Month: February 2021

I learned how to sew when I was a child. It began with darning socks. Yep, back in the day we repaired our clothing instead of talking ‘green’ and then throwing everything away as soon as it was less than perfect. Of course, most of our clothing was organic and not made of something synthetic, which is certainly a lot harder to repair. To repair a sock’s worn heel you inserted a special wooden disc beneath the hole then stitched back and forth in two directions, weaving the new material together into the old until there was a completely new heel in place. The trick was to make the repair smooth enough so that you could not feel it when wearing the sock. My skills evolved to sewing buttons and making dolls out of old socks. Eventually I could sew patches on shirts and jeans and my ability with a needle has served me well and often. Those were times when nearly every grocery store sold sewing supplies, cloth dye, iron-on patches and patterns for making your own clothes. Home Economics was a popular class in school for both genders. Not no mo!

As an aircraft mechanic I learned how to sew new fabric onto rebuilt aircraft wings, an exacting endeavor with a perfect number of perfect stitches per inch and long stitches through the wing fabric which helped hold the linen in place during flight. Everything had to be done quickly so the organic material did not sag excessively before the first coat of nitrate dope was applied. This shrank the cloth into place and weather-proofed it. If you messed that up, you stripped the fabric off and tried again. Successive coats filled the weave of the cloth and produced an aerodynamic glass-like finish. There have been a lot of marine fabric and sail repairs through the years, all hand-sewn. I still have my leather palm and awls used to push needles through heavy material, including leather.

On a recent morning I set about repairing a beloved pair of old sweat pants and tried threading a needle. My arthritic fingers made it a challenge and actually seeing the eye of the needle well enough to insert the thread was certainly humbling. The experience was a sobering milestone in my aging process. It goes on the shelf beside the first time I was asked if I qualified for a senior’s discount. I was indignant at first but have soon learned to demand every break as often as I can. Shovelling a foot of snow today was another marker, but that’s not an age problem. Let’s just say i bought some wine today bottled under the label of ‘Fat Bastard.’ Enough said.

A friend recently speculated on what I can find to write about in these Covid days when we are essentially under self-imposed house arrest. Sometimes I wonder myself. Unfortunately there are far too many Covid-related issues which deserve comment and so there is always something to raise a question about. Hopefully some day soon this will again be the travel blog it was intended to be.

Despite the near-quarantine conditions there are still a number of out of province, and out of country, license plates. I’ll assume nothing but certainly do wonder what’s up. The borders are supposed to be closed. I recognize Pamela Anderson’s SUV with its California plates, but she is a hometown girl who again lives here a lot of the time. So I don’t want to assume anything about who’s doing what here. I do wish folks could respect themselves and each other a little more. The face mask issue rages on. A fellow ranted that now they’re trying to make us afraid of fresh air. I can see his point but I’ve had friends and family fall to this virus and I believe it’s real. If you’re not prepared to wear a mask out of respect for your fellows, will you volunteer to dig a few graves?

I’m an old bog trotter who knows there is a lot I don’t understand but it seems that shutting down the planet’s commerce for a few weeks would stop this bug in its tracks. We should have done that a year ago. Think of all we’ve lost because we did not. Despite all the dire consequences, it seems a small price to pay to stop an apparently thinking virus which will keep mutating faster than we can concoct new vaccines. Remember the old mantra “An once of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” We must stop putting economics ahead of our health and that of our planet. This is not a suspense movie. Morgan Freeman nor Dustin Hoffman cannot save us. It’s real life. What sort of economy will there be when millions more are dead?

Yeah, there’s a lot to write about. Unfortunately stupidity is infinite and it gets boring. I know I’m the same wooly-headed sheople as the rest of the herd but I insist on retaining the judgment to step out of its core, breath some fresh air and try to think for myself a bit. Instead of “Baaa” I choose to say “Woof” and that is not going to be tolerated.

At the moment we’re experiencing an intense winter high. It’s cold and windy with threats of “significant” snow fall. The media is trying to turn winter into another dark story. Perhaps it is my old fart memory but I swear that 40° in Winnipeg, or snow in Toronto or Calgary was once regarded as normal.

While walking Jack a few mornings ago we came upon some rabbit tracks in freshly-fallen snow. They travelled up a trail then abruptly ended in a tidy pile of rabbit fur with a tail. Leading on up the trail from the scene of the ambush a set of large house-cat tracks meandered onward. Garfield lives! It has been snowing here all day, a fine sifting sort of snow that manages to pile up quite quickly and will require shoveling a second time by day’s end. At least I’ve heard no-one mention Global Warming for a few days.

“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less” – Marie Curie