Tag Archives: life

ONE SQUARE A DAY

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It’s so difficult to come to the keyboard these days. It’s difficult to start a conversation. It’s equally hard to start the day. I’m trying hard not to let time slip away. The time on this earth is valuable. It is limited and it will never come again. I’m resolving not to let my thoughts and emotions get the best of me and render me useless. The show must go on. I start my day with those daily routines. Breakfast, taking my vitamins, getting out of my pjs, straightening a thing or two and feeding Oscar, my sourdough starter.

I wandered downstairs to look at my fabric stash. I’m thinking of joining the100dayproject. It starts on January 31st. I thought I would sew a square a day for a 100 days. I have already sewn a few squares together a couple of years ago, thinking I would make a colourful summery quilt. Here’s my chance to finish another abandoned project. It would give me a purpose, add to my daily routine. A square a day could keep the pyschiatrist away. It would also help to clear out my fabric stash.

It’s not that I lack things to do. I have a million and one interests/things to do. I lack emotional stamina to keep going. I fall into ruts and off the wagon often. I do need motivations, many cups of tea and those strong rah! rah! rah! from the sidelines to cheer me on to the finish line. My first 100dayproject in July/2016 helped me to realize doing art instead of just talking about it. Here’s the first and the 100th of that project.

I’m feeling super pumped now. It helps that I’ve just been out on the ski trails and breathing all that fresh air. I tried the ski trail at the Wildwood Golf Course the first time today. I did the 2.5 km perimeter loop. It’s just what I need to develop technique and confidence. It took some time to get back to the parking lot. I had no concept of how much being out there under grey skies. I quite enjoy the spaces when I was alone. I could practice without worrying about how ridiculous and clumsy I look or if I fall. I would have to had an audience when I couldn’t make it up a hill and slid backwards, eventually falling. But no despair but laughter on my part for now I am able glide downhill comfortably without much fear. I’ve left those weak knees and jelly legs behind.

I am so glad to have had this time together. It’s good to have this conversation. It makes me feel not so blue, that life has meaning and purpose. So I will let Carol Burnett take me out with her sign off song. And I will tug my earlobe for luck.

THE BEST OF TIMES, THE WORSE OF TIMES

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What strange times we are living in. It is almost straight out of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. It is the best of times, it is the worse of times. I hope the outcome is that it is also the age of wisdom. We have no one person or country to blame. We are all in this together, whether it is by duplicity or complacency. We are in an upheaval. This is our French Revolution. It is unprecedented times.

It is a bit frightening. It does not make me want to take note. I still don’t like to take my head out of the sand. But I’ve finally all grown up. I come out and take a look around. I am learning to see how things as they are and not how I would like them to be. It’s a steep learning curve to take my personal emotions out of the equation. But I am getting it. You can teach an old dog new tricks. Enlightenment does not always bring gratification. Sometimes it brings regret – of wasted time and energy. Gratification comes much later.

I have been showing up less here on the page. I feel a reluctance to put down the words. I am also feeling an upheaval within, a change, a revolution. They are hard to articulate. I am sitting, feeling and savouring them for awhile. I am giving them and myself time to evolve and develop. I don’t want to sabotage the outcome as I have many times in the past. Meanwhile I’m trying to live each day, be my own person as best as I can.

I am still working on Stephanie Bennett Vogt’s A Year to Clear. I have faltered a little here and there but always try to get back on track. It is easy to do one little thing a day on hard days. When things flow I do more. I guess that’s what going with the flow means. There’s no point wasting energy fighting myself. I’ve learned to put that energy to better use. I have given up growing lettuce in these winter months in the greenhouse and the sunroom for the same reason. There is not enough sunlight. It is a season to rest from the planting, growing and harvest of the preceding months. It is the time to get ready for spring and start the cycles again.

We are still in the midst of Covid-19. It will not be over soon. We are locked in, psychological if not physically. I’m beginning to feel much like Dickens’ characters, Charles Darnay or Dr. Mannette locked in jail. I worry about my mental and emotional well being. It is good to have projects and challenges to work on. This is a gift of time. I shall put it to good use. The days are slowly getting longer. In a few weeks I can think about starting a few bedding plants. This is the best of time to do different, to do better, to reinvent our lives and our world.

THE LONELIEST NIGHT OF THE YEAR

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It is New Year’s Eve. It’s the first Christmas and New Year without Sheba. My eyes mist and my throat tightens. It is the way of nature. There’s birth, life and then death. A cycle complete but not an ending. I like to think that Sheba came to me in the guise of a fox the other evening while skiing in the park. I went or fell down two little hills. A little fox came and stayed with me till I was on my feet again. I thought it was a cat at first. I called ‘here kitty’. It came within a certain distance, crouched down and watched me all the while. I felt we were part of each other, breathing in and out. A miracle of connecting. Perhaps it was Sheba coming to check on me. I remember her favourite cuddly was her little fox with a squeaker in the head and tail.

Happy New Year has come and gone. Not as much fuss as other years but it was still marked with an explosion of fireworks at midnight. I did not feel I missed much. Most of my new year’s eves have been pretty quiet affairs. Sometimes it can be the loneliest night of the year for many people. I know that I’ve often felt a misfit and a failure on many of these evenings. One year my then husband and I attended a New Year’s Eve party at his boss’s house. There was a pot of chili on the stove, people here and there. We all wore party hats and had whistles streamers. At midnight we dutifully blew our whistles but none of us seemed at all pumped. It was the saddest party of all times. It still left an impression on me after all these years.

I’m well past my prime and finally I’m okay being left out of the hoopla. What I mean is I’ve never been a party girl but never been brave enough to admit it. It’s a natural thing to want to fit in, be part of the crowd. I wonder if we are all like that – putting up a front. So for the first time, I don’t have to make up a cover story for New Year’s Eve. I did nothing. So there is a silver lining to every cloud, even Covid-19. I probably wouldn’t have taken up skiing either if it didn’t happened. I would have missed out on our moonlight skis. I would have missed the fox/Sheba encounter. I wouldn’t have had this pause to think, to question the many aspects of life, of relationships, of my past thinking /behaviour, of where to next and how to get there.

THE BEST OF EACH DAY

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These last days of 2020 seem the hardest. It’s a good reason to return to the keyboard – to put words onto the page instead of getting lost in my emotions. Be here. Be now. I try not to give myself a hard time. It is cloudy and oppressive. I stand up, pick up and straighten a few things. I look out and see the children playing outside at the daycare, one house over. It is good to see and feel their energy. I put the kettle on. I damp mop the livingroom and kitchen in the meantime. I make a cup of black instant decaf. I welcome the change of taste.

There, I’ve gotten a hold of myself! I didn’t let myself drift off into the wave of what should I call it – lassitude, boredom, listlessness, anxiety, hopelessness, depression? A medley, a stirfry of negative energy/emotions. I think I’m just being human. Who can honestly say that they haven’t been feeling any of these? Perhaps it is an overworked phrase but we are in hard times. We’re in the muck of Covid-19. It is not the first in the history of the planet. It’s only one of many but it could be the beginning of the end of us. So let us learn from it, shall we?

There’s no use crying over spilt milk or locking the barn door after the horse is gone. We must work together to make our world healthier and safer. How will you contribute? The first step forward is not to deny we have a problem. I have done that. The next step for me is not to feel hopeless and defeated by my and our world’s problems. There are good days, not so good ones and then there will be bad days. No two days are equal. But I can choose to do my best for the day I’m in. I can trade up with one paperclip at a time.

It is afternoon. The day is still cloudy as can be. I have managed to stirfry something for lunch, do the dishes and make a list for my errands. I could not find my car or house keys. My head is as heavy as lead. No point in a desperate search. I used the guy’s keys. At Freshco I picked up my prescription and a few things for my mother and myself. It was a long wait at the cashier line. Someone was having a coupon issue. I waited with patient forbearance. I was silent behind my mask, breathing in and out. I was through in due time. I did a little meandering through the mall in search of something. Strange to see a coffeeshop with tables removed and bottles of sanitizer on an empty table. Strange to see people having coffee in such surroundings.

It is now late afternoon. My mother was happy with my delivery – super fresh daikon, pasta, bananas, grapes, pasta and 2 Hawaiian pizzas. I took her some of my baked pumpkin chocolate chip muffins and cookies, too. She was delighted with the steamed Chinese buns I gave her over Christmas. She said that if I added a bit of sugar to the dough, it would be just perfect. There was a time when it was my mother who gave me home cooked stuff. And I couldn’t say no. Now the shoe is on the other foot.

IT CAME UPON A MIDNIGHT CLEAR

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It is the day before Christmas and not a preparation have I made. Perhaps this year I have stripped off all vistage of the holy season. I am bare naked, without pretense. Aren’t we all this year? Is it such a terrible state to be in? I feel that now that I am bare bone, I can start to cloth/build myself in truths instead of lies and hoaxes. I hope you don’t think I’m being blasphemous. I am not anti God. I am not anti anything. I am back in the desert searching for myself. I have left it for too long.

So now it is Christmas Day and it is almost over. How can you tell I have short attention span? It’s been really short these days. My mind is going every which way. I feel this inner restlessness and agitation. It is not the best time for deep philosophical diggings like what is the meaning of Christmas or do I believe in God. Maybe those answers will reveal themselves in quieter times. For now let’s just chill, which is just what we did last night. We went for a moonlight ski after supper and a glass of chokecherry wine. It was a beautiful night. The streets were quiet and lit up. Everyone was home. We could see them through the windows. I heard It Came Upon a Midnight Clear playing in my head.

It was the best thing that we did. We had the park almost to ourselves except for a father and his kids tobogganing on the hill. It was beautiful and serene in the dark of the evening. We had enough lighting from the street lights, the houses around and the headlights on our toques. It was good to rest those serious troublesome thoughts of mine. I was busy concentrating on the physical act of staying upright on two sticks. I am getting better and more confident. I will never become a fast or an olympic skier. But I am learning to have fun. I will leave my deep thoughts and writing for another day.

TENACITY AND SPACIOUSNESS

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My friend thinks I have tenacity. That is true and good in some cases but not so in others. I really love the challenge of developing a physical skill that I don’t have a natural ability for. I feel such an envy and yearning when I see how easefully someone can hop on a bicycle and ride off, even a young child. Meanwhile, I had to struggle and struggle to master the confidence and skill to be at ease. Perhaps the struggle is the draw. I do not like easy, not even crossword puzzles.

Today I felt I was actually skiing and not just shuffling along. It’s a glorious feeling to finally feel the flow. Just to be clear, I’m not flying along by any means, but I have the feel of being comfortable on two sticks. I was pushing and gliding some at a good pace for me. I made it around the loop and back 2 times. I am making progress. Practice makes for better.

So that was yesterday. My thoughts do not flow so easily or smoothly sometimes. My fingers hesitate and stutter on the keyboard. I’m okay with it. I’m being more mindful, paying more attention. I’m not running off at the mouth without thinking and feeling. I’m taking the time to know the whys and wherefores of my feelings and actions/inactions. I learn that it is what self care means. I have to clear my inner clutter before I can clear my outer one. I have to quiet my outer chatter before I can quiet my inner one. I’m working hard on all fronts but not too hard. And that is called self compassion.

I am still very much a novice at self care. I get easily distracted by anything. I’ve just come back to the keyboard from a wild goose, time wasting chase. The important thing is I came back. I’m going into week 4 of Stephanie Bennett Vogt’s A Year to Clear. I’m still with it, a day/one paperclip at a time. Slow is good. It gives me time for the habit to take hold. I’m still reading Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, page by page, chapter by chapter. I am resisting the urge to skim, to read ahead. I’m practicing savouring, experiencing and feeling it all. So far, so good. I have this impatience, to race ahead to the heart of the matter, paying little heed to all the details leading up to it. I don’t like to take the time to cross my t’s and dot my i’s. I don’t bother to savour my coffee/tea/wine.

I’m taking time to bother now. I will make a grand adventure of it. I have made a start. It feels good to have space and order to work in. It is relaxing not to have to dig through piles to find something. I feel wonderful and in control when I clean up and put things away after I’m finished working on a project. I can. I can. I have the tenacity. My heart wants spaciousness.

LIFE IS HARD AND I’M FLAT

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Feeling kind of flat another blogger wrote. I’m feeling that way, too. I can’t blame it all on Covid-19 though. The feeling comes upon me now and then, for whatever reason. I will not exert myself trying to find the reason. It comes with the mysteries of being alive. I will bear it and get with the program. But I am really irked and bombed out with all anti-mask and conspiracy theories and rallies in our city lately. I will try to tap it out of my system.

I have alot to get out of my system. I feel stressed just ordering supper online. We decided that we would do Christmas meal early this year since our Chinese restaurant is closed from December 22 onward, not opening till the 26th. I have trouble deciding from the menu. We’re taking some of the food over to my parents. Will this or that be ok? Too spicy? Too tough? Too many meat dishes? Etc. Etc. I sound like the Yul Bryner in the King and I. That wasn’t the only decision and order I had to make online today. But I got it all done. I also ordered the New Balance Sports Slip 900 walking shoes after much hemming and hawing. I have bad feet. They need support and my slippers gave none.

You can see that decisions or shall I say indecision can cause a lot of angst and anxiety. It eats up alot of time, too. I feel a bit besides myself after this workout. A ski would have been much more beneficial and enjoyable. I skipped another day – to rest my feet. But I shall resume tomorrow. The guy went this morning. He informs me that, indeed, the city had groomed a trail in our neighbourhood park. So Santa does exist after all. Shame on me for being such a humbug. I felt even more contrite listening to the story of the Amazing Kreskin on CBC radio. Did you know that he sends out thousands of Christmas cards every year? If you make it onto his list, you will keep getting them forever as this CBC radio producer has. This is a much nicer story than the ones about Covid-19, anti-maskers and the cospiracy theories.

Talking about masks, I’ve made my second one. It was much easier than my first but the elastic part still poses difficulty. Practice does make better. I shall make a few more, varying cloth patterns. I don’t think we can discard them any time soon, seeing the numbers for today is still high – 3 deaths and 226 new cases. I know, it’s just a hoax. I wonder what the Brits say about that. I bet no one is laughing.

Postscript: Supper is over. The food was delicious. But it was still hard – picking up and wiping off everything. Then dividing out the dishes and taking them over to my mom’s. It was worth it though. At least I tried and it gave my parents something to look forward to. I do understand why it is so difficult for some people to mobilize themselves to do something, anything. It is damned hard from get go – deciding that I would do this supper for my parents. Then phoning them because then I am committing. And THEN I had to make good my offer. This kind of thing will be hard for me forever. It would be easy not to do anything. I will continue to do something forever because I am a living being.

FALLS AND FAILURES

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The other day I wondered why I am still so caught up with all my stupidity on my clutter. I have been retired for 7 years and I am still writing on and on about the same things. When am I going to stop? It feels rather bizarre. I feel my life unlived. I need to stop. Right now! I can hear Caroline Myss‘ voice shouting. Stop it, right now! But you know that I won’t. I have committed a year to doing Stephanie Vogt’s A Year to Clear.

I haven’t made great progress. I am taking those ‘baby steps’, a phrase I hate with a passion. Let me rephrase it to little steps. No point in using words and phrases I do not like. It is important how we talk to ourselves. It could make or break us. I AM making progress. I feel my path clearing before me. It’s like being on the ski track. I am getting to be a better skier, too. Not speed wise though. I’m still mincing along, like a Chinese maiden of yore, on bounded feet. I’m using less effort and steadier, though I did tumble straight off today. I landed flat on my back. My head thudded in my soft snow.

Our failures lies not in our falls but in not getting up. I rolled onto my side. Got my skis out from underneath me. Bent my knees toward my chest and got up almost gracefully. It is very satisfying rising with my boots still attached to my skis and my feet in my boots. Hooray, I am risen! I will have to practice in leaning forward more. I am still falling straight back, right on top of my skis. Amazing! And the day was so beautiful, the trees casting shadows in dappled sunlight on the snow. The dogs across the back alley barked as we circled around the park. I did my usual 2 to the guy’s 7.

It is almost the end of the day. I am tapping and waiting for supper. My sourdough chocolate chip cookies are in the oven after the roast came out. It’s not the baking and roasting that is labourous. It’s the dishes and cleaning up after. I did a whole mess of washing dishes, pots and pans today. I made Chinese steamed buns this morning. Then there was lunch and the cookies. I try not to think of how much work or time it all takes. I said to myself, OK, it’s a process. Do one thing at a time. There is no rush. No need to count how much you have accomplished. It works pretty good. I got into a flow, washing one dish, then two, a pot, a pan and so on.

Now I need to set an intention to sew another mask tomorrow. I have the pattern and material ready and set out.

LOST IN SPACE

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I think I am uncomfortable with the emptiness of spaciousness. Hence all my clutter. It’s not that I am a hoarder. It’s not that my house is jammed full of stuff. I have pockets of stuff here and there. My desk, diningroom table, sewing table, coffee tables…There’s a common theme here. Tables! Things do not get thrown out or put away. I have an inability of finishing tasks. They are sitting out, waiting for me to come back. It is the same way with a trip. I love the tripping but I don’t want to get to the end. It’s when I get there, what will I do? That is the discomfort, the emptiness, the unknown. Then the unknown is forced upon me because a trip does end.

How silly is that fear and whence did it come? There are no answers to some questions so I shall not waste time mulling it over. I let the feeling come and work through it. Now when I start something, I try to finish it in a reasonable timeline. I work on it with simple tasks. When the dishes are done, I dry and put them away. I hang up the laundry after it is finished. When it is dried, I take them down, fold and put them away. I haven’t made great strides but I do feel a change. It took a lot of effort at first. The inclination to leave things for ‘later’ was so strong. It’s much easier than. There’s almost a pleasure in completing a job and doing it well.

I have the same aversion to ’empty time’, too. It is uncomfortable/strange to do nothing. I am always doing something, reading, writing, drawing, cooking…..It’s not that I can do nothing now. I just do fewer things. I do things slower. I make more time for slow walks, slow baths, sleeping in a bit. I’m getting back to more how I used to be. I used to be able to sit, sip tea and just listen to CBC radio and do nothing else. There was time for my brain to rest. There was time for me to feel the pleasure of just being. Now I am almost afraid of empty time and spaciousness. It is time for recovery and retrieval.

ONE PAPERCLIP AT A TIME

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I’m in my irked and frustration mode this morning. I am comforted by Stephanie Vogt’s (of A Year to Clear) confession that she is a pack rat. In other times, I would have dismiss her ability to help people to clear and declutter their lives. Now I know that personal experience not only looks good on a resume. It actually works. You have to be there to truly know the whys and wherefores. I love the sentence: Yes, clearing even a single paper clip or hairball has the potential to change our lives. It certainly does! It reminds me of the one red paperclip story of Kyle MacDonald. He started with one paperclip and traded up to a house in one year’s time.

I’ve tapped away some of my ill feelings. It’s a good way of starting the day. Sometimes I’m held hostage by my emotions. I have nobody to blame but myself. I can choose/change – an action, emotion. It’s up to me. I’m holding myself accountable. It’s not always easy but I can build up my resilience, one paperclip at a time. I’m working on slowing down my brain by reading Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. I remember having read it during one lonely hot summer when I was in high school. We didn’t have a library in town. I bought it in the town drugstore. You can guess there was a dearth of selection. Why a drugstore carried Charles Dickens was hard to fathom.

It was a difficult read. I’m not sure I grasped the story at all but one cannot forget the opening and closing lines. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,” ‘It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done, it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known. ‘ Then there’s Madame Defarge. I only remember her name. I don’t know what peaked my memory and interest at this time. Where do thoughts and memories come from? At any rate, I am surprised to find I am enjoying the read. It has much more substance and the English is far, far better than my usual thrillers. It is also calming for my brain. I hope it is growing new dendrites.

I think my brain has reached its maximum work capacity for today. We put in time downstairs, clearing a few paperclips on my sewing table. It was hard work. I didn’t know where to start. I had to be the coach and the athlete. Start here! Do one thing. Then another. Believe you me, I had a thundering headache after but also a sense of accomplishment. Tomorrow will be easier. And maybe this summer we can drive out to Kipling and see the famous red paperclip and the house that is now a cafe.