Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Nom de Plume

I've had some inquiries about my nom de plume "Fundy Blue."
"Nom de plume" sounds so much better than "username!"

Bay of Fundy
Out of Westport, 
Brier Island, Nova Scotia


I have been using Fundy Blue as a computer identity or username
since the mid to late 1990s,
well before the AOL Time Warner Merger.
I can't remember the exact year, but the occasion was joining AOL,
before Facebook, before Blogger, heck before Google!


 
                           Wharf, Westport                                            Fishing Boat, Bay of Fundy



I followed the instructions to create a username
which used the example of someone named "Major Tom."
He was somebody big at AOL, but I can't track down who he was.

A naked Major Tom.
No numbers, symbols, or extraneous letters.
Clean and Cool!


Ducks, Clean and Cool, Bay of Fundy

The instructions said that you might have to try several usernames
before you found one that was available; or,
that you might have to add numbers, symbols, and/or letters to your username
to distinguish it from someone else's using the same name.

NOT!

Not me!
I was going to find a unique username,
and it was going to be clean and cool -
no numbers, no symbols, no extra letters!


Humpback, Bay of Fundy

Not only that, but
it was going to be mine the first time I entered my username choice.
No second or third choice for me!

Fishing Boat, Westport

Anal, I know!
It was the challenge for me.
The fun of the chase.

Not only that, but
my username had to reflect the essence of me!
(Whatever that meant.)
And it had to resonate in my soul!
(I wasn't sure what that meant either,
but I knew what it would feel like.)

Fundy Blue

So for a whole weekend I racked my brain searching
for the name that would reflect the essence of me and would resonate in my soul,
while I cleaned and dusted and scrubbed.
My house never looked so good!

And then suddenly,
while vacuuming the living room,
right in front of the stereo that was blasting Celtic Mass for the Sea,
Fundy Blue hopped into my mind.
Major resonance!

Humpback, Bay of Fundy

I ran to my Macintosh LC,
logged on to AOL,
typed in Fundy Blue
and, voilĂ !
The username was mine on the first try.
Take that Major Tom!

Memories Are Made of This!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_LC


I was born in Wolfville, Nova Scotia,
in a hospital overlooking Cape Blomidon and the Minas Basin.
The Minas Basin is the eastern inlet on the upper reaches of the Bay of Fundy.

Cape Blomidon (Home of Glooscap)
Minas Basin


Sara, Louise, and Donald MacBeath

My mother's mother's people have lived on and around the Bay of Fundy 
for over three hundred years.

A Section of the Mitchell Map
Depicting Southern Nova Scotia and the Bay of Fundy
1750s, Published 1774


I spent many summers and the odd winter or two 
on the shores of the Annapolis Basin, 
like generations before me.
Digby Gut spoke to me even in my earliest memories.
And the waters of the Bay of Fundy beckoned through Digby Gut.


Digby Gut
Oh Lovely Mudflats! 
 Compliments of the Some of the Highest Tides in the World!




Fundy Shore on the Rocks at Point Prim
Our Family Even Brings Along Members Who Couldn't Make It - 
Like My Brother-In-Law Flat Peter!


What can I say?
I was meant to be Fundy Blue!

Beautiful Cove on Bay of Fundy
Long Island, Nova Scotia

Many of these photographs were taken on August 1, 2010, during a trip "down on the Islands"
when my family and I went whaling with Mariner Cruises Whale and Seabird Tours.
This excellent cruise company was founded and is operated by high school friends of our family.

To hear a clip or two from the Celtic Mass for the Sea CD that I love so much,
you can click on this link or the duplicate one a few paragraphs above.

To hear a clip accompanied by guitar only, 
you can click on this video.
It's not the gorgeous version with string orchestra and Celtic ensemble, 
but it's so deliciously Nova Scotian, I couldn't resist!


A long answer for a short question, "How did you get the name, "Fundy Blue?"
But now you know.

15 comments:

  1. Haha! Someone beat me to it. I was going to ask you if "Fundy Blue" had something to do with the Bay of Fundy. And it does. Love the pictures and glad to know that you really are Louise!!!

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  2. Thanks Audrey! I may live in land-locked Colorado, but my heart is never far from the Bay of Fundy! I hope that you are enjoying a great day.

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  3. Louise~~~~

    I didn't realize that you were born in Wolfville, just like me...EKM Hospital. The building is still there used for a health center now. I have spent some time over the years in this hospital for family reasons so remember it quite vividly.

    Fundy Blue suits you to a T....hands-off anyone daring to mess with you username. I remember when I was mulling over Sophie's blog and my username...it just rolled off my tongue one day because someone had given me a HIGH 5, Sophie loves to jump and the symbol ^ looked like a mountain top which denotes height...et voila "sophie...^5" I digress!

    You certainly have been in the cyber world for a long time AOL...does it still exist?

    That picture of Digby Gut....well we have friend who has a cottage I'd say right about from that spot....so cool...and yes the mud flats....covering yourself in layers, letting it dry, crack and run into the fast tides....loved it.

    I worked at Digby Pines for 2 summers and ended up at Point Prim one evening as the sun was setting...unbelievable spot....there was a piece on the radio just this morning about PP lighthouse...trying to get moneys together to save the place.

    The last video was great....Scott MacMillan's wife (lady standing beside him on the HFX waterfront at end of video) was in our Qi Gong class...such a back to the earth gentle person. I hadn't realized she sang....in our class we are so quiet and don't ask questions...oh well!

    You Mom and Dad look so proud holding you there Louise...such a wonderful picture to have in your possession.

    Hope you cold is getting better as in disappearing.

    Regards! Ron





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    Replies
    1. Hi Ron,
      Yeah, we were both born in EKM. I was actually in the nursery at the hospital with John and Judy Pineo, because they were born within a day or two of me. I think we were even mentioned in the same birth announcement in God's knows what newspaper.

      You, too, came up with the perfect user name with sophie...^5!

      I no longer have an AOL account, but some people do. For years I used Cherry Creek's staff website and then gmail.

      So many connections! I wonder if you worked at the Digby Pines when my brother Roy did. He worked there for a couple of summers, too, while he was in university.

      Mom was the one in our family who liked to roll in the mudflats! Probably Roy and Barb too. Not me! Icky! Icky! There were things in that mud! How about the mud in Mudville? Roy and I liked to throw rocks in the mud off the dikes by Wolfville and watch them get sucked down!

      The Point Prim Light House is getting pretty dilapidated. Sometime I'll have to do a post on it. There's a webcam there now, but I usually go to the one at the Fundy Restaurant in Digby. Our family (very extended) loves to load up on fried scallops and fried clams and head to Point Prim to watch the sun set.

      And do tell - who's your friend - Smith's Cove? - who has the cottage? I'm dying to know.

      Give me a break! You do Qi Gong classes with Jennyfer Brickenden, Scott MacMillian's wife! It is truly a small world! I did Qi Gong classes at school for a while with our PE teacher and some others, but then things got way too busy, and we all fell by the wayside. It's good stuff! I'd like to get back to it. "Qi" is a good Scrabble word.

      I'm lucky in my pictures! :) Except, my family has been slow to respond to my requests for missing copies of our Northern photographs, so I'm probably going to have to get back to my "Human Refuse" posts without them and add certain pictures in later. Aarrrgggg!

      My cold is improving. I've got until tomorrow morning to get on my feet, because I have a ticket to go back to the Pompeii exhibit at 10:30 a.m. tomorrow. Hope I don't have to crawl - just kidding!

      I better go - T is hungry!

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  4. What a wonderful post! Now we know how that name came to be. And I love these images. They are all terrific. That photo of you as an infant with your parents is so beautiful. They look so proud. Isn't it an incredible feeling seeing our parents so young? Sometimes it shocks me that so many years passed so quickly. One minute they were just getting started and the next minute they're elderly folk, some of them even gone. Such is life, I guess.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks, Martha!
      I love that photo of my parents and me. It is shocking how quickly time flies. My parents are both gone now, and I miss them terribly. When I look at that photograph, I can feel my mom's arms around me!
      Have a good evening!

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  5. What a wonderful post! I love the beautiful photos - I would love to explore Nova Scotia.

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    1. Thanks Terry! These pictures are the Bay of Fundy waters at their best - let me tell you! I'm so glad you enjoyed them. Nova Scotia is beautiful and very different from Colorado. I hope that you are enjoying a good day. :)

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  6. What a great story!
    It shows how a bit of thought about something will lead to the right choice!
    I don't know you, but it certainly fits the profile I have of you!!
    Your picture are wonderful, How I would love to witness those whales myself!
    Thanks for showing the map!
    your post is so lively!
    Cheers Fundy, keep well!

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    Replies
    1. You are always so positive, Noushka! Thank you.

      The whales are magnificent, and the Chad and Sisters Two (boat) rarely goes out without finding whales.
      When I lived on Freeport, Long Island, well before whales cruises,
      whales were there, and whales were cool, but they were just - well, whales!
      Nobody made a big deal over them.

      Penny Graham, who was in my brother Roy's graduating class, and her husband (another Roy)
      started Mariner Cruises. Penny is an expert on Fundy whales, and her two sons captain the boat.
      It is always a special day to go out on the water with them.

      That map was made not too long before my first relatives showed up and published right around the time they did.
      I love old maps!

      Have a good day, Noushka!
      I'm definitely on the mend!

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    2. Oops! My family was there in the 1670s - before the map. The second group came in the 1790s!

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  7. Hello Louise,
    I was wondering about the name... now we know! Great pictures it looks beautiful and I enjoy looking at maps also! Hope that your cold is better and you got to go back to the Pompeii expo, one last time!
    Ivan

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    Replies
    1. Hi Ivan,
      Thank you for the kind comment.
      I didn't get to go back to the exhibit today - and I was upset! :(
      Until I found out that the museum must have released some extra tickets,
      and I snapped one up a little bit ago for Friday morning! :)
      I'm glad that you enjoyed the pictures and the map.
      I have a copy of "New France" by Samuel de Champlain 1632 hanging in my study.
      Old maps are the coolest!
      Have a good day!

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  8. Hi Louise, It's Barb, I love your pictures ... it was a great day and we had lots of fun together ... but just to give everyone a real flavor for Westport and the Islands in the Bay of Fundy ... the summer of 1966 we only had 14 days of sunshine ... the rest was fog, fog, fog. I love the Bay of Fundy - it is my favorite area in the world - FOG and all.
    Cheers,
    Barb

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  9. Hey Barb!
    You've been on my mind! I'm so glad to hear from you.
    Summer of 1967 was brutal too.
    That's the June I did my provincial exams with 6 different foghorns blaring the whole time. And one of them on a dangerous reef went off every TEN seconds!
    Also the summer that I could literally put my hand out in front of me and not see it!!!!! Several days that happened!
    We didn't see the sun for three weeks because the fog was socked in the whole time!
    When is the book club meeting on Fog Magic, sis?

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