Saving my blog.  I've added this posting just to keep this blog active, since I don't want it to be deleted.  If you are interested in me, see my new(er) blog at http://paulintoronto.livejournal.com.

Gosh, it's been a long time since I wrote in my livejournal.  For those who have expressed concern about my well being, I thank you.  I'm doing okay, apart from the occasional searing flash of anquish that darts in at unexpected moments and then darts away again before I can finally weep.  Although I have cried a little, I know that it hasn't bee the great cathartic wailing-fest that needs to come along.  I am confident that my Bob will be there when it happens, as he always has been for the last couple of decades.  It won't be pretty, but it will be salutary. 

As for whether I will continue to post here, now that my year off is over, I think that I will probably stop writing as "paulonleave" and start a new journal with a new user-name, one that better reflects my current situation.  [By the way, I have signed and returned my contract for another "Four over five" leave, so that means I only have to work for four solid years before I get another year off.]  If I do start a new journal, I will post my new user name here and invite anyone who is on my Paulonleave friends list to migrate to the new journal.  I have really enjoyed blogging for the past year, and getting to "know" some people virtually, and I think it would be rewarding to continue.

This year at school I'll be teaching three English classes -- two Grade 11s and one Grade 12.  It has been a few years since I taught English, and I'm excited about it, although I'm very disappointed that my school isn't offering Philosophy this year.  I mention it here because I am thinking about making all of my students start Livejournals as part of the course assignment.  If  I do, of course, I'll have to make a separate "school" journal to link with the students'.  I welcome any thoughts anyone might have about this.  [Just bear in mind that the kids do have to write, and that writing journals is a pretty orthodox assignment, so it would only be the livejournal element, and the attendant inter-active possibilities, that would be experimental.]

Bob and I just got back from seeing four shows at the Shaw Festival, and as usual, the quality was excellent.  I can recommend Gypsy, Happy End and The Autumn Garden.  We also so the "new" Ann-Marie Macdonald play, Belle Moral.  If you saw the earlier version from circa 1993, called The Arab's Mouth at the Factory, you will recognize, and perhaps be disappointed by, Belle Moral.  But that's a longish story I won't go into now.

I guess this is sort of a miscellaneous odds and ends kind of posting.  I have a number of ideas for more unified pieces, but I haven't gotten to the point of writing them yet.

It has been ages since I saw the very hunky man who lives across the street from me and who likes to be naked in his apartment.  Now, on my last night in Paris, I notice that he has come home, turned on all his lights, and reverted to his previous habit of stripping down and trying on clothes.  Only this time, he has another hunky man with him who is wearing only a pair of white boxer shorts.

The City of Paris knows how to say goodbye to its lovers with style.

My mother died this morning.  ( Read more... )

These last two questions are probably the hardest ones to answer:

1)  Your blog provides instructive and entertaining insights into the life you constructed for yourself during the past year by introducing many of the people, places and events that affected you in good and bad ways--along with some wonderful photographs. As you look back over the year, do you feel that your experiences have changed you in any significant ways? Are there things that you now value less or more, for example, or goals that have been fulfilled, frustrated or affirmed? --bobalone

2)  How do you feel that you have been "changed" by this experience? I imagine there are subtle ways in which you have allowed yourself to become, at a deeper level, more of who you in fact are.  And will you be able to nourish those parts of yourself back in Toronto? I am hoping the answer to the latter is yes! --aa_bronson

( Introspective Answer )

You can learn a lot about a family during a four hour train ride, even if you don't actually speak to them.  ( Mom, Dad, and their grown-up boys )

I know that at least one reader wants to ask me some questions about my experiences here in Paris, so I though I would extend the invitation more widely.  So, if there are things you would like me to write about, or questions you would like to hear my response to, feel free to ask away in the form of a comment.  I'll try to answer everything, but I won't promise to do so....