Events of the Past Ten Days

I’d like to describe a series of happenings and experiences that I have had or have partaken of in the past ten days or so. Letters from the Annex ought to periodically focus on the opportunities given by life in this, my favourite village of Metro Toronto. I will begin though by mentioning a brief trip to Montreal ten days ago that I took to visit my friend of over 50 years, Mary Carten. Mary and I met in the novitiate of the Religious Hospitallers of St Joseph at Amhurstview, close to Kingston, Ont. Later we were part of the Order’s “juniorate” of students in Ottawa, and for part of one school year she and I travelled together from the juniorate’s digs with the Grey Nuns in Rockcliffe to our classes at the U of Ottawa. After I left the Order we remained in touch, visiting when circumstances allowed, particularly during the few years that Mary spent here in Toronto studying theology. After a long stint at a mission in the Dominican Republic, Mary returned to Canada about four years ago to undergo successive waves of heroic treatments for cancer which had already metastasized. To this day she continues with treatments, bearing it all with amazing stoicism because she continues to find joy and interest in her loving extended family, her friends, her faith, and the various issues upon which she has strong opinions, as well as the various questions to which many of us turn our minds periodically about the nature of good and evil and about the chances for survival of the human race.  Mary and I have pretty much always had good conversations. Even when my own life deviated in significant ways from that of a religious sister, I did not find her judgemental or dismissive. We would talk about the minutiae of our lives as well as the bigger questions.

On this visit as on one earlier I stayed overnight at the Mother House, a vast antique building adjacent to the Order’s Hotel Dieu Hospital. So much has changed in the lives of religious since my close encounter with them from 1961-5. Most of the sisters living at the Mother House are now my age or older. Having spent their lives in some form of service to others, they live out their last years cared for in modest circumstances but with the communal support of their own sisterhood. Eating in the refectory with Mary I could observe the various groupings of women chatting with one another over meals. The general feeling was one of peace and relaxation. All of the sisters that I met while there were  friendly and welcoming. Mary and I had a bunch of different talks during my brief visit, not leading to any particular conclusions, but just other threads in the long string of our connection with one another.

The day after my return Mark and I picked up our grandchildren Theoren and Emily at their dad’s house, along with their cousin, Gregory, who also lives with them and their mothers in Sutton. The plan was to drive the three of them to Newmarket to meet Catherine at the pre-arranged waterhole of the Swiss Chalet. There we had a communal dinner in celebration of Emily’s 14^th birthday. Gregory and Theoren who share a room seem constantly engaged in a repartee that vacillated between the hilarious and the offensive (to one another only, I must add). It seems to be part of teenage boys’ experience and repertoire. However, it can become annoying, to which Theoren’s sister and mother will testify. In the car I disrupted their dialogue by inserting leading questions into the mix – about their school programs and so on. Both were quite happy to respond and even to entertain other topics and questions, though left to their own devises they quickly resumed the exercise of connecting with/torturing each other.

We had a fine time at the dinner. As Catherine says, Swiss Chalet has a menu within which most anyone can find something to enjoy. We brought along a chocolate birthday cake for which our very busy waitress provided plates and forks at the end of our meal. We have a great series of photographs taken at Emily’s first birthday party which show her initial experience of chocolate. In the photos she stares at the piece of cake before her; she puts her fist into it; she gingerly raises her fist to her mouth; and then, in short order she employs both hands to convey its wonderfulness, to not just her mouth but to most of her face. The final picture shows the birthday girl entirely decorated with a dark, rich chocolate. I happened to find a card – at the train station in Montreal – that shows an infant girl face down in a chocolate cake. The perfect card for Emily! We all had a good laugh about the coincidence and the memory.

Last Monday I had lunch with three of my old friends (old in both senses, I might add): Maureen, Lorna, and Martha. We have known one another from early days in our Therafields’ lives, way back in 1968. For a number of years the four of us met bi-weekly for lunch at my home or at Maureen’s. Each of us would bring our own lunch which we would consume while talking with one another about the important things happening in each of our lives, how we were feeling both physically and emotionally, and periodically having a needed clearing of the air if tensions had arisen among us. It was a great gift that we gave to ourselves and one another. Over a year ago the habit of this meeting fell away for a variety of reasons,  but with the result of some gradual estrangements. About two weeks ago we met and thoroughly thrashed out this failure to communicate, having some “words” with one another in the process, but happily rededicating ourselves to the practice of regular meetings given to seriously seeing and hearing one another as well as being open about our own situations. Last Monday’s lunch was the first of these promised gatherings; it was great.

I attended two events during last week related to my interest in the Holocaust. One was a talk given under the auspices of the Centre for Jewish Studies about terms used over the decades to describe what we refer to mainly as “The Holocaust,” the origins of these terms and the historical context of their usage. The second is a fall term undergraduate class in the history department at U of Toronto taught by Professor Doris Bergen, entitled The Holocaust, Part I, to 1942. I came across Doris Bergen when I attended the New Research on the Holocaust conference last fall. I didn’t know who she was but was impressed with the easy and gracious manner with which she met and introduced speakers at the conference as well as encouraged those attendees like myself to get our butts into the lecture hall on time. At home I found that I had a copy of one of her books, in fact two copies. I looked at courses available about the Holocaust at U of Toronto and the Centre for Jewish Studies via the internet a couple of weeks ago and discovered Bergen’s course. I emailed her, explaining my background and interests and asking if I might audit her course. Disappointingly I did not hear from her. However! I ran into her at the lecture on terminology that I attended last week and made bold to introduce myself. She apologized for not answering as she had been swamped with emails right then at the beginning at the term. She said that, of course, I might be an auditor. So 49 years after I was a third year BA history student at U of T, attending classes in the Sidney Smith building, I was back at it again. It felt terrific! I will only be in town to attend six of the classes this term, but I will take advantage of each one. One of the texts to be used is Victor Klemperer’s I Will Bear Witness, 1933-41. I read his second volume that covers journals written from 1942-45 while in Puerto Vallarta last winter and in the meantime had purchased a copy of volume one, planning to read and write about it while back there this winter. So many happy connections.

Yesterday we had Ophelia and Heather for lunch on the deck off our kitchen.  They were delicious! We met these gals almost four years ago on the 15-day  tour with Gap Adventures that we took from Cairo along the Nile. I wrote about this trip in another blog: www.italyandegypt.blogspot.com It was great to reconnect and to remember some of our experiences together. They have suggested a reunion of the 13 of us who were part of the group to be held at their place in Oakville next summer. Six of our crew belong to the same family, all living in London, Ont; two are in California; and one gal lives in South Africa. Our fearless leader whom we called Magic will not be attending. All of us lost touch with him soon after we left Egypt as the revolution broke out within a week or two and his community of Coptic Christians were especially targeted by extremists.

Mark and I saw two movies this week: 5 Broken Cameras which I wrote about a couple of days ago, and, this afternoon, a documentary on the fabulous Robert Altman. It is a must-see film for anyone like me made happy by his long string of films from the seventies until relatively recently.

And then there have been the sessions – nine in total this past week – opportunities to talk in various levels of depth with people from whom I learn and who hopefully, learn something from me. It must be the very best job in the world, certainly the very best for me. 

So this is more or less a digest of the week (or should I say the ten days) that were. Oh, and I will mention that I have also begun to write about Rudolf Hoess, the commandant of Auschwitz, using information from Laurence Rees' book on that camp, looking at ways that Hoess' formation mirrors that of other young men who in our own time are drawn to extreme, fundamentalist organizations that justify horrific violence as necessary components of a movement toward a "greater good."