the banks of the creek is alive with birdsong (Video by Author)

You know that, even with their immense wingspan of up to 6.5 ft, Great Blue Herons will somehow manoeuver smoothly through the thick branches of the Chestnut trees to land soundlessly in the shallow, crystal clear creek, to stand like statues, waiting patiently for a careless minnow or oblivious frog. Far above, Barred Owls will stare with deep, yellow-orbed eyes; the squirrels will sound an alarm from their hideouts on the old trees, shivering and squealing theatrically. Blue Jays will squawk and dart from branch to branch, and timid Coyotes will disappear into the underbrush, hoping that the mice and rats who live under the outcropping of ferns and river rocks will provide them with a meal later tonight. In the afternoons, heavy shafts of hot summer sunshine will slant through heavy boughs, branches dripping with moss and lichen, providing welcome shade to all the creatures that call this area home.

Above: A beautiful Barred Owl in Hopes of a Meal (Video by Author)

Many of the trees, their massive trunks dripping with moss and lichen, lean wearily to one side, spanning the creek to rest tired limbs on their offspring who are still growing, still reaching, still learning the language of the forest and the greatness of their purpose. Pileated Woodpeckers and Northern Flickers, almost invisible in their camouflage, clutch furry tendrils of moss lodged within thick layers of bark, intent on the delicious treasures to be found beneath, each stacatto rap of their heads burrowing deeper for their prize, something soft, chewy, delicious. And every September, our resident Black Bear will come by to gorge himself on the chestnuts that litter our yard and the banks of the little creek, and once satiated, will climb one of the trees and stretch out along one of the enormous limbs, to nap for a few hours, sometimes even for a day or two. I love that he feels safe in this space.

Above: A Black Bear gorges on chestnuts before having a long nap (Video by Author)

I know that I will miss my enormous fig tree, planted 16 years ago, much too close to the house. It has grown so large that its branches curve in and around the wrought-iron railing of our second-floor deck; extending long, leggy branches, as unruly as an errant child. It redeems its wild appearance every September, though, each year offering more and more of its sweet, delicate fruit that tastes like expensive chocolate.

Above: My Fig Tree, covered with baby figs that will ripen in September (Video by Author)

Last of all, I know that I will miss the beauty of our neighborhood when we get a snowstorm. The forest out back becomes silent as the snow gathers, building on every tree branch and twig, the sound of the creek hushed. Our backyard has become a living cathedral of snow. The glistening snowflakes, the layers of fragile snow piled up on tree branches, the sheer, glistening spectacle that is Winter in Maple Ridge.

Above: A heavy snow turns our back yard into a sparkling landscape (Photo by Author)

I know our new home will gather new and beautiful memories as we settle in; we will hopefully have as many laughs and meaningful moments here. But I know I will always miss my home in Maple Ridge. Our memories truly form the essence of who we are, they become a patchwork quilt that sews the very fabric of our lives together. My hope is that these memories will now be preserved in this essay.

Now, we start a new quilt, working on each patch with hope and love. Let’s hope it will be as beautiful a quilt as our last one.

That spur-of-the-moment trip to Havana whet our appetites for more adventures, but we also knew that, financially, we would not be able to continue our world travels and raise a family. A decision needed to be made, and once we made it, we could not look back. It was really my health issues that made the decision not to have children much easier. Chronic health issues would quite often come out of remission, landing me in the hospital for weeks or months at a time. There was no way I could trust that I could stay healthy enough to be a good mother and provide a stable environment for a child, and if things did start going wrong, neither of us had family near us to lend a helping hand, and that scared me. It was a risk we decided we could not take.

We began budgeting seriously for travel, saving for adventures that would broaden our horizons. We maximised our annual four weeks of vacation time by planning around statutory holidays. Our love of Mexico deepened, and exploring the Mayan Riviera in the 1990’s, just before the big tourism boom hit Cancun and changed everything, was like being in paradise. We visited at least a dozen times from the early 1990’s and up to 2010, from Cancun to Playa del Carmen, Cozumel, Isla Mujeres, Tulum, Riviera Nayarit, Puerto Vallarta, Acapulco, and Nuevo Vallarta. And Mexico provided an excellent jumping point to destinations such as Guatamala and Belize.

We began to get a little bolder in our adventures. There was a tiny travel agency in Playa del Carmen, the same one we used to fly to Havana. This time, flights to Guatemala caught our eye. Irresistible. Once again, we boarded a teeny, tiny plane and soared up into the air on our next adventure. Flying over the “Peten Basin”, a tropical rainforest in the region of northern Guatemala, was stunningly beautiful and very interesting, in that it looked very hilly, almost like foothills, but covered with jungle. The airport in Flores, Guatemala, remains one of the tiniest airports we’ve ever been to; our passports were stamped and we were out the door within minutes of landing, where we found our Tour Guide waiting with an enormous smile. We had chosen to explore Tikal, an ancient Mayan city recognised as one of the most significant archaeological sites of the ancient Maya civilisation.

This full day exploring Tikal remains one of my favorite experiences all these many years later. As we began our trek into the jungle on our way to see the famous “Temple of the Jaguar”, I remarked to our guide that I had not realised Guatemala was such a hilly country. He just smiled and said to me: “Those are not hills. They are all Mayan Temples that have not been excavated yet; there are literally hundreds, maybe thousands of sacred temples to be uncovered”. I was astonished, thinking of the miles of hilly jungle we had flown over. So much to be discovered!! Our path left the jungle trail and headed into an immense courtyard, filled with partially excavated ruins and, of course, the stunning temples that surrounded the clearing. The Temple of the Jaguar rose up to an impressive height, the worn steps steep and crumbling, an invitation to only those sure of step and balance. I did not dare to climb it; the idea of breaking my neck or back, or any other bodily part, was enough to stay my curiosity. While others from the group took their lives into their own hands, I was content to wander the grounds.

I made my way to the edge of the plaza clearing, thinking I might catch sight of a Toucan or a Parrot, when, to my immense excitement, I came across a huge hole in the ground, probably about 30 feet in diameter. There was nobody else around. It was not marked in any way. Throwing caution (and good sense) to the wind, I edged my way over to peer into the pit. A long ladder led down into the depths, probably about 20 or 25 feet deep. Well, as you can imagine, I really just had to see what was down there. There was no question. The possibility that it could be filled with deadly Pit Vipers or some similarly lethal reptiles didn’t even cross my mind, nor did I consider that nobody knew where I was. If something should happen to me, I would be on my own.

The air at the bottom of the dark pit was cool and rather refreshing after the long hike. I had my video camera with me, and I started recording as I slowly turned around, looking to find what they might be trying to unearth. Seconds later, I saw it, an absolutely breathtaking sight. A huge Mayan mask looked blindly back at me from the wall. It had obviously been newly excavated; it was at least 12 ft. high and almost as wide.

Seeing the massive, carved face that had not been seen by anyone else except the archeologists who had unearthed it took my breath away. In the back of my mind, from far away, I could hear my name being called. The guide had come back to look for me, fearing that I’d become lost in the jungle. I yelled up to him and thankfully he heard me so they didn’t have to send out a search party. As he gazed down at me from the ledge above, I told him how incredible it felt to see this new dig. He was delighted at my excitement and interest, and climbed down the ladder to join me. He said he had taken part in the excavation, so he understood how incredible this sight was for a tourist.

That’s when he asked if I’d like to see something else even more amazing. Of course, I said yes. He led me across the large floor of the pit, where, suddenly, a significant crack in the wall was revealed. It was just wide enough for us to walk in. “You must see this!” he said. “It is something you will never forget! But we must enter this passage to see it. Are you game?” Now, I am extremely claustrophobic, but there was no way I was going to pass this up. He asked if the battery on my video camera was good, as it would be the only light once we went inside. I shrugged off my goosebumps and nodded. I really had no idea how much longer the battery on my camera was good for, but I needed to see whatever this amazing thing was! We entered the narrow crevice. My breathing became shallow and restricted with fear as we inched forward, keeping my eyes fixed on the white light of the camera ahead of us.

We were about 10 or 15 feet into the passage when it took a sudden curve and narrowed even further. I could not put my arms out sideways, and I felt my elbows touching the cool, damp walls. I shuddered, just about to let loose a scream, when, without warning, the crack opened into a large cavern, even bigger than the pit we had just been in. I guessed it must be about 30 feet in diameter. Even with the video light, the complete Cimmerian shade this far underground had a smothering, tangible feel to it, dark, heavy. I felt myself compressing, my lungs struggling with the weight of the pitch-black. I was sure the guide could hear my heart pounding, banging, pushing outward from my chest. He must have sensed my rising panic because he gently grasped my hand and pointed the light to the far wall of the cavern, about 20 feet away. Instantly, my fear was forgotten. I let out a sharp breath. An immense carved face filled one wall from the floor to the ceiling. It was likely that no other humans, except the handful of archeologists, had laid eyes on this face since the Mayans themselves created this wonder. The moment felt insanely special.

As I stared at the incredible sight, my eyes caught sight of movement along the black surface of the cavern. Then I heard a distinct fluttering and a sense that we were not alone. I looked up. Way up. The cave was absolutely filled with the sinewy, restless movement of hundreds of bats. They moved about, making soft, high-pitched squeals, not happy about having their habitat so rudely invaded. I could feel my guide’s anxiety at how I would react; I imagine many people would not be thrilled to be in a dark cave with a few hundred bats hanging above them, but me??? I have always been fascinated by them, so seeing them here, in this sacred space, was the icing on the “cave cake”! I could feel his relief as I just said: “Wow! How absolutely amazing!”

This adventure was almost 30 years ago, and I still recall almost every moment of this day I spent in Guatemala. Such is the power of travel!

Please come by to read Part 3 - Ambergrise Caye, Belize and Lamanai, Belize

The child stood inside the warmth of the house, gazing through the window to the driveway. She couldn’t see much; the single-paned windows couldn’t handle the bitter cold that had settled over Ottawa, the hoarfrost settling over the glass not only on the outside, but on the inside as well. Sighing impatiently, she leaned close to the glass and blew on her chosen spot, then, as the ice began to melt, pressed her hand into the slowly widening sphere, wincing as her fingers began to numb, yet still she watched and waited for her daddy to come home from work.

The spot on the window was thawing faster now; she pressed her forehead against the rimy layer, imagining her brain turning white and frozen, absorbing the icy mass. It was still snowing, thick, white blossoms dancing in the air, suddenly coming down harder; a sudden, angry squall picking up the flakes, blasting them sideways, forming a restless white wall that obscured her view. She would wait, she always did, watching for the first sight of Daddy’s big Thunderbird pulling into the driveway. It made her heart happy every night as she ran to meet him at the back door, where he would put down his lunch bucket and lift her up high for a hug, she, inhaling the faint scent of Aqua Velva and Brylcream, giggling happily. It was a routine rarely missed.

Tonight, though, she was extra anxious to see him, because she knew that it was almost time for them to make their annual Christmas Tree Trek. Daddy knew of a special forest, where the Christmas Trees grew thick and tall, with lofty boughs reaching for the sky, as if competing with each other to be seen, perhaps to be chosen as a family’s beloved Christmas Tree. Daddy said the trees in this forest had special souls that made them magical. Tomorrow was the much-prized “Weekend” and she desperately hoped it would be the day to find their Magic Tree.

The child knew that soon it would be Christmas; the days were growing shorter and shorter, the sun barely rising above a sullen horizon, a pale and milky orb that offered no warmth, the moon following closely behind, ushering in cold, clear nights, where stars glittered like astral gems, scattered across the black velvet cape of night.

Despite the bitter cold and the gloom of long nights, Christmas was a joyous occasion for the child, a time full of shining ornaments, and glittering, silver tinsel covering everything in the house; a time of singing Silent Night and The Little Drummer Boy, a time of looking through the colourful, glossy pages of the Sears Catalogue, hoping Santa would think she had been a good enough girl to bring her the dolls and toys she had put on her list.

It was a time of helping Daddy to hang the fuzzy blue, silver and white garlands from the ceilings; sometimes, he would let her stand on the dining room table with him, she, handing him pieces of tape and tinsel, always more tinsel. Even Mommy didn’t chide him for allowing her to stand on the table at Christmas. Room by room they would work their way around the house; she would giggle as he would place mistletoe in every doorway, this always made him smile. It was a time when Daddy would fashion an ornate Creche out of aluminum foil, where it would be placed inside the fireplace, cleaned and scrubbed to welcome the timeless scene. Once it was completed, it was beautiful, a stable of gleaming foil, with a special place for Baby Jesus and Mary, with layers built around and up the sides, forming a charming tableau where the Three Wise Men would stand, looking down with their offerings. Straw would be placed around the cradle where donkeys, cows, and horses would be gently placed, keeping Mary and the Baby Jesus warm.

It was a time of helping Mommy roll out the thick, squishy dough to make her delicious French Canadian Tourtiere pies, of sipping rich hot chocolate with sticky, sweet marshmallows bobbing on top. It was a time of baking with grandma, her kind eyes sparkling with love as the tummy-grumbling aroma of gingerbread men and melty shortbread cookies (with extra for Santa, of course) filled the house.

Most of all, Christmas was a time to lie quietly on her back, way under the magical Christmas Tree that she and Daddy had chosen, believing nobody could see her in this sacred space. It was a time of looking up, way up, into that enchanted, glistening, secret tree-world where time stopped, watching her face reflected in the bright gloss of a golden yellow Christmas ball, her eyes and nose distorted like in a fun-house mirror.

It was a time to breathe deeply, in…. out….. in….. out…. the glorious nose-tickling scent of pine-needles permeating her soul, a scent she would never, ever forget, an exquisite aroma that fused with and became a part of her olfactory senses, forming a memory that would last the rest of her life.

In memory of my loving parents, this was This Child’s Christmas.

I was once someone completely different. There were two significant events that changed me from the “old me” to the person I am now. Like the rest of the world, the COVID Pandemic in 2020 ripped the fabric of our world asunder, and even more personally terrifying, my diagnosis of inoperable ovarian cancer in 2024.

Back in 2011, I was relatively healthy. I had been dealing with severe, chronic Ulcerative Colitis since 1984, but after surgery, and with a new medication regime, I’d finally learned how to live with it - for the most part. My husband of 17 years and I were greatly enjoying a shared passion for travelling the world. But let’s start at the beginning, many years before, when we met in 1992.

Both of us were newly divorced, and for many years we had both been with a spouse who had no interest in traveling. So, on our second or third date, when we discovered that exploring the world was something we both longed to do, it was like we’d suddenly been given angel wings. Within the first few months of dating, we took off into the skies, our souls liberated and joyful. Our first trips were tentative and easily planned, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Barbados, Anguilla, St. Barth’s, Jamaica, Cuba, and Mexico. We were thrilled with the excitement of seeing new places together and learning about different cultures.

From left to right, top to bottom: Jamaica Inn (Jamaica), Shoal Bay (Anguilla), St. Barth preparing to land, Playa del Carmen (Mexico), Havana (Cuba), White Bay Beach (Jost Van Dyke), White Bay Beach, (Jost Van Dyke), New Orleans (USA), Havana (Cuba)

While we were in Playa del Carmen, Mexico we came upon a travel agency offering irresistibly cheap flights to Havana, Cuba. Who could say no to that? We booked Hotel Ambos Mundos, most famous for being Hemingway’s favorite place to stay and write. Flying on Cubana Airlines was not for the faint of heart; the plane was ancient, and everything rattled, including the seats, which were not properly bolted down. I had to tie my seatbelt around my waist as the mechanism was broken, and we hung on for dear life as the plane creaked, rattled, and rolled down the runway. I honestly didn’t think we would make it up into the air. But we did, white knuckles and all; we landed safely, all sweaty and excited, and stepped off the plane into a different world.

As we exited the terminal, my eyes widened as I took in the surroundings. The airport parking lot looked like a patchwork quilt of pink, baby blue, sunshine yellow, red - all colors of the rainbow, as vintage American cars arrived, picking up family and friends. It seemed that most of the passengers had gone abroad to purchase items they could not get on the island. Huge parcels were being stuffed into the trunks of behemoth Buicks, immense Oldsmobiles, chunky Chevrolet’s and rumbling Fords, all belching thick fumes of leaded gas. From microwave ovens and flat screen TV’s, to computers and air conditioners, no matter what it was, it all seemed to fit into these massive vehicles.

Many of the cars had been cobbled together with parts from junkyards, so the front and back doors on one side would be red, the rest of the car green. Some had black hoods and yellow trunks. You never really knew what combination you were going to see next!

As we boarded the bus to our hotel, I caught my first sight of a Cuban Truck Bus, a common sight in Havana, another way this country, so rich in culture and beauty, has been brought to it’s knees by the long-standing American embargo it has been subject to. They use every tool in their toolkits to keep their country functioning, but the people have very, very little to celebrate. It made me sad at the time, and all these years later, it still does. Watching locals line up every day to get their daily ration of bread made me feel sick, especially being there as a tourist. I can imagine how I would feel, watching well-dressed tourists arrive, spending hundreds of dollars to stay in a hotel that I must work in, in order to pay my bills.

We spent our evenings drinking Havana Club rum in the vibrant Plaza, under the gaze of the glorious “Catedral de la Purísima Concepción de María”. Live Cuban bands played every evening, seemingly on every street corner, competing for attention and hoping for some spare change from tourists. Small children darted around tables under the watchful eyes of parents and grandparents, grinning at us with shy smiles. Locals danced to the seductive rhythms; their hips and feet shaking to the Mamba and Salsa beats, faces intense with the emotion of the music and the night. Beautiful girls wandered through the square selling Cuban Cigars from a large tray hanging from their necks. We gave in to the desire to do something we normally wouldn’t, and, moments later, we were lighting up long, strong Cohibas, the fragrance searing these memories deep into my heart and soul.

This is the end of The Other Me: Part 1

Please continue reading: The Other Me: Part 2

I’m sure most of you out there have come across more than one person in life who takes great pride in being ruthlessly honest. I, myself, have met many, in fact, one of them is my husband. Happily, though, the only person he is ruthlessly honest with is me; he doesn’t go about criticizing strangers to their face. We’ve been together over 32 years, so it is obvious I’ve made peace with his sometimes painful observations, and over the years, he has learned to take the edge off his feedback. Like most people who embrace this practice, though, he takes pride in being frank. Occasionally, he observes the adage: “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all”, however, silence can say a thousand words, most of them not complimentary.

I feel lucky that, thanks to the wisdom of my mother, I was able to develop a particularly thick skin. She taught me early on that the opinions of others really don’t matter much in the grand scheme of things. She taught me to be myself, not who someone else thought I should be (except if it was her:). This is not to say that the negative or nasty comments we all suffer from over the years didn’t hurt me. They did. But they didn’t annihilate me, or cause me to sink into the despair that many do when they have been on the receiving end of unkindness.

My mom never wanted to raise a vain daughter; that was very important to her. She was never demeaning to me, but she never built me up to think I was better, prettier or smarter than others. Her methods worked well for me, and by the time I graduated high school, I was self-confident (for the most part!) yet able to be humble in the unpretentious sense, something that has served me well over the years in many relationships. And while I have often wished my husband didn’t insist on being ruthlessly honest all the time, I have learned to let him own his personal opinion and not let it be mine. The upside of this is that when he does tell me something complimentary, I know he absolutely means it, and it comes from his heart.

There is an argument to be made that most people who insist on sharing their unwelcome opinions with anyone and everyone come by this trait because they were raised this way. Case in point - my mother-in-law, whom I knew for only about one year before she passed away from cancer, was one such person. Before I met her for the first time, my husband shared that she was quite insular and never had any friends that he knew of. It didn’t take me long to realize why. Upon meeting me for the first time, she said: “Well, good luck to you. He’s had many relationships. You won’t last long”. If she were around now, she would have to eat her words; we’ve been married for 31 years.

Another caustic observation of hers came a few months into our relationship when I decided to try another “look” and bleached my auburn locks platinum. Yes, it was a big change, and yes, it did “wash me out” a little, with my fair complexion, however, I didn’t ask her for, nor did I care to hear, her opinion. “That looks dreadful on you. What did you do that for?” I just smiled and said I liked to explore different looks, and left it at that. Someone else, though, may have been crushed by this type of criticism. There was no mystery as to why she could boast of having exactly zero friendships and ended up being very sad and lonely in the years before her death.

The people who embrace this trait are, without fail, astonishingly proud of their “honesty”. Case in point: my Auntie Dot. “I say it like it is!” she would boast. “You’ll always know where I stand. I don’t sugarcoat anything!” No, you never did, Auntie. You never did. Neither were you seen as a nice person, nor someone that anyone wanted to be around. Those around you would be waiting, worrying what sort of flaw might catch your eye, and whether you would bring it up in front of family and friends.

I always wondered, though, why would my mother-in-law, or my Auntie, or any of the people with this personality trait - why would they think that their opinion was welcome at all? How could they believe their thoughts were important, so paramount, that people were just waiting to hear their incredible observations? How much vanity must one have to think to themselves: “She absolutely needs to hear my Very Important Opinion that she looks hideous in that colour, as does everyone around her”.

In thinking about this subject, and I have thought about it a lot over the years, there appear to be two different kinds of cruel honesty. The first one I call “Narcissistic Honesty”. These people tend to believe the world actually does revolve around them and their opinions. I will use the example of my mother-in-law here. She had no ulterior motive when she said something mean to me. There was no big thought process where she calculated the result of her words would have a desired effect - for example: “I’ll tell her she looks hideous and then maybe she will be so embarrassed she will never date my son again”. This kind of conversation was not taking place in her head. Narcissistic Honesty was simple for her - and is for others who fall into this category. She looked at me, didn’t like what she saw, and told me. Voila! “For better or worse, now she knows what I think”. Whether I would be devastated or not simply did not come into the conversation in her head before she blurted out the nastiness. There was no thought as to how I might feel, or how her son might feel at having his new girlfriend embarrassed in front of him.

The other kind of Cruel Honesty is the kind practiced by bullies. I call it “Toxic Honesty”. This particular brand is truly cold, calculated, targeted and enjoyed immensely by the individuals who appear to feel a rush of joy or satisfaction when hurting someone with words. They search for any kind of discernible flaw or weakness, then sharpen their tongues with relish.

As long ago as Grade 1, when I was a chubby-cheeked little girl with a gap between her front teeth and a last name of “LaBelle”, I was target practice for the “Toxic Truth Sayers”, the nasty bullies, the mean-spirited. I was frequently told that my cheeks made me look like a chipmunk. They would puff up their cheeks and pretend to be eating peanuts, causing hysterical laughter all around. Others made fun of the gap between my front teeth and called me a beaver. Others told me my eyes were too big. My last name, LaBelle, which actually means “The Beautiful” in the French language, was a lightning rod for children. I was often called “Debbie La Ding-Dong”, or “La Belle Fermier” - a French Canadian brand of tourtiere pies that were a common staple in Ontarian kitchens when I was a kid. In those early days, I hadn’t yet built up my armour, and my self-esteem hadn’t yet kicked in. So many times I would cry on the school bus ride home, sobbing as I rushed into my mom’s arms. I was a pretty sensitive little girl. Thankfully, Mom realized this early enough to equip me with some tricks on how to deal with school bullies. Her method worked so well that I have even used it occasionally as an adult in the workplace. It’s very subtle, and if you can get over being intentionally mean to someone, which for many of us is extremely hard to do, it works like a charm.

Instead of just running away or crying after they say something mean, Mom said, find something, even if you have to make it up, that you can use to criticize them. I was completely flummoxed when she said this. Was I really being told to lie? To be mean? Well, my mom said, this is the only foolproof way to stop cruel people in their tracks. And, mom said, I would probably only ever have to do it to them once. Having the tables turned causes a lot of damage to them; because of their toxic and bullying personalities, it is highly unlikely that anyone would have ever given them a taste of their own medicine. There’s something else about people who demonstrate Toxic Cruelty. They don’t have much self-esteem themselves - that’s why they pick on others. They are not able to take personal criticism, even though they can dish it out in spades. In fact, they will perseverate and replay your comments in their head for days or weeks, wondering, worrying if what you said was true. And they will not risk inviting another encounter with you, because their ego is so frail that they cannot risk hearing what else you might say.

Soon after my mother instructed me on how to deal with the next episode of Toxic Cruelty, one of the nastiest kids, the one who made a practice of teasing me about my chipmunk cheeks, took another swipe at me. “How many peanuts do you have stuffed in your cheeks?” she laughed, staring pointedly at me and then laughing hilariously at her cleverness. For a moment, I was poised to run away. Then, I remembered what mom said. I took a breath. I didn’t back away or start to cry. I just stared at her, looking at all her features carefully. I took my time. I wanted to get this right.

To be honest, she was a very pretty girl, and it was going to be hard for me to find something to criticize. Then I remembered the rest of what mom said: “If you have to, make something up”. So I took a deep breath and said it quietly, my first intentional, nasty lie. I said it almost like I’d just made an incredible discovery that very moment. “Oh my!” I said. “Do you know that you have one eye higher than the other?”

That’s all it took. The look on her face was utmost surprise, like I’d just hit her on the head with a dead fish. She had no words to counter with. Her mouth opened and closed once…. twice… and then stayed closed. I have to admit that although I felt very proud of myself, I also felt a little bad. I mean, I might have chipmunk cheeks, but I’m just a kid and my face will mature. I might have a gap between my front teeth, but I can always go to a dentist and have it fixed. But one eye higher than the other? Well. Oh oh. That doesn’t sound fixable.

To this day, I often wonder if the adult version of that little girl ever looks in the mirror and believes she has one eye higher than the other. Perhaps she learned a lesson that day. Perhaps not. But the truth is, she never again said anything to me about my appearance. I’ve only ever had to use this a few times since those childhood days, but I swear it works like magic. I like to think maybe I helped to teach these people a lesson when I slung the bully rock right back at them, but I don’t really believe that. The Toxin Cruelty that is found in bullies runs deep in their veins, saturating their souls in poison. I’m just glad I’m not one of them.

Share The Wistful Neo-Druid

There is nothing like having an unexpected diagnosis of inoperable cancer to stop you in your tracks. While you are stopped in those tracks, your physical body frozen and numbed, your brain begins to do this crazy dance in your head, like those entertaining videos we’ve all seen of cockatoos jumping, flapping, and jittering to their favorite songs. In this case, though, it’s not a happy dance in any way. It’s an “OMG, W T F, what the hell is happening!” uncontrollable freak-out kind of brain dance.

As I wrote in my very first Substack post “The Gift”, the moment you hear the words “You have cancer”, time stops for a moment. There is a pregnant pause. The words hang in your head, dangling back and forth as your grey matter tries to understand these three little words that will change your life forever. You nod calmly, looking for all the world like you’d just been offered a roll with your dinner. A little voice in your head speaks up, tentative and shy. It has a deceptively soothing tone. “Hey! It’s all good! It’s okay. Do Not Panic”. The silence grows as you grapple with the meaning of those words, but you are still smiling at the doctor, or doctors in my case. Their eyes are anxiously searching my face for my delayed reaction (will she cry? will she faint? will she panic?) while they, themselves, are fighting to find the right facial expression of their own. They can’t recall being taught in medical school how you should look when giving someone the absolute worst news of their life. You feel sorry for the doctors, their discomfort palpable as they utter these shocking, somber, sepulchral words to this unsuspecting woman, acidic vowels and caustic consonants splashing through her eardrums, burning and wicked, cutting a fiery path all the way through to her heart and soul.

Next, unbidden, an invisible line divides your brain. On one side is your old life - the one you had oh, about three minutes ago, when you thought you just needed some pills and would then calmly go on with your life. The side that planned and “looked forward”. (How does that work again?) The “one day I will…………” side. The “let’s save up our money to do this” side. Your “Let’s see if we can retire in France, or Italy!” side. Then, although you really, really don’t want to, your brain nudges you insistently over that freshly painted line and Bam! On the other side, your brain is a car that has suddenly hit a wall at full speed. And it’s not a big, safe car that protects you, either. It’s more like…. well, like a Smart Car. Your brain kind of folds in on itself, compressing like an accordion, discordant and jarring in the hands of an annoying child.

Once, when I was a child of about five, I fell off the Monkey Bars in my friend Susie’s backyard. I landed flat on my back, and all of a sudden, the world became dramatically different. There was no air. It was gone. Not one iota of air. I remember staring up at the calm, blue sky above, and all I could hear was a strange gasping sound that I soon realized was being made by me. I felt like a fish on the floor of my dad’s fishing boat, mouth gaping, struggling to stay alive. Time seemed to stand still. I was sure I was going to die. I remember Suzie’s face looking down at me with a worried expression, telling me I would be okay, just try to breathe! Then, miraculously, my next gasp contained oxygen.

Fast forward 58 years, but this time, I’m in a hospital emergency department, being told I have cancer. Hearing those words had the same effect as having all the breath pushed out of your lungs. In the adult playground of life, I’d just fallen off the monkey bars again. I couldn’t breathe. But this time I did not have a friend, or anyone at all, to reassure me; the two young physicians certainly had not yet learned the reassuring “bedside manner” skills that would have been so appreciated at that moment. They both took turns repeating the same words to me, over and over: “We’re so, so sorry”. Neither one was saying: “ You’ll be okay, just try to breathe” like Susie did. They were just really “so very, very sorry” which did nothing to quell the panic coursing through me. I had to talk myself through this one, fighting to catch my breath, get some oxygen back into my lungs.

And then, as I breathed in …… SUCK THE AIR, and breathed out …..PUSH THE AIR, something suddenly occurred to me. I now had my very own “best before” date. Sure, I might still be “okay” for a little longer, heck, I always keep drinking the milk for a few days after that date stamp. But one thing was now for sure. I knew that time would no longer be on my side.

Suddenly, so suddenly, you are a different person. The plans and dreams on the other side of that invisible line in your brain are no longer possible. You can’t go back. Your brain has jumped the line. Now, all it is capable of thinking about is how to tell your husband. Your loved ones. Your friends. How to tell them? How to help your beloved husband/wife/life partner cope not only with what will happen to you, but how they will cope with their very own new, rude reality.

Sometimes I find myself gazing back at the dreams and plans that live on the other side of that line. They tantalize with sweet possibilities that could have been. That small country cottage, nestled in the rolling hills of Tuscany - it’s still there, waiting for us to get back from the afternoon market in Montepulciano, home-made Tiramisu and fresh pastries in hand to have with our after-dinner “Corretto” coffee, the vase on the heavy wooden kitchen table awaiting fresh flowers that will sing with beauty and scent the air with notes of heaven. Our cats languidly await our return on wide windowsills, eyes closed, grooming themselves with lazy intent as late afternoon sunshine filters through the slender, silver-tipped branches of the olive trees, spinning soft petals of yellow into the air, bathing them in a magical, golden light.

Share The Wistful Neo-Druid

Before I continue, I need to share that I have sometimes been described as a bit of an airhead (is that even still a term people use these days?) I consider it fair to say that I sometimes (perhaps, often) have a problem staying focused on a job at hand. The only exceptions I can think of are when I am eating chocolate or lobster, which I concentrate on fully and consume with great gusto. But give me a job that is at all repetitive, boring or habitual and my mind will start to wander all over the map. The fact that I have not cut any fingers off when slicing up veggies, or walked out in front of a bus while on my way to work, is truly a matter of simple good luck.

And while the following details are not themselves important to my story, I want to share them in order to establish my mind-set and the circumstances surrounding my scare.

My neighbour, Anita, has gone to Hawaii for two weeks, and I am looking after her cat, Neveah, at her house while she is away. It’s something I’ve done any number of times over the past few years. It’s a lovely arrangement because Anita reciprocates when we go on vacation, coming by to feed and visit with Gucci and Fendi. She sends me nice pictures of the boys while she is here, which makes us feel a little less lonely, and yes, a little less guilty about leaving them behind. Although I would like to reciprocate Anita’s kindness and send some happy cat pics to her in Hawaii, sadly, it is impossible. I have never actually laid eyes on Neveah. She is a rescue cat of indeterminate age who is terrified of anybody except Anita and her family. Indeed, the only way I know she exists is because she consumes the food and treats I leave for her every day.

So, yesterday I told my husband I was heading over to feed the invisible cat. As usual, all I took with me was Anita’s house key, which is attached to a large grey luggage tag that says “American Tourister” on it, and my iPhone. I left our front door unlocked as my husband was home, so I didn’t need to bring along my house key (which is attached to a thick black car-fob). Pay attention, as this is an important detail of this story.

The key to her front door slid effortlessly into place, thanks to a helping of WD 40 in the lock the last time I fur-sat. I always call out to Neveah as I open the door, so she isn’t frightened by the noise of a stranger in the house. I always coax her to come, but she never does. The only indication that she is in the house and okay is that her dry kibbles are almost all gone, and any remnants of her wet food are caked on the sides of the bowl. I occasionally leave some of her toys in weird places so I can tell if she is playing with them, but usually they are exactly where I leave them, which makes me a bit sad. I can only imagine how lonely she must feel, but trying to hunt her down or get her out from under one of the beds would be so traumatizing to her I wouldn’t even consider doing this.

So I did the usual routine, talking loudly to her in what I hope is a soothing voice, filling her bowls and refreshing her water, then heading down to clean the litter box. We are having a hot spell right now, so I decided I should water a few of the hanging baskets outside with a watering can I found at the front door. As I left, I decided I would probably need to water again tomorrow, so I refilled the watering can and left it just inside the front door. I grabbed my phone and the front door key, turning it in the lock. Then I tested the door, pushing on it to make sure it actually was locked. I have a bit of an obsessive-compulsive issue relating to doors because a few years ago I accidentally left the front door to our townhouse unlocked as we left on a two-week vacation. When we came home and went to unlock the door, we realized it had been left unlocked. Sheer momentary panic consumed us as we both raced around the house to see if our computers, laptops, tablets, TVs etc. were still there. As it turned out, everything was fine. We were lucky that we hadn’t been robbed or vandalized. However, the fact that I did this once has remained painfully present in my brain, hence the OCD. So now, trying the door after I lock it is a method I use all the time - the action, the sound the door makes as I try to open it, helps it stay fresh and secure in my mind. So, with the door tested and the large grey luggage tag and key tucked into my pocket with my cell phone, I headed home - only about 200 feet from my own house.

This is where it gets weird. As I approached our house, I noticed our garage door was open and my husband inside sorting through some boxes. I remember thinking, should I go into the house through the garage, or should I go up the front steps so I could deposit Anita’s house key safely into the key box we keep inside the front door . I always worry that I will misplace her key, leading to my having to break into her house through a window at risk of poor Neveah starving to death. I distinctly remember my thought process; talking to Steve, asking him what he was doing, and deciding to go in through the garage. As I entered the garage I pulled my iPhone out of my pocket, then told my husband I was going to go and put away the key to Anita’s house. So, I stepped inside the house, reaching again into my pocket to grab the big grey luggage tag. What was in my pocket, though, was not Anita’s house key. It was my black car fob with my house key attached. The one I had left at home in the box before I went over to Anita’s. I stopped in my tracks. I checked my other pocket. Nope. No other keys. Just mine. “That’s strange!” I said to Steve. “Did I give you the key to Anita’s house just now, when I came in?” I asked. “No” he said, looking at me strangely. “Are you sure?” I asked, perplexed. “What did I do with it?! It’s not in my pocket. I only have our our house key. I just came back from her place and locked the door with her key. But I don’t have her key. Just ours!”

“Are you all right?” Steve asked, concern in his voice.

“Well, I don’t know!” I said in irritation. “Something’s not right! I don’t have the key to her house! I just had it when I left her place five minutes ago!” I began searching the floor of the garage, the tops of boxes, the top of the freezer we keep in the garage. Nothing.

“Maybe you left it in the door”, Steve said. That must be it! It must be there, hanging on the door!

I raced back over to her place and looked. Nope. No big grey plastic tag hanging from the door. I looked on the front steps and then retraced my path back to my house. Nothing.

“Oh my God!” I said to Steve in a panic. “I’ve lost her house key! How can that be? I was just there! I was being so careful! I checked her door and it was locked. So I couldn’t have left it inside!”

Steve was quite worried about me now. “Are you feeling okay?” he asked. I searched his face for a trace of sarcasm, but there was none. “I feel fine, except I don’t know what’s going on!” I was almost shrieking. “How can I have lost the key!”

Steve disappeared for a moment, and when he returned he had the big grey luggage tag in his hand. “Where was it!?” I shrieked. “In the key box at the front door” he said calmly. “You must have gone in through the front door first and then come out to the garage”.

“Why would I take put her key in the box and take out our house key and fob and put it in my pocket?” I said. “W T F! What is happening! How could this be? I remember making the decision to go into the house through the garage since you were out there!” I was beside myself with confusion and irritation. “Why would I take our house key when both the garage door and the entrance door to our house from the garage were both open”? Steve did not have an answer. None of this made any sense. I felt kind of sick to my stomach, to be honest. Now I was fearful that I had suffered some kind of fugue state.

I grabbed Anita’s house key from Steve and ran back over to her house again. I was having extreme panic-brain. I had to be sure that I had actually been there, that I had actually fed Neveah. I was scared for myself. I ran up the steps, opened the door, and there was the watering can sitting inside, waiting for my next visit. A wave of relief swept over me… that was a good sign. But - what had happened between the time I left her house and then found the key to MY house in my pocket and not the key to HER house?

Steve and I talked about this after I’d calmed down a bit. My mom died of Alzheimer’s and Steve asked me if something like this could be an early sign of dementia. Perhaps? I don’t know! Maybe it could be.

But I prefer the theory that there had been a warp in the space-time continuum. That’s much more interesting and dramatic that having early onset Alzheimer’s. Or perhaps I somehow went into a strange sort of sleep-walking state and switched the keys in my pocket. Was it some weird “Back to the Future” scenario and someone placed the wrong key into my pocket as they tried desperately to change the outcome of a previous life? Who knows! I just wish I could figure it out because I keep replaying the whole thing in my mind trying to make sense of it. But the reality is - I won’t ever know what happened here and I’ll have to let it go………

Damn!

Have you ever had an experience like this, one that defies explanation? If so, let me know in the comments!! Perhaps it will make me feel better, lolol!