Dad

I’m in a bring up the past kind of mood lately.  Not to say there isn’t a lot going on in the present… there certainly is, probably more now than at any point since my break-up.  It’s just I prefer to let the present unfold and I’ll talk about it after the fact.  It’s been a busy, busy week with little time to read anything, let alone blog or comment, but the pace should return to normal by next week.

Maria wrote in my last post that she thought I was mature for a 19 year old.  I suppose in retrospect in certain ways I was, but I still have to stifle a chuckle about that.  The good and bad thing about blogging is that I paint myself with my own brush.  Good because I know the exact truth of my own experiences and I can relay them to you as a way of releasing myself from my past.  Bad because I know the exact truth of my own experiences and I can twist, distort and sidestep them as I see fit.

The truth as I remember it was that I was probably about as mature as the average 19 year old young man is.  I engaged in risky behaviour.  I drank a ridiculous amount of booze and took a ridiculous amount of various drugs to the point that I barely remember my late teens.  I never cheated on anyone, but I jumped from bed to bed fast enough to make cheating virtually impossible anyway.  I fought.  A lot.  So much so that I can barely make a fist with my right hand and my knuckles and fingers look gnarled and twisted.  I cannot straighten my pinky finger and it throbs on cold days.

I look back on those days with an amused embarrassment cut liberally with a lot of loneliness and emotional pain.  But I totally get what Maria is saying too.  I did have a lot of maturity and awareness back then as well, as contradictory as that sounds.  Truth is I was always quite old for my age.  Part of it is makeup, I think, but most of it is definitely environment.  And no one person took up more space in my environment growing up than Dad.

I’ve alluded to Dad’s alcoholism before but booze is really the defining thing in Dad’s life.  He started drinking about the age of 14 and never looked back.  He is now 68, but in reality looks 15 years older.  He will die soon, and alcohol will likely be a mitigating factor.  It is only in the past year he has battled his addiction to alcohol, and he struggles mightily with it, especially since he will not resort to outside help.  Frankly, I am surprised he’s made it this long.

Next time you are at a movie theatre or a play, and there is a stock ‘drunk’ character look around you.  Most people will be laughing, but there will be a few who are stony or clearly forcing a chuckle.  Those are the ones who grew up or are married into a destructive environment with a drunk.  In reality it isn’t funny.  It’s painful and all-consuming and hard to describe to someone who’s never been there.

Dad was three people.  Sober Dad, Tipsy Dad and Drunk Dad.  Sober Dad rarely made an appearance.  If you caught him early enough in the morning, Sober Dad was quiet and thoughtful, usually reading the paper or doing a crossword puzzle or watching the news on TV.  Not much in the way of formal education, but whip-smart and well-informed about world issues.  He was intensely curious about all sorts of things, from mundane pointless trivia to more pertinent stuff, especially science and politics.  He was left-leaning centrist, pro-union railway man who voted NDP and detested the modern incarnation of big business and corporations.  He was a deeply critical thinker and took nothing at face value.  A keen mind, impatient with fools and hated hypocrites.  He was a dad in the way a lot of dads of his generation were.  Quiet and stoic, not sharing a lot of himself, but there when you needed him.

Tipsy Dad was the most common incarnation.  He wasn’t falling down drunk, but he clearly had a few and usually had a vacant, glassy look in his eyes.  This was how he was most of the day.  He would be louder, ruder, and his moods were usually all over the place.  He could have more positive traits like Sober Dad, but far more likely he would be boorish.  He had a tendency to bully us kids unmercifully when he was under pressure.  He would tease, poke fun, play mind games, wind us up and explode if we didn’t take his japes with the appropriate good humour. 

Drunk Dad in a lot of ways was better than Tipsy Dad, because he usually just brooded quietly and angrily, muttering to himself and shaking his head.  Once in a while though he would become violently angry and would go absolutely ballistic.  More than once he hit me.  Once he strangled the dog by the collar in front of me because I forgot to feed her.  I begged him to let her go and he did, but it was a gut-wrenchingly long time.  As a drunk, he was awful, spiteful, hate-filled, and ground down by a persistent perception of failure and worthlessness.  It was like living inside a pressure cooker that could explode any moment.  I often wondered why he drank so much, since it seemed to make him so constantly miserable.

Dad knew he drank too much but since he figured he was functioning – that is, he went to work everyday and made sure the bills were paid – it was okay.  Mom was on the verge of leaving him a lot of times, but did not want the stigma of having to go on welfare.  So she stayed.  So we all stayed.  And in staying, you learn to adapt to your environment.  You learn to read moods.   You learn to tiptoe through the minefield.  You keep your head down, your mouth shut and never say anything that’s going to wake the sleeping dragon.

The children of drunks have to grow up in a hurry, because they’ll never cope with the environment they’re in if they stay the same age and maturity level as their peers.  Once I became old enough to realize not all households were like mine, I stopped inviting friends over.  It was just easier that way.  I spoke and acted at home with the sole purpose of keeping the peace and maintaining an impossible balance.  It was like trying to build a house of cards during a hurricane.  It bled into virtually every other area of my life.

Often in my younger years, my appearance of maturity was in actuality a mask for a lack of maturity.  I was mimicking what I thought people wanted out of me.  No doubt a part of all that was real experience and real maturity, but the reality of it was it stunted me in far more important ways.  A real and balanced sense of maturity is still brewing and developing in me.  In all of us, I suppose.

Anyway, that got really far away from me, and a lot deeper than I expected or wanted to flesh out here.  I’ll return to it soon.  I’ll promise I’ll let you in on what’s going on soon.

-PW

PW's Most Awkward Date Ever (So Far)

Before I begin this post, there are a few things you should probably know about me.  They may seem off-topic, but it is relevant to the Most Awkward Dinner Date I Ever Went On.

I'm firmly in the liberal/progressive camp when it comes to both my politics and how I live my personal life.  I have been for most of my life.  It matches my moral compass the most closely and I couldn't conceive of living any other way.  I vote either Green Party or New DemocraticParty, depending on the election, what's at stake and the candidates involved.  Most conservatives (at least nowadays) would sneer at me for being a 'socialist' (little realizing, of course we are ALL socialists, just to varying degrees).  Now having said that, I believe that most people who identify as conservative are, at their core, good people.  While I don't necessarily agree with conservatives on most topics, I believe in their sincerity of doing what they think it right.  I can respect that, except when it comes to a few things.  Specifically when it comes to issues of race, gender or orientation.

Part of my journey as person is coming to terms with and overcoming my own racism, sexism and homophobia.  I am all these things.  No, I'm not saying this to assuage my white male liberal guilt.  I'm merely stating facts.  Being racist, sexist or a homophobe, or putting up with these things in my daily life won't get any of us anywhere.  Pushing other people down merely gives me the illusion of being elevated above them.  It doesn't actually make it so.  If my neighbour doesn't have the same rights, opportunities and harassment-free environments I do, it affects me.  I take this shit seriously.

Having said all of that, there are times I don't live up to my own morality.  It happens.  Often someone makes a racist comment or a gay joke and I pretend I didn't hear it because it's easier.  Or I don't want to rock the boat.  Or whatever.  I do what I can, but I'm not perfect and there are many times I've lacked the courage to take a stand.  There have been times I had, there have been many more times I haven't.  Now that I'm a father, I do voice my opinion more as an example for them to follow.

Soooo anyway, about this date...

It is 1995.  I'm 19, fresh-faced and fancy free living on my own out west.  I left home, the city and the province abruptly a few weeks after my high school graduation at the age of 17 and it would be about 3 years before I'd be back in Winnipeg.  That is a long and complicated story for another day.  Anyway, I was working as a gas station clerk, living in a cheap apartment above an appliance repair shop, partying almost constantly.  Things were okay... I was living mostly for the moment, the way 19 year olds often do.  Happy memories, but something I wouldn't want to revisit.

I was beginning to really grow into my own as far as sex and relationships go, which was a far cry from being an introverted nerdish bookworm in high school.  I was experimenting a little with same-sex relationships, but while it was fun, it really wasn't my cup of tea.  For the first time in my life, I was happy with how I looked.  I looked like the love child of Matthew Sweet and Gord Downie and dressed like Kurt Cobain on the MTV Unplugged concert a year and a half earlier.  There were quite a few partners that came and went in that stretch of time.

Anyway, in the middle of all this chaos, I was at a local bar one night with my cousin who was in town visiting at the time.  He happen to know a woman who was sitting with a couple of friends at the table next to us.  She was a native Winnipeger as well.  We started chatting and hit it off almost instantly.  Her name was Enid (so dubbed because we danced to the Barenaked Ladies song of the same name that night).  We talked and laughed and danced and talked and laughed some more.  I noticed after a while I was holding her hand without realizing it.  She was absolutely beautiful.  She looked like a 21 year old Nana Mouskouri with reddish-blond hair.  An absolute stunner.  Just my visual type.

The end of the night approached and she invited me back to her place.  I would have run there if she told me to.  We got there, but her sister/roommate was up watching television.  We went into her bedroom and made out for an hour or so but she wasn't comfortable going any further.  That was disappointing, but okay with me and I ended up sleeping on the couch that night.  I left in the morning with the promise we'd see each other again.

And we did.  We went out for coffee for a couple of hours and chatted, mostly about our time in Winnipeg (it turns out she grew up in the same end of town I did, but went to the 'other' high school.)  She was open about the fact she found me really attractive, and liked my personality, but wanted to wait a bit before getting physical.  I wasn't thrilled about waiting (I was 19, after all), but I was really attracted to her as well, so I could deal with that.  We went back to my place, watched a movie, made out some more and she went home.  We made another date that weekend.  I decided on dinner at a local Italian place that I heard was pretty good.

We talked on the phone every day until the date.  We chatted, but there was a bit of unease beginning to creep in.  She talked about her ex-boyfriend.  A lot.  Especially about the sex they used to have.  I'm not a jealous person by nature, and I wasn't jealous here (well, maybe a touch), but I was left kind of annoyed by it.  To me, it seemed a trifle rude and it sounded like she was probing me a little, looking to see if I sounded jealous or otherwise trying to get a reaction out of me.  It was getting to be a real turn-off, but we had such a strong connection before, I willing to let it slide for the time being, and I'd just politely tell her to cool it if it kept coming up.

Anyway, it's date night and she walks in, looking absolutely radiant.  We take our seats, have a glass of wine and continue chatting.  Things are going generally pretty good, but was still bringing up her ex-boyfriend every other sentence.  Finally I had to ask her nicely if we could stop talking about the ex so much.  She agreed, apologized and we talked about a few other things before the conversation slipped back to the ex again.  I was about to say something again when she dropped this little gem:

"Oh yeah, my ex called last night - we talked a bit and then we had phone sex... it was silly and I just did it 'cause I was bored."

Okay, there was a little build up to this that I didn't explicitly mention.  I don't exactly remember what it was, it was 17 years ago after all, so she didn't exactly drop this bomb entirely unannounced. 

But still... really? 

I sat in silence for a moment digesting this little tidbit.  I was irritated, but it really didn't strike me yet what exactly she said - it was just so gauche and inappropriate for a date I was really caught for something to say.  I mean, if she's still doing that with an ex-boyfriend... okay.  It's not like we're an item or anything... but why be so explicit?  And couple that with her affirmation that she is not going to do anything physical with me yet and I was at a bit of a loss.  I was trying to come up with something that was diplomatic and expressed my annoyance.  While that was going on, she literally dropped this bomb out of the blue.

"I really like you Wanderer, and I want to go out with you, but I'm not going to have sex with you."

If that happened today, I probably just would have thanked her for her time and walked out on the spot.  At the time, I had next to no formal dating experience.  I was still kind of thinking she was winding me up and she would be laughing any second.  It's not like I was overly aggressive or anything - our make out sessions were pretty steamy, but she had her boundaries and while I tested them a bit, I respected them.  And I didn't feel I was too aloof either, at least going by those same make out sessions.  We came as close to the border between what they would have called 'heavy petting' and sexual acts as I believe two people could go.  And we were both in it with gusto.

I seem to remember myself asking  "So what exactly are we right now?  Dating?  Friends?  I'm not sure and I'm not sure what to think about what you're telling me.  It seems to me like you want to have sex with your ex while keeping me in your back pocket in case things don't pan out, AND you want me to be cool with all of that.  I like you too, and I'm reaaally attracted to you Enid, but I don't do that.  You're with me or you aren't.  If you're with me, great.  If you're not, I can respect your decision.  But no half-assed 'sleep with him/date me platonically stuff, okay?"

Wow, you're all saying to yourselves.  That's pretty awkward.  Yes it was.  But IT GETS WORSE.  A whooooole lot worse.

She asked if we could finish our date and she promised she would think about what I had to say and give me a real answer about her intentions tomorrow.  That was fine with me, but I had a strong feeling things weren't going to work out between us.  And with the rest of our date, that feeling cemented itself.

We talked more about this and that, and she made some kind of compliment about me being mature for my age and not immediately trying to get into her pants.  I shrugged and thanked her, and then she dropped the Hiroshima of bombshells on me.

"That's what I hate about blacks.  If I'm out at a bar or something, they're ALWAYS trying to get me into bed.  There was this nigger in high school, and I used to call him nigger all the time and it used to drive him nuts!  It was so funny, and I got away with it too.  All they think about is sex.  I can't stand black guys!"

I'm abridging this tirade greatly, and I can tell you that she dropped the n-bomb a lot more than that.  You know how in movies, a character will say something really inappropriate and you hear that record-scratching sound effect and everyone in the room will collectively gasp and look at the character like he's completely crazy.  Well, this is how I remember this incident.  There were nine other tables and their conversations went deafeningly silent.  I could feel everyone’s eyes on me.  My face turned beet red.

Look at him, I imagine they’re whispering to each other, clucking their tongues and shaking their heads.  He wants to put his dick in a RACIST.  For SHAAAAMME!!

There is no doubt that everyone heard her.  I desperately wanted to say something, but I was so fundamentally shocked, all I could muster was “I have to use the washroom.”  I went and stared at the mirror for a while.  What the hell do I say to something like that?  Was she serious?  Was she trying to push me away?  What the fuck?  I washed my hands and slipped out of the restaurant and went home.  Cowardly?  Probably.  But I was baffled and reeling and had no real desire to go back and confront that dining room, even though I knew I had done nothing wrong.  I didn’t call her.

She called a couple of days later.  She asked if it was the racist language she used that I left, and I said it was that and her talking about sex with her ex-boyfriend that kind of killed my desire for her.  She said she was sorry, but she ‘had some personal problems’ she was working out (she didn’t elaborate and I didn’t ask).  She asked if we could try again, and I said no, that dating someone who holds such narrowly racist assertions wouldn’t be possible.  At that, I wished her luck and hung up the phone.  I was still pretty upset, because although I didn’t paint a flattering picture of her here, Enid had a whole host of really good qualities.  She was intelligent, (usually) kind, fun, nerdy, cute, and had excellent taste.

Oddly enough, she called me a few years later out of the blue when I moved back to Winnipeg.  Don’t know how she got a hold of me, but she was back in the city herself and we chatted for a while, mostly about jobs mutual people we know etc.  I was about ready to hang up, when she asked if I wanted to hook up.  No dating, no anything, just sex.  I’m ashamed to say I was tempted, but turned her down as I was dating someone else.  Even if I was single, the drama associated with her would probably(?) been enough to put me off.  In the end, no matter how hot, racism is just a gigantic turn-off.

So now I’m ‘in the dating scene’ again, and I absolutely hate it, but I’m somewhat comforted by the fact that no matter how awkward a date goes, it probably will never get that awkward.

How about all of you?  What’s your most awkward dating experience?




In a funny way, here's to Enid, who if nothing else provided a good story to tell...

PW's Date Goes... Not So Well, And Other Tidbits

Someone once said that 'A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person.'  Um, yeah.  That kind of describes how my date went on Friday.  She wasn't rude per se, but she was plenty condescending, which in my books counts pretty much as the same thing.

We met a couple of weeks ago at a local pub/eatery/live music venue and got to chatting and decided on the follow up date to get to know each other a little better.  We talked on the phone a few times, and I found her a little brusque, which wasn't a bad thing really, and after my ex-wife who would never get the point of how she was really feeling about things, it was a little bit refreshing.  It was just a bit of an odd way of speaking to someone whom you were exploring the possibility of having a romantic relationship with.

Anyway, we're having dinner and we were in the process of ordering entrees when our waitress got a little mixed up.  No problem, within a minute we sorted it out and she was on her way.  This is minor stuff, not Fawlty Towers-esque shenanigans.  My date leans into me and says in a loud whisper:

'What an airhead!  How old is she, like 30?  What 30 year old still waitresses?'

'Well, I don't know.  I try not to judge someone until I've walked a mile in their shoes.  Perhaps it's the only work she can get.'

'Oh... I guess.'

We talk some more, but we really aren't connecting.  She is very physically attractive, no problems there, but her personality is becoming really off-putting.  She asks why I don't have a car (I don't really need one, and I could use the money elsewhere), why I don't have a house instead of an apartment (long story, which is a polite way of saying none of your business) and why I didn't fight my 'bitch of an ex' for custody of the kids (again, not really first date material, but I felt that having them splitting time between two places would be developmentally harmful for them, they stay with mom, mom is primary caregiver, but kids see me whenever they want - it works best for THEM).

She asks why I didn't finish university, and I'm  really starting to bristle, because I keep wanting to say NONE OF YOUR DAMN BUSINESS.  Dinner can't come and go fast enough.  I'm giving non-commital, almost bored answers (ran out of money) and she was gob-smacked.

'You mean,' she asked 'your parents didn't pay for your school?'

'Nope.  In fact, I left home for the first time when I was 17.  I paid for school by working and saving.'

'Wow, I can't believe it.'

'Believe it.  My parents were not well off.  They had no money for us to go to school.  If we wanted to go to university, we had to get a scholarship, or roll up our sleeves and pay for it.'

'Wow.  So no school?'

'No.'

'Did they buy you a car?'

'No.'

"I guess I'm lucky... my mom and dad bought my first car and paid for school.  They have a down payment for my first house too... I guess I'm pretty lucky.'

'It's all relative...'

She cocked her head to one side with curiousity.

'I mean, yes, it would have been nice to finish school and know that I don't have to scrounge for the down payment for my house, but then I wouldn't have lived my life the way I've lived it to this point, which for better or worse I wouldn't have traded for the world.  At the end of it all, life isn't about what you have, it really is what you make it.'

'Oh, I guess so...' as if she wasn't sure... oh well.  Waitress comes back with entrees and we order two more drinks, hers some sort of martini and mine is a Newcastle Brown Ale (natch!).  And then she looks at the waitress and says:

'Did you maybe want to write that down?  You seemed to have trouble before...'

The waitress was taken aback a little.  'I assure you that your order will be correct'

'Well, just saying... I want to be sure, you know?' in a really condescending voice.

Urk.  I'm turning red.

The waitress whips out her pad, makes a note and returns with the drinks.  I'm embarrassed.  We eat in silence.

'You're quiet eh?' she says to me at last.

'Dressing down the waitress like that was really uncalled for.  She made a mistake earlier, and I don't think calling attention to it like that was good.'

'Waitressing isn't rocket science.  If she can't get an order straight then she shouldn't be a waitress.'

'Wow.  Okay then.'

We finish, pay up and leave.  We were planning to take a stroll but the weather is absolutely terrible.  I emphatically don't mind.  I begin to thank her for the evening, when she interjects:

'So, take a cab back to your place?'

'I... huh?'

'We can't go to mine, I live with my dad.'  I should point out she is 25 here, a full 10 years younger than me, so it's not that weird that she's still living with a parent.

'Well... uh... thanks for the company and the evening, but I'm not interested in seeing you again.'

'What?  Why?!' she was genuinely upset.

'I don't think our date went well, there was no connection on my end, so once again, thanks for the evening, but I'm going home now.'

'Is this about the waitress?'

'Partly yes.  I find your attitude toward other people that you consider to be beneath you off-putting.  So once again thanks, but once again I am going home alone.'

'But... don't you want me?  I want you!'

'You're very attractive, but the answer is no.  I'm sorry.'

'Oh... okay then.  Whatever I did, I'm sorry.'

I highly doubt that.  But whatever.  The world of dating again.  Hooboy, do I not miss this.  Sad thing is, this is far from the worst dinner date I've ever had.  Remind me and I'll share that little gem some day.



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It's no secret I'm a soccer fan and there was lots for me to chew on this week.  England played Holland on Wednesday, and the Three Lions fielded a very young, inexperienced squad against the Netherlands.  It was actually quite an entertaining game, and England played well for large chunks of it, despite falling behind 2-0 (including a stunningly brilliant goal by the Dutch Winger Arjen Robben).  They clawed back to make it 2-2 in injury time before the Dutch potted the winner a minute later.  First England loss in over a year, which sounds really strange, but true, but they were operating on a very experimental squad using a very experiemental 4-3-3 formation, and all this without a proper manager.  For Euro 2012, we shall see.

And this morning was the Tyne-Wear Derby, pitting my beloved Newcastle United against their hated local rivals Sunderland.  This is the big one.  This is the match Geordies all over the world wait to see.  This is Yankees-Red Sox.  Toronto Maple Leafs-Montreal Canadiens.  This is rivalry at its most intense.  This derby divides friends, family and co-workers.  Your best mate may be a Mackem (a person from Sunderland), but for 90 minutes you WILL hate his guts.  At best intense shame and ridicule is at stake.  At worst, hooligan violence will send people to either jail or hospital or both.  I was up late last night and did not want to risk sleeping in, so I stayed up all night to watch the 6 am start.  And Newcastle was... disappointing.

Actually both teams weren't at their best.  Tons of fouls and yellow cards and free kicks.  Ugh.  Brutal, constipated football.  Sunderland went up 1-0 on a suspect penalty call, but had a player sent off early in the second half for an elbow or punch (I didn't see it).  Newcastle dominated, but were looking for even-up penalty calls instead of concentrating on the play.  Then Hatem Ben Arfa was subbed on and lit up St. James' Park, but still no goal.  Newcastle got a penalty shot of their own.  Our star striker from Senegal Demba Ba took the shot and...  Saved!  Aaargh!!  Then finally in the 90th minute, derby hero Shola Ameobi tied it.  They got a point, but probably should have won it.  No killer instinct this week (or indeed the last few weeks), and they aren't looking like a team that is chasing a Champions League spot.

A short history of the Tyne-Wear Derby

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Nick and Gerry have settled into their new place, but Nick has been phoning me almost nightly since moving in with his soon-to-be stepdad.  I've been taking him out a lot more, and we've really started to bond closer than we've ever had before.  When it gets warmer out, I'll grab Gerry too and have both boys, but Nick needs me a little more right now.

He's turning into a really fine little boy.  Saturday he wanted me to come out and play, so I obliged him.  I took him to the park where we rolled around in the snow playing with his new Nerf dart gun.  Afterward, he hugged me and told me I was the best dad ever.  That is what gets me up in the morning, I tell ya.


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My soccer coach/player called me last week and gingerly asked if I was coming out this spring.  I look at my foot and tell him that I honestly don't know yet.  I've done some sprints at the Y, but my foot was really sore afterward.  I tell him I'll see and he sighs and says okay. I'm flattered.  I settled into a central defender role after playing mostly in high school as a keeper.  And I can certainly fill in as keeper when needed, but we have a Korean fellow who is phenomenal, it's a miracle he's just playing pick-up soccer with us rag-tag bunch.

Being a central defender means I'm pretty much only in 2/3 of the field and pretty much in the middle, except when chasing down a striker 1 on 1.  It's a good position for an older guy who can put on a quick burst now and again. Except I'm not so sure I can put on the quick burst anymore.  I used to have a flexible ankle to push off of when sprinting, but it's become a lot stiffer since the injury.  I may have to come off early, but centre backs usually play the whole 90 minutes.  I don't know.  All I know is I'm going to try.


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Check out Whichbook, a handy little website when you're stuck over what to read next.  Set your parameters of what you'd like (funny or not so funny - weird or not weird - lots of sex or no sex, you're allowed 4 options) and it'll make recommendations based on your interests.   From the 10 results I got, I've read 1 (Lullaby for Little Criminals by Heather O'Neill.  My ex read that one and recommended it - as do I), and I picked Finbar's Hotel by various Irish authors.

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I've been walking home from work for the past two weeks to lose the gut I picked up while in my cast.  Between that and practically eliminating beer from my diet, I've dropped 20 pounds in the last 6 weeks.  The walks are intense - nearly 10 kilometers in a little over 1 1/2 hours, which is my running goal by the end of the summer.  Remind me, and I'll track my progress here.



Well, no offense all, but I'm pretty tired so I'm calling it a night.  We'll talk soon


- PW

Uncle Walt

Every family has an Uncle Walt.

The black sheep.  The troublemaker.  The one relative that the other adults in the family hate and the kids absolutely adore. 

The adults hate the black sheep because they’re shiftless layabouts that don’t have steady work, haven’t settled down and started a family and/or are secretly jealous because they live the kind of free, joie de vivre life that they wished they could live.  The kids love them because they were adults that understood kids, would always have a smile and a joke, or visit with an armload of exotic trinkets and tall tales of faraway lands.

I’ve only met my Uncle Walt a couple of times in my life and it was when he was in his late 70s and early 90s respectively, so I didn’t get to see much of the mischief-maker that I heard so much about, although he was still sharp as a tack.  My mom swears we are both identical.  I’m not so sure, but I can see what she was getting at.  We both share a love of (harmless) practical jokes, dry wit and a penchant for sometimes making waves in the somewhat stuffier, more professional enclaves of society.

He was born in England around 1910 and spent much of his years as a young man travelling extensively throughout Europe and North Africa.  He mostly worked odd jobs, and came home when he ran out of money and work.  He rented an upstairs flat from my great-grandmother (who was Uncle Walt’s polar opposite; stern, reproachful, pragmatic and practical… stereotypically Scottish) when he wasn’t wandering and drove her insane with his shenanigans (although she never threw him out… I think deep down she loved his zaniness).  Once he came home with a pet monkey that he trained to steal food out of the kitchen and haul it back upstairs for him.  Everyone in the family swore that my great grandma was going to kill that monkey (Charlie the monkey was his name) sooner or later – and Charlie did disappear one day, never to return… but nobody really suspected her of killing him.

Uncle Walt was a notorious rake.  He was almost always penniless, but he was always dressed to the nines and had a thin pencil moustache that he sported until the day he died.  He was always entertaining young women, picking them up in pubs and music halls, taking them out dancing or to burlesque shows.  My great grandma forbade Uncle Walt having women in his room but he found ways around her which no one could ever figure out short of having them scale the side of the house and come in through his second storey window.  My Uncle Walt must’ve been charming as all hell to convince his dates to do that, because enough of them did, and he was often caught when their ‘passions’ would wake up great grandma or Charlie would get riled up and startle them into either screaming and/or stomping furiously out of the house.  Uncle Walt told me this the first time I was visiting when I was 13 (‘fucking’ was subbed for the more ambiguous ‘necking’) and he would laugh until his face was red. ‘I felt bad,’ he said to me, ‘But you’ve got to see the humour in it, lad!’

In the late 40s, my great grandma passed away and Uncle Walt traveled again, returning now and again to see the family, regale the kids (my mom now one of them) with tales of his travels, have a few home-cooked meals, borrow a few pounds and be off again.  The adults would grumble about how Uncle Walt should get a ‘proper job’, settle down and stop acting like a damn kid while the kids would swarm him and beg him to play and tell stories and continue to be the Coolest Uncle Alive.  He took the upstairs flat again, the house now belonging to his brother and his wife.  They were the first house on the block to own a television and one night, while the whole block was over watching a scary movie on television, Uncle Walt burst through the front door, with his overcoat over his head, moaning that ‘he was going to get the children!’.  About 15 kids (and most of the adults) started shrieking bloody murder, while his sister-in-law chased him six blocks down the street (with his overcoat still over his head, from the stories I heard) vowing that she was going to chuck his things into the street and he would never be welcome back – if she didn’t catch him and kill him first.  Flowers and chocolate and a John Belushi-esque smile (and a sincere apology) smoothed things over.

Uncle Walt disappeared again not too long after that, and then returned a couple of years later.  He was in his late-forties by then and starting to slow down a bit.  And the proof was that he was now married.

That shocked just about anyone who knew Walt, but not only that, his new wife was twenty-five years younger than him.  And not only that, his new wife was black.  In the 1950s.

It took a lot of courage for both of them to be together.  Her more especially, of course, because she moved to a city where she didn’t know anyone, plus she was a racial minority in an era of more open and derisive racism, plus she was married to a white man.  Aunt Irma has a yard of guts.  Uncle Walt lost a lost of friends because of his wife, but I’m proud to say that our family stood by them both.  And Walt did settle down.  Took a proper job.  Bought a house and never wandered after that.  And they were married for 43 years until Uncle Walt died in 2002.

I remember when I visited when I was 13 years old, and marveling at Uncle Walt and his stories, his humour and him in general.  He radiated a charm that only a certain exclusive tiny percentage of people have – a charm that binds nearly everyone that he talks to and holds them, until he chooses to let them go.  Aunt Irma would just shake her head in mock annoyance as he told me about his travels in Africa and his exploits on the continent, but I sat in rapt attention as he told me story after obviously exaggerated story.  I remember looking up and seeing my mom and my uncle Fred straining to listen to his stories as well.

But there was one thing that stuck with me more than anything else about Uncle Walt.  We were in a restaurant having lunch.  Walt was still impeccably dressed, if a little outdated.  His favourite suit was a deep devil-red suit with a matching bow-tie.  No one except Uncle Walt would get away with wearing it, and yet he wore that suit like with it on, he was the most handsome man in town.  And people believed it too.

Anyway, we were eating, and as a young man of 13, I had started noticing girls, but was incredibly shy and tongue-tied around them.  Our waitress in particular was an achingly, ridiculously beautiful woman of about 19 or 20, and I found myself so paralyzed with shyness I couldn’t even look her in the eye, let alone talk to her or order off the menu. 

Everyone else kind of laughed, but Walt leaned over and whispered to me:  ‘Lad, there’s no need to be so shy… women are people just like you’

And then Uncle Walt proceeded to flirt with our young waitress.  Not in a skuzzy, dirty old man kind of way, but in a roguish gentlemanly manner of someone who could still talk a bird down from the trees, but only because it pleased him to do so now and again.  And within about 10 minutes he had her giggling and smiling and blushing… and not in a patronizing way (unless she was reeeeally good, and in the waitressing business, that’s a possibility, but she was hanging around our table longer than she should have – other patrons were shooting her daggers) but in a genuine way that she was pleased and honoured that someone was paying her this kind of attention.  Walt gave me a wink as if to say See?  If an 80 year old fart can do it, so can you!  I was stunned.  Still stunned, to be honest.

Well, my mom thought I was the spitting image of my Uncle Walt.  We certainly share a few traits.  We’re both have mischievous streaks, perhaps a tad immature, a little on the shiftless side.  We both like roaming, although with the boys I don’t ramble anymore… not until they’re older anyway.  And in some ways we are polar opposites.  He was a ladies’ man.  I, while handsome enough, am not.  I do okay for myself, but I’ve never been one to play the talk-seduction-bedroom-so long game, even though at times in my life it has had its appeal.  I’m not dapper by any stretch of the imagination, but I do have a laid-back working-class chic sense of style.  And while I’m an extrovert in a group of people I know, I am the exact opposite in situations where I don’t know anyone.  I got a piece of him, but there are times I kind of wish I had more.

The point is that Walt, like all black sheep, couldn’t give a toss what others thought of them.  They lived life on their own terms, with their own goals and wants: not the goals and wants the mores of respectable society tell us we should want, but as shallow as he could be sometimes, Walt was true to himself.  And that was what drove everyone so crazy about him, good and bad.

And in that way, I’m most like my Uncle Walt.