Jenobi's World

Vancouver is a very green city. The amount of greenery is incredible considering the buildings are reaching higher and higher, almost touching the clouds. In fact, there are days when the top ten to twenty floors on some high rises are lost in the fog. That must be unsettling, looking out to a curtain of clouds. The shrubs, trees and evergreens are planted throughout the city, cleaning the air with their own breathing, giving us cleaner oxygen.  The amount of plants makes one want to have the same natural surroundings inside or at least on the balcony, if luck is on you side with that option. Currently, my little jungle is enjoying the warmth inside during the chill of the winter. Last year I lost faith in a couple of California Lilacs I purchased, frozen over a week and half of deadly -20°C weather. I had to heat the hummingbird feeder with a telephoto lens warmer for a camera. I didn't want to lose my new lilacs so I brought them inside, along with my Japanese dwarf maple, my cal...

  Like a cozy sweater, I wrapped myself in the past, took a deep breath and pushed play. I knew what was coming, and I was already familiar with the first episode of its release, but knowing I had full access to every episode made the experience more personal. There was no familiar theme song as it wasn't a reboot, but it had the feeling of something you know like the back of your hand, like that smell that brings you back to your grandmother's home or the taste that transports you to another time in your life. It was almost like the feeling returning to a numb limb, with which I have had recent experience, two carpal tunnel surgeries later. My brain, or rather my soul, was awakened from the fog bathed in for what seemed like forever.  I decided to use my time back in New York with ladies from my past. Although fictional, they definitely were part of my life, playing out storylines side by side with my life on the tube weekly. Having them back, 20 years later, aged and lived i...

Every morning I drag myself out of my warm bed and prepare for another work day, as everyone else does in numerous routines and rituals. I pop in my earbuds and tune out the nearby noise, listen to the news while doing my daily puzzles on my mobile phone on the bus, and mentally prepare my "To Do" list. Looking around the crowded bus I always look at the similarities students wear to university, checking the popular brands and styles. At one point during my employment at the university, I created a "style" Bingo game, matching brands and styles students wear, and I always tried to figure out how these younger "starving" young adults could afford Nike Air Force One sneakers, Canada Goose parkas, Blundstone boots and the like. I do this today, sneaking a quick snap of the style and Google Lens the style (no faces of course), sometimes outwardly scrunching my face at the price of the item on my screen. No wonder these kids are starving, they can't afford ...

Vancouver has never been known as a winter wonderland, well, at least the actual city center, but the weather pattern has consistently turned frigid. Usually, Vancouverites are used to the dreary gray decor, cloudy and rainy 24 - 7, making the shorter days even worse, as if the Sun is wearing shades. The streets are usually lined with puddles and the locals walk around the city with black umbrellas adding to the dark wet days of winter. I have noticed some people donning vibrant coloured umbrellas, standing out from the wave of black, but this is probably more for safety from cars, scooters, e-bikes, buses and other vehicles trying to peer through the rain. I was almost hit by a car and now I have a bright yellow umbrella, hoping I don't experience that shock ever again. This past week, the weather went from unusually warm and balmy in January to an about-face in February with negative temperatures and snow falling in the city and all over the Lower Mainland. The excitement of hear...