Category Archives: Reflections

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Mother’s Day

Mother’s Day was mostly just another day. My mother never let me attempt breakfast in bed. Chances are, she cooked breakfast for me. Mom’s right arm was never the same after the cancer, and her tendency to swing hot pans close to my head became a nervous running joke.

Mom did housework well until the end, but she never really cared about it. She had more conveniences in the 70s and 80s than I do now: dishwasher, microwave oven, laundry, cleaning lady. Our house was never a showpiece, unlike Aunt Joan’s, but it was clean. Clean enough, anyway.

Besides the obligatory card, all my mother really expected from Mother’s Day was to not have to cook, perhaps, and that her father wouldn’t wake her up by phoning during her nap. “Charlie” had no sense of time or frequency of calls near the end.

The nap would be a sound one, hopefully, with a few dogs on her, on the couch or beg, on dog beds surrounding her. I do that, too, but more with the cats. Somehow animals know that Mom and I will put up with intrusive companionship.

It’s hard not to feel sad on days like today. It’s not just that I miss Mom, and clearly never really got over it; it’s that I miss my family, even if in retrospect it seems more like the idea of a family.

It’s that weird adult sense that home is where I am, not a place to visit, and it’s the memories, of course – not of special occasions but everyday memories, the banal details of home and belonging that you never realize you’re going to miss so much.

 

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The personal and the political

I’ve been thinking a lot today about Jamie Hubley’s suicide, following Heather Mallick’s touching article in The Star and the boy’s father’s heartbreaking statement on his website.

Suicides of LGBT teens lately have been reported much more frequently than in the past, and Jamie Hubley, the focus of our thoughts today, is destined to be a sad statistic tomorrow, and while we applaud efforts like the It Gets Better Project – see the Canadian video here – obviously it isn’t enough to have famous people reaching out to gay teens, because that’s not real life…but it is a well-meant, mainstream start at removing some of the stigma attached to being a gay teen.

But it’s not enough – not nearly.

When I first read about Jamie Hubley, I was shocked. I admit that I was naïve: I am a reasonably privileged white Canadian male; my friends are small-L liberal types whose lack of prejudice I take for granted; and I live in Ottawa, which isn’t some hick Christian Republican city in the States (think Matthew Shepard and Laramie, Wyoming). My MPP and mayor are Liberals, my MP is a New Democrat, and I expect them to support and participate in Capital Pride (and they all do). How can it be so bad for a gay kid from an Ottawa suburb?

There was, perhaps, more press about Jamie Hubley because his father Allan is an Ottawa city councillor – by all accounts a good man, a recipient of the Governor General’s Caring Canadian Award for his volunteerism.

It was only when I read Cllr. Hubley’s statement today on the death of his son that I realized how foolish I was to think one teen’s personal situation would be automatically better than another’s because of geography or even having a loving, supportive family.

And I realized this because, for once, I stepped back from my usual chosen role online as a commentator and made it personal. Reading what Cllr. Hubley wrote, I realized this, too: I could have been Jamie Hubley.

I am so bloody fortunate. I am openly gay, and take it for granted that no one has an issue with it. I have a partner with whom I’ve lived now for over a year. I have stepkids and no one’s ever suggested we aren’t fit parents because we’re two gay men. I didn’t even feel disadvantaged by being gay and living in a town of 4,000, though until I met R it was rather lonely.

How quickly I forgot that, even if it did get better, it used to be much, much worse.

Like Jamie Hubley, I grew up in suburbia – Unionville, Ontario to be precise – and while my parents split up when I was a baby, I was raised by a loving mother, did well in school, and had friends…until I became a gay teen.

Like Jamie Hubley, even before I really knew what “gay” meant, I was teased and bullied for a lack of athletic aptitude (in Jamie’s case, as his father wrote, he preferred figure skating to hockey). Somehow, despite not being particularly “girly” or “sissy,” the other kids knew I was different, and they knew the difference was bad, and that they could get away with hurting me because – as my teachers often lamented – I made little effort to fit in.

It was tantamount to their saying that if only I weren’t gay, I wouldn’t be bullied for being gay.

I hit puberty early, in grade 5, and from that point on my school life fell apart. Having been the top student in every class up to that point, identified as gifted, blah blah blah, I suddenly started shuttling from school to school as I and my mother tried to find the magic solution – that didn’t exist – to keep me out of harm’s way.

It’s been reported that kids on Jamie Hubley’s school bus tried to shove batteries in his mouth for not liking hockey. In my case, I was socially shunned, beaten up, shoved into lockers – you name it. And it went on for years and years and yes, it did damage to me: to my self-esteem, to my mental health, to my view of the world.

We’ve all heard right-wing commentators associate us with all those sad statistics – higher rate of suicides, addictions, mental health issues – as if they were inherent to the fact of being gay instead of being a result of how often we are treated at a young age, then go out into the world with no guidebook, few role models…not a clue, really.

By the time I was seventeen only my parents, two or three friends, and a few teachers knew I was gay. I hadn’t told most of my family, and for that matter, I still haven’t. I am ashamed to admit that it was only this year that I told my favourite cousin, and I didn’t really tell her so much as I simply introduced her to my boyfriend.

That year – in 1992 – my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy. She wasn’t expected to live through the operation. (Happily, she did, and because she was determined and had excellent doctors, she survived for another fourteen years.)

Meanwhile, I was left alone at home. I wasn’t on speaking terms with my father and stepmother, who lived 200 kms away, and my mother’s family for some unknown reason thought it appropriate to let an only child, a teenager, a mama’s boy at that, stay alone at home caring for two dogs and two cats for a month while his mother was in Intensive Care.

This was when the bullying at high school was at its worst. My mother and I thought we had solved the problem by switching me to an alternative school, AISP, in North York, but shortly before Mom’s diagnosis I was attacked by a fellow student on a class trip. He called me “faggot” and kicked me in the chest, as I vividly recall, for which he was given a three-day suspension.

And so, I stopped going to school, even though I was an A+ student, liked by his teachers, liked even by many of his peers (mostly the female ones), all because some fucking delinquent asshole named Eric was somehow threatened by this studious, meek, gay suburban kid.

After three weeks alone, terrified to go to school, scared that my mother was dying, I tried to kill myself. To this day I don’t know why I changed my mind and called a family friend who took me to the hospital, but I did.

It did get better…in time, and after I switched to another alternative school called Subway Academy Two that offered individual learning with three teachers, all of whom encouraged me and made me feel like I belonged. Still, essentially I traded all peer socialization except for one single, solitary friend for the safety that Subway provided.

Why am I sharing my story? It is with great reluctance that I do. There are parts of this story unknown to even my partner, and I want to be taken seriously. This is not a gay blog, or a mental illness blog, though I am willing to admit that my youthful troubles led to anxiety and depression. Primarily, I’m known for politics, and this is more personal.

But it is political too, because if you’re reading this, you probably know me – in real life, or through social media, perhaps – and it’s just wrong wrong wrong for me to go on blithely retweeting and reposting stuff about Jamie Hubley if I’m not even willing to be honest about my own path.

When one is young, one lives in a bubble, really. When teenagers talk about their problems, it’s as if they don’t realize that anyone else has ever had the same issues.

I don’t know how else to let gay teens know that a lot of us went through the same shit except if we reach some sort of critical mass of personal stories. It’s all very nice that Dan Savage is doing something, but most gay kids won’t turn out to be Dan Savage. They’ll be more like, well, me, trying to be happy, trying to live a “normal” life, finding love and friendship, bettering oneself, helping to improve one’s community.

And even then, the cynic in me whispers in my ear that we haven’t – yet – changed society, that it is still an inevitable struggle for almost all LGBT youth, and there will be more Jamie Hubleys over which we share a link and shed a tear.

But maybe telling our stories is a start, and of course we should support local charitable and social services that can make a difference.

You can make a donation, as per Cllr. Allan Hubley’s request, in Jamie Hubley’s memory to the Youth Services Bureau of Ottawa’s Youth Mental Health Walk-In Clinic. It’s too little, too late, I know…but it’s something.

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The personal & the political #lgbt #canqueer

I’ve been thinking a lot today about Jamie Hubley’s suicide, following Heather Mallick’s touching article in The Star and the boy’s father’s heartbreaking statement on his website.

Suicides of LGBT teens lately have been reported much more frequently than in the past, and Jamie Hubley, the focus of our thoughts today, is destined to be a sad statistic tomorrow, and while we applaud efforts like the It Gets Better Project - see the Canadian video here – obviously it isn’t enough to have famous people reaching out to gay teens, because that’s not real life…but it is a well-meant, mainstream start at removing some of the stigma attached to being a gay teen.

But it’s not enough – not nearly.

When I first read about Jamie Hubley, I was shocked. I admit that I was naïve: I am a reasonably privileged white Canadian male; my friends are small-L liberal types whose lack of prejudice I take for granted; and I live in Ottawa, which isn’t some hick Christian Republican city in the States (think Matthew Shepard and Laramie, Wyoming). My MPP and mayor are Liberals, my MP is a New Democrat, and I expect them to support and participate in Capital Pride (and they all do). How can it be so bad for a gay kid from an Ottawa suburb?

There was, perhaps, more press about Jamie Hubley because his father Allan is an Ottawa city councillor – by all accounts a good man, a recipient of the Governor General’s Caring Canadian Award for his volunteerism.

It was only when I read Cllr. Hubley’s statement today on the death of his son that I realized how foolish I was to think one teen’s personal situation would be automatically better than another’s because of geography or even having a loving, supportive family.

And I realized this because, for once, I stepped back from my usual chosen role online as a commentator and made it personal. Reading what Cllr. Hubley wrote, I realized this, too: I could have been Jamie Hubley.

I am so bloody fortunate. I am openly gay, and take it for granted that no one has an issue with it. I have a partner with whom I’ve lived now for over a year. I have stepkids and no one’s ever suggested we aren’t fit parents because we’re two gay men. I didn’t even feel disadvantaged by being gay and living in a town of 4,000, though until I met R it was rather lonely.

How quickly I forgot that, even if it did get better, it used to be much, much worse.

Like Jamie Hubley, I grew up in suburbia – Unionville, Ontario to be precise – and while my parents split up when I was a baby, I was raised by a loving mother, did well in school, and had friends…until I became a gay teen.

Like Jamie Hubley, even before I really knew what “gay” meant, I was teased and bullied for a lack of athletic aptitude (in Jamie’s case, as his father wrote, he preferred figure skating to hockey). Somehow, despite not being particularly “girly” or “sissy,” the other kids knew I was different, and they knew the difference was bad, and that they could get away with hurting me because – as my teachers often lamented – I made little effort to fit in.

It was tantamount to their saying that if only I weren’t gay, I wouldn’t be bullied for being gay.

I hit puberty early, in grade 5, and from that point on my school life fell apart. Having been the top student in every class up to that point, identified as gifted, blah blah blah, I suddenly started shuttling from school to school as I and my mother tried to find the magic solution – that didn’t exist – to keep me out of harm’s way.

It’s been reported that kids on Jamie Hubley’s school bus tried to shove batteries in his mouth for not liking hockey. In my case, I was socially shunned, beaten up, shoved into lockers – you name it. And it went on for years and years and yes, it did damage to me: to my self-esteem, to my mental health, to my view of the world.

We’ve all heard right-wing commentators associate us with all those sad statistics – higher rate of suicides, addictions, mental health issues – as if they were inherent to the fact of being gay instead of being a result of how often we are treated at a young age, then go out into the world with no guidebook, few role models…not a clue, really.

By the time I was seventeen only my parents, two or three friends, and a few teachers knew I was gay. I hadn’t told most of my family, and for that matter, I still haven’t. I am ashamed to admit that it was only this year that I told my favourite cousin, and I didn’t really tell her so much as I simply introduced her to my boyfriend.

That year – in 1992 – my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy. She wasn’t expected to live through the operation. (Happily, she did, and because she was determined and had excellent doctors, she survived for another fourteen years.)

Meanwhile, I was left alone at home. I wasn’t on speaking terms with my father and stepmother, who lived 200 kms away, and my mother’s family for some unknown reason thought it appropriate to let an only child, a teenager, a mama’s boy at that, stay alone at home caring for two dogs and two cats for a month while his mother was in Intensive Care.

This was when the bullying at high school was at its worst. My mother and I thought we had solved the problem by switching me to an alternative school, AISP, in North York, but shortly before Mom’s diagnosis I was attacked by a fellow student on a class trip. He called me “faggot” and kicked me in the chest, as I vividly recall, for which he was given a three-day suspension.

And so, I stopped going to school, even though I was an A+ student, liked by his teachers, liked even by many of his peers (mostly the female ones), all because some fucking delinquent asshole named Eric was somehow threatened by this studious, meek, gay suburban kid.

After three weeks alone, terrified to go to school, scared that my mother was dying, I tried to kill myself. To this day I don’t know why I changed my mind and called a family friend who took me to the hospital, but I did.

It did get better…in time, and after I switched to another alternative school called Subway Academy Two that offered individual learning with three teachers, all of whom encouraged me and made me feel like I belonged. Still, essentially I traded all peer socialization except for one single, solitary friend for the safety that Subway provided.

Why am I sharing my story? It is with great reluctance that I do. There are parts of this story unknown to even my partner, and I want to be taken seriously. This is not a gay blog, or a mental illness blog, though I am willing to admit that my youthful troubles led to anxiety and depression. Primarily, I’m known for politics, and this is more personal.

But it is political too, because if you’re reading this, you probably know me – in real life, or through social media, perhaps – and it’s just wrong wrong wrong for me to go on blithely retweeting and reposting stuff about Jamie Hubley if I’m not even willing to be honest about my own path.

When one is young, one lives in a bubble, really. When teenagers talk about their problems, it’s as if they don’t realize that anyone else has ever had the same issues.

I don’t know how else to let gay teens know that a lot of us went through the same shit except if we reach some sort of critical mass of personal stories. It’s all very nice that Dan Savage is doing something, but most gay kids won’t turn out to be Dan Savage. They’ll be more like, well, me, trying to be happy, trying to live a “normal” life, finding love and friendship, bettering oneself, helping to improve one’s community.

And even then, the cynic in me whispers in my ear that we haven’t – yet – changed society, that it is still an inevitable struggle for almost all LGBT youth, and there will be more Jamie Hubleys over which we share a link and shed a tear.

But maybe telling our stories is a start, and of course we should support local charitable and social services that can make a difference.

You can make a donation, as per Cllr. Allan Hubley’s request, in Jamie Hubley’s memory to the Youth Services Bureau of Ottawa’s Youth Mental Health Walk-In Clinic. It’s too little, too late, I know…but it’s something.

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Remembering a friend

In all the chaos and confusion of our move to Ottawa, I was out of the County news loop until I read a reporter-friend’s Facebook post referring to someone I knew…someone I knew who was murdered. (Son charged in murder of Elaine Jeffery, Countylive.ca)

Elaine Jeffrey was a family friend. She and husband Jim knew everyone, it seemed, because they got involved in everything. Until her recent retirement, Elaine had been a lab technician at the hospital, was an avid boater, active OPSEU member, and an enthusiastic competitor at the Picton Fair’s baking competition; she and Jim held annual Christmas parties filled to the rafters with clients, friends, and family.

One of those family members – their son, Beau – has been charged with his mother’s murder. I knew Beau, too, and knew that the Jeffreys had struggled to help Beau find his niche. Both my stepmother and I thought perhaps that he had a learning disability. We knew that Elaine and Jim were relieved that Beau enjoyed his cooking course at college in Toronto.

Turns out we were very mistaken. One doesn’t kill one’s mother because one is dyslexic.

What I’ve heard – secondhand information only – is that Elaine and Jim were dealing with a son with severe mental illness. Prince Edward County had, last I checked, only one psychiatrist and no emergency psychiatric services. The process was frustrating for them, I have no doubt, and Beau’s state of mind frightening, but Elaine wouldn’t leave her son. And now she’s dead.

But this isn’t a blog post about how the system lets down the mentally ill and their families. I’ll leave it to someone else to ask those tough questions.

This is a post about remembering a friend, because I can’t stop thinking about her, and I wish I’d told her something, anything to let her know that I and my family cared.

And Elaine was a friend, definitely more than an acquaintance. I didn’t often see her except in my parents’ company but the memories I have are fond and personal. In 2009, Elaine and Jim joined us on a trip to Malta, and if you can travel with people without hating them afterward, you are friends for life.

We used to tease Elaine about getting involved in everything, but it was ultimately an endearing quality. The world needs more people who don’t just look away. I remember when an elderly German tourist took a nasty tumble at an historic site. Poor fellow was bleeding and hollering in pain, so of course Elaine rushed up and offered him…an Advil. We chuckled at that.

It was the thought that counted, of course, and Elaine Jeffrey would give you the shirt off her back, even if you didn’t need a shirt, just so you knew you weren’t alone when you were in need.

Not that she was saintly, because I liked her, and I only like imperfect people. There was that time my stepmom, Elaine and I downed about ten too many martinis and pretty much had to be carried away by poor Jim and my dad, and both Jim and my folks got very nervous looks when Elaine and I discovered all that lovely Maltese jewellery on sale…

A good person, Elaine was, but she also knew how to have fun. She had one of those infectious laughs that’s instantly recognizable. I can’t even picture Elaine in my head without a smile.

We hadn’t heard much from Elaine and Jim in recent months and I am genuinely remorseful that I never even thought about it. Elaine always took the initiative in calling us, inviting us for dinner, keeping open the lines of communication.

The last time I saw her, I was leaving a political party event in Belleville that Elaine was protesting as part of her OPSEU involvement. I was in the company of my mentor, a respected union leader, so although we were, in theory, opponents, Elaine, Bob and I chatted quite amicably. What do politics matter when you’re catching up with an old friend?

As I recall, our conversation ended with a promise to have dinner together. That never happened, but anyway, I’ve dealt with death before, and I know there’s no proper, effective, or satisfying way to say goodbye. Had we spent time together, well, we would have respected their privacy and still would have had no idea that she would be murdered by her own son. How could anyone anticipate that?

My heart is heavy, hearing that Jim realized Elaine was gone when she didn’t show up to her only grandchild’s birthday party. Elaine was a caregiver; what does a family do when they lose a wife, a mother, a grandmother?

I’ll always remember Elaine Jeffrey fondly as a genuine person: enthusiastic, sympathetic, energetic. May she rest in peace.

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As God is my witness

Had another Scarlett O’Hara moment today but without the dusty dried up carrot. Ran out of lip balm, which drives me nuts because I’m addicted to it, so just found a sale at Shoppers on Blistex products & declared, “As God is my witness I’ll never be without lip balm again.”

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The continental in me

I had to step away from social media. Take your pick of catalysts: Michael Coren’s despicable attack on the kids massacred at Utoeya? The trite (and glib, and callous) comments about Amy Winehouse’s death? The Internet is ugly today.

I signed off with a mention – “à la prochaîne, mon amie” – that reminded me of Windsor, Ontario’s francophone history, and my own family’s past.

I’m not really francophone, myself. My tendency of throwing out French expressions is rather a hangover aka affectation from my years working in a government mailroom as the only bilingual among three (one English, two French) uni-lingual co-workers. Just to make life interesting, I also supervised a deaf dude who was born French but was taught ASL in school so basically he couldn’t understand anyone, poor guy.

Now I personally think my habit of saying “moi non plus” etc. is more endearing than one co-worker’s favourite foray into the English language: “Fuck a duck.” Tabernacle, but that’s strong language, eh?

But anyway, my family is French, or used to be. Our surname is uncommon – it’s actually a place-name, to be precise a commune of Metro Paris’ Seine-Saint-Louis département – but it is French. Many of my New World ancestors were known as “Bondy, dit Douaire,” for “Douaire de Bondy” was the name by which my family was known on moving to Canada.

…And that is still weird. Good explanation for why we’re named after a suburb, yes, but “douaire” en français means “dower,” so our true surname sort of means “a legal provision accorded to a wife for her support in the event that she should survive her husband.” (I wonder, is there an English family out there called Mississauga dit Power-of-Attorney?)

Today I did a little hunting via Wikipedia and found more info on the family’s political history in Lower Canada. Merchant Joseph Bondy dit Douaire represented Warwick (1816-1820) in the Legislative Assembly of Lower Canada. Joseph’s daughter married American-educated phyisician Louis-Joseph Moll, who was elected to a single term (1867-71) in the Legislative Assembly of Quebec as a Conservative. Louis-Joseph’s daughter married Eugène Lafontaine, a lawyer, educator, judge, and published author who served as Liberal MLA for Napierville from 1886-1990.

And that’s where the trail runs cold, at least for now.

I’m not sure how my family came to relocate from the outskirts of Montréal to Windsor, Ontario, but they were certainly not alone. There are two Bondys in our local phone book, and the one that isn’t me is an Italian “Bondi” whose family changed the spelling of their name. (My dad asked. He is wont to ask about such things.) Meanwhile in Windsor there are 175 listings under Bondy.

My great-grandfather Bondy was clearly not a direct descendant of the political Bondys (the line passed through daughters) but he was certainly French, as was his indomitable matriarchal wife, Isabelle Fortin. But back then, in the 1920s, the couple made a conscious decision to raise their large brood (a dozen kids who survived to adulthood, half a dozen who didn’t – did I mention we’re Catholic?) as English speakers.

Grandpa Bondy ended up marrying a Scottish Dunlop, so now all that’s left of my francophone heritage is my claiming a connection to Confederation-era politicians and Dad’s telling everyone he meets in Malta that their common surname Bondi is related to ours. (Perhaps in Norman times, but Papa, that doesn’t make you Maltese, sorry!)

Windsor’s evolution from French enclave to assimilated city follows a similar pattern. Check a map and note street names. Some of the French names are the result of Windsor’s naming streets in new sub-developments after famous WWI and WWII battles. (My grandmother, for example, lives on Vimy Avenue.) But streets like Pilette, Drouillard, Parent, Gilles, Ouellette, Marentette and so on reflect, especially in certain neighbourhoods like Walkerville, a faded French fact.

We used to visit Grandma in Windsor every August and one of Dad’s “fun” games was to demand that I pronounce the (formerly) French street names, like Grand Marais, the sound of which anglicized suggests Niles Crane’s ex-wife off Frasier. Ugh. It hurts my ears.

So what happened to franco-ontarien enclaves like Windsor? My family’s story is probably typical. My great-grandparents were poor and it was the Great Depression; so that their children would have a brighter future, they assimilated into the dominant culture. Also, post-war Windsor developed into an auto industry town, with an influx of English-speaking workers further diluting the linguistic mix.

Well, now I’m moving back to Ottawa and my French is very rusty, for which I blame ten years living in a community in which “diversity” means “the greasy Chinese food restaurant on Main St.”

Still, I’m proud of the strange history of the Bondys in Canada. None too shabby to get elected for Warwick; after all, it’s reported to be the place of origin for poutine, and for that many of us are truly grateful.

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The best compliment ever paid

Another day of personal political musings following lunch at L’Auberge de France in Belleville with my old mentor Bob, whose reminiscences of campaigns past reminded me of another mentor, Frank.

Once I asked Frank for a letter of reference in application for a political job and he made the party’s director laugh at his comment that I have “a keen eye for political skullduggery.” It’s funny because it’s true.

One of my favourite stories that relates, sort of, comes from a past federal election. A last-minute independent candidate made the Elections Canada cut and, in the way of many independents, made little sense. Why did he exist? He didn’t seem to stand for anything, wasn’t known to anyone, wasn’t even affiliated with Lyndon LaRouche.

However, the independent did have signs – many signs – and those signs annoyed us, because they were the same colour as and placed uncomfortably close to ours.

And let’s just say I don’t believe in coincidences, so I bet our campaign manager that I could prove to him that the situation was akin to the allegations that the Independent Native Voice political party, running in the ’95 Manitoba elections, was a vote-splitter financed by the PCs. (Yeah, Wikipedia is a hell of a time-suck, eh?) [And I'm not trying to implicate Gary Filmon, either.]

And two months later I cashed in on my bet when the independent candidate’s name surfaced as a member of another party’s executive, and his Elections Canada returns showed one donation, and only one donation…made by a former member of that same executive.

Sigh. Good times.

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It’s not my fault. Really

This is a panoramic shot of Lac Gillies (QC) I took using the Pano app for iPhone from six shots. Okay, it isn’t perfect, but I’m not a photographer and I was on a boat, FFS. Gosh, you people are judgy.

Anyway, seriously, I had a lovely time with R up at the lake. Excepting the first night, we were alone, which meant that we lost use of the fridge (no idea how to change the propane tank), power (we drained the solar one day), and I can’t say that we ate terribly well, which at times was maddening because I was actually active and needed to eat. Apologies to R’s mother for shamelessly scarfing her pilfered peanuts.

But who cares about the small stuff? We had the pontoon boat, canoe, fishing gear, gas stove, cabin with a bed, and (of course) ourselves. Both R and I agreed that it did us a world of good to just get away from it all for a few days. We even consciously avoided checking the time for an entire day – I don’t think I’ve ever done that, and it was a weird but wonderful feeling.

R is returning in a few days with the kids – this is one of his summer weeks – and I would be jealous, except that I don’t mind the time alone. R understands, I think, my occasional need for solitude – and besides, we’re returning in a few short weeks to stay for most of the month of August.

The mind goes a little bit wobbly when I realize that it’s an hour to the nearest cell reception, but if this week’s experience is any indication, I’ll get a vast amount of reading done. Managed to re-read two Douglas Adams books in about a day. Speaking of, we just finished watching the original BBC TV series. The movie was fine; the series is better, though Alan Rickman is the perfect Marvin.

 

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