Late Bloomer!

Late Bloomer!

“Sciura” – from the Italian: Milanese slang for a stylish, put-together, older woman

It’s no secret that I have spent decades believing I was ugly (see: https://labellatestarossa.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-ugly-truth.html )

But something shifted in my life when I moved to southwestern Ontario 20 years ago that has accelerated over the past 18 months.

The first incident came only 6 months after I moved here. The man I was dating at the time took me on a winery tour in the Leamington area. And at one crowded tasting, a woman crossed the room and complimented my outfit, saying how it all “went together” and she loved the belt I was wearing. I was shocked and must have turned 17 shades of red when I thanked her.

Then it happened at the fabric store. With a client at work. At the library. In the grocery store. And more...

Then I turned 60 and the compliments from strangers only picked up. I remember being in the LCBO buying my birthday champagne and being told that I “rocked” my leopard-print pants and my curly red hair was “fab”.

The biggest decision I made at this time was embracing white hair. It was a traumatic experience letting go of the red. Being a redhead is an identity unto itself, and I felt like I was losing part of myself. The only way I could do that was cold turkey – over a long weekend, I used a gentle colour remover in two steps and then the GOAT of hair toners – Wella T18 aka White Lady.

Months later, I was offered a job as a judicial assistant. I looked upon the new position as an excuse to dress up for work. I bought suit jackets at Goodwill, Winners and the Bay, and on Poshmark. I wore the few brooches I had and bought more. I put on more jewelry and started wearing brighter colours.

Walking down the street one day, a young woman stopped me to tell me I looked “absolutely lovely”.

This was also the time I agreed to a knee replacement – or two. As I filled out the paperwork to get on the waiting list (it’s VERY long in London), the doctor casually said it would help to lose 10% of my body weight ahead of the surgery.

Me being me, I figured if I lost more maybe I could avoid the surgery altogether (ha!). So, I went to my family doctor, a man who had never bothered me about my weight the way my doctor in Ottawa did, and started on Contrave. I didn’t think I could handle self-injection and our health plan at work only approved Ozempic for diabetics at the time.

After two years, I had to regroup. Yes, I had lost over 50 pounds, but my knees continued to deteriorate, and narcotics are contraindicated with Contrave. I had to face the needle and start giving myself Wegovy so I could deal with the pain.

And I *needed* those pain meds, the rapid access clinic that gets you into a surgical wait line lost my referral – twice!

In addition to a plain black folding cane, I got a leopard print one, and a flower-printed one. I was determined to be stylish even with my mobility aids!

And it must have worked – one night I got on the bus to go home from work and was told I “look very pretty today” by the gentleman sitting across from me. Then a week later, same bus, same time and a woman looked at me as I got on and, in a heavy French accent, said “oh my, you are so chic”!

Chic – a word no one had ever said about me in my life!

Four and half years after starting on the knee replacement journey, I had my first surgery in December 2025. I don’t recommend doing this in the winter, especially one as cold and snowy as the one we just experienced. I was stuck inside for more than 2 months other than attending physiotherapy.

Out of boredom, I bought more clothes online!

Returning to the office was hard, but I wore my beautiful new clothes like armor; look good, feel good, right?

One March morning I woke in incredible pain, but we had a big meeting that day with our regional senior judge, and I needed to be onsite. I had been reading coverage of Paris fashion week online that week and decided to wear some new stuff and go full-on punk Chanel.

On went a simple black turtleneck, a ruffled black tulle skirt, black tights, black Chelsea boots, and a cream Chanel-style jacket and 5 or 6 strings of faux pearls.

At lunch, I had to go to the drugstore to pick up a prescription. As I walked through the aisles, a young woman came up to me and said, “I love what you’re wearing, this whole thing is just wonderful.” As I said thank you, she continued “I want to be you when I grow up”. I told her she just made my whole day, and she said she was glad.

I walked back to work still hurting, but feeling so much better about everything.

The young lady was wearing dark glasses, I don’t know if she was 30 or 40 years younger than me, but she made me realize that I had - at long last - become the person I wanted to be when I grew up.

And I realized that I had spent so many years not feeling the way that all these strangers made me feel - chic!

I started writing this blog post shortly after this encounter and put it aside. Then an article in The Toronto Star in mid-April brought the feeling right back to me. A story titled “Grown women are finally being celebrated in fashion, as stylish grandmothers land campaigns and walk catwalks”.

And this is where I learned about “sciura”. Sono una sciura!

My next knee replacement is fast approaching. I know that this time, instead of shopping online to relieve boredom, once I am cleared to walk up and down stairs, I'll be spending time in my basement sewing room, using the stash of beautiful fabrics that I never used because I felt unworthy of them.  

Because I am worthy. And I feel good about that!

Isn't It Time?

 Geez, that was a banger of a song from The Babys.

Whenever I tell people that I hate Christmas, they're shocked and then tell me that I'm wrong for many, many reasons. Someone said everyone gets the holiday blues and I should think of the positives.

It's a long story, if you want to jump out now, I don't blame you....

My grandmother died in the fall of 1966; she was 48.

It changed my family in hundreds of ways. But this is the story of how 3 people  were torn apart by this one event.

A couple of years later, my mother went to Toronto to visit her father. And she had lunch one day with him and a work colleague.

The very next day, my mother started an affair with this man. It's a story she told my sister and I 50 years later, shortly after our stepfather died.

My mom was always self-centred; it's something that came across in the way her siblings treated her, and what they said to me - directly and indirectly - over the years.

But my papa ADORED her!

I'm pretty sure that my mother told my father at some point about the affair because his personality changed. He started drinking a lot and was sad and quiet.

It reached a head in 1971. My grandfather came to visit for the 50th anniversary of my home town with my later grandmother (the woman you have all come to know as my Nana - she was my mom's stepmother) and my youngest uncles. 

A few weeks later, my family - mom, dad, my sister and I - went to Toronto to visit our family. But the 4 of us didn't return home.

My mother's lies started here.

My father was staying behind in Toronto because we were going to move there the next year and "he was going to find a new job and a place for us to live". Mom, my sister and I returned to the north.

One night, the ringing of the phone woke me.

On the other end of the line was the ex-husband of my aunt Betty. He had decided he didn't want her after a short year of marriage and driven her to my grandparents' home and left her there. Now, several years later, the gist of the conversation with my mother is that he wanted her back.

At this point, you might want to dispute my memory of things, but I have had an odd memory since I was a young child. I think it's why I'm good at trivia.

But I digress....

During this conversation, my mom told Uncle George that she and dad were separated. It pierced me to the core. And I said nothing to anyone - ever - until now, writing this post.

A couple of months later, my grandfather and Nana and my uncles came for our last Christmas in my home town. I do remember that on Christmas morning, there were so many presents in our tiny living room that no one could get into the room. We all sat around the edges and in the dining room opening packages and packages.

I don't know if this next event happened on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, but I went upstairs to my bedroom alone for some reason. I was looking out the window at the sunset glowing against the paper mill in my hometown. It was clear and the stars outside the window were bright even at 4:30 when the sun set at that time up north.

I could hear the sounds of a happy family below me - bubbling over with love and joy.

And it was almost like I could a voice say this out loud - this will never be yours, you will always be alone.

I was 11 years old.

********

On Christmas Day, late in the evening, my father arrived at home, completely by surprise. My sister and I were SO happy! 

I think he hoped to make one last grand gesture to get my mother back.

To say the attempt failed would be an understatement.

I remember my mother screaming at him to get out on the day after Christmas.

I didn't see him again until 1976.

*****************

Easter weekend 1972, a month before we moved to Toronto, my mother brought her boyfriend to our house to meet us. She told my sister and I that we had a new father. And a month later, we moved to a new city into an apartment with our "new father".

Mother tried to enrol us in school in Toronto using his name - legally not possible - and for years our father's parents weren't able to get in touch with us directly because she didn't trust them to not tell papa where we were. Only after my grandmother died did we return to our hometown to visit our grandfather. The story of how we got to see Papa again is best left for another time.

***

My stepfather was almost 20 years older than my mother, he had a grown daughter who married in 1972 and I think he resented raising another man's children.

He treated us like dirt, calling us ungrateful, lazy, fat, ugly and stupid. And not only did mom never stop him, she soon joined in.

He stopped being a jerk when we left home.

But our mother continued to hurt us at every opportunity, even when she needed us at the end of her life. Was it guilt? Who knows? Her favourite line when she was angry with us was "you're just like your father". 

*****

My dad died in 2001 - he was only a year older than I am now. But he, too, found love again with someone much older than he was. And our stepmother treated my sister and I like treasures.

I had hoped the pain might start resolving first when my stepfather died in 2014 and then when mom died 3 years ago. It hasn't. It probably never will.

Several years ago, the American writer Molly Jong-Fast wrote about her contentious relationship with her own mother. She wrote something that could have been about me:

"You're supposed to be over your childhood. You're not supposed to be haunted by that loneliness you just can't quite shake."

People who tell you to "just get over it" didn't have this life. Motherhood is held out as something sacred and precious. Mothers are supposed to do anything and everything possible to love and protect their children, right?

Some of us get the mother who cares only about herself.

I have spent a lifetime trying to find a way to prove that voice that I heard in my head at Christmas 1971 that it was wrong. That I would find love and a family of my own. But I have chosen wrong or blown my chances every single time.

And this is why I hate Christmas. And why I'm unable to love anyone, especially myself.

Remembrances of Nana - Dorothy Clarke Patchell Walsh January 31 1920 - November 14 2022

I have been blessed to have 5 grandparents. And Nana was in my life much longer than of those related to me by blood.

With all my heart, I wish that my younger cousins, especially my Patchell cousins, were able to know Nana the way Melanie and I did.

I first met her a couple of years after she began dating my grandfather – Ganggang, as Melanie and I called him, and we called her Aunt Dorothy then.

When we moved to Toronto after our parents split up, Nana, our grandfather, and our aunt Liz, were the constant reassuring presences in our lives. It didn't hurt that we had an aunt and several uncles who were close to us in age. We were more like children than grandchildren.

There were many weekends at the cottage, Sunday brunches when we all lived in proximity along the lake in Toronto, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, our tiny apartments crowded with people, laughter and food and music.

Some of those weekends at the cottage, my sister and I went with them alone, as mom and our stepfather went off on fishing trips. It was an ideal place to spend summers, especially for two transplants from northern Ontario.

My grandfather proposed marriage in 1976, and I had the unique pleasure of being a bridesmaid at my grandparents wedding along with Melanie and our cousin Christina. On that day, I christened her “NanaD”.

I'm not going to pretend that she was always a good influence; on a couple of occasions that I can recall, Nana, our mom and aunt took my sister and I to Woodbine to spend an afternoon watching the races. Don't worry – they placed our bets for us!

I consider myself to be the luckiest of all 19 grandchildren as I was able to go on the most epic girl's trip ever with my grandmother!

In 1990, I had a job as a personal assistant to someone running in the provincial election. The plan was that I would run their household – yes, it was someone fairly wealthy – after they went to Queen's Park. But they lost, and my services were not required. So I started working as an office temp again, in between rehearsing roles for small musical companies in Toronto.

At the time, Uncle Ger was doing his PhD in BC. He was going to fly to Toronto, drive to Florida with Nana, and head back to Vancouver. Nana decided that she would take me with her to Florida instead. We would make a vacation of the process.

I don't drive, never learned, this trip was going to take a few days!

We set out on a cold, sunny November morning and got from Toronto to Cincinnati the first night.

The next day, we went to the Kentucky Horse Park to see the exhibits about the history of horse racing and to pay our respects to Secretariat. It was a lovely, sunny, and now warm, day.

We hadn't made reservations at hotels along the way, thinking we would be okay since it was fairly early in the snowbird season. Not the best idea.

As we drove down I75, every exit we passed had large billboards for all the motel chains along the interstate system. And all of them had the words no vacancy flashing in red. An hour past the Kentucky-Tennessee state line, we came to an exit where the no vacancy lights weren't lit up and we pulled off the highway in deep twilight. But as we drew closer, we saw that all the major chain motels were full.

There was a sign pointing up a hill indicating there were more motels there, but all were full, except one near the top. It was a small, 5-storey mom & pop operation, and we were relieved to learn they had a double room available. Even better, our ridiculously low room rate included dinner AND breakfast in the rooftop restaurant. Nana and I head up to find a buffet that was a cliche of southern cooking – chicken fried steak, biscuits and gravy, even collard greens. We didn't care, we were tired and hungry!

We were at the top of the hill at this place – Caryville, Tennessee – and we could see the lights of the cars on the interstate and lights stretched along the banks of a lake below us.

When we returned in the morning we saw the mist rising from Cove Lake and could see the cottages and homes dotting the banks of the water. Breakfast was another southern masterpiece – bacon, sausage, pancakes, more biscuits and gravy!

As we left, we got the directions to head to Dollywood! Did y'all know that my Nana was a fan of Dolly Parton?

We headed out through Knoxville on our way to Sevierville and Pigeon Forge in Tennessee. We had lunch at a restaurant attached to a combination Christmas and model train store – first Christmas store I'd ever seen. Then we headed to Dollywood.

Only to find it closed!

It was between seasons at the park – they had closed after Halloween to prepare for the Great Smokey Mountain Christmas that would open 10 days later on American Thanksgiving. The person at the gate told us that we were free to walk around the grounds and that the gift shop was open.

Nana and I spent an hour walking around the park, taking in the sights including the replica cabin of Dolly Parton's childhood home. We stopped in the gift shop to buy a cassette tape of Dolly's greatest hits and drove through Great Smokey Mountains National Park, with the sun roof open, singing along – LOUDLY – to Dolly's greatest hits!

The next morning, we bypassed the traffic of Atlanta, going through Athens, Georgia on our way to Macon, where my guide book told me was a beautifully preserved antebellum mansion and a Victorian opera house. After touring Hay House and having lunch we headed to the Grand Opera House. They were closed too! I was going to give up and started turning away, but Nana said to the woman at the box office:

My granddaughter is an opera singer in Canada and I know she would really love to see your theatre.

The woman looked at me and I nodded my head vigorously! I really was missing rehearsals for productions with the Toronto City Opera.

The lady closed the box office and gave us a private tour of the facility. Lovingly restored in the 70s, it was as if a high-end European opera house had flown across the Atlantic and set down in Georgia. Elaborate gold work and 3 floors of private boxes flank the stage. A small orchestra pit, tiny dressing rooms, and wings not designed for modern theatre equipment are not usually seen by the public. As we left, I bought the t-shirt that I am wearing now!

Once in Florida, we spent a day at Busch Gardens seeing the wildlife, and went on a wild manatee hunt one day when the news said that a colony of them had been spotted near the Alafia River. So many people were there on Tampa Bay that the manatees had been scared off! Then we went to my aunt and uncle's house in Fort Lauderdale for American Thanksgiving – and I took my 2 native Floridian cousins ice-skating!

After our return to Largo, I flew back to Toronto.

Obviously, this trip has meant the the world to me as the years go by. And Nana and I would reminisce about some of the things we did over those 3 weeks.

More than anything, Nana was my champion.

When I moved out on my own, mom was angry with me and didn't speak to me for months. Nana was the first person in my family to come to my little bachelorette pad for dinner. Similarly, when I bought my house here in London, mom said it was the stupidest thing I had ever done. And Nana and Arthur, were the first members of my family to come and see my home. While on the Florida trip, she told me that she would run interference with my mom if I wanted to have a baby or adopt a child on my own.

Nana was not overly demonstrative, but you knew she loved you fiercely in her quiet way. The “I love you”s were more frequent in recent years.

She brought into my life 3 kind and loving men I am proud to call uncle. Her work ethic has been my inspiration and lead me to a new job at a time most people would consider retirement.

My life has been shaped and enriched by her love. All of us will never be the same without her.

In the timeless words of Dolly Parton:

Nana, I will always love you.

A Year in Review

Anyone who knows me knows that I had a horrid few years from 2018 to 2020! And that was aside from the pandemic that's given all of us almost two awful years!

2021 brought more loss to my family but my sister and I remain well and got to spend time with each other, which means everything these days.

My year is ending the way it began - updating the electronic scheduling program  for one of our court locations. But I want to say a public thanks to my interim manager Jessica for all the opportunities she's given to me this year. In addition to learning the ESP, she offered me the chance to become our Zoom trainer, become the regional backup person for the trust management system, act as support on new staff orientation, proctor all interviews and testing for all job openings in our region, learning how to use ICON - aka the criminal records database (never mind Santa, I can find out if you've been naughty!), and now working on the scheduling for all Small Claims Court matters in our region.

*Whew*

Most people expect you to be winding down your career when you turn 60 - I feel like I might be getting started again!

My Nana has been in the hospital a few times this year - not for anything related to Covid - but she is still with us and will be turning 102 next month.

It has been crushingly lonely being home alone almost the entire time (and I will now be working from home again for the next 3 months), and Twitter has kept me company when I wasn't on Zoom for work. I know I haven't met most of you, and it doesn't matter. My trivia families make me smile all the time - especially Eugene from the HQ Fam! He is exactly the same every day as he was in his appearance on the game - enthusiastic, upbeat, charming.

My Jeopardy Family continues to grow - and they make me grow. These wonderfully diverse people talk about their wonderfully diverse interests and have introduced me all kinds of books, music, movies, TV, and hobbies that I never would have known about if not for them. And they are gracious and accepting of wannabes like me.

A few of my Tweeps are facing health challenges with grace and good humour (as much as they possibly can given the circumstances) and I would like to send love and strength to Jen, Jeniene, and Sam.

Two of my Tweeps have started amazing new chapters in their lives in 2021, and I wish Brandi and Rowan much joy in the coming years.

For my friends in Ontario and London, we have elections coming up in 2022 and I think the pandemic has shown us who we cannot trust to have our best interests at heart. Let's vote accordingly!

Vote Cedric!

My friend "Kevin" amazes me on a regular basis - he's walked through a few fires in his lifetime and has upended his world in order to support his family. We should all be so lucky to have someone like him in our life.

Here's to finding our way out of the darkness in 2022 - wear a mask, wash your hands, keep your distance and get the damn vaccine!

A Christmas Play Story

I grew up in a very small town in northern Ontario that had a dominantly Francophone population. While there were several French Catholic grade schools, there was only the one small English Catholic school.  And a few people ended up in classes being taught by a parent.

Such was the case for Michael Kuiack, who was in my class for all the years I spent at St. Patrick's School from grades one through six. Michael's mom, Rita, was our teacher in grade five.

Today is Teacher's Day, and I wanted to write this story down for a couple of reasons, chief of them being the fact that Michael died late last year, and I wanted to share this remembrance of my childhood friend with his family. And I want to highlight the impact that teachers have on our lives - it's 51 years later and I still remember this vividly.

Our small school had an annual Christmas pageant held in our gymnasium, the whole school attended and parents were invited. Each class prepared something to present, and in 1970, the grade 5 class would present a short skit.

Four students were required for the skit:  3 girls and 1 boy.

It was Michael's misfortune that his mother cast him in the only male role!

The skit was about a young widower whose wife died at Christmas and he had lost his faith and will to live. The story was told by the couple's maid to her friend (Miss Anybody). Susie Kosowan played the wife, Cathy Torok was the maid, I was the friend.

The play was about how the young man got over his wife's death and found his joy for life again. It ended with him arriving home to find his maid chatting with her friend. 

I still remember exactly what was supposed to happen; Michael was supposed to say to me "Too bad that isn't mistletoe, isn't it, Miss Anybody? Oh, well... " And he was to kiss me on the cheek.

We were 10 - Michael was refusing to cooperate. "I'm not kissing any girl" he declared during rehearsals.

Mrs. Kuiack wasn't having it. "Oh, he'll be fine during the performance," she said to me, "that's why I picked him; I'm his mother, he has to do as I say."

Come the day of the performance, a packed auditorium settled in to watch their children and classmates.

Our little skit went well, with Cathy and I doing most of the dialogue, and then Michael's character bursts through the door at the end. "Too bad that isn't mistletoe, isn't it, Miss Anybody?", he said, and then proceeded to shake hands with me vigorously, instead of kissing me on the cheek.

The girl cooties were thus successfully avoided!

😊

I remember Michael with a shock of blond hair, a shy, crooked smile, and kind brown eyes. The photographs that his sister Denise shared online following his passing indicate that he kept that smile.

This little play lit an acting bug in me that I spent years pursuing as an adult performing in musical theatre in Toronto in the late 80s and early 90s. You never know how a teacher will shape your life.

And I hope this reminiscence brings a smile to the faces of the Kuiack Family.

Ahead by a century....

In 2018, when I was still president of my community association, I had the incredible honour of presiding over a ceremony to rededicate a World War I monument in my neighbourhood. With the help of my uncle, retired Captain R.T. Walsh of the Royal Canadian Regiment, my MPP, Terence Kernaghan, and my then-incoming city councillor, Arielle Kayabaga, members of the community gathered on a rainy Saturday to pay tribute to the students of the long-since-gone Simcoe Street School who perished in The Great War.

These are the remarks I gave at the close of the event. I am proud of them and wanted them to be out here for others to read.

They called it “the war to end all wars”. How naïve that seems today.

But 100 years ago, people around the world probably felt that HG Wells was right in calling it that. Surely humanity had learned from the carnage, and bloodshed, and self-destructive tendencies that had brought us to such a place.

Sadly, it was not to be so. And in the century that has followed, hundreds of thousands of more young men – for it is still mostly young men – have gone to wars around the world, and not returned, just as these young men did not return.

The footprints imprinted in this concrete remind us that they left the schoolyard where they once played, the neighbourhood where they grew up, their city, and province, to fight for King and country, only to lose their lives on battlefields in France or Belgium or in hospitals in England.

Today, we honour their memory, and the memories of the millions of others who fell, as they hoped to bring order, peace and prosperity to a world of rapid changes. Even a century later, our lives have been shaped by the sacrifice of these men. I am reminded of the words engraved on the Soldiers’ Tower at Hart House at the University of Toronto. Every time I walked beneath the arch, I stopped to read these words of Pericles' great funeral oration:

Their story is graven, not only on stone over their native earth, but lives on, far away, without visible symbol, woven into the stuff of other mens’ lives.

Thank you for your time today.

"I dream things that never were...."

After years of planning and saving, our big adventure was upon us on June 5, 1968 - we were going to Ireland with our mom, to visit the country of her birth, and meet our great-grandmother!

I'd like to tell you that the trip went well, but I suffered from incredible motion sickness as a child (well into adulthood, to be honest), and I had a major freak-out at the sight of the plane that was taking us from Toronto to London (England). The small airport in my northern home town could only accept propeller planes, and I was terrified of this jet with no visible means of lifting us into the air. I suspect that I cried and threw up for at least the first couple of hours of the overnight flight, much to the distress of those around me.

The Aer Lingus flight from London to Dublin was much easier for me as the plane had propellers. It was also packed with Irish Americans heading home for visits with family, just as we were. The sky was blue, the sun shone, it was a perfect morning, and we had just cleared the British coast when the pilot made an announcement.

Bobby Kennedy had been assassinated.

The happy conversations turned instantly to sobs, grownups around me, women and men alike, were crying uncontrollably.

Even the 7-year-old me was aware of who Bobby Kennedy was. He was, after all, on the news nearly every night of the week, and usually on the cover of The Toronto Star, too! Yes, I did read the paper. No, my parents never stopped me. They had a subscription and it was delivered to the magazine shop in town late every afternoon, where dad would pick it up on his way home. I've mentioned in previous blog posts how I credit this habit with my success at trivia.

I've talked about this in a previous post:

http://labellatestarossa.blogspot.com/2013/11/how-do-you-make-sense-of-senseless.html

and to this day, I remain inspired by the Kennedys and their vision for the world.

"Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not?"
     Senator Ted Kennedy's eulogy for his brother

Eulogy

My aunt, Elizabeth Walsh, died on Tuesday, March 6, 2018, leaving behind a large grieving family headed by her daughter, Cindy, and husband Roger Scott. Our family will not be the same without her.

Here is the eulogy I presented at her celebration of life service:

My aunt was one of those people with a rare gift - she could walk into any room and turn it into an instant party just by her presence. Her personality was as big as her smile and bright as her hair and it makes us feel her loss that much more keenly.

After my sister and I moved to Toronto, my aunt became a second mother to us. The best time was our birthday weekend, as our birthdays are less than a week apart. Aunt Liz treated us to lunch, and the restaurants got increasingly fancier as we got older. For my 18th birthday, she took me to the old Silver Rail on Yonge Street for my first grown-up drink.

Having worked as a cocktail waitress for years, she was unfailingly polite and kind to servers and taught us to be the same way. To this day, Melanie and I can go out and have wait staff tell us how we made their day by being their best customers.

Many years later, I was able to repay the favour; I somehow got tickets to see Swan Lake by the National Ballet on Aunt Liz's birthday and there was no question I would be taking her. We went out for Mexican and margaritas and then across the street to see the timeless story of the swan queen. We both loved it! Several years later, she was my date to a Placido Domingo concert - and we both adored that!

It's a rare and precious thing to have a second chance at love - but Aunt Liz and Uncle Roger are proof of the saying that love is lovelier the second time around. Their devotion to each other was tested in recent years due to illness, but it held fast. Uncle Roger, I said this to you on the weekend, but I'll repeat it now with a room full of witnesses - you're stuck with us.

My Wild Irish Clan has lost the brightest star in the constellation, but she will always be a part of us.

I then read the poem "Song of the Star" by the American writer Suzy Kassem.

Another day in Jeopardy!

It's been over 4 years since my first audition for my favourite TV show, and in the intervening time period, there were times I convinced myself that a second audition would never come.

Due to the Battle of the Decades Tournament spanning the 2013-2014 season, there were 8 weeks of shows where new contestants weren't required, and only one person from my audition pool showed up on my TV; he played for the Hamilton Tiger Cats, which gave him added interest to contestant coordinators. Rumour has it the Ti-Cats are the host's favourite CFL team, so that may have also had something to do with it.

When I was once again eligible to write the online test, it turned out Canadians were barred from writing due to some dumb internet privacy rules enacted by the CPC government. Even voluntarily giving your personal information to entities outside Canada was verboten, and our access to US game shows was cut off. Then the government changed and the ban was lifted after a face-to-face meeting between the Prime Minister and that other Canadian treasure, Jeopardy host Alex Trebek.

My next attempt at the online test was an abysmal failure. To say I bombed would be an understatement. Then I saw a former champion post online that she wrote the test (for fun) the same night I did, and she described it as "brutal". I didn't feel so bad.

I wrote again at the beginning of June and knew I passed. It was only a matter of waiting to see if my name would be pulled out of the hat by the computer.

And it was!

Once again, I would be off to Toronto to audition at a major downtown hotel, this time the Royal York - the grande dame of the city's numerous hotels, that was once the tallest building in the entire Commonwealth.

Given the weather-related horror story of my last audition (http://labellatestarossa.blogspot.ca/2013/07/one-day-in-jeopardy.html), I promptly began joking about facing another weather-related horror - a raging blizzard this time - since the audition was in November, not July. But we northern girls are a tough lot and I'm sure I could have scrounged up a dog sled if it became necessary!


It wasn't!

But my angioedema picked that week to make an appearance, and The Fish Lips wouldn't deflate enough by audition time.

I dropped my bag at the Via Rail baggage check and wandered across the street to the Royal York 45 minutes before my appointed time! A film crew was camped out in the Library Bar and I couldn't see any signage for the conference rooms so I stopped by the Concierge Desk to get directions and wisely decided against downing several tequila shots at another bar on the way.

Upon arriving at the Prince Edward Room, I encountered Ray who was also attending his second audition, though he told me that his first had taken place about 30 years ago in Pittsburgh! We shook hands, wished each other good luck, and then I proceeded to pace the room and the hall outside.

As more potentials arrived, I finally sat down, updated my application with a few names and an anecdote about angioedema, then put in my earbuds and listened to my favourite power song:  Make You a Believer by Sass Jordan.

I pulled the earbuds out as the contestant coordinators walked in, including the legendary Maggie Speak. It's not a claim made lightly; former contestants talk of her in almost reverential tones.

Maggie has one of the most thankless tasks in show business. About 20% of the potentials obviously have the knowledge to make it on the show, but their personalities could kindly be described as dull. Maggie questions, charms, and cajoles even the most taciturn individuals into revealing themselves during their short interviews. She'd probably be a formidable trial attorney!

There was more front-loading spiel than I remembered from my first audition; then we got down to business and wrote the next 50-question test. I kicked myself for blanking on three easy (well, they should have been for me) questions:  a world capital, the author of a classic book, and identifying a hit song from its lyrics – a song that is on my iTunes! *deep sigh*

Maggie and fellow contestant coordinator Ryan left the room to score our tests and leave us to our own devices... or so we thought!

I had once again chosen to sit in the front row, and I heard the door to the room open and close and then there were gasps and a buzz from the back. I turned to see Alex Trebek himself walking between the tables inches away from me! "Oh my god", I said, out loud, before I could stop myself.

Alex didn't miss a beat, though, he had heard me, and winked and said "not quite". I erupted into giggles.

It turned out that Alex was on his way to Ottawa to get his Order of Canada on the Friday and decided to stop in at the auditions taking place in Toronto. Though I learned later that he had not been at the morning session the day I was there.

"Any questions?", he asked us, and 28 people gazed back at him, for long, quiet seconds, before loud-mouthed moi spoke up and said "we have two people from Sudbury here today". They identified themselves and they chatted with Alex about his home town and what they do there. It broke the ice, and the questions flowed after that. I managed to work into the conversation the fact that I'm from Kapuskasing, which got me an appreciative smile.

I'm ridiculously jealous of my dear friend, Andy Saunders, who got a photo of himself sitting down with Alex at the next morning's audition!

15 minutes later, Maggie and Ryan returned with the results and Alex left us sitting there wondering if it had really happened; even if none of us make it to the show, we got to spend time with him.

Once again, I was called up as part of the first group to play the mock game, and while I didn't dominate this time, I did well. Maggie approved my buzzer-technique of using my index finger to manipulate it, and it worked well (though I will continue to practice with my Jeopardy! pen).

During my interview, Maggie asked me about the list of 50+ names of former champions and contestants attached to my application. We talked about the "family" vibe of the group and I got a bit emotional when I told her how much their acceptance of me as a "wannabe" meant. So JFamily this one's for you:   ❤

Every potential is asked what they would do with the money, and almost to a person, everyone says "travel". Even I did last time, though I got into the specifics of taking the Queen Mary II to Europe due to my fear of airplanes. This time around, though, I mentioned how much I'd love to build an ultimate master bedroom suite in my large, vaulted attic. "Claw-foot tub?", Maggie asked me. Copper slipper tub, I responded, and got an enthusiastic thumbs up!

I then said that they need to put me on the show SOON since Nana is going to be 100 in January 2020 and would like to see her granddaughter on TV before she shuffles off this mortal coil. Which prompted Tracy (a teacher with fabulous purple hair) next to me, to mention that her grandmother is 104. So I put my arm around her and said "you have to put BOTH of us on for our grandmothers". It got a laugh from everyone!

So now I wait.... my expiration date this time around is April 14, 2019. Almost sounds like canned goods when I put it that way.

Being superstitious and not renewing my passport four years ago didn't help; so I'll have to keep that promise I made to Kerry and get on it, since I now have travel health insurance through work for a crazy low price! If nothing else happens, I can hop on Amtrak and visit Pat in Chicago for a long weekend.

Dear Reader - please keep your fingers crossed for me! Oh, hell… keep everything crossed!

#MeToo

In the wake of the obviously long-overdue exposé of the horrendous behaviour of Harvey Weinstein, many high-profile women in the entertainment field have been tagged to weigh in by various news agencies, particularly the New York Times.

Canadian actor-director Sarah Polley was one, actor Mayim Bialik was another. I choose these two out of the many others because both have been involved in the entertainment industry for most of their lives. And their op-eds in The Times took very different tacks.

Ms. Polley took the system that protects predatory behaviour to task, Ms. Bialik said she chooses to protect herself by "...(dressing) modestly. I don't act flirtatiously with men as a policy". To my mind, she also appeared to suggest that ugly girls/women aren't targets.

A lot of people are - justifiably to my thinking - angry with her. As one of those ugly women, I can assure her that she's wrong.

The stalker I had at university was the older brother of a classmate. He was meeting the brother at school and I had thanked him for holding a door open - that's it. For the remainder of the school year, he would suddenly appear around campus in places where he knew I'd show up, despite not being a student. Then he somehow got my phone number.

I started university in the 1970s, no internet in every pocket, and this was pre- Theresa Saldana / Rebecca Shaeffer; stalking wasn't considered to be threatening, much less dangerous or criminal.

When I realized that the Paul Cooper on the phone was not the same Paul Cooper from the model United Nations committee, I told him not to call me ever again. To his credit, he didn't - but then I started getting letters.

Which meant he had my address.

He wrote long, rambling letters about being a born-again christian and how he "knew" that god had ordained me for him and that I would get a sign when the time was right.

People told me he had a crush and to forget about it. The campus police said they could do little to stop him, which is true when you consider the size and location of the downtown campus of the University of Toronto. They also thought he had a harmless crush, but I was frightened, and my boyfriend, friends, and other classmates ensured I was never alone walking around the campus, especially on those dark winter afternoons when I went from Hart House to the arena on The Philosophers' Walk.

The letters continued and I would simply "return to sender". Shortly after the holiday break, my beloved Hank was diagnosed with cancer and left school. But my classmates continued to surround me in a protective bubble for the remainder of the school year and the letters eventually stopped, though I would sometimes see Paul lurking at the corners where he thought he wouldn't be noticed.

Hank died that summer, and I returned to school in September broken in spirit. Three weeks into the school year, the incident occurred.

Following a class, I went to lunch at the Trinity College cafeteria with a group of friends - waiting for me was Paul with a massive bunch of flowers in hand.

He was bubbling over with happiness - Hank had died and this was the sign from god that I was meant to be with him, surely I had to see that.

There, in the middle of a room packed with 200 people, I started screaming and screaming as the impact of his words hit me. He dropped the flowers and ran only to be stopped by other students, while my friends tended to me and others contacted campus police.

This time, he was escorted off the premises and warned not to come back unless he had genuine business.

All I had done was say "thank you", nothing else.

I could tell you other stories; of the man that I went to work for as a summer temp the next year, who had the agency replace me without letting me know so that he could ask me out. On a Monday morning, I walked into the office to find someone else sitting at my desk, and he was waiting for me, wearing a new suit, sporting a new haircut. They didn't know my grandfather had died 2 days before and my family thought it would be good for me to go to work that day.

Or of the man that had a serious mental illness that worsened over the course of the year I knew him, and how no one took me seriously about the assaults because he was my boyfriend and had a key to my house. It wasn't until he caused a scene somewhere else and was coming to my place to "get" me that the police did anything - and even then, I had to phone a friend who worked for CSIS to get someone to come to my house. To the credit of the Toronto Police, when this came to court, they formed a protective bubble around me and I have never forgotten their kindness that day.

I am fortunate that I don't remember details about the assaults and that I had a wonderful psychiatrist who told me that I didn't have to remember in order to heal like so many people said.

He was fortunate that he had rich parents who could pay for his problems to go away, and that he was blessed with a ridiculously handsome face that helped. Like the probation officer that I called after he contacted me in violation of a court order. She didn't believe that a man "who looks like that" could be guilty of everything in his file. I called her supervisor and got him assigned to a male probation officer.

I am not attractive, I am not flirtatious, I did not invite these actions - these men did what they wanted, how I felt was not a matter of consideration. This is the mindset of the abuser/harasser - they will have what *they* want, PERIOD.

Any suggestion that dressing, speaking, looking, or behaving in a certain manner will protect you from this is WRONG! PERIOD!

And having the suggestion come from someone who uses their credentials as a scientist as proof of their feminist bona fides makes it even worse.

Right Back Where We Started From...

I deleted the update to my October 2014 post that I posted in the spring of 2016; none of it was true anymore.

Here we are at World Mental Health Day again, and my life has retreated to the point it was when I wrote about my struggles with avoidant personality disorder 3 years ago. There is no doubt that the issues I am facing in my workplace have a lot to do with this.

And the loss of the only supportive relationships in my life has been the most detrimental of all.

There are many people in this city who are smarter and more qualified than I am who cannot find work representative of their talents, so 5 interviews in 3 years shouldn't be regarded as a bad thing, but that's not the way my mind perceives it. That my two most recent directors dismiss my abilities, experience and education is even more debilitating.

Two days from now, Pints & Politics through the Urban League is hosting an event about loneliness. I signed up and I've been reading the links they've posted about loneliness in the context of living in a city. It's been difficult reading those articles.

This letter from The Guardian (UK) stood out:

When you’re approaching 50 and trying to ‘start again’ in a new place, it can be really hard. In a city it can feel like the whole world is out having fun, which makes you feel like a bit of loser. 

I was 45 when I moved to London and I am approaching 60 now. It is difficult to meet people for friendship when you are a middle-aged single woman. Most other single women in your age group are juggling children from their now-ended marriage, their jobs, and, usually, a new relationship. The female half of couples in your age range regard you as a threat to their relationship, and other single women in the same position as you look at you as competition. My experience of this city until 4 years ago is that it is cold and insular.

I have managed in that time to meet people who share my interests - mainly politics - but the biggest issue I've faced is that they are 10, 20, 30 and - in a few cases, more - years younger than I am. And other than a couple of interests, I have nothing in common with them. So I find myself on the outside, with my nose pressed up the glass of  social media feeds that make me feel even more alone.

Tonight I returned from a weekend where I spent days tending to my aging mother. It's emotionally draining for a reason other than the obvious one.... in 20 years, there will be no one to look after me.

In the 2 years since I developed chronic ideopathic angioedema, my panic attacks have returned; I'm afraid to sleep, afraid to be alone.... afraid that one day it will be the type of swelling that affects my tongue and and throat instead of just my lips and I'll die alone here and no one will know.

*****

I was betrayed this summer by someone I cared for, my personal safety and security compromised. And there's a voice in my head that tells me that I should never expect more, that this is what I deserve.

I have no one to talk to about this, no support system.

More than anything, I hope other people don't have these feelings too, and that they are able to reach out and find what they need. As the song says:  there must be something better than this.

A tale of two countries...

I'm not sure where this post starts; today is the 16th anniversary of my father's death, and that event always leaves me with a deep sense of loss. But I think it stretches back 25 years to the day I got my first internet account.

In 1992, there was no world wide web, no pictures, only words. And I was fortunate enough to stumble upon a group filled with witty, challenging, loving words created by a group of witty, challenging, loving people from around the world, mostly, of course, in the United States. Over time, I got to meet many of them. We went whitewater rafting, held quilting bees, attended chocolate fairs, and weddings, and consumed copious quantities of amazing food and drink.

I think it's fair to say that Nancy was the most beloved member of our group. She was a funny, kind, deeply loving woman with a great love of animals - no more so than her pet lizard, Herman. Nancy was a docent at the Memphis Zoo, the doting mother of Jenna and Derek, and an employee of the University of Memphis, where she covered the door to her office with Dilbert cartoons.

In May 1998, Nancy was diagnosed with a rare cancer of the bile ducts. The tumor was large and would have been difficult to remove surgically, but, by some miracle, Nancy's HMO agreed to let her have treatment at the Vanderbilt University Hospital cancer centre. The doctors were going to perform a chemoembolization - where the artery feeding the tumor would be blocked with a plug containing chemotherapy drugs to cut off its blood supply and shrink it to a point where it could be removed.

This is a fairly routine procedure today, but almost 20 years ago it was considered experimental, and Vanderbilt decided to fight with Nancy's HMO for her to have the treatment. They had it all arranged and approved, and she checked into the hospital in Nashville for the procedure.

Only to have someone at the HMO change their minds and pull the plug on the treatment while she was being prepped for surgery.

In the 1990s, universities in the US were one of those employers with "great" health plans for their employees. But, as remains the case today, insurers decide what treatment you get, NOT the medical professionals treating you.

Nancy died on August 12, 1999, she was 56, the same age I am now. Her loss was keenly felt by our group as a whole, and I think it's fair to say that we miss her still.

Despite having good coverage under her work health plan, Nancy's chemotherapy still cost thousands of dollars, and after she died, Jenna and Derek were forced to sell the family home to settle the debts that remained.

Fast-forward a year to Papa's diagnosis with throat cancer.

My father lived in Ste-Thérèse, on the north shore of the St. Lawrence across from Laval and Montréal. His cancer was discovered when he had a stroke caused by a tumor pressing on an artery in his neck. At his choice, he delayed chemotherapy to undergo physio to treat the side effects of the stroke.

Then he had another, more serious, stroke, paralyzing him on one side of his body. And started aggressive treatment for the cancer.

Here's the big difference in how treatment progressed for my Papa and Nancy:  Papa had the same oncologist as one of his hockey heroes - Jean Beliveau. Somehow, I can't see Michael Jordan would have been denied treatment as Nancy was - simply because he could pay for it without worrying about those pesky insurance company flunkies.

When my father died, my online family asked if my sister and I required any financial assistance to meet his expenses. Papa had prepaid his funeral and all his treatment was covered by the Ministère de la Santé and the Régie des Rentes, as he was placed on partial pension due to his illness. We got money back from the hospice because the Régie paid a month in advance for his stay.

No assistance needed.

*****

Nearly 20 years after these events, my friends and family in the United States continue to find their health care choices left to the mercy of insurance companies and conservative politicians who are little better than faith healers and snake oil salesmen.

After the vote in the US Congress last week, I publicly expressed my wish that I could adopt my American friends, and thanked my grandparents for emigrating to Canada.

Our health care system is far from perfect, and still underfunded, but I am grateful that I can walk into a hospital and walk out without handing over a credit card or worrying about pre-existing conditions negating the insurance I do have. Yes, my tax rate is higher, but it's a small price to pay for peace of mind.

And that's what makes The True North genuinely strong!

*****
My previous post about my Papa:  http://labellatestarossa.blogspot.ca/2013/08/it-must-have-been.html

I See You...

In the 1970 song "Everything is Beautiful", songwriter Ray Stevens echoes the words of 17th century clergyman Matthew Henry: There is none so blind as he who will not see.

I've been thinking about this a lot lately as a result of a Twitter conversation with my friends Marci and Amanda coupled with a book I've been reading.

I live in London, Canada, a city currently in a state of upheaval due to proposed changes to our transit system. We are the largest city of our size without a rapid transit system of either light rail or buses running on a separated grade. And we are bisected by two rail lines. While the southern line has many over and under-passes (as there are 3 rails), the northern line, run by Canadian Pacific, has one rail that runs at grade.

In the 11 years that I have lived here, I cannot tell you how many times I have sat in a bus on Richmond Street, stopped in traffic due to a train blocking the road. To make matters worse, two of the city's main hospitals are on the north side of those tracks and ambulances sit in traffic, too. The proposed transit plans would see a tunnel built under the tracks that could also be used by emergency vehicles.

Amanda has been economizing and using public transit instead of driving everywhere. She is a naturally gregarious person and chats with fellow riders and the bus drivers, and one of the topics of conversation is the transit plan. To her astonishment, a fair number of transit riders and even DRIVERS say they are unfamiliar with the plans.

And that fact astonishes ME, because there's been no shortage of public participation meetings about both transit and the municipal plan that has transit at its centre, as well as television and newspaper coverage. But, more than that, there were information posters ON THE BUSES themselves.

The information posters were conveniently placed in dedicated frames attached to the door of the driver cubby, where they can store their coats in winter. It's one of the first things you see when you step on the bus.

But you have to actually LOOK at it in order to SEE it!

Which brings me to the conversation with Marci and Amanda. Marci asked how we make people LOOK at something in order to SEE the information?

And, of course, the answer is - we can't.

That made think of all the things we look at, but don't really see.

This introspection was brought about by Amy Krouse Rosenthal, the acclaimed children's author, who died last month at the age of 51. A week before she died, the New York Times published an essay she wrote about her marriage and her husband. Having never heard of her before reading the deeply moving essay, I looked her up and discovered that she was not "just" a children's author, she had written some witty and insightful adult books, and was generally a "bon-vivant" - she lived very, VERY well!

I went to Kobo and found that her "Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life" was on sale and downloaded it.

It is, indeed an encyclopedia of Ms Rosenthal's life, but I was struck by how much she saw in those ordinary things that we do each day. I have an odd gift for remembering, but Ms Rosenthal absorbed life and found beauty daily in the world. She perpetrated random of acts of kindness, and hosted a flash mob at the Millennium Park in Chicago in 2008.

Last Saturday was an almost perfect spring day despite the snow the day before. So I hopped on a bus to head out to shop for groceries. I had forgotten to charge my iPad and didn't have anything in my hands to distract me on the trip there or back.

In eight and a half years of making that trip to that store, how had I never noticed that the sign outside the restaurant Piri-Piri has the caption "Eat, Drink, Repeat" under the name? Or that the Portuguese Fish Market sells juices for home-made wine and lists them all on a board on the outside of the store?

I have been making a conscious effort to see the world this week as I continue reading Ms Rosenthal's book.  With some luck and effort on my part, I will continue to do so, it's not natural for me. I'd rather tuck myself into my books and games and music on my travels - maybe so that the world won't see me.

In our transit debate, it seems more and more that the people against the plan refuse to see the people who actually use transit. "Certain types of people" use public transit a downtown merchant said to the chair of the transit commission, and the merchants are certain that "those people" don't patronize their establishments. As one of "those people", I'm tempted to ensure that those merchants don't see a penny of my hard-earned money!

This morning, someone nearly walked into me because she was too busy looking at her phone to see where she was going.  Has our connected world made us look at things - and people - but not SEE them?

It seems so; and the words written by a man who could not have foreseen the existence of cell phones ring truer than ever:  we are willfully blind because we will not see.

*****

Amy Krouse Rosenthal got less time on planet earth than I have had, and that's a sad thing. But her publisher has found a way to honour her spirit, and you can join in. Visit this web page to learn more:

http://www.chroniclebooks.com/blog/2017/03/10/amy-krouse-rosenthal-wish/