A Story - "Comfort Food" and Lights like a Winter Garden

A Story

Comfort Food

Shelly packed her sports bag with her clothes and taped up her memory box. Her mother had already filled some boxes with their other possessions. They travelled light. It was too much work to deal with more than the essentials.

Later that afternoon, they stepped into their new apartment.  Hardly new, though.  The floor was cracked, scratched parquet. The kitchen cupboards were flimsy cheap wood with crooked hinges. In the bathroom, the bath was pink but the toilet was white, the sink cream coloured.  Shelly would be sharing the bedroom with her mom. Two single beds filled the space with barely room for the rack they hung their clothes on.

At school the next day, Shelly tried to blend into her desk, but at the first lunch hour one of the girls, who had a gaggle of friends around her, came up to her and laughed at her cheap clothes and well-worn lunch bag. It was going to be a miserable year just like the one before.

On her way home from school, she stopped at the corner store and bought a couple of chocolate bars and a bag of barbecue chips. That was all she could afford.

Curled up on her bed waiting for her mother to come home from work, Shelly slowly ate her chocolate bars, savouring the sweetness and the smoothness as they melted in her mouth. A feeling of warmth crept over her like a hug. She licked her fingers and popped open the bag of chips. Salty and spicy the chips crunched as she bit into them. She crushed them like she wanted to crush the bully girls at school.

After she finished the chips, she flattened out the chocolate bar wrappers and the chip bag and put them at the bottom of her memory box. Letters from her best friends.

The sparkling lights of the town across the bay are like flowers in a winter garden.  They are cheerful to see in the dark winter months.

 

 

Vines and Leaves

 Here we are in October and there is still a lot of green around. 

Some Virginia creeper has made berries.  The red stems really set the blue berries off nicely.

The Virginia creeper is not as brilliant as it can be - quite dull in most places, actually.

Here and there, a bit of brighter colour shows up.

Grape vines and Virginia creeper are turning some trees and bushes into leafy mounds.

Grape vines are falling out of sumac which is also not as colourful as normal at this time of year.

An old barn makes a good support for vines.

 Here's another one. Soon it will be all covered except for the roof.

Spots of bright colour stand out against the green leaves and the blue sky.

A good frost often makes the colour more dramatic and we haven't had a hard frost yet.  I can't say that I am minding the pleasant weather, though. The cold will be here soon enough.

Off To The Big City

 We went up to Toronto for a few days to attend our son's graduation, and visit the grandkids. This is a photo of Hart House on the U of T campus where the morning ceremony took place.

 During the noon hour, we enjoyed the courtyard area of Hart House and ate the tasty lunch that was provided.  The students got to say their goodbyes and take pictures of their friends.

Later, after a terrific thunderstorm, we stopped at our son's apartment on the 32nd floor. This is the view out the window looking towards Lake Ontario. Lots of new building going on.

 On the way home, we scooted off the 401 highway for a bit and travelled along the 1000 Island Parkway.  Aah - this is more like it.  I can breathe again.

 Great rocks in this area.

And a shapely tree.
It's good to go away and good to come home.

Museum of Nature, Ottawa

 It says Victoria Memorial Museum, but it has been called the Museum of Nature for a long time.  Whatever it's called, it is a lovely museum that focuses on the animals, birds, fish and minerals of Canada.  Aren't the moose heads over the doors wonderful?

 The stained glass windows on the left and right feature birds.(click on photo for full width)

The last panel to the right in this set is a bit hard to see but it is a bird (peregrine falcon, maybe?) catching a fish. (click here, too)

The middle panel from the outside and looking out from the inside.  The far panels picture music and painting but I'm not sure what the middle panels are about. (click)

The museum has four floors and a basement level.  This was taken from the second floor balcony.  Each floor has two wings dedicated to a specific topic, and the centre is an open stairway.

 The wooly mammoths are life-size sculptures on the west side of the museum. (Sorry about the lousy picture quality-we were driving).
I have been to this museum several times, but I wanted to go this time to see a large exhibit of rocks and minerals.  They were amazing and there are photos to prove it, but next time I'll share some pics of the mammal and bird areas which are also great.  The rocks will be the grand finale.

And So It Goes

 This is a picture of the corner store and post office in the village near our home.  At the end of the month, it is closing and will be replaced with

these outdoor mailboxes.  Kind of sad.
When we moved to the area about 30 years ago, the village had several businesses as well as being a stop on the main railway line between Montreal and Ottawa. Back then, a person could do most of their day to day affairs right in the village as there were two small groceries stores (one had a butcher, one had basic hardware), a clothing store with essentials like rubber boots and warm socks, two garages that sold gas and did repairs, and a bank.  All these businesses have closed except for the post office and a small restaurant which will close soon, too. Just up the road a little, was a French elementary school.  The school closed two years ago as enrollment had dropped to 12 students.  During the summer months, baseball and soccer leagues used to be played at the local field.
Now, it seems the village is just full of old people. No urban sprawl in this neck of the woods.
It is a case of no jobs, and the young people needing to move to the city to find work. I know it's not just happening here.  It's happening in most of rural Canada.  Still I find it sad, the hollowing out of rural villages.

St. Joseph's Oratory - Montreal

We went to see St. Joseph's Oratory in Montreal yesterday.  We had been years ago, but our daughter wanted to visit it again so  we stopped in to have a look.  The building of the Oratory (place of worship) began in 1924 and it wasn't completed until 1967. It looks like an old building, but it is actually quite modern  which the interior reflects. It is a minor basillica (place of pilgrimage) and some people would climb the many front steps on their knees.  Not so much nowadays. The Oratory is, of course, dedicated to St. Joseph, but it is really in honour of Brother Andre, who had a healing ministry there.

 It is situated on a high point in the city and, from the balcony, the view went for miles and miles.   The Laurentian Mountains  show up as low dark blue humps in the far distance.

 Inside the Oratory, statues of some saints and apostles are positioned on the outer walls. Photos are a bit blurry as the light was dim.

 The light was ever changing as the sunlight shone through different stain glass windows. I wasn't too keen on the circular light fixture at the front of the sanctuary.

 Crucifix behind the altar.

 The organ is a Beckerath organ with 5811 pipes.  It was truly amazing.  The organist was practicing for a recital and I have never heard such a wonderful organ. At times, it sounded like a trumpet, sometimes like bells, or a clarinet - the variety of tones was spectacular. The acoustics in the church were excellent, matching the skill of the organist.

 Modern stain glass perhaps depicting the calling of the Apostles,the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus' healing ministry.

An attractive nativity relief.  There were also reliefs for the Stations of the Cross on the sides of large square pillars.

Park Crescent, London

 Raining hard this afternoon, so no gardening.  Some more pictures of London.  Park Crescent is near Regent's Park, my favourite park in London.  I really like the sweeping curve of this row housing which is now used as offices.

 The white finish brings so much light to the landscape.

The black railings are perfect against the white pillars.

Look at all those chimneys!  This building is across the street from Park Crescent, and Regent's Park is a short step away. 

Natural History Museum -London

 I was really pleased that we were able to visit the Natural History Museum with hardly any time spent waiting in line at the entrance.   The building is fabulous. A perfect tribute to  the eccentric Victorians who travelled the world in search of undiscovered plants, animals and artifacts. It has a very Egyptian tone to it which must have been very exotic in its time.  This is the main entrance.

 I found the beige stone highlighted with a blue-grey stone to be quite stunning, and all the details just keep you looking and looking.

Beautiful windows.

 A tiger (?) flanked by some iguanas.  So cool.  And did someone plant those green things or did they just pop up?  They fit in perfectly.

 Isn't this an amazing design?  Click for full size pic.

 What would a museum of nature be without a dinosaur?  This one had a very, very long tail that was only about the width of a pencil the last few feet of it. The vertebrae had an unusual forward tilt to them.  The inside of the building was just as wonderful as the outside with skylights and arches leading to the various exhibit rooms.

No wonder people make movies here.
As for the exhibits themselves, I was disappointed. Lots of stuffed animals and birds in glass cases with not a lot of information about them or much attempt to create an illusion of natural habitat.  The exhibits at the museum in Ottawa are much more interesting and attractive.  But that's OK, the building was well worth the visit.

Exhibition Road

 I was thinking about Exhibition Road, and remembered that I had some pictures of it that I hadn't posted.  Our goal that day was the Natural History Museum, but when we got there the line was very, very long so instead we went to the Victoria and Albert Museum across the street. The V & A proved to be a very interesting museum so we were glad we went to it.

 If you cut across Hyde Park through the middle from north to south, you end up at the top end of Exhibition Road. In 2003, the roadway was redesigned and it is really quite stunning.  The sidewalks were removed and a pattern of black and very pale pink granite was put down instead of pavement. My pictures in no way do justice to the wonderful effect of this spacious promenade.  Slow traffic is allowed down the middle of the road, but it was designed primarily with the enjoyment of the pedestrian in mind.

Decorated columns on the pillars of the Victoria and Albert Museum.

 Such intricate designs.

Another view down the road.  The dark line is a gutter which separates the traffic area from the pedestrian area.