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Tag Archives: Music

The Book Of Thank You ~ Post 7: The Canadian National Exhibition

01 Monday Aug 2016

Posted by duckykoren in Childhood, Education, Entertainment, Family Stories, Father, Grandmothers, Ice Cream, relationships, Rock And Roll, Thanks, Toronto, Tourism, Uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Children, Family, ferris wheel, grandfathers, Grandmothers, grief, midway, Music, Platters, Stories, Toronto, Travel, Writing

 

The month of August always brings thoughts of a family tradition started by my Father in 1966.

That is when we would make our annual visit to the Canadian National Exhibition, or more commonly known to the people of Toronto as the C.N.E.

On the last day of school in late June, every child would be given a free children’s pass to this annual event.

Father was never one to let something free pass him by.

Set in the middle of downtown Toronto and bordering on Lake Ontario, the C.N.E. covers 192 acres of ground filled with a stadium, bandshell, coliseum, midway, fountains, picnic areas and much more.

Using Toronto’s public transportation, Father and I always went on the first Saturday after the grand opening. This usually coincided with the annual grand Scottish Tattoo parades where the sounds of bagpipes could be heard at every turn.

My Father didn’t care for bagpipes, and I remember how he would cover his ears and whisk me off to a quieter venue, a building perhaps, one of the many which would showcase countries from around the world, cars, or home shows.

The food building was a grand concourse featuring kiosks of cuisine from all over the world. I was partial to the corn dogs, while Father always contented himself with a cardboard bowl of spaghetti which cost only twenty-five cents.

Throughout the course of the day we collected free magazines, brochures, samples and souvenirs. By the time we left at the end of the day we would usually have three full bags of treasure to take home. I carried one while Father carried two.

I was allowed to purchase one souvenir of choice which was usually a punching ball, or an invisible dog leash.

The last time that I went to the C.N.E. with my Father was in the early 1990’s.

We brought my two young daughters to share the experience with us.

What I remember the most about that day was when we went to the bandshell where their was a rock and roll revival being held hosted by Bowser from the group SHA-NA-NA. We found a patch of grass to stand and watch. While the Platters were on stage singing their hit UNDER THE BOARDWALK, my daughters and I twirled and danced to the music.

Those were very happy moments.

In 1969, while my Father was away on business, my Grandparents took me for my annual pilgrimage to the C.N.E.

All these years later, it’s hard for me to decide which memories of that day are dearest to me.

Is it the memories of going on the Ferris wheel with my Grandmother?

She handled my rocking the carriage very well. I could be a handful at times.

Shortly after that, as I took another turn on the Ferris wheel alone, she won me an orange stuffed teddy bear. To this day, I think she paid off the carnie just so that she could see the joy on my face as she presented me with a new toy. I named the bear Godfrey.

We were very fortunate that day as our visit to the C.N.E. coincided with the visit of Canada’s current Prime Minister, Pierre Elliot Trudeau, who was there for a cinematic premiere at the Queen Elizabeth building.

My Grandmother and I stood less than ten feet from him as he stood for photographs and welcoming speeches.

At one point, he turned his head left, looked at me and smiled. I smiled back.

Now, my Grandmother has always been of the opinion that the Prime Minister was smiling at her and not me.

Indeed, every time that we found ourselves together in the following thirty-five years we would lovingly spar  with each other over this:

“Trudeau was laughing at me…” she’s say.

“No, he was laughing at me…” I’d respond.

Then we would end the discussion by laughing at ourselves.

One of the last times that I visited the C.N.E. Was in 2005, seven months after my Father had passed away. I brought my two daughters and a good friend.

We made new memories as we walked our way through trapeze artists, upside down rides, tall cups of lemonade, tall ships, log flumes, ice cream, all behind the beautiful backdrop of the Toronto skyline.

It was good to be reacquainted with one of my childhood joys and be able to set aside my lingering grief.

Thank you C.N.E. for those new memories.

May there be many more.

 

 

❤

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 188: Picking Up The Pieces (A.K.A… ‘The Sprawl’)

16 Thursday Jul 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Children, Entertainment, Music, Toys

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Children, Entertainment, Family, Lego, Music, Pink Floyd, Toys

image

Like most children, I had my own collection of Lego. Not a lot, but enough to build a small house and an economy sized car.

I can still remember my Father walking barefoot across the living room. He would suddenly stop with a brief wince. Then, lifting his foot he would reach out his arm and proceed to remove a Lego piece from between his toes. As he handed me the offending Lego piece, the look on his face conveyed one message:

Death to Lego.

By the time that my sister was old enough to play with Lego he had enough practice from picking up stray Lego pieces that he could effortlessly bend the afflicted leg up in front of of him crossways in what looked to me like a ‘plié.’ With the balance and poise of a ballerina, he was able to hold this pose until his fingers plucked the Lego out of his foot.

Once he started having grandchildren he never complained about their Lego being all over his living room rug.

I’m sure that the Lego pieces hurt him just the same when he stepped on them.

I could tell this by his momentary wince.

After that, my Father was all smiles again.

Of course, my own daughters had Lego collections of their own.

You could not walk into my eldest daughter’s bedroom without stepping on one.

The Legos never broke. Instead, they would imbed themselves into your tender flesh. More than once, they have brought tears to my eyes.

By the time my second daughter was old enough for Lego, we had collected enough Lego to fill a shoebox. We also learned the importance of storing them properly and keeping them away from their Mother’s feet.

When my youngest finally outgrew them, I packed the Lego away with a happy sigh.

Never again will I have to deal with these plastic tidbits between my toes.

No more stepping on them.

No more tears.

After twenty years of my floors being…

“Lego free,”

…the time came a little over a month ago when my youngest daughter flew in from Winnipeg, to begin the final preparations to her wedding in September, which she and her fiancée decided will have a Lego theme.

When she showed me some of her plans, I retrieved the pail of Legos, which was stored upstairs.

After my daughter sifted through them, she decided that yes, they would be suitable for her wedding projects.

After packing them them up, she informed me that she was off to visit her prospective new Mother-In-Law, and show off her Lego projects.

Shortly after she left, I got up to head towards the kitchen.

By my third step, I suddenly stopped as my back stiffened. I had just experienced a sharp burst of pain from my underside of my foot. I didn’t have to look, I already knew what the problem was.

Yet another piece of Lego had managed to find it’s way between my toes.

Again.

And at that moment, I could almost hear a child’s voice from somewhere inside my brain telling me….

“They’re ba-aaack!”

In closing, I will leave you with this annoying little sound byte courtesy of Pink Floyd and my love for silly rhymes…

And it goes:

“All in all…

They’re just…

Lego bricks on the sprawl.”

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 174: Carpe Carousel: Seize The Ride

25 Saturday Apr 2015

Posted by duckykoren in disney, Entertainment, History, Movies, Music, Travel

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Carnival, carousel, Lakeside Park, Mary Poppins, Music, Ontario, Port Dahlousie, rush, Walt Disney

image

I’m sure that all of you remember the carousel from the movie ‘Mary Poppins’ starring Julie Andrews.

Some of you probably also know that Canadian rock band Rush’s song ‘Lakeside Park’ is based upon Lakeside Park in Port Dalhousie, a suburb in St. Catharines, Ontario.

What most of you probably don’t know is that the Port Dalhousie carousel which can be found in Lakeside Park was Walt Disney’s first choice for the carousel in his movie Mary Poppins.

Oh…

The serendipitous and random interconnectedness of it all!

However, St. Catharines was not in the position to sell it to him.

Further, this landmark carousel which had been constructed in 1905 was deeded to the city of St. Catharines on the condition that the carousel rides would forevermore continue to be made available to all for the historically original fare of five cents.

To this day, anyone can ride any one of the hand carved sixty-eight animals and four chariots on this carousel for the same cost as it did one hundred years ago.

So, the next time that you find yourself in Ontario Canada’s Niagara region, Be sure to visit this historical amusement ride.

With each ride costing only a nickel, imagine the fun you can have with a whole dollar!

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 170: “Can You Hear Me Major Tom?”

16 Thursday Apr 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Music, NASA, Science, Space, Spaveflight, Travel

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Apollo, Buzz Aldrin, Computers, David Bowie, History, Holiday, Houston, Johnson Space Centre, life, Moon Landing, Music, Nasa, Neil Armstrong, Rock, Space, Space Oddity, Texas, Travel, Ziggy Stardust

image

It was a very hot and muggy August day in Houston Texas when we visited the Johnson Space Centre during a family holiday.

While we were there, my Grandmother and I decided to go on a tour to see the actual NASA mission control room. It seemed only right because I felt like I spent most of my childhood watching mission control during the televised Apollo missions. What I looked forward to the most now was seeing mission control with my own eyes and not through a television screen.

During the tour, we were taken into the press room, where reporters were allowed to sit behind glass and observe mission control as historic events unravelled in real time.

What surprised me most was that mission control is in reality, much smaller than it appears on television. Mission control itself was now very empty and as devoid of life as the lunar surface.

After the historic Apollo moon landing in 1969, mission control, as we know it, became a historical landmark building. This designation prevents any kinds of permanent alterations. It is to forevermore remain as it was the day that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon.

Everything in that room looks exactly the way it did in July 1969. Every coffee cup, ashtray, and original computer casings are all still there.

Believe it or not.

Not being able to change anything posed a very big problem for NASA because the big ancient looking computer boxes which you may remember seeing on television went obsolete forty years ago. They cannot be swapped out.

At least on the outside.

What NASA had to do was constantly install new circuitry inside the archaic green metal boxes to make the computers more practical for those who use them now.

When there is a space mission, only portable televisions and computer screens can be installed so that those scientists who are running the show can watch the missions.

While standing in the press room, I placed both my hands on the glass that separated me from mission control. I was so close to actually being there, and was yet still so far away.

As I continued to gaze at mission control through the press room window, I thought of songwriter David Bowie’s iconic character from his song SPACE ODDITY, Major Tom, and how he must have felt like as he floated in his little tin can…

…where planet Earth was blue and there was nothing he could do.

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 167: Still Bitter After All These Years

13 Monday Apr 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Entertainment, History, Media, Music

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Music, phone, Pink Floyd, Poll, Radio, Rock, Supertramp

image

I never thought the grudge that I imposed upon myself so long ago would last this long, but here it is thirty five years later and I find that I’m still not over the events from the eve of December 31, 1979.

It was New Year’s Eve, and my husband and I were celebrating in our little apartment on Grantham Avenue in St. Catharines. He had recently gotten out of the armed forces, and was temporarily working in construction. It was only a few weeks earlier that I discovered that we were expecting our first baby. We were young, scared, and oh, so broke.

In the week leading up to the new year we were were listening to a Toronto radio station who was counting down the top 100 albums of the 1970’s. All week they had been advertising the phone number where people could call in to vote for their favourite album.

Frank and I had amassed a very serious record collection during our time in Nova Scotia from 1977 to 1979. At that time the average album sold for around seven dollars each. That’s a lot of money in the time when minimum wage was a mere $3.10 an hour.

There were many great albums in that decade that included Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon, Jethro Tull’s Aqualung, the Eagles’s Hotel California, Supertramp’s Crime Of The Century, both Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody and Sheer Heart Attack albums, Uriah Heaps Demon’s And Wizards, all the Led Zeppelin albums, and the list goes on…

In the last hour before midnight, we were at long last down to the last top two albums.

I had my money on the iconic Pink Floyd album, Dark Side Of The Moon.

Imagine my disappointment when it made number two for best album of the 1970’s.

It wasn’t hard to curb my disappointment though because, like I said, there were so many other extraordinary albums.

When at last the announcement came that the top album voted as the best album of the 1970’s was Supertramp’s Breakfast In America I was numb with shock.

Don’t get met wrong…

Supertramp was indeed one of my favourite bands. Had the number one spot gone to either of their first two albums Crime Of The Century, or Even In The Quietest Moments, I would have accepted it. However, I believed that Breakfast In America was more on the pop side of music or you can call it mainstream if you will.

I have never trusted a phone poll since.

For those of you who may wonder why, after all these years, I still find myself bitter that Pink Floyd did not get the number one spot for album of the decade, allow me to quote the Pink Floyd song that said it best:

“The lunatic is in my head…”

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 162: Thank You For The Food We Eat

02 Thursday Apr 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Grief, Music, Poetry, Religion

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Delta, funeral, Grace, grief, Heaven, Music, Pizza, Poetry, Religion, Room Service, Singing, Toronto

Sometimes we can find joy and inspiration in the most unexpected places.

Case in point:

We have a traditional family song that we sing after saying grace. It’s a simple and pleasant little tune. It has been sung at all family celebrations that involve food.

The verse goes like this:

Thank you for the world so sweet
Thank you for the food we eat
Thank you for the birds that sing
Thank you God for everything.

Amen.

My Grandparents have sung this, my parents, my cousins, aunts, uncles, the grandchildren and great grandchildren have sung this too. We have all sung it hundreds of times.

I aways wondered where this song came from. If I had to take a guess, I would have assumed that my Grandfather wrote it.

Then came the day when my Father told me where the verse really came from.

This verse was from a hanging wall calendar. It was made from linen so that when the year was over, it turns into T-towel. It hung in our kitchen from 1970, and halfway through 1971. As soon as he told me this, I immediately remembered this calendar.

Now, if you will, forward a couple of decades

It’s February 2000, and my Mother has come to Toronto for my Grandfather’s funeral. It’s a very sad time.

Mother and I had just arrived at at the Delta Hotel, and it’s been an emotionally exhausting day of funeral preparation, travel and grief.

To keep thing simple, at the end of the day I suggested to Mother that we just order in pizza.

She grew very quiet.

After a few minutes, she said that there will be no pizza. Instead, she has decided to order room service.

Then picking up the telephone, she dialled the restaurant and ordered a rack of lamb for herself, and scallops for me.

After the food arrived, we sat down, said grace and then sang Opa’s little song that I referred to earlier: ‘Thank You For The Food We Eat.’

We then commenced with eating dinner.

Mother was absolutely enthralled with her rack of lamb. She told me that it was the best she ever had. After taking a few more blissful bites, she looked up at me and said:

“You know what?”

“What?”

“I’m so glad that we ordered room service.”

“I would have been just as happy just having the pizza for dinner,” I told her.

“No,” she said to me quite defiantly. “I knew that we had to order room service.”

“Why did we have to order room service?”

“Because,” she said raising her eyes from her plate to me…

…”I could never have sung ‘Thank You For The Food We Eat’ over a pizza!”

For the first time in days, I found myself laughing.

So was Mother.

Further, I have no doubt, that somewhere up in heaven, my Grandfather was laughing too!

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 157: Random Words In The Night

28 Saturday Mar 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Art, Entertainment, Media, Music, radio

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Art, England, Music, Poetry, Radio, Sting, Writing

While listening to CBC radio as I drove to work for my night shift earlier this week, I got some welcomed insight courtesy of one of my favourite music artists, Sting. He was discussing when he recorded his album TEN SUMMONER’s TALES which was recorded at his home The Lake House in Wiltshire England. The album was released in 1993.

Sting talked about the dynamics of his house, where the album was recorded. He also discussed his relationships to the people he was working with. All this contributed to the enormous success of the album.

It was then that he made the following point:

“You don’t finish anything, you abandon it at some point because you can carry on tinkering with it forever. I know when it’s time to abandon. If you suffer from perfection, you will never release anything. The end result is the tour, you put something out and it evolves. The actual recording is only a snapshot of a particular day or time.”

Listening to these words as I drove in the night I sensed a small shift in my thinking.

I could learn from these random words caught on the radio that night.

It’s a struggle to write on a daily basis. You want to do your best, but there comes a point when you must put the pencil down and let go of your work.

In my last year of high school, I wrote a small book of thirty poems over a period of about 6 months. Then on a daily basis I would go through each poem, word by word, adjusting this, changing that. It was a long and laborious process, a luxury which time no longer allows me.

Please consider this as today’s snapshot, as imperfect as it may be.

Hopefully, my writing will evolve.

Many thanks to CBC radio for their fine programming.

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 156: The Sound Of Music Strikes 50

27 Friday Mar 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Entertainment, Movies, Music

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ice cream, Julie Andrews, LGBT, Movies, Music, Sound Of Music, Stowe, Trapp Family Lodge, Vermont

The announcement on this morning’s news that the movie THE SOUND OF MUSIC is now officially 50 years old brought back mountains of memories from my childhood, sweeter than any apple strudel.

That’s when I came to the realization that this movie has made its presence known to me throughout my entire life.

First, I had to check to see if this 50th anniversary was indeed correct.

After a few taps on my iPad, I was browsing through Wikipedia’s extensive reading list on how THE SOUND OF MUSIC impacted the world.

Although it was first released on March 2, 1965 it didn’t come to my attention until 1966. That was the day when my Mother brought home this movie’s soundtrack in the archaic form of a long playing record.

Within a month I had all the songs memorized word for word.

I still remember the day when my Grandmother and I went to Toronto’s Yorkdale shopping centre to see this movie.

Afterwards, we went for our obligatory ice cream cones at the ice cream parlour located next to the theatre. And when I say obligatory, I do mean obligatory. When in the presence of my Grandmother, it is an inevitable fact that you will be having a close encounter with ice cream.

I had banana ice cream cone. Her choice of ice cream flavour for that day was coffee.

As time passed, again and again, songs from the movie kept reintroducing themselves to me. Whether singing them in a choir, or plunking them out on a piano with my cousins, these songs were hard wired not only into my heart but into my brain as well.

Then came all of the family photographs of my Aunts, Uncles, Cousins and Grandparents, who had made the pilgrimage to Stowe Vermont to visit the Trapp Family Lodge.

One day it would be my turn, I told myself.

And that day finally arrived in October 2012, while my husband and I were visiting my Mother in Williston Vermont. It was Thanksgiving holiday in Canada and we had a few days off.

She invited us for a drive to Stowe Vermont, where she would treat us to brunch at the Trapp Family Lodge.

How could I resist?

At long last, I would be able to see for myself what I had witnessed in heaps of family photographs and postcards.

The fall drive through the Vermont mountains was both beautiful and unforgettable.

However, it was with a heavy heart a week later that I told my friend Mitch, that alas, while I was at the Trapp family Lodge I saw no blonde haired and blue eyed children, no lederhosen, no Muzak playing “Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens…”, no kitschy embroidered alpine dresses, nay…

… Not even one single *Edelweiss*.

There were only impeccably dressed Maitre’Ds, fancy yet austere hotel lobbies and seating areas and an incredibly expensive gift shop where very sad and boring T-shirts sold for a whopping fifty dollars a piece, and knitted hats for seventy five dollars.

We were very lucky that a bus tour had arrived otherwise we would not have enjoyed any German cuisine. The only other fare available was what you could get at the bar.

Mitch’s heart broke alongside my own.

I really should have seen this utter disappointment coming a long time ago.

That was in 1987, when the news reported the death of Maria Von Trapp, the character portrayed by Julie Andrews.

I spoke to my Mother who lived in Vermont, on the phone that same day and told her I had heard the sad news.

“I met her,” she told me.

“Did you really,” I exclaimed. “Tell me more.”

“She wasn’t very nice, in fact she was very bossy with her staff and customers.”

I was mildly shocked. Mother continued…

“The consensus here in Vermont is that even God is going to have a hard time keeping her happy.”

Oh dear.

My own two daughters eventually grew to love this movie as much as I did. In fact my youngest daughter turned one of the songs into her own:

“HOW DO YOU SOLVE A PROBLEM LIKE ARIA?”

What a problem indeed…

“Sigh.”

Looking back, I think that my friend Mitch, said it best…

“What the The Trapp Family Farm needs most right now, more than anything is a creative infusion from THE SOUND OF MUSIC’s biggest fan base:

…The LGBT community.”

I know this to be true because they were the only ones who held a moment of silence when it was announced that Eleanor Parker, the actress who played the baroness and Captain Von Trapp’s lady friend passed away on December 9 2013.

Otherwise, I have no hope whatsoever, and the proverbial hills will no longer be alive with the SOUND OF MUSIC.

Rather, these hills will die under the root of all evil:

The love of money.

In closing, I bid you a sad…

So long, Farewell!

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 151: Lucky Stars

22 Sunday Mar 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Astronomy, Childhood, Fiction, literature, Money, Music, Poetry, saving, Science, Society, songs

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

allowance, astronomy, binoculars, fathers, ice cream, money, Music, piggy bank, Science, Songs, stars, Toronto, universe

I am one of the lucky ones.

This is because when I was seven years old my Father saw to it that I had my own pair of binoculars.

First, he planted the seed that lit the spark.

He always talked about stars, and the moon and the sun. I was barely four years old when my Father would take me for evening walks down Dufferin street, in a popular Toronto suburb. As we walked, he would point to the moon and the stars and tell me how far away they were and how glorious and mysterious this universe was.

He even taught me a little German children’s song called “Weiss Du Wie Viel Sternlein Stehen.”

We would sing it together as we walked the circumference of our apartment building while out for our evening walks.

The melody was lovely, and the sentiment equally so.

Try to imagine me as a four year old child, stumbling through the following German verse:

Weißt du, wieviel Sternlein stehen
An dem blauen Himmelszelt?
Weißt du, wieviel Wolken gehen
Weithin über alle Welt?
Gott der Herr hat, sie gezählet,
Dass ihm auch nicht eines fehlet
An der ganzen großen Zahl,
An der ganzen großen Zahl.

Which in English translates into:

Do you know how many little stars there are
In the wide blue sky?
Do you know how many clouds
There are over the whole wide world?
The Lord God counted them so well,
That none are missing
From the whole big lot of them,
From the whole big lot of them.

My imagination had been sparked.

Then, I started receiving an allowance of ten cents a week when I was five years old.

My father had procured a ceramic piggy bank into which each week we would both ceremoniously insert a dime. This allowance was earned by making my bed, brushing my teeth, and generally for being a good girl.

From time to time, family and friends would give me small monetary gifts, a quarter here, a nickel there. Once, I received a dollar from a Grandparent in a birthday card.

“This is for ice cream,” read my Grandmother’s all too familiar handwriting script.

However, I knew better. Dad’s rules were that should I ever receive any money, half had to be saved. Happily, that still left me enough money for an ice cream cone at the local Dairy Queen.

By the time I was seven old I had saved six dollars. Not long after that, my Father saw a newspaper flyer advertising binoculars on sale at Canadian Tire. He told me that the magnification was very powerful, but I had no idea what that meant.

The price was $14.

Dad and I had an agreement that as long as I kept saving for a pair of binoculars he would help pay for half.

Luckily Dad was so excited about these new binoculars he was willing to throw in the last two dollars that I needed.

I remember the first time that I held those binoculars. They were heavy, shiny, black, and well made. That was a time before everything was made of plastic.

Those binoculars lasted almost fifty years.

An unfortunate fall from a high closet smashed it into two.

I was heartbroken, and kept a small piece of the leather strap as a memento.

It wasn’t until 20 years ago I read Antoine De Saint Exupery’s book, THE LITTLE PRINCE, for the first time.

He swept me away with his simple yet eloquent writer’s voice.

It was in his quiet narrative that I realized that I was indeed one of the lucky ones.

At the beginning of the book the main character explains how he once made a simple drawing.

This picture to everyone else looked like a plain ordinary fedora style hat.

But it was not a hat.

What he had actually drawn was a snake who had just eaten an elephant.

Then he writes:

I have lived a great deal among grown-ups. I have seen them intimately, close at hand. And that hasn’t much improved my opinion of them.

Whenever I met one of them who seemed to me at all clear-sighted, I tried the experiment of showing him my drawing number one, which I have always kept. I would try to find out, so, if this was a person of true understanding. But, whoever it was, he, or she, would always say: that is a hat. Then I would nevertalk to him about Boa constrictors, or primeval forest, or stars. I would bring myself down to his level. I would talk to him about bridge, and golf, and politics, and neckties. And the grown-up would be greatly pleased to have met such a sensible man.

This passage was an epoch in my life.

For years, I felt myself strange that I could sit in a circle of women at work who were endlessly discussing their searches for store coupons, pretty window dressings, the latest gossip, and feel completely alone. They became silent when I voiced my passion for social justice, reading, writing, and science.

In time, I began to eat alone.

That’s when I began to seek out like minded people, who In St. Exupery’s words I could about talk about…

Boa constrictors, or primeval forest, or stars…

I found them, or rather, we found each other.

Yes, I am one of the lucky ones…

I have been since I was four years old when my Father taught me a song about stars during an evening walk that lit the spark that led to a love of astronomy, primevil forests, children’s songs, and Antoine De Saint Exupery.

Thank you Father.

Thank you Friends.

X

My.Daily.Distraction ~ Post 145: Agreeing To Disagree

16 Monday Mar 2015

Posted by duckykoren in Celebrities, Entertainment, Television

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Tags

Aerosmith, American Idol, celebrities, Entertainment, grief, Jaylo, Jennifer Lopez, Judge, loss, Mother, Movies, Music, Scotty McCreary, Steve Tyler, Television, Vermont

I’d like to take this opportunity to poke a little good humoured fun at my Mother with the following short story.

Don’t worry…

She just loved to poke fun at me whenever she could.

In fact, she never missed an opportunity.

Like all Mothers and daughters, we had our disagreements.

I liked Johnny Depp, she didn’t like Marty Stewart, she loved Fox News, I preferred CNN, she liked the republicans, I was all about the democrats.

You get the picture.

There were a few things we agreed on too.

Like Jaylo for example. We both agreed that we didn’t like Jaylo.

Then came the night that I got a phone call from her.

She was a big fan of the television show American Idol.

I wasn’t.

She never missed an episode, and made sure she kept me up to date on every episode whether I wanted to hear about it or not.

“Guess what?” …she asked me as soon as I picked up the telephone receiver.

“What?” …I said.

“I just went online and bought a set of Jennifer Lopez movies.”

Yup, I thought to myself… her obsession for American Idol is kicking in again. The same thing happened when Steve Tyler became a judge. After decades of turning the radio dial every time Aerosmith started playing, she suddenly became his biggest fan.

Don’t even get me started on Scotty McCreary.

I sensed a moment of confusion before asking her:

“Now why would you buy a set of Jennifer Lopez movies when you don’t even like her?”

“I love Jennifer Lopez, I watch her every week on American Idol,” she replied.

“Mother, Jennifer Lopez is Jaylo.”

There was a few moments of silence as she thought that one through.

“I hate Jaylo!” she replied.

I was smiling at this enigmatic faux pas of hers for days.

I don’t know whatever became of those movies that she ordered. When I packed up her apartment they were nowhere to be seen. That will remain as one of life’s little mysteries to me. Maybe she cancelled them. Maybe she burned them.

In closing, it’s a good feeling to know that even though she’s gone…

…She can still make me smile.

I miss her so…

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