Moments Before Easter

MOMENTS BEFORE EASTER

She teased us
showed us warmer days
cities mainly browns and greys
fields sparse in places
yet winter brought some regions
more snow than ever

Warming running water
promise of spring
swept away with ice
rain becoming mighty winds
days more deep heavy snow blizzard
on the cross of winter
ready for the germinating egg.

She is such a tease
so much the remedy
of hibernating souls
touch the cure, oestrus memory
every part all the wholes
pure as perfect harmony

One toe then leg step
the way our listening hearts hear
distant melody present praise,
stone rolled whose feet walked
where prayers went, having begun
with winter water standing still
about to flow again

April sings with joyful laughter
friends and lovers caught
the morning evening breeze
singing forever after songs, arising light.
Dying year teasing eyes emergent kiss
awakening bliss at the moment door of Easter.



b©19april2014

Cali, the cat adventure

(Originally Kali, a fierce Hindu goddess now pacified somewhat as “Cali”.) Cali came to us via Erin and has abscesses on her buttocks. Erin and I were expressing pus practically daily but we were doing it together. I tried it alone and was successful one day but the next, she bit me in three places on both hands. Too late to make a prophylactic trip to the drugstore for a prescription for antibiotics that day. Fifty per cent of cat bites on the hand become infected so I am working on winning this doesn’t-get-infected lottery – heck, we’d buy a lot of tickets if we had a 50% chance of winning! (It’s fifty per cent for each bite so the overall odds are less that 50%.)

It became swollen by twelve hours but not particularly painful. I couldn’t decide whether I should be putting ice on it to prevent swelling or heat on it to prevent infection – so I did the logical thing – nothing. It was a little painful in the evening.

Now we are about 42 hours. I am going to have to make a decision. The roads are terrible – and perhaps even impassable for our lane and Elving Lane, not because of the twelve inch depth of snow but because the type of snow is heavy, sticky, difficult to plow or to walk in. The hand is still swollen, perhaps a little bit redder than the day before, it is not hot to the touch and mostly non-tender, in fact, light massage feels comforting.

So infection or no infection? I don’t want to be too optimistic. It is important to examine my fallback position – where would I go tomorrow if the swelling changed for the worse? So I spoke with the physician on call so, if it is easy to get out tomorrow, or if this does turn into an infection, I can get treatment.

Easter morning. Tomorrow is here and my hand is actually much better – too early to crow about winning this particular lottery but things are looking good. The bites on my index finger of my right hand got swollen but were never questionably infected.

And Cali?

The thought that we’d get antibiotics for her fizzled in the wake of the Good Friday storm. Plans for her care: keep her fed and watered, occasional pats on the head, let her recover on her own. I can’t wear enough protection nor can I count on luck to prevent damage to myself. I feel sorry for her - she seems to be quite agitated around Muchacha which is odd since M seems to ignore her completely except maybe to eat her food - but she is a cat and I'm not into cat psychology.

Coming Home from Elsewhere.....

The last two times that I came home from elsewhere, I was either copyediting or preparing something for the next departure. So I wasn’t really home. This time, I don’t have anything to prepare – my next departure is simply to be a doctor, I’ve had thirty years of practicing to be one, and like every other doctor I know, I would like to be the best that I can be, the challenge being that the horizon “fades forever and ever as I move”.

So home – with follow-ups from the trips to Ethiopia and to Banff to complete, to re-integrate my learnings and re-adjust the trajectory of the future.

Coming home is always a bit of a plunge.  There are huge differences between where I go and what home is – other places and experience collapse precipitously  – like feeling the cold water envelope your body as you dive into it. How do you compare city noise to nature’s silence?  The limited sky view under city lights to the depth of the stars in the heavens? Concrete and leashes to freely run dogs, cats and chickens?

Exotic foods? At the coop dinner, there were cabbage rolls and perogies with a traditional mushrooms sauce. I realized that I hadn’t had these foods for a long time and they are at least as exotic as some of the Ethiopian foods.

We’ve heard the saying: “Think Globally, Act locally”. I’ve been a bit remiss on the second half and a bit too much action in the global sphere.

When I travel, doing my yoga/physio exercises first thing in the morning anchors me. Often it becomes difficult to get that rhythm going at home – I seem to spend more time whining (not literally) and distracting myself first thing in the morning instead of just getting the job done. Perhaps I am experiencing a little rebelliousness over routine? I can do the exercises any time of the day – so I do, even they relieve pain for the rest of the day when they are done in the morning! Yup – this procrastination seems the sign of a whiner, desiring an trace of suffering, maintaining an element of masochism. I know that my days will become more settled when the routine gets back into the early morning.

In the distant past, Bill and I used to circle one another as he had to shrink to let me into the space and I had to become ready to accept his intimacy – I don’t mean physical intimacy because we’re more likely to jump onto one another like a dog onto a bone but the psychological space was often as much my difficulty in accepting the smaller circles of activity (and saying good to my recent experiences) as his ability to share. I cannot express how grateful I am for the home fires he keeps burning – the cooking and cleaning, the feeding of animals and the watering of plants. How fortunate I am to have such a home friend!

The dog. At first he is so appreciative of my return that he does everything I’ve ever taught him – as the days pass, he starts to behave more like a mischievous child than a trained six-year old dog.

The chickens. They don’t see me as anyone special – just a human that brings food and amusement. As they climb onto their roosts for the night, they purr.

When I get finished “coming home”, I’ll purr too.

"Snowmobilers", as written in the Wynyard Advance

It was too much to hope that we would emerge this spring unscathed, untrampled and unviolated by skidoos. We have long ago struck an agreement for clear passage across the quarter-section with our neighbours and the Edgebrook crew. East to West or vice versa, no playing on the hills – the hills belong to cross-country skis.

Some rude and irresponsible people came down from the North right next our house and proceeded to break up the snow cover with giant whoops and gouges – Elizabeth’s feeble attempt at a ski trail was soon long gone – and so, for the rest of the season, is the ability to forge new trails. They announce themselves with huge roars and signal their exit with the scent of gasoline heavy in the air. The antithesis of an environmentally friendly sport.

This letter is not merely about the right to pursue their sport against the right to pursue mine – albeit I think that I should set the terms for our property. This letter is about trespassing.  A sign is not necessary for you to be told that if you don’t have permission to be on that land, you should not be there. Furthermore, if you don’t know where you are, you should not be there.

This letter could also be about property destruction because we’ve experienced it: several years ago, skidoo shenanigans ruined our alfalfa by pounding the snow into it and exposing it to brutally cold temperatures.  What about the injury to winter wheat or rye otherwise safely tucked under snow cover?

I know that most responsible riders ride where they know that they should and could - but these rotten eggs spoil it for everyone. Other riders should not make excuses for them.

Jet Lag

On Ethiopia and jet lag

Still trying to get a grasp on the essence of Ethiopia – the sense that things will get better, the optimism. Not everyone wants to move to Canada! Amongst Ethiopians is an almost palpable sense that “things are getting better”.  My young friend, Zacharias, said that he had no desire to move somewhere else because he thought that he would find some of the same problems elsewhere. “I have a good regular job and things in Ethiopia keep improving, why leave?”

Milta, Abebech’s 15 year old daughter, said that she wanted to become an astronomer – her mother didn’t think that she’d get a job, but she said that her mother doesn’t know about the future.  Clearly she thinks that it will be improving. 

This optimism is difficult to capture, amongst the beggars along the streets, the skinny women with their equally skinny babies, the crippled and deformed, the elderly with canes – there are not enough birr to go around.

Then there is Saturday night in the hotel lobby – the sex-trade workers and the drunken white men, the noise at the bar and the quiet disapproval of the local staff.

At 10:30 pm on March 8^th, I leave for the airport in Addis Ababa.

At 6:30 pm on March 9^th, I arrive in the Regina Airport (and drive two more hours).

Jet lag – what is it? My brain was a mass of spaghetti – the connections were there but somewhat faulty. When we visited Elizabeth, Erin and Shayna, I was sometimes not able to connect my thoughts to my tongue – like intoxication but with a spooky clarity in my brain that is not present in drunkenness.

For the next two days, I alternated between wakefulness, exercises, brainless speediness with pingponging thoughts, overall buzziness in the body and sleep. The “buzziness” could not be relieved by bathing but would temporarily disappear after sleep. I could unpack my suitcase but not sort the papers; I could collect the bills but not complete the expense sheet. I couldn’t seem to sort out the day of the week.

The distracting unpleasant physical sensation seemed to have disappeared by Wednesday and that morning, my digestive tract seemed to have adjusted to the time zones – this meant that I was really home!

It actually did take a week before my mornings and sleep times returned to normal. My body arrived home on the evening of March 9^th – my diurnal rhythm got here on March 17^th.

My Ethiopia

Arriving after two “red-eye” flights, the line up for exchanging $US20 for a visa was expected; the absence of my luggage was not. Just as I was giving up hope in the disorganized chaos, a complete stranger brought my bag to me. A brief ride to the hotel, a quick check-in and an all-day sleep - horizontally.

Meet the others – David Zakus, Susan Jacoby, Vince Salyers – in the evening for a meal at the Beer Garden Inn next door to the Harmony, home of the "Blondies". Weather – a lovely 25 – 28 during the day and a 16 to 20 at night.

Tuesday: Getting acquainted with the teachers and their roles. Watching them work with the participants – instructor midwives who are increasing their skills as instructors.

That night, I woke at midnight with a burning forehead followed by chills. I did not have a thermometer but I am quite convinced that I had a fever – the “fever dreams” were also present. I alternately threw my covers off and pulled them back, sweat and drank copious amounts of water, finally awakening at 6:30 am. Although I felt like a wet dishcloth and just as stinky, I went for breakfast and spent the day, Wednesday, at the workshop site: I was given a tour of St Paul’s Hospital by a person who called himself a “nurse practitioner”. I had a cough and a mild headache all day so if there is an outbreak of the flu at the hospital, I would be blamed.

Thursday:  We attended the Ethiopian Public Health Association conference – held in the architecturally imposing African Union buildings. We had lunch off site, coffee in a little coffee shop and went back to our hotel.

On Friday, much as I would have liked to keep up the pace, my greatest need was to sleep which I did all day.

On Saturday morning, we heard David do a presentation and in the afternoon, we did a round of the “Mercado” arguably the largest market in Africa. 

Sunday we booked the day with Fikeray and he brought his family to go to the volcano resort. I needed my cane for the hills – flustered by the rush to the car and too many things to carry, I left my iphone on one of the terraces.

Monday: Toured two urban clinics that refer to SPH. Sat at the back of the classroom. Ate with the participants.

There are always people walking on the road – there are no sidewalks. A steady stream of workers and shoppers, tradespeople and hawkers winds out of the slums and suburbs and into the city centre in the morning and back again in the evening.

Tuesday: To Fiche with Enoch Pambour, research assistant to the project, and Josee (?) who is vaguely associated with the project. Enoch and I decide to take the hotel that he can afford. It doesn’t have any running water – each room gets a pail a day for washing and flushing. Bed - clean, frayed sheets, extremely firm mattress. There is a restaurant across the road for breakfast, lunch and dinner and there’s a bar scene associated with the hotel. Fiche - 120 km or so North of Addis Ababa - is very cool at night – it’s an elevated desert. Wearing a t-shirt, undershirt, manteau and two pair of pants, I'm chilled to the bone.

Wednesday: One of the most miserable nights that I have spent anywhere – it was cold, the bed was hard, I didn’t have a light in my room, and at 4:00 am, the diesel truck parked under my window started spewing smelly stuff at me. I started coughing the next morning.

Thursday:  And coughed and coughed and coughed. Through travels in bajaj’s, visiting the hospital and the health clinics and the zonal health office for the area under Enoch’s research interest.

The upside of electricity is obvious - lights, plug-in chargers, elevators however, the upside of having no electricity is no endless music blaring, especially over the three competing sound systems that I can hear from my room (thanks for the invention of ear plugs, I could sleep). T-V advertising in the restaurant/pub: Mercedes cars, gorgeous clothes, education and careers – seems that you can have all those glamorous things if you have an IUD!

Friday – Reviewed some of the data that we had about the hospital by returning  and meeting with the CEO and the Medical Director. Fikraye arrived at about 2:00 pm and drove back to Addis Ababa for a meeting, inexplicably held in the Hilton beer garden (was it to get us over any thoughts that we were being royally treated at the Harmony?). The second set of teachers has arrived to continue the course while Vince and Susan leave – Debbie Duran-Snell and Heather McLellan, Roger Turnell and Khalid Aziz.

Saturday – Visit the home of Abebech, Asfah’s sister. Got taken by the taxi driver who, when I told him that I was paying too much, offered to re-negotiate the fare. I declined saying that “a deal was a deal”. My friend’s family doesn't speak English - how awkward but there is one English speaking (high-school) daughter.

I went to a movie upon return – “Endless Love”. It is only 5 Birr for a big bag of popcorn; admission is 60 Birr – about $0.75 for the evening.

Sunday – Went to the closest church, a cathedral, and sat in the chanting, incense-waving service amidst hundreds, maybe over a thousand people.

Monday – I can't seem to tear my enjeera (bread) with only my right hand. Hand washing is extremely perfunctory but everyone at the table does it. Ethiopians make sure that “ferengi” wash their hands.

Tuesday – Sit down newborn mortality rounds in the hospital with Roger, two cases being presented by pediatric residents in the first year of their program. Met with Dr. Lia, Vice Provost, with Drs Turnell, Aziz and where we discussed the future of SPH as a referral centre – where would women stay, how to increase capacity to receive and refer-back patients,

Wednesday – Met John Guilfoyle at his hotel a mere ten minutes away. Walked – it was a delightful stroll through back streets and past walled and gated yards. John is involved in a fascinating SOGC project teaching a version of ALARM-I to health care administrators!

Started having stomach cramps at midnight, explosive watery diarrhea started about an hour later and continued until 5:00 am.

Thursday – Fikerye identified the culprit; the rewarmed lunch that we’d had the previous day. Of course, this was the one day during which I was teaching “Community Assessment”. The students did role plays, debriefed, received feedback and used the scenarios to both analyze the resources available to them and develop new ways to use them.

Friday – Dr. Lia was extremely generous with her time in the morning and frank in discussions. In the afternoon, we went to the CPAR offices, returning to the Harmony by public taxi. David chaired a debriefing session in the hotel lobby.

Saturday – Zacharias, nephew of Asfah and of Abebech, took me shopping at the little basement “mall” at the end of our street. With him by my side, I was able to fend off some of the frenetic behavior.  

Everything packs and I am ready for the trip home. At the airport, there is great gathering of security staff over a brass cross that I bought at the market for Bill. The guy who sold it declared that it was an “antique” but his price was inconsistent with antique prices. The security guys did all sorts of tests on it before they let me take it. I was certainly glad to be early at the airport.