Someone I know made an offer on a house in Toronto. Now this was a pretty large house in a good area, but it needed major updating, and there was knob-and-tube wiring and asbestos that would have to be dealt with, which are not inexpensive things. It had potential but it wasn't absolutely amazing, or even unique. Well, she didn't get the house. It had multiple buyers interested in it, and eventually went for $400,000 OVER the asking price. My jaw hit the floor when she told me.
I knew Toronto was expensive, but that is just plain ridiculous. Beyond the fact that someone could afford that, there's the fact that someone would be willing to pay that. I mean, I adore looking at real estate, and I have seen many, many houses I would love to buy. But even if I were fantastically rich, there's no way I'd sink that much money into my home. Even in my most dramatic daydreams, I'm nowhere near that end of the scale. When it comes right down to it, it's a shelter, with walls and a roof and drywall and hopefully heat and water. You need somewhere to sleep and eat and stay dry and warm. Really, you don't need much more than that. Our ancestors raised bundles of children in small, modest homes. Some lived in soddies, some in log cabins. I've seen Italian women churn out fantastic, amazing meals, course after course, on a hotplate in a kitchen not much larger than an Easy-Bake oven. What percentage of our income are we willing to spend on just this one basic need?
There are so many other places to put our funds, so many other causes, and so many people around us who are in need. It doesn't hurt to check our priorities once in a while and justify our financial decisions to ourselves if to no one else. I would rather live in one of those Tiny homes with my belongings in a cardboard box than to live somewhere over-big and over-priced, or to spend that kind of money just for the sake of saying I live in that location. Nowadays you just can't justify extravagant living, not when you're thinking on a global scale.
Friday, 3 October 2014
Tuesday, 30 September 2014
Reunions
I got notice this week of my thirty-year high school reunion. Oh my! Am I really that old? Have I been out of high school that long? I don't know what I want to be when I grow up yet! I won't attend, because it's a continent away, but it was fun to pause and think about the people I used to know and grew up with. Because of the way community worked in Utah, a lot of the kids I went to school with I also went to church with, and my 5th Grade teacher was also my Sunday School teacher (I used to play with his daughter in their sandbox). I've gone to the temple with my old French teacher. I babysat for my music teacher. A lot of us were together from kindergarten through university. And now here we are, graying and slightly pudgy and flashing grandkid photos. Imagine!
I recently reconnected with a long-lost cousin on Facebook, and it opened up a world of other befriended cousins, most of whom I haven't seen in nearly thirty years. It felt like Christmas, scrolling through the list of names with accompanying photos and remembering my absolutely enchanting childhood, filled with family. Rollerskating. Sleeping over. Singing around the piano. Playing Beckon and Nertz. Picnics and plays and Aunt Linda's pies. I remember my grandpa demonstrating tap dancing he'd learned in college. My uncle in his pin-striped suit, taking all the kids in the station wagon to cruise main street after my other grandpa's funeral. Learning to use the automated milking machine. Chasing rabbits turned loose in the yard. Hunting for Easter eggs and chocolate in a two-acre orchard. Trampolines and clinging in terror and joy to the back of the tractor as it reared to turn around.
I'm happy with the life I've chosen, and I love where I live. But it saddens me that my kids won't know what it feels like to be surrounded by a jillion cousins. There was always something going on, and instant friends only a car drive away. The memory of those days warms me, makes me want to scurry back to my childhood and the embrace of family. Hey, you jillions of cousins! I love you! Come and visit me! I'll pitch a tent in the backyard and make sloppy joes. I even have a few of Grandpa's mints left, squirrelled away in my dresser drawer.
I recently reconnected with a long-lost cousin on Facebook, and it opened up a world of other befriended cousins, most of whom I haven't seen in nearly thirty years. It felt like Christmas, scrolling through the list of names with accompanying photos and remembering my absolutely enchanting childhood, filled with family. Rollerskating. Sleeping over. Singing around the piano. Playing Beckon and Nertz. Picnics and plays and Aunt Linda's pies. I remember my grandpa demonstrating tap dancing he'd learned in college. My uncle in his pin-striped suit, taking all the kids in the station wagon to cruise main street after my other grandpa's funeral. Learning to use the automated milking machine. Chasing rabbits turned loose in the yard. Hunting for Easter eggs and chocolate in a two-acre orchard. Trampolines and clinging in terror and joy to the back of the tractor as it reared to turn around.
I'm happy with the life I've chosen, and I love where I live. But it saddens me that my kids won't know what it feels like to be surrounded by a jillion cousins. There was always something going on, and instant friends only a car drive away. The memory of those days warms me, makes me want to scurry back to my childhood and the embrace of family. Hey, you jillions of cousins! I love you! Come and visit me! I'll pitch a tent in the backyard and make sloppy joes. I even have a few of Grandpa's mints left, squirrelled away in my dresser drawer.
Sunday, 28 September 2014
Burdens and Opportunities
Someone recently posted the thought that God gives you mountains so you learn how to climb, and he felt he was scaling Everest this week. I sent him a quick message of encouragement, but it got me thinking. Today is what we Latter-day Saints call Fast Sunday. Once a month we go without meals for 24 hours and donate what we would have spent on food to charity, to feed those who go hungry on a frequent basis. It not only helps others financially, but it helps us to focus on the inner spiritual self while subduing the outer physical self.
Each month, I find it helps me to fast if I am thinking about and praying for a specific person or a particular need. But this month there seems to be so many people around me needing special help. A friend with cancer. A baby about to be born in the family. Another baby due in the spring. Someone's uncomfortable financial situation. An acquaintance's recovery from a difficult surgery. Someone waiting for news from their doctor. Someone looking for work. Loneliness. Loss. Pain. Disappointment. And it seems like a feeble cop-out to fling a generally-worded prayer heavenward for "all those who need Thy blessings." After all, we all need blessings of one sort or another. Everyone has a particular sorrow or challenge, sometimes visible and sometimes hidden. It's part of the human condition. And it seems a bit presumptuous to tell God, "You decide who needs help the most this month." As if He doesn't know already.
One of my bosses dislikes the word "challenge." She substitutes the word "opportunity" for it, instead. She's right, of course; every obstacle and disappointment presents the opportunity to grow or learn, and that is, after all, what we're here for. Someone else's problem provides us with the opportunity to reach and stretch and help and increase in compassion. But positive spin or not, the fact is that life can be incredibly hard. We need each other's prayers and outstretched hands. Even if we know the plan and see the bigger picture, we still have to get the occasional boost from someone else to make it through the day. So I think this Fast Sunday, instead of telling God to do all the work, I'll ask instead to be shown where I can be of most help, and then I will commit to doing whatever I'm shown.
Each month, I find it helps me to fast if I am thinking about and praying for a specific person or a particular need. But this month there seems to be so many people around me needing special help. A friend with cancer. A baby about to be born in the family. Another baby due in the spring. Someone's uncomfortable financial situation. An acquaintance's recovery from a difficult surgery. Someone waiting for news from their doctor. Someone looking for work. Loneliness. Loss. Pain. Disappointment. And it seems like a feeble cop-out to fling a generally-worded prayer heavenward for "all those who need Thy blessings." After all, we all need blessings of one sort or another. Everyone has a particular sorrow or challenge, sometimes visible and sometimes hidden. It's part of the human condition. And it seems a bit presumptuous to tell God, "You decide who needs help the most this month." As if He doesn't know already.
One of my bosses dislikes the word "challenge." She substitutes the word "opportunity" for it, instead. She's right, of course; every obstacle and disappointment presents the opportunity to grow or learn, and that is, after all, what we're here for. Someone else's problem provides us with the opportunity to reach and stretch and help and increase in compassion. But positive spin or not, the fact is that life can be incredibly hard. We need each other's prayers and outstretched hands. Even if we know the plan and see the bigger picture, we still have to get the occasional boost from someone else to make it through the day. So I think this Fast Sunday, instead of telling God to do all the work, I'll ask instead to be shown where I can be of most help, and then I will commit to doing whatever I'm shown.
Thursday, 25 September 2014
A Really Great Idea
For those of you who like to hike, walk your dog, or ride your horse in the countryside, you need to check out this brilliant (literally) idea at www.dontshootme.ca -- a line of high-visibility apparel and animal accessories to protect you and your animals from hunters. A friend's wife came up with the idea, and I think it's terrific.
We used to live out in Hillsburgh on fifty acres of forest, and one day men came to the door and told me, "Keep your kids inside. We're hunting wolves on your land."
Well. What is the proper response to that? I packed up the two-year-old and moved to Guelph.
Not all hunters are polite enough to ask permission to go on your land, and a lot of the time you may not know they are out there. And not everyone is as careful as they should be. It is just a smart idea to take precautions. A horse can look like a deer through the trees.
Even if you aren't in an area where you might encounter hunters, I like the idea of putting a bright orange vest on my dogs just to walk them down the street. It makes them more visible to drivers, and if Brio dashes off into the woods by the park, it will be easier to see him. Right now he blends in with the autumn leaves. And considering how many times my kids were hit by cars when they were younger, I probably should have considered putting a bright orange vest on them before letting them out on their bikes, especially at dusk. They may not have liked it, but I gotta say it's a great idea.
We used to live out in Hillsburgh on fifty acres of forest, and one day men came to the door and told me, "Keep your kids inside. We're hunting wolves on your land."
Well. What is the proper response to that? I packed up the two-year-old and moved to Guelph.
Not all hunters are polite enough to ask permission to go on your land, and a lot of the time you may not know they are out there. And not everyone is as careful as they should be. It is just a smart idea to take precautions. A horse can look like a deer through the trees.
Even if you aren't in an area where you might encounter hunters, I like the idea of putting a bright orange vest on my dogs just to walk them down the street. It makes them more visible to drivers, and if Brio dashes off into the woods by the park, it will be easier to see him. Right now he blends in with the autumn leaves. And considering how many times my kids were hit by cars when they were younger, I probably should have considered putting a bright orange vest on them before letting them out on their bikes, especially at dusk. They may not have liked it, but I gotta say it's a great idea.
Sunday, 21 September 2014
Home Again
My parents returned home this week from serving as missionaries in London for the past year. I'm sure it was a time of conflicting feelings for them -- happy to be home, especially with a new grandchild about to be born, but sad to leave friends and places that have come to feel like home after so long. We are so proud of them and the example they have set for their family.
I know how weird it feels to return home after years away. You expect everything to be the same, or you fear it will all be different, and in reality it is a mixed bag. Things have changed just enough that you feel off-kilter, a little disoriented. Familiar objects in different places, or familiar places filled with different objects. People whose faces have altered just enough to make you realize time has passed without you there to watch it. I should know this, you say to yourself. But you don't. You know just enough to realize you don't. You end up not being quite sure how to react, how to function, where to find things. You forget now and then that you are no longer away, and you find yourself looking for people and listening for sounds that aren't there. It doesn't take long to fall back into the groove, though, and after a while you forget you've ever been gone. But for that first while, it's like wearing someone else's shoes. Functional, even comfortable, but strange.
When I first moved to Canada, I had little idea what to expect. Oh, I can do this, I thought breezily. I know this. They speak English here, after all. How hard can it be? So I went about acting as if I were at home, expecting all to be, well, normal. And then I spent the next few months putting my foot in my mouth, because it turned out there were hidden differences and unanticipated quirks and I didn't understand as well as I thought I did. I ended up making a lot of mistakes based on faulty assumptions. (By the way, when Canadians tell you "Oh, it's okay. Leave your shoes on" when you go to their home, take off the shoes!) I sometimes think it would have been easier to move to a completely different culture, like Japan, because then I wouldn't have assumed anything. Of course eventually I molded to my surroundings and now it all feels perfectly ordinary. Now it's when I go back to the States that I feel as if I've stepped through the looking glass. I feel like twitching my shoulders and adjusting my head, à la Adrian Monk, trying to settle.
I picture my parents now, back among the beautiful mountains of home (which mercifully never change). I envision them touching familiar things, unpacking, finding forgotten treasures that they hadn't realized they'd even missed. Happy, sad, and feeling -- just for a while -- like tourists poking through someone else's house. Remembering, reacclimating. Getting the shoes to fit.
I know how weird it feels to return home after years away. You expect everything to be the same, or you fear it will all be different, and in reality it is a mixed bag. Things have changed just enough that you feel off-kilter, a little disoriented. Familiar objects in different places, or familiar places filled with different objects. People whose faces have altered just enough to make you realize time has passed without you there to watch it. I should know this, you say to yourself. But you don't. You know just enough to realize you don't. You end up not being quite sure how to react, how to function, where to find things. You forget now and then that you are no longer away, and you find yourself looking for people and listening for sounds that aren't there. It doesn't take long to fall back into the groove, though, and after a while you forget you've ever been gone. But for that first while, it's like wearing someone else's shoes. Functional, even comfortable, but strange.
When I first moved to Canada, I had little idea what to expect. Oh, I can do this, I thought breezily. I know this. They speak English here, after all. How hard can it be? So I went about acting as if I were at home, expecting all to be, well, normal. And then I spent the next few months putting my foot in my mouth, because it turned out there were hidden differences and unanticipated quirks and I didn't understand as well as I thought I did. I ended up making a lot of mistakes based on faulty assumptions. (By the way, when Canadians tell you "Oh, it's okay. Leave your shoes on" when you go to their home, take off the shoes!) I sometimes think it would have been easier to move to a completely different culture, like Japan, because then I wouldn't have assumed anything. Of course eventually I molded to my surroundings and now it all feels perfectly ordinary. Now it's when I go back to the States that I feel as if I've stepped through the looking glass. I feel like twitching my shoulders and adjusting my head, à la Adrian Monk, trying to settle.
I picture my parents now, back among the beautiful mountains of home (which mercifully never change). I envision them touching familiar things, unpacking, finding forgotten treasures that they hadn't realized they'd even missed. Happy, sad, and feeling -- just for a while -- like tourists poking through someone else's house. Remembering, reacclimating. Getting the shoes to fit.
Wednesday, 17 September 2014
Dearly Depotted...
We gather in remembrance of autumn-emptied gardens--
stirred soil, dry vines, leaning stakes
Wheelbarrow overturned, tomato cages stacked
like dunce caps in the corner
Hoses coiled, tools cleaned and sharpened.
Seed pods shatter, sending next year's life
into clod crevices, between pavers.
All green has turned brown and black
A blanket of mulch drawn around earth's shoulders.
Like the garden, I will bide my time,
sleepy, covered, and calm for winter
until with the touch of sun and shovel
I explode back to life in springtime.
stirred soil, dry vines, leaning stakes
Wheelbarrow overturned, tomato cages stacked
like dunce caps in the corner
Hoses coiled, tools cleaned and sharpened.
Seed pods shatter, sending next year's life
into clod crevices, between pavers.
All green has turned brown and black
A blanket of mulch drawn around earth's shoulders.
Like the garden, I will bide my time,
sleepy, covered, and calm for winter
until with the touch of sun and shovel
I explode back to life in springtime.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)