Dog Days

Today feels like the summer before my third year of university.  I remember it being a crazy hot summer.  I was subletting at The Partington House with friends and working at Wendy's, riding my bike pretty much wherever I needed to go in Windsor.  I was 20, it was my first summer away from home, and I was enjoying myself like crazy.  It was the summer I discovered They Might Be Giants, and "I Can See Clearly Now" by Holly Cole was my personal anthem.

But it was hot!  So hot!  I'd finish my shift at Wendy's and some nights go over and sit in Tim Horton's because it was just too hot to go home right away.  Other nights I would bike home and sit on the front porch with my housemates, smoking, and talking in the dark because it was too hot to even put a porch light on.

There were news stories about cows dying in the fields.  I would watch the neighbourhood kids in their sprinklers and want to go join them.

When the weather finally broke, I was out on my bike with one of my housemates.  If memory serves, we were out looking at places to live for September.  The rain came down in sheets, and it was glorious, with great booming cracks of thunder and lightning you could see even though it was day time.   We rode home, whooping and laughing, and then went and danced in the street in the rain with the neighborhood kids.

I don't want to miss a thing

Which is a mediocre Aerosmith song, but that doesn't make it not my truth.

I'm working full time, married to someone who works an opposite shift leaving us just one or two days a week to be married in. I start my first class towards a Project Management Certificate at a local college this coming Wednesday. I have just joined a local gym, and love it, and also have committed to giving them money for at least a year. I have a very active social life - I'm out minimum three nights a week having tea, knitting, watching movies/tv with friends. I am responsible for the well being of 5 cats and a very old dog, and doing stuff like making sure we have clean underwear and dishes. I also have a brazillion ideas for things I want to make - fibre, jewellery, food, clothing, children.

One would think that this would be more than enough to keep me busy. And it is. There are days when I feel overwhelmed and don't want to get out of bed (but I do).

And yet....

Today I sent off an email to the director of a new-to-me local theatre company asking if they are going to be holding a second round of auditions for their summer festival.

Because although it will run me ragged, I don't want to miss a thing. I want to grab all of life by the tail and ride it until it shakes me off, or I bring it down under me.

Guenivere

Just now, sitting at my desk, working on vacation reconcilitaion and listening to "Guenivere" by Shaye, I had a major revelation.

There was someone I was so angry with for so long. I just realized where part of that came from.

I was mad at her for being like me, with my storied sexual history, and her hiding affairs, and both of us being cheaters. She was meant to be the one who was stable and stuff, and she wasn't. I was mad that she lied to me, yes, and that she used me to further her agenda in her relationships, but I just realized that it was really that I was mad at me, and mad at her for being like me.

You see, until my current relationship, my current marriage, I have never had a relationship in which I was completely faithful. Even in my first marriage, which was an open one, I managed to go outside the rules of engagement, as it were.

This part of the song was something I believed about myself for so long:

"Sorry but I can't help myself
So I can't help you
I'm always searching
For something new
It's in my nature to be untrue"

It's something I still struggle against, and while I know that I wouldn't cross that line again (because trust me if it were going to happen , it would have happened this year), it's something I'm aware of. I get crushes, I flirt with people, but I work very hard at keeping that arm's-length engaged.

I wonder where this comes from in me. It's quite likely that at least one of my grandfathers philandered, and I know that another family member flirted with the idea but didn't follow through. Is it nature? Does it have something to do with experiences I had as a teenager and my resulting lack of self-care? I think the answer is a little of both.

Ultimately, I think I was chasing a fairy tale. People talk about how you don't want to settle, you should wait for the perfect...whatever. I don't think I have settled, although my life is not a fairy tale. That's just as well, since I would get pretty bored up in a tower all day.

"It wasn't just you, it wasn't just this
Maybe I'm looking for something that just don't exist
It wasn't just you, it wasn't just here
I'm not lady, I am Guenivere"

Three things

1. Fred got his EI payment today so I went and bought cream (among other things) and I have enjoyed coffee for the first time in three days. Nectar of the gods.

2. I finished knitting mom's silk socks, while watching some of Season 5 of Buffy. I had forgotten just how annoying Dawn was.

3. We are finally using up gift cards tonight. We're going to the Keg to celebrate our 2nd anniversary (a couple of days late). Snails and steak and lobster, here I come!

3a. Hooray for awesome bosses who give recognition in gift card form, or our anniversary dinner would have been the pork chops we had for dinner on Monday.

3b. Fred's anniversary gift from me was a copy of Hit Parade magazine detailing the Top 100 Hard Rock bands of all time. I figured he'd get more enjoyment from it than from a card, which was only three dollars less.

4. I'm really crap at sticking to my own guidelines...

Jumble

This has been a very tiring week. Work , personal finances, lack of sleep, emotional stuff...yeah, I'm pretty tired.

I could write about it all: new babies and old friends and my health worries, trying to keep afloat without feeling resentful, animals that think 5:30 am is a normal time of day to wake up...each of those could be a blog post, but I just don't have the energy.

Knitting hasn't been going well either. I took a course in toe-up socks at All Strung Out, taught by JohannaB that was awesome...but I didn't measure properly and my socks are too big for my feet. I have been working on the February Lady sweater since November. I picked up the stitches for the last sleeve on Saturday, and knit it inside out for an inch and a half. I bound off the wrong edge of a baby sweater. Lots of knitting fail.

So here are good things:

I passed my Canadian Firearms Safety Course (Unrestricted) last weekend with 100% on both the written and practical tests, and the new knowledge took something I was doing to make other people happy and turned it into something I'm actually excited about.

We can pay some major bills this week, since the severance pay finally came in. Also, I can get a hair cut, and hopefully squirrel away a little walking around cash for the Knitter's Frolic at the end of the month.

Tonight is knit night. Tomorrow is sleeping in (animals be damned) and Replacement Tea. The BlackBerry is staying at home for both events.

We have a roof, and running water, and food, and I am mostly healthy (my new, awesome doctor is helping with the health part), and my cats and dog love me unconditionally.

I have awesome friends at home, at work, and living in my computer.

Finally, I am running a constant soundtrack of feel-good music between blip.fm and my iPod. Music makes my world go around, yes it does.

Random Thoughts

I get that all those celebrity women do that weird cross-legged standing thing in photos because it's supposed to make them look thinner, but it just makes me think that they all need to use the potty.

Awesome blog: Clonehenge. It's all about replicas of Stonehenge, made in mediums ranging from silver to bacon. Seriously.

Can we just leave Rihanna alone? Please? Yes, I understand that by mentioning her, I am flying in the face of my own request. Still. Please?

See above point for Nadya Suleyman as well.

In fact, can we stop ridiculing and belittleing women for their choices and blaming them for being victimized, and try to be supportive of each other?

I'm re-reading "The Bitch in the House" by Cathi Hanauer. Sometimes it's good to read stuff that feels like it comes from inside my head.

Tonight I will buy this yarn, in order to knit this pattern for myself. Love!

I currently have a pair of socks, a turtle and a sweater on the needles (no photo yet of the sock, since it's not much more than a cuff at this point).

Coworker gave me a bag of Second Cup's blueberry tea. Heaven!

I have updated my Flickr to a Pro account, and added Google Analytics to my blog. This will either galvanize me into posting more, or paralyze me into posting less. I'm aiming for the former.

Even though the word "assistant" appears in my title, that doesn't mean that I am your assistant.

Tazo's Passion tea is also awesome.

Early Resolution

I have been thinking a lot recently about what makes me happy. What external things, what about myself, what activities make me truly happy.

I've got a pretty good list put together, and I've noticed a common thread: mostly, I really like to connect with people. Obviously, I mean people I like, not crankypants people at the mall. Not so obviously, "people I like" doesn't neccessarily mean "people I know" or "people I get to spend a lot of time with". Sometimes "people I like" also means "I like you in small doses, say for an evening", or "you live in my computer, so we can't go have a coffee, but I like you anyway". This also means that I have been thinking that people I don't like so much, I should maybe avoid.

Where I fall down on this (and on just about anything else I decide I want to do that will make me happy) is that I skew towards the lazy. It's easier for me to sit on my couch and knit and watch tv than it is to do just about anything else (this is why my kitchen isn't nearly as clean as it could be). I also have a tendency to get over excited about things and book myself way too much to do, and then wind up all burnt out, sitting on the couch, knitting.

So, I am starting small. I am sending Christmas cards (and now that I've said it in public I have to do it) and some emails. Once the crazyness passes in two weeks, I'm going to visit some people who aren't too far away, and spend some time at my local yarn shop. Then, late January/early February, I'm going to cram a whole bunch of visiting into one weekend. I know that I'll keep my momentum until about March. I just have to remember that I like spending time with people, and that while my couch is also nice, people have a tendency to move far away, and my couch ain't going anywhere.

November Morning Commute in Southwestern Ontario

Low clouds the colour of cream of mushroom soup leak flurries to add to the blanket of the first snow that already covers the fields on either side of the two-lane highway I drive twice daily.

Evergreen trees carry a mantle of soft whiteness, while the branches of the leafless trees are limned in silver, a few stray red leaves turned into a pink candyfloss confection.

I chat with a stranger as we fill our tanks, discussing winter jackets, the price of gas in the '80's (playing a game of "I remember when" one-upmanship), and whether the switch from imperial to metric was a government conspiracy (him: yes, me: no).

A different stranger, a lovely blonde woman, stops me just outside the parking lot: I have forgotten to replace my gas cap, and she has fixed it for me.

I get to work late, but safe, thanks to my four new tires, and schlepp my stuff to my desk, including my shoes in a bag, because it is November in Southwestern Ontario, and time to wear winter boots.

Weekend Round-up

Friday night I went out dancing for a girlfriend's birthday (I was driving, so didn't drink). We closed the bar and had a great time. Saturday I felt like I'd been hit by a truck. It turns out that I don't bounce back from being out that late quite the way I used to.

Fred was gone most of the weekend. It was the closing weekend of the controlled deer hunt, so he was out at my Mom's farm, sitting outside in the wind/rain/hail/cold. Not my idea of a fun time, but he enjoyed himself. One of the members of his party brought down a buck, so now I get to learn how to cook venison. Any suggestions?

Yesterday afternoon one of my friends hosted a Mary Kay facial class. We had a very good time, and booked three more classes with the consultant over the next few months. We're going to do a beach party theme at the end of January (focuses on total body skin care and no-sun tanning alternatives), a before and after glamour make-over mid-December, and another make-over session in a couple of weeks in which the consultant has agreed to figure out what kind of goth pin-up looks we can come up with. I'm betting Mary Kay never envisaged that use for her make-up!

Finally, I picked up a new yoga dvd, produced by Ali McGraw. Wowee! There are some bendy bits in there that I didn't know my body was supposed to be able to do! It's a 53 minute long dvd, but I didn't feel like it took that long. It's going to be a while (like, years) before I'm at the level where I can complete many of the poses, but I liked it enough that I'll keep trying.

Making a brighter day

I've been thinking all morning about what I should write about today. Do I write about Barack Obama? Do I write about my disappointment that Prop 8 in California passed? Do I write about my feelings about politics, and the state of the world?



Do I write about the fact that my weigh-in yesterday didn't show me the numbers I wanted, or that I've stepped up my exercise, or that I need to remember to find my tape measure so that I can track my quest for a healthier body that way? Do I write about my struggle with not labeling my food choices as good or bad, and working on not being ashamed of the food choices I make?



Well, at some point, I'll likely write about all of it (and I was worried I wouldn't have anything to say! Ha!), but today didn't feel like the right day for an in depth look at any of it, as I'm suffering from a bit of an emotional hang-over. So I wondered, what the heck would I write about?



Then, around about 10:30 this morning I wandered into the kitchen at work to rinse out my yoghurt cup and I saw the woman who does the cleaning in my office building. I am ashamed to say that I don't know her name, but we have been exchanging pleasantries every weekday for the past six months. When she was gone for two weeks a couple of months ago, I worried that I wouldn't see her again, that she had been transferred to a different building. When she came back, I told her that I had missed her, and found that I meant it. She had been on vacation to South America, her place of birth, to see her family. It was the first time she'd been home in fifteen years, and she told me how much she enjoyed seeing her mother and siblings, and her daughter who had stayed behind when she came to Canada.

This morning, she said to me "You weren't here last week, and I missed you." It brightened my day to know that I am a part of her world, in the same way that she is a part of mine. I think that tomorrow I will introduce myself properly.

ETA on Friday: her name is Marta.

A woman in harmony with her spirit...

"A woman in harmony with her spirit is like a river flowing. She goes where she will without pretense, and arrives at her destination prepared to be herself, and only herself." ~ Maya Angelou

This week at work our whole team - all 15 of us - have been face-to-face for the first time, ever. We have had people visiting from Halifax (Nova Scotia, Canada), Irving (Texas, USA), Egham (England) and Singapore. It's been a pretty neat experience all around.

Yesterday morning we did an ice-breaker, a get-to-know-you kind of exercise in which we had to answer questions anonymously with one or two words and then guess who had filled out which form when the answers were read out loud. I described myself using the words that came to me first, not over-thinking it, and was the first one finished. When it came time to guess, I was consistently guessed for almost every submission, except for the ones using descriptors like "sporty" or "adventurous", and my own.

Finally, on the fourth time my sheet was read, and after 12 of the 15 profiles had been accurately guesses, they put me together with my submission.

I've been trying to figure out since whether I don't project myself the same way I see myself, or if in the 8 1/2 months I've been there, people haven't been paying much attention, or if it's some combination of the two.

This has caused me to really think about how I see myself, and how I think I project "me". I've come back to the quote at the top of this post. That may not be quite how I'm doing things right now, but it's certainly where I'm heading: to being me, and only me.

Little Things

Things I do:

• bring my coffee to work in my own cup
• bring my lunch packed in reusable tupperware, or re-used baggies
• pack my dishwasher as full as possible before running it
• use cloth or reusable bags for grocery shopping
• separate cardboard out for recycling
• hold off as long as I can get away with it before turning on air conditioning/furnace
• use biodegradable bags to pick up after the dog
• use some household and personal cleaners that are friendlier than others
• use some energy efficient light bulbs
• use as much recycled household paper products as possible
• eat locally grown or organic food
• I quit smoking last December, reducing the chemicals I'm putting into my body, into the air, and the butts that were being thrown away

Things I plan to start doing:

• keep replacing old lightbulbs with the energy efficent kind as they wear out
• keep replacing household/personal cleaners with friendlier options, and look into natural alternatives where possible (like vinegar as a glass cleaner)
• put up a note saying that I don't want junk mail/newspaper/flyers delivered to my mailbox
• start separating recycling beyong cardboard, and take it to the dump myself (our townhouse complex only has two dumpsters available; one for cardboard, one for everything else)
• find out if I can set up a composter in my back yard
• figure out a way to collect rainwater
• cut down on pre-packaged food, make an even bigger effort to eat local
• request a new fridge/stove/dishwasher from the landlords when we renew our lease so that we can get more energy efficient models
• take an extra bag with me to pick up garbage when I walk the dog

I'm sure there are more things that I could do, and likely a couple of things I'm already doing that I can't think of right now, but this is a pretty good starting point, I think.

I used to have a t-shirt that said "We don't inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, we borrow it from our children." That was a good shirt.

Bye bye FB!

I've just gone and deactivated my Facebook account. I had a virus propagate from my account last weekend and it upset me enough that it soured the whole experience for me. I contacted one person that I want to keep in touch with and don't have any other way to contact, then deactivated the thing. I've been neglecting The Watcher's Diary lately anyway.

Sometimes...

...you think you're done with something; that you've healed, that you've moved on. Then you hear a song, and you hear it, really, really hear it for the first time, even though you've sung it a bajillion times, and it sends you into a tailspin (apologies to Sarah McLachlan for only quoting some of the lyrics here; these are the ones that hit me hardest).

Through the years I've grown to love you
Though your commitment to most would offend
But I stuck by you holding on with my foolish pride
Waiting for you to give in...
You never really tried or so it seems
I've had more than myself to blame
I've had enough of trying everything
And this time it is the end...

In the terms of endearment
In the terms of the life that you love
In the terms of the years that pass you by
In the terms of the reasons why

There's no more coming back this way
The path is overgrown and strewn with thorns
They've torn the life-blood from your naked eyes
Cast aside to be forlorn...

Funny, how it seems that all I've tried to do
Seemed to make no difference to you at all...

Apologies have been made, as well as a tentative peace, and I was puzzled by the whole thing coming when it did, and wondered about the reasons, but I took it (as I always have) at face value, despite all past evidence that I am a naive fool, and then got on with things because while it was unexpected, it was no longer a huge thing in my daily life.

Now, this hit me out of nowhere, and made me marvel at the layers of the psyche. I've had a good cry, and a cup of tea, and I'm feeling level again, which is good. It's just a scar that I didn't expect to be laid open at 9 pm on a random Thursday.

Lunch love

Today for lunch I have:
- tomato soup
- carrots
- yoghurt (raspberry-cranberry)
- a piece of Babybel light cheese
- a royal gala apple
- a red pepper and chipotle wrap that has light mayo, light marble cheese, Branston Pickle, romaine lettuce and low fat smoked ham in it

Yum! I am so happy it's lunch time.

To be a fly on the wall...

Facebook is a wonderful tool. I have been able to connect with people I thought gone from my life forever. I have been able to keep in touch with friends who are far away.

Today, I found out that my ex-husband is going to do stand-up comedy! He's got a night booked at Yuk Yuk's in Hamilton at the end of March. This is one of those things where I wish very, very badly that I could go and see, but it just wouldn't be the right thing to do in the end.

I left him, I gave him up, and rightly so. We were never really good friends, and should never have married in the first place. All of that means that I don't get to go swanning back in and get involved whenever I like - it's just not fair.

The thing is though, my favourite part of him, indeed what attracted me to him in the first place, was his sense of humour. A bunch of us would go out for drinks, and he would hold court telling his funny stories. In the 6 years we were together, I heard his standards so often that I could have told them myself...but I didn't, because no one could tell the stories better than he did.

I'd love to be a fly on the wall, because I'd love to be able to laugh at his stories again. I am so very proud of him (which may seem strange, given that we haven't spoken since 2004 and the last email he sent me was over a year ago now), and I hope that this goes well for him.

Now who wants to go be a spy for me? ;-)

Giving back

One of the myriad reasons I wanted to get a job closer to home was so that I could make some time to do volunteer work, and become more involved in my community. Back in November when I was labouring under the delusion that I would be finished with job #2 in mid-January, I signed up to canvass for the Heart and Stroke Foundation in February, which is Heart Month here.

February arrived, and I still had the extra job, and then I got a sinus infection, and there was a lot of snow, and I am a master procrastinator.

Finally, last night, I went out to ask my neighbours for donations. I expected to be turned away, or told off. I didn't expect to gather $50 in donations from 15 houses, in less than an hour. Today I'll be adding my own donation, as well as one from a co-worker.

Next February, no matter what else is going on, I plan to make this a priority. The H&S Foundation is an excellent cause and it's important to me to help them out, but it also helps me out, because I feel good about giving back.

I'm not a big fan of reality television for a number of reasons. For one thing, I don't feel there is a whole lot of reality there. Even voting shows like the Idol franchises (which I admit to being a guilty pleasure) are stacked by websites that attempt to convince people to vote for the worst contestants in order to skew the results. Mostly, I don't like reality shows because I don't like watching people be mean to each other. I even had to give up on the Amazing Race because of the negativity of one family a couple of seasons back.

Starting on Sunday, Oprah Winfrey ('cause she doesn't already have enough going, my goodness!) will be hosting her own reality show: Oprah's Big Give. The premise of this show is that she will give the contestants some money and they have to turn it into more money, and then give it all away. The person who gives away the most money over the course of the show is the winner. I'm pretty sure that they're all winners, really, 'cause giving back does that to you. I'll be watching the show, and hoping that competitiveness doesn't overshadow the goodness.

My face hurts!

I think I may have a sinus something going on. The front of my head hurts on the inside and I feel all puffy. And my ears keep popping. Wah!

I got myself a neti pot a while ago, but have been too lazy to use it regularly. When I get home from second job after 11 at night and still have to herd animals before I can fall into bed to get up at 6:15 (although at least it's not 5:15 anymore!), pouring salt water through my head isn't high on my list of things to do.

I have a hard time doing things that I know are good for me. I don't eat as well as I should because I don't want to make the time to make the food. I don't get as much excercise as I should because the few evenings I have to myself, I'd really rather just knit and drink tea. I can't figure out if it's laziness, or if it's that I don't think I'm important enough, or if I'm just too bleeding tired.

There have been inroads. Quietly, with no fanfare or quit meters, I quit smoking on Nov. 25. I can tell that this time it's for good. There is a different quality to it this time, and also the smell of cigarette smoke is making me gag these days.

A friend introduced me to Yoga Booty Ballet, and I love it! A minumum of once a week I am getting a half hour of cardio excercise. I go over to her house right after work (after stopping to let out the dog and feed the cats at home) and she feeds me dinner then we jump around in her living room. I also bought the dvds for myself and jump around in my own living room on days when I don't have to go to second job after first job. I've also been keeping an eye on portion sizes when I eat and have lost a few pounds in the past couple of weeks.

But I'd still rather sit on my couch and knit, and drink tea.

Dammit.

Heath Ledger is dead. I've been sitting at my computer for about an hour puttering and crying. which is dumb, because it's not like he was a friend, or someone I'd ever met. But I liked his acting. And he was very pretty and one of the few actors I've ever had a major crush on. I'm looking forward to the Batman movie this summer where he plays the Joker, but it's going to feel different now...

It seems that he overdosed on prescription pills. Some sites are saying he had a substance abuse problem. Whatever. I'm sad for his family, and for his friends, and for his fans.

Too young. Dammit. RIP.

Tiny Green Eyes

People are turning up pregnant all over the place! I know three people who are due in June, and it's all very exciting, and I have a giant list of things I want to knit. I am so happy for these friends (although very sorry that they are dealing with being sick) and I can't wait to see/meet the new people they are creating.

That said, when I found out last night that ex-best friend is trying to get pregnant, I got a little jealous. It was only a flash, only for a moment, but there it was. It probably had more to do with the "who" than the "what", and I recognize that.

We want to have a child (maybe more if we can manage the first one ok and don't misplace it or something), but we know that we need to get a better handle on things like money and cleaning the house regularly before we embark on the whole adding-a-person-to-the-household thing. Plus, with the five animals in the house, I'm not sure where we'd put a baby right now; it's already a little crowded. So we're being responsible, and grown-up, and trying to make the right decisions.

But, dammit! I want babies too!