Coffee and Gauntlet Runs

It's been bitterly cold today.

I went out first thing this morning to get a coffee. This is a daily ritual I impose on myself so that I'm forced to interact with the known world. It's a mild inoculate against feeling too isolated or depressed.

But with one bite of the frost, all my plans for today were gone. Suddenly getting a good grocery shop done just wasn't that important. Except it is in the sense that I need to make my eating a bit healthier than it has been. I certainly haven't been eating crap. I just like to eat things I've made for myself. It's healthier and logistically speaking I know exactly what's been used. When I get into these modes of constantly bringing in or eating prepared food, however good the quality, I don't know. There's just something to it, some dynamic that doesn't feel good. I start to feel a bit hollowed out if I do it for too long.

But if I'm honest, I'm feeling down because I'm relishing the return to work tomorrow with the enthusiasm one reserves for a colonoscopy.  And I was contending with some dynamics in my personal life this weekend that once in a while reassert themselves and that frankly anger me because I have to deal with the sheer stupidity of it all.

That was the one great gift of clarity in 2016: the value of distancing myself and getting out of dysfunctional relationships of all kinds really hit home for me. It was as if I'd had time to detox and could, for the first time, really see things clearly and for what they were.

You're not going to like everyone and they won't like you. You can love someone and be incredibly incompatible with them. The moment you're a human being and mess up, not everyone will give you the benefit of the doubt or be able to articulate their needs or emotions like an adult. They'll just see a situation as being your fault.

I used to see these kind of circumstances as a judgement on me of some kind. I've just come to realize it's just life. In the end people do what they want to do and see things the way they want to see them.

But here's another interesting thing, that again, wasn't clear to me until I experienced it.  Yesterday I was listening to a BBC interview with George Michael from 2007/2008 and at one point the interviewer asked him how he got back to writing music and recovering from drug abuse. Michael replied simply that he went through a long enough period where nothing bad happened. He had lost his first real love to AIDS, lost a bitter court battle with his record company and then his mother died - all in the span of three years. And for a time, he said, he just thought that life would always be that way, a miserable gauntlet run that would never end. But it did.

George Michael's observation hit me right in the gut because I realized that's where I'm at right now. It's why I've been feeling more, for lack of a better word, normal than I have in ages. Enough time has passed where nothing bad, really bad, has happened. No pets or people have died. No major relationship has ended. No job has been lost multiple times. Life is just life, variant but manageable.

And it's become clear to me in the settling of all this dust that for a while, I just had to put one foot in front of the other and keep going. Being able to remain upright was all I had going for me and that was simply the best I could do. 

So I can think about work tomorrow and feel bummed out about it. But I'm frustrated, not overwhelmed. I don't feel anymore that my current situation is going to be my whole life or that hurtful or annoying situations with people are an indefinite circumstance.  God only knows that more losses are coming as I get older. But I can't help but feel that if I keep going, work hard and have a modicum of faith in myself that some really great things are going to happen as well.

Because as much as I've typed a sentence of that ilk in the past, I actually believe it this time.

Static Cling

I was a little shocked today to find myself looking a bit forward to going back to work on Monday. I don't like my job. It's far too boring. But I do like the people I work with and the sense of progress that getting back into the swing of things gives. It makes me feel like I'm getting somewhere.

Key areas that I've decided to focus on in 2017 are my body and my job situation. I want to lose another 20-30 pounds depending on what's healthy for me and I want to get a new job where I can make more money and do work I find gratifying.

I think part of my problem in this area is that I've always thought work should feel like work. Enjoying it almost feels sacrilegious and I'm now beginning to believe that this mindset has hurt me a great deal. How do I change this? This is a question I need to address.

I think in many ways, I hold myself back. Nobody else, no other thing is in my way but me oftentimes. I want to dig deeper into this mindset this year. I want to understand why I have it and solve it.

I'm also focusing on making my life more comfortable and comforting. My home needs to feel less like something I put up with. And it's getting there. I've made a ton of progress. But one thing I did treat myself to yesterday was a Sterns and Foster pillow and may I just say by God and all the Saints this is literally one of the best things I've ever bought. I had a great night's sleep.

Today I picked up two humidifiers for the house as there is no amount of moisturizer that will help my parched skin. It's winter and the heating is going full bore and there's only so much to be done by slathering on thick creams. I was able to get a couple of super quiet ultrasonic models from Home Depot today and to my delight, the gift card my lovely neighbour had given me earlier this year covered most of the cost.

Here's to less static, on a number of fronts this year.

A Little Voice

I'm going to give this a try.

It's a New Year. Like many people I know, it was a new year that I was decidedly glad to see arrive.

2016 felt like a slog. I can't even say it was a bad year, discounting of course the unrelenting loss of celebrities and rock stars that seemed to happen every other week. But no, it wasn't that bad a year. In fact, a lot in my life got better or mercifully didn't regress and get worse. It had its share of disappointments, things I didn't see coming or didn't have the wherewithal to foresee. But nothing insurmountable, nothing irrecoverable.

And so what? I'm still here. I'm still hopeful my life is going to get better. I'm still hopeful I'll get better at seeing all the good things I already have in it.

So as I sat on the couch today, navigating day 10 of recovery from an awful flu, I took it into my head to start writing here again.  And then a little voice said "Do it every day. For a year."

I'm not sure I can. I'm not even sure I want to. There's part of me that doesn't want to be on the internet at all. And yet I feel I'm losing part of myself when I don't write. And writing has been really really hard the last few years.

I wonder if it would have helped? In a way, I'm glad I don't have everything that's happened documented. It's not stuff I want to relive. And yet having something to look back on is important sometimes, if for no other reason than that it creates a memorial of sorts, a testament to what happened, a corralling of it in the past.

So I'm going to write every day in 2017. I'm going to fence this year in and find out later what doing so will mean.

I don't think I can do it.

Set Adrift on Memory Bliss Part II

"It really is amazing how a song can take you to a place, a time from the past and make you feel the way you did back then...no matter how you feel at the present time...maybe that only happens to me...but I doubt it." ~ Martin Streek

"But I had to put her right back with the rest.

That's the way it goes, I guess." ~ P.M. Dawn

I've written about P.M. Dawn's song Set Adrift on Memory Bliss before. It's one of those early 90's rap gems that gets perilously close to cheesy, yet ultimately has remained a morsel of pure pop sampling goodness.  In the early days of Hip Hop's ascendancy, it was one of the first rap rehashes to get it right.

When I wrote about this song previously, I was talking about it in the context of music and memory and how visceral an experience that can be. Set Adrift...reminds me of a happy time in my life, the summer I stayed with my Grandmother in Glasgow, of having more time ahead of me then behind me, and of feeling hopeful.

This past Saturday, my family and I convened in our former home town of Brampton to say goodbye to an old friend, our family dog Gussie. My parents had kept her ashes since her passing in 1995. 

But with their move to a new town and the inevitable reflection that downsizing can bring, my parents decided it would make more sense for her ashes to be scattered in a place she loved. With summer vacation schedules converging, a task my parents were going to complete on their own became something our whole family would participate in.

We agreed to meet in a small plaza by our old house. Our old subdivision borders on two man made lakes that were added to the established forests already in the area at the time. Gussie loved walking along these lakes and in fact made many solo expeditions over the years from which we would frantically retrieve her. She had no road sense at all, and we were always worried she'd get hit by a car whenever she took off. 

The plaza was the best place to meet as it was close to one of the lakes and small forests through which we took Gussie on many walks. When I pulled into the parking lot, my family were already there. My Dad and I coordinated where we would be parking and I then followed him out. As the car started to move, the song to come on via my Itouch's shuffle was...you guessed it.

Coincidental? Perhaps.

Sentimental? Absolutely.

I felt as if it was a little visit from Gussie, a trip back to the time we had together. 

We parked in front of the path into the forest and headed in. None of us really felt like saying anything. We sprinkled some of her ashes amongst the trees and then down by the lake. The forest still had the same quiet rustling sound from summers past. The lake was slightly misty and more overgrown, with its requisite contingent of ducks and geese. It just felt right to bring Gussie back there and I said as much to my parents.

Afterwards we had dinner and then headed to our respective homes. It felt strange not going back to my parents' old house. And yet it felt right too. Brampton isn't the same city any more, and we're not the same people. And as much as I tend to live in the past these days, would I really want to go back there? Not really. I like who I am now more than I liked myself when I was younger. But I can't say I like my life as much.

I suppose I just feel my possibilities were better then. That sentiment and a general lack of progress in my life is something I've clearly been contending with for a long time now. It's hard not to go inward, to not feel afraid. There are many times where it feels like there is no point. Why invest in a new career path? Some bean counter can just take it away. Why try and have a relationship when your instincts and sense of self are so out of whack in that area that it will inevitably implode. Why try and build a home when paying your mortgage and repairing your home take all the financial resources you have? Why have artistic dreams and ambitions when it's all you can do to keep the sink clean and empty of dishes most weeks?

You might say that the above events are just part of the ebb and flow of life. You would be right. But I would like to win once in a while. I would like to stop being good at just surviving, and actually get some place I want to go. I didn't always win when I was younger, far from it. But I won sometimes. And that's what's been missing the last few years, a sense of progression beyond just edging ever so slightly more away from the precipice.  I'd like to feel I'm heading in a new direction entirely, that there is momentum, that I am leaving the wreckage of the last few years behind.

To be completely honest, I don't feel life is bad. I just don't find it currently or in the last while, to be particularly good. I just don't feel it's going to get much better than it is now, and that is frightening. I can say with certainty that as I get older, life will be filled with more loss. I'm not so sure it will be filled with any more gains.

And I suppose that's why when Set Adrift... came on my car radio, I gasped. I have been trying so hard lately not to focus on the negative, not to be glum and stuck mentally in what was and who I have been, but stay right in the present to try and make it better. One opening riff, and I got pulled right back. 

I'm tired of being adrift in my memories. I'd like to live in more bliss here and now.  

Perception

It's amazing how much your perception can change over the course of a day. I've begun to wonder if I perceive my life in any real way at all.

I woke up this morning, dogged by the same sadness that has been trailing me all week. I still feel, sometimes, so much at the mercy of my feelings and circumstances in terms of how it colours my perceptions of things.

For example, this past week was Daylights Savings Time. We went ahead by an hour, and as usual, the effect on my sleep was brutal.

It was that time of the month.

I'm contending with yet another new contract and trying to get used to everything.

I essentially felt overwhelmed, exhausted and miserable.

I felt mad at my circumstances. And then felt bad that I was mad.

I felt bad because I was in the feedback loop I lately find myself in, which is this: I have so many things that people want. Why am I unhappy?

I am healthy. I am mobile. I drive a nice car. I have a detached home in Toronto. I have a good paying job and the skills to get another if it doesn't work out. I can pay my bills, take care of myself and my pets. I have a kind and loving family. I have kind and loving friends.

And yet none of the above makes me feel any better.

I am unhappy. I feel like a failure. I really hate my life sometimes. Is it wrong to say that?

I have moments on my way to work, nanoseconds of space in my brain, where for just a moment, I am heading somewhere else: to do research for my next book, my play's rehearsal, to the studio to record, to paint, anything but what I am doing.

Where I am and where I want to be seem so far apart and it makes me so unhappy. And yet at the same time, it seems silly to try. In seven years I'll be 50 years old. FIFTY.  Jesus, where did all the time go?

Maybe I'm just tired and in need of a vacation. I just don't know any more. But I do know that getting out and about today really helped. I just focused on the present as much as possible. And as dumb as it sounds, Eckhart Tolle was on Super Soul Sunday today, and watching that really helped too, at least in terms of giving me perspective.

I feel like my thoughts are all over the place right now. Perhaps I can write on all this a bit better later on. But suffice it to say, just focusing on what I have right now, really did help me feel better. And ironically enough, I stumbled across this entry from a while back. Gilda Radner's quote was appropriate to say the least.

Still, I just don't know any more if I can find what it is that will ever fill the hole in my heart. For a long time, that was the Marine, but he's gone now.

Despite what I think will make me happy, from where I stand right now, it just doesn't seem possible in terms of making any of it happen.

Is it wrong to say that? So be it.

Regroup

I've wanted to write here on a regular basis for quite some time. I've only recently felt that I can start doing that again.

The last three years have felt like an endless endurance test. Between 3 job losses in 3 years, losing a ten year relationship and the multiple deaths of people and pets, it's felt like no sooner have I been getting up from the blow of one event, but the next one has come has come barrelling along, brass knuckled and ill timed.

Things are what they are now. My life is much better in many respects, and worse in others.

*  *  *

I remember starting this blog as a means to build a disciplined writing practice, to get back into writing in some way. I thought that having a sense of a readership, people waiting for the next entry would help me do that. To a degree it did, and so I thank all six of you from the bottom of my heart :). 

Some people write blogs as an exercise in catharsis, putting it all out there, warts and all for readers to consume. I respect that choice, but it's never one with which I've been comfortable. I tend to leave my wailing and gnashing for my journal, if for no other reason than that my journalling can lean towards negativity and is not necessarily a reasonable summations of things. There, I try to process my depression, make sense of things and of my life, take a tally of the small victories where I can.

Whereas my blog is written to be read. The revelations of my life are selective and better thought out. 

For whatever reason, I've been coming back to this blog quite a bit in the last month to read old entries. I thought the selectivity that I apply to what I write about here would make the blog entries less interesting to me than those in my journal. I've found the exact opposite to be true. The fact that I have written from a different perspective here has given me just that, another view on my life that I may not have appreciated if I had just written about the same time periods in my journal.  

There are things documented here that I had completely forgotten about, things that at the time seemed to take on a life and death meaning. There are passing notations on things that ended up becoming quite significant.

And in the end, it's just a different kind of documentation of my life. Because if I am truly honest, I am always seeking to find some sort of meaning in things. The record I've created here is another way to help me connect the dots. I suppose in the same vein, the lack of documentation here during the past few years is a record of a different, but equal kind.

*  *  *

Tears come at the silliest of times.  This morning I got back home with my coffee and as I pulled into the driveway, thoughts parsed through my mind in nano second increments, unbidden and unwanted. But if I was to slow down the progression, I would say it went something like this:

I am tired. As warm and friendly as I try to be, I'm an introvert and a creative at heart and I've just spent all week running around dealing with people having to solve problems that were not of my own making. I can't drive any agenda. This exhausts me. If I was meant to be a creative person and have a creative job, surely it would have worked out for me somewhere along the line by now. I feel trapped and I don't know how to get out. I feel so lonely.  I feel middle aged, fat, used up and past it.

Cue waterworks.

I don't know what to do these days other than to KBO. I'm just at a point for the first time in a decade where I'm not worrying week to week how I'll pay the bills. That's nice. That's something.

I'd like to keep and stay in my house but it needs a lot of work. I don't want to spend the rest of my days paying off a mortgage. I'd like to enjoy some relief from that before retiring if possible.

I'd like to carve out a space in my home for writing. I'd like to get more organized and have a normal living arrangement where things are easy and straightforward to keep clean. Still trying to get there.

And Jesus H. Roosevelt, can this winter please END already.

I think I've cried more in the past three years than I have in my entire life combined. I'm not exaggerating here. There's sometimes no other way to move past things than to cry them out.  Then you can move on. Any room in my house, the bathroom at work, driving in the car - all these places have been my sadness safe houses the last few years. Tears aren't noted for their convenient timing.

I've realized that I won't fall apart if I cry. That has been a great blessing. 

*  *  *

There have been a great many other blessings that have come to me since I was last regularly writing here.

Perspective.

Losing one job is tough. The second time is unimaginable. But by the time it happens to you for the third time, in as many years no less, it's kind of a non-event. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't happy about it, and it was a tough situation even though I was incredibly unhappy in the job I had. But less than three weeks later, I was back at work on a month's contract with no financial ground lost.  I knew what to do to turn that situation around, had learned from my past mistakes and was willing to take things as they came. As it turned out, the same place has kept renewing my contract. It's a great fit for me and it may go permanent. I can do that job while I look for something for which I'm more suited.

And if it doesn't work out, I'll find something else. 

Maturity.

The scales have definitely fallen from my eyes on several fronts when it comes to people, work and life in general. I still struggle with walking the line between when to take things personally and when not to. I tend towards the latter when frankly, that's just not appropriate. As Maya Angelou once remarked, don't go through life with a catcher's mitt on each hand. Know when to throw the ball back once in a while. 

I'm still trying to get better at knowing when to throw the ball back.

I certainly don't have the same rose-coloured perspective on things I once did. I don't believe in the potential of everyone to do and be better anymore. A lot, if not most people, don't want to do or be better. A lot of people just want to stay stuck in their stuff and their own agendas. It's cosy there.

Don't be a jelly fish, when the waters are shark invested.

Happiness.

I've learned that it's truly simple things that are the basic constructs of a good and happy life. Showing up. Keeping your promises. Paying the bills on time. Cleanliness and order in your home. Regular and restful sleep. Routine. Being able to save money for a rainy day. Taking care of and maintaining your physical and mental health. Setting goals, however minor, and achieving them. 

If you can get the above right, I don't think a lack of friends and family will buckle you. You can be immensely lonely and still feel a basic level of happiness. I believe you can have the best friends and family in the world and will not have happiness if your life is a never ending shit storm of reactivity, crisis, disorganization and ill health - physical or mental.  I know, because I've lived that way most of my adult life. 

*  *  *

So I have some plans. But more on those later.

Sometimes the Song Says It Better Than You Can

A Thousand Beautiful Things
By: Annie Lennox

Every day I write the list
Of reasons why I still believe they do exist
(a thousand beautiful things)
And even though it's hard to see
The glass is full and not half empty
(a thousand beautiful things)
So... light me up like the sun
To cool down with your rain
I never want to close my eyes again
Never close my eyes
Never close my eyes

I thank you for the air to breathe
The heart to beat
The eyes to see again
(a thousand beautiful things)
And all the things that's been and done
The battle's won
The good and bad in everyone
(this is mine to remember)

So ...
Here I go again
Singin' by your window
Pickin' up the pieces of what's left to find

The world was meant for you and me
To figure out our destiny
(a thousand beautiful things)
To live
To die
To breathe
To sleep
To try to make your life complete
(yes yes)
So ...
Light me up like the sun
To cool down with your rain
I never want to close my eyes again
Never close my eyes
never close my eyes ...
That is everything I have to say
(that's all I have to say)

More Randomness

I just have a bunch of thoughts going through my head lately. I tend to want to write here with a topic in mind, but such is not the case these days, and I'd rather get this stuff out of my head.

* * *

Speaking of which, I bought a "To Do" pad today at Chapters Indigo. It wasn't exactly what I had in mind, but it does have check boxes, which is what I need. I know it sounds strange, but I've realized that I need the visual cue of the box to check off and all my items cordoned off in a specific "To Do" book. I'm wanting to get more disciplined about writing things down, particularly regarding things I have to get done so they don't sit on my brain like an agitated granny. I want to see the whole landscape and prioritize accordingly. That will give me a sense of accomplishment and momentum.

I also got a money tracker book. It's a little notebook of tearaway pages, structured like a match book. All you do is write down at the top what amount of money you have in your wallet, and what you spend on what. That's all I'm doing for now and frankly it's enough. Things seem to move so fast, and next thing you know, 100 dollars has fluttered out of your wallet and you don't know why. I'm tired of having this vague sense of financial blackout. Eventually, I'll transition this approach to my entire budget, starting with my next payday. I can then make a note of everything that comes out, be it bill payments, debit purchases and the like. I'll move on to other more aggressive measures later, but for now this is enough. I've managed to keep my head above water financially speaking despite some very real challenges the last few years. As silly as it sounds, I was so proud of myself when the lease for my new car was approved because my credit rating was still good.

* * *

I suppose the above resonates with me because I always feel like I am living with this general sense of incompetence. The day to day of life has at times, seemed overwhelming. Yet despite everything, I've somehow kept going and kept it together. What I really want for this coming year is the sense of thriving, not just surviving, of feeling that I am on top of things, not just reacting to what is already heading my way.

* * *

I've felt a bit anxious driving around lately. Everyone on the road seems to be in a state of holiday induced rage, or at least impatience. Or it's the opposite; they're driving around in their own little bubble, holding everyone [ok. ME] up. It makes me nuts. The weekend before Christmas, Ragdoll and I went to the mall and were waiting for a parking spot, our signal on. A man pulled up beside us and stole it anyway. What is with people? Why is everyone so self-absorbed?

* * *

I went out with my folks, sis and niece on New Year's Eve to a great Japanese place north of the city. My dad took a picture of my mum and I for his cousin in Australia. He sent it to me this evening. I was delighted to see the re-emergence of my cheek bones. It's nice to see pictures of yourself and like what you see.

* * *

The other day I picked up my usual copy of Oxygen and for the first time, MixMag. I've decided that I'd like to be a DJ, even if it's just part time. It would be a good outlet for me I think as I love music and dancing so much. I get a newsletter from Hay House and they had an article from Joan Borysenko about burn out. She was talking about going back in your mind to the things you loved as a kid as a way to get your energy back. Those neural pathways are still there just waiting to get fired up. I realized that what music does for me is too important for me to not do anything with it. Folks seem to enjoy the mixes I put together, and I think I could really make a go of it. I'm still auditioning for plays and as always, struggling to find time to write any of my books. DJ'ing seems doable.

* * *

I've managed to keep my purse and wallet clean for three weeks and I've realized what the secret is. I throw out receipts. And by throw out I mean put them in the garbage.

I've avoided doing this for years because I feel bad about the environmental impact. I'd put papers and receipts aside for shredding...later. You can see where I'm going with this. Now I'm throwing non-essential receipts out, which other than for warranty purposes, means all of them. It's made all the difference. It's the same with coffee cups. For a while, I had a whole washed out collection of them at the office to take back to Starbucks. You can see where I'm going with this.

So I'll get to the whole paper shredding, recycling bit in due course. I think it's a very very important thing to do. The problem for me is that while I'm trying to do my part for the world's environment, my own has been suffering greatly. This is one key objective for 2011: to get my living environment up to snuff. Paint on the walls, Items organized. Enough already. So for now, to keep my car, purse and wallet functional and clean, all that paper has to go as expeditiously as possible. Next weekend, I'm getting the basement organized. It's the first step to reclaiming my home proper from the clutter I've been in as long as I can remember. It's not healthy, and I don't want to live like this anymore. I want a home that makes me sigh with relief versus exasperation when I walk through the door. I want to have people over, so that I can reciprocate the wonderful hospitality I'm always receiving.

Plus if I generate some garbage, so be it. I'm entitled as much as anyone else to take up a baseline allotment of space and resources in this world.

Randomness

"Experience is a brutal teacher, but you learn. By God, you learn." ~ C.S. Lewis

A new year is almost upon us. For me, 2010 has been inspiring and utterly heartbreaking all at the same time. I feel like I have learned a lot about myself, that I have grown up in some very meaningful ways and am better prepared for the future. In others I feel very childlike, as if I am ambling like a toddler through a terrain with which others are already well acquainted.

I am trying to sort myself out.

* * *

Since my last posting, I did manage to get back to yoga. The first two weeks after my bad respiratory virus, I did restorative yoga on Tuesday and Thursday nights. The Tuesday night class was more active, with 20 minutes of poses and I was very heartened when my teacher noted that I was a lot stronger since I last saw her. I have to admit, it was a great feeling to barrel through poses I had struggled with in the past, to experience them in a completely different way.

The Thursday night class was more passive in the sense that you have a practitioner working with you to move you through all the poses and stretches. There's atmospheric music, blankets, aromatherapy and comfy padding. It's totally deluxe and I feel like I've had a full body massage by the time I'm done.

I lasted two weeks of doing Tuesday and Thursday yoga as well as weight training and then the pace of things started to get to me. It was tough getting home late five nights a week and I had to ease it back in order to keep going.

Post holiday budget armageddon, I'm hoping I have enough money to book more classes and get into some more active yoga. It's a good counter to my weight training and cardio [such as it is these days.] It balances me out and makes me feel good about myself.

* * *

I'd be a liar if I said I wasn't discouraged by my weight right now. I'm discouraged in the sense that I'm still not at a normal weight and can't wear clothes I want to wear. Plus I'm impatient by nature, so this only compounds things. I've just accepted this and acknowledged it, but at the same time have also focused mental energy on the positive things I have accomplished in the past year. Some of these things include:

Being able to military press 50 lbs. I can't remember my rep count on this, but it was definitely more than five reps and a personal best.

I went from 24 sits up on an exercise ball damn well near killing me to being able to hold myself up in a "V" position [bent knees] while my trainer throws me a 12 lb medicine ball from both sides. I do two sets of 15 reps both sides.

The Return to the Land of Normal - This marked the first year I could shop for clothing in a lot of normal sized stores. Granted, I fit into their large and extra large sizes, but they are not plus size stores. I also bought new winter boots today, boots that I love and that wouldn't have fit over my ankles a year ago. I'm down three full sizes. It's nice to have options.

* * *

I had brunch with Indigo last weekend at Nadege and as always, parted from her company feeling inspired. I went across the street to the Japanese Paper Place and bought myself a couple of pink mole skin note books for me to start using during my training. I'm going to start writing down what I do so I can keep track of it myself. Obviously my trainer does this already, but I find that things just aren't sticking in my brain. I don't have the level of competence yet to be able to say "I'm going to train this, this and this today at these weights..." This is the next logical step for me. Indigo was talking about how she tracks her physical progress in writing and makes notes of her goals, so I decided I would do the same.

* * *

I've stumbled across a theme lately in blogs, articles and the like that I've been reading. They're written by women who are recollecting the power of their youth and beauty in some respect and how they are feeling the loss of these things or a if not an outright loss, at least a transitioning away from these things to another phase in their life in which other things are more important.

I don't remember my youth as a time of power in any real respect. I remember a sort of blind hope and optimistic feeling about my future, a sense that somehow I would be able to stumble along, figure it all out somehow and get to where I wanted to go, that unique giddiness one feels when you know there is more time ahead of you then behind.

But powerful? No. Beautiful? No.

It's the latter in particular that keeps coming up; women noticing they don't get checked out as much as they used to or not having a tummy as effortlessly tight and flat as it was when they were in their twenties. I have to say I just can't relate to this at all, at least not right now, where I am and based on my experiences. It's only in retrospect that I realize there were men in my past that were attracted me. But I certainly didn't think at the time that I had beauty that could get me any thing, any man or get me ahead in any respect. And I certainly didn't feel strong physically.

I suppose if being overweight has any gift, it's that you learn to rely on more internal measures to get what you want out of life. But the price you pay, at least as I see it, is that the full cross section of experience is closed off to you. That's what a big part of my personal training has been about, getting myself back into my whole body, not just living from the collar bone up.

Still, it's all well and good to be able to climb Mt. Kilamanjaro if I want to, but fitting into a size 10 dress would be nice too.

* * *

I got a new car a couple of weeks ago. It's a 2011 Subaru Impreza and I love it. I just couldn't take another winter of worrying about another major repair bill. I'd rather know what I'm paying month to month and have big repairs covered by a warranty. I'm glad I did it and I'll worry about what I'll do with the buyback 3 years from now. Although it's an automatic, and not as engaging to drive as my Forester, I have to admit that overall I'm just physically more comfortable in my new car. I think my legs are perhaps too short to drive manual well in that I always seemed to be so far forward.

It's also amazed me how much joy a purely material and utilitarian possession can give.

* * *

I want to write here about my trips to Scotland this year and about my uncle. But not yet.

* * *

I've been having some strange dreams this week, almost like I have been mentally cleaning house. I have to admit, I've awoken feeling lighter the last couple of days.

In one I saw my maternal Grandfather. He died when I was 17 and I have never dreamed of him. [I do believe I saw his ghost once but that's another story.] Anyway, my grandfather was sitting at a table and smiled when he saw me. I could hear my Granny talking in the background and I was just so happy to be with them both.

In another dream, the first man I ever loved turned to me and kissed me. Afterward, he said that he was sorry for having hurt me.

Summer Nights

There's something about the combination of cigarette smoke and womens' perfume in warm night air that is quintessentially summer. I've been out more in the last two weekends it seems, than I have in the last two summers combined, and on both occasions I've experienced summer nights drenched in smoke, scent and the lush rustle of trees. It's reminded how much of myself I am reclaiming back.

You forget about things. You forget about sitting on patios and how good an ice cold beer goes down around midnight while you listen to the gadget reviews tech geeks are conducting over malt while drunk girls talk to each other in their best aristocratic English accents. You forget about after dinner walking with a friend on closed shopfront streets and marveling over gorgeous shoes, then heading up to Chinatown to play "guess that smell" navigating restaurant garbage.

You forget the joys of afternoon tea and talk with a friend.

You forget. And thankfully, you can remember.

I sometimes shake my head in wonderment that I have gotten here. For so long it seemed impossible. It was impossible. But at some point I just put my head down and kept going, thinking that I'd eventually look up one day and find myself in a different place. What this approach lacks in coordination it makes up for in sheer pragmatism.

I have a lot further to go, destinations I can see off in the distance, places I have been to before as well as the new and unfamiliar. Sometimes I think possibility isn't everything; it's the only thing.

A Warm November

We've had a better November than most this year. Usually by mid-month, your nose gets singed by cold, but it's been mostly rainy with a enough sunny golden etched days to make up for it. I haven't been writing or reading much. I'm keeping my head above water and feeling on top of things, but that's only because I don't try and do it all. Something has to give, and this past month it's been my writing, both here and in my journals and my reading, both books and other blogs.

It was my grandmother's birthday last Monday and it's now slowly sinking in that I won't see her this Christmas, even though some part deep inside me knew at the time that Christmas 2008 would be our last together. I picked up a box of things she left me on Saturday. I went through it at my folks, brought it home, and put it underneath the hutch. It will be there a while. I don't want to go through its contents again for quite some time.

My workouts continue to go well and I am the strongest I've ever been. Yet I'm looking out right now at the unrelenting rain, and just want to be home sipping a coffee. It seems like all I do is work or workout these days. The Marine is lost to our basement reno. We are both tired. Our house is in chaos. Nothing at work, seems to work these days. There is too much to do, and not enough of my brain to take it all in.

I am fed up.

I Woke Up This Morning

And I wished summer was coming.

Breaking Foundations

This week I've had a serious rebound. Despite all the flu talk, I was thinking to myself last night how great it was to feel genuinely well and strong again. My usual aches and stiffness from working out are back, but I can't say I mind. To me it's a sign that things are changing.

Today though, I felt splintered. I didn't eat enough, certainly not enough protein. I got up too late, was too rushed running an errand first thing, and it broke my stride for the rest of the day.

The Marine has been working on our basement for a month and a half. He is exhausted and we really haven't been able to do much together with weekends being spent in and on the house. It will all be worth it in the end, but I miss what used to be our normal life.

But in some ways I don't. That old, soggy basement was much like the other parts of my past that I want no part of, a past where I was too tired and too sad most days. Now I am much more in the moment, instead of feeling like the only house in the neighbourhood that still has Christmas lights up in July. Part of me is terrified at the prospect of change, real change. I think that's the discomfort I'm feeling today, why I feel frantic and leaden at the same time.

But my discomfort is outweighed by my curiosity. I don't know where I'll be this time next year. Despite that, the thought of it makes me smile.

Inneresting....

Here's some links to a fascinating BBC documentary on near death experiences.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Breakage and Repair

"Walking down the Mercer Street
Been a long hot summer
Rain like daggers
Coming down on me"
~ Road to Somewhere, Goldfrapp

Last week I was the sickest I've been in years. I had hit my usual cycle of working out and getting sick. This time was different though. This time, the doctor I saw wrote me off work for the week. I had a virus, not an infection, and there was nothing for it but to keep drinking lots of fluids and getting plenty of rest.

Rest.

What a foreign term that has seemed for so long. I seem to always be occupied or pre-occupied with something, anxiety right behind me like the exhaust from a tail pipe. It seems impossible for me to slow myself down inside even when there is nothing to do. And yet this week I did nothing but rest and my body took things from there. Six boxes of tissues later, my head and chest are clear of what was, suffice it to say, a very nasty infection indeed.

I got my first bad sinus infection in 1994, the last time I was in Scotland. I was laid up for two weeks and it's as sick as I ever want to be in my life. Physically, I've never been quite the same since that infection and it has reasserted itself every time I have tried to push myself, be it working out, extra curricular activity or a busy workload. Eventually I got things to a point where working out always seemed to be the trigger, but the only one.

Part of me thought that I'd dodged it. I've been doing very well this time around but by Wednesday it was clear that I wasn't going back to work anytime soon. I needed to stop, in every way, and just not think or do anything. I was at the point of sickness, where you quite simply don't care how busy things are at the office or what chores need to be done. All that matters is sleep.

This past summer has taken a toll on many fronts. I needed to acknowledge that for what it was and as a result, I think I've finally defeated whatever it was that got its claws into me 15 years ago. I have hacked and coughed, sniffled and sneezed, cried and shook, without apology. My heart is broken and I can't put it back together unless I acknowledge its in pieces in the first place.

The mornings are quiet now without Shuggy's ritual "mep!" and I cry. Without reading through them, I grabbed a bunch of cards that were on our living room unit because I didn't want to encounter my grandmother's last birthday card to me. As it was, it was a placekeeper in a book that I picked up again yesterday morning and I cried reading its words. It's funny how at some point you expect your parents to start treating you like an adult, but your grandparents can fearlessly and forever buy you cards suitable for a 12 year old and not offend you in the slightest. Never again, will I be a little girl to anyone, the way I was to my grandparents.

I have thought of the Maritimer, re-read his letters and have cried. I've mulled over what I know about his life out east, finally processing all the feelings I cut off and shoved back down inside myself 11 years ago. That pattern of behavior has done as much as anything to make me ill. For a while, it was all I could do not besiege the people I found with relentless emails. People are where they are with this situation, and that's not my neck of the woods for damn sure. I wanted to hop on a plane, find them and shake every last detail about the Maritimer out of them. Tell me what you know. Tell me what you saw. Everything, no matter how trivial, tell me all of it. Show me absolution for my self-imposed blame.

For that's what a lot of this grief has been about: the coulda, woulda, shouldas, the siren call of my own perfectionism inviting me to once again, crash myself upon its rocks.

And then yesterday, some grace.

The book I picked up, the one with my grandmother's birthday card in it is by Elizabeth Lesser. It's called Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow. Ironically, I bought this book on a whim late spring before any of the events of late had happened. I had seen the author on Oprah and she struck me as a pragmatic sort, about as flaky as toffee. I could not have a better book to be reading right now. There is an incredible chapter about September 11th. I won't spoil it for you here, but this is the part that hit me full on:

"Driving home in the warm September night, I found my thoughts returning to the people on the airplanes, and to that moment when they realized they were speeding through space toward their death. I let my grip on life loosen, until I was with those people, sharing the awe, finally understanding the secret - the same secret we will all know when death is just a breath away: In the end, what will matter is how much we loved - our children, our mates, our families, our friends, everyone we knew, everyone who traveled with us during our brief visit to this unbearably lovely place. What will matter is the good we did, not the good we expected others to do."

In its extract, the above may strike you as maudlin. Don't make that mistake. I highly encourage you to get the book and absorb this in the context of the whole chapter.

What I realized after reading the above, is that as much as I can beat myself up regarding my time with the Maritimer and wish I had done some things differently, I also loved him with everything I had and as best I could during our time together. He did likewise. Nothing that has happened changes that. I had forgotten this central fact, omitted it entirely from my remembrance of him, and us.

It was a good reminder to recommit myself to the present, to be thankful and to value what I have now. For though I may feel much has been taken away, I also feel much is to be given in the time ahead of me. Though paths may now be closed to me, new ones are opening up.

This is the price I pay for making the journey to reclaim those parts of my soul I feel are still lost to me. I must show up and be willing to be see things through, to be uncomfortable. I think that's what a lot of the past week has been about. As much as I needed to heal physically, my heart needed to heal too.

R.I.P. Little Shuggy

My oldest cat Shuggy died today from kidney failure. I was there at the end and able to transition him out of this life and end his suffering humanely at the vet clinic of which he was a favourite client. He was wonderful.

I'll write here at some point in the future. I'm taking a day of work tomorrow to retreat a bit. I've had a lot of loss to contend with lately, and I need to ride out the numbness I feel.

Jeannie

"You are the music, while the music lasts." T.S. Eliot

It's ironic to me that one of the things I will miss most about my grandmother, is something peripheral to her as a human being. Her apartment had a north view over a park with a white church steeple that peaked up from the middle. In the midst of the fall colours, it was a visual oasis in what is often a soulless landscape in the city's extreme east end. Bordered by the confines of my grandmother's balcony window, you could be overlooking a small Virginia town for all you knew. For years, she had updates for my father and I about the family of foxes that lived there.

I got the call on Thursday morning. My grandmother had passed away in the early hours in hospital. There was a nurse there when it happened, which I was glad of, because I know my grandmother feared dying alone. I'm sure being alone and sick was hard enough and I always felt for her in this regard. I was glad she had the support network of friends, former co-workers and family that she did and that her immense suffering is over.

My relationship with my grandmother was complicated. There were familial and personal dynamics in place that we inherited, but we made the best of things which I am glad of. I've often remarked that it was quite something to have a grandparent still alive at my age, and in a similar vein, it's amazing to have said goodbye to my last grandparent at age 38.

In ways she could not have known, she inspired me. She was smart, very smart, and was still sharp as a tack at 88 years of age. I think often of the story she told me about her school principal begging her parents not to take her out of school. I'm still in awe of this happening in mid-1930's Scotland, when the societal take on education was that it was something you didn't waste on girls.

I'll always remember how much she wanted to be a nurse. She would have been a damn good one too.

I marveled at her knitting ability. My dad spoke often of how she'd knit in front of the television, her eyes never looking down at what she was doing and sweaters magically appearing over the course of a few days. He wore outfits for years as a child that she made all by hand. I still have the scarf she started for me and I'm going to finish it. I remember getting hand knit sweaters for Christmas. One year, she gave me one with a lovely brooch. It was a silver thistle with a topaz centre. It had belonged to my great-grandmother. I've never been able to find it again and I miss it acutely now.

I remember her taking me to what was then called the O'Keefe Centre to see Sugarbabies with, wait for it, Mickey Rooney and Anne Miller. Unbelievable. It was a fantastic show and a fantastic birthday present.

I remember her stories of the Clydebank Blitz during the war. I recall a story she told me about telling off another tenant in her building who had said that the Iraqees should "have the hell bombed out them." She asked them if they actually knew what they were talking about, because she had been bombed, and would never wish it on anybody.

I think about how she lost a child, twice, one as infant and one as an adult, just days before she lost her husband too.

She immigrated to Canada in her 50's, an amazing thing to do at that age I think.

I still have a silver locket she gave me for Christmas when I was twelve. I remember her saying at the time "Well you're twelve now. You're getting to that age." I felt so grown up, getting a piece of jewellery as a gift instead of a toy.

I feel as if I am fumbling for words here and not doing my grandmother justice. I am just overwhelmed with loss to the point of numbness. I am shellshocked with events of late.

Hell, my sister's dog of 14 years died two weeks ago too.

I once read a quote that said "An old person dying, is like a library burning down." How accurate a statement that is. In the end, our accumulation of experience and memory is left in the dust of our bones. What is it all for?

I don't know. All I can do is continue to carry people in my heart. All I can do is to enjoy life as much as I can and make the most of it, fundamentally uncertain, yet hopeful, that there is something beyond our last breath.

I have a great luxury my grandmother and other women of her generation didn't: I can do anything I want. I'm devoting some serious thought over the next while as to what that really is and I know if she can see me, my Granny will be cheering me on.

Love Letter

My darling, I want to let you know how much I love you. There are a billion reasons why. Here are just some of them.

You healed my heart, and continue to do so.

You convinced me and then proved, that loving someone again was a risk worth taking.

Even the most skitterish and shy of animals will always let you pet them. They sense your inherent kindness.

When I am sad, you let me cry. When I am tired, you let me sleep. You let me be right where I am and let me feel what I feel.

You cook me a lot of dinners and they are delicious.

You love books and art and music.

You are your own person and love me for who I am.

You subject me to various and plentiful acts of compassion a day; making me a cup of tea, taking out the garbage, giving me a hug, giving me solitude.

You raise your eyebrows up and down and it always makes me laugh.

You let me love you too.

Hanging On a String

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances; if there is any reaction, both are transformed. ~ C. G. Jung

I'd like to thank those of you who have commented, gotten in touch and generally lent a shoulder to cry on, be it a real or digital one. I have appreciated it more than you could know.

The last two weeks have been some of the loneliest of my life and the experience of this grief has been very painful. It's one thing to commiserate about a death and get support from those that love you, but what has really hit me is the lack of people with whom to grieve the loss of the Maritimer as a person in his own right, not just who he was in the context of my life. I've had no one to have any "remember the time" or "I loved his smile" conversations with.

At any rate, it's been immensely healing to just cry, to just let pain out. Who is to say it is all related to the passing of the Maritimer? But I think a great deal of it is.

I have been trying to come to some conclusions., rolling this thing around in my head like a pinball. Yet, no sooner do I conclude something, but a new insight emerges and I am back to the beginning.

I think it's not knowing. Every other experience of the death of someone I've loved has been much tidier in the sense that there were no unknowns. I loved them and they knew it. They loved me and I knew that. The Maritimer and I never had a clean break. Our "break up", if you can call it that, seemed more borne of necessity. He was going back to Halifax. He didn't ask me to come with him and my feeling is that he didn't feel he could. My whole life was here. He'd realized his whole life, except me [I'm assuming], was out east. I don't know if he was just running away. I do know one thing absolutely: if there was a way to go back to Halifax and not hurt me, he would have found it.

Reliving these memories, has been the quintessential experience of "if I only knew then, what I know now." I've had sliding door moments, where I relive events between the Maritimer and I and make different decisions. I see our wedding, our house in Halifax, our dog, our son. I think this is the only way my brain can process his death right now, to fully remember and evaluate things, ask the "what if" questions in order to be finally reconciled to what did happen.

And what did happen? As I look back, I see two people desperately in love with each other trying their best to save their relationship, trying their best to communicate with each other and frankly just not being terribly good at either.

And yet, we never talked again about where things ended up and that was what prompted me yet again to go looking for him. I needed to know he was ok. I needed to let him know I was ok, that we survived losing each other. I take comfort in the fact that unsurprisingly, I've since found out he was well thought of, well loved and surrounded by many friends in his life. He was ok.

He left me 11 years ago...and yesterday. That's the crux of it. Love doesn't have an expiration date. My life has been what it has been. The last decade has been extremely challenging in many respects. I did the best I could and it's netted out where I am now.

The lesson this has all brought home to me is that it's important to go through life with settled accounts. Say what you need to say. Try what you want to try. Dont' hurt or betray your own feelings because you don't want to hurt someone else's. Be reconciled to any outcome by being able to look back knowing you saw it through to the end either way, that you were fully present. It's not about everything being sunshine and lollipops and tied up in neat little packages. It's about living as honestly as you can.

So here's some honesty.

I regret not keeping in touch with the Maritimer even though I had my reasons. I'm sad he didn't keep in touch with me and I'll never know his.

I regret not being honest about my feelings and not having a real conversation with him about the whole damn thing.

I'm fairly certain I can speak for him on this last point. I think we both thought of each other briefly every Halloween [the day we met] and occasionally on our respective birthdays. Through the years, we encountered funny stories, pieces of music or news items and thought for a moment about how each other would react. I think we ultimately always thought of each other fondly, and wanted the other be whole and happy.

I also think the frequency of our thoughts of each other lessened as the years went by. I think our lives went on and the passing of time buried our disappointment with the past and unearthed an ability to more fully appreciate the present.

Selfishly, I have to reckon with the fact that despite our experience together and the love we shared, I may have ultimately ended up as just one woman with whom he had a relationship and that he meant more to me than I did to him. Perhaps his communication didn't stop out of some romantic notion of its being unbearable or his own demons preventing him from fighting for me. It's quite conceivable he just didn't give a shit. I did, after all, find out about his dying by accident. It's not as if anybody knew to tell me. The thought of this hurts me greatly, yet in recognizing it, I don't mean to disparage the Maritimer at all. It's just life and fair enough.

Time may tell the full story on that. It may never do so. In the meantime, I wait to hear more from folks out east. I plan to share my memories with them and hear theirs so that I can move on.

When all is said and done, I have only memories and the certainty of now. As most of the mental and emotional dust settles, I find that the memories I have are pretty damn good. What I have now is damn good too and deserves my full attention and commitment. In the end, after all the bullshit, hurt feelings, miscommunication and lost opportunities, all that's left, is love. And that, I'll never move on from.

Dear Diary

I've been sifting through old papers and cassette tapes, reconciling the loss of the Maritimer. It's been good to look back, to remember the beginning of things, to cry, to learn, to count my blessings past and present. So many aspects of that time have come rushing back to me. I'm still trying to make sense of it all. And I really wish the Marine was home. I've missed him.

As part of this personal archeology, I did come across another item: my diary from my school trip to Quebec City when I was 12 years old.

Ahem...a drum roll please:

1983/05/26

Today was the first day of the trip. The bus ride was very pleasant, and the scenery was beautiful. We stopped for lunch at Mallorytown. We then continued on, and stopped at a brochure office, and information centre. We stopped at Olympic Stadium and went on a tour. Then we went straight to Quebec City, had dinner at the Spagetti house, checked at the hotel, and then went on a tour. The old buildings are beautiful. [I actually did spell Spaghetti that way!]

1983/05/26 [for some reason it's the same date]

We went on a lot of tours today. We had breakfast at the Complex "G" cafeteria and dinner too. We went to the Citadelle. It was really big. It rained most of the day so it wasn't as enjoyable as I thought it would be. We went to a museum.

And after that there is nothing. My muse never struck again apparently. LOL!