Indulged in some movies last night including Heathers which I’ve had a hankering to watch; delighted to find that it’s still exceptional, blackly funny and stands the test of time. Nostalgia inducing, high school was hell, as Veronica observes, though I liked my friends. Well, most of them. All I wanted to do was get the hell out of there though, putting in the required effort to graduate. This recent poem seems apropos.
Wish I had more time to read but recently was able to complete kindred spirit C.M. Subasic’s novel about women rockers, 40 Watt Flowers and pen a short review. Colleen’s from Toronto but the story is set in Athens, Georgia where she resided for several years. Blaring with insight, sharply drawn characters and exceptional dialogue, 40 Watt Flowers is a fine, often funny chronicle of four young female musicians and the subculture they inhabit. Though a rather splintered sisterhood at times, together they overcome collective fear to form a band, a shared vision, a sound. Subasic is a marvelous storyteller, evocatively portraying place, process.
Still wondering, especially with my birthday approaching so thought it apropos to re-post this blog entry along with a recently scanned baby portrait. According to my mother, it was the runner-up prize in a baby contest. Story of my life, I swear.
Who’s Your Daddy?
March 8, 2012
I wish someone could tell me. Let’s talk paternity fraud, a term that didn’t exist when I was born. One of my New Year’s resolutions is to find my biological father. “Does he know I exist?” I asked dear old Ma after she’d blurted out on her death bed that my father, the only father I’d ever known, was not my “real” father. Shocked naturally, I didn’t believe her at first, but it explained so much! Why people often asked if I was adopted. Why I felt no kinship to my father’s side of the family, the Daneliuks, or the “Danefucks”, as our schoolyard tormenters called us. Why I took my mother’s maiden name. It explained the bouts of estrangement between my sisters and I, my half-sisters. We’d always been so different, what little common ground we shared divided in two. Why Grandma Daneliuk favored my sisters. She must have harboured suspicions. Why I always felt like a freak!
I asked my *alleged father*. Equally shocked, he could provide no information, but sympathetic, took a DNA test at my request. The results excluded him, “as the biological father of Heather Haley.” First thing out of his mouth; “I’d never have married her if I’d known.” Thanks Dad. Poor Dad. By lying on my birth certificate, my mother had betrayed both of us. All of us, biological father deprived of any relationship with his daughter. I was stunned by my sister’s reaction, intense sibling rivalry. “Ha! That means I’m the oldest.” Neither could she understand my dismay, or why I should care. I must always know the truth. Besides, I have a child and our health to consider. Ironic too, that fascinated by crime, intrigue and mystery, I wind up saddled with huge one, seemingly impossible to crack. I’m running out of time with everyone, including me, getting older. I’ve questioned my mother’s surviving relatives, all claiming to know nothing, though I wasn’t spared gossip. Apparently, Ma liked to have fun, often driving down from her home in Matapédia, Quebec to the CFB base in Chatham, New Brunswick to attend parties. Maybe bio-dad was stationed there, serving in the Air Force. I’d consult with a private investigator if I could afford to. Though I could go mad speculating, the writer in me can’t help imagining. I’ve developed a theory; she couldn’t tell me, didn’t know his name. Maybe it was a one-night stand. Maybe she was raped. She did describe such a scene to me once. Catholic, rural, Great Darkness-Duplessis Orphans era Quebec was not a good place to be knocked up. Ashamed, desperate to be married, her child legitimate, she lied. This is the real kicker; wed or not, knowing people would do the math, my grandmother tried to coerce her into an abortion. Sins are more sinful when the whole town knows.
I’ve been advised by someone who does understand how much this means to me that generalized ancestor DNA testing can provide valuable insights, give me an idea of bio-dad’s racial, genetic back ground. Family Tree testing provides email addresses of people who share your DNA and wish to be connected. My only other hope is to visit the relevant villages back east and start asking a lot of hard and persistent questions, if I can find people willing to talk. Of course any such information can be extremely unreliable and vexatious. I will try to arrange a trip out there in the not-too-distant future. Hey, I could make a documentary. We shall see. I still hope there is some way to find some answers.
I envy adoptees and sperm donor babies; they have legal recourse. Clues. In 2010, a woman named Olivia Pratten mounted a lawsuit against the provincial government, the first of its kind in Canada. It sought to amend the B.C. Adoption Act requiring physicians keep permanent records of all egg, sperm or embryo donors and allow offspring to access those records when they turn 19. Not having the right relegates Pratten to “second-class citizen status and represents the province’s wholesale abandonment of equality rights,” according to her lawyer, Joseph Arvay, a veteran constitutional attorney. Indeed. It’s a fundamental right to know our origins. Arvay cited a passage from Roots, stating “that in all of us, there is a hunger—marrow deep—to know our heritage, to know who are and where we came from. Without it, one is left with a disquieting loneliness.” Try and explain that to my sister and long-dead mother, whom I still miss. I think she had every intention of taking the secret to her grave, but dementia prevented that. Ah, family secrets, all too common and often entwined with abuse and domestic violence.
Though it’s not in my nature, perhaps I should just give up. Let it go. I’m torn. Still wondering. Thanks Ma.
And neither can the poet in me help but imagine:
PRINCESS NUT
If I could have been inside
the hollow tree that night
I would have seen his face.
I would know his face. His body,
spiced with sweat salt and tobacco.
My father. Forbidden topic.
Fugitive. Alien, though earthly
as a cyclone to my mother, clinging
from an oak as he pried her limbs apart.
I would have heard howling, watched
his head rearing back. Full lips, gappy grin
revealed. Full lips, gappy grin like mine.
I would have seen the twigs
and russet leaves stuck to their thighs.
I could have picked up
the knife. Saved my mother.
I would know, what is his,
what is mine. I would know
he’s the smooth nut in a rough cup,
I, one of many acorns.
The manuscript is coming together, painstakingly but such is the nature of editing, revising. Not much time for other projects but I’m still hoping to record an audiobook edition of my novel. So, a poem, from the forthcoming collection, to be re-named.
MY WEEK
Fed a germ.
Dog tottered.
Spooned flies out of yogurt.
Dislodged ants from the toaster.
Entered words.
Fought for blackberries
And free stuff.
Doctored bites.
Signed language.
Collected greens,
(Heirloom tomatoes.)
Parlanced a meme.
Registered my feelings.
The last house on HUSBAND RD
Has prolific bamboo décor.
You can sit in a resin chair there,
The white ones especially war-strong.
It’s too late in the week
To do anything nice
Or nicely.
Too late in our lifespans
For anything,
Though he’s still trying
To Xerox his ass,
Moon earth.
Egads! No time to write, or blog, or even record in my journal I’m so busy relocating/ launching the new business along with my big kid. But, I am making progress on the manuscript with the aid of a dear friend. Here is a poem from the forthcoming collection.
VOLCANO WATCH
Punch tools. Cutups.
Antlered animals.
Arm bones astonish.
Antipodes hook.
Winged jewels.
Bluegrass blades.
Amaranthine throats.
Nothing lost on me.
I am tossed about
In a volcano
Man, billows of black
Tidings. Lured to the horizon
Through a corn maze,
Past turbulence of mind,
Nothing but pink
Stars to separate us.
Slow Sunday, a spot of solitude, hence a new poem, for the new collection. I’m working to have the manuscript ready by the end of January, working title, Detective Work.
Perhaps not entirely appropriate-though no doubt he was once an upstart-I will dedicate it here, now to David Bowie. I’m still reeling from the news of his death. He certainly can keep a secret, or is it just me? Did everyone know he had cancer? I, like millions, idolized Bowie. Ziggy Stardust helped me survive high school, I swear, and I had the great privilege of seeing him in concert. I was moved by the Blackstar videos and will set about listening to the album. I’ve always loved this photograph by Canadian John Robert Rowlands and have a framed print of it in my living room. Bowie truly was a remarkable artist, an inspiration. Funny, black stars litter my book. I use a row of four black stars to indicate scene breaks within chapters.
A few years back I was fortunate to visit the Yucatan, now billed as the “Mayan Riviera.” An anthropology buff, I was thrilled to tour the ruins of Tulum and Chichen Itza. It was Christmas and I was astonished by the degree of Maryolotry, the inspiration for this poem from my collection Three Blocks West of Wonderland.
It bears repeating, especially in these turbulent times; Peace on earth, Goodwill to men, including women and children.
FIRST CAME MARY
Enchanted morning swim, matrix of turquoise
lagoon. Silver palometas, yellow damselfish
caress my legs. Casa Ocio walls whitewashed
in cactus milk. Coconuts on the lawn.
Palm fronds bowing, rippling like sea anemones.
Heavy mahogany Hemingway digs.
Gecko chirps from behind a gilt frame.
Cool terrazzo marble pulls sand from toes.
Double rain showerhead. Full throttle bottle bar
under a palapa. I ponder the power
of local masonry to withstand hurricanes,
why it seems odd to name them after men.
Beneath an arbor of pink bougainvillea
sit my dubious nephew, delicate girlfriend,
doubts sinking slowly into the deep
purple cushions. We are going to town. To Playa.
Soft brown doves adorn neon.
Turtles bask on green tile mosaic. Red house
hosts a party tableau of orange Fanta, blue corn
flowers, flags of paper lace, chocolate pan de huevos.
We smell agave, chili, vanilla, coriander and anise,
I’m once again participating in the 12 Blogs of Christmas with eleven other writers, organized by Martin Crosbie. As part of the event, we are to write about—not surprisingly—Christmas. Many of the other eleven bloggers have written about fond or funny memories of Christmas. Last year, I wrote about my fraught relationship with Christmas—acknowledging the magic of Christmas but also the busy-ness, commercial aspects, and guilt associated with Christmas (we have so much, and so many people have so little). So I can’t do that again. Most of my stories about Christmas go something like… we got too much, ate too much, spent too much (even though we don’t spend that much), stressed about a turkey, and were really happy to be able to go skiing and eat leftovers on Boxing Day.
I exaggerate. I’m sure I’ve had some nice Christmases, but since I’m often up to my elbows in a turkey, and have not had any famous disasters, they are not the stuff of stories. Then again, my memory is famously poor—all that living half the time in another world. This year I’ll be sure to burn the turkey, so I have something to tell you about next year (Hmm, I’m getting a strong turkey vibe here. It might be time to start serving Christmas steak).
To me, Christmas is about gratitude and reflection on a year gone by. In an effort to dredge up some Christmas spirit (and not seem like cross between Eeyore and the Grinch—I promise I’m actually not—Christmas commercials make me cry), I decided to do a post on the 12 writing things I’m most grateful for this Christmas. That’s not to imply that there are not a lot of non-writing things I am grateful for (there are so many of those things), but this is a writing blog (and I think this sentence is a triple-negative) so…read more…
Jennifer lives in the mountains of British Columbia where she can be found writing, hiking, skiing, borrowing dogs, and evading bears. She also works as a climate change researcher, evaluator and strategic planner. She has wanted to be a writer since she first read The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and didn’t want to come out of the wardrobe.
Jennifer writes science fiction, romance and dystopian fiction for children and adults, including In the Shadows of the Mosquito Constellation and A Pair of Docks, which was a bestseller in children’s time travel fiction. She has also contributed to several anthologies, most notably Synchronic: 13 Tales of Time Travel, which hit #16 in the Kindle Store.
You can subscribe to her blog for writing tips, industry insights, and two free short stories at www.jenniferellis.ca, and check out her writing on Amazon at: http://bit.ly/jenniferellis. She tweets about writing, cats, and teenagers at @jenniferlellis.
My transportation for the Christmas of 1967 was Dad’s 1958 Mercury pickup. It was one of the first “full box” pickups, instead of the old “step sides,” and I thought it was pretty classy. Think of the picture above with a front bumper and a two-tone paint job: white above, teal below. I was home from university, and Dad was out of the bush because it was too cold to work, so I was pretty well free to drive it around. Loggers can’t work below about -30 because metal gets so brittle that equipment breaks. It’s rather hard on people, too.
Yes, the Christmas of 1967 was rather cold. I came home from visiting friends on Boxing Day, and the weather report said it was going to be -60F that night (That’s -51 for you Celsius types). I plugged in the block heater of the pickup and waited for that reassuring gurgle that told me it was working. No gurgle.
Brought up in a logging camp with no electricity, Gordon Long learned his storytelling in the traditional way: at his father’s knee. He spends his time editing, publishing, travelling, sailboat racing and writing fantasy and social commentary, although sometimes the boundaries blur.
Gordon lives in Tsawwassen, British Columbia, with his wife, Linda, and their Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever, Josh. When he isn’t publishing, he works on projects with the Surrey Seniors’ Planning Table.
