I don’t perform out of some pathetic need for approval anymore. I’m performing for the art of it. I am honouring the art of it, trying to let free my ego. It’s a relief, to put myself in relief against the material rather than going at it unaware. I’m so hard on myself! I have had no formal training, have learned everything through trial and error.

I suspect people underestimate me sometimes. I am not unattractive and probably appear younger than my years. Often I encounter peers, give or take ten years, who assume I’m much younger and therefore not their equal. I have to admit I take some pleasure in blowing apart their biases. Case in point; I attended a writing workshop recently and most of the attendees were peers, in the sense that the oldest was probably not much more than 10 years my senior. They wear dowager shawls, bulky sweaters and sport hair-dos from the 70s. They must assume I’m a Gen-Xer, that I am not a contemporary. They read their passages, which are earnest, heartfelt and evocative. I go last, appropriately, since I am the *youngest.* When I finish they let out a collective gasp and one of them blurts, “Now, that’s a story!”

This workshop though, is a wondrous thing, as is its facilitator, Dale Adams Segal. The “Hour Stories” give you a template, and permission to listen, to the Other, which I suspect is my inner storyteller. The words “allow” and “accept” are vital to the process as well. There is no critiquing. Dale guides us through *warming* using breath, a kind of meditation that works to prepare us to receive. She counseled me to be gentle with myself and only then did I realize that I haven’t been. It’s so hard to be in this world, and then to be one’s self. There is so much harshness and judgment that it’s rather a shock to bewelcomed into a compassionate person’s realm, which is rather like entering a foreign country. I am assimilating though and basking in its sanctuary. It’s liberating! To let go of that outside world full of voices-the editor, the censor, the judge, the jury of *peers. *

I had to give my inner skeptic the night off. Dale is tiny, graceful, but unlike a lot of other petite women, does not make me feel large and awkward standing next to her. She may be small but she looks you straight in the eye and encompasses all of your being within a warm greeting. She is genuine and compassionate, truly compassionate which is so rare and beautiful, it astounds me. I am finding discovery, and peace.

Lately I’ve been in awe of kind people and wondering why, how, am I encountering more of them. How do those laws of attraction work, in theory? Why are assholes attractive, or attracted to, the confused? The emotionally damaged. Perhaps I am able to receive, able to receive compassion the way I am receiving story.

This is what I wrote, and if it’s a little rough, it’s allowed to be:

Fiona had been told many things about the unassuming house nestled between two rivers, the Matapedia and the St. Lawrence. Her mother Jeanette was the queen of blarney and Fiona grew up listening to many a wild and bent tale of Jeanette’s youth in the hinterlands of Quebec. When she saw the infamous house many years later, she was not confused or disappointed. It was exactly the way Jeanette had described it; welcoming, cozy, from the outside. It sat no more than a hundred yards from the water but was smaller than Fiona had imagined. How could six rooms contain all that had happened? Why did Jeannette have to tell her everything? The things she told Fiona made her cringe.
The clapboard house had been abandoned for many years. Fiona had to climb over mounds of debris to enter. Still it seemed to thrum with the past, all of their lives. She found ornate rum bottles, mouldy Hardy Boys books and a brass font for holy water. She wondered how it got there. Aren’t they the province of priests? Could her relatives be as larcenous and vindictive as she? Still, it felt like a prize, for finally showing up to the scene of the crimes. She regretted that many of her aunts and uncles were gone, that she couldn’t play cards better or speak French. They all loved to play cards. Any game at all; cribbage, Gin Rummy, Hearts. It was an opportunity to joke, to rib, to gossip and laugh.
Fiona was to learn that Jeanette told no one everything.

They were to be home by five o’ clock, Jeanette and her sister Mary. Swimming was something Jeanette excelled at. In the water she could hear nothing distressing or loud except the roiling river. She took pleasure in how her powerful arms propelled her farther out than anyone. They were too busy splishing, splashing and dunking to notice. While they were flipping and flopping, she swam. She swam past gnarled root balls, over green rocks slippery with moss, under precious threads of waterfall, warm with sunrays and finally around the S-bend, out of sight of the others, to bask on a bank of stillness.

She heard it in her head first, the screaming, in her dream state, where she thought; it’s the screaming where she lives. She sat up and cocked an ear, to hear panic and fear in the shouts of the other voices as the screams waned. She ran to the water, plunged in and reached them within minutes. By that time her cousin Reggie was going down for possibly the fifth time. Mary yelled, “Jeanette! Help!” Jeanette caught Reggie’s submerged, flailing body. Immediately he pulled her under and wrapped his arms around her head, his terror giving him the strength of two men. Jeanette could hold her breath a long time, prided herself on lung capacity but things were getting dire. Quickly. Mary tried to tug at them both but all three were becoming entangled. Lost. Jeanette got hold of a yank of Reggie’s brush cut at the back of his head and pulled him away long enough to surface. She caught a gulp of air and sight of the shore. That buoyed her. She was able to place his body behind hers, grab his arm and tow him out of the swimming hole.

She told Fiona she feared going home more than anything. They were late.

When Jeanette arrived her mother was indeed furious. It was hard for Fiona to imagine Jeanette being afraid of anyone but Riva’s temper was legend, as enormous and ferocious as she was small and bird-like. At hockey games, Riva was notorious for pitching empty mickey bottles onto the ice, bonking players in the head and not always the opposing team. A brawl would ensue if they tried to throw her out for she had admirers. The Habs would come over to the house after the game to celebrate, win or lose. Jeanette always said, “They were real sharp dressers.”
On this day Riva flew at Jeanette before she entered the door. “You were supposed to clean out the fireplace!”
“What?”
Jeanette didn’t refer to her tardiness, or the scratches and bruises inflicted by Reggie. She knew there was no point in arguing with Riva when she was in this state, roaring and red-faced as a force of nature. Jeanette went to the hearth and began moving the utensils and fire screen out of the way. They used the fireplace for cooking, like inhabitants of the previous century. There was a wood-burning cook stove as well but often there weren’t enough burners to prepare a meal large enough for six people, seven or eight if Reggie and Uncle Doug showed up for supper, so they used the fireplace to keep a pot of mutton stew warm or to boil water for tea or a bath for there was no indoor plumbing either.
Jeanette picked up the hand broom to sweep up the ashes. As she bent and reached in to reach the rear of the recess, she heard a loud *clack* and then a thud. Jeanette looked down to see the largest butcher knife in the house inches from her big toe. It had landed point-in the floor after hitting the mantel.
Now they went at it. Jeanette could only be pushed so far before her own rage fueled indignation and retaliation. She lunged at Riva, shoving her shoulders back as hard as she could. Of course at these moments, seeing her mother sprawled helpless on the floor immediately made her feel remorse and Riva knew it. She would rise slowly, all the while walloping Jeanette with a good dose of Catholic guilt, hissing, “I am your mother! How dare you push me! Your cancer-wracked, sick old mother!”