Monthly Archives: March 2018

The world is a magical sphere.

Posted on by

Yesterday was Pi Day and I spent much of it thinking of the magic of mathematics and, by extension, the world. Just think about this – for every single circle in the world, every single one of them, if you divide the circumference by the diameter, you get pi. YOU GET PI EVERY TIME. Isn’t that just incredible? Life is beautiful, made up of so many magical moments, and we should never let a day go by without appreciating them. In eager anticipation of pi day, I made a strawberry daiquiri pie for Sunday dessert; this recipe, but I omitted the avocado and cut the coconut milk to one cup, and then I poured my homemade magic shell on top and let me tell you, it was a glorious celebration of the circle.

Speaking of glorious things and mathematical magic, my husband sent me what must be one of the sexiest texts a girl can get: he informed me that he will soon be able to collect PC Points at Esso. You know that feeling when someone just GETS you? That’s the feeling I had when I read that. For, dear reader, I have become completely obsessed with collecting PC Points and redeeming PC Points and making up my grocery list with PC Points in mind. One day I swept into the yoga studio and excitedly told the girl at the desk my main accomplishment that morning: getting 10,600 points IN ONE SHOP BUYING ONLY THINGS I NEEDED AND NOTHING FRIVOLOUS. She was duly impressed. It’s gotten to the point where I eagerly anticipate Thursday mornings, when I can load my new offers onto my app. More importantly, I have figured out the basic algorithm and can make my list with that in mind. For example, I can predict with 90% accuracy when a certain offer is going to pop up, and I shop accordingly.

Is anyone still reading this?

In case there is any confusion, I am not being paid by Loblaw’s or anything, this isn’t in any way sponsored, it’s just that whenever I’m not teaching yoga I’m grocery shopping or cooking. This is literally true. Having young teen boys who eat pretty much constantly, and being a person who likes to make everything from scratch, my life is entirely revolving around my yoga classes and going to the grocery store, which may explain why my main source of unhappiness in the world is due to grocery carts gone awry.

Slight digression: my younger son pointed out that we had quite a few blueberry-pomegranate juices in the pantry, commenting that they “must have been on sale!” For years I have been slowly turning into a female replica of my father, and now it appears that I am simultaneously turning into my mother.

Back to the point: life is beautiful, math is beautiful, and I’m trying very hard to just take the heavy snowfall event that is going on right now in stride. The snow had just started its slow melting process and now everything is back to square one; this is not atypical for Calgary, but it does feel like winter will never end and spring will never come and we will be stuck with snow drifts and treacherous roads until the end of time.

The first person to complain about the “heat” when it gets to be 25 degrees in Calgary is going to get stabbed.

Well, perhaps not literally stabbed. Maybe just stabbed with an angry glare, like the Care Bear Stare but with much more vitriol.

My childhood Cheer Bear! This is, generally, my spirit animal, except when thinking about snowfall warnings and grocery carts.

Last weekend I found myself at the mall – not to worry, I’m still on my One Year Shopping Challenge, unbelievably enough, with four and a half months to go and I have bought nary an item – but I wanted some compression socks for running. I did enjoy peeking at the window displays and looking at the young girls wandering around, young girls being my fashion barometer. It’s one thing to see items remembered from childhood back in style, but it is, frankly, quite another to see items worn in one’s twenties back in style. It reminds me of the fleeting nature of time; the nineties were actually NOT JUST YESTERDAY, PEOPLE. Crop tops are the thing now, and while I loved them in my step-aerobics youth, I do not feel a woman of my age can really wear them without looking, as they say, like mutton dressed as lamb. What a gross and deplorable saying, and yet, it can accurately describe the feeling I have when I mentally try on today’s styles. Pants with very high waists, distressed and ripped jeans, cropped tops, and the like – these were things I wore in university. I finished grad school twenty years ago this year, TWENTY YEARS. So it only makes sense that they are now on point again but still.

Well, my wardrobe these days basically consists of yoga wear, topped with a cozy sweater and finished off with warm boots. I rarely wear a bra anymore due to the handy shelf bras in yoga tanks, which is starting to feel like a slippery slope. But even my much-loved lululemon is reflecting the styles of the nineties. For one thing, they now sell what is called a Belt Bag but is, in actuality, a fanny pack. The day I wear a fanny pack is the day I die, but there you go. Also for sale: the scrunchie. The SCRUNCHIE. I did love a good scrunchie back in the day, but I don’t think it’s mine to revisit. It reminds me of the Sex and the City episode where Carrie criticizes her boyfriend for writing a novel featuring a woman wearing a scrunchie, which seems like a very specific detail for a man to write about.

Ack! I just browsed a fashion site and came across a photo of a young woman wearing a floral dress with ankle boots, which was half my wardrobe, back the nineties. I guess I’ll just go back to researching my wrinkle creams and I’ll tell you about my amazing vegetarian glucosamine supplements another day. xo

This winter has frozen my brain

Posted on by

Do You Want To Build A Snowman

No, not really. It’s been the snowiest – or one of the snowiest? I don’t really know – winters on record, and frankly, I am at the point where I cannot even conceptualize a time where I won’t be wearing numerous layers and a coat that requires its own postal code. I cannot remember what the yard looked like without giant drifts of snow, and I am starting to forget what it was like to drive down the street. I refuse to drive down the our street due to the enormous snow banks and ruts – if a car comes in the other direction, one of the cars must somehow get somehow onto a snow bank in order for the other to pass. It feels like a recipe for disaster, and as we all know, automobile-related disasters can only end in dramatic tears and frantic phone calls to my husband who, inevitably, will be at work and unable to help. I shall not drive down my street until such time as I do not need a four wheel drive and/ or nerves of steel. I was looking at my closet yesterday and noticed all the footwear that is lying dormant. I know there was a time when I wore light shoes and even light boots, but I cannot really remember it. I’ve lost all perspective – haven’t I just always worn heavy boots every single day? The local meteorologists insist that the melt is coming, but frankly, I can’t imagine it. I feel like I’m in a much less-gory and not-at-all-incestuous Game of Thrones winter, which is destined to last until we all die from lack of food/ murder/ being killed by White Walkers.

I’d Rage Against The Machine But I’m Too Tired

I realized with a start that time change is THIS WEEKEND. Goddamn Daylight Savings and all the lies associated with it. The Alberta government – not for the first time, and certainly not for the last – was the cause of grave disappointment when they announced that they would not do away with the time change, because “everyone else is doing it.” I feel like my own mother, if everyone was jumping off a bridge, would you do it too? Are we all lemmings here? If EVERYONE thinks that time change is an antiquated concept, and that it really does nothing for energy savings, and that it is inconvenient and the cause of many car accidents and issues due to pure exhaustion, then why doesn’t EVERYONE band together and just agree to do away with it? Every single year I think this and I am sure that given that this ridiculousness has lasted this long, I will be in the Home saying the same exact thing.

Awkward Is As Awkward Does

This week I had my annual physical, and my doctor’s office was very accommodating when I mentioned I was a little tight on time. I got there a few minutes early and the nurse promptly weighed and measured me, and took my heart rate and blood pressure. I was quickly escorted to the room where I was asked to change into the robe. I glanced at the enormous robe, momentarily forgetting which way to put it on. Does it tie in the back or the front? At that exact moment, while I was standing in the freezing room, completely nude, the doctor knocked and started to open the door – thinking, probably, that he was helping me out by not making me sit idly in the freezing room, but instead starting the checkup right away. I appreciated his promptness but, as I said, I was standing there naked, so I asked for just a moment, please. Does it tie in the front or the back? I remembered from my mammogram a few years back – when I made the wrong choice – that that gown tied in the front. Were we doing a breast exam today? Maybe? Front or back, front or back, just make a decision. I quickly pulled it on and tied it in the front just as the doctor knocked again and walked in. It was immediately apparent that I had, gravely, made the wrong decision. The doctor looked at me quizzically as I awkwardly said I couldn’t remember which way to put the gown on. “Well,” he said tactfully, “Usually it’s the other way.” USUALLY. Like there are other women out there desperately holding the gown together at the front, showcasing their complete lack of medical gown intuition. There were a few awkward moments when the doctor was testing my reflexes and listening with his stethoscope. Wardrobe malfunction! I am not generally a shy person and the doctor has seen it all before, but still, there is something unsettling about unexpectedly flashing the doctor while just sitting on the examining table as he asks questions about general energy levels and if I’m still getting my periods.

That’s One Way To Get More Business

With all the snow, and the usual thawing and refreezing cycle, sidewalks and parking lots have been absolutely treacherous. A few months ago I came across an elderly woman who had just fallen and, subsequently, broken her arm while walking on the sidewalk. She was just sitting there on the sidewalk, waiting for the ambulance to arrive. If you can make it down the sidewalks without such calamity, you need the agility of a mountain goat to climb over the huge snowbanks surrounding them. Walking the dog is becoming an adventure, is what I’m saying. The other day I saw a man slip and nearly bail right in front of a chiropractic/ physio clinic. Sheer ice…right in front of the clinic.

All The Ladies In The House Say HEY

Happy International Women’s Day! I may not still have my posters of the Feminist Manifesto and the fish on a bicycle, but the principles are still there (automobile-related incidents notwithstanding.) Keep on keeping on, you beautiful women. Let’s continue to lift each other up and support one another. xoxo

How To Be A Better Person

Posted on by

Did you realize that TODAY is March 1? How did that happen? Well, time keeps on ticking and meanwhile it keeps snowing…but I’m not going to go there today.

What I was thinking about is that today – MARCH 1 OMG – marks two months from traditional New Year’s Resolution beginnings. Did you make any resolutions this year, and, if so, how are they going? My own resolutions ran the gamut from the somewhat vague – focusing more on single tasks, practicing more patience and mindfulness, being grateful every single day for the amazing gift of LIFE – and the concrete – squeeze in more movement every day, read more, play the piano once a week – and I’m happy to report that I am doing all those things. Well, the piano doesn’t always get played weekly but I did learn how to play the theme song from Cheers, which has been a goal for a long time and, frankly, is not very difficult. I could have done that years ago!

My resolutions, such as they are, are a work in progress. This isn’t like the time I resolved to learn how to bake bread or use my decorator tips or how to play Where Everybody Knows Your Name – it’s not a One and Done thing. I think that one of the great benefits – and part of the appeal – of New Years Resolutions is that they make us BETTER. Whether our resolutions have us paying better attention to our physical health and wellness, or to attaining or honing a skill, or to becoming better equipped emotionally to make the world a happier place, there is generally a common theme: we want to be better people. We want to be better, we want to do better.

This is the premise of my friend Kate Hanley’s latest book: How To Be A Better Person. You may remember that Kate is the author of Stress Less, which I reviewed last April with an anecdote about becoming curious instead of furious when a delivery man became incredibly angry with me. How To Be A Better Person is similar in format to Stress Less, and reads like a combination self-help book and checklist for life. There are over 400 simple ways to make a difference in yourself and the world, each with a little box beside it so you could, presumably, check one off each time you achieve them. I did not do that, but I did dog-ear each page when I thought hey, that’s what I can write about. Don’t judge me! It’s my book, I’ll dog-ear if I want to. But there were so many good little nuggets in there that my book is now one big dog-ear. I could write a whole blog series on this book! I’ll try to be succinct.

The book is broken up into eight sections: See the Positive, Connect With Your Feelings, Be Healthy, Show Love, Give Back, Stay Committed, Work Well, and Let Go of Your Stuff. I will admit that I liked the Be Healthy section the best, because I was already doing literally everything in that chapter: eating lots of fruits and vegetables, drinking lots of water, doing yoga, moving more, getting outside no matter what the weather (thank you Barkley for the motivation on that one). But I think the other chapters, that felt more difficult when it came to self-awareness, are more helpful.

For example:

If there ever was an Important Parenting Reminder, it would be this. We are all walking our own paths, and no one can do it for us. This is HARD though, when it comes to parenting, but so very important. This reminds me, a bit, of that famous “Your children are not your children” poem from Kahlil Gibran, which you can read in its entirety here. “And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.” How often do we think of our children as extensions of ourselves? Their failures become our failures, their successes are our successes. Sometimes we may even find ourselves living vicariously through them, through our own dreams and visions, and those dreams and visions may not have any import to them. Of course we must show we care and give them tools to make good choices, but those choices are theirs and theirs alone. This is so difficult, particularly when our children are different from us. Actually, it’s difficult when our children are similar to us too, as we can really take to heart their experiences and way of thinking. Their lives are their lives, and they must live them. I mean, think back when you were a teenager – you had choices to make and consequences to live with, and those decisions were yours and yours alone. We must let our kids do the same – even if it kills us!

Which brings me to this:

Sometimes my kids will be telling me something about their day, and I will become panicked about a small detail, whereas they are calm and cool. Clearly, this is my own issue and I’ve made it about me, and not them. Triggers – we have to learn what sets them off and how to deal with them. Just like I know that I cannot eat even one potato chip or else I will be scarfing down the entire Costco sized bag in minutes, a trigger can lead to regrettable outcomes.

But, it can also lead to good outcomes if managed properly. I was at Costco on Monday and as usual, the parking lot was a disaster; not only are there giant snow piles taking up parking spaces, but the usual “corral, what corral?” mentality was rampant. My friend Janet (HI JANET) always says that weekdays at 2:00 are the Magical Costco Times in terms of lineups and general busyness, but unfortunately 2:00 means that there are four hours for people to leave their carts willy-nilly all over the place, and on Monday there were many carts scattered throughout the lot, taking up parking spaces and generally destroying my sense of Parking Lot Feng Shui. Do I talk about shopping carts too much? Probably. But clearly this is a trigger for me; I can stand in long lineups with patience, I can let people go ahead of me, I will take a spot farther from the door to free up others for people less mobile, I will smile and chat happily with the staff.

But when it comes to seeing people walk their carts over to where ten other carts are scattered in the parking spaces and leave them, when the CORRAL IS RIGHT THERE, OMG, IT’S TEN STEPS AWAY, well.

I weep for humanity.

But as Kate says in the book, use it as a reminder to do something nice for yourself. For the amount of time I spend grocery shopping, I will be able to do many nice things for myself when I see disasters like this. Maybe I should book a pedicure. As it was, I put my bins in a cart – when you can’t do a lot, do a little, says Kate – and I practiced my ujjayi breathing as I went into the store. I bought two packs of my favourite cherry tomatoes, I smiled at a cute baby and his mama, I practiced gratitude for the ability to buy healthy and delicious food for my family.

And then I glared at a perfectly-able person shoving his cart in the direction of a bunch of other errant carts, causing a pool-table ripple effect of carts, some coming close to hitting parked cars. I glared and glared, and then, like a crazy person, gave a giant smile to another person who was actually returning his cart to the corral. GOD BLESS YOU, SIR. I hope he felt my positive vibes and I hope he had the best Costco Karma ever.