Getting it Done

Mrs. Chili came over this foggy and grey afternoon to help me/make me take care of the travesty that was once my desk and bookshelf, and that now is again. I had avoided it for so long that I no longer saw the precarious piles of random books, the inbox bursting with files full of unrelated and mostly recyclable items and the three boxes brimming full of miscellaneous I've-had-it-forever-and-I-can't possible-part-with-it CRAP. Guess what? I parted with so much today and although I'm not entirely finished - I've got a hot file and some odds and ends that need homes - my wonderful friend facilitated me moving out of rut of selective blindness and inertia. She attacked piles and made me decide, then and there, whether I was dumping, filing or recycling. She was ruthless and bossy and I needed just that!

I have walked into my office, sat at the computer and aggressively ignored all the mess and chaos around me for so long; I didn't realize how much energy I was expending pretending the mess wasn't there. I breathe easy as I look around. Sometime soon I am going to help her with a project she's been avoiding - don't we all have those? - and I am looking forward to it. What are friends for anyway?

IDENTITY ISSUES

This past Friday I received a fat envelope from the citizenship-processing centre (notice the Canadian spelling?) in Nova Scotia. As I had been told that my wait for my daughters' citizenship cards could take up to a year, I was thrilled to get them after only 4 months.

My kids were born in the US so they are American but are entitled to Canadian citizenship because DH and I are Canadian. After weeks of document wrangling, I put together the application packets; I gathered birth certificates, our marriage certificate and carefully labeled photos of the girls (mug shots: NO SMILING!!) and sent them off. I should mention the fairly embarrassing impetus for the application: I recently entered Canada with absolutely no identification for the children. When I pulled up to the window, I engaged in the standard series of questions. No, I didn't have any drugs or alcohol. No, I didn't have a GUN! Yes, I have my passport. And then, a difficult question: Um, nooooo, I don't have any identification for my daughters...

"Are you certain, Madame, that you have nothing to show that these are your daughters?" asked the exceedingly polite immigration officer.

Chagrined and flabbergasted, I simply shook my head. I offered to call my genealogist father and have their birth certificates faxed to them within minutes, but he politely declined. I had had my daughters' birth certificates in my car but had cleaned them out in some frenzy months before. The nice official did let us in that day, with strict instructions to never show up without proper ID again. As I drove off squirming, my eldest said, “I can’t believe you didn’t have ID for us!!!"

That folks, was what I call a moron manoevre.

So back to the envelope: the thing was galvanized with fibre tape - impenetrable! and required me to hack it open from the front with a pair of scissors. Inside I found official documents and TA DA... the identity cards that proclaim, finally, my kids' dual identities. But then I notice that they bollixed it up!! They put the WRONG face on the wrong card!! These cards were as useful as tits on the proverbial bull. Did the officials fail to notice the careful labeling on the backs of the photos? Perhaps they decided they didn’t agree with the way I named my daughters - perhaps my matching of names and faces offended their aesthetic sense and they corrected the problem? I am an identical twin, so I am used to having my face confused for my sister’s. These kids, however, do not look that much alike; people have actually inquired whether they have the same father!

The cards are now on their way back to the nearest consulate, where they will be reprocessed, free of charge. Shit happens, the nice consular lady told me in oh-so-polite other words, but we would be happy to take care of that for you. Have a nice day, eh?

Covering Naked Walls

Do you have naked walls? Do they bother you? I have been heartily sick of looking at my vast expanses of paint (albeit colors I chose) where lovely things should be. I have dithered these three years since I moved into this house and although we do have some lovely things adorning the plaster, there are lot of spaces just crying out for, well, SOMETHING. Over the last few years, my husband and I have planted hundreds of perennials, annuals, trees, etc., and I have been taking photos. Looking through thse shots, I realized I had grown my very own gallery.

Last year I grew my very first sunflower and after it was initially amputated by dining deer, it grew back into THIS!

This past summer I though I planted giant zinnias (packaging error) but instead got amazing giant red sunflowers. Aren't they glorious? I have now framed each of these photos to cover some of the nakedness and to console myself over the coming bleak winter. Honestly, I don't know what has taken me so long - these shots make me stupid happy and elevate my walls from bored blah to oases of color.

Happy Thanksgiving, eh?

This year my brother and sister in law and their children are coming from Montreal, as are my dear friend NatureDoc and her husband and daughter. Except for NatureDoc's hubby, we're all Canadian!

Canadians, as a rule, do not make as big a hooha about Thanksgiving. Yeah, we get turkey and do whole food orgy (earlier in the fall), but it's not the fervent, dare I say, mania that it is here. And you know what? Since moving here. I have become a dedicated convert to the whole meshegaas (me‧shu‧gaas  /ˌmɪʃəˈgɑs/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[mish-uh-gahs] -noun Slang: foolishness; insanity; senselessness. Origin: Yiddish) that is Thanksgiving. I think it's required, possibly in the fine print of American citizenship.

When I first moved to this country, ignorant Canadian yahoo that I was, I was initiated into the American Thanksgiving continuum by dear friends, who taught me well. For instance I learned decorations for Turkey Day will go up right after Halloween, extending the decorative shelf-life of the pumpkin by several weeks. I learned that children in elementary schools all over the country will do artistic murder unto vast quantities of red, yellow and brown construction paper in order to create traced-hand turkeys and pilgrims and Indian chiefs. I also learnd that the unsavory origins of the union of white man and noble Indian isn't mentioned, but glossed over with PIE. I came, I saw, I conquered, let's eat!!

Nevertheless, I know that at the very least I must have family (with the most points going to the person traveling the farthest) and dear friends that I dig hanging out with and relish cooking FOR. I learned I must have a great big (organic) turkey and enough side dishes to stupefy my assembled small horde. So, there will be lots of wine, carbonated apple cider for the kids, absolutely no football, and soft places to recline from the turkey-induced stupor.

So on to my planned menu: I am making a roasted carrot/onion/potato thing that will be comprised of yellow, red and purple carrots from my (organic) garden, pumpkin pie and sweet potato pie, both also made from the harvest from my very own organic dirtpatch. Finally, I am making a triple batch of my mother's fabulous rice and raisin stuffing. I didn't grow the rice, although it occurs to me that with the inordinate amount of rain we had this past summer, I could have!!

One thing I won’t be snarky about is the message of thanks my family and I all feel toward the universe. We are unbelievably blessed and that, despite the huge hooha, is the bottom line.

Have a wonderful thanksgiving!!

Blue Twin

A friend recently asked me to clarify the name of my blog. What the heck is a blue twin? (Whisper) Was I somehow damaged because of a lack of oxygen??

No, nothing like THAT.

Essentially, I was and am just that- the blue twin. One of a set of carefully and chromatically coordinated identical beings, I was given a color of my very own so other people would know which one I was. Family-type people. People like my grandparents, my aunts and uncles, cousins. Seriously. Color-coding us made it easy for people and that's fine - some people hear "identical twin" and they assume that determining which name goes which face is enormously difficult. Ok, which it was when we were small. Honestly, there are photos of us where I have NO CLUE which one I am. I know I am one of those babies, but there aren't enough distinguishing features to be certain of my identity. It's a bizarre feeling, let me tell you. However, as we got older and ditched our red and blue everythings, people got annoyed when we weren't in our shorthand hues. "Which one are you?" is a question I would hear way too flippin' often. Do the work, people!! Figure it out!!

I loved all things blue when I was younger, rejected it strenuously when I wanted to establish my own, non-twin identity, and came back to it as an adult. I now drive a blue (hybrid) car, type in my blue study and drink tea out of my favorite blue mug. It started out as an imposed visual aid, but I am now blue by choice. And Red? She's still red. I guess it stuck.

As a twin, I beg of you to consider the following should you ever have your own set:

1. Do NOT name them things that rhyme, i.e. Shauna and Donna or Donald and Ronald. Come on, it's cruel!
2. If you must name them the same first initial, make the names sufficiently different, i.e. Stephanie and Samaire, Sigmund and Steve.
3. Color code 'em! I know twins who were brown and green, purple and yellow. It makes it easier on a lot of people. Just make people figure out how to tell their faces apart!
4. NEVER give them anything to share. Insta broken bits.
   
5. Remember they are individuals. In possibly identical bodies.
   

Anyone have a twin story to share?

Lingering Cough

The scene: outwardly robust-looking person goes about daily business, living life. She speaks in a perhaps slightly rough voice but one outburst outs her; she has a barking, to beat the band, from the nether regions of hell, phlegmy cough that sounds like bits of lung tissue are breaking off.

Why won't it go away?

Does it love me so much that it cannot bear to parted from me? I have been getting looks of alarm from many people around me who cannot reconcile my somewhat healthy appearance with this NOISE coming from me. It's going on 2 weeks now and I am tired of sounding like a bull walrus. Fortunately, I am the only one in my household to be thus afflicted. I send my sincere wishes upward that this remains the case.

I hope all of you are enjoying a healthy autumn.

VOTING!

Yesterday, I participated in my newly American civic duty: I cast a ballot. In a scene reminscent of schoolhouse rock, I received my ballot and went into a little booth to do my voting thing. I didn't get to pull any levers, but I enjoyed filling in those little black ovals tremendously.

I became an American citizen over a year ago so I COULD bloody vote. I have been living here in "the States" for 12 years and have been paying taxes for as long, without the benefit of having ANY say in politics, from school board issues to local and federal government. That is as it should be; I don't think I should have been able to vote without citizenship. But now I can and am proud to be able to have played my part is yesterday's momentous rout. It's a brand new day!

Dancing with my Girls

Monty Python has a Broadway show currently running full-tilt - yah, you know the one- full of infectious, outrageous songs. Anyway, my girls and I have the darn music on a constant loop in our heads at the moment; ONE word and we're off on a dancing and singing whirlwind. This evening, as I put dinner together, I had the media player on my PC blasting the whole thing; my daughters and I yelled the lyrics, hammed it up big time and danced until we huffed. Then we held onto each other and grinned like fools. Husband came home during the finale, by which time we were gleefully staggering around the kitchen. I'm still grinning.