I remember my father's hands...

They were huge.

I can picture my hand going up to hold his as we are walking when I am very young, and all I grab onto is his little finger, and it fills my fist. I feel very safe.

Or as an older child, sitting at the kitchen table eating grapefruit. Mom has cut the sections, and we have eaten all we can scoop out with our spoons, and then we try to squeeze the rest of the juice out into our bowl. We pick up the empty grapefruit shell and squish it with two hands, using all our might, our elbows and shoulders trembling from the effort. Then when we are done, our energy spent, we pass the shell to Dad and with one hand he squeezes out more juice than we could with two. It is our favourite breakfast game.

Or when we eat soup. The crackers are on the table, and we are allowed to put as many crackers in our soup as we want. I take a stack of four crackers and hand them to Dad. He puts the crackers in the palm of one hand, puts the other hand on top and, presto, with one little squeeze, the crackers have been pulverized into perfect cracker powder which he lets fall into my bowl. I try with one cracker, but am left with unsatisfying, irregular chunks. We laugh.

Strong, safe hands.

I remember being given a free shirt....

It was a sunny summer day in Vancouver, BC. There was a big all-day concert at Stanley Park, they called it a "Be-In", I guess trying to re-create the glory days of the hippy movement in the late '60's. There was a whole line-up of local bands, and my friends and I were excited to go.

By the time we got there, more than half of the outdoor space was already filled with blankets and music lovers. It was too nice out to care about being close to the stage, so we happily set up our blanket slightly to the left, two-thirds of the way back. The breeze from the ocean was a bit cool, so I left my long-fringed buckskin jacket on over my tank top.

I was in heaven. I love live music, and I love being with friends, and I love being outdoors...so there wasn't much ruining my day. I felt like dancing, so up I stood, dancing like Stevie Nicks, fringes a-flying in the sunshine. It didn't matter to me one bit that I was the only person in a crowd over one thousand people that was dancing. I danced for the rest of the band's set, totally happy, totally alone.

I noticed up near the front of the stage one particular group of people. Most of them were engrossed in the music, but one man was staring at me the whole time I was dancing. He had on the most remarkable shirt. He was too far away for me to tell how old he was or even what his features were, but his shirt was impossible to ignore...bright day-glo orange, with some pattern that I couldn't make out. I determined to go talk to him once the band was done, and I headed towards him as soon as the music stopped.

"Hey, enjoying the music?"

"Oh, yeah, sister. I was totally grooving on your fringes while you were dancing."

The man had short, curly dark hair and looked to be in his forties. He also looked to be completely under the influence of LSD...I took him for an old hippy who was trying to relive his glory days some twenty years ago.

"Oh, cool. I wondered why you kept staring. Hey, man, that is one crazy shirt!"

Up close it was even better than I had imagined. It was day-glo orange paisley, with bits of day-glo lime, yellow, green...all on a black swirly background. It looked like some crazy black-light poster!

"You like it? Here, you can have it."

He began undoing the buttons.

"What? No, man, I was just admiring it, you keep it!!"

"It's OK, sister, I've got another shirt..."

He handed me the technicolor shirt and reached into his duffle bag for a plain white t-shirt, smiling like a lazy Bhudda the whole while. I thanked him and headed back to my friends and our blanket. They couldn't believe how cool the shirt was, and just shook their heads. Magical stuff like that was always happening to me.

This is a scan of the shirt. It doesn't do it justice. The orange is so bright that it almost hurts your eyes to look at it! But I thought I should include the scan for posterity's sake.

I remember hanging out with the Beatnigs....

For years I had a radio show at CiTR, a university radio station. One of my favorite perks of working there was interviewing bands that would come to town. I'd set them up in their booth with mikes and headphones, then head back to my booth, wave through the window, and off we'd go. I often didn't know more than ten minutes ahead of time if a band would be coming, so there were no rehearsed questions. We'd just start talking about music and see what happened.

I was expecting the Beatnigs to come, but I didn't know when they'd be arriving. I had been playing quite a heavy set, some Throbbing Gristle, some Coil, some Test Department, and it was time for a station break. I opened the mike and began talking, when all of a sudden I began receiving a back massage. "Ladies and Gentlemen of Vancouver, you may not believe me, but I am at this moment receiving a very impressive back rub from a tall, black man that I have never met before. No, don't stop, sir, we're on the air!" Good radio fun, I loved random radio! The Beatnigs had arrived, and Michael Franti was giving me a back rub.

I started the next song, some Einstürzende Neubauten, which really impressed Michael and Rono. I knew they liked industrial music, that's why I was playing it, duh! I ran a good show, I wasn't some dumb air-head playing pop tunes!! I'd done my research...after all, I'd known they were coming for at least an hour.

The interview went very well. Michael is a very intelligent man, and has opinions on just about everything, so I hardly had to say anything. In fact, for the rest of my shift, I didn't really have to do anything at all. I let loose Michael and Rono on the turntables and they mixed music for over half an hour while I stood there and soaked it up. That's good random radio!

Michael Franti is the driving force behind "Michael Franti & Spearhead". You should check them out. Michael is not only a great musician with a lively social conscience, he gives a great back-rub.

I remember finding stuff in my locker....

One of the perks of Junior High at our school was getting a locker in the hallway instead of just stashing your stuff in your desk like in the kiddie grades. I liked having a locker. It was my little space.

I opened the door of my locker one day and found that all my stuff...my books, my jacket, everything...was covered in cigarette butts and ashes. Someone had taken the time to cram the entire contents of their ashtray through the little air holes at the top of my locker. I sighed and began picking the dirt and soot out of all my belongings. I could hear other kids laughing as they walked by.

Apparently I was not allowed to have even the tiniest of spaces to myself.

I remember trying on clothes from the missionary box...

As the pastor's family, it was our privilege to have first dibs on the clothes that were donated for the missionaries. I never knew what missionaries these clothes were designated for, I don't know if anyone did. I just knew that if Mom came home with a big cardboard box, we were going to have to spend about an hour trying on clothes.

This was always fun at first. I'd pick out the old lady dress and put it on, then mince around the room like Carol Burnett as the old lady. If there was a hat, I'd put it on and pretend to be French. Mom would laugh hysterically, but soon she settled down to business. She wanted us to try on anything that looked like it might fit. Anything. Everything. Even the ugly things. And there were lots of ugly things!

Mom would spend a lot of time trying to convince us how great an outfit looked if she liked it. I distinctly remember the sinking feeling of futile stubbornness in my gut that arose as she oohed and ahed over a seer-sucker pantsuit. It was so out of fashion that I had never even HEARD of seer-sucker, but Mom was determined that it looked fabulous on me, and so it went into my closet.

I tried not to wear it, but one day there were no clean clothes and the bus was coming, so on it went. All day long at school, people laughed at me. I tried to defend myself, explaining that it was seer-sucker, but that term is nothing but cannon fodder to cruel junior high students. It was a long day, and I never wore the outfit to school again.

I remember an adventure at the bus stop....

It was a sparkling day in Vancouver, the kind of day where you can't imagine being anywhere else but in the middle of the city, right where you are. I was riding the bus home from somewhere, and I felt like breaking up my usual routine--the people filling the sidewalks all looked so beautiful and interesting! I got off at Granville and Broadway. There was a little cigarette shop there, and I wanted to see if they carried any unusual cigarettes. They did, and I bought some.

I headed out of the shop and sat on the bench at the bus stop, waiting for the next bus. I opened the pack of French smokes and lit up. A bus pulled up, but I didn't want to get on it yet, so I just stayed seated. The door opened. I was about to wave the driver on, when two of my friends got off the bus, Scooter and Olly!! (I'm not making up these names. Isn't that great?) They jumped over to the bench and squished me in a sandwich.

"Paula!! You're beautiful!! What are you doing here? Wanna come with us to an art opening?"

Yippee!! I knew this was a sparkling day! Scooter's dad was a fairly successful artist, and was having an opening at an exclusive little gallery right across the street! Of course I wanted to go! We hooked our arms together and sashayed across the street, sweeping into the gallery like three goofy rejects from "The Wild One". Scooter introduced me to his father, who was very busy schmoozing with the people in suits who had lots of money. We spent some time looking at the paintings, but mostly we hung out at the free bar.

Scooter dragged another older gentleman over..."Paula, I'd like you to meet one of my art instructors." The old fella seemed bored with the proceedings and was happy to hang with us three young ones. In fact, stealing the bottles of scotch and red wine from the bar and heading to my place was his idea!! Ha!! We each discreetly snatched a bottle of booze, hid it in our respective leather jackets, then headed back to the bus stop.

Scooter's art teacher was hilarious, with an opinion and a joke about everything. Scooter sat there watching him, a crinkly grin on his face, obviously deeply respecting the man. We sat in my living room listening to music and finishing those bottles, putting a lovely bow on the sparkling day.

I remember when I was a mechanic....

I was 6 or 7, I'm not sure. A lady in our church was getting married to a nice man, a mechanic. As was the custom, all the other ladies in the church planned a big wedding shower for her in the church basement. Someone had the cute idea to have the presents brought in on a wagon pulled by me, dressed as a mechanic, driving my little push-pedal station wagon. (Mine was a cool gold colour, not the sissy pink in the picture here.)

Mom left me pretty much to myself to pull my outfit together. I put on jeans with holes in them and an old sweatshirt. I asked Dad if I could borrow his tool belt and some wrenches and stuff, and I also asked for a shop beanie, the kind with a little brim. I tucked my hair into the hat, brim backwards, rubbed a bit of grease off the floor of the garage onto my face and hands, buckled on the tool belt and headed over to the church. I think Dad must have carried over the pedal car for me.

In the basement of the church, I ducked out of sight of all the ladies gushing over their little ladies games and tea and fussy little sandwiches. We tied the wagon onto the car in the hallway just outside their meeting room, and I climbed in to wait for my cue.

The door opened and one of the ladies beckoned to me. My stomach lurched a bit, but I composed my face into bored nuetral and drove the car into the room, heading for the table where I was supposed to drop off my wagon load...I could feel every eye on me. There was whispering and giggling, and all those women looking just at me...and I LOVED it! I decided that if I was a mechanic, maybe I should probably fix my car a little. I turned my head to the side to listen to the engine as I had seen my dad doing, then got out of the car, grabbed a wrench and stuck my head as far under as I could. More laughter and whispering! I tinkered for a few minutes, then got up, wiped my hands together in satisfaction, and finished my drive to the gift table, all decorated with pink streamers and pompoms. Could this be my first ever round of applause? I know I loved it.

I didn't stick around for long. Us mechanics feel kind of uncomfortable in the presence of all those ladies...we get worried that we will get them dirty or something. I seem to recall eating a bit of white cake with pink frosting and then heading back to the garage.

I remember seeing a white guy that played guitar like Jimi Hendrix....

Because of my radio show at a college station (CiTR), I was exposed to all kinds of music that I wouldn't have known about otherwise. One of my favorite guitar players was Roy Buchanan, mainly because he sounded just like Jimi Hendrix, all bendy and trippy....yet plain as day on the cover of his album, he was a grey haired white man. I loved the paradox this presented to me!

When I heard he was coming to town, I bought a ticket right away. I figured when I got there, I'd run into all the other people I knew...but as I entered the main area of the Commodore, I realized I was wrong. The club was full, but not of my scenester friends. I was surrounded by a club full of men, men with short-cropped beards, men with jean jackets, men who had no fashion sense at all. I was surrounded by blues fans! It was quite funny! I think there were about 800 men, and maybe 6 women. I had entered the blues universe.

It was an amazing show. Roy Buchanan played guitar in some other dimension, he was a complete master of his instrument. I never noticed anything else until the lights came on at the end of the show, he really took me somewhere, I tell you. Once the show was over, I hightailed it out of there...too much testosterone for me to handle, even though apparently I was man enough for the blues.

The next year, I heard that Mr. Buchanan had hung himself in his jail cell. I felt very sad about that, he had seemed so happy when he was playing guitar on stage...it made me wonder about happiness and the things that bring it, and why is it so fleeting? Why is happiness unable to penetrate to the dark parts of our soul? It didn't seem fair to me.

I remember Valentine's Days in elementary school...

We'd spend the week preceding Valentine's Day making little mailboxes to put on our desk. Then on the big day, everyone would walk around and drop Valentine's into all the mailboxes. It was expected that you'd just give a card to everybody, but I always had a hard time dropping a Valentine into Walter P.'s mail box. I really didn't like him. Near the end of the day, there'd be a little party where we could open our mail boxes and read all our Valentines.

Every year, from Grade 1 until Grade 5, my mother would make heart-shaped sugar cookies. She'd spread the hearts with pink frosting, then with white frosting she'd write the name of everyone in my class (AND my sister's class) on their own special cookie. Each heart would get a white piped edging of icing, and maybe a sprinkle of pink sugar. They were beautiful, true works of art.

On Valentine's Day, my sister and I would carefully carry our own Tupperware container onto the school bus, guarding it with our lives. "What do you have?" "Is there one with my name on it?" "Those look so good, can I have one?" As soon as we got to school, we'd give the container to our teacher, and she could guard it until the right time. I remember feeling very proud as the teacher would announce each year, "Paula's mother has prepared us a special treat!" and then she'd call up each person by name to get their very own cookie. It used to bother me, though, that Walter P. got a pretty cookie...I didn't think he deserved one at all.

Is that what they mean when they say "It rains on the just and the unjust"? Even the unworthy get pretty cookies? I guess that's good. I've been unworthy of most of the blessings in my life, too, if you come right down to it.

I don't remember writing this letter....

"Dear Roger: You don't need to apologize for writing a depressing letter. Depression is a normal human emotion. I love you even when you don't tell jokes. (God, how I need someone to tell me that now.)

Is loneliness an evil under the sun? If it is, then I am a very evil person. But I don't think being lonely is evil; it aches almost the same as love.

I will read 'Waiting for Godot.' When you become a famous director you may cast me as Vladimir.

Funny thing -- just yesterday I was full of joy and very happy. Now I feel awful. This too shall pass. I had been wearing my hair forward. Today I brushed it backwards. Everyone said they like it. This too shall pass. I was very popular in high school. Now I sit alone at dinner. This too shall pass. Oh God, I pray that it will . Consider yourself privileged, Roger. Rarely do I get so personal in a letter. (Perhaps that is why it is so short?)

From one brave new lonely wave,

Paula"

My friend, roger, called me yesterday. He had been cleaning out old boxes in the garage, and there was this letter from me. I had written it on the wrapping of a McDonald's Apple Pie, slapped a stamp on it, and mailed it to him. I didn't date the letter, but it was probably from 1985 when I was a student at Trinity Western University. I don't remember sitting and writing this letter specifically, but I do remember the general malaise of my youth.

Looks like I was emo before any of these young kids with their hair falling in their face were even a tear-drop in their fathers' eyes.