You Never Know What Life Brings

A long time ago I learned that every decision you make will affect the rest of your life. Some decisions are difficult, some are easy. Some bring you trouble, some bring you success, and apparently some bring you family you never knew you had.

I don't know what made me decide within the past couple of years to try to draw. My high-school art teacher told me I had no talent for it, so I stopped even trying more than 55 years ago.  A funny thing happens as you age. You no longer care how good you are at something, or what others think of your efforts to do things you enjoy. For instance, I sing when I'm among other seniors. I doubt that I can carry a tune, but seniors don't make fun of each other the way kids do. I'll get up in front of them and talk too. I don't know if I make any sense when I do that as I don't write out a speech first, but for some reason it doesn't make me nervous anymore. And so, now I also draw and post the results on social media for all to see. I did that all through the month of October for Inktober. The rules said to draw something every day in ink and post it online no matter how it turned out.  I got lots of support, in most cases, and it gave me confidence to continue.

This is where the decision to take part had an effect. Someone I didn't even know liked my drawings enough to reach out and ask me if I would draw their dog. I basically said it would depend on the photograph. After a week or so she sent me a few photos to choose from. Most of them had the dog in the distance, and I could have gotten off easily doing one of them, but I wanted her to be able to recognize her pooch. So, I chose a picture that was more of a close up, but it was really hard for me to see certain key parts of it, like the eyes, and the ears. I ran it through my photo editor a few times until I thought I had some idea of how to attack it. Then I told her I'd give it a try.

She had offered to pay me, so this would have been my first commissioned work. But I didn't know how to charge for that. I have sold photographs and paintings in the past, but I figured a commission is likely worth more, since you are trying to make someone else happy, instead of them just finding something you have already done that they would like to take home. I sent out feelers to people who have done commissions and got a lot of advise.  A common theme seemed to be that I should charge by the hour a fee of  at least minimum wage, for however long it would take me to draw the subject and then add on the cost of my supplies. They also insisted that I should get half before I even began. Well, I had no idea how long it would take, and so I didn't know how much half would be either. Worse than that, since I'm new at this, I wasn't even sure I could produce a dog that would be recognizable to the owner.

Coming up with a price and taking anything up front was causing me to stall. I wasn't comfortable with that at all. I asked questions while I was thinking about it. I asked what kind of dog it was as it looked like it might be a poodle cross of some kind. It had the curly hair, but didn't have as pointy a snout as I'd expect a poodle to have. It turned out to be a purebred Parti Poodle. I'd never heard of those before, but it at least gave me something to look up online if I needed to clarify the shape of things. I asked how big she wanted the drawing and she left that up to me, as long as it was at least 5 x 7. I asked which of my Inktober drawings had caught her eye enough to contact me for this job. There were, after all, various styles done with all different kinds of pens. She just said she like my drawings. I decided ballpoint pen would be the best choice, for this particular dog. I told her I had to get some better paper as I didn't want to just do it in my sketchbook. That was really just another stall tactic.  I went off to look for some hot press watercolour paper and had decided I would draw the dog as an 8 x 10 since I knew how to price a photo at that size, so I at least had a base number to work from.  I found a pack of mixed media boards that said they were good for crisp smooth lines. I'd never worked on such a surface before, and they were 9 x 12 but I bought them anyway.  She seemed happy with my size choice.

That's when I made a whole new decision. I had been enjoying the whole process of drawing everyday until someone mentioned a possible payment. As we had not discussed that further and I really didn't want to bring it up again, I decided I would just do the job for the fun and experience and accept whatever I was offered upon delivery. I could have just mailed it, but I wanted to see her face when she saw the drawing as I hoped to be able to tell if she was happy with it or not. We arranged to meet.

When she arrived she was not alone. She had a sister with her.  As I mentioned previously, I had never met this lady before.  I did know that we were related in some way though but I didn't know she had a sister. Automatically, I got another relative!  It seems that while they also knew we were related, they didn't know exactly how. Once I verified who their father was I was able to explain that my uncle was their grandfather, and while we had all met this man at some point in our childhood, none of us ever knew him well. We had a lovely visit, and I do hope to see more of them in the future.

I believe the drawing was somewhat recognizable, and accepted by the new owner. My decisions all worked out in the end. I was rewarded with a bag of expensive goodies, I earned valuable experience, and scored a couple of new cousins.  Not bad for having a bit of fun and learning a lot in the process and all because I made the decision to start drawing again after so many years.

Heritage Pie

A long lost cousin I've reconnected with on Facebook posted a scan of an old recipe she found recently. Apparently she has been sorting through things and eliminating clutter, just as I have been doing.  Sorting recipes always slows me down because I have way too many of them and I try every year to find a way to get them more organized and get rid of duplicates. She was having a problem too, but it was more because some needed to be rewritten before being tossed. And how do you toss away a piece of paper with your own Grandmother's handwriting on it, even if it is damaged by oil and time? Such things tug at the heart.

The recipe was for a Butterscotch Pie and for some reason I downloaded it. Probably because I have my own fond memories of Vera Coughlin.

 It wasn't easy to read, so I tried running it through some editing software, but all I really succeeded in doing was to get the yellow out of the paper and changing the size. I printed off my best effort and went about trying to decipher the words that had nearly faded away. I had just rolled out the last of my Christmas pastry and needed a filling for a single crust pie. I decided this was a good time to try this heritage pie.

As I began to mix the ingredients together, I was suddenly aware that the dear lady had not spelled out tablespoon and teaspoon as even tbsp and tsp. I had to hope that "T" was tablespoon and "t" was teaspoon and that it wasn't just a quirk of her handwriting that caused her to capitalize one of the T's and not the other.

There was another part of the recipe that confused me. It looked like she wanted me to add the warm milk to the egg yolks, but if you've ever made lemon pie filling from a package, you know you would add the egg yolks to the mixture in the pot, along with some of the cold water, before adding the hot liquid. I decided to do this the same way.

In the end, it all worked out, and I will write out the recipe in a manner I can understand for future reference.

Butterscotch Pie
1/4 cup butter
1 cup brown sugar
5 tbsp flour
pinch of salt
1 tsp vanilla
2 egg yolks (reserve the whites for meringue)x
2 cups of milk, divided

Cream together butter, brown sugar, flour, salt and vanilla in a pot.
Beat egg yolks with a 1/2 cup of the milk and stir into sugar mixture until well blended. Heat the remaining 1 1/2 cups of milk until it's hot but not boiling and pour into the pot with the rest of the ingredients.  Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly. When bubbles break the surface, cook for another 30 seconds. Pour into cooled 9" pie shell and top with meringue.

Meringue
Beat 2 egg whites until soft peaks form.
Gradually add 1/4 cup of white sugar and beat on high for 2 minutes until stiff peaks form.

It's a Small World After All

A "degree of separation" is a measure of social distance between two people. Six degrees of separation is the theory that each one of us is connected to each other with only six, or less, people between us.  Like a friend of a friend of mine, knows someone who knows someone who knows you.  Sometimes those chains are much shorter.

I've run into this sort of thing on Facebook a couple of times now.
A couple of months ago the mother of some of our ex-karate students became a "friend" of mine of on Facebook.  Immediately I saw that we had one friend in common, so I checked to see who that was.  It happened to be someone I've never actually met, but have been talking to online since well before Windows took over the computer world. We used to chat by way of the BBS forums back in the 1990's, and have kept in touch one way or another ever since.  It turns out these two women were neighbours and good friends in BC when they were very young. Both now live here in Ontario with me.

More recently a lady I've known for 36 years decided it would be interesting if each of her Facebook friends told us where they were actually born.  I spotted someone who listed Campbellford as her birthplace.  My Mom was from Campbellford, and I still have an aunt there.  I took the conversation into the background, and used the e-mail system to tell her who my uncle was, as I felt he would have been well known there.  It only took a moment before she told me her mom is his cousin.  That meant we were cousins too.  Then I tried to determine which side of my Mom's family we were related on, and by then she had her mom chatting with me also.  It turns out the Mother's grandmother was my grandfather's sister.  On top of that, the Mother said, her mother's grandfather was married to someone from the other side of my mom's family.  So here I have two new cousins, connected to me through both sides of my mother's family.  Actually, there are more cousins out there, since the girl I first found on Facebook has a couple of brothers.  The fun could just be starting.


I asked what the connection was between the girl from Campbellford, and my local friend.  It seems the met through some game online.  It's just by chance then, that I've now gotten connected to this branch of my family.  After chatting a bit we found there are several other coincidences running through our families. It's like a pattern or something.

And I really had to laugh when the Mother left a note on my page last night that mentioned someone else she found on my friends list.  Apparently he is her ex-father-in-law's grandson.  I only know him through the martial arts but it all goes to prove, we are all connected more closely than we seem to think.

The Family Thread

Once upon a time, more than 40 years ago, I worked with a single lady who often talked about her cousin. It seems he used to come to Ottawa from time to time, and take her out on the town. I heard about him for close to 5 years, before I finally met him one evening when I happened to be at her place when he showed up. She had always referred to him as Cousin Ron, which amused me as I’d never heard anyone do that before.

Anyway, that evening, he had come for an evening out, and ended up with two females instead of one. From that point on, it was always me who got to go out with him when he wanted an evening out. We eventually married, and moved out of the city.

I had a dear old auntie in Ottawa, who I had a close relationship with. We always made a point of visiting with her when we went into the city. She eventually needed some in home care, and she liked the lady that was assigned that job. Time passed and stories were told, both to us, about her home care worker, and to the home care worker about us. Something clicked. It turned out the home care worker was another cousin of my husband’s. In a city full of people, we found that to be rather amazing.

Eventually my aunt needed to go into a nursing home, and I found her a spot in one within walking distance of my home. It came to pass that a nephew of hers, that I had never met, tried to phone her at her old apartment. When he found the phone had been disconnected, he worried that she may have died. He went through the Ottawa phone book, and called everyone who had my maiden name, trying to find out what had happened to this dear old aunt. Eventually he happened upon my brother, who told him our aunt was fine, and living out here near me. So, this cousin I’d never met before came out to visit me and I took him to see our aunt. This man quickly became my favourite cousin, and we had many visits back and forth over the next several years. I often referred to him as Cousin Bob, to differentiate him from all the many other Bobs I happen to know. The interesting thing though, was that he and my hubby had been in the army together. In other words, my husband has known him far longer than I have. I figure my hubby and I were definitely meant to be together, I guess, as this cousin connection thing just keeps happening over and over again.

Today one of my best friends showed me a photograph and I asked where it was taken. When she told me, I said I knew the place, but I’d never been to that side of the building. And then I mentioned that I am related, in some way, to the owners of that establishment. Apparently, so is she! It would be really cool if we turned out to be cousins too. I am now looking into that and trying to find the connection.

There seems to be a definite pattern here, as to who passes through my life.  This world is a lot smaller than I thought!