Tap dancing Batman, Spiderman, Cat Woman, Wonder Woman, etc.

Today, I went to the dance recital for the lovely daughter of some friends of mine.  It was a long recital--almost 4 hours (with a break).  Anyway, it was delightful.  It started with 4 year old dancing bumble bees (adorable), and went through many different ages and styles of dancing.  My friend's daughter was a dog dancing to a very jazzy song (can't remember the title. 

One thing that, for some reason, got me thinking about tap dancing was a wonderful routine danced by young adults dressed in super-hero and super-villain costumes.  It was perfectly danced and I was amazed that Batman could dance so with with a cape.  In the end, the heroes put a rope around the group of villains and they tapped off of the stage to great applause and laughter.
I know that tap dancing wouldn't make everyone dance for joy, but it was a great part of the recital.  Who knows?  Maybe I'll dance as Cat Woman some day.

Music and dance--to someone who sometimes feel she has forgotten how--is so great for the soul.

Bucket list entries 27 and 28

27.  Take a ride in a seaplane.
28.  Take Tap Dancing lessons
29.  Take hip hop (looks a little less dangerous than ballet).

Okay, that was 29 on the bucket list.  So many things to do, so little time.

Don't Pick a Fight With Vancouver--You won't Win!

This past week, Vancouver has been beaten up and her spirit challenged.  She has suffered embarrassment and shame at the hands of thugs who bullied her with the excuse of Canuck's loss of the Stanley Cup. Mob mentality took over and tried to destroy Vancouver and everything she stood for.  Vancouver won.  maybe not the Stanley Cup but she won with her strength and beauty.  On Friday, I went downtown.  What I saw were boards filled with loving messages, people talking together who might not have met before.  I know I did!  Last week made me question my fellow humans but also reaffirmed my respect and love for the people of Vancouver!


I went from Georgia Street down Granville and found myself deeply moved.  Only 2 days before, I, like many other Vancouverites, found myself angered and saddened beyond belief.  I felt, after that, that I needed to see Vancouver again  the way I'd always seen her: majestic, busy, crazy, quirky, elegant...etc.  I walked through Stanley Park and found myself snapping pictures of the reasons why Vancouver is so loved.

Numbers 25 and 26 on Bucket List

25.  Learn to sign.
26.  Learn to sign my favourite songs while singing them!

From Surrey to Delta

From Surrey to Delta


By Patti Anne White
February 19, 2011


Friday night

6:30

I'm bouncing along in the little shuttle bus,

Which threatens to shuttle my ass and brains through the roof

With every little bump.



From Surrey to Delta Part 2



Apart from the jiggly ride,

I look out, tonight,

At the silhouette of the mountains, and the ocean of sky above it,

Islands of light cloud lit up by the lowering sun.

Wondering What's Beyond across the horizon? (or bookshelf).

If anyone had told me two years ago that I would be feeling the joy of living again, I would've been either really pissed off at you or burst into tears. Now, I'm discovering and re-discovering, singing with less inhibition, and realizing, once again, how much I love learning.

I was shelving books the other day at the Surrey campus of Kwantlen University when I thought, "darn, why do I have so many interests?"  It's a good thing to have lots of interests, but, like a child, everytime I went to a different area in the stacks, it may as well have been a candy store.  As I was at work, I couldn't read the books, just shelve and shift them, but I couldn't wait for my first research assignment since starting university to take out materials that would help me with that research.  Now what topic?  Hmmm. 

Bucket List! Numbers 22 and 23 and 24!

22.  Learn to dance the flamenco
23.  Learn to speak Spanish!
24.  Learn to roll the "rrrr's"!

Journeys

It occurred to me today, the way it has occurred to me many times before: I'm alive and am having to take two journeys at the same time.  One journey is one that I Never would have chosen, that of widowhood.  The other is, maybe because of the first one, the journey I can choose where it takes me! Some people in my life had said that it's all about me now.  Frankly, that terrified me!  I love caring for others and I'm used to making one person my soul focus as I had for almost twenty years.  It's all about me. When I look at my bucket list, I realize that some of them weren't easy to list.  They seemed impossible, but I think, maybe that's why I put them there.  I like the challenge of making many of those on the list part of my journey and very much possible!

Days Like This

It's days like this,

       Where the grey of the sky matches the cold gray of the ocean water,
       Where the rain mixes with snow after the sun comes out, briefly promising a new day,
       Where a heart, not ready for the season, wants to shut out the too-early Christmas music,
        and the ho, ho, ho's of the mall Santa making me want to hide.

It's days like this,

        Where the moods of those around can't be shut out,
        Where the self-importance of a few people who earn more than I do,
               can seem to knock me below ground,
      
       That I have to work harder at seeing the blue in the sky,
       The green of the grass and plant life still breathing, and the promise of goals met.

       That I need to look harder into myself to say "Are those people that important?"
       That I have goals and, as hard as it is some days, I will achieve them!




     

Bucket List : Numbers 14 to 21.

14.  Drive a tractor on a farm.
15.  Visit Northern Ireland where my Great Grandmother, Annie Harbottle, was born.
16.  Visit Carrington, North Dakota, where my Grandmother, Violet Hughes, was born.
17.  Go skiing at Whistler (I've skiied before, but never at Whistler).
18. Work as a Library Tech at a library for longer than 3 years.
19. Complete Degree requirements, get BA and then MLIS (even if I'm 80 when I'm done!)
20. Live on a houseboat.
21. Ride a canal boat through Britain and Europe (doesn't have to be fancy, just floats well).

Bucket List : Numbers 11, 12, and 13.

I've always wanted to go back to Zambia (or anywhere in Africa) so:

11.  Volunteer at an orphanage.
12. Take a safari.
13.  Place flowers on the grave of my foster sister, Ruth Nakazwe.

Bucket List 6-10

6. Get over my fear of snakes by staying in Australia or any of the countries in earlier postings.
7. Get more singing lessons.
8. Ride in a hot air balloon.
9. Hike the Chilkoot Trail in the Yukon up to Dawson City.
10. Sing in a nightclub.

Count on it, I'll be coming up with more.
11-15 coming up tomorrow.

Bucket List

I do not plan to kick the bucket anyday soon, but I have constructed a list of all things (so far) that I want to achieve or try in my life.  I sometimes get diverted but it's always there in the back of my mind.  Here they are, as I said, so far:

1. Ride a camel.
2. Ride a horse (I have ridden a horse...I just want to ride more often).
3. Stay in a yurt for a few weeks and write about what's like.
4. Cut a cd.  (If Susan Boyle can do it, so can I).
5. Ride an elephant (in India or Africa).


I have many others, but I have to go get ready for a dinner party.  Stay tuned!

Open Your Eyes

I'm still haunted by it.  The sound of voices all over the ICU ward, "Open your eyes, Jason!", "Open your eyes, George" and etc.  I also wanted your eyes to open but who could know the peace that lay behind your closed lids.  I hope it was peace.  After your body became exhausted by it's convulsions, your new heart valve beating strong, you were no longer the man with his bright eyes and beautiful smile.  You left me on Saturday although your body quit on Easter Monday.

I promised I'd move on, as hard as it was.  I was hoping you'd open your eyes and say, "Kidding!"  It would be a sick joke in many ways, but at least you'd still be with me. 

I see beauty all around me, the gorgeous green and blue of the ocean, bald eagles, rabbits and racoons.  I'm finally opening my eyes to beauty instead of keeping them closed, protecting myself against the reality you are no longer there.  You once wondered in anger, "do I make any difference to you?"  Oh, yes, you do and did.  My shell, which was tough and determined to stay on, is coming off and I'm seeing the sun again and it feels warm.

Signs of the Future (title for now)

I was exhausted...but not in a bad way.  I had just came from a workshop called "Learning for Life: Web-based Skill-Building Modules".  It was a job skills workshop that left me both exhausted.and exhilherated!

Most of the workshops that I have or will go to have two times: one, for the deaf and one, (in the afternoon) for the hard of hearing.  That afternoon, the facilitator signed the whole workshop and an interpreter was on hand to interpret Karen's spirited signing and for those of us (only two) who were hard of hearing and didn't understand ASL (American Sign Language).  That will be yet another course I want to take and am already trying (when I can) to practice some of it.

Was there silence in that little room?  Oh, no!  It was actually pretty noisy and exciting.  When you get six people signing all at once(including the interpreter), it's very noisy!  Donna also signed anything I or Joanna wanted to ask or say. 

I looked back and forth between Karen and Donna, trying, alternatively, to listen to Karen and to read Donna's lips.

I'd been to many employment skills workshops since my youth, but nothing, nothing, came close to today's feeling of wanting to be prepared for work.  I felt validated, hearing the stories of other people's struggles with employment; for instance, bosses that don't want to take the time or trouble to listen a little longer or provide what could help the employee perform their job better.  It was also good to hear that I wasn't the only one, where people just assumed I could read lips.  I do better than I used to, but I still have a ways to go and need to ask repeatedly what people say.  Some say "just talking to myself" or "never mind."  They don't help with communication.  I really want to hear what people say.

I still have over a week of more workshops and look forward to them all!  It is so empowering to be around so many great people with different ranges of hearing loss.  The facilitator can drive!  I know, I shouldn't be surprised, but one of the reasons I've held off on getting my license is my inabiltiy to hear some sounds behind me.  If Karen can do it, so can I!

Kitsilano High

I am at Arbutus Coffee on Arbutus and West 6th.  I'm sitting on a bench at a wobbly table outside the coffee house.

I'm trying not to get a free high from the fellow around the corner smoking weed.  Luckily, he is away from the main entrance of the coffee house.  Because I am going, in an hour, to the Western Institute for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, I don't want to be even slightly stoned.  That stuff is pretty potent--I still smell it. 

My table is right across the street from another old building, probably a store in the original incarnation, now set up as apartments. It has bay windows and has been maintained well by whoever owns it with great respect for the time it was built. 

Talk about a high--I"m looking at a side of Arbutus with a long row of cottage-style old homes, mature trees, and a pinscher cross, who trots happily towards me even though he is on a leash.  He becomes a friendly companion for a short time and I pet him, his intelligent eyes looking up at me.

There are modern apartment buildings in this area as well, but they do not grab my imagination or yearning.  Then again, anything to someday live here, sitting outside a coffee house, feeling high without weed.

Renewal on the Water

Sitting on a bench on Kitsilano Beach,

not wanting to move.

I'm afraid of missing something.

I can't be everywhere; I just want to be here...for the moment at least.

The slapping of balls by palms or fists over volleyball nets (several games at once),

Bare feet dancing and hopping in the sand, trying not to let the ball fall.

The salty, fishy smell of the beach and the people not caring what time or even what day it is.

I don't want to leave this haven in the city, where a young man pulls out his guitar, adding to the music of the sea.

Container ships wait in the bay, companions to the smaller boats --- sailboats, kayaks, and water taxis, and...unfortunately, power boats that scar the smoothness of the water.

Thankfully, I can't hear the ugly, macho-driven speed monsters.

Luckily, the sound of guitar strumming, chatter of power-walkers, and laughter of children are drowning it out!

Walking on Water or Flying?

I cannot truly say what attracts me to this picture. Is it the young man's body as he seems to effortlessly fly across the water?  I watched him for quite a while.  His arms stretched out in different directions, he could almost be a bird in the sky surfing the clouds.  Somehow, he reminds me of the Silver Surfer I'm sure I've seen in some comic books.  He seems like he's holding the sky and the twinkling water in his control.  While I'd never do it, skimming across the small pools of water seem like walking on water.

Kerrisdale

I'm looking down West 41st, once again accompanied by the memory of my favourite travel companion, Jason.  No, he's not really here and I truly hope he's at peace. 

At different times over many Christmas and summer holidays spent in Vancouver, he and I walked, hand in hand, down West 41st enjoying some of the little specialty stores and sidewalk cafes.  We crossed the East and West Boulevards (it's actually Arbutus Street, I think, but, in this area, the signs simply say "West Boulevard" and "East Boulevard").

A long band of green space in the middle divides the boulevards and an unused (at least by a train) track runs down the middle amongst the greenery.  Only children and walkers use this now.  What is it about train tracks that make it irresistable to me and others? 

Going down the streets off the main road, mature trees stand majestically.  I walk by where my sister and her husband once lived while still living in Vancouver.  The street and area is still beautiful with character houses--some being renovated.

As usual, I feel Jason's actual absence, but am determined to enjoy it and dream for the both of us.  I sit outside a cafe, nursing an iced mocha and watch people going back and forth, feeling happy and energized as time goes by. 

A lone feather, at the time I'm writing this has landed on my foot. Vancouver has a great many birds, especially seabirds so I don't react at first, but it's alone.  Who knows?  I remember once Jason told me he wanted to come back as an Eagle!

Fire Clouds in the Sky

I was walking with my mother on Crescent Beach tonight after my math class.  The sky over the ocean as the sun is going down is capable of such change.  No two sunsets I've seen over the water is ever the same.  On the way to the beach, Mum pointed over to the ocean and said that "it looks like the sky is on fire!"  and it did!  Colours of bright red and orange lit up even the sides of houses and cottages almost like a huge fire.

In the sky, I noticed that when the light hits it, actually looks like an ocean above the ocean with waves and ripples.  A pointy orange cloud looked like a volcanic mountain in a distant sea far above the ocean (if that makes any sense).  A whole new world seems to exist every night depending on placement of clouds and sun.