2:53 p.m. - 2003-09-06
The Arts
All right! A long lost play by Agatha Christie was found among the "unsolicited manuscripts" pile by the artistic director of The newly named Vertigo Mystery Theatre aka The Pleiades theater. Mystery. It is titled "Chimneys" and is somehow connected with Ms. Christie's own mysterious disappearance for six days one Christmas. The first ever performance of the play will be offered in their theater located in the heart of our downtown in October. That coincides with our annual Wordfest celebration Wordfest, which will feature world class writers offering readings and workshops for Calgary biblio and logo philes. The warmup event for Wordfest is the literacy festival "Word on the Street" that is scheduled for the end of this month. The whole purpose of this festival is to promote reading as a family affair. Words
Continuing on the literary front, my favorite astrologer Astrofish has just released his first book. I've read some of the partial profiles in "Fishing for Love Thru the Zodiac" and they are both witty and instructive. Although I do take issue with the "space cadet" designation my sign gets for its literary rating - unless he means a space-"time continuum" cadet, then we're copacetic.
I don't think it will help me figure out the dream I had about the planets Saturn and Pluto last night, though. What's with that anyway? Why can't I dream about some of the fun planets. Anyway, I kept dreaming about being in a time and situation where I seemed to be responsible for handling a fairly serious crisis. It wasn't family or community based, it was to do with national conditions. There was no panic or fear in me, just a lot of pressure to address things quickly and thoroughly. I haven't felt that type of reaction in sometime.
When I worked at the hospital here, for example, it was the response one had to marshall when something severe happened to a patient. There was no time for panic or emotion then - it could cost them their life. Just time for assessment, team work, and action - stress response at 11. At that time, I was a support worker, but everyone in the vicinity of a crisis situation was expected to assist as instructed.
Anyway, in this dream I kept being shown an ephemeris (chart showing the location of each planet on any given day) where Saturn was moving backward and forward through 20 to 25 degrees of Cancer, and Pluto was between 24 and 25 degrees Sagittarius. I knew that wasn't this year so, when I woke up, I went to the computer and found an online site that has a multi-year ephemeris. Seems that the crisis I "saw" will arise between August 2004 to July 2005. One friend of mine makes her living as a psychic. She has always contended that if you are shown it you can change it. Don't know how that works on a global level, but maybe the crisis doesn't have to happen. Maybe it is just that the greatest probability now is that it will. I'll have to meditate on that. "Meditate in my direction".
On the music front, the Canadian Idol search is down to three singers, one - Billy Klippert - is from Calgary. His sound seems very much like the style of Creedence Clearwater Revival to me. His rendition of Elton John's "Levon" was so powerful that even the most vicious judge in the contest gave him a standing ovation. The truly neat thing, from my perspective though, is that he attended high school with my number two son. Did they know each other? Don't really know - that isn't what makes the story so great.
You see, there is this self-appointed group of Luddites who feel somehow that they are the last word in rating the quality of education provided by each of our schools, even though they don't reside in this province. The criteria used to create their school ratings is based on how much money is invested in the schools (how wealthy the community is)and how homogeneous (read white/caucasian) the culture of the school is. The only "diagnostic tool" the luddites accept as a measure of teacher/student potential is the one-shot province-wide subject by subject tests administered near the end of a term. In the elementary and junior high schools in wealthier areas, it has become the practice of the staff to send children who achieve below a certain average home on the day of the province wide tests. In their senior highs, the students are just told they can no longer attend the classes - they're kicked out if they don't attain a certain average. There are two alternate strategies used to skew the results as well. In one of my sister's childrens' schools, volunteer parents are assigned to a struggling child as an "assistant" during the testing, for example. Those parents listen to the child's responses then write an interpretation (theirs) on the test paper. In the Separate schools, my partner parent council friend from the Catholic system tells me the process is even simpler. After the tests are written, they're given to volunteer parents who are provided with erasers and pencils - and the marking key. The major local paper here then spends at least one whole week spewing out all the drool (interpretation) the Luddites provide for them without critique or rebuttal allowed. High ratings actually affect property values in our communities - that's how much weight these idiots' opinions are given.
The staff at my sons' high school (and the elementary and junior high) determined that their responsibility was to teach all students, without culling for the very narrow criteria set by a bunch of used up old men who have nothing better to do with their time than try to drag everyone back to the '50's. Our provincial government, in collusion with these dinosaurs, have justified cutting out funding educational programs that address the balance of the students talents or skills in the city, by referencing those results. You know, funding for things like art, phys ed, music, languages and ESL, special needs classes, and even kindergarten for a few years. Level playing field - not. Those students aren't even allowed on it anymore. If the staff hadn't stuck to their guns, this young potential star could have been invited out the door before he finished the classes (music) that really mattered to him. Fortunately for him, an interest in sciences sent him on to university too. Guess the Luddites never heard of the schooling experiences of Michelangelo, Abe Lincoln, Albert Einstein, or Thomas Edison, to name a few. Guess our local newspaper hasn't clued in either.
Notwithstanding the Luddites, people in our city strongly support music appreciation. This month, there is a contest involving 75 pianists from 22 countries at the Esther Honens International Music Festival Honens and the Calgary Philharmonic's yearly offering of "Mozart on the Mountain" - yes the whole orchestra does travel up one of mountains and performs outdoors for their fans. Mozart. By the way, Mozart was a space cadet too, according to our friendly neighbourhood - well ok we share the same continent - astrologer. He started playing the harpsicord at the age of 3 and composing at the age of 5. He never attended school. Good thing, eh - he might have become a banker (no shame in that), but what would the rest of the world have lost?
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