Are you sitting down?

March 24, 1940 - August 1, 2009

This is what Danna had always told me she'd start our phone conversation with when my mom passed away. And the morning of Sunday, August 2, 2009 I heard those words. Danna called to let me know that on Saturday, August 1, 2009 my mom passed away in hospital. We immediately flew to Toronto to be with my family. My family had prepared ourselves as best we could because she was very sick for quite some time. However, when faced with the reality of it it was quite difficult. My mother didn't want a funeral nor memorial service and so we honoured that, but it made saying goodbye and having some closure very difficult. So the funeral home that was taking care of the arrangements she herself had made allowed us some time to see her body before she was cremated. It was an emotional and difficult thing to do, but I'm glad I did. It allowed me to say some things that were on my mind that I hadn't been able to tell her while alive, and gave me the chance to see she was gone and say goodbye. As much as my mom and I didn't see eye-to-eye (and it was often) I miss her alot. As hard as it was to get along with her, I loved my mother and always will. Death is so final and yet so abstract. Coming to terms with the fact that I will never talk to her again, that I will never see her again, and that she will miss many events in not only my life but in my siblings' lives, is extremely hard. However, I do have some peace in knowing she is no longer suffering or in pain. R.I.P mom, I love you.

2003

Thar she blows

Today we went on a whale boat tour with O'Brien's Whale and Bird Tours. We were quite excited to see Puffins and humpback whales. The Atlantic Puffin is the official bird of Newfoundland and Labrador. Atlantic Puffins are pigeon sized seabirds with a characteristic orange beak, that nest in colonies on small, rugged islands. It was at one of these small islands, Gull Island, that we saw thousands of these birds. It was quite the sight to see; tons of black and white birds with bright beaks sitting along the edge of the island. They were often in groups. They were also flying around in the sky and it was like when you see bats flying out of a cave on tv, there were that many. There were also seagulls and muirs (sp? could also be merr, murre or mur). Muirs look like minature penguins in colour and posture. They were so cute.

The boat

On the boat

Puffins hanging out on side of island. The holes in the island are their little homes with 2 compartments - 1 where they lay the eggs and 1 where they go to the washrooom.

Close-up of Puffins

Tons and tons of Muirs on the side of the island. The Muir seem to stay on the rocky part and the Puffin stays on the grassy part.

Close-up of Muirs (with 1 taking flight)

Birds flying around the island

After slowly coasting by Gull Island we went out into the water some more to look for humpback whales. Luckily we spotted 2, although we only kept up with 1. For the longest time all I (Bambie) could see was the water being sprayed from the blowhole, and then finally I saw the back and tail. WOW! It was beautiful. A couple times the whale would dive and we'd sit around for what seemed like eternity (probably 6 minutes) waiting for it to resurface. I never saw the head, and it didn't jump, but many times as we'd see the water spray from the blowhole we'd also see the back and top fin and beginnings of the tail. At one point the whale was quite close to our boat and right in front of us, and gave us a beautiful, close look at it's huge tail as it did 1 final dive before we left. Unfortunately I didn't get the full tail in it's glory, but I will post a picture of what it looked like. It was exhilarating to be that close to a whale. While I was hoping we'd see a pod, I would definately go whale watching again. The whole trip was breathtaking.

Back fin of whale. You can see the mist from the blowhole to the right of the picture.

Whale diving and tail just coming out of the water.

This is what the sequence looked like (not a picture I took).

Just as an aside, I brought Gravol incase 1 of us got seasick and it turns out it was a good thing I brought it too. Not for us as we were fine, but a man on the boat was seasick and I gave him a couple tablets. Why didn't more people think to bring Gravol though? *shrug* Oh well!