the purpose of tacky lawn ornaments

My friend Sherri lives on a block of the city that has some of the tackiest lawns I’ve seen in my life.  Lawns here are not grand affairs, just teeny-tiny plots only accessed by the first-floor residents (of the triplexes that make up the majority of Montreal’s housing).  Despite their minute size, they are tended well.  Hanging baskets, window-boxes, trimmed lawns and patches of beautiful bright color.  People seemed to miss the memo, however, on Sherri’s block.  

The best example (and worst yard) is the one that is not grass, but has the old white rock, faded masonry stone pavers around, juniper bushes, loads of fake flowers in their window-boxes and around the yard.  Then add stone bunnies, maybe some cherubs, a pair of flamingoes (but not bright pink–faded to almost white), a plastic bluebird and a plastic Bambi, and probably any other tacky thing you could think of for a yard (note: I have not noticed the gnome population), and that begins to describe this yard.  Think Disneyland stuffed in a 8 by 8 foot plot of land, and faded by the sun. 

Sherri and I were walking by and I said to her, “Your block has some of the most interesting yards.”

She points at a nicely-manicured yard and says, “See, this one is well-kept and funky, but that one [the aforementioned] is well…”

Me:  ”Yeah.”

Then we saw, at waist-height, three troupes of six yellow-vest-donning preschoolers, holding on to ropes manned by their caretakers.  They were on their way to the park, but they stopped at the same house, because all the kids were mesmerized by the animals in the yard.  They were so cute, pointing at les oiseaux, les fleurs, and the chevreuil.  It was fun to see someone enjoying that crazy lawn.

Sherri said, “Maybe that’s why the homeowners did it.”

yet another reason why i love my husband

Being a perfectionist and hyper-aware of what others think of me, and growing up that way led me to fear trying new things, especially sports. I was afraid I’d embarrass myself, I’d embarrass my teammates, causing them to regret having me on the team, etc.  Sure, I played volleyball, but I never pushed myself to try new things or to train for new skills for fear of getting it wrong.  There were lots of things I never even tried because I could never be perfect on the first go-around, so what point was there?

In breaking away from that stifling mindset, I was encouraged by my counselor, Sharon, to just TRY things. It didn’t mean I had to stick with something if I found I hated it.  But feeling intimidated without even trying isn’t a good way to live.  So I started to contemplate a sport I’d never tried, tennis.  

I had a conversation with my dear friend Jane who has been playing tennis for twenty years.  She and her husband used to meet so many friends through tennis clubs and she’s in wonderful shape, as she plays everyday.  I would like to play tennis with her someday after she has a necessary surgery.

Having heard me mention my desire to play tennis, my husband decided to surprise me.  Yesterday he bought some rackets and a couple cans of tennis balls, and wrapped them, leaving them on our bed.  I was so surprised by that thoughtful gesture.  He had even reserved a time at one of the McGill courts.  I had wanted our Saturday to have something fun and active together–and apparently he’d thought the same.

So today was my first day trying out tennis.  My husband is a strong athlete and is somewhat of a sports prodigy (in my opinion anyway), so he patiently taught me.  It was challenging but really dang fun.  I had to get over my fear of others seeing how badly I played.  I have a long way to go, but that’s part of the beauty of this–it’s a process.  I have to work and try and a lot of the skills only get refined by playing more.  I can’t be Venus Williams and never will be.  But I can at least try to have fun and try a new sport.  It felt very good.

a delicious tour of montreal

Start in Petite Italie at the famous Caffè Italia.  If you don’t look Italian, you’ll get stared down as you enter by the regulars.  This place serves a very italian-style espresso, and looks like a hole-in-the wall.  I think the mentality is ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’–so, delicious cappuccinos are served up in old seventies-style brown cups and saucers (despite having European lines, the cups were sooo dated).  For $2.50 you get a small cappuccino that’s not at all bitter (ahem, Starbucks), and for another $2.50, you can get two big thick slices of wonderful Italian bread smeared with Nutella.  It’s a decadent treat and the coffee complements it perfectly.  Simply add an Italian friend to the mix and code-switch from English into Italian, and you have a delightful conversation.

Then walk a few buildings up, stopping in Anatol, the Middle-Eastern spice store.  Spices, nuts, coffees, teas and dried fruits galore–sold at bulk prices.  Walking in is like going to a different country as the air is thick with fragrance.

Then attempt to restrain your spending at Milano, the Italian-owned supermarket that has an extensive selection of anything that is an Italian staple–fresh house-made pasta, olive oils, olives, breads, imported cookies and candies, more canned tomatoes than I’ve ever seen before, and even Italian toiletries.  I managed to spend $3.99 on a tub of piccholine olives and an extra buck or so for three Baci (the chocolate-hazelnut deliciousness).  

Walk downhill along St. Laurent and admire the quirky furniture stores and boutiques.  Stop in the train-car-now-turned-eatery called Patati Patata and pick up a small wooden basket (think 4 by 4 by 3 inches) lined in a bright green paper, filled with delicious skin-still-on fries and dip them in either ketchup or mayonnaise.  You’ll need those plastic forks the people at the counter give to you.  It is a savory treat for $2.

Walk and talk some more, and eventually you’ll end up by the Place Des Arts and near the Gay Village–both very colorful areas of town.  Stop in for a tea-fruit-juice mixed drink at any chain coffee establishment and kick up your feet.  

It is a very tasty 5k walk.  Mmm.

meet giles

Giles is the most beagly beagle you will ever meet.  He is four, beautifully colored (textbook red-brown, black and white spots), pretty sweet at times, and high energy.  We had the opportunity to dog-sit this guy for four days at our place, and it was quite fun to have a dog around.  He and I would hang out on the couch, mostly with me petting him.  We’d go for walks.  He loved sitting on the back porch and just watching–sometimes sprawled out in the sun, sometimes more alert.  He was great in many ways.

But beagles aren’t apartment-friendly breeds.  They have separation anxiety (resulting in pee-lakes in various areas of our place many times we went away), they have ear-piercingly loud barks, and they’re a sporting breed.  That means, out of instinct, they howl and howl and want to chase squirrels whenever they see them.  Giles was a dominant male and would growl aggressively at other dogs and cats.  He required 1.5 hours of walking per day and was way stronger than I.  

I really liked him, but think he’d be better in a country lifestyle, when he could run and play and have the company of other animals, where his howl would be buffered by acres of land between him and human ears.  His shedding would also be better in an outdoor lifestyle (Yeah, I didn’t think beagles shed that much, either).

I DID learn quite a bit about dog-training, though, and what dogs desire.  Giles’ owner loaned me a book by Cesar Millian, the “Dog Whisperer”–who emphasizes the facts that dogs like routine and stability.  They depend on their owners for a stable, calm environment and for food daily.  They like to work for their food (Sara makes Giles sit before he gets his meals), for example.  They thrive on being active, being loved and being rewarded.  The handler must be calm and assertive.  It was shocking how true this was.  If I was excited or had a high-pitched voice, the dog went crazy.  When I used a lower-pitched, calm voice, he listened and was much more obedient.  Repetition is key, and not spoiling the dog is also key for all of the training to work.

We were considering getting a Beagle, and now I know we won’t. That’s not meant to be harsh.  I think Beagles are remarkable and beautiful dogs (and he caught the eye of EVERYONE in town when I walked him), but we would need a more independent and relaxed dog for our apartment lifestyle.  I really do think there’s a breed of dog out there that’s right for just about everyone, and our time with Giles was fun and valuable, as well as patience-producing.  And I still think he’s ridiculously cute, quirks and all.

without you here, there is less to say

(The title of this post is from some Colin Hay lyrics).

I love the occasional metro performer.  The wise ones station themselves at busy stops, at crucial hours.  They often reserve their energies for when the most potential spectators are present, playing only pieces of works and stopping abruptly. Passengers, when stepping off one train to switch lines, are serenaded with amazing guitar work, latin-american pipe flutes or even singers in harmony.  But once the majority of spectators are gone, the musicians take a break.

Not so with the De L’Eglise violinist.  He plays persistently.  I noticed this yesterday as I walked a long way toward the exit and concurrently, the melody.  I was the last passenger to take the escalator up to the platform where he was, and was shocked as he played on and on even with such a trickle of spectators.  He was engrossed in his performance—he donned fuchsia earplugs to drown out the hum, swish and squeaky slowing of the trains, and had his eyes closed, moving in harmony with the violin concerto he played.  Just as he was traversing the most exciting portion of the piece, tones in crescendo and reaching toward the highest note, out of the corner of my right eye, I noticed the blue flash of the next metro train arriving at the platform below.  I felt the warm wind of the train and faintly heard the screech of its brakes, and pondered the coincidence of the highest note and the train’s arrival.  Then I stepped on the next escalator, and left, thankful for the bit of Mozart I’d heard and the passion of the persistent, unchecked performance.

a different approach to the same sacred union

Saturday I was truly honored to attend the wedding of my dearest Department of Italian-grad-student-friend’s sister.  It was held at the Madonna della Difesa church in Little Italy, a church founded-and-attended by immigrants from Molise, a southern province of Italy.  I arrived early, just as the florists were finishing up placing the white star lilies and white bows on the pews.  The church was stunning (as are most Catholic churches), with white marble everywhere, and vivid frescoes on the ceiling.  The Stations of the Cross were covered in gold, and the darkly-hued crucifix was a focal point, towering above everything.  The prayers were led in Italian, and the homily said in English, though with a heavily-Italian-tinged accent.  I was thankful for the priest’s words—encouraging the couple to find their source of love in the only One whose love is eternal, Jesus Christ.  His words were hard, not a typical, polished and lovey-dovey sermon, but they were solid.  He broke up the severity of the message with anecdotes and funny comments.  I found a bit more common ground with that particular Catholic church, with that particular priest, and was thankful to have attended my first Italian Catholic wedding.  The Ave Maria (complete with a stunning soprano performance) and other traditional wedding songs were gorgeous and elaborate.  I was struck by the formality of the event and enjoyed watching the guests arrive and seat themselves, dressed in beautiful attire. 

 

After the mass and greeting my friend, the maid of honor, I walked to the Jean Talon Market, which is the largest farmer’s market in town and was dazzled by the beautiful fresh fruits and vegetables and flowers.  I love the fact that Little Italy and the Market are only a half-hour Metro ride away.  Though I miss the mountains and sunsets of Colorado, I really do love urban life and all the wonderful experiences, sights and sounds of this colorful city.

a delicious night

A delicious night ensued on Canada Day a few weeks ago.  My friends Hilary and Julie (H., not my Colorado Julie) and I feasted on some brown-sugar-soy-sauce-fresh-pineapple-glazed salmon and walked downtown to the Jazz Fest.  The Montreal International Jazz Festival is a twelve-day festival every July with hundreds of performances, dozens of stages, and every possible take on jazz you could imagine.  With my over-polite but also over-impatient lead, we ended up listening to a band made of one percussionist and six or seven horns.  They played some crowd-rousing songs and were highly entertaining to watch as they swayed and danced as they performed.  Then we saw the real crowd gathering at the main stage for Bran Van 3000’s nine-o-clock performance, and I grew crowd-shy.  So Hilary and Julie led.  We were corralled around scaffoldings and through buildings in order to get to a side stage, where the eight-o-clock show was a bluesy-folk artist.  He was hilarious and bilingual and we had a good view.  After his last song, we felt the crowd becoming more and more dense, and knew we needed to get out before we were stuck.  Julie, a brave soul, led us à la opening of Star Wars, upstream through the crowd which was going toward the stage, as we rushed away from it.  We dodged, we turned, and we walked and squeezed around and ducked and took every dang opportunity we could to move.  We must have passed about 600 people.  At one point I though we had gotten through, but we were only about halfway.  We FINALLY surfaced on a side-street and took a minute to recoup and recover normal breathing patterns.  I’m an extrovert, but that kind of crowd could make anyone introverted and claustrophobic.

 

With all that hard work, we got hungry.  So we sought out ice cream and found it at La Cremière, which is a chain ice cream establishment here in Quebec, but it’s soooo good.  I had their swirl soft-serve (which was rich and creamy), with a chocolate enrobage (I love that, instead of ‘dipped’ it was ‘enrobed’ in chocolate).  The enrobage never got super-crispy like Dairy Queen’s.  It also wasn’t waxy.  It dried in a delicately thin shell that was wonderful dark chocolate.  I’m spoiled for anything less now.

 

We took our cones to an instructional tent set up and connected with the Jazz Fest.  It was a “Learn Harmonica in an hour” tutorial led en français by some hilarious guys.  They handed out harmonicas to the participants who were there early enough and went through the steps of how to hold and play the harmonica, and even taught them bluesy rifts.  We unfortunately did not get harmonicas, but we would have promptly ruined their reeds with our sticky and chocolatey mouths. 

 

The instructors finished with a sound I can’t quite put words to—they brought out different keys of harmonicas (including a bass harmonica, which was a foot long and three inches thick), and played them for us.  A particularly creative guy had taken what looked like a drum the size of a folger’s can, and created an electric harmonica with reeds and wires within the structure of the drum.  He could tap on it and play into it with what seemed like endless notes.  These four unassuming music geeks ended up playing the most beautiful, intricately-layered songs with alternating melodies.  They played blues, they played a Celtic song, they played Persian-sounding songs, they played an Electronica-style song, and ended with more Persian music.  It was incredible.  We sat down in the tent with our ice cream and had no expectations for the tutorial.  I just thought “oh, that’s cute, they’re teaching people harmonica (insert judgement about it being a quaint, simple instrument here).” We were all blown away by the complexity of the sound and the innovative universal approach the performers had.  It was truly the best ‘show’ I’ve seen yet at the Jazz Fest, and it wasn’t even publicized as such.  Even the sounds were thick and delicious that night.

a quick movie review

Necessary preface:  No, this is not a glimpse into my city.  :)

See Wall-E.  See it!  

Three measly pieces of information–that it was a Disney-Pixar film, that it was about a robot, and that it was highly, highly reviewed led Pete and me to choose to see Wall-E last night.  We don’t have a TV, so we hadn’t seen the trailer.  We also heard that Get Smart was only okay (despite the novelty of it being filmed in Montreal and having Steve Carrell in it), and all the other films playing looked dismal.  So we walked in fairly clueless.   

It’s a delightful film.  It’s artistic, hilarious, thoughtful, and even carries a hopeful and conscience-filled message, which is shocking because there’s not a ton of dialogue.  

The Pixar digital short prelude made me laugh so hard that I cried.  Certain moments of the film did the same.  

It’s worth a look.  Seriously.

a cute vignette

I was walking downtown on Monday and noticed a businesswoman in the process of taking a picture with her cellphone.  I glanced to see what I presumed to be her friend or relative being photographed, only to find a duck and seven fuzzy little ducklings somewhat nervously waddling on a driveway.  I stopped to look at them, and the lady excitedly said that she watched these eight walk across the busy road, and that crazy-driving-Montrealers actually stopped to let the ducks cross.  I think the mama duck wanted to take her babies from the ponds on campus elsewhere, but she took a wrong turn somewhere.  It happens to the best of us, I guess.

Welcome!  Today, I made this public knowledge to my friends and family.  

Curious as to why you see old posts?  Check the “About this blog and its author” link. 

I hope this goes well!