Learning to drive

I've never learned to drive.  I haven't even tried.  It's just too much of a responsibility for me! There are too many mistakes you can make and accidentally hurt someone.  I've never even ridden a go-cart.  But I like bumper cars.

I can ride a bicycle, but haven't done that for years.  I wish they'd make adult-sized tricycles!  I also like those vehicles you can rent on the Toronto Islands that have four wheels but run on pedal power like a bike.  They should have them everywhere!

Not having a driver's license can be inconvenient.  A few months ago I bought a cellphone and they needed my photo ID, but they didn't accept health cards!  So I had to go home and bring them my passport.  I think they now have a provincial photo ID for non-drivers.

I've always said that most of North America is too dependent on cars.  They're willing to spend a fortune on roads and airports but neglect rail traffic and buses and such.  Among other things, this isn't conducive to creating happy neighbourhoods where people walk around and talk to each other!

Diaries

I started keeping a written diary about fifteen years ago, at the age of forty.  I was fanciful enough to address the first entries to a non-existent girl in her early teens called Dinah! (After seeing Gangs of New York, I wrote: "I know how much you love Leo Di Caprio, but I can understand your parents not letting you see it.") But before long it turned into a conventional diary.

Then five years ago I decided to switch to a daily blog.  For several months I actually managed to come up with something new almost every day! (I repeated myself a bit.) I slowed down around the time of my mother's death, but these days I write three entries almost every week.  This was also around the time when I joined this memoir group, and started a second blog from the pieces I write there.

Writing an interesting blog is an art.  I like to start with a quote from a book I'm currently reading. (Just now it's Jack Kerouac's On the Road.) I occasionally post an image, but that's a harder habit to get into.

About ten years ago we subscribed to The National Post. Every day they'd print a day from Samuel Pepys' diary.  One day at a time is the best way to read it!

A snowstorm

When I grew up in New Brunswick we used to have some big snowstorms, cancelling school and everything, as late as mid-March. (I guess they still have them there.) But Toronto has a heat island so they aren't common here.

I think my favourite weather is just after a snowstorm, when there's a lot of snow on the ground, but the weather turns mild so you can almost feel the snow melting! (I guess my least favourite weather is a severe frost with no snow on the ground.)

When I was little I loved snow. One of my favourite Dr. Seuss books is The Cat in the Hat Comes Back, which is set in the snowy outdoors.  I used to ski, but it doesn't really appeal to me.

My favourite snow is the snow that's really close to rain, so that it comes down in big flakes and you can make snowballs and snowmen.  But then the temperature usually gets colder and it turns into icy snow, my least favourite kind!

Memories of Mother

The best thing I remember about my mother is that she was a great listener. (I wish I could listen half as well!) She always had time to listen to me, and it wasn't always easy.

I learned from her example to take a sympathetic view of people. (She even felt sorry for Nixon!) That's probably the most important thing she did for me.

I must also mention that she was well-read.  She liked to talk about people like Samuel Johnson and Abraham Lincoln. (She was also sympathetic toward Lincoln's unbalanced wife.) I'd come home from the university library and tell her the latest things written by columnists in the British magazine The Spectator.  There was "High Life" written by the shameless millionaire Taki Theodoracopolous (he once came on The Oprah Winfrey Show as a man who preferred younger women!); "Low Life" by sportswriter Jeffrey Bernard; and "Long Life" by Nigel Nicholson, son of writers Harold Nicholson and Vita Sackville-West, who became an MP and publisher.  I liked telling her what they'd written, and she liked hearing it.

She also told me a lot of stories about her Cape Breton youth. Like the time she was in a candy store with her sister, my aunt Alma, and said, "Let's get ten cents of this!" Alma said, "Ten cents, me eyeball!" A grownup overheard them and the next time he met them he repeated "Ten cents, me eyeball!"

I joined this memoir group shortly after her death, and I really with I could tell her some of the stories I've heard here!  I know she'd be interested in them.