Friday, December 18, 2020

Half Way There

 

Half Way There from guest blogger, D.J. McGowan

I was going to continue my theme about movies/stories/ entertainment this week but I saw a post from my son that I liked very much and asked if I could post it here. He agreed.

Despite all the lock-downs, deaths and over-loaded hospitals the world has been experiencing over the last few months we still hear/see statements made that this is all a conspiracy of the “one world government”.

Give your head a shake; at government meetings even allies can’t even agree on what coffee will be served. If they do agree it’s because they made some concession on another subject.

As a result I found the following post by Douglas J. McGowan to be interesting, entertaining and timely.

Doug worked in retail for a couple of years before joining the Canadian Army. He was with the Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry, the R.C.A.F. as a meteorologist, and retired from the Royal Engineers as a Master Corporal. He presently traverses Western Canada as a Commercial Driver.

Below his picture is his “half way there” post.

 


 

Ok friends, we’re about half way there. I spent a lot of time with my grandpa when I was little, he never spoke much, but one thing he did let me know was when we were half way there.

Grandpa Royal watched his dad die of a heart attack on the kitchen table when he was 11. To support his mother and two sisters he went to work running the horse teams skidding logs to clear all those beautiful back roads in the Blue Mountains of Ontario we all take for granted. Then he’d come home to the farm and do chores.

Mom was diagnosed with cancer when I was 7, and I lost her at 9. She spent a lot of that time in hospital, and I spent a lot of that time with my grandpa.

Now 50 years after he himself was that young boy working in the bush, I was there, and grandpa had left the horse teams for an antique JD caterpillar that he always kept well painted and clean.

When my age was still in the single digits, I had learned to stand well away from that steel cable under tension when he was winching out a log. It was a good thick cable that would most likely never snap in another 50 years, and I don’t think it ever did, but he taught me to stand back and knowing an 8 year old child probably had about the same patience as a young colt, he’d always tell me when we were half way to getting the log out, and half way to the total time I needed to remain in the safe area. I was also always told which field had the bull in it. It’s not that I ever was afraid of anything, it was just that obeying grandpa was the right thing to do.

Ten years later when I went to the Infantry, I learned not to step over a log when scouting, and not to put a mag on or a round in the chamber until the RSO told me to, and I checked my fire when the Umpire Staff told me to. It was made clear to me some decisions weren’t mine to make. The probability of anything happening was negligible, but to obey was the right thing to do.

Now I wear my H2S monitor on lease sites and at loading Plants. I sit in my cab and fill out my Last Minute Risk Assessment, and if the site boss tells me to walk around in my sock feet, well, I walk around in my sock feet.

We’re about half way there folks - we still have to get the work done. The firewood has to be got, our level of capability has to be maintained, and productivity needs to be supported, but let’s do all we can as individuals to control our environment and keep others safe, because it’s the right thing to do.

 D.J. McGowan

Saturday, December 5, 2020

I’ve always been a big movie fan

I just love the “view”.

Not so much the screen showing clothes, or pretty women or so-called “glamour” but the look into a different world than the one I inhabited. The look into the world of war (seldom depicted as ugly as it is) or a story about the experience of escaping from war. (“Oh, it’s all about great songs and harmony singing?” Sure it is.) Perhaps it's a chance to use deduction to solve the crime before the writers reveal the solution. It was entertainment from a different place and it can show the viewers how to make entertainment in their own world.
    As said in a line from a Jim Stafford song, "take a trip and never leave the farm".

     

Then I began to study the writing, acting and directing. Is it a good story? Could it be a better story? Do you believe the way he delivered that line? The character he created? Why did they jump from New York to Arizona?


          Then there was a period where several movies were released that I had and still have no interest in. Yes, I saw a few and thought, “I could have written something more interesting than that” or perhaps, “A few plot twists might have made it interesting.” Not funny, not informative or enlightening, not glamorous, predictable --- just not “there”.

          But apparently they were “the velly height of awetistic expression, don’t you know,” since someone kept writing and someone kept producing them.

          “Well, if you don’t like what is available, tell your own story!”

          As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve been around more than just a few days. I am relatively comfortable with my past despite having made several mistakes both embarrassing and serious. Therefore I have some experiences I can document and stories I’ve heard upon which I can expand. I’ve even managed an understanding of my own motivation and am able to make a good guess at others.

          So I started putting some of those stories in print. I found that I very much enjoyed the writing. When I later received comments about those stories I found I enjoyed that as well.

          There is another great benefit to writing.



          I’ve mention some of my favorite story tellers in previous writing. They include (and are not limited to) Michael Connolly, David Baldacci, Lee Child, Louis L’Amour, Tom Clancey and William W. Johnston. But after a while I find that I’ve read what is offered and I try someone new. If it is a story that I have to “fight my way” through then I sit down and write my own story. Usually, when I have completed this “new” story I can say, “There, that’s better.”

          But there is more to just the writing than the creating of enjoyment for the reader which, I tell myself, is what I am doing. When I am in “that place”, the world where the story takes place, I have “just taken a trip and didn’t leave the farm” and Jim Stafford’s Wildwood Weed had nothing to do with it.


Who is on your Christmas list?

Ship to any address for those versions in print.
Any email addresses for digital or Kindle versions.
"Look inside" before you order.
Isolated? Staying home?
Chose the best delivery date. Perhaps December 23rd us appropriate?
Or simple click on the cover of "Gunfighters, Thieves and Lawmen" off to the right --- that'll take you to the same place.