Getting miffed

October is usually one of my favourite months.

This one will have its challenges. 

Younger daughter had her first in-person recital in over two years last Sunday.  The event was masked (including the singers, who wore special "singing masks"), carefully spaced, and our British Columbian vaccine cards (mandatory the following day) were checked for admission.

At lunch, following the concert -- which went well, thank you for asking -- elder daughter's godmother remarked that she had a number of friends still refusing the vaccination.

"In the beginning," she said, "I was willing to see this as a difference of opinion.  Now, I'm getting a bit annoyed."  

Coming from a very conservative, and, to be honest, rather eccentric lady, this was a remarkable statement.

She was concerned about the surgeries, procedures, and treatments being deferred by the number of COVID cases in hospital, the vast majority of which are the unvaccinated.  I'm getting a bit antsy myself.  The Resident Fan Boy needs treatment for a condition that is not life-threatening -- yet.

The world is grown to one vast drysaltery!

This notice appeared on the exit door nearest our condo a few days ago.

Oh god. Just what we need.

Victoria does have a rat problem; my Friend of the Right Hand got infested once, and one of our house-sits featured a large rodent, who basically scared younger daughter into representational drawing.

I'm not sure the Pied Piper is such a good idea, though.

"It's a horror story," I explained, years ago to a future godmother, who was planning a show of the Pied Piper for her drama students. "The people of Hamlin don't pay him, which is wrong, but he revenges himself by taking their children away."

Future Godmother stared at me for a long moment. She was a divorced mother of two, on not great terms with her ex-husband.

"I never thought of it that way."

Best to just keep that door closed.

The middle ground

This is probably in a meme somewhere. I don't care.

It was new to me, as I zigzagged between others to maintain the six-foot difference. I chortled out loud.

Actually, the opening lines of The Twilight Zone are indeed, pretty damned pertinent:

It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge.

Doo-di-doo-doo, doo-di-doo-doo....

Signs of the times

Click to enlarge and read the children's message.

One of the things we rather like about our building is the variety of residents.

Not that we see much of them these days.

Among our number are retirees, young professionals, students, and four families with young children - the latest are our neighbours, a couple of willowy lawyers who gave birth to a daughter about two weeks ago. We didn't know until five days after her birth, when we heard what younger daughter described as an angry cat.

That's life lately, snatches of sound, and glimpses of movement. The hallways are deserted. It's even easy to get time in the laundry room.

This morning, I headed out to pick up some milk for Demeter, apparently the last time I'll be permitted to use my own cloth bags for shopping. It was colder than I'd anticipated, despite the bright sunshine, so I doubled back to get my coat.

That's when I noticed the signs taped beside the front door of my building.

What a strange time to be growing up. What will they remember?

Unfortunately, I get out quite a bit...

This appeared at my local coffee shop a few weeks ago. I don't know if I can confirm Douglas Coupland wrote it, but if he did, he wrote it when people were still watching television and before social media really took hold.

Mr Woof-woof

There are fleeting things that make a neighbourhood.

When we lived in Fairfield, it was The Whistler, a cheerful 50-something cyclist who became our gauge for how late we were.

After the morning struggle to get elder daughter dressed and breakfasted, I, with younger daughter strapped into the stroller, would stride east, the rising sun blinding all three of us. Out of the glare, the Whistler would emerge, peddling smoothly and swiftly, but we'd hear his steady whistling first, interrupted by a friendly "Good Morning" as he whipped past.

In Hades, I'd watch the platinum-blond trio of sibling neighbours burst from their front door, tumbling down the porch steps, quarreling all the way to the tank their mother was warming up (probably out of self-defense).

I don't know when The Whistler ceased wheeling his way west, because we moved. Gradually, the Battling Blonds across the street grew more independent, setting off separately to different schools with different companions.

In our current neighbourhood, a feature has been Mr Woof-woof. That's not his name. It's what I'd hear as I strolled to or from our apartment.

Woof-woof

Not bossy, not threatening, just deep and carrying. A huge white dog, usually sitting on the steps of his large house, tied to the railing, behind a gate reading "Beware of Dog".

I always felt rather sorry for him; he seemed to spend hours outside on his own. You're not supposed to wave or call out to dogs, according to those online articles - it's supposed to count as teasing - but I couldn't help calling out a soft "Hello, Mr Woof-woof", as I passed on the opposite sidewalk.

Just before Christmas, the Resident Fanboy ran into Mr Woof-woof, walking out one evening with his owner, who did tell him Mr Woof-woof's actual name. She also told the RFB that her dog had cancer.

And one day, I noticed the gate was open.

Years later, when we recall these little everyday details that made up where we lived, we might say, "Oh yes, it was always like that; that went on for years."

But it didn't.

Not quite so early one morning

On my morning descent, I notice that someone has dangled an ornament beneath the large gnarly branch of an ancient Garry Oak. It's the sort of quirky thing you'd expect to see in this part of the city, a tiny rendition of a birdhouse.

An older gentleman in stretchy light-grey pants notices that I have stopped to snap a picture and falls in step with me briefly, remarking on the neighbourhood, and how amazed he is that a family with small children lives in an enormous old house on the corner.

"Grandparents with money, I'll bet," I sigh. I can't think of many young families in the past couple of decades who could afford a large house within the old city limits without parental help.

"They've got a dog, too," I add. "They let him out in the yard by himself, I wish they wouldn't."

A friendly city worker cheerfully directs us to the other side of the street to avoid a cherry-picker, which is trimming back another Garry Oak from the lines and wires.

My stretchy-panted friend takes his leave and continues southward in his flip-flops.

Later in the day, the blessed rain finally falls.

All alone together

He's got one of those shaved-up-the-back-and-sides haircuts, with a lid of dark tousled hair tilting towards his forehead on top - the kind of haircut that will probably embarrass the hell out of him when he looks back on his selfies years from now.

He ferries things to his chosen table - laptop, expensive-looking leather backpack, iced coffee, wallet - all the time talking softly.  He's got earbuds in and continues his conversation, sometimes looking into the middle distance, sometimes rubbing the closed lid of his laptop with his fist, circling and scratching some imperfection.  He lifts the lid, closes it, lifts it again, talking all the while, turning his head to listen as if the person on the line were sitting in front of him.

When the conversation ends, he moves to the other side of the table to face out, rather as if his phantom partner has left, and the bench is now free.

Within seconds, he's speaking softly again, his hands hovering over, but never touching, the keyboard.