The Creative Act

Here is a speech I read at the closing of my grandfather’s casket. I sat between my mother and grandmother and cried along with them as I did.

I am Christopher, Gerry’s youngest son Paul’s eldest. I would like to thank you all for being here with us today to celebrate the life of my grandfather. I spent many nights with my grandparents and I would like to share a few thoughts about him that I have had since his passing. Most of you knew him as a young man, or an active man with his whole life ahead of him but when I was born he was already 57, just five years away from retirement and Florida winters.

My relation to him was as a grandchild, which means I grew over time and came to appreciate him in new ways and for a few years he actually got younger in my eyes. For instance as a child I found it annoying that I had soo many aunts, uncles and cousins that I had a hard time remembering all their names. As an adult I see the size of the family tree and the love found within its branches as his ultimate accomplishment. During the photo shoots grandma orchestrated he seemed like a young man, the father of a gaggle of people rather than an old man. The tree recently grew as my wife and I welcomed our first child into the family. Oliver arrived just in time to meet Gerry. When we all met for a photo shoot featuring 4 generations of men. Gerry, whose time with us was clearly running out, turned to my two month old and very matter of factually said “You’ve got a lot of living to do.” This sort of hope in reaction to life is the story of my grandfather.

I can’t count how many nights I slept on his couch, or ate poached eggs or played cards at his table, or fed the ducks on the Rideau with him, but it was certainly enough times to get to know he had done a lot of living. Maybe it is because he was so much taller than me but I always looked up to him. On one of our many walks together we stumbled upon a sidewalk being built, being a child I was fascinated by the machines involved and the hole that could easily have swallowed me up. Grandpa dutifully explained everything I was seeing and explained how a sidewalk would be the result. He really knew the details and I was very impressed, even as an 8 year old I knew this was weird knowledge for an economist to have.

But Gerry was full of surprises. Imagine my level of admiration when I learned that he had built his own house in the evenings and weekends after work when I could barely construct a snow fort that wouldn’t cave in. As if I was not impressed enough I later discovered the old photo of him in a military uniform and learned that he had been in airplanes during World War Two. Airplanes! Imagine! I am sure you can see how my 8-year-old eyes would have shone with pride as he explained he could tell me where we were based on the stars while I could not read a map.

I will remember a man who danced with my grandmother every chance he got, who could swing a club as well as any grandpa I ever heard of (I’ve seen the old hole in on trophy that proves his talent), had a den, and was king of the mixed tape. He was a man who when he learned he had Alzheimer’s wrote the most beautiful letter I’ve ever heard of and never tired of the Lawrence Welk show.

I was but a small part of the living he did, but he was and remains a large part of the living I have done. He was a man with the inside scoop on how to live the good life I hope today can be a celebration of that and also a reminder that we all have a lot of living to do.

Folks, April is National Poetry Month.  For  those interested, check out the League of Canadian Poets website (www.poets.ca) as well as the Canadian Poets Association.  I propose  a celebratory night in April coinciding with our meeting at Cuppedia to celebrate this as well as Al Purdy Day April 21. My challenge to all is to write something to celebrate Al Purdy and read it!

Dear Alisha,

I think your art is amazing – you have tapped into nature in a very magical way; do you know the story of the goddess Diana?  Just keep on going and ignore any negativity.

Regarding your editorial, “A Terrible Shame”, page B6 of the Saturday Observer of Jan 10th, 2009.

Dear Sirs,

Your editorial “A Terrible Shame” reads well but seems to tell only one side of the story, despite extending a literary olive branch to Arabic culture. You neglect to mention that the Arabs too were dispossessed, when the lion’s share of Palestine was ‘given’ to the Jews by the British for the creation of a Jewish state, despite its predominantly Arabic demography. Also, I dispute your unsupported claim that Israel, “as a western society (…) has always expected that peace will be achieved through negotiation and compromise.” Israeli policy surely refutes this statement if you consider; their blockade of Gaza (a de facto act of war), the dividing walls nearing completion in the West Bank, or the military strikes they routinely carry out against anxious neighbors with F-16 fighter aircraft and helicopter gunships. The record of ‘western societies’ in seeking peaceful resolutions includes the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, Rwanda, Bosnia, and the Iraq wars. Perhaps you understand these events as examples of ‘negotiation and compromise’. What I (and Red Cross, and Medicines Sans Frontiers) see compromised in the Gaza Strip is innocent human life, the significance of which does not seem to rank well against the all-important rocket attacks on whose account, apparently, the civilians of Gaza may blame themselves for their casualties.

Sincerely, Benjamin J. Oomen B.A. Liberal Arts

229 Argyle Ave. Apt 1106
Ottawa, ON. K2P 2J1

Home: 613 234 9203
Cell: 613 883 1385

P.S. Although I would love to see this in print, I do not really expect it to be published. That is because newspapers and other media outlets in our ‘western society’ seem to consider it taboo to consider seriously any guilt or wrongdoing on the part of the state of Israel. One has only to recall how Michael Ignatieff was lambasted for days after merely suggesting that Lebanon AND Israel were both guilty or war crimes. A suggestion which has proved, of course, to be true. Anti-semitism is no good, but it is possible to take Zionism to far.

but i love the night

Here I stand; she holds my hand.

The smell of wet earth fills my nostrils, and the late summer sun warms my face. The wind blows foretelling a storm.

Everyone is here but you. No one knows what to say but they all look beautiful. Suits, dresses, nice shoes, and colourful ties contrast the grey, green, and brown.

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Hi folks,
I am about to embark upon a series of poems and stories that I have long wanted to do. I have been building my abilities to get to the point where I felt I could reasonably start dealing with the issue of my mother in writing. As the series continues on you will like come to understand the dilemma I face with this. Those of you who know me well will already guess at the difficulty of this project for me. In a way it puts the e-mail to god to shame, even though these are likely not going to appear as powerful. So today I will post the first scratching, halting attempt at this, any and all sincere feedback is welcome, but this is a touchy subject for me…

As some readers of this site will know Danny Montreal and I work for a merino products company called Icebreaker. I recently did my last day there because I am moving back to Ottawa. Here is a little letter I sent out to the company.

To any and all who care, › Continue reading

I am my mother’s illegitimate son, the only happy result of a tryst with a Notary in the region of Florence. Back then, in 1452 things were different, people cared about the places they lived and paid closer attention their surroundings. I am profoundly disappointed that this has altered. Some change is good (I have been a driving force of much over time), of course, but other change is inherently worrisome. These are my notes to the future for any who care to read them. I must write them out because to remain silent is against my nature and because we the people of the past have a great deal to teach to any willing to listen. Lew Welch proclaimed, “Speak old man, thy wisdom’s meant for me,” to him and those like him is this letter addressed. › Continue reading

Dear God;

I am writing you an e-mail because I do not know what else to do. I read in a book that you are dead. I think that is crazy. I read in another book that you do the best you can to stop us from living in the painful civilizations we have constructed or at least ease our burden but that even you are not powerful enough. I like that idea. No offense meant but I like the idea that you are out there trying like the rest of us. We are Brother and Sister Peaceful Fighters for a better world. In this all-knowing but not all-powerful conception of you people are still holders of their own destiny.

We may have made things so fucked up down here that destiny is a joke and the deck is stacked against most of us in an insurmountable way. I won’t argue against that. But God, I need to believe in something. I am not sure I believe in you or if you are just a convenient idea prefabricated for me like my couch or my Ikea bookshelf requiring minimal assembly. › Continue reading