Home  >> Stories  >> The Tale Spinner #2012-34

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IN THIS ISSUE

• We remember our long-time friend, Dixie Augusteijn
• We get letters from Pat Moore, Shelley Klammer, Stan French, and Verda Cook
• Don Henderson urges Canadians to buy Canadian products
• Catherine Nesbitt forwards some smiles about church-goers
• Lew Carter publishes a thoughtful essay on the winter of life
• Sites are recommended by Carol Hansen, Catherine Nesbitt, Pat Moore, and Stan French

IN LOVING MEMORY

Eleanor (Dixie) Augusteijn passed away on August 19 at the age of 101. Among her many other accomplishments, she had been a contributor to The Tale Spinner since its inception. She wrote many stories for us, beginning with one about growing up on a farm in Ontario, others about living in South America, Holland, and back to Ontario. The last story she wrote for us was about her trip to Alaska and the Yukon when she was 95 and using a walker. She was a remarkable woman, a true adventurer.

Her daughter, Elizabeth, writes: "This is to let you know that Mum passed away early last Sunday morning. She died peacefully, with family around her, and was in no pain. We were glad that we were able to be with her during her last days. We had a small, private family funeral yesterday at Egan´s Funeral Home in Orangeville.

"She so enjoyed the Tale Spinner community and these last few months, although she read nothing else on the computer, always looked forward to the weekly edition of your newsletter.

"Her granddaughter Sarah spoke a few words at the funeral and I thought you might wish to read what she said:"

GRANDMA DIXIE

I´d like to say a few words about my grandma, and to remember her ... even though I know I can´t manage to capture in even many words who she was, or how I feel about her, or all the memories and stories that we´ve been lucky to share with her.

That´s one thing about Grandma, maybe the most obvious one at this point, is that, having made it last month to the milestone of her 101st birthday, how incredibly long and full her life was.

Just think of all the people Grandma knew over the course of her life. And we in this room, we´re just a very small number of the living who knew and loved Grandma. Most of the people Grandma knew, she outlived. All of her brothers - Clayton, Bruce, Clarence, Tom, and George, many of her friends ... most people of her generation, and all the previous generations that she knew in her younger years, they all died, many of them long ago. So in some ways, it´s like she must have been going to some pretty familiar territory, when she at long last joined them this past Sunday.

Grandma said one of her earliest memories was when they connected the telephone in Parkhill, when she was less than two years old. And not too many years ago, when she was in her late 90s, she was taking some computer courses, on Excel and other things. She lived through many technical and social and political changes, all sorts of changes. And she was flexible and she adapted to those changes. I always thought that was particularly amazing - just how well she could adapt, how much change she´d seen.

One thing we all know about Grandma is that she was a great storyteller. I liked all of her stories, the ones of growing up on the farm in Parkhill, and how she walked to school, and how life was much stricter then, with everyone working hard on different chores, but there was a feeling of community. She would tell about how they would have guests dropping by, and guests who stayed for months, and how much she liked that.

When she was still a girl, she started reading books about far-away places and was especially struck by one about the Incas in South America. So the amazing thing is she managed to get to South America - first to Ecuador and then to Venezuela. She lived in Ecuador from 1944 until 1950. That´s where she met Grandpa and they got married. Then they moved to Holland for a few years, and then to Venezuela, where they lived for ten years. Being able to travel and experience the world and have so many adventures and meet so many different people, it seems that her childhood dreams came true.

She has so many great stories from that time. Some of them were pretty funny. Just before she went to Ecuador, she was working for a brief time in Washington D.C. One of her bosses came back with a fat wad of leaves he´d got on one of his trips down to Latin America. He noticed the native people used it on long trips and thought there might be a market for it in the US. As it turned out, he was absolutely right, but a bit clueless - they were coca leaves!

We all remember some favourite stories that Grandma used to tell us. And she put a huge amount of time and effort into leaving us with a written legacy by writing her memoirs, or as she used to call it, her "memorial". Knowing that was properly finished was one of her very last preoccupations.

I also have my own great memories of Grandma. Emma, Laura, and I all benefitted from summers I remember as pure magic, on the farm in Haliburton. Grandma had her flower garden and herbs up in the big rock on the one side of the house, and there was a giant vegetable garden. Grandma used to enrol us in different arts and crafts courses at the Haliburton School of Fine Arts, which she and Grandpa helped found. And Grandma was always doing creative things herself, especially with fabric. She made us some incredible quilts, each square was a different picture - it took so much work to do those. When Emma and I were little, she´d make up stories with us, and each of us would take a turn adding to the story, which was usually - I don´t really know why - about a girl called Emily.

What I remember of Grandma is that she always had so many interests - genealogy, photography, gardening, various crafts, reading books on different subjects, knowing so much about history, geography, the world at large. And at the same time, she was always interested in us - in her family, in other people. She always really genuinely wanted to know what I was up to, and she supported me in many ways. That meant a lot to me. And I realize she did that for other people as well. She really cared about and supported many people. And she did what she could to contribute positively to the world at large. She contributed regularly to charities that work on environmental advocacy, nature conservancy, health issues, culture, supporting children in various countries, disaster relief, political advocacy - so many causes.

I think it was that genuine interest and engagement that kept her young, even though for as long as I remember, she seemed to always have particularly rare and complicated medical conditions, the kind that doctors get quite excited by.

As Grandma got older and mobility was more difficult, she decided to move to the Lord Dufferin Centre and make it home. She used to make me laugh because for a long time she´d refer to herself and all the residents as "inmates." And although she was slowing down a bit, the way she lived there was pretty much the way she´d always lived - she joined the food committee and lobbied for better meals; she started a current affairs club; she was an avid member of the book club; she charmed and befriended many of the staff and the other residents. And through books and her computer and her family, she reached out always and remained part of the larger world. She was always proud of and interested in all the doings of the family members, and the great- grandkids - Jessi, Jake, and Tristan.

Once someone has been around as long as Grandma, even though none of us has any right to complain that she wasn´t around long enough, or that we would like more time, and even though it´s hard to imagine a life that could have been fuller or richer than hers, with little reason for doubt or regret, she´s been a fixture and a constant for so long that it will take a while to re-imagine a world without her in it.

CORRESPONDENCE

Pat Moore writes: After sending your story of growing tomatoes in your indoor garden to my friend Karen, I received this story from her:

When I was a newlywed, I decided to grow some tomatoes as a surprise for my husband because he loved them. I didn´t know a thing about growing them. In fact, I had never grown anything, but I bought some anyway and planted them. I was told I didn´t have to do much but put them in the ground and water them.

When my husband came home, I showed him what I had done. I had made a nice little area for them. After he finally got through laughing, he asked me if I had any idea of how many tomatoes I was going to have out of these plants. I told him probably maybe one or two out of each plant because that is what the picture looked like that came with the tomatoes. I wanted to be sure we had enough, so I bought a whole tray. I could not understand why he started laughing again. So he explained to me that one tomato plant produces many many tomatoes, and by the looks of what I had in the ground, there would definitely be many! He was soooo right.

Plus, he never told me that tomato plants grew and grew and grew. And I had not planted mine very far apart. I definitely had the largest and tallest tomato garden in town, I think. It was like a jungle. But I kept watering and tying up tomato branches everywhere, as I had huge huge tomatoes. One slice of a tomato more than covered a piece of bread. And some of the tomatoes looked like three in one. He should have told me how big they were going to get, but he said he wanted me to be surprised. Well, I sure was.

And in the end, we had plenty of tomatoes, and so did family, neighbours, and friends!

Shelley Klammer writes: I love the tip about the frozen lemon.

I will be using that. I love grating lemon rinds into my soups and sauces, and to freeze it sounds like a brilliant idea!

Stan French writes: I had a similar experiment years ago. I wanted FRESH tomatoes year round, and I had an indoor 4 tube X 4´ high light box for plants in a corner false door where a door was once in this wartime house. My plant grew from floor to ceiling! It was eventually stinky! It never had edible fruit. My outside plants were great for a few years, and then not so good in the same location.

Now, decades later, I have four containers in that backyard location and we may soon have more fruit than we can eat.

Verda Cook writes: I just finished reading the Tale Spinner and your experience with growing tomato plants under lights. Two suggestions. First - because of the lack of blooms, I wonder if the fertilizer you are using has too much nitrogen. The first number in the formula should be low, the middle number higher than the first and last number. This will produce less but stronger growth and give the plant the energy to produce fruit.

When first starting the plants, at the stage that the plants are about 16 inches tall, the middle leaf at the very tip of each branch or the top of the plant, should be pinched off. This will force the plant to produce side branches and become more bush like and produce more in fruit.

I do wonder what variety you chose. Some varieties are not suitable for growth under lights. Also the lights should not be on for more than ten hours. Too much light forces "leggy" growth. Just a few suggestions for your next try.

ED. NOTE: Thank you to those who have written about growing tomatoes. Next time I will have a better idea of how to go about it and may even get some edible tomatoes!

Don Henderson feels strongly about this subject and suggests that we all make sure that if they are available, we buy products that are

MADE IN CANADA

A physics teacher in high school once told the students that while one grasshopper on the railroad tracks wouldn´t slow a train very much, a billion of them would. With that thought in mind, read the following, obviously written by a patriotic Canadian:

Shopping in Lowe´s the other day for some reason and just for the fun of it, I was looking at the garden hose attachments They were all made in China. The next day I was in Home Hardware and just for the fun of it, I checked the hose attachments there. They were made in Canada!

Start looking....

In our current economic situation, every little thing we buy or do affects someone else - even their job and thus our economy.

A quote from a consumer: "My grandson likes Hershey´s candy. I noticed, though, that it is marked made in Mexico now, instead of Smiths Falls, Ontario. I do not buy it any more."

My favourite toothpaste, Colgate, is made in Mexico now. I have switched to Crest.

You have to read the labels on everything.

This past weekend I was at Wal-Mart. I needed 60W light bulbs. I was in the light bulb aisle, and right next to the GE brand I normally buy was an off-brand labelled, "Everyday Value". I picked up both types of bulbs and compared the stats - they were the same except for the price. The GE bulbs were more money than the Everyday Value brand, but the thing that surprised me the most was the fact that GE was made in Mexico and the Everyday Value brand was made in - get ready for this - a Canadian company in Ontario.

Their Equate Products are also made in Canada, and are very good.

Just to add my own experience on buying Made In Canada, I was looking for for canned mushrooms that were made in Canada and could never find any, so I would buy fresh. Recently I found Ravine mushrooms - made in Canada, with a little red maple leaf on the can. A little more money, but when I opened the can, I saw mushrooms that looked like real mushrooms, not mushrooms that looked as if they were cleaned in bleach.

Another product I no longer buy is Del Monte or Dole canned fruit. Del Monte is packaged in Taiwan and Dole is now a product of China.

Why should we pay for their fruit when our growers are left with fruit rotting on the trees? E. D. Smith is still made in Canada ... buy theirs. At least you will know what is in it and have some quality control. Strubbs Pickles, who made the best dill pickles in the world and top 10 pickled herring, is out of business, probably from the cheap competition from India and Asia.

Smuckers has bought almost every Canadian food maker that is not owned by Kraft. They have closed all the Bicks Pickles plants and moved them to Mexico and the States.

My challenge to you is to start reading the labels when you shop for everyday things and see what you can find that are made in Canada. The job you save may be your own, or your children´s, or your grandchildren´s, or your neighbour´s´!

Throw out the myth that you cannot find products you use every day that are made right here. If you accept this challenge, pass it on to others in your address book so we can all start buying Canadian, one light bulb at a time! Stop buying from overseas companies!

We should have awakened two decades ago. Let´s get with the program. Help our fellow Canadians keep their jobs and create more jobs here in Canada. If President Obama insists on a "Made in America" policy, which is commendable of him, to support American workers, we should do likewise.

Buy Canadian! Read the labels. Support Canadian jobs.

ED. NOTE: Buyers should be aware that a Made in Canada label does not necessarily mean that the contents are Canadian, because companies are allowed to use that label if the packaging is Canadian, even if the contents are from foreign countries.

Catherine Nesbitt forwards these oldies but funnies:

GOING TO CHURCH

A Jewish Rabbi and a Catholic Priest met at the town´s annual 4th of July picnic.

Old friends, they began their usual banter.

"This baked ham is really delicious," the priest teased the rabbi. "You really ought to try it. I know it´s against your religion, but I can´t understand why such a wonderful food should be forbidden! You don´t know what you´re missing. You just haven´t lived until you´ve tried Mrs. Hall´s prized Virginia baked ham. Tell me, Rabbi, when are you going to break down and try it?"

The rabbi looked at the priest with a big grin, and said, "At your wedding."

An elderly woman walked into the local country church. The friendly usher greeted her at the door and helped her up the flight of steps.

"Where would you like to sit?" he asked politely.

"The front row, please," she answered.

"You really don´t want to do that," the usher said. "The pastor is really boring."

"Do you happen to know who I am?" the woman inquired.

"No," he said.

"I´m the pastor´s mother," she replied indignantly.

"Do you know who I am?" he asked.

"No," she said.

"Good," he answered.

A kindergarten teacher gave her class a "show and tell" assignment. Each student was instructed to bring in an object that represented their religion to share with the class.

The first student got up in front of the class and said, "My name is Benjamin and I am Jewish, and this is a Star of David."

The second student got up in front of the class and said, "My name is Mary. I´m a Catholic, and this is a Rosary."

The third student got in up front of the class and said, "My name is Tommy. I am a Methodist, and this is a casserole."

The young couple invited their elderly pastor for Sunday dinner.

While they were in the kitchen preparing the meal, the minister asked their son what they were having.

"Goat," the little boy replied.

"Goat?" replied the startled man of the cloth. "Are you sure about that?"

"Yep," said the youngster. "I heard Dad say to Mom, ´Today is just as good as any to have the old goat for dinner.´"

Lew Carter published this essay in his newsletter, "Lew´s News":

THE WINTER OF MY LIFE

Time has a way of moving quickly and catching you unaware of the passing years. It seems just yesterday that I was young; then came the highlight of my life, my marriage and a new life with my mate. Yet, though it comes back fresh, it seems like eons ago.

Where have they gone, those years. I know I lived them all. I get glimpses of them now and then and of my hopes and dreams, and I not only face the winter of my life but I´m in it, and it´s caught me by surprise. How did I get here so fast? Where did my youth go? And all the years of my life?

I remember seeing older people through the years and thinking that they were way ahead of me, and winter was so far ahead of me I couldn´t imagine what it would be like. But here it is. My friends are retired and getting gray. They move more slowly and so do I.

I once was young and eager and able, but now I´ve become one of those old people that I never realized I´d be. Just getting a shower is a real accomplishment, and taking a nap isn´t a luxury, it´s mandatory. If I don´t lie down intending to nap, I´ll fall asleep where I sit.

I knew it was coming, yet I´m unprepared for all the aches and pains, and the loss of strength, and the ability to go out and do things that I wish I´d done but never did. Of course I have regrets. There are things I wish I hadn´t done, but I can´t go back and live life over. What´s done is done. There´s no going back.

If you´re not in your winter yet, let me remind you that it will be here sooner than you think. In fact, you may be in your winter now and not know it. Whatever you want to accomplish in your life, get with it. Do the things you want to be remembered for and share life with your loved ones. The way you live your life is your gift to all of those who come after. Live it well. There´s still time. Start now.

SUGGESTED WEBSITES

Carol Hansen has not yet tried the method shown in this site for separating the yolk of an egg from the white, but finds it interesting. It is easy to follow, even if you do not speak the language:

Catherine Nesbitt forwards this link to a video of a 100-year-old woman on the Jay Leno show. You will enjoy the interview with her, and she even plays the harmonica:

Pat Moore recommends this site for people who love elephants. These Dutch tourists were lucky to happen upon the elephants having a mud bath:

Pat also sends the URL for a short movie based on the factual story about a baseball game on April 26, 2008. It proves that winning has nothing to do with the scoreboard:

Stan French suggests this site to see why Germany has a positive trade balance, in spite of paying workers some of the highest wages in the world:

Sticking a worm tower right into the soil will keep your garden fertilized with worm castings that improve soil fertility, water holding ability, and drainage. It´s simple to build, and it´s like getting a little super nutrient composting action right there on the spot.

What should a community do with its unused land? Plant food, of course. With energy and humour, Pam Warhurst tells at the TEDSalon the story of how she and a growing team of volunteers came together to turn plots of unused land into communal vegetable gardens, and to change the narrative of food in their community.

To check out the features of the "freedictionary", which changes daily, go to