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Testing, testing…

May 20, 2012 in Life in England | Permalink

There is a certain nervous tension in the air ‘chez nous’ this weekend. Both Pearl and I are in need of examinations.

For new readers I should explain at this point that Pearl is my rather lovely Mercedes 300SL, about which you can read more here. It is widely held that – for chaps of a certain age – owning a convertible is a sure sign of mid-life crisis. If that is the case then mine must be one of the longest on record, given that I have not only owned Pearl for more than 10 years, but she also is my third rag-top. Perhaps my life is a perpetual crisis… On the other hand, if this is indeed mid life, then I should be in for a good long innings!

I digress…

I am in need of a medical examination as part of the application process for my Canadian permanent residency. More on this – quite probably much more – in my on-going series of posts explaining the whole process in gruesome detail. Let us – for now – focus instead on Pearl.

It is that time of year at which Pearl’s MOT test falls due. I feel sure that vehicles in Canada are subject to a similar testing regimen – indeed I have no doubt that such is the case the world over. In the UK the test was instigated in 1960 by the Ministry of Transport – hence the origin of the name. We no longer have a Ministry of Transport, but the name survives in acronym form as the title of this annual inspection.

When first established the test was applied to vehicles aged ten years and above. By 1967 it had been modified into roughly its current form, applying to all vehicles that have achieved their third anniversary. This reminds me of the witty comment made by Michael Flanders – the vocal half of Flanders and Swann – during their 60s musical comedy review, ‘At the Drop of a Hat’.

“Hello again. We had to look outside during the interval, see if our car’s all right. It’s getting a bit old, it’ll have to be tested soon. You know they started these tests for 10-year-old cars, they brought it down to six, now five, they’ll bring it down to three. There’s even been some talk of having them tested before they leave the factories.”

I grew up on Flanders and Swann, largely as a result of my mother’s affection for them and for their satirical songs. They were an unlikely duo who had been at Westminster School together before the war, but who hadn’t really started working together until they met again once the war was over. In the meantime Michael Flanders – who once had ambitions of becoming an actor – had contracted polio and was confined to a wheelchair. Donald Swann wrote the music and played the piano, and when they discovered that Flanders’ humorous introductions went down as well as the songs they adopted the review format that was to make them famous.

Their humour was gentle, witty and intelligent – all the things I like in comedy. I was immediately impressed by a duo who could base a song on the first and second law of thermodynamics – who wouldn’t be – but the clincher for me was an elegiac lament called ‘The Slow Train’, which – by incorporating the idiosyncratic names of many of the bucolic English villages and hamlets that had their railways stations sundered from them in the early 60s as part of the wide-ranging cutbacks imposed by the pillaging Dr. Beeching (the first Chairman of the British Railways Board) – contrived to say something heartfelt about the loss of a minor but important part of our heritage.

“The Sleepers sleep at Audlem and Ambergate.
No passenger waits on Chittening platform or Cheslyn Hay.
No one departs, no one arrives
From Selby to Goole, from St Erth to St Ives.
They’ve all passed out of our lives
On the Slow Train, on the Slow Train.”

 

I digress – again!

Pearl is now some 26 years old and getting through the MOT test is no longer the formality that it once was. To be fair, she does live in a dry garage – under a cover – for much of the year, and does a relatively low mileage mostly in dry, sunny conditions – but I reckon she has earned that. Anyway – when it came to it she sailed through with flying colours.

Let’s just hope my medical goes as well.

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A word from our sponsor

May 17, 2012 in Moving to Canada | Permalink

There is quite enough to be done in putting together an application to become a permanent resident of Canada without having to think too much about the hoops through which one’s sponsor has to jump as well. I rather thought I would leave that side of things to the Kickass Canada Girl, who not only relishes a challenge but is also jolly good at this sort of thing.

This doesn’t seem quite fair, however, to those eager readers who are keen to know how the whole process works (huh?!) so I have reconsidered and taken a peek at the document checklist that the sponsor has to fulfil prior to submitting their part of the application.

There are 15 items on the list!

Fortunately they are not all required in every circumstance. Here is a quick run-down of those that I believe the Girl will need to include:

  • Completed ‘Application to Sponsor’ form.
  • Completed ‘Sponsorship Evaluation’ (my understanding is that – if I had children – she would need submit a ‘Financial Evaluation’ instead).
  • A copy of the receipt for the fee.
  • Completed ‘Sponsor Questionnaire’
  • A photocopy of one of – Permanent Resident Card, Canadian Citizenship Card, Canadian birth certificate, Canadian Passport.
  • If previously married or in a common-law relationship, one of – proof of separation, divorce certificate, annulment certificate, death certificate (of former spouse, naturally!), declaration of severance of common-law relationship.
  • An original ‘Option C Printout’ of the last ‘Notice of Assessment’ for the most recent tax year (or other acceptable evidence of employment income).
  • A letter from her employer stating period of employment, salary and regular hours per week.

That doesn’t seem too onerous and once the Girl has this little lot sorted out she can add to it the considerable pile of documentation that I have to provide. She will then submit the whole shooting match to Citizenship and Immigration Canada and we can sit back and await the outcome.

More on my part in the proceedings next time.

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A tough occupation

May 16, 2012 in Moving to Canada | Permalink

“Citizenship is a tough occupation which obliges the citizen to make his own informed opinion and stand by it.” – Martha Gellhorn

As I noted in a previous post, Kickass Canada Girl is visiting the UK – for a week – at the end of May. This is a particularly pleasant surprise as I had not thought to see her until I travel to BC at the end of June.

She will be here primarily to attend her citizenship ceremony. She applied for British citizenship while she was still working in the UK and this has duly been granted. The ceremony – which apparently entails taking an oath of allegiance and listening to the National Anthem (though possibly not a great deal more) has to be attended within three months of the grant of citizenship, and will thus not wait until she is here again during the summer.

This naturally acts as a wake up call to me – particularly as we are now aiming to bring forward my immigration date to the summer of 2013 – to get started on my application for permanent residency in Canada. The forms and information pack have been acquired and it is time to set things in motion.

The procedure is – quite properly – complex. There are a number of routes by which one can gain resident status:

  • Skilled workers or professionals – in one of the 29 listed skilled occupations – each of which is subject to a quota and other restrictions.
  • Canadian experience class – one who already has work experience in Canada – again subject to other relevant criteria
  • Investors, entrepreneurs and the self employed – subject to the requirement to invest at least $800,000 Canadian, or to own an existing Canadian business.
  • Provincial nominees – those nominated by a Canadian province or territory
  • Family sponsored – for which one must be sponsored by a Canadian citizen to whom one is related. Again – other criteria also apply.

Those who wish to know more about the process should visit the Citizenship and Immigration Canada website, which is packed with an exhaustive amount of information.

For a variety of reasons – not least my age, which renders me ineligible under the points system that governs skilled worker applications – the only route open to me is family sponsorship. Fortunately (and fortunate in so many ways) I am married to a Canadian Girl – and a kickass one at that!

The process by which a Canadian citizen can sponsor a family member is also, inevitably, complex and time consuming. There are two main components to the process:

  • The Canadian citizen must apply to be a sponsor for the family member.
  • Once approved the family member must apply for permanent residency.

Both applications must be submitted together, through the sponsor. It is still possible to apply if either the sponsor or the relation – or both (or niether!) – lives outside Canada.

Hmmm!

To avoid this treatise becoming just too perplexing I think I will leave the next chapter for a further posting. This will give your brain – and mine – a chance to recuperate.

 

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…the darling buds…

May 13, 2012 in Life in England, Photos | Permalink

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.

William Shakespeare

May is usually my favourite month. The first true taste of spring – the newly mown grass – the azaleas and bluebells – the fresh munchy green of the reborn floliage. It is time to step outside and to breath deeply of the nascent summer – to sit outside a pub and feel the sun on one’s shoulders. To lunch on tender new English asparagus – to lick the garlic from one’s fingers after the year’s first bowl of moules marinière – to savour the first sip of a chilled glass of crisp Sauvignon Blanc…

We have been granted a brief respite – two days on which the sun finally wrestled its way from behind the clouds. I took the Fuji x10 out to record the occasion.

Tomorrow it rains again!

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Apposition

May 10, 2012 in Life in England | Permalink

I have to work this Saturday – the occasion being the main event in the School’s calendar – the annual prize-giving and speech day which, in our case, goes by the name ‘Apposition’.

Apposition is as old as the School itself and thus dates back more than 500 years. The School – in common with other similar schools – is a charitable foundation with religious origins. Ironically, the Founder – unconvinced of the virtue and probity of his fellow churchmen – decreed that the governance of the School should be placed in the care of one of the preeminent livery companies of the City of London. The company remain the School’s trustees to this day.

Wishing to be able to hold the headmaster (known in our case as the High Master) to account, the livery company devised an annual examination of his abilities as an educator. An independent intellectual would be engaged each year to act as the ‘Apposer’.  A select coterie of the brightest pupils would be tasked with writing and delivering – before the Apposer and the assembled dignitaries – declamations on a range of academic subjects. The Apposer would then judge the High Master’s performance on the basis of the learning of the boys and – if satisfied – would recommend that the High Master be re-appointed for another year.

There have been – in the School’s history – two instances of High Masters not being re-appointed following this appraisal, but the last such was in the mid-eighteenth century and the event is now considered to be purely ceremonial. The occasion does, however, give parents and guests alike an opportunity to see some of the smartest boys in action and – if they are by chance related to them in some way – to glow quietly with pride as a consequence.

A list of this year’s declamation topics should give some idea of the level that these eighteen year old boys attain.

  • Mad Hatters and De-ranged Hats – Mathematicians will know what a de-rangement is. Others may want to take a quick glance here before looking away again quickly!
  • Can Noise be Music – From one of our music scholars (a brilliant cellist). Apparently the answer is that noise is not music, but it can be if we choose it so to be.
  • The Death of Neo-Liberal Economics – This year’s Apposer is a life peer who was a cabinet member in a previous Tory administration. It will be interesting to hear what he makes of this!
  • 11 Ball Juggling – How Hard Can it Be? – The physics behind juggling with 11 balls, by a young man who recently broke the world record.

 

If all goes to plan this time next year will see my last Apposition. I will miss these schools, with their strange rituals and quirky traditions… not because I am heading west to BC, of course, but because I will be retiring…

Still – plus ça change…

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Reasons to be cheerful

May 8, 2012 in Life as we know it | Permalink

“A bit of grin and bear it, a bit of come and share it
You’re welcome, we can spare it – yellow socks
Too short to be haughty, too nutty to be naughty
Going on 40 – no electric shocks

Reasons to be cheerful – part 3″

Ian Dury

The weekend just gone was the Mayday Bank Holiday in the UK. Normally, not having to go to work on a Monday – and consequently not needing to commute into London – would be cause for unalloyed joy. In this particular instance, however, it meant another day of staring gloomily out of the window at the rain. There was, apparently, a small tornado in Oxfordshire – but we didn’t even see that much excitement!

I did feel rather sorry – paying yesterday, as I did, a brief visit to our local market town – for the good burghers of that community. Considerable work had clearly gone into the setting up of the annual May Fayre, with stalls, stands and fun and games throughout the town. Nothing is quite so sad as the merry English fayre under inclement weather. Being English we don’t have the good sense simply to abandon the event altogether and neither is there a Plan B. Everybody turns out regardless, hip flasks full of Dunkerque spirit, and has a thoroughly miserable time tramping around the sorry-looking amusements, wishing that they were somewhere – anywhere – else.

Kickass Canada Girl informs me that the next public holiday in Canada is in another couple of weeks time, when Victoria Day is celebrated – in honour of Queen Victoria’s birthday. This is so splendidly bizarre a notion that it could almost have been designed purely to make the British feel more at home… which maybe it was. Wikipedia has this:

Following the death of Queen Victoria in 1901, May 24 was by imperial decree made Empire Day throughout the British Empire, while, in Canada, it became officially known as Victoria Day, a date to remember the late queen, who was deemed the “Mother of Confederation”. Over the ensuing decades, the official date in Canada of the reigning sovereign’s birthday changed through various royal proclamations until the haphazard format was abandoned in 1952. That year, the Governor-General-in-Council moved Empire Day and an amendment to the law moved Victoria Day both to the Monday before May 25, and the monarch’s official birthday in Canada was by regular vice-regal proclamations made to fall on this same date every year between 1953 and January 31, 1957, when the link was made permanent by royal proclamation. The following year, Empire Day was renamed Commonwealth Day and in 1977 it was moved to the second Monday in March, leaving the Monday before May 25 only as both Victoria Day and the Queen’s Birthday.

Got that?

This all reminds me somewhat of my previous school which celebrates, as its major open day each year, King George III’s birthday – the 4th of June. For a variety of (doubtless) very good reasons – mostly to do with public examinations – this day never actually falls on June 4th, but is usually several weeks earlier in late May. It is still – needless to say – called ‘The 4th of June’, which can be confusing to the general public since street signs are put up advising of traffic restrictions for… ‘The 4th of June’!

 

Now – all this rain, grey cloud and the current miserable climate are no doubt responsible for us all suffering from SAD. This apparently genuine condition was defined and named by Norman E. Rosenthal and his colleagues at the National Institute of Mental Health in the US in 1984. They must have been tickled to bits when they came up with that particular acronym. Nice one chaps!

I, however, have good reason right now not to be sad (see what I did there?). In a few weeks time the Girl is going to be paying an unexpected visit to the UK, for reasons that I will expand on later. Whoopie! She will be here just in time for our next public holiday at the start of June which, this year, coincides with the Queen’s Jubilee – for which we get an extra day off! Celebrations all round – but let’s hope that the weather has also perked up by that point.

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The Piper at the Gates of Dawn

May 5, 2012 in Flotsam and Jetsam | 8 comments

A few evenings ago I watched a fascinating TV documentary about Kenneth Grahame and the creation of ‘The Wind in the Willows’. The story is an interesting one, but I was somewhat disappointed that the program made little reference to what seems to me one of the key elements of the book, and to the strange fate that has befallen it.

I have, in a previous post, recommended Jackie Wullschlager’s excellent book ‘Inventing Wonderland’, which is a study of a small group of contemporaneous authors – J. M. Barrie, Lewis Carroll, Kenneth Grahame, A. A. Milne and Edward Lear. The common thread uniting these writers – if you accept Ms Wullschlager’s premise (which I do!) – is that they each contrived to create a classic work of ‘supposed’ children’s fiction whilst themselves exhibiting traits indicative of an inability to fully realise the transition from childhood to adulthood. I say ‘supposed’, of course, because in spite of this exigency these works speak as much (if not more) to adults as they do to children – which may well go a long way to explaining their enduring appeal.

I have a little knowledge of the subject because – half a decade ago and more – I studied in some detail the life of J. M. Barrie. I was writing a play at the time about Barrie and the creation of ‘Peter Pan’ and in the course of my research I happened upon Ms Wullschlager’s book. The play was completed about six months before the frankly inaccurate and overly simplistic Johnny Depp film hit the multiplexes, and you can probably imagine how ‘thrilled’ I was at that particular turn of events!

When it comes to ‘The Wind in the Willows’, however, the background to the book’s creation interests me less than some of the content therein – in particular the seventh chapter – ‘The Piper at the Gates of Dawn’. When I first read the book as a youngster (probably about the same time as first heard an adaptation on the Home Service) it was this section that affected me most. Years later – when shopping for classic children’s books as a gift for the progeny of a friend – I found myself browsing through a lavishly illustrated hardback edition (sadly the illustrations were neither the wonderful originals by E. H. Shepard nor the later Arthur Rackham variants). I scanned the book idly, looking for the familiar prose of my favourite chapter…

…only to find that it was not there!

I looked again – and again! The chapter was missing…

Now – I am aware of only one or two instances in which elements of children’s books have been selectively edited out. I can just about imagine circumstances in which something that was once thought acceptable is no longer deemed to be so – but what on earth could possibly offend in ‘The Wind in the Willows’?

For those not familiar with the book, chapter 7 describes how – one hot, breathless summer night on which no-one can sleep – Ratty and Mole help Otter to search for his missing son, Portly. As dawn nears – after a fruitless night of searching – Ratty is suddenly captivated by the distant sound of ethereal music. Entranced they follow the mystical cadences to their source, where they encounter – on an island in the middle of the stream – a vision of the great god, Pan. The missing Portly is discovered fast asleep between the god’s hooves.

Rosemary Hill – writing in the Guardian in June 2009 – decribes this mysterious chapter thus:

“Those of them who went on searching for the divine often found it enveloped in clouds of pantheism and neo-paganism, spiritualism and theosophy, the faiths of the doubtful. It is this diffuse but potent supernaturalism that appears in The Wind in the Willows in one strange, unsettling chapter, “The Piper at the Gates of Dawn”. It is a section that abridgers of the book have always been quick to drop, though Grahame himself thought it essential” … “Whether it is the latent homo-eroticism of the vision or simply the sudden change of tone that makes the scene so uncomfortable, it is certainly a failure. But while artistically it is the weakest part of the book, it is at the same time the key to it.”

There is much to dispute in Ms Hill’s reading, not least the assertion about the ‘faiths of the doubtful’, which – by her tone – I gather she intends pejoratively. I would prefer to substitute ‘sceptical’ – the definitions of which include: “a person who habitually doubts the authenticity of accepted beliefs” and “a person who doubts the truth of religion, esp Christianity”. The InterWebNet offers a plethora of examples of those of established faiths – in particular Christianity – attempting to appropriate the text in support of their own beliefs. This is actually quite offensive. Grahame is far too good a writer: had he intended this interpretation he would have written it.

It is strange that the chapter that Ms Hill describes as a “failure” and “the weakest part of the book” should have had such an effect on me as a child that I habitually look for it first whenever I pick up the book. Grahame is right to consider it essential, and it is indeed – for me – the key to the book. Grahame comes as close as anyone ever has to capturing the essence of the numinous experience. Here Ratty first hears the magical music:

“Rat, who was in the stern of the boat, while Mole sculled, sat up suddenly and listened with a passionate intentness. Mole, who with gentle strokes was just keeping the boat moving while he scanned the banks with care, looked at him with curiosity.

`It’s gone!’ sighed the Rat, sinking back in his seat again. `So beautiful and strange and new. Since it was to end so soon, I almost wish I had never heard it. For it has roused a longing in me that is pain, and nothing seems worth while but just to hear that sound once more and go on listening to it for ever. No! There it is again!’ he cried, alert once more. Entranced, he was silent for a long space, spellbound.

`Now it passes on and I begin to lose it,’ he said presently. `O Mole! the beauty of it! The merry bubble and joy, the thin, clear, happy call of the distant piping! Such music I never dreamed of, and the call in it is stronger even than the music is sweet! Row on, Mole, row! For the music and the call must be for us.'”

…and after their encounter with the god…

“Sudden and magnificent, the sun’s broad golden disc showed itself over the horizon facing them; and the first rays, shooting across the level water-meadows, took the animals full in the eyes and dazzled them. When they were able to look once more, the Vision had vanished, and the air was full of the carol of birds that hailed the dawn.

As they stared blankly. in dumb misery deepening as they slowly realised all they had seen and all they had lost, a capricious little breeze, dancing up from the surface of the water, tossed the aspens, shook the dewy roses and blew lightly and caressingly in their faces; and with its soft touch came instant oblivion. For this is the last best gift that the kindly demi- god is careful to bestow on those to whom he has revealed himself in their helping: the gift of forgetfulness. Lest the awful remembrance should remain and grow, and overshadow mirth and pleasure, and the great haunting memory should spoil all the after-lives of little animals helped out of difficulties, in order that they should be happy and lighthearted as before.”

This is not merely Edwardian whimsy, nor some failed attempt at a search for the supernatural. ‘The Wind in The Willows’ is about Longing and Loss (which – along with Love – are the three great subjects of all art) written during a golden summer in which everything seemed possible, but at the zenith of which everything might also be lost – as indeed proved to be the case as the world spiralled into the maelstrom of the new century.

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…what we get!

May 3, 2012 in Life in England | 1 comment

“Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get.” – Mark Twain

I added to this blog – some short while ago – a ‘Today’s Image’ feature. The intention was that I would regularly upload and display images captured day by day with the Fuji x10, which I now carry with me as a matter of course.

Those reading this post in real time will observe that the current image is of a rather splendid clock. Residents of Victoria will recognise it as being one of the predominant features of the atrium of the Bay Centre in that fair city. Now – clearly this must have been taken some weeks ago, before I returned to the UK.

The reason for the image not being more up to date is that the weather in the UK since I returned can only be described as ‘shocking’, and I have not felt moved to go out looking for photo opportunites. This has been the wettest April for a hundred years – indeed the wettest since records began. We have now moved into May and are all deeply disappointed to discover that the weather is no better. I struggle to recall the last day on which it did not rain, or indeed on which we were not overshadowed by the regulation thick blanket of grey cloud. Depressing!

So bad are things that the cricket season – which should by now be well under way – has seen virtually no play throughout the first three weeks. The only positive – from the reader’s point of view – is that you have thus far been spared my ramblings on the subject of that great game.

So much rain has fallen in the past week that some areas in the west of England are in serious danger of flooding, and the papers have been full of images of rising water levels as rivers burst their banks.

And yet…!

England is in the grip of a drought! Though April was washed out, March was one of the driest on record – as have been, in fact, the last two winters. The aquifers are at an extremely low level and it will take many months of rain for them to be fully replenished. The papers are carrying – alongside the photos of flooded fields – headlines warning that we may, by the end of the year, see standpipes in towns and villages as the water supply is cut off.

Only in England!

When referring to the weather in Victoria, Kickass Canada Girl is partial to the familiar quotation – “If you don’t like the weather, wait a minute”. This saying apparently originates in New England and – contrary to some popular belief – was not actually said by Mark Twain. I do myself like the variable Victorian climate (which is clearly a good thing) as it seems to me to elude the dreary inevitability inherent in much English weather.

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…a straight line!

April 30, 2012 in Life as we know it | Permalink

Those who write, post or comment on Long Distance Relationships (LDRs) – be they academics, altruists, cynics, sympathisers or those who are currently (or have been previously) themselves embroiled in such a situation – all concur that communication is vital, and that the nature thereof should be agreed in advance by negotiation between the parties concerned.

As you may have noted from previous posts, Kickass Canada Girl and I belong to the school of believers in frequent communication, however trivial or brief it may be. We are – for this and other reasons – immensely grateful that we did not have to endure this experience even five or ten years ago. Skype, email, SMS messaging and mobile devices such as the iTablet and smartphones have enabled global communication in a manner that would have been unimaginable to those who went before us. The idea of embarking on such a relationship with only landline telephony and airmail – let alone in the days when the only communication was handwritten and went by sea – just doesn’t bear thinking about. In this way – as in so many others – we are very lucky.

So important is communication considered to be to the health of an LDR that scientists and developers dedicate considerable effort and resource to enhancing it. Mary E. Morrison’s 2006 article – “How To Make Long-Distance Love Work” contains the following example:

“Cornell University scientists, for example, have started researching “minimal intimate objects” as a supplementary means of communication. Imagine both you and your partner spending your days at a computer. In the taskbar of your computer screen, you see a small box with a little circle. When you click on your circle, the corresponding circle on your partner’s screen lights up: a quick, one-bit message that’s nonintrusive but establishes an ambient awareness of you. As you work, you’re right there with each other.”

That’s not all. A UK company called Little Riot are about to launch a product called ‘Pillow Talk‘. Their publicity blurb claims:

“Pillow Talk is a project aiming to connect long distance lovers. Each person has a ring sensor they wear to bed at night, and a flat fabric panel which slots inside their pillowcase. The ring wirelessly communicates with the other person’s pillow; when one person goes to bed, their lover’s pillow begins to glow softly to indicate their presence. Placing your head on the pillow allows you to hear the real-time heartbeat of your loved one. The result is an intimate interaction between two lovers, regardless of the distance between them.”

The eight hour time difference between the UK and BC rather rules this one out, of course – quite apart from any other consideration!

Finally, for those who really can’t keep their hands off each other, Mara Siegler of Blackbook Magazine offers this weirdness:

“Before conquering us in a global revolution and turning the human race into fuel, robots may actually grow to love us, or at least make our romances better. Hooman Samani, a researcher at the National University of Singapore, has been experimenting with what he calls “Lovotics.” He’s given the metal beings the equivalent of human hormones so they can react to love and also created two totally creepy bots to help couples in long distance relationships. 

The “Kissenger,” which sort of looks like a Pokemon reject, can be plugged into the computer while Skyping and supposedly feels like a real kiss.  Don’t have a significant other to use this with? No worries, you can go solo.

Take a look. Either put the video on mute or jam out. Your choice.”

…and at this point I stop looking – before things get even more bizarre.

 

In response to my last post on the subject of LDRs the Girl sent me a one line comment expressing her view. It reads:

“Hmm, nobody seems to sum it up the way I do – it sucks!”

I totally agree. One result of our recent cogitation on the nature of our long distance relationship is that we really don’t want to have to keep it up for two years. We are, therefore, reworking our schedule based on my ‘retirement’ being moved forward to the summer of 2013.

More of this anon!

 

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…is not necessarily…

April 28, 2012 in Life as we know it | 2 comments

The sheer quantity of material available online – and elsewhere – concerning Long Distance Relationships is quite staggering. Much of it will naturally not be relevant to any given situation and some of it is, frankly, a little creepy. This post contains a selection of items pertinant to those in a similar position to Kickass Canada Girl and me.

Statistics on LRPs are revealing. These are from America, but as is the way of such things they doubtless echo reasonably closely the situation in Canada and the UK.

  • According to the American Census Beaureau more than 3% of married couples live apart.
  • A 2009 study from UCLA suggests that those couples who do choose to live apart:
    • frequently live in urban areas,
    • tend to be among the better educated,
    • tend to be younger.

However:

  • The American Association of Retired Peoples (AARP) estimates that the number of married couples – of which the partners are 50 years old or more – who live apart, tripled between 2001 and 2005.

Laura Stafford, University of Kentucky professor and author of “Maintaining Long-Distance and Cross-Residential Relationships writes:

“The older you are when you do a long-distance relationship, the less it seems to matter because you’re not changing as much.”

I’m not sure how true this is, though I guess we may find out. The young are probably more accustomed to change and may thus be more resilient. We ‘oldies’ are may be getting more set in our ways, but are hopefully also imbued with wisdom. We have – after all –  been around the block (a few times!) now.

I must admit to only having glanced at Laura Stafford’s book. Indeed what becomes rapidly apparent when browsing the online book stores is that the range of published material available is extensive. Some of it is pretty academic in nature, but the majority would fit more comfortably into the ‘self-help’ category. The sheer volume (groan!) of these publications makes it impossible to make particular recommendations, but does reinforce a long held view of mine that in such circumstances the traditional bookshop wins out any day over the online variant. I much prefer to spend an hour or so browsing physical volumes, to seek out the ones that speak to me – the ones that chime most with my own instincts.

Most of the sources I have studied do seem to agree on basic principles. Here are a few useful tips for those contemplating embarking on an LDR – gleaned in this instance from around the InterWebNet:

  • Establish the ground rules from the start. Do not assume anything – leave nothing up in the air. This should be a no-brainer. Avoiding unecessary friction is key in a situation in which finding resolutions will probably be hampered by restricted communication.
  • Agreed on an end goal for the LDR. A painful time will pass much more quickly if there is a definite end date. It will also help tremendously if the LDR is in itself of benefit to the relationship in some way.
  • Agree on a level of communication. This will vary, but for many people frequent contact – however brief and prosaic – seems preferable to occasional longer conversations. This is certainly the case for us.
  • Alternate visits to each other’s base. A sense of balance and fairness will make things a little easier. Sharing the burden reinforces the relationship.
  • Trust each other. Nothing is as corrosive as jealousy or mistrust in a vacuum. You should not – it hardly need be said – do anything to breach the other’s trust.
  • Make your own life – but be sure to share each other’s vicariously.
  • Take every opportunity for intimacy. Of course! Goes without saying…

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