Maplewood In-House Horse Show

Margot's love of horses shows no signs of abating. It's hard to believe that she only started horseback riding a couple of years ago after we cast around for a new extra-curricular activity after trying a few others. And now look at her!

Recently, she competed in her first ever equestrian competition at her new stables, Maplewood Equestrian Centre*. She was nervous, but determined, to do well.

I wasn't quite sure how she would fare, but ever since the spring, when she rocket-powered her abilities with a month of intense lessons, I've been reasonably confident that she can hold her own.

And boy did she ever! She was in two different horseback events at the intermediate-one level: dressage (an event where you have to demonstrate the control of the horse in a stylish way) and "Hunter" (a form of jumping) and won the "Reserve Champion" award, which is 2nd place! In getting 2nd place she actually won two individual events, which made her day. 

The next Charlotte Dujardin

I must admit, seeing her happy surprised smile when she won those two individual events put me in a great mood. There's few things better than seeing your child succeed in something they enjoy. What I loved most was that she was gracious and kind to the other competitors. There was one girl who wasn't having the best day and Margot was grateful that in one event that girl beat her as it would cheer the other girl up. 

Take a bow, my girl!

Horseback riding is definitely bringing out some nice qualities in Margot: 

• patience, to work with animals, 
• discipline, to keep working to improve herself; and 
• confidence, to deal with adversity (her horse in the dressage event bucked twice - it was quite scary!)

No matter how far she goes with all this, I know she is making wonderful memories. I'm so happy to be able just to be along for the ride.

* she also goes to Wesley Clover Stables.

Going to the Cinema: Shaken, Not Stirred.

Continuing with the theme of starting-up-again-things-that-I-mostly-forgot-abut-during-the-pandemic, which started with a play I saw a few weeks ago, this past weekend I went to see a movie with Glosette Girl and her brother, J. Woohoo! 

To really justify seeing things on the big screen we decided to see an action movie: James Bond - No Time to Die. We saw it at the Cineplex in the west end of Ottawa, by the Bayshore mall, which is sortof our go-to movie location.

We started the movie with masks...no promises after the lights went off!

Technically, it's not the only movie we have seen during the pandemic. We also saw Tenet, last year. But this time felt much more normal. For starters, there was some random dude sitting next to me. That caused me to do a bit of a double-take. Last year we were really spaced out with nobody near us.

Also, although we had to show our proof of vaccination and wear masks when we entered the cinema and sat down, we were allowed to take them off during the movies. It's funny, if you watch the news it oscillates between despair and joy when it comes to Coronavirus. But thinking back to last year, I think things are waaaaay better now. 

Margot's activities and her school routine hasn't been disrupted yet (knock on wood). Last year at this time she had already been quarantined once. For those who are vaccinated, border restrictions are slowly coming down, and I'm even going back to work again - permanently - two times a week starting tomorrow. I can hardly believe it!

But back to the movie! It was OK with over-the-top dialogue and action sequences. But if you haven't seen the previous Bond movie (Spectre) make sure you so as this one is pretty much a direct sequel. Ah Daniel Craig, you old rascal. Remind me to start drinking more straight hard liquor.

Grade Six: the Next Level of Homework

The last couple of years have been pretty easy for Margot homework-wise. She gets assigned a few Netmath problems; a bit of reading; maybe she gets asked to create a Powerpoint presentation. All in all, nothing too hard. With COVID, I had the impression that teachers were just treading water as they tried to keep kids under control. When you spend a third of the class explaining to the class how Googledocs works, it doesn't exactly suggest you're on the path to advanced learning.

This year, I swear it feels like Margot's teacher is stepping it up a notch to make up for lost time. Almost every day since school has started Margot has been doing homework.

It's gotten so bad that pretty much every waking moment she has that's not occupied with horseback riding she's hitting the books. There's barely anytime for Harry Potter anymore!

It's actually pretty stressful because Margot takes her homework very seriously. While it's great that we don't have to force her to learn, she has a tendency to get discouraged far too easily when she can't figure out a problem right away. It doesn't help that because Margot goes to a French school it sometimes takes me a little bit of time to figure out what a question is asking.

Workin' 9 to 5

Glosette Girl and I are still trying our best to find the right balance between being diligent and being calm but I don't think we've landed on it quite yet. I am not looking forward to high school...or worse, university!

Truth and Reonciliation

Last Thursday was Canada's first ever National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. The day honours the lost indigenous children and survivors of residential schools, their families and communities. 

My work closed for the day. Oddly, even though I live in the nation's capital, there didn't seem to be any big events planned. I would have expected some recognition similar to what I'm used to with Remembrance Day. Eventually though I found out that an event was being held all day on Parliament Hill.

I made it to the site around 10:30 am. I found the area in front of Parliament to be populated by a crowd of orange-shirt wearing attendees. Some were indigenous, but there were also non-indigenous school groups there, families, couples and a smattering of interested individuals like me.

Again, somewhat oddly, there didn't seem to be any representative of the Government there.

As I listened to the speakers I noticed two very different tones. On the one hand, there were speakers who expressed great frustration and anger at what had transpired and indicated that actions would be taken on other indigenous-related issues going forward, like climate change. On the other hand, there were speakers who primarily expressed sadness and hope - sadness at what had been allowed to happen and hope that the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation represented a first step in Canada's myriad people moving forward in a spirit of empathy and understanding. 

I was left to wonder which tone represents the most likely immediate future for my country.... anger or hope? People tend to have short memories and it's easy to forget that just prior to COVID-19, here were indigenous blockades of railways across the country in protest of a natural gas pipeline in British Columbia.

Canada is sometimes thought of as a boring, calm little corner of the world, and compared to many other regions, that may be true. But there is a lot left to be written about my country's relationship with its first peoples.