Author: C-Anne Robertson

When I sold my mother’s transfer wheelchair today, this is what the people who purchased the wheelchair told me: “

“My mother is 83 years old and recently fell and broke her elbow and wrist, and who knows what else!” She had surgery to fix her arm. While she was in the hospital she got worried about covid. Someone at the hospital apparently told her it was survival of the fittest, and so she checked herself out. The hospital discharger her without even checking to see if she would be able to care for herself at home, or if there was anyone to assist. She was not able to look after herself , and her more elderly husband couldn’t help much either. The daughter was desperately trying to arrange home care, but she said they were all backed up with the various cuts to service in the hospital. Once she got home her mother was not able to walk. The home care people advised the daughter to get a transfer wheelchair to help her mother out. She looked on kijijji, and felt she had won the lottery by finding one.

It looks to me like a number of challenges ahead for this senior. We definitely need to do more for our more vulnerable citizens. And more money into the medical system we have won’t fix it. More care is what is needed.

Ok, going to try again, for the 6732nd time, I am going to just say something. It won’t be particularly significant or important; I might change my mind about what I say, or I might not, but I’m just going to say right now….

It is a lovely day, I think I’ll take the dog for a walk.

I lay on the cool cement of the bench

and watch as the elm buds unfold into leaves

against the drifting sky.

Their birthing is framed by wires strung to connect me to the rest of the world.

 

Am I connected?

To what?

To whom?

I feel the cement on my back and the grass at my feet.

The ants crawl over my shoes.

Magpies scold me.

And the robins and waxwings happily sing their songs oblivious

of nearby traffic that nearly drowns them out.

I try to reconcile it;

to fit nature with the unnatural,

to justify the destruction

with the creation

as a ladybug craws across my camera.

Again I start the spring work,

and step on my baby blueberry bush as I brush away the dead leaves.

I apologize.

Am I too aggressive to grow a garden?

Does clearing away the dead leaves make the small shots feel naked?

Does raking the grass feel like a good back scratch?

Or like someone pulling out hair?

I don’t know,

because this realm is foreign to me.

In my day to day work in an office

I have become a stranger to nature,

the product of a long line of more and more urbanization,

less and less nature.

But, I do see the ladybugs everywhere –

And I cheer them on.

And celebrate the wax wings who flit from tree to tree.

I rest again and feel my back pressed against the cool cement

of the bench transplanted from another place and time,

as a reminder of what was and what did not come to be.

The sun on my face soothes

My very essence

As it kisses my cheeks.

The lilies spring to life before my eyes,

Happy in their place.

The sweet woodruff turns green against the wall.

The silence rings deeply in my ears

While the traffic of the nearby road

drones on.

The natural and the unnatural become blended.

The squirrels manage it well as they race from branch to wire

to branch

in their romantic games above the manicured lawn

and the asphalt.

Is my silence nothing to say to myself?

No conversation left?

The calmness of a satisfying day?

The stillness of indecision?

Uncertainty of what is next?

There is noise and motion all around,

Yet I feel still and small,

unnoticed in a world that races on, going no where

in all directions.

I feel astonishingly close to other lives

And yet so far apart.

My niece Amelia was shopping at Apache Seeds this week and while she was there she noticed an elderly woman, perhaps 75, carefully and at great length making selections of a few plants and packets of seeds.  She would look at the prices, add them up, put some back, take another, add them up; all with a look of concern on her face.  Finally she made her way to the counter where she asked the clerk to tell her how much it added up to, which was just over $25.00.  When she was informed of the price, she looked through the few packets, and once again and took some out to reduce the expense.  Amelia, noting her dismay at the cost said to the lady at the till “I’ll be paying for these seeds and plants.”  The elderly lady just looked at Amelia and started to cry.  Then Amelia started to cry with the lady behind the counter added to the flow of tears.

In relaying the story to her mother later that day Amelia was incensed that our eldest citizens, in such an affluent society, have to worry about buying a few seeds.  It is upsetting …. but I just want to say to Amelia, thank you, from all of the rest of us, for taking matters into your own hands, for not waiting for the government or someone else deal with the matter.  You are creating community in a concrete jungle by sharing a few seeds and bedding plants.

In the morning I love to step on the thin clear sheets of ice covering the spring puddles.  They sag with my weight and crack as I slide across them trying to be quick enough to keep my feet dry.

As a child in Fairview spring was so much fun.  We made little boats and raced them in the ditches.  We carefully waded into the deep puddles and watched as the weight of the water collapsed the rubber boots around our legs, and then we retreated just before it spilled over the top and filled them with ice water – we were quick enough most of the time.  Getting wet wasn’t really a tragedy.  The mud was also magnetic.  I remember being stuck so solidly once that I couldn’t pull either of my feet out and so just stood there and hollering for help until someone came to the rescue and pulled on my boots until at last, with great slurping and sucking sounds they were free.  It felt to me as though I was saved from being sucked right down into the ground.

But alas, here I still am, 9 years after writing this entry, still enjoying this spring ritual!!

So many things to be grateful for:

All those small, medium and large business owners who have worked so hard to get businesses up and running, who have hired people, who have gone the extra mile to deliver good products, and who have paid taxes to help get our public services where they are today. Thank you Graham, Carol, Dan, Chris, and so many others.

And a special thank you to all the farmers, who we could not live without; and who are that special class of entrepreneurs whose whole business depends on the weather! Now there is courage! Especially in Alberta. Thank you Fraser, Nolan and all the farmers I know in the Peace. And thank you Wallace for your years infusion of vegitables.

A huge thank you to those who are keeping the heat and lights on, the water clean and running, the garbage taken away, and the sewage… well whatever you guys do with the sewage! Thanks all of you, and thank you Jeff!

And how about all those who are working in grocery stores and places that sell food? I love food! Thank you so much, your work is appreciated! Special thank to Mike, who just started a butcher shop, so food provider and entrepreneur!

Thank, thank you to all the guys who keep the roads open and running. What a thankless job – YOU ARE AMAZING. Especially in a place like Edmonton where the weather reeks havoc with roads – it seems so wrong that you are just constantly attacked for potholes and then when you work to fix them you are attacked for endless construction. What gives! Thanks so much for all of your work.

And a big thank you to the health care workers who keep us all up and running so that we can do the things we want to do, and create our lives and society in the way we want it created. This is the physio therapists, chiropractors, midwives, nurses and doctors, the massage therapists, the nutritionists, the lab tec people, the heart surgeons…. Thank you Laura, Wendy, Stephanie, Elise, William, Oksana….

Oh yes, and what about the artists, the writers, the painters, and musicians. You bring your soul to our lives, remind us who we really are and show us what we could possibly be. Thank you Jeana, Caroline, Amelia, Karen, Donna and all the other amazing artists in my life.

This could go on forever, and it most certainly will. I am so lucky that everyone I know is so important! So, THANK YOU, everyone I know, for what you are doing to keep us all moving forward!