do do do Lookin' out my back door

One of the perks of working early in the morning is getting up to see the summer sun blaze up from the Harbour over my back yard.
They say you can't go home again but I am happier here than I ever would have dreamed: a quick trip to the beach, a 10 minute walk around town running errands, and family close by. I like knowing the people who pump gas on the island next to me, waving to people as they drive by my house, having picnics in the front yard, and chatting to townsfolk at the supermarket.
This is the smallest of small town life but it suits me surprisingly well.
I miss Bangkok, Rome, Taipei, and Tokyo- but for right now this is the right place for me.

the Write Life

Kindly ask me for more
time, forgiveness, distance
to what audience is this directed
Mr. Kwame of the inevitable hard luck in Nigeria
a black man waiting for my impossible return to his bed
the current set of lives so dependent on my own
or an unimagined future other
Myself, reincarnated, unfurled, nearing the final insignificance
each asking me for more-
weighing me down with their psychological proximity
i erase you all with piercing prose and start a new page.

The Single Life

I recently read a book with the promising title - Single State of the Union: single women speak out on life, love and the pursuit of happiness. I am always looking for a book that will examine the lives of women in a similar situation as I find myself in; single mother with no designs on a permanent attachment. But low and behold, the book was filled with tales of the single life by women who had pulled out of the solo flight plan and were now happily ensconced in the forever after with some male life form.

I don't feel that being part of a couple is a good or bad thing- I would just like to hear a few voices of single, successful and content women.

I once had a friend that had many short term, dramatic and exciting affairs. She never got too worked up about any one man and was carefree and happy in between their comings and goings into and out of her life. I could not imagine being satisfied with such an unsettled, uncommitted life, but now I see I have made my own stability and am committed to myself and my children.

Men may come and go- I enjoy the moment and then move on and return to my own life after a brief and stimulating departure. I need the break I get away from motherhood that men bring into my life but I need the freedom to be me that being single allows. I am not very good at compromise and can't imagine another person in my family's life being anything other than a visitor.

Having said all that; I met a man yesterday and am thinking of how I can get his phone number.

I recently heard a radio report from a mother whose daughter just left for university. She was feeling depressed because her daughter was starting off on a new adventure in life and she was now left to finish off her life with no foreseeable adventures in her future. This shocked me. What was this woman thinking? Why was it that when her children flew the coop , that she did not think she could do the same?

When my children leave home- I will be leaving too!! I will get back my more adventurous live that I have forfeited while my children grow up. I know many mothers worry about the empty nest- all I can think about is how I will regain my singular freedom. That is not to say that I begrudge my children the restrictions they place on my life. I wanted them, and want to keep them safe and am unwilling to take the risks I used to take while they are still young. But in the back of my mind I am also waiting for the day when they take flight so I can too.

The Indian Problem

The Indian Problem

“I don’t know why those people are complaining. They got an education. They would have nothing if those schools hadn’t taken them.” This was a comment I was recently treated to while discussing the fact that the Nunavut Territorial Government was not as successful an experiment as had been hoped when the territory was promulgated in 1997. I believe that so many of the people who were meant to administer the “self-government” did not have the educational background to do an adequate job. Hence the above comment that those that got education in residential schools should count themselves lucky.

Well, to the best of my knowledge most kids in middle and high school do not appreciate the educational opportunities they have been afforded. How could the native peoples of Canada be expected to appreciate their educational experience when it was accompanied by sodomy, beatings and cultural annihilation?

What people fail to realize is that even though the residential schools have not been in operation for years, the abuse that occurred there has been passed on from one generation to another like a maladaptive gene. Abuse begets abuse. The scars on the grandparents’ hearts manifest themselves in the often abusive lives lead by their children. It takes a great deal of work to break this cycle and very few people can. When they do, it is a personal triumph but in this case an entire class of people have been affected and a few success stories don’t attract attention away from the general trend.

This issue may be of concern to many Canadians no matter their ethnicity. But for me, I have always taken a special interest in Native problems. My Great Great Grandmother was Iroquois. I never met her and saw but a few pictures of her, but her Indianess is writ large in my mythology of the clan.

Skinny Bitch

Today my neighbour came knocking on my door to pass on some clothes from her daughter. Said daughter was through with the attire and as her mother politely told me, I was the smallest person she knew. She didn’t use skinny, in some circles that has a negative connotation- as in the above title SKINNY BITCH.

If you are a woman, you have no doubt looked at another woman and thought those exact words to yourself. I know I have. I have not always been as thin as I am now. My early years were set at 15 to 20 pounds more than my current weight; perhaps even more than that. I was not a fan of the scale so I cannot be certain. I was never overweight but I was certainly not as svelte as I am now.

In my current incarnation I feel I have to defend those sisters that like me fall on the low end of the BMI index. My first defence is that I suffered, and suffered greatly to attain this weight; and I am not talking about dieting.

I have a medical condition, that when it flares up, makes it very difficult to eat. Food brings stabbing pain and has me doubled over and crying on the floor. And no it isn’t some psychosomatic anorexic side affect. 6 years ago I had emergency surgery because the pains indicated a bowel so twisted that gangrene was setting in. After the surgery I could not eat for one month. That will make you one Skinny Bitch; and indeed bitchy. When you are hungry and know you can’t eat because it will give you pain that makes you wish you were dead- well food becomes a bit of an enemy.

Although my health has been better and I have not been hospitalized for 7 months, a long stint out of hospital for me, I still have a daily battle with what I can eat and how much.

Perhaps, you think that my case is extraordinary; but I will demonstrate that it is not. A friend of mine once complained to me that everyone considered her a skinny bitch, but like me it was through no fault of her own. This woman had a digestive problem- chrones /irritable bowel/ or colitis- I can’t remember which- painful, hard to treat and a fast ticket to slimville by way of pain and suffering.

People that have the reverse problem with food don’t care to hear about those who eat and eat but can’t gain weight. But please think a minute before despising the sprites that pull size 2 off the rack and complain that it is too loose. That person may not have desired to be that size but may have had it forced on her like an NG tube in the E.R.

Love and lust, but no sex

Sat here in my too tight jeans, thinking about the smell of my sheets; I perused the poemhunter. I reviewed my favourite poem by Hart and investigated poems on the topic of murder. Having written one on the murder of an old friend; it is a topic that interests me. I found a new poet to pursue who is aptly named Mark Slaughter. Unfortunately my name does not lend itself to such ironic futures.

After reading about the blade, I sought out poems about the shaft. Much to my surprise under the topics index one may find love and lust, but no sex. This disturbs me. It’s a topic that occupies my pen frequently. Are poets and fans of poetry supposed to be too sensitive to read and write clearly on this basic human function? Does it have to be covered with other words, hidden in the semantics of lesser prose? Sex, Sex, sex- see it didn’t burn your eyes out or blacken your soul.