I saw a picture the other day of all the different cell phones that have been around over the years. It made me think about Alexander Graham Bell who was experimenting with getting sound to travel across a wire because his mom and his wife were both hearing-impaired. He changed the world when that first “call” went through in 1876 and the telephone was born. Continue reading
Month: July 2017
There was a young boy in the early 1800s in England who got very little formal education. His father was imprisoned for having debts when the boy was 12 years old. The boy got a job in a shoe polish factory and lived in a tiny room while his mother and other siblings joined his father in jail which was the practice at the time. Continue reading
For those of us who grew up using a rotary phone with a long curly cord and no Google, the Yellow Pages was the go-to book to find friends, order pizza and look up the number for a plumber.
Did you know that in 1883 when a printer was putting together the regular phone book as usual, he ran out of white paper so he used yellow? And a few years later the Yellow Pages was born. Continue reading
On this day 48 years ago, the first man walked on the moon. Astronaut Neil Armstrong stepped outside his rocket ship onto the lunar surface as people around the globe sat and watched their televisions in awe.
How could a human travel so far and do something so impossible? Continue reading
I’m currently reading a book that has been a best seller since the 1930s and I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to pick it up. It’s called How To Win Friends And Influence People by Dale Carnegie. A book that has been selling for almost 100 years! Full of common sense nuggets.
One of the pieces of advice the author shares is that the best argument is no argument at all. Continue reading
Do you remember the Swatch Watch? I had one. Pink and blue and yellow and green. It was a fun way to express myself as a teenager.
Before Swatch came about, watches were all about telling time. Taglines talked about precision and brands you could count on. Then someone decided that your watch could be an accessory to your look, your outfit, the story you were trying to tell. Continue reading
People are so resilient. You go to a new job or house or club or school and it seems so strange. Then before you know it, it’s like you’ve been there forever. Continue reading
Author Regina Brett once said, “If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.”
In life, it seems that often the highest highs are intertwined with the lowest lows. We share our successes with friends, neighbours and social media networks. But we often face our lows alone. We’re embarrassed. We don’t know where to start. We don’t want to be judged. Continue reading
American abolitionist and author Harriet Beecher Stowe once said, “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”
Almost four years ago my now 14-year-old son qualified for the champ level of Irish Dance before his time. Although he worked hard and grew a lot, he didn’t place when competing locally or recall for a medal at a major international competition since then. Four long years. Continue reading
This past weekend we celebrated the 150th birthday of Canada. So many stories were shared by fellow Canadians and it got me thinking about mine.
In the late 60s, my parents, who hadn’t met yet, travelled to Canada from Ireland for work. Both planning to stay one year. My dad was looking for handyman or machinist jobs and my mom had been offered a job as a nurse at Humber Hospital in Toronto. She was given a key to her hospital-owned apartment, outfitted with pots, pans and the all-important kettle.
My parents met at an Irish house party and the rest is history.
My mom was a nurse for 40 years and my dad worked taking care of the lines at Labatt Brewery for 35 years. Although my brother Seamus, my parents and I travelled back to Ireland often to visit our relatives, we were always proud to be Canadian.
I am so thankful my parents settled and became citizens in a place that is one of the safest countries in the world, where you can become what you believe, where education is free, medical treatment is offered to all, any faith can be practiced, and democracy allows us to choose our leaders. May we continue to work on truth and reconciliation with our indigenous peoples and may we remember the beauty and the peace of our home and native land as we celebrate its 150th year. Oh Canada. You had me at hello. #Canada150