ahead by a century...

I have a confession to make…

Yesterday, I pumped gas for the first time!! This may come as shocking to some and even shameful to others but it’s true! The reality is that I’ve never owned a car before and hence, the opportunity to fill it with gas never presented itself until now! I’ve spent, quite literally, all of my driving eligible days living downtown and until I met Steve, a car was never a part of my life. Even now, Steve is really the one who uses our car the most and in turn, maintains it. I take it out for the odd shopping trip from time to time but more or less, our set of wheels is Steve’s baby!

Steve has been away in Calgary for most of the week which meant that Tugger and I were left to hold down the fort on our own. More importantly though, this also meant that with my chauffeur out of town, I found myself at the ripe old age of thirty experiencing my first solo excursion to the gas station!!! I was a bit shaky going in but I managed to keep my cool and figure things out without any damage to myself or the vehicle!! High fives all around!!

This does lead me to my second confession though…I love being domestic!

This may not come as a surprise to those who know me well but it did come as a bit of surprise to even to me! With Steve away, I’ve also been doing everything else around the house that either Steve would do or we would do together; Grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, getting the mail, laundry, feeding the cat. All in all, I’ve been a one man band this week and guess what…I LOVE IT! What’s funny is that none of this is new to me. I lived for years by myself before Steve came along and all of those things had to be done then too but somehow, with age perhaps, I’ve come to develop a certain appreciation for being able to maintain the comforts of home.

I’m sure as I write this, there are women out there convinced that I am the demise of our gender and would gladly wait in line at the chance to shake the 1950s out of my system but I almost find it necessary to step up and admit to the fact that, while I’ve spent a lifetime working towards my career, it’s possible that I could be very happy (dare I say it) without it.

One of my favourite writers, Sarah Ban Breathnach, has spent a lot of time writing about the Victorian era…a time when it was actually considered an art to maintain a home and those that lived within it. The ability to achieve balance and serenity within the home was held in the highest of regards and no amount of corporate ladder climbing could compare. During the Victorian days, home truly was where the heart is and they cherished it as such.

Even decades later, during the Depression, women everywhere made it their mission to find happiness in the home. While there was very little to go around, they quickly learned that home had far less to do with monetary value as it did the nurturing that went into it. Calm spaces, warm atmospheres, organized living…this is potentially what maintained so many people through some very dark days.

It’s not likely that you’ll soon find me standing in my kitchen with my hair in rollers as I bake muffins, but it’s reassuring to know that there was a time and a place where my love of cleaning would have fit in just fine and even more so, I could have raved about the likes of grocery shopping and pumping gas without being looked at cross-eyed or concern that I might be hospitalized!

But so it is with life…the best artists are never fully appreciated until they’re gone!

it's just that easy...

It’s a really, cold, dark and dreary day in Ottawa today. It’s been raining for a number of days now (tail end of Ike) and I’ve been shocked to see how much the gloom of such weather can suck the soul right out of me. It always makes me think of my Mom who lives out in the middle of the ocean. As beautiful as it is out there, she’s always telling me stories about months passing without even the slightest glimmer of the sun. Oh, the agony.

The thing is that I actually really love the rain. I love curling up in a big, comfy chair with a good book and spending the day lost in someone else’s world. I guess the thing is that I don’t really do that too much anymore. Even when it rains, it still seems to be business as usual in the woods these days. I guess that rainy days used to signify some special for me…an indulgence in the lazy weather and a good excuse to let my soul do the same. I’ve noticed that I find myself fighting my natural tendency to want to hunker down when the skies break open and in turn, my body and mind resist with every part of my being. Rainy days just aren’t meant to be frittered away on the usual.

One of my colleagues just came back from her three week vacation in Europe and she was asking this morning if I found it hard to get back into the routine of things after our return from Australia. The answer to that would be a resounding YES! It wasn’t actually returning that I found difficult. That, I was prepared and even excited for. It was the speed at which life seems to occur that I wasn’t ready for. I was telling her that one of my favourite parts of our vacation was getting up each morning and just slowly having breakfast while we would read the paper or watch the world go by in downtown Sydney. The “rhythm” of vacation was almost intoxicating and I found that whatever seemed to happen throughout the rest of the day, it never seemed to damper our mood too much because our day had already started so wonderfully. THEN, we return home and are faced with somewhat (not always) frantic mornings that include rushing to eat breakfast and moving around in a fog until my mind catches up to my body. It’s exhausting!

For anyone out there who is already eager to hit the comment button so that you can tell me that the chaos our life endures is always choice, please spare me!!! I’m quite sure that I’ve told myself that enough for all of us!! Fear not though, I have decided that one way or another (though I’m not yet sure how), I am determined to reclaim both my mornings and my rainy days!! It simply must be done!

And so…

I, Gen with a “G”, hereby agree that I will no longer stare in envy at those enjoying their morning coffee in peace nor will I resist the temptation of a good novel and an even more tempting pillow on days when the predicted rainfall equals five millimeters or more.

[imagine signed dotted line here]
------------------------------------
Genevieve V. Georget-Smyth

Et voilà!

time to take some notes...

I've had a lot of feedback lately from people who have been wanting to post comments on the site but don't know how. Don't worry...you're not alone!!

So let's take a brief blogging pause for a little tutorial, shall we?!?!

For those of you who would like to join in the "cyber-conversation"...it's as easy as clicking on the COMMENT button below and joining in the fun! And despite popular belief, you don't even have to register a blog site to do so...just click on "comment" and hit either the "other" icon or the "anomymous" icon and TA-DA...no registration necessary (and we have the added fun of sharing our thoughts with everyone). I know all of you well enough to know that you have something good to say!!

So, come on...get your blog on!

too many floors down...

A couple of weekends ago, we were painting our bathrooms. After two days of inhaling paint fumes, I found myself in our basement doing the inevitable and dreaded clean-up of all the paint supplies. I hardly ever go down into our basement. Aside from throwing the odd box down there from time to time, it’s really Steve’s terrain and frankly, I usually even forget that it’s there. During this rare moment though when I was in our basement, I found myself feeling very unsettled. As I stood on the cold, concrete floor, hunched over the big plastic sink cleaning the paint brushes, I felt like I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I’ll admit that it caught me a bit off guard. Finally, I heard Steve upstairs coming towards the basement stairs and it suddenly hit me…For about four months, from September to December, after I graduated from University, I used to live in a basement not unlike the one I had just been standing in.

As I’ve discussed many times before, the year that I graduated was a very hard time for me. I was going through a devastating break-up, I was overwhelmed at the thought of not being a student anymore, I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life and the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel had most definitely been turned off for an indeterminate amount of time. Needless to say that it wasn’t amongst my brightest of days. During this time, it was very hard to make decisions regarding housing when I didn’t have a full-time job (or any job for that matter) and I didn’t know if I was staying in Ottawa or moving away. The extraordinary problem solver that is my mother, promptly stepped in and took hold of the situation with a sense of perspective that I simply wasn’t capable of at the time. She arranged for me to live with some friends of hers that had just moved to the region and weren’t using their basement. It wasn’t ideal but, it was inexpensive and non-committal. It would give the time and flexibility that I needed to figure things out without many of the external stresses that were already making my life very challenging.

So, late that August, I packed my stuff (which wasn’t very much) into the back of their pick-up truck and we drove to the outskirts of the original city boundaries of Gatineau, Quebec. I had never lived in Quebec before and I had never even seen suburban Gatineau before, but as we drove further and further away, I began to feel relieved at the distance that I was putting between my self and the memories that were making me feel trapped. Sure enough, we arrived and sure enough, it was indeed a basement. The floor was concrete, there was insulation along the walls covered in clear plastic, there were wooden beams in all directions and a big, loud furnace in the corner just next to where my bed would be. No doubt, it would be gloomy but then again, so was my life…so it seemed oddly appropriate at the time. Looking back, I think that by this time, I was almost prepared to just roll over and accept the despair that seemed to have taken me over. My soul was tired and beaten, and I no longer had the energy to fight it anymore. That is, until one crisp, sunny morning when planes started to fall from the sky…

I woke up in the basement of September 11th, 2001 and just stared up at the ceiling while I listened to the amplified sound of feet walking up above. For the past couple of weeks, that sound had become the essence of what my life had become…me, hunkered down in a cold, dark cave while the sound of other people’s lives woke me up in the night. I began to despise the very sound of the family living up above…the sound of them sitting down to dinner together…the sound of them getting ready to go out for the night…even the sound of them arguing over the car…it all just seemed like such a cruel reminder of the hollow existence that I was enduring. In fact, the sound came to bother me so much that since then, I’ve never lived beneath anyone ever again.

I’m not sure how long I stayed in my trance while I listened to their morning routine above me but eventually, the furnace kicked in and I was startled back to reality. I rolled over in my bed, tried to catch of glimmer of the outside world through the tiny window in the corner and turned on my stereo that was next to my bed. Just as the song finished, the DJ from the morning show came on and said “for those of you just tuning in, we’ve just received news that a plane has just crashed into the World Trade Center in downtown Manhattan. There is still no word of casualties however it is suspected that this was indeed, an act of terrorism. We will report back with any further details as we receive them. I repeat…we are receiving reports that the United States of America has just been attacked by terrorist.”

Given that I was already running late for work, I quickly got dressed, grabbed a walkman that was sitting on the living room table and ran out of the house. As I turned to close the door behind me, I noticed that the others had forgotten to turn the television off when they left for work. As I approached to hit the power button on the remote control, I quickly glanced up and realized, to my horror, that I was watching a second plane approach the towers. I stood stunned as the impact occurred…not just to the World Trade Center but also to my terrified eyes.

The rest of my day was spent in a fog of confusion. I had managed to catch the bus to work in downtown Ottawa only to find out that businesses everywhere were shutting down for the day. Police and RCMP could be found in every corner of the nation’s capital as we had suddenly turned to survival mode. With the American Embassy, the Prime Minister’s Residence and Parliament Hill all within four blocks of each other, downtown Ottawa had become chaotic with panic. I remember a bunch of us standing in front of television at the Radio Shack store downtown watching everything unfold live before us. Shortly after, the manager came and turned off the television because we were too many in the store and were creating a fire hazard. Funny…literally three minutes earlier we had watched the first tower collapse and all the while, we were considered a fire hazard.

Shortly after the attacks occurred, the RCMP had closed down all of the interprovincial bridges between Ontario and Quebec and I could no longer get home. I felt stuck in a war zone with no way out and no safe place to go. As every minute passed, businesses were closing their doors and the roads were congested with commuters making their way back to their families. But I had nowhere to go. I had no friends in town or family that I could go to. All of my colleagues had returned to their own homes and I felt all alone and desperately afraid. I finally found my way to the gym that I had been a member of and amazingly, they were still open. I spent the next four hours with the few people still forced to work and we watched and cried and wondered how the world would ever be the same.

Eventually, they too were given the go ahead to shut their doors and once again, I was out on my own. I headed to a corner store nearby and while inside, I overheard a cab driver say that one of the bridges had just been re-opened about twenty minutes earlier. I desperately plead for him to take me home and an hour and a half later, I arrived back at my basement. While the entire world had changed…the basement had not. It was still cold, dark and damp, but it was all that I had at the time and it would have to be good enough.

I hunkered down in my bed for the next couple of days and never took my eyes off the television. I ate gummy bears and drank chocolate milk and never received a single phone call from anymore…nor did I make one. In the depths of the night, as the family upstairs was curled up on the couch together, quiet as ever, I had no one; no friends, no family, not even any neighbors to go through this hard time with. I only had this basement. Then, and only then, did I realize just how far I had really fallen. I had drifted beyond sadness and into apathy…a dangerous little hole that knows nothing but hopelessness.

That was my darkest day. And about four months later, on January 1st, 2002, it would be become my second darkest day (a post for another time) but it was also the day when I discovered that I wanted things to change. For the first time in a long time, I cared again. Or at least came to recognize that perhaps I had still really cared all along.

I would continue to live in the basement for four more months after that and while it would prove to be one of the saddest times for me, it was also a time that helps me to appreciate every moment after that so much more. It sounds ridiculous in a way but I needed the basement. I needed to know that even the dampest and darkest of places couldn’t break my spirit. I needed to know that enduring one of the scariest days in my life without anyone else to share it with also couldn’t break my spirit. Mostly, I needed to know that although it may have seemed that way for a while…I hadn’t actually given up on myself.

In the months that followed, I found my first career, made new friends, learned what it was like to be in my own company and eventually, moved back to the city that I loved and into my own (and first) apartment. I moved into the top floor of that apartment building actually and for all the stairs that it took me to get there…I was always elated to be on the top floor…in a room with a view. Many challenging and sad times still followed as I tried to figure myself out again but none as hard as that moment, on that day, in that place. I pray daily that I never have to be there again but if there is one token of wisdom that I took away from such an experience it’s that whether it be the cold, dark corner of a house or the cold, dark corner of your life…if you ever find yourself in the basement, it means that there’s no where left to go but up! And take my word for it…that is reason enough to wake up every day and search for the tiny bit of light and the glimmering rays of hope that shine through that small corner window, even if it is tucked away behind the furnace.

the road to hell is paved with paper...

So it turns out that our Tugger has a thing for eating paper! I’ve never met a feline with such a craving before. I’ve known cats who like to play with paper and even some who like to sleep in paper, but never one to eat paper!

And apparently he’s not very particular about what kind of paper either. It could be a paper bag, a receipt, a bookmark, tissue paper, bus tickets, our grocery list, our visa bill, toilet paper…you name it, he’s got a hankering for it!

At first, we just considered it one of those cute little quirky attributes that only a cat could possess but as of this morning, he’s taken his paper fetish to a whole new, and rather questionable, level…

This morning, we woke up to a rather well chewed up Bible!! Our beautiful, hardcover Bible generally sits on the floor next to my side of the bed and even though it’s been there ever since Tugger joined our family, up until last night, it apparently didn’t satisfy any of his cravings. It seems though that he has tired himself of his usual paper snacks and has decided to move on to bigger and better things!

I’m a little bit concerned now though about Tugger’s well-being come the day when he decides to make an appearance at the pearly gates of kitty heaven; I mean, I know that the Old Testament can be a bit of a drag sometimes but I really don’t think that God’s going to be impressed knowing that half the book of Exodus is digesting in his tummy!

Really, Tugger…regardless of how adorable we think you are...we've got to draw the line somewhere!!!

first comes love...

I’m exhausted! Truly…there are no words for the degree of fatigue that I’m feeling right now! I went to bed at 8:30pm last night and still felt like crying when the alarm clock went off this morning! My lack of shut-eye was all for good reason though as we just got back from an amazing weekend in Tilbury, Chatham and London for a variety of different visits but mainly, for Dawn and Josh’s wedding.

As I mentioned late last week, I was quiet nervous about the prospect of returning to London as it’s been nearly a decade since I’ve really spent any time in my old neighborhood. When I left London to move to Ottawa, I was very ready to leave and it was important for me to leave various parts of my life behind in order to become a better version of myself (which I wasn’t doing a very good job of in London).

I had just turned nineteen when I moved. My cousins were all much younger back then, our family was going through a variety of different changes and just as the seasons were changing…so were we. In fact, a lot of us were moving on around that time. Change is good. Actually, as the saying goes, sometimes change is as good as a break but, with that it also means that things were seldom ever the same again…at least for me.

So anyways, needless to say that this past weekend was much anticipated. As we drove to the church where the ceremony was being held, memories of my childhood flooded over me with an impact that even I wasn’t quite prepared for. What was interesting was that the everything looked exactly the same…and yet, every single one of us were different. We were all grown up…some of us were married…some of us with children of our own…some of us still enduring change and others finally settling into life. It was heart warming actually.

After the ceremony, Steve and I had some time before heading off to the reception so, we parked the car and I took him on a walking tour of my old stomping grounds. There was something nearly divine about walking past my old house and by the old cemetery because those very spots are where the early pages of my book takes place. I’m sure that most of you know this already but for those of you who do not; with lots of encouragement and gentle nudging, I have indeed started my book. The first words found their way on paper last fall and while the beginning of 2008 proved to be a bit too busy for me to commit much time to it, I have settled into writing mode once again and the pages are slowly accumulating. The first chapter (so far) happens in that very home and on the grounds of Woodland Cemetery. So walking through this part of my life, while living in my present life, added an element of intensity to what I am experiencing at the moment while writing. It all seems too oddly appropriate!

So, we are home now and having spent a weekend in my old home makes coming back to my current home have a whole new meaning. It’s as though we were literally driving through the time and space that changed everything. That eight hour stretch of highway 401 changed my life forever and has continued to do so every time I make the trip. I’ve always been a home body for as long as I can remember and this weekend I realized just how much I love home…both of my homes.

I didn't take a whole lot of pictures of Dawn and Josh's wedding because I was too busy getting my groove on but, to see the remainder of the pictures that I did take, click here.

where the heart is...

I’m going home tonight. When I say “home”, I mean London, where I spent the better part of my life growing up. It’s been a really long time since I’ve been back. My mom moved to B.C. shortly after I came to Ottawa and slowly but surely, everyone just moved away. The more settled I became in Ottawa, the less reason I had to return to London. I’ve gone several times to visit briefly with Christina (which is reason enough) but I really haven’t spent any quality time there in almost ten years.

Dawn and Josh are getting married there this weekend and their ceremony is being held in the neighborhood where most of my time in London was spent. I finished elementary school there. I started high school there. I had a crush on the boy next door there. I said goodbye to my grandmother there. I had countless birthday parties and some of my favourite holidays there. I made friends and lost friends there, and I even found and lost my self there a couple of times. Really, I grew up there. I was sad to leave and am apprehensive about going back. Nervous almost.

It’s not home the same way Ottawa is home or the way the canal in the winter is home. It’s not home the same way being in Steve’s arms is home or the way Christina, Russ or Joanne are home. It’s not home the way hearing Tugger first thing is the morning is home or my Saturday morning runs are home. But it is one of the first homes that I’ve ever known and such a large part of my memories growing up. And now I’m going back…ten years later…a different person from when I last saw it.

They say that it’s never too late to go home. I guess we’ll see.

looks like we made it after all...

This past Wednesday was our anniversary. Our third anniversary actually! Apparently the third anniversary is represented by leather, which we thought was dumb...so we went out for steak instead!!!!

While we don't necessarily make a really big deal out of our anniversaries just yet, I think that as every year passes, we do begin to gain a certain degree of pride in the accomplishment that is marriage. I'll admit, we're getting better at being "us". We understand each other better, we listen better, we compromise better, we work our way through the waves of spending a lifetime together a little bit better. In a world tainted with a divorce rate of nearly 50%, I think that as each year passes, we certainly acknowledge that every little bit counts!

When Steve and I were preparing for our wedding, we spent a lot of time with Father Joe preparing for the part that would come afterwards...the marriage. One of the final questions that Father Joe asked me in the last week before our wedding was "what scares you most about getting married?" My answer was "getting divorced". While I had no doubt regarding our commitment to one another, I also knew that nothing is a guarantee. I suppose that is the risk that you take though and what also makes the commitment so sacred.

Over time, I have to come to discover a side of my marriage that has left me confident than ever that my fears will never see the light of day. I've come to realize that while Steve and I are not necessarily very similar people, we do in fact, want very similar things in life. This shared vision for our life together really seems to make many elements of marriage much smoother. It appears that, as unromantic as it is...practicality just might be one of the keys to marriage.

It wasn’t until one of my favourite writers, Elizabeth Gilbert, sparked the most interesting thoughts regarding marriage in her novel, Eat Pray Love, that I finally began to let go of the preconceived notion that marriage had to be held together by love alone and that I began to give myself some credit for what appeared to be some insight regarding this adventure that I’ve been on for the past three years!

I clearly can't cover it nearly as eloquently as Gilbert does but, in the latter part of her book, she discusses the fact that a hundred years ago, our fathers would have sat down with our potential husbands and asked all of the practical questions regarding our future life together; where will we live? How will we support ourselves? How many children will we have? Is he a cat person or a dog person? You know...all of the fundamentals that make spending a lifetime together a little less complicated.

Over the past century though, we've experienced the feminist movement and a variety of other factors that have given women an independence unlike any other time in history, and this includes choosing a spouse. This does sound wonderful and progressive, and in most ways it is but there is one thing that we, as women, have forgotten about; we are emotional creatures. We tend to react and feel our way through life based on the rush of hormones that we experience and the cyclical delusions that can often be created because of it! I'm not saying this is bad at all...I'm saying that father stepping in to take the marital bull by the horns also wasn't necessarily a bad thing either!

As women, we are smart, ambitious and successful but, most of us, when it comes to love, still hope for the fairytale ending and still yearn to be rescued by Prince Charming. Of course, I can only speak for myself but, regarding matters of the heart, my vision can be a little bit cloudy! Even with the best of intentions and with my greatest of desires to keep my head on straight, it never fails…when I fall in love, I have a tendency to fall hard and fall fast! Steve was certainly no exception!

As the amazing creatures that we are, our emotional tendencies have a habit of taking over our more logical and practical side on occasion. This, Gilbert claims, is where we need to be careful; while we may have replaced our fathers in the process of choosing our spouse, we haven’t progressed with the same zest when it came replacing someone to ask all of the important questions. In turn, we have allowed our emotional selves to make this rather significant choice in our life only to find out years later, when the fog finally lifts, that we don’t have a whole lot in common with the person we are sharing our life with.

Is this the cause for our alarmingly high divorce rate? Possibly. Is this a valid issue to consider regardless? Absolutely! Believe me, I am by no means an expert in marriage by any stretch of the imagination. Heck…my twenty-one year old cousin has been dating her boyfriend longer than I’ve even known my husband! Semantics aside though, if there's one thing that I've learned during my three years of marriage it's that all of those little shared desires in life, while they may not be the things that the perfect Valentine’s Days are made of, are necessary. The bottom line is this...if one of you wants to live in the mountains and the other wants to live in the city...someone is going to be unhappy, regardless of how much you love each other. Wanting the same thing matters.

So ladies, to make a long story short…Prince Charming is definitely out there to give all of us the fairytale ending that we’ve all been waiting for. But when he shows up on his white horse and sword a blazing…be sure to take a moment and ask him which hockey team he’ll be cheering for come playoff season!!!

until there is three...

I spent an evening last week with an old friend of mine whom I haven’t seen in awhile. As we indulged ourselves in some ice cream and much needed catching up, we crossed paths with an old colleague of hers taking a stroll with her young daughter. We chatted for a couple of minutes and just before parting ways, this woman said to my friend “when am I going to see you out here with a little one? You certainly seem to be late in the game!” As I stood there appalled at what I had just heard, my friend stood there crushed. While she smiled politely and gave the standard answer of “all in due time”, I could tell that she was devastated.

My friend and her husband got married about five years ago and for the last three years, they have been trying to start a family of their own. So far, to no avail. With no easy answer to their difficulties, they just keep trying. What started as a fun reason to “practice” quickly turned into charting and temperature taking and one month at a time anxiously waiting to see if they would have to endure it all over again. It hasn’t been easy for them and fertility issues aside, one of the biggest challenges has been tolerating people’s complete lack of consideration and sensitivity to a situation that frankly, is none of their business.

There seems to come a time in every couple’s life when all of the cosmic pieces seem to fall into place and you suddenly wake up one day realizing that everyone around you is expecting an announcement unveiling the expansion of your family. I know because Steve and I are currently in the thick of that storm. We’ve been married for three years, recently bought a house, went on a big trip and got a pet. In the lottery of life, it appears that we have four out of the five winning numbers which, to the outside world, seems to mean that having children is the next obvious step. And maybe it is (or even surely it is) but, as a couple, it would be nice to be able to make that decision without an entourage of people waiting with baited breath to spit the words out before we do. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that loved ones don't have the right to be joyful and optimistic about the prospect of children. In fact, even we have our own small little circle of trusted friends that have always shared in our intentions and with whom we are already grateful for their support, discretion and excitement towards our future, whatever and whenever it may come to be. I can say though, from experience, that there are times when the hopefulness, spontaneity and surprise of starting new life can get lost in the all-consuming desire to avoid the inevitable question...

This being said, for months now I haven’t been able to do so much as sneeze without people asking me if I’m pregnant. For the most part, we don’t validate these comments with a response but at other times, we have been forced to put some distance between ourselves and the inquiring minds because we simply don't want to continue to justify why we currently only have the pitter patter of little paws instead of little feet.

This brings me back to my friend, my beautiful friend who grins and bears it every time someone throws an interrogative remark her way. I'll be the first to say that surely no one's ever had the intention of hurting her feelings or indirectly reminding her of how hard they’ve been trying to make this happen. In fact, some may even have the best of intentions but, even then, you could still be opening the flood gates for someone that may already be struggling to keep their head above water. You just never know. Having children is not like buying a house or going on a trip. No amount of saving your money or planning your vacation can create a child and at the end of the day, it’s God’s timing and not yours.

I suppose my sadness and heart ache comes from the recognition that maybe someday that could be me. Again, you just never know. Maybe someday I could be sitting here three years from now desperately wanting to be a parent but instead only feeling the betrayal of a body that doesn’t seem to be working and the pressure of people anxiously waiting to share in yet another part of our life. Someday it could be me smiling politely at yet another acquaintance who has suddenly decided that my private struggle should be their public knowledge. I can't help but wonder what the reaction would have been if my friend had just answered truthfully. Somehow I think the discomfort alone might have caused her old colleague to think twice before taking it upon herself to decide who's "late in the game" ever again. But then, by sparing her the embarrassment and awkwardness, my dear friend was giving more compassion than what was being offered to her in return.

So, as I trudge through my own journey amidst the perfect storm, I pray that not only, when the time comes, will the creation of a family come a little bit easier to us, but I also pray that the friends and family that we already have will be a little bit easier on us as well.

I’m sure that creating the miracle of a child is hard enough all by itself…so at the very least we should be able to enjoy our ice cream in peace!

an olympic recap...

Alright, alright...I know that as a blogger I have been unforgivably tardy with posting but I've been spending the past sixteen days glued to a different screen for a change.

As I write this, we are watching the closing ceremonies of the Olympics and starting tomorrow...it's detox for those of us that have been seeing coloured rings in our sleep! Even this morning, as we woke up (albeit rather late because we had been up until all hours watching the men's volleyball final), we turned on the television only to find channel upon channel of Olympic-less programming. By mid-afternoon, a nervous twitch had set in and the comfortable groove that we've become so accustomed to on our couch was starting to resemble its original shape. Frightening!

A part of me is terribly sad to see it all come to a close and another part of me is looking forward to life proceeding as usual. The difference in time zone has certainly added a bit of strain to our sleeping schedules as the two of us are so easily seduced by live coverage! Getting to work on time in the mornings has been a challenge. On the other hand though...it's our turn next! The countdown is on for our moment of glory in Vancouver (537 days to be exact!) and I have no doubt that it will be spectacular!

So, now that we've had plenty to soak in, I feel that no Olympics would be complete without a Top Five list to wrap it all up (and it helps with the withdrawal symptoms!!)...

The Water Cube

By far one of the best Olympic venues ever made. Home to countless Olympic accomplishments and evidence of just how brilliant Chinese architects really are.

Olympic Commercials

As someone who spends every day in advertising and marketing, I can be a bit critical of what crosses before my eyes but the 2008 Olympics had me completely fixated. The commercials were brilliant. My favourite of this games would have to go to Bombardier and the Nike.courage campaign.

Show Jumping

My favourite Canadian Olympic moments this year were in show jumping. The Olympics are dominated by the young and it was fantastic to watch the more seasoned competitors get their moment in the sun. Eric Lamaze and Ian Millar brought me to tears every time!

Water Drums

How fabulous are these and how have I never seen them before?!?! I mean really...how sexy an interlude is this to have for water polo?!? It's so sexy in fact that I wish it were me!! I love it! Every day should start with these!

Steiner Wins Gold

Matthias Steiner, superheavy weight lifter became my favourite "non-Canadian" moment of this Olympics. After enduring the very sudden and unexpected death of his wife just weeks before the Olympics, Steiner managed to blow his own personal best record out of the water and take home the gold medal. He held a picture of his wife as he stood on the podium and took a little piece of all our hearts with him.

There are so many more but, in the end, that's what defines a truly great Olympic Games. And with that, we bid farewell to China and yet another splendid triumph of sport. Thanks Beijing, you really know how to put on a good show!

Vancouver...you're up!

victory at last...

I’ve received a bunch of rather random emails as of late encouraging me about my writing. Some as simple as “please write your book!” I’ve found them to be so thoughtful and much needed. I wonder if people have sensed my discouragement in the universe?!?! While I haven’t lost all hope entirely, I have been wavering from time to time regarding my place in the writing world. Though, even as some of the wonderful emails have said…doesn’t every writer wonder about that?!?!

On another note, I was thinking the other day about one summer (of many!) when I lived in London. Our city used to be home to the London Tigers Minor League baseball team. Back in the day, Canada still supported baseball and even the small teams brought a lot of patriotism and a slight competitive edge to our little urban centers. When the Tigers weren’t playing though, the city used to stadium to host other major events that happen to be going through town.

One day, my Mom took me to the stadium for a show jumping competition. I’d never seen one before and at the time, wasn’t overly interested. I was a Western rider and spent the better part of my young life at a ranch during the summer months. Even during the school year, my Mom would drive me out to the ranch on weekends while I taught groups and spent time with the horses. That one summer day was really my first introduction to equestrian riding of any kind.

Sure enough, I fell in love with show jumping. While I had no desire to pursue it myself, I just loved the intensity and elegance of the sport. I never would have thought that I could be sitting at the edge of my seat in anticipation during such a competition. Low and behold though, my Mom and I spent the entire day at the stadium, hot dogs and pop in hand, one heck of a sunburn was brewing on our foreheads and we watched these incredible animals lunge and jump over obstacles. Better yet, we watched the beautiful harmony between man and beast as they tackled each little challenge and conquered in the end.

At the end of the day, when the two of us were leaving, one of the riders was sitting near the fence with his horse. An absolute horse lover myself, it was only a matter of seconds before I darted over with little regard for any rules or my safety. With little hesitation, the rider let me pet his horse and told me a bit about him and their history together. As we left, he let us take a picture with him and signed an autograph for me. It was a really great encounter that I’ve never forgotten, mostly just because of how kind the rider was to me and how passionate he was about his sport.

As it turns out, that rider was Ian Millar with his trusty horse Big Ben. And now, at the age of 61 and after participating in nine (that’s right…NINE!) Olympic Games, Ian gets to bring home a silver medal for team show jumping. Not only am I excited because this is his first Olympic medal but I’m thrilled because I can’t think of anyone whose kindness (to a complete stranger) could possibly deserve this more.

This has, by far, become my favourite Olympic story of 2008!

Read more about his fantastic win here.

olympic rings of controversy...

Did you guys know that when I first went to University it was because I wanted to work for the Olympic games? The Olympics has always been a magical time in our household. Every night, we piled into the living room and spent countless hours watching the best athletes in the world in all their glory. And when I was little, it was a grueling four years between Olympics because they held both the winter and summer in the same year…so when it finally came around…it was a big deal!

I so vividly remember the Calgary Olympics and how spectacular it was to watch the torch make its way to the Stadium. My Mom even took me out to a small remote town to watch it go by in person. I was awe-struck and ever since, running with the Olympic torch has been on my list of “100 things to do before I die”. There is just an exceptional energy that comes with the Olympic games that seems to stop me in my tracks. I love it!

Of course, there is sadness that comes with it as well sometimes. I once had a chemistry teacher that went to Munich on the Canadian rowing team and as far as he’s concerned, those Olympics never happened. That time in his life never happened. It’s heartbreaking to think that his Olympic experience traumatized him for life and that he turned his back on his sport forever after that. It is however, the exception I hope and not the rule.

Over time, my love and appreciation for the games grew and I wanted nothing more than to be involved somehow. Sport has always been very important in my life and this event just represented the pinnacle of what it can do to a world, a nation and the thousands of people that patiently waited for their moment to arrive.

When my moment finally came along to take my first steps at getting my foot in the door, I quickly realized that there were elements of this passion that I hadn’t considered…most of which was the fact that I would be away from home and moving every four years. When I connected with people that were involved with the games, I realized that none of them had any long term relationships, any pets or even any furniture for that matter. Their life was at the mercy of the International Olympic Committee and their next choice location to host the games. Don’t get me wrong, this is a whirlwind experience and the job of a lifetime for anyone…except the homebody! When my first opportunity came up, to work for the World Cycling Championships, I cried for a week at the thought of moving. After five days of pacing around in endless terror, I concluded that this was not how my dream was suppose to feel. For all the passion and desire that I had towards the games and all that it stood for…it shouldn’t be this hard. There were simply fundamental things about who I was that couldn’t be overlooked for a job…any job.

At long last, the opportunity came and went. I felt relieved at the decision of letting it go and no more than two months later, I met my husband. It was my first of many signs reminding me that I had made the right choice. Life proceeded with the knowledge that I needed to do something closer to home and every two years, I would find my spot in front of the television and watch the magic once again!

This year’s Olympics though have raised a lot of questions about how Canada values sport. Already, we’re into day seven of the games and we haven’t won a single medal. Surprising? Maybe! Disappointing? Absolutely! A clear indicator that our country has failed miserably at producing world class athletes? Not so much!

The headline of the Ottawa Citizen this morning stated “Canada doesn’t really value sport” and that “Olympic medalist Silken Laumann challenges notion that nation has strong sports culture”. One look at this statement and I couldn’t even bring myself to read the rest of it because all I could think of was “whatever happened to sport simply for the sake of sport?” Yes, it’s true that our emphasis on funding may not equal that of the U.S. or many European countries but, dare I say it, medals aren’t everything and somewhere along the line, we seemed to have forgotten that.

All of the things that I remember loving about the Olympics; the hard work, the unity, the underdog, the opportunity for a country to show itself off to the world…all of these things seem to be getting lost in a flurry of politics, world records and endorsement deals. Where’s the sportsmanship in throwing your bronze medal on the ground or spending all of your air time criticizing the opening ceremonies? What happens to the lone athlete from Fiji or Zimbabwe (or Canada!) when the cameras only care about the winners? They worked hard to get there too…medals or not. And someone out there is proud that they did…medals or not.

While I watch the passion of my childhood disintegrate before my eyes, I can’t help but think that it’s certainly not our country’s value of sport that seems to be lost…but rather the priorities placed on the end result of such sports that seems to be losing its way. Sadly enough…I’m more fascinated by the commercials now than I am by the coverage.

Olympics of the past…I miss you!

to change or not to change...

Is it just me or does anyone else find that changing is hard? I’ve been trying really hard this summer to work on various things that I would like to change in my life…behaviours, patterns, hair styles…all of which have happened to no avail. Well, I say that but who knows…six months from now I may catch myself doing something and think “geez…that’s different, when did I start responding that way?” I’ve always thought of change as something that happens to me…instead of a process that tends to occur over time, often without us even noticing.

I’ve been finding the struggle to change rather interesting though because as a whole, change is one of the few things that we can really count on in life. It happens time and time again, whether we want it to or not. In turn, we find ourselves adapting to it time and time again (also, whether we want to or not!!) so, it leads me to believe that the act of change should come rather naturally to us, shouldn’t it? Or do we perhaps resist it because of the very reason that it already happens so often outside of our control?

As usual, I don’t have the answers to any of these questions but, I do know that it’s almost embarrassing to admit how many times I’ve tried to change my ways, only to find myself months later in the same trap that I’ve aimlessly been trying to free myself from. And I can’t quite figure out why. It’s not for lack of commitment or ambition. It’s not for lack of determination or vision. I’ve proven in more ways than one that all of these qualities are ingrained in the very essence of the person that I am. So I find myself puzzled!

I did however find comfort as of late in the Book of Romans, Verse 7:15…

“For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.”

It appears that even two thousand years ago, people were struggling with the same desire to be the very best version of them selves and yet, found their “usual ways” to be more overbearing than our ability to resist temptation.

I don’t know whether to feel encouraged or sad at this reality. For all of our coping mechanisms, change doesn’t seem to be one of those things that instinctively kicks-in when needed most. For all of the ways that we’ve evolved over the centuries, I’m stunned to find that there are certain things that never do change in the end. Our desire for chocolate and pretty shoes being one of them!

I guess what they say is true after all…the more things change, the more they stay the same!

let the voting begin...

Over the past couple of years, Steve and I have developed a new appreciation for the likes of stand-up comedy. I mean, really…what better way is there to spend an evening than laughing?!?! For two or three years now, we’ve been watching the reality show Last Comic Standing. The plot’s pretty basic; A bunch of comics go up…do their routine…people vote and the funniest moves on until (you got it)…there is one last comic standing!!!

Steve and I are not ones for reality television at all but, thanks to this show, we’ve found ourselves in stitches at least once a week due to some brilliant comic that we’re seeing for the first time! In turn though, we’ve also made it to the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal and are developing or list of must-see comics for the near future.

Tonight is the finale for this season’s show and let me just say that there has been a great round of laughs this time around! They shortened the season this year (I imagine due to the Olympics starting tomorrow) so each night it’s been two hours instead of one and we’ve religiously parked ourselves in front of the television in order to get our ab workout for the day!

Going into tonight’s finale…I have two favourites! Both are hysterical, both are worthy of winning and I’m sure that both will go on to be very successful regardless of tonight’s outcome. Us Canadians are apparently not allowed to vote (even though we had a Canadian comic in the running up until last week) but, if I had to pick just one…my vote would go to Jeff Dye, the twenty five year old from Seattle. Now, I’m not just saying this because he is beautiful (Which he is! Girls…I’m sure you’d wholeheartedly agree and wonder where he’s been all your life!!!!), I’m saying it because I think he genuinely deserves it. Oh man…is he ever funny! Steve and I found ourselves in tears last week watching his set and anyone who can make me laugh that hard about being eight years old gets my vote.

Please…watch it! And ladies…enjoy the moment ;)

a question or two...

I watched one of my favourite movies this past weekend…You’ve Got Mail. It’s not my favourite because of the acting or the intricate plot line or even for its creativity. In fact, I just like it for its simplicity. Like a good friend, it’s just easy to be in a room with!

The first time I saw it was purely by accident. It happened to be playing on tv on night and I had it on in the background as I went about doing other things. Pretty soon though, I found myself distracted enough to finally sit down and watch what was left of it. I’ll be the first to admit…it’s a corny little romantic movie that would likely never happen in real life but, who’s to say that the world couldn’t use a bit more of that?!?!

I think, more than anything, I just loved the setting of the movie. It takes place in New York (I love New York!), mostly in the fall (I love the Fall!) and usually in one of two place; either in front of their laptops (I love my laptop!) or in their bookstores (I love bookstores!) with a never ending soundtrack of jazz (I love jazz!) playing in the background…so really, I suppose what I’m getting at is that I wish it were me in that movie frolicking through the leaves at Thanksgiving along Fifth Avenue, laptop in hand on my way to a bookstore!!

There’s one part in the movie when Meg Ryan’s character begins to wonder about her life and what lead her to where she is. She says “so much of what I see reminds me of something that I once read in a book, when shouldn’t it the other way around?” As I browse through Facebook and see where so many of my high school acquaintances have ended up (in rather lavish and exotic lifestyles)…I often wonder the same thing. Have we ended up here because we wanted to or because we weren’t brave? Like anything else, life is what you make of it but, it appears that some of us have an easier time throwing ourselves off the ledge of uncertainty than others.

Yesterday afternoon I sat in the big leather chair next to our fireplace, with a blanket and Tugger curled up on my lap while I started a new book. As I looked out at the dark clouds rolling in, I thought to myself that I couldn’t really imagine wanting to be anywhere else but here. Of course, I know that there are people who would cringe at the very thought of our semi-suburban life that we’ve begun to create but, it’s safe and it’s friendly and it leaves room for growth and inspiration. Of course, there is restlessness of a different nature too; the restlessness that has far less to do with where you are and more to do with what are you. I’m quite certain that is the monster that I wrestle with more often than not.

At one point in time, Ryan’s character is struggling with trying to keep her little bookstore, which has come to be her purpose and livelihood, alive. Every time I see it, I get little pains of sympathy as I always seem to find myself on the other end of the spectrum; trying to bring life to my writing instead of trying to prevent its heart from stopping. While she’s mourning the potential death of something she once loved, I’m still trying to give birth to something that I have yet to create.

I often catch myself wondering who really reads this and if it ever means something. I wonder if it will ever amount to anything other than one more occupied corner of cyberspace or one more outlet where words get taken for granted. Today is one of those days!

All this while still trying to have a good hair day and find time to stop for coffee!

Simply maddening!

never argue with a woman...

One morning a husband returns after several hours of fishing and decides to take a nap. Although not familiar with the lake, the wife decides to take the boat out. She motors out a short distance, anchors, and reads her book.

Along comes a game warden in his boat. He pulls up alongside the woman and says, "Goodmorning, Ma'am. What are you doing?"

"Reading a book," she replies, (thinking, "isn't that obvious?")

"You're in a restricted fishing area," he informs her

"I'm sorry, officer, but I'm not fishing. I'm reading."

"Yes, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment. I'll have to take you in and write you up."

"For reading a book?" she replies.

"You're in a restricted fishing area" he informs her again.

"I'm sorry officer, but I'm not fishing. I'm reading."

"Yes, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment. I'll have to take you in and write you up."

"If you do that, I'll have to charge you with sexual assault" says the woman.

"But I haven't even touched you" says the game warden.

"That's true, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment." "Have a nice day ma'am!" And he left.

The moral of the story: Never argue with a woman who reads. It's likely she can also think.

Simon's Cat...

This must be where Tugger learned it from!!!

Someone take away this man's pencil...my feline is trouble enough without his tutorials!!!

Wow…I have a lot of catching up to do. It’s the kind of catching up that requires me to just sit down and carve out the time that I need to get life organized again. For any of you who have been reading the papers lately, you know that my work days of late have been somewhat tumultuous (on that note, thank you to everyone who has been emailing to check in. I have very much appreciated knowing that you were thinking of me). Given the circumstances, I’m not really in a position to offer my opinion about it just yet (at least not in writing!) but, needless to say that it has left my mind feeling rather exhausted. Each day has provided its own challenges and to witness the degree to which people will go out of their way to hurt each other has really made me ache. It’s been a very upsetting way to learn that there really is no price that you can put on your reputation and dignity.

All of this to say that I am patiently waiting with baited breath for some down time in which my brain and my body can work cohesively together in order to start plucking away at my to-do list. If you’ve emailed me lately and haven’t heard back…then rest assured that you are on that list!!!

First things first though…a rest! I need a little rest! Steve’s actually been out camping with Colin so, for the first time, I have the house (and Tugger!) to myself. So tonight I plan on going home, putting on my comfy clothes, and watching too many hours of sitcoms (thanks to Steve’s fancy new television, it’s actually like having company over because everyone is life-sized!)! Then maybe I’ll have a bath, a glass of wine and early to bed. This girl needs some beauty sleep like nobody’s business!

As Steve gets home tomorrow night (hopefully all in one piece), it will also be the start of our much needed August long weekend! The timing couldn’t be better!! We’re heading to Kingston to spend some time cruising through the thousand islands with Heather and Roberta, and I have a coffee date with some of my girls on Monday but otherwise, we intend to do nothing but play and rest all weekend long! It will probably rain all weekend (just like it has for the entire rest of the summer thus far) but at this point, it could even snow and I wouldn’t care…I just want to unplug my brain and have a change of scenery.

After that…it’s on to the to-do list!

Wish me luck…I feel like I’m going to need it!

p.s. thank you cartoonist from the Globen and Mail for making us laugh (even if you are making fun of us!!)...given the week we've had, it's long overdue!

Carrie Bradshaw...You're So Wise!!

"Later that day I got to thinking about relationships. There are those that open you up to something new and exotic, those that are old and familiar, those that bring up lots of questions, those that bring you somewhere unexpected, those that bring you far from where you started, and those that bring you back. But the most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you can find someone to love the you you love, well, that's just fabulous." ~ Carrie Bradshaw, Sex & the City (final episode)

Rebuilding...

Okay, so I know that I haven’t written much in the last ten days or so. I read somewhere that when people get writer’s block, it’s because they are lacking passion. I certainly hope that is not true. In my case, I’ve just been contemplating change a lot lately and for me, change has to be a solitary thing absent even of the written word.

I don’t cope well with change. I am a creature of habit and while I don’t necessarily resist change, I certainly approach it with a bit of apprehension. Even when I know that the change is a good thing, as the age old saying goes...I have a tendency to choose the devil that I know versus the devil that I don’t know.

This past week involved some change with one of my closest friends and in doing so, all of my fear and anxiety regarding change came flooding to the surface once again. I’ve been very blessed to have some extraordinary friends in my life and in turn, I’ve come to realize that usually the best of friendships have to endure a period of tribulation and the real test of longevity is always found on the other side. In many cases even, you never fully understand the depths of your friendship (or how much you love them) until it’s been put through the ringer and left hung out to dry. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve been better able to respond through the eyes of compassion and a shared desire to endure versus my usual reaction of emotional fear (which seldom gets me anywhere but into trouble!). Nonetheless, maturity gained or not…my quickness of breath never fails to follow me every where I go in patient anticipation of the long sought after “normalcy” that was once taken for granted.

As I spent the weekend thinking about this, Steve and I attended the very last service held at the Metropolitan Bible Church (aka. the Met). Since Steve and I are considered a “mixed marriage” (two different Christian denominations marrying each other), we’ve made a very big effort to attend services that reflect both of our religions. We tend to alternate between the Met and Blessed Sacrament Church but lately, we’ve found ourselves at the Met a little bit more often than usual.

The Met was built nearly 76 years ago in the depths of the Depression when a group of a hundred Christians got together and decided that while they may be poor, they were still rich in love with Christ and needed a place to celebrate. Now, three quarters of a century later, the Church has been renovated and expanded multiple times and has five different services every Sunday (two of them held off site at Carleton University). Now, due to the ever increasing needs of this ever expanding congregation and watching the ceiling fall down more than once, a new building has been built and the Christian community is moving to its new home next weekend. A beautiful new place to worship on acres of green space with many new and much needed facilities will house a new generation of believers and begin a new legacy.

This kind of change though, doesn’t come without its own sense of apprehension. We tend to get so used to the way things are that it’s often very difficult to let go and embrace the possibility of how things could be. We become afraid, vulnerable and reluctant to let go of what we’ve known for so long, even if it does mean opening ourselves up to better and bigger opportunities. Most of the service last night was spent passing a microphone around and giving members the opportunity to reflect on their favourite memory of the Met. One gentleman began going there when he was three years old with his grandmother. He was baptized there, he was married there, he said goodbye to his wife there and now he will have to watch condominiums be built there…as will we all. But Pastor Reid tried to ease our anxious minds by reassuring us that no part of what we love will be left behind. He quoted Hebrews 13:8 stating that "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever” in order to remind us that Christ will be the same in our new sanctuary as he was in the old.

As I walked out of the doors for the last time and ran my fingers along the bricks, I thought of our old Church, my dearest friend and the changes that we are enduring together. I thought about how much I’ve loved singing in the sanctuary and how much love hearing from my friend every day. I thought about how much comfort I’ve found among its walls and how much comfort I’ve found in my friend’s words. I thought about how grateful I was for having such a place to worship and how grateful I was for sharing in my friend’s life. And for the first time, I thought about how much I would miss this building and how much I would miss my friend if I wasn’t willing to endure the change…both of these experiences have been incredible gifts from God.

Yes, it’s always hard to adjust to a different framework and the growing pains of new surroundings but, at the same time, it’s even harder to enjoy any relationship, with God or with loved ones, when the ceiling is crumbling down around you. So, instead, you endure the agony and hard work of putting back together the broken parts of your foundation and finding yourselves a new place to reside…a place with a bit more room to grow. Often times, change is just that, growth; we just grow out of our broke down churches and our new friendships, and if we’re really lucky, we move forward with courage into the more mature and better suited versions of what we’re leaving behind.

Sometimes our faith and love, for our sanctuaries, our friends, our God, is just so grand that you need a bigger roof and stronger walls to protect everything you’ve worked so hard for.

Because God knows that there is absolutely no way that I’m willing to let it sit out in the rain and get ruined.

Christian the Lion...

Oh my goodness…do not watch this if you are feeling emotional in any way or you will find yourself weeping in front of your computer screen in about sixty seconds!!

For all of us animal lovers especially…This is incredibly touching.

John Mayer...You Say It Best...

Take all of your wasted honor
Every little past frustration
Take all your so called problems
Better put 'em in quotations

Say what you need to say

Walking like a one man army
Fighting with the shadows in your head
Living out the same old moment
Knowing you'd be better off instead

If you could only
Say what you need to say

Have no fear for giving in
Have no fear for giving over
You better know that in the end
It's better to say too much
Then never to say what you need to say again

Even if your hands are shaking
And your faith is broken
Even as the eyes are closing
Do it with a heart wide open...

And say what you need to say

A Letter To My Younger Self...

Dear Little Miss Genevieve,

You’re ten years old today! It’s a good thing too because you drove our mother crazy in anticipation of finally reaching those infamous “double digits”!! I guess no one really calls you Genevieve right now, do they? Most people call you Genny or some variation of well-earned nicknames! I don’t know if Mom has told you this yet but she said that she and Dad named us Genevieve Victoria so that when we became famous, we would never have to change our name! Sweet, isn’t it? So promise me that any time you ever feel a little under the weather, you will remember that long before we were even born, a couple of people had some really big hopes for us. I know that right now, you find it hard to live a life with the name Genevieve as it just seems so grown up and sophisticated but I promise you that eventually, you will grow into it and in some ways, you might even think it suits you. It goes with well with your long legs!!

As you turn ten and I turn thirty, I wish that I had some really great words of wisdom for you. As it turns out though, I seem to be learning just as much now as I did when I was your age…sometimes, it’s even the same lessons over and over again (no, we don’t appear to grow out of our stubbornness just yet!). I’m finding that advice, much like happiness, is something that we seem to reflect on in retrospect. At some point in time, we look back and say to ourselves “yeah…that was worth writing down” but, with youth comes the inability to see that life will and does go on, whether we make the same mistakes or not.

About five or six years from now, your going to find yourself curled up in a ball on your bed, crying your eyes out because you’ve had your heart broken for the very first time. You’ll soon come to learn that you are a person that loves so deeply with every fiber of your being. This means that you also grieve, hurt and feel that loss with the same degree of passion. While you’re curled up in your moment of misery, Mom is going to reassure you that, one of these days, you’re going to meet someone that will more than make up for all the love that you put out into the world that never seemed to come back. Though it will seem like little consolation at the time, believe her…she is right. Paul McCartney’s words will follow you through more tears than you ever thought possible…“in the end, the love that we take is equal to the love that we make”.

As I say this though, I want you to know that dealing with men in the earlier part of your life will come as the most unique example of trial and error that you’ll ever experience. I’ll be the first to admit that men are still a complete mystery to me but one thing that I do know is that for all of their differences, men bring so much feeling into life. They are handsome and funny and protective. They smell good, they have the most adorable smiles on their faces when they are happy to see you and they will, with utmost certainty, flip your world upside down!

Two men in particular though, will make your heart break so much that you’ll feel like it might never beat again. While you endure the agony of humanity’s cruelest test of patience, to have loved and lost, you will find comfort in knowing that you are, indeed, still breathing. Much to your surprise, you’ll come out on the other side anchored by an even stronger ability to stand on your own. Somehow, despite the pain, you do find that a broken heart still beats just the same. You will discover though that friendship with someone that you’ve once ached over can be equally agonizing. Something about the way you once looked at each other never really goes away. The sound of their voice, the way they reach out to grab your hand in a crowd, the first sight of them after too many days apart…they just leave an indelible mark that is not easily erased. Eventually though, you come to realize that maybe you don’t want them to be erased from your life. Instead, maybe it’s okay for them to be the incomplete chapters of your life…the blank pages at the end of your book. After all, they were fantastic kissers!

One day though, at the most unexpected moment, the most handsome of all men will come along and promise to hold your heart in the palm of his hand so he can protect it from the ravages of the world. It won’t always be easy but it will always be worthwhile. You will laugh like you’ve never laughed before, you will see the world in the brightest of colours, and you will be healed with him in a way that you could never have been without him. What you will learn about yourself through his eyes will help to you grow in a way that only comes from such pure and unconditional love. Then, surrounded by (almost) everyone you love, you will stand before God and commit your life to him. The sun will shine brightly the day you wake up to marry the man of your dreams.

I know that right now you don’t know much about God but, in due time, you will find your way back to Him. It will be a painful search at times and you’ll be more lost than you’ve ever been but, He will find you and you’re life will never be the same again. Be prepared to defend your chosen path though because not everyone will share in your serenity. But that’s also part of what makes it so special…that your decisions are slowly starting to become your own. You’ll learn that your choices, like your faith, only require that you believe in them and not anyone else. For all the validation and approval that you seek, through your faith, you’ll realize that your existence, in and of itself, makes you worthy of being loved. I really wish that this was something you could learn sooner but, sometimes, we only open ourselves up to the possibility when there are no other options left. You’ll cry, you’ll fall on your knees and you’ll raise your hands to the heavens but you’ll also be pleasantly surprised to find that the heavens are always more than happy to return the favour!

Relationships will become the foundation of your life and the reality is that relationships can be hard. Humans are unpredictable and the people we love can cause us more tears than we would like to admit but, in the end, they are our reason for being. It will never become easy for you to let go but you need to know that some relationships, regardless of how important they are, need space. Time doesn’t only make the heart grow fonder but it also paves the way for forgiveness, grace and the necessary room to grow. During these times, try to have compassion. It isn’t always the easiest thing to do but, everyone does the very best that they can and more times than not, it’s more than good enough. You are who you are because of the people who loved you. We don’t always make the wisest decisions in the midst of love but, we always do what we think is best, be it right or wrong. To show humility and understanding to another person’s choices takes great maturity and I’m proud to say that it’s a maturity that you’ll develop very soon and will become one of your greatest gifts.

Speaking of gifts…let me assure you that your life will be blessed beyond what you are even capable of imagining right now. Your life will become layer upon layer of every day miracles; the arms that hold you while you sleep, the furry friends that welcome you when you come home, the serenity of the walls that protect you, the shoulders that are constantly there through laughter and through tears, and yes, you will see the Southern Cross with your very own eyes (and it is just as incredible as you always imagined it would be!). The people that you choose to fill your life with will become your pillars of strength, your reflection of yourself and your very proof that God exists. Carry them with you always for they have witnessed your life in immense ways.

Let me tell you something though, young lady…with great gifts comes great responsibility. You will be blessed in ways that some people will spend their entire lives hoping for and in turn, you have been entrusted with considerable duty. As the older and wiser one of the two of us, I feel obliged to tell you that I have great expectations for you and the manner in which you walk through this life. And while it may seem like a lot of work now…I know that you’re up for the challenge; I expect you to always find the light when there is darkness. I expect you to always hold your head high because whether you know it now or not…you are a Child of God. I expect you to be the hands that reach out to help another and I expect compassion from you even when it’s not being offered in return. I expect you to find joy in the simplicities of life (you’ll discover Starbucks in your twenties…that is a great day!) and I expect you to share that joy when others need it most. I expect you to always find forgiveness in your heart…not just for others, but also for your self. I expect you to never give up on another person and to be thankful everyday, even if you’re just thankful that the day is finally over. I expect you to share your last Smarties and to share your heart. I expect you to believe in others even when they don’t believe in themselves and I expect you to never, ever, refuse a good piece of birthday cake!!

Most importantly though, don’t be afraid. You’re so much stronger than you think and twenty years from now…you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.

Bonne Fête belle petite fille!
xoxo

What Dreams May Come...

I had a dream last night that my teeth were falling out! I’m pretty used to these because for as long as I can remember, I’ve had dreams about my teeth, except that usually, in my dream, a tooth is just loose and the entire dream is spent anticipating when it’s finally going to fall out and me frantically trying to prevent it in the first place.

Last night though, my dream involved all of my teeth crumbling to pieces and every time I went to open my mouth, it was full of my teeth. Needless to say that I was in a wee bit of distress about this (and I think I was on a job interview too…always a good place for losing your teeth!).

So, when I finally woke up this morning, I checked quickly to make sure that all of my teeth were solidly in place, I then proceeded to brush, floss and mouth wash meticulously…then made my way to the computer to google the meaning of my nocturnal occurrence. Sure enough, one of the most common interpretations of such a dream is anxiety towards aging!!!

Not only do I find that completely hysterical but, I also think that means that things aren’t looking too promising for birthdays to come!!!

To Fear or Not To Fear...

During the summer of 2000, I spent thirteen weeks traveling out West. A group of six of us drove from Vancouver to Winnipeg and back on the road trip of a lifetime (with many tears along the way!). Our last three weeks of the summer was spent working at the Pacific National Exhibition in Vancouver. Every morning, we would leave our swanky hotel near Robson Avenue in downtown Vancouver and make our way to the PNE grounds via the infamous stretch of Vancouver’s East Side known as Hastings.

For those of you who aren’t entirely familiar with East Hastings, it’s one of the most run-down and dangerous places that you may find in the entire city. East Hastings, at one point in time, was known for having the highest rate of HIV infection in the Western World. Drug addiction, homelessness, prostitution and violent crime are all too familiar in this part of town and for a fairly sheltered girl from South Western Ontario, it was a sight that I had never seen before.

Every day we spent hours stuck in rush hour traffic driving through this alternate world and every day, as I peered through the windows of our SUV, I witnessed people having sex on the street, injecting drugs on the sidewalk and poverty unlike anything I ever want to see again. Oddly enough though, none of the people living in these conditions seemed to care that we were there. Much to my own surprise, I found the fact that our presence went completely unnoticed to really upset me. Somehow, my inability to look at any of these people in the eye (because they never looked at us), made us seem different. And we weren’t really...I knew that. Every day, I felt awful driving through their neighborhood because it felt like they had been put on display. Kind of like the freak show at the local fair, I felt like someone could have been standing on the corner shouting “come one…come all…come see the most apathetic people in the world”. It was heartbreaking.

One day, motivated by my desire for someone, anyone, to care about the desolation that existed in the midst of such wealth, I decided to take the bus home from work. In order to do so, I had to transfer buses three times, which meant that I would have to stand at the corner of pure terror and complete vulnerability until I found my way home (in broad daylight, of course). Sure enough, I made my way and I soaked in every moment of witnessing what felt like another dimension of humanity. The more time I spent walking among them, the more I realized that this could have happened to any one of us. The roads through life do lead in many various directions and one wrong turn could have just as easily brought me here under different circumstances. It’s so easy to see the obvious things that make us different but we all started with the purity of life before the fork in the road came along.

Anyways, as I stood waiting for the last sequence of buses to take me back to the marble floors and crystal chandeliers of my hotel lobby just blocks away (but what seemed like a world away), I overheard two girls sitting on the pavement just next to me. They were leaning up against a shelter wall, smoking cigarettes. Each one couldn’t have been more than ninety pounds and you could easily see the track marks along their inner arms. Their eyes were dark, their cheeks were sunken in and their souls looked tired. The one girl was crying to the other about some guy that she had been with. As she sobbed to her friend, she frustratingly shouted out “WHY DOESN'T HE LOVE ME?”

I couldn’t help but turn around and look at her as the words came out of her mouth. My bus came at that very same moment and it was soon time for me to leave the land of the neglected. While people pushed and shoved their way on to the bus around me…I just stood and looked at her. She eventually looked back at me…straight into my eyes. I gave her a shy smile and eventually turned to walk onto the bus. She didn’t smile back but she knew. She knew what I was trying to say to her...

...That I too, had just asked that very same question the day before and in turn, we quickly realized just how similar we really were. I appeared that regardless of where we were from or how we spent our days, we seemed to share a common trail of thought that consumed our mind...a common rush desire to understand the incomprehensible...a common ache to finally get to the bottom of the million dollar question...BOYS!

Even now, almost a decade later, I can't help but wonder if maybe, just maybe, she's figured out the answer? Because I know that I certainly haven't!

Canada Day was a blast…as always!
Ottawa really knows how to throw a good party!

For more pictures from Canada Day, click here.

The Art of Negotiating Sleep...

Steve and I rose with the sun this morning having shared a very good night last night. We had such a great night because, low and behold, we got to sleep through the entire night!!

At the risk of sounding too much like “real parents”…we woke up rested, excited and proud because for what is possibly the first time…our little Tugger slept through the night!!! Or, at the very least, he didn’t feel the need to wake us up to share in his nocturnal prowlings!

Ever since we got Tugger, almost two and a half months ago, we’ve found ourselves routinely getting up anywhere between 2am and 6am to kick the little guy out of our room because he either purrs, plays or is just outright stubborn about this cherished time that we so call “sleep”. Even he is pretty used to it by now as he no longer tries to race back into our bedroom before we close the door. Instead, he just gives us this defeated look and walks away as if to say “fine…then I’ll hunt without you…but don’t think for a second that I’m sharing any of my winnings with YOU!”

I think it’s worth mentioning though that even Tugger has developed his own little ground rules regarding our sleeping time; even if we do kick him out…the moment our alarm clock goes off…he patiently sits outside our door and meows pathetically until we let him back in. As far as he’s concerned, this is non-negotiable! We’ve accepted his terms thus far and our system seems to be working quite effectively!

This morning though…I woke up to the alarm and as my eyes opened, I had a brief moment of panic because I realized that I hadn’t gotten up at all to remove our fur ball from the bedroom. I tried frantically to think of where he could be or what could be wrong that kept him from waking us, as per our agreement! Sure enough though, as the split second passed, I looked over to find my purring little guy lying right next to me, curled up by my pillow, one eye peeking open at me and the other is a slight daze of his own! It was heavenly…our kitty let us sleep! They really do grow up so fast!!!

Before we give him too much credit though, here’s the look he gave me on Sunday when I woke him up from his eighteen hour afternoon nap!!!!!

For more pictures of Tugger (not sleeping!), click here.

A Cure for the 21st Century...

Why is it so easy to feel trapped and cornered in this huge world of possibility? As I often sit in my office, I become overwhelmed with this feeling of having taken a wrong turn somewhere and suddenly finding myself in unfamiliar territory. The more lost I get, the more I fear that I can no longer find my way out.

Sometimes I wonder if I was born during the wrong time in history. Women in the 21st century seem to lack so much balance and more so, they seem to consistently pursue further imbalance by taking on more and more that inevitably continues to tip the scale. I often feel like I don’t know how to live in this state of disregard for our well-beings and it frightens me how surrounded I already am by the influence of ambition. I spend all day surrounded by women who scramble relentlessly to climb the corporate ladder and all the while, are watching their marriages, their families and their sanity dissolve before their very eyes.

I long for days of horse-drawn carriages and isolated convents…days of simplicity and mental equilibrium…days when having red hair was the worst of our problems! This place, these walls, this computer screen has chained me to feelings of driving in a fast lane that I accidently merged into, sadly enough though, I don’t exactly feel like I’m in the driver’s seat anymore.

I want out. I want to break free of this crippling feeling of being held captive against my will…held hostage for all to judge and criticize for my lack of desire to work sixty hours a week. I feel like a pack of wolves is keeping watch while the blackberry gets forcefully glued to my hand. How do we end up like this? How do we find our way out?

I find it incredible how so many of us have spent our whole lives going to school in order to live a life pursuing careers. I, myself, never thought to do otherwise. At the age of ten we’re asked “what do you want to be when you grow up?”, only to find ourselves at the age of twenty, thirty or forty still asking the same question.

When I sit on the front steps of my new house, the world seems vast and full of possibility. I am reminded that I’ve travelled to the corners of the world and read history in the palm of my hands. When I sit here, in my office, I feel like my world is reduced to this time and this place…with no where else to go. Even more tragically is that I overlook a spectacular scene of creation and a miracle that should bring serenity at its very sight. But it doesn’t. It brings heart palpitations and a depletion of my hope.

Two summers ago looked much the same way. My beautiful view was blurred by tears and anxiety that perpetually seemed to have brought me to my knees asking for mercy. Time did bring clearer skies and a more optimistic forecast…but I spent forty minutes this afternoon at the foot of the Lord begging for Him not to make me endure that storm again.

One of my favourite writers once said that when days like this fall upon us, we are to try and find comfort in that which soothes our soul; a good book, a beloved pet, a warm bath, the embrace of a loved one, a good dose of chocolate…whatever it takes to makes the rumbling, dark clouds a little easier to bear. In the end…if all that fails…we’re to take two Tylenol, go to bed and give her a call in the morning!

The fact that I have the book, the pet, the bath (a rather large one!), the loved one (lots of them), the chocolate AND the Tylenol leaves me feeling a little selfish for being sad at all…but maybe the best remedy to sad days is just that…counting all the ways that could make it better. Fur balls and loving arms are indeed very hard to frown at.

But still, just for today…anyone got any Tylenol?!?!?

Easter in July!

I think that I need Lent again! Or rather, I think that I need Lent to begin with!! As I mentioned back in March, Lent wasn’t an overly successful time for us this past year. Between the move and our trip, we found ourselves being less than disciplined and “reflection” was one of the last things that we ended up having time for. Though the summer months are usually fairly hectic for us, all things considering…so far, it’s actually proving to be a time of a bit more consistency than the past six months. So, I figure that perhaps God wouldn’t mind if I jumped on the Lenten band wagon a bit late this year. Better late than never, right?!?!

My beautiful cousin, Dawn, is getting married this coming fall and for the past few months, we’ve been passing emails back and forth about the time leading up to her wedding. Having been there myself three years ago, it’s still rather fresh in my memory what the summer was like filled with anticipation. A good friend of mine had mentioned to me to try and use that time to reflect a bit as I entered this new and very exciting phase of my life. It was great advice and I really made a conscious effort to soak up everything I could before the big day. I took the liberty of passing on the same advice to Dawn because before she knows it, the wedding will be here and life will never be the same!

That being said though, I don’t think that weddings are necessary in order to “allot” time for reflection. The season of Lent is all about re-evaluating our life and our commitments…counting our blessings and filling ourselves with gratitude. It’s about trying to observe the bigger picture and realizing that, as children of God, we are expected to hold ourselves (and our lives) to a higher standard. This too, doesn’t need to happen only at Easter.

A lot of amazing changes have happened to us this year and I think that this summer, I would like some solitary time to push the pause button! Things are quieting down at work for the first time in nine months and now that life is settling a bit, I feel it’s time to take a little breather from it all. I would like to recommit myself to a couple of things and spend some time being a bit more disciplined than I have been as of late. At the very least, in order to purge myself of all the decadent food I’ve been eating!

So, from now until the weekend of Dawn’s wedding (I can’t wait!), I am going to set aside two lunch hours a week to spend on my own however I please. This is just one of many goals to follow this summer that will help to re-establish my sense of balance and continue to anchor me as I move ahead with the rest of the year. Once I’ve figured out the rest of my goals, I’ll let you know. I have a tendency to be a bit ambitious with my motivation…so I need to think this through properly so that I don’t fall flat on my face before I’ve even crossed the start line!!!! I do know though that one of them will be to cut back on my Starbucks consumption (sad but true…it’s necessary to test our limits sometimes!)…I’m anticipating that their shares will plummet significantly as a result!!

In the meantime though, wish me luck! I’ll likely need your encouraging words when I find myself, peppermint mocha in hand, slowly moving against the grain of righteousness!!! Father Joe would be so proud!

Happy Birthday Canada!
We love you!!