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One of my
earliest memories: I am knee height to the average-sized
man. I am dressed in an outfit my mother made: a matching
pink a-line dress and coat. I am dressed like a tiny Jackie
O.
My father and I are embarking on an outing ("Don't tell your
mother!"). He has told me we are going to the stock market.
I am extremely excited. I am imagining stock: Cows and pigs
and horses and goats. I love animals and can barely contain
my anticipation.
When we arrive, I manage to swallow my disappointment: but
only barely. There are no cows. No pigs or goats. And
nothing remotely horselike. It is a big room with a lot of
men and a lot of shouting. There are chalkboards on the wall
and other men are rubbing out notations and putting up new
ones with impossible speed. There are cigarette butts on the
floor and the room is full of smoke. I hold my father's hand
tightly to avoid being swallowed in a sea of wool-clad men's
legs. The stock market.
As I would later learn, I was on the floor of the old
Vancouver Stock Exchange which, as any Vancouverite of long
standing will be able to tell you, was one of the most
nefarious exchanges of all. With the way everything has
turned out, I would like to be able to tell you that I was
-- right there and on that day -- bitten by some odd bug
that lodged itself in my brain and has carried me through my
life. It did not. But that day -- and my father, for that
matter -- cemented the idea of the world of securities as
being accessible and exciting. Even to tiny pink-clad
girls.
My father loved the stock market. Family lore has it that he
lost great big wads of money on that exchange floor. A
moderate man in almost all ways, the stock market was his
one weakness, his one big vice. And I suppose that, for the
sake of the roof over our heads, I should be glad that
whatever huge clots of money he poured onto the floor of the
exchange, it was money he could afford to lose. Others have
not been so lucky.
My father's penchant was for securities of a somewhat
romantic nature. Gold, silver, medicines that would change
the world: that was the sort of thing he loved. Another fond
memory -- my personal style more Carly Simon than Jackie O.
by this time -- is of a wonderful camping trip we took in
the British Columbia interior. Dad wanted to get a good look
at the workings of a gold stock in which he'd invested. The
trip turned out to be better for me than it was for him. The
wonderful invention the stock promoter had been flogging --
some type of super sluice box that would produce gold
practically out of dirt -- turned out to be something of a
bust and dad went home feeling like he'd been had, which
turned out to be not far from the truth. I still have that
trip, though: the beautiful mountains and rivers of my home
province, a rickety bridge and the excitement of tracking
down a gold mine -- an actual gold mine -- that I,
through my father, had a stake in. It was pretty exciting
stuff.
I have lived in Los Angeles, California; Munich, Germany and
Vancouver, British Columbia, where I was born. No matter
where I go, though, Vancouver calls me back. I've come to
the conclusion that some people are born in the wrong place
and spend their lives trying to find the right one. And some
of us -- I have to think we're the lucky ones -- get put
where we're meant to be. There's something in the air there.
Something in the water. I can go away, but I always have to
come back.
Since 1993 I've shared my life with a very special man: the
artist and photographer David Middleton. We live in a crazy
house in the Gulf Islands in British Columbia where we feel
lucky to be able to spend our days mainly involved in
creative endeavors, only occasionally interrupted by old
episodes of The Antiques Roadshow which we both love
for no apparent reason.
We share our life with a black Australian Kelpie named Jett.
Though she is the sweetest dog on Earth, hardly anyone
besides me and David know this. She was abused before we got
her and is generally afraid of people: which manifests
itself in a lot of crazy barking followed by hiding. We have
found that sharing our life with a formerly abused animal
has given us more rewards than challenges. If you're
thinking about getting a dog, I'd highly recommend a rescue.
She takes so much joy in her world, every wag of her tail is
like a thank you.
David and I launched the online publication,
January
Magazine,
in 1997. Since then it has grown to be one of the most
respected book-related magazines on the Web. January
continues to be a source of tremendous inspiration and an
intense labor of love.
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