Kathleen Molloy

I have developed a long-term professional crush on Leonard Cohen. Why is it then that in my 38 years I’ve never been to one of his concerts, poetry readings, or book launches?

Not one concert.

For my birthday, I treated myself to his Live in London concert CD. And I played the CD - a lot  - on the way to and from school – to the point that the kids were filling in the words to the songs that they used to mumble.

“Mommy, is that the Hallelujah song?”

“Yup.”

 When Kiddo #1 was 2 and a half I frequently heard “Loooo-lah” screeched from the back seat of the car.

Not many years later as I celebrate my birthday with Kiddo #2 screeching “Loooo-lah” from the backseat, Kiddo #1 asked “Mommy, who is going to replace him when he’s dead?”

Who is going to replace Leonard Cohen?

Amanda Earl has posted a list of new Canadian poetry pieces published for this Autumn. See the Ottawa Poetry Newsletter below for the list that she has sorted by province and publisher. Wow!

Surely some of the folks participating in the 2nd Canadian Book Challenge will opt to flush Fall fiction – prefering instead a poetry pick.

From Quebec City we crossed the bridge to Île d’Orléans, following each of the Quebec licence plates that declared “je me souviens”. Like every traveller, we wanted to taste the island, all of the fresh produce sold at the end of the farmers’ driveways; the berries freshly picked and the corn boiled and salted at the side of the road; baked bread, chocolate, cheese, cider, and of course maple syrup treats ready to be gobbled up.  In the last stretch of our holiday, food cooked with local ingredients, using century old recipes, forced us to slip into stretchy pants.

But Île d’Orléans is not strictly about gluttony. It’s about bike paths and poetry. It’s about rolling crops and seaside homes wrapped with verandas. It’s about putting your watch in your purse and slowing down. It’s about remembering to forget your busy life, remembering a simpler time. Je me souviens.

It’s about Félix Leclerc, singer, songwriter, author and poet.

Félix Leclerc gave Quebecers the motto “Je me souviens”. And twenty years after his death Quebecers remember. We visited the interpretation centre/museum/shrine dedicated to Leclerc and his work. In one corner was a recreation of what his office would have looked like, complete with original letters from children thanking Leclerc for lending his name to their school. Another corner was an audio-centre to listen to his songs and stories. Poetry was stencilled on the wall. Visitors whispered and pointed.

Though the exhibit was interesting, I was most interested in the whispering visitors. I had never seen a cultural homage quiet like this before. (I’ve never been to Graceland.) Years ago in Amsterdam years, I saw a stain-glass picture of Margaret Atwood. At least it looked like Maggie. But truth be told, I had just been knocked in the head with a Frisbee, so my perception might have been out of whack. And it was, after all, Amsterdam. Having said that, Maggie in green glass was as close as I’ve come to cultural hero worship. Until Félix.

I have only read one of Leclerc’s novels: The madman, the kite & the island. It is for good reason that he is considered one Quebec’s eminent folklorist. He is a wonderful storyteller.

http://www.rfimusique.com/musiqueen/articles/104/article_8088.asp

http://franco.ca/edimage/grandspersonnages/en/carte_j04.html

We were roughing it in the bush.  Susanna Moodie would have been proud.

At Forestville we spent three days in our trailer tent, damp and stinky (us – not the tent!). Our campsite did not have showers, electricity, or potable water but it did have the rolling waves of the St. Lawrence, plenty of polished red stones for the kids to collect, and proximity to a few mighty fine trucker breakfast bars.

One of the truck stops offered showers and we strategically rotated our wardrobes so that on Sunday we could enjoy a family shower. But when we rolled out of our tent on Sunday we discovered that the truck stop was closed on Sundays!

Forestville does not have a laundry mat. The resource-based town had a handful of cute B&Bs, all cute and all full. The local Econo Lodge was full; there was no room at the inn. To boot, many of the camp grounds between Forestville and Tadoussac were booked and those between Tadoussac and Quebec City had been flooded with over 200 campers having been evacuated.  

So we stayed put for three days at Forestville, waiting to see if the winds would pick up our trailer tent and toss us across the water to Rimouski. I bought the kids warm fuzzy pjs from the local discount store and we congratulated ourselves on how well we pulled together as a family, damp and stinky. We were roughing it.

And just when our damp and stinky pride because to shine through the cracks in the tailer tent that the mousquits had chewn through…a big honking Winnabego pulled in beside us. Encouraged by the hum of their propane heater that sounded like it was filling up a hot air balloon every two hours…the owners set up their sewage pipes, put a house plants on the picnic table between our sites, and cheerily installed their Express Vu dish.

We apparently had very different ideas as to what it meant to be roughing it.

And that got me thinking… it has been more than a century and a half that Canadians have used the term “Roughing it”. The first literary reference that I am aware of is the title of Susanna Moodie’s 1852 Roughing it in the Bush. 

By all accounts our adventures in Forestville were not “roughing it”– not compared to those of Susanna and her sister Catharine Parr Traill as they clear cut the land to build their homesteads in Upper Canada. Perhaps the only thing we truly had in common was the black flies. Did Susie and Cathy ever get used to the blood leaking from their ear drums from scratching black fly bites? Then again, if Susanna Moodie was truly roughing it, would she really have had the time to write over 300 letters, countless works for YA readers, poetry and fiction, and journals?You decide.See her works as noted by Online Guide to Writing in Canada:http://www.track0.com/ogwc/authors/moodie_s.html

fiction

• Mark Hurdlestone; or, The Gold Worshipper (1853)
• Flora Lyndsay; or, Passages in an Eventful Life (1854)
• Matrimonial Speculations (1854)
• Geoffrey Moncton; or, The Faithless Guardian (1855)
• The World Before Them (1868)

fiction for young adults

• Spartacus: A Roman Story (1822)
• The Little Quaker; or, The Triumph of Virtue (n.d.)
• The Sailor Brother; or, The History of Thomas Saville (n.d.)
• The Little Prisoner; or, Passion and Patience (n.d.)
• Hugh Latimer; or, The School-Boy’s Friendship (1828)
• Rowland Massingham; or, I Will Be My Own Master (n.d.)
• Profession and Principle; or, The Vicar’s Tales (n.d.)
• George Leatrim; or, The Mother’s Test (1875)

poetry

• Patriotic Songs [with Agnes Strickland] (1830)
• Enthusiastic; and Other Poems (1831)

 And to learn more about the sisters see what Collections Canada has to say about their family:

http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/moodie-traill/index-e.html

 For a review of Roughing it in the Bush look at this one from Trent University located in Peterborough, Susanna Moodie’s “bush”:

http://www.trentu.ca/admin/library/archives/zwommoti.htm

 And for the digital version look below:

http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/moodie/roughing/roughing.html

I’ve read Moodie. Enjoyed her works year after year. Sure, she found it difficult to settle into the brush around Peterbourgh in the 1840 – no doubt– but she also lived a privileged life. And I’m not convinced that she and I share the same definition of “roughing it”.  I suspect that if I met her in Forestville in the rain, she would be scooting between raindrops trying to get her houseplants back into the Winnebago before they drowned or the black flies carried them off.

The town folk of Harve-Saint-Pierre were not waiting at the port for our arrival. They were hopping in anticipation of the docking of the Tall Ships.  Mingling into the crowd we munched another seafood pizza (floppy dough base, 1 layer of butter, 1 layer of ketchup, 1 layer of shredded crab with shrimps and scallops, topped with melted cheese) while I sulked. This was the first port of call during our trip where I truly struggled to be understood with my grade-school Toronto French. Moreover, I had no idea what anyone was saying around me either!

My beau teased me for having ordered yet another seafood pizza. I had to, on account of the root beer incident and on account of the fact that every time I spoke with someone in Harve-Saint-Pierre I walked away with something other than that which I had ordered.Using my polished grammar I had order “une racinette” to wash down the shredded crab.

«Pardon? »

The cook leaned in so that I could yell it into his ear.«Une racinette. Une cannette de racinette, s’il vous plait.»

« Comprend pas. »

I thought that if I mentioned the company name it would be clearer that I wanted a root beer, « Un ah et doub-ble-vay .»  

« Comprend pas. Désolé. »

« Un A&W. » I pointed to the orange can in the display case behind him.

« Heh? Un root beer? » As I nodded he broke my heart.  « Na pu. Fini le root beer. No Root beer.»

This was after I had already been to the pharmacy looking for paper napkins to bring on our pizza picnic and the clerk presented me with maxi pads. [So that you know, in Harve-Saint-Pierre paper napkins are called “les petits papiers.”]

The grey skies and my big pouting lip could have put a damper on the day but as usual my beau found away to help me not take myself so seriously. He pointed to a road sign. “You can blame rue de la Berge”.

“I don’t get it.”

“Look at the sign.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Look at the sign.”

The street sign was painted red, white, and blue with a nautical flourish. Each of the street signs announced that Harve-Saint-Pierre was proud of its Acadian heritage. “Okay, so maybe I don’t understand them because I’m not used to the Acadian accents but that doesn’t explain why they don’t understand me!”

My beau kissed me, gave me a sip of his root beer, and rounded up the family for a visit of the Roland Jomphe House which hosts this Order of Canada poet’s permanent exhibit called « L’Autre Roman » (the Other Novel). 

http://www.duplessis-travelguide.com/La-Minganie/Maison-de-la-culture-Roland-Jomphe/