Ode to an amazing young woman

Every morning when I awaken, usually by 5:30 or so, one of the first things I do is read my morning paper... in this case The Gazette. It's a small thing, usually ridiculously so, and therefore it doesn't take long to get to the final part I read, the obits. In my lifetime of reading the daily obits - and I guess I do so because I lost my parents at such a young age - I have only been shocked into numbness a few times. Once was when I was in my early twenties and I read that my next door neighbour, a senior Mr. Cassidy whom I had just been gabbing with two days earlier, died following cararact surgery.

But nothing compares to the sadness that is washing over me now as I relate how much of an impact Ellen Joy Cohen made on so many lives. I just read her obit about 30 minutes ago and I am still reeling. In her mid-forties or so, Ellen succumbed to something (I have no idea what) that followed her surgery and treatment for breast cancer about 16 months ago. She was always so upbeat and in our last communication late last year, she sounded amazing. I had no idea she was sick again, which makes this even more of a shock.

Ellen entered my sphere of influence when I learned she was making wigs for , and doing the hair of, people who were terminally ill. I interviewed her for my column, we had lunch that day in Westmount and I remember she brought a few of her wigs and a dummy head along, which I used in the photo I took of her. She would often, she told me, crawl into bed with her clients to do their hair, if the afflicted party was too sick to move. She believed in letting sick people live out whatever time they had left with dignity and with women especially, having dirty hair, or worse, no hair, deprived them of that.

I was very moved by our meeting and by this incredible young woman, who had a busy life but nontheless made her two young sons her biggest project always. She was divorced from a guy who sounds like a real gem of a man (facitiously stated), but rather than allowing bitterness to swallow her up, she found the light and moved on. Ellen always found the light. I have rarely if ever met anyone so positive, so caring about other people.

Our meeting was in May, 2008. In late June or early July, she confided in me that a lump in her breast was cancerous. She had surgery, took her treatments and optimistically reported that she had beaten it a year later... or so it appeared. She asked me if I could do another column on her, as a pick-me-up for others going through the same thing (Ellen always thought of others first) and I told her it would be better to find a columnist with much wider reach. I recommended Mike Boone at The Gazette and two weeks later, the always eminently engaging Boone published a column on Ellen that was quite terrific.

Ellen and I last emailed one another sometime in December and she sounded good. Till I opened my morning paper today, I thought she was. Now, as I plan to attend her funeral tomorrow, I am flabbergasted and sad. I cannot believe this world has lost such a fine woman... and that her sons, both under 10, I believe, have lost their mom. Boys, you will grow to learn how very special she was and I am so sorry for your loss, a sentiment I offer her parents as well. What a daughter she must have been.

Rest in peace, Ellen, and I will miss you. Wherever you are, I have no doubt that the light is shining on you.

O'Keeffe revelation makes Globes an informative experience

Well, as I watch this year's Golden Globe awards and almost just threw up when egotistical, rude and obnoxious Alec Baldwin (I worked with him and the rest of the Baldwin brothers... I know) won yet another one, I was stunned to learn that a movie on the life of late American superstar artist Georgia O'Keeffe... WE INTERRUPT THIS ENTRY TO REPORT THAT SOPHIA LOREN JUST MADE AN APPEARANCE ON STAGE AND SHE IS ABSOLUTELY STUNNING (but I digress)... BACK TO OUR ENTRY... ran on the Lifetime channel in September.

Gosh, I am so in awe of that woman, who died at age 98 in the late 1980s. Anyone else know her art? If not, ya gotta look into it. Her colours, her subject matter, her talent and her eccentricity, make her one of the most fabled female artists in history. Did you know she dressed mainly in black and white when photographed because she believed the art and not the artist should be the focal point? She was not, however, photographed often, at least not after the passing of her late lover-then-husband Alfred Stieglitz, the father of modern photography. It was the affair between Stieglitz and O'Keeffe, which began in the 1920s after he started exhibiting the young artist's work at his fabled New York studio, that really drew me into their life stories two years ago. Artistic geniuses both, they were destined to be together, despite the vast age gap, Stieglitz being decades older and married when they met.

Stieglitz was an atheist born into a German Jewish family, she was quite Christian, and the two spent summers at the family's Lake George, New York house, working and playing. There and New York, actually, a city O'Keeffe grew to hate. When her husband died pretty much of old age, she went back to her favourite spot on Earth, Ghost Ranch, in New Mexico, and stayed there till her death, a virtual recluse. She later purchased an old adobe church in the wee town of Abiquiú, New Mexico, and made this her home. It had this incredible wooden door she was enamoured of.

I won't go on, though I can with total fascination, but I am still thrilled that a dramatic film on her life, starring Joan Allen as O'Keeffe and Jeremy Irons as Stieglitz, has been made. I haven't read great reviews on it yet, but it's still worth seeing, if only to gain a visual glimpse into the woman, as we have already been left with the untold riches of her art.

I just hope the then-young opportunist who inserted himself quite outrageously into her life during her waning years, Juan (real name, John) Hamilton, doesn't find a way to make a buck out of this project, as well. He's made millions off O'Keeffe's talent and trust already.

Bloodsuckers one and all

After all the hoopla surrounding the HBO series True Blood, I decided to finally see what the fuss was about and buy Season One on DVD. Vampires have always fascinated me, though I am partial to zombies and serial killers in my own short stories, and at this point it takes a lot to engage me. I am not a fan of Twilight and there's a cable TV show on now that didn't do anything for me when I tuned into its debut.

But True Blood? All I've heard are ecstatic rumblings and I decided to join the Sookie Special. What's the verdict with one of the discs left to go? Oh man. Somebody get me a drop of "V" and fast!

It's no surprise, really, that I am hooked on this show. I think no one does television as well as HBO. The Sopranos. Rome. Entourage. Curb Your Enthusiasm. Four of my favourite shows of all time. In fact, other than movies and HBO, I don't watch much TV anymore. It sucks. Well, actually, True Blood sucks... but in a good way. Wanna experience true love and passion? Study Sookie and Bill. Want pathos? Exhibit A: Poor Grandma Stackhouse. Comedy? Tara is just hysterical. As for vampire lore, go no further than the vampire nests of Louisiana and learn what they're really all about, their unique brand of justice included, no sugar coating necessary.

There's blood, nudity, sex, great cuisine, lush natural surroundings... I have been to Louisiana, roared across the bayou in a motorboat, traversed the French Quarter at midnight, devoured crawfish and sweat hot sauce out of my pores. Watching this show makes me ache to head there again. Yes, in New Orleans you also see appropriately-attired vampires lurking on the shadowy streets. Are they real? Now I'm not so sure they're not.

I gotta tell you one thing, though. As I age, I realize that vampires are more civilized than we humans. They aren't nearly as cruel to one another as we are. I actually envy them.

Vampire movies I recommend: The new theatrical release Daybreakers is chill. 30 Days of Night is one of the most frightening vamp films I have seen, a real treat. Nosferatu, both the original and the remake starring the late Klaus Kinski. Vampyr is a 1932 German black-and-white masterpiece that will leave you chilled to the bone. And the first Underworld film pleased me a lot, because it was something new. I also enjoyed Wesley Snipes's performances as vampire-hunter Blade, even more in the second film than the first. You must see the original Dracula, because Bela Lugosi does a great, albeit campy job and it's still a classic although it doesn't make people faint like it was once purported to do. The late 1970s version with then-sexy Frank Langella (Nixon in Frost/ Nixon) was good, but the later Francis Ford Coppola version was even better. Gary Oldman, who's a year younger than me, I just learned, was a phenomenal Dracula and any movie with Anthony Hopkins in it is a cause for celebration. I can't wait for the new Wolf Man film.

But True Blood? My blood is pumping faster in wild anticipation of Season 2!

A spirited little chat

When you are looking for work and have all the time in the world - well, at least more than you are used to - you look for ways to fill your time. Money is a tad scarce these days and so I have been spending loads of time at the gym... virtually daily, which I don't think I did even when I was 12 years younger and into weights big-time. I feel great, I am eating better and suffering from fewer headaches. For me, that last part is motivation enough, because I have had almost daily headaches since I was five years old. Do the math and consider how many meds, per pill, you think I may have taken since then. It's a wonder I still have a liver, never mind that it's still functioning.

I have also been reading more. Always a voracious reader, work left me with less time and my reading has been limited to the late night variety, after 10 minutes of which I always fall asleep. Bathroom reading is somewhat better... but, LOL, I think I'd be in there a lot longer if they made super comfy toilet seats. In my case, when my ass gets numb, it's time to leave! Yeah, I know... TMI!

After horror fiction, I'm a big fan of biographies, as well as books on anything metaphysical... and this is the gist of this entry. I have always had a major fascination with UFOs, Bigfoot, Nessie, ghosts... pretty much anything spectral or spooky. I guess it has a lot to do with my love for horror, or certainly ties into my being adopted and, errr, just weird.

When I was quite young, I started reading books on odd, inexplicable occurrences, by authors like Brad Steiger, Ivan T. Sanderson and my favourite in this genre, Frank Edwards, whose book Flying Saucers: Serious Business is one of THE definitive books on unexplained aerial phenomena, written by a rather brilliant, highly respected radio man. Of these three, only Steiger is still alive, but if you are into this genre, read any or all and I guarantee you a riveting time of it. British researcher Colin Wilson is one of the better writers today and if you want to read a really oldie but goodie, look for anything by Rupert Furneaux, who penned several books featuring oddities throughout time.

Growing up fascinated by macabre subjects, an only child, and adopted to boot, I would fantasize, inserting myself into the worlds of the weird I would read about. I would also question where my place was in this bizarre universe, whether I had a spirit, what the meaning of this life was... perhaps more than the average person did. By the time I was in my early twenties, I was totally fixated on the occult. Reading Shirley MacLaine's Out on a Limb and Michael Crichton's Travels got me even further hooked and when I then read Journeys Out of the Body, by Robert Monroe - the latter dealing with astral projection - the die was set. I simply HAD to know whether we had souls, spirits we could release from their earthly vessels, to fly around the universe at will whilst we meditated or slept. I bought more books on the subject, started meditating daily... I even purchased my first Herkimer Diamond, a semi-precious stone mined in Herkimer, New York, said to help facilitate an OBE... out of body experience.

I tried to leave my body several times weekly for two years... and failed. So, assuming I was just trying too hard, I quit, setting this little project aside for a while. That period is now officially over and I am trying again after 25 years or so. The past few days I have dug up my old books on OBEs and meditation and I have been reading. Now that I am older and have slowed down a bit, or become wiser regarding how enthusiastic I will allow myself to become, perhaps it will work this time and I'll push through the envelope into some new realm.

Yeah, I know some of you think I am a nut-job... and that's okay. We can't ALL be strange and eccentric, because that would be too boring to contemplate. Interesting characters make for an increasingly interesting plot, don't they? Aren't these writings more meaty for some of you than the multitudes by parents ranting about how their kids are little geniuses... or are devoted to the family dog? I dunno, perhaps not. My reason for writing this blog is to mix it up, to bring you along on my journey as I see what's on the other side for me and to allow you to share in the ups and downs. I'm happy with it so far, though I have no pre-ordained plan as to how I am going to continue this yet. Excuse me if it seems a bit haphazard... and if it's not as visually exciting as many of the others out there. I promise to try to import some photos I have taken, to change the style... in short to give you reason to come back and to tell your friends why they should as well.

In the meantime, however, I have some meditating to do. See you on the astral plane!

Tough to be a boss

While reflecting on some of the awful bosses I have had in my lifetime - and few have been any good - I remind myself of my own experience supervising the work of people and how hard that was. Besides working as an editor and having people under my purview, I was Director of Sales and Marketing at Semtronix in Ottawa for three years and after one of the partners was shown the door, I was called upon to look after the work of several employees. This included the office administrative assistant/receptionist and the main electronic technician.

Not long after I assumed these duties, it occurred to me that this was challenging work... responsibilities that were not for just anyone. True, there ARE in fact people who are born to be leaders of men (and women)... I'm sure Genghis Khan didn't need to take any courses to lead one of the most massive and successful hordes in history. Harry S. Truman inherited an atomic bomb program that certainly placed him in charge of men who were able to end the Second World War in a rather vivid manner. Martin Luther King Jr. put a new face on civil rights... although his tenure as a boss did not end so well for him...

But you get the drift. Being a boss is about much more than inhabiting a snazzy office, barking orders at people and letting them take the fall for your inadequacies and failures. And for the most part, the only good thing most of my bosses have been good at has been, well, bossing. Not leading by example. Not showing generosity and tact. Not knowing the sometimes very subtle difference between pressuring and motivating employees.

Sometimes the bosses I have had have been downright immoral. As a young man, I had a boss who would come onto my then wife sexually whenever I was not at my desk and he intercepted her phone call. He actually told her how he wanted to tie her up and described vividly what he would do to her. I was young, newly married and terrified of losing my job. And truly it is experiences like these that have given me the cojones to not put up with anything abusive against me today, from anyone... certainly not from a boss. Really, I wish I could time travel back to that decade some 30 years ago, take this guy aside and instruct him how to address a lady, whether she be a wife of mine or anyone else's.

What I also learned is that being a good boss is about constant work... and education. There are courses in motivating employees, psychological tricks you can utilize to get them to devote some passion to their work because they want to, not because they fear you.

Anyone wanting to read about a guy you'd really want to work for should pick up the recent book Warren Buffett's Management Secrets, regarding how the richest man in the world views his most important asset, his employees. I'd work for this man in a second. I should be so lucky.

Just know, however, that your likely unhappiness with your boss is a shared state of mind. I am sure that there are few good ones out there today, mainly because bosses are so fearful for their own jobs in a depressed market with shrinking budgets that they simply forget to be good managers. Self preservation is part of the human condition and when you've got a family to feed and work is about "you" versus "them"... well, how many of us would put the "you" first, or would instead handle a situation so deftly that both "you" AND "them" come out unscathed?

Would I be a boss again, if given the chance? The answer is yes and I think I'd be a darned good one, due to the experiences I have had with the bad ones. Then again, you get to an age where employers don't seem to value you so quickly anymore and, surprise, surprise, your life experience enables you to do things you could not properly do when you were young, vain and thought you had all the answers.

Not that there aren't some younger leaders of men (and women) who do a terrific job. They are, however, few and far between, too glutinous with self-approbation to realize that their staff is the key to their success to begin with.

So if you are heading off to work today and are in a position of managing a group of people, just remember a guy named Julius Caesar. There's always a Brutus waiting in the wings, with a long knife hidden beneath his robes.

Whether he uses it or not is totally up to you.

Tweedle-dumb on Twain's torch

I had to laugh when reading the media's "headline" news that country superstar Shania Twain has donated the Olympic torch she ran with in her hometown of Timmins, Ontario to the museum there bearing her name.

First off, who gives a darn? True, if I had been a torchbearer, I'd likely have spent the $350 required to keep my flame holder as a souvenir, mainly because I have this collecting madness (although I have been assured that it's nowhere as bad as anything you see on the strange TV show Hoarders). But if this museum is so hard up for stuff that this torch now becomes an icon... well, pretty sad, I think.

Second, there is the museum itself. Last March 20, I kicked off my official work as The Colon Guy with the first stop on the Giant Colon Tour, a five-day stint in Timmins. When the Mayor stopped by to see the Giant Colon, he asked me if I had been to the museum yet. When I said negative, he told me... "if you have some time this weekend, drop in... I will call ahead. Just tell them the mayor sent you."

Now, let me tell you that there is NOTHING to do in downtown Timmins. Aside from a very good cafe there, that's about it. Locals told me the museum was a sorry institution and that Twain had been there but once in years, to show it to her young son while it was closed to the public. In any case, I was in fact off work that Sunday and I called to find out what time the museum was open... only to hear on a recording that it was closed weekends during the winter months!

Ahhh, Mr. Mayor? You'd think you'd be aware of that. At least you've got that cafe to be proud of....

Kindle pretty kool

So the publisher of my very adult horror chapbook Hard Night emailed me today asking my permission to include the story in a Kindle package, which is a very cool prospect. Kindle, of course, is an Amazon tool whereby you download all manner of reading material, including books and newspapers, for a pittance and then view them using a device that you buy from Amazon for about $250 or so. Sounds expensive, I know, but compared to what you might spend on your reading material over 1-3 years, you'd save a lot in the long run.

In the case of Hard Night, the 2005 chap was published in a very limited edition of 150 signed, numbered copies at a cost of $9 US per and sold out pretty fast. For about $3 per download, you would get all their chapbooks. Even the most frugal of you would be able to enjoy this racy zombie story set in Quebec's Laurentian mountains, circa 1973. It's my homage to George Romero... with a lascivious little twist.

I'm just thinking that $250 may not be so much, after all, when you consider how many people - at a time of economic downturn at that - are still buying gas-guzzling SUVs and how many expensive restaurants are bursting at the seams, populated not only by successful entrepreneurs, but by students, as well.

I know I certainly can't afford an SUV and that I currently dine at places like Scores, with their cheapie soup and salad-bar special. It's not only my healthier way of eating and sweating-at-the-gym habit, either... I simply don't have the cash these days. I listed seven items for sale on ebay today, because divesting myself of collectibles when I am alive and can use the money seems much more logical than having my executor sell them at a series of garage sales for a buck when I am dead.

So, yeah, buddy, if you can spare a dime: scribe15 is my ebay moniker. And Hard Night is just waiting for your hungry zombie brains to devour it as soon as possible. Some day, I hope, this computer of mine may just prove useful for more things than checking Wickipedia, looking myself up on IMDB... and writing this blog.

Not that there's anything wrong with that...