Thoughts on this Day

We are fortunate to live in this place and time. I’m thankful for friends and the history we share. I’m thankful for the spirit we muster in the face of malignant evil and ignorance at home and abroad. I’m thankful for the peace we have enjoyed, as fraught and fragile as it is. I’m thankful for the food on our tables, yet I am acutely aware of how lucky we are to have it. That luck can never be taken for granted: the best “luck” is the product of the goodwill we engineer collectively. To the world, happy Canadian Thanksgiving.

Inspired by the calendar. Image by Georgi Kisyov.

Doodling

At McGill, I would diligently take class notes (with pen and paper, of course), as the professors pontificated. But then I’d get distracted and start inventing typefaces in the margins. Then I’d sketch the professors, or other students, or what was outside the window. Then I’d blink and stop myself and get back to work. But why was I doodling? Why was I so distractible? I finally got my answer last week when I read a letter Dad wrote to Mom when they were both 17. Taking up half of the second page was a doodle. So, apparently, it’s genetic.

Inspired by Artless. The image is of my Dad’s doodle, the caption reads: “You would love my daughter even if she didn’t have any money? That’s all, son. You can go now. I don’t want any idiots in my family.”

Artless

I was terrible at everything to do with crafts. I dreaded art class and was embarrassed by my pitiful uncreative renditions. In hindsight though, what an avant-garde concept to have a class dedicated to art.

     I was however obsessed with cursive writing. I loved those booklets with the lines and would sit for hours trying to perfect the B’s, F’s, and the S’s.

     Ironically, one might consider it art these days, given no one sub-30 can read it. I’ve watched many stare at cards blankly, politely smiling with thanks when for all they know I wrote screw you, and your birthday. 

Inspired by I fold. Image by ilbusca.

I fold.

The girls in Grade 4 showed me how to make noisemakers out of paper, then fortune-tellers and water bombs, flapping birds and pagodas. Our library had a book by Shari Lewis (of Lamb Chop fame) that taught me how to turn that water bomb into an Easter bunny you could stuff full of jellybeans. Robert Harbin’s books took things more seriously and introduced me to the Jackstone, still the most complicated thing I have ever folded from a single piece of paper. 

     Today, I own a half shelf of origami books and a pack of 500 sheets I’ve never opened.

Inspired by Paper, Scissors, Cloth. Image based on a photo from Folding Paper Puppets.

Paper, Scissors, Cloth

When I was a kid, I had several pen pals. Those letters were fun to receive, but I was particularly drawn to the æsthetics: the cancelled stamp; the air-mail envelope with its barbershop edging and blue stationary; the thin crispness of it all. There are still some things in life that hold that allure: sachets of tea, a wrapped Band-aid, cakes of unopened Ivory soap, a box of amaretti, brand-new skeins of wool, Kleenex, seed packets. Maybe I am drawn to their old-timey paper? Their vulnerability? Unprotected by plastic preparedness, they reveal themselves thoughtfully, one unfolded corner at a time.

Inspired by Notice. Photo by Laurie.

Forgotten Lessons

I recently trod the battlefields of World War One, where hundreds of thousands died horrible deaths. Thousands more bore wounds, visible and invisible, for the rest of their shortened lives. War is hell. Today those battlefields are peaceful, the land is productive, and the fallen, the thousands of fallen, are remembered. Yet the lessons from their deaths are not. 

      Clausewitz called war the continuation of politics by other means. We learned after 1945 to extend politics and avoid war with diplomacy, multilateralism, and rules-based institutions. That consensus is now crumbling. War is hell, and we are drifting inexorably towards it.

Inspired by Already Committed. Photo by the author of the Belgian grave of an unknown soldier, nationality unknown.

Notice

The minutes and hours click by as you scroll on your phone, bored and interested at the same time. Your eyes begin to blur and hurt, you look up, hours have gone by—days maybe—what have you done recently?

Who have you talked to? Did you notice the breeze? The taste of Autumn in the air? The edges of leaves turning gold? The raptors on the wing—riding the thermals? You haven’t? Where have you been? This isn’t criticism. I, too, have trouble being present. I, too, feel numb of late. I, too, let the world pass me by. 

Inspired by September Mourn. Image of what you might be missing right now, by AI (for the irony of it).