Treasure Hunting

Well, I knew there was a reason I decided to get off on Avenue Road and walk across to Bathurst. If I hadn't been strolling down Brooke Street, I would have missed this, this broke-ass rocking chair. I've been looking for a rocking chair for so long...it seemed

like a sign...seeing it there on the curbside, discarded for its broken caning. I picked it up and carried it home (I think there's a scene in Married to the Mob when Michelle Pfeiffer does something similar), that's who I felt like. Not Michelle Pfeiffer, but the character she played in the movie. Angela, I think here name was. Now I have to find a place that does caning...I don't know if this will happen, but I will give it a go and look.

Wednesday, after my doctor's apartment I went to my father's condo as I was on his side of town. I told him that I would be visiting primarily for two reasons...(seeing him was a given)

to try and fix his dying Bonsai tree that I gave him, and to dig in the basement and look for stuff that CHY saved for me. He left me there in the "cage" (that's what condo lockers look like) and boy did I have a good time going through boxes. What fascinated me was how disorganized all the pictures/mementos/post cards/slides were...it kind of delighted me as well, because that's exactly how I am. I have these two slim memory boxes and I just throw things in there willy-nilly...but there were two big boxes full of stuff. I've decided to appoint myself family archivist and try to put things in order and come up with several volumes of books. Luca, at work, showed me how to use a slide scanner...and Rob told me that once I get everything organized I should do iphoto or some such Mac program. (Every day I grow sorrier that I did not buy a Mac).

It's amazing to see pictures I've never seen, and to see how absolutely stunning my mother was.

I know I'm biased, but she was movie-star beautiful.

I definitely want to decorate with the snap shots. I got this idea to blow up a snap shot on 3 feet wide canvas and hang it on the wall. The difficult part will be choosing the pictures.

The best thing I found was a yellowed article clipped out of The Voice of St. Lucia, dated December 30th, 1961. The article was entitled, "Double-Ring Ceremony Takes Place at Cathedral High Mass" and it was all about CHY's wedding. It had sentences like "The Bride looked regal and charming , as she moved gracefully up the aisle in her rapturous and breathtaking bridal gown of 'drama peau de sole'." And this, "The sweet little flower girls, Misses___ and____ in their pretty bouffant dresses, their crowns of roses and their bouquets, echoed the coral of the Matron of Honour" I just loved..."sweet little flower girls". The way my mother told it, one of the sweet little flower girls, who is a distant relative on my father's side,

puked on her wedding gown and stole her camera. My mother hated her as an eight year old flower girl and continued hating said flower girl well into her fifties. There are many, many reasons I feel blessed to be CHY's only daughter, but thinking about that long-lasting grudge is one of my all time favourite reasons.

I read the article while I was in bed and laughed heartily as I reached to turn off my bedside lamp.