As I commented to my partner earlier today, the patently boring review of one’s life is diluted by adherence to the thesis, “Write what you know”. It is a small compliment. Yet for whatever prospective reason I also imagine it is worthwhile to note the specifics of those whom one remembers in particular. Just part of my pervasive angst but otherwise moderately sustainable.

The summary record of my life is boldly speaking a division of childhood, teenage and adulthood of which respectively I remember nothing, some and most in that order. The altering depth reflects the surviving worth of the details not just the diminutive and distancing effluxion of time.

Childhood:

I am informed I was born in Montréal, Québec (1948). At two months of age, my parents and I went to England where my sister was born about a year later. The trans-Atlantic voyage was accomplished on the Queen Mary. Our nanny in England was Mrs. Begg (“Auntie Begg”) whom I only briefly recall because she continued for many years upon our return to Canada to send birthday greetings.

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As I languished in bed earlier this morning, I addressed the issue of productivity. Specifically I examined whether being as I am now demonstrably unproductive is a manifest peril? Having spent the better part of a lifetime (basically everything I can safely recall from the age of ten onwards) devoted to accomplishment of one order or another, I now find myself submerged in a pool of iridescent indolence. It is an achievement of dubious success in spite of the shimmer; the effulgence of the moment is undeniable but I rather feel I’ve done little or nothing to deserve it. Is it the want of orthodox christianity, the absence of punishment for the crime, the reward without the suffering, the summit without the steep climb? As unfamiliar as I am with my present circumstance of inconsolable satisfaction, I am spirited to discover it is a poison which haunts young people as well. This, not because I prefer universal disadvantage, rather because it illustrates universal applicability of the infection and thus softens what might otherwise be dismissed merely as a private neurosis.

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The chronology of springtime is upon us. Its celebrated flourishing performance is as inevitable and unstoppable as its seasonal celestial transition. Everyone whom I know in this hemisphere of the whirling globe is anxious to proclaim to me their overriding occupation of late within gardens, upon meadows and adjacent ponds. As I drove home today from Stittsville along the Appleton Side Road it was evident beneath the azure dome that residents of the glistening county properties have undertaken the enhancement and definition of their rural estate. Things were in pristine order within the rolling boundaries of awakening green.  Its picturesque image was akin to a vast dining table set with silver, linen and Crown Derby awaiting the arrival of the guests. The headtable guest is Springtime itself, the innate burgeoning verdant grasses, hedges and trees, the overnight arrival of duty bound participants who will in turn flawlessly explode.

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If I were asked I would commend jazz to even the most illiterate. The variety sufficiently assures there is little risk of confusing Beethoven and Bach particularly if you haven’t read about jazz or much less have never heard it before. It is not however only the variety that enamours me.  I wouldn’t make a similar generalization about Rap music. As a pure vehicle for the technical examination of sound, jazz excels. Jazz can be dressed up or down.  Made to be happy or sad. Thoughtful or whimsical.

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Reluctant as I am to admit to materialism, upon reflection I suppose it isn’t something for which I ought to feel the least indignity.  Retail after all is at the heart of global prosperity beginning for example on our own shores in Canada with the inestimable fur trade. Indeed my own paternal grandfather was among other things a fur trader, specifically silver fox.

The North American fur trade began as early as the 1500s between Europeans and First Nations and was a central part of the early history of contact between Europeans and the native peoples of what is now the United States and Canada. In 1578 there were 350 European fishing vessels at Newfoundland. Sailors began to trade metal implements (particularly knives) for the natives’ well-worn pelts. The first pelts in demand were beaver and sea otter, as well as occasionally deer, bear, ermine and skunk.

Fur robes were blankets of sewn-together, native-tanned, beaver pelts. The pelts were called castor gras in French and “coat beaver” in English, and were soon recognized by the newly developed felt-hat making industry as particularly useful for felting. Some historians, seeking to explain the term castor gras, have assumed that coat beaver was rich in human oils from having been worn so long (much of the top-hair was worn away through usage, exposing the valuable under-wool), and that this is what made it attractive to the hatters. This seems unlikely, since grease interferes with the felting of wool, rather than enhancing it. By the 1580s, beaver “wool” was the major starting material of the French felt-hatters. Hat makers began to use it in England soon after, particularly after Huguenot refugees brought their skills and tastes with them from France.

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After a spluttering start on April 2nd – and the subsequent cancellation of the opening ceremony and rebooking – the Mississippi Golf Club officially unbuckled today April 12th, a blustery Friday. In anticipation of the event we had invited my erstwhile physician to join us for breakfast in the club house but he reluctantly advised he was scheduled to be in surgery. Undeterred we pursued our springtime provocation though admittedly this morning with a fraction of hesitancy given the intemperate conditions.  We were nonetheless elated upon driving over the hill on Wilson Street in the Village of Appleton along the Mississippi River towards the golf club to see that the parking lot was agreeably congested.

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There is within me a long-standing urban bias which irresistibly and oft times voraciously compels me to honour traffic, not so much the vehicular kind as the figurative urbanity of life, the busyness of the streets, the flourishes to and from the theatre, the concert, the art galleries, the market, the offices and the retail stores. The suavity and worldliness of the urban citizens sometimes collide with the breeding and mannerliness of their rustic cousins but there is undeniably an atmosphere of exhilaration on the sidewalk of Fifth Avenue and the commotion surrounding Bergdorf Goodman and the Plaza Hotel.

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Through the screened balcony door wafts the carnivorous aroma of a barbecue. Likely it is from the corner unit below. Overnight their seasonal patio furniture has materialized. It has taken but one day of climbing temps and azure skies reflected in the river to invoke the broadband summer tradition. Coincidentally this morning we spoke with Chef Wendy MacDonald at the Mississippi Golf Club. The latest intelligence is that the clubhouse opens for business on Friday. We have accordingly booked our inaugural outing though regrettably sans Mr. Bones who is bound for duty in the Operating Room.

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Several weeks ago I ordered a mariner’s cap, similar to the traditional Greek fishmonger’s woollen cap with a small shiny black brim, dark blue navy colour, iconic gold anchor front and centre, black woven braid about the bottom edge and some knotted gold cord for decoration. It arrived (after clearing Customs and paying a small fee) in good order. It would have been fine if it had fit properly; but it didn’t. It was too big. My fault.  At least at first I thought it was. Instead of measuring with a string or tape as suggested by the retailer (who by the way is in Sweden), I opted to use the same broad measurement encrypted on the other hats I already own (in this case XL). Turns out in retrospect, after having (out of curiosity) today measured the circumference of my head with a tape measurer, the belated conclusion is the same as I drew initially from examination of my other hats (XL).  So even if I had measured as instructed I would have chosen the same broad measurement, the wrong one. And while you might be excused for imagining that that is today’s lesson – namely, don’t bother to read the instructions – it actually isn’t. The real lesson is that on-line shopping continues to have its insurmountable perils in spite of its efforts at efficiency. By the way I also should add that the measurement table was identical on another hat site in New York City.  So the error wasn’t just a blip.

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For the most part I would say I can tolerate alleged social indiscretions especially those deriving from or directed to what I consider either superfluous or pretentious conduct. For example, referring to a new adult acquaintance by first name; or, sitting down before the guests are seated at table; or, sampling a plate of community hors d’oeuvres before inviting others to do so. That sort of thing, basically nothing that is damaging if at all except as exotically recognized by some quaint book of etiquette. At most the penalty for such misbehaviour is the collective remorse of others, perhaps an ingredient of sorrowful pouting; or at worse an unexpressed regret for lack of breeding.

People who ridicule etiquette as a mass of trivial and arbitrary conventions, “extremely troublesome to those who practise them and insupportable to everybody else,” seem to forget the long, slow progress of social intercourse in the upward climb of man from the primeval state.

Etiquette in Society (1922) by Emily Post

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