Jetlag

It's brutal.
At least for me, wide awake at 2 am local time. 5pm back home. Hi everyone! Waves....
Seems to be a major adjustment, in spite of the pills I was popping on the plane. And that was, how many days ago?
Leaving the Island was challenging; goodbye/farewell to friends, family, a van still to sell, stuff to store, loose ends and melancholy from the letting go. Time began to accelerate until we were standing beside a pile of luggage at Bjorn and Gabrielle's... then again at the airport in Vancouver.
Bill Reid's Jade Canoe is a powerful statement of the journey, bringing along all those characters...Recognize anyone? They're all here in me today, right now.

Time blurs, cramped into an airline seat via Air Berlin, I read, doze, stand, watch inane movies with no sound. We taxi in and step out of the plane into Dusseldorf. No one asks me if I have a return ticket. Collect that pile of baggage again and schlepp it onto the skytrain, the real train and into a locker so we can explore Dusseldorf.
Early morning, not much action. Elke and I walk along cobblestone streets, crossing the canal looking at the buildings.
We make a big loop get some food and haul the suitcases and pack sacks back onto the platform. Watch people, lots of smokers, sharply dressed women, an occasional shabbily dressed man, folks with dogs, bicycles. A multicultural assortment. The trains and passengers come and go. Ours is late, Elke's worried her record of making every connection will be broken. Even the ticket taker is concerned as they figure out another connection. The view is spectacular, we race along beside the Rhein river, castle ruins on the promontories, barges in the river, ancient (well really old) towns, villages and wall to wall 6 story apartment blocks in the cities. Gardens along the railroad verge, a massive array of solar collectors, wind farms, endless fields of corn, the ubiquitous church spires marking crossroads every one, individual.
The train makes up the time, we step off one and onto another across the platform. Seamless if one ignores the bruised toes and wrenched shoulders from hauling close to 200lbs of (do we really need all this sh..stuff?) luggage. Elke crashes onto her suitcase propped in front of her as business men work their strategies, write their letters or whatever on mini laptops. I watch the (miles) kilometres go by, fishermen at rivers edge, sheep, cattle, corn, plowed fields, forest, brick houses and factories lining the rails edge.

Our destination today is Eisenach.
We take a taxi through this old, old town up and up through the beech, oak, hazel and ash forest to Wartburg castle and hotel overlooking an almost endless vista of forest, the town in the valley below, wind farm in the distance.
We are here for a family celebration, the 50th birthdays of Martin and Gudrun (belated) Elke's sister. Sabine her youngest sister is here with her son, Martin's brothers and their children.
The view from our room is amazing, Dinner.... also amazing. I do my best to tune my ear to the German language, I'm rescued by Raphaela sitting next to me who speaks English quite well. We talk about travel and opportunities. Much effort is made by the party to include me, occasional translations of jokes and quick synopsis of speeches. White wine, red wine... it all helps make me feel welcome.
We're the first to leave as the time zone catches up to us.

The Container

What a great idea , save the rent and then I'll have a resaleable metal box that has multiple applications. However. Transient vagabond nomads might deposit their ancestors in some unnamed locale but I need to know where to put my stuff. I want it sitting on land I trust will still be owned by a friend when I return. I'm likely incurring a debt: social investment favour wise.
I make some calls and head over to Vancouver where I enlist the help of Tero who drives me out to Surrey to look at various choices. None of which I wanted to bring home although they would have easily done the job.
The ones on the Island just became more reasonable.














More searching. I take the Mill Bay ferry to Brentwood and the Saanich peninsula. Instead of calling first I use google and find myself at another obscure address, outside Vanisle containers dispatch. Carla the dispatcher talks me through the intersections till I find the well hidden location where Tom greets me, shows me in and out, up and around. After inspection, walking on the roof, reviewing the choices, I buy one. I also get a rack for the wall, a fancy new lock and the delivery arranged, coordinating with the land owner. That was easy!
Now where exactly did you say it could go Gabriele?
With a neighbour's backhoe an old house site hidden in the trees is scraped clean of blackberries, light bulbs and various other things. A few branches trimmed, some pier blocks, six 18 ft 2x10's and we are ready.
On delivery day the driver cannot get up Bjorns driveway. He knocks on the door at 6am, not happy. He has a series of jobs following this one.
Elke greets me as I emerge from shower. On the phone Gabriele suggests I might need to be there.
By the time I arrive the container is sitting in plain view out in the field.

I call a few crane truck companies. It is likely we may need a new site. The backhoe is arranged again and a nice garden spot is carved out of the blackberries. It has issues though, can still be seen probably seasonally from the house and it seems to resemble a stream bed or potential pond site. Not looking too level.
I arrive early on the appointed day, place the pier blocks. I ask if it's possible to place it in the first spot. The operator says "yes" if we cut some branches. Get the chainsaw! and a ladder. And more branches are dragged aside.
The metal box slides around the corner sinking slowly, shifting onto the blocks and shims are placed appropriately. The trucker backs out and away. We hang up the shelves, slide in the 2x10s and we're ready to load. I lie down on the shelf, enough room to stretch out and sleep if need be. Let's see, tomatoes would grow well along the south wall here, Maybe a peach tree?
A couple days later it seems to have settled. The pier blocks, somewhat askew. Alan helps me unload more stuff from our storage and fire it into my big box.
We return with a jack and as it lifts, it slides so I stop it right there. Yikes.
It must be twisted, I secure a rope from the topside to a plum tree.
After some big concern, my expert team assures me... no danger, no problem and no worries. Do nothing. Except of course continue filling it.
Another load, then I unload all the camping gear after our trip to Pachena, neatly sandwiched in between.
I deliver most of my wall art to Moni, she 's happy! All the family pictures hidden away, although we have some great laughs reviewing stacks of photos of siblings at various stages of development.
A last load from the storage facility. Elke helps and while I sweep out the cat litter and eucalyptus leaves, she picks blackberries. As we exit the fellow at the gate remarks he will "miss my smile." Why is it I never got his name?

So the saga never ends, as the container sits hidden in the trees frequently visited. We tie up the loose ends; the nightmarish events that create themselves, as entropy and chaos intersecting with intention.

Education

For the past 20 years I've defined myself as an educator, working with challenged/special needs children as well as providing support for the teachers with discipline and behaviour . I loved my job (if you can call it a job!) the pleasure of connecting, establishing relationship and communication. Supporting and enhancing a child's growth through learning is/was more of a calling than work. However at the end of the school year I submitted a letter of retirement for September. And I have some opinions!
I see the teaching of children as rich and deeply rewarding when I engage fully . Unfortunately the politics and agendas of some mostly well meaning people along with an antiquated premise continue to sabotage many children's creativity and personal expression. We need to spend more time engaging with our future citizens in their interests and providing imaginative responses to their encouraged questions. What is our intention for these potential leaders, teachers and entrepreneurs?
I hope they will also be growers of food, ideas and new life enhancing technologies. That they will want to learn from the past, lessons our generation has rejected as irrelevant: connection to the natural world, growing our own food, making our own clothes and adding sums in their heads.
I am worried about a generation of children so reliant on electronic technology they are challenged to entertain themselves without it. I worked with children unwilling to write or print or do any mathematical operations without enhanced support. Call me what you will, there are still places, thank goodness, where the cell networks don't reach. Where wi-fi is just a misspelled combination of letters. Our environment is being degraded and we act as if it is not. A society in denial. Our most vulnerable members have no choice in whether or not they wish to partake .
I believe in the importance of a classic education. Knowing how to express oneself allows us all to communicate efficiently.
"It takes a village to raise a child" is not just a cute phrase. The value of community is lost when we herd our children into anonymous cohorts separating the challenged from the gifted instead of having them teach each other.
I am now perched on the edge of my own flight away from the nest. A voyage of discovery and exploration as I continue my commitment to life-long learning. I'm embarking into new environments and possibilities for learning and sharing, expanding the opportunity to be the best I can be. Sadly I do not have any magic solutions. There are many choices when it comes to education, I have chosen to embrace the multiversity of life as a classroom, the libraries of the world, the land itself. I will continue to create and question my reality.