Wednesday, December 28, 2016

2016: Year In Review

I so don't want to join in on all the "Fuck you, 2016" sentiment that's going around right now, but I have to admit that it is hard not to hate a year that brought us President-Elect Donald Trump, and took from us George Michael, Carrie Fisher, Alan Rickman, David Bowie, Leonard Cohen, and a host of other luminaries. 

Sometimes I see social media posts from my circle of friends and acquaintances, and they make me want to weep. Even worse, they make me want to give up. My goal for the coming year is to try and find a way to be informed while still staying positive. I don't want to be a Nero/Pollyanna, endlessly fiddling while Rome burns, but if all we ever point out is the dark, the despairing, the apocalyptic... aren't we feeding the beast? No, wait- I'm going to be more declarative on this one: We ARE feeding the beasts of negativity, despair, hopelessness, and apathy if all we notice and write about are the bad things that surround us. It's all too easy to be a dark tourist in this life, watching the world crumble and posting things like "We're all doomed." But it takes real guts to see the world at its worst and face it with humour (sometimes very black humour indeed) and hope, and then to actually take action against the things that scare us. Some of my friends have faced unimaginable pain in their lives and emerged angry and fierce and funny, dammit. They are my inspiration as we limp into 2017.

For me personally, 2016 was actually not a bad year at all. I am- still- lucky enough to love and be loved by a really wonderful person. I have a great relationship with my parents and sibling. I grew to like teaching more and more, and for the first time in ages, I made enough money to live on comfortably. I'm still living with family/roommates, which keeps my rent low, and I'm even starting to look for my own place, which I crave. But I love my house, and I love my neighbourhood, so I have the luxury of having lots of time to find my own digs. Considering the current Vancouver rental market, that's a damn good thing. 

(Although doing a post like this may seem self-indulgent, I like writing them, because I'm often reminded of events and occasions I'd totally forgotten.)
Here we go then, the year in review:

January: I dragged myself out of the sleepy torpor created by almost a month off, and got back to work, albeit reluctantly. I screwed up the courage to back out of a gig that I really didn't want to do, and felt nothing but relief once I did. But, as my sweetheart always says, I am the busiest lazy person he knows; I helped him to move apartments by finding him a place (Facebook luck) and by unpacking and helping to set up his new home. 

February: Halfway through the month I dived happily into rehearsals for a new play. It reminded me that although teaching puts food on the table and is becoming more and more fun, theatre really feeds my soul. The process for this show required everyone to be onstage for the entire performance, and also to be at all rehearsals, all the time. What could have been arduous was simply wonderful. I happily took the bus to rehearsals, and it was the perfect time to be working 6 days a week, because it barely ever stopped raining. 

March: My show opened, to good reviews and decent houses. I got the chance to work at a theatre I'd never worked at before (The Firehall Arts Centre). During this busyness, I was also rehearsing for an album release concert, and of course, I was still teaching as well, both privately and at a music school. 

April: The album release concert happened, and it sounded beautiful, although it could have been better-attended. I worked, trained for a Standardized Patient roleplaying gig, and learned to make yoghurt, a feat I have only attempted twice since. 

May: "This life I wanted to build for myself in Vancouver? It's happening." I wrote last May. I was realizing that, much as I may miss my crazy life up north doing interpretive theatre in a gold rush ghost town, my new life is rich and I have no regrets about turning my back on that world. (Except that I wish I could visit, but it's so remote and expensive.) I went to Victoria to see friends, played gigs, got a volunteer gig ushering so I could see more theatre. 

June: The day after my music school job ended, I jumped on a plane and flew to Saskatoon for the second summer in a row, to work for a different theatre company for 6 weeks doing theatre-in-the-park. Our play was a Cree story, and I got to work with indigenous actors, do workshops with youth, play 6 different instruments, go to a sweat lodge, and reaaallllly get to know parks all over Saskatoon. I had also made a strong commitment to getting healthy, and this was helped immeasurably by the fact that I had to bike and walk everywhere while I was away. I loved doing the show, and I loved being back in Saskatoon, my new second home. 

July: This month gave me the rare gift of being able to focus on one job for a while, while getting to know my second home a little bit better. Despite weather that was often more like Vancouver's than Saskatoon's, we were only rained out twice. I took the plunge and got my hair cut. Then I cut it even shorter. I started to be very aware of the discrepancy between my idyllic life and the injustices that were giving rise to hashtags like #BlackLivesMatter. 

August: Flew back home, went to a job interview (quite hungover), and managed to secure a new job, teaching music to preschoolers, which was not something I knew anything about. Decided to procrastinate like hell on that one, and enjoy my month off to the hilt. There was a great deal to enjoy: I made a music video of one of my songs (or rather, two lovely people made it; I drank a lot of wine and sang along to a recording of myself over and over); a cousin of mine came over from the UK and we all made a trip up to the Okanagan to have some wonderful family time (plus, I learned to rock climb); and my lover and I spent several blissful weeks house-sitting a converted barn in Fort Langley. We also spent a lot of time working, because we discovered to our surprise that our creation, Little Ali Fox, was one of ten finalists in the Ottawa Animation Festival's Pitch This! event, and therefore we needed to raise funds so that Jay could travel to Ottawa. I continued to run a lot, and because we were living in the middle of nowhere, I also used my bicycle a great deal. It was blissful. 

September: Holy switching gears, Batman! I transitioned from rural life: dirt between my toes, homegrown veggies, river swimming... to so many new challenges. My music school underwent a huge shift in its way of operating which ultimately benefitted me greatly, as I was able to use my skills as a multi-instrumentalist rather than just being a reluctant piano teacher. I began teaching preschool music at another music school, a job I hated for several months until I got on top of it (more or less) and learned to love it. I started playing ukulele  On top of this, I went back to school as a student, taking a psychology class at Capilano University. which is one of the prerequisite courses of the Music Therapy program.  On top of all this, I decided that there was JUST NO WAY that Jay should go to Ottawa for this animation festival without me. So I impulsively bought a plane ticket and went with him for 31 hours. Which was AMAZING. Expensive, but amazing. We didn't win Pitch This!, but it was still worth it. 

October: More work, more music, more running. I really enjoyed my new band, which I formed in the fall when the old folk band dissolved due to members moving away. I bought a U-bass, which I love playing, both at the music school and in my band. Music, music, music. And Psych 100, which I loved, to my surprise. 

November: Man, what can I say about a month in which we watched a narcissistic orange get elected president? We all felt the world collectively cringe. We all struggled to feel any hope at all. 

December: Somewhat to my surprise: It snowed!!! (The ground, over 20 days later, is still more white than green.) In fact, this is the first white Christmas in Vancouver that I can remember. Also to my surprise: I got an A minus in my Psych class (maybe because my exam was delayed by a day. THANK YOU, SNOW.) I finished schools of all sorts, and dived happily into doing fuck-all for 3 weeks. Oh, and I decided to set myself a fitness challenge and try to run every day for 30 days. Aaaannnnd, the gods said:
Ha
ha
ha
ha 
ha.
But hey, I ran over 10 times! So it wasn't quite as impressive as I had hoped, but I still ran way more than I usually do.  
I got to score a short film, which was a blast. I attended, and participated in, my music school's Christmas concerts, and felt more love for my work than ever before. It's a complicated, frustrated love at times, but hey, what love isn't? 
Oh, and Christmas! I love Christmas! 

And by the way, if we're speaking of love... I have to give major kudos to Jay for his amazing ideas, his crazy work ethic, and the way he gives 110% to everything. I love you with the passion of a thousand fiery suns, to quote from the podcast I'm listening to as I write this. Also my friends, both the ones I talk to on Facebook, and the ones I actually, you know, see

That was my year. Welcome to 2017, folks. In the spirit of hope, I hope I'll see you all next year. Be fierce. Be funny. Above all, stay alive. I love you. 

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