Canada Reads!

This week CBC, our national broadcaster, announced the line up for "Canada Reads 2009". For those of you unfamiliar with this event it is kind of a combination virtual book club and debate. Every year Canada Reads features five Canadian works of fiction each of which are presented and defended by one of five Canadian celebrity panelists. The proceedings will be hosted by the always adorable Jian Ghomeshi and will take place the week of March 2 - 6. By the end of the week the Canada Reads panel will declare a winner (although I don't think there is much of a prize other than the honour and a nice jump in book sales). In the mean time you can wade into the novels and join in with the online discussion in the forum. Or, if you're like me, you can wait until the debate, let the panellists duke it out and then choose a book. And hopefully you'll discover some great Canadian lit along the way.

This year's line up:

The Book Of Negroes by Lawrence Hill

This is the saga of a woman's life from childhood to slavery and finally freedom.

The Book Of Negroes is being defended by television host Avi Lewis.

The Fat Woman Next Door Is Pregnant by Michel Tremblay, translated by Sheila Fischman

A day in the life of the author's childhood neighbourhood in Montreal comes to life in this tale defended by radio and television broadcaster

Anne-Marie Withenshaw.

Fruit by Brian Francis
This is the story of an overweight, unpopular thirteen year old growing up in the eighties in the largely blue-collar city of Sarnia. In order to deal with the ridicule of his peers the hero of this book retreats into his own imaginery world, complete with glamorous "Bedtime Movies" and a pair of talking nipples (hey, I'm not making this up!)

Fruit is being defended by Vancouver writer and radio personality Jen Sookfong Lee.

Mercy Among The Children by David Adams Richards
This novel set in the Miramichi region of New Brunswick examines the consequences when a boy vows to God that he will always turn the other cheek.
This title is being defended by singer/songwriter Sarah Slean.

The Outlander by Gil Adamson

The year is 1903 and a young woman finds herself on the run across Canada's west after becoming a widow "by her own hand."

Gemini award-winning actor and filmmaker Nicholas Campbell will be defending.

Happy reading!

I'm a wiener, I'm a wiener!

May I direct your attention to the shiny new web badge proudly displayed in my sidebar, the lovely colour-coordinated one with the viking ship. Yes, that's right, as of 10:56 pm I crossed that elusive NaNoWriMo finish line, and five days under schedule! I have been a writing fiend (mainly out of sheer panic).

What now? Um, bed. Then I'm taking a short break from the writing thing and focusing on a pile of holiday projects that are hanging over me. I have two Christmas stockings to make and embellish, a little sewing project for Santa Claus, a scarf to finish knitting, a gingerbread house to decorate, generally putting on my Martha Stewart hat (does Martha wear hats? ... anyways, you get the picture). I still plan on blogging though, to keep some writerly momentum going. Besides, I'd miss you guys.

Ok, off to do a little celebratory happy dance, then sleep. My brain is tired.

Slight recalibration ...

Due to the continued wintry weather through the night we need to make a slight recalibration of the amount of snowfall in my previous post ...
Up until now I have never seen the words "momentous" and "colossal" used in a snow squall warning. Crazy.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas ...

Oh, yes. I don't know about where you may live (some of you Michiganers might know of what I speak), but it's been snowing here now for about five days straight. Not unusual for one of Ontario's "snowbelt" areas ... if it were January! We have over a foot of the fluffy white stuff out in the yard now and more if you look at the snowbanks lining the driveway where we have shovelled, repeatedly. It's crazy! And apparently we're not done yet.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm one of those twisted winter-enjoying types (winter-loving is too strong). We take the kids skating every weekend, we like skiing, tobogganing, snowshoeing ... but even I am not thrilled when winter decides to rear it's frosty head this early. At this rate the snow banks will be too high for me to shovel any more by Christmas (insert Ray's short joke here).

I'm trying to find the silver lining inside the snow squall:
1. the kids love it
2. we will have really impressive pictures to send to my youngest daughter's former foster family in southern China
3. I can finally bust out the funky chunky scarf I knit myself last winter
4. the Christmas decorations that we are going to put up tomorrow will look totally fab with all of the snow to set them off. Yes, my oldest convinced my dh to let the kids decorate the Christmas tree tomorrow while he clamours up the ladder to put up the lights outside. It's a tad early, but what the heck, might as well go with it.

Back on track

Consider my last post therapy. It always seems when I feel overwhelmed and then post about it a good night's sleep gets me back on my feet and ready to go again. I have gone ahead and submitted an idea to the newspaper for a column. The theme is green living for families. I thought it was a pretty wide topic with lots of interesting possibilities. I'll keep you posted.

Lest we forget ...

Today Canada recognizes Remembrance Day, a time when we pause to honour our veterans of conflicts past and present. A time to remember the sacrifice of those who so valiantly fought and never made it home.

Today I will remember in particular one of the many brave men in our family who have served. I will remember him because for many years he was forgotten. His name was Arthur Manuel Hall. He was my maternal great-great-grandfather.

I discovered Arthur quite by accident. I was researching the background of a medal that my father had been given years before. As I examined it, looking for information to enter into my google search I found a name and service number inscribed on the side of the coin-like medallion. The name was Arthur M. Hall. I recognized this as my great grandfather's name, Arthur Montague. Curious for more details of my great grandfather's service I performed a search of the national Library and Archive's World War I database. I found Arthur amongst many other Arthur Halls, but one stood out. It was the name just above his. The name was similar, Arthur Manuel Hall, maybe a coincidence, but the regimental number for the two soldiers was almost identical. I clicked on Arthur Manuel's name. I was amazed as I read his attestation, or enlistment papers. Arthur Manuel was Arthur Montague's father.

I called my grandmother and pressed for details. She knew none. We had worked on the family tree before and there was never any mention of Arthur Senior. Even with the details I could now provide her my grandmother remembered nothing. She explained that she knew very little even about her own father, who died when she was only a teenager from complications related to being gassed during the war. There was never any talk of her grandfather.

It was an odd feeling to be the first person in decades to be introduced to Arthur. His papers told me he was a small man, only 5'4". He had a dark complexion with black hair and brown eyes. He had his initials "A.H." and a figure tattooed on his left arm. Arthur worked as a tin smith.

Over the next several weeks I tried to find out as much as I could about Arthur Senior. It was as though this long lost member of my family was coming to life before my eyes. The information was sparse. I learned about his regiment, where he fought, that Arthur had been killed in action. After consulting with a message board of WWI experts I also learned the details of Arthur's death. One of the members had taken the particulars and found the diary record for Arthur's battalion on the day he died.

War diary of the 1st Canadian Infantry Battalion 1917, Dec. 9th:
"During Day Enemy very quiet. Enemy barrage came down on right of our front line at 2:00 A.M. Enemy raided battalion on our immediate right – (27th Canadian Battalion) – Enemy never passed our wire. One non commissioned officer and 10 men wiring. Night very dark. Weather raining. Casualties – four on right killed, two on right injured"

That is all, just a notation on a page. There is no description of how. There is no name.
His military records disclose no more about his death. There is no medical report. The casualty card simply states "killed at front," his injuries apparently catastrophic since no aid was administered. He was simply one of four killed on the right, a notation in a column in a journal.

I am comforted however that he was not one of the countless unidentified soldiers buried in an unmarked grave. Arthur Manuel was laid to rest in a reportedly pretty little cemetery in the French countryside. The details of how he came to be in this serene place under the shadow of a large stone cross, rather than one in a vast landscape of crosses in one of the larger burying grounds remains a mystery yet for me to solve. But I know this. One day I will travel to France and find the pretty little cemetery known as "la sucrerie", after a sugar factory that once stood on the grounds. I will find this place and seek out quadrant II, plot C, marker number 13 and I will sit by my great-great grandfather's grave and I will tell him that he is not forgotten.

Lest we forget ...

What I've learned from NaNoWriMo, week 1 ...

1. 1,667 words per day isn't as hard as I thought it would be
2. I eat compulsively when I write (there goes my 13 lb weight loss all to hell!)
3. those little Halloween-sized Coffee Crisp bars are brutally addictive and should not be legal
4. my husband is extremely supportive of my writing (shouldn't have doubted that)
5. I really can be productive at the computer and manage with the rest of my daily routine (I just have to be creative with how I go about it)

I'm having a pity party, want to come?

Ok, Vivi, I've officially joined you in the ranks of NaNo-bitch. The wheels have essentially fallen off my grand NaNo plan and I am struggling to hold on. As you all may recall I made the momentous decision to start dragging my keester out of bed at 5:00 am to allow myself two hours of uninterrupted "me time" so I could try to foster a writing routine. This worked like a charm, for exactly two days. I was productive. Things were flowing. Then the fargin' time change happened. I expected it would cause a temporary disruption in the girls' sleep (they normally awaken at 7:30, so probably count on a few 6:30 ish mornings ...) Wrong. For some reason the time change caused my youngest's "mommy detector" to go into hyperdrive. For four mornings straight she woke up at 5:15! On two of those days I hadn't even gotten my document open before I heard her staggering down the hall. And not only was she up, she was up to stay. The first morning I made the mistake of trying to take her back to bed. The shrieking that ensued was horrendous, especially since she shares a room with her sister. So the darling child was hauled into mommy & daddy's bed where my poor groggy husband was expecting us. After four mornings we decided that we were getting dangerously close to this developing into an ingrained pattern. So very begrudgingly I have given up trying to get up at 5:00. I am now trying to squeeze my writing in where ever I can grab a few minutes. I'm managing to make my word count goals so far, but this kind of defeats the purpose of the whole thing. My main reason for NaNoing this year was to make some time for me and to establish a good writing routine. I would be lying if I said I wasn't feeling somewhat resentful yesterday. Apparently even by dragging myself out of bed over two hours earlier than the kids normal wake up call, I'm still not allowed to have any "mommy time".

Fortunately when my youngest woke up crying at 5:40 this morning (I guess she realized she'd overslept her previous 5:15 wake up call) I was able to get her back to sleep and she stayed asleep until 7:00. Even better was that my oldest wasn't woken by her little sister's escapades and she was able to sleep until 7:30. Fingers crossed that tomorrow sees further improvements. I'm hoping that if I can get the kids back on track sleep-wise that in a new days I may be able to try sneaking out of bed at the crack of dawn once more.

Taking a brief pause from NaNo ...

.. to mourn the loss of Joaquin Phoenix. No, he hasn't died. But he has officially announced his intentions to retire from acting to pursue a music career. I am devastated. He is my ultimate favorite actor. He was just so deliciously creepy as the spitefully jealous Commodus in Gladiator and riveting as a troubled young Johnny Cash in Walk The Line. I could go on, but I'll get depressed. Since it would be horribly bad karma I won't selfishly hope for him to fail at his newest endeavor so that he will return to our movie screens where he belongs. Instead I will wish him well and savour his last film Two Lovers. sniff. Good bye Joaquin.

Swing away Merrill, swing away ...

Work in progress!

I am happy to report that bright and early this morning I officially started Nano'ing. And yes, I hauled my sorry carcass out of bed at 5:00 a.m. And no, it didn't kill me. In fact, despite the lack of reporting on my sorry excuse of a word count widget, my tally for this morning is 1,915 words, 248 over the average daily requirement (to hit the 50,000 mark by November 30). Just like clock work, when I hit save after my last word count check my youngest rolled out of bed, but not until I had over two hours of uninterrupted writing time. I could really get into this early to rise thing (I might actually have to begrudgingly admit to my DH that he's been right all along - damn!)