Random Summer Thoughts

I’m borrowing a page from Judy’s book and writing some Random Summer Thoughts. Because in the middle of summer, sometimes that’s the only way that thoughts come out.

1. We hung out at the library last night. It was rather funny to watch the three children. True to form, Julie soon had a stack of books and was asking if she could take home more than her usual limit. (Sure enough, she’d finished the first one before she fell asleep last night.) Also true to form, Nikki gravitated toward the magazines and was soon checking out the latest fashion and exploits of the rich and famous. (Anything that screams “pop culture” draws that kid in.) And not to be outdone, Maddie followed her heart, and gravitated to where the people were. First it was the teenagers on the computer – they decided they wanted her to be their little sister. Then it was the girl watching Arthur on the kids computer. Before we left, at least 3 separate people wanted to take her home.

2. Every once in awhile you see something that renews your faith in humanity. On the news last night was a documentary about a man named Chandrasekhar Sankurathri. His wife and 2 children were killed in the Air India bombing 20 years ago. Instead of letting bitterness control his life, he turned his energy to something good, returned to a very poor region of India where his wife grew up (they’d been living in Canada), and built a school and treatment centre for the blind. Amazing story. He named the school after his daughter and the treatment centre after his son. In that way, they still live on. Seems to me, if you have a little extra money that you’d like to put to something good, you wouldn’t go wrong sending it to his foundation.

3. But then there are some things on the news that have the opposite effect. They’ve made a movie of the life of Karla Homolka. What is it about sick and twisted criminals that makes people want to watch them on the big screen? Why would I want to sit through two hours of a movie watching this sad, pathetic, wretched woman join her husband as they rape and murder a bunch of young girls – INCLUDING HER OWN SISTER? My last post was about celebrating only the victor in a great race, but sometimes we do the opposite and celebrate the most depraved. What’s that about? I feel for the family members of the victims – knowing that thousands of people are watching a re-enactment of their daughter/sister/niece/granddaughter get brutally raped and murdered.

4. We put the camper up for sale yesterday. I’ll be sorry to see it go. We had some great memories in that camper. Like the first weekend we used it and we announced to our family that Maddie was going to born. But it’s time to let go. I’m trying not to let myself get too attached to possessions. I read on a blog yesterday that “every part of the soul that is filled by a possession is a part that is unable to love freely.” A camper is JUST a camper (even though I DID spend hours sewing curtains and cushion covers, painting walls and re-doing the floor. Sigh.)

5. This weekend we’re going to the Austin Thresherman’s Reunion. It may not sound like too much excitement to the average reader, but it holds a lot of memories for our family, so I’m looking forward to it. It was one of the only summer outing we’d go to when we were kids, and almost every year, we got to watch our Dad kick butt in the stooking contest. I think he won every time he entered, and each year he brought home a silver dollar as his prize. That silver dollar collection was one of the most prized possessions in Mom’s china cabinet.

6. One of the other things we’ll probably do this weekend is visit Spirit Sands – Manitoba’s “desert-like” region. When we told the girls we were visiting a desert, they looked at us incredulously and asked “are there starving people there? will we see lots of dead animals?” Hmmm… guess that’s what they picked up from TV.

7. I'm looking forward to hanging out with my family (brothers, sister, in-laws, mom, nieces, nephews - you get the picture) this weekend. We'll relive old memories, have a few good laughs, share food, play with each other's kids, probably mock each other a bit, and talk about Dad. We can't help but talk about Dad when we're in a place that holds so much of the best of him.