A haircut and a hug from Poland

On a particularly emotional day a few months ago, I decided to get a haircut. I had been missing my departed loved ones – my husband, my parents, and my parents-in-laws – more than usual. I needed to do something to boost my spirits.

Instead of going to my usual salon, I went to a new place.

I am the kind of person who doesn't really enjoy chatting the whole time that my hair is being cut - partly because I can't see without my glasses on and partly because I am not comfortable chatting or sharing details of my personal life with a room full of strangers.

But this day was different.

The woman who cut my hair had an accent. My curious journalist-self kicked in and I asked her where she was from.

"Poland," she said.

Interesting, I thought.

"My mother was born in Poland, and my dad was born in a part of Ukraine that was Poland at one time," I told her.

This led to a conversation about whether I speak the Polish language (I don't); how long she's been in Canada (two years; she and her husband came for better work opportunities); how I and my husband wanted to go to Poland when we were in Europe in 2013 but we ran out of time, however my youngest sister went to Ukraine that year and saw the area where our dad was born. 

The hairdresser asked whether I make any Polish food.

"I don't but my mom made perogies and cabbages rolls. What kinds of food do you make?" I asked her.

She told me she likes perogies, but she puts all kinds of different things in them - "white cheese, broccoli, garlic  - delicious!" 

Just then, I glanced up as she was trimming on one side of my head and I saw her name tag.

"Agnieszka." 

I was dumbfounded. "Oh my gosh! That's my mother's name!" I exclaimed. "Agnes."

"Yes," she replied. "It is hard for people to say here."

I miss my mother very much. She was a strong, faithful Christian woman with a zany sense of humour and a passion for bright-coloured blouses.

I sat in awe of this circumstance – a Polish hairdresser who shared the same name as my mom.

I will not call it is a coincidence. In my daughter Lisa Driver’s first award-winning book, Opening Up: How To Develop Your Intuition and WorkWith Your Angels, she notes that what we often think of as “coincidences” are actually signs that the universe is sending us a message. Our angels want to let us know they are with us. I have had too many “coincidence” experiences in my life to just set these aside as accidental. The probabilities of me going to that shop on that day at that time when that particular hairdresser was available to cut my hair are too big to comprehend. Everything aligned for that to happen.

I sat and enjoyed the rest of the cut – which is difficult to do when you’re almost blind without your glasses on!

When the haircut was done, I put my glasses back on and noticed a keychain that was hanging on the drawer handle in front of the salon chair.

"I love Poland," it said.

I smiled.

I asked if I could take a photo of it.

 “Yes,” Agnesiewska replied. “This is better, " she added as she turned the ornament around to show me the other side of it.

"I Love Polska."

Much better.

I felt a huge grin forming on my face. A message of love from my angel mom. A reminder of my Polish heritage.

As I was paying for the trim, Agnesiewska asked me, "Your mother - she lives?" 

"No,” I replied. “She passed away in 2011.”

"Oh... I sorry." 

This precious Polish woman paused just long enough for me to let her response sink in.

Then she sighed and added, "Ah... Life!"

Life indeed.

PRAIRIE FARM STORIES OF SELLING CREAM TEACH US WHILE CELEBRATING THE PAST

In 2015, I wrote this "Read My Book" piece for Regina and Saskatoon newspapers to introduce readers to the fascinating anthology Cream Money: Stories of Prairie People. The book has been popular, due to its sharing of Prairie history and memories of the old days on the farm:

We can learn much from the people around us. Whether they are family, friends, acquaintances or people we have just met, there are stories to be told and lessons to be learned. This concept has been a driving force in my work as a freelance journalist for more than 30 years and has followed me into the field of book writing, editing and publishing.

In 2011, when I began working with the Saskatoon German Days Committee to help them create their book Egg Money: A Tribute to Saskatchewan Pioneer Women, I commented that they could also publish a book called Cream Money, since cream money was another important income source for farm women in days gone by. Of course, their Egg Money book is based on a statue of that name in downtown Saskatoon, so “Cream Money” did not make sense as a project for them.

So in 2014, my husband and publishing partner Al Driver and I decided to invite writers to send us their stories of selling cream and other interesting tales from past decades of farming on the Prairies. We collected 29 short stories and two poems from 30 Prairie writers, including myself.

My mother, Sabinka Staszewski, came to Canada from Poland in August 1929. She was two years old and made the 12-day voyage by ship with her mother, father and three siblings (ages eight years, six years, and six weeks - see photo below). After arrival in Halifax, Nova Scotia, they headed west by train to what would become their new home in Athabasca, Alberta, 95 miles north of Edmonton.

The family spent their first two winters living in a hole in the ground. Literally.

During the First World War, my grandfather had seen houses that were dug into the hills of Romania. There were no hills on the Alberta farmland he’d purchased, so he adapted this idea and created the first dugout house anyone had seen in that region. Their dugout house was four feet deep, eight feet wide, and 14 feet long. A small wood-burning cook stove and oven was used for cooking and warmth. Their large trunk was their only other piece of furniture until my grandfather constructed a long bench.

One of the first items my grandparents purchased in town to add to their meagre possessions was a young Holstein cow named Jenny, to supply the family with milk. Cow’s milk was an essential item on every farm in those days, especially for a growing family. 

Other parts of my family’s story include the fact that my father, also an immigrant, and his siblings were punished for speaking Ukrainian in school. Until they could afford their own cow, my grandmother helped milk a neighbour’s cows so she could bring a quart of milk home for her own family each day.

These are lessons that we can learn from and stories which need to be told to preserve not only our history but to teach the next generation. Other stories within the pages of Cream Money tell of hard work, of children and mice falling into milk cans, of saving cream money for essential items such as teeth repair, of sending the cream cans to town by train, and relishing the rich desserts made with farm-fresh cream.

On days when I am tempted to feel gloomy, I remember the story of the dugout house. Life in Canada is good. Let’s keep sharing those stories.

Cream Money: Stories of Prairie People is available from www.driverworks.ca, McNally Robinson Booksellers, Chapters, Indigo, Coles, and other select retailers. 

Here's a link to my blog about the fun book launch we had for the book!