Oh, right, EYEBALLS.

So much to do in the next few weeks! Three group projects (I HATE THESE), three papers, hundreds of pages of reading (not for the papers), one quiz, one longer test, one composition in Italian, WUFS activities, and to top it off…both my final exams are on the same freaking day!

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again….

GGGGGGGGGGGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Canadians have a strange relationship with the films made in this country. Unlike in France and other European countries, many Canadians resent the use of tax money to fund filmmaking projects, and yet, without that funding, our films would never be made, never be seen. We just do not have the infrastructure to support a film industry to compete with Hollywood.

Having said that, Canadians have made some great films, which win international awards, including Academy Awards. I present a very biased list of my 10 favourite Canadian films. Not all of them could be termed “classics,” but the bulk of them have had some success, either here or abroad. More than anything else, these are films that have spoken to me in one way or another about what it means to be a Canadian. I’ve also tried to limit it to films that have been made in the past 20 years. While I appreciate films like Mon Oncle Antoine and Le declin de l’empire americain, I have only seen them years after, and in a context of analysis, rather than because I wanted to see them.

10. Termini Station (dir. Allan King, 1989)

This film was my first introduction to Canadian film. It was filmed in and around Kirkland Lake, in northern Ontario, where my biological father and his family live. He was so proud that his his town had been a movie set, and he took me to see it twice. Megan Follows plays Micheline, a young woman trapped in a small northern town. She has a problematic relationship with her mother, and longs to leave. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen it, but some scenes and impressions have stayed with me. It was also really neat to recognize locations in the film.

9. My Winnipeg (dir. Guy Maddin, 2007)

Guy Maddin is probably on the vanguard of Canadian feature-length experimental filmmaking. All of his films have a touch of the antique about them, either in setting, or in the use of materials which harken back to the silent era. Of all his films, though, (and I realize, by some Maddin fans, I’m considered an idiot) My Winnipeg is the most interesting to me. In it, he explores his personal history, his memories of the city where he grew up, and laments that change comes to all of us. This spoke to me on a personal level, for the places we come from never leave us, no matter what happens to them. For the Maddin neophyte, I think My Winnipeg is also his most accessible film.

8. One Week (dir. Michael McGowan, 2008)

Starring Joshua Jackson, One Week starts out with a bombshell: Ben Tyler has stage four cancer, and probably doesn’t have much longer to live. In order to come to grips with this news, he sets off on a cross-country motorcycle ride, and along the way, he sees the breadth and depth of Canada from Toronto to Trefino in British Columbia. What I love about this film is the breath-taking photography. If you’ve ever wondered what Canada looks like going westward, there is no better film for seeing the physical beauty of my country. It’s also darkly comic, too.

7. waydowntown (dir. Gary Burns, 2000)

Sadly-I’m-Bradley has a permanent shrine in the WUFS office in the form of a 2L pop bottle filled with marbles. waydowntown takes place in an office/apartment/retail complex of linked buildings where it is possible to live your life without ever having to go outside, and that’s exactly what the characters try to do. This is a “small” film, in scope and success, but my friends and I had a lot of fun watching it, and it left me thinking (long after the credits finished rolling) about the nature of cubicle farms and the monotony of corporate life.

6. Bon Cop, Bad Cop (dir. Eric Canuel, 2006)

After Porky’s, this buddy cop flick is the most financially successful film in Canadian history. It has everything good and bad about Canada and Canadian film in it: classic Canadian satire and comedy, Francophone stereotypes, Rest of Canada stereotypes, hockey fanaticism, our obsession with regionalism which is overcome always by a bigger threat. So, if it’s so great, why isn’t it higher on my list? Because, as fun as it is (and it is incredibly fun), all of the elements I’ve listed above make it a very superficial film. It is possible to walk away from seeing Patrick Huard and Colm Feore (who is one of my favourite actors, bar none, in this or any other country), and leave them in the dark of the theatre. It is, however, a wonderful romp!

5. The Sweet Hereafter (dir. Atom Egoyan, 1997)

Frankly, the fact that this film did NOT win the Academy Awards it was nominated for ticks me off, even if Titanic and L.A. Confidential were stiff competition. The lyrical beauty of this sadly allegorical film will take your breath away. The acting is pitch-perfect, the characters and the story stay with you long after you’ve seen it. Egoyan has made other, more accessible films, but never one as beautiful and heartbreaking.

4. C.R.A.Z.Y. (dir. Jean-Marc Vallee, 2005)

The music and times of the 60s and 70s serves as a backdrop for the eponymous sons (Christian, Raymond, Antoine, Zac and Yvan) of a tough French-Canadian father and his loving, harried wife. The film largely follows the second youngest, Zac, as he struggles with growing up Quebecois and homosexual. Zac’s need for his father’s approval and love leads him to question how and where he fits in in his family, and in the world. There is a beautiful sweetness about this film that I love.

3. Last Night (dir. Don McKellar, 1998)

The world is going to end tonight. You know it. Everyone knows it. It was announced on TV ages ago, and all evidence points to the veracity of the reports. What do you do on your last night on Earth? In mood and humour, it is much like waydowntown, and I find that the two make a very interesting double bill. Both films feature Don McKellar in tragi-comic roles, and both left me thinking long after. In the case of Last Night, I wondered if I would spend all the last day with my family? Would I try and follow Craig’s example? Would I crawl into bed in a fetal position and just read and cry? What would you do on your last day on Earth?

2. Le Violon Rouge/The Red Violin (dir. Francois Girard, 1998)

Simply put, this film restored my fascination with Canadian film. It is beautifully shot, epic in scale, lush and riveting. The Red Violin is a coveted object, not only for its storied history, but for the passion it inspires within the people who wish to possess it. The film follows the history of this violin through Italy, where it is created, to Austria, China, England, and finally, Montreal, where all the threads are tied together. For me, the setting of the end auction is particularly telling: Canada as a nation represents a place without much past where threads of a life can come together and help an immigrant forge a new identity, a new relationship with the world. Unlike in America (and I realize I could anger a few readers), Canada does not expect those threads to disappear in the light of the new identity. Such is Samuel L. Jackson’s Charles Moritz. Like everyone before him, he is entranced by The Red Violin, but his appreciation is manifested far differently. As a viewer, I felt The Violin was finally being placed in a position where it would be appreciated for itself, and not for what it can offer. We all need that.

1. Cube (dir. Vincenzo Natali, 1997)

It’s hard to clarify why I love this film in an easy way. It’s incredibly low-budget, it’s science fiction (not my favourite genre), and the acting is hit and miss. However, it’s an inventive, paranoid futuristic nightmare, and it features the inimitable David Hewlett (on whom I have a bit of a crush, to be honest). Again, this is the kind of film my friends and I could make, and yet…not. The characters seek to escape the confusing set of rooms they find themselves in, discovering clues to the nature of their puzzle, and each other, as they move through each room. There was one simple set, lit from the exterior, with a variety of coloured gels to give the idea that it is several rooms they are exploring. The practical aspect of making this film would be relatively easy enough to recreate, but the mood is impossible to recapture. You have to see it!

It’s been a tumultous week. On Wednesday, Mom got the happy news that she does NOT have lung cancer (for the record, neither of my sisters nor I thought it was), however, this relief was short-lived, because on Thursday morning, unimproved from basic care, my Dad took her to the Emergency room at the hospital. She was admitted for aggressive treatment of emphysema (COPD—Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease) IMMEDIATELY. She was there until yesterday afternoon.

The bulk of her care has administered in the Cardiac unit, which is one of the two areas of the hospital where a machine called a BI-PAP can be used. Essentially, the BI-PAP (and it’s little sister, the C-PAP) forces oxygen into your lungs, while “sucking out” the carbon dioxide damaged lungs hang on to. My mother’s carbon dioxide levels upon admission were so high, she set new hospital records. None of the respiratory doctors had ever seen anyone walk in with levels that high. For the first time, she was truly frightened for her life.

I don’t know much of this fear will last. She already seems to think life will go back to normal now that the scariest part has been dealt with. In my mind, in the minds of my sisters and Dad, based on things the doctors treating her have said, this is just the beginning. My mother will need oxygen therapy for the rest of her life. She needs to completely quit smoking, and to learn how to breathe properly. Most of us take breathing for granted; even I, with my asthma, don’t think a great deal about it. My mother cannot afford to do so ever again, or she will die.

Dad is talking about taking his (8 months of) accrued vacation now, and then retire in April so he can look after her. Mom kinda needs a babysitter. Through this, we have tried to keep a sense of humour, despite our fear and sorrow. I’m not worried about losing my Mom—at this point, it’s a foregone conclusion—I’m more worried about how much time I have left with her. This means I have to begin seriously dealing with my shit where she is concerned.

It’s all too easy
to take so much for granted
oh, but it’s so hard
to find the words to say.
Like a castle in the sand
the water takes away
but how can life
ever be the same?
‘Cause my heart is broken in pieces
yes my heart is broken in pieces
since I’ve lost you

~”Since I Lost You~ by Genesis

Today was a good day of school for me. First, I was able to help out my (very late for class) prof, by getting the screening underway in Contemporary Canadian cinema, and then I found out that most of the WUFS exec, and a few other people I really like are in my Theories of National cinemas class. I’ve even already been asked to join a presentation group!

Mom went to the doctor, and had some preliminary tests done. She has another appointment this week for more tests, and is really taking it all seriously. We will see how serious she is when the doctor tells her (AGAIN) that she must quit smoking.

All in all, I am a happy j-girl.

A situation seems to be rearing its ugly head again. Last autumn, my sister, P, and I had a very bad falling out over my inability to cope well with her frequent calls about the same goddamn crisis. It’s happening again.

She’s never had a very good track record with men. First of all, she seems to think that a) attention from a man will complete her life, and b) the men she picks are as perceptive or as open-hearted as she tries to be. It is really sad to watch her, knowing that she is missing telltale signs that fairly scream “RUN!!!” to anyone else who hears her talk/whine/bitch about the circumstances.

This series of (relatively understandable) missteps is compounded by her determination to make whatever the relationship is into something lasting and permanent. It is just painful to be in her support network when the relationship hits its inevitable rocky parts, or finally breaks down altogether—she just talks and talks and talks about it until I get fed up.

Her latest situation is with a man she has been lovers with on and off for a year. This time last year, she decided she was tired of being a f*cktoy for someone who wasn’t as into her as she was into him, but it took her at least three months to cut off contact. During these three months, she phoned me every day to talk about it. No matter what feedback she got (and believe me, she asked for it), she always found excuses not to give it any credence, and to harp on the same way she had when the phone was answered. When school started, I needed to concentrate on my studies, and simply didn’t have the time or interest in listening to the same complaints, assertions, excuses (both for her and him). I’m afraid I wasn’t very diplomatic.

Our problems with each other came to a head on our Girls’ Weekend to Montreal to see NKOTB. I’m not going to go into detail. Suffice to say, we stopped talking to each other until just before Christmas time. It was both terrible and a relief not to have to field her calls everyday.

She started seeing this guy again sometime in the late spring, and despite the fact that their relationship went from f*ckbuddies to almost-boyfriend/girlfriend, his treatment of her remained the same. Until a month ago, I had no idea this was going on (ignorance is bliss). She and I were able to have good conversations, and to develop our own relationship in supportive, loving ways. I was beginning to regain the trust I had in her before last autumn, and then, the bomb dropped. She told me what had transpired and that their relationship is, for all intents and purposes, over. But, if text messages are to be believed, it’s not. And her calls to me have begun repeating themselves, only slightly varied from their previous entities.

As I did last year, I attempted to let her know I didn’t enjoy these conversations, that I found them distracting from the more important concerns—for example, our mother’s health. This I did without any success. When I told her she was repeating herself and it was getting annoying, she told me she was still “processing” the end of their relationship, and to give her some slack.

I wonder if she’s able to process her problems without me as her audience?

I honestly do not know what to do. Keeping my mouth shut and suffering in silence doesn’t work, because eventually, I burst, and not in the most appropriate ways. Being up front doesn’t work, either because I am incapable of subtlety that she can grasp, or because when that fails, and I need to be blunt, she becomes angry.

All I can really do, is screen my calls. However, with things being what they are with our mother, I’m not sure I can afford to ignore her calls all the time.

And before a certain smartass on the West Coast starts trying to draw comparisons, let me say I am aware of the irony. It’s much easier for you to walk away, however, and you have.

Esso has just left my apartment on his way back to the Atom Mill town and the kitties. I will not be seeing him, except in extremely rare circumstances for about 2 months, and probably longer.

This is because he is working another outage, where the reactors are shut down for cleaning, scanning, maintenance and whatever upgrades are necessary to the equipment. Esso’s job this time gives him added responsibility, and that will mean an extra 1/2 hour per day of work beyond what anyone else on his shift is expected to do. He brought me his schedule, and he doesn’t have a weekend off until at least October 17—and even that is debatable.

I wasn’t expecting to need him as much as I do right now, especially in person. The rapidity of the decline of my Mom’s condition is making me question so many things right about my return to school. I have one more year. I need to graduate. I also need my Mom able to take care of herself. I wonder sometimes if my education is more important to me than my mother. My knee-jerk reaction is, “of course not,” and I toy with the idea of taking this year off if Dad needs my help. The idea upsets me in so many conflicting ways, both selfish, and selfless.

Most of last week, I had trouble sleeping, trouble eating, trouble concentrating on anything at all. With my ADD, you’d think a lack of concentration on things would be a regular state of being, but this was so much worse.

As a mind/body/Zen experience, I do a lot of cross stitch. I put in a DVD, pull out my project, and stitch to movies and TV episodes I’ve seen time and again. It relaxes me, and allows me to think better than any physical exercise ever could. Last week, I didn’t do any cross stitch at all. Nor did I read much beyond research on emphysema. I did watch the first 3 discs of Lost, season 2, but didn’t care enough to pay a whole lot of attention to them.

In short, I was numb and barely able to function.

Through this, a “friend,” informed me through his blog that he doesn’t want to be there for me. This isn’t the first time. He wondered what it made him. In my world, when you don’t want to be a friend to someone who is in great distress, it makes you a pathetic friend. A fair weather friend. I probably shouldn’t have said anything to him, because we are now not talking to each other. It’s more stress, another relationship I am in danger of losing along with my mother. The timing is crap, and I’m trying not to think about it.

I do have friends I can talk to. R-dot is going through medical issues with his own mother, but that good lady knows what is wrong, and knows she needs regular, in-house help. His wife, Deesh, has been a great listener, and so has My Hyphenated Friend from school, although MHF is quite young, and has yet to experience a health problem of this magnitude in her immediate family.

I’m hoping school will help me to focus on something I can have some control over, and drive away the crippling fears that I get carried away with.

There are some numbers that stay stuck in your head. Soon, I must dial the one that is the most important phone number I’ve ever known in my life—that of my parents. They have had the same number for as long as I can remember. It has never changed in all these years, one of those sets of digits I never have to look up or try to remember. Dialling it is a complete reflex, it comes automatically when I pick up the phone. I am dreading the conversation that will take place when, in a week or so, I finish punching in the last number.

My mother has smoked since she was about 18, and possibly longer than that—18 is the smallest number she will admit to. Recently, my sisters, Dad and I have become increasingly worried about her health. She is not able to breathe and sleep at the same time, so she falls asleep at strange times at the drop of a hat in the middle of the day, and stays up most nights struggling for breath. She has lost some weight, which she could ill afford to lose, and her complexion is ashen. We are sure it is COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), also known as emphysema.

Unfortunately, as individuals, we have been unable to convince her to get medical attention. She has a history of putting the needs of others first to her own detriment, and because this has gone on so long, her health has deteriorated far past what most of us would be willing to deal with ourselves. But my mother is resourceful and tough. She finds ways to cope, and ways to brush off the concerns of others who are witnessing her coping mechanisms: friends, family—her own husband and mother.

I am starting to believe her judgment has become impaired. On Sunday, she drove my nieces and nephew to her trailer for the last week of summer vacation. She stopped at least twice at the side of the road to nap. The drive is generally around 2 1/2 hours, but somehow, she was unable to complete the journey in one shot. Scary as that is, what is scarier is that she informed the children (ages 15, 11 and 5) to go and play in nearby parks until she woke up again and was ready to go.

The more I think about this, the angrier and more afraid I become. My mother seems to think that ignoring her health problems hurts no one but her, but this is the clear-cut evidence that she is wrong. She endangered the lives of those children by choosing to drive them alone when she clearly should not have been behind the wheel. She further endangered them by kicking them out of the car so she could sleep. ANYTHING could have happened to those kids, anything from injury to abduction, and my mother was asleep.

As individuals, we have been able to achieve nothing. Getting her the help she needs is going to take the combined and consistent approach from all of us. We cannot do it, except in numbers. My sisters and I are going to sit down on the phone and work out a strategy to get her the help she requires. We’re trying to get Dad on board as well, but he hates confronting her. His stance has to change, because if we are right, HE is going to have to be her caretaker, and as she worsens, he will need us to help him.

It’s all about numbers, y’all.

I’m in the middle of fall cleaning. I know, most people do what I am doing in the spring before long, hot summer days make them lethargic or keep them out of the house. For me, though, the impetus is that school starts in 14 days, and I have been away for two months.

Cleaning, for me, does not mean just wiping up messes, scrubbing, sweeping, laundry. Nope, it’s organization. Getting stuff sorted out so it’s easy to find and functional. I think my biggest problem sometimes is in letting go of stuff that looks like something I’ll use in the future, like the pencil topper I got with a pack of batteries a few months ago. Never mind that I use re-fillable mechanical pencils, or that it’s shaped like the Energizer Bunny—one of the most menacing advertising characters ever created. That went in the garbage today, and I already feel about 60 lbs. lighter.

I just spent four hours straightening, cleaning and sweeping out my bedroom, which badly needed it. Two days ago, Deesh helped me purge my closet of clothes I am no longer going to wear, and in return, I am looking after her apartment for a week. She and R-dot have cable TV, so I think I might go up and watch some stuff (shhhh!).

On and off, I have been going through and organizing my desk area. I’ve gotten storage boxes for supplies, pitched lots of stuff I was hoarding for no apparent reason (see Energizer Bunny reference, above), and taken quite a few notebooks and old class notes up to Esso’s. At some point tomorrow, I will also be packing up some of the books and such that I don’t want to throw out, but definitely won’t be reading while in school. Those will also be Esso-bound.

On a totally unrelated note, I never realized how much I missed flopping out in front of the TV until I got back last weekend. I could watch one of the DVDs I own for the umpteenth time (“Oh, Mr. Bennet!”), but I feel like I need to see something new, and potentially sucky so I can feel all superior. Right now, I just feel like a tired, achy woman who’s kinda covered in dust.

Last October, Esso helped rescue our little Freddy by giving him a home to live in, and helping him heal after a vicious attack by another animal. When he first mentioned the scheme to me, I was skeptical. Mo and Willy were not exactly the best of friends, and Mo was never very good with big scale changes, but she coped well with Freddy, and they were able to draw boundaries and have a tacit peace.

Which makes the relationship I have with the little guy all the more interesting. Mowgli was MY girl, and even with our old dude, Floyd, she could get very jealous of my attention. I firmly believe one of the reasons she couldn’t stand Willy is his almost indiscriminate need for someone’s—anyone’s!—attention. Fred took to me like a duck takes to water from the get-go, and Mo seemed okay-ish with it when I was here at Christmas time, and again before she passed away.

Our relationship has only deepened in the two months I have been here. He frequently snubs Esso’s company for mine, and I sometimes wonder if it’s because I’m in the house most of the time, but then I think, no. This has been happening since we first met.

At Christmas last year, Esso advised me that Freddy didn’t eat the treats he put out for the cats. Freddy didn’t particularly like playing with the laser pointer. He also didn’t seem to be a fan of Willy’s scratchpad, and wouldn’t sleep on the bed if we were both up there. I can proudly say that Freddy, thanks to my influence, has changed his tune on every single one of these things, plus a few other quirky things.

Every morning, he is the first to rub up along my leg as I check my e-mail, and play around a bit on the computer. Every afternoon, he has a quiet rub as I read or watch TV. Every night, he nestles beside my thigh for a few minutes for a good night skritch.

I’m going to miss the little guy.

As Esso knows, I have made the decision to have my body cremated after my death. It’s not the bugaboos nibbling away at me that bothers me, it’s the idea of taking up more space in the ground than necessary. I’d rather be ashes scattered somewhere than a block of land that might be better used for gardening or tree planting. Plus, with all the chemicals they pump into people, and the DE-LUXE nature of most caskets these days, it would take over 100 years for my body to become good, rich compost.

However, I am a history buff, and every week or so, bodies from the past are found which tell us something about the way people lived and died in their own time. In Perthshire, Scotland, a Bronze Age “hero” was discovered this week, relatively intact with floral tributes and the personal effects of the kind we still put in with our dead. Esso’s uncle was buried with his favourite pipe and a picture of him and his granddaughter, for example–two things he loved.

This has got me thinking about what to do with this shell I inhabit. Cremation seems the responsible, logical thing to do, however, for the sake of posterity, wouldn’t the future generations WANT to know what we looked like at this time in our history? Of course, it’s not likely I will be buried with valuables or even in such a way that those future scientists/archaeologists/historians would find valuable for research purposes, but it’s always possible. In such a case, cremation removes the evidence that I even existed. Is that responsible?

With any luck, I have a few more decades to sort this out…