Whew, that really is the question isn’t it? There was a movie made in 1966 called “What’s It All About Alfie?” I was too young to watch the movie and full disclosure, I haven’t watched it to this day but, from what I’ve read in the synopsis it was very much about a man who lived a rather shallow and riotous love life in the swinging ‘60’s and when hit with his own mortality, predictably, he tried to figure it all out.
Although I haven’t seen the movie I will always remember the title song. The melody and lyrics are beautiful and profound. I find it odd that I remember songs like I heard them yesterday but can’t remember if I took my vitamins this morning. Ask me who wrote or played a song…crickets. Ask me to sing or hum it, I’m there.
I believe that what touches our core, our spirit, our deepest depths is what stays with us, good or bad. We only have to look at our childhood, if we experience trauma it remains with us and often we “don’t remember” the trauma because we repress it. Conversely, we can look back on our fondest and sweetest childhood joys and never forget them. Either way, music often reminds us of both. Music is powerful, so powerful that it is the universal language. So powerful that it can be the only thing dementia patients respond to and remember when nothing else moves the needle.
Perhaps one reason this song has always stayed with me is because it begs the question, What’s It All About Alfie? and then it provides the answer, Love, it’s all about love. Since the beginning of time songs have been written about love. The lyrics are different, the melodies are different, the genres vary, but the message is crystal clear, when we have love, we have everything. It’s not just romantic love that makes us whole, it’s parental love, sibling love, friendship love, the love of animals we love and who love us back. Love is love, upside down, inside out or round and round. ( Diana Ross - UPSIDE DOWN)
I recently went to Edmonton to visit family and friends. I grew up there and though at this point I’ve spent more of my life living away from Edmonton than I did living there I still say, “I’m going home.” Edmonton is where I was born, where I went to school, where I was married. It is where I was first loved and where I found true love.
Do I love Edmonton the city? I do not. Would I want to live there again? When pigs fly and scarily, with the advent of AI, they might actually be doing that soon. Do I love going home? I do and not for anything but to see the people I love. As a place to live it has no appeal for me. I drive around and remember and reminisce. It’s fun and interesting to see the changes from my time there to today but I don’t have any pull or loyalty for the city itself. I think fondly of the good ole days and that’s as sentimental as I get over it.
I’ve actually never really understood the whole my country tis of thee mentality. As an adult who has lived in a few countries, I’ve questioned why we bordered up the planet and wondered how we came to be such a divided species. How and why did we become segregated into our own nations and cultures? I understand the biological and physical attributes that make us different physically and how we came to be through evolution and our geographical locations. You know, dark skin is more protective in hot countries, narrow eyes help in extreme light like the sun on snow in the extreme north and why there are fat-bottomed girls, (Queen - FAT BOTTOMED GIRLS ) mostly because females are the child bearers. It’s evolution, unless you don’t believe in that, and of course, you do you.
What I don’t get is why we have created a world where those differences are so threatening that they have become the basis for the atrocities that have been and are still being committed today? All because of what? A piece of the rock we wish to occupy? The colour of our skin, our sex, the God we pray to, or not? Who our hearts choose to love?
If all we need is love, (The Beatles - ALL WE NEED IS LOVE) then why, since man learned how to draw a line in the sand, is that not enough? Aha, backtrack a moment here, is it because we learned how to draw that line in the sand? Give him an inch and he thinks he’s a Ruler….
Somewhere along the way we decided we don’t need each other unless we are one and the same. We don’t need to share. We don’t need to be magnanimous and open and giving. We don’t need to love each other or even like each other, not one little bit. We can be self-centred, ego driven, greedy, malicious, vengeful, murderous, hateful, racist and we can do it in the name of insert here, because that absolves us from personal responsibility and has us protected behind a curtain of collective belief.
Now, don’t get me wrong, there is a piece of my heart that will always be Canadian because that is what has been ingrained in me and what I know but, I am also Scottish and Hungarian and Irish and some other bits of ethnicities thrown in there and I am thrilled to be all of them.
I am not led by blind faith or blind loyalty. I like to think that regardless of my background be it a Canadian or a Martian, I would choose to stand for human dignity and freedom first and foremost and for those of you who have fought and protected me so I can write this blog without fear of reprisal, I know you did it for the exact reasons I just stated. I have undying respect for you and your service.
It’s just that I don’t believe any country or ethnicity or culture or faith is better than any other and looking at our track record, globally, historically and at the present time as to how we have treated each other, it has been pure and utter shite! (That’s Scottish for absolute shit!) Merde! (French for shit!) Szar! (Hungarian for shit!) You get my drift…
No government, no faith, no culture, no body has the right to decide if we are a worthy being based on where we come from. They don’t get to decide what we should or shouldn’t believe in. They don’t get to decide what we do with our body. They don’t get to decide who we should love, what we should read or whether we are entitled to the same dignities and basic rights as any other person.
If you are Swedish and you love rotten herring and mid-winter lake plunges have at er’. That’s your right and I won’t tell you otherwise and you don’t get to decide I’m less than you because I don’t like IKEA furniture or your meatballs. Well, I do like some of your stuff IKEA but definitely not your meatballs. I jest, as did the jesters of medieval times and if they were not funny enough, according to the Heads of State they were performing for, it was off with their heads.
Do you see where I’m coming from? How are we almost a quarter way through the twenty first century and it seems we are moving backwards instead of forward? How is it that every year we stand at epitaphs, monument walls, grave sites and pulpits, in fields of flowers and on candle lit beaches, holding ceremonies and vigils where we pledge to never forget and yet, we don’t seem to remember?
Only seventy years ago a holocaust took place in Europe. In Canada we are still finding the graves of indigenous children and the last Residential School closed just fourty years ago in 1983! China is still interning and persecuting the Uyghurs. Russia is at war with Ukraine and now we have the Gaza conflict. Oh wait, we have the Gaza conflict, again! and these are just a few of the existing conflicts today. They, whoever they were, weren’t lying when they said history repeats itself, were they?
Today, as I write this I am at a loss as to understand what we are doing? What are we thinking? Why haven’t we learned? Will we ever learn? Maybe we won’t? Maybe we are not capable of changing to the point of "WE ARE THE WORLD” standards (written by Lionel Richie and Michael Jackson) except for the line, “We’re saving our own lives” and it doesn’t matter what happens to anyone else.
As I drove towards the airport to leave Edmonton I mourned a little bit. I mourned my Dad who held a fierce loyalty to Scotland and his roots. I mourned my Grandparents, who left their homeland of Hungary because of war and communism but maintained their attachment to their heritage through the Hungarian community they nurtured. I mourned my sister from another Mister whose roots were French Canadian and was proud of that lineage. There is something ingrained in us so deeply that most of cannot and will not let go of those invisible borders. I mourned the passing of the wonderful days I had growing up. I mourned the years I missed with my people, past and present. I never mourned the city, always just the people.
Happily, it wasn’t all mournful. I was grateful and thankful. I am so fortunate to be able to see my family and friends as I know it’s not so easy for so many. I loved that I re-konnected with old friends and it felt like we just saw each other last month. The only difference was a few wrinkles, grey hairs and mentalpause moments. The laughter never changed.
I visited my newest great niece, who is about to start walking and take on this world that I’m questioning so much of late. Who am I kidding, I’ve always questioned everything. I visited with my octogenarian Aunt and Uncle who always had a hot meal, a ton of laughs and a huge hug ready whenever we needed or wanted them. I visited my nieces and great nieces and my sister and brother and I left with a fully replenished heart.
So, what is it all about Alfie…anybody? Is it all about love in the end? The song says:
I believe in love, Alfie
Without true love we just exist, Alfie
Until you find the love you've missed
You're nothing, Alfie
When you walk let your heart lead the way
And you'll find love any day Alfie, Alfie
I always returned to Canada. Not because of it being Canada but because this is where I was loved and found love, without borders. I think the song is right.
Love Kiki
Xoxo
“Love is the whole thing. We are only pieces.” — Rumi
Well said Kiki. Well said. XO