A Little Bit About Laughter

I used to get into a lot of discussions about God, faith, and religion with my mother during my teen years.  She was the only adult I knew who wouldn't ignore my spiritual confusion or berate me for feeling atheistic.  I think she got annoyed with me, but she's my mother.  She has a high tolerance for annoyance, or at least she should after having four children, all of whom are annoying, not in the least counting myself.  Furthermore, she can't stop interacting with me just because I ask questions about the nature of existence.  Darwin agrees with me.

Anyways, I remember one conversation where I brought up prayer, and my mother told me that post-operative patients who pray experience faster recovery times.  I didn't believe her at first, but then I did the research and discovered that she wasn't just filling my head with maternal niceties: patients actually do experience faster recovery times when they are faithful to a religious denomination and pray regularly.  Apparently, the act of praying relaxes the body, stimulates the mind, and keeps the patient's mood more level.  Whether this is a placebo effect or not, I can't deny it.  The science is actually out there, all conducted by competent medical officials and published in peer-reviewed journals.  Check out PubMed and you'll see what I mean.

Prayer isn't the only act that speeds up recovery and assists in the healing process though.  As I learned in my graduate Indigenous Literature class and my Aboriginal Education courses, laughter also has healing properties similar to prayer.  Laughter and, by extension, humour causes the body to relax, stimulates the mind, and keeps the patient's mood elevated or at the very least more level.  I don't mean to suggest that the effects on the body while laughing are the same as well praying, but they are nevertheless similar.

The reason I'm writing about praying and laughing is because the one thing that really sticks in my memory from Veronica Fedor's visit to our class was her laugh.  It was a whole-body laugh, a lean-your-head-to-the-sky laugh, an open-your-mouth-and-bare-your-teeth laugh.  It was a laugh that took all her intercostal muscles, diaphragm, lungs, heart, neck, throat, larynx, jaw, and tongue to accomplish, a laugh that started somewhere in the depths of her abdomen and rose up to the ceiling of the Bora Laskin auditorium with a strength and force greater than any army or nation.  Hers was a laugh with the weight of ages, one that turned terror into something else, something manageable, something that, in retrospect, could be laughed at.

It's hard to believe her face was the same as the one in her passport.  That Veronica was much more steely and stony than the woman who sat in front of us in the Bora Laskin.  It's difficult to imagine her smiling or laughing when those old photos were taken, but I can't imagine that laugh was born overnight.  That laugh was cultivated.  It was reinforced over the years to withstand the hardships, built like a prayer to accept what cannot be changed and see the humour in it, the dumb luck, the good fortune, and the wonder.

The Ross Rifle

My firearm education began when I was quite young: too young, I imagine, by comtemporary standards.  Forty years ago, there wouldn't be anything strange about a six year old being taught to handle his- or herself around a gun.  Now, it seems, if something has even the slightest potential to do harm, it must be kept out of the child's reach until they're mature enough to handle it.  Of course, by that time, they're past the point of learning about safety or sense, which leads, I would argue, to greater danger in the future.

Not that all children should learn their way around guns.  Knowledge about firearms and weaponry isn't exactly necessary for children.  In my family, it certainly wasn't.  It just so happened that Dad had an interest, and he didn't want that interest to be misconstrued or engaged with irresponsibly.  Hence, the education in rifles at such a young age.  Two things happened in my household when you turned six: 1) you got a Swiss Army knife, and 2) you fired a gun for the first time.  True, it was a BB gun, but still, we handled the bigger hunting rifles when Dad was illustrating was he said were three rules of firearms.

"First," Dad said, "you always check to make sure the gun isn't loaded."  At six years old, I was barely bigger than a toddler, so checking the barrel of a hunting rifle was pretty much impossible on my own.  Nevertheless, I had the open weapon in my hands and was staring down the empty barrel a second later. The way Dad talked about checking the barrel had me paranoid that guns could somehow load themselves when you weren't looking.  Every time I stared into the barrel, I half expected to stare into darkness, the pinhole of light at the mouth of the weapon sealed up behind a bullet.  That was never the case.

The solid click of metal as the gun sealed shut still gives me shivers.  I am still scared of getting my finger caught in the interlocking metal sheaths, slicing open my skin or creasing my flesh into blood blisters.  Every time Dad and I get out the guns, I have phantom pain in my fingers, small stinging spasms like the gun barrel has nipped me.

"Second," Dad pressed his index finger on the stock, "never put your finger on the trigger till your ready to fire."  I lived in gun culture, even then, so much so that I couldn't fathom not having my finger on the trigger if I was holding a gun.  Dirty Harry never held the stock.  Han Solo never stayed a hand on his blaster.  My finger felt useless on the stock.  The feeling was foreign.  I was so inundated with weaponized heroes that not holding the trigger seemed wrong.

"Third," and this was the rule that had Dad shaking the rifle at me for emphasis, "never, ever point this at anyone.  Ever."  Even if I checked the barrel, even if my finger wasn't on the trigger, I was not supposed to take aim in anyone's general direction.  I was to point the gun at the floor if I was going to point it anywhere, and never have it trained on my feet.

This past summer, I was reacquainted with my father's firearms after a long absence, but I still remembered myself.  I checked to make sure they weren't loaded, I kept my finger off the trigger, and I didn't point them at anyone.  Dad gave me a different lesson this time though.  He told me all about his Ross Rifles.

Ask anyone in a grade 10 history class...okay, not anyone.  Ask someone who's been paying attention what the Ross Rifle is and it's pretty much guaranteed they'll tell you that the Rosses were one of the biggest problems faced by Canadian soldiers during the First World War.  The bolt would frequently jam or backfire, resulting in the injury or death for the shooter.  The fact that it was endorsed by Sam Hughes didn't help the Ross's reputation.  I, like many students, was under the impression it was a poorly made weapon, and I considered the Ross to be an indication of military mismanagement during the First World War.

Trust my father to set me straight in this matter.  No, he didn't deny that the Ross had its problems, but unlike my Grade 10 history teacher, Dad contextualized it for me.  The Ross had a special kind of bolt that automatically turned and locked into the barrel, unlike most bolts which had to be rotated in order to lock.  This made loading and reloading easier over other models from the time like the Lee Enfield.  This bolt made the gun popular for snipers during the war, a fact I didn't realize until I read Joseph Boyden's Three Day Road and had this conversation with Dad.

Unfortunately, this innovative bolt proved to be the Ross's undoing for trench warfare.  If any kind of dirt got lodged in the barrel, the bolt would jam and be nonoperational.  The bolt threads could be damaged from foreign matter in the barrel, and even when they were cleaned, the bolt would close but not lock, meaning the round could still be fired.  Wikipedia actually has a fantastic picture of the Mark II and III Ross Rifle bolts on their site, including a close-up of the threads.

Having handled rifles in the past, I was marveled by the Ross, which handled beautifully in my clean, not-at-all-trench-like basement.  I didn't get to fire it at the time, but I had a new respect for the weapon from this conversation.  I wish my Grade 10 history class could have instilled the same kind of reverence for a Canadian produced firearm.  No offence, Lee Enfields.  I'm sure you were a better alternative for the trench-bound.

Below are two pictures of my dad's Rosses.  Both have been sportized, but the shape of the weapon is still there:

Another Five Hours

Chapter by chapter, page by page, this story is just working itself towards completion and, in a way, I'm along for the ride. 

Apologies

My ISU is incomplete.  It will be incomplete for the next ten hours.  I apologize for the inconvenience and accept that this may result in a lower mark.  However, I don't want to be dishonest about how long I've spent on the project, and I love the story so much that I want to see it finished.  By the end of the weekend, it will be complete, as will my one page reflection on the subject.  My one page reflection will likely read, "Thank you so, so much Dr. Epp for letting me write Doctor Who fanfiction as a part of a history class.  Thank you for letting me explore history in my own way, for letting me explore teaching in my own way."  Somehow I'll manage to extrapolate that into a one page reflection.  For now, the sentence and the three chapters of the ISU will have to do. 

An ISU Update That's Posted in a Timely Fashion?

Yep, I am actually on a computer right now working on my ISU update.  The first few posts should be up and ready within the next two hours.

Amendment:  first post is coming along nicely.  Will be up by tonight.  Hopefully within the next little while.  

Updates: En Masse!

Thursday, January 27th: attempted to upload podcast to the internet, which resulted in a HUGE falling out between my computer and I.  We refused to speak to one another for a long while, and I sent it to sleep on the couch for the night.

Thursday, February 3rd: reconciled with computer long enough to research historical events for the story.  These events included Confederation, the Big Bang, the colonization of Canada, 1972 Canada-Russia Hockey Series, and Vimy Ridge.  Other events hat may be noted include Canada's Space Program, the Cuban Missile Crisis, Lester Pearson's Nobel win, the wikileaks, and ancient history including Plato and Socrates.  Computer decided to freeze during one of these searches, resulting in yet another argument.  This time I was sleeping on the couch.  The computer took my bed.

Thursday, February 10th: Mel and I met to discuss our respective projects once again, clarifying our ideas.  Began typing chapter one.  Computer and I back on speaking terms, but things remain tenuous.

Thursday, February 17th:  I intend to finish and post at least chapter one of the story.  Have decided to use a third-person narrator instead.  Must decide on a historically insignificant name for her.

A Verifiable Orgy of Cultural Allusions, Literary References, and Theoretical Diatribes

When asked why he preferred blondes in his movies, director Alfred Hitchcock claimed, "Blondes make the best victims.  They're like virgin snow that show up the bloody footprints."  Essentially it was the contrast between the pure innocent with the extraordinarily guilty that made fairer-follicles so fascinating and attractive for Hitchcock, a disjunction he often used to play with conceptions of good and evil. 

I also feel the need to reference, rather inelegantly, the Marquis de Sade, a writer of such carnal vulgarity I almost feel guilty making reference to him and/or admitting to having read some of his works, especially in a blog dedicated to my schoolwork.  Almost.  Alas, I'm not guilty enough to abandon his name now that I've made mention of it.  No, I'm not attempting to draw any comparisons between de Sade and Hitchcock, partly because I don't feel either gentlemen would appreciate that kind of comparison, but mostly because the points of comparison are rather limited: Hitchcock was a light-hearted trickster, almost boyish really, even though his darker, more violent films would suggest otherwise.  He sought to peel back the artifice just to show that there was artifice in the world, not because he thought that artifice was necessarily evil.  Actually, I would argue he found that kind of artifice humourous, about as much as he found tarnishing the ideological purity of the blonde entertaining.  The Marquis, on the other hand, was sick, perturbed, and angry.  Exposing the powers-that-be as frauds, hypocrites, liars, and cheats wasn't enough for him; he was out for blood and sex and pain and anarchy.  I'm invoking both men to make a point about Christopher Hitchins, Mother Teresa, the Catholic Church, and symbols. 

Speaking of symbols, here's one more cultural allusion for you: in the movie V For Vendetta, the anarchist V says, "Symbols are given power by people.  A symbol in and of itself is powerless, but with enough people behind it, [a symbol] can change the world."  Thanks to the power of Google, I've just discovered that Charles Baudelaire said something similar.  "The whole universe is but a storehouse of images and signs to which the imagination will give a relative place and value," he wrote, "it is a sort of pasture which the imagination must digest and transform."  I agree with M. Baudelaire: thanks to human sensory perception, the world exists as nothing more than a representation of a representation of a representation of something that never existed. 

Now, just what does all this have to do with Christopher Hitchins and Mother Teresa?  I've just illustrated above that Hitchcock, de Sade, V for Vendetta, and Charles Baudelaire have very little to do with each other, let alone anything to do with Hitchins and Mother Teresa.  And yet, there is an overlap in what occurs within the texts that I've mentioned, just as there is an overlap between Hitchins's book The Missionary Position and other literary texts I haven't mentioned above.  All of these cultural artifacts - from Hitchcock's films to de Sade's books to Alan Moore's entire corpus of graphic novels to Baudelaire's poetry to Hitchens and Mother Teresa - are concerned with stripping the gaudy veneer from ideologically revered symbols, each in varying capacities, and all of them present different ways to respond to the revelation that there is no virgin snow in society, no more than there are bloody footprints clearly visible atop it, if you'll pardon the metaphor.

My grandmother is a devout Roman Catholic, and she is a wonderful, generous person.  These two concepts - my grandmother, the Catholic, and my grandmother, the kind, wonderful person - are sometimes conflated, but I know they're independent of one another, at least in part.  Anyways, my grandmother is enamoured by Mother Teresa, as are, I believe, most Catholics.  Just this past Christmas, we - my mother and I - gave her a copy of Where There is Love, There is God, and I think it was one of the best gifts she could have ever received.  Then again, she's my wonderful, generous grandmother: she treated every gift like it's the best gift she ever received.  I have never read a book by Mother Teresa, but I can imagine the kinds of things that can be found in a book of hers given my Catholic upbringing and my knowledge of religious doctrine from throughout history.  "Love thy neighbour," the book likely reads in some capacity, "and be happy with your life for what it is.  And love God.  And don't use contraceptives."  All great teachings that, if implemented by the readers, could lead to an enriching and wonderful life.  If my grandmother is any indication, those kinds of teachings do lead to fulfillment. 

In 2006, Oprah Winfrey discovered that a supposedly autobiographical book, A Million Little Pieces by James Frey, was actually a work of fiction masquerading under the heading of non-fiction.  I don't want to rehash the endless arguments about the validity (or lack thereof) with regards to Frey's claim that the book was autobiographical.  What I want to emphasize here is the main argument that Oprah and her critics engaged in about whether or not the genre of Frey's novel was important.  Was the book any more or less meaningful as a fictional text as opposed to a non-fictional text?  The answer, I think, depends on the reader, since meaning is the reader's business, not a billionaire's.  A Million Little Pieces is meaningful when someone reads it and finds it meaningful; it isn't meaningful when someone reads it and finds it lacks meaning. 

By the same token then, Mother Teresa is meaningful when someone - my grandmother, for instance - finds her work meaningful.  Whether her good work actually exists or not is irrelevant, just like it's irrelevant as to whether or not A Million Little Pieces is fiction or non-fiction.  If a book written by Mother Teresa can give someone hope, courage, and understanding, if it can make someone think twice before they're an asshole to another human being or inspire people to give money to charity, that book is meaningful, and it has done good work.  The idea of Mother Teresa is a lot like society's idea of blondes and figures of church authority.  Their very role as an idea makes them a good thing.  They can't exist in cultural consciousness or, indeed, in any consciousness - remember, consciousness is based off of sensory perception, and all sensory perception renders the world a representation of a representation of a representation of something that never existed - because consciousness doesn't have the capacity to recognize others in their full, complicated glory, especially when those objects have achieved status as symbols.  Symbols are, as Bruce Wayne says in Batman Begins, "incorruptible...everlasting."  Dom Cobb says of the projection of his wife in Inception, "I can't imagine you with all of your complexity, all your perfection, all your imperfection."  Symbols are uncomplicated; they're artifice, but they're uncomplicated. 

So I can agree with Christopher Hitchens about Mother Teresa.  She was corrupt, she was a hypocrite, and she wasn't the devout woman the world believed her to be.  And, as a symbol, that image can't be supported, not without a complete reevaluation of her as an artifact.  In Hitchockian terms, one is either the virgin snow or the bloody footprint.  To de Sade, it's all hell.  This doesn't make Hitchins's reading of Mother Teresa as wrong.  It doesn't make his interpretation any less meaningful, not to me anyways, but to my grandmother, Hitchins's reading would be seen as an attack because of the way Mother Teresa operates as a symbol in her mind.

None of the readings of Mother Teresa are incorrect.  Like all human beings, she was flawed, she was sinful, she was limited to a singular cultural context.  But like all symbols, she does still have a fundamentally good message to spread to the world.  People just need to be careful to live their lives in her image as a symbol and not in her image as a woman.  Or not.  If there's no meaning for you in Mother Teresa, there's probably meaning for you in something else.  I just hope that symbol preaches love and compassion, even if they don't practice it.