To thine own self be true

as Margaret Wente points out in The Globe and Mail today about activists who don’t expect to be criticized when they are for reverse racist and bigoted remarks. Canada and many Canadian universities are way too soft in applying equalitarianism and  are ridiculously tolerant of reverse prejudice and discrimination. Political correctness is often a cover for this negative type of speech and action, and never taken to task amidst an increasing atmosphere of paranoia. Check out her column.

That was how kids announced themselves at people’s doorways in the ’50s and early ’60s. Of course, apples were traditional to give out until the reports of razor blades in them emerged, and then candy and chocolate became more the prevailing norm.
If you’re a parent, it’s best to still walk your kids around. and stay with them There are still creeps out there and have been as long as I can remember. Halloween is still a red-letter day on pervert calendars, so stay safe out there.

Some people seem to go all-out with decorating and the horror angle. Back in the ’50s and ’60s, there was never anything that: the weird over-the-top music and voices, as well as the special visual effects.

I still remember the kids in school going from classroom to classroom in their costumes, spooking the younger kids. There was no political correctness then and you could dress up as anyone you wanted to. Girls tended toward princess costumes more than those of contemporary superhero and tarty celebrities of today.

And, of course, kids used pillow cases to collect their hauls. The big fun came at the end when kids got home and dumped their hall on the floor or carpet to see “what they got”. The candy lasted for days, sometimes weeks or till Xmas, if doled out by parents.

These days we usually get about 75 kids or less at the door. My adult daughter comes here with her companion to give out candy. I usually go out later with them to do a walk around the block and see how houses are decorated and get some of the old flavour and atmosphere of still one of the most memorable days in kids’ calendars.

There’s been talk of banning Halloween, but I doubt it will happen despite all the grinches in the minority houses who still leave their lights off, don’t like kids, are too cheap to buy candy, or refuse to participate fully in Canadian occasions and fall rituals.

“Our pet, Juliette”, 91.
A CBC TV fixture on Saturdays after Hockey Night in Canada in the ’50s and ’60s. About as close to a sex symbol as Canada had back then, though the variety show singer-hostess was more ‘motherly’, and appealed to both sexes.

BTW, back in Winnipeg in the ’60s, people in the suburbs burned their leaves at the bottom of their driveways. Doh. A fire hazard that led to a ban to that practice.

So what do you need to enjoy this annual task and ritual?
-An Obusform belt to support the back of the person who is doing the raking and transport of leaves to bags.
-Gardening gloves.
-A shovel for shovelling leaves into bags.
-A plastic fan-rake. Not metal. Ruins your back from tugging and catching. Used for raking up after bagging, too.
-Garbage bags. Might as well take the bag box outside. You’ll need more than you think.
-A white plastic sheet which can be curled into a garbage bag to give it body and support.
-Have a seat to sit down on without arms for breaks.

Ok, plan the raking in segments. Dirty parts of the yard, as in where birds feed, can be raked up against a fence unbagged. Snow and winter will break these down. Make tall piles for the main part. After bagging, rake leftovers against fences or into garden.

Bagging: Use the shovel for scooping leaves into the bag. Your helper holds the bag. First, though, fully open the garbage bag while the other puts the folded-up white sheet into the bag. Then shovel till full. Use your hands to scoop smaller bits left after shovelling. Pull up the white sheet out of the bag. Tie the bag. Later transport bags to your garbage area.
This all works and is easy on the back. Having another person for the bagging part simplifies that part.

You’ll appreciate the relatively clean yard left after you put everything away and won’t kill yourself holding leaf blowers or vacuums (with numerous changes) for long periods of time, risking deafness.
No, old-school and manual is best. Good exercise and a sense of pleasure engaging in an old ritual which goes back to the beginning of the bagging era. Brings you in closer contact with Nature and death, too.

with a place as well as a person.”
–Alec Waugh

Mission Hill Winery, West Kelowna, B.C.

(cellar: les aging barrels)

(cellar’s oldie display specialties)

(a sample of their specialty wines awaiting tasting at the end of the tour)

“And the wine is bottled poetry”–Robert Louis Stevenson

Also, the ambient Dirty Laundry winery between Kelowna and Penticton in the hills.

work in a firecracker factory? Why is anyone surprised when a firecracker family catches  or blows up?

Obit. Fats (Antoine) Domino, 89. A really cool black performer from the days of 45 records. 13 top 20 hits in all, 1957-1961.

“I found my thrill on Blueberry Hill.”
“I’m gonna be a wheel someday. I’m gonna be somebody.”
“Let the four winds blow.”
“I want to walk you home.”
“I’m ready, yes indeed.”
“I’m walkin’ to New Orleans.”

One of the legends of the ’50s I grew up with on the radio, Fats was typical of the minimal 50% black performers I liked back then. who included Brook Benton, Dinah Washington, The Orlons, The Coasters, Little Richard, Sam Cooke, Johnny Mathis, Chuck Berry, Harry Belafonte, Nat King Cole, The Platters, Lloyd Price, Sarah Vaughan, The Drifters, The Shirelles, Gary U.S. Bonds, Chubby Checker, Ben E. King, Gene Chandler, The Dovells, Ray Charles, Major Lance, and on and on.

Yeah, I was a relatively ‘color-blind’, typical Canadian teen who enthusiastically bought their records long before I ever heard of or knew anything about something called civil rights. A case of ignorance is bliss for sure for a kid who just loved top 40 pop music of the day.

One of the richnesses of my life and collections is my audio collection of great books, readers, and writers. Nightly, I have my pick of ‘who I go off to sleep to’–their voices (more on that in future writing) echoing soothily or provocatively in my ears.

Beside my bed, I have a cassette player (many of these performances are out-of-print and scarce or rare) and a CD player. Last night it was Newman’s voice which, for the second evening in a row, has read to me from the rareish Mr. and Mrs. Bridge recording (with his wife, actress Joanne Woodward).

Presence is such a funny thing. Best experienced, live and in person. I never had that pleasure with Newman, but suddenly at 11 pm last night, there he was! Preserved and as alive and memorable as ever in a role quite different from Hud or Butch Cassidy (he had a wicked sense of humor, by the way). Paul and his voice–a key, essential part of who he was–as captured in 1990 AD. Paul dead since 2008 and yet still delightfully, accessibly there nine years later for me, personally and intimately. One of those occasional epiphanies that evokes the response of “Can it get any better than this?”

I regard all of my audio recordings (including rare readings on LP by the likes of John Steinbeck, Evelyn Waugh, Bertrand Russell, and Hurd Hatfield) as precious unique artifacts that never cease to amaze, delight, and enthrall. Much of my scarce video collection used to work much the same way, but, of late, life, purpose, and meaning has come down to presences for me, and the experience of presences.

The human voice, whether spoken or printed (the latter which of me which you can read throughout this blog), is the most intimate artifact of all, apart from/in addition to touch and touches of a personal intimate nature. What people truly long for or miss, as the key imprint of presence (along with face).

And so it is I miss Newman, the person and presence he once was. But, luckily and happily, I can remember and retrieve some of that in the darkness and quiet of evening or night as I discover the world of Evan S. Connell’s novel and world, along with the sensibility, tones, and presence of one of the great actors of all time.

…………………………………………

ps/ Re. the subject of voice, that is why I have enjoyed and amassed quite the collection of interesting signed books, with oddities ranging from Stephen’s Frye’s autograph in the Wilde screenplay to Woodward and Bernstein’s autographs in All the President’s Men to Newman’s signature in his cookbook, to rare signatures by the likes of Peter Ustinov, Siskel & Ebert, Simon & Garfunkle, Charles Schulz, Sidney Poitier, Michael Caine, Arthur Miller, Somerset Maugham, W.H. Auden, Thor Heyerdahl, Graham Greene, Donovan, Dave Brubeck, Kenneth Branagh, Joan Baez, Robert Altman, Archibald Lampman, Ian & Sylvia, Robert Service, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Gabrielle Roy, Sinclair Ross, Lawren Harris, Mordecai Richler, A.Y. Jackson, Margaret Laurence, Stephen Leacock, Gordon Lightfoot, Marshall McLuhan, Norman McLaren, Grey Owl, Northrop Frye, Bruce Cockburn, Leonard Cohen, Bertram Brooker, Laura and Aldous Huxley, Jonathan Winters, Tennessee Williams, Martin Scorcese, Eugene O’Neill, on and on….

I see and feel their presences and have contact with something they once experienced whenever I open any of hundreds of signed I am fortunate to own. Experience, in a similar way, their voices. Voices and imprints of people and geniuses I have admired, enjoyed, and, to some extent in various ways, emulated. their characters, their values, their art and wisdom.

T.S Eliot spoke of the importance of building on the past work of poets. Matthew Arnold and Northrop Frye spoke of the influence, likewise, of past literature, geniuses, and culture. My own interest in the above speaks of my own sensibility, breadth, and depths. The various voices and imprints of the great past that reflect my own deepest values, beliefs, attitudes, meanings, and purposes, reflected in my own daily life.

–You are the protagonist of your own life.

-The experience of beauty is important in affecting and enhancing your imagination, mind, sensibility, feelings, spirit, and soul.

-It is important to have some way of expressing your feelings and thoughts, to release them and possibly share them, too.

-The main challenge of life is to think of and arrive at your own answers to life’s main and biggest questions. Most importantly, have you recorded them for yourself?

-It is important to understand what is common, permanent, meaningful, and true about human experience, and how that applies to you.

-Do you have an understanding or ‘system’ that makes sense of life’s apparent chaos and confusions? Are you ‘at home’ in the modern world?

-What role do the humanities play in your character, knowledge, understanding, sensibility, and appreciation of daily life?

-Are you the master (or mistress) of your own life?

-Are you a thinking human being? Do you examine your own life?

-What are the great forms and works of culture that have lasted?

-What does it mean to be alive and fully conscious of it?

(inspired by Clifton Fadiman’s 1959 still insightful video about the humanities, available for free viewing on the Encyclopedia Britannica website–look under Fadiman’s name, then Videos)

(an excellent documentary about a great American woman writer)

(her classic; the edition I studied in 1970-71 in AmLit at U of A)

“That is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great.”–My Antonia