One Week

It started as a love letter to Canada and for me, it ended with a teary-eyed mess in the car on the ride home.  Last night we went to see the movie "One Week" a movie that has been advertised here as a "love letter to Canada."  It's a story about a young man, 3-months away from his wedding, having been diagnosed with stage-4 cancer, who packs up his saddle bag, straddles his newly purchased vintage Norton motorcycle and begins a cross-country road trip from Toronto to Tofino, transversing 2/3s of the vastness that is Canada.  I'm a sucker for a road trip - whether taking to the road myself, or enjoying it vicariously on the big screen so there was no way I was going to miss seeing this movie!

As promised, the scenery was spectacular.  The main character, a fine and healthy looking young man is literally a ticking clock who snaps pictures along the way at every oversized monument between the Muskokas and the surf-shacks on BC's western most coast.   The Big Nickle in Sudbury, the Giant Goose in Wawa, and the World's Largest TeePee in Alberta are as much a part of our national landscape as the great Canadian Shield and the boreal forest, and through his photos they become secondary characters in this movie. 

I was prepared for this story.  I had seen enough trailers to know what to expect.   I was prepared for the plot line of him questioning the validity of everything in his life while he struggled to live fully before he started treatment...before he became a patient.   I was prepared for the take-your-breath-away scenery...of the prairies at dawn, of the lakes of northern Ontario at sunset.  I waited with anticipation for shots of the Rockies and of my favourite city in the whole world, Vancouver.  I was richly rewarded.  The movie is Canadian eye-candy at its best.

We both really enjoyed the movie - the perfect way to cap off a perfect Spring Saturday.  As we began driving home I asked Dwayne the question that is posed at the end of the movie:  "If you only had one day, one week, one month to live - what would you do?  What life hold would you grab on to?  What wish would you fulfill?  What's the minimum in life?"

I hate to say that I wasn't entirely actively listening to Dwayne's response (he said something about a trip to Ontario & Kelowna), because I was busy thinking about how I would answer that question myself.  That's when the tears began.  It is an overwhelming question that could not be easily answered.  It's not as simple as I'd pack up and go to Italy and eat fresh pasta everyday (although that would be fun and certainly very, very high on my list).  It's not as simple as you would think.  And for someone like me who is SELDOM at a loss for words, not being able to articulate an answer was rather surprising to my husband and me! 

Which brings me to the interactive portion of this blog, dear internet.  Yes, this is where you get to weigh in.   Click on comments to answer the question I pose to you - "If you only had one day, one week, one month to live - what would you do?  What life-hold would you grab on to?  What wish would you fulfill?  What's the minimum in life?"

If you've never driven across Canada (or even if you have), this is a must see movie.  If you love road trips, this is a must see movie.  If you love Canada, this is a must see movie.  

Windows on the World

In return for soldiering on through the LONGEST WINTER IN HISTORY, today Karma has smiled down upon us and rewarded us with the promise of Spring.  Warm, gentle breezes, BIG blue sky, 20-degrees and blooms, blossoms, buds and did I mention BLOOMS are popping up all over our property!

 After hibernating all winter, this morning I could not get my cleaning bucket out fast enough  to wash down all my windows.  I unleashed my inner domestic goddess and scrubbed and polished every window within an inch of its life, erasing 6 months of wind, rain, snow and dirt and in some cases, dog snout snot.  It's nice to be able to see out of them again, because once I could actually see out the windows, I noticed that OH MY GOD - not only are my crocuses up, but tulips and daffodils are on their way too.

My heart did a little jump for joy when, upon closer inspection of my flower beds, I discovered that not only did I survive THE LONGEST WINTER EVER, but so did my clematis and lilacs.  The tender shoots of my hydrangea are just starting to poke up and dare I say it, but so did the pretty yellow shrub that I can't remember the name of - it's doing okay too and is just covered with tiny little buds.  And so are my peonies.  My second most favourite flower ever, I planted two bushes last spring and patiently waited for their big, showy flowers to appear in July.  Um, ya, not so much.  Evidently peonies don't flower the first year they're planted, but guess what?  That's right, this is YEAR NO. 2 so I fully expect to see big, braggadocious, bold and showy pink flowers this year.  

We spent our morning cleaning up the detritus that landed in our yard over the winter - fallen, dead branches, entire boughs of evergreen trees, a dead mouse or two and even an empty Guinness bottle we think was left-over from our wedding last August.  We pulled deadfall out of the ground and cut back some of our perennials.  We raked and we swept and we congratulated ourselves for delivering a nicely green lawn so early in the year (as if we had anything to do with it).   We are HOME-OWNERS.  We are LANDSCAPERS.  We will soon be VEGETABLE farmers.  But mostly what we are now is EXHAUSTED.