During the holidays my sister's family hosted a get together attended by about 30 people with pot luck food and a bean bag tossing tournament in the newly built garage connected to the house.
Kristina, the lady who told me at Buffalo Lake that for Russia 'it is about family' was there and we talked for a bit. I heard she started working as a steamfitter/pipefitter and with experience she now had an office job working with drawings regarding planning, material take-offs, she mentioned she had a couple people over seeing her work and how there were different levels in the trades and how some trades had changed over the years. I mentioned I worked in drafting and told her I worked in a shop for two years before deciding to go to technical school because I didn't want to pull wrenches when I was fifty. I mentioned that I was pushed onto a software vendor's platform and somehow fit into the conversation the material "you gottta eat" to which she replied 'well you do' and "Look after the kids and the dollars will look after themselves" to which she replied 'Oh great, I got a pink job!' I told her 'I don't think it is a pink job, I think it is military'. She said she had some of that. I asked her how Sasha was used in Russian as Emma's mom had talked about it at the lake, she replied that her name was Alexandra and how Sasha was used similar to how 'Chuck' is used for the name Charlie.
Lily and Emma who I first met at Buffalo Lake were there also, Emma was being sociable in the garage where most of the people were while Lily stayed inside the house with a few of the other kids and colored pictures in a book, after a while as Breanna sat with her I looked at her work and told her "Good work." Breanna, who's mom is knowledgable about computers, had a conversation with me earlier in the garage where I learned that she was done high school and had plans to go to university though she had decided to wait on that and was working with for my sister. Lily's mom Sasha was not in attendance and the kids were there with their father who stayed in the garage, in conversation with him I mentioned how when I was little I was given some money and my mom told me that when I spend the money "to ask myself, 'are you sure that is where you want to spend that money?' I told him I wanted a new coffee maker. Before he left to go home he wished me luck with the new coffee maker.
Later in the evening I met Nicole who I learned was nurse. She showed up later after the tournament was over as she had been working that day.
I returned to Calgary on Sunday. Yesterday I did go to Canadian Tire and get a new coffee maker, my brother and my sister both phoned and wished me a happy birthday. My sister who called in the evening told me she was busy working during the day, I asked her 'with Bree?' and she replied 'yes'.
I do not have any of the pictures Lily quietly and diligently worked on to show here so I will include these references of other pictures I have previously posted.
SI Message - Uncle Si's pictures of planes, before he continued his education and became a surgeon he was a bomber pilot in the second world war.
SI Message - Picture from the book BUILDING and WORKING TOGETHER, A Study of the Thorhild Area using "Look after the kids and the dollars will look after themselves." |
