All About Me

All About the House Next Door
a home-made cake for Alice's fifth birthday

 Lunch with Lorraine Wright included an all-about-Arta talk.

I couldn’t tell her everything, though I tried. 

She had three questions of me, all of which she might have asked at any lunch.

The first was how are you doing in these pandemic times?

She asked me the question a number of ways and each time I added to an already privileged gratitude list: I have access to any kind of food I might wish for; I have fabulous books stacked by my side waiting to be read; I have access to the internet, to read, to send messages, to blog; and I have learned enough Zoom technology that I can go to Zoom church with people. I give myself a 10/10 on the scale of possible happiness.

She asked me again how I am doing. I had to think if there were any chinks in my happiness scale, and there might be one – Richard, Miranda, Michael, Alice and Betty live next door. Now four of the five of them have gone to the lake, so my previous happiness scale might be down a bit. I explained to her that not only do they live next door, but I have an open invitation to eat with them every night. Every night. When I told Lorraine this, I looked into her eyes, just as I look into the eyes of anyone I tell this to. I want to see how amazement registers on people’s face. Lorraine just leaned over, put her hands on mine and said, “Arta, you are at 11/10 on the happiness scale.”

All About the People in the House Next Door
... 3/4 or the cake gone and everyone is full...

Lorraine’s second question to me was about the church. How are you doing with the church, she might have asked. I don’t remember the exact formulation, but I tried to capture the intent of the question. I told her that in the past two months, I have had the best job in the church. She asked me how so. I told her that my new bishop telephoned me one night and before he could do much more than identify himself on the phone, I had interrupted to tell him that I am fine, not to worry about my family-of-one during these hard times, and to take care of those needing his outreach, and I assured him I would call on him in times of need.

I couldn’t even have interrupted myself; I went on and on for so long. When he got a space to speak, he said, “Actually, I wasn’t calling to ask if you needed my help, I was calling to see if you could help me.” An instant review of my skill set, and I couldn’t think of what he might need that I have, but I am all in for helping where I can.

Bishop Hampshire: “Will you help me produce a bi-weekly newsletter for the ward?”

Arta: “I think you have the wrong person for that.”

Bishop Hampshire: “No. I think you are the right person.”

Arta: “Bishop Hampshire, I think you are wrong. And I think all my children would tell you that you have the wrong person. Whatever made you think I could help you that way.”

Bishop Hampshire: “I don’t know you well. But your name came to me as someone who might help me.”

Arta: “I do blog. Why don’t you go out, take a look at what I do there, and get back to me. I don’t think I am the person for you. I know I don’t have the skill set for what you are looking for.”

We said cordial good-byes. In 10 minutes, he got back to me saying yes, he had read enough of the blog to believe I was the person who could help him.

In the interest of making a long story short, here is why I think working on the newsletter for 13 issues was the best job in the ward.

1. I had a direct email-line to the bishop, anytime, day or night. No subject was off-limit, no opinion unheard. “No opinion?”, I asked him. “No, he said, “if you have an alter-opinion, I want to hear it.” I tested him out. He was true to his word. Her is open to hearing every side of a story.

2. I interviewed people about their lives and heard details that seemed so precious to me, so dear, ideas that were so full of experience and maturity and wisdom.

3. I got acquainted with the other person who does the behind the scene work: Natalie Berg. In 100 years I could not have imagined our spring-winter pairing, me in my 80s and she in her 20’s. For me a deep friendship occurred with her.

4. The pandemic times require forward-thinking. Bishop Hampshire has created a weekly 4 page newsletter and seen that there is a facebook page for our ward. I don’t know what to call him. The newsletter did publish a photo of him beside his motorcycle. #BikerBishop could be one handle for him. Or how about #ProgressiveBishop. Find a ward keeping up with ours as far as maintaining social connections are concerned. I think we are onto our 15th Issue of Ward Newsletters. Maybe I will just say #BelovedBishop, #NewsletterBishop, #COVIDawarnessBishop.

All About the People in the House Next Door
... is this slice the new normal for a birthday cake? ...

I liked this ward job.

Dale Hampshire made me feel as though I had something to contribute.

 I made a mistake.

I was giving up my exercise time, and my family blogging time because I was figuring out how to do such an open-ended job.

The ward newsletter was on my mind most of the time.

Always there were questions in my mind: is the newsletter creating diversity? are we finding an expression for all of the voices in our ward? is the newsletter maintaining focus on the personal in people’s lives? do the columns help us to know each other better? are we hearing the voices of the children? the teens? the graduating students? the mid-career adults? are we valuing artistic expression as much as literary work?

Actually, the questions were weighing heavily.

Who wouldn’t want a job like that?

I had to give it up.

If I get my own life under control again, that is the job I hope someone will ask me to do again. So that is my answer to how I am with church. Bring it on when I have time.

And that is the end to some of the questions asked and answered at lunch.

Arta

The Rum Runners

When the men were finished having their hair cuts in Sydney, we went over to The Rum Runners to have lunch.

Rebecca had mussels, I had haddock, Alex had a panini sandwich and Duncan a foot-long hot dog.

I never know what will be on a menu for Duncan, since he has a limited palate.

We sat by the water in Schwartz’s Bay and watched people walk by on the boardwalk.

...boats in a marina in Schwartz Bay by The Rum Runners ...

Some people walked dogs. That wouldn't have been something I would be doing.

 I was interested in the blue expanse of the water. Rebecca had a deck of cards so we entertained ourselves with a game that the boys know well, me less so. I think h
hearts are trump which is confusing.

Duncan often wins games. More often than chance would predict.

I always wonder what it is that has him figuring out strategies of survival so early in games.

As well Rebecca played that word game that belongs to the Blaine and Viola Hudson family: I am thinking of a word that rhymes with bill, and the group have to answer back with “is it something that makes you well” to which the original person answers back, “no it is not a pill”.

 Or they loose.

A good game for a car or to play while waiting for one’s order to come in a restaurant in the Salish Sea.

Alex wanted to know why a restaurant would call itself The Rum Runners.

Isn’t that illegal? Is it good to valorize something that is illegal? Why would people even come here to eat? Should we even stay?

 The menu had a story about the original rum runners and how this area became rich off of prohibition in the U.S. But capitalism, even from the past, wasn’t enough to convince Alex that naming something The Rum Runners was a good choice.

 Arta

Biscotti and Cie

... charming second floor seen above us ...

Christine picked me up at the National Gallery and drove me through the lovely Gatineau Hills to a small tourist village, Chelsea.

She was looking for the perfect lunch spot, and she knew from past experience that it could be found at a charming cottage, now turned into a restaurant called Biscotti and Cie.

I ordered something new to me off of the menu.

A panini sandwich made from roasted beets, squash and goat cheese, which tasted just like that: beets, squash and goat cheese in a toasted, buttery bun.

... one of us is waiting for a hot beverage ...
... the other has had her first beet sandwich ...

We whiled away the hours of a sunlight afternoon in a café decorated with Persian cushions and beaded lamps.

She filled me in on stories of the Mormon WOCA women, whom I have read about but never met.

A day to remember.

Lunch at the Rose Garden

From Bonnie Johnson

It's a beautiful day here but I'm thinking of my loved ones 

in the interior with the smoky skies.