Letter #29 - Implementing Constraints

Letter #26 - Feeling Small

 We are nearing the end of the letters though oddly the end of the month has come and gone.  Christina has returned to her online life and I am still reading her thoughts as they come to my mailbox in little mismatched groups.  Sometimes it is hard to piece it all together, when #26 arrives before #23.  It is not hard to see why Christina worries about this blog... about her carefully crafted thoughts being conveyed to the digital world.  She has lost control and is now relying on a postal system that loses $36 overnight packages (and won't refund you until it arrives at the destination) and takes 17 days (or as little as 3 or 4) to send a tiny piece of paper wrapped in an envelope from Toronto to Vancouver.  Here is a glimpse into her thoughts on feeling small outside of her well-constructed online world.

Letter #25 - Slow

Today was a lazy sick Monday.  I almost didn't check the mail, but eventually I just had to get out into the gorgeous sunshine and go somewhere.  Two letters greeted my in my mailbox - #25 & #26.  I must admit I was surprised to receive two letters in order - what a novelty!  Between napping and tea-drinking I read these letters.  This one resonated with me on this particular day where I felt I had done nothing, wasted my holiday, all because of some virus.  I was annoyed and had wanted to bring the kids on a great adventure, study for a few hours, clean and make a nice dinner.  Instead I cuddled two little boys, read stories, and napped with them.  It was a slow day.  Thank you for reminding me that slow has a place in our hectic world.

Letter #21 - Time as Sacred

plus... Christina tucked in a polaroid of me painting at her 30th birthday party

Letter #23 - Fully Alive: Choosing active life over passive hobbies

 

Letter #16 - Dream

Letter # 17 - How the fast is going (envelope eaten by baby Oliver...)

Letter #20 - A blue-grey kind of day.

A lot of blank space here... gives you time to think about all the things we miss that we can't fit through the wires.

I find myself sometimes staring at the screen wondering what exactly I am looking for here... as if there is something, somewhere on this vast internet, that will somehow fill the void or numb the feeling or enlighten my bored mind.  Maybe if I google the meaning of life or somehow stumble across the perfect most inspiring blog then suddenly everything will fall into place! 

But really what I need in these moments are all the friends who have moved far away, and who knew me all those years ago when I wasn't a mother or a teacher or a wife.  Sometimes I just need to sit with them and remember when we would sit on the roof and drink tea and look at the stars... or be reminded of when I woke up in the rain, yet in my bed, on one of my first nights as Christina's roomie...  or the time I came home and she was sitting on her bed sobbing amongst a huge pile of clothes on the floor.  I was so astonished to see anything out of place that I didn't know if I should ask her what happened to her CLOTHES or what happened to her, and in the end I don't think I asked anything at all, just sat there and waited for the story to unfold. 

What I really need in these moments isn't an email or even a phone call, I need a jet plane to fly me off to Toronto or Montreal or Calgary or Nashville!  But you know what seems to be the next best thing?  A letter.  A piece of frail paper fed into my Olympia de Luxe, typed out from the heart, and put in the mail where it will be received in 2 days or maybe 17 days... depending on the weather, the distance, and the mood of Canada Post that week.  And when that dear friend gets it in the mail, she might be changing diapers or drowning in laundry or sitting staring at her own screen wondering what she needs... and there will be a glimpse of the past, a note from a faraway friend who misses her dearly and still remembers the little things we did together.

A picture snapped in Halifax on Michael & Christina's honeymoon

Letter #18 - Too wired for their own good?

Are we too wired for our own good?  I won't write much on this either... as the article you just read was fairly lengthy.  I will say that as a mother I worry that my not-yet-three year old son knows how to navigate Youtube and that my one year old wants nothing more but to play with my phone.  As a teacher, I see my students every single day literally stuck to their smart phones.  When they think I'm not looking they sneak a look at facebook or quickly write a text.  If there is a lull in class they immediately plug in their headphones.  They do not want me to do examples with them on the overhead because they just like looking at things on the digital projector... they would rather be passively observing some digitalized version of what I am explaining to them in real words and symbols that they can tangibly see and hear.  It does worry me because I can see that their ability to concentrate has shortened from only a decade or so ago when I was in high school.  It also worries me because they are addicted to the constant information being put out there for them to see.  When I was in high school we had to dial-up to connect to the internet and the noise it made was so loud my parents knew everytime I was going online.  They got an internet bill each month saying how many hours had been used, and if we went over I had some answers to give.  Plus, even though we were connected to social sites like MSN Messanger and ICQ, our access was limited by the sheer physicality of accessing a computer.  So even if we were addicted we had to limited our screen time because we simply could not spend all day sitting at our computers.  Today's kids face a different world... one which we will have to learn to navigate sooner or later!

Letter #4 - Lost and Returned! (and the passing of a dear family friend)

  

 

Included in this letter was a write-up on a very influencial man in Vancouver, Milton Wong, who had recently passed away.  Here is the clipping of the article, with apologies for how it is divided - newspapers are not easily scanned - they are so big!

 

Even though I did not know Milton Wong, I felt a pang of sadness that it took me a whole month to hear of his passing.  I couldn't help but imagine a time not too long ago when loved ones would go overseas, or even just to another part of the country, and news of an illness or death might not reach you until it was too late, certainly not in time to book a last minute flight to visit in the hospital or attend a funeral.  In moments like this I am thankful for technology. 

If you had a difficult time reading the article click here.

Letter #15 - A Lovely Postcard!

 

Letter #12 & 14: Bumps in the Road