The Whiddens of Calgary

Things are getting very different, very quickly…the mountains are behind us now, and the flat of the eastern side of the Rockies has begun…just as you drop down into Denver and from there east it becomes the flat plains of the U.S. so here, the prairie provinces begin to take on their character…. It’s harvest time on the prairie…large, strange looking machines work the land….cutting, raking, baling the different crops….Huge round bales of hay and alfalfa sit like fat checkers sitting on their sides in the extensive fields….rows of plants for canola oil dry In rows waiting to be swooped up and separated by large combines…..the wheat is tall now, has turned golden. and dances in the wind waiting for just that moment for harvest. The late summer skies are filled with clouds which blow in off the Rockies and scatter themselves across the landscape in a continually changing array of white puffs….The shadows of the clouds slowly work their way from hay section to hay section. At one point some creative farmer began to put hats on fence posts…mostly baseball caps, but others of all styles from fedoras, to cowboy hats, to some that got left behind by the red hat ladies…they now string every 8 feet for over 2 miles, and add to the interesting drive. “The wind comes sweeping o’er the plains,” as Rogers and Hammerstein tell us, and they have put up the wind turbines to harvest that aspect of life here on the edge of the prairie….all this has just been a primer for what is to come because we will hit the heart of it in the next few days…everybody tells us to be prepared for boring mile after mile of wheat and crops..but this is what we’ve come to see, so we await that with anticipation, just as we did the mountains. We’re staying with another wonderful Servas family, the Whiddens here in Calgary…it has been a really nice fit for us here…John is an elementary school teacher in a very diverse school…there are 26 languages spoken in the homes of the students in his school. He’s taught everything from kindergarten to 7th grade. He has a quiet demeanor which is very becoming and he and I had great conversations about a lot of different topics…He is very patient and even when the his teen-age daughters are bickering. He keeps his cool and just finds non-confrontational ways to solve the issue..His kids adore him, and he takes time to be with them from playing volleyball with them in the street , to reading to them as he has all their lives…it’s a nightly ritual, even when there are strangers in the house. Colleen is the family busy-bee…she’s a university professor of music at the University of Calgary and has done musical productions at the university, as well as community choral productions…It’s a family affair…the girls sing in the productions…John played Nanki Poo in the Mikado. . She’s flits here and there with auditions and rehersals and she has an exuberance about her that is infectious, and I know her students would follow her over a cliff if she asked them to.

Aleida, 15, is quiet and beautiful, and has a very calm demeanor. She doesn’t say much, but she reminds me of my friend in Uzbekiistan, Nigora, who also has a lot more going on inside than she lets out. But she’s quick on the uptake and can hold her own in repartee with anyone, even an old man from the south. However, Twyla who is 13, is the pistol of the family, and reminds Carol and me so much of why we enjoyed teaching middle school. She’s Kim Genschmer all over again, and that’s not a bad thing to be, certainly. She is bright ,energetic, full of life and herself…all a joyful combination of the exuberance of life. Last night’s entertainment was a visit to the Goodwill Store…Twyla found a wedding dress that she “Just had” to have…half price, at $35 dollars…she had the money..John and Colleen just shrugged their shoulders and let it be…We were regaled by the fashion show upon returning to the house…Twyla, so tiny, with this huge wedding dress with long train….Carol helped her see the loop which helped hold the train up while the bride dances. She also brought out another dress that she had bought previously for her princess costume for Halloween… We’ve been invited to stay another day with them and will gladly accept to be a part of their lives a little bit longer….Servas people are so open and generous…we look forward to meeting more families on our trek across this vast and beautiful land. John and Colleen have given the girls a wonderful jump-start on life by taking them on world tours of 4 months each over the past three years…to Europe, S.E. Asia, and to the Middle East…they took time off work to do this for the girls, and traveled by the “chicken bus” across the lands, giving the girls a true picture of life in these countries as lived by real people, not just the movers and shakers of society…I admire them greatly for what seeds that they have planted in their daughters….they are amazing young ladies…so mature and will do so well in life because their parents have given them a gift that will remain with them always. Twyla was just 11 when they made their first odyssey. Yesterday we went to the “head-smashed-in buffalo jump.” It is the area where the “first nations” (native populations) drove buffalo over a cliff where they would harvest the animals. For my friends overseas who don’t understand the importance of the buffalo to the native tribes of North America, the buffalo was the lifeblood of their society providing meat, clothing, shelter…all aspects of their lives were dependent upon the presence of the buffalo…many theories contend that the tribes of the American west were never defeated militarily as much as they were starved into submission by the killing of the buffalo herds which deprived them of their way of life. Anyway, it was very well presented, with indigenous people explaining the process and a well-done video presentation…Fort Macloed also gave us a picture of early life on the prairie….as the North West Mounted police (eventually the Royal Canadian Mounted Police) took control of the land in a much more peaceful manner than the blue coats to the south… Calgary was a far more cosmopolitan setting than I expected….lots of new skyscrapers going up (can you say oil money?) with some very interesting and unique architecture…lots of languages being spoken on the street, and a feeling of vibrancy. Carol says it isn’t just the famous “Stampede town” that she remembers. It is really a sprawling city…it builds out not up, with the exception of the oil buildings down town…Edmonton had it’s “Petroleum Club,” high rollers only please, and I’m sure Calgary has the same…there’s money here folks…and they flaunt it….there are mile after mile of upscale housing developments…3 car garage a minimum with 4 very prevalent….it just goes on and on and on…John said that Calgary has a bigger footprint than New York city….that really boggled my mind, especially when he said it had a population of just one million…I was figuring minimum 3 at the sprawl…. We said our farewells this morning and let the family get back to their routine..Aleida gets her bathroom back and their lives will smoothly glide from step to step again…but we will always be fond of our time there…our spirits are taking good care of us and guiding us to people who add greatly to our lives… We’re on the border of Alberta and Saskatchewan in Medicine Hat…but that’s another story.