Erin's Journals

Well here’s one for the books: a library in an airport! If you know me, you’re familiar with the fact that I have been in a lot of them in the past year (er, that’s airports, not libraries). Thanks to jobs with the Canadian Real Estate Association, welcome visits back to Toronto to emcee events and, of course, our trips to Ottawa to be with four-year-old Colin, I’m gradually getting to know the ins and outs of some of this country’s terminals pretty well.
 
So it came as a complete surprise when last November I was sitting in the Halifax airport awaiting my flight west, and I heard a big “Clunk!” over my shoulder. I jumped, wondering what someone had just chucked into the recycling. Then I turned to see this:
 

 
I’ve noticed a lot of things in airports – from a player grand piano and clear plexiglass lockers (in Istanbul), to miniature spas, full (and over-sized) art installations and live musicians entertaining weary wanderers. But I’ve never seen library facilities.
 
It turns out that, not only can you drop off your books here, you can also borrow them!
 

 
If you have a Halifax Public Libraries card, you can grab a book here before you go. There are children’s as well as adults’ books (and why does the adjective “adult” mean something completely different when it comes to movies?) with titles that they hope will entice everyone to borrow as they go. 
 
The idea is to take libraries out of the brick-and-mortar past and present, and move them into places where people on the go can also take advantage of them. In some cases, a person who might have borrowed a book, and will be away when it comes due, can simply drop it off as they await their flight (or in a kiosk closer to the entrance/exit of the airport). Or you simply choose something you want to read on your way out of Stanfield International Airport and return it upon arrival. Brilliant, yes?
 
As much as individual book sales numbers are interesting to watch, I love hearing that libraries are ordering Mourning Has Broken: Love, Loss and Reclaiming Joy (HarperCollins Feb. 26) and sometimes when I’m walking through airports, I do some positive envisioning: I see my book sitting in the store for travellers in search of a read.
 
But this? What an amazing idea! Well done, Halifax Public Libraries. Just another way to make more books available to more people: what the world needs now!
 
By the way, I got the great news yesterday that our book is already in reprint (I’m not sure how that’s different from a second edition, but it’s good news, I’m told). And here’s a link to a story CBC did about those book kiosks in the Halifax airport. Think we could ever do this in other Canadian terminals?
 

And the countdown continues: three weeks today is our book’s release. But if we thought we were done, we had another thing coming!

Rob is working furiously to edit the 11 chapters (plus foreword, epilogue and acknowledgments) that make up Mourning Has Broken: Love, Loss and Reclaiming Joy. It’s difficult for him to be cocooned away in the quiet of our bedroom while we have company here, but fortunately, despite the quite epic rains of the past weekend (see the flooding we were driving through – and the damage it did to our car – in a post I put up on Facebook on Saturday), our friends have been wonderfully understanding about finding ways to have fun and explore the area on their own!

People – especially those close to us – understand the life of freelancers and the randomness with which a project that was up in the air (an audio book) can suddenly become more urgent. So away we go! While Rob’s editing, I’ve got a new writing project on the go.
 
I wish I had any inspiration for a new book, but as I’ve told Rob, “If it’s anything like the first one, something pretty awful’s going to have to happen and I don’t think either of us wants that!” Ah, humour. No matter how dark, it does help us through.
 
So here’s what I’m busy pecking away at these days (besides my daily journals here, of course). I was contacted by a friend who works in publishing at Walmart and was asked if, by any chance, I might be interested in writing for their site. Intrigued, I took a look at what they were suggesting and thought: If I can write things that I know to be true, that resonate with me and might with you (um, without any need for more rhyming) then this could be a perfect fit.
 
So I sat down to write something about being good to ourselves at this time of year of love and hearts. Using guidelines generously provided to me, searching my heart and doing some research into products and availability, I came up with this piece for ideas.walmart.ca. 
 
With a focus on wellness, comfort and things that I think might be helpful to someone in my shoes (as loose fitting as they are these days – about the only thing on me that is or are!) I came up with my first article. 
 
So here we go. I hope you enjoy it and if you have any ideas you want to send my way, I’m always open to suggestions! Drop me a line or post it on my public Facebook page. And, as always, thanks for your input and your support. And a BIG thank you to the editors who made this first effort as good as it could be! Also, my very good friend (and fellow freelancer) Lisa Brandt is writing there, too…so if you’re poking around the site, look for her!
 
Here’s to new adventures. Ever wonder why they all seem to come at you at once?
 

Well, this is a big day on our family’s calendar: this beautiful woman was born February 4, 1933. He she is at 72. And this is not going to be a sad journal, I promise you!
 

 
Mom would have been 86 today; she died in nearby Palm Desert six years ago yesterday. Actually, we’re pretty sure she left us on the evening of February 1st when a brain aneurysm took her down, quickly, at the home she and Dad were renting for the winter. They’d just finished a great day with my sister Cindy and her husband; they’d had dinner while watching a M*A*S*H rerun and she suddenly complained of an awful headache, how hot she felt, and boom. She was on the floor.
 
The hospital was good enough to keep Mom on life support until three of her four daughters (youngest Leslie didn’t have a current passport at the time) could be there to say our good-byes as they took her off life support. How grateful we were to play soft music and say our goodbyes with six roses in her lovely hands (one for each child, one for her and one for Dad).
 
I write of Mom’s passing in Mourning Has Broken in terms of having been visited by death before in our lives; the circle of life and the expected passing of a parent is the way things are supposed to go. But it was what happened when she was taken off the breathing apparatus which had sustained those last hours of “life” that was remarkable. Here’s some of that story. 

The mechanical clicking that had accompanied her aided breathing had stopped, and all we heard above our sniffles and quiet words to our mother were the slowing beeps as the numbers on a machine registering her heartbeat continued to drop. Aware that the staff was waiting to come in and prepare the private room for another patient, we steeled ourselves for the final goodbyes. Down, down, down the numbers dropped: 98 . . . 82 . . . 60 . . . 
 
When the numbers had gotten down near the teens, my sisters began to gather up their jackets, the speakers, their purses. I sat at the bedside and rubbed mom’s arm, speaking softly to her all the while. As the beeping pattern changed, I looked up.
 
52 . . . 60 . . . 72 . . . 88 . . . the numbers began to climb! What was this—some kind of miracle? “She’s not quite ready to go yet,” I said hopefully. But when I stopped rubbing her arm, the numbers and her heart rate slowly began to drop again. Was Mom sending a signal that she knew we were there—that she wasn’t going to be leaving us all?
 
As lovely as that would have been to believe, I suspect the truth is that she really did go on her way when she fell to the floor in her bathrobe at home. What we were witnessing was some kind of static-electric reaction to me rubbing her skin. Of course that was it . . . wasn’t it? 

How I wish that Mom was around to be a part of this book journey that we have undertaken, but I remain grateful (the sentiment of gratitude arises again and again in this book) that she didn’t live to endure the passing of her granddaughter and, one year later, her first grandson. There are always things for which we can be thankful, and certainly that is one.
 
We’re also grateful that she filled out a book of memories for her grandchildren to cherish. I’m not sure where that book is now, but hope I have it somewhere at home on a bookshelf and that it wasn’t ruined in a flood that hit Lauren and Phil’s home a few months after her passing. I’ll have to look for it. Here’s one of Mom’s humorous entries. 

 
It’s a great thing, writing down some thoughts (including the lighthearted ones) by which your descendants may one day know you. I highly recommend this – just get a pen you like and get writing, or poke someone you love to do this for you and your own children! We were able to use some of mom’s entries for her grandkids to read at her “Momorial.” A wonderful thing, indeed.
 
Have yourself a gentle Monday and thank you for stopping by. Tomorrow, word of another writing adventure that you might enjoy taking a look at. This time, Rob’s not on the hook to edit; I’m just writing away like a mad fiend! How much fun is this? (Lots!)
 

Well, here we are in February. For many frozen folks who read this journal, there lies on the horizon a high temperature above freezing. After wind chills and truly trying conditions over the past week, you deserve it.
 
Here in Palm Springs (where I have been loathe to even mention the weather, even the rainiest which, I always remember, I don’t have to shovel) we’re heading into another wet, coolish spell. Unusual, we’re told, but these days what isn’t? Unfortunately, with company here, we don’t get to show off the sights and beauty of the area with as much golden lighting as usual, but given that Ross and Yolande, our friends from Georgina, were delayed by a day in getting here by problems with a snow-covered jet at YYZ, it’s all perspective, isn’t it?
 
Speaking of perspective, it’s been quite a week of highs here in our home. Not temperatures, emotions: to see on amazon.ca that Mourning Has Broken now has “Bestseller” tagged next to it, as it’s #1 in books on Grief & Death. (Yeah – not a category anyone wants to lead in, I suppose, especially when it’s also an autobiography of sorts, right?) But it sat, as of yesterday, at #8 in Books for Women and #17 in Memoirs.
 
Now, I know I’ll never hit #1 in those latter two categories (as if surpassing the incredible and accomplished Michelle Obama in any category could ever be a possibility!) but we were just simply stunned and humbled by the presale of our labour of love. As Rob pointed out, “It isn’t even in stores yet!” and I responded, “Maybe I didn’t really have to write it!” Yes, we’ve been a bit giddy over it. Which is also a very strange way to feel about a book like this. I didn’t say any of this made sense….
 
But all of this brings me to an email I got yesterday that truly is the underlying message in this book and the way that Rob and I have chosen to move forward. J writes:

You probably don’t remember my email to you after Lauren passed away. I related my family’s story to you. My son had lost his wife after giving birth to their third child and first daughter in 2015. He was left with 3 children under 5. No one can imagine the heartbreak my son and our families experienced except those who have gone through it themselves. My son has happily moved forward (he thought he never would) and has a wonderful woman in his life now…she has 2 children of her own so life is very busy for them..and us as grandparents! But it is so wonderful to see him smile and enjoy life again. We will never forget his beautiful wife and mother to his children of course but this is an example that things keep going and we have to make the best of it because the alternative is much worse. Sincerely…J.

I responded to her that we have totally embraced that concept and are nothing but happy with the fact that, in our own lives, we have a daughter-in-law (or that’s how we refer to Brooke) who has brought so much joy and love to two broken boys, as well as to Rob and me. 
 
The start of a new month is a great time to look ahead and see how things can be different if we adjust our perspectives. Or our sails, as the saying above reminds us. 
 
Thank you for sharing these days, these moments, these highs, lows, signs from above and signs to take our shoes off this week. Let’s do this again Monday, shall we?
 

I wanted to express my gratitude for the outpouring of thoughts and, often, your own perspective about yesterday’s very raw journal. I received most of them on Facebook, but also some came in my email. Thank you for taking the time to share; they say that confession is good for the soul, right? (Well, someone did.) And I do believe that living as transparent a life as one can, especially when you have even the tiniest platform that might be able to help just one person to identify and step out of the dark, is living your best life.
 
Of course, there’s a fine line between the personal and the private. Radio guru and my own long-distance mentor Valerie Geller always preached about the importance of sharing the former and leaving out the latter. I learned so very much from her.
 
Just as I learn from you – and from paying attention! Case in point: we were going through some open houses here in Palm Springs, CA last weekend. No company, so why not, right? I tucked into my purse a pair of flimsy hotel slippers to wear in the houses, and off we went.
 
Eyebrows rose when I put them on in the first two houses (I had sandals on and wasn’t going to walk around someone’s house barefoot – for their sake and for mine) and then, in another we entered, a pretty blonde lady named Grayson – whose spelling I never caught – asked me if I was from the midwest US or from Canada. 
 
Well, tap my timbers and call me maple syrup! “Canada,” I answered in surprise. “How did you know?”
 
Turns out Grayson is from Red Deer, Alberta and has dual US citizenship, as does her husband. She now works in real estate in Palm Springs, smart lady. She said that the only people she encounters who take off their shoes are from those two places.
 
And it got me to thinking. My mom, who died right here in nearby Palm Desert just seven years ago next week, would ask me, “What the heck is all of this about taking off your shoes? When did that start?”
 
I wondered what she meant. As far as I knew, we’d always taken them off (perhaps having to do with the slush and muck that would inevitably get tracked in during the shoulder months, not to mention the depths of winter). We expected that when people came to visit our house or condo (but not the cottage). It just seemed to be natural. Would you come in with your coat on?
 
I posed the question in a Twitter poll @erindavis that ran from about noon on Tuesday ’til the same time yesterday. About 300 people took part and here are the findings: 
 

 
I got some great comments, too. Like this one. 
 

 
And these two…
 

 
Okay Lisa – now I’ll be noticing that, too. And finally, this from Max who just wants her piggies to be free range!
 

 
I found it fascinating that even though so many of our fellow countrymen-and-women come from arguably the coldest parts of the continent, Grayson knew we were Canadians from us taking off our shoes! 
 
Or perhaps we really are just that polite!
 
If you’re looking for actual reasons why shoes should come off, this article could help.
 
Have a good day and thanks for contributing to the journal if you answered my little poll!