Suddenly I hear a heavy pounding on our solid wooden door that contains one small but important peephole. The door is our only entrance/exit to this place.
Each pounding is followed by a deep Spanish “Allo!” My heart hammers inside my chest. Fear grips my wired body. I bolt upright and glance at my husband beside me. Sound asleep. Like a baby.
“Wake up!” I whisper frantically. “Someone is pounding at the door!”

One of my husband’s greatest irritations is being abruptly awakened from a deep sleep. Takes him forever to get his bearings.
“Huh?” he manages.  
Pounding at the door persists.
“Someone’s trying to get in!” I gasp in fear.
Not quite awake, he tries to leap out of bed and into his shorts.  
“Look through the peephole!” I beg. “See who it is!”
He disappears. I hear nothing from him, only a steady pounding from outside the door. He reappears in our bedroom which faces the front of the street.  
“Can’t see anyone,” he says. “They’re gone.”  
It is true. The pounding has stopped.  
Loud voices are still audible as the intruder clomps down the stairs. Now more awake, my husband peers out the screened bedroom window that looks onto the street.
“There’s a white car with four-way flashers on in the condo parking lot across the street,” he whispers.  
Frozen with fear, I cannot will myself out of bed.
“Is it a police car?” I ask, shaking in the hot, sticky night air.
“No. Never seen it before. Armando (the condo custodian) is talking with the guy in the car. Guess it’s a good thing I didn’t answer the door.”
With that, he removes his shorts, climbs into bed and promptly falls back to sleep.  
I can’t believe his nonchalance. I am horrified.

I lie, stiff as a board, with heart pounding and eyes wide open staring into the darkness, my ears straining for strange noises while still hearing voices in the street below our balcony. Every inch of my inner fibre is stretched for the fight-and-flight mode. I am furious he can fall back to sleep so quickly when it is obvious our lives are in danger.
Who was pounding at the door? Why? What do they want? Did we do or say anything that may have offended a Progreseño?  
By now my fertile mind is rife with terrible scenarios. Am certain there are hordes of infiltrators from another province that Ivonne at the internet café told us about who are brandishing gleaming knives, ready to murder us and dump our bodies into the Gulf for the sharks to devour. I see us begging for our lives, offering money as bribes, pleading we didn’t mean to do whatever it was we did, if only they leave us alone. We will never again see our beloved sons, our wonderful families. I am paralyzed with anxious agony.
My eyes are wired open. My ears hear every sound --- the noise of the car --- or is it cars? Are they coming or going? I cannot sleep and need to use the washroom now but am terrified to go. What if the marauders hear the toilet flush and know that we are in here after all? They will try again to get us. Then I remember. There is a bottle of Javex in the bathroom. We can use it as a weapon. Throw the bleach into their eyes as they break down the door. We will not go down without a fight.

I look over at my husband, sound asleep, and can’t believe his indifference. I would scream at him but then the menacing band of marauding murderers would hear me. Am lying in a living hell.
Finally, the dawn arrives. By some miracle, we are still alive. Although still distraught, I need to know what happened last night.
I walk onto the balcony. It is amazing how comforting the light of day is to the eyes of a terrorized soul. I see a norteamericana woman across the street at the condo and she is talking with Armando, the condo custodian, and waving a piece of paper in her hand. At least Armando appears unscathed. The woman is Elizabeth who lives around the corner from us. Elizabeth sees me on the balcony. She shouts: “Do you know --- blah, blah, blah --- ?”  
I shake my head. I cannot hear her.
“...coming to see you,” she yells.
I dash out our wooden door leaping down the stairs while my husband sits in the apartamento calmly reading the morning news on the computer. Elizabeth is waiting at the bottom.  She shows me names scribbled on the paper I do not recognize.

And then I hear the story.
Robert from Toronto arrived in Progreso late last night to meet Canadian friends who weren’t there. The white car belongs to the taxi-driver Oswaldo, a wonderful man who helps anyone in distress. He drove all over Progreso in the middle of the night trying to find Robert’s friends. He banged on our door because Armando at the condo told him we were a Canadian couple. He suggested Oswaldo try us.  
Which he did. Which threw my active mind into overdrive.
When I climb back up the stairs to our apartamento, I explain all this to my husband as he scans his computer.
“See?” he shrugs, “there is a perfectly logical explanation and it involves a kind Mexican. Certainly not worth losing sleep over.”

        Two months ago, I wrote in this space about Isabella, our Nicaraguan ‘daughter’ who had run away from home after successfully graduating from high school.
Memory flashback
         Allow me to briefly refresh your memory.
       While in Nicaragua teaching English at a university, my husband and I met Isabella at the age of 10 through a teaching pastor. His mission has been to help lift Nicaraguan girls out of poverty through education. So many become mothers when they are children themselves.
        Isabella was the child of a rape. She lived in poverty with her family. Her mother --- because of the rape --- had difficulty accepting and connecting with Isabella. Despite this unhappy rejection, the girl lived at home developing a close bond with her abuela, her aging grandmother. Abuela sold handmade souvenirs to tourists to augment the family’s meagre income.
        Since 2013, we have happily supported Isabella in her quest for higher education. We have kept in touch through regularly translated letters from us to her and vice versa. Even Abuela wrote us: honest and forthright information about her granddaughter.
        To qualify for continued aid, Isabella maintained good grades and high standards of conduct.

Successful high school graduation and entry to Nursing
        Thanks to real-time videos and photos, we watched Isabella, wearing a white graduation gown, receive her Honours diploma from High School last year. At 17, she was radiant, proud, a young woman on the edge of success, escaping her past.
We were elated!
        Sensing a wonderful future for her, we promised to continue our financial support so Isabella could enter Nursing, her chosen profession.
            And then, Isabella ran off with a 19 year old youth. No-one had heard from her.

Fast Forward…
            Until last week when we received this from our teaching pastor:
          Her mother and her grandmother reported to me that she returned from Rivas a few days ago, pregnant and ill. The young man who stole her is unemployed and was unable to feed her.
        To return home, Isabella was required to apologize to her family. Our contact continues:
        She has already recognized the serious mistake she made and she expresses that, when she recovers her health and stabilizes her pregnancy and the birth of her baby, she will try to resume her studies.
        She says she is very sorry to disappoint both us and our pastor contact, who often counselled Isabella during rough moments.

        As disappointed as we are, our man-on-the-ground says for Isabella to achieve high school graduation is considered a major accomplishment.
        For Nica girls, Isabella is a success story.
        However, based on her grades, we know she is capable of higher achievement. We have decided that if Isabella wishes to continue her education, we will support her.
        Maybe knowing that she has financial backing --- and having tasted a small measure of educational success --- Isabella will enter Nursing after all in the future.

        We travel the world. Except not now with the COVID lockdown.
       So, we’ve been living on memories. For me, that also means recalling all those dire moments when I was caught somewhere looking for someplace to answer the Call of Nature.
        You’d be surprised what the world offers people like us.

Small Town, Texas
        The washrooms at a gas/fast food stop called Cowboys are another story. My mother judged all human beings by the state of their bathrooms. She would not have a good impression of Jefferson, Texas. 
        The ladies’ washroom was dark, dingy but passable.  At least it had toilet tissue and soap. On the wall was a sign: No gentlemens allowed in here. This is the ladies’ washroom. If you do use the toilet, please make sure the seat is up.
        In the men’s washroom my husband reported a sign also. Please close the door. We don’t want a show! The gents’ door opened into the kitchen of the Subway franchise.

Progreso, Mexico
        We loved our second floor apartamento in this typical Mexicano casa. This is also where we learned why Norte Americanos are considered anal about bathrooms.
        Our turquoise and white tiled tiny baño was, well, tiny. It looked like a leftover thought. We had to step up into this small room to use the toilet. A tiny window looked out on scarlet bougainvillea blossoms that you could see while standing in the small shower stall.
        The toilet was fine. But it was the handwritten sign in English beside the toilet I remember: Please do not throw papers into the toilet.  Please throw them in the wastebasket.
        We lived in a no-flush tissue zone. The status quo for most of the Yucatán Peninsula --- in fact much of Central America --- where antiquated/non-existent sewage systems are the norm.

Sierra Madre Mountains in Mexico
        After four-and-one-half hours of non-stop driving up, up, and just over the mountains, our driver stopped for breakfast and a washroom break. His choice of restaurant and washroom facilities matched his penchant for driving. Terrible. We were parked on a small projection of land that leaned over a long drop. 
        The washroom facilities, if that’s what you could call them, were uniquely inadequate and not so clean. Wooden buildings sat on the edge of the outcropping and hid two seatless and stained toilets (no surprise), one for each sex. Flushing was pouring a pail of water into the toilet. 
        Let’s not guess where the flushed contents go.

Miraflor, Nicaragua
        We hired a guide and took a day trip to an indigenous area outside Esteli called Miraflor. After a two-hour bus ride (30km, 18.6mi) over an almost impassable rocky road that began in darkness at 5:30 am, I thought it best to take a bathroom break before beginning our hike at 1400m (4600ft).
        It was impossible to describe the filth and inadequate facility. I took a photo of the toilet area instead (see accompanying picture). It was the only baño I’d encounter on the hike. In this area many homes are without running water.

Penang Airport, Malaysia
        Waiting for a flight to Thailand, and not feeling especially well, I thought it best to visit the washroom before we embarked.
        Airport washrooms generally get two thumbs up.
        I suppose if I’d chosen the right cubicle --- i.e. the one with the western-style toilet --- it would have been okay. However, a crowd of waiting, impatient women forced me to take the first available cubicle.
        Damn! It was a squat toilet. I should have backed out but it was too late.
        Now I know why so many Southeast Asian women wear the long skirted kebaya or sarong.
        Try using a squat toilet when you wear jeans.

Coastal Jungle Town of Pangkalan Bun, Kalimantan, Borneo/Indonesia
        Finally, we arrived at our top-rated hotel. ‘Top-rated’ because each room has an attached mandi (bathroom), a frivolous detail I insist we include when finding accommodation in a jungle town. After a one-hour flight from the mainland, bumpy roads, and a broken-down taxi, I am desperately in need of a mandi.
        Bursting into the room, all looks fine: the usual accoutrements, bed, windows, wardrobe, mirror. But where’s the mandi? I spy a door on the far side of the room, race across the bare floor, thrust open the door. Suddenly I stop.
        To get to where I want to go, I must first manoeuvre down a few steps to a lower room. Too bad for me, the odour from this area is most foul: sewage mixed with heat, humidity, mildew, tropical rot.

Lhasa, Tibet
        Public washrooms should be avoided at all costs. While in China, I learned washrooms were dismal. But in Lhasa, I almost endured the worst.
        I was forewarned, though, by a piece in Lonely Planet, our go-to bible during those early days of budget travel. Suffice it to know, toilets were of the squat variety. The standard model is a deep hole in the ground from which rise noxious odours.
        Before entering the public toilet shack, know your doors. A reader reported that she entered through the wrong door. It was quite dark and she could also see it was very dirty. She also thought she was on a floor but had to take a step down to the squat toilet. Terrible mistake. She fell into a vat of excrement.
        At least I didn’t take that near fatal step. But I did come away from Lhasa with a bladder infection.

What I Have Learned about the Worldwide Call of Nature…
        There’s no place like home. And there’s no toilet like your own.
        Strategies for women travellers using squat toilets - click here

        I have just received word from her grandmother that Isabella has run away with a 19 -year-old boy.
        We are stunned to read this news in a text from our contact.
        Isabella is our Nicaraguan ‘daughter’.
            Years ago, on one of our trips to Nicaragua, we met Isabella. The child of a rape, she lived in poverty with her family. Her mother --- because of the rape --- had difficulty accepting and connecting with Isabella. Despite the rejection, the girl lived at home, developing a close bond with her aging grandmother, her Abuela. Abuela sold handmade souvenirs to tourists to augment the family’s meagre income.

        As English-speaking volunteers at an Universidad in Managua, capital of Nicaragua, we met Isabella through a teaching pastor. His enduring mission has been to help lift Nicaraguan girls out of poverty through education. So many become mothers when they are children themselves.

Dismal future
        Nicaraguan girls in poverty face a dismal future. Teen pregnancy in Nicaragua is the result of a machismo culture and a lack of education, including sex education.  When girls become pregnant, boyfriends disappear.
        According to a report called "Stolen Lives" by Planned Parenthood Global, the rate of 10- to 14-year-old girls having babies in Nicaragua has increased…one in three teenagers gives birth to a child before she turns 18.
        Nicaragua is the poorest country in Central America, the second poorest in the Western Hemisphere, and has widespread underemployment and poverty.

Meeting Isabella
        Our Managua teaching pastor --- approached by Abuela for help --- asked whether we would be interested in meeting Isabella.
        We were.
        Isabella’s home, a concrete casa, sits on an unpaved road in a satellite town outside of Managua. It is small with little furniture; cement floors and a tiny, ill-equipped kitchen are in sight as we enter a side opening. There is no door.

Abuela
        First, we meet Abuela: a wise old woman suffering from chronic health issues.
Yet her priority is Isabella. She seeks a sponsor for her granddaughter. Someone to help with school expenses. She wants her 10-year-old granddaughter to have a future. She knows the only way is through education.
Isabella
        We are introduced to a shy and pretty 10-year-old with a ready smile and dark, flashing eyes. Shoulder length, chestnut coloured hair frames her open face. She proudly shows us her Abuela’s handicrafts and presses a ceramic rooster in my hand.

Support
        Since 2013, we have supported Isabella in her quest for higher education. She has willingly signed a contract drawn up by our Nica pastor contact; she must attain good grades and maintain high standards of conduct to qualify for continued support.
        Occasionally, as she grows older and her needs increase, we contribute spending money for a two-wheel bike (later stolen), a second-hand cell phone, a small monetary reward for graduation from Grade 8 with honours. (She is elated…as are we!)

Letters, we get letters
        In return, Isabella and her Abuela write us separate, regular (translated) letters about her progress in school. We respond in kind. Whenever possible we return to Nicaragua and visit Isabella and her Abuela. Isabella is learning English because she understands its importance in the ‘outside’ world.    
        Sometimes when we receive her letters, she expresses frustration or fear: an illness, lack of confidence. Eventually she confides she does not want to get pregnant like so many of her classmates. She wants a career. Independence. A future.
        To keep her dream alive --- it is so easy to stray --- we write back to ignite encouragement, citing examples of successful women who came from humble beginnings. Like Michelle Obama.

High School Graduation!
        Thanks to Abuela and our Nica teaching contact, we receive real-time videos and photos of Isabella, wearing a white graduation gown, receiving her Honours diploma from High School last year. At 17, she is radiant, proud, a young woman on the edge of success, escaping her past. We are elated!
        Sensing a wonderful future for Isabella, we promise to continue our financial support as she continues her education and enters Nursing.  
        Excited, we text her: when you graduate as a nurse, we will be honoured to attend the ceremony and watch you receive your diploma as you walk across the stage.
        We can hardly wait.

And then…
        It took Abuela a week to write a heart-broken note to our contact who texted us immediately:
        I have just received word from her grandmother that Isabella has run away with a 19-year-old boy.
        Abuela suspects her mother’s rejection was only one of a number of issues that sent Isabella into an unknown future. We are very disturbed, heartbroken. Deeply concerned.

Postscript
        If Isabella returns, Abuela knows our offer of financial support still stands, as long as our Nica daughter wishes to further her education. It’s a promise we will honour.
        Unfortunately, to date there is no news.  

My Latest Travel Blog: What do the Chapel of Bones, Cork Trees, and Megaliths Have in Common?

         “What a strange looking motel this is,” I comment to my husband.
        We are independent travellers, crossing the lower section of Mexico.
       It is March, the month of newly awakening flowers and foliage. We are bone weary after an all-night bus ride and arrival in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, capital of the state of Chiapas. We need a place to sleep. Badly. The bus depot ticket seller has directed us here.

        I glance around me. From the road, this motel with the blazing neon lights, even in daylight, looks like a fortress. The shrubbery adorning the front lawn is shaped like a heart. High windowless walls surround the contained units. You can’t see what’s on the other side.
        Even the darkly tinted windows of the office make me wonder…this is a motel?!
        However, the price is right. Cheap.
        And this is when it should have hit me: you can rent a unit by the hour.

Registration
        We knock on the office window to register. The window slides back an inch.
        “No need to register,” says the husky voice within.
        What? I think. No passport requirement? No name?
Discreet Garage
        We are directed to a nearby unit with an adjoining garage; said garage door is open. If you look down the mini street of similar units, all garage doors are closed. Office instructions, in Spanish, direct us to close the garage door from within by pressing a wall button, then enter the unit via the side door.
        Obviously, you don’t want anyone to identify your family car.

Discreet Unit
        We step into the unit. Switch on lights. Glance around the room after a beam of soft red light bathes the interior. We notice no windows.
        The room is clean, spacious. A king-size bed in the middle, facing a wall-sized mirror, dominates the room. Pale purple satin sheets peek from under a soft jungle-patterned bedspread. White cotton towels, twist-formed into a heart shape, sit atop the bedspread. Disney cartoon character scatter rugs on the tiled floor lie on either side of the bed.
        Mini packages of mints are surreptitiously within reach on each bedside table. Overhead pot lights are dimmed. The furniture has fake wooden drawers and cabinets.
But the large flatscreen TV is real.

Sliding Window, Perfumed Tissue
        Plus, there is a discreetly curtained sliding window, hidden behind another wall mirror. It opens to the garage. A red button sits on the frame above the window.
        The clean baño, with a full sky-light, features an indigo bidet and toilet, a multi-body sized glassed-in shower and more white fluffy towels. The toilet tissue is sweetly scented.
        Impossible to use the internet because there is none. And you aren’t here to use it anyway. But there are mucho lists of adult movies.
Gone for the Day
          Despite our exhaustion, we quietly leave and explore the rest of the city before returning to our lovenest. Famished.

Food
        We are hungry. Not with passion now but with empty stomachs.
        No restaurant because guests wish to remain anonymous.
        So, we phone our order to the officina: bottle of white wine, fried chicken, French fries, salad: American comfort food. We want a break from Mexican road food: burritos, tacos, enchiladas…
        After a short wait, the red button above the curtained window flashes. Then, a loud buzz.
        We slide back the curtain, open the window. A tray of food silently appears from the other side. We cannot see who delivers it. We remove the food. An anonymous she/he/it pushes la cuenta across the tray for cash payment por favor.
        In Spanish, we read the accompanying note: please telephone the officina when we want dishes removed. We are to use the same buttons and buzzers.
Overnighters
        I’m sure we were the only renters who remained all night.
        But we had the best sleep ever. Bueno!
                                                            ***

Hoteles de Paso         
        Love Motels in Mexico are known as hoteles de paso or ‘no-tell motels/hotels’.
        These lovenest hideaways are a Mexican phenomenon that underlines a sexual double standard. These days many hoteles de paso have gone upscale: units with private swimming pools, luxury furnishings, high-end entertainment units, specially outfitted banôs.
        Many love motels rely on young people who earn decent incomes but still live with their parents. These couples would never think of having sex in the family home, even with a bona-fide accepted spouse.
        Gay, straight or mixed couples, and those involved in other diversions, also take advantage of these love hotel clandestine arrangements.
        Finally, we understand these no tell motels/hotels are booked solid during National Secretaries’ Day in Mexico!

        As the soft, puffy, powdery snow continues to fall this cold February day --- and looks like it will never stop --- I ponder this strange month of 28 days.
Why such a short month?
        Rumour has it that Augustus Caesar (aka Caesar Augustus) stole a day from February to add to August, the month named after him.
Origin of name
      The word February comes from the Roman festival of purification called Februa, when people were ritually washed.

Special Day Additions
      February is more than a boring month now. There are special days of recognition. Not listed below are some familiar ones, like Ground Hog Day.
February 1- Spunky Old Broads Day
        Dr. Gayle Carson, a bona fide SOB, founded this special February day in 2002. In her words, "I started it because I found that once a woman hit 50, she was almost invisible…” And as any female over 50 already knows, this is not true.
        So belated SOB Day to any woman out there over 50!

February 5 – National Shower-With-A-Friend Day
        In early February, it’s cold outside, darlin’. And darkness still comes early in our northern hemisphere. Blah. What better way to shake the blues than taking a shower with a friend (or two)?
        Created in 2016, this day also means it’s quite okay to take a bath with a friend. Just don’t forget the rubber duckies.

First Saturday in February – Eat Ice Cream for Breakfast Day
        This is a no-brainer. The popular day is over by the time you read this. But mark the date---Saturday, February 5 --- on your 2022 calendar. This is the official ‘Eat Ice Cream for Breakfast’ Day.
        A stir-crazy mother in Rochester NY in the 1960s created this special holiday due to sheer winter boredom. Her kids needed something to look forward to amidst gray skies or, like this year, COVID-caused curtailment.

February 14- Ferris Wheel Day
        You thought this date was only for Valentines? Well, no.
It also commemorates the birthday of George Washington Gale Ferris, Jr., creator of the first Ferris Wheel. 
        A civil engineer, Ferris created the first Ferris Wheel for the World's Colombian Exhibition in Chicago in 1893. Now you know.
February 15 – National Gumdrop Day
        On this date we honour the popular, gelatin-based candy.  
Gumdrops have been a favorite candy for many decades. A Gumdrop Cake is especially popular around Christmas.
        Today the same gelatin-based Gummi candies and Gummi bears (some legally available with ‘higher’ ingredients) are the most popular type of sweet.

February 16 - Do A Grouch A Favour Day
       We all know grumpy folks. They may be beautiful at heart but something/someone has made them grumpy. This day is set aside to try and un-grump them.
       Try showing some love to cheer them. Then again, maybe all they want is to be left alone.
        In that case, stop bugging them and they won’t be grumpy.
February 20 – Northern Hemisphere Hoodie-Hoo Day
        By this time winter is a bore and we need a break from the blahs.
       On this celebratory day, you are encouraged to go outside your home at noon, wave your hands above your heads and chant "Hoodie-Hoo".
         Believe it, this is a copyrighted holiday!

February 22 – National Margarita Day
        This is also the birthday of one of our sons who happens to love bartending, especially concocting Margaritas.
        Here we are, right in the middle of winter. Time to think sunshine, palm trees, the tropics.
        Margaritas have been part of the cocktail scene since the 1930s. Frozen Margaritas appeared in the 1970s. I’ll drink to that!

February 27 – Polar Bear Day
        This is the day we celebrate the world's largest carnivore. A mature polar bear can stand up to 274 cm/nine feet tall and weigh 635.03 kg/1400 lbs.
Polar bears are native to Alaska, Canada, Greenland, Norway, and Russia.  
        These immense mammals are, shamefully, an endangered species now. Warmer temperatures and melting ice are contributing to their decline. It's not too late to take action and save sea ice and our polar bears by helping to fight climate change.
February 29 – Leap Year
        The next Leap Year is 2024.
        Sadie Hawkins Day, borrowed from the Lil Abner cartoon series by the late Al Capp, is sometimes celebrated on February 29.  However, this day is actually ‘observed’ each November 13.

        On this mournful January day --- grey, moody, cold --- that matches the current mournful state of the world: COVID, climate change, misery of millions, shock over the recent attack on the U.S. Capitol, it is best to cocoon.
        I close my eyes.

At camp
        Immediately, I am at camp again. On the banks of the Ottawa River on a wooded, 40- hectare haven. Living with five other girls my age --- early teens --- in a bell tent. Girl Guide members, we have bonded during the school year. Now we live together for a few weeks each summer at Camp Woolsey. Away from parents, home, and related responsibilities. Pure bliss.
        This particular year, in a lucky twist of fate, we five have landed positions on Woolsey’s waterfront staff. Our jobs bring prestige, privilege. Meaning we don’t have to peel mountains of potatoes or wash dishes in the Mess Hall. Such duties are relegated to mere campers.

Lessons in life
        However, no matter inclement weather or cold grey river water or black flies, our job is to teach swimming, canoeing, and water safety to campers. All day. Every day.
Gunwale bobbing on canoes was our popular time-off pastime. Today, this game we played astride the gunwales/sides of a canoe, is outlawed. Too dangerous. Liability insurance is now necessary.
        And yet, gunwale bobbing gave us the opportunity to take chances, to learn how to balance, to fall into the water and get up again. Valuable life lessons.

Night adventure
        In the evening, after campfire songs like Land of the Silver Birch, Fire’s Burning, and Taps (Day is Done, Gone the Sun...), we were expected to tumble into our tents and sleeping bags, (flash)lights out, and sleep.

        Except we waterfront girls never followed protocol. After leaders finished their ‘bedcheck’, we crept out of our tent and raced onto the path immediately behind our site. Circulating rumours of a boys’ camp not far away had piqued our interest.
        We decided to raid it.
        Unfortunately, traipsing along a woodland path in the dark proved difficult. Especially when unidentifiable bush noises alerted suspicious leaders that not all was normal. Also, our no flashlight rule to avoid detection was a liability.
        Despite our precautions, our deviously responsible leaders came looking. We dove into nearby shrubbery to escape discovery. When we thought it safe --- once they paraded past our hiding spot --- we ran for cover back into our tent. All this action in darkness.
        The next morning, we awoke to terrible rashes covering our bodies. Rashes that itched and oozed with scratchy sores. Seems, in our haste to hide, we had chosen a patch of poison ivy.
        To this day, I swear we saw smirks on our leaders’ faces.

Retaliation
        Of course, we must retaliate. Anonymously. We hope.
      There were no modern bathroom facilities at camp. But there were those old-fashioned outhouses (with carved half-moons in the door of a small wooden latrine) set apart, due to unsavoury odours, from the campsite. One was designated for campers.    The other outhouse, placed farther away and delicately surrounded by greenery, belonged to camp leaders.
        Cleaning these latrines and throwing lye crystals on the odious contents strewn below the hole were tantamount to hell.

        While some kept vigilant watch, the rest of us took on the smelly job of exacting our revenge. We opened the leaders’ latrine door, lifted the toilet seat, secured saran wrap across the ‘hole’, replaced the toilet seat, left the little wooden building and immediately hid in the surrounding shrubbery, ignoring the swarms of eternal buzzing insects.
        Didn’t take long before a leader needed to answer the call of nature. She ambled along the path to the executive latrine.
        Stifling giggles, we watched her step inside. Lock the door.
        We heard her screams. Immediately fled the scene. Tried hard to silence loud snickers.

Yesterday
        But all this innocent tomfoolery was yesterday.
        Now I must return to today and the current sad state of our besieged world.

        When I was seven years old, our family (three children plus mom and dad) moved from the Maritimes “down home” to Ontario “Upper Canada”. A big move.
      I cried all the way on the train from Saint John, New Brunswick to Ottawa, Ontario. I was leaving behind grandparents and cousins. My entire world.
       In that long-ago time, housing in Ottawa was at a premium. Especially for families with children. Accommodation for a couple with three small children was almost non-existent. But I didn’t know that then.

        My parents chose to live with a French-Canadian family in a Sandy Hill boarding house near today’s Ottawa University.

Sacred Heart Church
        One of my favourite memories of that time is the magnificent Roman Catholic Church on Laurier Ave East. If ever your faith was in doubt, attending Christmas Midnight Mass in L’Église du Sacré Coeur, a heritage stone building, brought your faith back into focus.
        Sacred Heart Church, a Sandy Hill landmark with its central bell steeple flanked by two smaller spires, stood on guard like a sentry since 1889. The Church’s interior was massive. Oversized ornate paintings of Jesus, Mary, angels, disciples and biblical scenes surrounded endless rows of wooden pews. I recall the sweet fragrance of incense during Christmas Midnight Mass.

        (A sad sidenote: On a bitter November night in 1978, an immense fire with flames that painted the sky orange and could be seen from across the Ottawa River in Aylmer, Québec, virtually destroyed Sacred Heart Church in three hours. In the morning, rescuers made a near-miraculous discovery. In the basement, they found an intact statue of Mary with three candles still burning at her feet. )

        Our family’s attendance inside this francophone Church was due to the invitation from our French-Canadian landlords. Madame Michelle, and her devoted husband, Monsieur George Doucette, were a comic book couple. She was large with an ample bosom and a booming voice amplified when she spoke her heavily-accented English. He was short, thin, and probably fit nicely between her breasts.

Réveillon
        Christmas Eve was a total boarding house affair. Tenants brought food to share in the post-Midnight Mass meal called the Réveillon. (My mother always contributed minced meat pies. Once a week Mme Doucette would pay her to bake pies. They were ‘so perfect’ and her made-from-scratch pastry legendary).
        “Réveillon” comes from the French word “réveil,” meaning “to wake up.” Mme and Monsieur Doucette invited all boarders to attend Midnight Mass with them as their special guests and then return to eat, drink and ‘wake up’. With the arrival of dawn, we all fell back into bed.
        The Doucette home sparkled with festive lights. A heavily decorated fresh fir tree protected gaily decorated gifts beneath it. My mind still inhales the blissful scent of fresh evergreen.

      At Sacred Heart Church, I especially liked watching parishioners recite Hail Marys with their personal prayer beads I so envied. How I lusted for a set of those beads! Even the Mass, celebrated in Latin, added to the religious mystery of the moment.
        To be in that grandiose church the moment Christmas Day began and hear the hymn “O Holy Night” at the end still sends shivers of anticipation up and down my back. After Mass, when the congregation spilled out into the black night, the snow inexplicably began to fall. Soft, billowing flakes floated down, landing on our noses, covering the most mundane object in dazzling white.

        Meanwhile, back at the Doucette home, the “Réveillon” had begun. Noisy diners devoured tourtière (a meat pie made with pork and beef or veal), ragoût de boulettes (meatballs in brown gravy), les pattes de porc (pigs’ feet cooked slowly until incredibly tender), and mashed or roasted potatoes.

        After the meal Monsieur Doucette would play the piano while we sang and danced. The adults imbibed heavily. So much so, I still hear Mme Doucette’s heavily accented English as she approached my much younger, good-looking, and shy father.
“Mon petit cochon,” she flirted. “My little piglet…”
        It was all part of the Réveillon.
        All part of a perfect childhood Christmas memory.

        He came home from World War II a changed man. 
        He lied about his age to enlist because he was younger than the official acceptance age.  As the son of a World War I hero, a year-long resident in England with his mother’s family, and an idealist with strong convictions, he held a slightly romantic view of war.  His brother, relatives and friends had already enlisted. It was the exciting, heady mood of the day to ‘sign up’. A talented artist with his own mind, he wanted to join because he felt it in his blood. And it was The Royal Canadian Air Force that attracted him because he wanted to learn to fly.
        There was a systemic problem, though.  His artistic temperament fed a sensitive vein that ran through him. If he saw colours in technicolour, then he saw battle atrocities in vivid replays.  Over and over.

        Soldiers aren’t supposed to be sensitive.  They are taught to be tough robots.
        After his return to civilian life, his subdued temper flared more easily. Tortured by the realities of war, his subsequent art reflected a declining mental state.  Dark canvases featured war lords, demons, and hell.  Years later, his condition would be recognized and labelled as post traumatic stress disorder but at the time, he was diagnosed manic depressive.

        This decent gentle man once took his children for walks in the woods where he paused, listened to the wind whistling through the trees, and whispered: “hear the fairies dancing through the leaves?”  He wore corduroy jackets that warmed his touch and skin, the fabric emitting an aura of sweet tobacco from his pipe: the perfect place to snuggle when the world let you down.  He painted murals on the bathroom walls, creating a fantasy world for his bathing children.  His talent caught the eyes of prominent civic citizens, which led to numerous local newspaper articles and a scholarship. He painted day and night because it was his life’s blood. And in the evening his children, tucked into bed, were comforted when they heard their mother read to him as he put paint to canvas. He encouraged them in all ways creative, from drama and music to art and writing.  Today some of his grandchildren and great grandchildren exhibit---and excel---in those talents.

        So each November, especially because Remembrance Day is part of this month, I think of him.  Perhaps I’ve embellished some of his characteristics but then, why not?
        For this soldier---who suffered as do all soldiers---was my father.

Hallowe’en
        If you ever meet the Devil on a dark road, don't try tricking him into climbing a tree.
        Or else, you could end up like Irish folk figure Jack O'Lantern.
        One night in a hamlet in Ireland, a conniving local drunk named Jack trapped the Prince of Darkness in a tree by hacking a sign of the cross into the bark. In exchange for allowing Satan to climb down, Jack made him promise to never claim his soul.

        As Jack’s life unfolded, he proceeded to act like a jerk during his entire time on Earth. Naturally, when he died, Heaven definitely closed its doors on him. So Jack turned to his old pal, the Devil. Satan, believe it or not, upheld his end of the deal and ignored him. To seal his message, the Devil hurled a piece of coal from hell at the dead man.
        With nowhere to go, Jack took the blazing coal and placed it in a turnip to use as a lantern. The dead man then set out, doomed to wander until he could find an eternal resting place.
        Which is why today on Hallowe’en Eve, we see Jack O’Lanterns everywhere. Jack is still searching for a resting place.

Hallowe’en origin…
        The history of Hallowe’en goes all the way back to a pagan festival called Samhain.
        The word "Hallowe’en" comes from "All Hallows' Eve" and means "hallowed evening."
        Hundreds of years ago, people dressed up as saints and went door to door, which is the origin of Hallowe’en costumes and trick-or-treating.
        Ghosts are especially popular this night.

Day of the Dead
        Meanwhile, across the ocean in Mexico, the faithful celebrate the Day of the Dead on November 1st. Skulls are a common sight.

Personal ‘Day of the Dead’ experience
        Once upon a time, due to ignorance, I thought Day of the Dead festivities were somehow connected to North American Hallowe’en celebrations and All Saints’ Day.
        Not.
       Day of the Dead is the time Mexicans remember family and friends who have died. They visit the cemetery and leave food offerings shaped like skulls at the altar. Candles, incense and a picture of the dead person are part of these ceremonies. Parades to the cemetery by relatives of the deceased are common.

        My husband and I happened to be in Veracruz, Mexico, on The Day of the Dead years ago.
        Veracruz, a large city, was festive, frenetic and alive when we arrived after a long day’s drive. We chose to eat at a popular outside dining area in a local plaza. Mariachi bands played while diners ate at the various restaurants. 
        Walking back to the hotel after our meal, we were met by enthusiastic revellers. Gathered around a festively decorated marble entrance, they invited us to join them. Once inside the hall, we realized the sheltered statues in a well-lit display were of Veracruz’s forefathers.  Creative pieces of installation art and homemade shrines relating to the deceased leaders were placed before each statue.

        Since this was the Day of the Dead, the group invited us to participate in their local custom honouring their city’s forefathers.
        Admiring the art and paraphernalia, we were suddenly serenaded with live music. Six female dancers, each wearing local finery, began to dance in a slow, mesmerizing rhythm. Each dancer’s black lace dress was adorned with brightly embroidered floral designs. Their upswept hair styles sparkled with interwoven strands of fresh flowers. Golden jewellery dangled from their ears and circled their necks and wrists.
        A whiff of alcohol hung in the air. Of course, we accepted a glass of home brew.

And so…
        This was how, in a foreign coastal city, we---a couple of gringo strangers---were warmly introduced to the Mexican traditional celebration of the Day of the Dead.
On these auspicious dates…
        When black cats prowl and pumpkins gleam, May luck be yours on Hallowe’en.
And…
        Remember and celebrate the Day of the Dead.        

Day of the Dead celebration video