Concrete Nativity

It was our church's children's pageant last Sunday, but instead of staging yet another play, they elected to do something different. 

Everyone was seated at tables instead of in rows, and each table had a different nativity set on it. As the children read the various scriptures of the Christmas narrative, we were all encouraged to pick up a different nativity figurine from our table and provide dialogue when prompted. For example, when the person at the front read, "soon after the baby was born, Joseph said...",  since I was holding the Joseph figure, I responded to my tablemates, "Actually he kind of does look like me, doesn't he?"

It was a fun and engaging service, and in addition to being highly interactive, it prompted us all to look at the oh-so-familiar Christ story from a different perspective, and I think some of that is due to the outrageous variety of nativity sets in play. There were realistic ones and cartoon ones, modern ones and classic ones, some from other cultures, an abstract one, and even a Peanuts nativity with Charlie Brown as Joseph and Lucy as Mary.

Like Shakespeare, people have transposed Biblical stories into other settings since forever, and looking at the panoply of creches and characters around the tables, I started to daydream about a modern North American setting for a story about the birth of Christ (and I know, I am hardly the first to do so!).

It doesn't translate too well in terms of a nativity set, but I can't shake the image of a concrete parking garage in a medium-sized hotel with a "No Vacancy" sign visible outside. The interior is bleak and grimy but not filthy, barren and desolate but heated.

When picturing Mary, I don't necessarily see a frightened girl in her early teens, as being with child at 14 or 15 was hardly out of place in first-century Palestine. I imagine someone young nonetheless, presumably questioning their own mental health having no father present, and only visions and dreams giving any indication as to his true identity. Maybe they've left university or college to deliver a baby under exceptionally trying circumstances. 

Which brings us to Joseph - does a modern retelling require a husband? I have had two friends conceive children without a partner because the pull of motherhood was that strong to them. Original Mary would have died without Joseph's willingness to take her in, and modern-day Mary can certainly use the support. Maybe our Joseph is her father or step-father, someone who thought he was done with raising children, but whose love for his daughter prompts him to step in and help once more.

And amidst all this, I picture three unhoused people with animals (a one-eyed dog, a mangy cat carried in a pocket, a tame rate perched on a shoulder) to replace the shepherds, who would not have looked like cute children with tea towel headdresses. Shepherds were perennial outsiders who spent most of the year sleeping oustide with their flock, keeping them from straying and protecting them from wolves. They would not have spent any time at all worrying about their clothes or hair, and would have appeared and smelled distressing to 'civilized' folk even then. How reassuring would it even be to have such rough folk assure Mary that 'sky people' or extraterrestrials had told them about her special baby, and thus paying their respects?

But there would also be renowned scientists staying at a convention at the same hotel. Drawn to the garage by an inexplicable phenomenon, they could assure Mary that the previous visitors were correct; her newborn child is both special and expected. What gifts might they bring - a warm jacket, an expensive watch, a synthetic diamond used in a demonstration?

The nativity is a difficult story to reimagine with modern sensibilities, when God no longer guides us with pillars of fire in the desert or burning bushes, nor corrects us with floods or plagues. A woman claiming to be impregnated by God was nearly stoned then, and would almost certainly be institutionalized now. The interactions and conversations are hard to reinterpret in a time where everyone must maintain some degree of both skepticism and cynicism.

But when I close my eyes, it is stunningly easy to picture the tableau; a gritty and dim cement enclosure, a rough shelter containing a radiant mother, a concerned father figure, wanderers, wise men, and of course, a miraculous baby, as all babies are.

Merry Christmas!

(Yet another interpretation)

Little Man Writ Large - Napoleon, Reviewed

Sir Ridley Scott's Napoleon was a movie I had really hoped to see in IMAX, but with the whole household suffering from colds at the time it was released, it was just not to be. Today, a month later, Audrey and I finally got to see it, and since our anniversary is on Tuesday, we splurged on VIP seats.

I highly suggest VIP for this film but really all movies over two-and-a-half hours. That's not to say Napoleon feels long; Napoleon Bonaparte's life was eventful enough that you are never left dangling for an excessive amount of time before there is some more political intrigue, or another battle or another development in his relationship with Josephine.

And this relationship is really the hinge of the movie almost every time it is away from the battlefield. Now, I like history, but know very little about post-revolutionary France and everything I know about the Napoleonic wars comes from the books and shows about Richard Sharpe. Which, to be fair, has tremendous content about the period, but very little about Napoleon himself.

Joaquin Phoenix does an excellent job portraying a man at once confident of his abilities yet insecure about his place in the world. His infatuation and dedication to Josephine (Vanessa Kirby) is both understandable and inexplicable, sometimes within the same scene.

Kirby's performance is mercurial, and takes Josephine from a widowed aristocrat to the Empress of France, but the story is forced to focus on her marital indiscretions and inability to produce an heir. 

It is all handled very well, and the sets and costumes are sumptuous, but the scale of the battle scenes are what made the movie a standout for me, particularly Austerlitz and Waterloo. I am certain CGI must have been used, not once could I point out any poorly rendered bits or uncanny valleys. There are no impossible establishing shots, or cameras following cannonballs or mortar shells into the shocked faces of their targets. 

Whether watching from above as shells shatter the ice around fleeing infantry, or circling a British square with hapless French cavalry, the exquisite balance between order and chaos that Sir Ridley is known for keeps you transfixed. It is nothing short of amazing that he filmed this entire epic in 61 days, but with him using 11 cameras simultaneously for each battle, maybe more credit should be given to his lead editor, Claire Simpson.

Sadly, as much as I want Scott to win a Best Director Oscar one of these days, I don't think Napoleon is the film to give it to him. Maybe it is the lack of surprises, maybe Joaquin channeling "Old Boney's" egocentrism makes him too difficult to relate to, but there was just not enough of an emotional connection to the story to engage me the way, say, Black Hawk Down did. Maybe he will have better luck with Gladiator 2 next year?

At any rate, there is still a lot to like for history and movie buffs alike - the sets, costumes, hair, and such are amazing, and the battle sequences even more so. But at 2:38, make sure to choose a comfortable seat.

The Cup of Cheer

Years ago, decades actually, I stumbled across a collection of slow cooker recipes in a Cerlox-bound book at Costco (or maybe even Price Club from when we lived in Etobicoke). It was curated by Good Housekeeping and because I am an intrinsically lazy person who loves hot meals, it seemed like a good investment. 20+ years later, it still gets regular looks in, particularly for the Hot Buttered Apple Rum on page 23.

Now, I am not a particularly ambitious person in the kitchen, especially if you go back a decade or two, but this warm punch recipe had very few ingredients in it and all of them were easy to find. Honestly, the toughest part was the cheesecloth, which I think I found at either Safeway or possibly The Bay, so, yeah - not too difficult.

We have a coffee butler kind of thing that holds an entire batch (nearly 2 L) and keeps it hot for hours and have kept this recipe on hand for potlucks, sledding parties, winter open houses and sometimes just 'cause.

You can make it with or without adding rum, and most times we do, although either way I recommend maybe using a bit less brown sugar than they suggest, and most people who have had it really, really express a lot of appreciation for it.

My favourite way to serve it is in the Irish coffee glasses Audrey got me as an anniversary present many years ago, with a wee pat of butter floated on top (seriously, it adds tremendous taste and texture to the whole thing). I put some in the crock pot this morning before leaving for church and shared a glass with my sister when she came for supper. And for me, sharing that drink with her? That is when it really, really started to feel like Christmas is coming.

I don't know what it is about hot boozy beverages that put me in mind of the holidays, and family gatherings and suchlike. Dad always loved finishing up meals out with a cup of coffee and a wee glass of Drambuie or something similar. and both Tara and I inherited our mother's love of Irish coffees and the infinite copycats and similar drinks. But I remember serving a glass to someone who was a little unsure what to expect, and having taken a big sip once it had cooled, beamed at me while bringing their shoulders closer to their ears and proclaiming, "it's like drinking a hug."

There are more of you reading this that I would like to hug than I am reasonably going to encounter in the next little while, so, if you are so inclined, I invite you to make a batch of Hot Buttered Apple Rum, and think warmly of our household when you drink, preferably on a frosty day.

Gone to the Dogs: Skye's Arrival

 For almost a month and a half now we have been a two-dog household. 

Skye's owner had a situation that made keeping her untenable, and she had heard how well Canéla had done with us since adopting her in 2021 and hoped we would be able to re-house her. 

Truth be told, we are okay being a one-dog home, but with Fenya and Bobby recently moving to a pet-friendly building in Toronto, there was an opportunity here to get this 16 lb allegedly Havanese mutt into a nice situation in another province.

After some false starts and an apparently heartbreaking departure from her other home, Skye (yes, same as the one in Paw Patrol) joined us on October 24. 

She is a sweetie, but knowing she was an impulse purchase from the pet store in West Edmonton Mall that closed down suddenly years ago may go some way to explaining not only the cryptic nature of her breed (as she looks almost nothing like a Havanese and probably has as much Cuban blood as I do) but also some of her various neuroses.

Oh yes, she is a cute one, but not without issues.

For openers, she has a distaste for being alone that borders on psychosis, snuffing under closed doors until becoming borderline hypoxic, and scratching relentlessly at the kitchen door when we were trying to limit her travels to linoleum while we assessed her housetraining.

She also did not let the fact that she is less than 15 pounds stop her from tearing down a metal baby gate we had set up for the same purpose.

Her parkour skills make containment difficult as well - she is fully capable of jumping onto Glory's bed which is actually an inch higher than the kitchen table. But while we have never seen her go directly from the floor to the table, she has traversed the living room floor to the love seat to the recliner back and over the room divider onto the kitchen table several times now.

Housetraining-wise, while we were told she was pee-pad trained, the two times she has used the ones set out here in the past 40-odd days can probably be dismissed as random chance, and she has been known to drop onto them for a nap as well, so...

But the worst experience came the day after her arrival; perhaps an hour after Glory suggested putting a pool noodle or something under the wooden gate in the back yard, Skye got out, presumably under said gate, which I had suggested was physically impossible.

This prompted a frantic, hour-long search for her by Audrey and I, first on foot, then in two separate vehicles, catching and then losing sight of her in the neighbourhood and being told by a lovely lady who drove over from Griesbach to help catch her that she saw Skye on Castledowns Road.

The feeling of helplessness and anguish, coupled with the thought of telling Fenya and Bobby that we had lost their new pet before they even met her threw my guts into turmoil. By chance, I saw others chasing her in a residential area nearly 2 km from our home and roared down the street to cut her off. 

Blue icon in upper right is our place, red pin is where I found her

It still took another ten minutes to actually catch her, with her dodging and outrunning four of us. Once I picked her up though, she snuggled closely into my neck, which prompted an "aww" from one of the pursuers and a comment of, "guess we know who the dad is" from another.

This prompted an hour of securing the yard with a wooden board on the gate and krazy karpets threaded between the iron fence railings before I collapsed in an exhausted but relieved heap.

It is tough not to feel some sense of rejection when this happens, but it really is natural; Skye had not been with us even 24 hours when this happened, and naturally there would be a compulsion to return to the former home. But since then things have adjusted pretty well around here for the most part.

We have abandoned attempts to have her sleep in the kennel as she would scratch at the gate and bark for up to two hours before finally falling asleep. Since none of us seem to be allergic, it has just been easier to let her sleep in our bed, which is only really a challenge when Canéla jostles with her for space or is surprised by Skye in the night. This dog has a deep-seated need to be as close to humans as possible (preferably Audrey, who now routinely leads a parade of dogs around the house like a Disney princess).

Canéla, meanwhile, has done a very decent job adjusting to having another dog in the house, although she clearly wants Skye to engage in more play with her (but maybe she doesn't know how? many of her behaviours are more cat-like, frankly). There are some small traces of jealousy and maybe even pouting on Canéla's part, but on the whole, she has been gentle and accommodating with her new roommate. Skye has only recently begun playing with the various dog toys we have around, but that may have been a physical issue as well.  

It turns out that Skye's diet was almost exclusively boiled chicken, and this meant her teeth were neither getting scraped by kibble or biscuits nor cleaned at the vet. As a result, we recently discovered the poor thing has an abscessed molar that is infected and needs to be removed, along with 7-9 other teeth. The vet we took her to says she may not have chewed on the infected side of her mouth for 6 months to a year but is now gamely eating kibble mixed with soft food (to make sure she gets enough eaten with her antibiotics). 

Despite all her neuroses, Skye is not a complainer, so who knows how much this discomfort might be impacting her behaviour? I never saw her pick up a toy until after starting on antibiotics. Maybe we haven't even met the real dog yet, who is already established as being a bit of a character.

The original plan was for Fenya and Bobby to take Skye back with them in November, as they came to Edmonton for his Master's convocation (congrats again Bobby!), but they have had no luck finding anyone who could keep her over the Christmas holidays while we are all in Texas together. Currently, it looks like Skye will stay with us before and after Christmas, and hopefully, Bobby's family can take her in while we are away.

But even if that doesn't work out, I am confident we can find someone to house her for ten days or so; she is pretty undeniably cute, after all. Who wouldn't want to assist a helpless dog with a smile like this?