Niagara On The Lake - White Christmas

 I spent a beautiful day at Niagara On The Lake yesterday with a group of people I know from Toronto.  I went to see White Christmas at the Shaw Festival.  I loved the venue finding it cozy probably because of the wood within the interior.   The staff in Niagara area is always welcoming and polite which enhances the experience.   The only thing missing was snow, because watching the play was joyful and Christmas began to fill me.   We also did some shopping, the first time in a long time for me mainly because of lack of time.  I bought two tops which I wouldn't have worn a year ago, but what the heck.  One is Mickey Mouse shouting Merry Christmas and the other is white with silver beads.  Now I just have to try them on  to see how it fits.  I also bought some warm slippers which was a hit. Of course chocolate which has become a staple in my home.  It ended with a trip to a restaurant, a new place which I won't identify because there was a lipstick stain on the coffee cup brought to me.  Otherwise the food was fantastic as was the service.  I didn't realize how empty the night is at Niagara On The Lake.  They definitely hang up the sidewalk.  What a contrast to the business of my city.  I was planning on doing a lot of paperwork today and attend a meeting where I wanted to say goodbye to colleagues and let them know I am leaving but I think I will pause and put up my Christmas ornaments.   The play lifted my Christmas spirit, so work can pause a bit longer.  What do you think? 

A trauma informed Therapy for men and couples by Kristal De Santis, LMFT

De Santis loves working with men as do I.  She reports that 75% of suicides globally are by men and one in four men seek professional help.  Early intervention reduces risk of suicide.

Safety Exercise:  Emotions?  Is it going into your body?

Deep breathing together.

What is stability to you?  It begins with grounding.

Self regulations :  Him breaths ;  her possibly reaching out to him.

Repair work:  I’m sorry about that action; I can see I hurt you.  I understand how my actions affected you.  Now how can I make it right.  

Here is my plan for doing it better next time.  How are you doing?

Respect:  Where are they at?  Rupture to repair.

_____________________________________________

Suicide is going to be a topic I am going to talk about again.   I downloaded a lot of slides, however some did not want to have things shared.   In that case I won’t be sharing anything.  As you know I have decided to retire 30 Dec 25 and will then be considered a Registered Psychotherapist - Inactive.  What I am going to do moving forward is still provide you with notes of theology, psychology, u-tubes of interest as it pertains to mental health and pretty much continue as I have been doing.   If you have any questions of anything I share, please do not hesitate.  What do you think?

    

The Community Effects on the Soul - English

                                    

THE COMMUNITY EFFECTS 

                                                                       

                                                            ON THE 

                                                                       

                                                                                                     SOUL

BY: Silva Redigonda

                       

The Community Effects on the Soul

The texts Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant  by Anne Tyler and Lives Of The Saints by Nino Ricci both demonstrate the effects the role of the community has in the lives and fates of Pearl and Christina.  This essay will argue that both Pearl and Christina were influenced by the community to conform to a way of life not of their preference and that their reaction to this influence ultimately led to Christina's death and Pearl's isolation.  

                    The Pressure of Conformity

  Both Pearl and Christina live in a community where society dictates the norm of what is expected of a woman.  Women should be married, as in Pearl's case and married women should behave virtuous as is expected from Christina.  Pearl and Christina are both resistant in their actions from the pressures of the community, yet eventually succumb to the pressures.

Pearl is conscious of how her single status is considered inferior.  Being thirty and not married is defiant  but pressure to marry takes its toil.  Pearl understands how the community is reacting towards her,  "They had thought she would be an old maid.  They'd grown tactful …insultingly tactful.  Talk of others' weddings and confinements halted when Pearl stepped out on the porch"  (Tyler 6) Pearl also feels that education is considered a finality to the prospect of marriage, "She felt that going to college would be an admission of defeat."  (Tyler 6)  Marrying Beck and leaving her community immediately because

of his career, gives the reader insight that she marries because of peer pressure rather than love.  This insight is reflected by her not being happy just by being married to Beck.  She appears to need the attention that marriage provides in her community.  "She never even got to enjoy her new status among her girlfriends…Everything seemed so unsatisfying."  (Tyler 6&7)  

The stigma of single life continues to haunt Pearl.  This is demonstrated when Beck leaves her.  Pearl behaves as if this has never occurred.  Not even her children are informed of the truth.  Pearl reflects how the community had responded to her single life prior to marrying Beck,  "They had been so sure no man would marry her.  She could never tell them what had happened." (Tyler 11)  Pearl's pretense that her husband is away on business extends a lifetime.  As an adult, her son Cody recalls, "First he leaves and Mother pretends he hasn't… A thirty-five year business trip…"(Tyler 284)       

  In Lives Of The Saints Christina gives the illusion of not caring what the community thinks about her.  But from the beginning a simple act as changing her clothes after being bitten by a snake while alone with a man provides an insight to the opposite being true.  When Christina's son returns with help he notices," She had put on a new dress, a sleek flowered one…and had combed out her hair." (Ricci 11) 

Comments from the community such as, "You're too proud" (Ricci 46), and "Walking around like a princess" (Ricci, p 47) illustrate that the community feels that Christina is arrogant.  This is reinforced when Giuseppina, Christina's 

Childhood friend tells her, ,"…You can't afford to walk around like a princess.  It turns people against you."  Christina becomes pregnant from a man other than her husband who is in America and Giuseppina's  predications come true.  The community rejects Christina, "no one stopped by anymore…and if people passed my mother sitting in the front of the house they did not look at her…"(Ricci 52)  The effects of the community on Christina is demonstrated by her withdrawal.  Vitto relates the changes in his mother, "My mother began more and more to keep inside…sometimes simply shut up in her room; and she and my grandfather hardly spoke.." (Ricci 52).  Ultimately the pressure from the community is too much for Christina.  In her own moment of desperation she succumbs to a an act of superstition as was advised by her childhood friend, "you take a chicken …drain out the blood, then cut out the heart …wash your hands in the blood…pour into the ground".  Christina had found it humorous and ridiculous at the time (Ricci 54).  The community effects her so profoundly that Christina eventually performs the act.   Vitto provides this insight,  "Now the mystery of the blood on my mother's hands explained itself, for on a wooden block in front of the chicken run lay the limp headless body of a chicken…and a pan of blood resting on the ground nearby (Ricci 114). 

The community's rejection of Christina continues and it is not until Christina's behavior demonstrates a lack of defiance by attending church after a time of absence does this change.  Vitto relates, "And so our home which for

months had known only a lenten silence, was once again filled with a little life and conversation…my mother's presence at church…taken  perhaps as some kind of a sign…of the repentance and guilt…" (Ricci 146)

Both Christina and Pearl succumb to the pressures demanded from the community.  Pearl feels the need to be married, to be socially accepted. Rather than face life without a husband after Beck leaves her, Pearl continues a life of deception to avoid the stigma of being without a husband.  Christina's rejection by the community causes her to perform a superstitious act to redeem herself and to return to church. These women are similar in allowing the community to influence their lives.

                            My Soul Thee Takes

The community leads to Pearl's isolation from others as she attempts to keep her life apart from the community who has judged her.  Christina is led to her death in her attempt to escape the community.  Both women are victims of their community who has condemned them.

It is not until nearing the end of the text Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant that the reader understands the gravity of the community role's in 

diminishing the spirit of Pearl.  "….she hadn't been anyone's wife for over a third of a century; that she'd been frantic, angry, sometimes terrifying mother; and that she'd never shown the faintest interest in her community but dwelt in it like a visitor…doors tightly shut when at home.  That her life had been very long indeed 

but never full, stunted was more like it."(Tyler 285).  This is not the same woman who was once social, happy and content with life before the community 

passed judgement.  Ezra brings this to light has he reads his mothers diary to her recollecting her past, "I baked a few Scottish Fancies but they wouldn't do to take to a tea…I went out behind the house,…I believe that at just this moment I am absolutely happy." (Tyler 277)  It is through these diaries that glimpses of Pearl come to light.  Ezra enlightened indicates, " She [Pearl] had once been a whole different person…had spent her time swinging clubs with the Junior Amazon and cutting up with the Neal boys…and taking first prize at the Autumn Recital Contest (Tyler 264).  Pearl was driven into isolation, Ezra reflects, "Certainly she saw no friends; she had none.  As near as he could recall, she had never had friends."(Tyler 259)

Pearl had many suitors to choose from in her youth, "Frank brought her perfumed blotters and a box of …candy…Roy couldn't seem to tear himself away…Burt Tansy took her to the comic opera…Arthur…Hugh McKinley…"(Tyler 268).  Pearl had no problems attracting men but because she remained single when others considered it inappropriate, it reflected negatively on her persona.  The contrast of her full and happy life before being judged by the community and then trying to hold on to the image of marriage to avoid rebuke by the community leads to her isolation. The final obsession of being married is fulfilled at death at her eulogy.  The minister who never met 

Pearl reads," Pearl Tull, the minister said, was a devoted wife…" (Tyler 285) She had accomplished her deceit to her end.

Christina lives in a very social village.  The desperation and conflict of her own beliefs in contrast to the community leads to a nervous breakdown, "Your mother's staying in the hospital a few days." (Ricci 116).  Christina manages to escape her community, only to be faced with another on the ship to America.  The person she will need the most not only judges her as well but his own problems with alcoholism causes her death."  It was not the first death for this physician who Christina considers, a "drunken idiot" (Ricci 212).  Christina's own death is foreshadowed when the doctor recalls the complications of the last pregnant woman on board three month earlier, "The baby, unfortunately was stillborn." (Ricci 217) When Vitto is sent for his help, the doctor responds, "You're that woman's son, aren't you, the pregnant one who thinks she's a princess." (Ricci 228)  

Ricci and Tyler both demonstrate the influence a community has on its' victims.  Christina and Pearl were both judged.  Pearl acts the part of a married woman through out her life which takes away the joy of life and of living free to love.  Christina more defiant manages to escape after realizing the community is consuming her.  Her escape is not complete for another community is there to judge her, one that Pearl avoided after her marriage to Beck.  The person Christina will need the most on the ship has already judged her.  This judgement from a doctor is ironic due to his incompetence as a physician.  If he had thought 

more about Christina as a person,  he would have remained sober and would have had Christina monitored after giving birth.   Both Pearl and Christina failed to be able to live the life they wanted.  Though Pearl and Christina both left the community they lived in, Pearl chose to do so in isolation.  Christina bolder than Pearl escapes the country only to die at the hands of another community in judgement of her.  These two women were victims of a community who betrayed them.

Bibliography

Ricci, Nino.  Lives of the Saints.  Toronto: Cormorant, 2004.

Tyler, Anne.  Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant.  Toronto: Random House, 1996.

  

Have decided to retire!

It has been quite a year and doesn't stop.   I have attended all my conferences and have exceeded once again my education requirements.   The Conference with the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists will be my last due to retiring.  I will continue to provide you with notes until that is all depleted.  Why not use it if it benefits you?  I have watched some new investigations of interest to post and share.   When I say retiring, that doesn't mean stopping.   That means change.   This will be the third time I have retired from careers.  That doesn't include my other miscellaneous jobs I have had since I was thirteen years old.  My objective now is to close down my business which will take a while.   Deciding to make this next transition is comforting.   I have given myself lots of time to decide and I am hoping that once the dust settles, I can have more time to write my next book.  I read alot this summer and had to slow down because my focus was to sell my house.  It gave me an opportunity to think towards a different direction.    I will definitely be sharing that with you so you can prepare yourself if you ever have to sell or buy property.   My services have always been to protect people, justice and helping those struggling.  As my mother once told me, I never had just a regular job.  I have been offered quite  a few very interesting positions, but the timing was never right as I made my clients a priority.  So, that is all for now as I proceed with the college to retire.  Have a good week.  What do you think?

Rememberance Day - Never forget

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/14TJn8TbZew/ 

New Minister for Veteran Affairs reports

 "On the subject of veterans’ homelessness — veterans are two to three times more likely to experience homelessness than the general population and women who experienced military sexual trauma are 4.4 times more likely to face homelessness — she says “one homeless veteran is one too many.” 

Blue Jays/Hallowe-en/Conference - Retirement - Should I?

 As you know I am not a sports person but sports orientated or not, it was impossible not to be pro Blue Jays.  The buzz in Toronto was impossible to ignore.  We even got a break from hearing repetitous terrible news as the focus was Blue Jays.  The Blue Jays became our break from what ails us as we focused on winning.  Even, I would monitor the scores and watch segments which I have never done before and it was a learning experience.   I recalled playing a bit in grade school during lunch breaks until a teacher took me out of class and wanted me to play for the school.  I said no, not quite understanding why she thought I was good enough for the school team and not sure if I could keep impressing her.  I have always played just for fun and if it is for the school, it is no longer fun.  She tried everything even telling me I can take time off classes to play.  It is at a different level.  That continued as I grew older and played at various sports - I quit, when it became serious.   For me, sports was for fun only.  As I watched the segments of the game with the Blue Jays and Dodgers,  I thought it was more of a chess game, which was a different perspective.  Each move was calculated and methodical and at times I felt it painful to watch.  If I meet a Blue Jay again, I shall just thank him.  I will be more prepared.  The game could have gone either way and I respected both teams.  Fans who were so invested mourned, but none could mourn more than the Jays.  I think they were amazing.  I have a new found respect for all players.

Hallowe'en was something different too.  I had more at my door at over 200 than ever before.  I had little police people with motorolla radios and all in full gear.  It was so cute.  There were also swat teams and superheroes and superheroines.  What amazed me was how polite the children were.  I only had one person, I found disturbing.  He was a middle aged mustached man who grabbed a handful of chocolate and when I told him to just take one, he gave me a most hateful glare.  I was glad there were a lot of people around.  In the spirit of the Jays playing their final game, one sole teen was dressed as a Jay with his own baseball bat (probably not a good idea having a bat).  I couldn't believe the amount of kids who came in groves.  I was exhausted when it was over.  

The conference was also tiring mainly because of all the technical problems which went non-stop during the first day and didn't quite quit.  I missed one session as a result and had to watch the repeat of another video because I kept getting booted out.  I was surprised at how inefficient I found the technology to be which tarinished the experience.  At the end a spokeswoman downplayed the incompetence by saying there were a few problems.  Nothing worse than downplaying the problems.    However, do you remember or know of the day when children who were non-white had to have the National Guards so they could go to school with white children and the angry mobs?  Yes, I got to see them and hear them speak now as adults.  That in itself made the entire conference worth while.  I was in so much awe.  I took lots of notes and will be sharing that with you.

Retirement -  I keep changing my mind each day.  But I was thinking of what I love to do.  It wasn't until a family member told me I love what I do that surprised me.  Why do people tell you instead of asking you?  That is a problem for so many and it is because of that that I notice it more and perhaps make more of it.  But, what do I love?  My work as a therapist does not make me happy.   It is fulfilling and rewarding but not what I would call fun.  What I love is writing (books) but it does not bring in the bread and butter, but I do find it fun and love meeting people.  I love travel.  I love learning new things.  That is all for now, while I weigh in the pros and cons.  Some days I am leaning more of continuing and some days more on leaving.  My skills are transferable.  I am educated.  I think analytically and systematically.  What is there not to love?   I am giving myself til the end of December to decide.   I have all my education hours, so I just need a bit more time.

That is all for this week.  There is lots to share and I shall probably have more time next week.  Though we are in day light saving time, I am still on the old clock.  My body doesn't want to transcend and it doesn't have to.  I manage my own time.

       I want you all to have a nice week.  Keep safe.  If you want to order a book from me do so at https//www.silvaredigonda.myshopify.com.  If for any reason, you have trouble ordering a book, please let me know.