useful items

Aha! I knew they would come in handy one day.

That's Primo displaying a popsicle stick creation.

A twist tie secures the net on the top of our stick bug habitat.

My junk resources await use, they anticipate transformation.

A Syringe, Two Corks, and Assorted Chopsticks

Wielding a blow torch; soldering metal. Creating.

In this moment, this one, is family life. Warm hands apply a pink sticky note to my bicep. Silence occurred in this house, miraculously, only seconds ago.

Now the dog barks, at the behest of a five-year-old. The screen door opens and the bare feet of the bigger boy scuttles across tiles. He is on a mission. The little one, pink cheeked with heat, and tired after a day out in the world, presents a book to me. I'm so mad at you, he says, leaning against me. Because I made him go get the book.

So I must go now.

A syringe leftover from a dose of antibiotics makes a wonderful bath toy. Two corks too. Assorted chopsticks -- well, we might use them to eat noodles, or to build something. Anyway, I never throw anything out.

It never hurts to try something new. Otherwise, there's just the rut and what I know of me. And I'm sure there's so much more.

A New Twist

The most obvious junk in the drawer is a collection of twist ties. Which i have packaged into one plastic bag and will count when I have another moment.

Wikipedia says: A twist tie is a metal wire encased in a thin strip of paper or plastic used to tie the openings of bags such as garbage bags or bread bags. They are often included with boxes of plastic food bags or trash bags, and are commonly available individually in pre-cut lengths, on large spools, or in perforated sheets called gangs.

Gangs, eh.

My mother objects to zip locks. Her preferred method of storage is a plastic bag, previously used to contain something, cleaned, dried, and sealed with a twist tie. Her twist ties are neatly organized in a container with sections for such things. Not only does she reuse her plastic bags, but she also reuses her twist ties until the metal is quite bald.

Here`s twist tie art (http://www.elfwood.com/~chelseasewel/Twist-tie-Dragon.2624729.html).
I wonder what other uses there are for twist ties...

I`ll include a photo and final count of the twist ties in my junk drawer when the camera returns from Mazama, Washington, where it is being used to record trad climbing ascents by a guy who looks into my junk drawer and laughs while searching for the corkscrew and beer bottle opener, which are also housed there, but are not exactly junk.

Now that the twist ties are removed, the junk drawer is looking much less junkie. Next on the agenda are the rubber bands.

Looking at my junk drawer, I think about the junk drawer of my psyche. That place where I put stuff that I don`t want to think about.

For my Aboriginal Perspectives on Education course, I am required to read about residential schools, the Canadian government`s policy of assimilation of indigenous people, genocides in Canada, the 60`s scoop, and the sad reality that more Aboriginal children today are in foster care than were in residential schools.

I believe that cleaning out my personal psychic junk will free up space in my mind, heart, and soul to put in new stuff that will assist me in my new role as teacher and thinker about education. I am (surprise surprise) interested in alternatives to the public school system, and also very ready to teach within the system to learn more about it.

There you go: junk drawer as metaphor for life.

The Junk Drawer

Do you have a junk drawer?

Mine is a default filing location for all those things that don't belong anywhere else -- miscellaneous things that I can't throw out.

It's not that I'm a pack rat, it's just that I hate the thought of garbaging something potentially useful.

In less wealthy countries all of the things in my drawer would be resources. Why throw out these manufactured products that could have more of a life than the landfill? Does this collection make me feel rich? Or am I hoarding trash because of a Depression mentality developed from my mother's stories of making do with little.

In India scouring dumps and garbages provides an economy for otherwise disenfranchised people. In India, trash pickers provide the vital service of recycling. Check Chintan Environmental Resource and Action Group (http://www.chintan-india.org/) for more details on that.

Inspired by a course I'm taking at UVIC this summer (Indigenous Education)--a course taught by an inspiring teacher--I plan to empty this junk drawer.

I want to look at what's in the hodge podge mixture. I want to let go of old stuff that's not useful any more. I want to make space for good stuff, new stuff, stuff that I don't even know about yet.

I'll keep you posted.

The Next Assignment

Sunday morning at Goldstream.
Late June’s sky is dull.
The boys’ bodies are warm at wake up,
my husband and the white dog yawn.

Coffee,
a fire,
my book.
Then my son and I walk
to the waterfall.

The chute tumbles.
Emerald ferns sparkle.
Water leaps
from canyon’s rocky rim
into the still pool below

where the diamonds disappear
into darkness.

Nearly naked
I stand,
goosefleshed,

and consider.

The pool looks

cold and deep,

strangely alluring.

But what might I find

at the bottom

of that beauty?

Face your fears,
my son tells me,
eight and a half --
mid way between boy and man –
already.

This week he endured the dentist’s drill,
I don’t like this, he cried.
But he did it.
Sometimes we have no choice.

I dive in.
A shock.
But

water is the bending element.
Transferring my mass to its buoyancy,
I don’t fall;
I fly.

My son watches,
then leads us back to camp.
Look how he finds his way.

Arbutus,
Doug fir,
salal.
Honeysuckle,
red cedar,
stinging nettle.

Nature has no favourites.

Back at camp
Secundo brews salmonberry espresso.
My husband throws cedar shakes
into the fire
annointing the air.

Incense,
innocence,
bliss:
the all knowing
acceptance of whatever it is.