Insurers have quite a thing going ......

My brother Johnny has quite a wit. He stands up for injustices in this world and has a unique way of eliciting a smile from others in the process.

I got some very sad news yesterday about my brother. He is in the hospital in Bathurst, New Brunswick with a diagnosis of liver and kidney cancer, metastasized from the throat cancer he had in 2000, at the same time as our mom was dying from stomach cancer.

Inspite of being terrified of all things medical, especially doctors and needles, his courage in the face of radiation, commando surgery and a life threatening illness, has been a great inspiration to me. His quality of life has been deeply affected. He lost his teeth, taste buds, appetite and boyish good looks. Since then the journey has been up and down, but he bought into life and carried on with chin held high and sense of humour intact. As his 6 foot 2 frame dwindled to 110 pounds (not much fun living on boost), he would joke about wishing I could give him some of my excess poundage. Oh I wish!!!!

In 2003 he moved to Bathurst and became the conscience for their local newspaper. One of his letters to the editor read like this:

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"Insurers have quite a thing going

Can you imagine working for a company where, if your customers “dare” to ask for financial restitution for an accident and have paid for this coverage, they are either penalized by larger rates or cancellation of their coverage – as if they had insulted your rules.

If I ever come back to this earth in the after-life I would like to be a CEO of an insurance company. I would have financial security, and what a pension! To heck with the customers, the poor beggars. "
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During the past eight years he has been there for me, particularly when I was facing chemo and radiation treatments for Breast Cancer. During those days he called me often, listened to what I was going through, sent me copies of his articles and shared old photos. I was so touched by his love and support, understanding and balmy outlook on life. I feel very helpless now living so far away from him at this poignant time in his life. I pray that I will have the right words to say to him when I go there next week with my brother Kevin, and the courage to love him enough to say goodbye.

I plan on reading him George Constanza’s words of wisdom:

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The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. What do you get at the end of it? A death. What’s that, a bonus? I think the life cycle is all backwards.

You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you go live in an old age home. You get kicked out for being too healthy, go collect your pension, then, when you start work, you get a gold watch on your first day. You work for forty years until you’re young enough to enjoy your retirement. You drink alcohol, you party, and you get ready for high school. You go to primary school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back, you spend the next 9 months floating with luxuries like central heating, spa, room service on tap. Then you finish off as an orgasm!!!!! Amen.

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I’m sure Johnny would take out that insurance policy inspite of the high premiums if he could just live his Life in Reverse. Maybe he will put this on his CEO “to do” list and get the last laugh first.

Gifts of Grace

A Fabulous New Year!!!!!!

(Please note that in Flickr album photo links below: you can double click on the photos to enlarge them and read descriptive text, use the back button to get to next photo and view them as a slideshow.)

I recently had the opportunity to listen to a remarkable dissertation by Elea, the minister at my brother's Unitarian Church, on the topic of "Grace...... an ineffable loveliness...... the breath of something incomprehensible." She felt that grace could not be controlled or defined or fully comprehended but if we float in the creative embrace of life and pay attention and open ourselves up to grace it can be tasted and felt and lived. She urged that we practice the habit of acknowledging moments of grace and this made me poignantly aware of how truly blessed I have been over this Christmas season. Thus I pen this post in a state of gratitude for the many Gifts of Love and Grace, the gifts behind the gifts that I received this year.

I was blessed with the gift of Laughter. We are closest to other people when we laugh together. It is a universal language that holds us in a flow of connectedness. There was a pearl amongst the email jabberwocky this year. It was an Elf Yourself animation that allowed me to insert faces of my friends into figures of dancing elves. I spent many hours passing on this gift of humour to others. Sadly to say they have gone north leaving just an empty hat.

I also attended a wonderful Newcomers Christmas Party with Amber and the entertainer was an Elvis Impersonator. Sexy he was not but his humour was contagious and before the evening was out he managed to elicit a kiss from everyone. The season got off to a great start. I am grateful to have met so many nice people at this club and great peals of laughter can be heard whenever we gather.

I was blessed with the gift of Hospitality as many people welcomed us to their homes. We enjoyed pre-Christmas visits with friends and family in Toronto, Lindsay and Peterborough. How great that I now live close enough to share Yuletide comaraderie (and a hot tub) with my old and dear friends, Joanne, Inez and Cathie who came all the way from Ottawa. We had a wonderful brunch with my cousin Steven and Caroline and enjoyed seeing the recent renovations on their house. We also managed to visit Marion and Hugh and my uncle Gord who has been quite ill. I was so happy to hear that he was able to make it to Pollards on Christmas Day, his first outing since last July.

I hosted a bridge party and gift exchange for my four groups of students followed by a festive lunch out at Crossroads, our famous Elmira Mennonite restaurant. This has been a terrific year getting to know our new neighbours Walter and Joyce and the day we left for the airport we were invited to some toasts and munchies around their tree.

I was blessed with the gift of Music. We rarely get to see my brothers or their families at Christmas because of distance but this year, Kevin sent me a unique present (click on the uTube video with Kevin's picture on the screen for sound) and one quite in tune with his talents and passions. Every year he participates in a local choir with his daughter and this year they had a special young Jewish friend visiting who had never experienced Christmas. They took her along for their a wonderful traditional cutting the Christmas Tree outing.

Sadly were were not able to visit with Arthur’s family or my brother Johnny this year but we did get snowed in with Ernie and his boarders the weekend before Christmas. He had his crèche out and was in great spirits looking forward to spending Christmas Day with the Connolly family in Lindsay. I do have happy memories of seeing my brother Johnny last Christmas. On one of our outings this year to a Kitchener event called Christlkind, I took some photos of a train collection that I thought Johnny would like as he is also a train enthusiast.

I was blessed with the gift of Family and Love as we travelled to Edmonton to spend the holiday with my niece Karina and her family. We have never been with them for Christmas and rarely travel outside the province at this time of year. Our children Aaron and his wife Nagmeh and our daughter Amber went there too so it was a unique and special holiday.

Though our own decorations were slim we enjoyed Karina's home in Christmas attire and also made several visits to the new home they are having built. This home is situated in a upscale subdivision in Sherwood Park with huge lots. While there we saw our first white hare. Karina and Kyle have had quite the year working through the details of house construction and are quite excited about moving in by the end of January. One of the unique features of their home is an upstairs media room with speakers installed in the ceilings and all the high tech components efficiently placed. You can look out from this room into the vaulted living room. The kitchen will be amazing - spacious, a fireplace, granite counter tops, lots of elegant cupboards and a pantry to die for. We are so happy for them in this dream come true.

We had several fun outings while in Edmonton; the Edmonton Mall, bowling with Kyle's family (I was so sore the next day that I could not lower myself to the toilet seat), a hockey game with the Oilers, a fabulous dinner theatre of the sixties and seventies Rock Music and light tours of Candy Cane Lane and the Legislature Building. There was also a display at a private residence called Maizies House, in which her son was continuing to celebrate his mom's love for Christmas lights, by offering their incredibly decorated house on tour to the public for the season and this year they had raised over $30,000 in donations for diabetes.

It was such fun participating in their Christmas traditions. Christmas Eve was a time for old movies and we watched "Bishops Wife" starring Cary Grant. We had a leisurely Christmas breakfast after picking up Aaron and Nagmeh at the airport and once Keegan returned from his time with the Hoculaks, we opened presents around the tree. Later in the day we joined the Stokowski family for an awesome Christmas dinner at Kyle's parents place. Marlene and Fred were wonderful hosts and we experienced a genuine home cooked traditional "Turkey" and Polish meal, sang carols (that was quite a racket), played charades and exchanged a few gifts. We went to bed stuffed and happy and speaking of bed, I must comment how grateful we were to Keegan for giving up his wonderful King Sized bed to us. I had 10 days of excellent sleep!!!

I was blessed with the gift of Surprises. Before we left for Edmondon, I came down to breakfast one morning and there was Amber with a wonderful unenxpected Christmas gift for us. She had been working hard all term at school but we had not yet seen her creations. I never expected to be receiving furniture made by my daughter. The table is exquisite - perfect joints, solid, lovely finish. I was so proud of her.

Not to be outdone, her brother gave us another joyful surprise. The first gift I was given on Christmas morning came from my son Aaron and his wife Nagmeh, and it was a little photo book entitled"Grandma's Brag Book". You can only imagine our surprise and delight at such great news. We have been very envious of our friends having grandchildren and now it is our turn.

It sure is an amazing feeling to think of ourselves as grand parents..... so many trips down memory lane to our own parents, when we told them the news and the many ways they helped us through the years with our own children. Did I mention how old this makes me feel??? Did I mention how inept I feel, yikes, I don't know how to be a grandparent!!! Humm .... is this a chance for us to have the revenge of the cradle. An extra bonus is the baby's due date, July 3rd, as our daughter Miranda will be visiting from Australia for a month at that time so she will be part of the celebration. Well nothing in life is quite like the miracle of your first baby and we thrilled that Aaron and Nagmeh will be blessed in this way. The Phelan name will continue on!

Speaking of Miranda and Ralph, we had our first visit webcam skype date with them on Christmas Eve and were able to watch them open the presents we'd sent. Various theatrical antics were performed on both sides as we played with the technology. It was wonderful to see them after a year. Miranda proudly showed us the Chocolate Chip Cookies and Nanaimo bars she had made for the Belton Christmas celebration. It kind of tugged at my heartstrings to be so close and yet so far away and it was hard to say goodbye.

I am so grateful for our family, that we are able to keep in touch across the globe, that we are able to make the effort at Christmas to spend time together in laughter and love. Being with Karina's family made me look back in awe at the circumstances that brought us together so many years ago. It was the momentous and unselfish decision by her father that placed her in our lives as a daughter and sister and how I cherish her love and support. This was a gift that keeps on giving and will be there for my children and grand children long after I'm gone.

I am blessed with the gift of a Happy Marriage - the one I take most for granted. Although my husband find's Christmas difficult because I am so absorbed with all the preparations, this year we made an extra effort to spend time together. I am thankful for my sensitive, helpful, thoughtful husband who puts up with my foibles and always puts his family first. He worked all year finishing up projects around the house, made a frame for my stained glass gift to Karina at the last minute and even managed to keep in a positive and upbeat frame of mind throughout the holiday. It seems that his work never ends and I'm so glad we had such a lovely, restful holiday. He was able to return to work refreshed.

So on this note I end, thanking everyone for your lovely Christmas presents and most importantly, the Love and Time you've put into preparing gifts for us and being with us this year. We are blessed beyond measure. Life is good as we live in God's amazing grace.