Do you ever feel as if you’re in a dream? You’re having an experience so foreign to your everyday life you wonder how you came to be where you are? Those were my thoughts seated with M on the sunny terrace of an ancient stone farmhouse, eating an Easter Monday lunch, looking over the green hills of Basilicata, Italy, while being serenaded by the most charming group of folk singers.
I closed my eyes to absorb it all. We left that comforting lunch of vegetable lasagna, grilled meats and fresh picked oranges to drive down the ever winding roads of Southern Italy towards the sea and Apulia.
(M is getting accustomed to these Italian drivers, where they hug each others speeding bumpers until they make their daredevil passes. )
Farmhouses were on theme that day. We stayed in a romantic recovered farm property, at Masseria Montenapoleone, on part of a plain of centuries old olive groves.
The food this trip has been exquisite but made so by the atmosphere. We breakfasted on a terrace surrounded by a stunning array of geraniums, rose bushes, cacti and fruit trees and were hardly able to put down our iPhone cameras to eat our poached eggs and cream filled croissants.
Despite the beauty surrounding us we ventured out each day to hillside and seaside towns.
One day it was to visit Alberobello, famous for the funny circular peaked roofed houses (called trulli), another to climb amongst the stairways of Ostuni, stepping into the magnificent basilica. We paused at cafes to refresh ourselves with gelatos or a cool glass of vino.
Other days we traveled to the seaside towns of Monopoli and Polignano a Mare. Staring out from the stone walls at the Adriatic Sea, I felt so far from my foothills home in Calgary. It was the end part of the trip where I had a greedy need to smell more Alpine roses, enjoy more pistachio gelato, and gaze longer at the sea.
We were in the boot of Italy staying in the absolutely charming town of Bernalda, at a very special small hotel built by the Cópala family. The gardens were exquisite and though my family had told me there had been another spring snow storm at home in Calgary, I was still overwhelmed with plans to up my Canadian garden game. Whisteria hung over the garden walls, fig trees climbed around the breakfast veranda, and the geraniums had grown into bright red geranium bushes.
Still, we were tempted to drive out of Bernalda, passing families enjoying gelato on their Easter weekend strolls, to discover a true wonder of the world.
The green hills of Basilicata
After a trip through hills of the greenest farmland we gathered in an ancient building to be brought by van into a valley and then carefully led into a cave, or crypt, where it’s said a shepherd revealed that visible on the walls where he sheltered his sheep were some sort of paintings. Mama Mia! Paintings indeed! Under special lightening (no photography allowed) we were staring at stunning frescos dating from the 8th and 9th century!
This rupestrian church was discovered on May 1, 1963 by members of the Circolo La Scaletta of Matera.
In 2001, the Zètema Foundation of Matera launched an exemplary, scientifically-based full recovery project of the rock monument with the support of the Central Institute of Restoration.
Called the Crypt of Original Sin – this cave was the “cult site of a Benedictine rock monastery from the Lombard period. It is embellished with a cycle of frescoes painted by the artist known as the Painter of the Flowers of Matera and expressing the historical characteristics of Benedictine-Beneventan art.”
Sitting in the cool dim cave, listening to an audio presentation accompanied by low gorgorian chanting and imagining the monks painting a thousand years previously, left me feeling enraptured but also very small – ready to jump back out into the light and remembering to keep smelling the roses.
Quotes and photographs are from the La Cripto Del Peccato Originale website copyright 2023.
M and I are on a long holiday to see how much we can eat! … I mean to celebrate his retirement. We’re in the boot of Italy but so much bread, olives, pasta, sausage, calamari, pizza and gelato has gone to my head and I’ve left out this post penned in Sicily.
Back on Sicily we left the Baroque city of Noto, and traveled toward Catalina pausing in Syracuse, the birthplace of Archimedes and home of Pythagoras and Plato, to walk the seawall above the Ionian Sea and lunch at an outdoor cafe. Beside us a chic and thin Sicilian couple ordered a big plate of crispy calamari, just as we did. Full of the fat rings of fried squid, we were ready to pay and continue exploring but noted that the Sicilians were now indulging in big plates of tomatoe and olive covered rigatoni, and you bet they’d finish with gelato and/or cannoli. Observing so many Sicilians dine that excessively I was desperate to know the secret of binging like the bourgeoisie and still mirroring skinny models. Behind us an American told his server the portion was too large to finish. The waiter declared rather emphatically, “This is Sicily. We only have big portions. Enjoy it.”
When M and I weren’t discussing how locals packed away so much fine Italian grub and remained fit, we were back to being blown away by their driving. They flew past us on rough stone roads, with garden walls boxing us in, maneuvering the blind corners with moterbikes overtaking us all. M exclaimed and I gasped and gripped the door handle, convinced the Sicilian drivers had some sixth sense combined with a strong faith in the afterlife.
Drivers and diners aside, what I’d like to bottle and bring home is the the delightful transcendent scent that filled the air when we arrived at the country inn we were booked into, situated in an orchard of lemon and orange trees. The afternoon that we’d heard there was a spring snow storm back home in Canada M and I competed for the best lemon tree photograph. I got into bed that night intoxicated not by wine or eperol, but that sweet aroma of lemon blossoms.
On this special Italian holiday we’ve said arrivederci to Sicily, and Bonjourno to the boot of Italy. M and I flew from our tour of Sicily through Rome, back to Bari in the boot of mainland Italy. We drove the winding highway to a small hotel in Bernalda, whose wisteria filled gardens made me want to stay forever and also to get home and wake up my Canadian flower beds.
Rome to Bernalda
After being up close to Mount Etna, Sicily’s active volcano, we might have felt we were finished with astonishing sights – until we took a short drive from Bernalda to neighbouring Matera. This incredibly picturesque town has its roots in the neolithic period and was occupied essentially by cave dwelling people right up until the 1950’s when it was forcibly evacuated by decree of the Italian government. The decree was necessary because of sanitation and health considerations made necessary by the fact that the people, the children, the chickens, the donkeys, the pigs and everything else all lived in the same caves together.
Museum Depicting Traditional Cave Home
Alarmingly, these people relied upon animal manure to heat their homes, which gives something of a view of why in modern times, an end to it all was necessary.
While the cave houses were condemned and empty for years, under strict regulations, they are now being renovated. Plumbing, sewer and electricity now adorn fashionable apartments owned by a younger generation, at considerable expense. The result is a picturesque and unusual location in southern Italy.
The location is sought after by filmmakers, including the James Bond folks who filmed No Time To Die here. We were told they poured gallons of Coca Cola on the slippery rock streets to make them sticky rather than slick for the speeding car scenes. The clean-up afterwards made them even more shiny white. If you ever are so fortunate to visit the south don’t miss Matera.
My husband, a guy not always crazy about organized tours suggested one dull winter day, as we planned our month long Italian adventure, “Oh go ahead, book us a few tours.” Prego. I picked one I’d love. And one he’d love. Mine was for our second day in Palermo, Sicily and was fantástico! Discover Sicily has been an exotic, sometimes scary adventure. It has a rich history marked by centuries of conquest and influence from Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Normans. Our tour was called Ten Tastings of Palermo and went beyond our expectations in culinary delights!
Mercato di Ballaro
The aromas! Oh the tantalizing aroma’s! And the vivid colours! Michelangelo, our guide with a company called WithLocals, was too good to be true. It sounds corny but it was as if we’d met an old friend – an Italian history foodie-type old friend – our kid’s age, but stay with me!
He described Palermo as being layered like a lasagna. It’s Sicilian cuisine has been influenced by Arab countries, the French, Spain, Greece, and North Africa and to explore this Michelangelo took us to the historic Mercato di Ballarò. Located in the Albergheria district.
Our first delight was a piece of fluffy Arabian style salted bread hot off the grill. Our taste buds were awakened. From their we let him deliver us through milling customers to a booths selling tuna crouquettes, and lightly battered asparagus, mushroom, and artichoke where described the artichokes as as being as big as a baby’s head. Michelangelo then insisted we’d never tasted egg plant parmigiana if we had eaten it in Sicily. So true – it was an alluring mouthwatering mix of the ‘aubergene’, tomato sauce and gooey cheese.
Sicilian Artichokes
From there we stepped through a bottleneck of people, to an open area with American music blasting, and all ages of folks dancing and laughing in a square crowed with food booths, and plastic tables and chairs. Michelangelo called out an order to a woman behind another grill and soon presented us with our last plate of hot delights.
Since our arrival in Palermo we’d noticed people everywhere, seriously everywhere – sipping on bright orange drinks, resembling orange Fanta – but not. It’s an apéritif known as an Aperol Spritz, a mix of Aperol, prosecco, and soda water. On that sunny afternoon we discovered its refreshing appeal to accompany our thinly battered, crispy fried sardines and the best ever lightly spiced potato croquettes.
With our bellies bursting Michelangelo suggested we stroll to a wide seaside boulevard when we walked amongst local parents and grandparents pushing little bambino’s in fancy Italian strollers, kids on scooters, cruise ship passengers, and dog walkers of decidedly Italian dogs.
In the afternoon sunshine, we were treated to creamy Sicilian gelato and the popular cannoli. Prego.
The tour I booked with M’s heart in mind won’t be for a few days, but here’s a hint – ‘leave the guns take the cannoli.’ Ciao for now.
April 2025. We’re here in Rome, Italy! I’ll skip past the actual travel days, with sleepy boredom in an airport lounge and then almost missing our connecting flight having miscalculated the distance to the gate in Frankfurt’s insanely enormous airport. And I won’t go on about my vow against airplane breakfasts (icky icky eggs) or the usual circadian rhythm mess of a 30 hour day. All the same, the triumph of Rome is so alluring that its wonders were magnified by the state of our stunned jet lagged brains. Jumping ahead eights hours with only poor sleep and a bunch of niggly naps, heightened the marvel of that first mixed-up day of sleep deprived sight seeing.
With clearer heads we could have performed speedy searches on our phones to name the monuments, to pin point the cathedrals, and understand the streets direction, but that would have subtracted from our awe struck confusion.
The coliseum
From the fresh squeezed morning orange juice to the midnight cocktail on a six story rooftop, the day unraveled in a winding, blur of awe. We tread over cobblestones trying to follow that blue dot on google maps, stood stunned before ornate fountains, magnificent cathedrals, and ancient (like really, really ancient) statues of the likes of Neptune and Caesar.
And why so many leather goods shops I pondered, buying a cute little purse I didn’t need, (though who couldn’t use one more cute little purse) while trying not to be run over by scooters and motorbikes, ubers and taxis. Like sheep we followed a crowd to St Peter’s Basilica mesmerized by a single guitarist serenading us with the Beatle’s tune ‘Here Comes the Sun’. Lingered before midcity architectural digs, pizzerias, and pubs all the while listening to the sing song-y Italian spoken around us.
Time travel archeological sight
There was an afternoon nap, before our dinner of fat olives, rich gnocchi with ragú sauce and then chocolate topped basil gelato. Fantástica. But the highlight was the nighttime stroll home. Rome is amazingly lit from the ground up, cathedral windows, marble fountains, and tall cypress trees glow in the black night.
We walked slowly, well satiated, our feet tired, staring up at seagulls flying in and out of the light. It was ten pm as we lined up for pistachio gelato, then relied on Google maps blue dot to end our circular route through narrow alley ways with curious closed shops. In bed with closed eyes, I still viewed marble angels, Roman gods, and the wide rolling Tiber River. Tomorrow we’d set more exact goals of historic sights. And throw coins in that fountain.
Life’s funny – that was something my dad said. And he’s right – life is funny. In later years he ‘d always tell us, “Thanks for the call,” after a phone conversation, making sure we knew how appreciative he was. And when we were saying goodbye after a visit, he liked to tell us, “The latch key is always out,” reminding us how welcome we were. I can picture him saying those things while sitting in the big comfy chair that he’d made room for in their kitchen, toothpicks in his pocket, the newspaper on his lap, a cup of coffee if it was morning, tea if it was midday, at his elbow. In this image my mom is at the table counting their daily pills and vitamins into a days-of-the-week container.
My dad has been gone three years. I wish ‘gone’ met he’d left home, maybe ran away before they had to move into a senior’s residence. But no, my dad has died. I worry my kids or grandkids will forget him if I fail to verbalize all his dad-isms, so I repeat them frequently and pray that they are listening and remembering.
And life is funny, isn’t it? What, I wonder will they say about me – those kids and grandkids of mine? Will it be my too familiar – love the ones you’re with? (Meaning stop staring at your phone.) Mostly, I hope I’m passing on what my dad passed on, imagining I hold counsel with much of what he believed in. He was a man of strong family values, maybe old-fashioned (he was born in 1928) but here’s hoping everything is new again.
My dad believed in taking the family on a summer camping holiday every year. He believed in Sunday dinner and especially Sunday drives. Until he gave up his license at age eighty-six, he would help my mom into the car and together they’d do a thirty-mile circle from their city through the town he grew up in, stopping for egg rolls or ice cream as they drove through the rolling foothills.
He believed in a seafood feast on Christmas Eve and buying gifts, never gift certificates, though he’d cajole my sisters and I into shopping for our mom, on his behalf. He believed in going out for coffee in coffee shops, if not with our mom, then with his brothers. He had strong feelings about how kids should learn to skate and ride bikes, and as a frustrated non-swimmer he made sure all of his five kids were at least semi-accomplished aquanauts.
He believed in a beer with cheese and crackers before dinner, and tea and dessert afterwards. I remember that even on those camping trips in the woods, while mom prepared dinner on a coalman stove, he’d serve up our appetizers of sharp cheddar and crackers. Their after dinner campsite tea would be accompanied by a tin of something sweet from home. He always said chocolate cake should be served with red jello and a bit of whipped cream.
My dad believed in picnics in the mountains as a weekend treat. We started the same tradition when our kids were babies. It never failed that they would fall sound asleep on the way and be left to dream, while my husband and I enjoyed the peace and our packed lunch. My dad believed you cover a sleeping person with a blanket, even in warm weather. It’s hard for me to resist copying that bit of coziness.
Have I adopted all of his tenets to pass along? He believed in real cloth handkerchiefs and always had one in his pocket (yuk), and also carried wooden toothpicks. I prefer the plastic variety. He believed in connecting with the person serving you a coffee with a sampling of his wry humor. I’m not nearly as funny as he was, but I do try to get a smile. Who could argue with his stanch believe that family should come home for Christmas. We gathered around a table laden with baked salmon, a still icy shrimp ring, and fried oysters. My mom’s background was Ukrainian and so we dined on perogies, cabbage rolls and garlic sausage at Easter time, but on Christmas Eve my dad crushed crackers with a big glass rolling pin and us kids helped roll the oysters in the crumbs for her to crispy fry for our feast.
Oddly, my kids don’t care for oysters, at least not cracker coated and fried, but I do them up every December 24thanyway, and talk about my dad and how the family feast meant the world to him.
It’s impossible to celebrate without invoking my dad’s memory and sharing his beliefs with those gathered around. My mom was his north star and his biggest belief was in his love for her. She gifted me with another set of values – the wonders of what she held to be true. Let me tell you about those in my next blog. And remember – do love the ones you’re with.
It happens so quickly. The day is hot, you’re in your lightest t-shirt, sweating with an icy refreshment, smelling like sunscreen and summertime. The evening brings a big breeze – the winds of change – the temperature drops, leaves turn golden overnight and suddenly it’s a sweater day. A friend said to me once that the new year should start in September – as that is the time of new beginnings, holidays end, work life accelerates, kids start playschool and grade school or even leave home for fresh adventures. It’s been a decade since our family was knocked off its feet as one by one, yet all so quickly, our four kids were launched from home.
Before that there was a familiar rhythm to getting back to packing lunches and supervising homework and meeting new teachers. And then suddenly the tune changed – we were helping our kids (young adults really) pack suitcases, buy dorm or apartment supplies – Ikea dishes and clothes hampers, maybe a tea kettle. Possibly you know that drill – or perhaps instead you’ve got a traveler on your hands, causing you some trepidation as they shop for backpacks and the perfect tiny tent. The world’s opened up again and they’re going to navigate the furthers corners of it. It should be exciting, right? So, what’s with this quaking you feel? And sleepless nights rivalling when you had wee babies in the house?
That was me – times four. Those autumns of our kids flying the coop were full of chaos and apprehension. How would our comfortably close family readjust? As we were just adapting to our oldest daughter leaving for university and not coming through the gate at the end of a school day, pausing sometimes to lie on the lawn and gaze at the clouds, the others started to flee, also -one to be a liftie on a far-away ski hill, another for university on an island, the last to travel Europe solo.
Those times are behind us. Now I’m calling my young granddaughters up to ask what they’ve decided to wear for the first day back to grade school and hearing mostly about their eagerness to hang with friends again. The next morning their mom, my daughter Zoë, tells me that in all their excitement and rush after those lazier summer mornings, she forgot to tell the oldest where she would meet her when her new school gets out. Oh no, I say, but then we’re both consoled in an odd way that for the first time this granddaughter is taking a cell phone to school and so finding her when the bell goes won’t really be a problem in 2022. (As the kids say, “No judgement.” She’s twelve and getting about on her own.)
I tell Zoë that September brings me back to the panic of those under rehearsed autumn mornings when she and her three siblings were young, and then I think about the days when in quick succession they left home. It was Zoë first, packing up her paints and fantasy novels, then Cole with his snowboard and video camera, two years later Hudson with his dry wit and philosophy books, and finally Lily kissed us and flew to Europe – though somewhere before all that she kissed us and ran away.
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
From our too quiet house I wrote a book about the change from bubbling wrapping to letting go, titled, Text Me, Love Mom; Two Girls, Two Boys, One Empty Nest. It wasn’t easy for this mom of four to adjust to late night anxious calls, to hear from a daughter looking for a place to cry out loud, the way she liked to cry, to adjust to the unease, angst and face it – sometimes new peace – over grilled cheese for dinner, because who cooks for two? The media and an older generation would have us believe that we have overindulged, overprotected and generally, now that parent is a verb, over-parented our kids. I was able to stay connected and endure their flights from home with the aid of satellite communications, during this anxious time of back and forth texting, calling, consoling, and applauding as everyone in our family got their bearings again. If you’re up for a bit of a wild ride – check it out – Text Me, Love Mom offers an opportunity to contemplate and laugh over the perpetual trial and error of another stage of parenting. Or stay in touch with my blog where I’m musing about other topics now – check out the list in the sidebar. And I still feel nostalgic in September….
Oh Canada – our true North strong and …. What’s going on in this big, cold country of ours? I think we’ve all been sadder, then we we were aware. Now a convoy of truckers beginning on the west coast and growing through each province is headed to our nations capital to peacefully protest restrictive mandates. Why has this Canadian trucker’s convoy at this time in these long, long months brought out thousands of families waving the maple leaf flag in twenty-seven below weather? What is this that folks as diverse as comedian and actor Russel Brand, entrepreneur and business magnate Elon Musk, and country singer Paul Brandt are all supporting the trucker’s convoy? Why in frigid snowy weather as the sun rises and sets have Canadians lined the streets to cheer, wave our flag, and offer to feed the men and women from across the nation in a truck convoy that is by some accounts 53 km (40 miles) long? Hutterites, Mennonite’s, Indigenous, Black and Sikh citizens have given their approval. Huge convoys are coming up from all over the United States and support is being heralded from around the world.
What I see now – what I wish everyone could see, but our mainstream media is still doing ‘coverage lite’ , is great throngs of citizens lining the highways, offering truckloads of meals, offering parking spaces, mechanical help, even dental services for truckers with tooth aches – and a chiropractic from Maine is trying to come up and fix trucker’s sore backs. I’ve followed several Convoy Facebook groups – one which grew to 600,000 members before it was taken down. (Why?) There are videos with energetic country tunes, big rigs, small trucks, and on overpasses and in snow banks families of every description packing boxed lunches to feed their new heroes while their kids bundled in snowsuits, hold up the signs they’ve drawn. Truckers are making videos of thanks wearing their sunglasses, as more than one has said – to hide their tears of emotion. Citizens who felt they’d been left alone with their troubles are saying they can’t stop their tears of joy. A Quebec sovereigntist reported feeling ‘Canadian’ for the first time.
Communities supplying meals to truckers who supply us.
Clearly this is not about vaxed or unvaxed. By the numbers alone we know that. There was a time in the beginning of this pandemic where folks were belittled for daring to talk about our Charter rights, liberty and freedom – we believed in flattening the curve. But with that came QR codes – and young hostesses across the land forced into the uncomfortable position of policing segregation and requests for proof of ID to allow patrons to drink a coffee indoors. Businesses small and large have suffered immeasurable losses due to forced lock downs and restrictions. Life’s celebrations – weddings, Bar Mitzvahs, graduations, retirements have been halted. Our elderly have been kept away from those they needed most. My siblings and I allowed our own dad to be isolated from us for nine weeks of his final year before we came to our senses and took action to bring him into our embrace again.
We’ve all masked, we’ve distanced. We’ve suffered horrible hurtful loss of our loved ones to COVID, and along with it our mental health has been strained beyond tolerance. Suicides and drug overdoses have increased. The authorities wanted 80 per cent vaccination rate. They got it, but continued to demonize those who for whatever reason just couldn’t use or abide this vaccine. Omicron is spreading among the vaccinated and the boosted and the vax passes if meant to keep away the potentially sick, don’t make sense and should have been revoked.
Photo from Facebook group
This outpouring of support for the trucker’s convoy might only be a response to too much over-reaching government control. People long to feel connected and united in their delight. Citizens around the world are sending messages of support for our truckers whose mandate is one of peaceful, calm protest. Yet our leaders and news sources find the few crazy’s in the thousands to try to in-still more fear in fear-weary citizens. Global news (shame on them) shows footage of the US troubles last Jan 6th and compares this to that. And yes, in groups of this magnitude there will be trouble makers and extremists to be dealt with, but truckers are reporting police forces and RCMP are helpful and for the most part supportive, directing traffic and guiding them on their way. Media has repeatedly questioned the GoFundMe (currently above six million dollars) which is intended to cover fuel of the registered truckers, with any remainder going to our veterans. Our Prime Minister, instead of offering to listen and talk, called the convoy a minority fringe of people with unacceptable views. What? As in he, the leader, will not accept them?
Hutterite women show happy encouragement in Saskatchewan and others line the highway greeting truckers.
I believe Canadians want to feel free from government control again. They want to feel trusted to take precautions but not be dictated to. To be given their livelihoods back along with their feelings about bodily autonomy, no matter their choices. To feel cared for by their communities, to be heard and feel the joy of togetherness. I know they are thanking this group who are saying end the restrictive mandates, let good people work again. And what is the symbol of this protest? It appears it is our Canadian flag.
Too much time has passed since I last calibrated my thoughts in a blog post – strange reflective time. In my last Text Me, Love Mom column I wrote about moving my dear old dad – the best dad – to a new senior’s residence, as he needed a higher level of physical care. It was a good move. That facility was friendly and kind, trying to cautiously give the residents as much comfort from visitors as they could within the bounds of Covid restrictions. (People talk about caring for our most vulnerable, but I think we need discussions that include listening to their own wise self-determination.)
When Covid first reared its despicable head the senior’s residence where my dad lived then went into full frightened lockdown. He had a small apartment there and was considered only in need of ‘assisted care’ because he’d originally moved in with my mom – his most loving caregiver, but she’d died nine months previous. His immune system was mighty in that he was never ill but his body was frail and worn out, his lungs needed to be on oxygen, his heart on medication, he was unstable on his feet even with a walker, and his short term memory was gone. Yet he had a robust will to live, to be social, to share what was on his mind, to be part of our lives.
My dad, Thomas Allan, was one of seven children – six boys and the sister they adored. More than once I tried to get him to tell me how nine people were able to find space to sleep in their tiny two bedroom house in Black Diamond, Alberta. The answer was always murky. They managed. The first ones in got the bed. He’d talk instead of the family dog, Purp, of hitching rides to the nearest town with a train station to jump on top of a train for a short prohibited ride to the next stop, or of making a raft that broke apart on its first Sheep River voyage, and of being known around town as one of the Allan boys. I remember at an embarrassingly late age being taught by a new sister-in-law that we shouldn’t start to eat until our mom, the cook, sat down. I think both my parents, but especially my dad, came from families where your instinct was to dig in to get enough grub while sitting around a table with nine hungry boisterously talking family members.
In those first three months of Covid where we washed our groceries, debated masks, and stockpiled canned goods, the assisted living facility shut us out, kept residence in their rooms, and brought them meals on paper plates to eat all lone. My siblings and I made deals with ourselves, if it goes on two more weeks we’ll get him out. Two would become three … but we couldn’t decide what ‘out’ would be. To live with one of us? All without main floor bedrooms. None of us with medical backgrounds. To rent a place more suited to his walker and oxygen and poor mobility, and hire nurses? My dad would say he was a social democrat, but he never ever could get his mind around his complete loss of control in the exercise of ‘being saved’ from Covid. “What have I done wrong?” he would ask me over the phone. “Tell me, Candy, what did I do?” He was breaking our hearts.
That harsh lockdown period lasted too long but we finally argued our own and a dear loving companion’s way in, as what the authorities called essential visitors and witnessed how Dad had lost ten pounds, not from illness but from loneliness. We could finally ease up on the detailed phone call schedule us siblings and his grandchildren had adhered to, and return to bringing him our love in person. Some of our best afternoons after that were slow chats in his room. It didn’t matter that he nodded off continuously – when he woke it was with a sense of calm to see someone there, rather than a panic of where was he and why was he alone? (My humble opinion? Billions have been spent and livelihoods destroyed in failed efforts to contain the virus. Almost 90 per cent of the deaths have been in Long Term Care facilities. What if the billions were spent instead in isolating the sick from the healthy even in LTC?).
On a rainy fall afternoon encouraging him to eat the lemon pie I’d brought, I pretended to need to know how he met our mom again. “At a house party,” he said. “People used to have more of those back then.” I asked if he’d arranged a second date that night, to a movie, or dinner? “I don’t know,” he said. “It was a long time ago.” In fact he did know, though he told me just this, ”I drove her home to her aunt’s house.” He paused, pushed the pie away. “She captured me,” he said and closed his eyes to sleep again.
I now have in my dresser drawer the bundle of love letters my parents exchanged during the first months when they lived four hours apart. In one he wrote, “I’m sure glad the search is over. It was getting hard on the eyes hunting for you for twenty-four years.” Mom, less the romantic – someone had to be practical – had written in her beautiful script about getting her hair chopped off much too short. He addressed his next few letters to ‘Chop-chop’. Known for his wry humour my dad wanted always to give someone else a smile, though he kept a straight face before and after.
It’s supposed to be good luck to have rain on your wedding day. The rain was torrential on that June day in 1953 when Tom and Vera promised to love each other to death due us part. In the next ten years they brought five kids into the world, making seven of us at the dinner table, or sleeping in a crowded tent trailer on vacation, and riding out in a big wood panelled station wagon to visit our grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins in Black Diamond. In his ninety-fourth year my dad wanted us to plan a family reunion with our big Allan family – imagining us all leaning into each other around a prairie campsite but Covid forbid it.
My dad’s favourite pastime was the circle drive through the foothills landscape he was passionate about. He used to do it with my mom on a Sunday afternoon, stopping for an eggroll in Turner Valley, or a burger in the Diamond, maybe just an ice cream sundae and coffee in Okotoks, before heading home. For the past few years one of us kids would be at the wheel driving Mom and Dad, and then just Dad. Sharing his affection for that small journey, our hearts would lift as we faced the Rockies and we’d make small talk about the measure of snow capping the steel grey mountains, as we as we gave him what he felt was freedom. It became too much effort for him to get out of the car but we’d park and bring him back a treat to eat with the view of the Sheep River – before returning to the city where we’d mask up again to get him and his walker and oxygen back into the tall building he resided in.
Short term memory loss is a bugger. He’d call many, many, many times a day. Sometimes I couldn’t bear to tell him that I’d just left him. Or that it was bedtime for him and me both and I wasn’t going to go there. He’d always ask us to, “Drop by with a latte.” We were both happiest when I could say, I’m on my way and I’ll stop at a coffee shop.
Why a latte? My dad was a Black Diamond boy, who before he gave up his licence at age 86 would drive forty-five minutes to another town to have coffee with his brothers. Coffee was their communion. But a latte was something that we had to bring to him. A coffee he could get from a caregiver where he resided. Really he was saying, Come over. Bring love.
I wish he would call me now. I wish I could bring him another cup of love. I long for one more circle drive.
My dad died on November 29th, 2020. He died in his sleep. I thank God for that, because it meant he didn’t leave this earth waiting for us to pick up the phone, to bring the latte or take him for a drive. His heart quit beating as he rested. When I arrived before sunup to kiss his head good-bye I longed to tell him that when I stepped from my car I heard coyotes howling at the fading moon. I wanted to tell him that there must have been meaning in that.
John Steinbeck was one of my dad’s favourite authors. Steinbeck wrote in East of Eden, “All great and precious things are lonely.” My dad was precious. I wish that he had never been lonely.
Text Me, Love Mom 