Ten Things Tuesday: a letter to camp

Dear Girls;

In the eight days since we left the states for Canada on our arduous trek across hostile mountains, er in a Prius stuffed with all of your summer crap, I have missed you, but I also have begun MY summer’s adventures.

1. Right after you got on the bus that left at 7:35 because some Shmo and her family decided the 7:15 AM leaving time was only a recommendation that didn’t apply to her, I summoned my inner 14 year old and took to my bed with a stack of books and some snacks. I gobbled through the latest Kushiel book by Jacqueline Carey, Kushiel’s Mercy, as well as Lois Mcmaster Bujold’s latest, Passage. Both of these authors have created worlds so comprehensive and vivid, and gripping, that I pretty much did little else for two days. Bliss, really.

2. I hung out with Val and her gorgeous girlfriend in the gay village in Montreal. My friend Leeba (who’s known Val for YEARS) and I had dinner in a great cafe and then spent time in a bar called the Drugstore, chatting, people watching and catching up. It was relaxed and lovely and  wonderful to reconnect. Val is HAPPY and beautiful and as snarky as ever. The night was stupid hot, so the gelato place next door to the bar totally rocked. The village is one of those places where anything goes and tolerance and acceptance is the well-defended norm.

3. I spent time with my aunt and uncle, both in their 80s, and among my favorite people of my life. Auntie Rhoda began painting in her early 70s and her vibrant landscapes and beach and boating scenes cover the walls, along with old photos of family, showing the wonders of distinct genetic traits I’ve begun to see more and more when I look in the mirror. Whenever my aunt sees me, she invariably tells me that I look just like my Grama, her mother and you know what? I really do. Eerie, that. We hugged and smiled a lot, she showed me photos of some of her 13 grandchildren and 2 great grandchildren and I left with a bowl that was my Grama’s and which my aunt decided I needed to have. Uncle Jack and I were being far too civilized to each other so as I was leaving I asked him if perhaps I hadn’t been TOO nice to him. He nodded gravely that I had, so I called him an old schmuck and he laughed and seemed much happier for it. Time is SUCH a precious thing to share with loved ones, girls.

4. You know how your Oma’s house is FULL of chocolate and cheese and other delectable things? I stopped on the way to Montreal at a huge health food store in Vermont and picked up some organic cookies and cheese and coffee to add to the things my mom already had in the house. Suffice it to say that as per usual when I am staying at my parents’ house, I ate well in a veritable food holiday.

5. On Saturday I left Montreal to head to Ottawa to spend some time with my old friend Naturedoc and her family. Armed with nothing more than a mapquest printout (”You mean you DON’T have a TomTom personal navigation system?”), I made it deep in the countryside to the house overlooking the Gatineau river where I stayed for two days. We slept in a little cabin - I on a futon - and were treated to massive thunderstorms and lightning flashes that illuminated, if briefly, the entire cabin. The storms moved through in the ugly of the night and I was completely unsuccessful in my attempts to read my watch by those micro flashes, so I had no clue what time I was roused from sleep or how long they lasted. Maybe I need to relax about needing to know what time it is?

6. With Naturedoc as my date because your dad couldn’t get the time off work, I attended the wedding of our friends Aaron and Erin while I was in Ottawa. Maybe I shouldn’t consider it a speech impediment, because it’s kind of judge-y and not very nice, but neither the attendees (or at least those from Ontario) or most people from around the states in which we live can do whatever vocal gymnastics necessary to say those two names so that there is a distinction in the sounds. You and they just don’t seem to be able to move your tongues into the right position or something. Growing up in Montreal as I did, I pronounce the first AHron and the second EHHrin, but to compensate for being from Ontario, all the speakers came up with cute distinctions like WErin and MAaron to keep the bride and groom straight. The wedding itself was non denominational, all about love and commitment and being the other’s ally, and was utterly lovely. The facts that a thunderstorm was brewing while they said their vows, that candle lit to symbolize their union blew out from the oncoming storm, and that the mother of the groom sported not one but TWO black eyes (she was FINE, but the car in which she drove to the wedding and which hit a deer was totaled) were unforgettable, but meaningless.

7. Happy Canada Day!!

8. I’m back at home now after getting a wee bit lost coming out of Ottawa; Naturedoc made it very clear that in order to get back to Montreal and then back to New England, I needed to avoid highway 50 because it was a slow, roundabout annoying as FUCK route through cornfields and nothing much else. To my dismay I could not seem to avoid that particular way and found myself meandering all over the map for nearly three hours until I finally joined up with a highway I recognized. It was fabulous to be in Canada for 8 days (the longest I’ve been there since 1992), and my accent certainly is thriving (I am certain eye rolls will confirm THAT), but it’s good to be home.

9. I’ve just spent the day with Chili, planning our butts off; each of us has a section of Literature to teach at TCC (our last classes) and based on themes, we’ve established which stories, poems and movies would serve the themes we’ve chosen of humanity/civility, Love, Fear, and Individuality and Identity. This is a course I would want to take; we’ll be watching/analyzing/deconstructing several movies, including one new to me until tomorrow morning, Mississippi Burning, to drive home the themes. We’ll be reading Frankenstein, some Poe, watching Fishburne and Branagh’s Othello, The Sixth Sense, the Last Samurai, reading Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery, and supplementing that with what we hope will be rousing and stimulating discussion fodder. We hope.

10. You and your sister have now been in camp for a week and I miss you. That said, I will see you in three weeks for visiting day, will bring more stamps for the plethora of letters you have been unable to send because of lack of stampage, will smother you in hugs and embarrassing kisses, and will then let you go three days later for another 3.5 weeks. I know you are having a superlative summer with your friends. I love you. Now go and get a piece of paper and write me a bloody letter!!! I won’t even mind if you attach a dead bug.

Love,

Your O’Mom