December 13, 2020

 Dear Friends

Today is St. Lucia's Day, and I made safransbrod rolls to celebrate, the way I usually do.  Don't particularly like them but Lee and various other members of the family do, so they've become a tradition. But this year, untraditionally, Lee is going to have to eat them all himself as we are in semi-lockdown, like so many other folks.

Needless to say, 2020 has been a terrible year, although we've got off with relatively little damage, unlike far too many other families. We've lost three friends to Covid-19, as well as a neighbor we didn't really know. Other acquaintances have been very, very ill: this thing is real, people!

But we all (kids, their partners and their kids included) have been not really touched by the disease.  There have been cases at Jeanne's school but not in her Grade Five class, and while there were two cases in Thom's Grade Three class, he tested negative and his friends escaped without major problems, I think. Everyone except Sophie has been working from home since March 13 (Yay! for teachers who are on the front lines), and she taught remotely for a couple of months last spring when schools were only on-line. Elin has been Zooming into McGill where she's Advancement Officer at the Schulich School of Music, and missing the commuting-by-bike that she had been doing. Lukas started a new job with the Canadian public service in October and is currently working remotely. He and his family will be moving to Ottawa sometime in the new year.

But getting back to "normal" is not likely to happen any time soon, I suspect.  Even with a vaccine it will be months before sufficient people have been vaccinated, and until then it's "masking for a friend."  Our Christmas celebrations are likely to be on-line also, except for a walk or two perhaps--if we're lucky.

 

Not everything has been horrible, though, I must admit.  We spent a good part of the week before everything fell apart having a little escapade in Quebec City.  The plan was to visit an exhibit at the Musée nationale des beaux art featuring in Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera (verdict: good but could have had more Diego and less Frida), eat a few gourmet meals, and walk around one of the loveliest cities in North America.  That we did, and then came home to discover that everything was going to "pause" for a month. Hah! It's turned out to be much longer than that, but I've often revisited our trip mentally because there are, thankfully, many ways to escape. (The photo is the view from the heights, looking out toward the St. Lawrence.)

Lee has had a chance to do a fair amount of "sawdust making," too.  His latest projects are elegant bow front tables for the entry and the kitchen to replace the radiator covers that came with the house. This involved actually bending some wood through a fascinating technique to make a curved apron.  The photo is of a little model he's made, which gives some idea of what the finished table will look like.

In the run-up to the US general election I spent hours and hours on the phone, calling into meritorious electoral races, helping get out the  vote. As dual citizens, we are still registered in California but the Dems really didn't need much help there, while they certainly did elsewhere.  We are delighted that the Biden-Harris ticket won and are appalled that so many people in the US think it was a "stolen" election.  As the courts have asked again and again, where is the evidence? 

This fall we also finally achieved a major home improvement.  It started with the realization that getting into and out of our lovely, claw-foot bathtub was not going to an option in the future and that we needed a walk-in shower.  Then came the second flash that, if things were torn up for one project, we might as well do two.  I've always wanted a hood over the range, and the flooring in the kitchen dated from the 1950s, so we added that to the plan.  Of course that led to new cabinets, new countertops, new fridge, new stove etc. The work went well--on time and under budget, would you believe--and we are delighted with the result. An added fillip: the colours we chose--yellow and grey--were named Pantone's colours for 2021, so I guess we for once were ahead of the curve.

Also this fall my 17th book, Concrete: From Ancient Origins to a Problematic Future was published by the University of Regina Press.  It's had quite good reviews, to my great pleasure, and I'm already working on a book that might be seen as a sequel.  It's tentatively called Against the Sea:  Saving Civilizations from Rising Ocean.  I was supposed to go to Jakarta to investigate Indonesia's plans to move its capital because of threat from rising waters, in fact, but obviously that is not in the cards for the time being.

Who knows what the new year will bring?  Health and a few good times for you and yours, I hope.

Best wishes

 

Mary