Green Wizardries: A Brave New Spring

January 11, 2024

“Come look at this,” my husband called. The ewe lambs were chasing a pair of ravens around their paddock. It was really cute. The ravens were trying to pull tufts of wool off the lambs and the lambs objected. By lambs, I mean little sheep under one year of age. I do not like to lamb until much later in the spring when the sweet little babies can be greeted by pleasant weather.

The ravens love to line their nests with lambs’ wool. Another sheep farmer told me the same thing is happening to his flock and, indeed, this happens every spring but I have never seen them try to steal wool so early.

Ravens in the southern part of the province tend to lay their eggs in February which means building the nest in later January but ravens are very wise and this pair are quite old and they are successful parents. I expect they know more than they let on. Spring may well come early this year.

Which brings us to the seed order. I have various favourite seed sellers. My top pick is Sal Dominelli’s Sweet Rock Farm on Gabriola Island. Sal has been growing seed for more than twenty years and is an organic producer of open-pollinated and heritage seeds. I got some Island Star cannabis seeds from him a couple of years ago and grew a monster plant that has kept us and our friends in marijuana which we use to make ginger snap cookies as sleep aids. I really like Island Star because it is an old-fashioned cannabis strain that does not tear the top of your head off.

Sal produces about 90% of his own seeds but does bring in a few varieties from other organic farmers. He only has three varieties of cucumber but the varieties he produces are excellent and his seed is always very fresh and he packages ample seed in each envelope. Other seed companies are not so generous. I will buy most of the seeds I purchase this year from Sweet Rock Farm and no, I don’t get a discount for promoting his excellent products.

Dan Jason’s Salt Spring Seeds has lots of varieties to choose from and he is an organic producer and a very nice man. I like the quality of his seeds and if Sal doesn’t have something I want, I can almost be sure of getting it from Dan Jason.

My next favourite seed company is Richter’s Herbs. They have an encyclopedic variety of culinary, medicinal and magical herbs. I limit myself to three new herbs a year so I can study them and learn how best to prepare them. Richter’s does not advertise their magical herbs but they do hint at the folklore behind some of them. I recommend John Micheal Greer’s Encyclopedia of Natural Magic if you are interested in developing a magical garden.

Other garden jobs in January include putting another layer of mulch on any root crops you still have in the ground. The carrots and beets will thank you if you can get this done before then next really cold snap. Frost damages their tops, causing them to rot. While you are at it, the leeks would also appreciate a few more handfuls of leaves tucked between their stocks.

If it looks to be going to minus five degrees Celsius or lower, especially if there is no snow cover, it is a good idea to cover any leafy greens such as chard, kale or lettuce that you have in the garden with tarps or whatever coverings you can drag over them.

It is important to remember that you cannot pick any vegetables in the garden while they are frozen. If you do, they will thaw to mush once you get them indoors. I will go out and get a supply of leeks, carrots, beets and kale before we get a big freeze. I leave the vegetables in an enclosed and unheated porch where they keep very well. If your root crops are well mulched, they will not freeze and will be fine to pick even if you have to dig them out from a layer of snow. I just prefer to dig them before all that unpleasantness.

By the later part of January, it will be a good time to start pruning fruit trees, grape vines, fruit bushes and kiwi vines. I saw one small orchard on Denman that is already pruned to within an inch of its life. I checked the trees of one of the older farming families on the island and they have not yet started to prune. I think I will follow their lead.

Keep your secateurs clean between each tree or bush. I like to wipe mine down with a Dettol-soaked rag. Dettol is not as hard on the steel as bleach is.

I have the first bright yellow aconite blooms in my garden. I think this is going to be an okay year.

Pizza, Pop & Chipper

January 11, 2024

We awoke this morning to threatening skies and an increasing drizzle of rain. It was looking as though it could be one of those days. Seven of us embarked to work with C.O. Person, but not before hitching up our disabled wood chipper and dropping it off at the mechanic in town for repairs. With that accomplished, we tarried forth to the B.M.X. track to continue the work we’d begun yesterday.

With the removal of the old bin and delivery of a new one, our work was much the same as the day before. Raking, pitch-forking, transporting by wheelbarrow and loading up the dumpster. A morning that justifiably saw us suiting up in rain gear eventually eased under overcast skies and the cover of the evergreens, leaving us to strip away such sweat inducing garb.

Over lunch break Marie, the park manager, saw fit to bring us pizza, pop and chips as the day’s weather didn’t lend itself to milkshakes. The name of the pizzeria wasn’t stamped on the delivery boxes so there was no way of identifying exactly who was responsible for such tasty pizza. Three pieces each and it didn’t last longer than ten minutes. I gotta say these little tastes of civilization, while not expected, are quite the treat. For shudder inducing comparison, this morning’s breakfast was three slices of cold, stale toast and two pancakes with but a trace of warmth. Certainly not enough to melt the whipped butter we’re given to spread upon them.

It’s well established that lunch is the hottest meal of our days for the reason that we cook on site. We’ve certainly complained about what it is that we’re provided to cook for lunch but the reality is having a stove at least reminds us what a hot meal is like. Still though, none of that rates compared to pizza takeout!

Once again, a very appreciative thank you goes out to Marie. She may indeed benefit from our pathetically low-wage labor but we, too, benefit from her thoughtfulness and generosity. It’s definitely a win-win situation.

Our day concluded with the retrieval of the presumably repaired wood chipper. With any luck we can now get around to chipping up all of the alders we cleared from the side of the highway which have been waiting on us for almost two full weeks. Much longer and we won’t need to chip them for they’ll likely have decomposed all on their own!

Opposites Attract News pt.2

January 11, 2024

The T’ai Chi Ch’uan Way

January 4, 2024

Many of us were lucky enough to know and learn from the radiant Doreen Hynd during her lengthy (illegal, but that’s another story) sojourn on Hornby & Denman Islands. I was her student for 13 years; learning the Wu style under Doreen, who practised it for about 60 years, changed my life. She herself was trained over many years by Sophia Delza, a designated Master of Wu style, and the first to bring the form back from China.

Doreen’s life had so many ups and downs, shocks and disturbances, disruptions and new starts; yet she had an indomitable spirit that did not abandon her. Imagine talking pirates down from robbing you at knife point in the black of night on a junk somewhere in Southeast Asia, you on deck and your children below. Just one story.

She expected to live to 100, and died at 96, with daughter Rachel by her side. The entire time she lived in Canada, she had no medical insurance, but that was ok as, to my knowledge, she never needed a doctor. She listened deeply to her body always. She knew she needed to be outside and to move to keep her system humming. She did floor exercises every morning to stay supple. In her early 90’s, she would often walk the mile or so from my little cabin on Denman home to her place, just to “stretch her legs”, after giving me a 1 ½ hour lesson which I would have to end, exhausted from the focus. Lessons were followed by our soup & toast lunches, where we would freely canvas the world of ideas, unrestrained. Then that walk back, where I’d accompany her ½ way and she’d trek on the rest of the way, bright and firm in her step.

She was rarely injured until close to the end, when she had a fall at her daughter Ghretta’s house, and from then on, felt its effects. When a person in one of her classes spoke of a fall or other physical mishap, she

would gently inquire: “Were you doing it the T’ai Chi Ch’uan way”? With that quiet lesson, I learned to pay attention when leaning hard in one direction, when reaching a long way, when moving quickly. My frequency of physical injury has dropped significantly by incorporating that simple question into my daily activities: “Am I doing this the T’ai Chi Ch’uan way?” Although Doreen in her later years may have lost some memory of the exact sequence of the moves of the Wu style, she never, right until the end, lost her wisdom.

Doreen was so fully alive while she lived; she taught me that women can be sexual right into their 90’s. She had a dancing spirit and she trusted in the universe. Her adherence to Christian Science comported with her inquisitive nature and her belief in natural wellness, but she never proselytized to me.

The time of Covid was very difficult for Doreen, because she believed so strongly in well-being as something we cultivate ourselves; at that point in her life, the idea of a virus so contagious you couldn’t hug people was anathema. And a closed border was even worse! Nonetheless, she always expected to return for another visit to her beloved islands, and I often feel her cosmic presence when I am practising my T’ai Chi Ch’uan on the beach, especially on a windy day.

One of the key gifts Doreen gave me was her embodiment of the basic tenets, the core principles of T’ai Chi Ch’uan, which means “Practise of the Essence”: slowness, lightness, calmness, balance and clarity. I try to live my life with these principles close to me, close as Doreen remains in my heart. As I write this piece on Denman, I see three tiny hummingbirds in the rosemary, so like her vibrant spirit. May we each make of our lives an offering, as Doreen did.

Editor’s Note

January 4, 2024

(A letter in response to Sally Campbell.)

Hello Sally.

Happy New Year!

Thank you for your submission.

We’ll queue it up for our next issue, Jan.4th.

And how timely it is!

I just so happened to receive a lovely poem submission from Ed Emswiler! ‘The Gift,’ penned in memory of Doreen. (See attached)

Doreen (a big fan/supporter of the paper) posed me the question when I was still relatively fresh in my role of Publisher (Spring 2019), “What is the soul of the Grapevine?”

She continued (I’m paraphrasing), “the heart is not rational, it can be prone to flights of fancy. The soul, on the other hand, is steady. It’s who you are each and every day.” This really stuck with me. 18 months into it I was still getting settled. Learning systems, returning to Hornby after a nine month absence and scaling up our production to have considered the deeper questions. I knew I had some soul, but a paper?

By this thinking it would stand to reason that my soul may eventually come through in the paper. Like an artist over time develops their style. An organic process with no specific timeline. Besides, my ‘open to all islander’ policy I figured would help inform the paper’s soul, so long as I maintained editorial consistency. An open forum that all locals could partake in couldn’t be more ‘community,’ to my mind. My naiveté all that time ago makes me blush. I mean, how could allowing for open discussion be so fraught?

Enter Covid.

This isn’t to say that my soul is tortured (At least not if I ignore the howls of those disapproving of my touches). I’ve always recognized my steadiness (stillness is quite another thing!). I understood that ‘steady’ would be a requirement to produce a weekly publication. 316 issues into things without missing a beat confirms for me that, at the very least, I know this aspect of myself. And the paper is nothing, if not steady.

Being committed to freedom of expression colours the soul of the Grapevine (who knew?). When Doreen posed me this question, the world was 100 years beyond a pandemic and the freedom to express oneself seemed a natch. Four years since Covid’s arrival it still seems a natch to me (steadiness/consistency). I know there are islanders who wish TIG away for this stance but as we’ve seen with much in the world, propaganda and narratives are constantly being spun to manufacture consent/compliance so providing space for heterodox views has never been more important. You know all too well of this. Look no further than Gaza and its plight. Bombs land on its head while the media justifies dropping them. It’s why I’ll always stand for a person’s right to say their piece. Of course, this brings some heat from time to time so I could say in response to Doreen, “the Grape’s soul is spicy, for sure!” I can almost hear her rejoin, “have you ever tried stillness? You know, the T’ai Chi ch’uan way?”

May 2024 see more stillness in the world than what we’ve experienced leading into it. Before that can happen however, a ceasefire or several need be. It’s why I welcome your contributions, Sally. You lend relevance to the Grapevine’s soul through your dedicated writings and consideration. An interesting full circle completed with this week’s submission!

Cheers to you.

All the best!

Mike

Shucking Oysters: The Hum of Distraction

January 4, 2024

People just don’t seem so — how can I put it politely — savvy in their brain anymore. Three minute attention spans. Coles Notes interactions. No real conversations. And by conversation, I mean a verbal exchange, with an occasional question inserted in between. Nobody seems to be interested in learning about each another. Asking how you are doesn’t count. And besides, no one even listens when you respond. You could share that you are suffering from irritable bowel syndrome and nary a blink of the eye. We’ve lost that loving feeling. Do we blame the pandemic for literally obliterating our social skills? Or do we blame it on social media and “smart” phone addiction?

I see so many of you on the ferry fixated on the glow, oblivious to your surroundings and thoughts. In your cars, in the lounge, all with your eyes glued to the screen, fingers, flicking, flicking, flicking. Swiping and scrolling in search of a connection or some illumination. It’s kind of fascinating and disturbing at the same time.

But, does that thingie actually make you smarter? Sure, you can look up some factoid right away and impress others. “Did you know that mice always pee in the same place and rats have no control of their bladder and pee everywhere?” Is this a sign of intelligence? Able to distill bon mots in seconds? The world of digital technology is great at answering life’s small questions, like where can I find sweet potato starch noodles, yet it is distracting us from living our realities.

We spend on average three to four hours a day looking at our phones and as much as eleven hours a day in front of all our screens. UofT Philosophy professor, Mark Kingwell, wrote that the interface is now our entire environment. “It is the air, the air of instant gratification that we breathe everyday.” The irony of this online “connection” Kingwell notes, is that it “continues to breed alienation and polarization, false notions of popularity … where loneliness begets loneliness in a shadow-play of promised connection.”

It’s not about information and knowledge. We want wisdom. There’s a difference. We stumble through our messy lives, hoping to pick up scraps of wisdom here and there. Unfortunately, Eric Weiner warned, “we mistake the urgent for the important, the verbose for the thoughtful, the popular for the good.” We are “misliving.” Technology is dulling the wisdom of our intellect. We need to observe the world with our own senses. Like Hercule Poirot, we need to use our little grey cells more.

Many join Facebook to stay in touch with their friends but are unable to maintain an uninterrupted conversation with a friend sitting across from them. Cal Newport wrote in Digital Minimalism that “smart phones have reshaped people’s experience of the world by providing an always-present connection to a humming matrix of chatter and distraction.” The Like button, “bright dings of psuedo-pleasure,” is akin to gambling every time you post something on social media, “a metaphorical pull of the slot machine handle.” There you are, constantly checking to see how many Likes you have after you posted a picture of your Christmas turkey dinner. We are addicted to social approval.

When it comes to technology, more is better. More connections, more information, more options. The IPod gave us the ability to be continuously distracted from our own mind. The smart phone has creepy ways to disrupt any remaining sliver of solitude we have. The quick look at the slightest hint of boredom. Surreptitiously glancing at any number of apps or websites to give you that immediate and satisfying fix. This is not what we were designed for; “humans are not wired to be constantly wired.”

The transformation of the cell phone from an occasionally useful tool to something we can never be without is not a good thing. The peer pressure of missing out on something is huge. Parents worry that their kids won’t be able to reach them in an emergency. People need directions and recommendations for the best Korean restaurant in Campbell River. Even executives will constantly check their phones for messages after business hours.

Newport writes that “what’s remarkable about these concerns is how recently we started really caring about them.” Those of us born before the mid-80s have fond memories of life without a cell phone. And yes, all the concerns mentioned still existed in theory, we just didn’t worry about them as much. As Newport wrote loftily, cell phones are “useful, but it’s hyperbolic to believe its ubiquitous presence is vital.”

Apparently, we humans are naturally wired to activities that require less energy. Texting your sister instead of calling her on a phone; liking a picture of a friend’s new baby instead of popping by for a visit. Social media is taking people away from real world socializing. We are missing the quality of the richer interactions. Compulsively flicking and swiping merely “emits a patina of socialness.”

Sherry Turkle wrote in Reclaiming Conversation that “face-to-face conversation is the most human — and humanizing — thing we do.” We learn to listen and to learn the meaning of empathy. Social media, emailing, texting, instant messaging do not count as conversation. Cell phones have become “woven into a fraught sense of obligation in friendship” where you have to be on-call “tethered to your phone, ready to be attentive, online.” Tapping a Like button is not friendship; it’s a hollow parody.

I’m not saying to get rid of those thingies, or stay offline, or throw the lot into a landfill. It’s not about technology, it’s about quality of life. Social media is addictive because it gives us something which the real world doesn’t: instant gratification and approval. I’m saying, enjoy the real world while you can.

The Gift

January 4, 2024

The Gift

by Ed Emswiler

I wish the best for each and all of us

of every religion and non-religion,

of every sex and predilection,

of every race and culture,

of every political persuasion

or socioeconomic status.

As we continue our journey of understanding,

That everything

is a gift.

That human kindness

and Love,

are the greatest gifts,

we are to learn

and take away.

It’s the inside

that counts.

In every leaf and grain of sand.

In each and all of us.

In memory of Doreen Hynd

December 24, 2023

They’re Calling Ethnic Cleansing “Voluntary Migration” Now.

January 4, 2024

Listen to a reading of this article (reading by Tim Foley):

Israeli officials are now openly admitting that they’re working on “encouraging” the migration of Palestinians from Gaza, ridiculously claiming that this migration would be “voluntary” despite their having deliberately made the enclave uninhabitable over the last three months.

The Times of Israel reports:

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s two senior far-right partners endorsed the rebuilding of settlements in the Gaza Strip and the encouraging of “voluntary emigration” of Palestinians on Monday, while hawkish opposition MK Avigdor Liberman called for Israel to reoccupy southern Lebanon.

“Speaking during their parties’ respective faction meetings in the Knesset, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich presented the migration of Palestinian civilians as a solution to the long-running conflict and as a prerequisite for securing the stability necessary to allow residents of southern Israel to return to their homes.

“The war presents an ‘opportunity to concentrate on encouraging the migration of the residents of Gaza,’ Ben Gvir told reporters and members of his far-right Otzma Yehudit party, calling such a policy ‘a correct, just, moral and humane solution.’

“‘We cannot withdraw from any territory we are in in the Gaza Strip. Not only do I not rule out Jewish settlement there, I believe it is also an important thing,’ he said.

“The ‘correct solution’ to the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict is ‘to encourage the voluntary migration of Gaza’s residents to countries that will agree to take in the refugees,’ Smotrich told members of his Religious Zionism party, predicting that ‘Israel will permanently control the territory of the Gaza Strip,’ including through the establishment of settlements.”

The repeated use of the word “encourage” stands out in these remarks, given that encouraging Gaza’s inhabitants to flee their homeland is exactly what Israel’s actions since October have been doing. Once you’ve made 90 percent of Gaza’s inhabitants homeless with internal displacement, forced half the population into starvation via siege warfare, destroyed the enclave’s entire healthcare system to the point where disease is now running rampant, all while raining death and destruction from above in a wildly unpredictable manner with airstrikes routinely hitting designated safe zones, you’re offering the population some very strong “encouragement” indeed to vacate the region as soon as possible.

This obviously makes the argument for the “voluntary migration” of Gazans completely nonsensical, since violently coercing someone into doing something and ensuring that they’ll die if they don’t do it is the exact opposite of what the word “voluntary” means.

But that’s the slogan we’re seeing pop up again and again as Israel draws closer to its final solution to the Palestinian problem in Gaza. Netanyahu and his cohorts have been repeatedly uttering phrases like “voluntary resettlement” and “voluntary migration” to describe the plan for Gaza’s Palestinian inhabitants to either move to refugee camps set up in the adjacent Sinai Peninsula in Egypt or to be taken in by other nationsaround the world.

Netanyahu has said that a team must be established to “ensure that those who want to leave Gaza to a third country can do so.” Iraq invader Tony Blair was reportedly being eyed as a potential leader of such a team by Israeli officials, though Blair has denied this.

Mitchell Plitnick wrote the following on the absurdity of the “voluntary migration” talking point in an article for Mondoweiss last month:

“The term ‘voluntary emigration’ is likely to be heard quite a lot in the coming weeks and months, and it is one of the most cynical, dishonest terms one can imagine. There is, of course, nothing voluntary about people leaving Gaza. Israel has made the place unlivable, and that was before the current bombardment.

“Now, they are essentially being forced to leave under the threat of imminent death. The people of Gaza did not suddenly lose their attachment to Palestine. They will die if they stay, as will their children. If you cut off water, electricity, food, and medical care, destroy all the shelter, and then ask a person, ‘Would you still like to stay?’ their decision to leave is obviously not voluntary.”

But that’s the narrative they’re going with apparently.

And it’s nothing new; Israel has been falsely claiming for generations that its violent forced expulsion of Palestinians known as the Nakba was voluntary as well. In 2000 Palestinian academic Ghada Karmi wrote that “The Israeli version of history — that the Palestinians left voluntarily or under orders from their leaders and that Israelis had no responsibility, material or moral, for their plight — has been successfully marketed to the world community for decades.”

The plot to relocate Palestinians from territories desired by Israel is also far from new. In a 2002 article for The Guardian titled “A new exodus for the Middle East?”, Israeli historian Benny Morris writes that the agenda to “transfer” Palestinians to other countries has existed for as long as modern Zionism:

“The idea of transfer is as old as modern Zionism and has accompanied its evolution and praxis during the past century. And driving it was an iron logic: There could be no viable Jewish state in all or part of Palestine unless there was a mass displacement of Arab inhabitants, who opposed its emergence and would constitute an active or potential fifth column in its midst. This logic was understood, and enunciated, before and during 1948, by Zionist, Arab and British leaders and officials.

“As early as 1895, Theodor Herzl, the prophet and founder of Zionism, wrote in his diary in anticipation of the establishment of the Jewish state: ‘We shall try to spirit the penniless [Arab] population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it any employment in our country … The removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.’”

This is a very, very old agenda, being presented as something brand new that is only just occurring to Israeli officials just now. They didn’t just come up with this. It’s been fantasized about for as long as Israel was a twinkle in its founding fathers’ eyes.

This is the real objective in Gaza. Not the “elimination of Hamas” (whatever the hell you want to pretend that would look like in practice), but the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.

Hamas is not the target in Gaza. Hamas is just the excuse.

My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece here are some options where you can toss some money into my tip jar if you want to. Go here to buy paperback editions of my writings from month to month. All my work is free to bootleg and use in any way, shape or form; republish it, translate it, use it on merchandise; whatever you want. The best way to make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. All works co-authored with my husband Tim Foley.

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Featured image via Wikimedia Commons.

Letter to the Editor – Ron Sakolsky

January 4, 2024

RE/MAXING GENOCIDE

As we enter the new year, I have been feeling very helpless lately given the unrelenting onslaught of the Israeli government’s genocidal war on Gaza that has unfolded, escalated, and now is threatening to become a wider war in the region. As the atrocities mount, many local folx here on the rock seem to find comfort in the illusionary world of Denman exceptionalism. The exceptionalist story which we like to tell ourselves is based on the idea that the outside world is a terrible place with its wars and injustices, but our hands are clean by dint of the fact that we live in the best of all possible worlds here on Denman Island far away from the fray. While some locals might question why the federal government’s foreign policy automatically supports the Israeli government with few qualifications, the larger issue of the ongoing land grab that originally established and continues to expand the boundaries of the Israeli colonial state is lost in the self-congratulatory rhetoric of Denman exceptionalism.

However, Denman Island is deeply enmeshed in the Israeli system of oppression that is the context for the current war because of the island’s harboring of a local chapter of RE/MAX, the parent corporation of which is entangled in a sordid web of complicity with Israeli apartheid. The US-based RE/MAX corporation is the largest real estate brokerage network in Israel, and is currently involved in the ongoing sale of settler-occupied Palestinian land in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Locally, the corporate franchise’s Denman-based owner/realtor, Bente Pilgaard, is a major player in the real estate industry’s increasingly ramped-up gentrification of the island that we call home, with the result being the skyrocketing prices that make for a shortage of affordable housing here on the rock. This is a problematic role for which she has never been held publicly accountable because it is built into the colonial system of land ownership that is beyond the reach of Islands Trust officials who can only legally deal with land use issues. Moreover, the RE/MAX corporation which she represents is up to its neck in monetizing the original theft of Indigenous land both in BC and internationally in Israel and beyond.

As a person of Jewish heritage who has long been a critic of the Zionist colonial project known as Israel, I realize that nothing that we might do on Denman Island alone will stop the Israeli war machine from engaging in its dirty work. But instead of falsely claiming exceptional status, we can join hands and hearts in solidarity with other like-minded people worldwide and be part of something larger than ourselves in exposing/opposing the local mechanisms on island that are part and parcel of the genocidal devastation being rained on the open-air prison camp of Gaza and its world.

Not in My Name!

Ron Sakolsky

Phoenix Riting! – January 4th, 2024

January 4, 2024

Notes from the road (I’m in Chemainus; it was a short road):

2023 was very good to me, on the whole. Worldwide, it was weird. Island-wide, likewise. I’m not going to try to sum up the year here, though it’s on my mind. It’s New Year’s Day as I write. 2024 is still shiny, wrappers hanging in shreds, the new year barely opened. What will it bring? I notice feelings of hope, upliftment, and also dread. We’ve been repeatedly burned by recent years, hope punctured as new disasters and disappointments show up early in the year. Remember 2020? I recently re-read a journal entry from 2019, in which I mentioned “the collective ‘eek’ coming up in January of 2020.’ I saw it coming. This year I see some big ‘eeks’ coming up. Different ones. So many eeks! There are a lot of ‘aahs’ to balance them, and I mean to squeeze the yum out of every one.

Last night was a huge, sweet ‘aahh’. I didn’t spend New Year’s Eve on Hornby; I bought tickets to the Daniel Lapp Caravan show in Duncan (before I found out about the Hornby show). Turns out I had no regrets! It was well worth the expense and trouble of spending $50 and driving all the way to the Cowichan Valley when I could have spent half as much and stayed home for a show that would also have been amazing. Truly, had I stayed on the island, I would not have regretted that! The Hornby party looked like a fabulous time. But this was a truly special, once in a lifetime experience. Daniel Lapp is a wizard of fiddle and trumpet, and of course the Atkinson family, Marc, Odus and Arlo, and our familiar bassist Scott White, made up the rest of the ‘Caravan’ so you know it was a heartwarming, uplifting, blissfully musical way to ring in the New Year! Champagne was served at midnight, and delicious food was included with the ticket. I danced right to the end of the night, and limped to the car with blisters on my soles.

It was a synthesis of Hornby and ‘the world…’ it was wonderful to be there with a handful of Hornby and ex-Hornby friends, and I reconnected with my old Cowichan dancing friends. Today my group will hike on the Cowichan River. As much as I love my island, we exist within a greater context and I’m grateful for the opportunity to experience it, once in a while. It helps me to appreciate my island even more. I’m looking forward to returning home and turning on the taps to see sweet water flow once again.

Let me back up: Christmas Day was a wild storm—we had a 24 hour power outage in my neighbourhood—but it was even crazier for me, if you can imagine. I cooked my vegan turkey (with rice paper ‘skin’) with stuffing (omg delicious) early because the power kept flicking off. I was well warned. I filled the bathtub with water and every available container with drinking water. Just before I left, I was running water only to see the flow slow, then stop. Uh-oh! That wasn’t good. Then I went to the home where the dinner was to be held. When everything was mostly done, the power went out. We had a lovely time, with old friends and new, sharing amazing vegan and vegetarian food, music and conversation. Went home under the brilliant Full Moon and stars overhead. It was warm, beautiful, glorious really.

The next day, the power returned, but the water did not. Big shoutout to Dave Wishart for service above and beyond, showing up right away, organizing electricians and excavator for what turned out to be a huge job and being generally friendly and competent. Turns out the pump was ancient. “I’ve seen one of these before, once. Never worked on one.” The electrical wires needed to be upgraded, a new breaker installed to accommodate a proper modern pump. Now, it’s all shiny and new, and I’m told it will be up and running when I return. I forecast laundry in my near future.

How was your Christmas and New Year’s? That was mine. Let me know what you think at phoenixonhornby@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you!