Wednesday's Words for December 27, 2017

I don’t go overboard decorating my house for Christmas. In fact, other than our tree, the house holds no decorations at all, with one exception. That exception is the heart of my home, my kitchen. I have a box that we keep upstairs for eleven and a half months of the year. That box is labeled “Christmas Kitchen” and inside it is everything I need to display my Christmas spirit.

The rest of the year I have a “lazy Susan” in the center of my table. A silver tray with four glass smaller trays that form a circle, and a round one that fits in the middle, this piece was a gift from my late son. I’m not certain why the name “Susan” is associated with this device. I know several women named Susan and not a one of them is lazy. I’ve also heard the term “loose Susie”, and I don’t get where that one comes from, either. But I digress.

My usual kitchen table centerpiece is currently in my office, because we don’t have any other place to set it. On my table in its place is a small green wreath, inside of which sits a large red candle. On either end of this wreath, I have a glass candle holder, with long red tapers. Then, on each end of this collection stand two red, wooden, hollow “Santa boots”. These boots measure three inches tall and two inches in diameter. Accompanying this center piece on my Christmas-time table are four place mats, plastic, but with holly and ivy and glittered pine cones forming the decorative pattern.

In the Christmases of my early childhood, these four boots were part of my parent’s annual Christmas display—there was the Creche on one table, and the boots and a large candle in a wreath on another. The candle was also red, not smooth like today’s candles, but knobbly. This candle would be lit only on Christmas Eve, and only allowed to burn for a small period of time.

The boots would be filled with nuts and hard candies. It’s a testament to one of the differences between those times and these, in a way; today if you set out four small containers of candies and nuts for your guests, you’d probably be considered “parsimonious”. We weren’t as gluttonous in those days, not by half. Ice cream was available only in a small brick, that when opened would sit easily upon a luncheon plate.

I came into possession of the wooden Santa boots after my sister passed a few years ago. The old candle is still in existence and at this moment is sitting on a shelf at my brother’s house. I have no idea what my siblings did with the Creche in the aftermath of my mother’s passing. At the time I was a little too emotional to think of such things.

I change my table setting on the same day as my husband erects our tree. Because our daughter developed an allergy to pine trees the same year our house here in town burned down, we have a small artificial one, that doesn’t stand more than five feet tall. The tree is festooned with miniature ornaments. The surviving older glass bulbs from my childhood and my husband’s, are no longer displayed, but kept safe to pass down.

We’re not fancy people, not by anyone’s measure. I’ve always been more concerned about the quality of the hospitality I offer my guests than the appearance of my house. If you’ve ever met me face to face, you’ll know I present a clean and neat appearance, but I don’t tend to wear makeup, or even a lot of jewelry. I can’t see the point in fussing.

I treasure my simple pleasures, and my simple traditions. When I look at those Santa boots on my kitchen table, it’s as if I’m reaching across time to join hands with that little girl I used to be. I feel once more the comfort of my parents’ presence, and am reaffirmed by a sense of history and continuity.

I wish you all a very Happy New Year. May 2018 be a year of love and laughter and peace.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for December 20, 2017

The first snowfall of the season finally arrived here in Southern Ontario a few days ago, and of course, it was accompanied by bone-aching cold. The day after the snow fell, according to the weather network, it was 18 degrees out – but it “felt like” 7.

Talk about scientific precision! To me, too cold is too cold. This old body of mine can’t tell the difference between 18 and 7. This body just shivers, and craves a blanket, a heating pad, and for the thermostat to be cranked upwards. Oh yes, and a nice hot cup of coffee, if you please.

Seriously, this ancient house of ours does have air leaks when the breeze comes from the west or north west. Generally, in the winter months, I keep my furnace set at 70. If I’m a bit chilly, I put on a heavier sweater or, if I’m relaxing in the living room in my electric recliner, I cover myself with a blanket.

If the moment comes when, even covered, I think I’m cold, then I turn up my furnace a whole two degrees! Of course, if the wind drops, back down to 70 it goes, because all things being equal? 70 really is warm enough.

My beloved didn’t take the snow blower out until several days after the blanket of snow fell. To his credit he did a really good job of digging out the car, clearing the walk, and clearing the opposite side of the road from our car. On the 16th and the first day of each month we have to park on the opposite side of the street from where we were. We do have a driveway, but it is off the side street that is a steep hill to the south of our house (we have a corner lot). I don’t park in the driveway during the winter. One swipe of the snow plow and we could end up with a heavy, unmovable three-foot ridge of snow at the end of that driveway—and possibly on our car, too, as the driveway is just deep enough for the car to fit into. How steep of a hill, you may ask? Well, if I were standing on the sidewalk in front of our house at the corner, the elevation of the driveway (looking up, of course) is more than my height from where I’m standing at that point.

We always get a laugh on storm days. One of our living room windows faces that side street. We invariably chuckle when cars attempt to go up that street, only to slide right back down again because they can’t make it all the way up. Salt and sand can only do so much. In the end, steep and icy is steep and icy.

We’re settling in here, getting used to spending our time in the same place practically every day. One thing that my husband was surprised at was how fast the days go. At the end of most days, when he was working, he would answer my question, “how was your day?” with one word: “long”. He’s pleasantly surprised that time isn’t dragging for him now.

We’re just about ready for Christmas. All the gifts we’re giving this year have been procured. I may do a little baking. My granddaughter, who usually comes so we have a baking day is now seventeen and working two-part time jobs. There’s nothing wrong with that. I’m pleased that in years to come, she’ll have the memory of those past baking days to look back on.

 As I write this, and get ready to send it out to you, David is in the living room, setting up our tree. It’s a small one, not even as tall as I am. Because it’s tiny, I bought a bunch of miniature decorations to go on it. We no longer seek out those “icicles” because, goodness, they end up everywhere! We’ll have the lights turned on in the evening as we sit, side by side, reading our books. There will be a heating pad for me, blankets for both of us, a thermostat waiting to be turned up. And oh yes, there will be coffee. Most of mine these days is decaf, but I quite enjoy the taste.

David and I wish you all the very best joys of Christmas—fun, family and friends.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for December 13, 2017

What can I say about the debate currently taking place on many of the television news magazine programs, and talk shows? It really does feel as if we, as a society, have finally begun to turn a page. With all the show business, television, and political people being shown the door based on allegations of sexual harassment and inappropriate behavior, it feels like a new day has finally dawned in our society.

I say, “feels like”, because I’m not convinced—but I am worried.

Yes, it is far passed time for those who believe it’s perfectly all right to practice sexual harassment to be stopped. Passed time for those who use their positions of power to threaten those under their aegis if they don’t submit to their demands for sexual gratification to be shown the door. However, we need to go forward in this apparent “social cleansing” with great care and due process.

I am completely uncomfortable with the concept that a person can lose their livelihood on the basis of unproved allegations alone. I heard one person on the side of the “throw all the bums out” brigade actually say, “it’s not like they’re going to starve to death”; and this person also said, “they’re just losing a job.” What a totally asinine comment to come from a so-called enlightened and intelligent person. The accused are losing more than a job. Their reputations are in tatters and they have been transformed into social pariahs. Just losing a job? Hell, they’ll be lucky if they ever get one of those, ever again.

This cleansing would be problematic even if there was no such thing as a person who would lie in order to seek revenge for past wrongs, or for the fulfillment of a personal agenda. But we all know, unfortunately, humans do lie. They especially appear to have a propensity for lying now that that particular sin is practiced and even celebrated with new, clean sounding labels like “alternative facts”. And in case you take exception to my calling “lying” a sin, I will point out that I didn’t decide that. Exodus 20:16 did.

But I digress.

My point here is simple. Yes, using your position of power or authority over another to coerce or try to coerce sexual favors is wrong. Yes, touching another person without permission, especially in an inappropriate way or an inappropriate place is wrong. Yes, we need to have a discussion on these issues, and not just one gender but both genders must stand in solidarity on these principles and stand for what is just and fair and right.

That discussion needs to delineate and spell out the difference between brushing one’s hand against another’s posterior, and grabbing another’s genitals outright; between an adult who tries to kiss another adult, and an adult who molests a child. These transgressions are not the same, they are not equal, but they are all transgressions and need to be stopped.

We have to take care as we go forward that we do so with careful, thoughtful deliberation, and not with our emotions in the driver’s seat. We need, all of us, to work together to make our work places safe for all people, and to ensure that no one forces themselves in any way, shape or form upon another. And if we deign to take from a person their career as a punishment for these transgressions, if we’re going to destroy a person’s reputation, then we better make damn sure that such charges are proven—or at least credible—and that such penalties are warranted.

Because to continue to proceed headlong without due process down the course we’ve already embarked upon is to risk the very gains and the principles we seek to claim. To continue to lash out as we have been doing, painting all the people accused of various wrongdoing with the same brush, is to diminish the case against the child molesters among us, equating that crime with groping—and to risk the very principle we’re trying to enshrine in reality.

We must take care that those who are accused are truly guilty; because accusers are human, and humans lie. So let’s get our collective anger under control, put shackles on our personal thirst for vengeance, and stick to the high ground and do the right thing.

These words come to you from one who in the past has been a victim of the worst kind of sexual predation. It’s not easy to let go the need to “get back” at those who did wrong to us in the past. But it is the right thing to do.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for December 6, 2017

I’m 63 years old. You’d think that by now, I’d be used to the fact that December is the month when Christmas occurs. But no, every year I seem to raise my head above the sand in which it is perpetually buried, look around, spot a calendar, and say, “oh, crap. It’s nearly Christmas!”

I suppose I could claim an excuse this year, considering that so much of my mental storage space has been used up dealing with our recent life change—if it weren’t for the fact that, as I said, 63 years old now, and counting. I should know better.

We are, as one might expect, paring back expenses. Tightening the old belt. It’s going to be a few weeks before we know exactly how much money we’ll be receiving monthly from the combination of David’s company pension and the government one, so therefore, we won’t know the total income we’ll be dealing with until then. As for my income (since I am not now nor do I ever plan to be retired), I never know how much money I’m looking at until I get my quarterly check. That’s just the nature of the beast, and after ten years, something I’m used to and very grateful for.

If you’re thinking I’m not a person who deals well with the concept of financial uncertainty, you would be correct. I know it’ll only be a matter of time before I know what to expect and can organize accordingly. The real trick for us, of course, will be adjusting to getting two payments a month instead of one each week. That may take awhile.

We shopped ahead, loading up on meat and canned goods. I re-organized my small deep freezer, so that I can find what I’m looking for faster. At the moment, we hope to be able to get by having two major grocery orders a month, and then shop for perishables like milk, eggs, bread and butter as we need them. Extras we’ll relegate to my quarterly check—at least that’s the plan, for now.

It’s all just a matter of getting used to a new normal, and I know it’ll all work out. Being older also means I don’t really get worked up all that easily over the bumps in life. I try hard to keep the main thing the main thing, and roll with the flow.

I did my Christmas shopping yesterday. I went to the bank, took out my budget and stuffed it into fourteen Christmas cards. Done. I used to give gift cards, but they charge you about 6 dollars per gift card, and then tax on top of that, for the fee! So, I decided to cut out the middleman.

Now, that’s one area right there—the giving of gifts—where it’s good to be older. When I was younger I shopped for hours for actual gifts for everyone, and worried that people wouldn’t like what I had chosen for them. I can recall spending a lot of time over the holiday season, worrying about that, and whether my house was clean enough, my food good enough and plentiful enough, and blah blah blah.

But now I’m older, and the main thing being the main thing, I have a whole new attitude. We give what we can; we host as we can; I can promise not to poison anyone with my cooking and baking; and we still love with our whole hearts. That’s who we are, and people—yes, even family—can take it or leave it.

For me, Christmas is about celebrating the birth of the Son of God. It’s about spending quality time with family and friends, and resting in the sweet, sometimes bitter-sweet, memories of my years on this planet so far.

A little seasonal music, a warm cup of cocoa, and a good book to read in between socializing—and if I’m lucky, an after-dinner chocolate to sweeten the deal.

And remembering that the main thing is living, laughing, and loving and not working, worrying, and weeping.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for November 29, 2017

I may have shared with you the fact that David would leave me a note every work day, and had done so for the last few years. Here is my beloved’s note to me on last Friday—his final day of work:

End of days! Parole!!! Last time! No more lunches to make! The only 4:30 is in the PM! The alarm is history! New Beginning! New Life! New adventures!

Over the years, our family and friends would assert that between the two of us, I tended to see the glass as half full, whereas David tended to see it as half empty. The note he left me on Friday was a proclamation that he was going forward with an optimistic attitude. I was very gratified to see that, because I know that this moment for him was bitter sweet.

Facing the future can be uncertain. For someone like me who tends to also be on the anal side, it can be more than a bit scary. The truth is, I’m very optimistic, if I have my ducks in a row. I’m not really sure that I do this time. Only time will tell. In moments like these I rely heavily on my faith. God is in control of my life. I have nothing to fear. I just need to focus on the things I’m supposed to do, and let Him handle everything else. For me, there’s nothing tougher than “let God and let go”.

While a part of me as dreaded this moment—a total change in my own routine, as well as switching from work earnings to pension earnings, not really knowing exactly how much money will be involved—the other part of me rejoices for all the reasons my husband noted above, plus one other.

I have seen him struggle over the last year, especially, because of his COPD, and the general pains of arthritis and getting older. He’s felt frustrated because physically, he couldn’t do the maintenance at the quarry like he used to do. In the last couple of years, when they needed his expertise—and he had quite a bit after 39 years in the industry—he assumed the role of supervisor, standing on the sidelines and telling them what to do to fix what was wrong. He couldn’t get in there himself and actually do the work, and that was a wound to him. I’ve seen him struggle to breathe when it’s cold outside. I’ve prayed for the day when he wouldn’t have to do any of that anymore, and that day has finally arrived.

Despite some of my comments here and there, I’m not really concerned about no longer having my house to myself. The truth is, we’re both good at being together and being separate in the space we have here. My office only has one door, instead of two. One of the first things he wants to do is purchase another door to hang, so that I can close both doors when I need to. That’s a good first step. But we’ve already taken other steps so that we can each be on our own.

A year ago, my beloved moved his computer into the living room, making his “office” in the corner of that much larger space. He has wireless headphones, so that when he wants to watch television he can do so without disturbing me as I work. The headphones are good for him, too, since he has suffered significant hearing loss over his career, and they allow him to really hear the programs he watches.

I am looking forward to what adventures life has in store for us. And being older, our definition of that image-evoking word, “adventure” is definitely different than it would be for someone much younger.

I still feel understandable trepidation as we move forward. I just have to remind myself to put a smile on my face, and look bravely toward the sun.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for November 22, 2017

The last week of my husband’s working life has arrived and so far, nothing is the way either one of us thought it would be. My beloved is counting down the days until Friday—but the first two days of this week he did so from home.

They had a sudden change of plans, and needed to fill an emergency order, the result of which, for Monday and Tuesday, there was nothing there for my beloved to do, as they suspended regular operations. They offered to bring him home on Monday, and to give him Tuesday off, and of course, he chose that rather than to stand around outside in the cold doing nothing for two days. So today, he’s back at it, and Friday will be his last day on the job.

I looked on his extra time at home as a blessing, because I had pulled a muscle in my left knee on Friday. It was nice having him here to help me out. Whenever my arthritis acts up, and I have even more pain than usual in my legs as a result, I try very hard not to just sit around. I try to keep moving, even if it is painful. I’ve found, however, that after a few decades, my tolerance for pain and my ability to keep a smile on my face and a bounce in my attitude are not what they once were. But life does go on.

David is really looking forward to next Monday. He told me he’s planning to get up with the alarm, so he can turn it off, and then go right back to bed. It’s something I’ve heard a lot of people adding to their wish lists—to finally “follow through” on what the working Joe or Joan would love to do when the alarm goes off in the morning, but of course they don’t because they have to get up and go to work.

For David, if he were to begin to set his alarm to get up at 6:30 in the morning once he’s retired that would be, in fact, sleeping in 2 hours from what he’s used to. He says he’d like to get up no later than 7:30, because he doesn’t want to waste the day.

That’s my preferred time to get up, too. I do haul my butt out of bed, even if I am tired. My reasoning is two-fold. First, by that time, I’m usually sore from being in bed so I really do need a change of position. Second, I know that if I continue being tired I can go into the living room, get into my recliner, and doze pretty much whenever I want to. My daytime priorities are my writing, and some housework. I make supper for us every day except Friday and Saturday. David doesn’t like to cook so I don’t ask him to or expect him to, it’s as simple as that. Last weekend when I was in so much pain, he heated microwave meals and soup—and that is the most “cooking” he’s done in the last couple of decades.

As it stands now, David plans to take the first week of the rest of his life, doing very little. He wants to enjoy the absolute freedom he’s accused me of having day in and day out, the freedom to do whatever he wants to do.

If he equates freedom with total inactivity, I’m pretty certain one week is all he’ll want to spend doing that. Though he is much more talented than I am when it comes to lounging about, I know he’ll become bored doing nothing for too long.

I need my routines, as trite as they may be, and my pattern of “multi-tasking”—mixing creative work with the physical, in order to keep my mind from stagnating and my body in some form of working order.

I’m thinking that before long, he’ll discover the very same thing is what he’ll need, too.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for November 15, 2017

In August of 2010 we returned home from a vacation that had included a visit to Disneyland in Orlando, to attend an RWA conference. The month before, we’d said goodbye to our Boots-kitty. He was an all black Persian, that had originally belonged to our Sonja. She brought him with her when she moved in here for a time. Having been an indoor cat until then, he became quite fond of the outside world while Sonja was with us, and when she and our son moved to an apartment in another city, she thought it would be cruel to suddenly deprive him his new-found freedom outside. Though we live in a town, this is a quiet neighborhood, with little traffic and plenty of cats.

We agreed to keep him, since he was already a member of the family. That was in 1997, so he was old, about 14 or 15 when he left us. A week before we came home from our vacation in 2010 it was to learn that a new cat had arrived—on her own as it were, or if you believe in such things, sent here by God when she was likely abandoned. I say abandoned, because she had no front claws. People who declaw cats don’t generally let them outside. Efforts were made, of course, to find her home and her owner, all to no avail. The area vets had never seen her before, and she had no “chip” implanted.

Now, her arrival was eerie, to say the least. She was all black, like Boots, except for a patch on her chest. Not a Persian like Boots, but she appeared to have some Maine Coon in her, and she had long hair. She showed up on our porch on a rainy day. My daughter was staying here looking after our old dog, Rochie, while we were gone, and discovered the cat when she came home in the middle of her work day. She spoke to this kitty, of course, as no one in this family would ever chase away a stray. My daughter returned to work, and when she came back again at the end of the day, the cat was still here, so she invited the kitty in.

This black cat went straight to the corner of the living room where Boots’s green cat stand had stood (and which I had removed when I came back from the vet on that fateful day because I couldn’t bear to look at it), turned to look at my daughter, and, (so my daughter said) gave her merry hell for the stand being gone. To appease the small beast, my daughter asked this interloper kitty if she wanted some treats.

Whereupon this cat made its way to the kitchen and jumped up on the same chair that Boots would jump up on to receive his treats. For these two reasons, my grandson’s girl friend named this cat Spooky, while he named her Creepy.

Not caring for either of those names, I called her Puddy. When I came home from vacation, I walked straight to where she’d been ensconced since she arrived—inside, on the fourth step of the stairs going up to the second level. I patted her, and spoke to her, and that was it. She followed me into my office, and was the first critter to inhabit the spot on my writing desk between my monitor and tower.

In her attempts before we arrived home to locate her owner, my daughter had taken her to the vet, as I said, to see if there was a chip in her, but there was not. The vet told her at that time that Puddy was an older cat—likely at least seven or eight years old. My daughter thought that perhaps she’d belonged to an elderly woman who’d had to be moved by her family to assisted living. She said she sees that all the time in her line of work (she’s a community care giver). They tell mom they found a wonderful new home for her beloved kitty when the truth is, they simply put the cat outside and abandon it.

Puddy made her place in our family, and when Mr. Tuffy arrived a couple of years later, she tolerated him once he acknowledged her position at the top of the family totem. She was demanding at times, earning the nick-name bitch-kitty. And in the last month or so, she became very affectionate with me. She demanded to be held a lot, and I accommodated her as often as I could. I had the sense in the last couple of weeks especially, that she was saying goodbye.

On Monday, October 30th, my beloved let our Puddy out the back door as he did every morning, before he left for work. She would go out early each morning and then when she was ready, would come right back in through the cat window and yes, she could go out the cat window too, but why make the effort when one of her staff was there to wait on her?

On this particular Monday, however, Puddy didn’t return. That had never happened, not once in seven years. We looked for her, of course, and called all of the area vets, and the proper authorities. We found no sign of her, and even while I looked and called, I somehow knew we wouldn’t.

She left us as she’d arrived, and as she’d lived—on her own terms, taking in the love and affection and massive amount of Temptation cat treats as her due. I don’t expect to see her among the former pets I’ll encounter at the rainbow bridge. I believe there’s a woman with a prior claim, who’s lap she’ll belong in, and that’s as it should be.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for November 8, 2017

Today is a double birthday celebration in the Ashbury family! Today, my beloved turns sixty-five years old—and our second daughter, our Sonja, turns forty.

Both are landmark birthdays, and despite the way both of the celebrants sometimes grumble about making a fuss, or the ever constantly mumbled, “please don’t remind me”, I believe that birthdays are to be celebrated.

They are proof that so far, the bastards haven’t beaten you down. They haven’t won. You survived another year, and you’re still here, baby!

That sentiment isn’t as negative as it might appear, at first glance, to be. It kind of reminds me of that old joke about a man, falling from the sixtieth floor of a building, being heard saying as he past the thirtieth floor, “so far, so good”.

I know that I tend to always give a mostly upbeat message in these essays, and that’s because despite everything, I’m a mostly upbeat person. Maintaining a positive attitude affects things more than I can prove to you; the more positive you remain, the more positive you feel, and the more positive life actually becomes for you.

That doesn’t mean I don’t know how crappy things can be, how dark, or how hopeless. I do know because I’ve been there, which is why I insist upon having an attitude of gratitude, and celebrating the bright side as often as possible.

When I do those two things, I’m saying, sure, there is a dark side to life, and crap happens. Crap happens to everybody—but I don’t care. I don’t care that there may be horrors or disasters in my future. They will happen, with or without me. I will get through them. They don’t come to stay, they come to pass. Like the song says, “if you’re going through hell, keep on going.”

Life is entirely too short to spend your time worrying. We already spend enough time working, and wondering what the future could be. Friends, you add worry to that mix, and that is a triple ‘w’ that has nothing to do with the internet. How much better to give life it’s due: go to work, do your best, then at the end of the day go home, and try to remember that life is really for learning, laughing, and loving.

I’m not sure how we will celebrate these two milestones this year. I’ve heard no news or whispers from the rest of the family, so I don’t know if the kids are planning anything for David, or not. Although he was very humbled and deep-down pleased by the open house his company hosted for him at the beginning of October, he’s never really cared for parties. I’m not sure why that is, exactly, but there you have it.

He and I differ in that regard.

Party or no party, I do know the kids will be certain to call on the day of, and visit as soon after as they can. Our kids usually don’t forget our birthdays, though they have a couple of times. We certainly understand how busy life can be, especially for those still dealing with kids. And when they do forget those things, well, I believe there’s a value in human growth and development when we make those little faux pas from time to time and experience a bit of rue. Not a bad way to keep the ego in check, either.

Since this is a Wednesday, I’ll serve my beloved one of his favorite suppers, and give him a pass on doing the dishes. That might seem like just another Wednesday in the Ashbury household.

But the difference, I believe, as it is in most things, is in what lies within the heart.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for November 1, 2017

In the Ashbury household, the countdown clock to retirement is at R minus 23. My beloved’s last day on the job is Friday, November 24th. The day following is the company Christmas party, to be held at a steakhouse not far from the job site. We’ve been invited to attend, and it will be, in all likelihood, the last time my husband sees any of the people he’s worked with—some for as long as twenty-five years.

He’s never been one to mix socially with his co-workers. He never really made any close friends on the job. In fact, he really only has a small handful of people he considers to be close friends. I actually believe that’s how it is for most of us. We could all probably count the people we have met in our lifetimes in the hundreds, but close friends and confidants generally without using all the fingers of both hands.

David commented in his note this morning that he thought it was going to be harder to get up each morning the closer he drew to the end. He really is tired, and looking forward to no longer having to get up at 4 in the morning. I’ve been a witness to how difficult it’s been for him these last couple of years. He’s worked hard all our lives, even to the point of, early on in our marriage, shoveling driveways in the winter when he was out of a job. He deserves his rest.

We’ve done a fair bit of talking, as you can imagine, over the last little while, about what our daily routines will be like. He insists that he doesn’t want to waste his days away, and so will likely get up at no later than seven-thirty each morning. Of course, for him that’s three and a half hours later than normal.

I’m more of the theory that we’ll kind of release the norms of getting up and going to bed. David used to be a night owl, and so did I though we went through those particular stages at different times in our lives. My brother told me recently that he tends to go to bed and get up early, whereas his wife of more than 50 years now gets up and goes to bed late.

I won’t be surprised if we have a similar circumstance, after a while. We’ve never lived in each other’s pockets our entire lives. We’ve never been a couple who had to do everything together. We’ve always pursued our own interests, and actually enjoy the time we spend by ourselves (as in, himself and myself). Aside from the three weeks he’s had off over Christmas the past couple of years, we haven’t spent day after day together, not in the last, well, thirty-nine and a half years. There was always work, and so this is going to be…interesting.

We joke about it a little, because we are both very much aware that no one is perfect. We’ve been together a long time, but that doesn’t mean we live, sleep and eat hearts and flowers. No one does. We’re each of us very capable of getting on the other’s nerves. For his part, my husband plans to get himself a scooter, and go out a couple days a week. For my part, I plan to get up earlier, and encourage him to nap if he’s tired. One takes one’s alone time where one can find it.

We aren’t marching into our futures, secure and solid in our idea of what it’s going to be like for us. We’re old enough to know that few things are as imagined. But we’re also wise enough to understand that this is the dawn of a new phase in our lives. So we’ll face it the way we’ve faced most challenges over the years.

We’ll do the best we can, and try very hard not to sweat the small stuff.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for October 25, 2017

Autumn is definitely in full swing here in Southern Ontario. The good news is that our walnut tree has finally dropped practically all of its leaves. The bad news? There was a bumper crop of walnuts this year, and about half of them are still up there!

Calm days aren’t so bad. Windy days? Friends, we are living in a war zone! Those little bombs make a bang when they hit the roof on their way to the ground. Those that are on the road make a loud pop when run over by a vehicle. If it’s windy, and you have to go out the front door? You pray to be spared a walnut bomb on the noggin.

War, as they say, is hell.

As we all know, there is more than one kind of war being waged in our society these days. There was a war on poverty once, though anymore it looks like it’s morphed from an effort to ease the suffering of those afflicted by it, to an effort to simply make the lives of those afflicted harder and crueler. There’s a war on drugs, but I have no idea if we’re winning or losing that one.

People who identify along different places of the political spectrum seem to be at war, as well, and with each other, at that! That is a sad, sad state of affairs. Really, isn’t that war not much unlike the controversy between the over/under proponents on the best way to hang toilet paper?

And then there’s another war going on, one that did in fact begin raging long before I was ever born. This war I call the forgotten war. There have been moments during my life time, when it’s suddenly in the spotlight. And every time that happens, hell, I think we end up going backwards a couple of steps, instead of making progress.

That war, of course, is the one that nearly every woman alive on this entire freaking planet is aware of and even familiar with. It is a war being fought in classrooms, and courtrooms; in Hollywood, and New York. It is a war that is waged in restaurants and boardrooms, in factories and everywhere else that people—female people—work or live.

It’s a war for respect, for equality, and for the right not to be harassed, not to be touched, not to be ridiculed or made to hear rude, sexist comments. It’s a war for the right not to be raped.

Every time this war is in the spotlight, as happened most recently a few weeks ago when the New York Times published their story on Harvey Weinstein, people are all, “this is so shameful, disgusting, sick, despicable…” if you can think of a really powerful insult, it was likely hurled by someone to describe the now publicly shamed producer and what he’s accused of doing.

That’s always the first thing that happens after the spotlight has been turned on.

The next thing occurs when it becomes clear that no one is ripping to shreds the brave women who finally stood up and said “enough!”. That next thing is that more and more women dare to step forward. This time, though someone told me the hashtag is reborn and not new, the #metoo campaign exploded and yes, I published my own “metoo” post on my Face Book wall.

And then the next thing that happens is the flood of comments by many, intoned with various tones of sobriety or hope, that maybe women will now finally be “empowered” to stand up for themselves…and this is where I really, really have a problem.

Since the Council of Nicaea in AD 325 (pretty close to the beginning of recorded history) when the wise leaders of the new Christian faith tried to decide if women were beasts or human (human won, likely mainly because the Bible pretty much forbids bestiality), up to today, this war has been fought, women have stood up—and pretty much been beaten right back down again because of it. Ridiculed, humiliated, and often punished because they dared to complain, or dared to have been the victims of harassment, verbal abuse, or rape in the first place.

This time, I heard one commentator ask the right question: what causes this despicable thing to happen? I can’t recall the exact answer given at the time, but it was the wrong answer. Here’s the right one, and it’s not complicated.

The cause of this harassment is bad, inappropriate, an unacceptable behavior by some men. Period.

What’s needed to end it, is not simply for women to stand up, to speak out, because we have been doing that for all of our lives.

What’s needed is for good, decent men to stand up with us, to speak out, and let it be known that this behavior is not to be tolerated anymore. It is not right, and it should end, now. That is the only way things are going to change. Women can not do it alone. Good, decent men have to help.

I do believe, with all my heart, that there are plenty of good, decent men available to get the job done.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for October 18, 2017

Every once in a while, I do something, or say something, so stupid, I amaze myself. I figure a regular injection of “duh” in my life keeps my head from getting too swelled. Of all the things in my life I’m thankful for, my ability to laugh at myself sits near the top of the list.

This past weekend I experienced such a moment. It was almost as if the cosmos had intoned, upon my awakening last Sunday morning, “and now, for a moment of comic relief.”

That day I slept in until 8 am. Ideally, I like to be up by 7:30, but there are days from time to time when I’m tired, and on those days in the daily struggle of mind over mattress, mattress wins. I wanted to watch one of David’s talking heads programs with him that’s on at nine, but I do have my first thing in the morning routine to adhere to. I really am a creature of habit. I like to start the day in the same way, every day. It’s an hour of “me” time that I guard jealously.

I also, on Sunday morning, finish my grocery list and then print it out. Yes, I have a grocery list on an excel spreadsheet. I list the items in the order I hope to find them in the store, and I even have the price listed that I expect to pay. There are actually occasions when the cost at the cash register is less than the total at the bottom of my list. Not always, mind you, because groceries are, by and large, more expensive now than they have ever been. But it happens.

Now, as to my humiliating Sunday morning. First, I need to explain I have a new wireless keyboard and mouse (my first wireless keyboard). About a week after I got it, I awoke one morning to find it upside down on the floor, batteries out and my cat laying peacefully sleeping where the keyboard had so recently been. So, from that point on, I’ve made it a practice to put the keyboard up top of the two tiered letter tray that sits on top of the file cabinet each night, a place where the cat can’t get to.

On Sunday I turned on my computer, brought my keyboard down, and prepared to finish my grocery list. Fingers on keyboard and…nothing. It didn’t work. The first thing I thought, of course, was: batteries! And even though the batteries in it were supposed to last 12 months and it hadn’t yet been three, I immediately changed them. And…nothing. The keyboard did not work.

Even though keyboards aren’t very expensive, I balked at the idea of buying a new one. I mean, what is it with stuff these days? Doesn’t anyone take pride in their work? I understand the concept of built-in obsolescence. No manufacturer will have much of a business if the things they build last forever, but still. Only months? Just a few short months?

Then, my gaze landed on that tiny little thingy in the USB port. You know the thingy I mean, the one that allows keyboard and mouse to work in the first place. And even though the mouse still worked, I decided to pull that sucker out, turn off the computer, and then after I turned it on again, insert the thingy back in the port. I figured that maybe the keyboard somehow lost its connection. It could happen, right?

Nope. Keyboard didn’t work. I left the computer, feeling really put out that I would have to go into the city and buy a new keyboard. It really interfered with my unusual Sunday morning television viewing, as I kept feeling put out, thus not enjoying the sharp wit of the commentators. And then, yes! My tech-savvy daughter dropped in!

I told her about my keyboard, and asked her to please, please, have a look at it. I was hoping there was some geeky-thingy she would know about that she could perform, to fix it. She looked at me over the top of her glasses. Daughter: Mother, did you check the batteries? Me: (somewhat affronted, because, sheesh, really?) Of course, I did. I changed the batteries and yes, they were brand new batteries I put in.

She went into my office, and I returned my attention to the television. But not so much so that I didn’t see her appear in the doorway of the living room just moments later, my keyboard in hand.

Daughter: You know I love you, right? I didn’t think we would get to this point in our relationship quite so soon. Then she turned the keyboard over and said, purposefully speaking as if talking to an imbecile, I might add, “You have to make sure the on/off button is turned to the ‘on’ position.”

Duh. Color me embarrassed and feeling really stupid. Not a bad thing, as well I know, but still. Again, in my defense, this is my first wireless keyboard.

Note to self, and perhaps words to just generally live by: check to see if there’s an on/off button first. Happily, that worked.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for October 11, 2017

Last Thursday, my husband was surprised by his company with an “open house” held in his honor at a local restaurant. I had been in on the surprise, of course. It was my job to get him there, on a Thursday night at 6 pm. I was able to accomplish this by telling him we were meeting my brother and his wife at the restaurant. They had, of course, been invited, so I spoke the truth!

My beloved was extremely surprised, and touched, by this event. Attended by 40 to 50 of his current and former co-workers as well as his current and former bosses, it was an evening of laughter and reminiscences. The company reserved a private room, and the restaurant provided platters of nibbles, enough food that my poor beloved, who had been thinking about the menu at that eatery (the best one in town and our favorite), did not leave hungry. 

My brother asked me if this was a regular occurrence—if his employer regularly honored people who were retiring. I told him the truth—it might very well happen at the upper echelons of management—but for a man who was basically a member of the rank and file, this was a first. Seriously, in the years my husband has worked for the corporation, he had heard of no one being given even so much as a watch. My brother was astounded, as was I when I first received the call from the site’s admin telling me about this “open house”.

By the time David “hangs up his pick and shovel” for the final time, he will have completed 39 and a half years at that quarry. He was asked Thursday night, “why not put in another six months to make it an even forty years?” His answer was simple. After November, the next several months are winter, which can be bitter here in southern Ontario. He’s worked outside for all of those thirty-nine and a half years, as his is an outside job. But he decided last winter would be his last. Breathing is especially difficult for him in the cold months, even without adding in the stress of being physically active.

As if the fact of the party itself wasn’t enough, there were also gifts for him. His supervisor knew of a man who made “models” of different pieces of manufacturing equipment, and so they commissioned a model of a rock crusher. This “sculpture” has a small, engraved plaque which notes the occasion.

They also gave him a printed book, filled with pictures of his years at the quarry, all taken after it was sold by the original owner. That was a wonderful touch. There will no doubt be days when my beloved is nostalgic for the past, and this book filled with color pictures, will be a good way for him to remember a career of doing what he loved.

Prior to the corporate take over, David was the one who built many of the pieces that made up the plant—including building conveyor belts and fabricating one metal braced tunnel for one of the belts to go through. He took pride in his work, in being able to sit down with the first owner and sketch out the pieces that good man required through the years.

This book shows some of those pieces, which were still in use at the time of the takeover. It also shows him performing various duties, as well as photos of him and his co-workers posing at different times through the years, whenever the site superintendent got his/her camera out. There were photos taken at the first Christmas dinner held by the new management, and one at the dinner last year. That one is the final photo in the book, and is a picture of us both.

David’s official last day is November 24th. The next day will see the 2017 Christmas dinner at a steak house close to the site. We’ve been invited to attend, a last chance to see and speak with some of these people with whom David has spent, in some cases, many years working with.

It’s never been his habit to socialize with the people with whom he works. So it really will be a last meeting. A final good-bye, over food and laughter, before the first day of the rest of his life.

For any interested, I’ve put a picture of the model he received as a gift, as well as a picture from the book, on my blog, Wednesday’s Words. Here is a link to it: http://wednesdayswordsbymorgan.blogspot.ca/2017/10/last-thursday-my-husband-was-surprised.html
 

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for October 4, 2017

We have a long weekend approaching here in Canada. Yes, it’s time for Thanksgiving north of the 49th. As most of my friends in the U.S. know, we tend to have a shorter growing season up here, and in most parts of my province at least, the harvest is already underway. Thanksgiving is at its heart a harvest festival, so ours precedes yours—even though the tradition we follow started in 1621 in Plymouth. In short, we plagiarized your holiday!

Time moves too darn fast these days. It seems to me that it was mid summer just a week ago, and now here we are, about to celebrate the holiday wherein we give thanks for all that we’ve received in our lives. Well, I suppose the closer truth might be that most of us give more thought to the feast we’re about to cook and eat, and to the social aspects of the occasion than we do to the actual giving of thanks part, but I do live in hope. And even if you don’t dwell on the meaning of the holiday, it does touch your mind at some point, and I believe that most people do take at least a moment or two to reflect on things they have to be thankful for.

Here in Canada, we have a lot to be grateful for. While we must be vigilant with regard to safety in these generally chaotic and fearsome times, for the most part, we don’t have to worry about armed conflict within our borders. We don’t have to fear being rousted by an armed militia that has the freedom to do to us whatever whim strikes them at any given time, or being shot by someone as we go about our daily business. Much of this world is not so fortunate.

For the most part, we have access to fresh water and clean air, to shelter and clothing and food, and if we’re in an accident, we’re taken immediately by ambulance to the nearest hospital. Much of this world is not so fortunate.

For the most part, our children attend schools without our having to shell out thousands of dollars, and those children spend their days receiving an education, and often a meal or two, so that they are able to learn without the pangs of an empty belly clouding their efforts. Much of this world is not so fortunate.

I confess that I am guilty of sometimes feeling a little smug when it comes to life here in my country, although I am always aware that things could be better. Because yes, we are very lucky here, and fed here, and educated here, and safe here—but truthfully, it’s only for the most part.

So, while I will spend this Thanksgiving Day giving thanks for all of the blessings I’ve received, I’ll also be mindful of those who don’t have as much. Because I truly believe that we, as a society, only rise to as high a level of accomplishment as the least of us is able to attain.

If we’re going to stand tall and stand firm and argue that caring for the least is not the job of government, then it must be the job of the rest of us to do so. Our own blessings are tied to our generosity toward others. That has been true since the beginning of time, and will never change. We need to understand that and embrace that, and then help those who are less fortunate in whatever way we can, as often as we can.

The proof of truly being thankful for all you have, lies in the way in which you share what you have with others.

To my Canadian friends, I wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for September 27, 2017

Autumn has arrived. We’ve attacked the fallen walnut leaves for the third time, and will likely have to do so again before the neighborhood maples drop their leaves around the end of October.

When it was me doing most of the raking, I always figured that since I had enjoyed the beauty of those neighboring trees through the spring and summer, spending a couple hours raking was a fair price to pay. I no longer do that chore.

When our grandson isn’t on the job, my beloved is. But please don’t feel too sorry for him. You see, at a company golf tournament a couple of years ago, he won a leaf blower. So, while there is some effort involved, it’s not the heavy slog of raking—at least not until he has amassed a pile. Then he puts nature’s debris into the brown paper bags, and that can take some work. The only thing he really minds about the entire process is that he can’t do physical work like he used to.

The countdown to his retirement is in serious territory now—less than two months to go. I will admit that I am at this point used to the idea (or should that be resigned to the idea?). We’ve joked some, and I’ve told him that if I ever tell him to go outside and not come in until the streetlights are on, that he should perhaps stop and examine his recent activities.

He thought that I’d made a very clever joke—but he also knew I meant it. This is going to be an adjustment for the both of us. But then, we’ve been together more than 45 years, and through that time we’ve undergone plenty of adjustments. We’re not in the U.S. army but we’ve used their motto—adapt, improvise, overcome—for most of our lives.

There’s an old saying that the only people who really like change are wet babies, and I think there’s some truth to that.

He is looking forward to not having to get up at four a.m., to not having a boss, and to not having to interact with people he doesn’t necessarily like. It’s been slightly more than fifteen years since I last worked outside the home. I spent much of my working years employed by big companies, so I do understand his feelings on the matter.

I even know, although we’ve spent some time negotiating responsibilities around the home and the upcoming division of labor, that he’s likely going to take the first few weeks and do as little as possible. I really am all for that. If retirement is supposed to be a reward, then he should be allowed to feel as if he’s being rewarded.

You know how, as a parent, you live your life a certain way and hope that your example inspires your kids? Yeah, I don’t think that works the same way with spouses. David and I are two totally different people. It’s rare for me to blow off a day. I might not get everything done I think I need to do, because I can’t do physical work the way I used to, either. But I rarely spend more than an hour or so “doing nothing”. The only codicil to that is when I am captured by a good book.

My daily routine is what I call “multi-tasking”. Every hour of every day is filled with either writing, or housework. There are always things to be done. Dishes that missed the after-supper round up the night before, a bathroom to be cleaned, a floor to be vacuumed, and a bed to be made. Supper also has to be made, unless it’s Friday or Saturday—yes, I now have not one, but two “no-cook” days. As I said, I may not get everything done on any given day, but I work on it as best I can. I’ve learned that an hour or so taken with my legs up in the early afternoon generally eases the pain of my arthritic joints so I don’t need pain meds until evening.

I keep busy so that by the time I head to bed, I’m tired, and I can sleep. Rare is the day that drags, and I guess in a way I’ve traded the right to loaf around for a lack of boredom.

I’m honestly looking forward to finding out what my husband’s after-retirement routine, once he settles in, is going to look like.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for September 20, 2017

When I was younger, “folk wisdom” was more of an element in our lives than it is today. It seemed to me, at times, that the older people had a saying for everything. Adages and common-sense approaches don’t seem to play much of a role in life these days. Instead of relying upon old saws and old folks for wisdom, we now have the Internet.

Some attitudinal habits, however, appear to hold true. For example, there used to be a saying in New York and area, back in the early years of the last century: “If you see it in the Sun, it’s so.” This saying, of course, played a central role in a very famous OPED known as, “Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.” Not to mention the inevitable holiday TV movie that appeared in 1991, inspired by it.

The concept illustrated above, with apologies to St. Nick, wasn’t about Christmas. It meant that if an item appeared in print, then it had to be the truth (think of it as an early if/then statement). And the reason folks felt a certain amount of assurance believing that, was that in those days and for the most part, newspaper reporters and editors did their level best to make sure that the stories they printed contained the true facts of a matter. The same held true for the newscasts. The Huntley/Brinkley and Walter Cronkite nightly news were programs, in the beginning, that had no “sponsors”. The major networks provided the news on their own dime. No ads meant no reason to skew the reporting. That was then.

Of course, lying really is as old as time—as is blaming someone else for your misdeeds. Just read the book of Genesis if you need proof. But I digress.

Somehow, we’ve carried on that attitude that if it appears in print—if we can read it—it must be true. People, that is not so at all today! In fact, it’s truly never been so to the extent we wanted to believe it was. Just because you see something on the Internet does not mean it’s the truth. You still have to use logic and discernment to make a judgement: Is this item that I am reading actually true?

And yes, there really is such a thing as the truth.

The use of smoke and mirrors is so prevalent these days, everyone should be issued sunglasses and gas masks free of charge. Seriously. Do you know what my daughter told me a while back? It was something that totally gobsmacked me. It happened when she was sitting beside me and I was posting something somewhere on line—I can’t remember the exact place or occasion, but it was on Face Book and I was answering a question. She asked me why I had written what I had, some sort of a confession that some might consider embarrassing. I told her that what I had written was the truth. Her observation? “When you’re on Face Book, just lie. Everyone does.”

I told her that no, not everyone does, because I don’t. I’m pretty sure there are lots of others who don’t, as well. But I would rather see others adopt my daughter’s skeptical attitude than to blindly accept whatever they read as being truth.

There have always been those who would take advantage of others. There have always been those who would push their own agendas regardless of what is real or true, and regardless of what is best for the world at large. The Internet hasn’t changed that; it has, however, facilitated it. Now John or Jane Doe who might be bitter or angry because of personal wounds, perceived or imagined, can strike out, strike back, from the safety of their armchairs. If someone pays them enough money, they are happy to say anything—anything at all! Think about that for a moment. People who have even a slight bent, who would dearly love to “pay someone back” or take their negativity out on others or earn a fast buck without caring where it came from feel free to do so within the anonymity of the world wide web.

I don’t have any answers to this challenge we face. For the moment, it seems that too many people are focused on their anger, saying whatever makes them feel good—a good feeling that evaporates as quickly as the sound of those words dissipate into the ether.

All I really have are questions. Oh, and adages. I have tons and tons of adages and old saws. My favorite is what goes around, comes around. I believe in Divine Justice, or as others refer to it, Karma.

Yes, they have indeed called for more vehicles, because the line to ride the Karma bus keeps getting longer and longer and longer.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for September 13, 2017

Now that Mother Nature has taken us to school, and reminded us once more how puny we are in comparison, the hard work of rebuilding can, in the case of Texas continue and, in the case of Florida and the Caribbean, begin.

I sat in front of my television, as I am sure many of you did, a silent, praying witness to the destruction that hurricane Irma wrought on the Caribbean and the state of Florida. I couldn’t even imagine going through such a thing. As I watched I was inevitably reminded how lucky I am to live here, where I do. Rare indeed are hurricanes in my neck of the woods. I had to look it up. I knew of one—Hurricane Hazel that hit this area in the year I was born—but I wondered if there were any others.

The Great Galveston Hurricane of 1900 found it’s way as an extratropical storm to this area. In researching it, I discovered it did affect my own town, and that during the storm, the town’s flour mill caught fire, causing $350,000 dollars damage to the mill and 50 other stores and offices in town. I’m not sure what the modern-day equivalent to that amount of year 1900 dollars is, but for those times, it was a massive loss. But nothing, of course, compared to the number of lives that monster storm claimed: between 6 and 12 thousand souls perished. It was and remains the deadliest natural disaster in U. S. history.

Reading about that storm, that arrived in an age when they didn’t have the advance warning systems we have now, sent a shiver down my spine. In the account I perused, it stated that storm ended Galveston’s “golden age”, that in its aftermath, investors turned their backs on that city, and focused on Houston, instead.

Looking over the video footage the last few days, of some of the Caribbean islands—St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Barbuda as well as St. Martin/St. Maarten—one wonders not only how these islands can be re-built, but if they will be. The loss to these small paradises was not just lives and buildings: a lot of the vegetation has been scrubbed away. Man can rebuild a house; but he cannot recreate the lush flora of the region. Only nature can do that, and that will definitely take time.

I try very hard not to be political in my comments. I’m not being so, now, exactly. But something happened in the days leading up to the landfall of Irma, and I really have to say something about it because, quite frankly it really got me angry. One of the more bombastic of radio personalities, one who is in West Palm beach, shot his mouth off before the arrival of the storm. While the hard-working Republican Governor of Florida was entreating his citizens to not ignore the warnings, to evacuate ahead of the event, this jerk with a microphone claimed to his audience that the hoopla over Irma was a left-wing conspiracy, perpetrated by those with a “climate change” agenda.

I am all for free speech. I may not agree with what you have to say but I will defend your right to say it. That stated, I believe making such a statement, under the circumstances, should be equated to yelling “fire!” in a packed theatre. Many people believe every word this jerk says; it is therefore my hope that if any of his listeners, heeding his words, came to serious harm or died, he should be held responsible.

And you’d think, that, having given that “opinion” from his lofty on-air platform that he would have stayed in West Palm Beach, knowing there was only a little breeze coming his way, not the monster storm cited by the Governor and everyone else. Right? Ah, no. The cowardly lyin’ evacuated. I wonder if he headed west, to, say, Marco Island or perhaps Naples?

Sorry. That was a bit barbed, but nothing angers me more than those who make money by spewing trash, regardless of the side of the political spectrum they’re on. I’m old fashioned and naïve.

I believe if you have a platform, then you should use it to uplift, not tear down.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for September 6, 2017

And just like that, the summer is over!

We spent all of this past summer right here at home—or, rather, in our home province as we did have that one long weekend at KallypsoCon, just down the road from us. It’s the first time we’ve done that in several years, as we usually go to Pennsylvania the first week in August. That trip is a combination of research of the area for a future novel, as well as touching base with friends.

My point is that our going away even for a week, I thought, affected my sense of the speed with which the summer passed. Some summers we’ve been away from home—out of the country—for at least two, and sometimes for as many as three, weeks. And at the end of those summers I always felt as if doing so made the summer seem to go faster.

Now I can say that no, summer just passes very quickly, period.

In front of our house we have a walnut tree. Now, these aren’t to my knowledge, the kind of walnuts you can eat. They’re good for squirrel food and that’s about it. Each year, this tree is the last to get its leaves, and the first to lose them. As soon as the tree has grown those green nuts, the leaves begin to turn yellow and drop off. This is a process that lasts at least a couple months—and it started a week or more ago.

Sometimes, at this point, our grass is a bit on the brown side and bristly to the touch. This year we’ve had a fair bit of rain, so the grass has remained green. It needs to be cut and for that, we’ve a grandson on tap. The days are gone when either my husband or I can manage this task. If our yard was flat, well, then we could. However, it’s anything but, and the uneven and hilly terrain is too much of a challenge for us.

Yesterday, Mr. Tuffy was once more able to growl and bark at the kids who line up for the school bus right at the corner of our property. There are actually two groups of students awaiting transport—one more or less in front of our house, and one in front of the neighbor’s. We both have a corner property on the west side of an intersection. I don’t let the dog out onto the porch until after the kids are gone, because they don’t deserve to be barked at in person. So Tuffy has to be content with barking at them from the back of our love seat or from atop my desk, until after the buses have collected the children. The last one arrives about 8:26am.

I also tend to keep him inside in the morning during spring to fall, preferably on my desk, until I “see what sort of a day we’re having”. I thank my beloved for the need for this subterfuge. You see, on the weekend and holiday mornings, when David is home, Mr. Tuffy has coffee with daddy. Just a few drops in the bottom of his cup, but it’s tradition. Have I told my husband this isn’t good for the little guy? Of course. My beloved argues a few drops a couple days a week won’t really hurt him and he might be right. However, it’s my responsibility to see to it that no cup is on the porch the first time he goes out each morning. During the good weather, my husband awaits his daughter there, and leaves his half-done coffee when she arrives.

So, Monday to Friday I have to get out to the porch and scoop my husband’s morning coffee cup and deal with it without the dog being any the wiser. And in case you think he wouldn’t know? The first thing he does the first time he gets onto the porch every day after I get up, is to run to that single table we have there, looking for daddy’s coffee cup.

Once he sees it’s not there, he forgets all about it.

Some of you may be wondering, “but Morgan, don’t you drink coffee in the morning? What about your cup?” I think my answer may be an example of canine-thought, but I’m not sure how that helps us any. Yes, I do have coffee, at least three cups a day. But since I have never put my cup down for the dog, he doesn’t expect it of me.

As I said, I think there’s a message there somewhere. I’m just not certain what it is.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for August 30, 2017

The pictures coming out of Texas beginning last weekend, and over the past few days have been heartbreaking. To see some small towns practically demolished, and the streets of Houston with waist to chest deep water—and rising—is beyond shocking. Entire neighborhoods will have to be leveled, I think. You can’t have homes submerged for so long a period in so much contaminated water, and hope they’ll dry out and be fine. You just can’t.

The disaster that was Hurricane, and now Tropical Storm Harvey truly is unlike any storm we’ve ever seen. Usually a hurricane comes, rages for a day or so, and then goes away. The cost in human lives can be counted almost immediately. When I awoke this morning, it was to news that the death toll had reached 18, doubling overnight. The authorities fear that number will climb, once the water drains away. Hurricane Katrina stole 1,836 lives. We can only pray that is a number never to be matched or exceeded.

In addition to the deaths, thousands of people have and are going through hell. Thousands have escaped with their lives, but have lost everything they possess, save the clothes on their backs. Some arrived at the shelters, shoeless. For the person experiencing it, losing everything is more than a shock, it’s a violation—very similar to the kind of violation one would feel after a physical attack. It’s happened to us twice, through fire, so I know a little of what these people are feeling.

The Houston police chief, Art Acevedo said during the telephone interview that I listened to Monday morning, that he feared the worst was yet to come, and his words have proven true. All of the water brought by the rainfall and flooding in south east Texas will head to the Gulf via Houston. There are over 6 million people in the metropolitan Houston area, a number far too high to have tried to evacuate, given the propensity for flash flooding on many of the roadways leading out of the area. A family of 6 was lost, having perished attempting to evacuate their flooded home.

The Army Corps of Engineers had to release water from two Houston dams into the Buffalo Bayou on Monday morning. This was done to prevent uncontrollable flooding of the Houston Metropolitan area, and to keep the dams from failing. It was a measure taken much sooner than originally planned, because the water in the reservoirs rose so quickly. Some people were not yet flooded until the gates of the reservoirs were opened. And even so, one of those dams, built in the 1930s, still breached it’s banks, spilling water into areas that had previously escaped flooding.

A category 4 Hurricane with no “steering currents” gathering last minute strength from the unusually warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, coming ashore and lingering, wreaking havoc and with the potential for unprecedented rainfall—well, there was simply no real play book to follow for this crisis. They are writing the book for this one as they go along. Another blessing? There was no storm surge in the Houston area.

 This is going to be a very long recovery for the people of south east Texas, and especially, it would seem, for the people of Houston. The storm has moved on but the water will continue to bring heartache until it eventually drains away. What the water hid will then be revealed and the true recovery can begin. Only six days of Harvey, but the rebuilding, the mending of lives, and of spirits, the reconstruction of neighborhoods—that is going to take years.

The one bright light throughout this disaster has been watching neighbors helping neighbors, and strangers helping strangers. People came from far and wide, brought their own boats, and just got to work. Much has been written about the great divide within the United States these days; and yet I am certain no one offering help inquired if the person in need of that help was a democrat or a republican. They didn’t care what color their skin was, or if they might be an immigrant or native born. In the midst of the chaos named Harvey, all those people were Texans, and they were Americans—they were brothers and sisters. And while this tragedy has been hard to watch, and clearly even harder to endure, the affirmation of the greatest of the values for which America stands, has been something we all needed to see—and more, something we all need to emulate.

There are ways we all can help the people devastated by Harvey. Canadians can donate money through the Canadian Red Cross. Here is a link to the designated page on their website: http://www.redcross.ca/about-us/red-cross-stories/2017/red-cross-responds-to-devastation-caused-by-hurricane-harvey

The American Red Cross is, of course, involved in providing assistance. In addition, here is a list I found of resources in need of various donations, for my American friends who want to help: https://www.yahoo.com/news/help-victims-tropical-storm-harvey-212340221.html

You don’t have to give a lot; you might think your five dollars won’t help, but it will. Your five dollars added to the five dollars of thousands of other people means thousands of dollars times five will flow and be used to help put people’s lives back together again.

In the meantime, let’s all send positive thoughts and prayers for the people affected by this disaster. The people of Texas are resilient. They will get through this, and come out stronger. I truly believe this to be so.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for August 23, 2017

When I was younger, I couldn’t help but notice that I had either time, or money, in surplus but not both, never both at the same time. If I was working full time, then I never had time to do the things I enjoyed doing. On those rare occasions when I was out of work, I had lots of time, but not too much in discretionary dollars to spend. During those stretches, I would peruse the farmers’ markets in my area, and buy up bushels of cucumbers or beets, or baskets of peaches, strawberries or blueberries. The more stuff I could make – and in those days, it was cheaper to produce home made – then the more money I could shave off the grocery bill.

In my canning career, I’ve made everything my mother made except for one thing: sauerkraut. That whole process just seems like too much work to me. Plus, she had a marvelous stone crock, and I’ve never had one of those. Truly, for the amount of sauerkraut my husband and I consume here (the kids never cared for it) it’s better all the way around, to just buy it.

But I’ve made lots of jam, as some of my friends will attest. Strawberry, blueberry, cherry, peach, I’ve made them all and in copious quantities. I’ve made bread and butter pickles—and of all the things I have canned they were the most labor intensive to produce. There was the washing (scrubbing) and slicing and then covering them in ice for a few hours. Then packing the jars, interspersing the cucumber pieces with green and red pepper chunks, and pieces of onion. I tried using those tiny onions but oh my goodness, those little suckers are a lot of work to peel.

I’ve made dill pickles more than any other kind of pickled produce, and I’ve made sweet pickled beets.

I’ve also made sweet green relish, sourced from cucumbers. That was one of my mother’s specialties. Recalling the first time I made that after my mother died never fails to put a rueful smile on my face. As the pot full of ground cucs with a few onions, and vinegar and sugar and the “bouquet garni” simmered away, filling my house with that loved, yet dreaded scent of autumn, I stared at the mixture in the pot and began to howl with laughter.

You see, when I was a kid I hated helping mom make the relish, because my job was slicing the cucumbers length-wise and then scraping the seeds out of each half and into a bucket. Bushel after bushel after bushel of those ugly green cucs waited for me and my spoon. And here was my first solo batch of my mother’s recipe sweet green relish—bubbling away slowly, seeds and all. I guess my memory had hidden from me the scraping part, as it would any other past horrible trauma.

The other condiment my mother made, and that my mother-in-law also made, was chili sauce. I’m not sure why it’s called that. Does anyone know? There are no chili peppers in it. There are tomatoes and green and red peppers, and onions; in my mother-in-law’s version, there were also peaches. I’ve incorporated peaches into my sauce. There’s vinegar and salt and sugar and spices: ground cloves, ground allspice, and ground cinnamon. I put everything into a large pot, and let science take over. There is a slow gentle simmering, and an aroma filling the air, an aroma that takes me back in time. The chili sauce only simmers for hours, as opposed to how my mother, and now I, prepared the green relish, which was a slow simmer for 3 or 4 hours for each of 3 or 4 days.

The scent of mom’s relish would sear my nostrils every autumn. I swear it sometimes was absorbed by my bedding, it was so rife throughout the entire the house!

I don’t make much these days, as it really takes a lot out of me. But this past Monday, I decided to make some chili sauce. I used a recipe I found in an old cook book of my mother’s, a book that dates back to the 1940s. It was a large yield recipe and I tried my hand at dividing it into thirds, so I made a third of it. The peaches were a guess, because, as I said, that had been my mother-in-law’s add-in and weren’t included in the original recipe.

The aroma did take me back, as I said, and was pleasant without crossing that line the green sweet relish always crossed in the first hour of its cooking.

And the final product—seeing something I made filling a couple of jars on the table—that was pure satisfaction in and of itself. It always is. That sight was nod to whatever instincts that reside within each of us that hark back to the beginning of time, when we had to live by our wits and our work, the sight of those jars was a signal that I have done my job, I had provided for my family, to help get us through the lean months of the coming winter. That is a kind of satisfaction I have found nowhere else.

The taste test was last night at supper. Mr. Ashbury gave it two thumbs up.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for August 16, 2017

I cannot remain silent. To witness such grotesque injustice, and say nothing, is to agree with it. This past weekend I watched thugs marching in the streets of Charlottesville, Virginia, spewing hate and Nazi slogans, giving Nazi salutes. That is completely intolerable, completely and unequivocally wrong. I know my history. The United States of America as well as my own country of Canada went to war, not even a century ago, against the evil of Nazism. One cannot claim to be a patriotic American or a patriotic Canadian and be a Nazi. You just can’t. It is not physically, emotionally, or morally possible.

Looking at the bigger picture, I have to ask myself, why do human beings hate?

Why do we allow ourselves to feel the roiling, boiling cauldron of emotions that leave us full of anger, full of rage? Full of hate? Those feelings don’t make us feel good. They don’t create, they don’t uplift, they don’t enhance. Nothing good comes from those emotions. So why do we allow them purchase within our souls, and within our society?

Of all the things we, as a species, permit in our lives, the one I don’t understand is this pervasive, black, crippling hate, the likes of which we all saw on our television screens over this past weekend. I can’t understand it. Am I hopelessly naïve? Oh, more than likely.

So, what makes people hate?

I’ll tell you one thing, I don’t as a rule proselytize in my essays. And I won’t over much, this time, either. But I will say this: I have read the Bible. I state that because I have also heard some of these haters saying they believe in God, and I do not doubt that they do: after all, Satan believes in God, too.

I am a Christian, and hate has no place in my faith. That isn’t my opinion, it’s fact. There is no hate in that Good Book. Jesus did go into the temple with a whip which He made in response to seeing God’s House turned into a ‘den of thieves’. That was anger—righteous anger. That was not hate.

Hate is not the emotion used by God. Hate is the tool of Satan.

So again I ask, why hate? There is absolutely no positive to be gained through hate. See, I told you I was naïve. The only gain these haters are interested in is power. They hope to overthrow democracy, and take over, and “purify” their nation. Their words, not mine. It appears lots of people agree with them. Maybe those people think if there we only white people around, life would somehow be better. More jobs. More money. Just like the good old days!

But that’s not true, not any of it. Those people just want the power for power’s sake. And once they get it, they may decide, hmm. All those blonde people, just you know, being blonde. Those blondes steal our jobs, they’re the reason life is no longer good here. We need to get rid of the blondes! If we got rid of the blondes, life would somehow be better. More jobs. More money. Just like the good old days!

Yeah, that sounds silly, but there is as much logic behind that as there is logic behind their stated goals and motivations now. Those that would have power at any cost will lie to attain it.

Let me say that one sentence again. Those that would have power at any cost will lie to attain it. And they will use any means—stirring up fears, feeding insecurities, whatever it takes—so that their mindless minions will believe, and will do what’s asked of them. And those who are pathological liars just lie because they can’t help themselves.

I believe in the right of all people to protest. I believe in the right of all people to speak their minds, and to have their say and to choose their own beliefs.

However, when people go to a so called “rally” armed with guns, knives, clubs and shields, they’re not there to protest. They’re there to commit violence. They are there to hurt other people. Unarmed people. Ministers, and pastors, and community volunteers. Legal assistants.

And if they drive their car into a crowd of innocent, unarmed people, hoping for a high body count? Why, then they’re terrorists.

We all have the right to protest. We do not have the right to riot, to hurt, to maim or to kill.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for August 9, 2017

This past weekend my husband and I tackled a long overdue job—one that we had to do upstairs. This was supposed to be our bedroom/office area. Unfortunately, the renovations, a joint project between my husband and our second son, were never completed after our son died. My husband simply didn’t have the heart for it. There needs only the finishing work to be done: drywall, and some type of finished flooring. Over the years this space has housed bedrooms for my grandkids, and a place for my daughter and her son when they moved in with us for a couple years.

We also use this area for storage, and what called us up there this past weekend was the task of sorting through the thousands of books we have stored up there—some on bookshelves, some in boxes, and some in a very long, sturdy wooden cedar chest.

Yes, my friends, I said thousands of books. The last time my daughter counted them, there were over 4,000. These are mostly paperbacks, though there were a few hard cover books in the lot. Some of the oldest books dating back to the 1940s and before sadly weren’t in good condition—nor were they when they came into our possession.

Our goal, over this past weekend, was to separate the wheat from the chaff, basically. What books did we really want to keep and which ones could we put in a pile to give away?

I know. You’re all still up there at the 4000. Seriously, I think’s closer to 5000 if you count the more recent books, the ones that are down stairs on our 6 bookshelves. You’re probably wondering where all those books came from.

To preface, I will tell you that we’ve always had books, and to top that off, we have had 2 house fires where we lost virtually everything, including our books. My beloved pointed out in the middle of this weekend’s sorting work, that this was indeed our third collection.

When the kids were younger, when we were struggling, and both of us working, each bi-weekly payday we’d give ourselves 20 dollars a piece as our “allowance”. That total of 40 bucks was our entire entertainment budget. And each payday, we would take ourselves to the bookstore at the plaza in the town where we shopped. There, we would each purchase as many books as possible with our allowance.

 At the time, I’d begun to read romance, and became somewhat hooked on some of the monthly release lines, like Silhouette Desire and Harlequin Loveswept, and other lines, too. Those books were fairly inexpensive. My beloved actually liked historical romance, and he read those long before I did. He’d also buy other action adventure books.

 When we each finished reading our books, we’d often swap and read each other’s. As I said, that was our entertainment. We also bought a fair number of books at garage sales. “You can have the entire box for five bucks!” What a deal that was for us, a deal only topped by the time we bought a four-piece living room suite for 15 dollars at a garage sale—but that is another story.

Sorting began Saturday morning. I know my husband was expecting a battle; I know he somehow thought that I would want to keep a ton of those books. But that was never in my plans. Yes, there were a few books that I’d really loved. And when I would come across those? Why, they went into the keeper box, no question about it. By the time we called it a day on Saturday, David had accepted I wasn’t going to cling overmuch to the past.

I found all of my old favorites except one; I’m going to post on my face book page about that one, because I don’t recall the title or the author, just the plot.

My reading tastes, and yes, my standards have changed. That’s not a slight against the two lines of books I’ve named, not at all. Anyone who’s watched an episode of an old favorite television series will know what I mean. Books and shows over twenty years old seem less sophisticated when you revisit them; as they should because they reflect the society in which they were produced, and times do change. There’s a kind of social innocence to those pre-global terrorism days that one could almost term halcyon.

I’m grateful to the hundreds of authors who wrote thousands of novels, tiny vehicles of escape and relief. Back in the days before I ever believed I would be a published author, I sank into those simple, happy stories and felt uplifted. Those hours of escape were as good as any vacation I later took.

In the end, we kept about four boxes worth of books, and have twenty-two boxes ready to go—hopefully to good, grateful homes.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Wednesday's Words for August 2, 2017

One hundred and twelve days, and counting.

As the date of my husband’s retirement draws nearer, the reality of the change we’re about to undergo begins to press home. Sometimes, I’ve been guilty of looking at what’s about to happen to us as we enter this brand new phase of our lives—embracing David’s retirement—through the lens of how it will affect me. I’m working hard to let that go for awhile, and concentrate instead on what this will mean for my beloved.

Something David said the other day really brought this need into focus for me. He said, “For the first time since I was 16, I will not have a boss.”

That admission brought to mind the very real fact that I, myself, have been without a boss since 2002. Over the last fifteen years, I’d pretty much forgotten what a pall it can be to have a boss. I think we can file that realization—that I’d ‘forgotten’ under the heading, “denial is more than a river in Africa”. I spent some time over the last few days recalling just what it was like. I figured this would be a good way to really understand my husband’s state of mind.

In truth, over the course of my working-outside-the-home career, I’ve had a couple of perfectly awful bosses—one who claimed he shouldn’t be subjected to the sight of me with my cane; and one who worked hard to try and make me quit so he could hire a former female co-worker whom he really liked from his previous employer. That last situation was a case of bad pheromones all the way around; he didn’t like me from first sight, which really hurt me at the time. He found his victory when I had my first heart attack; this company had a habit of getting rid of employees who might need to take advantage of their “self-insured” long term disability. My victory was in giving him, on that last day, a list of books on people and leadership skills, pointing out to him that he didn’t have any of either.

To this day, if I think too hard about how either of those people treated me, or of what it was like to put up with their verbal abuse and crap attitudes for as long as I did, I feel a little bit sick to my stomach.

I’m excited for my husband to get to that day of no boss.

David has been at the quarry for nearly forty years. His first boss there, the man who owned the then family business, who took over for his own father—this man just recently passed away. There was no funeral per se, just a “celebration of life” sort of visitation, and of course we attended. This man, though sometimes driving my beloved to curse a blue streak, was nonetheless very good to us. He was always there if an emergency arose, and trust me, we had more than a few of them along the way. He was the first to offer a helping hand when we lost our house to a fire, and much later, when I had to have emergency triple-bypass surgery.

The first two bosses David had after that man sold his family company to a large conglomerate were good, decent men. They were fair, and sought to make the employees under them feel as if they mattered. In turn, they quickly discovered the men now under their supervision would work hard in return for that respect.

That last point leads me to digress: why are corporate managers too stupid to understand this one salient fact of human nature? Give an employee the sense he/she matters, let them know their contribution is important and appreciated, treat them with respect, and the return on that investment of time and attitude will make the corporate bottom line swell! Doesn’t cost a damn penny, but returns thousands. I wish they’d all get a clue.

The next two bosses David had, however, clearly had no people or leadership skills. They completely killed David’s love for his job. That was his largest source of personal pride, and of the way he defined himself in the world. All that, and in the end two exceptionally mediocre “corporate soldiers” took that away from him. The boss he has now is a good man, but for David, once some lines have been crossed, that’s it. His current boss worked his way up through the ranks, and so he is less arrogant than the previous two, more understanding that a company whose product is gravel for the construction and cement industries is really built upon the work done by the men on the floor—and that the quality of their work is directly related to the respect and dignity with which they are treated. In short, he has good people and leadership skills. The men under him feel as if he truly has their best interests at heart. I think he does, because he has argued, successfully, against a plan the company had last year to lay employees off early. It is a seasonal industry and some layoffs are inevitable. Of course, David’s seniority keeps him working the longest, but he had lots of layoffs with the company over the years, especially in the beginning. In that regard, and many others he’s paid his dues.

Right now, he’s at that stage where he really wants to be done. He may have more than forty years in the tank, and only four months left to go, but human nature is what it is. These last few months are beginning to feel like forever to him.

He’s eager for his new beginning.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury