Thanks Bloggers, I’ve Fallen and I Can’t Get Up!

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frantic writer

Arrrrgh!  I am falling behind in my own writing and I can’t get up.  It’s entirely your fault!  Yes you, you fellow bloggers.  I have been catching up on your writing.  I follow a great number of blogs, but only because a great many of you are great writers!

I frantically flip through the humorists while scarfing down my favorite yogurt and fruit in the morning.  You are funny as hell, by the way.  I read the short fiction stories while I scarf down a quick lunch – wow, if only I had half of that creativity. While contemplating my son’s requests for later bed times and higher allowance, I read the thoughtful musings on everything from parenting to how we view ourselves, to what really burns someone’s butt.  Thanks for the respective reassurances, great ideas, and food for thought.  It goes on and on from there, and I stand transfixed while dinner burns.

I wonder if I’ve fallen into some kind of wordy Alice trap – navigating through mazes and mazes of great advice, ideas, creativity and interesting and thought provoking opinions and situations.  I think I should be inspired by all of this, but I somehow come away feeling — empty. My mind is the storied black hole. Am I intimidated too much by so much goodness?  Have I morphed from a ‘journaling’ addict to a comparative reading junkie?

So much to see, so much to learn, and I know I still have opinions and thoughts of my own aplenty.  I just don’t seem to be able to string them into a reasonable string of sentences that will eventually make a point.

WordPress itself tries to help me with all their daily great suggestions and writing tip prompts.  Great ideas WP and I will get to those, maybe right after I catch just this latest post from Ned.  And You’ve Been Hooked, and Twisted Sifter, and Gotta Find A Home….  Arrrrghh….

So, uh, anyone got any good tips?

RL

Dejah is Soaring

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The bagpipes were playing and the Red Serge of two RCMP officers were present when we arrived for the service.

Hundreds of us gathered to say goodbye for now to Dejah; our hearts heavy as we looked at each other knowing this made it more real.  It was time to acknowledge that one of our babies had moved on.  He came to us through Glo and Bob, but we all saw how he was family to many more, some he hadn’t even met, but to whom he became beloved nonetheless.  Such was, or rather, is, his beautiful spirit.

The air was a mix of warm expectancy and wistful anticipation, the kind where we needed to say to ourselves – hold it together here.  Just hold it together at least until you can take a seat.  We pinned on little yellow ribbons in support of beating childhood cancer as we lined up to sign the guest book on our way in.

There was so much love gathered today through Dejah that at times it was overwhelming.  They were not tears of grief, it was the fullness of hearts spilling over.  All got lifted up with all the messages of love spoken by those who took turns to share their feelings and experiences with him. His sister Rayne couldn’t have had a better letter of sibling love to share with us.  His Uncle Dwayne spoke to that part of us that loves with a parental heart.  Family friends shared how their lives have been impacted by him and his family.

We watched a video that displayed how much life that young spirit lived in between the bouts of inconvenience caused by cancer invasions.  It was astonishing to realize how much life he packed into the short thirteen years he was to be here.  It seems miraculous actually. Through those pictures we saw how much he loved to laugh, and he showed what really living was about, even with insurmountable challenges.

One of his best friends, Tre, stood up and told us, in the way only a kid can, what it was to be Dejah’s friend.  He told how Dejah was a video game king that regularly brought his opponents to their knees.   Tre made us laugh as he admitted he was one of those friends who felt like crying when Dejah wanted to play a video game because he knew he was going to get wiped out within minutes.  He reminded us of what it means to be a kid when he described how they would put Dejah into a baby cart at the grocery store and run until it fell over, and then they would fall over laughing.  We were overcome by Tre’s beautiful recounting of his friendship, and from the wisdom, far beyond his years, that he gained from it.

Dejah was the typical hockey-obsessed Canadian kid – one happy to throw a dig at his soccer loving friend, Nuvin, in good-humored contempt.   This is especially funny because Dejah was the inspiration for the start of a fantastic organization, started by that friend, called Kick for a Cure.  They work to raise awareness and funding for research of childhood cancer treatments – mainly through annual soccer tournaments.

He was an inclusive caring boy who lit up the hearts of so many with a remarkably warm smile.  That was an often mentioned point.  He laughed, and loved, and played the hell out of life.

He showed, even today, that to really live is about grabbing the moment we have, this one right here and now, and making it as worthwhile as we can.

Grab the opportunity to smile and laugh at anything you can. Do whatever it takes, even something as crazy as recording yourself elaborately eating your last bite of a sandwich.  Just. Do. It.  You have no idea how funny that will be some day.

It wasn’t an easy life for Dejah, and just like the rest of us, he had some days that made it too hard to smile.  His lesson isn’t that life will always be easy, it’s make the most of it when you can.  Strive to make the most out of what you do have, while you have it.

All too soon, the celebration was nearing the end.  We were all given tree saplings to plant in his honor and then we were given blue helium-filled balloons.  It was time to symbolically release our fears and pain and send out instead, our love for Dejah and for each other.

We cheered as the balloons rose and we watched as they drifted up into the sky, up and up, and then somebody realized a distinctive shape to them.  Look, Caroline said, they’ve gone into the shape of a heart, and they had.  Somehow that didn’t really seem all that surprising.   It was just another addition to the moments that display the power of Dejah’s spirit.

An earlier post I wrote about Dejah has, so far, been read over 1,100 times on seven continents.  Those are the reads that I can track, the ones that I can’t probably drive that number into the thousands.

It’s astounding to realize that a seemingly average young boy from Eagle Ridge in Coquitlam has touched so many people around the world.  It boggles my mind to try to comprehend that his spirit has literally surrounded the planet.

Glo and Bob, that spirit that was to be such a gift to so many came through you, and you nurtured it until it became whole in its perfection, until it was time to be released.  You are to know that you did well.  You did very, very well.

Dejah's second last Facebook post

Dejah’s second last Facebook post

RL

The family requests in lieu of flowers that you consider making a donation in Dejah’s memory to (your choice):

Canuck Place Children’s Hospice:
https://payment.csfm.com/donations/canuck_place/donate/
or
Kick For A Cure:  http://www.kickforacure.ca/donate-to-kfac/

Our Home and Native Braves

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Andrea Hotomanie, Principal, Glenda Speight, Constable Erin McAvoy

Andrea Hotomanie, Principal, Glenda Speight, Constable Erin McAvoy

As Remembrance Day approaches, I am reminded of how profoundly I was moved by the Remembrance Day assembly at my son’s school last year. I found it particularly poignant for two reasons.

What I found initially striking was that the ceremony was presided over by all women, something I’d never seen before.  They were school Principal, Glenda Speight, RCMP Constable Erin McAvoy, impressive in her Red Serge, and Andrea Hotomanie, the district Aboriginal Support Worker.

Andrea Hotomanie was the second reason of note.  She stood up in recognition of the First Nations who serve and have served in the Canadian Military. She wore a magnificent button blanket around her shoulders.  It was the first time I had seen this kind of inclusion at any school remembrance assembly.  It brought me to tears.

It moved me so deeply because it was the first time I felt my grandfather and uncles included in these remembrances in a way that they hadn’t before.  It brought them, Cree warriors from Northern Alberta, faded from history for so many decades, up to the front too.  I felt they were being honored for the first time as servicemen and not as guests in the back of my mind, while all the other heroes were noted up on the screens and in the speeches. Between Andrea’s presence and my son nearby, this acknowledgement brought it all fully home to my heart.

All those many years ago, there was never any doubt that at least three of my uncles would join the military from the time that, as young boys, they stared admiringly at the one photo of my grandfather in his uniform until they were all signed up and fitted into their own.

photo compilation by Robyn LawsonAlong with pride of nation and reverence for the uniform, there was another underlying and stirring reason to join up. Uncle Philip finally expressed it after I asked him why he always declared that his favorite job was being in the Canadian forces.  He said, “Respect”.  While he wore that uniform, it was the first time in his life that he was treated with honest to God respect, and it didn’t matter where he was in the world.  It was his greatest time of honor and pride.  I can’t say so for my grandfather or the other uncles, but I suspect they felt much the same.

Their presence at the Remembrance Day assembly that day was palpable to me, and I have no doubt that they were all there in full uniform.

There is a lot of history about Indigenous participation in the military and the details are available more than ever.  I would encourage anyone to look up that history sometime for some very interesting and enlightening reading.

For now, I would just like to say thank you to my family for their courage.  We will always be proud.  We will always remember.

In remembrance of:

Private John Joseph Baptiste Gray – WW1

Private John Joseph Baptiste Gray – WW1

Private Frank Joseph Gray – WW2

Private Frank Joseph Gray – WW2

Philip Gray Military Photo

Private Philip Sanford Gray – Korea

Private Larry Alexander Gray – Canadian post, Quebec

Private Larry Alexander Gray – Canadian post, Quebec

To an old friend serving in Afghanistan, Deputy Chief of Staff, John Valtonen, as always, thank you, and stay safe.

RL

readers digest logoOur Home and Native Braves was published October 30, 2013 on the Reader’s Digest community website:  http://www.readersdigest.ca/our-canada/community-blog/our-home-and-native-braves

Recommended link for Native military history:
A Commemorative History of Aboriginal People in the Canadian Military:
http://www.cmp-cpm.forces.gc.ca/dhh-dhp/pub/boo-bro/abo-aut/index-eng.asp

Shake the video, from Portraits of Dogs, Mid-Shake

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Sometimes life hands you a new perspective that gives a little thrill along with a great moment of lightness.  This is one of those perspectives.

Enjoy some lightness friends! And, maybe try to stay dry.

<iframe src=”//player.vimeo.com/video/77111226?portrait=0&badge=0&color=df5840″ width=”500″ height=”281″ frameborder=”0″ webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen>

SHAKE from Variable on Vimeo.

Women Too Unstable For Leadership? A Blogging Conversation from the Mid East

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One of the benefits of being a part of the blogosphere is getting a ‘fly on the wall’ perspective of other cultures.  One of these perspectives recently caught my eye and has been in the back of my mind since.

One of the bloggers I follow is a young educated woman in the Middle East, whom I believe to be early twenties in age. She is a lovely writer who has written about such things as her impending arranged marriage.  She is accepting of that, and has great respect and confidence in her parent’s decisions made on her behalf.

EqualRIghts allShe recently posted another view in regard to gender equality that said she does not support the idea of equal rights for women, preferring instead the idea of equal respect for both genders.  This certainly piqued my interest.  What did that mean exactly?

I was further intrigued by the number of readers who liked the post, some declaring it her best yet, and other comments that were highly in favor of women knowing where they are meant to be as women. Some congratulated her on her mature and reasoned outlook. Some made me sad about the way they disparaged other women.

The much shortened version of what she said was essentially that men and women are different with equal value, but not equal in strengths such as leadership.  Women are really meant to grow families, and men are meant to rule.  One of her replies to a comment on the post said: “Yes I know some of history’s greatest rulers were women but ruling is an attribute of men because they are more emotionally stable than women”.

I don’t think I have to point out how most of us in our part of the world would react to that statement, nor to any of the comments that followed.

I wrote her for some clarification, offering circumstances where their ideals might not suit all women’s situations.  She said she understood Western ideals and agreed with most of what I had to say, but she was speaking from her own cultural stance and to what is important in her part of the world.  She said she felt the issue for them is not so much about ideas like equal pay, as they are already paid equally there, but more around social interaction like those that use humiliation to coerce and make women feel badly.

I thanked her for explaining herself to me, but I still came away feeling a little uneasy.

I’ve been a self-sufficient woman for the majority of my life, and I have been dependent on a husband for part of the balance. In either case, I firmly believed that I had full and equal rights in all decisions and responsibilities in my home and in all realms of our society.

Along with the power of making one’s own decisions is the burden of responsibility for them, and of any consequences.  I wonder how the idea that women make poor leaders, or whether or not women have ability, is a justifiable statement from a place where one does not yet have full responsibility for decisions. What kind of fear(s) is this based in?

The bottom line is that I believe that making decisions about your own life is the intrinsic point of a ‘right’.  It is a right that belongs to all people. It is all having a voice in all that matters.  Certainly that involves exercising it or giving it away at will.

To hear, and see it supported, especially from young women, that women are not equal to men and to imply they should not have equal rights, is disheartening to me.  Regardless of culture, to have it stated that women are equal in value to men, just not in strengths is puzzling given the amount of history easily attainable. One woman’s ambitions are another woman’s weaknesses?

I hope someday they can compare all the amazing and inspiring women leaders the world has known to all the numbers of men who have failed miserably in the same role and see that it all had nothing to do with gender.  Maybe there will even come a time when they will see that some men make exemplary stay at home parents too.  It’s their ‘right’ to be whatever they feel best suited for; it’s their right to act upon that.

It was very interesting to get a personal glimpse into a part of the world I’ve never been, and to get to be a part of a discussion I might never have had outside of these blogging contacts.

In the end, she and I respectfully agree to disagree.  It’s an enormous conversation and not one that was going to be completely resolved or understood in a few emails. This will be about eventual circumstances and time to see what is to evolve.

I am curious though, about the things they do want to change about their culture.  In particular those things that they said were hurtful to women. Who will pick up the lead on those changes if not themselves?

RL

Referral post:  foodpeopleloveandstuff.wordpress.com/2013/10/12/you-say-equal-rights-i-say-equal-respect/