elle oh vee ee...

A good friend of mine recently approached me with a problem that needed advice. As I sat down with her over coffee she uttered the three most agonizing words that a girl can possibly say; “I love him”. Agonizing, you ask? Yes…terribly! And the reason is because if any girlfriend comes to you with a problem that involves this statement, it means that there’s a reason she is telling you and not “him”. The most likely of all reasons is because the “him” being referred to probably isn’t aware that she loves him which in turn, leads us to one of nature’s cruelest of conditions…unreciprocated love.

Now, I’m not sure if all women get to experience this kind of torment during their lives but fortunately (or maybe unfortunately) for my friend, I am one of the lone women who have endured this cruelty. Lucky me!

I have loved three men in my life in a romantic capacity; One being my long time boyfriend during and after university, another being the man that I married and lastly, the mystery man of my life…the man that I silently loved from afar and admired from a distance. Looking back, I have a hard time differentiating between whether or not I loved him or I was IN love with him…two very different kinds of love. But regardless…it was all consuming love none the less and it was just as hard to let go of when the time came. What made it especially hard was that there were feelings to some degree on both ends (at least I think so) and he was a part of my world…just as I wanted him to be. He’d made my knees weak on more than one occasion and left a trail of hopefulness in his wake. And yet he never knew the depths of how I really felt.

One of my favourite songs is John Mayer’s ballad; Say…a lovely song about putting yourself out on a limb and speaking the unspeakable. I thought of this when my friend asked my advice because up until that moment, it never really occurred to me what would have happened had I actually taken John Mayer’s advice instead of my own. Of course, I don’t wish the past to be any different because I wouldn’t want the present to be any different but as my friend sat in anguish over what move to make next, I couldn’t help but think back to my own anguish and what the ripple effect may have been had I made a different decision.

The bottom line is this; I loved someone and I never told him. Actually, I never told anyone. Until this moment, right here...right now, I’ve never even uttered the words. The knowledge of loving someone who didn’t love me back was more than my poor soul could take at the time and worst of all, it took me ages to package that love away in a box so that I could make room for another love. While I’m fairly certain that having him return my affections in the way I had hoped for was not much of a probability at the time, I do wonder if releasing my own feelings would have helped me move on faster?

I wonder if I had had the courage to look him in the eyes and say “I love you”, would my heart still have stopped at the very thought of him even years later? If I had whispered “I love the way you look at me and I love the person that I know you can be”, would I suddenly have been freed of my agony instead of wanting to inhale countless pints of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream just to make sure that I kept my mouth shut?!?! Could those three words have made the pain easier?

I guess that’s the thing about wonderment…there is no real way of knowing and no way of making anything different…and that’s the price we pay for not acting when the opportunity presents itself. The experience as a whole though did leave me with some knowledge to pass on to my friend; that love for another person creates a caring that never really goes away. Even now, although our contact is rather limited, I do genuinely care for him and his happiness in a way that is different than other past men in my life. And I likely always will. Something about having given him a piece of my heart makes him important in a very unique way…whether he knows it or not. This is indeed something that my friend will have to come to accept because regardless of what she chooses to do, that love will override any hurt, fear or fallen pieces that come to be as a result of her decision.

So, what does a formerly agonized girl say to a currently agonized girl? Well, the very best that I could do was this; “go home, have a glass of wine, listen to John Mayer and call me in the morning. If that doesn’t work then we’ll call up our friends Ben, Jerry and Cherry Garcia!”

What can I say…when your heart hurts…no amount of rationale is going to make it better…you have no choice but to call in the big guns!!

“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 than to never say what you need to say again.” ~ John Mayer

marvin and me...

Have I ever told you about Steve’s reading habits? They drive me nuts!!! He goes through these little phases where he reads books back to back and gets completely enthralled in them to the point where he won’t even get out of bed in the morning without going through a few pages first. Then, one day, he’ll just stop and he won’t read a thing (other than the ESPN sports page) for an entire year. It’s the strangest thing!

I, on the other hand, usually have two or three books on the go at any given time. That, in turn, drives Steve nuts! He regularly questions the need for having books dispersed all over the house! What can I say, I love them! Just looking at them makes me happy!

My latest book was Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures by Vincent Lam. I just finished it a few days ago and was pretty surprised that I enjoyed it so much. It has nothing to do with the writing as much as the fact that I’m not usually a fan of short stories. I usually prefer one long plot that I can get lost in for hundreds of pages at a time. It was good though…really good!

My next one comes highly recommended to me from a whole raft of my fellow book lovers; Water for Elephants. Surprisingly, I had never heard of it before and then sure enough, I received three copies for my birthday!!! Clearly, the universe wants me to read this!

I’ve been meaning to mention for a little while though about another book that I read this summer that I absolutely loved; Marley and Me by John Grogan. This was another book that I received for my birthday (from Steve) on the strict condition that I didn’t end up bringing a dog home one day after work!!

For anyone who hasn’t read this book yet let me just say that I highly recommend it! It’s such a simply story about a family and their dog, Marley but it’s also a story that just about anyone (especially any animal lover) can relate to. I had a lot of pets growing up and know first hand just how much joy they bring to a home but, one of my pets in particular came to mind when I was reading this book; my old cat Marvin…quite possibly the very worst cat in the world!!

Marvin and I came together in my second year of University when I finally moved out of residence and back into a place that permitted pets. For weeks I had been scoping out the Humane Society looking for potential fur ball to keep me company this guy in particular always stood out to me. He was large, handsome and had a big sign on his cage that said “very aggressive and not good with children”! Well then…what’s not to love?!?! After four weeks, I brought him home and we became fast friends. He was indeed very aggressive and what the quaint little sign on his cage forgot to mention was that he was also very destructive. He tore everything apart and destroyed everything that he could get his grubby little paws on. My downstairs neighbor even called the police one night telling them that I had a barn yard animal in my apartment! When the officers showed up I told them “I have a rather large cat and a rather large boyfriend…take your pick!!!” They smiled, turned around and asked my neighbor to do some fact checking next time before he called 911!!

The humane society wasn’t sure how old he was because he had been a stray since birth and clearly still had some of his wild tendencies. He eventually grew to be 26 lbs worth of wild tendencies!! Really, it was like having a small bear in your house! After about six months, I managed to ease the destruction and aggressiveness out of him somewhat and he became the loveliest of pets. He was my companion and I loved him to death. He slept on my bed every night, greeted me at the door every day and drove me crazy just about all the time!

The summer that I graduated from University was a little uncertain for me. I wasn’t sure if I was staying in Ottawa or moving away, hence I decided to keep my living arrangements as flexible as possible. Due to the life that Marvin had already endured as a stray, I didn’t want to put him through the potential trauma of too many moves so my mother graciously offered to take him until I discovered where life was going to take me. The clincher is that my mother lived on the Queen Charlotte Islands, about 100 miles off the coast of British Columbia, which was going to make this one move for him a bit of an adventure!

So, in late April of that year, I took Marvin to the airport in his fancy new cage, adequately doped up on veterinarian prescribed drugs and I bid farewell to my feline friend for a little while. It was hard and I knew that it was about to make an already tumultuous time in my life even lonelier with his absence. As misbehaved a cat as he was, he still made me smile every day.

By December of that year, my life began to settle down and it was time to bring my big guy home. I had started a new job and had just found the perfect apartment fit just for the two of us!! For nearly six months my mom had taken wonderful care of my roommate and I couldn’t wait to see him again! Very generously, my mom sent him on an Air Canada flight back to Ottawa via Vancouver for the first weekend in my new place (and just in time for Christmas!). He was leaving late on a Friday evening and due to arrive early the next morning. I spent the Friday night cleaning and unpacking our new place, and anxiously awaiting the purrs of my long lost feline. Late that night (around 11ish) I received a call. The person on the other end of the line asked “hello…is this where Marvin lives?” A bit perplexed, I responded “well, yes…in about twelve hours or so. Can I ask whose calling?”

Now, this is where the real fun starts!!

She politely answered “oh, of course! I’m calling from the Four Seasons Hotel at the Vancouver International Airport and I have your cat Marvin here with me and I was wondering if it’s alright for him to eat tuna?”

[insert look of confusion here]

As you can imagine, this wasn’t really a phone call that I was anticipating hence, I didn’t really have my list of witty comebacks available on hand!! Though once the initial shock of this statement wore off, I began to inquire a bit more about all the missing pieces in between!

As it turns out, a snow storm had hit Vancouver that night and my kitty’s connecting flight to Ottawa had been cancelled. Marvin had been left in the baggage claim area until another available flight was found for him to travel on. Some sympathetic employee saw him sitting there all lonely and decided to approach some other of his fur loving friends for a rescue plan and just like that, Marvin was being put up in a room at the Four Seasons Hotel for the night…tuna and all!

So how exactly does the worst cat in the world end up in one of the finest hotels in the world? I guess it just goes to show what happens when you show a little whisker!!!!

Marvin did, at long last, make his way home and what a reunion it was! Marvin and I spent the next three years together in that little home of ours and believe me when I say that he left his mark! Chocolate milk stains, scratched door frames, destroyed bathroom tiles and a tortured window screen that may never be able to be replaced!! There is no end to life and love with the world’s worst cat!!

Marvin ended up making his way back to B.C. eventually when “unresolved issues” between he and Steve finally forced us to part ways! Sometimes there is only enough room for one man of the house in a girl’s life. It was a sad day but he and my mom are happily chasing eagle feathers on the West Coast and Steve and I are happily getting accustomed to our furry friend over in the East. Let’s face it, after so many years with it just being Marvin and I, it was clear that he was meant to be an only child!

But when I look back on my life before love and marriage swept me away, I will forever be able to say that until I found the perfect man…I had the perfect feline!

p.s. Thanks mom for the picture!

latest transcripts...

"Just touch the world and that is perfection"

~ Victor Sinclair

the blog that gen built...

This is my 300th post! Three hundred! That’s a large number and certainly not something that I thought I would be looking back on nearly two and half years ago when I first started this blog.

I’ll admit that my blog has evolved into more than I anticipated. Originally, it was called Gen and Steve, and it was our way of keeping in touch with all of our new extended family since our lives had been changed by marriage. Eventually, it turned into Mostly Gen and Sometimes Steve as it became evident that our little piece of cyberspace was really my domain in our relationship! Over time, it became an online journal of sorts…the trials and tribulations of life as we too evolved into something different than when we started. Being away from family and friends is hard. Having a way to bring them into our lives makes it easier…even if only temporarily. Pretty soon and for a very brief time, it became Almost Always Gen and Hardly Ever Steve because let’s face it, Steve was no where to be found! Other than the odd blog marathon that he would do on a slow day at home, Steve's interest in our blog was about as enthusiastic as his desire to remember birthdays! Mind you, I do think that it’s worth mentioning that of the two times he has posted on our blog, both post, still to this day, receive countless clicks from random readers worldwide. He’s a man of few words but when it comes to the ones that he does say, he certainly makes them count!

Finally, one afternoon, Steve got kicked out of our world wide nest and our blog became my blog. In fact, it became my confessions of what it’s like to walk through this life and before I knew it, it became more than I ever thought it would be. I suddenly allowed myself to write about my life instead of our life and in turn, I had twenty-seven more years to use as my muse and shortly there after…I had a readership!

I love this blog! I love coming here whenever I can and sharing what I can. I have found myself experiencing things all over again…some good, some bad…but all necessary. Some people write to tell a story…some write out of obligation…others write because they have something to say. I write because it heals me. There are things that I have yet found the ability to say but somehow, I can write. My joys, my disappointments, my fear of thunderstorms and love of the written word…I can bring it here and in a round about sort of way, it makes sense.

Then, of course, there is you! Those who come here to share in my life and read what I have to say. I’ll be honest when I say that there are times when the comments left on this blog (or sent to me via email about my blog) have carried me through deep moments of self-doubt in regards to my writing or my direction. It has come to matter to me that I don’t leave you wordless for too long (not to mention that I hear about it when I do!) because my blog is more of an interaction now than just an outlet. Some of you have been here since the beginning, others have joined in along the way…but all contribute in a way that makes it all very worthwhile to me.

The other day it occurred to me that three hundred posts would equal approximately three hundred pages (give or take) written in two and half years. That could be my novel right there! Nearly three years of my life written one day at a time. I’m going to have to remind myself of this when I feel discouraged at the progress of my book…when it never seems to take any direction and when the pages never seem to amount to much. I’ll have to remember that this too didn’t seem like much at the time; a template blog in a universe of information. But pretty soon, it became this…

It became my Confessions from a Road Less Travelled.

coming and going...

I swear that I looked up at my calendar just a second ago and all of the sudden realized that not only are we half way through the month of October already, but also that’s its Thursday and not Wednesday! I love it when those kinds of surprises happen!

So, life in the Smyth household, where are we at? Well, our Thanksgiving weekend was wonderful! Christina, Joanna, Sara and her two furry friends (Molly and Hugo) drove up from South Western Ontario on Saturday to help fill our house with joy and laughter! Chris and Caroline joined us the next afternoon. By Sunday night, we were well on our way to a turkey coma and one too many desserts. But honestly, what is Thanksgiving if it’s not filled with gluttony?!?!

I’ve always wanted one of those households…the one where everyone congregates during holidays with plenty of oversized meals and too many bottles of wine! I grew up in a family like that and when everyone started going their own ways, it’s the single biggest thing that I missed the most. The Smyth house in Tilbury is very much like that, as is the Georget house in Montreal…open doors to anyone and everyone! It may seem like a bit of a circus to some but in my eyes, there is nothing better than a house full of people that you love.

Now, as an adult and with a house of our own, Steve and I have started to do the same in our little way. Thanksgiving was our first time hosting a holiday and we had barrels of fun preparing for the big weekend. I wish that I had taken more pictures of it all but in reality the reason that I didn’t take a lot of pictures is because I was too busy enjoying everyone’s company. It’s so easy to get swept up in!

Also, we saw Cirque de Soleil with my Dad on Friday night and like all Cirque productions…it was fantastic! Of all the various productions that I’ve seen by Cirque de Soleil, I can honestly say that Corteo was the most beautiful for me. It was so angelic and beautiful…so playful and romantic. I was so mesmerize by everything and just couldn’t get enough of it. Really, imagine sitting down to dinner with the people who think this stuff up…what kind of martini do you think they would order?!?!

All in all, life is back to normal now though. Everyone has gone home and the elections are done (so are the Liberals apparently!)…the normal rhythm of life appears to be finding its way again. Just in time for us to mix it all up one more time!!!

Steve is off for his canoe trip in a little over a week and once again, Tugger and I will be holding down the fort on our own, which can only mean one thing…too many reruns of Sex & the City and not enough sleep! Bring it though…I’m ready!

Some of other exciting news though; I’m going to be a student again! This morning I registered for a writing class at Algonquin College and in two weeks, I’m going to have to find my way through a campus full of seventeen year olds and learn the discipline of studying all over again. It’s not a big class or a long class, but it’s a step in getting me an inch or two closer to my writing career! I’m pretty excited and frankly, it makes me want to go out and buy pretty coloured pens and pencils!!

So it’s back to school, back to the sticks and back to some sense of normalcy in our household…whether it looks that way or not! If I’m not careful though, I’m going to glance up at my calendar next time and it will be December! Now that’s a scary sight!

"For flowers that bloom about our feet;
For tender grass, so fresh, so sweet;
For song of bird, and hum of bee;
For all things fair we hear or see,
Father in heaven, we thank Thee!"
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

For more pictures from our incredible Thanksgiving Weekend, click here.

life in the circus...

I’m running away with the circus tonight! Well, at least for three hours or so!!

Steve and I are going with my Dad this evening to see Corteo, the latest production of Cirque de Soleil. This will be the fourth production that I will have seen and every time I go, I feel like I’m swept up into some magical dream world that I can’t quite pull myself out of. It’s the most exquisite of escapes!

When I watch things like Cirque de Soleil, I can’t help but recognize how big the world really is and how much potential it has. I often get very caught up in the details of my own small little world that sometimes, it feels inescapable. Not that I want to escape from it, but I don’t often consider the possibility of any other life. And yet, here is someone else’s day to day to life…being in the circus! They travel around the world, swinging from chandeliers and all the while, our lives have crossed paths. It never fails to amaze me.

When Steve and I were in Hawaii, we spent a day driving to the top of Haleakala Crater; the active volcano on the island of Maui. Just before reaching the summit, we came across the planetariums along the side of the volcano, some of which are the best observatories in the world. It occurred to me at that moment that, this too, was someone’s life. They lived on this beautiful island and drove up this volcano to their office, as astronomers gazing out into the night sky. Isn’t it amazing when you think about the endless possibilities that are out there for each of us? Someone has to swing from a chandelier in the circus…why not us? Someone has to name the stars…why not us? How different would our lives be if we forced ourselves to remember how much bigger the world really is?

On the other hand, I wonder if those that live those lives ever wonder the same thing about us? I wonder if that astronomer ever looks at us driving up the volcano in our newly wedded bliss and says “hmmm…how exotic…a Canadian snow bunny discovering the rainforest on her honeymoon”. Or if that acrobat ever feels claustrophobic spending their life isolated to the Big Top? Okay, probably not…but you get the idea!

I’d like to think that our lives, whether it is an office job or taming lions, are only as adventurous or confining as we make them. I’d also like to think that our world is only as big or small as we allow it to be. It’s true…we can’t all be astronauts or Indiana Jones, but we can all borrow bits and pieces of each other’s lives in order to spice up our own. I mean really, who hasn’t dreamt about running away with the circus?!?!

the madness and the misery...

I’m sick! Annoyingly sick actually! I’m the kind of sick that makes you want to clean all of your sheets every day because you can just feel the sickness on them. I’m the kind of sick that makes all of my colleagues cringe back in horror every time I cough. It’s the kind of sick that has left my night table of veritable medicine cabinet of tablet form relief. Worst of all, I can hardly even taste the wonderful mint chocolate Girl Guide cookies sitting on my desk in front of me. Now that’s cruelty!

Do you believe that sickness is caused by stress? I’ve heard that been said many times before and ever since, I’ve tried to keep tabs on the correlation between when I get sick versus what happens to be going on in my life at that moment. I don’t often get sick at all actually but if I do, it’s almost always at Christmas time, when all of us are hunkered down around a puzzle in the Smyth house and all of us have touched the same puzzle piece twelve times (if not more). I think that is most certainly, without a doubt, a product of stress. The frenzy of Christmas parties of other related events all month usually leaves me feeling rather depleted and I can usually feel the sickness coming on for a few days before it hits me full force.

The sickness that I have now though is the worst kind of all. It’s the kind that wasn’t present when you went to bed that night but instead, left its attack for the wee hours of the night when you least expect it. The bugger ambushed me! This kind of sickness can’t be warded off with a simple day in bed…you need to call in the big guns for this one. And just like its remedies, this sickness can’t be blamed on one too many parties either; oh no, there is a much bigger force at work here and it’s called madness! Pure, simple, unadulterated madness! It’s the madness in me that thought I could rationalize with the irrational and compromise with the uncompromising. It’s the madness in me that has caused me to get this ill with no hope of getting better (at least not soon enough for me to enjoy my evening). And now it’s the madness in me that’s saying “Buck up Gen…you’re not sick…you’re just sick of all this nonsense!”

Hmmm…I wonder; could my madness have a point? Is it possible that my maddening desire to make it all work out is also what made my body call it quits since quite clearly, my mind was doing all of the work anyways? Wouldn’t that mean that I’m actually sick in the head?!?! Or is just the cough medicine talking?!?!

I don’t know. All I know is that I need an exorcism of sorts to rid myself of the madness and in turn, hopefully everything else that is clogging up my sanity.

Someone, please pass the Kleenex…

off to the races...

In one week, it’s Election Day in Canada. It’s not big like the U.S. Election is big but it has been nearly two and half years since we’ve gone to the polls and for the first time, I haven’t yet decided who I’m voting for.

I’ve always been an idealist at heart. I believe in the power of the people and a democratic society but I also spent three and half years working on Parliament Hill where I received a first hand glimpse at reality.

I love Election Day! It feels so empowering to walk to the polls and exercise your right as a voter. I believe that for all of our system’s short comings, come Election Day, we are better able to see the bigger picture and realize just how fortunate we are to live in a country with this democracy in place. I strongly believe that Canadian citizens who don’t vote should be fined (or at the very least, we should withhold our hugs from them!!) as I don’t agree that ignorance is a reason to take voting for granted.

Right now, I find myself caught in the age old debate that questions “are we voting for a Party or are we voting for a Leader?” This is where I find myself stuck! Believe me, I know what the principals of a democratic society are and the basis of how it should function but my time spent on Parliament Hill gave me another angle that I think is very much worth considering when we walk up to the ballot box.

I’ve always been a big fan of Jean Chretien. I thought he was a fantastic Prime Minister and he gained my vote even more when he stood his ground during 9/11 and the war that soon followed. It takes a strong person to not allow your self to be bullied into a war that isn’t yours to fight and whether I agree with his stance or not, I still admire his conviction.

I’ve had the opportunity to meet Mr. Chretien a couple of times with his wife and while I’m sure that he could hit me with his car and not know who I am, he still left an impression on me…a humble impression. The impression of a man who is still human at the end of the day, I believe that is something that we all tend to forget.

One winter day when I was sitting in my office in the West Block, I glanced out my window looking down O’Connor Street and there was Mr. Chretien walking from the Victoria Building to his office in the Center Block. It was a perfect winter day and he had the most wonderful smile on his face. The streets had been discreetly shut down while he took his little stroll but I really enjoyed that side of him.

I was never quite sure what to think of Mr. Paul Martin though. I always thought that he was a terrific speaker, very friendly and certainly a force to be reckoned with but I was always undecided on his position as Prime Minister. Then, before we knew it, the Liberal Party came crashing down and instead of seeing politicians and the leaders of our country…I saw a bunch of rotten little children fighting on the playground. I lost a lot of respect for Paul Martin during that time. I have a big issue with bullying, whether it be on the playground or in the House of Commons, and the moment someone uses such a tactic to get their way, I feel that they are choosing power over integrity.

I left politics after Paul Martin won the election and for the first time, I voted Conservative. After all, if the Liberals couldn’t figure things out among themselves, how were they realistically going to a run a country? It was also the first time that I started to really consider the role of the leader in my decision making process. I know that, ideally, we are to choose the best candidate within our riding (regardless of their party affiliations) and they are to later represent all of our concerns (regardless of what we voted) but, without a leader who encourages their Government to do just that, then we are left at the mercy of party platforms which, let’s face it, isn’t always what it appears to be. I have watched more than one Member of Parliament try to juggle the views of the Party versus the views of their constituent, only to be left in a political battle of their own regarding their loyalties.

This may come as a surprise to some people but I am not actually a member of any political party. I have chosen not to do so because I believe that if I truly support democracy in its ideal form, then I support whatever is in the best interest of our country. It upsets me a great deal when people that I’ve worked with talk about how their life long goal is to see their party of preference fill the entire House of Commons because if they really wanted what was best for Canada, they would favor a minority Government that encourages discussion and compromise as oppose to a majority Government that has too much power and control.

So that brings me back to today…one week from Election Day and no closer to making a decision. I’ll admit that Stephen Harper hasn’t been so bad. It’s true that he hasn’t necessarily met all of our needs but it’s easy to judge those decisions when we don’t have to be the ones to make them. On the other hand, his Government has done more during their first two years then the Liberals did in their last two. He’s gotten better. He’s gained more experience, more confidence and frankly, has taken the beating of the electoral debate quite well.

Then there is just that…the attack; One of my biggest pet peeves about politics. I despise the relentless banter back and forth about how terrible the other party is and how you shouldn’t put your trust in them because x, y and z. I realize that the opposition’s job is to, well, oppose but as far as I’m concerned, when it comes down to election time, if it’s a party worth voting for, then they should be able to tell me all about their strengths instead of their opponent’s weaknesses.

Seriously, it’s infuriating.

But this does lead me to Stephane Dion, the current leader of the Liberal Party who, despite what appears to be a lack of experience, has surprised me during this campaign. The Liberals were actually one of the only parties to not have a conservative bashing commercial during the start of the campaign. I was impressed. Not only was it a really nicely done commercial but it stuck to the Liberals priorities and goals. This caught my eye from the very start. I’ve also noticed a certain level of respect out of Mr. Dion that I haven’t seen in the others (notably Mr. Jack Layton) towards his colleagues and this too has impressed me. No doubt, I question Mr. Dion’s ability to be a strong leader right now but then again, two years as Prime Minister proved to mold Mr. Harper into a fairly diplomatic man as well. All in all, I think that Mr. Dion has potential that I didn’t quite notice before.

Let’s not forget the NDP which I’m saddened to say, I feel has diminished as a note worthy party a couple of years ago. Jack Layton’s policies just seem too extreme and unrealistic now. Our old riding has always been NDP and will likely be so once again. Not only did we hold the seat for the party celebrity, Mr. Ed Broadbent, but the current Member’s mother was the former Mayor of Ottawa. So all things being equal, I think that Ottawa has a certain soft spot for the NDP, regardless of how far off the deep end their leader may have gone.

So…there you have it; I’m torn between Stephane Dion’s ideals and Stephen Harper’s reality. On one hand, I don’t want to risk a Conservative majority and on the other hand, I’m not entirely convinced that the Liberals are solidly back on their feet just yet. I admire one man’s fight and the other man’s pacifism. One man clearly communicates what I may want to hear while the other man struggles to express what I truly believe.

The tides may be turning in our country very shortly and with the U.S. Election right around the corner, it will be changing even more so. It’s often hard to believe that we put all of our faith and trust into just one person to lead the way but at the same time, take for granted the fact that the choice really is ours. Oh politics…we can’t live with you and we can’t live without you. I just don’t know.

In the meantime though…I’m Genevieve Georget-Smyth and I approve this message!

cure for an emotional hangover...

Yesterday was our first day of real “recovery” from an otherwise dramatic week. We felt drained, tired and in desperate need of some space. So, what exactly is the best cure for such a condition? As far as we’re concerned…it would be junk food, laughter and laziness!! All of which we were easily able to fit into one night!

Steve and I took a rather lovely (though rather unexpected) drive along the river after work last night and reveled in the beauty that is Autumn in Ontario. It really doesn’t get any better than right now.

(somewhat) warm days + cool night = pretty trees! This I know to be true!

Our drive led us directly to our junk food! Hamburgers and French fries and ice cream, oh my! Steve even felt so sympathetic to my week (and so tired of hearing about politics!) that he agreed to spend the next hour watching episodes from my newly acquired Season Three of Sex & the City! Lucky girl! But get this…I stumbled upon an episode that I had never seen before!!!! I’m not entirely sure how this happened because I’m quite positive that not only have I seen every episode, but I’m positive that I’ve seen them all twelve times! Madness! So this came as a delightful, yet shocking, surprise to discover a whole other half hour in the life of my favourite New York girls! It does however make me wonder what else is possibly floating around out there that I don’t yet know about. Hmmm…

Finally…the highlight of our night; an evening spent with the hysterically funny comic, Gerry Dee at Centrepointe Theatre! We first heard of Gerry Dee when coming across NBC’s Last Comic Standing and thought that he was brilliant right away. His comedy was so simple in nature and yet something that everyone could relate to, while having the most unique and side splitting delivery of almost any comedian that I’ve ever seen! Most of his show revolves around his career as a teacher and the distinct differences between men and women while intoxicated (really quite amusing!). We also had the unique privilege of hearing all about life after Hollywood fame and some of the challenges he encountered along the way. If you ever get the chance, please do go and see him. You won’t regret it! Just don’t ask him about his feelings towards Air Canada!!



So there you have it…the perfect cure for an emotional hangover!! At least in the Smyth household anyways!! We woke up this morning feeling refreshed from laughter (with a bit of a scratchy voice!), saturated with grease and sugar and pleasantly reminded that “this too, shall pass”.

the best of times and the worst of times...

It was the worst of times and it was the best of times. That’s how the saying goes, doesn’t it?

I always wondered what exactly that meant and then finally, this past week, I did indeed experience the best of times and the worst of times. As far as experiences goes, it’s not something that I would recommend on a regular basis…the intensity of it alone is enough to put anyone on blood pressure medications in a hurry!

Allow me to elaborate a little bit though…

About two years ago, I changed. I know that we are all changing all the time but this was different. Something in my head changed…something about the way I looked at the world and my place in it changed. I began to realize that our relationships do not define us. I have so often reacted to situations out of fear that it has consistently blurred my vision and my ability to make choices that are in the best interest of my health and happiness. Fear of what, I’m still not quite sure. Fear of rejection, fear of being alone, fear of not having someone there to validate my existence. Two years ago though, I started to realize that if I lost every person that I was close to, whether it be by choice or not, I would still fundamentally be me. Granted, I would be a sad, broken hearted version of me, but still me nonetheless. My values wouldn’t change, my morals wouldn’t change, my ability to walk through this world wouldn’t change. One foot in front of the other, I would still go on. Of course, relationships alter the course of our lives and change the way we live it (usually for the better) but at the end of the day, they do not determine our worth.

This revelation was a rather significant turning point for me because in doing so, I no longer considered relationships as a means of survival but instead, one of the joys of living. It also enabled me to stop reacting out of fear and start making choices that I thought were in the best interest of those that I care about, myself included. Don’t get me wrong, fear still creeps into my pores from time to time and it’s a conscious choice on my part to move forward in spite of it, but now it is indeed just that…a choice.

I had to put my learning to the test this week though and believe me, it wasn’t easy. I wasn’t expecting it to be easy…I was prepared for that. What I wasn’t expecting though was how incredibly loved I would end up feeling. It was overwhelming. Just when I was forced to make difficult choices regarding people that I love and just as my heart was breaking, I was suddenly surrounded with so many people wanting to hold all of the pieces together for me. At the risk of sounding too emotional and sappy, the amount of support that I had -- the gentle words from an ocean away, the hugs from friends near and far, the chocolate cookies for breakfast – all of it nearly brought me to more tears than the pain did. And there is, of course, my husband…the most amazing man that I’ve ever known and the one who consistently gives back to me all the love that I’ve ever put out into the world…the one that holds me long into the night and tells me that everything will be okay.

And just as I told my beautiful, stunning friend yesterday afternoon as we stood on the sidewalk saying goodbye to each other; for the potentially the first time in my life…I believe it. Everything will, most definitely, be okay.

darn good advice...

...don't buy into everything. But do buy a great denim jacket because it goes with everything!

fen shui for the soul...

When Steve and I first moved into our house, there was something about our dining room that I just didn’t like. Something about it, aesthetically, wasn’t working for me. I am certainly not an interior designer by any means, but I do know when something doesn’t fit. Often times though, I don’t know what it is that doesn’t fit. Like life, all of my design preferences revolve around balance. I need things to look and feel balanced in order for me to enjoy them and if they don’t feel right, it will nag at me endlessly until I make it right.

Our dining room was especially daunting for me because I had never had a dining room before. The second floor of our house (home to the kitchen, living and dining room) is very open and in turn, offers a unique challenge when going from decorating a small space to decorating such a large space. We didn’t want to over clutter the room but at the same time, the large wall added a rather dramatic advantage that we had never enjoyed before.

One night, Steve came home from work and I had removed everything in our dining room and had it all sitting in the kitchen. I stood looking at the dining room, completely bare, with nothing but the chandelier and the table. I had gotten so frustrated with the look of this space that I had just decided to start all over again.

Slowly, throughout the night, Steve and I began to replace certain items in the room and one at a time, we rebuilt the décor of our dining room. In doing so, it was much easier to identify what was throwing off the balance of everything else. Eventually, we discovered the culprit and our dining room is now one of our favourite and most loved places in our house.

This strategy of “going bare” had never occurred to me before. In the past, I would just put on my best fen shui hat and play around with things until it looked right. This time though, I was so overwhelmed, mostly by all of the little things, that I felt the need to disassemble and start again from scratch. It worked well though. By pulling apart the bigger picture, all of the small details weren’t so intimidating.

This summer, my life felt much the same way my dining room first felt; cluttered, unbalanced and it made me cringe every time I looked at it! Also like my dining room, the task of figuring out the one piece that didn’t seem to fit felt overbearing and unappealing. Come August though, I decided to try the same technique that I had used on the dining room; remove all the activities from my life that were taking up space (good and bad), leaving only the essentials, and slowly but surely, start putting them back in to see what works and what doesn’t work. Of course, there was a bit of unease towards this process as it also meant removing some of the things that I love as well but sometimes, even the things that we love most need some tweaking.

So, that’s what I did. I took a nice long break for all the “extras” in my life to see how it would fit. For two months now I haven’t run with my group (so sad!), volunteered, attended church activities or extended myself beyond the fundamental activities throughout my day. I am normally quite a busy person, so this experience proved to be more difficult than I anticipated but it was good though…enlightening. It was refreshing to see what it is that actually consumes my time on a daily basis and how much they contribute to my well-being (or don’t).

The result wasn’t necessarily surprising. I concluded that like space in a house, it’s not really a matter of how much time you have (because that’s not going to change!) as much as it matters how you use the time that you are given. Running with some of the best training buddies ever – GOOD! Watching the new remake of Beverly Hills 90210 – NOT GOOD! Bible study and church BBQs – GOOD! Facebook – NOT SO GOOD! Reading a delightful book with a yummy coffee in hand – VERY GOOD! An hour on a crowded, smelly bus – TERRIBLE! It’s all a matter of priorities really! But sometimes you have to blow the dust off in order to even catch a glimpse of them.

I’ll admit that it’s a little bit of a shock to the system going from two months of “quiet time” back into the full swing of things but I’m trying to consider it kind of like going back to school; no more slacking…it’s time to put yourself to good use again (at least for five days out of the week!). As my day timer is slowly filling up again with lots of delightful commitments, I’m trying really hard to keep a close eye on it and not let things become too cluttered again. After all, I’m a busy girl…I don’t have a lot of time for cleaning anymore!

and baby makes many...

If everyone recalls correctly…about nine months ago, there was a rash of baby announcements made within our circle of friends! All of which actually, mere weeks apart! It appears that the water in the area had been tainted with something delightful and miracles were happening all over the place!

Well, ultrasounds have been had, bellies have grown, bedrooms have been redecorated and at long last, all of the new family members have happily and safely arrived. Isn’t God great!

First up was Colin and Sandra who welcomed their beautiful baby girl…Brooklyn Alexander, to the world. This little one will likely be dog-sledding before she learns to walk if Daddy has anything to do with it!!

A week later was the arrival of a second son to Mark and Hélène…Rhys Donaldson, and if this little guy looks anything like his older brother (we haven’t seen pictures yet), Mom and Dad are going to have their hands full when all the girls start randomly showing up around the age of twelve and giggling incessantly over how handsome their boys are!!! Good luck with that!!!

And last but certainly not least is the newest member of the family for Mark and Trish…baby Noah Brinkman, who despite potentially fun stories down the road, was not named because of the extreme rain fall and flood warnings! Fear not, baby Noah…you don’t need to start building a boat just yet!

Congratulations to all of our fabulous friends who clearly, make equally fabulous babies!

the fall of summer...

It’s the first day of fall today and my favourite time of year. Lindsay and I were sitting outside at lunch today and commenting on the amazing smell in the air. It’s the kind of day where it’s summer in the sun and fall in the shade, and there is a golden shimmer cast upon everything in sight. It’s stunning.

I’m always relieved when fall comes around. I’m not a person that is very comfortable with summer. I love the warmth and the sunshine but I find the summer to be very unpredictable and it makes me anxious. We are always out of our routine in the summer and something in the air seems to flip the world upside down. Most people seem to desperately long for the reprieve from the cold weather whereas I just consider it a season to be survived. It’s as though I hold my breath and just pray that I make it out alive. So far I have.

I’ve never entered into the month of September as the girl that raves about months spent at the beach or on patios. Instead, I’m the girl eager to wear all my new fall clothes even if it’s still thirty degrees out! With the exception of the summer that I got engaged and the summer that I got married, I don’t generally remember summers fondly. I’m usually chomping at the bit for it to be over so I can enter into a safer and more familiar time of year. Odd, I know but it wasn’t always this way.

Growing up, I used to spend the better part of my summers out a ranch just outside of town. I would spend my days swimming, camping and best of all, riding. My Mother always worked so hard each year to be able to send me and every year, I couldn’t wait to be back. It’s actually kind of strange because I was never very comfortable in groups. I was intimidated very easily and large groups (especially of girls) made me feel overwhelmed and scared. But I loved the horses and I did love my summers spent with them. I made new friends, got out of the city and gave my Mom some space from the confines of being a single parent.

My favourite memories of the ranch were getting up really early in the morning to round up the horses from the fields. Anyone who knows me well knows that I am not a morning person in the least but, I could never resist the opportunity to wake up to the early morning air and walk out into the fields that were lightly covered in dew as the horses stood in the distance. Together, we would watch the sun come up. It was so quiet and peaceful at that time of day and although I was young, the staff always let me go out and start bringing in the horses for breakfast. It was gorgeous to watch them first thing in the morning and I always got the impression that they talked about me when I wasn’t looking!

I went to the ranch for a long time and because I essentially grew up there and had such a strong understanding of the horses, I was offered the opportunity to work there at a fairly young age. Of course, I jumped at the opportunity to be paid for doing something that I loved but there were challenges that I would have no way of anticipating or dealing with.

Being younger than everyone else was hard. As a teenager, the two year difference between my peers and I was significant. The other girls spent most of their time chasing boys and getting excited about make-up (yes, even at camp!), and I just wasn’t there yet nor did I care to be. Our differences were obvious and it became a reason for them to dislike me. To add insult to injury, those same boys that were being chased became my friends and started to spend more time with me. I wasn’t completely naïve though. Even at sixteen I understood that my long legs and teenage waist contributed to their motives but in the end, we were friends and continued to be for many years. But these friendships didn’t go over well with the girls that I had to share a tent with all summer. In fact, it just fueled their dislike towards me and eventually I just found myself going home on days off crying and pleading with my Mom not to make me go back.

Late August, the summer that I turned sixteen, I was on site duty in the girl’s area for the night. We were deep in the woods but still close enough that I could see the lights from the chalet in the distance. Most of the girls in the area were under the age of ten and had been asleep for a couple of hours already. As eleven o’clock rolled around, I sat at the picnic table with my flashlight and a book. I heard the sound of someone approaching in the woods and when I pointed my flashlight in their direction, I noticed that it was one of the off-duty guys coming to check up on me. He and his sister were new to the ranch that year and we had become fast friends two months earlier. He was a calm and gentle person, as was his younger sister, and like me, he wanted to “belong”. He was a year older than me and his family had recently moved to the region, leaving behind all the friends and family that he and his sister had ever known. Sending the two of them to the ranch was their way of letting them make new friends while their parents settled into their new home and routine.

He came and sat with me at the picnic table and asked about my night. It had been a couple of days since I had last seen him and we found ourselves catching up on the recent happenings of our lives in the woods! It was no secret that, given the opportunity, he would have happily welcomed the idea of becoming more than just friends and more so, it had sort of become a running joke among staff throughout the summer. For all of his great qualities though, a summer love simply wasn’t part of what I was looking for and the closer we came to going home, the more I encouraged him to set his sights elsewhere.

Part way through our conversation, I asked him if he would watch the area for me while I went to go and grab a drink. I turned around to head to the chalet and somewhere between blinking, breathing and thinking…I was on the ground. He had come up from behind me and had pinned me on the ground. His face was right next to mine and I remember asking him what he was doing but as the words came out of my mouth, I already knew. I begged him to get off of me but he was heavy and I had never felt so small and tiny in my entire life. He was determined; If I wasn't going to give myself to him, he was going to take me...one way or another.

I don’t know how much time passed but I heard my name. Someone was calling my name and he heard it too. He froze in a panic, looked me dead in the eyes and made me swear not to tell anyone what had happened. He got up and stood behind a nearby tree in the darkness. At that same moment, a girl came bursting through the woods, grabbed me by the wrist and started walking with me on the dirt road towards the chalet. She kept asking me over and over again, before I could even answer, “Are you okay?”

As we walked in the cold night air, I could feel the dampness beginning to form. The trees were quiet and peaceful, all sounds had been made silent and as this girl marched with an air of intention, I followed like a lost little girl desperately searching for my parents. I kept looking over my shoulder for the shadow that I knew was behind me somewhere and each time I did, my breathing just lingered in the air until I turned my head and saw the lights again. Eventually, I just stopped in my tracks. I stood standing in the night, staring at this girl…dirt in my hair, my clothes torn, my body scratched and once again she asked “are you okay?”

She knew.

Just then the silence broke as footsteps ran through the woods. I, too, broke at that moment. As my senses finally began to realize what had just occurred, I threw my self on the ground in fear and tears overwhelmed me. The girl guided me up and we ran through the night again until we reached the safety of light. In my sobbing, I kept asking her how she knew and she kept telling me to keep moving and that she would explain later. So that’s what we did. Leaves rustled, branches broke, breaths quickened and the innocence of summer had disappeared forever.

It was later explained to me that my friend had been “persuaded” to do it. The other girls that disliked me so much had promised him unconditional friendship…but there was a price to pay; Me. Acceptance and popularity was the game and I was the pawn. He was asked to prove him self to them by surpassing his feelings for me. Adolescent loneliness can do crazy things to people.

As it turns out though, one girl’s morals ran deeper than her desire to belong and she came for me. She pulled me from the wreckage and carried me home. I don’t really remember anything after making it to the chalet. I remember writing everything down. I remember waking up the next morning to the snickers and grins of girls who felt they had conquered in the end. I remember refusing to press charges and I remember packing my things to go home. I remember telling my Mom about it over dinner one night as calmly and with as little detail as possible. I remember fall coming and I remember never going back to the ranch ever again.

A few months later, I got a letter from him. He told me how sorry he was and how terrible he felt. He told me that he had been going to counseling and he hoped that I would one day be able to forgive him. It was a nice letter…a sincere letter. Truth be told, I don’t ever remember being afraid of him. I was, most certainly, terrified of what was happening but I don’t remember being afraid of him personally. He kept saying my name and somehow, it made me feel like he didn’t want to be hurting me. There was pain in his eyes and even to this day, I sometimes wonder if that night hurt him more than it hurt me. Of course, everything about it left its mark; For a long time I was terrified of large groups and its only been recently that I’ve been able to be comfortable having trusting friendships with other people. I still get very nervous when people are behind me and I haven’t quite grown comfortable of the dark again. Mostly though, I miss the summer. I miss looking forward to the summer and yearning for its warm sunshine. I miss feeling the excitement of its unexpectedness and I miss breathing deeply the first time I feel its warm breeze over my face without a pain of anxiety filling my body.

While I have learned to manage and accept my feelings towards the summer that I turned sixteen, I still find myself wishing sometimes that I could live in a world only of fall.

helium's top rated girl!

So not too long ago, I joined a network of online freelance writers to see how my writing would be received among my cyber peers. Helium.com is a rather large and intricate network filled with any number of topics to submit to from politics and personal finance to arts and humanities. As a member, you post your articles to whatever channel you choose and other members rate your work. Each time you get rated, you move up or down in the list of articles relative to how others have been rated. What’s great about this site is that it’s also a marketplace for publications looking for specific articles. The better your ratings are, the more credible and appealing your work becomes to them and they are free to purchase your work directly from the site.

By no means did I join the network in anticipation of being published. Mostly, it was just to take my writing beyond my blog site to see how other writers (some professional) would rate my work. As it turns out, they are rating it fairly nicely! I’ve only submitted three articles so far but all of them have rated in the top 50% and just this morning, my most recent article became the top rated in its category! I’m so excited!

Below is the article that I submitted, which has been tweaked to the helium writing guidelines from a previous post that I had written. I submitted it under the category of Photography: Humour, which I was very apprehensive about doing because despite my best efforts…I don’t consider my writing very humorous at all!!

I realize that this is such a tiny baby step in the big, bad world of writing but right now, being at the top of Helium’s Photography: Humour list feels like being at the top of the New York Times Bestseller list!!!

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Picture This...
Article Submitted By:
Genevieve V. Georget-Smyth

Picture this…It's eight grade and you are at one of your last elementary school dances. The disco ball is turning, the lights are flashing and the DJ is playing something that you've heard on the radio a thousand times already (in my day, it would have been something by Heavy D or Criss Cross, remember them?) when suddenly, a slow song comes on. The gymnasium suddenly parts like the Red Sea, with all of the guys against one wall and all of the girls against the other. The teachers who are chaperoning the evening look about as uncomfortable as everyone else feels and somehow, you all know that you're all thinking the very same thing…who's going to make the first move? While everyone is standing there, time is slowly ticking away as you are contemplating whether or not you have the guts to ask THAT guy or girl (okay, never mind, ANY guy or girl) to dance. Slowly, one brave person begins to walk across the gymnasium into the adolescent equivalent of the Bermuda Triangle and the song ends. The moment is over and then TLC suddenly comes on the speakers reminding you not to chase after waterfalls…stick to the rivers and the lakes that you're used to!

This scenario, like so many others, is a perfect example of what happens when we let the moment slip away. When we long for something but, neglect to take the opportunity because of fear or insecurity or as Bono would so eloquently put it "we're stuck in a moment that we can't get out of".

What happens when we stand there against the wall of the gymnasium, staring at that one single person that we so desperately want to approach? Is it a fear of rejection? Fear of what we know? Or fear of what we don't know? I think that in many cases, our imagined reality (that the guy/girl of our elementary school dreams secretly has a crush on us and wants to ask us to run away to Mexico with them!) is better than the potential truth of our current reality (that they may say no and immediately go running for the hills!).

Here's the thing though…how often, when weighing these odds, do we stop to consider the difference between probability versus possibility? Anything is possible but the odds of the worse possible scenario happening are a lot less in our favour when we consider the probability of it happening! All this to say that, okay, perhaps that guy/girl won't suddenly be stuffing your desk with little Garfield Valentine cards but, odds are that they also aren't suddenly going to transfer schools the following Monday just so they don't have to look you in the eye ever again! My guess is, whatever does happen, come grade nine, it won't matter anyways because you'll find yourself in a whole new adolescent abyss and four years of just trying to avoid embarrassment! With that being said though, you will also never have to look back and wonder if those four years could have potentially been spent on the beaches of Mexico ordering virgin daiquiris with your elementary school flame!

How many of these little things have happened to you? A moment comes and provides the best, and possibly the only, opportunity and we spend so much time contemplating it and weighing its options that before we know it…it's gone. How many times have you failed to seize the day? Seizing the moment, any moment, is guaranteed to do two things; first, it is guaranteed to throw you into the unknown. What's interesting about this is that this is why most people don't seize it fear of the unknown. Secondly, it is guaranteed to change your life. What's interesting about this is that this is why most people DO seize it; regardless of the outcome, your life will be altered in some manner and more times than not, in a forward motion. Either way though, you will never be left wondering what could have been.

So, after spending the day reflecting upon this enlightenment, I noticed that there is one thing in particular that I have never seized…my passion for photography. My husband and I collect photographs, usually purchasing a new work to mark each new occasion in our relationship; moving in together, getting married, our honeymoon. I simply love photography and always have. Perhaps it's my love of people watching or the fact that I'm highly intuitive when it comes to people's emotions but whatever it is, I feel the need to capture it somehow. Oddly enough though, I've never taken up photography and I've hardly even owned a camera before! And, much to my surprise, I can explain this (God bless psychology classes!); I have no idea whether or not I would make a good photographer but, my imagined reality that I'm an award winning photographer in hiding is better than the potentially true reality that I'm a terrible photographer altogether. Crazy, I know! But sometimes, we just want to believe something so badly that the possibility, whether its true or not, is easier than the probability.

So, what's a girl to do when confronted with this dilemma? Well, you have to allow your hand to let go of the wall and make the long journey to the other side of the gymnasium with everyone watching (yes, even the teachers!) and you have to ask that cute boy from home room if he'll dance with you because they are only going to play Boyz II Men once tonight and you better believe that you are going to be in love when they do! And you know what…even if he says no, you can still find joy in knowing that the moment you crossed over to the other side of the line, everyone else took a deep breath and did the same thing. And because everyone else was so busy worrying about their own sweaty palms, they didn't even notice that you had to swallow your pride, walk away and touch up your cherry flavoured lip-gloss!

So that's what I did…I let go of the wall, seized a giant online camera sale and bought a Nikon D40 (go big or go home, right?!?). It's sleek, sophisticated and perfect for capturing our life on film! I'm certainly not saying that National Geographic will soon be knocking at our door but, at the very least, we now have a digital witness to our lives; Some thing and some way to look back and smile at the moments gone by…the moments that we seized so we'd never be left wondering.

calling all followers...

I know that everyone wants to be a leader but in this case...following is good!

Blogger just came up with a new widget feature called "Follow" which essentially allows me to have my very own fan club! Am I excited about this feature? We'll see!

As flattering as this could be...it could also be the universe's way of seeking revenge on me for having the following voice mail message:

"Hi! You've reached Gen and Steve. Unfortunately we can't come to the phone right now but if you think you're important, leave a message and if we think you're important, we'll call you back."

So, if you're a fan (preferably of a none "stalk-ish" nature!)...scroll to the bottom of the sidebar and be the first to be a follower!! Please...my ego is counting on you...

(and if in a few weeks time, you notice that the follow feature has mysteriously disappeared and our voice mail message has changed...you'll know that karma had its way with me!!!)

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]
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Genevieve V. Georget-Smyth

Et voilà!

time to take some notes...

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