Fireworks and other memories...

 May 25. 2022

This past weekend here in Ontario, we celebrated Victoria Day. Named for the late Queen, it commemorates her birthday, and is always the Monday closest to (but not after) May 24^th. The Victoria Day weekend is similar to the Memorial Day weekend in the U.S. only in that it serves as the unofficial beginning of summer.

Through the years when I was growing up, I looked forward to this weekend each year because it was the time of fireworks. Back in the late 1950s through all my childhood, we Canadians had our major fireworks displays to celebrate Queen Victoria’s birthday and no, it didn’t matter that she was long gone.

I can easily bring to mind the very first firecracker I ever lit. In those days, yes, the little packages of explosives (that looked like mini sticks of TNT) were quite legal to buy, and easily available for kids to get on their own. My daddy was right there with me, coaching me through my first one. I had the “punk” in one hand and the small red explosive with a wick in the other. I lit the firecracker…and in the excitement of the moment threw the punk away instead of the firecracker.

My daddy of course stepped forward and slapped that tiny explosive out of my five-year-old grip, sending it a safe distance away. Knowing myself, I likely cried. Also, there were no big commercial fireworks displays in our area. We did see pretty sparkly colors in the sky, though, because the neighbors pooled their resources and then together put on a lovely display for the entire neighborhood.

When I was a young teen, several years after the death of my father, my mother took me to the first large show held in Hamilton that was put on by the Sertoma Club (Sertoma stands for “service to mankind”). Called their Bang O Rama promotion, there was entertainment provided by various performers with a marching band or two thrown in, and all that began before dusk. The highlight of the evening’s entertainment, of course, was the largest fireworks display my mother and I had ever seen.

As a young adult, fireworks as the highlight of this weekend were overtaken by the more “grown up” pursuits of friends gathering, with music, cookouts and beer. Colloquially the weekend was called “May Two-Four”, and not just because it was the weekend closest to May 24. You see, here in Canada the popular size for a case of beer is 24 bottles. That’s what the two-four stands for in this quaint saying. In our early married years my beloved would go off with his male buddies for a camping/fishing weekend. The camping/fishing was the stated reason, but the true reason was seeing just how many “24s” they could consume.

Then David quit drinking around 1983 and so far, he hasn’t resumed. And as the kids got older, they became our focus for the long May weekends. That meant that fireworks once more became the central attraction of this weekend. We were faithful in getting them out to where there were public fireworks displays, and often other attractions, too. We had our lawn chairs and blankets and some coffee in the thermos so we could sit in comfort as we oohed and ahhed. We also had excited and happy kids at the end of the day, so it was all good.

Sometime in the late 1990s we here in Canada switched to having our larger public displays of fireworks on Canada Day, which is July 1. But when I was a child, Victoria Day was the only firecracker day of the year.

I might miss the beauty and wonder of seeing those explosive colors decorate the night skies, but I don’t at all miss the often cold, dampish atmosphere we endured in pursuit of the large and spectacular shows. The kids never minded the weather and as a plus, they sure did sleep well once we got them to bed, afterwards.

This past weekend’s weather was one of the most traumatic in our neck of the woods in a very long time. A massive line of thunderstorms passed through Ontario on Saturday—and accompanying that group of storms, were derecho winds as well as a small tornado. People died, and that sure doesn’t happen around here very often. As of Monday morning it was reported that eight people had lost their lives—one of them just down the road from this small town, at a camp site that also has a public swimming area, a site that we’ve visited many times in the past. Loss of life due to storms is horrific at anytime, no matter how many perish. On top of that, hundreds of thousands of people ended up without electricity for several days. And while it had been plenty warm before the storms rolled through, they brought chilly temperatures in their wake.

I turned the furnace on again Monday morning. It’s a simple thing to do, just the press of a button. And no, I no longer care about the principle: “we shouldn’t need the heat on in the last week or so of May. Tough it out and put on a sweater!”

It’s not that I’ve given up my principles. I’ve simply adjusted them to fit my current reality (translated: I already wore a sweater as well as a blanket). My new guiding principle is kind of like, “I shouldn’t have to shiver in my own home in the last week or so of May. Turn that furnace on!”

I have a similar new principle saved up for late fall, in the event we get an out of season heat wave—only that principle involves the air conditioner, and to hell with what anyone may say. If we get a heat wave on November 1, you can bet that A/C will be going on.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 

 

 

 

Thoughts on the Queen of Canada

 May 18, 2022

During my lifetime to date, there have been 13 Presidents of the United States. Also, during my lifetime to date, there have been 12 Prime Ministers of Canada and 11 premiers of the Province of Ontario.

However, in my lifetime to date there has also been only one monarch: Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. For those who don’t know, and I am certain there are many, Her Majesty is not only Queen of Great Britain but the Queen of Canada. Her “style” (how she is recognized) officially in Canada is: “Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom, Canada, and Her other Realms and Territories, Queen, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith.”

As were my parents before me, I am proud to claim Her Majesty as my queen.

She represents and truly is the greatest single example of public service done right that I can think of. She made this promise, over the radio on her twenty-first birthday: “I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.” In the years since, she has always put her duty first. She knows how to put country before self, a lesson that many of today’s so-called public servants (aka elected officials), in any country, would do well to emulate. Any officials, that is, except President Zelensky. He’s got it right.

From time to time through the years when I’ve heard or read of speculation that she might retire, or abdicate, I’ve just shaken my head. No, I would say to anyone who would listen, she will do no such thing. She promised to serve for her entire life. She is a woman of her word.

I really wish there were more people in the arena today who were as steadfast in their word, and as honorable in the keeping of their promises, as is my Queen.

As we were watching some footage of H.M. at the Jubilee Horse show on Monday, I became quite emotional. I felt so very happy that she was beaming and having a good time. She loves her horses, and all horses, and always seems so happy whenever she is pictured near them. As well, the show featured her granddaughter, Lady Louise Windsor, driving the carriage that the late Prince Phillip used to drive in horse competitions. Family—her family especially—is very important to H.M.

She may strip a liegeman of titles and honors for cause, as a Queen is sometimes required by duty to do; but she would never completely turn her back on a son—and rare is the mother who ever would.

Her own mother, who after her husband’s death and the ascension of her daughter asked not to be referred to as the Dowager Queen (as was the custom), but the Queen Mother, also believed in duty and family.  Folks sometimes focus on the wrong thing. One might say of the Royal Family, well, they’ve always had pots of money, haven’t they?

But pots of money did not protect the relative privacy of the marriage and home life of Prince Albert Edward, the Duke of York and his Duchess, Elizabeth Bowes Lyons and their two young daughters. When his older brother, Edward VIII turned his back on his duty—when he put himself before his country—the Duke of York became the king he hoped he never would have to be. Pots of money did not protect the King from succumbing at a relatively young age to cancer. Pots of money do not, in short, protect anyone from the vagaries of fate or the reality of life.

In the end, the sort of person you become has nothing to do with money, or prestige.  It is the result of the choices that you have made through your lifetime. One may choose to follow unprincipled leaders and turn their backs on their duty and even, apparently, on decency.

Or one may make a pledge at the age of twenty-one and still be keeping that promise some seventy-five years later.

It is all of it, very simply, a choice that one makes.  

 

Love,

Morgan

http://morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 

 May 11, 2022

As I write this, the current outside temperature is 61 degrees Fahrenheit, headed for a high of 82. Fingers crossed, we are hoping we’ve seen the last of the snow and the sleet and the icy sidewalks until at least October or November.

Yes, it’s finally spring! Later today my husband is planning to cut the grass for the first time of the season. I’ll be pleased, I’m sure, to have the green lawn which at this time of year is looking particularly lush, trimmed and neat. However, to the north of our porch, growing beyond the garden in which they thrived last season and into that lush lawn, there are dozens of spears of lilies-of-the-valley poking their hopeful little heads up.

I’m not sure what it says about me that I’m a little saddened, knowing they’re likely about to be leveled. Anyone who grows lily-of-the-valley knows they will take over, and always grow beyond their area—unless of course one goes into the back yard and has a great idea on how to make that particular area look so much better…. But that’s a story for another day.

I suppose I could come up with some poetic way to immediately console myself over this anticipated sadness—for example, I could thank those spears for appearing for the audition, but the roles have all been filled. Or I could just let the small sadness stay with me for a little while.

I’ll do that because I think sometimes, we don’t want to let ourselves feel any unhappy emotions. I understand that because over the last few years it seems as if the unhappy/negative side of our emotional spectra have had way too much prominence in our lives.

Just as one may have the thought that they can’t cry because they may never stop, one may also worry that if they give in to the sadness and grief, they’ll never feel happy again.

That’s not an outlandish prospect, because some people seem to be destined to hit that one valley experience that they will never be able to climb up out of. Sadness and grief are different for every person. We all experience them differently and the truth is that some people never do just visit those emotions. Some people do “live there”.

I don’t live in my sadness and grief, but then, I never expected them to completely go away, either. I believe that a profound loss does often engender a profound grief.  And if you’ve suffered several of those losses in your lifetime, it does change you. How could it not?

I still count the passing of my father when I was 8 as the greatest seminal moment of my life. I spent a great deal of the time over the next 13 years following that tragic event being afraid that my mother would die, too. Which she did, when I was 21.

And while at that point I had a husband and one child and was looking to have more, the knowledge that anyone could die at any moment was never buried deep enough in the back of my mind. It still isn’t, but again, I really don’t dwell there.

I, like most adults of my age, understand that we’re truly not promised tomorrow at all. Whether the people that I love live, or die is not within my control. And I believe that is another important concept for us mere humans to embrace. There are just things in our lives that we’re not only unable to control, but we’re also not meant to.

Therefore, I don’t mind acknowledging the moments of sadness that come to visit. But I also acknowledge the special moments, the loving moments, the funny moments. And I try to balance it all out by looking at the big picture and reminding myself that because our time in this life is short, every single moment matters. Happy moments and sad moments. Giggling moments and crying moments.

Every moment in my life is mine, has been mine, will be mine, and I proudly lay claim to them all.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 May 4, 2022

My husband, when he was about a decade away from his anticipated retirement date, came up with a plan as to what he would do for the rest of his life after he reached that glorious milestone. He’d hoped, by the time that he retired, that he would be able to pursue what for him would have been a wonderful hobby: he had it in mind to restore steam-era farm equipment. He’s been a tinkerer all his life, and had an acquaintance who became a friend, an elderly gentleman who actually had a working steam traction engine. Everything about that piece of machinery fascinated David, and he spent a lot of time with that man learning all he could and at the same time helping him with some of the work of his farm.

He set about planning how he could make his dream a reality. He’d need a workspace, one that he could use year-round. Well, we figured we had enough land here to put up a garage of sorts. The interesting part would be finding just the right piece of equipment for sale in need of some TLC and David’s innate mechanical talents. That would be the last phase of his plans, and he thought to begin looking for the perfect metal candidate about a year off from his retirement.

And then, just a few years shy of his 65^th birthday, David was diagnosed with COPD—Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. And as he drew nearer to that retirement date, he knew that as much as he would have loved working on his long-imagined piece of steam-era farm equipment, he could no longer, in all honesty, manage the task, physically.

He was deeply disappointed, but he didn’t let himself dwell in that dark place for very long. David knew he had to find something to keep him busy when he was no longer a part of the work-a-day world, and if he couldn’t exercise his body in that pursuit, he would exercise his mind, instead. So after he gave the matter a lot of thought and, knowing that whatever he decided to do, it would have to be a bit more sedentary than what he was used to, he came up with his plan B.

He decided that he would write a book. But not just one book. He set his sights on producing a trilogy.

David’s adaptability is a skill honed over a lifetime of being faced with disappointments, of having to rethink a situation and take a new track. In short, it’s a skill honed from living real life every day. To date he has completed two of the three books, and while seeing them published may be something he does down the road, that wasn’t the point. In November he will celebrate his fifth year of retirement, and I can tell you that by and large, he has been content, and not at all bored.

I compare his example of dealing with life to what we see around us, and it makes me feel sorry for the younger generations. Quite frankly, they have been cheated.

And in all the ways I think that the children here in North America have been short-changed over the last twenty to thirty years, the one I believe is the most egregious is that we have made life far too easy for our children and grandchildren—to the point that they have not learned how to deal with disappointment or frustration.

It is one of the worst unintended consequences of the so-called kinder, gentler environment with which we’ve surrounded our children in the last twenty-plus years. Children stopped having to worry about failing a grade in school; they stopped having to worry about not making the team. They didn’t have to worry about not winning a trophy at the end of the sports season, because everyone won a trophy.

Oh, what’s that? You read a history book and now feel ashamed of some of the ways our forefathers and mothers behave? Don’t you worry your pretty little head about that. We’ll just rewrite the history books!

These latest generations, be they millennials or gen z, who have been immersed in the lifestyle of instant gratification, of never having to fail or be excluded, could very well end up having an extremely rocky road ahead of them. As they reached adulthood, they began to discover that as padded and insulated as their growing up years had been, they were completely unprepared for real life. And those educators and politicians, clearly folks who hadn’t dealt well with their own encounters with frustration and disappointment and therefore thought to spare the poor darlings a healthy dose of the same, instead left them ill prepared to face those very real things—things that because of our being human are practically guaranteed in real life.

Here I digress to impart a clue, because I truly believe everybody should have at least one: real life happens independent of anyone’s wishes.

We have a generation of people who grew up believing that they should be happy, and they should not have to face any tough, emotional situations. That they shouldn’t worry their pretty little heads… In short, we have raised a generation that believes a whole hell of a lot of lies.

To those geniuses who came up with that theory that the way to raise kids is without having them face anything “uncomfortable”, and are still doing so, I have one question.

Where did you ever get the idea that throwing a child into the deep end of the pool was the ideal way to teach that child how to swim?

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury