I have a bone to pick...

I was talking to my mother yesterday. To provide a bit of background, my mom had a knee replacement two weeks ago and is undergoing physio and blood tests, not to mention pain. She's 82 years old. My father, who adores her, is 83 and the most honest man you could ever meet. In my whole life, my father has only yelled at me twice (for which I'll keep secret!). He's a very patient man who spent his working life teaching young men in jail and then through technical school, young men and women, how to do auto body work. He's the light of my life.

Anyways...when I asked my mom what was going on yesterday, she mentioned that my dad was at ICBC because someone claimed he had backed into him with his van and done damage to his vehicle. Now my dad, even though he's elderly, is a very honest man. He figured that maybe he could be responsible so he checked his van...nothing there. Upon further conversation with my mother, I discovered that this was not the first time this had happened. In fact, he had been accused of this once before (I didn't know...but we won't get into that now!).

So, my dad has to spend two wasted hours at ICBC with my mom at home with no help. This is ridiculous. There are actually people out there who are watching for elderly people to blame their stupidity on. I am so angry about this that I'm ready to go to the newspapers about it.

What do you thing?????? Should I????? Or am I overreacting??????

Let me know.

It's snowing again!

I've been thinking about my life as a little girl growing up in Coquitlam. We used to have so much snow during the winters! (mind you, I was a little shorter then!) I can remember building snowforts with my brother and having snowball fights with my dad. We used to strap the old skis on and ski down the hill, right into the front yard. Como Lake used to freeze up every winter and we'd all take our skates down to the lakeside, strap them on and spend the evening as a family on the lake. There would be hot chocolate and shovelling and so many family activities to do. I can remember my dad telling me to 'put the car in third gear as soon as possible' when driving in the snow; I wasn't even close enough in age to drive!

My point is that those were family times. Our snow over Christmas turned into being 'family time'. You couldn't get out to drive anyone to the mall so everyone had to be at home together. The power kept going out so we all had to be in front of the fire, together. It didn't even matter that the ever-present blackberry was clicking away. We were together and that made the holidays special.

I know that this snow is not heavy and will probably turn to rain this afternoon. However, it's giving me a time to reflect on how important it is to take time and be together.