I went to a line dancing class yesterday. The first time I have done that kind of thing in fifty years. No kidding. In high school I used to square dance and do 'country dances', which is essentially square dance in two long lines. Loved it. Unfortunately I married a man who can't do this kind of dancing and so I lost track of it. And I thought I had forgotten how until about half way through the class when I stopped stumbling over my own feet and knocking into the people beside me and my feet took off. In little bits, that is. I still lost track from time to time, but I have the basics of two dance lines and can do the first one with full speed music. And I loved it. It is so nice to realize that you still have a skill that you thought was long gone.

What is line dancing? This is -- although this is one pretty slick foursome.

What's with the class? Well, it goes back to government money. The Province of Ontario came up with some funds last year to get seniors to be more active. Our township got a chunk of it and commissioned a small study to see what seniors would like to do, if it were available.

In our township there are a lot of small community halls, each one supported by a small group of people who like this kind of activity. When the old small townships amalgamated into the big one we now have, all the little township halls became the property of the amalgamated township, but the local groups continued to run them. I am a committee member on one of them. Each hall committee gets $1000 per year to run its hall. This basically pays for the telephone and we raise money to keep the halls going by various means -- dinners, euchre parties, rentals for funerals and other celebrations. And we are all very keen on keeping OUR local hall going. So the halls were all asked to send a rep to work on the study and guess who got sucked in. Hi.

We ended up deciding that what was needed was a roving seniors' centre that went from hall to hall and provided exercise opportunities and socialization for seniors and the people who would bring them if they couldn't drive. And the survey of activities turned up with line dancing and shuffleboard as two of the recommendations. We also got a small further grant to put in a facilitator to get it up and going and she is a real darling. So, we have an experimental line dancing class to see how it will be received and I decided I had better go along and show the flag.

Glad I did, even if my knees are squeaking like rusty hinges today. It'll be a while before you see a video of me, however.

Wordless Wednesday

The Christmas dresses were being unpacked today.

Deer in Trouble

Lanark Highlands deer are dodging bullets this morning as the start of the hunting season began at dawn to-day. Local hunters began setting up in the bush well before dawn and soon after sunrise the crash of high powered rifles could be heard in several locations.

Little Buck, the G Acres resident deer, is sticking very close to the house this morning, as the G's have an understanding with the local hunt camp and no hunting is permitted in the vicinity of the house. Reached at his favourite feeding station, Little Buck was resigned. "I plan to stay within a few hundred feet of the house for the next two weeks," he said. "But it is going to be pretty tense."

As the orange coloured bodies whine by on their ATV's, it is not only Little Buck who is tense. All of the local deer are nervous and jumpy, liable to forsake their normal habit patterns and jump out onto the road at the least provocation. Over the next two weeks, a great deal of venison will be harvested for local tables, but the deer population is deeply upset.

Grama sewed up a cat costume.

Danier Leather -- The Follow Up

This morning the mailman delivered me a small express post parcel from Danier Leather. When I opened it, there was a gift card inside for $50.00. That is an impressive sum of money, by my standards, to be giving someone as an apology. I was expecting something in the range of a business card holder. Some years ago we were giving a dinner party and one of the bottles of wine we served turned out to have a pickled grasshopper in the bottom of it. We did not discover this, of course, until the bottle was empty. There were the predictable jokes about the great body of the wine, but JG was upset enough to contact the LCBO and the sales rep for the wine company. We got one (1) replacement bottle and one (1) bottle of the same plonk as an apology. Danier Leather is in a whole different league.

I am just about to dig out my box of cards, find a 'Thank You' one and handwrite a letter of thanks to the company. That is, after my eyes stop whirling.

Wait till the Fundraising Committee sees what we've got for the auction! My experience with charity auctions leads me to think that the best thing to do is to buy something with the card and auction it, as people won't bid much beyond the face value of a gift certificate, but they will push up the price up if something looks particularly succulent.

Is this the power of the internet, do you think, or would the incident have played out the same way if I had just snail mailed the letter and not blogged about it? Is the question worth a BlogRhet post for some discussion on this issue? I would love to know if other people have had that kind of response to posting a complaint.

Will I be there by Candlelight?

I have been obsessed by songs and poems about candles for the last little while. Please forgive me if some of these quotes are not accurate; I'm working from memory here.

Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light
Like a little candle, burning in the night.
In this world of darkness, so let us shine -
You in your small corner and I in mine.

This was my mother and my aunt's favourite hymn. They had jokes about it. My aunt, who could draw amazingly well, once made a cartoon of herself as a candle in a corner. I had it for years, but I can no longer find it. Never mind. Their memories steadily shine away in my heart.

My candle burns at both ends.
It will not last the night.
But, ah my dear, and oh my dear,
It gives a lovely light.

I love candles; at Christmas I celebrate the solstice by lighting candles all over the house. Big fat cinnamon scented red ones, tall silver tapers, a row of tiny green evergreens, a creamy coloured angel with gilt wings, a square green one with holly painted on it. I hover in the living room with a candle snuffer in my hand, but I love every heated minute of it.

Night's candles are burnt out.

There's that still, deep blue or grey moment, every morning, just before the dawn, when everything is an outline. I often wake then, for the most mundane of reasons, and wish I had done so earlier, so that I could have taken a few minutes to look at the stars. We live in the deep country and our neighbours are few and thankfully don't have yard lights. At night I can go out onto the deck or kitchen porch and see a whole sky of blazing stars. Not so much candles as diamonds. A river of them. I don't know why that's such a memorable line of Shakespeare's, except that the scene is so famous.

Yes I answered you last night,
No this morning sir I say.
Colours seen by candlelight
Do not look the same by day.

Candle lit faces are softer, more relaxed. Is that the light, or the effect of the candles? Faces glow, eyes shine, smiles are more vivid. One of the most beautiful photographs I have ever seen was of a child, holding a fat tapered candle, with the light of the flame reflected in her eyes. I lived my childhood with my mother's light reflected on me. She loved the sun. I love stars. And candles.

Panning Elizabeth

The YD and I went to see Elizabeth, the Golden Age, this afternoon. I had read three reviews on the film, one of which was a rave and two were less than enthusiastic. After seeing the film, we are also less than enthusiastic. 'It's so disjointed,' muttered the YD as we left.

Indeed. In trying to hit on all the highlights of the middle years of ERI, the movie has made itself into a series of flashy episodes with no central thread. And the scriptwriters took some really weird liberties with history. (JG says that I know far too much about Elizabethan history and that someone who didn't might not be so underwhelmed.) But! Sir Francis Drake and Sir Walter Raleigh have become one person, flipping cloaks, exhibiting tobacco at court, committing piracy on the high seas and, finally, personally running a fire ship into the Armada, a feat which neither of them performed. I'll forgive them the Armada bit, although why a white horse got equal time and Sir Whatsis had to swim underwater for a long way in his boots, coat and stuffed puffy pants is beyond me.

They haven't aged Blanchett enough either. No one would want her to be less gorgeous, but she was 25 in 1558 and the Armada is shown as arriving in 1585. That's 28 years. 25 + 28 = 53. She should not be discussing with Walsingham the fact that the court physicians can swear that she is still able to bear children. Or she's lying. The real Elizabeth did that a lot. But the poor movie goer is confused.

I could go on, but I am probably boring the Americans to tears. (You should hear me about liberties taken with TLOTR!) In its favour, the film has gorgeous costumes, great special effects, amazing lighting and a wonderful performance from Blanchett. Even with nothing to work with, the woman is amazing. But why they had to bowdlerize her speech to the army at the time of the Armada is beyond me. As is why they chose to show a six year old Isabella of Spain a lot. Mary Queen of Scots is suitably hateful except for the Scottish accent. I can't believe they did that! Her first language was French and she didn't speak much Scots at all, as far as I know. (I am going on. Sorry!)

The YD was a bit put off by the music, also. Too much sound and fury in all the exciting moments. (Torture scenes, Mary's beheading, the storm that did for the Armada, etc.) The YD mentioned that the Tudors are all over the place right now, and she's right. The mini series running on Henry VIII is giving me even more historical heartburn. I'm driving my husband crazy with my whines about historical accuracy. Elizabeth - The Golden Age is worth going to see, though, if you like historical drama. Buy some popcorn and some earplugs and suspend disbelief.

More about Danier

For anyone who has not been reading this thread, I posted a sad story about being ignored in a retail store here, the commenters urged me to write it up as a letter, which is here, and before I send it, the retailer, Danier Leather, found the posted copy and their representative sent me this email.

I talked to the writer of this email this afternoon, a conversation somewhat muddled on my end as I managed to fry my Blue Tooth connection half way through. Annette T was patient with me, however, and we managed to get a two way information exchange done. Although Annette had read the letter and the post it stemmed from, she had not picked up that the main threads of that post were discourtesy in retail personnel (Julie at Using My Words) and discrimination due to age, my ongoing preoccupation. Nor had she picked up on the cross links to BlogRhet threads; not surprising since I noticed that my BlogRhet logo does not link to the blog and that I had not explicitly tagged the BlogRhet threads. (I really didn't structure that post well. I'm an embarrassment to myself.) What I hope she took away is that I was as objective as I could be in recording the incident.

What she got across to me was that she is very good at her job, which is cleaning up after the snags that are bound to happen at a many outlet retail chain, and that she is prepared to take the time and effort to understand the background from which I wrote. I hope she enjoys BlogRhet! As it is her job to do, she ended up by offering me a gift to placate me. I wasn't going to accept it because the acknowledgement of the incident was what I was wanting, but then I thought of my latest effort at fundraising, which is an auction to be held in Christmas shopping season, and accepted. We're into the last $50,000.00 we need, by the way. What she cannot do, of course, is specifically sort out what actually happened -- that's the job of the manager of that outlet, poor thing.

It's quite possible that as a 'consciousness raising' effort, the post and letter have been a success.
It certainly has brought it home to me that I need to structure my posts better and make my points more clearly. The example I used just overwhelmed the main theme, not just in Annette T's mind but in the commenters' as well. Well and so. If the sales staff at Danier are going to get educated about ageism, the least I can do is learn from it also.

Danier Leather is Blog Savvy

Like, Whoosh!

When I got home from a day of meetings, I found the following email in reply to the one I posted yesterday. And the letters are still sitting in my car because I forgot I was out of stamps. Now I'm embarrassed -- I should have posted the letters in the mail before I posted the letter. On the other hand, this is certainly one quantum leap faster than snail mail. I intend to phone Ms Trocki in between tomorrow's meetings (fundraising is still taking over my life) and will report back. But certainly this is a pretty comprehensive and courteous reply to my specific concerns.

Dear Mary,

I am responding on behalf of Jeffrey
Wortsman. Our customer service department and Mr. Wortsman himself, regularly check blogs to anticipate any service issue and we came across yours. Although we have not received your letter, we would certainly like to assist you. I would like to begin by apologizing for the level of service you received from our Kanata location. This is not the way we strive to do business. We would also like to thank you for taking the time in giving your feedback, it is important for us to hear from our customers for our growth and improvement. I would love the opportunity to redeem our company in your eyes. At your convenience, please contact me at 1-877-9danier to discuss this further. The district manager for that location, as well as the VP of Store Operations are aware of what occurred and will follow up with the store staff through coaching and
training.

I look forward to speaking with you soon.

Kind regards,

Annette T
Call Centre
Operations, Manager
Danier Leather Inc.

Letter to Danier Leather

To the commenters on the 'Ouch that Hurt' post. Here it is and I am about to mail it.

Mr. Jeffrey Wortsman,
President and Chief Executive Officer
DANIER LEATHER INC
2650 St. Clair Avenue West
Toronto ON Canada
M6N 1M2

Dear Mr Wortsman,

On October 5th, 2007, I visited your Kanata Centrum store and was very unhappy with the experience. Here is a description of what happened:

I wanted to buy to buy my husband a wallet as a birthday gift. I have shopped in your stores before; in fact, I have purchased, over several years, four coats and have never been unhappy with the service. I am a white haired senior citizen and on that day I was dressed (as I mostly always dress) in tidy but inexpensive clothes. I entered your store and found four staff members behind the counter, one serving a customer, two working at something and the fourth acting as greeter. She greeted me but did not follow up. I asked for the location of the wallets and one of the workers raised her head and pointed. I went and chose a wallet and returned to the counter to pay for it. I saw two cash registers, one in use. I stood there and no one looked at me. I walked up to the counter. No one seemed to notice.

The door of the store opened and a woman came in. The greeter said hello, the woman made a remark about the scent of leather and the greeter asked her if this was her first time in this store. When she said yes, the greeter walked past me and my wallet and offered to show her around the store. The clerk at the cash register was taking a long time, arranging a payment of some sort. The other two clerks did not raise their eyes from their binders. I waited. I started off interested in how long it would take for someone to notice me. After, maybe, five minutes, no one had. At that point I was so angry that I was afraid to say anything lest I lose it completely. I put the wallet down on the counter, slowly, stepped back, slowly, and walked out of the store. No one noticed.

You are quoted in a news article as saying : "We are taking the necessary steps to return the Company to profitability and are employing strategies that focus on our key customers." Senior citizens are very likely to have available cash to spend. And in the near future the number of senior citizens is going to increase dramatically. You would, in my opinion, be wise to advise your staff that conservatively dressed seniors might be key customers.

Yours truly,

Ouch, that hurt!

There's been a somewhat amusing discussion going on in the Ottawa paper lately. Seems that Reader's Digest did an article in which they set up phoney incidents in some of Canada's major cities to judge how courteous the city was. They ranked the cities, and Ottawa came in dead last. The Ottawa Citizen replicated the phoney incidents, and several articles and editorials on the subject have appeared, the latest in this morning's paper saying that Reader's Digest is unimportant. I found this funny because early this month I found the perfect candidate for the Rudest Retail Store. Serendipitiously (ew, is that a word?) Julie at Using My Words did a post on courtesy.

You want a perfect example of rudeness (and ageism, too!)? I've got it. I went into a leather goods retail outlet -- it's a chain with four stores in Ottawa -- to buy my husband a wallet as a birthday gift. I have shopped in this chain before; in fact, I've spent considerable money there. On this particular day I was dressed as I mostly always dress, in decent but not expensive clothes, but I am a very obviously a senior citizen and, er, a substantial one. I entered this particular outlet and found four clerks behind the counter, one serving a customer, two working at something and the fourth acting as greeter. Her eyes slid by me. I asked for the location of the wallets and one of the workers raised her head and pointed. I went and chose a wallet and returned to the counter to pay for it. There were two cash registers, one in use. I stood there and no one looked at me. I walked up to the counter. No one seemed to notice.

The door of the store opened and a woman came in, a slim, well dressed thirty something. The greeter said hello, the woman paused and the greeter asked her if this was her first time in this store. When she said yes, the greeter walked past me and my wallet and offered to show her around the store. The clerk at the cash register was taking a long time, arranging a deferred payment of some sort. The other two clerks did not raise their eyes from their binders. I waited. And waited. I started off interested in how long it would take for someone to notice me. After, maybe, five minutes, no one had. At that point I was so angry that I was afraid to say anything lest I lose it completely and become the gaga senior everyone dreads. I put the wallet down on the counter, slowly, stepped back, slowly, and walked out of the store. No one noticed.

My debacle took place over three weeks ago, but I was telling the story at dinner on Saturday and I realized that I am still angry. Very angry. I should write to the store manager, except I am pretty sure she was one of the people behind the counter. I should write to the company headquarters, I suppose. I haven't because, written down, it looks so petty and I don't want a 'Getoverit' response. I think what was so awful was that I felt invisible. Not worthy to be a customer in this expensive store. I would expect that all of the clerks work on commission, and the wallets are probably the least expensive items in the store. But someone should have told the staff that a customer buying a wallet might just return and buy something more expensive and, therefore, should be worth a minimum of notice and that senior citizens often have money to spend.

It's tempting to name the store here and tag the chain name. But that's petty, too, if I do it without having tried to inform the chain management first. I've always had empathy for the visibly different people who are discriminated against. The little kid who can't get served. The wheelchair bound person whom other people's eyes slide past. The people of colour who are judged by skin tone. The fragile old lady whose companion is asked questions when she, herself, can answer them. People whose accents cause rude requests for repeats. All those. I've frequently admired the calm and good humour with which such people respond to rudeness.

Now I am one of them. I am sure I could have used calm and good humour to salvage the situation. Instead I was so angry I cried. And I have stayed angry. And sad. And more tolerant of the focused fury with which some minority leaders demand attention to their perceived incidents of bigotry and bias.

And, in response to the Citizen's 'Fuggetaboutit' editorial, yes, it is all a matter of perspective.

The toad beneath the harrow knows
Exactly where each tooth-point goes;
The butterfly upon the road
Preaches contentment to that toad.

Joining the Raging Grannies is starting to look like an option.