The "Occupy Your Memory" Stories Spring 2012

Story #15 - Getting Defenseless – written 07June12

“What are you doing out there”  Writing?”

Well in fact I was … and it’s not clear why I hesitated to respond in the affirmative.  Writing is clearly what I was doing – with a note book in my left hand and a pen in my right.  But perhaps the walking back and forth was distracting.  On the neat lush lawn in the back yard of the café where I frequently seek inspiration in suburban Kabul.

Are writers typically observed sitting down?  Perhaps it was not the writing being observed but rather the walking – and hence the genuine question from the woman sitting at the lawn’s edge who I passed on a visit to the toilette.

I’d like to learn how to treat that question as genuine.  And hence no need for a defensive or illusive or qualified response.  Funny where those usually take us.  This time I offered a half truth about writing something for “the music class I work with” which provoked a very short dialogue about the Afghanistan National Institute of Music (ANIM) quickly and ineptly dead-ended by my observation that “they only work with professionals – and in a more structured context.”

“Well...  it was nice to meet you.  Bye”

I guess I should start wondering why did she ask?  As part of my occasional scan of the clientele I had noticed her sitting at a table in semi-work mode with two male colleagues.  I don’t spend much time cruising the restaurant’s customers because I am usually trying to walk and see my way through the story that I am working on.

With luck a little nugget will have revealed itself on the short drive from the office.  I like to go in with momentum.  That’s good for a coupla paragraphs at best.  Each of these stories has needed a few gems along its way – typically two hours in creation.  That’s the nature of these particular nuggets – they provide a vivid image of where the story should be but not where it could go.  So the writing fondles and rotates and polishes for a while but inevitably its back to mining.  To pacing.  And the café garden has been a faithful path to pace.

On the rare occasion when one of these stories reveals its ending early on there is actually something of a letdown in energy.  “How to get there?” is a less compelling question than “Where to go?”

That said I note that to date the early revealers seem more likely to unfold as “complete” stories – with a beginning and an ending and hopefully a not too subtle “point”.  Apparently that is what readers are looking for and I do have to be sensitive to them.

“I saw you out there on the lawn.  Are you are writer?”  There it was again a coupla weeks later.  This time I fumbled off something about “coming to the café to scribble after work at UNHabitat where I am responsible for blah blah blah …

“Well good luck. Bye.”

Hello!?

Nugget please!?

It is good to know when to call for help.

To know when to get back on the garden path.  With the intentional steps.  And the breath.  Even the slightly choreographed hand movements.  To immerse in the moment … of patiently turning over ... and rereading ... and gazing up ...  into the cloud fluffed sky.

Defenceless against even the most genuine question.

#14 – Letting go of holding on  –  written 06June12

“Stay calm.   Don’t let go.”

The two of us were no longer in the canoe. 

We were in the water.  Quite suddenly.  Unexpectedly.  How had we not seen the storm coming up?  The swell approaching?  Our craft had started to ride to the crest of the wave.  But the crest rose faster. 

And we went over.  Into the chilly April waters of Lake Opeongo in Algonquin Park in Canadian Shield central Ontario. 

Forty eight hours earlier my mom had dropped us at the boat launch on Highway 60 with one canoe and enough gear for a four day outing.  Teenage boy adventure.  A little paddling to an island campsite.  A little survival activity like stocking the woodpile and erecting some shelter.  I had canoe tripped as a summer camper a few years previously and enjoyed sleeping under the stars beneath the over turned canoe.  So my friends Michael and Rob shared the spacious tent.  Lights out with sun down.

It coulda been lights out when the canoe went over.  Both Michael and I were experienced paddlers and had seen the training videos dramatizing what happens when a big wave grabs you broadside.  Dumping is inevitable – and the risk of getting a debilitating hit on the head from a thwart is real high.  Luckily we both surfaced unscathed.

And stayed calm for a bit.  The next step in responding to a spill is to attempt to right the canoe.  This involves getting under it in the air space between the canoe and the water, pushing it up and flipping it over up while treading water.  Two strong young men generally have no difficulty with this manoeuver in calm water - AKA the swimming pool.  But of course in a heavy swell the boat won't sit still.  Try as we might we couldn’t hold it perpendicular to the big persistent waves long enough to execute the heave and toss.  And the water was getting cold.

Holding on wasn’t going to save us. 

So we abandoned ship.  And headed for shore.

I figured we really couldn't miss it.  Looked to be less than a kilometre away.  With the benefit of a big swell at our backs.

“Keep your head up. And stroke.”

Mathematicians use the term “catastrophe” to describe a certain phenomena of discontinuous mathematical function.   Like hysteresis.  Or perhaps the temporary disappearance of time. 

I have no recollection of swimming that ostensible kilometre.  Nor of reaching the rocky shoreline.  Out of the water.  And up into the sparse bush.

Michael apparently found me soon thereafter huddling against a large rock. Conscious, but incoherent.  Irrational.  Beyond any awareness of my own survival.

So he dragged me along the shoreline – gently but insistently.  Eventually we came to a camp site.  With people, tents and a roaring fire.  I’m told they stripped me down, bundled me in a sleeping bag, sandwiched me between two warm bodies, and poured warm liquids into me.

Michael saved my life. 

And I lived to let go of another boat.

#13 - The new Tantra – written 02June12

It seems that so much these days is about occupation.  I guess we gotta thank Wall Street for that. The first “Occupy” movement was a highly visible and creative attempt to invade and expose somebody else’s space.   Of course they took on just about the biggest guys of all.  No better way to brand it – win or lose.

That inspired a host of energy to help popularize a number of social revolutions.  Crowds of people from all classes of Egyptian society taking over Tahir Square – and taking casualties to defend it.  Québec university students filling the streets of Montréal for more than 100 consecutive nights to protest cuts to education – not even a “virtually-no-right-to-assembly” law hastily passed by the Québec Liberal party could stop them.

Of course the Buddhists discovered it early on.  “Being in the present” and ”taking everything (yes – all of it) on the  road” – means being with and sensitive to everything that we have been to date.  Hopefully with compassion and  detachment. But please - only one life time.   I can’t square life after death or reincarnation or inherited karma or any number of celestial virgins.

That of course opened the door for the professionals to develop “Occupy Therapy”.  Psychotherapists built a whole discipline and language to describe and communicate it.  One school on the St Juan Islands fashioned “Memory Occupation” – a near tantric practice enabling effortless movement between past and present.

Early this year  the new tantra arrived in India.  Subtly of course – the Indians consider themselves adaptable but only at their own speed.  Not at all “as you like.” The launch was held at a grade B holy place in the Himalayas – a workable compromise balancing respect and evangelism.  I had some time on my hands.

The guru used a sophisticated technique of channelling the past through writing.  We jumped right in to an exercise in which she challenged us to write “30 things that happened  to you – no more than one succinct sentence each.”  30 small windows to be opened as the urge struck.  To be spontaneously occupied. 

Last week I tried to help my music students – Afghan teens who are high beginner English – occupy the famous Afghan musician Ahmad Zahir and his American “brother" Elvis Presley.  Hoping to make a point  about  universal emotions and cultural building blocks.  How  do we feel?  Who is responsible?  You  know - the usual young  adult mentoring questions.

At the end of the class a quiet young man stood up and recited in Dari a beautiful poem he had written for us “inspired by Allah, Rumi and the spring dust of Kabul.”  It was very moving.  A couple of us gathered around him and I wondered out loud if we should think about turning his poem into a tune – or something a little bigger.

Careful. 

This could be bordering on appropriation.

#12 - One way into the Neighbourhood – written 01June12

There's just one hill to climb.  The only hill in fact on our recently adopted running route.  But it’s a steep one.  Centuries ago both the British and the Americans sent exploratory parties up these nearly vertical cliffs before deciding on more suitable – albeit less subtle – approaches to conquering la Ville de Québec.

Now days there is a series of switch-backed stairs.  But it’s still punishing.  We always slow right down to a walk less than half way up.  Nonetheless the heart keeps pounding – pushing the thighs up and down, and clinching the fists to power a strong forearm rhythm. 

Up.  Up. Up … to the Plains of Abraham.

A coupla times a week we set out from our rented rooftop apartment just outside the walls of the old city.  Once inside the St Louis Gate there is a nice gentle descent down a back road behind the historic Église de St-Jean.  Or occasionally we wait to about the 3 K mark to descend on the paved but knee jarring Côte de la Montagne street – through of a steady stream of traffic heading from the likes of the Chateau Frontenac down to the bustling XYZ market on the shores of the St Lawrence River. We moved fast and relatively invisibly through the streets – but we were still tourists.

And we weren’t usually so light footed.   My teenage daughter Lex and her friend Katie arrived for a week from Vancouver - curious to see what native French speakers looked like.  Their Vancouver “bonjour” – sounding excessively theatrical – was warmly received.   Their suburban mall visits always returned curious gifts and interesting ingredients for the kitchen.  They often started cooking late at night – reluctant to give up the day’s laughter.  They left as they came – on the giggling ViaRail train to Montréal and then Toronto to continue their respective eastern Canada family swings.

Margaret’s mother kept more reasonable hours during her visit.  It was the XYZ anniversary of Bach's whatever and we joined the celebrations at various Catholic churches in the city.  Dorothy has a keen ear for classical music and a curiosity about churches – probably nurtured as an Anglican minister in the Okanagan valley in central BC.  We shared some awe in those big imposing sanctuaries.  Heard some big voices.  Felt a big holy presence.

Up. Up. Up … and onto the Plains of Abraham.  Ahhhhhhhhhhh.   As always - the relief.  The big slow gear down.  The deep breath to fill those suddenly spacious lungs.

Back … in the world.  Almost back in our neighbourhood.  Past the secluded little cliff top perch where I often brought my guitar and newly acquired volume of “Musique de les Isles de la Madeleine” – a hybrid of Maritime Acadian and French Celtic that I was keen to investigate.  Passed the shady grove where we often brought our baguette, cheese and red wine luncheon – chosen in part for its commanding view of the XYZ field and its buzzing hive of activity at the centre of the Festival d’Été. 

Then across La Grande Allée – Québec’s Champs-Élysées without the Arc de Triomphe on the horizon – and soon down the street that served so many of our everyday domestic needs.   Back among our neighbours going about their daily lives. 

Not unlike we would back home I suppose.  Welcoming people in neighbourly way.

No matter what they had climbed up to visit us.

#11 - We might have to perform … again  – written 30May12

“This one could be a fake sir.”

“Say that again please.”

“This one could be a fake.”

The driver and I had rehearsed a few times how he would make this snap decision.  He really only had a coupla of visual clues to go on.   Springing up suddenly on an unexpected strip of urban roadway.  Illuminated by only the vehicle headlights.

“ … a fake sir.”   Yikes.  I suddenly felt like I had not adequately rehearsed how I would instruct my fellow passengers.  Nor implement the contingency plans for their unpredictable reactions.

This time we were going to drive right though a checkpoint.

I’d done plenty of other rehearsals in Kabul.  One of the most complex is for a "compound breach" – bad guys likely heavily armed and perhaps with suicidal intent getting “inside the perimeter”.  In 2011 I lived on the top floor of the smaller and more defensible of 2 four story houses in a compound on a corner lot with two entrances in a northern suburb of Kabul.  Not a typical high profile bad guy  target but  the employer was understandable cautious having lost international staff in two provincial incidents.

So we were risk conscious.  And acted accordingly.  We had sandbagged the landing of the top floor  giving us protected sights down 1.5 flights of stairs.  Sights from 2 well ammunitioned AK47s which our Samoan weapons guru ensured we knew how to strip down and reassemble and then point straight.  We had a length of quick launch razor wire ready to roll down the stairs, and four gallons of cooking oil to slicken the ascent of any invader. 

There was of course always the possibility that some of our colleagues on the lower floors might not make it to the top before we raised the draw bridge – but that never happened in rehearsal.

Similarly there was never any revolt during the drills for "crossing the bridge” between the two houses.  Conceived as the means to gather residents of both houses into a common rooftop protected area – basement safe rooms having been called into question with a coupla recent tragedies – the bridge had become a flash point for insults and more between the North American project engineers who insisted it be "built to code" of steel and the British project security who demand it be constructed of cheaper and more expeditious bamboo.  The security design carried the day and the blood stayed bad but mercifully on “compound breach” drill days the two factions managed to put aside their differences and cooperatively simulate the strategized response.

This time we were going to drive right though the checkpoint. 

I issued the “Passengers we are going to drive right through this checkpoint so hold on and duck down” warning.

The checkpoints have no physical barriers  and the guys with guns who person them are smart enough not to stand in the middle of the road.  At 20 metres distance the driver killed the headlights and hit the accelerator.  Hard.  And then the horn.  I think one of the passengers cried out. I know I was still gripping the seat when we passed the District 3 police station half a kilometre down the road. 

A few months later there was a non-fatal incident at a fake checkpoint near the Kabul Zoo on our usual route home.  Then a suicide bomber missed his military target but  killed three police men 200 metres away on Darluman Road north of the Parliament Buildings.

We are still rehearsing.

There’s always a chance we might have to perform again.

#10 - Beached snow angel – written 29may12

The water was rising unexpectedly quickly.  The local tides are known to be quite dramatic.  And this particular piece of shoreline was real shallow  with 50 foot cliffs right behind us. 

I got anxious for a moment, scanned the waterfront, and directed Lex up a steep gully.    The vegetation started to close in.  We took a curious look back down to the ocean.  An enormous piece of driftwood – at least 2 metres in diameter – crashed against the cliff below us. 

We shared a reassuring smile.  And dived in to the jungle.

Our winter retreats were generally much more risk adverse.  Elementary school break was usually two weeks in duration and my time was the window post Xmas pre New Years – my daughter hated to miss her mom’s holiday parties.  Lex  and I had got in this annual groove of packing up the car with camping gear and “golden bears” and heading south from Vancouver.  Sometimes there would be a stop in Seattle to visit friends – usually on the way back when the urban treats held more attraction.  Typically we made a very leisurely beeline for the wild west coast of the Olympic Peninsula.

For the third year in a row we were headed to the deserted Klaloch state park. Our winter car camping style was quite comfortable.  Pitch the tent at our favourite spot right above the ocean at the top of a princely cliff.  Stock the woodpile.  Spend the day beach combing – or do a bicycle trip into the rain forest.  Enjoy a warm dry home cooked evening meal at the Klaloch Lodge one kilometre south of the park.  Walk the dark highway back to the headlamp eerie tent.  Light the fire and break out the munchies and slowly close down the day with the some campfire fantasies. 

I always sleep well in a tent.  Lex has been a superior sleeper ever since her +10 pound birth.

I liked those trips with just the two of us.  The car adventures … being on the road … no expectations.   Our little family.   Sometimes though I missed the gaggle (three) of girls that usually invigorated our summer travels.  Those were more structured – all the better to accommodate the girl power that would bubble up and need frequent food, water and validation.  Many years later in 2005 I shared that simple recipe with colleagues at World Vision when we opened the first girls’ school in Jawand in the remote headwaters of the Murgab River in Central Afghanistan.

With those three girls I would be busy cooking - and a curious spectator to teenage philosophy.  Or I’d be behind the wheel listening to the 1000^threhearsal of something from the Lion King.  Or I’d be stoking the campfire buying time while I conjured up the next chapter of the frequently demanded but never documented “Tale of the the Three Haunted Sisters.”

That steep gully retreat from the fast rising tide almost certainly saved our lives.  And we earned it.  West Coast jungle can be virtually impenetrable.  You spend a lot of time on your belly.  In the dark.  Without a compass and a flashlight you can end up circling around and around.  We were technologically equipped, but it still took more than an hour to make the short trip –a coupla hundred metres maybe - to the coast highway.

The next year – our final winter trip - was exceptionally wet.   I am not sure if we even camped for one night.  We wanted to be on the coast and so the rain drove us south.   Out of the mountainous peninsula.  And down to the beach.

Where it started to snow.  The temperature hadn’t dropped and the sky although cloudy was still bright.  But still it came down - heavily.  We watched for a while from the porch of the small cottage we decided to rent.  Then Lex pulled us up for a stroll down to the ocean. 

“Shall we make angels dad?  The snow won’t be here for long”

#9 - My regards to the guards – written 25May12

I think it was a movie I saw about an airplane “incident.” The airplane was in fact incidental – the unforgettable image I have is the young man convincing a couple of his travelling companions to leave the plane just before the flight attendants close the doors.  He has had a vision of disaster.

So I left my place of residence about 15 minutes ago and headed for the neighbourhood  café.  In half an hour there will be a luncheon in our compound for 12 Ministry of Interior guards who we engage - in three shifts – to protect our  compound.

We also paved the street in front of the compound – turning it into a very fast soccer pitch. All part of the good neighbour strategy.  We have a nice comfortable setup here.  There are three mosques within calling distance.  Absolutely no reason to leave.

Not everyone inside is happy though.  Security is volatile in Kabul.  Freedom of movement codes can go rapidly from green to red … emotions from acquiescence to resentment and sometimes way beyond.   Occasionally our team holds a security meeting to let people talk things thru.  Good employee assistance programming tries to nip dissent in the bud with just the right amount of consultation and transparency.

The discussion at our most recent meeting was thoughtful.  The concerns were dutifully reflected on.  The meeting minutes included an action list.   Item number 5 read “Show our appreciation of the exterior guards.  How about the old reliable Afghan alliance builder – the free kebob luncheon.”

Right about now the airlock by which one enters our highly secure perimeter is probably processing our luncheon guests.  Inside the 1.2 acre compound there are five Ghurkhas.  Short - tough - battle tested.  The head Ghurkha has more than 20 years’ experience in the Indian army – including a stint on the Siachen glacier on the disputed border with Pakistan in the Himalayas.

There used to be nine Ghurkhas protecting the inside of the compound.  A few months ago during a major cost cutting initiative it was discovered that for insurance purposes only five are required.

At the café I read that Francois Hollande has made a surprise visit to the troops in Kapisa Province abutting Kabul Province to the north east.  It is home to the infamous Surobi district – a fierce insurgent stronghold.  Today's media shows the French President leaping from a helicopter, tie adrift, to troops at faithful attention.  By Dec 2012 they will all be gone.

Troop withdrawal is a critical milestone in the NATO retreat strategy.  Casualties are on the rise again.  Blue against green (men in Afghan National Army uniforms firing on coalition forces) killings are an increasing concern.  More folks than ever are asking “how do we know who our friends are?”

The thank-you lunch will  be served shortly.  I better check in and report my non-attendance.
Just courtesy really. No need to keep a plate of goat waiting.

I send at SMS to two colleagues who I can trust to relay the message..

“At Flower St Café.  Give my regards to the guards”.

#8 - The reason to get up – written 24May2012

I used to get up at 0550 to climb a mountain.  You might have thought that was the best time of the day.  We never climbed at any other time so it’s hard to say but the volume of morning walkers and runners never ceased to surprise me.

It sure made me feel safe.

The summit of Kohi Khweja Razaq  - at the top of the ridge running west of the InterContinental Hotel – is a classic urban hike.  Almost straight up through one of Kabul’s countless ad hoc hillside residential neighbourhoods.

A very potholed weather beaten road leads to the trailhead behind Kabul Education University.  There is an informal parking area next to a water pump.   If we have a driver he will stay with the car.  If we have driven ourselves … well I sometimes wonder on our return if someone has slapped an IED on the underside of our vehicle.  We never carry one of those long handled mirrors designed for such checks.  None of us has been trained about what to look for.

Well it’s not quite straight up.  But steep enough that you gotta get out of the car, wake up and kick right in.  The legs gotta get right to work.  It’s a pretty good surface but you often have to pick your footprint with care.  Total intention required.

I don’t wear my watch but occasionally somebody who has summited before me will announce times.  25 plus good aerobic minutes.  Body high on endorphins.  The martyr flags on the hill are always vigorously engaged with the wind.

For a few months in the winter we are on top at sunrise.  Often there is a humble reverent lingering of individuals and small groups chatting quietly.  It needs to be seen. Again .... and again. Each person painting their own magic composite. 

From a score of ascents.  I was probably on top 25 times in 2006 and early 2007.  In May 2007 an armed man attacked seven of my colleagues on the hilltop.  He threw a grenade that failed to explore, and fired a couple of rounds from a pistol with apparently faulty sights.  I was fortunate to have slept in that day, or perhaps gone on a mission out of the city.

These days I get up at 0550 to meditate.  I start with a couple circuits of the HESKO labyrinth – the 1/2 ton sand bags piled four high which surround the major building in the compound. Then I sit for half an hour on my apartment roof.  And finish with a little yoga.

My ex-colleagues don’t climb Kabul mountains anymore.  I've moved to a different part of the city and now freshly inspired by a retreat in the Himalayas I have a better reason to get up at 0550.

A new paint brush maybe.  But I am busy with the same composite.

#7 - Driven – written 22May12

I held on.  Very tightly.  And tried to keep my eye on the horizon as instructed.

“You are the driver dad.  The horse is the car.  Take charge and you won’t fall off.”

Yeah right.  It looks like a long way down.  How did I get up here anyway?

Admittedly a bit reluctantly.  I am afraid of heights and allergic to all kinds of animals and I almost certainly ventured the argument that I could walk/run while she rode.

“You will slow us down dad.  We are on horses so we can cover some ground.  And go for the occasional gallop.”

Well I was pretty game for both those things.  And it was day three of our outing on Salt Spring Island off the BC coast.  I needed a little freedom from the small group of friends and kids that were sharing the large weekend cottage retreat.

We were a quite compatible melange of three adults and four pre-teen children from five birth families.  We had done our share of short local getaways – usually in the fall when the skies are dry and the tourists have gone home.  Lots of energetic games and spirited laughter and campfire hotdogs.  Eventually I always try to break away for some quiet time.

My daughter Lex had been on a horse often enough for her to know that I was confident she knew what she was talking about.  It was my first time in the saddle.

On the horizon – straight ahead of the horse – was the crest of Maxwell Ridge. It runs up a gentle climb to the highest point on the island.   There’s Vancouver and the Lower Mainland off to the west.  And not much but ocean and trees for the rest of the panorama.

We couldn’t stay long.  We still had to take on the gallop circuit at the bottom of the other side of the ridge and then get back to the cottage in time for Chilly. 

You always have to go down.

The “car” wasn’t so easy to control descending.  Seemed like it wanted to drive itself.  “Lean forward and hold on with your legs dad.  Don’t feel like you have to keep up with me on the way down.”

Nowadays I spend a lot of time in two countries where I ride in the back seat of a real car and somebody else does the driving.  Buckled up of course for safety and insurance purposes.   Sometimes I am lucky and get a cautious safety conscious driver - I can sit back and relax.  Other times the guy behind the wheel clearly has a testosterone challenge and really needs to keep up – if not get ahead.

So I hold on. 

No driving from the back seat.

#6 - Not ungrateful – written 21May12

They were very grateful.  Those Afghan girls were all wide eyed smiles the day we opened their school.  No more third shifts after the boys.  No more parental excuses why school was unsafe - or inappropriate.

Well we only saw the smiles.  Some were cautious.  We development types like to intuit cause and effect.  We take professional pride in extrapolating “outcomes” – how what we do will change the lives of the people we work with.

Outcomes like Girl Power.

It was truly a shared emotional high.  The opening of the Jawand Girls School in the upper reaches of the Murgab River in north central Afghanistan in the fall of 2005 was the culmination of almost a year of strategic collaboration with a small group of fathers who wanted their daughters educated.  They faithfully walked us through the cultural and political minefield to community approval.  In turn we would provide the one way ticket out for their girls.

Six months earlier three of us had been huddled over a map of Afghanistan.   The map doubled as a table cloth welcoming our red wine and thin crust pizza – it was another Tuesday “open to NGO partners“ evening at the Italian Provincial Reconstruction Team's (PRT) in downtown Herat.  We had a handful of well thought out parameters - like “Girls School Opportunity?” - with which to evaluate seven potential school sites.  I  liked my colleagues - each of us respected how good development almost always benefits from a rigorous analysis.

And I really had no emotional bias.  I had visited each of the contestant towns only once – enough time to learn how to spell and pronounce its name.  One has to walk the dusty downtown streets of rural Afghanistan at least a few times, and confront discomforts such as female colleagues insisting upon walking one metre behind in their blue bags, before one can begin to distinguish.  Before one can begin to know anything worth basing a decision on.

On occasion in development work we are privileged to make a much more rapid emotional attachment.  I arrived in Balakot Pakistan three days after the 7.6 earthquake in early October 2005.  50 kilometres west of the epicentre it had instantly at 0840 in the morning become a field of collapsed three story buildings.  Offices.  Schools. Shops.   Suddenly tombs for thousands.   That has never left me.

The Jawand Girls school was as expected opened with a host of speakers – all male.  And the cutting of a big emblazoned ribbon – by male government officials.  But the wide eyed smiles, and the little voice chatters, and the secrets waiting to be shared all filled the air.

And burnt some tears.  My joy.  Not to be contained.  My reward for being there.  For coming back.  For trusting those parents who looked ahead – albeit somewhat selfishly.

They were very grateful those girls.  And some of them have probably cashed in that one way ticket by now.  Likely most of them were in school about eight months later on the day when somebody flushed Korans down the toilet in Guantanamo Bay.  Like many of their fellow students at the boys’ school they went on a little field trip to our office down the street.  Each girl tossed a handful of stones in token protest.  Perhaps – but I know it felt a lot more threatening to my colleagues who were barricaded inside for 36 hours.

I was very grateful not to be there that day.      

#5 - Soft landing – written 20May12

She is going to try the hill.  Oh God. 

Wait!  Its steeper than I thought.  She’s only been on that bike a coupla weeks.

What if she falls?

Well my daughter Lex had already fallen.  The previous year - down the back porch steps.  Just as our good friend and babysitter J was handing her back to us. 

We had had a nice parent’s only afternoon on First Beach in English Bay.  The same beach in fact where we had previously walked thru those last few days of pregnancy and prepared ourselves for the likely Caesarian.  “The birthday party” as the surgeon called it.  He hosted more than 100 every year.  Nothing between 8 AM and noon though – prime golf time.  “Good stroke and good follow through” are the surgeon’s greatest assets.

She didn’t appear to be hurt.  J seemed the more distraught of the two.  Later that evening on reflection those big bruises on Lex's hands and knees were somehow reassuring – perhaps she had had the presence of mind to feel herself falling and respond defensively.  But there were nonetheless big tears all around.  First from our daughter’s pain.  Later they came with a more thoughtful reflection on the vulnerability of our precious gift.

Hold on!  Oh God. 

Wait!  She is going to crash into those pedestrians.  She’s only a little child.

What if she falls?

My daughter remembers thinking the same thing – “what if I fall?”  Or at least thinking that she better hold on and keep the wheel straight like mommy had taught her the previous week.  And head for something soft to land in. 

Like the beach!

Not long ago she remembered this out loud while driving me to the airport.  As she finished this recollection her cell phone rang and she took a brief call.  At the end of the call I admitted to significant discomfort when she drives and talks on the phone at the same time.

“Yeah dad – I know it’s a bit dangerous.

And there’s no soft landing in sight.”

#4 - Some Doubt? – written  19May2012

There was no doubt who shouted.  The other would never have.  Culturally inappropriate.  No genes for a response like that.

Give the other a gun however and the cultural dynamics might change dramatically.

The expat was actually quite surprised at the volume his voice could deliver.  The other three men in the small office literally froze.  Bodies and faces in minor shock.  Breathless.  For a moment.  And more.

And then in their thawing the three men turned slowly to each other.  Looking for an explanation.  Or maybe refuge.  Something just a little less uncomfortable.

The ex-pat’s echo slowly decayed to silence.  It unlikely that these three men had ever been together in silence.  Well conspiracy maybe.  But they seem to get paid more for talking than for listening.  More for proposing rather than implementing.

But what was there to say now?

The ex-pat eventually took a deep breathe, humbled himself with a conciliatory hand to heart, and excused himself for the remainder of the afternoon to the local café to ‘chill out”.

And he did in time.  A couple of ½ carrot ½ tangerine juices sipped while circumambulating the café garden helped restore the bigger picture.  And fueled by a cup of that wonderful espresso – such loyalty that coffee buys! - he then composed his apology for the management meeting the next morning.

“What I meant to say was …”

There is no doubt that his colleagues will nod their polite acceptance.  

#3 - I Never Stabbed Myself – written 18May2012

I never stabbed myself. 

One learns to approach with care.  All the usual precautions.   Look around first, check your gloves, have you got thick soled shoes on?  Don’t poke around too much – go for the visible ones.  

You always find that there is no shortage.

Picking up needles in the Down Town East Side of Vancouver is in many ways a symbolic act.  Yes we wanted to reduce the risk of transmission of disease.  And keep the streets clean for our kids to play in.  But every needle picked up off the sidewalk or out of the dirt by a park bench says something about the magnitude of the illness.  Loudly.  About the addiction.  And the cost.  And the prudence of safe injection sites.

My day job was less controversial – but still challenging.   Trying to understand – let alone mitigate - the employment challenges facing homeless, mentally handicapped, drug and alcohol compromised folks. 

I rarely saw their faces.  The employment challenged I mean.  I was an agency guy – you circulate among meetings looking for ways to broadcast your agency’s mandate and spend its money.  You stare across the meeting room table at other agencies’ guys and try to make a connection. 

We did some good things.  So much human ego is tied up in work.  Volunteer, paid, part time. I learned a lot about how tied my own sense of worth is to work.  I could empathize.

From time to time I visited the Women’s Centre.  It was one of three agencies in which we had embedded employment services.  I appreciated the haven – amid the chatter of the women and the laughter of the children it was a sanctuary from the low grade tension on Hastings Avenue. 

And a glimpse of something very alive.  The smiles  ... you know how a child can explode with eyes and mouth wide open in awe.  The young mothers entertaining surprise.  With goodies pulled from purses – “guess where I found this”.  With disclosures – “the child’s father is back again”.   With bruises …

I never asked about those.

#2 - Sacred Trust – written 19 April12

“Do you trust me?”

“Well you know as much as I do about this trail” she replies.  “Which isn’t much.”

It's another imminent sunset and no campground.  This trip we are attempting the southern access to the well known Butterfly  meadows and the eastern panorama of the formidable Mt Moran  in the North Cascades in Washington State.   If all goes according to plan we will be in familiar territory tomorrow after descending the Leopard  snowfield.  It looks ominous from below – a few years back we dipped our hot and weary feet in the glacial lake at the Leapard’s  foot before setting up camp in the meadows to drink from the evening stars.

No such relief this evening.  We arrived at the trailhead a bit late after taking extra time to double and triple check our plans with two outfitters in Seattle.  And we are not making the same time that I anticipated – my legs feel heavy and my lungs shallow.  The pain is threatening to turn to doubt.

“I can take the lead.” she offers. “You settle into the slipstream for a while.”  She likes to make fun of my fascination with practical applications of science – but in truth we are wonderfully compatible on the trail.  Taking the lead is not just about setting the pace, but scouting the trail.  And being the first to crest the next pass and marvel at the new horizon and satisfy the curiosity of the climb and find the comfortable boulder for two.  Where we can share the triumph, and the splendor.

But with darkness descending she knows the immediate challenge is to pace us through an unknown forest for an uncertain distance to a suitable place to pitch the tent.  I hope that place jumps out at us.  But we have learned not to depend too much on either good fortune or local wisdom when the sun is going down.        

The trail is solid and I am matching her steady deliberate steps – but barely.  I force a little exaggerated sway to my hips to provide some extra propulsion and mitigate the fatigue in my thighs.  I count the breath, then lose it, then count again.  I try to fill my chest with a little extra air but there is no room.  And there is almost no light save the focussed glow of our headlamps.

My body is starting to sag and my autopilot is in charge.  So I am slow to notice when the forest suddenly breaks and we emerge into a starlight field.   With a faint ridge a few kilometres in front of us in the direction of the glacier. 

“This is our campground” she observes quietly after breathing in the big sky above us.

“Right where we trusted it might be.”

#1 - Sea Weed – written  18Apr12

Its low tide in English Bay in Vancouver Canada.  The Bay is highly urbanized and built right up to the shoreline in many places so when the tide goes out it creates a whole new space for exploration

But that’s not why Auntie Miné and I are here.  And she’s not my Aunt – she is the elder sister of my wife Sandra’s father.  Second generation Japanese Canadian, ex-oil executive, now quietly retired and warmly eccentric.  

And we are out looking for sea-weed.  That Japanese delicacy which wraps sushi and decorates rice and in its native form clings to rocks in shallow and not too cold salt water.    It’s a bit of scramble down from the public access path and then there is a drop of a metre or so to our hunting grounds.  We have our waders on to secure our footing and stay dry – but it’s an unusually hot day and my feet are already sticky and irritated with sweat.

Miné takes my hand for the last big step and plops down beside me with a restrained squeal.  “This is one of my favourite spots.  Not too picked over.  And some good wakame here – tasty and more nutritious than the kombu we usually pick over in West Van.”

So we set to harvesting.  Seaweed does not just slide off its rocky home into one’s hand.  I put my fingers on the edge of a sticky blade and pull.  A small piece of the blade comes off while the rest clings possessively to its perch.  “Try not to tear it Peter.  The long elegant strips taste better.”

My technique improves slightly over the course of the next coupla hours.  But at the end of the day when we spread our harvest on the kitchen floor my pile is significantly more ragged than Miné’s.    Sandra complements me on my “volume” as she plunges each pile into a sink full of cold water and agitates it thoroughly.  It’s difficult with a home process like ours to remove all the salt, and once dried in the sun this wakame will likely end up finely chopped into almost invisible pieces in a miso soup.

Late afternoon comes and Miné needs to head home for her afternoon nap.  I offer to drive but Sandra’s says “no I will take her.  You have been the good son-in-law today.”

Poem #3 - Bloor Street Subway Blues – written 26July12
Yet Another back to Canada subway crossing of Toronto

Another winging across town …
underground.
Another cross section of Toronto diversity –
It gets around.

Around the city there’s an air …
long pined for
Around the intersection of urban curiosities
You’ll see the signs for.

For whom the bells tolls, at the station,
On arrival.
For whom the sunlight – once ascended –
Signals survival.

Poem #2 - The easy math of transformation – written 21July12
Coming up to Ramadan – a Muslim American friend offers that
all spirituality involves getting on a specific path and then eventually getting off it … this strikes a big chord in the middle of my first night back in Canada

Tomorrow could be another big day.
Restless feet itch
Something like a twitch
Taken over from the play

Of living wild and free
Of trying to be better
Of living without fetter.
It’s not something one can see

Beyond the spirit to the path.
To be on it for a while
To be off it with a smile
There’s nothing odd about the math

Of transformation, even surrender –
It’s not the loss but the lesson
It’s not pretention to contention –
By my soul … and all its render.
By my heart … for all that’s tender

Poem # 1 - Undisturbed – written 13Jun12
For my Aunt Isobel whose life is coming
to an end – thanks for your inspiration

I wish we could go for a boat ride
Together one last time
Or some other from-my-childhood family-memory
Back when we were still
Creating them.

Now we are each too old to paddle
Or even try to climb
Down to by-the-lilies water’s-edge
Through once we launched without
Disturbing them.

But most I’ll miss your letters and your words
Though often without rhythm.
Your guiding-without-pointing faith-statements
Accounted for many spirits without
Naming them.

You may be gone soon - before I’m home - and
It borders on sublime
Attention to-the-moment’s final-passing

….. deep breathe ….

Then lonely for a while without
Blaming them.

There’s no
reclaiming-them.