“The Spirit of the Land is not sad. Even though we may be on the path to destruction, the Land is not sad. This is the way of death and life and death and life. Do we grieve the loss of dinosaurs? There will again be life, even if it is not human life. There will again be beauty. This is the Way. This is how Creator works.”
I wrote that in March, last year, 2024. I have been grieving the changes for longer than that – changes like the current long drought that hurts apple orchards, maple trees, and forests. I watch my beloved Pond, as the water levels drop further than they did in the last drought of 2020. One day recently, I sat by the pond, so quietly that Muskrat and Duck ignored my presence. My heart filled with gratitude that Pond is still Pond, even when the water is low.
But that does not stop the grief, not my grief. The other night I sat there again, listening, watching, meditating, in the stillness. That night, it seemed like Pond, the Wild, the Land, were all telling me that this is what Shift looks like. This is the face of Change.
(See the usual water level, just below the birch on the far side.)
And the grief welled up in tears. I don’t want Shift. I want Same. I want a full pond, full of water. I want the companionship of my Other than Human Friends. I want Dragonflies and Frogs. I want birdsong. I even want mosquitos to feed them. I want to sit here with Pond when I am 85.
I am afraid for the future. And I grieve. But the Land is not sad. This Land has lived through the loss of dinosaurs and virgin forests. This Land remains, and will remain, long after I am gone.
There is no change, no plan, no amputation, No nurse with power to heal, None to take us by the shoulder to look us in the eye and warn of danger there inside this fascination to wring every ounce of life from this slow death.
There is no hope of change, no coming back. This death will come, must come. Is it not better to accept this death, this dying, than suffer the long wait and close our eyes and ears to those who shake their heads at our fascination with love and life that turns to hate and death? Is it not better to lose a hand than lose our souls?
We twist soft hearts, all love, all softness of care for what remains, until the hardness, the holding, the grasping exhausts us, and only then release this stranglehold on what was never meant to be so hard, this twisted love, this desire, this greed, to keep what we thought was ours, that twists our selves, our humanity, into shapes unmeant to last.
“At least he went quickly,” they say. “At least he didn’t suffer long. What a blessing, really,” they whisper, even while our hearts break at what is gone, forever lost, this life we thought would never die.
Twenty years ago this month, I fell into politics. I’d known for some time that something was coming, something was changing in my life. Every time I felt into it, I got an image of myself in a canoe, being told to lie down, and not even peek over the edge to see where the river would take me. Just let the river flow. If I’d known I’d come ashore into politics, I’d have paddled furiously in the opposite direction.
I grew up in a Conservative family, my father a card carrying member of the Progressive Conservatives. (They don’t call themselves “progressive” anymore, by the way, just “Conservative Party of Canada”.) The family tradition was so solid that I believed I was not allowed to voice any other opinion, or even ask questions. (Like the time I was reprimanded for asking why Baptists only baptize adults, when I was trying to find answers for an Anglican friend in my high school Art class. Sorry, Mom and Dad. I still remember being shut down for asking. I love you, but….)
In 2005, I was upset with both the Liberal government and the Conservative opposition. Something had to be done. In the moment that thought crossed my mind, it was as if I heard these words from on high, “Well, you could run!”
Run? Who could I run with? I went to my computer to read party platforms, really read them. For the New Democrats (NDP), I could put a check mark next to almost all the items. Plus, Jack Layton was the leader. He seemed authentic and real. He remained so until the day he died. Someone recently said to me that Jack was the only NDP leader who would have made a good Prime Minister, except that he died. I still miss him. Anyway, I immediately sent in my $10 membership fee, and within a few days had met with local party leadership.
After that, I went to see my Daddy. (My mother had been gone for years already.) I said, “Daddy, I have news. You’d better sit down.” His face blanched, and he sat. He probably thought I was dying.
“Daddy, I’ve joined the NDP.” He breathed a sigh of relief. “And I’m going to run.”
In my journal, May 9, 2005, I wrote: “Went to see Daddy. He is surprised but pleased. He’s relieved that I don’t have to make a lot of noise at the convention.” How funny is that? No idea why he’d say that. Maybe someone can explain. I just know he supported me, through not one but two elections, as did the rest of my family, but of course I can’t be sure who actually voted for me.
In this current federal election, some complain that the Liberals are stealing Conservative ideas. I want to tell you a story about that, because the difference is in the details. In 2005, a teacher at a school some distance from me invited me, and other candidates, to speak to his class. When I arrived in the school parking lot, who was also getting out of his car but the Conservative candidate. Someone had misread his calendar. It was my turn with the students, but here we both were, after a long two hour drive.
Now I have to say that the two of us attended the same church. We actually sat in the same pew. I sat on the left, and he on the right. I joke about sometimes circling around and sitting next to him, forcing him to move a little more left. We were good. No animosity.
So in the school parking lot, we agreed we would share the hour with these students. The memory of that event is one of my favourites. The students asked questions, and we would each respond, until finally one of them said it sounded like we were saying the same thing! How could that be? The Conservative and I looked at each other and laughed. The difference is in the details. For example, we both wanted to help parents afford childcare, but our party policies approach that differently. The students learned an important lesson that day.
I ran a good campaign. I took enough votes away from our Liberal incumbent that my friend won the seat. The Conservatives won the election. Soon after that, I joined the choir. We no longer sat in the same pew. He and I rarely spoke of politics, except for one day when I had to tell him about a dream.
I dreamed it was a late fall day. I was shocked to find, in my back yard, the Conservative Prime Minister and a gaggle of men in dark suits, wanting to do an “audit”. They thought I was hiding something, since I had my garden already clean and dug for the coming spring planting. I went to church that Sunday, with the story, and asked my friendly Member of Parliament to tell the Prime Minister to stay out of my garden. We had a chuckle. I doubt he told the PM a thing.
As our April 28, 2025 federal election approaches, I am still asking questions. I’ve learned enough over the years to know that no matter which party is in power, people will blame them for policies of the previous government, or, for that matter, for the state of our roads and the lack of doctors, which, by the way, are provincial decisions, not federal. Currently, with Canada in economic war with our old “friend” south of the border, I have to make my decision based on which leader seems most capable of leading in a time of war. My choice is between a man with a PhD in economics from Oxford who has loads of experience, versus a man with a Bachelor’s degree and no experience at all, outside of politics.
Regardless of who wins this election, I believe we are headed into new territory. No party, no leader, can save us from the upheaval we are facing, whether it be flood and wildfire, or the collapse of civilization for all the reasons we hesitate to even imagine. It’s a question of which leader and which set of policies could carry us best into an uncertain future.
Last night, on the edge of sleep, I had the thought, or realization, that I do not any longer need to babysit Carol. I’ve told the story of my childhood memories of Carol many times, most recently while sitting with my husband’s relatives after his father’s death. I was wondering if any of them remembered her. Still it surprised me when that thought woke me last night, with a sensation of falling into freedom. Each time I started to drift off, this same sensation of falling into freedom thrilled me into wakefulness, joy, and expansiveness.
It felt like an invitation to follow my own path in my own time, at last. What child of 8 or 9 is expected to babysit an adult? Actually, it happens far too often, that children parent their parents, but not as many children end up parenting their adult neighbours. My small self must have continued to feel responsible for her, in some way, and responsible for others, too, such that I have spent a good part of my life trying to follow other people’s timing and other people’s paths, instead of my own.
Here is the story of Carol. When I was little, Carol and her husband, Gilbert, moved here as part of the influx of people “from away” working on the construction of Mactaquac Dam. They lived across the road from us, in the old house where my grandmother was born. Carol did not like to be alone, especially in such an old creaky house, at the end of a very long driveway. She would leave home each morning with Gilbert, who would drop her off at our house. She would spend the whole day with Mom, often falling back to sleep in our spare room, and sleeping most of the morning, if I remember correctly. The spare room was off limits to us children, but my grandmother loved Gilbert, so Carol’s presence in the house, and in the bed, was welcomed.
When I got home from school each day, Carol and I would walk to her house, so she could make supper for Gilbert. When he returned from work, I walked home – alone. Here are my memories of that time:
1. My fear of bears in the old orchard. There never were any bears, but Small Me knew that bears liked apples and were known to frequent orchards. I would approach that part of the long driveway slowly and with trepidation, then hurry past and on to the road.
2. How loud the spring peepers were, when I walked through the hollow, by the pond, the same pond where I live today. They were so loud, I had to cover my ears! I always wonder, even now, if there were more spring peepers when I was little, or if my hearing was just more acute. Perhaps both, but every spring, when the air sings with frogs, I remember Carol, and my walk through the hollow in early evening.
3. Listening to Bobby Vinton’s “Roses Are Red my Love,” on Carol’s 45 record, over and over and over. I would often remember Carol’s patience when my own kids or grandkids would do the same thing, chasing the silence away with their delight.
4. My first home perm, a Toni, applied by Carol. Here’s me in my Grade Five school photo, age nine.
5. Lobster! The first lobster I’d ever seen was on Carol’s kitchen table, as a special treat for Gilbert. I could not imagine anyone eating such a gross looking creature! I don’t think I was even aware of the existence of lobster at the time, nor the fact that they were not inherently red, or how they were prepared. Imagine my 8 year old eyes widening with astonishment.
6. Gilbert’s nickname, thanks to Grammie, was Gilligan, from Gilligan’s Island, a tv show that Grammie loved. It first aired in 1964, and ran until 1967. I have no idea why Gilbert reminded Grammie of Gilligan, but I think they were both funny, and definitely both young.
7. And lastly, I remember playing Rook with Carol, Gilbert, my parents, and grandmother, around my grandmother’s table. No, not quite so, as I was too young to play cards, but I often sat, even as a tiny child in a high chair, during their games, with my own set of cards. I remember Grammie laughing that Gilbert much have the lucky chair, as he so often won. She thought trading chairs might help. I’m not sure that it did.
So, falling into wakefulness last night, with the realization that I no longer needed to babysit Carol, fascinates me. I decided this morning to pull a card from my Wild Unknown Tarot deck for more insight into this sense of freedom. The Empress card flew out of my hands as I shuffled. This card features a dark starry night with a crescent moon, and, in the foreground, a brilliant white tree, with leaves shifting from white to pink to red, and purple, bright against that dark sky. No matter how dark is our night, the Wild is with us to renew us and keep us in beauty.
(I’ve been thinking about all the Bible stories where the Wild comes to the rescue, where the Wild shapes the recollection of history – how the Pharoah of Moses’ day suffered under a series of natural plagues, how the Red Sea drowned the Egyptian army, how a big fish rescued Jonah, how Noah’s flood changed the world for a new beginning, how brimstone poured down on Sodom to punish the inhospitable inhabitants. The other day, when I was distraught at what is going on in our world, the Wild told me that she’s got it. She, the Wild, Mother Nature, will clean up the mess we humans are making. Mother Nature will be Wild in her cleanup, but the Sacred Wild is still where we need to turn for solace in our distress.)
I often read Carrie Mallon’s insights about Wild Unknown tarot. She says this Empress is “unapologetic about taking up space.” The tree is deciduous, following the rhythm of the year, the rhythm of life. Babysitting an adult when I was 8 or 9 was not an appropriate job for a little one in the spring of life. This falling into freedom is about following my own natural rhythms, paying attention to the reality of my body, and who and what I am now. It’s about allowing myself to flow, and to live in this soft body with affection and joy.
“When the Empress appears, consider what you are nurturing,” Mallon continues. How long have I been nurturing what is not mine to nurture? How long has little 8 and 9 been care-taking? “Are you tending to yourself with as much reverence as you would give to someone you love dearly?” Mallon asks. “Step fully into your authentic nature.”
When I was 8, I believe I was a Master Conflict Avoider. Little Me knew, for example, what was upsetting adults, when the government decided to expropriate land, and flood the river valley to generate electricity. Little Me could read the paper, too, after all. But she protected the adults from her knowing and her feelings. She thought she had to deal with her own response to world and community events all by herself. The grownups had enough to deal with.
But Little Me is also grateful to Carol for time away from home. My house was full of siblings. What a treat for me to be able to play Roses Are Red My Love with no one telling me to be quiet. My daily trip with Carol across the road and along that narrow driveway gave me quiet space to fill with my authentic self. Thank you, Carol, for giving me that freedom. Thank you for the perm and the music, and even the memory of that lobster.
Dream Bringer’s Studio 