Daniela Ginta, Freelance Writer

Gratitude makes the journey better. Kindness, too.

Author: Daniela Ginta Page 52 of 99

My path is a winding one. I write, I raise my sons, I love and I live.
Waking up to a new adventure every day. I have all that I need at every moment.

Chasing Happiness

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On June 27, 2014

In Life Stories, Motherhood

HappinessIf it’s past 9 o’clock kids should be in bed, or so the unwritten laws of good parenting dictate. But the breezy night just set in after a long hot day and we still dance our feet on the pavement on the way to the river.

We take the back alleys because they are unpretentious. No perfect lawns, no empty yards. There are signs of life in the back alleys, you see.

The boys hop and chat, one’s words stomping the other’s words because ‘oh, I had this thought and it’ll go away if I don’t say it now…’ and what do you do then… Word stomping has its place.

Today is not it. While one talks the other listens and finds something to do on the side. Kids’ hands and minds are such busy machines, they cannot sit still and they should not. That’s how they stay joyful. That’s how they learn the world.

‘I will call this happiness,’ big boy says, wrapping his palm around the big fluffy head of a Tragopogon.

This is happiness… the night breeze carries his words further. I smile. Indeed, nothing wrong with that.

‘I want happiness,’ little boy chirps in.

That’s when it gets better. They run to get the next happiness globe of fleeting stuff (literally) and their laughter hops along with them.

‘My happiness, I touched it first!’

‘Mom, you want some happiness?’ The best answer is the one my soul paints across my face; I smile because what else can match the state I’m in. I have some, look, it’s right here.

‘I want some!’ little boy says, realizing that the blob he was holding was taken away by the wind.

Big boy laughs and wickedly rubs ‘happiness’ onto his little brother shirt, throws me a big smile and does the same to my shirt. There are signs of happiness all over. Sticky, fluffy, goofy. Let the magic be…

We get home late, having bumped into every blob of happiness on the way. It shows, inside and outside.

Boys brush teeth, they ask for cuddles, and one more and then just one more… I am stuck in thinking of how simple it is to get some happiness.

It is. It’s what you make of it really. It can be as elusive as a blob of fluff that you have now and the wind takes away the next second. It could be that someone wrestles you to the ground and takes it away. Chances are you won’t be laughing but then again, why not? It’s already gone but there is more to get if you keep on going…

Happiness is there, but you won’t find it where the aim is perfection. Just ask the boys. The big fluffy happy blobs are all huddled in the back alleys, where it’s all real and some of the less elegant things show. ‘cause they do, life is like that.

As for that happiness? Open your eyes, stretch out your hand and grab it before the wind takes it away… and if it does, keep on going, there’s more.

And you know how I know the boys were right? Because this morning on my run, I took the back alleys as I usually do. There were big fluffy Tragopogon heads all along and though I did not pick them, they whispered their secret to me.

The boys’ dash hunting happiness during our late night walks, the laughing about all the happiness they can rub on each other or mine over the occasional ‘Don’t rub your happiness on me!’ – it was all there. And just like that, happiness was there too.

Really, it’s what you make of it. So we made it a Tragopogon fluffy head. In fact, I am ready to change the plant’s status: from invasive species to reason to smile and keep going. Wouldn’t you?

Life Is Only A Part Of It All

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On June 26, 2014

In Life Stories

Passing onThe mood is somber today. The two guinea pigs that squeaked their way into our lives for the last four years died suddenly, one after another.

Digging a grave, no matter how small, is not a small thing. It just isn’t.

But I had to. One last night and one this morning. We chose the spot under the lilacs, it’s out of the way and lilacs are suitable guardians.

The ground was soft at first but then it turned rock hard. All I could think of was digging a real grave, it’s overwhelming in all possible ways. It was a flurry of convoluted feelings that ruffled my mood for a long time.

You can’t think further than that, there is a lot of murky stuff you don’t know how to approach. Life, as real as it gets. Life and death are the opposite image of each other, continuations of each other, complementing each other.

Every day, all around us, life grows roots in what was alive yesterday and dead today. It feeds the next blooms, it powers the next laughter and it reminds of the only thing we hold solidly at all times: the moment we’re in. A short, revealing ownership that carries us into what’s next.

I dig, we lay the piglets in, the boys cover and we hug. It makes everything easier. They had a good life, we all agree. And passed the five-year-old mark, which many say it’s a good age for a guinea pig. We made small crosses out of wood and twine, the boys wanted to.

A few steps away the garden abounds with green; growing, from the roots up. Continuation.

Pumpkins are in bloom, bright yellow, small suns staring into the big one in the sky. By afternoon, the flowers will start to wither, they only last a few hours… Right next to them, spinach, lush and green and loved by the piglets. Dandelion leaves, spinach and peppers were among their favourites.

The boys sighed… Now we have no more pets.

Indeed. I cannot be persuaded to buy any from the pet store and they don’t want that either. Hosting the piglets (SPCA-adopted orphans) made us think of how unfair it is to the animals. All the cuddles in the world and vitamin drops do not make up for freedom. A golden cage is still a cage.

Ours were not big on cuddles though. Just like bunnies, they are skittish creatures, guinea pigs, and like to be among their own kind. And who can blame them. Being prey animals, they also hide their sickness to not be vulnerable to predators, the ones who know write. It’s sad to know that. It means their instincts are still within, so the longing for freedom must be too… It’s unfair to restrict that.

The day moves along. I tend to the garden, the boys pick the slim strawberries harvest and they munch on baby carrots. I open a pea pod and they eat the bright green blobs. They’re sweet just like that, out of the pod, we’ll have some more for dinner.

The pods go in the compost, to die and live at the same time.

Life continues, it’s the circle that has no beginning and no end. Today we caught a glimpse of it, and we got to feel, again, how it rattles the illusion of permanence.

Once again, I am grateful for reminders, they are but soul dwellings where I stop and look to what’s behind and what’s in front of me. Life: to see, to heed, to be part of. We are.

 

Critical Thinking Develops, Just Like A Muscle, When Used Often

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On June 20, 2014

In Armchair Mayor Column, Environment, Kamloops, Life Stories, Social issues

(Published as a column in the AM News on Friday June 20, 2014)

To protectTwo issues are topping this week’s hot list. One local – the imminent closure of Stuart Wood Elementary – and one provincial, the approval of the Northern Gateway pipeline.

As it happens, they seem to have at least two common denominators. The first is that they will affect more than the present generations and they will cause changes to the landscape as we know it.

The second is that such decisions require open and extended public consultations and a strong dose of critical thinking in order to be deemed acceptable by the majority of people, an important safeguarding feature of any democracy.

The Stuart Wood imminent closure has brought forth a sad reality and it extends past the walls of the actual heritage building. The downtown needs a public English-speaking elementary school. Lloyd George is a French immersion school that could be converted, once again, to a dual track. Or another site can be considered as a potential location for a new school.

Should the school close, the whole face of the downtown will change; its vibrancy will suffer and new families may be deterred from moving in, knowing that they’ll have to buss their children to a school up the hill.

As the saying goes, when there is a will, there is a way. In this case, it could be paved with some solid critical thinking bricks leading to a result that will benefit families with young children and all residents who want their community to stay as vibrant as ever. Schools can do that.

As for the Northern Gateway pipeline, yes, it was approved. No big surprise there.

The decision was made after an independent panel reviewed scientific data, the PM said, and yes, it is supposed to bring tremendous economic growth and create new jobs.

And who in their right mind would stand in the way of economic growth and more jobs (though opponents argue that more existing ones will be lost should the pipeline happen)?

The answer is no one; if it’s done right, that is.

By the looks of it, there are still multiple issues regarding the pipeline. Will the jobs (most of them temporary, let’s not forget that, once the pipeline is built) be given to Canadians, and how much of the revenue will stay in the province?

Yet he ultimate question and most important is, of course, how much is the pristine beauty of that area of the province is worth, should a spill occur. You simply cannot put a price to that or risk it in any way.

According to Nature Canada, the oldest nature conservation charity in Canada, a pipeline has an estimated ‘one in four chance of a major spill during its lifespan.’ Any risk of a spill is too much.

The process leading to the final decision was anything but responsible, according to a group of 300 unapologetic scientists who called the Northern pipeline report flawed and useless. Environmental groups, regular citizens and a coalition of BC aboriginal groups openly opposed the project, saying that the pipeline should not happen.

Too much to risk, they say and not enough to gain.

Here’s an analogy: imagine you’re standing on a cliff by the water, ready to jump in. You are a good swimmer, but there are boulders that can hurt you as you jump. Some say the risk is minimal, the risk too small to count, others say the risk is high and the effects irreversible; they say you shouldn’t. Would you still jump?

Critical thinking is what we employ in making decisions. From every day small ones to big, monumental ones that are to be reflected onto many generations to come as well as the present ones, and also sealing the fate of the place we call home, province and country-wide both.

We tell our kids to think before they act and be ready to face the consequences. But if consequences are not immediate, as in this case, who will be facing them?

Critical thinking is required in today’s world more than anything. We’re bombarded with a flurry of information, we have to choose, we have to stand by an issue or another, and, bottom line: we have to be present in the community, just like we are in our own homes, and have a say in the decisions to be made.

In case of decisions involving more than one person and one generation, the effect of any ill-fated mishap is multiplied to the point of being impossible to estimate.

Critical thinking, getting involved and voicing an opinion might just prevent that.

How else can we look into our children’s eyes and say ‘to the best of my knowledge, I did everything I could’ without looking down because in truth, we know we did not…

Are We Witnessing The Disappearance Of Something We’re Equipped To Do So Well and Benefit From?

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On June 18, 2014

In Armchair Mayor Column, Life Stories, Self-improvement, Social issues

(Originally published as a column in the AM News on Friday June 13, 2014)

In yet another attempt to purge some of the dust-collecting items in our home, I went through the old correspondence drawers. Two of them.

I kept all letters that my parents wrote from the time I left home at the age of 18, same with my sister’s , and my close friends’ also. I kept the greeting cards too.

It was only two drawers, one and a half to be precise, so it shouldn’t have taken too long. But it did. I got caught up in reading some of the letters, including some very candid ones written by my niece when she turned seven and was trying her hand, literally, at handwriting.

Then an old nag surfaced. The disappearance of handwriting. Cursive writing, as we call it.

My sons have always been fascinated with the magic of it. They love the roundness of words as they appear on the paper, and they love the almost mysterious nature of a handwritten letter.

Many of today’s kids type instead of writing down on paper, because they’ve learned to do it so fast you get dizzy just looking at them do it. They get even faster by using acronyms for everything and writing as if they drew letters and numbers from a hat and threw them on the screen. Spelling is taking a hard hit as we speak.

Short words become shorter and so does attention span.

Most of today’s children will not write a single handwritten letter or have a journal. Have you tried handwriting after typing for a while? It’s painfully slow, you make mistakes, and the hand seems to be disconnected from the brain. Patience is a precious, rare commodity these days.

But what also happens is that when you write things down, they seem to stick better.

Some researchers who looked into how the brain does it all went as far as to suggest that in some cases dyslexia may be lessened should we return children to good old handwriting. It’s worth a try anyway.

Because, they say, when you struggle to learn how to write that letter, many areas of the brain fire up and there’s a whole process involved in mastering it.

Printing and typing, or writing the letters following a dotted line just don’t get the brain firing up so intensely.

Journal writing, by hand, has been used a therapeutical tool by many a psychologists over the years and many people swear by keeping a written account of their days. Ideas flow freely, you just allow the brain to drip onto the paper and the time dedicated to it is a time of solitude and an opportunity for introspection.

A mirror of some sort, you could say.

When we write by hand we become mindful by default.

Reflection time gives us a measure of where we are in the world, allows us to think without being rushed and encourages brain and personality growth.

The letters I was perusing a couple of days ago tell more than the stories within. They are a reflection of the people who wrote them; a glimpse into time, then. Just like that, my many journals over the years tell stories of more than just life happenings.

Letters and journals are human maps. You can read emotions, just like you can read words. I cannot escape the feeling that we will lose something precious and essential to our nature if we live them behind.

Typing may be fast and efficient but it’ll never be the same. Acronyms have been around for a while. Journalists and students jotting notes have always employed them with success. While handwriting, that is.

Students taking notes by hand learn better than when they type course notes. Having but paper and pen, and a whole lot of attention directed to the teacher rather than a handling a laptop, while simultaneously texting or updating some social media status, keeps you present in a room where you’re supposed to do nothing but acquire knowledge, think and ideally, ask enough questions to start healthy and topic-oriented debates.

Writing things down makes you think. Hitting backspace starts happening before you write things down more often than not. Perhaps that could serve as an enhancing feature of ‘freedom of expression.’

Which Legoland Is More Real After All?

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On June 16, 2014

In Life Stories, Motherhood

Because I live in Lego land. Truly so. The living room is home to a half-built castle which is home to a half-built garage which is, temporarily, just temporarily they say, home to some lost Lego souls (plasticky yes, but in Lego land that is norm) that have lost their hats, hair and an arm here and there. Yes, it’s all small parts. Very.

As you make your way into the kitchen – small open spaces allow for little if any delimitation of such areas, but please allow me – there is a box of Lego which I cover out of respect for myself. It’s a bit too much to see. The remains (if you are a pessimist) or the building blocks (if you’re an optimist) of an airport, plus some aircraft bits.

I am a realist, which is why I choose to put a lid on it. Literally. I know it’ll be a while until any Lego aircraft will be on takeoff status. It’ll come, just not yet. There are only that many hours in one day you see.

Just as you veer into the hallway leading to the boys’ room, a nice pine dresser almost invites the unawares to pull open the drawers. The bottom one I suggest you leave be. Yes, it’s the Lego of many sets, grouped under that impossible to describe category that shall not be named.

LostThat’s the drawer where I throw pieces as I find them, when I clean up or, in a more unfortunate turn of events, in the middle of the night. Which I do, more often that a human should be allowed to. I am not at my most gracious when that happens, but there’s nothing like a square little bugger like that to remind you about living in the moment.

If you’re still with me, we are now in the boys’ room. Under one of the beds there are two bins of … Yep, Lego. The Hobbit series came in strong because you see, when the kid has Lego on his Christmas or birthday wish list, you oblige, because, and only because… Lego is a game of building, thinking and well, growing up in a most harmonious way. Thinking, while staying out of trouble. For now. And not every day, but that’s a story for another day.

There are three more bins, a recent and lovingly passed on inheritance from my partner’s busy Lego past. Lots of exciting, now long extinct sets that need but busy hands to exist again in all their glory. Busy hands are here, I see them every day.

They do get busy. Every now and then, a fever runs through the house and I am never sure whether to bask in the fresh breeze of that enthusiasm or pack some quick bags and run out the door to hide until the fever passes.

Why, you may ask? Creativity is my most favourite ally in day to day life, so should I not encourage it when it hits home? Yes. And I do. But here’s the darker side, if you will allow me to call it that. As the fever carries on, great ideas materialize into half-built this and that. Like mushrooms after a copious rain, they sprout all over, especially on the kitchen floor because ‘Mom, I love sitting here while you cook and build Lego.’ Hence the kitchen becoming a mine zone. I am, in many ways, a survivor; a good thing.

Now when we call it a day, nothing really disappears. This plastic new species that inhabits our abode is work-in-progress for days to come, so I have to let the various contraptions be wherever they find some living space. On the dining table is tops. Location, location, location! Then there’s the floor, under the chair in the corner, on the old chest-turned-coffee table-turned ‘don’t you dare brush by it or everything falls off’ and so on.

A mere 800 square feet of living space can only allow for that much storage space though. So once the Lego cavalcade sets itself comfortably all over our living quarters, we politely retreat to dine outside. Al fresco as they say, with complimentary bugs. The bright side is that we get to see growing structures not made of Lego for a change.

Bad weather sends us back inside every now and then but then again, bad weather is a rare occurrence.

LotsSo yes, we live in Lego land.

I’d like to keep on doing so, because you know what? At the end of the day, no matter how many stray pieces attempt to tear my plantar ligaments, and yes, they do, the pain passes like a fleeting cloud and the happy glow of seeing the boys create and getting excited over building ‘something I’ve always wanted to build’ is a sight to behold.

The latest development is that any leftovers are picked off the floors as opposed to being shoved under the bed. Most days anyways…

As for the real Legoland (real is in the eye of the beholder)… well, for now I will choose to maintain the same attitude I have towards zoos. I prefer seeing the wild stuff, if I happen upon it by any chance. As you can easily infer from what you’ve read so far, chance favours me quite a bit. I get to see lots of wild stuff, hence my polite decline to seeing more. For now anyways…

So you see, although challenging at times, life in Lego land means a few things:

  •  That the boys learn patience (ever tried to search for the tiniest, say, white piece, in a big mound of many white pieces? It’s a skill.)
  •  That they learn to be bold in how they create…’It’s a barn’/’No, it’s not!/’Yes it is, because I am the one building it!’ Feel free to replace barn with anything that crosses your mind.
  • That they don’t care much about an orderly house and that allows them to just be. Clear of anything that might hinder spur-of-the-moment creativity, they learn to follow the impulse that allows them to transform ideas into palpable things.

Which in turn allows me to know they are still boys. In no hurry to grow, in no hurry to dismantle their castles, trains, train tracks, barns and people, in no hurry to stop playing.

Which is something we often forget. We start favouring orderly houses and having everything where it belongs at the end of the day, forgetting that children belong in that place where they can play at their hearts content to the point of having to be peeled off at bedtime and waking up early because they have to build further. From one day to the next, life is Lego land is as real as it gets. And seamless.

Continuity… The strongest argument to let Lego land be… A reminder of now and of all the tomorrows to come. Feet hurting or not, it’s a great place to be. Really. Age-proof too.

My Dad, My Poems and The Old Typewriter

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On June 16, 2014

In Life Stories

(An older post, but just as new in expressing my immense gratitude to my Dad, who typed my very first poems on an old typewriter…Because you can never say ‘Thank you’ enough times…)

The albatross...Every day that he did not have to go out in the field, for work, I mean, my Dad would come home with a few typewritten pages. His work stuff that he got to type that day.

There was something miraculous about those typed words. Even the paper smelled differently. And my Dad’s fingers always had some ink on them.

Do you know the old typewriters that go clank clank when you jump with your fingers from one round landing pad to another? Letters come out one by one like odd but cute hollow critters, all lined up in a neat row on the paper and then when you get to the end of the row you pull on this lever with a swift move and the ink tank moves all the way to the left and you start again. Clank clank.

If the paper is too soft then each letter is blotchy and as it sits there all embarrassed by its lack of grace and the big mess around it you feel like you want to pet its round hollow head and say it’s OK little odd thing, you’re on paper, you’re where you should be, that was the point.

Because somehow even though you’re still a kid, the fascination that comes from seeing your words on paper is beyond all imperfections. And when all the words you’ve ever written are handwritten seeing them typed for the first time is a mighty leg-shaking experience. A good one.

The pages my dad holds in his hand today are sprinkled with my words. My poems and short stories that he typed that day. He likes them he says.

I know he’s not just saying it. By the way he looks at me I just feel these solid stepping stones of encouragement that he lays out there for me to walk on and take off flying when I’ll feel like it. I had told my Dad that I want to send some poems out to a few contests.

I am grade 10 and have been writing for quite a while now. Too long, my sister would say, let’s play instead. Up in my quince tree, writing away about the world around and the one inside. Poems, stories, my journal. I am part of a couple of writers’ groups, mostly grown-ups where everybody’s writings is dissected and poked at. My first shot at literary critique if you will. Intimidating but good.

I touch those typewritten pages for the first time and I skip a beat. I read them, fold them neatly in half and put them in an envelope.

My Dad smiles as he sees me run down the cement steps with the envelope in my hand. The walk to the post office is hopeful, how else.

The woman sitting behind the thick glass panel in the deserted post office takes the change through the small round mouse hole and hands me back the stamp. She’s probably bored with her job and annoyed with my bringing my dog in with me. Lick, stick and slide the brown envelope into the long thin mouth of red mailbox outside.

A few months later I buy the literary magazine, yet again, and this time I see my seashell poem there. The albatross one too.They’re both there. I forget to breathe.

The words are not the cute hollow black caterpillars my Dad stuck to the paper for me a while ago. These ones are still mine but they make me think of kids who leave home all rambunctious and bedhead-haired-all-day-long to go to boarding school and return all clean and well-mannered a while after.

I keep reading my poems. They’re mine alright. I show them to my Dad. We laugh, he shakes my hand, a ceremonious thing he does because hugs are reserved for other occasions. And it’s perfect. I feel all grown-up now. I show them to my Mom. She’s happy. They buy two more copies of the magazine so they can cut the poems out and keep them in the kitchen in the old cupboard with the small bible and old photos of me and my sister. For show and tell to people who stop for coffee and chat.

I took a detour from writing for many years. But I missed seeing my words dance and laugh belly laughs on paper. So I started writing again. I’ll never stray from it again. I can’t. And every time my words make it on paper, glossy and not so glossy, but published somewhere out there, all I can think of is how this whole thing started: with my Dad typewriting every one of them and believing they can fly high like the very albatrosses his little girl was writing about.

The gift of published word. How did he know?

Some TV Sets Have More Stories Once Unplugged…

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On June 10, 2014

In Armchair Mayor Column, Environment, Kamloops, Social issues

Originally published as a column in the AM News on Friday, June 6, 2014

A few days ago some of our neighbours had a garage sale. A bit of a slow day, that Saturday, they did not get many customers. At the end of the day, they left a few things on the lawn with a ‘Free’ sign attached. Among them, a vacuum cleaner and a TV set.

Three days later, the TV set is still on the lawn, the ‘Free’ sign fading away as we speak. It’s in great shape but it lacks flatness (the irony…), so no one wants it. It has survived the last night’s thunderstorm and the scorching heat during the last few days.

And why would anyone want it anyway. Free is yesterday’s bargain. Worthless, or so it seems. Today an item has to be either antique-looking or brand spanking new to be taken into consideration.

Yet an uncomfortable thought surfaces as I write this. Where’s this TV set going to go now? Dump? Perhaps not yet, but a few more days of being subjected to the elements will render it broken and thus useless. And then what? Then it’s the dump.

Think of how many TV sets are there already and how many will join the ranks of broken paraphernalia soon. Unless they’re all being sent to some third world countries for the kind of recycling that we would not get close to – too many toxic chemicals and heavy metals to meddle with – but hope someone will.

New models of everything, from trucks to TV sets to children’s electronic gadgets come out every year. From one day to the next, the truck or car seems to make an odd sound and may not be worth fixing but replacing altogether, the TV screen could be a bit bigger, and the kid’s toy… well, the new games just won’t fit. So there.

Everything new is made with resources, mostly non-renewable ones.

Every few days a new mine project surfaces and location details are unsettling. Like this morning when I caught the tail end of a news piece about a new mine nearby, the Ruddock Creek Mine. To be opened, should the environmental and safety assessment deem it doable, near the headwaters of Adams River.

Yep, the one I learned about as soon as we moved to Kamloops; I learned that every four years it gets so full of spawning sockeye it turns red. Millions of them, I was told about the numbers many witnessed in 2010. So the 2014 will be another big one. What about 2018? Or 2022?

Our own Ajax conundrum takes us on a dance of back and forth that tugs at our minds mixing the needs and wants in such ways that we don’t know what’s what and whether we need it… Tailings here or there, the thing is, mines to be opened or reopened near communities need to be properly assessed. No shortcuts, no misleading information. Transparency.

It’s not paranoia or some mad environmental activism, but fear of what’s to become of this province in a few years should all the projects be freely approved. The Northern Gateway Pipeline assessment was described as ‘flawed analysis’ by 300 Canadian and US scientists in an open letter to PM Harper just days ago. The project should not be approved, they strongly urged.

Economic growth goals make sense as long as they don’t destroy the very grounds they rely on to happen. We need jobs, people need oil and copper and gold and zinc and they’ll need more because more is never enough these days. But when the goal is mainly exporting and the jobs not that numerous, is it truly worth it? For who?

Some of the above resources were used to make the TV set that sits on my neigbours’ lawn. What gives?

That we need things as we go through life is true, just like it is true that a country cannot rely solely on its own set of natural resources to mine and use. Some will come from somewhere else and some of ours will go somewhere else too.

Yet during the planning for mining, transporting and using of resources, the health of land and people cannot be dismissed or brushed over in flawed and incomplete assessments.

It comes to what we’re willing to live with. If you spill a bucket of oil in your garden, how long till you’re comfortable to let your pets or children walk around? How long till you trust that patch of land to grow your veggies in?

The TV set I pass by on my way to downtown is a sad reminder that we do live with the consequences of our actions. This one is just more visible that’s all.

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