Gifts my mother gave me

Miriam Cameron Perry, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

 Gifts my mother gave me:

• She took us to see the Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens as if it was our family shrine
• Picnics! From proper picnic hampers at the Botanical gardens at Niagara Falls to tomato sandwiches in parks in Tehran she made a meal outside an adventure.
• She took us to see the cannon that Rudyard Kipling's Kim sat on in front of the museum in Lahore, Pakistan.
• Tea. It's always time to put a kettle on. We visited tea plantations and drank Assam Tea in Assam.
• The love of books. My mother would get up in the middle of the night to have a few peaceful moments to herself. We'd awake to the sound of her typewriter and one after another we would sneak into the kitchen to huddle by the coal stove and insist on chapter after chapter of the latest book in progress. Eight kids - sniffling at the sad bits. Picture it.
• How to patch a wound, knit a sweater and make a mean shepherd's pie. 

Things my mother didn't give me:

• Middle name. Neither I, nor any of my five sisters have middle names. I didn't give my daughter one.

Many more but these struck me! My mother has been gone for years now but these are gifts I will always have.

Coming to America

Rutledge Ave., Charleston, S.C.

Repost of 7/4/2009 entry:

For much of my life I felt like what my brother Jim likes to call a "Cultural Nomad". Each time I moved I started over completely with little overlap of friends or family. I had finished high school in India and my family had returned there. I was alone in Canada and by some happy stroke of good fortune was accepted into the Nursing program at Ryerson University in Toronto. It was during the time nursing schools were being absorbed into universities but I found a room in the old dorm at the Hospital for Sick Children.

I'd never had a room or bed of my own, worn any clothes but hand me downs, hadn't eaten a whole candy bar, never been in a bank or driven a car. I had braids down to my waist, dorky glasses and had seen three movies in my life. I was alone in Toronto after being part of a family of ten and I was in heaven. I loved it. I cut my hair, bought a pair of jeans, ate my first pizza and squeezed a lifetime of new experiences into two years.

It was a nasty wake up call to discover there was a freeze on hiring nurses when I graduated. Nothing. I applied everywhere, but nurses were working in book stores and as waitresses that year and half of my class left the country. US hospitals crossed the border to recruit us. We were considered good catches for foreign nurses since we already spoke English, eh.

I naively accepted the first job I was offered, packed everything I owned in a single suitcase and one small cardboard box and ended up in St. Petersburg, Florida. I was immediately assigned to be Charge Nurse on a Medical Surgical Floor. Poor souls.

That was 1977. I married my hippie from Philadelphia and moved into his half built cabin on a mountain in West Virginia. I worked in community hospitals and large medical centers. I had two children, ran a free- standing birthing center in Hurricane, W.Va. and eventually settled in the lowcountry arriving the year before hurricane Hugo.

I've been welcomed, respected, taught by experts and loved in this country. After my divorce I finally went through the process of becoming a citizen and every year on July the 4th I feel gratitude to the friends I've made in this country and for the home I found in Charleston.

Seven things about me

Charleston, S.C.

Isn't this house a beauty? I am so lucky to live here and walk by these gorgeous places every day.
 
Lowandslow challenged me to come up with seven interesting things that everyone might not know about me. I don't usually do these things but since he is one of my loyal readers and a frequent commenter (thank you, thank you!), I will do my best. Here we go:

1. I once won $10,000 in travel from the old Rhodes Furniture store on Sam Rittenburg Hwy. My kids were younger then and I dropped them off with my parents for the summer and went around the world. I rode a train through the Canadian Rockies, hiked on Vancouver Island, explored Hong Kong, stayed on a houseboat in Kashmir, enjoyed a lazy canal boat in France and finished off in London. I spent every last cent.

2. Although I am not opposed to eating meat I rarely cook it. I live on scrappy salads at work and simple healthy meals at home. A friend recently told me I was a "lazy vegetarian".

3. I took my own delivery pictures. Shut up. Don't picture it.

4. I grew up without a tv and had only seen three movies by the time I was seventeen: The Sound of Music, Ben Hur and Love Story. I've been making up for it ever since.

5. I walked across England from coast to coast and at the end I weighed exactly to the dot what I weighed when I started. I kept thinking I was going to walk off all those big English breakfasts. Ooops.

6. I consider flavored tea hot juice. Yuck.

7. I once failed a septic tank inspectors course in West Virginia and I'm still pissed about it. It was a rainy afternoon, I was hanging out with a couple of hippies and tagged along. I never wanted to be a septic tank inspector but they failed me because they didn't want a little gal passing the test, no one stood up for me and I didn't fight it. Grrrrr.

Whew. Seven. That's it! I am not going to name anyone but if you drop by please join the fun and come up with seven things most people might not know about you. I mean YOU. Leave a note in comments letting us know you are playing along so we can read them.

My Moment of Fame

Charleston Magazine

I kept getting emails from people congratulating me so I finally walked down to Harris Teeter and bought the January Charleston Magazine. Although I am a subscriber, I send my subscriptions as gifts and read old
issues at work for myself.

How fun is this!? Pretty damn fun.

Style Editor Ayoka Lucas and photographer Leann Canon came to my house just before I went away on my trip and put this together. I think they did a lovely job and I am incredibly flattered that they featured me. I've always loved Charleston Magazine. Thanks folks! You made me look good!

A message from my mother

Hoya Blossom, Charleston, S.C.



I don't bother with many plants anymore but I have a few hanging pots in my living room windows and always try to have a hoya plant. My Scottish grandmother was famous for the hoya that grew all the way along an arched opening between her sitting room and library and was heavy with blossoms every year. My mother had cuttings of her plant and when I went up for her funeral many years ago, I was handed a cutting of the original that she had been rooting for me. And, yes, I smuggled my third generation cutting across the border and home to Charleston.



The plants don't bloom very often but when they do they are amazing little bouquets of waxy blossoms. Check out the google image gallery of Hoya blossoms.



My original cutting bloomed for the first time on Mother's Day - the anniversary of my mother's death and for many years after on that date. I had a bad panicky time when that plant died after trying my best to nurse it back to health. Eventually I got another and this week I have a happy bloom. Hi mom! :)))

Family history by the book

Charleston, S.C.

I moved a bookshelf this weekend, emptying the dusty shelves onto a bed, throwing out Budget Travel magazines from ten years ago saved "just in case".

It's almost as good as reading a diary going through old books. The pile on the bed was a snapshot of interests that took me so far back into my childhood I tumbled down a rabbit hole of memories.

I shared common interests with my grandfather and have some of his old books. He loved art, music, birds and magic. I spent many an hour in his library drawing from sketchbooks, learning the escape secrets of Houdini and pondering hypnotizing my siblings to my advantage. I still have his books on British witchcraft, figure drawing and water colours of ships at sea.

I spent time as a kid, studying the faces in the "Beautiful Children" prints by the old masters, fascinated that the odd little people in the paintings were considered beautiful in their time. Through the years I added calligraphy and bird carving books which he would have liked, and I know he'd be proud of the magic and science tricks for kids from when my children were little.

My grandfather came from Scotland as Alexander Cameron Auchinachie. When no one in Canada could pronounce his Gaelic name without it sounding like a double sneeze he finally legally dropped it and went by his clan name Cameron. I am pleased to have at least one book signed before the name change.

Airmail Please!

Eutawville, S.C.

When I was a kid in India, without tv for entertainment, no telephones and only half an hour of English music on the radio on Sunday night, my friends and I competed in soliciting pen pals from far and wide. I have no recollection of what prompted this, but I sent an ad to the Winnipeg Free Press promising to correspond with anyone who would write me by Airmail.

The postman's arrival was a big deal and everyone gathered round when I got an envelope from Canada. The only person responding to my ad was a ninety year old gentleman by the name of Alfred Stone who wrote from the Wentworth Lodge Retirement Home in Dundas, Ontario.

He rambled on for pages in blue ink handwritten letters on thin paper sent by Airmail as requested. He thought I had nerve insisting on the extra postage but surface mail took 4 - 6 months to arrive. If I was to have a senior citizen as a pen pal, Mr. Stone was the right one. He had just started violin lessons and was rehearsing for a performance. He had recently taken up woodworking and was making an bowl made of intricate inlaid pieces.

Mr. Stone knew exactly the right trick to keep me writing back. In each envelope he sent, he included a crisp two dollar Canadian bill. Gasp! Real pretty foreign money! He signed the letter, which I have to this day, "You can I am sure, use this."

You betcha! I kept my fortune in a worn envelope with tiny ticked pencil marks for each addition, translating it into Rupees and recalculating it endlessly according to the current exchange rate. I was the sister with MONEY.

We went to see Mr. Stone. When my family returned to Canada for a visit we drove to meet him. We walked down to the community room where he played us a tune on the piano and showed me the ribbon he won at the fair for his hand carved wooden bowl. He was a good catch.

Happy Birthday Jim!

Mawlai, Shillong, India

One hundred and forty seven years ago tonight, give or take a hundred years, I sat straight up and wide eyed on the top bunk of a double bunk bed (yes, one bed - four kids) listening to the howling wind and knowing that my mother was giving birth in the next room. It was her eighth baby and perhaps less frightening to deliver with my Dad's help than go to an unfamiliar hospital. Things happened so fast the decision was quickly made for her.

Happy birthday Jim! Aren't you glad your sisters raised you right?

We strapped him on our backs and played wild games of tag, hardly ever dropped him on hard cement floors and halfheartedly taught him to read a bit in English. Click here to see a picture of my dad sharing a special moment with my two youngest brothers.

Lay Down the Towel

Charleston, S.C.

The folks in the marketing department at my hospital are known for coming up with some very creative ads. They have successfully used employees and often my volunteers as actors and models. I was in a tv spot last year examining the rash on the arm of my assigned tv husband and encouraging him to see a doctor.

It was fun! People recognized me and strangers offered to let me check rashes all over town. Heh. I've been handy for a few shots for senior programs mainly because of my white hair. I shouldn't have been surprised when the gals in marketing called laughing their heads off, saying they needed me for another commercial.

This spot is on awkward questions people have to ask their doctor. My theme? Yep. Incontinence. My only line was, "When I laugh, I leak!"

They had a great film crew working the shoot and decided to let down my hair. My hope is that people will be so distracted by my long hair that they won't hear what I am saying. Ya think?

Seriously, of course - there are awkward questions that people need to be able to ask their doctor. It is a clever idea for a spot and I wasn't the only person convinced to help out. My co-workers are going to get a kick out of this one and someone might actually get help.

Now, I am going to pile my hair back up on my head as usual and go for my walk.

Somewhere in Europe

Perry Family Travels

Hmmmm....where do you think this is? The photo next to it looks like Vienna but these old slides were not labeled. Does anyone recognize the landmark?

I am the shorty in the back row. Yes. There were eight of us.

Edit: I added this second view clearly taken on the same day. Vienna!

New Year

Shillong Peak, Shillong, Meghalaya, India

I've always liked New Year's eve and day. This photo is labeled 1965 so it was the end of the second year New Year I spent in India. I already had my friendships well established.

We always stayed up until midnight as kids, with the coal stove on, playing carrom and crokinole. There was a "midnight feast" and token gift exchange.

I am one of eight so there were enough of us to put on little plays and performances that always involved my sister Shirley doing her infamous Beggar Woman dance for tips. Gotta support the arts!

Church Photo in Lieu of Attendance - Khasi Hills

Khasi Hills, Meghalaya, India

When I was a kid, living in Shillong, India, we would often attend church services in the outlaying areas. All ten of us would pile in the old yellow Willy's jeep and head far into the hills to remote villages.

I often joke that I have a lifetime pass and won't need to attend another church service as long as I live - and I mean it. I am exempt. Sundays alone could easily involve three separate services, morning, afternoon and end in evening services by kerosene lantern.

I'd spend my time drawing cartoons of the preacher and eagerly offer to take crying babies outside. I'd lay on the grass playing with the kids and torturing ants with my magnifying glass while the congregation belted out the good old familiar protestant hymns in Khasi.

This image is from a brittle slide in my Dad's old box probably from the mid 1960's.

Off Campus

Kaziranga Nation Park, Assam, India

Clearly not in the lowcountry.

The family slides in my dad's old wooden box are dusty and brittle with age. It seems hardly worth the trouble scanning them in, but occasionally there is a neat effect. This is a one-horned rhino in the high grass of Kaziranga National Park in the tea country of Assam. I was riding astride an elephant with my legs spread so wide it took a day to get my knees to touch.

There are no dates on the slide frames but I was young then with braids to my waist. Good memories. It was the first real family holiday I remember taking, driving from the hills of Shillong up into the plains with ten of us squeezed into the yellow willy's jeep.

Monkeys on the roof, tiger paw prints in the mud, snakes in the lake, parrots in the trees. An English tea planter invited us in for tea. We walked down to the river one morning and all the elephants had come for their bath lounging back in the water for the mahouts to scrub their back and spraying the babies with their trunks. When friends talk of swimming with the dolphins I say, I swam with the elephants.

It all looks so civilized now. Go. Ride an elephant into the tall grass through the mist at dawn.

What Does Joan Do?

It's Volunteer Week and a good time to clarify what the heck I actually do.

We are fortunate in this country to have so many people willing to do unpaid work supporting the causes they believe in, that we actually need people to coordinate their efforts. That would be me. I am the Director of Volunteers for Roper St. Francis Healthcare and I coordinate the day to day program at Bon Secours St. Francis Hospital.

I have over 450 active volunteers between the ages of 14 - 96 in our facilities in any one month. Last year our volunteers served over 82,000 hours. Amazing.

In health care the processing is so complicated I am lucky that I have any volunteers at all.

The idea is, if a hospital employee is required to go through safety, infection control, privacy training, health screenings, backgrounds checks etc. to keep our patients safe, why wouldn't we have to do that for someone who is working for free? We do.

My life is processing. I am contantly orienting, placing and training a rolling roster of volunteers of all ages who come to serve. These folks make an great difference in the service we offer and many do it because someone helped them when they most needed it.

Volunteers welcome and greet, help with clerical support, fill water pitchers and help feed, make rounds on patients, push wheelchairs, help in the nursery and drive golf carts. I have a singing volunteer, a couple of clowns and pet therapists whose trained dogs wear official hospital ID tags. We regularly get letters and phone calls grateful for the kindness of this cast of incredible characters that have gathered determined to make a difference.

We have a great reputation for helping students on career tracks and the hospital is well staffed with young professionals who started in my office. I have student mentoring programs, career evenings and a summer camp. I am fortunate to work with a wonderful staff who welcome and teach students interested in health careers.

It's Volunteer Week! Volunteers are working all over this city adding to our quality of life in ways we can't imagine. I hope I say it every day, but thank you, thank you, thank you volunteers.

A trip down memory lane

St. Mary's High School, Shillong, India

I've been enjoying some comments that take me back to my past. A recent one said, "Joan, if I remember correctly your hair length was below the waistline. Sometimes it nearly reached the knees. And do you remember the schoolgirl whose hairline nearly touched her ankles?"

I do remember her. She was a classmate and good friend. Her name was Phimklet. Phimklet means "you won't forget," so of course, I never did.

We hiked from Mawlai on the outskirts of town, three miles to St. Mary's High School and back each day. No wonder I still walk everywhere.

Another reader who found me online some years ago sent me these pictures of my class. I had such good friends (Rani, Mala, Madhumita Roy, Neeta, Poonam) and although I wasn't famous for academics I knew every way in and out of that school. We were always playing pranks and practical jokes. I my fill of Italian nuns poking hard fingers in my chest demanding to know why I "wasn't more like my sisters." Heheh.

I am in the center of the top picture with my hair pulled back, big grin and dorky glasses. Fun days.

Googling around I found this poem about Mawlai.

Weekend Field Trip

Mawlai, Shillong, India

Okay, okay, I admit this one isn't from my Charleston album.

I have received emails lately from folks who have landed on my blog because of the Indian connection. It has been delightful to hear from you! I don't run into many Khasis in Charleston.

I did grow up in Meghalaya - the home of the clouds, and this is my elementary school photo. If you look closely you can spot a few pale faces scattered in the group and my mum on the left. I am on the top row center and am one of eight siblings. My dad was headmaster of the elementary school in Mawlai.

It was a terrific place to grow up and certainly one of the most beautiful parts of the world. We played wild late night games with packs of kids, washed our clothes in the rivers and our hair in the waterfalls. We took picnics to the old British polo grounds, Shillong Peak and rowed the boats on Wards Lake. I don't remember wearing shoes regularly until we hiked in to Shillong to high school.

My brother Jim lives there still and has written a traveler's guide to the north east available from chillibreeze. On Saturday 3/12, Jim successfully helped coordinate the Guinness book of world records Cheraw Bamboo Dance in Mizoram.

This is the link to my sister Shirley singing a Khasi favorite: Sier Lapalang.

To any Khasi who comes by I say "Khublei!" and want to show you that there is a greeting for you inscribed in the streets of Charleston. Of course I have no idea who did it. ;)

Of all the galas, in all the towns........

Charleston Place Hotel, RSFH Gala, Charleston, S.C.

Of all the galas, in all the towns, in all the world, she wears that gown into mine....

Ha! Is the correct quote "Great minds think alike" or "Fools never differ"? Julie Diamond (right) and I wore exactly the same gown to the RSFH Gala last night. Julie's husband Joe has the office next to mine and she had actually called me to ask how formal the event was and what I was wearing. I guess I didn't describe it very well. We had a good laugh and decided we both had good taste.

It's fun to dress up once and a while. I even had my hair done for this one and it's become a once a year ritual. I have to face the hairdresser and it's clearly obvious that I have been hacking away at my own hair all year before I pile it up in a clip each morning. Sabriam Brinton at Whispers on Wentworth looked stunned at the chopped up mess I'd made after I last cut it with bandage scissors and trimmed me up to be presentable. Tada! Miracle worker. Thanks Sabriam!

The (ahem...) good old days...

Sandstone, W.Va.

No, it isn't Charleston. It's a wee polaroid emulsion of a picture I took years ago in the mountains above Sandstone, West Virginia. I was in a similar cabin not far down the road.

Back when I was young, scrawny, happily naive and pretty freshly off the boat from growing up in India, I eloped with my happy hippie who claimed to have been building his dream cottage in wild and wonderful West Virginia. The cabin turned out to be a one room shell on the side of a mountain with no insulation or plumbing. One side of the cabin was to be a window that would drop for a tree house effect.

Vision, people. You had to have vision.

A shovel and a roll of toilet paper was the outhouse and I was to carry water from a creek in the valley.

We moved in in the fall before one of the worst winters in recent history. There was an insulation shortage that year and none was available. One night I looked down from my sleeping bag in the loft to see the wood stove glowing red hot. While it was as hot as we could get it, the water pan for cinders in front of the stove was frozen solid. My water for tea was frozen. My toothpaste was frozen. The creek was frozen, the ground was frozen.

The young man living in the cabin in the photo only had his dog to keep him warm. He would go to Hinton, bring back cardboard boxes and tear them apart to staple on the wall to insulate the place.

Crazy times. No one can say I haven't been a good sport.

By any other name - JCP

Salad Caprese, JPaulz, Charleston, S.C.

My sisters keep changing their names.

I'm one of eight kids, you know that. My ever practical parents didn't waste middle names on daughters. It was assumed that if and when we married we could simply take Perry as a middle name. My brothers got elaborate family names - James Murray, Robert Stewart, Roger Cameron Perry carrying on long lines of Scottish and Canadian ancestors.

I've been Joan Perry since I was born.

They didn't count on a lot of things. They took five daughters and three sons and raised us in one of the few matralineal societies in the world. In the Khasi tribe of North East India women own the property, the youngest daughter inherits and the children carry the mother's name. With that background it didn't make any sense to me to change my name when I got married. Besides a brief period when I was eleven and told everyone my name was Josephine (Little Women) I've been content with my short and simple name.

My sisters started doing odd things when they turned fifty. Grace added a "y" and announced she was now Grayce. Barbara started signing her name Barbra Rose. Third in line, I've let the team down. I haven't done anything creative yet besides add the occasional St. in front of my name for Halloween in honor of St. Joan. I work at a Catholic Hospital with floors named after saints and did campaign unsuccessfully to have our new fifth floor named after me. I mean named after her.

I should take a middle name of something I love......mushroom, blue, chocolate, avocado, muenster, maple butter, Johns Island tomatoes, tea, braised lamb. Let's make a drool causing name. Joan Maple Butter Perry?

I've decided. Caprese. I have been eating armfuls of fresh tomatoes this summer cut up with melt in the mouth buffalo mozzarella, fresh chopped basil leaves, a drizzle of olive oil and reduced balsamic. I eat it at home. I order it in every restaurant that mentions it. I slice it perfectly, I chop it madly. I use red tomatoes, orange, green and cherry.

Capreeeesay. You have to say it like an Italian and wave your arms to make the name flow.

Joan Caprese Perry. JCP for my monogram. Hint, hint.

When next you order insalata caprese, please say, "Hey! I know the lady who was named after that salad!"

Before & After - Backyard Style

Charleston, S.C.

Two things, one - I clearly spend way too much time on pranks. Two, I have very patient family and friends. Three, being mature sucks.

A couple of years ago I painted a quilt on my ratty old garage doors. They couldn't look worse so I used up every old dribble of paint I had and turned it into a bed mural. I thought it would be terrible funny to joke about everyone I'd had in my bed. Harhar. Recently, thinking that I would eventually sell my house, I decided to do the grown up thing and paint it. Grey. Sad, eh? How incredible boring is that?

A couple of my victims were: my daughter and her sweetie, nephew Caleb, sister Shirley and niece Teresa, nephew Jesse, brother Roger and his wife Kathy.