The Zombie Apocalypse is here…without the zombies.

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Keep Calm and Carry on.

Easier said than done at any given minute of the day right now, given the global state of affairs.  This is serious.  Really, really serious.  Deadly.  And let me predicate this by saying:

  1.   HUGE thanks and undying love to all the first-responders out there who are actively putting themselves in harm’s way on the daily, in the name of the greater good.
  2. Thank you, thank you, thank you to whatever fates/divine intervention decided to give the Province of BC Dr. Bonny Henry.  She is a rock, an ocean of calm, and a steadying force in these times.
  3. For the LOVE of EVERYTHING, please self-isolate and stay home for the next two weeks.  Please.

 

I check in with myself during the day, and I have finally identified the strange, disembodied flutter in the pit of my stomach:   terror.  I am quietly terrified.  I am OCD and tend toward anxious over-thought at the best of times, however these are extraordinary times.    We are small business owners with a small crew we feel very responsible for.  We have two school-aged children, who (reading between the lines) will not see a formal classroom again until September.   We have a mortgage and bills that continue.

Notwithstanding, we are on the lucky end of things:  we have full (not hoarding-full, but full) cupboards, we have the ability to feed the family and keep the lights on.  Our business is deemed an essential service.  We are exempt from a lot of the freefall that is occurring in the restaurant, travel and entertainment sector.

I think of my Grandmother a lot.  She turns 97 next week and served in the RAF as a Wren.  She experienced the shortages, empty shelves and rationing that we are seeing now.  I spoke with her today.  She said “You’ll get through it.”

She is right.  Our generation has no experience with limits, but we can and will adapt.  We will adapt our lifestyle to this temporary lock down.  We will adapt our socialization to tech check-ins via WhatsApp or FaceTime.  We will cook our meals according to what is available, and celebrate, truly celebrate when we are once again able to be together in close quarters with our friends and neighbours, casually, if not blithely living.  We will look different, we will feel different, and we will remember, but yes, we will get through it.

In the meantime,

Keep calm and wash your hands.

The Zombie Apocalypse is here…without the zombies.

The cruel irony of healing

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There is a cruel irony we are experiencing as A continues to heal, grow and thrive on a strict gluten-free diet. Pre-diagnosis, and even the days and months that followed diagnosis, his reaction to getting ‘glutened’ was so swift and furious, it left him physically shattered and left me an emotional wreck from my failure to protect my child.

In a way, his swift physical rejection of gluten was a good teacher: it solidified gluten ingestion as a bad thing, which helped psychologically when he was tempted with things like pizza with his buddies, or sharing in a celebratory birthday cake. And boy, was it swift.

Later, as his gut healed and he lost the inflammation, we saw his physical reactions diminish. A would still physically react to getting “glutened” with gastro distress, mood swings and malais, but sometimes it took longer.

Sometimes it took so long to react, we found it nearly impossible to track back exactly what was the source of the gluten. Ironically, this was bad, because while a diminished reaction in the short term did mean he was not quite so acute quite so quickly, it did not diminish the long term internal damage he was exposing himself to.

Ironic, right?

And so now we move forward with a gentler, more subtle reminder to maintain his dietary vigilance, to stay gluten-free. I am trying to not go down the rabbit hole of over-thinking cross-contamination and being less symptomatic, and what it means to him. I am trying to not overthink what subtle “glutenings” will mean for his increased risk of cancers and other auto-immune diseases.

Instead, I will focus on the irony of what a healthy gut brings.

The cruel irony of healing

A year of Growth

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2020 is an opportunity for a new year, a new “chapter”, (as my Dad would say), and new opportunities. One of my personal resolutions this year is to try and grow things.

Last year was my first foray into growing veggies, and short of mistaking escarole seeds for romaine seeds, (don’t ask how, I really don’t know!) the garden had moderate success. We harvested loads of beets and overbought the tomato plants, so we were swimming in red sauce.

I loved it.  I really loved it.  The evening water became a time to meditate and reflect and reconnect with the earth.  Hippy-ish for sure, but I really did reconnect. It was calming.

This year I have already laid out my West Coast Seed catalog planting schedule, and polled the family on the veggies they want to see.  I am excited.  We are setting up the greenhouse in time for February, in hopes of growing little seedlings for transplant later.  

This is an opportunity for me.  An opportunity to both work on my self-care, and grow a little food for the family.  I am even foraying into houseplants.  For years I swore off of them, my only talent being how fast I could kill them.  And now I am studiously trying to grow an avocado from a seed, (any tips?  Still nothing, and it’s been 3 weeks)  and attempting to keep a birthday orchid alive until, well, my next birthday.

Our mild west-coast climate means I am already seeing snowdrops, and the tops of the daffodils outside.  I love it.  I love watching the fresh green shoots push through the earth and lengthen into something I forgot I had planted.  It makes me feel like I am succeeding at something for me.

I look forward to this year of growth, in a lot of ways.  

 

A year of Growth

And the Oscar goes to…

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I love movies.  Specifically, I love making movies.  I was blessed to call it a profession for a few years in my mid-twenties, and it afforded me travel, adventure and truly unique experiences.  The hours were murder on relationships, however, and I made the choice for me to move on to something else when I chose to have babies.

It was bound to be a natural progression:  I was a theatre junkie from a very young age, spending my teens in the lighting booth and behind the curtain calling the show onstage.  I went to any play anywhere, and the Fall found me at the Fringe every year.  The stage bled into my early Uni days, putting up an avant-garde four-man show in Peterborough, thoroughly puzzling and offending the locals.

I miss it.  A lot.  I miss the performance, the very life of the production.  I struggle with how to maintain a connection while honouring my family commitments  – theatre is more forgiving, but film is a ravenous time-eating thing.

And so for now, I sit and watch the movies, the awards shows, and try and guess at who the Academy will favour this year.  Every year I try and see at least some of the shows up for awards, (Ironic, right?  I love to make them but don’t see a lot of them!) and understand what this years’ crop of movies is reflecting in us.

This year is a good year.  I have seen four of the best picture nominations, and I feel I can come intelligently to the table.  It’s ironic in some ways – some (sure a little more than last year) diversity, no female directors for best picture, and an antiquated machine that is in the process of ageing out in the era of Amazon, Hulu and Netflix.  And still I watch.

And dream.

Perhaps one day, I will return, re imagined and in balance.

I keep dreaming.

And the Oscar goes to…

Fresh Starts and New Beginnings

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The Scots call it Hogmanay – Gala day, or New Years’.  It holds a special place in my heart  because I am one of those people that buy in to the fresh starts, new beginnings, and yes, even resolutions for a new year.  I believe in the power of a “new day, with no mistakes in it” (Sorry for the rough translation, Lucy Maude Montgomery)

And boy oh boy, do we need a fresh start and a new beginning!

2019 can officially fuck off.  It was a terrible year, highlighted with too many hospital visits, accidents, and irrevocable family drama.  We had some amazing high points, don’t get me wrong, but overall, I have never been more eager or impatient for a new year.

(I do know how lucky we are – most, if not all of our 2019 issues were solved with an impeccable Canadian medical system, and the power of insurance.  That is to say that we are lucky enough to live in Canada, and can afford the insurance required for things like replacing stolen cars and fixing broken bodies.  And I know these remain mainly first-world problems:  we are not fighting for our lives, we are not subsistence-living.  We are still okay.)

That being said, I am looking for a change.  I want to improve my health, and I always wanted to complete a triathlon, so I have signed up for one in the fall. (Just a sprint, but still!)  I want to approach the downward slope towards fifty with energy, strength and longevity.

I want to write more.  My aim is to post more frequently to this blog – it not only improves my writing, but provides me with a little forced meditative time.  I need to practice better self-care, and writing is one outlet.

I also want to do less with more intention:  it is so easy to get caught up in the vacuum of “busy” without taking time for the moment;  to be more proactive and less reactive.  It has always been hard for me to sit still, and my “busy” has become like a nervous tic.  It is harder for me to just sit still than anything else.

And I really, really want 2020 to be better.  I want clarity of vision, calmer intention and a happier year.  I want to take a lot of the old habits and trade them in for more healthy, mindful ones that provide more peace.  (Did I mention how shit 2019 turned out to be?)

So please accept one more new years’ post about resolutions and intention, and know that it comes from the depth of my soul, and deep in my heart; from a place looking for better; quality not quantity, and depth.

Haud Hogmanay!

 

 

 

Fresh Starts and New Beginnings

(un)Comfortably Numb

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We are midway through October and I feel as though I have lived a small lifetime in these scant two weeks. Full disclosure: this entire post contains (un-)remarkably First-World problems. I am sufficiently self-aware to know and appreciate that we are all safe, dry and fed, and for that I am always thankful.

It really peaked the Thursday before Thanksgiving: having run out to warm the car before the school run, (’cause We the North!) we were literally getting our coats on in the fron hall when I got a call from the neighbour.

Neighboyr: “Hi! Ummmm, I think your car’s just been stolen!”

Me: “Hi! What?”

(you know that feeling when you are hearing something that your ears take in but your sluggish early-morning hippocampus just refuses to process?)

Neighbour: “I was just looking outside and I saw this lady walk by your car, stop and look left, then look right, and then she hopped in your car and drove off!”

Me: “Thank you. I need to hang up and call the police now”.

And so it began. Or rather continued. I kept physically walking by my front door and opening it, helplessly looking longingly out to see if this was a joke, or if it wasn’t a joke, perhaps the thief had had a change of heart and returned it. It’s not like it was worth stealing anyways: old, basic and ugly with a freshly-dented back gate from the rear-ender we were involved in the week previously. (Oh yeah, did I mention? Rear-ended on the way to school to perform volunteer traffic duty: choke me with the irony!)

Thankfully a very kind neighbour drove one to the bus and I walked the other one to school after a kind but fruitless visit with the local law enforcement. I kept looking out that door all day, numb with shock over what had happened. That it was simply gone.

I am not naive enough to think that my neighbourhood is somehow immune to random crime, and I’ve never NIMBY’ed, but this was a jolt. I mean, I have been warming up my car for as long as I have had it, and it’s a 2010 for goodness’ sake.

So I filed police reports and insurance claims and kept looking out my front door.

Slowly becoming comfortably numb…

POSTSCRIPT:

The van was found a day later, out of gas, locked and abandoned. It had become a statistic: used in a string of petty thefts, (multiple families’ mail and chequebooks were found inside), it was mildly crashed up, reeking of pot, with a small dime bag left as a bonus. The two mysteries were (a)the thieves were present enough to lock it before abandoning it, and (b) there was a worn paperback novel detailing the musical British Invasion of the sixties…go figure.

(un)Comfortably Numb

An Animal Story (or two) Aside…

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I once was a wrangler of bees. True story: as part of a film crew shooting a little independent feature, I was asked to wrangle bees. In lieu of the props department (and by department I mean one twentysomething woman with anaphylaxis and an epi pen) and in absence of a true animal department, I was given a small collection of bees and a Coles notes version of how to train a honeybee.

The shot involved the POV of a driver looking out his cracked windshield into the far dirt road, with a focus shift to a bee crawling across the outside of his windshield. And it was up to me to get the bee to track camera left or right, according to the DOP’s instructions. We shot a number of takes, and I was able (full disclosure: with the help of a lot of sugar water) to get the shot.

Fast forward to the days of early parenthood, and my young children were gifted an aquarium. We took great delight in our first goldfish until one and then two went (literally) belly-up. Off we went to the big-box-pet-store, and secured two replacements.

Replacement fish that brought in their own pets: soon all the fish were infected with worms. Back we went to the pet store for some tetracyclene and instructions. Helpful Pet Store person illustrated how I should capture the fish one by one, place them in my palm, and remove the offending worms with tweezers.

“Won’t they die?” I asked the obvious.

“Oh no, they’re (the fish) good out of the water for ten seconds or so!” I was confidently schooled. (the worms died immediately)

Off home I went, to spend five days de-worming my fish. I broke on the sixth day. The aquarium was retired.

Fast forward to yesterday: I was handed a little orange-lidded bottle and told to get a urine sample from my dog.

Seriously.

I had no faith in myself, and no clue as to how this was going to go down.

So I hatched a plan. I snuck out beside her for her final pee, in the darkness of our backyard. Totally unsuspecting, she nosed around and started to drop her hind. I took my moment, dove to the ground and positioned the bottle in the right spot.

“I DID IT!” I squealed: total victory! I could not believe it had worked, and save for a slightly embarassed dog who wouldn’t look at me for the next hour, I got my sample to the vet.

A small aside!

An Animal Story (or two) Aside…

Bucket Lists

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I think everyone has a bucket list: a small (or large) mental collection of “Hey, wouldn’t it be amazing if….” or “I’ve always wanted to…”‘s in all of us. Some are formal and organized. Mine is more a quiet collection of experiences inside of my head.

I am blessed with many, many amazing experiences. I have hiked the West Coast Trail. I have backpacked across Western Europe. I have crewed on a Schooner off of the coast of Africa. I have worked in film and television, and witnessed the beaches of Northern France transformed with landing craft and hedgehogs into the Allied landing beaches of the Second World War. I have swum with sharks off the shores of the Galapagos.

I’ve driven a tank, cheered in Hawk Alley, and wrangled bees for a perfect camera shot. I have given birth to two incredible human beings. I have also never completed the Grouse Grind. This is on my mental list; my “I want to be able to say that I have done this.” sense of completion.

I tried to wrangle the kids, and there was no talking to them. Not on a sleepy Sunday with the first full day of regular season NFL starting. So I went solo. (***NOTE: DO NOT attempt solo hiking unless properly prepared and always tell someone your plan!)

I knew I would be okay by myself on this trail, as it was so well-traveled. I headed up Nancy Greene Way, and parked, unsure of where it began.

The Grouse Grind was marked by a chain-link fence and a notice to hikers warning them of the task ahead. There was also a whiteboard advising of a bear sighting and a bees’ nest at marker 21/40. I nervously looked around, snapped a selfie and began.

A couple of observations about the Grouse Grind: there are the obvious Pros, with their annual pass lanyards, the weekend warriors, and the newbies. Regardless of your category, everyone, everyone was positive, upbeat, and very, very supportive. I had strangers reassuring me that I was doing great, and I in turn passed on the positivity.

And everyone did it at their own pace. I heard Trudeau returned to the Grind and posted a not-too-shabby time of 52:50. I knew that the really in-shape people did it @ 46-59 minutes. The website warned that newbies should expect 1-2 hours for their time. I was going to time myself, but I was not going to push. I was going to enjoy the ride, as I had no idea what to expect. (Other than the North Shore Grouse Grind warning of a 2800′ stairmaster)

I took lots of breaks, drank a lot of water, and took a lot of moments to stop and look around.   There were easy bits, and hard bits, and bits I didn’t like.  But the forest was beautiful, under a heavy cloud cover and continuous but light drizzle. Little squirrels (chipmunks?) continually zig-zagged across my path with green pinecones, obviously well-used to the human action. The silence was intoxicating, broken only by the occasional group of hikers who were chatting as they ascended. (how they managed to casually chat and ascend escapes me)

The final quarter went quickly, and when I finally saw the break in the trees, I couldn’t believe I had done it. A very leisurely pace at 1:55, but I had done it nonetheless.

And as I sit writing this with my shoulders and knees still sore, I am proud to gently stow this one away in my mental bucket list. I did it.

Bucket Lists

And so it begins.

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We are here. The end of Summer break, the end of vacation, and the start of something new. I love the Fall, with its’ crisp mornings and cozy sweater weather. I got married in September: fifteen years ago, on a day where it rained around the majority of the city, but miraculously, not on our waterfront slice of heaven.

On the cusp of Labour Day we turn our attention as a family to the coming weeks: football practice, swimming lessons, ultimate and more importantly, homework. We are working together as a family to set everyone up for success: nutritious meal planning, grab-and-go (GF)meal prep, and successful studies.

It’s going to be a full term. Our September calendar is already full, handled expertly by the good people at Google. It will be busy but fun, and full of new friends, new sports and new communities.

We are ready. Clothes are cleaned and re-stocked, the uniform is named, new shoes sitting at the door. We are blessed to be able to do this; I know many families are not able to approach back to school with the same shiny newness.

I look forward to the coming months, and all the new adventure that it will bring our family. I will also consciously remember to breathe deeply through the anxiety, take a minute to reflect and just enjoy the moment.

And so it begins.

And so it begins.

It’s complicated…

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I think I have mentioned before that parenting is like a slow water drip against the forehead, a quiet and incessant silent scream.  It is also a “V” for VICTORY, and a communal shout among us of winning a round: whether discipline, dietary, or watching our kids make the RIGHT choices at the RIGHT time.

We are hitting the Teen Years no harder nor softer than most:  for all the ten FUCKING AMAZING RIGHT DECISIONS my child makes, he makes two radical face-palm-what-were-you-thinking-wait-I-guess-you-weren’t decisions.

Sigh.

We are lucky, we really are.  So far, he still talks to me, and so far, I have a pretty good estimate of what is going on in his head/day/month/year/life.  More so than most.  I want to still believe we are close.

The stuff that matters, he is there.  He is with me.  He lets me in.  I live in terror of him growing silent and withdrawing.  I know from experience.  Silence is the worst.  Silence means you have lost them.  I went silent.  Then it went kinda sideways.

The stupid, inane, annoying, “please just listen to me and respect the rules ‘cause they are there for your protection” stuff is the stuff that he pushes boundaries on.    I should be thankful, but it still annoys the fuck out of me.  I have the latest tech.  I can shut down his phone.  I can block him from wifi.  I don’t want to, but I am a little bit at the end of my rope.

I just want him to understand that as parents go, I (like to think) I’m pretty cool.  Easygoing even,  as ‘cool’ is not a ‘cool’ word for parents to use any more.  I understand.  I really do.  I remember my earlier years vividly, and swore a personal promise to myself a long, long time ago to never ever end up like my parents.

That these stupid “boundaries-for-your-protection” things are annoying, but if we all play by the rules, then we get less and less and less boundaries.

Looking around at the peer group, I really, really am thankful.  There is no illegal, harming or habit-forming behaviours going on with him.  I am thankful.

But it’s complicated.

So tonight, off we go to bed, trying to right the wrongs of the fucked-up parenting decisions that came before us, wrestling with our own demons and previously well-laid paths,  aiming to stay tuned in to our kids, giving them an open dialogue and a platform to be them, all the while blocking the wifi signal, confiscating the TV, and threatening the Worst. Possible. Teenaged. Threat:

The flip-phone.

It’s complicated…