November Blues

The thought of November at our latitude in the Northern Hemisphere conjures images of short and gloomy days, cold north winds, mixed precipitation with rain and snow, and a predominantly greyscale landscape. 

This year we have enjoyed many days of high pressure with blue skies and sunshine. The sun follows a low arc in the sky between dawn and dusk making long shadows and creating interesting light contrasts for photographs. 

My parents moved us from Toronto to this region in December 1969. At the time it was predominantly a manufacturing region with factories that made goods from buttons to tires. There were factories that produced shirts, towels, bedding, shoes, cookies and bread and manufacturers sold surplus items and seconds at outlet stores. 

Mom was always on the prowl for bargains and would buy fabric ends to make clothes for us. She shopped for discount food and shoes at the outlets.

The first picture is of a local manufacturing site that has been renovated into condominiums, office space and restaurants while maintaining an industrial look. The region is now a technology hub as well as a post-secondary education centre with many old factories being repurposed.

The pedestrian bridge on the left crosses the Grand River in the old town of Galt, not incorporated into the city of Cambridge. Galt has maintained its heritage buildings, many of them made of limestone. 

There was a severe flood of the Grand River in Galt in May of 1974.  I was a student in Hamilton at the time and took the intercity bus home on a Friday afternoon for the weekend. The bus had to turn back at Galt as the river had overflowed and the water was chest-deep around the bus terminal. Since then, flood control walls have been built along this section of the river and a new dam was built upstream to control seasonal flooding. This picture was taken from the pedestrian bridge.

Galt is very picturesque and has been used for movie sets including multiple episodes of the TV series Murdoch Mysteries. The series is set in Toronto in the early 20th century. It is one show Grandma D. would have loved as it features places she was familiar with as a young adult. 

We are taking the dog for walks in the woods again now that the colder weather has helped control the ticks that have become an increasing nuisance each summer in recent years. We have to be vigilant in natural areas now for ticks that attach to humans and animals. 

The fine weather has been perfect for me to continue commuting to work on my bicycle and I have exceeded my mileage goal for the season. The last picture is along the trail that leads to the hospital. The bare trees, blue skies and water look beautiful in the afternoon sun. The colour of the month is blue which is appreciated even more as we anticipate the inevitable arrival of grey and white winter weather.

Remembrance

Silence: A Sonnet for Remembrance Day

by Malcolm Guite*

November pierces with its bleak remembrance
Of all the bitterness and waste of war.

Our silence tries but fails to make a semblance
Of that lost peace they thought worth fighting for.
Our silence seethes instead with wraiths and whispers,
And all the restless rumour of new wars,
The shells are falling all around our vespers,
No moment is unscarred, there is no pause,
In every instant bloodied innocence
Falls to the weary earth, and whilst we stand
Quiescence ends again in acquiescence,
And Abel’s blood still cries in every land
One silence only might redeem that blood
Only the silence of a dying God.

A young, dedicated clinical aide who works in my unit at the hospital returned this week after a leave of absence.  I told them they had been missed and inquired how they were doing. 

"Not very well", they answered sadly.  "I cannot handle all the news of war and the images of death online."

I recognized a very empathetic person who was overwhelmed by the news cycle and I have ongoing concern about the burden they carry. I reminded them that each generation has lived in a time of war and social upheaval of some kind. My grandparents were young adults during World War 1 and the Great Depression. My parents were young teenagers at the end of World War 2. I grew up during the Cold War, and remember the Vietnam War and at least three wars in the Middle East in the 1960s and 1970s. There have been many other conflicts in the last three or four decades. While we remember those who died in military service today, we also see that war does not bring lasting peace.

My coworker is overwhelmed with the amount of bad news that is available. Previous generations did not have to deal with the 24-hour news cycle we have on the internet and cable news programming. There is much good in the world too but it does not make headlines. We must not abandon hope for the future and must work to become peacemakers in this world. We need to show younger generations how to make bridges between different groups of people and to be resilient in the face of adversity.

*Follow this link https://malcolmguite.wordpress.com/blog/ to Malcolm Guite's website and blog

All Hallows' Day

I could not look on Death, which being known,

Men led me to him, blindfold and alone.

Rudyard Kipling

I was talking to the young pharmacist on our unit at the hospital, a mother of three and five-year-old children. One of our physicians gave her a book of fairy stories her children had outgrown and the pharmacist described the gruesome illustrations. Red Riding Hood was pictured holding the bloodied head of the wolf as her grandmother, who had been eaten by the wolf was extracted. She asked the physician if the pictures bothered her children and the physician replied that they had not been an issue. (I have seen similarly gruesome illustrations of David holding the head of Goliath.)

Working at a hospital is to be surrounded by death and I have to be careful that I do not upset others when talking about things I see. Our Western society has become increasingly death-averse as medical science can identify and treat many deadly ailments. Death is hidden way in hospital and hospice corridors away from home where people used to be born and where they died. Too often older people, some with multiple comorbidities, avoid end-of-life conversations with their families and the medical team is forced to provide futile treatments in an effort to avoid death. Many churches avoid talking about death preferring to offer prayers for healing and resurrection promises rather than addressing the realities of human suffering. The church that we attend recognizes congregants who died in the past year in a special and moving service this week. 

I pulled the pictured selection of books from our home library. Writers and poets from past generations wrote much about death and suffering. Foxe's Book of Martyrs came from my father's mother and it is the most difficult book for me to read.  Life offers good and evil and we cannot ignore either.

The Peace Prayer or Prayer of St Francis describes the contrasts we experience as human beings. We must enter darkness in order to appreciate light. What good is a candle in a world that is always filled with sunlight? 

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.

Where there is hatred, let me bring love.

Where there is offence, let me bring pardon.

Where there is discord, let me bring union.

Where there is error, let me bring truth.

Where there is doubt, let me bring faith.

Where there is despair, let me bring hope.

Where there is darkness, let me bring your light.

Where there is sadness, let me bring joy.

Rudyard Kipling's epitaph at the beginning of this post is from his collection Epitaphs of War. We will face Death "blindfolded and alone" if we lack the courage to look at it in life.