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Today is Friday the 13th.  Scary for some I suppose, but it's never really been something I worry about.  Discussing this with an acquaintance recently, I mentioned that I was not really the superstitious type.  It dawned on me, though,  that I been raised by a woman who would say the same. After, that is, she had already knocked on wood a few times, fretted over the bird that hit the window and threw some salt over her shoulder. She wouldn't pass another person on a staircase, would refuse to sit down to a meal with 13 at the table and always left a home by the same door she entered it. Strangely,  Mom had been doing all these things for so long she was completely unaware. This reflection gave me pause. Was I really as unaffected by superstition then as I originally thought?  No black cat or ladder has taken me off my planned course. Neither have I sweated over a broken mirror. I've both accepted and returned empty dishes which used to contain food, given and rec

I have to do it. I have honoured Remembrance Day and now my mind fills with what's to come. You don't love Christmas the way that I do and not be starting to get excited. There are 42 shopping days before Dec. 25 so I'm on the mark and ready to go this weekend to get it done. Well, most of it. It's always nice to leave a few things for the last week, particularly if you can pick them up downtown on a still winter's night,  lights twinkling, snow gently falling, carols pouring from outdoor speakers. For now though, I'm focussed on this Saturday and an annual outing with a girlfriend. On a November weekend before the rush, we have traditionally booked a room in a nearby city, a place with speciality stores offering unique inventories. While shopping alone is a favourite pastime of mine, when you shop with the right person it's the best.  My friend and I  bounce ideas off each other.  My if-you-love-it-buy-it attitude complements her pragmatic approac

It's another beautiful morning for this Remembrance Day in my community.  The weather that has been part of this significant occasion over the years has exemplified what we've come to expect in November in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. It's a mix of some good, mostly bad and what can be truly ugly.   Canadians have paid their respects at services across the country, standing in bitter cold, snowstorms and chilling rain. This year, however, conditions will not distract those in this pocket of the country from the occasion's solemnity as we are blessed with balmy temperatures and a cloudless sky.   We can stand with bowed heads in silence, reflecting on the sacrifices of others without trying not to think about frozen fingers and toes.  We can remember and we can also think about what we have gained by others' losses. Always on Remembrance Day I'm also given to reflect on the good fortune of being born in Canada. I'm proud of the country in which I live,

I live in Canada — the true north strong and free, a nation of 'nice' people, of wide open spaces, abundant resources and the strangest mess of weather you can find. In my corner of the country, we have so far revelled in an unseasonably lovely autumn. Temperatures have been pleasing, on some days even balmy.  Leaf raking has been done in t-shirts and there was even a late October campfire with the neighbours. The urgency that typically happens as we try to put away the outdoor furniture and batten down the hatches for winter to blow in, just hasn't been there.  Though there was a tiny trace of snow a few weeks ago,  it soon disappeared and a calm complacency has settled instead. Not to be confused with denial, of course. In Canada we know that the weather changes in a heartbeat. If it rained yesterday, it might snow today and tomorrow could promise sunshine and warmth.  Clouds can scurry overhead, ominous predictors of inclement changes,  while a mile or two out of