nicola vs chair

The chair wants to be pink.

I want it to be white.

For the past three weeks we have been engaged in a battle of wills- me as the aggressor and the chair as the passive-aggressive “victim”.

 

In the middle of moving, for some reason, I decided to refinish this chair. I tell myself that I do not want to move it if it isn’t worth fixing.  But I don’t think that’s the real reason. As I dismantle so much of the life I have spent the past thirty years building, part of me wants to hold on.

 

My parents bought the chair- a decrepit platform rocker- along with a matching loveseat, at an estate auction near Beaverlodge in the early 70s. At the same time, they bought the oak table that currently sits in my dining room, the 6 chairs now owned by my middle child, and a spool bed now owned by my sister. While every other item has been refinished, reupholstered and put to use, the chair has languished in basements, garages and storage sheds for the past 50 years. The upholstery has faded to an ugly green-gray. Pieces have fallen off. The wood seat, replaced at one time with plywood, is mildewed and rotting.  My dad tried refinishing it once and could not get past the red stain that someone, long ago, had applied. A stain that permeated the wood.

My friend Kelly volunteered her husband Bruce to rebuild the seat, so that problem was solved. He is a master at fixing things.

I decided to paint it white to go for a shabby chic look. 

I should have talked to people first but instead I gave it a good wash with mineral spirits and sanded it down lightly before I started painting. The stain immediately bled through. I painted it again. And again. My friend Sheila said to use Bull’s Eye primer so it covered it over with that. Again and again. Still pink. Whatever stain was applied is resistant to change. The chair wants to be pink. My English teacher friends said try shellac primer. So I used that. Better.  But still a little pink.

 

The painting gives me time to think. I think about our upcoming move. We have lived in our current town for 30 years and in our present house for 14 years. Why are we moving? Moving away from our dearly beloved house and a community where we have great friends? A place where we can go to the local brewery and always find people to visit with over a pint? But our kids have moved far away and we want to be just a little bit closer to at least one of them. I do not like the politics of this place and I know I can’t change it. I don’t like the long winters. After the fire, I thought I could help remake the town into something new and better. But it will always be what it is. Part of me feels that if we stay, I will become like this chair, gradually fading away to nothing. 

I need something to restore me.

 

When I move, what will change? Will a different life be a better life? After 30 years here, how much of me has been imbued with the culture and landscape of this place? How much of me will be resistant to change? We would like to move to the Columbia Valley. An acquaintance said, “Oh, then you’ll be mountain people.” We also thought of Vancouver Island, to which my brother’s partner said, “Oh, then you’ll be island people.” Are we mountain people? Are we island people? What would either of those identities entail? The only true geographic identity I have ever had is being a northerner. A northerner, with all the stubbornness, resiliency, “can-do” attitude, creativity, and self-sufficiency that entails.

Can I be something else?

 

I think I am winning my battle with the chair.

 

It’s almost white. But I’m not done yet.

 

I know that when I am finished, I will always see a little pink. I will always know that under the paint, there is a stain embedded deep in the wood. A stain that cannot be removed. Like the chair, for good or for ill, I will always be stained by my history and geography and all those who have impacted me. Whatever replaces the north as home will only ever be a layer over my true self. Underneath, I will be a northerner wherever I go.

Northern Child

Next month my middle child will graduate from university. 

She left home for university a few years ago, full of hopes and dreams. I prayed her journey would be easy and her burdens would be light. But I knew that as a northern child she would face many challenges on the path to her degree. Those of you who have northern children will understand what I mean.

Because your child is a northern child, she is statistically far less likely to have parents with a high school education and even less likely to have parents with a post-secondary degree. Because she is a northern child, she has had less access to health care and is far more likely to experience chronic illness. Because she is a northern child she has had next to no access to mental health services and statistically has a lower life expectancy. Because she is a northern child, she has had fewer options in her K-12 education and fewer opportunities to participate in extracurricular activities, including opportunities in the arts.

Because your child is a northern child, her challenges continue on the first day of college. On that first day, when the children of your urban friends come home to a hot dinner and folded laundry and someone who cares, your child will come home to fast food or a hastily cooked meal she will make herself. Your child will come home to laundry that needed to be done; laundry may never be folded again. Your child will come home to a dorm of kids she doesn't know or an empty apartment.

Because your child is a northern child, she will use her hard earned summer cash to pay the rent and buy food while the children of your urban friends make car payments and buy concert tickets and take spring break in Mexico. She will wrack up debt while others save money.

Because your child is a northern child, she will experience discrimination. People will tell her, in ways subtle and not so subtle, that she is a hick because she grew up in a small town. At times she may doubt her abilities when she realizes that didn't go to the right high school where she didn't have a chance to take calculus or computer programming or belong to the right club or a competitive sports team.

Because your child is a northern child, she may experience terrible loneliness. Your child may struggle. At times, she will feel she doesn't belong and she doesn't fit in and she may not know what to do or where to go. And your child will do all of that all on her own. And while she may give in to feelings of despair and frustration, she will not give up. Because your child is a northern child.

Your child is resourceful. She grew up knowing that if she wanted something to happen, she had to make it happen. Your child is resilient. She has suffered through fires and floods and brutally cold winters and by doing that she learned that she is more than capable of overcoming any hardship that lies ahead. Your child is tenacious. She will not quit until she gets where she needs to go.  

And because your child is a northern child, when she completes her education she will know she worked far harder than her urban counterparts to get her degree. Because she obtained more than an academic education. She learned how to be her own person on her own terms in her own way. When she was sick, she found a doctor. When the rent was due, she paid it. When her friends stayed behind, she made new ones. Your northern child took responsibility for her own life.

And whether your child spends weeks or years in her studies; whether she chooses to return to the north, or travels even further afield, no matter where she goes or what she does, your child has the strength of the north in her bones. Your child has northern ingenuity in her blood. Your child has the pioneer spirit of her ancestors in her heart. She will bloom wherever she plants herself.

Because your child is a northern child.

Your child is the very best child there is.

My northern children.