Biking in Tuscany

 Biking in Tuscany

When you get to a certain age your body seems to be outside the warranty and parts start to break down and are either no longer in stock, or are just obsolete and past the useful shelf life.  I can’t really complain because I am still active and very much enjoying life while being aware that there is a growing list of limitations, and things we do with less frequency, or perhaps not at all. 

 When I sit, for example, on my rowing machine, in my garage, which I can still do, I see other sports related equipment sitting in storage that I no longer use.  There are several shelves of camping equipment.  This morning over coffee Cheryl and I were discussing whether or not we should even keep it all, the issue being if we would ever camp again. 

 It is actually difficult to cross that threshold and say I will never do something again like camp, ski, snorkel, play tennis, bike and the list goes on and on.  But I do see rackets for tennis, squash and pickle ball wasting away on a high metal shelf.  My skis are rusting with poles and boots in another corner.  My bike has been re-purposed as it now sits on a stand allowing me to petal it vigorously to nowhere while getting all the cardio vascular benefits of stationary biking.  At least the up-side is, on monitor, and vicariously I can, in my mind, cycle through the hills of Tuscany rather than the hill on Margaret St just down the block from my house. 

I first noticed, while skiing in Banff two years ago that I had no ability to make turns because of the pain and weakness in my right knee.  I could no longer down-hill ski.  It was wonderful being on the mountain, but yet again another stationary experience as I could not move, left or right, with my skis while there.  

Later, back in Waterloo,  while walking with Meghan and Cheryl my knee started to collapse associated with immense sharp pain.  I would begin to fall only to regain the strength in my knee before hitting the ground.  I got to the point when Cheryl had to get the car and come back in order to drive me home as I could not complete the remainder of our walk.  I’m generally okay around the house but now have a range of about 300 steps before the first episode sets in followed by many more in rapid sequence.  My walking range has been significantly reduced.  I am now a candidate for knee replacement surgery.

I have since seen three doctors received an X-ray and today got an MRI.  This machine, this huge machine was located in a small very cold room.  I was required to lie inside its huge circumference legs first for twenty minutes.  When you see these machines on TV doctor shows they hum softly and look quite benign.  From where I lay I could see the General Electric Logo next to a tiny sticker warning of laser radiation, which really surprised me as I thought this experience was all about magnetism. The machine made tortuous  extremely loud sounds that even my ear plugs could not adequately blunt making me think of the actual torture scene from Ozark in which excessively loud sounds were used to drive Marty Bryde insane.  It seemed to work on him and was having the same effect on me.  I was ready to confess to anything.

I held the little emergency rubberized bulb in my right hand which would, at a squeeze, stop the process and bring the calvary. I held it tightly in my grip over my stomach in the comfort knowing this loud evil child’s toy would not defeat me. 

Suddenly it was all over and I could go home.

Moments later I sat in my car with the seat heaters on high, desperately trying to regain body heat, thankful it was over and thinking knee replacement was about a year away.  Maybe after that I could walk the neighbourhood, take my bike off its confining stand, finally leave Tuscany and conquer the hill awaiting me on Margaret Avenue. No sense being such a sissy.

Marty Rempel 

 

Educational demands of over achieving parents...

The Six Percent Factor Versus An Educational Time/Space Continuum

I did not schedule parent/teacher interviews at the end of semester two for all of the parents this year because I felt that it was totally unnecessary.  My reason had to due with what I term the 6% factor.  My experience with many over-achieving parents of over-achieving students always led down the same rabbit hole. In such interviews the mother, never the father, invariable asks of me: How can my son/daughter do better? 

I feign a cough, avert my eyes, enabling me to roll them and say, “But your son did score a 94% average in all his academic subjects this semester.”  

“By every measure that we hold holy in the Commonwealth and the entire Dominion of Canada that is actually considered by most to be an excellent grade.”

“Yes, the mother says with some degree of patience in her voice, “But what happened to the other 6% of his mark?”

You see the 6% factor.

The corollary of the Six percent factor is in fact any percentage mark between 90 and 99.

I mildly grind my teeth and tense my muscles since I have gone through this particular drill many times before and I have already, in my mind, raced ahead of the interview and am thinking, “Holy mother of Jesus is she not listening, or does she just want to wring every last ounce of individualism, joy, free time and spirit out of this poor kid?”  I sadly peer into the distance across the gym teaming with dozens of parents on a quest for information, then start to shake my head.

Instead, I smile and say, “What does Joe/Jane (let’s keep this generic) do for fun after school?  Is he/she on any teams?”

The mother is likely thinking at this point, as she too has probably gone through this  fruitless socratic process with teachers many times before at other times, in other schools, “Holy father is this man dense...is this not a simple straight forward question, not some mystic enigma.”  She looks sideways, across the gym floor, into the misty distance and gives a gentle, polite cough.

We share a moment of quiet across the desk and stare at each other for a brief moment in time as we sense each has an on-going conflicting inner monologue.

If I wore a tie I would now straighten it.  I do sit straight, impeccable posture lends credibility.  I endeavour to explain to the mother that the so called missing marks are for all practical purposes located in a matrix called the holistic ether in what educators term the vague, but otherwise nebulous place that can only be reached by clicking your pedagogical heals three times thereby expanding the soul outward in widening spirals in a quest for knowledge and insight often away from the  confines of the core curriculum and in the ultimate quest of becoming a diverse student, and only then will the glory and radiance of the missing 6% show itself and shine down and bless your child with ultimate perfection and insight, or you know words to that effect.  

It is best to think of your child as an unfolding hyperbola which is always approaching yet never reaching the point where ying intersects yang, or in spiritual terms, the nirvanic bliss of perfection.  I say this with a straight face.  I do not smile.  This is after all a Catholic school, so I make the sign of the cross.  The mother goes away perplexed yet hopeful not knowing if her quest has been completed.

So, you can see I did not schedule interviews with the parents of 246 students simply to avoid this type of no win situation, in which over zealous parents force the limits of diminishing returns and hope to achieve perfection in their children.  When, as I see their children have by every measure succeeded in academic terms and now need space and some free time, which is part of the educational time/space continuum.

To me it is like smuggling tea from Hong Kong to Shanghai.  You can do it, but why bother.  High achieving Canadian parents, often seem unable to receive kudos for their children or their children’s teachers and always demand more.  There is often too much pressure on kids to perform to these unrealistic standards.  These students tend to lose their childhood in the process along with the joy of learning.

Instead I met with the parents of the few students who were actually struggling, or actually failing a course.  I thought I could help them.  I thought my time and theirs would be better spent. 

Vancouver and Immersion Van Gogh

 August 2021

Curiosity Killed the Cat and other Conspiracy Theories

 

Curiosity Killed the Cat and Other Conspiracy Theories

Celebrating the Summer Solstice

and lifting me from the 

doldrums of reality, 

on the evening of the lunar eclipse

while Venus was in decline, 

out of curiosity, while in Vegas, 

I dropped in on the

Flat Earth Society’s Annual international Conference.

A GLOBAL meeting I mused,

The theme boasted “A World with no Distortions” 

Intrigued.

I listened.

He spoke of the curve, but was that a metaphor? 

The break out sessions promised truthful revelations 

on “NASA and Other Space Lies”,

“14 ways the Bible says the Earth is Flat”,

“How to Talk to Your Family and Friends About a Flat Earth.”

Did not the Ancient Greeks calculate the circumference?

Math is a truth.

Social media has given us the allusion of fluency

and the credibility of doubt

with paranoia and mistrust

for all those in control, 

our intelligence is  now artificial,

if we can believe the world to be flat

then do vaccines kill? 

and masks suffocate?

The cat should throw this all off the table.

The meeting stands adjourned.