Jodie Ponto Photography

Spring has finally sprung (in Nelson, BC at least)!

EXHIBIT A:

Although I’ve seen the sun a few times over the past few months, today is the first time all year I’ve actually felt warmth radiating from it. I celebrated by basking in a leisurely sun-drenched dinner on my front porch and walking one block to the grocery store in my slippers to procure dessert making supplies.

EXHIBIT B:

People are flooding out of their homes and are taking to the streets everything they usually do inside – for example, painting.

As winter’s death grip slowly strangles more and more light out of each day I’m becoming suspicious that the little creatures who reside with us are being affected by seasonal affective disorder even more than I am. How else can you explain the recent rise in mouse suicide rates at our house (this is the second in the past two weeks … you can read about the first one here)? Some may claim we’re encouraging the SAD varmints’ sorrowful spiral into suicide by carelessly leaving implements of death lying all around the house. However, I would argue (as demonstrated by the photo below) that we are taking active suicide prevention measures and if the little mice are truly that miserable they have the right to end their own lives if they so choose.

“So, how many brothers & sisters do you have?”

It’s a small-talk question I’ve grown to dread. I always find myself fumbling for a flippant answer like, “Oh, I’m one of those (l)only children” … all the while seeing the questioner’s eyelids lower with the sudden suspicion that they’re talking to a spoiled & selfish brat who is probably very unhappy, lonely, and dysfunctional.

Us only children have had a bad reputation ever since the late 19th century when that jerk of a psychologist G. Stanley Hall claimed that only children could not be expected to go through life with the same capacity for adjustment as children with siblings because “Being an only child is a disease in itself”. Media of the time jumped on board with Only Child Syndrome, one journal stating ”It would be best for the individual and the race if there were no only children”.

Well, I’m here today to rescue “Only Child” from its stereotypical pairing with the word “Syndrome”.  Yes, I’m sibling-challenged, but I think if you look at the following photargument you’ll see it has not created a maladjusted monster at risk of contaminating the human gene pool.

EXHIBIT A:

Some people might argue I’m casting my dinner bowl aside like a grubby & ungrateful little princess. However, I would argue my mother forgot my usual puréed caviar & Baby Dom and the storm-scale temper tantrum on the horizon is completely warranted.

EXHIBIT B:

Some people might argue I’m exhibiting classic signs of early onset couch-potatoery, most likely caused by a lack of young playmates. However, I would argue that without young playmates to distract me I had already developed the capacity to meditate deeply on the meaning of life … and look darn sharp while doing it too.

EXHIBIT C:

Some people might argue I’m seeking solace from my fortress of sibling-less solitude in cocoa’s comforting arms. However, I would argue beaming out from behind that beater is the grin of someone who knows something the rest of the world doesn’t, namely the hidden health benefits of chocolate consumption.

EXHIBIT D:

Some people might argue I’m a walking flashcard for classic signs of exhibitionism, most likely stemming from being reared in a center-of-attention type environment that bred a being with the unquenchable desire to remain the center-of-attention by any means necessary. However, I would argue that the sheer magnificence of my flexibility renders this point null.

EXHIBIT E:

Some people might argue if I’d had siblings to sadistically torture I wouldn’t have manifested masochistic tendencies towards engaging in activities such as putting my own tongue in the vacuum cleaner. However, I’d argue that … well … really, it’s hard to argue with sadomasochism and perhaps on second thought we could scrap this piece of evidence as irrelevant to the case, which I think has already been sufficiently made.

For the record, Lindsay Pratt is the woman I would marry if:

1.) She would let me have the occasional fling with the pool boy,

2.) She didn’t already have a manfriend, and

3.) She wasn’t moving to the Kootenays.

However, this love has not blinded me to fact that something strange, something suscpicious, and maybe even something downright supernatural occurred at her Going Away Bash at Tim n’ Tycs in Fort St. John yesterday night.

A fierce force was unleashed in the finale of her set, suddenly firing off a superstorm and causing lighting to strike the pole across the street, in turn killing the power and prompting a impromptu candle-lit acoustic show.

I know over the years many people have speculated about the possibility of Lindsay Pratt being a witch, what with her night black hair and banshee cackle and affection for brooms. Now, I’m not claiming she was stirring up spells in her cauldron or suggesting we rush right out and burn her … I’m just laying out the witchy facts and photos for you so you can make your own judgments on whether she should be taken to the stones, stocks, or stakes.

Staying hidden in the shadows so we don’t see her true face?

Have you ever met a human being who lets out such supernatural wails before?

Summoning up the superstorm with subtle secret hand spells?

Basking in the winds of the superstorm she created?