Another Day, Another Word

Theme: Words encompassing and arising from a person's name


Orwellian [awr-wel-ee-uhn]

adjective: of or relating to the works of George Orwell (especially his picture of a future totalitarian state)

I know I know, it has been awhile since the last word, what can I say, I've been busy.

This word of course comes from George Orwell, the pseudonym of Eric Blair. It is usually used as a reference to his dystopian novel 1984. In fact the term, Orwellian, has become the same as Dystopia. The thing I find quite interesting about dystopian stories, both in books and on the screen, is that while they purport to show the future they usually are only giving a "Tale of Extension" about the times the author has lived in or through.

1984 is a classic example of this. Set in the year of 1984, it was actually written by Orwell in 1948. A time when Brittain was still suffering from the harsh privations of WWII. The war time rationing did not disappear completely until well into the 50's. Orwell paints a picture of a world eternally at war. The war is used by the powers that be to control the common people by:

1. Absorbing excess production of the population that would otherwise raise the standard of living.
2. Allow the people to be blinded to the oppressions they live under because they are doing it "For the good of the cause"
3. Keeping the people in a constant state of fear and xenophobia.

Winston Smith, the protagonist, starts his rebellion by the simple act of starting to write a journal. While not forbidden it is not condoned either. this is the kind of state where unless something is specifically allowed it is against the law.


While most dystopia's are works of fiction, one of the best is based on fact. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is based of his real experience of life in a Russian Gulag (Forced Labour Camp). The name of the protagonist Ivan Denisovich is a common name, the Russian equivalent of "John Smith". Once again, we see the twisted world through the eyes of the 'everyman'.




In the land of film one of the best Dystopia's is Brazil, produced and directed by terry Gilliam in 1985. here we see a world of endless, meaningless but still brutal Bureaucracy. A world obsessed with plastic surgery. Where a simple clerk dreams of a better life.



What actually prompted today's word was a the latest novel by Ben Elton, Blind Faith. Which in many was is a reworking, updating or possibly a homage to 1984. The setting is moved to the end of this century (possible 2084...), once again set in London (while it is never actually stated in 1984 as the cities no longer have names) and again focusing on an every man. Who also is actually a cog in the machine of oppression to which he is trying to rebel. In '84 W Smith rebels by writing a book, in Blind Faith Trafford rebels by reading them. Books are not banned, only fiction and science books are. You can read all the 'self improvement' books you wish but to read anything of quality is to single yourself out as an 'elitist snob', who is 'up themselves' and 'thinks they are better than everyone else'.

Which will lead to you being torn apart by an angry mob. There is no such thing as privacy.

Well that is a good enough round up of today's word.

Another Day, Another Word

Words encompassing and arising from a person's name

Kafkaesque [kahf-kuh-esk]

Ah Kafka, a surrealist before the term was coined. You may notice that many of the word's in the current theme are auctorial descriptives. (ok, so guess I have to define that as well: Auctorial descriptives are a series of adjectives based on authors' names)

Not surprising, since few things have the power to change the way we see the world than the pen of a master writer.
But Franz Kafka holds a special place for me as the term Kafkaesque has a very fluid meaning and differing interpretations.

EG:

"marked by a senseless, disorienting, often menacing complexity: Kafkaesque bureaucracies"
"marked by surreal distortion and often a sense of impending danger: Kafkaesque fantasies of the impassive interrogation, the false trial, the confiscated passport ... haunt his innocence"

The main reason I see for this is that Kafka wrote in an intentionally ambiguous language in his native German. Which has caused many problems for the people tasked with translating his works. To really get the taste of his works I would suggest his novella The Metamorphosis but in line with the issues I mentioned about translation I would strongly recommend finding a copy translated by either David Wyllie or Joachim Neugroschel.

To give an example of what Kafkaesque is, the first line of The Metamorphosis:
"As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a monstrous vermin"
And so it goes from there.

Another Day, Another Word

Continuing on the theme of words encompassing and arising from a persons name.

Caesarean [si-zair-ee-uhn]

Now I assume that you all know the meaning of the word.

noun
1. the delivery of a fetus by surgical incision through the abdominal wall and uterus (from the belief that Julius Caesar was born that way)

Now wether it was Gaius Julius Caesar, who became the first Emperor of Rome, that the c-section was named after or one of his ancestors is hard to determine now. Caesar was a common name in the Juli family for many generations before Gaius' birth. The oldest surviving reference to it now in existence was by Pliny the Elder in the first century AD, some 300 years after the big GJC. Pliny stated that it was an ancestor of the Emperor that it was named after.

But like in so many things Rome in general and Gaius Julius Caesar in particular had such a far reaching influence on Europe and western civilization that most sources state that is was GJC himself who was born via c-section.

Either way the name has stuck.

Going a bit further on the impact of Caesar on the modern world.

• The title of Emperor, which Napoleon bestowed on himself (well actually the French word is empereur) just prior to leading his Grande Army on a merry jaunt around Europe is a direct descendant of the Latin Imperator which was equivalent to commander or General.
  
• Dictator was the title given to one person, in times of great crisis, all the powers that were normally held by the senate. Part of the deal was that they were Dictator only for a set period of time.
  
• The Russian Tsar and the German Khizer were both derivations of Caesar

I could continue but that is enough for today.

Another Day, Another Word

Thought I would change the theme today. I was inspired by reading an article in the SMH (Sydney Morning Herald) this morning written by one of our ex-PM's. Someone who took great joy in the use of language and slicing up his opponents with words. So today's word is:

Goebbelsian [Go-bells-e-n]

So can you guess the new theme?...

That's right! Words encompassing and arising from a persons name.

SMH article

Now, I cannot give you a dictionary definition for this word for after a bit of googling it looks like this was the first use of the word. So this may end up in the OED (Oxford English Dictionary, the Big 16 volume one which gives the definition and then quotes the words first use in print) as the reference.

What I can do is give a little background on the person involved...Joseph Goebbels.

For those of you who don't know he was "a German politician and Minister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda during the National Socialist regime from 1933 to 1945. He was one of Adolph Hitler's closest associates and most devout followers. Goebbels was known for his zealous, energetic oratory and virulent anti-Semitism."

A lot can be gleaned about the man and the meaning of Goebbelsian from his ministerial title "Minister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda"... Normally the two terms used would be seen as Mutually Exclusive. George Orwell used the same twisted language in 1984, where the War Ministry was called The Ministry of Peace.

More detail here is you so desire:Joseph Goebbels

I think you get the idea.

Another Day, Another Word

Today's word:

Sinister [sin-uh-ster]

Here is another word that has changed its meaning over time. The current definitions are:

adjective
1. threatening or portending evil, harm, or trouble; ominous: a sinister remark.
2. bad, evil, base, or wicked; fell: his sinister purposes.
3. unfortunate; disastrous; unfavourable: a sinister accident.
4. of or on the left side; left.
5. Heraldry. noting the side of an escutcheon or achievement of arms that is to the left of the bearer, as opposed to dexter (apologies for those dealing with dexter case for bringing the word up here...) meaning right side.

Sinister came into use in English in the late middle ages, 1450ish. What I find interesting is that, while the spelling we get of the word comes from Latin ( via French), the association it has with bad, evil etc actually comes from the ancient Greek usage. Both cultures used the word to mean left. The Greeks also used it to describe an 'evil omen' because they would always face north to make a reading of the portents. Apparently if a bird was seen in the west, thus the left side, it was bad.

Don't ask me why, it just was. One the other hand (not the topical word play...) the Romans saw the left side as fortunate.

So we have the Roman spelling but the Greek meaning.

Another Day, Another Word

Today's word:

Salient [sey-lee-uhnt]

Another one I quiet like. Salient is one of those words that many people use (" The salient point of the matter is...") but few actually know what it means. It first made its way into English in the mid 1500's as a term in Heraldry to describe a leaping animal eg: :Salient Lion.

It came to English from the Latin salire "To Leap" but goes further back than that. It's most ancient know form is from PIE (Proto-Indo-European: The ancient mother tongue from which of most European, Middle Eastern languages formed. Sanskrit comes from PIE as well.) sie also "To Leap"

From the heraldic origins we have its next two uses, both military, for the most outward jutting point in a walls defences, a salient angle and the first part of a battle line to engage the enemy, the salient troops. This was about 100 years after its first use.

It then took another 200 odd years for its more modern use to mean anything that is prominent or important. So we finally make it back to where we started but now we know what a salient point actually is.

For one final bit of Trivia: The last name of Antonio Salieri the composer, who was cast as the villain in the great film Amadeus about the life of Mozart, (If you have never seen it, do yourself a favour and rent it) comes from the same origin. His name sounds so much better as it is than if it was Anglicised to Anthony The Leaping...

Another day, another word

Ok, time for me to ramble on a bit.

One of the things that fascinates me about language is its organic nature. In that the meaning attached to a word or phrase is mutable, it changes over time and usage. So for the next couple of words' I will look at some words whose meaning has changed or been greatly expanded over time. Which brings us to today's word. (Nice segue, don't you think?...)

Weird

Now, I assume that everyone is familiar with this word, as it is still in general use today. However the common usage of it today, as in 'strange', 'out of the ordinary', and 'disturbing' ("You're really weirding me out, man!") is very different from its origins. The person we have to thank for that is none other than 'Old Bill', William Shakespeare.

His description of the Three Witches in Macbeth (It is OK to type the name, just not to say it. If you don't know what I am talking about, I'll tell you later) as Weird Sisters set the word on the path to the common usage we know today.

Prior to this the word came from the Old English, word of Wyrd which literally meant "That which comes" and was used to describe fate, destiny and prophesy.

Shakespeare used it in this sense in The Scottish Play to describe the three witches when they told both Macbeth and Banquo what their future would hold. One to be King and the other to father a line of Kings.

Now this is what I find interesting, while Shakespeare's intended use of the word was for it's traditional meaning of fortune telling, it came over time to adopt it's more modern meaning of strange because of it's use in the play and the way the witches have been portrayed on stage since the 1600's.

So the man who is responsible for changing the meaning of Weird, did not actually intend it to happen.

Weird isn't it!...

From Messy Junkies, to Archeology of the Future.

Messy Junkies:

This little rant was kicked of by an unknown junkie. I had recently moved to Sydney and was living at a great place on Boundary Street in Paddington. I went out into the back courtyard one day to enjoy my morning coffee sitting in the sun. During the night someone had shot up in the back alley and had thought a good way to dispose of the used fit (syringe) was to lob it over our back fence.

So as I blearily stumbled, bear footed, out to greet the morning I was presented with the sight of an uncapped used fit; with that lovely dollop of blood in the end.

It is no surprise to say that I was not joyously happy at the gift that had been left. I reemerged with a pair of pliers and a used drink bottle to get rid of it.

The morning coffee in the sun was a ritual for me at the time. I was new in town and trying to make way into the photography business; was still not working much so most mornings were my own. Over the ensuing weeks I was again greeted with a couple of times with the same present from out thoughtful local user.

After the third or fourth time I took a walk up to the needle exchange at Kings Cross. Boundary Street, not surprisingly, was the dividing line between Paddington, Darlinghurst and The Cross. The exchange was not far from our place; they were a bit surprised when I asked for several of the small disposal bins, but now ‘works’. I didn’t bother to explain…

I placed one of the bins in the back alley outside our place and kept the rest.

In my wanderings around the area I started to notice the number of fits left lying around. The publicity campaign for Clean Up Australia Day was in full swing at the time. So I decided that my contribution would be to clear the local area, as much as possible, of used syringes. So on the day I donned my old pair of leather rigging gloves, stuffed several bins in a back pack and away I went. Two hours later, with four bins stuffed full I called it a day feeling I had ‘Done my bit’.

It didn’t take long for my clean up efforts to be replaced with fresh supplies. Ah, those junkies, they are a persistent lot. So, over time, what had been a once only gesture on my part evolved into a monthly ritual. Every couple of weeks I would don the gloves, go for a walk around the neighborhood and clear the current build up of syringes.

As I got to know the areas of high concentrations, the ends of several allies, small dark alcoves etc; Where the users could gain a little privacy while they shot up what I began to notice was not how many fits were left behind but how many were not there. Allow me to explain:

While about one third of the fits I would collect would have had the needles recovered with the little Day-Glo orange caps by the users I was amazed by the number of empty caps I would find. In some spots there would be hundreds of them but only a few needles. I realized that the number of fits that were being used was much higher than what I was finding. So many of the users were at least disposing of them, hopefully not into locals back yards as one had done and sparked this whole little adventure of mine.

The link to Archeology:

I came across an article in the Sydney Morning Herald about an Archeology dig that was going on in the rocks area on a site of a brothel from the early days of white settlement. One if the details that struck me was the discovery of old rags in the remains of a wall that had been used as menstrual cloths by the women and then shoved in the wall as way of disposal. The comment was made that it is usually the junk and detritus of past civilizations that is turned up in digs as it is the stuff that is lost or thrown away and forgotten that is preserved while things that are useful are not.

This rang true for me as what I had so often seen in history programs on the Mediterranean was the shards of broken pottery from amphora, the bottles, cans and plastic bags of the Ancient Greek world that had been used in massive numbers at the time. I started to think: “So, what would have the best chance of surviving from the current times for future Archeologists to dig up?”

Small, pretty indestructible, used in large numbers and considered worthless…

Then it came to me, the little bloody orange caps from used syringes!

All of a sudden I had a vision of a dig in the area, several hundred years in the future, and them uncovering hundreds of these little plastic caps and them wondering and speculation what we had used them for and why in such huge quantities? Also, why did they turn up in large numbers here and not at all in other digs, at sites relatively close by, all of which belonged to the ancient city of Sydney?

I felt two things:

1) Was I doing a disservice to future science by cleaning up the caps?

2) Should I leave some sort of time capsule to explain why they were here and thus make the job easier of any possible future students working on their Doctoral Thesis in Archeology?

Yes, I know, sometimes my mind works in very strange ways.

You should be dancing…Yea!

I recently moved into a new place in West End. It’s great, good people, close to everything and on top of the hill with 180⁰ views from the CBD to Mt Cootha. A post of some pictures will follow soon. Of course to celebrate the new place we had to have a party.

Last Friday the 22, being the winter solstice, sounded like as good a time as any. I whipped up a flyer in illustrator and emailed it out to all concerned. Also pasted it up at Zen Central, where I teach, to let all those whose email I don’t know, know about it.

It was a great night; we finally shut down the turntables just after three in the morning but the most joyous event for the night came much earlier in the evening. Megan, a dear friend, suffered a spinal injury as a result of an accident at a party late last year. Around nine pm I walked into The Yoga Room, where DJ Druid was bring the love to all, to see her dancing. My heart leapt, I was so happy for her. It was the first time in more than six months I had seen her on a dance floor.

She still has a long way to go in her recovery but it was wonderful to see her like that again.

Who I really am?

Early this month I participated in a week long physical theater intensive called Winter Stomp held by the amazing people at Zen Zen Zo. I found it incredibly rewarding. A week long residential course where you do nothing but eat, sleep and train for eight to nine hours a day. No phones, no email, no contact with the outside. In the massively connected world in which we live it so rare to be allowed the opportunity to disconnect for a time and keenly focus on one thing.

It greatly reminded me of times spent in long yoga retreats. I soon found myself dropping into the same mind state and intensity of focus. It seems that we rarely push our selves to test our limits is this modern, cloistered world of ours. A rarity then, to be able to bring to one's training the specificity of intent achieved there. Many thanks to Lynne, Tatie, Aideen and Dave. Not simply for the engaging quality of instruction but how it was all put together as a community of shared effort and support.

The overarching theme for the week was the question:

Who am I really?

This theme was interwoven through much of the work in an effort for us to strip away many of the facades we construct for the world and gain a deeper understanding of self. I am sure there was also recognition that we often unknowingly deceive ourselves as well.

This work culminated in a solo performance on the last night by all of the stompers of a piece of completely open style attempting to answer the question posed.

As I had been on several occasions during the week I was enthralled at the level of talent, stage presence, directorial skill and just plan old hutsbar on display that night. There were quite a few pieces that are hard etched in my mind for years to come.

When I had sat down earlier in the day to put together my piece an interesting thing occurred. Being the elder member of the stompers this year I had done a bit more work on this particular question of self examination. Through many hours of ‘Just Sitting’ and contemplating this very question I had come to realize that, not only the answer, but the very nature of the question, changes as we progress through our lives.

As I sat I found a poem forming unbidden in my mind. Back at school I had written huge amounts of poetry. Long rambling affairs that, thankfully, are lost to time. So I began to answer the question from the viewpoint of who I have become but in the style of a long gone fifteen year old who was sure he knew what it was all about.

Here is that poem:

“Who I really Am?”

An explanation is eight verses.

I have said it before,

I’ll say it again

After all of this time

‘Still don’t know who I am

I have read and I’ve listened,

To philosopher’s, guru’s and fool’s.

I’ve done all the courses;

Worked with most of the tools.

A virgo, A Shinto.

A monkey. A nine.

All convenient labels,

For those who want to save time.

A tool using mammal,

With an oversized brain.

Who still keeps doing the same shit,

Over and over and over again.

I am not this physical body.

Though, I’ve really enjoyed what I’ve got.

But there is not a single cell I me.

That was here when the boy, Craig, grew up.

I am not my Brain either.

This conscious mind. It’s not me.

These senses, they cannot be trusted.

All this I was taught, too well, by LSD.

So, I’m composing this little ditty.

To perform and display who I am.

I’m trying to create a big finish…

But I fear it will be rather lame.

I don’t know where this life will lead me.

It’s been fun so far; I’ll trust luck.

So again to the question, Who am I?

I don’t know and I don’t give a fuck.

My first New Year.

While not my first New Year, what follows is the first one I have a solid memory of and therefore the first in a sense. While many have followed much more active and spirited, none has been quite as strange as this.

I was somewhere between 10 and 12. Being the last child, my parents were rightly enjoying a night off from us as my brother and sister were both going to friends’ places for the night. So I was put to bed as my parents headed off to a party, to return home in the wee hours. I simply did what any young lad would do. Waited for ten to fifteen minutes after they left, got up turned on the TV and sat down with a selection of sugar and ‘stayed up till New Year’.

After working my way through the commercial stations, is it just me of is Tv coverage of fireworks displays the most boring thing that can be filmed. “Oh look, another green streak of light on the tv, wow…”

I ended up on the ABC. Some b&w war film was playing, cool. I soon realised that is was a film about B52’s and nukes so it couldn’t be WW2. So why was it in colour? No, I wasn’t a film buff at that age but many a long Sunday afternoon had been spent watching enough WW2 films that I did have some clue there.

As it wound it’s way to end I worked out that everything hinged on the fate of one damaged B52 was what it was all about. The sight of a pilot ridding a nuke down to its target was the first thing I never forgot about the film.

The second was, as the streets around rose to the sounds of car horns and general screams of Happy New Year, the final scene unfolded with hundreds of nukes exploding around the world to the strains of every Englishman’s war time sweet heart “Vera Lyn” signing her big one “We’ll meet again”

I sat alone in the house on the first New Years I was alone and I watched the end of the world while everyone cheered in the back ground. I have always wondered if the timing of the ending had been deliberate on the part of some ABC program director.

I think I was 17 before it all made sense. I had fallen for Kubrick films and was working my way through them as I could track them down. Someone let me a copy of Dr Strangelove, I had herd of it but was unsure of the story. I just knew it was one of his war films.

It didn’t take long for me to work out it was that film.

I had never told anyone about that night. How could I have seen that film when I was fast asleep…

It may have been the first time I realized my own mortality, not sure. It was however, I think, the first time I trying to encompass the idea that, we humans could actually wipe everyone out. That was what I had trouble sleeping about for the next couple of weeks.

The Effect of place on memory.

I was helping a friend last Easter. She was holding a yoga retreat in Springbrook in the hinterland of the gold coast and I was going to be on staff for the four days. One of the other teachers gave me a lift from the train station to the retreat centre. As we drove through Mudgeeraba, a small hamlet on the highway that had been a timber town in the good old days, I was surprised to see that my grandparent’s house was still there. It was supposed to be knocked down not long after we sold it 20 years ago.

A coupe of weeks later I was down at the coast again and decided, out of curiosity, to drive out to the old house and have a longer look. While the house was still there the township had changed, almost beyond recognition, from the sleepy little town I had spent summer holidays in. The post office was now “The Old Post Office Café” and there was a post office shop in the new commercial development a couple of blocks away.

When I arrived I was in for shock, the place had not changed at all. The old shed was still out the back etc. Well, it had changed a bit, the veggie garden beside the shed was gone and the place was filled with cars. The house was on a massive block, two titles if I remember correctly, and was being used as a small used car yard. I walked onto the property and looked around.

The shed had been a semi-mythic place for me as a child. Huge (not so big now though), dark and almost filled to the brim with all manner of tools that gave the place a unique smell of dust and rust. It had been a place of discovery and mystery for me. My grandfather was working for the local council at the time. Close to retirement, he had been a farmer for most of his life, the job was more a chance for him to get around the area and chat to the locals or so it seemed to me at the time. I would dive into the stacks of junk in the shed and come up with some tool that I had no idea of its use.

“Pop! What’s this for?”

“Well bring it here so I can see it lad. What you have there is…” and he would tell me at length about my latest find. I would usually only get a vague idea of what he was talking about but it didn’t matter.

“This reminds me of the time…” He would then be off on one of his stories of times past, ancient days to one such as me. A time where horses still worked the land, but only just, they had all but disappeared from the roads and soon too for the fields. Days of no television and no power. I loved his stories and wish I had put them down on paper.

The side door was open, inside bent intently over vice a man was rewiring a starter motor. Patiently, deliberately, he wound the copper wire; oblivious to me standing there almost looking over his shoulder. I didn’t want to intrude, to break his flow. So I stood there and took it all in. The old dark wood, massive doors with hinges as wide as my forearm.

The shed was full again with stuff. Tools and what looked like projects started and put aside to be completed for another day. I remember it had taken us at least two days to clear it out when Pop came to live with us. The shed was big enough to park four, possibly six at a squeeze, cars; but there was only room to inch in the tiny old 323 that Nanna and Pop had at the time. There were enough tools there to give half a dozen workshops a good start in life. Wire tensioner, saws from tiny fret saws all the way up to two man cross cut jobs, awls, planes – both metal and wooden, picks, shovels, augers, plum bobs, axes, mattocks and lots I stuff I hand never gotten around to showing to pop for him to explain to me. I stopped counting at six hammers and that was the complete ones, there were at least that many heads without handles as well. I don’t know where it all went. I was too young to worry about such things, or to muse on what effect such an event was having on my grandfather; what was it like to see tools one had used to shape and create a life, many of which had attached to them memories of people and places long gone, be taken up and removed from your life as well?

The guy working in the shed noticed me, after a time, and turned to ask what I wanted.

“Just having a look around, you see this used to be my grandfathers place…”

I went on to explain how it had been a long time since I had been in the area etc.

“Ah, Tom Burton, my mother used to live across the back lane over there. She know him and Eddie quite well.”

We chatted for a while about this and that; he had been using the shed for a workshop almost since the day we sold the place. Slowly refilling it, with the clutter of a lifetime, that had been emptied when we left. I thanked him for his time and let him return to his work. I smiled as I turned away, the shed was still there and someone was using it to fashion things in wood and metal with their hands. Pop would be so pleased.

I turned to the house. The old back landing had been enclosed. I stood there for a while just taking it all in. The owner came over after a while to see what I wanted; I didn’t seem to be interested in the cars. I gave him the same speech I had the guy in the shed and was surprised to find that this was the same man who had purchased the place fro us twenty years ago. He had planned to develop it but it had ended up staying as a car yard. We chatted for a while and he asked if I would like to come inside and look around, which I did.

Beside the old back door was the old wooden clock face with the sign above it saying “Sorry, we are out. We will be back at” and you would let the visitors know when you would return. There used to be a pen and paper attached, for your visitors to leave you a note. A relic from the days when people never locked their doors. Well not the back door anyway, anyone who knew you always came round the back. The front door was only for strangers. As we stepped in the kitchen, I was suddenly ten years old again and half my height. The place was the same, nothing had been changed. The same lino on the floor, paint on the walls and those off green doors on the cupboards with the funny little circular air vents in them. I felt as if all I had to do was close my eyes and when I opened them again it would be 10 am and we were arriving for a Sunday lunch with Nanna and Pop. As we walked in the back door, nanna would be sitting at her usual seat at the kitchen table getting things ready for lunch. Pop would be either out in the garden or if it was summer in the next room waiting for the cricket to start on tv.

Nanna died when I was quite young. Cancer. The word still brings a chill to the heart and the slight intake of breath now, but a generation ago it was much worse. With all the advances that have been made in treatment since then, I think that the big leap has been made in early detection. Through better methods, greater awareness and vigilance. When it was finally picked up, it meta-sized so long ago and her body was so riddled with it, it was hard to tell where it had started from. It was not a question of treatment, but simply of time. She passed in the night, a couple of days into her first stay in the hospital.

I remember coming down for the funeral. We walked in the back door, as usual, but she was not there. Everyone settled down to talk, to exchange the memories one does at a time like this. I was restless, I found myself aimlessly walking around the house, then outside. My father found me not long after, standing alone at the side of the house with tears streaming down my face. I known she was gone, on an intellectual level but it had had no concrete meaning till then. While they had often been to our house I had never been there and not seen her. Dad found me about an hour after we arrived. I had been unconsciously looking for her, wandering around the house; trying to see if she was still alive, somewhere. When I could not, the loss became real. I was out in the back yard crying with my whole being, the way only a child can. I had lost relatives before but had been too young to really understand it all. That was when I said good bye to her. The actual funeral, sitting in a strange church, had little effect on me.

All this had come spinning back to me in the moments I had walked into the kitchen. I pushed down the lump in my throat and continued the tour of the old house; other rooms brought back memories but nothing like the first steps in the kitchen. I thanked the man and made my leave.

I have many photo’s of her to remind me but the one I wish I had would be of her, sitting at the kitchen table, peeling veggies, smiling and looking towards the back door as her grandson walked in.