Jiffy Pop

As my regular readers will know, I’m an old-fashioned gal who loves nostalgia. Apparently nostalgia is a popular thing in a pandemic world. It might be one reason why camping has been a top activity for families this summer.

People are creating new memories, about which they can be nostalgic years from now. There are also us older folks, shaking our heads as we compare our nostalgia with the newer version.

I remember camping as being a time when most of the everyday rules were suspended. Bedtime was when we were done having fun for the day; parents didn’t mind because that meant we were out of their hair.

As far as I can tell, this part hasn’t changed in principle. The difference is that often the activities and entertainment are provided by the parents, not thought up by the kids.

If we ever said we were bored while camping, we were given a task like picking up any garbage on the ground in the campsite or chopping wood. It taught us to come up with our own more attractive alternative. Today’s version is often supplied: I saw more than a few parents setting up videos for viewing in camper trailers.

I’m not sure what is new and exciting for kids today; for me it was simple things that changed when we went camping. Perhaps that was because we didn’t have portable screens? I bet some other old folks out there share my memories.

Are you ready? Here we go…

🥣 Those nifty miniature cereal boxes you could cut open and eat from. We only had Apple Jacks and Fruit Loops out of those boxes, never at home. Thankfully my dad ate the Rice Krispies.

🍪 Camp cooking was home-grown ingenuity – wonders that could all be cooked in a fry pan. Store-bought cookies were a camping delicacy – Oreos and Dad’s Chocolate Oatmeal were our favourites. Mom’s cookies at home were good, but you couldn’t pull them apart or lick off the coating.

🚘 Time in the car was even entertaining. (Okay, it was, except for when my little brother took up more than his share of the back seat, or when the dog drooled on my shoulder. ) We sang songs and played “I Spy” and license plate bingo.

It’s true that there were times I didn’t enjoy in the moment. Cold and wet and tired, dragging myself back to the campsite after hiking Illecillewaet glacier, I felt even worse when my vinyl runners melted by the fire as they were set out to dry. And when my cousin got his roasted marshmallow stuck in my pigtail, that was no fun either. But those times are the threads that make the fabric of my life unique.

I don’t mean to say one has to suffer to have a good story, but experiences offer us a chance to learn and grow, and share the excitement that can entail.

When I was a kid, the ultimate camping treat was Jiffy Pop popcorn. It was a compact tinfoil pan when Mom packed it, but once we shook it over the fire or Coleman stove, it unfurled into a magnificent silver ball full of steaming hot popcorn.

On our recent trip to the Kootenays, I discovered the current version of Jiffy Pop does not have the “pop pop” I remember. Rather, it was the “beep beep” of the microwave. I winced, mourning the loss of a great tradition.

“When I was a kid” was the preamble for my Dad’s tales of how his childhood was more interesting than mine. Dare I say “challenging”? He might have even said “better”.

Now that I’m about to become a grandmother I look forward to being able to pass along the wisdom of my days to a brand new generation.

Most of all, I hope camping will be an occasion to remind my grandkids about having time when there is no need to rush, just a desire to share. We will sing songs in the car and stop for ice cream and collect treasures and roast marshmallows. Then they can tell their kids about the days of old…

A Few of my Favourite Memories

It’s Father’s Day today. I gave my Hubbie a big hug – he’s going to be a Grandpa soon, so next year it will be an even bigger celebration. He has done an amazing job being a consistently present and loving father with his daughter.  The other part of my Father’s Day was a few moments remembering my Dad.

I’ve mentioned him in many of my posts, how close we were and how much he loved food. I wanted to post something in his honour today, and memories flooded back as I reminisced.

I still have the pan he used to make me fried egg sandwiches, and as I built the nachos for dinner tonight I remembered how meticulous he was with those chips – like he was constructing a card house.

As these images flashed through my mind, I thought of something I’d written many years ago, just before he died. I decided that was the best piece to post, so here it is, my column for the local community website in October 2007.

I still miss you, Daddy. You still remind me to stand tall, not let the bastards get me down, and follow through (and not just on my jump shot). I will always remember who loves me.

A Few of my Favourite Things

We are moving, and other things have happened of late that have made me look back and smile at memories I have. Autumn always makes me even more reminiscent than usual (perhaps because I was born this time of year) but not in a melancholy way. I suppose some would say it is overly romantic, but I like to think that looking back can help you go forward, if you see things in the right light. The golden light of an autumn day seems just right for me… can I share a few gems with you?

It is not hard for me to think of food memories, possibly because as a kid I hardly stopped eating. My father used to say I had a hollow leg – I could eat like a horse and I just kept growing taller and eating more. I remember him saying that maybe if he put bricks on my head that would slow things down and it seemed that might be the only remedy. I could have new pants in the spring and be watching for the flood before summer was over! 

I don’t want you to get the idea that all we did was eat though… after Sunday breakfast I remember the whole family sometimes having some goofy family time. Music was often playing and it wasn’t just hippie tunes, either.

I have great visions of all four of us marching through the house to the tune of “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” (just like the brooms Mickey Mouse tried to control). My father would lead my mom, my brother and me around from room to room like a parade marshal, even going up and over the beds!

These are favourite memories of mine because they make me smile and that in itself makes me proud. I think it is a great testament to the way I was raised that I can look back and say I had such a great time.

My Dad will not be around much longer and that makes me sad. But you know what? Every time I eat a fried egg sandwich I will remember the early mornings he got up to make me one before basketball practice. Eating peanuts in the shell will always remind me of being little and sharing some of Daddy’s treat as he sat watching a bit of TV, with a paper bag on the floor to catch the shells.

A new delicacy will forever make me think of Friday nights when I lived in Vancouver and we would share an evening of nibbles at “the treetop bistro” in his West End apartment, swapping stories and solving the problems of the world. All those smiles will far outweigh the sadness, and I will toast to his happy adventures wherever the waves may carry him.

Here’s to you, Daddy.

New moments, old memories

I love ice skating. As a kid I saw competitive skaters like ballerinas, and both were akin to fairies in my mind. I didn’t have the guts to take up the sport to that level – I could hardly walk and chew gum at the same time – but I always loved it as a duffer. I’ve had the good fortune to skate outdoors in the Rockies, and in Charlevoix, Quebec. Even as a duffer it is magical.

Tonight was our first Girl Guide meeting of the new year, after our Christmas break. The tradition for our unit is to have a skating party at the community rink in Kelowna.

It’s fun to see the girls after all the excitement of the holiday season, with their stories of what they did and what Santa brought. It’s a thrill to see them skate, some of them for the first or second time.

I also love this meeting for the memories it brings back…

• my Dad lacing my skates nice and tight before a family skate, and pushing my mitts into my coat sleeve cuffs till my fingers hurt against the mitten seam.
• Skating at Mayfair Park in Edmonton on the lake, then along the Bow River when we moved to Calgary – outside among the trees, with speakers that blasted music to skate along to
• Playing “crack the whip” and trying so hard to not be the one to let go! (Then laughing hysterically when we all slid out across the ice)
• Skating with my little brother on his bob skates (once he had graduated from the plastic bathtub on a rope towed by my parents
• Watching my mom skate so gracefully (she competed a bit as a girl) – the figures, the spins. She taught me how to skate backwards – that was as fancy as I got.

My mom came to my skating party when I was a Brownie. She broke her leg that night, catching her blade in a gouge in the ice made from all the hockey play on our little community rink. It was a dramatic end to the evening, and it sure made for an interesting Christmas that year but thankfully we smile about it now.

I didn’t tell the girls about how my skating party went when I was a little Girl Guide. I did watch for gouges in the ice, though. I took pictures of them all, and gave them thumbs up as they wobbled and skidded and then skated – hooray! New moments in the memory books.

And I was sending good thoughts out to my mom, feeling thankful for the memories. And wistfully smiling at the same old warm feeling, remembering times with my dad, now gone.

All that in an hour, on a not-so-cold winter night. Life is good.

Daddy’s 👧

From the beginning, I was a Daddy’s girl. My little brother and my mom were close, and my dad and I had a special bond I was his Princess.

 

I inherited many character traits from my father but being a foodie wasn’t one of them. Rather, I helped make him a foodie with some of my adventures.

When I was a kid, we ate simply. Both my parents were from the Prairies where meat and potatoes are the norm. Exotic spices were not a part of our pantry until my teen years. A fried egg sandwich was a funky dish.

The most unusual childhood dinner I remember was finan haddie, from a can. It was served with toast, and canned tomatoes in a bowl on the side. My dad liked it. I thought it was fun – different tastes and textures than meat and potatoes. My mom told me years later she was embarrassed to serve it, because it was mostly out of a can.

Back before there were so many snack choices, it was easier to have a favourite. We made popcorn in a pot on the stove, shaking it so as not to burn the kernels. To this day I don’t go to the movies without having popcorn. Our other favourite was Cheezies; when I spent a year in France during my university studies I was over the moon when my dad sent me a bag of them in a care package.

Gradually our tastes expanded. I learned of many new ingredients and techniques from my European travels, and my dad sampled new dishes as my mom expanded her cooking repertoire and they ventured out to different restaurants. By the time I was a young adult, my dad was even cooking meals.

Some of my best memories with my dad were our Friday night dinners when we both lived in Vancouver. I would go to his apartment and we would whip up whatever new dish he had discovered. I would bring wine and dessert, and we would talk till the wee hours, trying to solve the problems of the world.

I wish we had more Friday nights. I wish I had been able to have coffee with him more often. I wish we could still go to a movie and share popcorn. But most of all I just miss his company.

At least I have all those memories. Every time I eat all those foods, I smile and think of all the times we shared.

Happy Father’s Day, Daddy.

 

A princess in a lost kingdom

The Lost Princess – Jacob Joseph

It’s Father’s Day today, and I’m sad. I feel rather forlorn. You see, I grew up as a Princess, with all the trappings of a young girl in a magic kingdom. I had an idyllic childhood, full of happy memories in good times and lessons learned in tough times. Everything always turned out okay, and more often than not it felt that way because my Dad was the one to cheer me on or push me on. After all, he was the one who made me a Princess. The problem is, he’s gone now.

I miss my dad every day, but Father’s Day hurts in a special melancholy way. It makes me remember the myriad of things that my Dad taught me, and then the breath catches in my throat as I am struck with not being able to tell him or hug him to say thanks.
I don’t like to dwell on the past – you can’t live there. But I don’t want to forget “wonderful Daddy from Winnipeg” , as we used to joke should be his title.  So if you’ll indulge me, I’m going to mention some of my favourite memories and learnings:

• Waking up to music he would play… I had a turntable in my bedroom and he would come down and put a record on to wake me up for school. Billy Joel, The Eagles, Supertramp, Neil Diamond, Nilsson. I still love “Dad rock”, as all that music is now labelled.
• Watching CBS Sunday Morning, together and then separately when I was older, but still sharing our love for the good news and the quirky discoveries in the world. I still watch, and often smile at stories I know he would have enjoyed.
• Marching to “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” – through the house, pretending to be like Mickey Mouse with his broom.. The whole family would march in a line, my brother and I swinging our imaginary brooms with great fervor and my Mom bringing up the rear (to make sure things didn’t get too crazy). We’d go down the hall and over their bed, even. It makes me smile every time I think of it.
• Eating the fried egg sandwiches he used to make me before early morning high school basketball practice. I wish now I had practiced even harder. I wish I’d known then that stronger arms would have helped my shot. But he cheered me on through my clutziness, and even bought season tickets to the Vancouver Grizzlies’ inaugural season years later, so we could watch games live. I travelled from Calgary whenever I could, and we saw Michael Jordan play!
• His sayings still get me through tough days – “Illegitimum non carborundum est” (don’t let the bastards get you down) and “optireculitis” (a condition in which your optical nerve gets tangled with your rectum, giving you a shitty outlook) .  When I felt as though the world was against me, he would always say, “Who loves you, Kricky? Your Daddy does.”
•  Our trip to Maui was full of great memories and lots of laughter. He hadn’t been well and the quality time was good for both of us. I was so chuffed when one of the last times we spoke he talked of how great that trip was…
  

  we had appies on the deck in our hotel suite at the Fairmont Kea Lani – living the good life!

• The Treehouse Bistro, which was the 2 directors chairs at the corner window in his West End apartment, was the place we solved all the problems of the world on many a Friday night. Now I have the chairs, and every time I sit in one I think of our great ideas, and the spectacular meals we ate in them.
• “Where’s the other 2 percent ?” – the answer to my declaration that I got 98% on a test at school. Then it was frustrating to be teased, but it made me tough enough to take the blows the world dealt me, and it made me want to push myself and improve.
• “Drive till you get there”. Learning to drive, a standard no less, was stress at a new level with my dad, who was an RCMP officer for a time as a young man. Thanks for keeping me safe, Daddy.
• “If you got it, flaunt it”. This wasn’t meant to be trashy, but rather to encourage my self-confidence. My dad knew I was the not the kind of kid who fit in, and he more than anyone helped me learn to be myself, and be proud of that.
• “Take 10 pictures for every one you want. Film is cheap.” Nowadays it’s even cheaper with digital pics, and I’m thankful to have memories recorded. I wish I had copies of more of my childhood photos!
  

  one of my favourite shots of me taken by my Dad

I could go on, but perhaps the most important thing I learned, ironically, came from the fact that he got sick. For many years the doctors predicted he didn’t have long to live, so my dad did not sit back to save for a rainy day. He lived the Carpe Diem philosophy to the fullest he could. It shaped my life, and has been my motivation to strive for that balance in life we all hope to have.

I so wish we’d had more time together. But I am so thankful for all that I got from my dad. I might be a Princess without a kingdom but I am still a Princess. I can still flaunt it, I can still battle the dragons, I can still reach for my happily ever after. I know somewhere there is a soul out there smiling proudly. Who loves you, Daddy? Your Kricky Princess, that’s who.