September 11th

I don't think I've ever done a September 11th entry.  Funny, that date meant nothing before 2001. Well, not to most folks, anyway.  To us?

It's our nephew's birthday.  He was 11 years old.  Good age to have a colossal act of violence forever associated with your birthday.  Good age to burn that in.

So happy birthday, Buddy.  Love you.

My memories of 9/11 are the same as many folks'.  Woke up and dashed to the TV not even knowing why--something I'd heard on the radio while sleeping, I'm sure.  I turned on the TV just in time to see the second plane hit.

And then the wave.

You know, that wave of unreality that washed over?  That "I'm watching a Michael Bay movie" sensation?

And then I threw myself at the computer.  I had a lot of online pals who were part of the Project Greenlight gig.  A lot of pals in NYC.  Immediately, I went for the PG chat room.  Where was Serena?  Where was Doug?  Had anyone heard from Stephen?

It was a long while before we learned that one of our own had been on Flight 11.  Tom Pecorelli,

Tom was a great guy--funny, sharp, talented.  He was a lot of things, including cameraman for Fox Sports and E! Entertainment Television.  He was married to his love, and they were expecting their first child in April.  Tom had been in the Boston area for a friend's wedding and to visit his Dad.

He walked around carrying his boy-to-be's ultrasound picture.  That boy is now a handsome young man who never  had the joy of resting in his father's arms.

Three or four days after the towers fell, our boy, who was three, found a potato bug (you may know them as pill bugs or "rolly-pollies").  It seemed a harmless thing--we were doing yard work, so we admonished him to be careful with the potato bug and then went back to our task.  We lived right in the flight path of an International Airport, so the silence was something palpable,  made us edgy, uneasy.  After a few minutes of working under that pall of nothingness, our little boy approached.  He held out his hand, in which the now-dead potato bug rested, and said, "Fix it, Daddy."

Fix it.

Hubby and I crouched down, and I said, "Oh, honey, I'm sorry.  It can't be fixed."

Our boy was insistent, so earnest and sad.  "Please, Daddy--please fix it, I broke it."

Voice cracking, my husband explained that, once something is dead, it can't be fixed.  It's forever broken.  Our boy's eyes filled with tears and he said he was so, so sorry.  Poor Mr. Potato Bug.

And then the grownups lost all cohesion.  We wrapped ourselves around our boy and cried and cried.  Over a potato bug?

Of course not.  Well, maybe a little.  But mostly we cried because of all those people.  And all those other people who'd lost those people.  We cried because we realized how foolish it was to ever think that making war internationally wouldn't eventually splash back here.  We cried because the world our little boy is going to live in isn't the world of my childhood.  It's the logical consequence, I recognize that now, but the carefree assumption that terror and war only happen in other lands?

Gone.  And I grieved.  I mourned that almost as much as I mourned the amazing, varied, priceless human beings we lost on 9/11.

And before I go (and I am going--there is no room here for funny pictures or complaints about awful baby names), I want to say thank you.

To Canada.

Because in the days after 9/11, when our skies were bereft of planes and our American citizens were stranded in the air, unable to come home, Canada took them in.  Canadians opened their airports, their arms, their hearts, and their homes, provided shelter and food and care.  Because they are our friends.

So thank you, Friends.  I hope we never, ever have to return the favor.  

I Love Canada. And Fruit, too.

So, I never knew much about Canada growing up.  Sure, I'd been to Ontario, I'd been to Quebec, I'd even been to New Brunswick, but these were all short jaunts, not opportunities to explore or really learn.  I mean, after all, how much am I going to learn about Canada from that tawdry cheese-fest that is Niagara Falls (make no mistake, I love it, but it's utterly gaudy)?  These were all, of course, pre-Passport-at-the-border visits.  Canada's not as convenient these days.

Niagara does tacky so well!

I learned nothing about Canadian geography when I was in school.  Nothing.  No provinces, no capitals, nothing.  I learned more about Canada watching Mick Jagger cavort with Pierre Trudeau's wife than I ever did in a public school setting.  And I was okay with this--I mean, I made a few efforts to memorize the provinces and such, but my brain just didn't want to grasp and really retain the information.  I didn't really care until I had a child and decided I didn't want him to be as ignorant as his mother when it came to Canadian geography.

And then came the Toronto Song.

I don't remember how I came by the Toronto Song.  I think my sister may have tossed it my way. All I know is that my then six year old grabbed it and RAN.  And I thought, "Okay, the song's a bit rude, but it's funny, and more important, it's making this stuff STICK in a way it never has."  And it wasn't just sticking for ME, it was sticking for my boy, too.  At six years old, he knew more about Canada than I did at 39.

Now, that's not the visual version I prefer, but the video I like can't be embedded.  But here's the link:

The Toronto Song (my preferred video version)

Yes, it's rude, but understand, it was written by a Canadian comedy team and meant to lampoon the rivalries that pop up between provinces.  I KNOW Ontario doesn't suck, I KNOW Quebec isn't revolting.  But this is a fun song, and it really did lay those provinces down in a way that has stuck in our heads.  I mean, I always knew Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland, and Quebec were "East-ish," along with Ontario, which was "a little less East-ish."  I always knew the Northwestern Territories and Yukon were way north and way cold.  I knew British Columbia was seriously west.  I knew that  Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta were somewhere in the middle, and that Calgary was in Alberta and has a big rodeo.  Probably better than many Americans, but not great.  But now?  Thanks to this marvelously snotty, silly song, I know where they ALL are!

I have shared this with Canadian friends.  Only one was openly hostile about it--in fact, she got downright ugly.  In a "provincial rivalry" kind of way.  It was adorable, and I never played the song for her again.  My other Canadian friends either liked it or were polite enough to pretend they did.  Those Canadians can be marvelously polite, can't they?  It's one of the many things I like about them.  Seriously.  I like the heck out of Canadians, I think sometimes I'd like to be one.  They're smart, funny, saner, and take better care of their own.

We bought a whole slew of really beautiful produce at Wegmans Thursday night (that's night before last).  Some amazing, giant, knobby-looking oranges that resemble nothing so much as Rocky Flats minneolas--you know, used to be a minneola, but has been radiated to something more muscular and scary?  LOL, these are called "Sumo" mandarins, and they are a wonder to behold!  They're huge (as tall as the star fruit, markedly bigger than the other oranges), and they're gorgeous and I can't wait to eat one!  We also got blood oranges (haven't had a blood orange in ten years, easy), our minneolas, plus Macoun, Jonagold, and Opal apples.  Never seen Opals before.  I wasn't the only one oohing and ahhing over them, either.  Here's a pic of part of the haul (left out the bananas and salad fixings).

I didn't pull out ALL of it, just representative pieces.  Those are D'anjou pears, a kiwi, and a star fruit, too.  Along with bell peppers, of course.

The gigantic Sumo, surrounded by (right to left) blood orange, minneola, and navel.

I came across a blog the other night, folks were talking about the strange dolls they'd found while on vacation.  They were piled next to light posts and road signs.  Not tons of them, just a few.  I was strongly reminded of the dolls my ex and I found in the cemeteries in Paris.  Some were very plain, very basic, but some were more colorful, like this:

Note the funky little bag she's carrying.  If you watch any "Supernatural," you'll probably think of that as a "hex bag."  Many of the little grave dolls had these.  Now, don't mistake me--there were many graves that had DOLL dolls--you know, baby dolls.  Especially children's graves.  This was something else.  Am I an atheist?  Of course I am.  Am I deeply skeptical and not given over to much superstition?  Absolutely.  And when my ex bent down to pick one up as a "souvenir?"  I leapt forward and said, rather sharply, "DON'T TOUCH THAT!"

Sure, it sucks that he was contemplating lifting something off a grave, and I'd have yelled at him over that, too.  But this was something more.  It was a deep, from my gut reaction.  I laugh about it now, and no, I don't believe the little dolls can curse you, and yet there's just enough of me that still raises hackles at such things that . . . well, better safe than sorry?  I feel ridiculous saying it, but it was a strong, "No, I don't believe in it, but why mess with it?" feeling.

No, I will not turn in my Atheist card.  Thing has cost me far too much in so many ways.  Or, rather, people's response to it has.  It's mine, I've earned it.  I'm proud of it.

Today is a dietary day off.  So's tomorrow.  I've lost nine pounds in two weeks.  If I gain back two, and then lose another four or so next week?  Hey, net loss.  And I'm not being AS crazy this weekend.  Plus, I'm finding it easier to get back on Monday mornings.  And that's good.

Oh, and bad paneling, too.