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August 16, 2017
by Lynda Davis 4 Comments

Why do some people soar under adversity and others stumble?

It’s been several years since I read The Glass Castle an autobiography by New York journalist and author Jeannette Walls and it still ranks as one of my favourite books. Walls grew up in a creative but highly dysfunctional family. Her mother was an artist and her father, quite simply, a dreamer who kept promising his family he was going to build a marvelous home for them out of glass and spent an inordinate amount of time working on the plans for his unrealistic scheme. Both parents were intelligent people but totally unequipped and unsuited to raising four children. As a result, Walls and her siblings frequently went hungry, lived an itinerant, unstable existence and were forced to parent themselves. Surprisingly, they all survived and surpassed their parents in making a success of themselves. How that happens and why some people rise above their beginnings while others fail is a subject of endless fascination to me.

Jeannette Walls’s personal story has now been made into a movie of the same title as the book starring Woody Harrelson as her alcoholic father Rex, Naomi Watts as her misguided mother Rosemary and Brie Larson playing the adult Jeannette. The movie is true to the book. Unfortunately two hours is not enough time to cover all the details of her complicated and erratic life but it still does an excellent job. Anyone who has lived with alcoholism in the family will understand the pain and uncertainty that accompanies loving a family member with an addiction. The story also serves as inspiration for those who are trapped in a difficult family dynamic. Jeannette Walls learned that her only escape lay in getting an education and extricating herself from her family. In a pact with her siblings, they agreed to support each other and build a better life for themselves. Which they did. Go see the movie and you’ll understand why I recommend it.

P.S. As if I didn’t get my fill of child neglect for one day, I doubled-down and because there was nothing else on television that night I watched Angela’s Ashes. The true story by Frank McCourt of his neglectful and abysmal childhood growing up in Ireland is eerily similar to that of Jeannette Walls, in a different decade in a different country. No money. Poor parenting. Alcoholic father. Vulnerable siblings. Blessed are the children.

Click here to read my original review of the book The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls.

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August 14, 2017
by Lynda Davis 2 Comments

You know you’re a senior when . . .

Baby boomers came of age at a time when the mantra was never trust anyone over thirty. Ouch. Some of us now have grandchildren over thirty which means we’ve come a long way since then and have learned a thing or two along the way. We’re brutally aware of our age, particularly when we start doing or saying things that sound like they’re from another era or generation. Here are a few real-life examples experienced by baby boomers that drive this message home. You know you’re getting old when:

We’d like doggie bags and separate cheques please.

Closing a place means getting home from a Saturday night out on the town at 8:30 p.m. not a.m.
We go out to lunch instead of dinner because a) it’s cheaper, and b) we don’t like to drive after dark.
We take leftover restaurant food home in a doggie bag for dinner that night (see Item 2 above) or lunch the next day.
Celebrating New Years’ Eve is iffy because we can’t stay up until midnight. Then, there’s the driving after dark issue.
We prefer talk radio to rock radio.
Out of our mouths pops, “Boy, when we were young . . . “ followed by comments about how spoiled, entitled and lazy so many young people are today and how terrible today’s music is .
Sturdy arch supports beat out stiletto’s.
Sourcing cheap booze is the result of having the time to price shop instead of having no money.
We’re thrilled we qualify for seniors’ rates at the movies, on public transit and special days at Shoppers Drug Mart. That means extra money for Item 8.
We opt for electrolysis on our upper lip and chin hairs instead of getting a Brazilian.
Major chunks of the monthly budget are devoted to getting our colour done.
Major chunks of time are devoted to hiding fashion and beauty maintenance costs from our life partner.
You turn out the lights and hide in the den on Halloween instead of going to a crazy party.
You’d rather just skip Christmas and head south.
We still know how to close a place but now it’s at 9:00 p.m.
Your peers at the community centre sixties dances look so much older than you. They’re all old, fat and bald and they dance funny, like they don’t know they’re old, fat and bald.
A good parking spot now means closest to the mall entrance rather than down a country road after dark doing things our parents wouldn’t approve of.
The definition of an ideal mate is no longer cute and a good dancer. It’s healthy and a good RRSP.
You get your political jollies sitting in your pyjama bottoms and reading the editorial page in the morning paper instead of marching in your bell bottoms and waving a placard.
The criteria for a good bra are comfort and coverage not black lace and transparency.
Grannie panties feel divine.

And the list goes on. But you get the picture. The bottom line is we’re lucky to be here celebrating the best years of our lives.

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August 10, 2017
by Lynda Davis 2 Comments

Never send your husband to the grocery store unsupervised. The sequel

Early cave men were traditionally known as hunter-gatherers, bringing home the wild bacon and mastodon steaks to feed their families after a rough day on the tundra. Their wives then took over roasting the kill over the family fire and kept the cave swept clean in case company came. Things haven’t changed much as I discovered this past week with the tundra now replaced by Real Canadian Superstore. It’s common knowledge among women (gained from years of experience) that men cannot be trusted in grocery stores. They take leave of their senses and the stupid gene kicks in. Before you can stop them they’ve loaded up the cart with giant bags of Cheesies, popcorn, Pub Mix, sugary fruit danishes and gallons of nutritionally questionable beverages.

I’ve written about this issue before (click here to read the original Never send your husband to the grocery store) and it’s obviously a genetic flaw that was passed down through the centuries and endures to this day. When medieval wives screamed that they had enough fermented mead beer already, hubby kept sneaking it in, stashing the barrels behind the pig pen and enjoying a flagon or two when mummy went to visit a girlfriend. Whenever I go away for a few days, I’ve no sooner turned the corner at the end of the street when my husband peels out of the driveway and heads to KFC, after which he and the dog blissfully survive on a bucket of greasy chicken bones and fries. By the time I get home, the recyclers have carted away the evidence.

Men have a different concept of healthy eating.

The hunter-gatherer reemerged this week. It was with a great deal of hesitation and reluctance that I asked my husband to pick up a pork tenderloin on the way home from golf. Sounds simple. There were four of us for dinner (the fourth does not eat meat) and I figured that would be a perfect amount to barbecue with a bit left over for the dog.

Along with the meat, in he came with a super-sized bag of Chicago popcorn, two giant bags of Brookside chocolate-covered blueberries, a bag of Kilimanjaro deluxe chocolate nut mix (“it’s the healthy kind with 70% cocoa”), two bags of ripple chips (“but they were on sale just inside the door”), a bottle of Italian salad dressing, a jar of extra spicy salsa and for good measure, a $20.00 lottery ticket. And, instead of getting a tenderloin, he’d bought an enormous full loin of pork that was so huge I could hardly lift it out of the bag. I really didn’t know pigs had loins that big. We have enough to feed mushu pork to all of mainland China for the rest of the year. After cutting it up, I bagged enough pork chops for fifteen (15) meals. My honey still isn’t quite sure what he did wrong and in fact is rather proud of himself. Needless to say, the dog is ecstatic.

If you haven’t seen it already, check out this hilarious YouTube video Don’t Send a Man to the Grocery Store from YouTube by Jeanne Robertson. Click here.

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August 8, 2017
by Lynda Davis Leave a comment

The Chicago Exposition still thrills more than a hundred years later

With its classically designed white buildings illuminated at night by brilliant electric lights, the lagoons, canals, innovative landscaping and a 264 ft. Ferris Wheel, the Chicago Exposition of 1893 managed to eclipse its Paris predecessor.

I first heard about The Devil In The White City on a trip to Chicago a couple of years ago with a busload of seniors, a.k.a. baby boomers. The tour guide recommended the best-selling book by Erik Larson and the title came up again in conversation with other book lovers since then. It’s the true story of Chicago’s efforts to win approval for the construction and staging of a world-class exposition that locals hoped would eclipse the Paris exposition famous for its Eiffel Tower. In the late nineteenth century Chicago was known primarily as hog town. Its slaughter houses were the premier tourist attraction and the city was a cesspool of dirty streets, unclean drinking water, raw sewage, poverty and disease. City fathers and local businessmen envisioned literally turning their city from a sow’s ear into a silk purse admired by the world.

After a great deal of early lobbying, the contract for design of the site and its buildings was awarded to Burnham and Root, an up and coming Chicago firm of creative architects and engineers with a few local buildings to their credit and a strong vision for the event. As a result of the inevitable political back and forth discord and slow approvals, the project start was delayed until a mere twenty-two months before the scheduled opening in May 1893. The design and construction team had less than two years to deliver a complex that would cost billions in today’s dollars. The challenges of unstable soil conditions, constant power struggles among team members combined with designing untried and untested structures in unpredictable and uncooperative weather conditions created an environment that seemed destined for failure.

Dr. Holmes’s innocuous-looking pharmacy and hotel/office building was the scene of a number of gruesome murders and became known as the Murder Castle.

In the midst of the drama of designing and building the great Chicago Exposition of 1893, another drama was unfolding a few blocks away. Unknown and undetected, an obscure Chicago doctor by the name of Herman Webster Mudgett known primarily by one of his aliases H.H. Holmes was selectively murdering young women who flocked to the city in search of jobs and to enjoy the magic of the world’s fair. It was a crime even beyond the scope of Jack The Ripper. The city and its police force were so preoccupied with events surrounding the exposition they had neither the resources nor the interest in pursuing the dozens of cases of missing young women.

The Devil In The White City is a mesmerizing true story and I couldn’t put it down. The White City refers to the stretch of classically designed white buildings comprising the exhibition framed by the blue waters of Lake Michigan. As someone who worked most of my life in the construction industry, I found the challenges experienced by the designers and builders of the facilities particularly fascinating. Even though it happened more than one hundred years ago, the business problems weren’t that different from today. And back then, the builders didn’t have the modern equipment and methods of communication and technology that we possess today. The fact they completed most of the work in less than two years is a miracle.

The Chicago Exposition of 1893 managed to surpass its Paris rival with such innovations as the Ferris Wheel rising an astonishing 265 feet above ground, electric lights which for the first time completely illuminated an urban landscape at night, voice transmissions over long distance, the zipper (a Canadian invention) and Cracker Jacks™. The research carried out by Erik Larson in writing this book is detailed and fascinating. And be sure to read the extensive Epilogue which follows the main characters’ lives after the close of the fair. The combination of the challenges of building the exposition, overlaid with the true story of an undetected serial killer is just too juicy not to enjoy. I sure did.

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August 4, 2017
by Lynda Davis 1 Comment

Boomers are singin’ a different tune these days

When Jim Croce sang Time in a Bottle in 1973, he wanted to “save every day ’til eternity passes away just to spend them with you”. How I would dearly love to capture time in a bottle but now it’s for general living. As an early baby boomer, I turn seventy this year. It’s a big number and I’m now confronted with the horizon in ways I never anticipated. Remember when we were children and teenagers? We were always wanting to be older, bigger, further along the continuum of life; we were five and three-quarters years old, or nearly sixteen. As young adults we couldn’t wait to leave home and start our own lives, get our first apartment, get married and have children. Then, we found ourselves planning ahead to pay off the mortgage or even counting off the years or months until the kids left home and we were free again. I clearly remember during my working days that I could hardly wait for Friday, counting down the days until the weekend when my real life kicked in. Although we listened to those who warned, “Don’t wish your life away”, it has now taken on real meaning.

I’m a baby boomer who considers the current years as the best years of our lives. Since I retired, I’ve enjoyed good health, a comfortable lifestyle, the love and companionship of amazing friends and family and all the benefits of living in a safe, free country where we take care of each other. What more could any person want or need? Material goods have diminished in importance and value. Having the latest fashions, the most expensive jewelry or the fanciest toys no longer has the same appeal as it did when we were in our thirties and forties. We accept our personal shortcomings with good humour. I’ll never look like Christie Brinkley and I’m fine with that.

The fact that we have time at all is a gift not to be squandered.

In the Frank Sinatra song It Was A Very Good Year, he’s, “in the autumn of the years.” I would like to think of myself as more than vintage wine from fine old kegs. In fact, I feel every verse of that song is part of my existential life today. On some level I still feel like I’m in my twenties but relieved that I’m not. We’ve picked up the wisdom inherent in aging but kept our curiosity and vigor for learning and growing. It’s the best of both worlds—feeling content with the status quo while reaping the benefits of experience.

We need a new anthem

The Rolling Stones have gathered quite a bit of moss and taken heat about still being rockers at an age when they should be rocking on the front porch with a cup of hot cocoa. When Paul McCartney penned When I’m Sixty-Four he had a romantic, unrealized vision of life at that age. Boomers were under the assumption we would live forever, that we would always be young, hip and rockin’. Youth comes with a sense of invincibility but time’s now slip slidin’ away far too quickly. Perhaps it’s time for Mick Jagger to update “Time is on my side” to something closer to our reality. That may no longer be our truth and we need a new anthem. Time is no longer just about the love of our life but about the time we have and the love of life itself.

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August 2, 2017
by Lynda Davis Leave a comment

Martin Amis provides a brutal look inside a Russian gulag

I seem to have a peculiar attraction to novels about Russia. House of Meetings by British author Martin Amis is a fictional story of two brothers sentenced to ten years of hard labour in a Russian gulag during the Stalin years after the Second World War. They are sent to the same camp in northeastern Siberia at the sixty-ninth parallel and subjected to unspeakable horrors which they amazingly survived. I’ve always wanted to read something by British author Martin Amis and the fact I chose this book means I was probably exposed to a somewhat tempered version of his writing. But it was still extremely intense. And, with his extensive vocabulary, I should have had a dictionary beside me as I read.

Narrated by the unnamed older brother who was a handsome, decorated officer in the Russian army that conquered Germany at the end of the war, it is written as a memoir and letter to his American stepdaughter. The narrator attempts to validate his choices and experiences in life, describing them in brutal detail. The seemingly weaker, unattractive younger brother Lev succeeded in marrying the only woman his older brother loved and the effects of the strange love triangle that unfolded spanned several decades. The book’s title House of Meetings refers to a cabin at the labour camp that was used for rare conjugal visits by spouses of the prisoners. Lev’s one meeting with his wife Zoya is a source of fascination for his brother for the rest of his life.

The narrator revisits the gulag when he’s in his eighties to make peace with his memories and his life. Many intellectuals were imprisoned during the Stalin years for no reason other than to meet his insane quotas. Exploring the psychological impact of the experience on poets, doctors, teachers and others is difficult to imagine but Amis digs deep. He researched records, diaries and personal accounts of former prisoners and presents a complex picture of what it took for them to survive. It’s not an easy read but it is fascinating and I think Amis could have written the story as a fictional memoir without the encumbrance of the stepdaughter. I’d give House of Meetings nine out of ten.

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July 27, 2017
by Lynda Davis 4 Comments

DUNKIRK . . . was it good for you?

We watched Dunkirk on opening day in an IMAX theatre where the sound system vibrates your seat and unless you’re sitting in the back three rows it’s difficult to take in the entire panorama. The only thing missing was the sprays of water like you get in the Pirates of the Caribbean theatre in Disney World. In retrospect I wish I’d watched it in a regular movie theatre as my head kept bobbing around trying to take everything in and the volume level gave me a headache. According to the reviews it’s a great movie. While I enjoyed it, I didn’t love it. And a couple of friends who also saw it on opening day shared my reaction. We really didn’t think it measured up to the hype.

The movie focuses on the activities of a small number of soldiers and civilians who played a role in the Dunkirk evacuation in early June 1940 at the beginning of the war, before America was involved. When allied troops were defeated and driven to the western shores of France, the navy commissioned every type of civilian owned fishing and pleasure craft to cross the English Channel and retrieve 300,000 allied troops from the shallow beaches, not accessible by military ships. It was a massive civilian effort and allowed the allies to bring the men home to regroup and rebuild to again face the enemy. The action centres on a hospital ship, a few battle ships, three Spitfires and their pilots, the crew of a civilian pleasure boat used in the rescue and half a dozen ground troops who were trying to escape France. The story is filmed from three perspectives, the shore troops, the Spitfire pilots and one civilian rescue boat. The actors playing the ground troops were all good-looking young men with dark hair and I had trouble telling them apart. Despite the use of a title screen showing which day it was, I was confused by the switching from day to night and back to day again. I’m a proponent of chronological order.

What they left behind.

The threats, challenges and dangers were accurately and brutally depicted. The tension was high and the action seemed real but personally, I found the focus too narrow. Considering the availability of employing extensive special effects to recreate the horror and scale of the evacuation, the movie makes the Dunkirk evacuation look smaller than it really was. The allies abandoned thousands of vehicles and tonnes of military equipment in the chaos, which was not depicted in the movie. Filmed on location at Dunkirk, the beaches are pristine with long lines of quiet soldiers standing in the water awaiting rescue. I would have liked a few real-life old newsreel shots of the actual evacuation thrown in at the end of the movie to tie everything together. Perhaps my judgement is unduly harsh and I have a feeling my impression may not represent the majority of movie goers. There will be a great deal of esoteric analysis of the film by Christopher Nolan. Was it moving? Was it representative? Did we get the meaning? When you see the movie, let me know what you think. I was rather underwhelmed.

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We need a new anthem

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