An Old New Year's Eve Memory

     I grew up in rural Southern Indiana.  As a kid our family always celebrated New Years Eve up at my grandparent’s farm house.   I assume our New Years celebrations where pretty much the same as most rural farm people’s at the time.   The evening always started with a big farm supper, after which we kids had to help clear off the table and maybe help dry the dishes.  After that, the fun part of New Years Eve began.

    The whole extended family gathered in the living room, sitting in a circle for games.   The “Ring on a String” game went like this: 

    A ball of string was brought out and everyone held out their hands and the string was strung around the circle of hands, then before loop of string was tied at the ends, someone’s ring was added unto the loop of string. 

    Someone from the group was chosen to be in the middle of the circle facing away from the ring, and then the ring on the string disappeared beneath someone’s closed fist.

    Everyone sitting in the circle, started moving their closed hands back and forth along the string, with their hands bumping into their neighbors.  During this movement of everyone’s hands, the ring was secretly passed from one person’s hand to their neighbors, circling this way or that, around the circle. 

    The goal of the game was for the person in the center of the circle to figure out who had the ring, by carefully watching everyone moving their hands back and forth on the circle of string.   Once they guessed correctly, the person who had been caught with the ring, had to then be the one in the center of the circle.

    The other game we usually played was called “Rhythm”.   Again everyone was sitting in a circle.   Together, everyone joined in on a four beat rhythm, that consisted of one slap on the thigh, then a clap of hands, then a finger snap on the left hand, followed by a finger snap with the right hand, all to the four beat rhythm.  Once the rhythm got going, the designated lead person would say during the two finger snap beats:, “Category:” then name some category of things, like “type of birds”, “some kind of car,” or “some song”.  

    Going around the circle in turns, each person had to name something in the chosen category, saying it to the beat of the two finger snaps.  Of course, keeping the rhythm, while thinking some new item in the category, eventually led to someone messing up.  When they did, they were the one who had to start with a new category for the game.

    After playing the games for a while, my grandmother would slip into the kitchen and make big bowls of popcorn for the crowd.  As we all crunched on the popcorn we continually glanced at the big old clock on the fireplace mantle, waiting for twelve o clock and the New Year to arrive.

    About five minutes before twelve, we kids would all go into the kitchen and grab a pan and spoon to use as noise-makers, then put on our coats and go outside into the dark.  We would stand there patiently and silently in the cold, waiting for the big hour.  

    Usually before our time keeper’s watch got to midnight, we would hear the far away sound of neighbors, whose clocks were a bit faster, start to make noise of celebration in the dark of night.  

    Then using those fast neighbors as an excuse, we all began to yell and pound on our pots and pans with the spoons, making as much noise as we could, as we joined in the celebration for the arrival of a brand new year.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Changing Light, Changing Mood

     I have always been fascinated by how the ever-changing light illuminating the landscape, creates such different feelings.  This morning when I went outside to feed the birds, there was a yellowish-pink  glow in the sky in the east.   A bit later, as the sun rose a bit, it was lighting up sections of the mountains and the tips of the trees at the end of my pond.  That is when I shot the photo above.

    Forty-five minutes later, after I had finished painting, I looked outside and every thing had changed because the sky was now completely overcast with cloud.  The mood of the scene I had photographed earlier had totally changed.  I got out my camera and took a photo of the same scene.  (below)   It has a completely different feel.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Wow, Look At That Aurora

 

        2025 has been a really good year to see an aurora, and I have seen many photos of spectacular, colorful examples of the Northern Lights that people had captured on film.  Every time I hear about an aurora, I always think back on an experience I had, and will never forget.  I know I have blogged about it before, but just in case you missed it, here’s the story:

            One clear, cold January night I went out into the darkness to tryout the “Night Vision” capabilities on my camcorder.  It was pretty frigid and dark as I stood out in the pasture and began to scan the open skies through the viewfinder of my camcorder.   I had the “Night Vision” on, and what I saw through the viewfinder was amazing:  Moving cloud-like areas of green, swirling across the viewfinder.  

            “Wow,”  I thought, “This is an amazing aurora.”   I pressed the video button of the camcorder to record the incredible aurora I was seeing, for posterity.  I kept my eyes glued into the viewfinder.  I was so happy to be witnessing and recording such an amazing swirling green display in the sky.  

            After a while I lowered the camcorder from my eyes, and was surprised that I couldn’t see the aurora with my naked eyes.  I looked back into the viewfinder, and there it was again.

            “Wait a minute, something’s not right here.”  I began to think, and then it hit me. 

            There was no aurora.  What I was seeing, and recording was my breath, fogged up from the cold, and drifting across the front of my camera.

            I felt pretty deflated and foolish at all of my excitement in thinking I was witnessing an amazing aurora, that turned out to be,  just my breath.

You can see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Twelve Days of Christmas Cartoon

     I confess, at a very young age, the phrase had me wondering if I had been cheated by just having the one day.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Low Horizon Sun & Thawing Soup

     Living in the North (Interior British Columbia) means that during the winter our days are fairly short.   From our house, when we do get a clear day, the only view of the sun we get is through the trees on the neighboring property.  The winter sun never climbs very high in the sky, it just skims through the trees, then disappears behind the mountains.

    I was reminded of that a few minutes ago when I looked out of the kitchen window and saw the golden glow of the sun just breaking the horizon.  The time was 8:45.

    I guess I should be happy that we are seeing the sun at all.  For days and days now, the skies have been overcast with cloud.  During the winter, clear skies often mean cold temperatures.  This morning it was -21°C (-5°F), so I have some birch firewood burning in our wood stove. 

    I made some soup yesterday in the Instant Pot and had no place to store it, since our refrigerator is still full of left over food from our Christmas Eve party.   I ended up putting it outside on the balcony overnight.  Of course, with our -15° overnight temperature, this morning when I brought the soup in, it was as hard as a brick, frozen solid.  Now I have the soup sitting on top of our wood stove thawing out and heating up, so it will be ready to eat for lunch.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Boxing Day Holiday, Forever Tainted

             December 26th is the Boxing Day holiday in Canada.    Because I had grown up in the States,  I had never heard of Boxing Day, and it took me a while to hear about it even after we moved to Canada, because we usually traveled back to the US over the Christmas break.  Boxing Day is also a holiday in Britain and other Commonwealth countries. 

            When I first heard about it, I assumed it had something to do with the only “boxing” reference I knew:  Two guys pounding on each other in a ring, but then learned that it was a day when Britain’s aristocratic rich used to box up gifts to give to their servants for Christmas.  Because we weren’t rich and didn’t have any servants to give gifts to, we normally didn’t have any scheduled things to do on the Boxing Day holiday, but we were always happy to have the day off from work.

            On Christmas Eve of 1997, we hosted a small get together of friends at our place.  Among the people that attended were John Bird and Margaret.  John had been a close friend since he and his wife Linda, had moved to an old log home just down the road from us.  Later, he and Linda split up, and John and our friend Margaret began their relationship.

          John was a creative woodworker and great outdoorsman.  I always considered John the healthiest person I knew.  He was very careful about what he ate and he always made me feel guilty, because he was always jogging up the road or hiking in the mountains.

        There was nothing unusual that happened on that Christmas Eve get together.  We ate and we talked.  It was a nice event.  The following day on Christmas, we all got together again.  This time, we joined John and Margaret for a meal up at Margaret’s place.  Again, it was just a friendly gathering and nothing extraordinary occurred.  

        The following day was Boxing Day.  My wife and I just had a quiet day to ourselves.  It was a Friday, so in the evening we fixed our traditional Friday night pizza.  I remember how cozy and comfortable it was in our living room.  The Christmas tree lights were glowing and the fire in the wood stove was warm.  Then the peace we were enjoying was interrupted by a phone call.

              I got up and answered the phone.  It was the hospital.  They said that John Bird had died and Margaret was there and could we come in to give her some support.  We were struck numb with disbelief.

            We rushed down to the hospital, and walked quickly down the empty hall to the nurses desk.  I happened to glance over, down one of the hallways and notice a little girl hunched over on a bench.  When we got to the nurse’s desk, she pointed us over to Margaret, and then I realized that the “little girl” I had seen on the bench, was Margaret.  It was like she had shrunken.  It was pretty bad.  She kept wailing “ I don’t want him to be dead..”

              We hugged and cried.  I don’t see how we could have offered any comfort to Margaret, we were so distraught and broken up ourselves.  It seemed that John, who had been short of breath that morning, had gone cross country skiing to get some fresh air.   When he returned home, he was taking a bath, when he started having chest pains.  He managed to call Margaret and asked her to take him to the hospital, thinking it was an asthma attack.  Margaret rushed over to John’s house, and he walked out and got into her the car.  

        As Margaret drove him to the hospital, John suddenly grasp his chest and muttered, “Oh shit, oh shit.”  He had suffered a massive cardiac event and died on the way to the hospital.  He was 51 years old, the same age as his father, when he had died the same way.

            As we were trying to comfort Margaret, a nurse came over to us and asked if we wanted to see John.  We declined, but then later, Margaret said she wanted to see John again and wanted us to accompany her,  so we went into that first room and where John was laid out. 

        John was still in his hiking pants and jacket.   He looked natural except for a green plastic airway vent still in his mouth.  Then I noticed that his right eye lid was not totally closed and his eye was dull and lifeless.  I think that’s when it really hit me that he was gone.

            John had a huge circle of friends, and the news of his death struck everyone the same: shock and disbelief.  It fell to me to make one of the most difficult phone calls I have ever had to make.  I had to call Linda, John’s ex-wife, who had moved to another small BC town and inform her of John’s death.     I hadn’t spoken to Linda for a long time, and when she answered her phone and I identified myself, Linda said, “David”, her voice filled with delight and excitement at receiving an unexpected phone call from an old friend.  

        After experiencing so much emotional grief myself, Linda’s cheerfulness upon answering the phone, threw me off, and choked me up, but I steadied myself, and I felt it was best just to be direct, so I said as gently as I could, “Linda, listen.   John is dead.”  It felt like I was crushing someone with a hammer.  There was silence at the other end of the phone.  I gave Linda a brief explanation of what happened, but the silence remained.  

        “I can’t talk now, David.  I will call you back later”

        Those events are the ones that always come flooding into my mind every time I hear a reference to Boxing Day.  For most people Boxing Day is the big shopping blowout of the year, a chance for big bargains.  The TV news is always full of people lined up for hours waiting for the stores to open their doors so they can go rushing to the bargains.

        On Boxing Day, I always think about 1997, and our friend John, who seemed so healthy and vibrant.  I think about how precious and fleeting life and friendship are, and how we really should be more appreciate of our friends and celebrate them more than we do.

View my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Back To Normal With A White Christmas

     It seems strange for the Interior of British Columbia, but for the last two previous years, the Robson Valley experienced “green” Christmases.  Yep, Christmas arrived and still we had grass in our yard, instead of snow.  Fortunately, this year we seem to be back to what used to be normal:  A “white” Christmas.

    Yesterday, we already had about 6 inches or more of snow on the ground, and it began snowing again.  I had been clearing my driveway several days in a row.  

    We were having some friends over for Christmas Eve, and by yesterday afternoon, looking out of the window, I started to become concerned because the snow was coming down fairly thickly.  At 3:30, I decided I had better do something about all of the snow that had fallen, so I got out the snow blower and cleared the driveway of the 4 inches (10cm) that had fallen. 

    By 6:00 when our friends started to arrive, it was still snowing hard, and they told us of how bad the unplowed roads had been for their drive over to our house.  We had a good gathering with a lot of tasty food, and interesting conversations.  When the gathering wrapped up and everyone started to leave, there was another 4 inches of fresh snow on the driveway and everything else outside.  As our friends  were gathering up their dishes, and putting on their winter gear, I was outside brushing the snow off of their vehicles and scraping the ice from their windshields.  That took a lot longer than I thought.

    It looks like we will be spending Christmas day doing dishes.  Once the kitchen is cleaned up, I will be  getting the snowblower back out to clean the driveway again, but I am still happy to have a white, normal-looking, Christmas.  

    The snow did blow in some colder temperatures too.  It was -16°C (3°F) this morning.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Drive-In Movies

     Going to a movie was something our family only did periodically, so it was always a special treat when I was a kid.  In southern Indiana we had two types of venues when the family wanted to see a movie, we could go to a theater downtown, or we could go to a drive-in.   Most of the big-name, high production value films were shown at the theaters; the drive-ins usually featured cheaper, second-tier movies, making the admission price at the drive-ins cheaper. 

    Cars would pull into the drive-ins and park on one of the spots along the many elevated rows, that elevated the front of the car and the occupants inside, so they would be facing the big movie screen in front of them.  Beside each parking spot there was a post holding speakers (photo below) .  The speaker could be pulled over and placed inside the car, hung on the window.

    Just in front of the big movie screen there was usually a playground to occupy the kids, as everyone waited around for dusk to get dark enough for the movies to be shown.  In the middle of the parking area there was the projection building which sold popcorn, hot dogs, candy, and other movie treats.  Drive-ins usually showed double features.  It seems like drive-ins were where a lot of the monster and horror films were shown.

    As you might expect, drive-ins were most popular during the warmer parts of the year.   Our family had a pickup truck, and a few times in summer, we would go to a drive-in with the truck.  When we used the pickup, we would back it into the elevated row, instead of driving in.  Once parked, we would unfold the lawn chairs we had brought with us, set them up in the bed of the pickup, and watch the movies that way.  When using the pickup, we usually brought some blankets along to stay comfortable as the night cooled.

    Of course, one of the big advantages of going drive-in movies for teenagers, was the fact that being in a car with a girl or boyfriend, allowed a lot of time for making-out.  You could always watch the best one of the films in the double feature, then make-out during the second film.

    Before we moved to McBride, there used to be a drive-in movie across from Koeneman Park.  It was long gone by the time we arrived.  I could never really understand the economics of having a drive-in in these northern climes.  For about half the year, the weather is too cold to be parking in a car, and during the summer, the daylight lasts so long it seems like it would take forever for it to get dark enough to show a movie.   I guess maybe that is why the McBride’s local drive-in disappeared.

You can view my paintings at davidmarchant2.ca

A Piece of Pizza; Well-Done

     My wife was baking a loaf of bread this morning.  When she put the bread unto the middle rack of the oven to bake, she didn’t notice that on the top, upper rack of the oven there was a cookie sheet with a piece of left over pizza on it.  As her bread began to bake, we both began to notice, not the delicious scent of freshly baking bread, but the smell of smoke and burning.

    When she opened the oven to investigate, a cloud of smoke came streaming out.  From her angle above the oven, she couldn’t see the pizza.  I was further away from the oven when she opened the oven door, so I could see the source of the smoke;  the char-cooked piece of pizza.

You can see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Are Clock Radios A Disappearing Commodity?

     I have always enjoyed having a clock radio beside my bed.   I liked the convenience of being able to just reach over and click a button to turn on the radio, so I could listen to the news or other CBC talk shows as I lay there.  I rarely used my clock radio to wake me up, but I usually turned it on immediately after I had shaken the slumber out of my head.  

    The clock radio also had a function that allowed me to press a button which turned on the radio and it radio would play for 45 minutes or so, then turn itself off.  I often used this utility when I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t go back to sleep.  I just let the talk on the radio lull me back to slumberland and turn itself off.

    A few weeks ago the CBC station I always listen to on my clock radio started to be filled with static.  At one point I tried to call CBC to tell them that their transmitter in McBride was having problems.  It was probably a good thing that the old CBC phone number I had written in the back of our phone book, no longer got me to the place I wanted to go and I gave up trying, because shortly after that, I realized that it wasn’t the CBC station that was failing, but my old clock radio.

    The loss of my clock radio really impacted my normal daily (and nightly) habits.  I made it the aim of my next trip to McBride to go to the hardware store and buy a new clock radio.  I was totally dismayed when I did go to the hardware store to discover that they had no clock radios.  They had a lot of bedside clocks, but not one clock radio.  The hardware store in McBride was the only place locally that might have had one, so I was forced to do without for a couple of weeks, until the next trip up to Prince George for a dental appointment.

    When I did go up to Prince George, I went to London Drugs, a big drugstore that sold all kind of small appliances and computers, and other non-pharmaceuticals.   I was shocked to discover they also had no clock radios.  I was beginning to experience a low-level panic, not knowing where else to try.   Luckily in the next place I stopped (Best Buys), they did have have two types of clock radios.  I bought the one with a wireless charging feature, allowing you to charge your phone by laying it on top of the radio.

    A couple of days ago, I told my sister who lives down in the States, about my troubles in finding a new clock radio, and she said she was recently in a Target store and a guy came up to her and told her he had been looking for a clock radio in several stores and couldn’t find any.  I guess Target didn’t have any either. 

    It sure began to look like clock radios are a disappearing commodity.   I guess it is the advent of the mobile phone that is killing the clock radio market.  I guess if it is more convenient for people to use function on their phones and that is what they like to do, that’s okay, but my old fashion mind still likes using a clock radio. 

    

You cn see my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

The Winter Solstice Arrives With A Fury

          Today marks the Winter Solstice.  The days that have been getting gradually shorter, will now change direction and begin to gradually lengthen.

       For me, the winter solstice has always been the start of the new year.  Even though we still have the hardest part of the winter season ahead of us, the fact that from today on, the days will be gradually be getting longer, is a huge boost to my psyche.  

        It is easy for me to understand why the winter solstice was so important to the ancient people who studied the sky.  For those people who carefully observed the sky, the discover that on the same day every year, the diminishing of the daylight stopped, and that the days following began to lengthen, was a hugely significant event.  It was so important that it was not only celebrated with festivities, but also with the great monuments that they built.  Those structures were often situated so that the place where the sun set on the solstice was marked in some way.

        For me, this year’s official advent of winter certainly began in an eventful way.  Last night our jam performed at McBride’s Midnight Makers Market at the Community Hall.  There were tables where participants could make Christmas oriented items, and other tables where vendors were selling homemade crafts and food.  Our jam provided live background music for the event.

        When we had finished playing and started to dismantle and gather up our equipment to take out of the building,  I had to really push to opened the door of the hall because of the snow behind it, and was rather gobsmacked at seeing the fury of snow that was falling outside.  We had to walk through the deepening snow to load up all our equipment into the back of my pickup truck.  After it was loaded, I headed home, and I couldn’t believe the whiteout of snow I had to drive through.

        I have of course, driven down our road thousands of times, but last night was the most memorable drive down our road, ever.   I had a hard time even identifying where exactly I was, because the snow was coming down so thickly.

    I tried to just keep my truck in the middle of the road, but even that was difficult to do, because the visibility was so poor.  Last night as I drove very slowly, it would have been helpful to see some tire tracks in the road to follow, but instead there was just a solid white surface behind the thick white veil of falling snow in front of my windshield. 

        The snow was all coming down at an angle and that influenced where I thought the middle of the road was.  At one point, down by the river, I had to catch myself because I got too close to the left side edge of the road.  Even driving so slowly, it was a harrowing, white knuckle drive.  

    As I said, it was difficult to see where I was, as I drove down the road.  At one point, I began to wonder if I had already passed our driveway.  Fortunately, I have a lot of reflectors on our name sign at the top of the driveway, and I was much relieved when I saw them shine through the sheets of falling snow, and realized that I had found our driveway.

        Today, on the Winter Solstice, I will have to crank up my snowblower, and spend some time clearing all of the snow from our driveway.  I was a little surprised when I went outside this morning, to see that there were only 5 inches (13cm) of fresh snow on the ground.  After the snowstorm I had to drive through last night, I thought there would be a whole lot more of the white stuff to deal with.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Record Players

         Here is a story I got from my 1996 diary:

    One afternoon Linda Bird, a friend of ours stopped by for a visit.  She told us a story that I will always remember.  It seems she was at her house, baby sitting a 7 and 12 year old for a friend.  Sometime during the evening, the kids discovered some LP records and wanted to listen to them.  When Linda put one on the turntable and played it, the kids were amazed; they had never seen a record player before.

    I found Linda’s story so memorable, because I had forgotten just how quickly audio technology had changed.  Record players had been such an integral part of our lives as we grew up.  We depended heavily on them for our music, and by 1996, they had been relegated to the past, replaced with cassettes or CD’s, and kids had been growing up having never watched or heard a record play.

    In our youth we played our vinyl 45’s and albums over and over.  We got so used to the crackles, scratches and skips on the record, that we anticipated them whenever we listened to the songs.  We were surprised upon listening to those same songs on a tape or CD, when those familiar  scratches didn’t occur.

    I remember stacking pennies or nickels on the record player stylus to make it heavier and hold it down tighter into the grooves of the records to prevent the skipping on some songs.

        The photo above shows all of my old records.  

        Surprisingly, records and record players have made a comeback in recent years.  Music is again being released on vinyl records, and you can buy blue tooth turntables which allow you to listen to your music on your devices or with earpods.  I have often heard that the sound you get from records is much fuller and more accurate that the same songs on CDs.  

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

The Photo that Always Gives Me Hope

     Canadian singer Bryan Adams had a hit with the song, “Summer of ’69”.   Whenever I hear the song I flash back to my life-changing summer in 1969.  It was a summer that had a profound effect on me.  I had just graduated from university, and had applied to join the Peace Corp.  I was happy at being accepted and overjoyed upon learning that we were to be spending two and half months in Hawaii to be trained.

    Being in Hawaii was a life-changing experience for this Indiana boy.  I suddenly found myself in a tropical paradise, full of amazing land and sea scapes, dramatic topographies, and colorful tropical plants.  As a result, being in those beautiful and colorful surroundings made me a more sensual person.  On weekends, we trainees had free time, and some of us would hitch-hike to the dry side of the island of Hawaii to sleep on the beach.  It was a wonderful, sensual experience surrounded by nature.

    Field trips were part of our training, to familiarize us with the Tropics, since we were being trained the teaching of elementary school science for two years in the Philippines.  One of those field trips we took was to an area that had previously been destroyed by lava flows from a volcano.  

    As I walked across the black, barren, moonscape-like rock of the lava flow, I came upon a fern starting to grow out of a crack in the harden rocky lava.  It was an inspiration to me, seeing how life somehow finds a way to re-establish itself, in what seemed like an impossible situation.  I used my old Argus 35mm camera to snap a photo of the fern. 

    I had always been partial to ferns.  I had loved learning about evolution and how life changed and evolved on our planet.   In my youth, I was fascinated with paleontology and had some experience in collecting fossils.  In my meager fossil collection, I had several fossil imprints of ferns that had been alive 350 million years ago.  

    I loved ferns because they had always seemed so ancient and primal.  Seeing this fern growing out of the Hawaiian lava, seemed to show me that life is still struggling to adapt and survive.

    Seeing the fern growing through rock gave me hope that life will somehow continue, despite catastrophic conditions, and certainly hope is a commodity that we desperately need today.

      

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Flip-Flopping Weather

     Mother Nature can’t seem to make up her mind about what kind of weather she will give us.  Because the Robson Valley is situated in the Canadian Rockies, it sits on the border between the warmer/wetter weather systems coming off of the Pacific Ocean, and the dryer/colder air blowing down onto the prairies from the Arctic.  This year the border of those two systems keep nudging each other back and forth, giving us rather unpredictable weather.

    For the most part, our weather has been moist and mild, with temperatures moving just above and below the freezing level.  We haven’t really had any really frigid temperatures.  

    I was getting pretty tired of rain, and last weekend, colder temperatures moved in, dumping about 5 inches (12 cm) of snow on the ground.  

    “Finally,” I thought, “winter has arrived,” as I cranked up my snow blower for the first time this season, but I was premature in my thinking.  Two days later after a heavy rainfall and temperatures rising to 7°C (45°F), all of our snow had disappeared.  Last night we got it back.

    We often hear the old saying, “If you don’t like the weather, just wait wait five minutes.”   That certainly has been the situation so far this year.  

View my  paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

The Widow by John Grisham

 The Widow by John Grisham

    I was busily reading The Hound of the Baskervilles and was about halfway through, when I happened upon an online interview with John Grisham, an author whose novels I had always enjoyed reading.  Among the other things, the interview touched on was the fact that Grisham had just written a mystery, his first.  Since “Mysteries” was this month’s book club theme, that felt like a cosmic message, so I bought the ebook to read, for after I had finished the Sherlock Holmes.

    Grisham’s novel is about Simon, a low level lawyer with a small practice in a small town, who dealt mostly in mundane things like disagreements and wills.  Simon is in a loveless marriage and has three kids, who both he and his wife love.  To avoid his wife, he sleeps in a small room above his office, and just visits home periodically.  

           His practice doesn’t generate a whole lot of income, and that income is reduced by Simon’s addiction to sport betting at a local bar.  His economic fortunes become further threatened when he and his wife finally decide to divorce, meaning John will not only have child support payments but also house payments after giving the house to his wife.

    One day Eleanor, an eighty-six year old widow, comes into his office wanting Simon, to make her a will.  She explains that she recently had a will drawn up by the lawyer across the street from Simon, but she just doesn’t trust him.  

           As Simon begins to question the kindly old woman about her financial situation for the will, she tells him her late husband once worked for Coca Cola, and for decades bought Coca-Cola stock.  For decades he had also bought Walmart stock.  She tells Simon that her worth is probably somewhere around 13 million dollars.  However, whenever Simon seeks documentation for her finances, Eleanor is always evasive.

    Despite the lack of actual documentation, Simon continues to work on a will for Eleanor, but the will begins to become very difficult for him to create, because Eleanor has no living relatives and doesn’t want any money to go to two of her late husband’s sons from a previous marriage, and neither does she want it to go any of her elderly friends.  There are no charities she wants to leave the money to, even through Simon really pushes her to come up with some beneficiaries. 

    Simon does begin to see that he could do quite well financially as a result of making Eleanor’s will and becomes somewhat ethically torn.  He doesn’t want to steal all her money, but he does decide to increase his fee for making the will substantially, and legally sets himself up to manage her affairs because of Eleanor’s age and frailty.

           As he continues to work with Eleanor to complete her will, he becomes caring and concerned for the old woman.  They often meet to have lunch together at local ethnic restaurants in an attempt to get more satisfactory information from her.  She is a very reckless driver, and Simon ends up helping her deal with some of her many traffic tickets.  

    At about this point in the novel, I begin to wonder, where is the big mystery,  but then suddenly WHAM, something happens that turns Simon’s whole life upside down.  It is an event that could even end Simon’s life, and he doesn’t know why he is suddenly put in that situation.

    I found The Widow to be a wonderfully engaging novel that I found hard to put down.  I hated the fact that I was reading it so quickly, because as I got closer to the end, I started dreading that the entertainment I was getting from the book would soon be over.  I, like Simon, just couldn’t figure out who was responsible for his sudden fall from grace.  

            I have high praise for this Grisham mystery.  I enjoyed it immensely.  It was well worth the $18 I paid for it.

View my paintings at davidmarchant2.ca

Rob Reiner

     It was very upsetting last night when I came across the breaking news that Rob Reiner and his wife Michelle had been found murdered in their home.  I had a lot of admiration for Reiner, who was an American treasure, for his sensitive and humorous cinematic work as a movie director (Stand by Me, This is Spinal Tap, Princess Bride, When Harry Met Sally, Misery, and A Few Good Men, to name a few) and his acting (All in the Family, Spinal Tap, Sleepless in Seattle, Wolf of Wall Street, and others). 

    I also admired Reiner for his humanitarian work toward giving others a better life.  He sponsored a bill in California to tax cigarettes, with the money going to fund early childhood education.  He also worked advancing other progressive activities.   Whenever I heard him interviewed, I was always struck by how much his views aligned with my own. 

    I first came aware of Rob Reiner, as most people my age did, as “Meathead” in the hilarious TV comedy, “All in the Family”.  Meathead played a progressive, antiwar, antiracism, young counter-culture character, whose views and comments in his dialogue, even back in the early 1970s , were the same as mine.  

    Every time “This is Spinal Tap” the Reiner’s mockumentary about an over-the-top and ridiculous heavy metal rock band comes on TCM, I end up watching it again.  Reiner just this year released the sequel to the movie, “Spinal Tap, The End Continues”.  I was looking forward to seeing it, but now it will be with some sadness, knowing of his horrific murder.

    I was sickened this morning when I heard what the President of the United States had said about the death of this talented and caring internationally recognized, and praised American.  Of course Trump made it all about himself.

    Rob Reiner’s death is a great loss to everyone who cares about cinema, humanity, humor, and empathy toward others.   I am sad, knowing he is no longer with us.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca