About me …
I have been a public servant for nine years, a published writer for 34 and an educator for 37. My years in education spanned the gamut from pre-school to post-secondary, mostly at the two ends: teaching/learning with young children (15 years in kindergarten and primary and an equal period sharing with parents, other adults and student teachers).
My writing has been mostly op-ed political and historical commentaries with forays onto the travel and religion/spirituality pages. For a decade I was a regular contributor to the “Commentary” spot following “The World at Eight” on CBC Radio One. .
I’ve been itinerant for many of those years. I’ve learned, written and taught in Alberta (Edmonton and Calgary), BC (Kamloops, Vancouver and Vancouver Island, Sunshine Coast), Québec (Laval and Montréal), and the UK (Glasgow, London, Surrey). I’ve lived for shorter/earlier periods in Saskatchewan, Ontario, New Brunswick, and France. Edmonton has been my home since 2003 and for a number of years before that.
I have visited all of Canada’s provinces and territories except the newest, Nunavut (plan to make it there soon) and still know only a fraction of the immensity of Canada’s lands and peoples. Yet I know the many-splendoured Canadian spirit well. I am that.
I hold degrees in Political Science, Education and History. Before these, I was close to an associateship in music that I may yet complete in the second half of my life.
I’ve harvested grain on the prairies, picked fruit in the Okanagan, and been out in coastal shell fishing boats. I did not become even a competent amateur in any of these trades yet observing them taught me something about the lives and skill sets we depend on.
In these wanderings I’ve landed in some places at noteworthy times: living in Montréal in the 1970 October Crisis, in England during a Thatcher election (I volunteered for the SDP in two ridings including the only one in which Margaret—then Roberts—ever lost.)
In a second sojourn in Québec—a teaching exchange—I found myself in an almost-general strike as the honeymoon of the René Lévesque years wore off. “Il m’as trahi(e)”
Later that year I was studying in Vichy, France the summer of the lead up to the Claus Barbie (the “Butcher of Lyon”) trial: my closest approach to Holocaust history. It turned out the house where I was saying was not far from Marshall Pétain’s but it was difficult to find anyone who would tell me that. “On n’avait pas de choix” I heard a lot.
I’ve been a feminist almost lifelong, before the word was recharged in the 1970s.. I first discovered it in the encyclopedia, working on a report in Grade 8. The article mentioned Abraham Lincoln as an example—and I decided that described me. I already knew things Paul of Tarsus wrote about women were wrong, no matter who said them or where.
A major influence in my childhood and adolescent years was the lay leadership school founded by my parents in the 1950s. There are four aspects of this that I carry forward:
These tenets underlie my writing and of the Canadian Classroom on Rails I am building.
I have been a public servant for nine years, a published writer for 34 and an educator for 37. My years in education spanned the gamut from pre-school to post-secondary, mostly at the two ends: teaching/learning with young children (15 years in kindergarten and primary and an equal period sharing with parents, other adults and student teachers).
My writing has been mostly op-ed political and historical commentaries with forays onto the travel and religion/spirituality pages. For a decade I was a regular contributor to the “Commentary” spot following “The World at Eight” on CBC Radio One. .
I’ve been itinerant for many of those years. I’ve learned, written and taught in Alberta (Edmonton and Calgary), BC (Kamloops, Vancouver and Vancouver Island, Sunshine Coast), Québec (Laval and Montréal), and the UK (Glasgow, London, Surrey). I’ve lived for shorter/earlier periods in Saskatchewan, Ontario, New Brunswick, and France. Edmonton has been my home since 2003 and for a number of years before that.
I have visited all of Canada’s provinces and territories except the newest, Nunavut (plan to make it there soon) and still know only a fraction of the immensity of Canada’s lands and peoples. Yet I know the many-splendoured Canadian spirit well. I am that.
I hold degrees in Political Science, Education and History. Before these, I was close to an associateship in music that I may yet complete in the second half of my life.
I’ve harvested grain on the prairies, picked fruit in the Okanagan, and been out in coastal shell fishing boats. I did not become even a competent amateur in any of these trades yet observing them taught me something about the lives and skill sets we depend on.
In these wanderings I’ve landed in some places at noteworthy times: living in Montréal in the 1970 October Crisis, in England during a Thatcher election (I volunteered for the SDP in two ridings including the only one in which Margaret—then Roberts—ever lost.)
In a second sojourn in Québec—a teaching exchange—I found myself in an almost-general strike as the honeymoon of the René Lévesque years wore off. “Il m’as trahi(e)”
Later that year I was studying in Vichy, France the summer of the lead up to the Claus Barbie (the “Butcher of Lyon”) trial: my closest approach to Holocaust history. It turned out the house where I was saying was not far from Marshall Pétain’s but it was difficult to find anyone who would tell me that. “On n’avait pas de choix” I heard a lot.
I’ve been a feminist almost lifelong, before the word was recharged in the 1970s.. I first discovered it in the encyclopedia, working on a report in Grade 8. The article mentioned Abraham Lincoln as an example—and I decided that described me. I already knew things Paul of Tarsus wrote about women were wrong, no matter who said them or where.
A major influence in my childhood and adolescent years was the lay leadership school founded by my parents in the 1950s. There are four aspects of this that I carry forward:
- an approach to life that includes inquiry, intellect and inspiration in harmony
- a non-creedal stance to Truth. We can never capture it in words for all times and places. No one can define “Canadian.” We can describe and share our discoveries
- leadership training/education - not limited to academics and subject experts and
- the importance of integrated, supportive, non-invasive community on our journey
These tenets underlie my writing and of the Canadian Classroom on Rails I am building.