Blood.

I just rode the Greyhound back tonight from five day's-worth of holidays in the Okanagan with family and friends. Appropriately enough, the sky grew dark and scary as we drove through the mountains, and rain hit the bus hard as the wipers flashed to keep the glass clean. After 5 days of hot sun, blue skies and dry nights, the rain signalled like nothing else that the party was Over.

I ate cheese curds on the bus, because I was hungry. Now I smell of dairy, and I feel queasy, in that will-it-pass-or-will-it-get-worse kind of way. It is midnight, and the Snack Of Regret is keeping me awake, because I'm afraid that if I sleep, I will wake up and have to barf. Don't eat cheese curds on the bus, people. Just don't. 

My cousin was visiting from England with his wife, which was the reason for my visit. Twenty years since we'd last met, so one of us was a child (him) and one of us was barely not-a-child (me) last time we set eyes on each other. Now he's married, with a job in IT. And a musician, and probably many other things I don't know about. We'd be walking around, or talking, or just hanging out, and I'd look at his face and see my own features looking back at me, and I would marvel. He looks more like me than my own brother. My father and his look remarkably alike, and this resemblance has been passed on to their children. Big eyes, wide cheekbones, thin lips, fine brown hair. Some of the same features I have already written about how I love/hate, and they're not just mine: they belong to my bloodline.

I never really understood about extended family. They were Over There and we were Over Here and that's just how it was. What IS family? For me, it was just the four of us. A few satellites: grandmas and grandpas would appear occasionally and then go home again. One grandma lived with us for a while, but I was a teenager, and too self-absorbed to really make her part of my life. The weight of Family and Blood sits so lightly on my shoulders. I really think that is a gift that my parents have given me, that lightness. Hundreds of boring family dinners and petty disagreements missed. The stale trap of life within a group you never had the luxury of choosing. But also: no cousins to grow up with. No connection to the people who came before me. No seeing my eyes and mouth in the people across the dinner table from me. 

My cousin, my dad, and me.

My people were all around me this week. My cousin and his wife chose to come here from the UK to spend their holiday with us. My brother and his wife took the time to show them around Vancouver. I gave them my room while they stayed here. Then we drove up to the Kelowna to spend time with my dad and his girlfriend, who welcomed all us overgrown kids: fed us, drove us around, bought us meals. My boyfriend and his mom spent hours driving me to and fro so that I could also visit with them in Penticton. I am lucky not only in my blood family but in my chosen family: my friends, my love, his relatives and friends.

 I walk into the tidy sewing room in the pleasant condo shared by a retired husband and wife in their seventies, and my heart misses a beat. There she is, smiling out from a photograph. My lover's long-dead girlfriend. Her parents have invited my boyfriend, his mother and I for a quick coffee; they haven't seen him in many years and they want to say hello. We are very Canadian: we are polite and friendly. There are no tears, and only the gentlest of reminiscences, although the way of her dying left a lot of pain behind. Mostly we talk of their present: retirement, quilting, grandchildren. I look around the table and sip my coffee and marvel at the strangeness of it. If she were alive I would not be here at this table, whether or not my love and I would have eventually found each other anyway. And yet although it is strange for me, and probably for them, I am glad to be here in this moment. I feel a little closer to the man I love and to his mother and also to his past. 

Social media is really great sometimes. It's made my family connection stronger, even with the great distance that separates us. We FaceTime and we FaceBook. The older generations have all died out now, and so far there are no children to follow us. But we are lucky. We feel that lightness, the freedom that comes with our generations, but we look at each other and say I choose you. To be family, yes, but also to be friends. My people.

This is why I love my mom:

Because she's still stage-managing cool shows at the age of she'll kill me if I tell you nevermind.

Because I can place a phone call at 7:30 and say "Please come to this gig. There's no one here and I need company." And she'll be right there.

Because at the gig, when the lead singer explains that his next song is about a photo of a child in a war-torn country, crying at the ruins of her bombed-out school, my mother is irreverent enough to lean over to me and say "I think most kids would be delighted if a rocket hit their school."

Because she'll stay 'til the end of the gig and drive me and my accordion home.

I had a dream the other night, that my mom was dead and a lawyer and I were dividing her property, which in the dream amounted to (I kid you not) a box of chocolates. So I was saying to the lawyer "Well I think basically we should divide up the chocolates so that everyone gets a little bit of everything: nuts, cream centres..." And then in the dream I realized that she was truly dead and my heart cracked open.

So here's to a long life ahead for my mom, who plays by her own rules, drives me nuts (and cream centres too), and is always, always there for me when I need her. I don't know what I'll do when she's not.

Roadtrip

A conversation then ensued, on not unfamiliar lines. Miss Bartlett was, after all, a wee bit tired, and thought they had better spend the morning settling in; unless Lucy would at all like to go out? Lucy would rather like to go out, as it was her first day in Florence, but, of course, she could go alone. Miss Bartlett could not allow this. Of course she would accompany Lucy everywhere. Oh, certainly not; Lucy would stop with her cousin. Oh, no! that would never do. Oh, yes! 

-E.M. Forster, A Room With A View

There was a moment, while I was unpacking my things in the hotel room that first night, that I had a twinge. Here we were, two related, unmarried spinster ladies brushing our teeth and folding our underwear; already tired at 8pm! I was holidaying with my mom: how un-cool! Would this trip be a disaster? Then I shook it off. My mom is no Cousin Charlotte and I am no Lucy Honeychurch (in more ways than one since I am far too old for one thing). This roadtrip was a chance to spend some time together before I vanished up north for the summer. I chose Seattle because it is in another country and therefore exotic, but it is less than 3 hours' drive away and therefore easy to get to.

Oh Seattle! Being there is like being in an alternate-universe Vancouver: there is a market, and an ocean view, and mountains, and delicious restaurants... they are so alike, and yet there are differences too. More brick buildings (a shame if The Big One hits Seattle, but so lovely in the meantime). More visible history. Less soul-destroyingly boring condos. Better liquor laws. Neighbourhoods that feel vibrant and funky and have managed to keep Big Business at bay. I was trying to quantify the different vibe but all I could come up with was that people in Seattle seem to have a true appreciation for the finer things in life: food is crafted with care, cafes are lovingly decorated, buildings are painted inside and out, communities are cherished and nurtured, the arts are supported. I know that I am seeing it through the rose-coloured lenses of a quick pleasure trip, but that's how it feels to me.

Anyway, the two spinster ladies got along famously, and if we did have an alarmingly uncool tendency to fall asleep around 10pm clutching English mystery novels... well, we had an excuse: we walked between four and six hours a day. And Seattle is not a flat city. I had a little guidebook which suggested various neighbourhoods we should visit, and every day we picked a few and trekked around them. I think we basically did a marathon, but we stretched it over 3-and-a-1/2 days with lots of food stops. My mom is the kind of person who looks as if a good wind might topple her, but I mapped one of our days of walking and it was over 10k. She is also totally game for trying out my vague suggestions: "I remember eating breakfast about 7 years ago at this great little Mexican place in Beacon Hill- I think it's the one that's mentioned in this newspaper. Can we try and find it?" "I think there's a park at the end of this road. Can we check it out?" "I read about this play that's about Scottish soldiers in Iraq. Shall we see it?" And she'd smile and nod, and off we'd head to Beacon Hill/Golden Gardens Park/the Paramount Theatre.

We also stopped in at Delancy and Essex, which I'd read about here. In fact, we bookended our trip with 2 visits there, because: succulent pizza! Seductive cocktails! Little cauliflour-and-pine nut-toasts! Lovely ambience! and the second time we met Molly Wizenberg, who owns both places with her husband. It's a little bit weird, meeting someone whose blog (and book) you've read, because you feel like I know all this stuff about you and yet of course, you don't really know them at all. But she was very sweet, and it's nice to know that down south in Alternate-Universe-Vancouver there is a little pizza place and cocktail bar that is just as lovely in real life as it sounds in print.

The elegant Essex.

My hands-down fave community in Seattle is Ballard, and I like to think there's an Alternate Universe Alison who's just opening a little bar or bookstore there (okay, enough with the alternate universe stuff, it's getting a bit creepy).

This? Oh, just one of the many reasons I didn't lose weight in Seattle.

I like to think I know a little bit more about Seattle now, and I certainly know enough to want to go back, and soon. 

Golden Gardens Park, Ballard.

It's funny, finishing this post now, because I'm back up north, have been since Saturday. When you travel very quickly from one place to another, totally different place, time has a funny way of playing tricks on you. I was still in Seattle this time last week, but it seems like a small lifetime ago. I got home from the States, finished packing and moving out, crashed with my long-suffering mom for 2 nights, got epically drunk with my brother, took the Greyhound early Saturday morning (still dizzy and nauseous from the cocktails), and... arrived. I'm cat-and house-sitting for friends this week, which means I have cushy digs all to myself for a while. I've been unpacking, catching up with friends, enjoying the unseasonal warmth, and getting more exercise in a few days than I ever get in Vancouver. Work starts tomorrow. I look out at the mountains and the bog, and marvel that I was somewhere so different just a week ago. 

What Superbowl?

I spent most of the day in a blissful state, which was so surprising and pleasant and also unexpected. It was a very lazy state of bliss, which is why I have no pictures to document it. I was petsitting at my brother's place, and I spent a large part of the day on his big comfy couch, along with the cat and the dog. They were my gurus of sloth, and I was their eager apprentice. At one point, my stomach full of a delicious home-cooked breakfast, lying back on the couch with my feet propped up, I chuckled from sheer delight. Later that day I saw that my sister-in-law had posted something about the wonderfully relaxing Thai massage she was getting (hence my petsitting duties), and I thought: you didn't have to go halfway around the world. You didn't even have to leave your place.
But of course that's the thing. You do have to leave. My brother and his wife's place is a sanctuary for me precisely because it isn't my place. In fact, with its right-downtown location, bland anonymous hallways,  highrise view and small square footage, I often feel as if I'm staying in a hotel when I'm there. A hotel where tumbleweeds of pet hair whisk by, but still...
I was so relaxed that I didn't even remotely freak out at the fact that I was going to meet my sweetheart's little girl this afternoon. And because I was so relaxed, of course she was too. She's five.  We had a lovely time together. I always forget how much I enjoy the company of children because I don't spend much time with them as a rule, but they can be so great. Especially once they hit 4 or 5 and are becoming little people rather than tiny tyrants with limited vocabulary skills and stability issues. (I'm NOT a huge fan of toddlers or babies, in case you hadn't guessed, although there are exceptions. I like people I can talk to and reason with, but I have always pretty much loved my friends' kids even when they were very tiny. Proof that I have good taste in friends, surely.) And so a momentous occasion happened with little fanfare or fuss, which is exactly as it should be.
Contrary to the title of this post, we did actually have the Superbowl on tv for a minute or two. For the halftime show, which I thought was an utter waste of time. Ignoramus that I am, I had assumed that a halftime show would be at least 30 minutes. Maybe an hour. Nope. And although I think Beyonce has a great voice her tunes leave me untouched. So mostly we watched Horton Hears A Who instead. (Hey, there was a 5 year-old around.She was a good excuse and I utterly loathe football anyway.)
And so a blissful day was had by all, except maybe the cat, who was slightly alarmed at there being a small child in the place.
A couple more weeks to go and I'll be having a 1-week break, which seems mighty soon after Christmas Break but I'm not complaining. They call it Reading Week, but it's basically our Spring Break. And I'll be chaffing at the bit for some kind of small adventure, and hopefully exercising a bit too. After all, there's a corset in my near future... I got on the exercise bike that's in our living room the other day and it felt really good to work up a sweat.
By the way, I don't think I've mentioned (and if I have it bears repeating) that I love school this term! It's funny how you can have such a 180-degree shift in attitude, and I think a lot of it is just that I've come through whatever depressed/overwhelmed state I was in and am feeling way more positive about everything in general these days. The giant chip on my shoulder about how nobody liked me and how out-of-place I felt just kind of...vanished, and I am getting along fine with all sorts of people in my classes.
I AM feeling pretty guilty about not working right now, though, especially since last term I managed to hold down a pretty demanding sound design job for the first month and a half of term. Plus I just miss being challenged, even though I always complain like hell when I feel overwhelmed and anxious about work. What happened was that my brother and I both have some money coming to us, courtesy of my granddad, who died last October, so I decided I didn't need to rush out and look for a joe-job this term. I know, maybe that's a lazy attitude, but my reasoning was:

• I really wanted to enjoy this term without getting spread too thin trying to work as well
• Weekends are pretty much the only time I can spend quality time with my sweetheart
• My joe-job qualifications are in retail rather than restaurant work. It's harder (although not impossible) to find evening shifts in retail work than it is if you're a waitress/cook. 
• It would be hard to find a restaurant that would take me on, since I'm nearly 40 and still have NO experience in the food industry
• Murphy's Law states that no sooner would I land a joe-job than I would get offered a great music/theatre gig and have to juggle waaay too much stuff at once. Plus, I have to leave town in May, which makes me even less of a catch for any store that might be hiring. 

But of course I was counting on the money coming in early January (which I had been told would be the case). One month later, I'm still waiting. Ouch. It may be that Fate is telling me to grow some gumption and start creating opportunities for myself. Maybe I shouldn't be so eager to learn life lessons from my lazy feline and canine companions after all...

holiday

You know you're in for a long bus ride when the the (wo)man who's about to sit next to you on the Greyhound hacks up a lung and then says "Don't worry, I'm not contagious" in a phlegm-riddled voice. "Heather" had the body of a woman, the face and voice of a 50-something man, and a cough that was terrifying to hear.  But the plus side was that she (?) and I were on an express bus from Kelowna to Vancouver with no stops in suburbia along the way. We actually arrived in the city almost two hours ahead of schedule; so early that I couldn't raise my mother on the phone (she's a bit cel-phone challenged, and it often sits, forgotten, in her purse, which is where it was tonight as I tried to contact her many many times), and so I took a cab home instead of getting a ride with mom.
It's good to be back in my sitting room with my spiky Charlie-Brown Christmas tree. I bought myself a few belated-Christmas treats tonight: a little yet powerful laptop speaker, some warm socks, a box of hair colour... gonna see in the new year with no roots showing, dammit! It was a good year for prezzies: mom gave me some money (yay!) and a juicer, which I am going to start using right quick, as the Christmas indulgence has taken its toll and the scales are telling me it's time to EAT LESS. Dad continued a fine Christmas tradition we started last year: he waited until I was in Kelowna and then took me to buy a pair of boots. Boots are a fetish of mine (I seldom wear shoes, actually) and I can't really afford them and Boxing Day usually produces some great bargains... Last year I got some fabulous red boots, but this year I needed some practical, comfy everyday walking boots. I got these:

I LOVE Keen boots! And these are as comfy as they look...

He also gave me a mandoline, which was a cast-off gift, because it was in his kitchen and he wasn't using it and I was like "I wanna make more salads this year!" It has a safety handle thingy, but I have already managed to julienne my thumbnail with it. However if I master it, I will have many thinly-sliced vegetables in my future.
Christmas was a little dull this year, I have to admit. Christmas Eve rocked, because I spent it with my mom, and we had a lot of fun. We went to the Christmas Jazz Vespers at a big church downtown in the afternoon and then we ate Beef in Guinness sauce at her place with her roomie, her eccentric cougar millionaire friend S, and her lonely and rather wistful friend Q. It was better than it sounds, trust me. Then I went caroling in West Van with some friends late at night and had a couple hours' sleep at my mom's before getting on the Greyhound to see my dad.
Unfortunately, his ladyfriend, L, was really sick with a nasty ear infection. PLUS my brother and his wife hadn't made it out of Vancouver because they needed to rent an SUV to make the trip, and there were none left. So we didn't really do... anything. In the past we've visited neighbours or stayed at home and drank too much wine or went skating on the pond down the street... but there is definitely a critical mass of people and wine that must be reached before fun and shenanigans can happen. And we didn't reach it this year. My dad and I are very similar in some ways, but for whatever reasons, we don't really click. Without my brother there, it was pretty quiet. Oh, and his dog had died last spring, so the house seemed very big and quiet. I often found my dad's dog really annoying, but it wasn't the same without him trying to eat all the Christmas food. I just don't feel as if I can be myself with my dad,  and I don't have much to say to him. So we watched a lot of Netflix and tv, ate too much, and went for a couple of bracing walks while his girlfriend suffered through her ear infection. So as I mentioned, I am happy to be home! Better luck next year.
Boring Christmas aside, I have been feeling pretty good lately. Acupuncture seems to be helping my mood, and even those painful acupressure seeds in my ear seemed to be effective, if annoying. Tomorrow night I am off to see Gogol Bordello at the Commodore, which I am very psyched about! I saw those guys years ago in Seattle and I am thrilled to see them again. I still have another week to go before school starts up again, and I plan to enjoy my last days of freedom to the max. My next mission is to find something cheap and fun to do on New Year's Eve, something involving music and dancing. I am damned if I'm going to start 2013 in a boring way!
Happy Christmas and New Year to all of you. May your year start any way you want it to! Love and peace and creativity and fun to all. xo

13 Things That Were Great About Today... and 1 not-so-great thing

1. I called my sweetheart this morning while I was still lying in bed. I love doing this.
2. He mentioned that it was "all white" where he was. I got up and drifted over to the sitting room and lo! It was snowy where I was, too! Have I mentioned how much I love snow? Especially before and around Christmas?
3. My marks are in, and my lowest grade at the end of this term is a B+ (one class). All the rest are A's, A+'s or A-'s. Yes!
4. I actually went to my local library today...
5. ...where I ran into my musician friend Dave. Thereby assuring that there will be some kind of giggery or jammery in my future...
6. and I also now have a whole bunch of interesting books to read and movies to watch. For free. Love the library!
7. I dropped my stuff off at the laundromat, so now I have clean sheets and clothes.
8. I had the bright idea of calling my mom, so I had company for a great walk. Up the hill into Burnaby Heights, stopping in at all the interesting-looking delis and butchers and bookshops.
9. She was looking for some green peppercorns in brine, which I'd never heard of before. (Unless they were the famed "pickled peppers" that Peter Piper picked a peck of). And we were in one of those great stores that just has everything packed away on its teetering shelves, a fabulous mess of middle eastern and Italian and god-knows-what and I looked down and... voila. 
10. I asked at my favorite bookstore if they were hiring. And they ARE. And they have a giant cat. I have always wanted to work at a store with a cat.  So I might actually have some work for the new year.
11. We got back to my place after a 2-hour walk and made potato pancakes as well as chorizo sausages and sweet-sour cucumbers, accompanied by applesauce and sour cream. You know when a meal is actually all that you hope it will be? Yes.
12. This teapot. Which I bought at my favorite restaurant in the little town I live in all summer. So not me, with its flowers and froufrou. But somehow it pleases me deeply. It has cherries for feet! How great is that?  I am drinking orange spice tea out of it right now.
13. It is almost 7pm and I have a pile of new books to look at and movies to watch. How nice. 

1. My acupuncturist put some auricular acupressure beads into my left ear. Three of them. They're supposed to help with my foot and back pain and with calming thoughts. I'm supposed to rub them 3-4 times a day. But they hurt. A lot. Not only when I touch them but when I try to:

• wear a hat
• use my headphones
• lie on my left side to sleep
• ...and when I'm just sitting there minding my own business.

Given that my back gets sore when I lie on it, it seems rather cruel that yet another option (sleeping on my left side) has been taken away, at least for the next few days. Plus, how am I supposed to have happy thoughts when my damn ear hurts all the time? Has anyone else tried these? Are they supposed to hurt this much??

In the midst of honking horns, gleeful shouts, a fairytale ending to two weeks of olympic games-

A sobering email comes in.

It's from my aunt in England. It's titled simply, Mother. It can only mean one thing.

My grandmother, my mother's mother. Gladys Dennis. Grandmee is dead, at the staggering age of 103.

Bon writes so tenderly in this post about caring for her grandfather as he nears the end of his life in a hospital bed. I am bowled over by her love for him. I am so sad that I have never felt anything like this for my own grandparents.

My relationship with her was a casualty of distance and dementia. She lived in England. I live in Canada. When she did live with us, for 5 years, her mind was still ok but her body was failing her. She was the sick lady in the guest bedroom. Then as her body got better, my parents split up and she went back to the UK and lost her memory. My aunt would go upstairs to work and Gran would forget that she was still there and call the police and say she'd been abandoned. She went into a home and survived, as tiny and frail as a bird, long after her sense of self had flown.

When she saw you, her face would light up and she'd say "Hello, Lovely!" Even though she didn't really know who you were she knew you were someone she loved.

She couldn't remember what happened fifteen minutes ago, but she could sing the lyrics to wartime pop songs and seeing Hitler's face in a documentary could still inspire pure terror in her.

Her house was bombed to the ground in World War Two.

She survived on her own after her husband Fred Dennis died of emphysema when my mom was 19.

She was born in 1906. Nineteen-oh-six. Can you imagine the things she saw, the changes she lived through?

I wish I'd known her better. I wish I'd appreciated her more when she was with us. I wish so much of my family wasn't so far away.

Rest in peace, Grandma.

The new year is really here. Time to take down the blue disco-ball Christmas decorations hanging off every available surface in our apartment. Time to start making those calls and doing that practicing and looking for those jobs and setting those goals. It really is. Time, I mean.

As we age, my brother and I, and have no children to replace us as "the kids", we spend Christmas in a floaty sort of limbo. The Day itself, the 25th, becomes less important (for me, Christmas has always been about the 24th anyway; the anticipation being so much more fun and mysterious and exciting than the payoff of Christmas Day.), but if I'm lucky and not working, Christmas Day becomes Christmas Week, which lasts until the 1st of January.

So it was this year. My brother, his wife and I flew to my Dad's on the 25th (replacing getting up early for presents with getting up early for the airport), and lay around on my father's truly excellent couches eating rich food, drinking too much, and watching hockey. There were no hyper-excited children underfoot, and not much in the way of presents, since we'd spent the money on plane tickets instead. And what is Christmas without kids, really? Well, just a time to eat, drink, be with family. A time for talking with far-flung family members over the speakerphone or on Skype. A time to be there for my dad, who lost his wife last Boxing Day.

He's doing great, though. Looking ahead, not pining for what he lost. And, symbolic though a "new year" is, I too am looking ahead to see what comes next.

I'm working on my attitude, that's the first thing. I'm staying positive, even though I have this cold which won't #%$%& leave. I partied a little too hard last week, ran 8km with my super-fit brother right after Christmas, played a high-energy New Year's Eve party and stayed up until 3:30 that morning. All of which was very, very fun. All of which was very, very bad for this cold, which has lodged itself in my chest and nose and is hanging on like grim death.

So the challenge has been: how do I spin this into something good? And the answer- well, maybe I can be thankful for having this weekend free, so I can rest and take care of myself before work and meetings begin. Maybe I can be thankful that being stuck inside gives me time to do some brainstorming and journaling instead of running around trying to do too much in the cold and damp.

And I am thankful. Because although staring the new year feeling awful was not what I would have wished, it has reduced life to the essentials. Stay warm and dry. Conserve energy. Plan, but don't do. Spend one day doing nothing but watching tv and eating expensive takeout you can't even taste because your nostrils are plugged up.

Rest, and wait, and see what happens next.

Online Journal... or Performance Art?

Had an interesting conversation with my mom today on the perils of blogging.

Mom's never read my blog. Not that I'd mind her reading it- I don't say that much about her here, and our relationship is very close. But we were talking about family, and relationships, and my dad, and my recent visit to see him. Which I had been considering blogging about here. But as I said to Mom tonight, " I wouldn't want him to read the stuff that I was going to write here. And if I don't want him to read it, then I shouldn't be writing it here."

I consider blogging to be a form of performance art. There is, in its public-ness, a "look at me" strut, an online airing of things that are maybe better left in the dark. It's a fine line. I want to be honest, to make this thing more than a banal listing of the Momentous Events of My Day. Jesus, if you want that, read my Twitter/Facebook blather:

• Going out to see a play!
• Making dinner right now- yum!
• Listening to music!

Who cares?

And I get a thrill that you (whoever you are) read this, that friends and strangers (not many, but some) find these words in the vastness of the internet and spend some time with them, with me. I have no intention of making this blog private.

But today's conversation was a good wake-up call. I have not (yet) violated anyone's sense of privacy here. That I know of. I admit that I read blogs like this one and tune in eagerly for more. Blogs like that disclose so much. That's her choice. But it's not mine.

I will be honest here, but not at the expense of other people. I was lucky to wake up to this before someone got their feelings hurt.

J just asked me what I was blogging about. And so I told him, about the conversation with Mom, and the not writing really private stuff about people other than me and he was like, Duh. Because he's always found this blogging thing kind of weird. And because he knows that sometimes, it's all about him right here. Love ya, Babe.

He's Good. Maybe Too Good.

J is too good with the birthday/Christmas presents. I'm definitely going to have to step it up this year, especially in light of the fact that my Christmas present to him last year was... a dolly.
Nope, not this:
or this:
...but this:In my defense, he did actually want one. I mean, he asked for one and everything. But still, a dolly? Could I possibly have chosen a present with less romance?

Now that you've seen how bad my present was, let's see what J got me this year for my birthday. On the great day itself, I had the small matter of a trip back from an island, a cd release party, and a stinkin' head cold to take care of, so he saved my present until yesterday. I wanted a surprise, so he didn't tell me what it was. In fact, I didn't figure it out until we got off the skytrain yesterday and arrived here. Yes, in honour of my newly-sparked interest in cooking, he signed us both up for a Knife Skills course. And it was awesome! For over 2 hours, we learned to dice, mince and julienne... and we got to eat the fruits (veggies, actually) of our labour: a smoky bacon-and-clam chowder and a frisky Asian chicken stir-fry. I could get addicted to cooking classes. I mean, I know cooking's all popular and trendy right now, thanks to "Julie and Julia" and countless other bestseller books on the subject, but learning to cook really is fantastic.

But now the pressure is on. Christmas will be here before we know it, and J's birthday (and it's a big one this year) isn't far behind. And I'm gonna have to bring it. Help a girl get some inspiration, will ya?

On The Shore.

Being back on the North Shore is a trip, and I don't just mean that in the it-takes-one-hour-to-get-here sense, although that certainly applies too.

I mean it in the sense that I can walk up the hill from the house we're house-sitting, and stumble across the home of an old classmate of mine, a kid who once bought me my first bouquet of roses when I was in grade nine. His dad was-and still is- a taxidermist, and he was obviously a man who loved to take his work home. The lamps were made of, well, legs. There was a stuffed bear looming in a dark corner, and beavers and deer frolicked stiffly in various poses. It was the stuff of nightmares; no wonder that relationship never went anywhere, although I remember the roses fondly.

Around the corner from where we're staying is the house belonging to the father of my best high school friend. She married in Ireland, and had a second wedding at her dad's place. Now we've fallen out of touch, and walking past his place makes me feel nostalgic and sad. She has two kids now, and a stepson who must be a teenager. The last time we spoke, she sounded more Irish than Canadian.

Another short walk downhill is the house where my dad lived for a short time, with the woman he rebounded swiftly into a relationship with after my mom left. (sorry, that's bad grammar, but oh well) They had a giant dog, a Great Pyrenese, who had hip displasia because of her giant size. Dad and Misha would hobble down to William Griffin Park because, as Dad said, "We like to watch the skateboarders."

Bits of memories swirl around my neighbourhood like leaves; I reach out, and catch a memory in my hand with every walk I take.

Boy, do I love me some Honey Nut Cheerios. J bought me a box yesterday, and I have to confess that when I went to pour myself a bowl this morning... most of them were gone. That's right, because my menu for yesterday went something like this:

• bowl of cereal
• bowl of cereal
• bowl of cereal
• bowl of cereal
• bowl of cereal
• salmon, salad & rice (see? I know how to eat nutritiously)
• m+m's
  
• warmed-over Chinese food leftovers (oh well, there was one healthy thing somewhere on today's menu)
• bowl of cereal

I kid you not, that was exactly what I ate yesterday, give or take one or two bowls of cereal. Do you ever have days like that, or is that just me?

I claim mitigating factors, though: I had been scared and stressed the day before by the sight of my loved one inexplicably doing the Mashed Potato on our floor (update: he finally got a doctor that took this seriously: he had blood tests yesterday and he'll see a neurologist next week. Now we wait and hope that someone can figure out why this happens to him every year or so. Oh, and he can't drive until they figure it out. AND-wait for it- we just got the car fixed. Life, eh?), and I woke up yesterday feeling all dizzy and sickly. I know- what the hell is going on in this house? In fact, I began to wonder if that was exactly it: was it, in fact, the apartment that was making us feel weird? Yesterday night, after a record day of doing almost nothing (hey, it's hard to do stuff when you feel as if you were riding an amusement park ride or drinking too much all day. I had to take some anti-nausea pills just to start actually moving) I attacked the bathroom and kitchen with a vengeance. Dirt, be gone! Mold, stop growing!

If you Google "Mold" online, you can read a truly horrifying litany of all the things it can do to your health- and yes, seizures and dizziness are both on there. Now I'd be very surprised if mold was making us sick, since we are well almost all the time. But it was a good wake-up call, and our place is cleaner this morning because of it.

This is a weird post. I have some other ideas brewing; I want to write more about the concept of being "grown-up" (which includes cleaning your apartment and bugging the building manager to do some maintenance, already, and paying taxes, etc. etc). And I want to write about how an otherwise sensible woman can run 10km and spurn cigarettes, but still not manage to lose weight. And other cheerful stuff. But today I have to get ready for the big Redboot tour of Vancouver Island: practice, publicity, etc.

I want to leave you with a story of optimism, to balance out the health worries and navel-gazing that go on around here:
My friend Russ plays the double bass; we've played together for years and he's good. We'll get somewhere, and he'll just set up camp in the corner and practice quietly for ages- he doesn't show off, doesn't spout on about how music is his life, blahblahblah, he just does it, and gets better and better.
Anyway, his expensive Czech bass got stolen out of his car the other night- at his house, in his carport, and we all thought: end of story. You can file the police report, tour the pawn shops, but you'll never see it again.
Well, here's an excerpt from an email I got from Russ today: "I am really happy to say that my bass did turn up tonight from a teenager who said he 'found' it in the park. I didn't give the guy a hard time, I am just glad he brought it back."
God knows what really happened, but isn't that great?

He was on the phone, and then suddenly, he was on the floor.

I heard a thud from the other room- the wind blew our screens over again, grrr- and called out to him: "was that the screens again?" No answer, just more thudding, so I ran over to his desk and he was on the floor, facedown in an uncomfortable position, twitching and making noise. Just a few seconds of fear before he came back to me, confused and sore, bleeding where he'd bashed his lip and nose in his fall.

My brother's dog had his annual seizure a few weeks ago, and it must be in the air because today J had his, although it's been over a year since the last one and we'd hoped like hell they'd gone away to wherever inexplicable brain weirdnesses go when they're not terrifying us.

He looks as if I hauled off and punched him one- swollen lip and nose, one side of his face red and scraped. And so the fears start again: what will he do to himself the next time? Where will he be? What if, god forbid, he's driving when it happens?
He's at the doctor, with strict instructions from me not to come home without a referral to a specialist. I'm still shaken.

It's been a busy week. I've been wanting to post more, but life got in the way. Which it should. After all, when a talk on costume design has your boyfriend researching this , you might be inspired to suddenly buy this Art Deco floor model General Electric radio:
And then you may just want to sit around and take in its awesome beauty all day. (Nope, it doesn't work, which is how we were able to afford it. But it has all its parts, so we might get it fixed at some point. Or it will be turned into a giant iPod player. Or just a great big lamp stand, which is what it is now.)

And who has time to blog when the weather is so warm and sunny that you're running every day? (About 10 pounds lost so far, folks. booyah.)

And when you're opening this show tomorrow morning, life gets interesting. And fun.

And then you're heading off to here for a quick visit, and then back to town for more shows... well, that would keep anyone from the computer!

*mother-in-law is healing nicely post-surgery and Boyfriend has been a superstar; looking after her, driving to rehearsals and shows, and staying overnight with Mom so that everyone has better peace of mind. What a guy.

The Latest

Good stuff and not-so-good stuff, all rolling around in the mix, like always.

Good stuff:
The Redboot Quartet album is recorded, mixed and mastered! Or, as I should say, Liquor For Thieves is almost ready for sale. That's what we're calling it; don't ask what it means because we don't know, we just liked the phrase. And we all like liquor, so it seemed to fit. Two days, twelve tracks, 1 day to mix and master it. We managed to pull off a pretty skillful album in a tiny amount of time with very little rehearsal, and I'm particularly happy with my playing, which I think is some of the best I've ever done. It's a rush job, but I love the sound. Stay tuned for news on touring and the cd release party we're dying to have!

I'm drinking tons of water, losing weight, and eating my veggies and other low-carb things again. A recently rediscovered friend from highschool is my "buddy" in this, which has been helpful. Also running quite regularly, helped by the fantastic weather we've been having.

Not working a lot, which is financially worrying, but it's great to have some extra time to myself. Yesterday I was able to go for a run, then sit in the park just watching life go by (which I almost never do, and it's so relaxing), and then stroll all the way down the Drive. Very good for the soul, especially in light of the

Not-So-Good Stuff:
Seems to be the era of Worrying About Our Mothers. Our divorced, alone-in-the-world mothers. At least mine is incredibly healthy and active for her age; hell, for any age. And has a strong network of friends and some family. But she needs to find somewhere to live- to own somewhere, not rent- and I don't know what she'll be able to buy with her share of the proceeds once she splits them with her sister in the UK. Who co-owns her condo. And with whom my mother is no longer on speaking terms. What a tangled web. Why does she have to move? Long story. But she does.
And J's mom is recovering post-bypass, but is suffering from balance and memory loss. Which seems to be fairly common after heart surgery, if the internet is to be believed. The question being whether or not she'll bounce back (some do) or not (some don't) to her pre-surgery sharpness. It's starting to sink in that the road to recovery will be long and that J will shoulder almost all of the burden, as she has no other family here, and no friends, and although J's dad will help somewhat, he'll push her buttons almost more than he helps.
I'm trying to help; cooking meals to be frozen so that J and his mom can eat easily once she's out of hospital, visiting when I can. There's this selfish monster in me that's already crying "this isn't fair! What if things get worse? Is this the beginning of much harder times?" The problem is that we've been lucky so far, and have so few responsibilities, and now we have to man up and deal with this. I know there are so many heavier burdens, and I'm not proud of my selfishness, but it's there nonetheless.

As always it's a question of finding balance, looking for the sunlight through the clouds, and growing up a little bit. All around us these days are signs that time is speeding by so fast: friends' children are getting big, we watch Jim Carrey in a movie and marvel: "He's looking old!" A stepmother's ashes are scattered, a father mourns and a mother has an operation. The thing to cling to through this is that there is so much living left to do, and to see this all as a relentless downhill slide to the grave is silly. Now to put these good thoughts into action...

Today I learned what a wuss I am about hospitals.
Today we woke up at 6:20am because J's mom's open heart surgery got bumped up to 9am. She didn't even know she was getting surgery until 2 days ago. She went into the hospital for exploratory surgery, and-surprise!- when she comes out of the OR today she will have had a triple or quadruple bypass instead. These guys don't mess around.
This morning we sat with her for 2 hours until they loaded her onto a gurney and moved her into pre-op. Where I got to meet the surgeon who'll hopefully make her life a lot better. (He was younger than J, clutching his morning Tim Horton's coffee as he said hello.)
Everyone was friendly, sympathetic and competent. I have every faith that they will do stellar work on her. But watching her get wheeled away, looking so much like her son, my heart (luckily so strong and healthy) skipped a beat. I know I've said this before, but I've been so lucky, and my family has been so healthy, that hospitals are almost an unknown world (which is weird, because my brother works in one. But you just don't drop into the Adult Psych ward for a casual visit.)
Here's hoping we won't get to know hospitals any better in the next little while. And that my mom-in-law gets out of this one ASAP.

Scattering the Ashes

this is how it ends
we chose this weekend: family and friends
long flat sands, tidal pools, the rain stopping just in time.
real life makes our ritual short and our hearts lighter: our dogs chase and bark, your grandchildren splash and play nearby
we remember you with tears and smiles, with messages scribbled on balloons to let fly into the grey skies, with tulips and daffodils scattered with your ashes
all that's left
let time do its work
let the tide do its work
and carry you to the sea

we scattered my stepmom's ashes today at the beach she loved: her family from the east and her step-family in Vancouver, friends from several towns, dogs and children.
what she would have loved: that we are all together this weekend; that I went with her grand-children to the Aquarium yesterday; that 8 of us sat in a Yaletown restaurant last night and ate, drank and laughed hugely (and racked up the most epic bill I've ever seen); that tomorrow we'll have Easter brunch and drink a toast to her.
Rest in Peace, June.

thoughts that were a lot more coherent in my head than they appear here.

We sat around a table at Stella's last night- my family- drinking exquisite overpriced Belgian beer and getting happily sozzled together: me, Jon, my brother, sister-in-law, and my Dad, in town on business. Work has been an escape for him in the last couple of months since my stepmom died. The companies he works for have money to burn before the end of the fiscal year so he jets off to Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, and there must be some relief in not rattling around in a house that was large for two people and now houses only one.

I feel guilty that my life hasn't changed more since June's death. That I could say oh god that's tragic and still go on with things as before seems horrible; not because it lacks respect for the dead but because I can't make more room in my life for my father now that he's alone. In another ideal universe I give up work and move in with him and we break through the awkward pauses and find a new closeness in our shared grief.
But it's not like that. I simply can't stop working; every job and every dollar is essential. And if I'm more honest, I didn't want to, not really. I love my dad, and we like each other too, but it's not easy, not the way it is with my mom. We don't have a shared vocabulary.

So we did what we could last night: we got expensively tipsy together and had some laughs and maybe it wasn't much but at least we all enjoy being in the same room together, and if we need a few beers to make conversation flow a bit more smoothly well, that's what beer's for, right?

And it gets me thinking, especially in light of a few blog posts I've read recently on the whole moms-versus-nonmoms debate in the blogosphere. You know, the one where some moms are saying well you just don't get it 'til you've had kids I mean I'm way more of a woman than you'll ever be and the childless are saying don't give me that crap and if you complain about being sleep-deprived one more time I'll... Both "sides" feeling cranky and judged. I love shit like this. I love wading through the posts and the endless commentary, agreeing and disagreeing with various writers. I read a lot of "mom" blogs like a voyeur who peeks into a noisy dark room and takes it in hungrily then says that was... interesting. I don't want to live there, ever. But maybe I could visit again sometime?

Here's what I think: I think choosing to have OR not to have kids is an inherently selfish decision. I mean, I didn't choose not to have kids because the planet is overcrowded (although it is), or because I was afraid I wouldn't be a good enough mom (also true). I choose to be childless because my love of travel, sleeping in and playing music far outweighs any desire I have to breed. And you parents, you didn't have kids because they might discover a cure for cancer (they most likely won't, you know) or create world peace (ditto). You had them because you wanted someone new to love, or to save your marriage, or because it seemed like a good idea at the time.

But getting back to family (see, I'll tie this all together eventually). You may have kids and they'll have kids and you'll all sit together at a table one day and drink beer and act like a clan of some sort. Or you may have a brood but you all hate each other or live halfway around the world and never see each other. Or you may choose, like my brother and I, to live a life without kids. To bring our branch of the family to an end. Which means that if (god forbid) I'm widowed one day, there may be no one to have dinner with.
When I'm old, who'll be at the table- so to speak- with me?

Tribe.

Lying in bed the other morning, I had a thought. (I'm actually doing less lying-in these days, and getting up early and boy, does it feel good.)

My thought went something like this: remember a while ago, you were complaining to J that all your girl-friends moved away? That you didn't belong to a tribe of women like the Ya-Ya Sisterhood? (Okay, they were actually a wee bit dysfunctional and weird, but still.) Well, that complaint hasn't come up lately.

I'm realizing that I do have a tribe, and I am trying to do my bit to keep our bonds strong, even when work and distance threaten to break us up. The phone rings, and it's my amazing mother, calling from across the country with her news and her love. Sixty-something (I can't divulge her age- she'd kill me) and touring our huge country in a battered red van with a bunch of actors. I Facebook someone I graduated from high school with, and suddenly we're walking down the Drive, and I'm meeting her little son for the first time and all the years in between grad and now melt away and we find friendship in the new and the old. I'm catching up with an ex-bandmate at a party, and wondering why we haven't talked in over a year because we have lots to talk about. I'm getting drunk with my sister-in-law. I'm gossiping with a girlfriend I've known since I was a teen, talking kids and theatre and Life. I'm playing music with another one, grinning madly as our 2 instruments make one voice.

My tribe is out there, and it nourishes me every day. It just took me a while to realize that.

Turning over new leaves.

The new year settles in, and so much is the same, and some things are different.

We're trying, we really are. We've tightened our belts so this is week 2 of doing a weekly shop for groceries and not eating out. Last week we spent- well, I'm not going to tell you, 'cause it's embarrassing. But we lived on that food for a week and didn't cheat, no eating out except for my forays to Shoppers for Liquorice Allsorts. This week we almost cut that grocery bill in half. The secret? Make a weekly meal plan, take the ingredients from that plan and make it into a shopping list. Most importantly, take a calculator to the supermarket with you!!! We're eating smaller, healthier meals, losing some weight and saving money. We're making to-do lists every week and trying to follow through. I'm playing my clarinet every day. J's doing his video work. The bathroom floor got thoroughly scrubbed for the first time in, um, a long time. We're slowly learning that a little planning ahead can pay off in a big way. Right now our schedules are pretty free, so we'll see how we do when things get busier...

I am frustrated and red-faced that I'm 34 and just learning this stuff. I wish my parents had showed me this way earlier, like maybe when I was in the womb. Or that I'd clued in when I was in my twenties. Even more embarrassed to realize, just now, that I did know some of this stuff but was too lazy to change. But I figure I can either wallow in that frustration or say well, I was late to the game. But not too late to learn a few new tricks.

No new photographs for ages. It's hard to get excited about pictures when your world is grey, rain, melting snow, dirt, more rain. Our winter wonderland has turned back into Vancouver's usual winter wet. I need, need, to get out and exercise, but have so little inclination to do so in this damp that clings like a monkey. We stay as warm as we can, curl up under blankets, nestle.

I learn again and again how love keeps changing. With the new year comes, for me, a new strength of love and resolve to keep working so that this person will keep loving me back. If it takes a few to-do lists to make life run more smoothly; well, they're worth it.