Remembering Belaud

07 Wednesday Dec 2022

Tags

—ooo—

Remembering Belaud

Belaud was three months old when he entered my life, but he died in 2019. When I first saw him I thought there could not be a lovelier kitten.

However, for the first two weeks, Belaud was in mid-air. He was flying. I think he was nervous. He didn’t know me and he had just left his family. I could not go and meet Belaud, but the breeder sent me a picture of his father, Tennessee, and she told me Belaud would look like Tennessee. His mother was an aristocrat. She had a very long name.

Belaud was my second chartreux. There was a previous Belaud: Belaud I. Chartreux look almost the same, but my first Belaud was more dependent on me. Everytime I left the house, he looked worried. Fortunately, he was with Mouchette. They played together. They were lovely to watch. My house was not very large, but it had more space than we needed.

This is a strange time in history. There is not a single chartreux available in Quebec. I would have to fly to France to find Belaud III, but even French breeders have been affected by Covid and I could not afford to fly to France, not at this point. The markets are fluctuating.

The above photograph was taken in Magog. Magog is less than a half-hour drive from Sherbrooke. Chartreux enjoy cars. The law demands that cats be inside their carrier, but with chartreux, the carrier protects the chartreux, not the driver.

I did not live in this building when Belaud was adopted. I wanted to move, but decided not to do because I was not feeling well. I lost the former apartment to a dishonest realtor and an unconscionable lawyer. I asked the lawyer to phone the realtor and explain that I wasn’t feeling well. It ruled out moving to a new home. I didn’t pay his bill. It was the beginning of emphysema. It causes shortness of breath, but it is not a great obstacle.

This building I live in is perfect for an aging woman, but it is a smaller apartment and it needed and still needs renovations. Moreover, it could not accommodate hundreds of books. So, I have missed my former apartment. And now I miss Belaud.

I am looking for a third Belaud, but I may not find one.

The war in Ukraine has not ended, so I believe this will be a humble Christmas. The days are getting shorter and the light will return.

RELATED ARTICLES

Belaud (2008-2019) (29 Nov 2019)
The Chartreux portrayed (14 February 2019)
Belaud the Cat’s Suite (28 February 2012)
Belaud the Cat (31 July 2011)

I wanted to say hello. I haven’t recovered fully yet, but you are in my heart. 💕

**An Amaryllis** (https://florium.com/amaryllis-hippeastrum-joker/)

Winter has come …

15 Tuesday Nov 2022

Posted by michelinewalker in Quebec Art, Sharing

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Clarence Gagnon artist, New Computer, sharing

Baie-Saint-Paul, par Clarence Gagnon

Winter has come. I was 78 in July, but the photo at the foot of this post was taken on 19 September 2022. I expected to have many wrinkles by the age of 78, but I don’t. However, I have aged. My skin is rather transparent, and my lips are thinner. Moreover, my memory fails me and when night falls, past events leap upon me. I regret some of the decisions I have made.

New Computer

But the business of the day is the purchase of a computer. I needed help choosing the right computer. So, I am in Magog where my friend John helped me to choose a good computer and set it up. I should have replaced the former computer a year ago, but a Covid vaccine caused pericarditis and gout.

These are difficult years: Covid, Putin invading Ukraine, inflation, and a devastatingly sick climate!

The Language Laws

I will no longer discuss Quebec’s language laws. I had to speak English during the decades I lived outside Quebec, but I was in a very friendly environment, and the difficulties I faced were not related to my mother tongue.

RELATED ARTICLES

Colonization and the Revenge of the Cradles (11 January 2014)
Maria Chapdelaine (26 January 2012)

Sources and Resources

Clarence Gagnon EN

—ooo—

Love to everyone 💕

Clarence Gagnon, L’Hiver (I have used this video previously.)

Micheline, 19 September 2022

On Pain: Mid-December

18 Saturday Dec 2021

Posted by michelinewalker in Covid-19, Human Condition, Medicine, Sharing

≈ 9 Comments

Tags

Acceptable pain relief, Constant pain, John Amos Comenius, Medication, Myocarditis, Pain, Pericarditis, sharing, Side effects of Covid Vaccines

Lawren S. Harris (Pinterest) Group of Seven, Canada

—ooo—

Winter has come. There is very little snow, but it is cold. Storms devastated many American states. I grieve for those who have lost a loved one and their home.

Medical Tests

I went for tests on the 14^th and 16^th of December. On the 14^th, I was in considerable pain when I arrived for the tests. So, afterward, I returned to the Emergency Room. The doctor who looked after me told me, somewhat aggressively, to dismiss all previous diagnoses. She also stated that we did not have a firm diagnosis concerning my illness and that she would not prescribe medication. If my memory serves me well, my doctor also said that she was a young emergency-room doctor and that she did not have the authority to prescribe medication. Other emergency-room doctors had prescribed medication.

But we did have a diagnosis. I had been diagnosed with pericarditis, inflamed muscles in the rib cage, a deteriorating left shoulder, and arm, etc. In rare cases, the vaccine can cause pericarditis and/or myocarditis. However, Covid-19 is the greater evil. Therefore, one gets vaccinated.

However, after my heart was examined and tests performed, this doctor wanted to send me home unmedicated. Pain may sound the alarm, but it can grow into a medical issue. I told her that I could not tolerate this level of pain and needed medical help. I could not understand what had happened to me.

Another doctor walked by and asked, jokingly, if I was the lady with the sick shoulder. How did he know? I said that I was indeed the lady with the sick shoulder and told him that the pain had become so intense that it was crippling. Something had to be done. He said he would look at the papers. In the end, the doctors, or my doctor, phoned the pharmacy to prescribe barely effective painkillers, but painkillers.

However, I still wonder why I was not prescribed effective medication. I am small, but I am not a child. The doctor also said that the pain I felt was not always constant. It could stop for a few minutes and then recur. Therefore, it did not warrant medication. My friend Paulina arrived, caught a few words, and said that for the last few weeks, I had not been the same. I was not at my computer.

One is asked to provide a number from one to ten to describe the intensity of one’s pain, but that is very difficult. I was not being burned alive, yet I was experiencing considerable pain.

Reality has changed, but has it changed to the point where taking a few tablets of codeine is considered harmful? Moreover, although Covid-19 has exerted an influence on everyone, the medical use of morphine for a few days is still acceptable. In rare cases, Covid-19 vaccines can trigger pericarditis and myocarditis which in no way lessens the benefits of the vaccine. This may have led my doctor to a degree of analysis paralysis.

This little post is not under “Medicine in Quebec.” But I am worried. Will I be left to age and die in pain as though I were the epitome of nothingness? It comforts me to think that if there is a God, and there is a God, God knows me.

—ooo—

This is the month of Christmas and the day of the longest night. The Winter solstice, is very near in this hemisphere.

We are going back to Félix Loriaux. Would that I could find more pictures of his Buffon pour les enfants, One site does show illustrations of the Buffon pour les enfants, but are short of images. So, I may have to order the relevant books, if they are affordable. As you know. Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon was a naturalist. The animals he discussed were animals, not animals in disguise.

Below the video, you will find a page from an illuminated manuscript belonging to madame Marie Hainaut (1285). I love this naive depiction of an angel telling the shepherds that Christ is born.

A picture on our video features anthropomorphic humans, humans disguised as animals.

As for the related articles, they are the story of a Czech gentleman, John Amos Comenius, who may well have been the first educator to state that illustrations helped students to remember. A picture is worth a thousand words.

RELATED ARTICLES

Johann Amos Comenius: Word and Art (7 November 2015)
Orbis Sensualium Pictus (13 January 2011)

Love to everyone 💕

Bardcore/Modern Medieval Christmas Editon | Medieval Instrumental Music Compilation

**Livre d’images de madame Marie Hainaut**, vers 1285-1290 Paris, BnF, Naf 16251, fol. 22v. La naissance du Christ est annoncée aux bergers, aux humbles. “Et voici qu’un ange du seigneur leur apparut [.]. Ils furent saisis d’une grande frayeur. Mais l’ange leur dit : “Ne craignez point, car je vous annonce une bonne nouvelle [.]” *(**The Birth of Christ announced to the Shepherds**) (Photo credit: the National Library of France [BnF])*

A Lost Paragraph

01 Sunday Aug 2021

Posted by michelinewalker in Canadian History, First Nations, Nouvelle-France, War

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

Capitulation of Montréal, François de Lévy, Jeffery Amherst, Missing Paragraph, sharing, Siege of Louisbourg

**Le Chevalier de Lévis** (Photo credit: Google)

—ooo—

Dear readers, I apologize for attempting to update my last post. In fact, an apology is no longer essentiel because the few lines I wrote have disappeared.

I had modified the paragraph that precedes the conclusion. I wrote that, ironically, Cameron of Lochiel’s decision to a refuse a promotion that would not allow him to help the d’Habervilles reinforced James Murray’s conviction that their “sovereign” could not do without the services of so loyal and grateful an officer. Cameron of Lochiel richly deserved a promotion. He is the hero in Aubert de Gaspé‘s Anciens Canadiens.

—ooo—

I also wrote that I would be closing my post in the not-too-distant future. My memory plays tricks on me. I will resume my career as an artist. I do watercolours, sanguine, drawings… Once in a while, I will dip the brush in my coffee instead of the water, but it does not affect the coffee. I really do not know what will happen to me. Nor do doctors. I can still function but I make spelling errors, repeat myself, etc.

Fortunately, scientists have now determined that Covid-19 attacks the brain and they have started to map out the harm inflicted by Covid-19. Forty-five years ago, no one knew. For 15 years, I did not dare tell anyone that I could not attend meetings that took place in the evening, or go out, whatever the event. In 1991, a Spect scan revealed a seriously slow rate of perfusion of blood to the brain and extensive damage. I was not expected to do anything anymore.

I tried to return to work. However, a new Chair, who wanted to avenge the dismissal of a colleague, would not look upon me as a full-time member of the Department. For four years, I taught on a part-time basis. I re-entered the classroom after he resigned. However, once I resumed my duties, my workload kept growing. I was teaching in several areas of learning. I fell ill and made decisions that I regret.

James Murray was a good man and Cameron of Lochiel, the bon Anglais. It seems that the only person who would harm the citizens of New France and the Amerindians who lived among them was Jeffery Amherst.

I will quote Wikipedia:

Amherst’s legacy is controversial due to his expressed desire to exterminate the race of indigenous people during Pontiac’s War, and his advocacy of biological warfare in the form of gifting blankets infected with smallpox as a weapon,notably at the Siege of Fort Pitt. This has led to a reconsideration of his legacy. In 2019, the City of Montreal removed his name from a street in the city, renaming it Rue Atateken, from the Kanien’kéha Mohawk language. The town of Amherst, Nova Scotia is controversially named for him, as is the town of Amherstburg, Ontario.
(See Amherst, Wikipedia)

It seems there is a rotten apple in every basket.

RELATED ARTICLES

An Update: the French and Indian War (26 July 2021)
Last Words on the Battle of Jumonville (25 July 2021)
The Battle of Jumonville Glen 24 July 2021)
The Good Gentleman (9 July 2021)
The Order of Good Cheer (19 June 2021)
La Débâcle/The Debacle (13 June 2021)
Jules d’Haberville & Cameron of Lochiel (12 June 2021)
Les Anciens Canadiens/Cameron of Lochiel (9 June 2021)

Nouvelle-France’s Last and Lost Battle: The Battle of the Plains of Abraham (24 March 2012)
The Battle of Fort William Henry & Cooper’s Last of the Mohicans (26 March 2012)
Louis-Joseph de Montcalm-Gozon, Marquis de Saint-Veran (25 March 2012)

Sources and Resources

Wikipedia, The Canadian Encyclopedia, & Britannica
Les Anciens Canadiens (ebooksgratuits.com). FR
Cameron of Lochiel (Archive.org ), Sir Charles G. D. Roberts, translator. EN
Cameron of Lochiel is Gutenberg [EBook#53154], Sir Charles G. D. Roberts, translator. EN

Scots in Canada

26 Wednesday May 2021

Posted by michelinewalker in fur-trade, Lower Canada, Scotland, Scots, Scots in Canada, Sharing

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Beaver Club, fur-trade, Hudson's Bay Company, Montreal, North West Company, sharing

*Ravenscrag*, built for Sir Hugh Allan in 1863, the Golden Square Mile (Wikipedia)

—ooo—

I have continued to research Scots in Canada. They were fur traders and became were wealthy. When beavers nearly disappeared, they became explorers. As fur traders, they founded the North West Company (1779) which competed with the Hudson’s Bay Company (established in 1670). They lived in the Montreal’s Golden Square Mile (mille carré doré) and socialized at the Beaver Club, a gentleman’s dining club, founded in 1785. Later, they moved to Westmount, Montreal. A few senior members married French-Canadian women. The French who had remained in the fur trade after the Conquest were senior members at the Beaver Club. New France had its bourgeoisie and bourgeois remained. Some were Seigneurs. Affluent French-speaking Canadian may have lived in Outremont, a lovely area of Montreal. Until recently, bourgeois French Canadians did not live in Westmount. They lived in lovely homes located in Outremont. I visited relatives in that arrondissement. Their homes were lovely, but their dining-room could not accommodate a hundred guests.

Charles Chaboillez was a wealthy fur trader, but he lost his money. His daughter married James McGill who, in his will, paid his father-in-law’s debts and provided him with an annuity.

Montreal is a gem, but the money was in the hands of Anglophones, as Mr Neilson told Alexis de Tocqueville and as Tocqueville himself knew.

The Château Clique is associated with some members of the North West Company, but seigneurs and French bourgeois also belonged to the Château Clique. Fur trading had its classes, and the wealthy are its upper class. The French had been voyageurs and Amerindians were their guides. However, one could be wealthy in New France and Canada without exploiting others. I would not make that generalization.

RELATED ARTICLES

The Auld Alliance and Scots Guard: Scots in Canada (20 May 2021)
Alexis de Tocqueville and John Neilson: a Conversation, 27 August 1831
(13 May 2021)
Alexis de Tocqueville on Lower Canada (17 Janvier 2018)
Canadiana.1 (page)

—ooo—

Love to everyone 💕

Les Indes galantes de Jean-Philippe Rameau, sous la direction de William Christie

Charles Chaboillez, a French Fur Trader (Wikipedia)

Absence

14 Wednesday Apr 2021

Posted by michelinewalker in absence, Pandemic

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

absence, Poor memory, sharing, technical difficulty

I apologize for a delay in posting. There have been many events. The worst, however, is difficulty logging in to Windows/Microsoft. I supply a password. It works, but suddenly it no longer works. I do not think the password is the problem but something else. I am also facing criminality on the Internet.

As for my posts, the next one is a song in which the Vent du Nord ensemble express an opinion on Confederation. At this point, statues of the main father of Confederation have been removed. A building or buildings named after him have been renamed.

I have been updating posts on La Fontaine. La Fontaine’s Official Site is no longer the same, so the link to the text of the fables must be changed. These posts are listed on a page and, to my knowledge, all have been updated. In the days of Covid-19, informative posts may benefit students.

Where the Pandemic is concerned, the rapid emergence of variants combined with civil disobedience are undermining the vaccination campaign. The number of victims has risen. It seems that Easter has been as deadly as Christmas and refusal to wear a mask or to be vaccinated are deadlier still. It would be my opinion that governments respond to protest by loosening sanitary measures prematurely.

My memory is playing tricks on me. It’s a neurological issue caused by the virus H1N1, which I caught in February 1976. Beware of “slow Covid.”

Given the passing of Prince Philip, I am playing my “royal” music, the second movement of Beethoven’s 7^th Symphony. It has long been a favourite.

Love to everyone 💕