Tag Archives: the Ultimate Blog Challenge

Home Alone

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I am in danger of falling off the wagon. I’ll try not to just sit and stare at my screen. I’ll just pretend I’m writing morning pages and just keep tapping, hoping to find words and ideas, hoping to make sense and a post for the 12th day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge. I’m home alone. The guy has gone for a week of sailing with his brother and other like minded guys. He started this sailing venture with another fellow. Then it morphed into a few more boats each time. It’s yearly thing now with ‘regulars’ for over 10 years. They call it the Elbow Run, sailing on Lake Diefenbaker. The village of Elbow is right on the lake. He gets t-shirts made every year with a different design and the logo The Elbow Run.

I do enjoy a short sailing trip but not exactly keen on sailing and not bathing for a week. So I look forward to my yearly week alone. Before, I had Sheba for company but I’ve been winging it by myself for 5 years now. I always thought I could be more free and get more done while he was away. It just dawned on me last year that it wasn’t so. It was an illusion. It was more work since I have to do it all by myself – the gardens, cooking, cleaning and everything else.

I still value this week alone. It’s good to know I can stand on my own two feet. It builds confidence and a backbone. I’m not truly all by myself. There’s time spent with friends and my father. We do our daily coffee. Today I helped him figure out how to work his toaster oven. Tomorrow he’s going to use it to bake some basa fillet for supper. It’s really a pleasure to watch him bounce back from grieving mom and blossom these last while. I feel blest to have this time with him.

I’m about done here. I am a wee bit tired and getting towards bedtime. It’s a day well spent. I baked 6 loaves of bread this morning. It was cool and there was no more bread left in the freezer.

Giving a Damn

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This is a very difficult summer. Am I repeating myself? Should I stop now? It is so true though. No two days are the same. It’s rare to have a stretch of nice steady weather. After a couple hot scorching days, today the sky is grey and heavy. I am waiting for the clouds to drop their load. I am heavy and slow with their weight. It is hard to move and feel upbeat. I am working hard to string the words together for a post for day 10 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge.

I wonder how everyone else is feeling and doing. Does anyone else feel that this is a very strange year? The world seemed to have changed overnight. It does not feel safe or sane. I don’t know what or how to do. I just carry on as best as I know how. I hope I am not just going with the flow but making some difference for the better, no matter how small. It is easy to be complacent, not give a damn. But we really should give a damn.

That’s a good reason to keep showing up and tapping out the words. Many times it is just to make myself feel better. Some times I do glean some wisdom for my efforts. It makes me happy then. Right now I am just talking, trying to ease myself out of this heaviness. I feel like a ton of bricks, like a pregnant elephant. I hope I don’t look like I feel. I changed into an oversized black top just to be sure. We’re going out for supper.

A Moment in Time

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July is a difficult month to show up for a challenge every day. On a hot afternoon, I feel lazy and move like a sloth. It’s tempting to curl up with a book or curl up and snooze. Knowing that a little slothing can start an avalanche of napping, I’m putting an extreme effort here for the 9th day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge.

This morning, knowing that it was going to be a hot day, I took the opportunity to sit with tea on my newly cleaned deck. I let everything fall away and lost myself in my new book from the library. All That Life Can Afford is a easy light read. It’s just the ticket for me. And I was in a perfect moment, in a perfect spot. It was early morning, in morning sunshine, still cool with a slight breeze. I could hear the birds and traffic from our busy street. All was right with me.

Ain’t No time for the Blues

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July the 4th, the height of summer. The flowers are blooming, the grass is growing and so are the weeds. There aint no time for the blues. They’ll have to come back some other day. The house is a mess. I am also. The gardens are also crying for some attention. I have to pull myself up by the bootstraps and get to work.

It’s not easy though. I was tempted to skip the gym this morning thinking of all the weeding and watering. The temperature gets brutally hot by midmorning. But I thought it best to stick to my routine of going to the gym Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings. It’s good for my body and soul. We had an early start this morning and was done by 9. I set to work watering and weeding the back garden beds. It’s gets the sun all day but early morning it is relatively cool. Next I took the whipper snipper to the grass in front of the raised beds. It was a good effort for the morning. I need to do this more often regularly.

My day is gone. The afternoon was spent with my father. My brother has taken over the care of our father’s yard and garden. Since he’s away for a week, it is my job. So after harvesting some Chinese greens, I gave the garden a few drops of water. Then I whisked dad off to the mall for coffee. We ran into our friends so coffee was longer than usual. We were a bit slow getting to my sister’s for a barbecue. It was a busy day for us all.

Now it is almost bedtime. I need to bring this post to a close. I thought about another day off but 2 days in a row might lead to many more. So by gosh and darn I got here to say good night. Till tomorrow then.

Day 4 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge.

Working on Living

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Yesterday was a hard day. I finished reading What My Father and I Don’t Talk About. It was a great read of 16 writers’ essays on their fathers. However, it left me feeling more melancholic than usual. I would still like to read What My Mother and I Don’t Talk About though we had talked plenty. I am sure that she had not told me everything. Now, I can’t ask her. I am still travelling in the landscape of the bereaved. Some days are harder than others. The heat and humidity made it harder yesterday. I know that life goes on no matter how I feel. The world still spins on its axis. The sun still rise and set each day. And so must I – rise to the challenges of living and then rest when tired.

I took my father out for lunch yesterday. I didn’t realize it was Canada Day but it worked out well. At least I can say that’s how I celebrated our country’s birthday when people ask. I’m not big on celebrations. I am a true humbug. I think that came from being an immigrate child of immigrants. We were poor starting out in this country. We didn’t celebrate birthdays, Christmas, New Year, Easter, and Thanksgiving like everybody else. On Canada Day, we didn’t join in the town’s festivities. So I do think that as a child, I must have felt left out, odd, not belonging, etc. etc.

I tried hard yesterday not to languish in my melancholia. I tackled 2 bags of my mother’s clothes laying dormant on the basement floor. It wasn’t too bad, not worsening my mood. The clothes stirred up some good and happy memories of mom in her younger years. Now, I see her vibrant and happy in my mind’s eye. For me, sorting the 2 bags was a big accomplishment and enough for one day.

Today, I am feeling better. The heat is still on but there’s not the humidity/heaviness weighing me down. There is a breeze. I am okay. I went to the gym this morning. Worked the weights. Worked on skipping techniques. Worked on hula hooping. I can talk and hula at the same time. Now to hula while walking. That’s another thing. So meanwhile I am working on feeling social and feeling good. I’m going to sock it to life.

PS. I am also working on the Ultimate Blog Challenge.

July Writing Challenges

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July 1, another new day, another new month. The morning is getting on and I’ve been tarrying with my morning tea and reading What My Father and I Don’t Talk About. 16 writers talk about their relationships with their father. It’s so speaks to me right now as I navigate my own journey with my father after the passing of my mother in October of last year. It’s been a difficult journey. Perhaps I will write about some of that during this July’s Ultimate Blog Challenge.

I’ve lost track of time and if not reminded of it by a UBC friend, I would have been late coming to the UBC party. I thought June has 31 days. I hope to show up here every day for July with a new post. I’ve participated for quite a few years. I’ve never planned on what I am writing. I just show up at the keyboard and hope for the best. Mostly it is just about my mundane every day life- moans and groans, gardening, arting and what I’ve been reading.

Perhaps I can make some changes, gives some thoughts and do a bit of planning. I am going to keep it easy and simple. There’s more likelihood of me succeeding if I do. I am happy to be in this writing community to learn and share. Happy writing everyone.

A Celebration Post

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It’s April 30th, the last day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge. I’m happy to be here at a happy ending. I achieved all that I set out to do. I kept it simple. I kept it easy. I showed up almost every day, missing just 3. I tried my best. I had a beginning, a middle and now an ending. It was nice to meet some new friends as well as reconnecting with past ones. What more could a girl ask for?

I’ve had a busy day starting with the gym in the morning. I worked the hula hoop and skip rope into my routine. It’s good to challenge myself with new stuff. I’ll see if practice does make for better. Then it was going for groceries and then lunch with my exercise buddies. You know lunch with the girls can last for a couple of hours. I was home for a few minutes when I got a text from my brother. Dad had fallen in the livingroom while he was there. He couldn’t get up by himself but was not hurt. Still I worried.

I went over to see for myself. He was lucky that my brother was there when he fell and lucky he was not hurt. I asked him to show me how he was on the floor so I can teach him how to get up. Good thing I had such good instructors at the Y gym on functional fitness. Dad was a good pupil. He was able to learn how to get into a position so he could use a piece of furniture to get himself up. After all that we had to go to the mall for a walk and a coffee. We ran into Mom’s coffee friends there and the time just went.

I’m home now, sitting with a chrysanthemum tea and tapping a few last words. I’m tired. It’s been a hard year but it’s been a good April. I’m glad I participated in this UBC. It’s helped me regain some peace and mental strength being here every day tapping on my keyboard and reading others’ offerings. Sorting through ideas, words and feelings have dispelled some brain fog. It’s good to be able to think clearly again. I feel blessed to be here now.

Thank you Paul for giving us this special place.

These Moments

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I took a 2 day vacation from the Ultimate Blog Challenge. My income tax return was calling me with urgency. I was not keen but I knew it was best that I gave it my undivided attention. I’m glad that I did. I am now breathing easier. I knew from past experience it was not a terribly hard or lengthy process. Still, I go through these moments annually with it AND often with other issues. These moments of feeling impending boom – from putting off, procrastinating,thinking of the worst possible scenarios.

I haven’t push the review and optimize and send buttons yet. I’m there but I am still procrastinating. At least the feelings of dread are lighter. I’ve gone through piles of papers the last 2 days. I’ve investigated how long I need to keep certain documents and made a pile for shredding. My head feels better, not as fuzzy and befuddled. I saw that I was organized once upon a time. At some point, I dropped the ball. I do not berate myself. Life is hard. These last couple of years have been very hard. I’ve done the best I could. Some things are more important than others. I prioritized.

I’m still experiencing some of these moments. This morning I got lost in scrolling through news of our federal election. I skipped my morning meditation and writing my morning pages. I realize I could lose my whole day scrolling through this and that. It’s a time waster but somehow it is a soother. I used my will power to curb my instinct and looked towards other more useful means of pacifying myself. I got off my butt and washed the dishes by hand. I found the physical act of washing by hand calming and have been doing it for awhile. Next was the dust mop on the kitchen floor and sweeping up the crumbs form our meals.

Now, I am tapping out the last words for the second last day of this challenge. I feel it is important to finish what I had started.

Operation Income Tax

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It’s a sunny Saturday morning. I’m preparing a face off with my income tax. I had been filing my own when I first started working. Then my brother became an accountant. It made sense to let him do it for me. I took it back when I retired, thinking it would be good for my brain. My brain does need a regular workout. It’s lazy, always taking the easy way out. Anything that needs a bit of reading for instructions, my eyes glaze over and I would dump it in the moment. Years of this bad habit have landed me in a big mess, my head full of nettles.

It’s a good time to make some changes, do some work on this lazy brain of mine. With the tax deadline of April 30th breathing down on me, I’m making a start. My desk is covered with so much dust and paper clutter. I had to fix all that first. I tried to rid some of the stuff and not just move them from one spot to another. It is hard. So much mental hanging-ons. But now I’ve cleared my desk top so there’s room to breathe.

I’ll just sip a little tea and breathe before moving to the next step. After all, Rome was not built in one day. I have till midnight Wednesday to complete the job.

Tsunamis and Tidal Waves

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I am enjoying a bit of good energy and vibes this morning. It’s such a relief after yesterday. I have been warned about days where grief can hit you like tsunami or tidal wave. I am not even sure if it is grief. It came out of nowhere yesterday morning. I was hit with such a bad feeling. It was hard to swallow, think, to move. I wondered how I could carry on, breathe, cook, clean, write my post. I worried about my father’s health. He is after all, 93, the same age as my mother. I don’t want to be responsible for for his health/life. It doesn’t seem fair and I am a little ticked off at my mother for leaving us – and without a manual to guide us.

It’s a bit strange but most times I don’t feel her death. She’s just not here. And with her gone, I feel the many losses of our family. There’s no one to call me by my Chinese name except my father. I just realized that yesterday. It makes me feel somewhat heart broken. And there will be no one to ask or talk to about our home village and all things regarding our heritage and ancestors. My father still has a remarkable memory about all that though he has not been back since he left as a young man. I was drowning with all these thoughts and guilt on things I didn’t do.

All things do pass. I was able to get beyond my emotions and put one foot in front of the other. There’s life to be lived and things we have to do. No matter how we feel, we have to get up, dress up and show up somehow. Some days are better than others. Today is a better day. I thought out what I want/have to do and the best of how and when to do them. Progress is slow and minuscule. I see results and I am happy with them. I’ve been to the gym this morning, planted all the cauliflower and harvested lettuce from the greenhouse for lunch. I am a happy and relaxed camper.