Well, it's been a long haul, but tomorrow it all comes to an end. Tomorrow will see the completion of a thirteen day work cycle without a day off. Time flies when you're having fun... and when you're extremely busy, so in all honesty, since I was both, I can't really say I've been suffering. What I am is tired. Extraordinarily tired. I feel like I could sleep for a week and rather wish I could, but since I can't, I'll take as much time as I can in bed this weekend.

Putting together this show was a pretty amazing experience quite unlike those I'd had before. Many of the Arts Centre staff pitched in to help, mainly from the Gallery, but the theatre's technical director set the gallery lights today and did a marvellous job of it. He really brought the carved antler portraits to life. It's amazing just what the setting of a light can do. The teamwork exhibited was superb, with a genuine feeling of comraderie, which is not to say there wasn't sniping, bitching, and complaining, but overall, we all worked well together and shared the load.

It's humourous to me that I spent as much time as I did (which is to say, a lot) writing up condition reports, first for the out-going show and then for the incoming show. Apparently, I do a perfectly good job of condition reporting so nyaahh to my collections management instructor who said it wasn't my thing. Of course, I also spent a lot of time taking hangers off the backs of work and affixing better ones, rolling paint on walls, scraping spackle into holes and other sundry activities. It was today's activity that I quite possibly enjoyed the most. This will possibly sound fairly anal and strangely compulsive coming from someone who generally comes across as pretty laid-back, but truly, applying the vinyl titles to the walls today was a great deal of fun.

Working mainly with Matt, one of the preparators, with some assistance from Sarah the intern, I got to put up three titles on the wall. Have you ever wondered how those big letters get pasted up on the walls? Sure, sometimes they're painted or screened on, but often they're printed vinyl. Like a cross between car window clings and gigantic Letraset, these titles were massive poster lengths of text sandwiched between sheets of coated paper that had to be peeled off (from underneath) and pressed onto the wall with special rubber-spatula-type tools. Before we could do any of that, though, we had to measure, line up, centre, level and tack up each line in the place we wanted it. While levels and tape measures were made use of, so were our eyes. Matt had to agree, I am something of a human level. It also turns out I'm a pretty excellent judge of inches. We bonded while we worked and laughed a lot, which was a foil to the tension of the job. Once a letter is up on the wall, it's very difficult to get it off or reapply it so with each line we only really got one chance to get it right. And, with only minor set-backs and hitches (tears, bubbles, etc.), we did it.

The opening itself was pretty good. It was well attended and everyone seemed to have a fairly good time. People actually looked at the art, discussed it, and stuck around until almost ten o'clock. The Curator had to actually start herding the remaining people out the door. I didn't get home until after eleven o'clock and I'm really tired now. Tomorrow, I get to lead a group of people from, and visiting, the Chamber of Commerce on a tour of the new gallery show. I wonder what I'll say. Heh. I'm sure I'll think of something.

I had my doubts about this weekend. I was being sent to an Arts Summit in town and was apparently signed up for it even before I had arrived in Whitehorse. Granted, much of the conference did end up being a review of things I already knew, or had experience with, and the first morning began with the over-used and terribly cliche "mind-map exercise", nonetheless, it was a good experience. I was able to introduce myself to many of the poeple with whom I'll be working and generally make myself known to some of the Yukon arts community. And, perhaps most importantly of all, I did glean some insights and ideas from a couple of the sessions, in particular, the session on getting results from your endeavours, and the very poorly attended (or should I say 'intimately' attended?) session on voluntarism. The latter was quite interesting for me as the Gallery has a serious shortage of volunteers, as in, none. It was also interesting because the executive Director of the Centre sat in on this with me so we basically went back and forth and used the YAC as our model. In the end, we came up with nothing definitive, but I now have a tentatively scheduled meeting with the voluntarism consultant later this week.

Yesterday, there was a session for which neither myself or the intern had any interest. Succession Planning is not an issue that touches us quite yet. As the hour long session butted up against a fifteen minute break, we decided to hop into the YACmobile and take a drive up the Alaska Highway. And so, that is exactly what we did. We drove about half an hour north of Whitehorse and before needing to turn around to head back. Within seven minutes, we were out of the city and in the middle of... well, I hesitate to say 'nowhere'. When you're surrounded by rank upon rank of mountains, rising one above the other, and there are nearly sheer drop-offs on either side of the two-lane highway filled with spruce, jackpine, poplars and birch, and there are fluffy clouds rolling down the sides of the higher mountains... Well, anyway, it certainly felt remote (which is is) and despite the "9-1-1 will no longer work" sign informing you of your remoteness, the surreality of the scenery does not make it feel like a nowhere. We took some particularly stupid tourist photos at a look-out, and then turned around and headed back into the town. Just that little foray into the wilderness was enough to make Whitehorse look like a booming metropolis.

Time is flying like a sparrow in a hurricane. I've already been here for four weeks. Busy does not even begin to express what I am. When I get home in the evenings, often after 7pm, I make dinner while listening to the CBC (oh, bless you, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation !) and then settle down with Kinsey and play on the MUD for a few hours before showering and hitting the hay. Sometimes I manage to read for a bit before I conk out, or do a crossword, but more often than not, I lie down and within minutes, I'm unconscious.

Spring has finally sprung, and hopefully it will last now. After a month of -30 degrees, this +5 degree business is a relief. It feels like an heat wave. Whitehorse is becoming somewhat gruesome, though, as the hardpack starts to melt revealing all the layers of sand for the road and accumulations of dog crap, massive turds made by massive sled dogs. Kind of gross. I bet the slopes around the city look fantastic when the flowers start to bloom, though. I look forward to that. I understand that May is lovely.

I have begun the search for an apartment, and if things go alright tomorrow at the viewing I have scheduled, I may well have one. I won't get my hopes up, but it certainly seems to fit my needs, at least in description. It will even allow me to have a cat (or two !). People seem to have a strange idea of what being a good pet owner means, and so a lot of apartments are pet-free zones. Also, apartment prices vary widely up here. In some instances, because of electrical heating (ouch), they can run more expensive than an apartment in Toronto. Crazy, I know. Anyway, this place is available in May, and if I'm lucky, the cat at the Humane Society with which I may be smitten may also still be available in May. For the cat's sake, I hope he gets adopted first, but I know I'll be a wonderful pet owner for him, so I'd like him to be mine.

Last night was the "Burning Away the Winter Blues" festival. It was a strange family event with strong pagan overtones that celebrated the return of the sunlight to the Yukon. It's been running for about eight years and has varying popularity. Maybe 200 people came out for it, which is actually less than I'd expected, but considering they market it to the arts community, rather than the wider community of Whitehorse, I guess that's a good turn-out. Each year, someone constructs an effigy to represent, I suppose, Old Man Winter, which is then paraded along the river to a great big bonfire and ceremonially thrown in the flames. This year, there was a dragon puppet, kind of like a Chinese dragon, that 'fought' with the effigy before triumphing and hurling Winter into the fire. People are encouraged to bring things to burn and there are refreshments served, etc. It was fun, but poorly organised, and the poor guy carrying the effigy didn't even get offered a glass of water at the end, nor did he receive any thanks for carrying this thing for 45 minutes along a slippery, snow-covered path. Anyway, I decided that Old Man Winter was my representation of George Bush and we were burning him to celebrate the 3rd anniversary of the War in Iraq, which apparently the USA hasn't, in fact, won. It made for me the whole thing a much more poignant cleansing ritual.

Now I must don my coveralls, originally bought for my Rosie the Riveter costume for Hallowe'en last year, and go help paint in the gallery. The paint was donated, but not the labour (nice), so we have to do it. Of course, I have no appropriate footwear for this activity, so hopefully they won't mind me using bare feet. If they do, I'll wear my socks.

I have not mentioned it, mostly because I really didn't know what to say, but our beloved Julie was hospitalised eight days ago for what was apparently another stroke. This is a terrible set-back. Some of you might remember that she had a stroke in the spring of 2001 and it was a very serious bleed that did a lot of damage. It has been a long struggle for her to regain as much mobility as she had, even with a fall a couple years ago that broke her hip. But, she was able to write and draw and work had just begun at the house to have an elevator installed to take her back to her upstairs studio space. And then, a stroke. It has affected the other side of her brain compromising her stronger side, particularly in her leg, and has utterly sapped her strength.

When I speak to her on the phone, which I've done twice, I hear the frustration, exhaustion, and disappointment in her voice. I feel so helpless. The first time she had a stroke, everyone could take shifts in the hospital with her, but five years later, her husband is older, more fragile. Her children both have small children of their own. My mother is not as well as she was and cannot visit as often as she would like. And I no longer live anywhere near Toronto. It hurts my heart that she is in the place she is and I can do nothing but think of her and call her. I feel my isolation here and can only imagine the isolation she surely feels relegated to an hospital bed. I hope she is able to move to a rehabilitation facility soon.

In other news, today was a Toronto kind of day in Whitehorse. No, we didn't suddenly have an immigration spike, nor a drive-by shooting. Instead, it is slightly above zero degrees and wet snow has been lightly falling for the last ten hours or so. It's wet and mucky out. Warm, but mucky, snow sticking to everything and soaking through the ankles of my jeans. Is it strange that it made me feel homesick? I suppose not. But it made me think of the times I ate fresh wet snow off of tree branches, went sledding behind my school, and a myriad other strange nostalgic memories. Maybe it was that I was watching the kids playing in the park and doing the things kids do. My lunches, filled with the Art Camp kids, are a lot of fun. Today, getting over a migraine, though, I took it easy and mostly just observed them, rather than actively playing with them.

The dynamics of children are complicated. There is a constant testing of boundries, shifting of roles, and pushes for supremacy. In this group, when left to its own dynamics, there are a pair of children who lean toward the bully side of things, and a third who can be careless with the feelings of her friends, but ultimately, they're all a good group of kids. I know the art teacher has had real problems managing them, but I haven't. This doesn't suprise me; I lay down the rules and talk to kids at their level without resorting to concepts of interaction that simply do not apply to children. Kids respond to respect and contact, but they also take advantage of those they deem weak.

On Monday, they all wanted to test me. How much could they get away with. I had to figure out what was my limit and let everything under it roll off of me like water from a duck's back. When the limit was reached, swift warnings were given. When it was passed, I cut them off and shut them down. I cannot really explain how I do it, but it almost always works. Sometimes I must sound harsh, but bullying and disobeying is not something I'm willing to tollerate - and I have a high tollerance for kids 'being kids'. Yesterday, the testing was less. They had all figured out that I am lenient and fun, and by not pushing my buttons (hah, I sound like my mother), the fun was continual. The fun stops when the behaviour changes. Ultimately, fun is better than not-fun. Heh. Imagine that. Kids aren't stupid by any stretch.

Today, when I went in and asked them to keep their voices down and not to man-handle me because I had a very bad headache, every single one of them respected that. Even I was surprised. Before we could leave for the park, one of the six year olds, a girl who can be very bossy, told me that one of the group was hiding. It was the six year old boy in the group and he was hiding behind the upright piano. I crouched right down in front of him and asked him what was the matter.

Boy: Please, just leave me alone.
Me: I can't just leave you alone, we have to go as a group. What's the matter?
Boy: I don't wanna say. Just leave me alone.
Me: You aren't gonna tell me?
Boy: (shakes his head)
Me: (pushing back his hood and brushing the hair out of his face) Hey sweety, did someone say something to you? Was someone mean to you?
Boy: (nods his head)
Me: Ohhh nooo. Who was mean to you?
Boy: My friend.

I knew who he meant - it was the little girl who told me he was hiding. I went and collected her from the group and brought her behind the piano. The other kids totally knew I was "dealing" with someone and fell silent. Behind the piano was out of their eyes, though, and semi-private. I stood her in front of the boy and crouched down again, this time facing her.

Me: ***** tells me you were being mean and bossing him around. It is not nice to boss people around, hon, and it has to stop, do you understand?
Girl: (miniscule head nod but with a defensive glare)
Me: You have to appologise.
Girl: (stoic silence)
Me: Do you like it when people boss you around, tell you what to do? Do you like it when people are mean to you and hurt your feelings?
Girl: (shakes head and whispers, defiant look replaced with big, round, glistening eyes) No...
Me: I don't like it when people are mean to me, either. By doing it to *****, you hurt his feelings and to make it better, you have to appologise.
Girl: (turns to the boy) I'm sorry.
Me: (nodding to her, I turn to the boy again) Do you accept her appology for hurting your feelings?
Boy: (looks at the girl, then nods) Yes. It's okay.

I turned, then, and hugged the little girl, thanking her for understanding. Then to the boy, I asked if he was ready to go to the park and he said yes. I took his hands and helped him up and hugged him, too. The two kids looked at each other and gave little smiles that communicated more than their words ever could and then she hugged me and he grinned and joined the group. The rest of the kids knew that something 'serious' had just happened and very thoughtfully did not ask what.

The next incident didn't happen until we were at the park, when one of the bullies got a taste of her own medicine and cried foul to me. My response was simple. "I don't care who did what to whom, do you understand? I care that it does not happen again, do I make myself clear? When you're with me, you treat each other respectfully and fairly and you do not tease or bully anyone else. You treat each other the way you want other people to treat you. Do I make myself clear?" I think there must have been an implied threat in my tone because they cut it out and went back to playing really well together, laughter filling the park again. When we got back to the studio, I stuck around, despite my head, for another hour and a half, to help with the sculpey projects they were starting. Everyone was helpful and co-operative, to the point where their instructor, who gets totally frazzled by them, actually started to relax and have some fun, herself.

When I left, they all told me to feel better and waved.

On my first day at the Yukon Arts Centre, a beautiful bouquet of spring flowers arrived from my mother (and Chester). Although I've pulled out the tulips and some of the little purple flowers have dried up and died, half of the bouquet is still fresh and remains quite attractive - twelve days later ! I, too, am feeling fresh (and attractive !) twelve days into my posting. I've already done a fun variety of things, including hanging a massive 70-piece salmon-related exhibition in the children's gallery. I particularly like the metre-and-a-half long papier mache salmon, which we ingeniously strung from the ceiling. The people are fun and although I'm having some difficulty figuring out exactly what my role here is, I am enjoying it.

I am starting to enjoy Whitehorse, the town, too. Small though it may be, it has many of the things I've come to expect in any locale that claims to be a city. It even has a decent comics/gaming shop on Main Street. It's not The Silver Snail, mind you, but it serves the purpose and they can order things for me. I even took the proactive step of giving them my contact information should anyone be seeking a player for a more 'mature' D&D or similar fantasy-style game. I figure, what the hell? It's a way to meet people outside of work. I have also eaten in one fantastic Mexican restaurant and one less fantastic, but still yummy, Indian place. Restaurants are expensive up here as everything is trucked in and anything 'exotic' is particularly tricky to come by. I also found a decent music store and there is a bookstore I'm itching to browse through. Additionally, I went to the Humane Society and put my name down to start volunteering there. I hope to go there on Thursday for the first time to actually get involved in it. I guess it's a good way to meet the animals and for the cats to figure out which one wants me as a 'mom'. :)

The weather is glorious, if a bit chilly. In twelve days, I think this is only the second cloudy day. I cannot get over how bright and sunny it is. The days have already visibly lengthened since my arrival and probably by the end of the month we'll have surpassed Southern Ontario in daylight hours. I look forward to having a car of my own to explore the surrounding countryside, but when the snow clears, there is also a bicycle at my disposal. I'm not sure I'm quite fit enough to effectively tackle Two-Mile Hill, but there's only one way to find out, right? I have already started to browse the car dealership websites and adverts, though, because this really is a car town. It sprawls up and down mountain sides for kilometres. I've already determined that Subaru is right out of my range, since they no longer make an entry level vehicle. Also, I've determined that it is not necessary to have four-wheel-drive here - most people don't. People seem to do just fine with good winter tires. It looks like entry level Kia or Toyota are my two best choices here. Anyway, we'll see. I do not look forward to paying for a car. Who knows, for summer weekends, it may make more sense just to rent one. I'm more concerned that I find a permanent place to live for May.

Well, I've been here for a week now and despite the bitter, bitter cold (unseasonably so, I've been told), it's not too bad. I mean, really, it's not any colder than Winnipeg was this passed November. In fact, because of the prairie wind, Winnipeg was colder. I am living for a while, rent-free, in the apartment usually used by the interns who come to the Yukon Arts Centre. It's pretty nice, two bedrooms, a fully appointed loo (though with something of a mildew problem), a pretty decent kitchen with a breakfast/dining space, and a living room. There is a parking spot with a plug (for plugging in the block heater to keep the engine warm), which wouldn't matter except that I'm using the gallery station wagon, too. Free car, free apartment? Ya, I'm alright with that. The car is particularly handy as Whitehorse is laid out really oddly, and I live in Riverdale (there's one in every city, isn't there?) and it's quite a long way from the gallery.

The Gallery is really beautiful and in a stunning location. Of course, it would be better for its attendance if it were downtown with everything else, but what can you do? Someone felt it would be good to link the gallery to the theatre and so there it is. But it's a stunning location, sort of perched on a hill overlooking the downtown, with mountains overlooking the Arts Centre in all directions. There are trees and paths through them, the Archives and College are next door, and half way down the hill, there is a minimum security prison. Seriously. Nice spot to be incarcerated. When the sun is setting, the surrounding mountains, which are currently spotted with evergreens and peaked entirely in white snow, turn salmon pink. I shall endeavour to get this caught on camera.

I've been very busy at work, settling in and trying to figure out exactly what I'm meant to be doing. Today was easy, as I spent most of the day working with the Community Programmer to hang a new show of children's art. There are something like seventy pieces on display and we didn't manage to finish mounting it. We shall accomplish this task tomorrow. My lunch break was spent downtown looking at a "miniature" house that will be available to rent come April. It is nice because, though tiny, it has a sheltered yet sunny garden, it's bright during the day, utilities are included, and it's close to lots of neat things. Additionally, the landlord is perfectly happy to allow me to have a cat. On the downside, it is ridiculously small. Were I on my own with no chance of people staying with me, I would probably take it. The thing is, if I am to have guests, things would become much more awkward. It is only two rooms. As well, I'm not sure there is room enough for all my books. So, as adorable as this place is, it just doesn't meet my needs.

Well, I am welcome to stay in this apartment in Riverdale until May, so I'm not concerned. I will begin looking for a place later this month. Ideally, to move into a place for May 1st or 15th would be perfect. I could pack up my stuff before I leave for the United Kingdom and then when I return, make the move and start fresh. Once I have a place, I will get a kitty. I need the company. Additionally, I shall start looking at getting a vehicle later this month. There are a few dealerships up here, including Nissan, Kia, and Subaru, and if you prefer American models, there is a Ford and probably a Chevy dealer, too. As for other stores, there are enough stores to meet my needs. There are the Loblaws-type stores, selling the President's Choice line, there is a Canadian Tire, The Brick, Mark's Work Wearhouse, Ricki's, Reitmans, and a few other shops. There's even a gaming store downtown, which I have been told is far more traditional than the nasty Gaming/Internet cafe by my apartment. I will check it out soon.

I shall wrap up this entry here and talk more of my conceptions soon. No, really, I promise. I have no cable television - I won't have anything better to do. ;)