Confessions of a Strata Council Vice President

They must have seen me coming a mile away. Fresh blood with that ‘I was once on student council’ look. I had not been an owner in the building for long before I was approached by Angela. Join the strata council, she said, it’s not that big a commitment. Ten meetings a year, a few emails, easy. Ha! I know better, I scoffed. I hadn’t been on the arts council for thirteen years – president for six – for nothing. I knew email was the silent killer, and that there was always more work to do than you planned for. I told her to give me a year before asking again. I was burnt out. I needed time to resettle with my family.

A year later, another council member knocked on my door. I liked Fred. He lived just down the hall from us. He talked me into it. Okay, fine, I said. Not many months after I joined, Fred had the audacity to move to the Okanagan. He had replaced himself with me. Jerk. Or maybe Fred was just smart. Succession planning in action.

We’ve owned our condo for eight years. I have been on the council for seven of those, more or less. I had to take time off to recover from a head injury in 2020. Other than that spell, I have volunteered my time to the cause. There are perks to being on the council. I like knowing what is going on with my building, maintenance-wise, even though I only own one sixty-second of it. The interesting thing about condo ownership is that you own your unit, but you also own a share of the common property and pay for its upkeep with a strata fee relative to the square footage of your unit. Common property in our building is the hallways, the elevator, the building’s mechanical and plumbing workings, the lobby, the exercise room, the parkade, the parking lot, the landscaping, the guest suite and adjacent washroom, the roof, the exterior, and the exterior infrastructure stuff like drainage. I appreciate having a say in how the common property is maintained and improved. Our building is twenty years old this year. In West Coast terms, twenty is considered an ‘older building’. Shocking, I know, but ongoing maintenance is necessary, especially in a damp climate. The provincial government has now required all strata councils to order a depreciation report and dedicate ten percent of all strata fees to a contingency fund. Too many condo owners in the province have been subject to crippling levies as a result of poor management. I personally know of a large complex where individual owners had to come up with eighty thousand dollars each to reconstruct the entire building’s envelope due to years of water damage from wind and rain. It is in my best interest to be involved. Of course, every owner receives strata council meeting minutes. They only have to read them to stay informed. They can also vote on new amendments and resolutions at annual general meetings. Another perk is being an integral part of one's community. I like to bring a lightheartedness to our meetings. Unless there is an element of fun to volunteering, I am likely to lose heart and interest. 

Are there downsides to joining a strata council? Sometimes. We recently had to hold a mediation meeting for two owners who were basically at war with each other. We had never done that before. We set strict parameters for the meeting, keeping in mind that any action we took would set a precedent for future similar situations. The meeting was not comfortable, but I believe it achieved what we set out to accomplish, which was satisfying. I have also had panicked calls from people when water is dripping from their light fixtures. Many new condo owners are inexperienced. They own their units, but they don’t quite understand that the strata council members are not landlords. We can advise (in this case I told the owner to run upstairs and knock on the door of the unit above. Sure enough, the person above had let their tub overflow), but the responsibility to call their insurance company and deal with damage is their own responsibility.  Additionally, as stated earlier in this post, much of our business between meetings is done by email. Unless you are good at keeping up with this brand of correspondence, then strata council is not for you. I had to set up a separate email account due to the sheer volume of emails I send and receive weekly for strata business.

While the building next door is self-managed, we in our larger building employ a property management company. They send a representative to our meetings, seek out quotes for maintenance work, take care of meeting minutes and archive them, keep track of contractors, look after our accounting, negotiate insurance, handle legal advice, and communicate with owners on our behalf, acting as a buffer in difficult situations. They can also be very helpful in emergencies. As far as we’re concerned employing a good management company is money well spent.

Our current strata council has seven members. Only two of us are under sixty, mainly due to the fact that retired and semi-retired people have time to volunteer. I need to start looking around at other owners for future members. Perhaps one day soon I will pull a Fred. I will find a fresh-faced youngish person and invite them to join council, and then ten months later, abandon them. Just kidding. Sort of.

‘til next time,

Rebecca

*Angela and Fred are fake names to protect the innocent

Blogger offered to insert links in this post. I allowed it in case anyone out there would like to learn more about this dull topic. Please don't get mad at me if the links are all AI slop.

 

 

ADDing it Up

If you frequent TikTok, Instagram or Facebook you can't help but notice that a lot of adults are talking about being recently diagnosed as having ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) or ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder). Social media apps have been instrumental in helping people to recognize both common and uncommon traits of these neurodivergences. Medical doctors like brain expert Dr. Amen, celebrities such as Trevor Noah, Diary of a CEO's Steven Bartlett, and Mel Robbins, as well as regular folk are making videos to share on the subject, and a whole new wave of self-knowledge (and sometimes self-diagnosis) is sweeping the world. I have members of my own family who have been officially diagnosed, some quite a bit after such a diagnosis could have helped them in school. Other members of my family, including my sister, Clare*, are simply aware they possess some or many of the traits of someone with ADHD and have decided they have lived this long without medication or professional support, so they are simply carrying on being the successful people  they are - just with more self-awareness. When I listen to Mel Robbins talk about her own ADHD, it's like I'm listening to Clare talk about herself. 

A couple of months ago, I was having coffee with two girlfriends. One of them was telling us she was sure she had ADHD. She pointedly asked me if I noticed traits in myself. What came out of my mouth at that moment surprised me. I had only just realized it. I said I had difficulty concentrating unless I was really interested, and when I forced myself to concentrate for extended periods of time I became really tired. My brain wanted to fly off in disparate directions whenever I had to listen to something that wasn't grabbing my attention, and that it had always been that way since junior high school. My friend with ADHD said she thought I swung the opposite way to her. She tended to hyperactivity. I tended towards lethargy, especially after periods of intense concentration. I said I couldn't remember being hyper a day in my life, in fact, and that I envied people like her and my sister. "You women get shit done!" We laughed.

In elementary school, I developed good study habits and became used to good marks, so I expected these to continue as I entered my teens. Honestly, I was surprised when my grade six math award did not translate into a good grasp of algebra when Math no longer related to the physical. They lost me with abstract concepts. Try as I might, I spaced out in class and my math marks continued their descent. I still did well in school, especially in English, French, and the Humanities, but the Sciences apart from Biology eluded me. While many of my friends were methodical in their approach to school work, I was a binge student - procrastinating like crazy and then cramming for tests and spending an entire weekend writing a paper due Monday. I had to feel pressure in order for my brain to focus intently. I started to feel like something might be wrong with me. 

College was fantastic. I had only to take courses I was genuinely interested in. I genuinely loved the whole experience, but my habits had not changed. I was still a binge student when it came to tests and papers. Fortunately, I loved to read, so I was always prepared for class in that way. I carried on to university, but after my first year there, which I enjoyed, I began to find my classes tedious. I remember the last paper I wrote was for Classics. It was excruciating to force myself to complete my paper. I typed while the tears rained down my face. I called my mom. I didn't know what was happening to me. I had always loved being a student. I had loved everything from the smell of a new HB pencil to that first crack when I opened a brand new textbook, but that enthusiasm had completely left my body. My mom didn't know what to say except, "Come home for a week. We'll sort it out." We did not. 

I don't want to diagnose myself with anything. I would rather trust a professional if I ever choose to go down that road. I did take part of an ADHD test a doctor gave to my niece, but very little of it applied to me. If I do have some traits of neurodivergence, they are manageable now. What are they besides the above I have described? I am messy. I am really sensitive to the energies of others. I am either incredibly creative and productive or I am paralyzed into inactivity. I run and practice yoga, not to expel excess energy, but to create it in my mind and body and to increase my ability to focus. I have learned many coping mechanisms to deal with my shortcomings, like making lists and setting reminders on my phone, but I will be the first to admit my traits have been hard on my self-confidence over the years. I wish I had had someone to guide me through the difficulties I encountered in university. I felt so alone. Someone close to me once asked me how I felt about the fact that all my friends had successful careers and I did not. I know I was hurt when they asked it, and I have asked myself the same question many times. Now, however, I have decided to give myself a break. I have honestly done my best so far, and that's all I have. I have loved being a mom. I provide a good balance for my husband, whose frontal cortex is firing on all cylinders most of the time. I like my humble job(s). I like being helpful. I care about the world. People say I'm funny. I guess I'm okay even if my brain likes to take regular vacations. 

'til next time!

Rebecca

*My beautiful sister Clare wanted me to use her name.

 

 

An Engaging Topic

My husband and I were living it up in Vancouver, celebrating our wedding anniversary. We had spent the night at a guest house after indulging in a grand meal at the sort of restaurant people like us only go to once in a blue moon, and decided, for nostalgic reasons, to go for brunch at Sophie's Cosmic Cafe, a Vancouver institution, before heading home. Sophie's is chock-a-block with vintage chachkies and brightly coloured walls, and serves old-school breakfasts. V ordered an egg and sausage platter, and I ordered the French toast. We drank coffee (my half decaf Americano was actually kind of awful, but I didn't complain because the food was so good) and tucked into our meals. 

Like many restaurants, Sophie's had music playing at a good volume through the speakers. I noticed as we ate, that the playlist was vintage, like the restaurant and its contents (and some of its patrons). I hummed along to the tunes while V and I enjoyed our brunch experience, my mom's voice in my head saying "No singing at the table" silenced. A song came on that I had loved as a kid, "Don't Bring me Down" by ELO (Electric Light Orchestra). I had finished my breakfast and was sipping my bad coffee, alternating with ice water, and started singing along quietly. Suddenly, I heard a voice in the booth behind me, also singing along quietly. We both noticed each other singing at the same time and turned around to see to whom the other voice belonged. The chorus came up and we sang to each other, just a little louder,  

                    Don't bring me down

                    No, no, no, no, no

                    Ooh-ooh-hoo

                    I'll tell you once more before I get off the floor

                    Don't bring me down

People near us started staring. We didn't care. We sang the whole song together. Songs you knew when you were young tend to stay locked in your brain forever. I remembered most of the lyrics, even singing 'Don't bring me down BRUCE' instead of 'groos' as it's supposed to be, because I had never learnt the original version of the line. When the song was over we shook hands and introduced ourselves. Turns out the man I was singing with was celebrating his seventieth birthday, and sharing brunch with some good friends who had flown in for the occasion from Winnipeg. We all chatted for a bit in a jovial manner befitting a birthday celebration, and the man thanked me for singing with him - said I had made his day. He invited us to his birthday party (I'm not sure he really meant it), but we said we had to be going home.  

The experience I had at Sophie's brought to the fore some thoughts I have had lately, about how people these days engage (or don't) with the world. I grew up in a boisterous family in a small town where we knew almost everyone. Most of my siblings will still talk to anyone, anywhere. I am a bit more reserved than some of my family, but in the right moment and mood I can have great interpersonal exchanges with strangers. People often talk about how unfriendly Vancouverites are, but I have found that you often get what you give. My experience at Sophie's is a perfect example. Sure, I don't do impromptu karaoke in restaurants on a regular basis, but I tend to have friendly exchanges with people more often than not if I begin the exchange by being open and friendly towards them. I have to say, this happens more often with people who are my age or older. The pre-cellphone generations are much more used to greeting each other and initiating conversation. I find, even in my own mid-sized home city, that young people rarely make eye contact with me if I am walking down the street. It's like they are trained not to. When I do get a greeting or a smile I am pleasantly surprised. I do not want to harp on the younger generations. It's not their fault. They are a product of the society they grew up in. But, I do want to encourage them to engage more outside of their social bubble. As you get older life can often get decidedly lonelier. We are more isolated than ever before. If you don't believe me, Google the subject. There are a thousand articles proving my claim and warning of the dangers prolonged social isolation can wreak on one's mental health. 

There is a passage in a book I am reading by Ann Cleeves, the great mystery novelist, that reads: 

"When Jen got home, the kids were holed up in their rooms again. They answered when she shouted up at them, but they didn't come down. There was evidence that they'd scavenged for food. She thought that prison wouldn't be any sort of deterrent for this generation, as long as they were allowed cell phones and internet access in their cells." 

Makes you think, doesn't it? God, I hope it does.

I also have to work on reaching out more. After going through burnout a few years ago, I isolated myself to a great degree, just to get some rest. I had been an incredibly social person who tended to attract similar friends. When I think back to my 30's and 40's I was rarely alone. Now I am alone a lot of the time. I don't generally mind because I have learned to like my own company and a quieter life than before, but I know I need companionship so I make the effort to engage when I am out and about. I greet people, especially elderly people, I make small talk with sales people and servers, and I compliment young parents on their cute children if they'll let me. While I hope I am brightening their day, I am the one who benefits most. And, if I can 'make someone's day' like the man in Sophie's Cosmic Cafe, then I get an extra-big boost of serotonin. Engaging is good for me, and I will argue that it is good for you, too. 

https://youtu.be/z9nkzaOPP6g?si=K2URmgx1QohGifRE

                   

'Til next time, 

Rebecca

Feelings, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa

When you're a small child, you usually concentrate on having one feeling at a time. You're either ecstatic, mildly contented (when playing with a toy, for example) or crying your eyes out like the world is going to end. Some little kids also get really angry, but I was not one of those kids, in my own memory at least. As a teenager, your moods can swing wildly and teens can often milk those feelings for all they're worth for maximum impact. When you feel sad, for instance, you might put on some equally sad music so you can really wallow in it for a while. Conversely, you can become loud and expressive when high on a happy feeling. My girlfriends and I were a lively group when excited and happy. We were a common sight around town, linked arm and arm across the road singing at the top of our lungs.

An advantage of growing older and becoming more experienced is the ability to entertain opposing emotions at the same time. A person can be going through something really, really hard, but still find joy in the everyday things like an unusual bird or flower, or a new song on the radio that grabs their attention. I would argue that this ability is acquired through discipline, just like any other skill. If I'm having a hard day, I try very hard to not let my difficulties own the whole of me. I seek out activities like exercise, reading, writing, and cooking to ease my mind, or I seek out a friend to talk to. Having children helped greatly with the discipline. I simply could not wallow in sadness or my sensitive children would pick up on it and become concerned. The term 'fake it 'til you make it' comes to mind. 

Today, for example, I am in pain. I have a tricky back, and it doesn't seem to matter that I practice yoga daily, walk and run regularly, spend large amounts of funds on excellent mattresses and pillows, my back will insist on giving me problems from time to time. My back started acting up yesterday. After a rough sleep during which any movement woke me, I got up still in pain. I did some gentle yoga and went for a walk around the lake. Although certain movements caused me to flinch until I was loosened up by walking, I reveled in the symphonic bird song all around me, and stopped frequently to take in the views of lake, shadowed trees, and snow capped peaks. I am no stranger to pain, though. I've been 'carrying on' through bouts of back and neck pain since I was in my twenties. I know, with gentle movement and treatment, my pain will go away eventually, which makes it a bit easier to endure. Physical pain is just a part of life for so many of us. 

Emotional pain is a little harder to get past. Especially grief. I liken it to the ever-presence of pebbles in the shoes of my heart. We all experience various degrees of painful loss in this life. The death of a loved one, a rift in the family, a decline of health and a pining for the healthier version of ourselves (or a loved one), an overwhelming sense of despair at the state of the war-torn world and the health of the planet. We limp along, despite the pebbles, and try to move forward. Every morning is a chance to start again, to see our world in a new light. Every day we get to choose how to navigate through the rough stuff with a sense of balance. We can entertain our grief and sadness and not shove it under the rug, but we can also make the effort to find the joy in getting to live another day in what is really a beautiful world in so many ways. 

(*I speak only of personal experience. I am aware that sadness and despair are not always a choice, that some people's mental states are more prone to them than other's. So, please, see a health care provider if you simply cannot find an ounce of joy. You, and your mental health, are so worth it.)

'til next time, 

Rebecca

Generation Cell Phone

I've been thinking about how each generation of children we raise lives in a different world than the one before it, and how that affects parenting those kids. I have three kids who would be considered young Millenials and one that would be considered GenZ. I know various factors contributed to their style of upbringing, but with the rate of change being as drastic as it is in this age of rapidly advancing technologies, even in the five year gap between my third and fourth children (both being girls) I noticed a difference. This main difference was the hand held pocket personal computer and communication device known more commonly in this country as the cell phone. And, I'm not just talking about my youngest's possession of one and how that affected her life, but of my own. 

I put off having cell phones in our home as long as I possibly could. My husband was issued a flip phone for work, but the rest of us did without phones, and no one thought to ask for one because they were yet to become commonplace among their peers. We did have the family computer in the living room, and we all took our turns to do schoolwork or writing projects, play games from DVDs like Magic School Bus and I Spy, Lego Harry Potter and LOTR, watch YouTube videos, download music, and play Club Penguin when those online activities came along. Often there would be more than one kid sitting at the computer at a time, sharing their experience together. One of my kids was loaned a Game Boy in Grade Five from a friend, and when I saw how addicted he became I asked him to give it back and never borrow it again. My older daughter somehow talked us into letting her get a Nintendo DS with the digital pen thingy when she was a pre-teen, but she never seemed to become as addicted as her brother had to the Game Boy. My goal was always for my children to develop their 'real world' interests first and use the digital gadgets as a tool for relaxation and entertainment on a limited basis.

I remember waiting in the elementary school yard for my youngest. A woman asked me if I was on Facebook. I told her, ugh no, that if I wanted to communicate with people from high school I would do it the old fashioned way - I wouldn't. A couple of years later my eldest who was in high school asked if he could get a Facebook account. I told him yes, but I would get one, too, and then he would have to be my 'friend' on the site. Facebook was this scary unknown to me then, and I feared losing awareness of what my son was up to. Little did I know the only thing he would use it for was posting music videos and messaging friends about social gatherings. He was the first to leave the site a few years later, too. To him, Facebook was lame already. Not so for me, I found. To my surprise, it was actually really fun to reconnect with old school-mates, my large, scattered family, and acquaintances in this limited way. For many of us it became a way to cheer each other on from afar, and to make each other laugh. People were sharing their travels, their kids' achievements, their health struggles, and their hilarious daily foibles. I soon became rather addicted to all the daily updates, and anyone who is 'friends' with me on Facebook knows I am a regular contributor. I do know my life would be lonelier without it, especially during Covid when digital connection became so vital to many of us. I know it seems I digress. We were talking about cell phones, but social media is a huge part of their use. 

I remember the day I told my husband I couldn't put off having a cell phone any longer. My job was requiring my use of one. We went to the Koodo kiosk at the mall and signed me up. By that time, flip phones were not the norm any longer. The phone I chose had a touch screen and so, in addition to being connected to the cellular network, it hooked up to our home WiFi. My carrier was Shaw, so free WiFi was available in lots of places. Unlike with the computer, I could lie down on the couch and read articles, scroll Facebook, and message people. I'm not going to lie, that was a revelation. One by one, my three older kids got phones as well, although they were well into their late teens. When all three of my older children had moved away to attend college or university, my youngest and I thought, with her busy schedule, that she should get a basic phone, too, so we could communicate on pick-up times from her theatre rehearsals in the next town. If I remember correctly, she was thirteen when I got a new phone and she inherited my old one. Fortunately, my youngest was too busy at the time to become completely addicted to her screen, and she was very handy as a tech assistant when her dad or I couldn't figure something out on our phones. 

The other day I was remembering my youngest and I sitting in our living room when she still lived at home, both looking at our phones. I compared it to the days when she or I, or other members of our family, would sit at the computer in the living room, whatever we were doing open and available to the rest of the family, opposed to both of us isolated with our little screens in our own little worlds. Most of the time she was chatting with her friends and theatre colleagues, while I scrolled social media or read articles, or chatted with family and friends of my own, losing track of time. I wondered how this change had affected our lives in a deeper sense. I know teenagers deserve to have privacy at times, but to be honest, I think personal phones have  given them too much privacy and too much information available 24/7 to absorb - a lot of it sad and/or alarming. Of course, the difference from my own girlhood is huge. I couldn't even have a private telephone conversation in our house, the corded phone being on the wall in the very center of a small house full of up to nine people at any given time. And, TV news was limited to an hour or so a night. I also wondered how my time spent isolating myself with my phone made a difference to her life, or was it just normal to her - part of the culture of the late 2000's that she took for granted? I know there are scholars out there studying the effect of technology on our brains and we are still learning. I know I have made changes in my own consumption. I turned off the Facebook and Instagram notifications on my phone, and I have learned to recognize in myself when I have become over-saturated with information and screen time. Fortunately, I feel like I have struck a balance with the devices in my life, but it took a long time. That we expect our kids to figure this out on their own is a big ask in my opinion.

I can't help but wonder how the younger moms and dads raising Generation Alpha are doing dealing with all that the world is throwing at their families. Probably their best, as most of us have done before them, learning, failing and winning as we go. 

Until next time, 

Rebecca

Where does Individuality End and Community Begin?

 As I get older and join the melting pot of somewhat invisible middle aged women, I think a lot about the concept of individuality. When I was younger I strived to stand out in the crowd. I dressed differently than most of my peers (I favoured a button down shirt and slim leather neck tie for example), and I listened to the alternative music of my generation. I didn't want anyone to put me in a box with a label. That would have been the end of the world in my view back then. Being the youngest of six may have had something to do with that. I was greeted at the beginning of the school year by teachers who said things like: "Not another Lamb kid", or  "are you as good at math as your brother, Stephen?" Ha. No. But pretty good at English Literature, for which I received an award in Grade 12. I had a great group of friends and got along with most people in my school, probably also a result of being the youngest of six widely varying personalities. 

My mother used to say, "Sometimes you just have to join the Human Race." I think she meant that sometimes we had to do things in a normal, accepted way. I struggled with that over the years. While considering myself somewhat of a rebel, I also wanted elderly ladies to like me, and I had a secret passion for ballet and all things Victorian/Edwardian. I was also desperate for my family to be proud of me. As the youngest I had received the teasing label by my siblings as 'spoiled baby' and I wanted to live that down. I worked hard in college and was accepted to all three of the big universities in British Columbia, my home province. I ended up going to the University of British Columbia, mainly because my parents had gone there and spoke so fondly of their time there, but also due to the fact that my sister and her husband lived in Vancouver and I could board with them. First Year mandatory housing at university was not a thing in the late 1980's and it was hard to get a place in the dorms. UBC was an eye-opening experience for me. My first day on campus I looked out on a sea of black leather jackets. The alternative uniform was Roots sweatpants, chunky wool sweaters, and wool socks with Birkenstock sandals. Both looks said 'money', and coming from a large, poor family, I fit neither. For the first time in my life I felt awkward in my individuality. A couple of professors complimented me on my look, but that was hardly satisfying to me. Clothing was not the only way I felt like a fish out of water at UBC. I was a small town girl, used to knowing everyone and feeling free to go everywhere. I felt lost. I did find a home in the arts lounge and began to make friends there through conversation with people with whom I shared classes, but I didn't socialize with them much outside of school. I was afraid to take the bus from my home in East Vancouver to meet them anywhere at night. Small town girl problems.

After I was done with post-secondary education, I got married. I soon joined the ranks of wife and mother and dressed a lot like other wives and moms: comfortably. Energy and money spent on expressions of individuality took a back seat to the daily grind of parenting, and I loved it. I felt free from trying to find my 'self'. I had a built-in purpose each and every day. Raising kids and being a team with my husband was the best part of my life so far. I made friends with other moms and felt a real sense of belonging.  As my kids grew older I was able to work and volunteer, and there also, I found my purpose as an individual outside my family. To my surprise, my purpose seemed to be about being part of, and giving my time and my heart to, a community, whether that be the local arts council or festival society, other families through providing day care at my home, or helping out at my church. Life was so, so busy, but it was good.

After twenty-eight years of raising children, suddenly, they were gone finding their own lives outside our family. Like so many other mothers I really struggled with finding my purpose beyond those twenty-eight years. My kids are, by and large, very independent people, so I suppose we did our job well enough. After all those years of living in the ultimate community (my family) I found myself having to, well, find my 'self'' once again. Over the past couple of years I have spent much time alone, most of it recovering from a head injury. While I enjoy my own company in general, I don't believe the solitary life is the life for me. Ironically, while spending so much of my youth trying to be an individual, what I really desire is community. Back then, I realize now, I was secure in my quest for individuality because I had a community.  

I think, as a human race, we all crave a sense of belonging, no matter how much we want to be known for our uniqueness. Finding community can be hard work and involve much trial and error, and there have been a few dead ends on my journey. I also spend my time going back and forth between the mountain resort where my husband works and lives most of the time, and our home (and my seasonal work) in a medium sized city an hour and a half's drive away, so committing to a community is a challenge. I am fortunate to have little pockets of community in my extended family, the friendships I have made in the various places I have lived over the years, and within the work environments I have been a part of. That being said, I am still looking for something bigger, wider, and more encompassing. Will I ever get it? That remains to be seen. In the meantime, I will continue to put my heart and time into my little pockets of community in hopes that one of them grows into something more full. 

Until next time, 

Rebecca

When People Don't Like You

I try to get along with most people. I'm not an 'in your face' kind of person. I tend to hang back and feel my way into an acquaintance, to see if what I have to offer as a person will be accepted before I try to deepen any relationship. There was a time when I made friends quickly and easily. Those days seem to be over. In fact, over time I have begun to protect my energy more and more, and maybe other people around my age do the same. The relationships I have fostered over the years matter a great deal to me. I treasure the friends I have because I feel safe and welcome with them, and I hope they feel the same about me. 

A few times I have encountered people who simply do not like me. I accept that, but it is always interesting, not to mention humbling, to ponder why people may not like me. There have been people who have crossed my path whose energy seems to clash with mine, even though, like I said, I try to get along with most people. Years ago I was in a choir. I love to sing, and I enjoy the choral format. I get a thrill out of being part of a wall of voices creating a living work of art to present to an audience. When I was invited to join the choir by some friendly people of my acquaintance, I readily accepted. I attended the first few rehearsals and people around me seemed to be fairly friendly, the musical selections a good challenge for me, and I thought, 'this will be fun'. Despite my positive attitude toward the experience, almost immediately I felt a strange negativity directed towards me from the director. I am not even sure he realized what was happening. I've always been a sensitive being, and I know that what I am feeling with another person may not be felt (or acknowledged) by them, but I could not ignore the rays of hostile energy coming my way from the director. I felt completely unwelcome. Still, I persevered and spent a couple of seasons with the choir, even though I sometimes came home in tears. 

During my time working as a cook in a café a regular customer gave me a similar reaction as the choir director. For some reason, I just brought out something a bit nasty in her. She used to narrow her eyes when she saw me, although she would plaster a smile on her face when I served her food. I have no idea what I did to provoke her dislike, but again, our energies seemed to clash like Luke and Darth's lightsabers. One day I made a decision on how to handle this customer. I would be super duper extra nice to her. Amazingly, my strategy seemed to work. We carried on to have decent, if somewhat fake, exchanges. She was in the café daily, so I had to come up with something so I wouldn't dread her appearance. Recently, I ran into her at a garden center. She recognized me, but could not place me right away, and when I said I used to work at the café in question she nodded and then we talked about the beautiful white poinsettias she was buying. "It was good to see you" we both said as she left the garden center. 

My most recent mysterious, negative experience with a person was just a few weeks ago. A school that comes every year to the resort I live at was finally able to return now that Covid is more manageable. I had met this person, a man who works for the school and heads up the out-trips, and we seemed to have an amicable relationship. I was happy to see him again as he has always been really friendly towards my husband and we had even visited the school before Covid and been given a tour by him. This time, however, his reception of me was frosty. When I mentioned it to my husband he said, 'Nah, he's just got a lot on his mind'. I accepted that. The next time I saw the man in question I was cheering for him as he was about the cross the finish line in an annual cross-country ski race. Afterwards, he was again frosty and dismissive and only spoke to my husband. The last night the school was here, my husband asked me to come to the pub for the final gathering, which I did with a woman friend who works here. When the man in question came into the pub he greeted my husband and my friend and completely ignored me. This time, my husband noticed and felt as confused as I did. I concentrated on talking to another person near me, and then went home, relieved I no longer had to pretend everything was fine. 

A good friend of mine quit a co-ed sport she loved because she felt completely unwelcome by the male participants. At that time I was also in the choir so we could commiserate. Sexism may have played a role in both of these situations. My friend and I are not ones to shrink our personalities around men. 

When I was younger these unfortunate clashes with other humans would have eaten me up inside, but as I have grown and matured I realize they are simply a part of being in the world. While I am bothered whenever I have seemed to upset someone, I realize I cannot take full responsibility for their dislike of me if I have examined my behaviour and simply could not come up with any reason for their dislike. If their reason is simply because I am a (mostly) self-assured woman with a somewhat feminist bent, all the more reason to discount their attitude towards me.  'Ain't nobody got time for that!'

Until next time, 

Rebecca

Soup and Soft Landings

Earlier this never ending summer, when out for a walk, I received a text from a lovely friend. She asked me about the current forest fire raging in the provincial park where my husband works, and how he was dealing with the stress. I replied that my husband was pretty stressed and very, very busy. She asked if I have trouble keeping up to him, and I replied "I don't try. I provide soup and a soft landing." She replied, "We're good at that!!"  She was nursing an injured husband at the moment. As I continued with my walk, I smiled at the phrase that had popped into my head, "soup and a soft landing" and thought it would make a good title for a book. I don't have a book in me, so a blog post will have to suffice. 

Sometimes, when I am questioning my post-active-years-of-motherhood purpose here on earth, something happens to remind me of the benefit of simply being here for the people I love. Or even just for people in general. In August I worked at the local sunflower festival. I worked in the farm store, mainly just taking people's money and answering questions. Our visitors were from all over the world. I met folks from the Philippines, India, Ireland, France, Texas, Denmark, Germany, Spain, Ecuador, and beyond. Flower festivals seem to bring out 'the happy' in people, and many lovely little conversations and exchanges were enjoyed. I had a mask on (having had Covid in July, I was not eager to contract it or pass it on again), but I made sure to smile big with my eyes and my greetings. People really do respond when you take an interest in them as individuals and not just customers exchanging money for goods. Their faces tend to light up and they respond with a little joke or a kind word. Sometimes the reverse would happen. I would be focusing on tallying up their purchases and they would say something positive about the festival and tell me to have a great day. I distinctly remember one man about my age, maybe a bit older, who had brought his two kids to the festival from Vancouver. While his teenage daughter said she would take the little brother back out to the fields after they finished their ice cream, the man said he would seek refuge in the shaded seating area outside of the store. He then told me he was two years into cancer treatment and had learned the hard way about the effect of sun on the skin. The skin cancer had gone into his lymph nodes and into his brain, but he was fighting it successfully so far. I told him my brother-in-law had the same cancer over twenty-five years ago, and I had reason to believe the treatments were more effective now. I truly wished him well, and his eyes told the story of the pain and anguish he was enduring. "I have to carry on for the kids," he said. The love expressed between him and his children was beautiful and I wished him well from the bottom of my heart once again. I hope he went home with some beautiful images of flowers in his head and some comfort and hope from our exchange.

I've noticed as I get older that life becomes more and more about essentials: communications between people, intention, a really good meal enjoyed with a loved one, a perfect piece of fruit, trees, flowers, gratitude for what this body can still do despite injuries, a sense of more to life than meets the eye. I've realized that despite my hermit tendencies of the last few years (post burnout recovery to be honest) I really do love people, and I love to be there for people. Not all the time. Sometimes people really frustrate me. I found myself reacting a few times, just last week, to just such persons testing my patience (I'm talking to you, speeding Toyota truck driver). Overall, though, I hope to provide 'soup and a soft landing' to the people in my life and appreciate when they do the same for me. 

Although last night I made chili. Close enough. 

Embracing Life in the Slower Lane

As readers of this blog are well aware I grew up in a mountain town, a sporty town, an artsy town, a hippie town. While I related well to my hometown's mountain, artsy, and hippie aspects, I found the sporty one eluded me. Not that I wasn't fit, I really was. With the lifestyle my active family promoted I had no chance not to be fit. We were a hiking, huckleberry-picking-in-the-hot-sun, everyone-takes-swimming-lessons, walk everywhere family. My mother despised camping, preferring to spend a day out of doors then return to her own bathtub and bed. Thanks to my friend's mom who organized a week long camp through their church, I was able to attend summer camp two years in a row. We learned how to paddle a canoe, did nature themed art projects, played orienteering games with a map and compass, and sang riotous songs around the campfire each night, and I absolutely thrived. None of the activities intimidated me as school sports tended to. Oh, I could run and still do, but team sports? Anything requiring skilled eye/ball coordination and strategy? Nope. I was trained by the 1970's and 80's school system to revere sports and the people who were talented at them, always making me feel less than. I believed you were either good at sports or you weren't, and was confused that I could learn to steer a canoe but fail at volleyball. PE class, while not entirely humiliating - I could fake it 'till I sort of made it - felt like a waste of time. 

As I got older I began to align myself with the outdoorsy community. I spent a winter gaining my ski legs. I climbed some serious peaks in my area. I attended the Banff Film Festival and worked at a local outdoor sports store selling backpacks and canoes, offered the job by the owner because I was 'active'. I dated a ski instructor/mountain biker from a nearby mountain town. I read Outside Magazine when the store was quiet, reading about major feats in the outdoors by women much stronger than I. I found that my troubled back was not happy carrying heavy packs. I skied beyond my ability and ended up injuring my neck. I tried tree-planting and left after one day - it killed my achilles tendons. I felt unsatisfied by my outdoor athleticism. If I couldn't be like those women I read about or sold equipment to, what was the point of taking part in that world? I suffered from 'all or nothing' thinking. 

When I started falling in love with a super-jock I was unimpressed. Would I spend my life feeling inadequate because I couldn't do things at his level? He windsurfed and played beach volleyball and tennis, and was quite competitive. In winter he skied and played indoor volleyball in a Vancouver league. When he talked to me about all the wonderful, outdoorsy, sporty things we could do together, I looked him straight in the eye and said "What if I don't want to do all of those things? What will happen to us?" He paused and said, "but you love nature, don't you?" I replied, "yes, I really do, but I am not into conquering it, so if you want this to work you are going to have to lay off pushing me to do things I am uncomfortable doing." He still wanted to be with me (it must have been my sparkling personality and clever wit). He did not give up trying to get me to expand out of my comfort zone, though. I had to learn to trust him and we have had a rather wonderful life so far, filled with adventures that made me love the outdoors even more. My years of pushing myself to learn to ski, both cross-country and downhill, all the hiking I did as a child and teenager, and the canoeing at summer camp, prepared me for a life where I could, if not excel at any of those things, own enough skill to have fun doing them and become better at them as we exposed our children to the wonders of spending time in nature in all seasons. 

Today, our kids are grown and independent. I spend much time at the resort my husband manages. It comprises a ski hill, several beautiful lakes, and a vast network of cross-country ski and hiking trails. I walk, cross-country and downhill ski in winter. In summer I thoroughly enjoy a five kilometer run or hike around the main lake often followed by a swim.  I sit on our deck and enjoy the wildlife that visits our yard: deer, ground squirrels, grey jays, snowshoe hares, and the very occasional bear or lynx. On rare occasions my husband and I take a canoe out in the evening. Mostly we just go for evening walks or short hikes in the wildflower meadows when he is finished his work day. Nothing I do up here is major or epic. I simply enjoy the exercise in such a beautiful setting, and I am now at peace with that. Meanwhile, my husband is training to run a 60 km trail race. I will be proudly cheering him on from the sidelines. 

Engines and Fuel

I just finished reading the short novel What Strange Paradise by Canadian journalist and author Omar El Akkad. In Chapter 20 the smuggler's apprentice Mohamed says something simply awful and cynical to the passengers on the ancient run-down fishing boat that carries them across the Mediterranean to a shore they hope will provide a better life than the war-torn places they left behind:

        "You sad, stupid people," he said. "Look what you've done to yourselves. The West you talk about doesn't exist. It's a fairy tale, a fantasy you sell yourself because the alternative is to admit that you're the least important character in your own story. You invent an entire world because your conscience demands it, you invent good people and bad people and you draw a neat line between them because your simplistic morality demands it. But the two kinds of people in this world aren't good and bad -- they're engines and fuel. Go ahead, change your country, change your name, change your accent, pull the skin right off your bones, but in their eyes they will always be engines and you will always, always be fuel."

The irony of the smuggler's apprentice spewing the above as he is facilitating the migrants' journey to the West, making money off it, no less, seems lost on him. I definitely do not pretend to know much about the Middle East's history of troubles, but the fact that the leaders of much of those lands promote a deep mistrust of the West is well-known (and in some cases well founded). Still, people flock by the thousands in leaky boats and rafts in uncertain waters, wearing poor quality pdf's, risking life and life-savings in search of what the West seems to stand for. 

I have always been interested in origin stories. I enjoy learning how people got to where they are now. If I meet someone from a foreign country I often ask what brought them to Canada. I remember one woman who is now a friend answered that question with "Amnesty International and the Catholic Church. My dad was a wanted man for speaking out against the dictator of our country". Having lived a comparatively sheltered and privileged life, I acknowledge how out of touch I can be with the true, lived struggles of people who leave everything behind, often including the graves of many loved ones killed in armed conflicts or raids, to come to a country like Canada. I have to read books like What Strange Paradise to try and internalize some of what these immigrants experience. Or, I ask my hairstylist who was a Vietnamese boat person. He, too, got on a boat with his brother and father not knowing if they would live or die on the crossing to a new land. He is proud of the life he and his family have built here, and he and his wife, like many immigrants, work very hard. He has told me more than once that Canadians don't know how good we've got it. 

When I was working at my friend's tulip festival this past April I was reminded of how much it resembles an international airport during holiday times, or perhaps the UN. Every possible skin colour, ethnicity, and accent is represented (okay, a slight exaggeration, but you get the picture) Languages flow around me like bubbling streams. I love it. This year I worked in the farm shop where we sell potted and cut flowers, souvenirs, treats and drinks. As I greeted each customer I took the opportunity to be as welcoming as possible. I made short conversation with each of them and found my smiles returned. Each customer has an origin story. Each customer has as much right to be on this earth as I do, no matter where they were born. Many of them have earned that right much more than I have by the risks they have taken and the sacrifices they have made to leave all that is familiar. I am grateful not to think like the smuggler's apprentice, dividing humans into engines and fuel, and I need to continue to work in my small way to make Canada a place that gives equal opportunity to all. 

We can all be engines and fuel for each other. 

Until next time, 

Rebecca

Recommended Reading

For the last couple of months I've been immersed in my own personal version of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's annual Can-lit contest Canada Reads. One of my goals for the New Year was to read more books from diverse cultural perspectives. I could read British murder mysteries by the likes of Ann Cleeves and P.D. James until the cows come home, and in fact I have. The cows are in the building as we speak, and it is time to let them rest awhile before putting them back out to pasture once again while I indulge my penchant for dead bodies found by hyper-intuitive sleuths (who have issues of their own to solve or merely live with) in ancient castles or on dreary, windswept Atlantic beaches. Additionally, mystery novels are glorified puzzles that are solved at the end. Very tidy. Not terribly realistic, but great and satisfying reading.

The last time I read a culturally diverse book, and that was just before the pandemic, was when I gasped my way through Life of Pi. I was traumatized by it, just as I was traumatized by Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance years ago. Both books were beautifully written and valuable to literature in general, but I had a hard time getting over them. I am the sort of person who travels alongside the characters in a book I am reading. The things that happen to the characters affect me in a way that is hard to describe. When I read an engaging book I also enter it for the duration. I witness the good, the bad, and the ugly and carry it around with me. When I was a teenager a book could affect my entire mood. I am better at separating real life and fiction now - perhaps my skull is just thicker, but my heart is still quite sensitive. If I have a deeply sad or disturbing book on the go I read it during the day, and read another, lighter book before I go to sleep at night, so with this strategy in mind I decided I needed to open myself up to some more challenging, educational reading once again. If I want to be a good citizen of the world, my country, and my community, I need to learn from the writers who wish to teach us how to be that through their stories.

So, what is on my cuturally diverse list this season, you ask?  The first book I read this year was Washington Black by Esi Edugyan. Wahington Black is a sweeping, transatlantic epic of a novel about a young Caribbean slave boy with a very special talent. The story is full of eccentric characters and the barbarism of slavery, and it was defended in this year's Canada Reads, so at least I had read one of the books on their list. The second book on my personal list was All the Quiet Places by Brian Thomas Isaac. Now, this book entered my soul and gave me heavy dreams. If you want to learn about the lasting impact of colonialism on Indigenous peoples and their communities on a personal level, I highly recommend All the Quiet Places. The author is so good at describing and setting a scene I felt I was right there with the characters, not viewing them from a platform far away. The third book I read was Diamond Grill by Fred Wah. Diamond Grill was published in the mid-nineties, but appeared on my radar a few months ago. The poetic prose of this book perfectly captures the nuances and complexities of growing up bi-racial in mid-century small-town Canada. Yet again, I was transported, this time to the Chinese-Canadian restaurant that closed in my hometown when I was seven years old. The fourth book on my list is Three Day Road by Joseph Boyden. I was hooked by this book immediately. Boyden is a legendary author. Three Day Road is expertly written from the perspective of two people, an elderly aunt recounting her past as a 'bush Indian' in northern Ontario and her nephew who has returned, haunted and maimed, from the battlefront of the First World War. As the elderly aunt paddles her nephew back home she tells him stories from her life, and he silently re-lives his horrifying experiences as a talented sniper in the trenches and bombed out landscape of France. I learned so much from this book and look forward to reading his other novels, when I recover from Three Day Road, that is. 

I have more books on my list, including a few currently on hold at my local public library. I am so grateful to the many authors who tell stories from their own unique perspective. My life is richer because of them, and I hope I can translate what I learn from these stories into action as a more sensitive and aware citizen and friend.  

Snow White Fear

I was commuting to college with my brother-in-law. He was used to Manitoba snow, not necessarily the messy, wheel-sucking sludge that afflicts British Columbia roads. He steered one way and the car slid another. He attempted to correct the sliding and we got turned around and started going backwards over the edge. I was screaming my head off, convinced we were going to die. The car bumped down the embankment, and stopped. We looked at each other. We decided to risk opening the doors and climbing out. It appeared the car had been hung up an a sharp rock which had punctured the undercarriage, bringing us to a halt.Thank God!We climbed up the embankment and hitchhiked back to Nelson where I lived with my parents and he lived with my pregnant sister and their little girl. It was the first car accident I had ever been involved in. My brother loaned us his car until my brother-in-law's insurance got sorted out and they bought a new one. I did a fair bit of the driving to college for the next while.

A couple of years after the accident with my brother-in-law I was going on a ski trip to Banff with a boyfriend. He had been up for 24 hours for his shift at the hospital and was exhausted. We never should have left that night. I think I pushed him to leave, saying I would help keep him awake. By Kootenay Pass he was too tired to drive, and said I would have to. I didn't have much experience driving a standard, but I was willing to try. I wanted to get to Banff and start our week of skiing. The night was cold and clear and gleaming with stars. We climbed the pass at midnight and began the descent down the other side. We hit black ice. The truck did a 180 and hit the guard rail, which sent it spinning in the other direction. Fortunately, we hit the guard rail again and the bumper hooked onto it, stopping us completely. The bumpers were destroyed. My boyfriend was awake enough to take over the driving from there while I sat quaking and apologizing. I think I remember checking in at the police station where he reported the accident.  Our relationship was never the same after that night. I felt our age difference keenly as he took a tone with me that pointed out my immaturity. I confess to having a bit of a wild streak back then, and somewhat of a fearless mentality when it came to risk. I think the proper term for it is youthful stupidity.

They say as we age that we lose our risk-taking tendency. We know the consequences of injury and loss of wages too well to gamble them for an adrenaline rush. I, for one, have taken this theory a bit further when it comes to winter driving. For years now I have found the combination of being a passenger and an unwilling driver on snowy roads terrifying and anxiety-inducing. Oddly enough, I had no difficulty driving snowy roads when I was in my thirties. We always had four-wheel drive and lived in mountainous areas. If I wasn't comfortable driving my husband would and he is an excellent driver - I was, and continue to be, always in good hands. I know the memory of the winter accidents described above haunts me somewhat, but my irrational fear cannot be completely related to those incidents of long ago. There must be some other explanation.

My intense fear seems to have originated from our move to the Lower Mainland. I think moving here made driving a much more intense experience than when we lived on the Island or in the Kootenays. I have been driving since I was nineteen, but I still consider myself a relative novice when it comes to Freeway and city driving. I wonder if I'll ever be completely comfortable moving along at 110 kilometerss an hour with hundreds of cars, semis, and motorcycles jockeying for position all around me on the Freeway. And the addition of snow merely intensifies this discomfort. If I can go slowly and carefully, I am alright, but it seems no one else has time for that. So, I would rather not drive. One would think I would be content enough with my husband doing the driving, but I am not thrilled with that scenario either because I have no direct control over the vehicle. I have taken to breathing slowly and deliberately like a yogi while we drive to and from the mountain resort where he works (and which is our second home) in order to calm my anxiety. To be honest, I am getting pretty sick and tired of this crazy fear of mine.

Last weekend was a particularly snowy one. My husband was coming down in the 4X4 on Friday night to pick up my daughter and me, my sister and her daughter. My little car is not equipped for the snowy mountain roads and I would never attempt the trip at night in any case. I had expressed my fear the night before in a phone call with my husband and he had calmed me with some well chosen and often heard words. I decided the next morning I would change my approach to the drive. My mantra for the day was going to be, "He is an excellent driver who knows the road. I am in good hands." I know it sounds crazy, but it worked for me. I had decided to stop being so afraid. It snowed all day down here as well, and I drove my twelve minute commute to work, both ways, without incident and without fear. That night, he arrived about 7:30. We packed up the truck and picked up my sister and her daughter from their house. The snow fell heavily until about ten kilometers before the resort, but I remained calm, chatting happily with my sister and our daughters. My husband was an excellent driver who knew the road. I was in good hands. When we arrived at the resort I said to my husband, "I did pretty well, didn't I?" He just grinned.

Will I be fearless on the snowy roads from now on? I highly doubt it. My soul is too well acquainted with fear to merely flip the record over and change its tune. I like to think I am developing some coping mechanisms, however, which will hopefully make me stronger than my fears in the future. My life involves a lot of snow now, so I may as well become friends with it again. Returning to skiing is helping me reacquaint myself with the ways of the white stuff, too, and I am loving it. At the end of a day on the slopes or the tracks, I am too content and tired to worry so much anyway.

A Slow Burn(out)

Everywhere you look there are young people trying to change the world. They are starting their own businesses while raising young children, achieving advanced degrees, inventing new and improved stuff, working to save the environment, running for office, and renovating crumbling houses (at least on TV). While their energetic output is encouraging and inspiring, and their earnestness is heartwarming it also sets off some alarm bells, at least in me. I used to be one of those people. My goal was to make people in my former small community appreciate and value the role of the arts in their everyday lives, and I worked hard volunteering my time to help make that happen. I also worked from home to make some extra income and volunteered at my church.  I did all this while raising four active children, running to stay fit, and cooking like mad. My thirties were a whirlwind of gratifying, caffeine-fueled community involvement and motherly ambition. My early forties were a slow decline into burnout. Let this post serve as a gentle warning to my young friends.

Burnout is real and, in my experience, happens when you begin to be unable to separate your 'self' from your 'work'. We are so busy in this Western Hemisphere trying to become so many things. Much of this ambition is good. We should aspire to grow, to learn, to strive for a better world, but we also need to simply be ourselves sometimes. We need to protect our peace of mind from too much intrusion, which is difficult in this age of social media and subsequent addiction. Social media nags us continually to DO SOMETHING. Yes, the world has needs, but they are endless. We can all do our bit but none of us can do everything - the treadmill was once a form of punishment for a reason. Gone are the days when simply enjoying oneself was a worthwhile goal, and I am sad about that, for enjoying oneself with the simple pleasures of life can reap great rewards, fend off depression, and spread ripples of good feeling around us. I recently read (for probably the fifth time) Peter Mayle's A Year in Provence. My aunt loaned me the DVD of the televised version and I am making my way through the series now. A Year in Provence is a funny, delightful account of Peter and his wife retiring from successful, but high stress careers in London and moving to the South of France where they restore a two-hundred year old stone farmhouse and spend their days eating, drinking, walking their dogs and getting to know the local culture and characters in the Luberon Valley. Not everything is ideal at all times for the couple, but they embrace their new life and Peter continues to write popular books for the great enjoyment of others around the world. His books exude a sense of having time for others without agenda, of experiencing life with all the five senses, of not taking oneself too seriously, and of laughter being, in fact, the best medicine. The point I am trying to make is Peter Mayle is an educated man and a gifted writer but he doesn't produce his beloved stories by beating himself over the head for not 'doing enough' and being miserable. Quite the opposite.

We all have gifts and most of us must work to pay the bills. Fully recognizing how to use those gifts and figuring out what work to do is sometimes a long road. Many of us learn by trial and error. In my own case,  and living in a city with a large homeless population, I recognize my desire to help the less fortunate, especially the homeless. Some days I honestly feel like the homeless are my sole responsibility, but I am wrong and must guard against these feelings because I know they stem from personal guilt that I have a nice place to live and my fellow citizens pushing those laden shopping carts do not. The desire to help others should never come from guilt. It should come from a more positive feeling of wanting to share. Guilt may be the impetus but it should not be the reason. The amazing helpers such as the Union Gospel Mission, Covenant House and others in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver are not able to carry on doing what they do simply out of guilt. They do it out of love, and that is what keeps them going. They have a special kind of grace to do the work they do and I would hope their work makes them happy and fulfilled and energized most days, not drained and left feeling perpetually vulnerable and raw. At this stage in my life, guarded against burnout, and recovering from some heavy personal stuff, I give my homeless neighbours spare change, smiles, greetings and hopefully some dignity. For now, that is all the emotional energy I can spare, and recognizing this is no small thing.

I leave this post with one prevailing thought:

Let Me Tell You Something

Writing, for me, is an astoundingly personal thing. It is not only thoughts put into words, but my thoughts, my words, borrowed from my experiences and filtered through my fractured lens. "How do I know what I think until I see what I say?" or something like that. The fact is, I choose to post my thoughts on this blog for two reasons: 1) Writing for a potential audience is a good practice. I like talking to people and this way I can try to organize my thoughts into something cohesive with a beginning, middle and an end. So often, real conversations get interrupted or sidetracked, which is fine and fun most of the time, but can be unsatisfying for someone who likes to finish her stories. 2) I like feedback, even if most of the time it's only from family members and friends who support me as as person. I am not an introvert as so many writers tend to be, only a people person who needs some regular time and space to herself to sort out her thoughts.

As I sit at my desk this Saturday morning, later than I planned due to half an hour waiting for someone to answer my call at the Royal Bank of Canada VISA headquarters, I begin the plunge, yet again, into sharing my thoughts with 'the world'. Yet, I feel shy about sharing those thoughts sometimes, this morning included. Why should anyone care what I think? Really! The world is in constant turmoil and I tend to write about little, everyday matters which feel so inadequate in this current climate of fear and upheaval, not to mention flooding, fires and pestilence. My posts don't solve anything or help anyone in any concrete way - except perhaps, me. The act of typing words strung together as sentences and forming paragraphs is therapeutic and creative. Each time I blog I have built something, a sort of structure which I can add to the others of my building, and that process is, in itself, satisfying. Clicking the 'publish' button is like locking up my building once the windows are in. I know it isn't perfect and there is still much more work to do in my painfully slow progress as a writer, but my structure has at least reached a stage where I can look at it and say, 'There. I made that. I finished that."

I am a person who needs to contribute, but I am struggling to figure out how my contributions will be shaped in the future. For thirteen years I was on the board of the community arts council of my former town. Six of those years I spent as President. Then, I got a paying job. My job is not anything spectacular. It's a humble, three days per week position as kitchen staff at a cafe-bistro, but I enjoy the creative nature of my work making food for people (anyone who knows me should be aware of my passion for food), the tips are good, and it helps pay the bills. We also moved to the mid-sized city where my daughter's busy theater life happens. I had to let the arts council go and now I've stepped away I see what a huge role it played in my life. I maintained a sense of personal value and purpose in my volunteer role with the council, a role which also happened to be a huge amount of work. Stepping away allowed me the time to pick up my blog again after a two year hiatus, and I find some renewed sense of value and purpose in writing my posts. For now, my blog has to be my contribution to my community. I know in comparison to my other roles in life its impact is tiny. I know I am mostly just talking to myself and a few others, (thank you, family and those few friends), but sometimes the things we do for and from ourselves end up creating a positive, albeit diminutive, ripple.

Growing up when women were the product of the 1970's 'You've come a long way, baby' brand of Feminism, I entered motherhood with the sense I may be an anacronism. I had dropped out of university after deciding against becoming a teacher (yes, there is huge regret there) and had no visible career. I wanted to be at home with my beautiful kids and was lucky my husband was ambitious and career minded enough to earn a good living for the both of us. Yet, I craved more. I loved stories and reading, so I tried to write books as a way to glory and meaning within my family and friend circle of strong, capable, well educated women, but my books were failures. My books were failures mainly because they were deeply flawed in structure and I didn't know how to fix them. I survived those failures and learned the truth about myself. Writing is important to me, but it is not my ticket to another portal "outta here". It is the ticket to my inner life, my heart, my often wavering sense of self in this crazy world, and I will keep doing it even if people stop reading it. Honestly, though? I hope they don't stop reading it.

*The photo is a snowshoe hare changing its colours for a new season.

Number 260: The Last Post

When something feels like it is naturally drawing to a close - I like that expression; I imagine a delicate hand drawing a curtain over a tall window as, outside, day fades to dusk over the distant hills - I believe in letting it.

For the past few months I have felt this blog pulling away from my reach. I have attempted to pull it in, to own it once more, only to have it pull away from me again. I am not one for forcing things, and so I think it is time to let it go for good.

I started writing my Letters online in September, 2009. Five and a half years and 260 posts later I find myself looking outward toward other projects. My life has changed, too, as have my areas of focus. Three of my four children are grown up now and I am somewhat less home-based. I am just about ready to begin the revisions of the novel I spent last year writing and I know the task will consume whatever limited creative output is at my disposal.

Allowing change is healthy although, admittedly, transition can be hard. I will miss the online interaction with other bloggers and readers. While it is a stretch to call these others in the blogging community 'friends', I do believe some genuine connections were made with people in the U.K., Colorado, Virginia, and other places closer to home, and I am grateful. The entire experience enriched my life and furthered my ongoing education immeasurably, but I believe I have exhausted the format I chose for my blogging project. I have tried to write Letters that anyone, young, old and in-between might enjoy reading. I sought feedback but grew uninterested in agressive self-promotion because it seemed to detract from the simple pleasure of putting together my weekly posts. I shared bits of my psyche, my interests, memories, my pursuits and passions with whomever cared to read about them. The number of readers was rarely high but I do believe I brought a bit of light and joy to some people, some of the time.

My friend Kate who has made several wonderful scrapbooks of and for her children once told me that my blog was like a scrapbook for my children, of our adventures together and of my thoughts on many topics such as marriage and motherhood, the arts and nature. I like to think that is true. At some point, perhaps, I will have a book printed of some of my more interesting posts for them.

If you are reading this last post I want to thank you for providing me with a treasured audience, whether this one time or all two hundred sixty times. I have thoroughly enjoyed writing to you, wherever you are, and send you all my best wishes. Please have a listen to this lovely song, for it sums up my thoughts so well:

The Parting Glass

Sincerely and with love,

Rebecca

Sunset on the Fraser River

How to Land a Job in Thirty Seconds

I had been looking for a few months, casually, mind you. I was not confident that any business would be able to accommodate my offered limitations. I only wanted to work a couple of days per week; I could not work weekends; I wanted a job I would not have to take home with me.

Two of my children - college students now - have spent their holidays working at a busy cafe-bistro in the nearby resort village where their dad also works as a manager at the main resort hotel. My kids have often expressed their gratitude at working for such kind people as own the cafe and the owners never tire of telling me how appreciative they are of my children's good work ethic and attitude.

One Wednesday morning, which happened to be my husband's day off, I was struck by an idea out of the blue. I wondered aloud to my husband whether the cafe might be an option for me. I love cafes. I have worked in one before and spend much time in them, and know how busy they can be. My husband thought it was worth a try. That same morning I had to go to the resort village to take care of something at the art gallery I help to run. My husband had to drop in at work as well so we decided to make the ten minute trip to the village. I had phoned the cafe in question earlier, even before I was struck by the idea of working there, and one of the two owners answered. No, they would not reopen until the weekend - they take the entire month of January off like many businesses in the tourism dependent village - but they were in the cafe painting and cleaning and she had said, "Come by, I will make you a coffee!" A good opening line if I ever heard one.

My husband and I took care of our errands and then stopped by the cafe. The owner made me the promised coffee - my usual small Americano (espresso topped with hot water) - and we chatted about our college kids, the owners' time off and whatnot for a few minutes.

"The thing is," I said, "I am looking for a couple of days per week of work. It has been a challenge because I cannot work weekends."

It is difficult now to describe exactly what transpired in those seconds between my statement and success. The owner's eyes opened widely and she made the following points in some order: We have been so worried about reopening so short-staffed. I would love another adult working here. We have been waiting.

I responded with something like: Really? You have? I love cafes and cafe culture. I'm so glad. And then we hugged.

Even more simply put, they needed me as much as I needed them, which in my view is a great way to start a working relationship.

Back in January when I was working backstage for the musical my youngest was performing in I thought, 'When this is over I will enjoy all my free time.' When the play ended its run, however, I found I did not enjoy all that free time. I found it hard to get motivated. I was increasingly lonely and isolated. Almost all the work I do throughout the year - my volunteer work, my writing - requires self-motivation and often a mental workout. I realized that in January, even though I was so busy the structure of my days helped me get things done at home. I appreciated my time more. I did not feel quite so adrift and my days and weeks had a form and shape beyond getting up and seeing my daughter off to school and occupying myself until she returned at three o'clock in the afternoon. Although I did not want to be running off my feet as I had been during the play I did want more structure in my life. I needed it. Perhaps my life at home would suit an introverted person but I am not an introvert.

I worked my third shift at the cafe last Friday. There is so much to learn and I am absorbing everything with my eyes and ears at every minute. The cafe is a hopping place. The food is excellent and I find I am proud to make and serve it. We make most of our menu from scratch and plate it prettily. Our coffee is very good and roasted locally by people I have known for many years thanks to my other roles in the community. I have to work hard but the job is never boring; there is always a sauce to make or something to chop or clean. I am comfortable in the kitchen and feel at home in the physical and social nature of the work itself.

What do my children think of me working at their cafe? My youngest is happy. "This is good," she said decidely, after I assured her I would not be working on weekends or full time. She will also begin working a little at the adjoining ice cream parlour this summer. My older children, who will work at the cafe again when they return from college in the spring were happy for me, too, especially after I assured them that if the question came up of who would get hours in the summer they would always take precedence over their mother.

On Friday, many people I know came into the cafe. One person who works for the village's tourism office and whom I know through the arts council of which I am currently president said to me as I served him his lunch, "You are doing this, too?"

I said in response, "Yes, part-time, but this I get paid for."

He smiled and said, "Yes, this is true."

Note: I typed this post from the handwritten version I wrote in, you guessed it, a cafe this past weekend. The photo above is of the view from the resort village in question. 

Learning to Fly

My youngest daughter is deep into rehearsals for a production of a family-friendly version of the Broadway hit, The Addams Family. The musical is based on the original American comics by Charles Addams about a fictional family who, according to Wickipedia, 'are a satirical inversion of the ideal American family; an eccentric, wealthy clan who delight in the macabre and are unaware, or do not care, that other people find them bizarre or frightening.' The comics were published at intervals in The New Yorker between 1938 and 1988 when Charles Addams died. Films, TV series, video games and the above mentioned musical have all been based on the comics. Charles Addams said of his created family: 

Gomez and Pugsley are enthusiastic. Morticia is even in disposition, muted, witty, sometimes deadly. Grandma Frump is foolishly good-natured. Wednesday is her mother's daughter. A closely knit family, the real head being Morticia - although each of the others is a definite character - except for Grandma, who is easily led. Many of the troubles they have as a family are due to Grandma's fumbling, weak character. The house is a wreck, of course, but this is a house-proud family just the same and every trap door is in good repair. Money is no problem.

My daughter is double-casted (meaning she shares her alternating roles with another young actress) as Grandma and as a 1960's flight attendant, or stewardess as they called them in those days, in the chorus of undead ancestors. The production is on a large scale and will have a two week run in the new, and quite swanky, cultural centre in our nearby, mid-sized city which is also home to the school of performing arts which she attends for classes and rehearsals. I have not read the script, but I have a skeleton of the story thanks to my daughter's general enthusiastic chattiness, as well as a good idea of the various songs and dances - she practices in the house, of course. We have, thankfully, a room with a door on it downstairs where she can feel free to make all kinds of delightful vocal noise, and a large square of plywood on which she hones her tap sequences.

When our girl first began to practise her parts she would only do so when we were out. She has come a long way. Now she gleefully shows us videos of her and her castmates working on their routines which the director has filmed and posted on a secret Youtube channel, and eagerly demonstrates her dance moves. The school of performing arts is her second home and she loves everyone there and everything about it. Kids aged twelve to eighteen attend the school's Mainstage program and kids from tiny tots on up take all kinds of other classes and programs. Our daughter started with a couple of summer camps and then took two year-long programs before she asked to join the Mainstage program. Even though the program is a huge commitment from the kids and their parents, we agreed. Her sister was leaving home last September to attend college and our youngest would be the only one home during the school semesters. In order to help her forget how much she missed her siblings we helped her with her audition for the musical and enrolled her in the program. Little did I know how much I, too would become involved.

No, I will not be acting, singing and dancing in The Addams Family. I will be helping backstage as part of the production crew. I am learning new words like 'fly system' which are weighted ropes that are pulled with a certain amount of skill and muscle to move the set pieces up and down on horizontal pipes hung from the rafters above the stage, and 'main rag' which is the big, red velvet curtain which can be used to hide more involved set changes or to indicate the opening or closing of the performance. Tomorrow evening I will be learning what I need to do backstage for the entire show. I will have to be up past midnight many nights from now until the end of the show. Considering I am generally in bed by ten o'clock I will have to drink some extra coffee in the afternoons so I do not nod off in the cozy dark of the backstage area during the show. Then, we have 'cue to cue' rehearsals on the weekend, followed by two dress rehearsals on Monday and Tuesday, preview shows on Wednesday and Thursday, and then opening night on Friday.

I am glad I am not one of the performers. During our safety tour of the backstage area of the theatre the other night, I faced the rows and rows of seats from the stage and imagined them filled with people awaiting and expecting the performers' best. I confess I gasped at the thought. But the kids? They seem fearless. Those who catch the acting bug seem to thrive on performing in front of crowds. My daughter has certainly caught the bug, but even she has confessed to being a little scared and nervous. She has never performed for such a large audience, not since her elementary school choir shows when the audience was filled mainly with parents. She is also tremendously excited to take the past four months' practise and rehearsal and preparation and throw it at an audience. For my part, I merely hope I can support her and the other kids by doing whatever it is I have to do backstage properly. I will take a break to watch at least once from the audience, though. My husband and I are going to attend the opening night performance and gala.

Watching this video from the original Broadway production has stirred the magic for me and I can't wait to see my daughter and all her friends in their roles. As we say in the theatre biz, 'Break a leg!'

Being Canadian: A Complicated Kindness

As our lives on this globe intersect at an ever increasing rate, the desire for us to understand each other as nations grows. When we encounter another culture we often have many questions, some of which have clear cut answers and some of which do not. For example, if one of my ex-pat British friends is asked why Brits drink so much she will say decidedly, 'because they know their country's going down the toilet and there ain't nothing they can do about it.' On the other hand, if I ask why Brits make such good television, the answers are as in depth as I choose to go. The question I would like to ask Hollywood is: why is the collective imagination in the US fixated on superhero and post-apocalyptic movies? I imagine the response to be: because America's debt and lifestyle gap between rich and poor is so off the charts they crave something drastic to happen in order to save the situation, but their own answer would probably have more to do with hero worship. However, if asked why Canadians seem so polite, the answers are not quite so clear. What is it that makes us say 'I'm sorry' every time something happens that may or may not inconvenience another person? 'I'm sorry' is the typical knee-jerk response when we Canadians bump into each other, when we set out to give an opposing opinion, even when we go for the coffee shop cream urn at the same time. As children 'I'm sorry!' is what we call out to the parent bearing down on us with a threatening look in their eye, hoping against hope those two words will stem the tide of disciplinary action coming our way - that worked for me a few times, so I included it.

It occurred to me today that the 'I'm sorry' habit may be something more than what many comedians claim is the Canadian's way of getting out of a potentially uncomfortable situation.* I was in church yesterday when an elderly woman in the pew in front of me accidentally knocked the book in my hand as she sat down earlier than I. Her apology was profuse and completely unnecessary due to the fact that she had barely touched me. I automatically responded with, "Oh no, I'm sorry." We smiled at each other with sympathetic looks peppered with good humour and left it at that. Something then occured to me: the 'I'm sorry' habit is at best about having good will toward other people. Let me explain. If a man and I go for the coffee shop's cream urn at the same time, generally both of us will urge the other to use it first. One of us will be more insistent than the other and finally, after a several laboured seconds one of us will pour the cream into our cup. We will then return the urn to the counter and smile at the other person who kindly insisted we go first, and we will go back to our seats, him feeling proud of his gallantry, and I feeling grateful for it. If this reads like some sort of complicated dance, it is, but as Canadians, we learn it early in life so it stays with us always and leads to a fairly comfortable and pleasant way of going about our daily business. If I have my head down in the grocery store as I consult my list and accidentally bump someone else's cart, I will apologize immediately. If an explanation is required to calm the ire of the bumpee, I will give it and I can usually get a smile from them in the end. Like many Canadians I will do almost anything to avoid conflict, especially in public.

Why are we so eager to avoid conflict at all costs when other nations (I'm thinking France, Italy) seem to thrive on it? I have a theory about that, too. As I said above, I have a few British friends who have lived in Canada for many years, but are still a bit baffled by our social niceties. In theory I agree with them wholeheartedly when they say they prefer the Brit way of just calling a spade a spade and being done with it, rather than all this dancing around the issues. "Brits just speak as we find and move on," said one ex-pat friend after she had witnessed two co-workers in her Canadian office have a big ol' cat fight. Apparently, they had hidden their true feelings about each other for so long that eventually, and predictably, they reached the boiling point and the lid blew off.  My Brit friend who is a teacher had a hard time figuring out the parents of her students until she understood about the tendency of Canadians to avoid open conflict. She would think everything was going along fine with a parent and then one day, somehow, would find out the parent had been harbouring resentment against her for months for some action taken with her child. My friend had detected a certain chill in the air when she and the parent came in contact, but had no idea of the feelings simmering away underneath the surface. My theory about why we Canadians may act like that parent at times is essentially based on my observation that Canadians avoid open conflict because we who live in a cold climate eight months of the year place a huge value on personal physical comfort and safety, and this makes us lazy in our dealings with others. We just do not want to 'go there', but eventually we have to and by then the situation is usually beyond nasty, or at least beyond what it was originally. But, this is the 'I'm sorry' habit at its worst, and, being Canadian, I would rather not dwell on the negative.

I suppose we have historically been the Peacekeepers in global conflict because really, we would just like everyone to calm down, sit back and relax with a beer or even a doughnut. Anything pressing can usually be put off until tomorrow, and a difficult decision is generally made better by the act of sleeping on it. A Dutch man I once worked for said when he first moved to Canada in the 90's he was unimpressed by the Canadian way. No one seemed to work with any urgency, we valued our holidays more than anything, and meeting for coffee at Tim Horton's was often the highlight of the day. Mind you, he had immigrated to British Columbia, which is seen as one of the more relaxed provinces in the country. Over time, he said, he began to see the wisdom of our ways. He began spending more time enjoying life with his family and exploring the area near his home.He decided life was not just about work and making money, but that approach took some getting used to. Now, I would not be surprised if he even said to his clients, "I'm sorry, I cannot possibly fill your order today. I am celebrating Canada Day with my family," and let the chips, or rather the doughnut sprinkles, fall where they may.

*Twelve Ways to Say I'm Sorry

My apologies to author Miriam Toews for stealing her book title 'A Complicated Kindness' for this post.