Category Archives: I love my friends

How We Spend Our Days

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I finally did it! Lest you think that the “it” in question is something interesting and exciting, let me hasten to tell you what “it” is. For the first time ever, I completed an entire week of time-tracking, of writing down the exact way that I spend my days.

I have tried to time track before, and failed on the first day. Truthfully, I have failed in the first few hours of the first day of tracking; for one, it is so boring. It’s boring and tedious to write down the number of minutes spent doing any given thing. For another thing, when I last tried this the boys were in junior high and I was teaching a LOT of yoga classes, and the sheer number of drudgery-and-food-related things that I recorded within the first few hours of the day was incredibly depressing. This is how I am spending my one wild and precious life? I thought, before abandoning the project.

But I was curious, for reasons I’ll get to later, and so I set myself up for success by creating a two-page-a-day chart that would record start and end times, and I cut down on the daily tedium by filling out in advance the first seven things that I do every single day without fail, thinking, correctly, that once the morning routine was recorded, the rest would be easier.

The results were not unexpected. A big swath of my week is devoted to yoga, exercise, and dog walking, and another to gardening. Writing takes up a good deal of it, as well as food preparation and household tasks, which feel less drudge and onerous these days, personal care, reading, and spending time with my husband, kids, and friends. Remember that old story about putting the big rocks in the jar first, and then allowing the little rocks to take up the spaces in between? At this point in my life, everything feels like Big Rocks, and, simultaneously, nothing does.

My days are pleasantly full, and while none of my daily activities feels optional, they all technically are. Even personal care, food preparation, and household tasks: strictly speaking I COULD really let things go in the hygiene and beauty department, I COULD allow the house to become a cesspool of filth or, more realistically, hire that out, and I COULD DoorDash all our meals or rely solely on frozen pizza and toast. I could! I won’t, but I could.

What I’m saying is that everything that occurs in my day feels Very Important to me. I am not a person who scrolls much, but I do like to check my Facebook and Instagram once or twice a day, and in no way does this feel like a waste of time. I love to check if it’s someone’s birthday, or if someone is on vacation or bought a new house or outfit, I love to see if someone’s kids are doing something interesting or if their pet is sleeping in a cute way. I want to see someone’s shoes or what they made for dinner. I am here for even the most mundane of updates: you want to talk about the new Zumba class you’re going to, or the shitty day you had at work, or the weird sign that was at the community centre? I AM HERE FOR YOU.

The upshot to all of this is that I am very nosy, and I cannot get enough details of other people’s lives.

It is this nosiness that brings me to the whole reason I did this time tracking experiment in the first place, and that is the blogging community. I always think about blogging as a hobby, but then my friend Pearl (HI PEARL) wrote about creating as a way of life, and blogging is part of that. It can take up as much or as little time as a person might want. It is important to me to put out a weekly post that is interesting, entertaining, and, most of all, polished, and so it takes hours to go from Idea to Published. It is also important that I respond to any and all comments; if a person takes the time to comment, I want to take the time to respond. I have time for people who have time for me.

This is a nice segue into the other side of blogging, which is community building. If a person reads and comments on my blog, I am going to read and comment on theirs; it’s common courtesy in my mind, not exactly a Quid Pro Quo, but more like a Keeping Up With My Correspondence. Plus, as I said before, I’m nosy. I want to know what’s going on in your life!

All takes time, of course, and that is a finite resource. I budget between 30-45 minutes a day for blog reading and commenting, and it was this time budget that was the reason I did the time tracking experiment in the first place. I wanted to see if I was, indeed, keeping within the budget. I did, clocking in at an average of 40 minutes per day. Most of this happens first thing in the morning while I’m drinking my coffee; if you’ve ever had an unhinged or incomprehensible comment from me, that’s why. It’s early! The coffee hasn’t kicked in yet!

How we spend our days is how we spend our lives, and I’m happy with how I fill my time. I wasn’t sure, moving here, how things would go. I wasn’t sure how my husband would handle retirement, I wasn’t sure how I would handle not having kids to take care of or yoga classes to teach, but, as we all know, worry is a waste of time. Everything worked itself out: my days are full and fulfilling, and I didn’t need a time tracker to tell me that.

Weekly Reading

Shopgirls. A beach read – but make it in a department store in the 1980s. This was a very quick and light read about a young woman who, despite her youth and her Salvation Army outfits, is the top salesgirl in I Magnin, a fancy San Francisco department store. It was cute and diverting, a nice easy read for a sunny weekend. Thanks to Bijoux (HI BIJOUX) for the recommendation!

Fun For The Whole Family. Dysfunctional families, childhood trauma, family secrets, complicated sibling relationships, estrangement – but make it light and fun! A lot of heavy topics in this very engaging and diverting read about four estranged siblings coming together in the middle of a North Dakota winter for the first time in years, but the book is not heavy at all. It’s sweet and lovely, a heartwarming pick-me-up, and another great summer read.

I have an important garden update! My perennial garden is in full bloom, including the butterfly bush.

The flowers are frequented by bees and butterflies, and I finally caught on camera the enormous yellow butterfly that has been zipping around lately.

It made me so happy, and reminded me of my friend Suz (HI SUZ), who is everyone’s favourite expert in butterfly husbandry. She had recently talked about HER butterfly bush, and I am heartened to think of us on opposite corners of the continent, enjoying the same things. This community – together but apart – is the one of the best things about blogging, and one I do not take for granted. Thank you, everyone, for being here and being a part of my life. xo

Thank You For Being A Friend: Nourishing Relationships

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Yesterday I went to the first baby shower I’ve been to in well over a decade. I have known the father-to-be since he was a young teen, and in my mind he’s still that age, even though intellectually I know that a) he is older than my own sons, who are grown adults, and b) he is married, employed, a university graduate, and, as mentioned, a father-to-be. Time makes you bolder, even children get older, I’m getting older too…

The grandma-to-be, Sammi, is a very, very dear friend of mine (HI SAMMI) and I feel like the arrival of this baby is the start of a new era. Our first grandbaby! It’s the same way I felt when my friend Tara (HI TARA) had her first baby, back in 2003: communally, she was OUR first baby. It’s a beautiful feeling, seeing these chosen sisters of mine have babies who I have always loved, and now those babies are starting to have babies of their own. And I think to myself, what a wonderful world.

It’s been studied extensively, but I think it’s also kind of obvious, that having healthy and loving relationships has a statistically significant, positive effect on our health and our ability to live long, happy, healthy lives. It is so important to surround ourselves with good people who nourish and nurture us. I place enormous importance on my relationships not only with my husband and kids, but with my incredible friends who I consider my chosen family. We are family, I got all my sisters with me.

Have you ever been ghosted? I have, and fairly recently. I will say that it was more surprising than hurtful, and for a while I was in denial that it had happened. I cannot be in denial anymore; it has been over nine months and I have received nary an answer to my texts, no 50th birthday message, and not even a lousy social media like. Not even a Facebook thumbs-up. It’s quite odd and bewildering. When I lived in Calgary, I saw this person at least weekly, and we talked or texted almost every day. I felt that I was a Person of Value and Importance in her life, but it seems that I was only a Person of Value and Importance by convenience, or situationally.

The truth is that I don’t really begrudge it, this ghosting. I strongly believe that we all need to have positive, non-toxic relationships in our lives; sometimes people change over time, and so do their friendship needs. Perhaps on moving away I could no longer be the friend I was – one who was valued for physical proximity – and so that ultimately changed our friendship in a way that became unhealthy, or maybe even toxic to my former friend. I don’t think of myself as a toxic person, but there are two sides to every story, and maybe her story is something different.

From Donna Ashworth’s Wild Hope

I have long believed in the adage that people come into your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime, and to that I would like to add the message from this poem by Donna Ashworth. Everyone brings a joy, a love, or a lesson, which sometimes means that people teach you what you don’t want to be, what you don’t want in life, what you don’t want to do. We can, and should, take the lessons offered from those people, but we don’t need to have those people in our lives or, if they are unavoidably in our lives, we need to set boundaries around them.

Do you ever think how incredible it is, this world of ours, where our lives are shaped by the people we encounter? I’m not talking about the people whose lessons are toxic ones, but the people who perform small kindnesses, who show us things that they love, who do something that affects us so much that our lives will never be the same? Sometimes these people have no idea the effect they have had on us. For example, I’m sure my grade six friend Kristi has no idea that having dinner at her house sparked a lifelong love of Caesar salad, a thing I didn’t even know existed before that evening. I’m positive my husband’s friend’s ex-wife Christine has no clue that she introduced me to the wonder that is guacamole. So many people have taught me what I want to be merely by being in their presence. A yoga friend, Sarah, once said clearly and firmly, I don’t want to talk about people behind their backs when a group conversation got gossipy, teaching me something about principles and gracefully standing up for them. A young yoga acquaintance, Laura, related that she had allowed an elderly, confused lady to hold her baby in Starbucks, letting her believe that her baby was that woman’s grandchild, until the woman’s helper led her away. What a lesson in compassion and generosity.

Catherine Newman has never met me, but her writing saved me in the early days of motherhood and inspired me to start this very blog, which has led me to this whole beautiful community. Our lives are a mosaic of the influences of others, and it’s up to us to choose which colours we let shine through. We can choose to surround ourselves with people who nourish us in every possible way, and I’m glad you’re all here, nourishing me, whether or not you know it.

Weekly Reading

Probably Nothing. This was a cute book about a woman who is about to ghost the guy that she’s been casually sleeping with…only to find out that he has suddenly died of a wasp sting. His eccentric family is under the impression that they were in a Very Serious Relationship, and immediately takes her in. As she becomes enmeshed in their vibrant craziness, antics ensue! A quick and easy read, with a nice message about chosen family, thematically enough.

33 Place Brugman. This is what I would call a Very Informative Novel, in that it details the lives of people living in an apartment building in Brussels in 1939. Belgium was occupied by the Nazis from 1940-44, and this book shows the everyday business of people who are living this reality, as well as the Jewish people in the apartment who fled prior to the occupation. Nothing is quite as it seems, and the book shows how people can change and adapt to a violent and hungry daily regime. This is not an easy read; there are multiple characters – fortunately there is a cast of characters in the front of the book – and the reader must pay attention constantly or miss a crucial detail. Even with constant vigilance, I felt like I was missing details, only to find out that the events in question were being alluded to and would be fleshed out later in the book, which made the story a bit confusing and tricky to follow. Neither did I find this to be a particularly enjoyable read, from the subject matter to the very convoluted and time-jumping writing style. However, it was a good book to read in that there was a lot that, sadly and alarmingly, resonates in today’s world: people being rounded up, people disappearing, and anti-Semitism.

Today marks three years since we lost Barkley, which is a sad anniversary to be sure. I was so traumatized by his decline and death that I refused to consider the possibility of having another dog in our home. All I will say is that sometimes – most of the time – the universe sends you what you need.

I hope you have enjoyed my Nourishment Series! Next week I’ll be back to regular programming, in case anyone wants to hear about my adventures in Costco, gardening, and all the other exciting things that make up my days. Have a good week, friends, and remember that the universe will send you what you need. xo

Ducks, Dialects, Daddy Cool

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I learned something absolutely wild this week, and even though I immediately fact-checked it, I still was in shock and disbelief. I still AM in shock and disbelief.

From an episode of Were You Raised By Wolves – my current and longtime favourite podcast about modern etiquette, which is more fun than it sounds, really – I learned that, in Minnesota, the children’s game Duck, Duck, Goose is not Duck, Duck, Goose. Instead, it is Duck, Duck, GREY DUCK.

I had to turn off the podcast for a moment to stare out the window. It felt like everything I had ever known was in question. Do I, like Oprah, know anything for sure? I just cannot say, I just cannot say.

I instantly texted my favourite Minnesotan, Lisa, to ask her if this was true, if everything I have ever known was a lie? And Lisa, darling Lisa, Lisa who would never lead anyone astray, told me that yes, all is true and more. Not only do Minnesotan children chant Grey Duck before running around the circle, but so do those in North Dakota.

The world, it is a wild and wonderful place. (HI LISA).

Isn’t it wild, isn’t it WILD how things differ between regions? Let’s take language and dialect, for example. It is a common perception that Canadians pronounce about like aboot, and yet I have never in my fifty years met a single person who sounds like that, and I have met people from all over the country. Accents and dialects do differ across our great country, of course. I can tell a prairie accent from a Maritime one, I can pinpoint if a person is from Newfoundland or Quebec; I live in BC and I have friends all over Ontario, and yet never once have I heard the word aboot. Eh, I hear and say often, but aboot? Never.

Calgarians can easily identify non-Calgarians, simply from how the city is pronounced: it’s Cal-GREE, not Cal-GARY, and although I no longer live there, I will offer a gentle correction. That is the only thing I will correct, though, because so many words are pronounced differently based on regional dialect, and there is no such thing as “correct” or “incorrect” when it comes to that. When it comes to mischievous, coyote, groceries, mascara, and tomato I personally say mis-chee-vious, kai-oh-tee, grow-sher-ees, mah-scare-ah, toe-may-toe. I also pronounce tour with two syllables, too-er, rather than “ture” or “tore,” but I pronounce tournament as ture-nament. I contain multitudes.

It’s funny that language and dialect are so interesting to me, yet so dull to write about. I’m boring myself. Let’s move on.

The other day I heard the song Daddy Cool twice during a single workout: once on my own playlist while I was on the elliptical, and then once during a Peloton ride. God, I love Boney M and I love that song. It reminded me of a funny, albeit embarrassing story circa 1995. My friend Alice (HI ALICE, if you’re reading this) was engaged, and had confided to the Econ Girls, of which I was one, that she hated the word fiance. Our friend Tony, not an Econ Girl per se, but as he was studying economics we didn’t exclude him based on his sex, suggested that we refer to her fiance as Big Daddy Cool, and that stuck.

It stuck a little too well. I was at her bridal shower, and one of the games involved questions about the couple, including the correct spelling of the groom’s name. It was at that moment that I realized that not only did I not know the correct spelling of the groom’s name, I did not know his name at all. I had never called him anything at all except Big Daddy Cool, or, sometimes, Big Daddy. I was seated right next to his mother, and if there’s anything worse than being at a bridal shower and not knowing the groom’s name after meeting him dozens of times, well. There’s actually a lot of things that are worse, but still, it wasn’t my best moment. It could have landed me on a segment from Were You Raised By Wolves.

Weekly Reading

The Spoon Stealer. This book concerns a peppy old lady looking back on her life, which is divided between Nova Scotia and England. She has a talking dog and a habit of stealing spoons wherever she goes, after her brother tells her that a spoonful of kindness is all it takes to make a difference. It’s a very sweet concept and there are a lot of heartwarming messages in this book, but the writing style just wasn’t for me and I found it very difficult to be engaged with the story. In fact, I kept thinking when is this going to end, and then at the actual end, I discovered that the story was based on the author’s family, which made me feel terrible for mentally disparaging it.

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. This has been on my TBR for a long time, but I had forgotten about it until Lisa and Laura (HI LISA, HI LAURA) mentioned it to me recently, so I bumped it up. I have a lot of thoughts, buckle up. This is a memoir by a very acclaimed author of her family’s move from Tucson to a piece of land in Appalachia; the move was precipitated by their desire to eat entirely locally which the author claims is impossible in the arid land of Arizona. They were motivated to reduce their carbon footprint via trucked-in or flown-in food, and I do think this is a very admirable thing to do. Each family member was able to choose one exception to this rule, and her husband chose coffee, which was extremely relatable to me. They do accomplish this locavore-style of eating, both through community purchases and their own garden and animals. I will say I skimmed over quickly the parts in the book where they discuss slaughtering their own meat versus factory farmed meat. I already know about this, I agree raising one’s own meat is a sustainable way to eat meat if one does, and also I do not want to read about it. The book is peppered with recipes – Laura had mentioned one for zucchini chocolate chip cookies, you can bet I’ll be trying that – and that is quite delightful. However, I found the book as a whole to be a bit dated – it came out nearly 20 years ago, and even the updated epilogue from 2017 was a moment in time – and also reeking of privilege and judgement. I was in my early thirties – around when this first came out – when I read The Good Food Revolution; before reading that book I had absolutely no idea what a food desert was. I had never heard of it. I had never heard of children unaware that carrots and potatoes grow in the ground, that apples are from trees, etcetera. I had never, not once, realized that there were entire communities of people without access to a grocery store or to fresh fruits and vegetables. That book really changed my perspectives and cultivated a lot of empathy in me for people who are just trying to feed their families in any way that they could, and after reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, I felt that the author was a privileged white woman whose answer to climate change was to a) grow a garden, or b) go to the farmer’s market. And I love both of those things but it is an incredible privilege to do so. Gardening is a lot of work and takes a lot of time. Going to the farmer’s market requires access to one, as well as money, and I’m not sure in this day and age if that is always possible. We don’t all have a piece of land in Appalachia that we can ditch our life for, even if we could all just leave our jobs. Another thing that stuck in my craw a bit is that the author and husband takes a trip to Italy, and while I loved reading about their local eating in places I had so recently enjoyed, I also wondered how they justified the jet fuel. I suppose one doesn’t preclude the other, but it was a detail that bothered me. The last thing I’ll say is that the author speaks very lovingly and with great empathy for the tobacco farmers of her youth, who built the communities surrounding her. I do think it’s a really hard thing, seeing an industry that employed everyone you know disappear, but I wondered what her take on other reviled industries – let’s say energy, for example – would be. I wondered if she would have the same level of kindness for people who were also just putting food on their tables via an industry that is generally not looked on with love. Laura and I spent some time discussing the author’s more recent book – which I haven’t read and I WILL NOT – Demon Copperhead, which is about the opioid crisis in her very community. Was the disappearance of the tobacco industry a precursor to that? Maybe. Anyway, lots to think about, the tl;dr is that I loved the descriptions of gardens and seasonal recipes, and I hated the privilege and judgement emanating from this. The food industry as a whole, and the way we approach eating and nutrition are extremely complex and often terribly problematic, and this book does shine a light on those issues.

Whew! After all that, I am going to give you an update on my own garden! Because I am nothing if not a multicoloured tapestry of a person. I have been using garden spinach in my smoothies all week, there are teeny tiny green tomatoes on two of my plants, and the iris garden, friends, the iris garden is bringing me so much happiness. Every morning there is something new! We have so many different colours – purples and burgundies, white and yellow, peach and variegated – and I love them all.

You have no idea how difficult it is for me not to post a photo of every single iris in the garden, thus making this ridiculously long post even longer. I blame Barbara Kingsolver! No, I only have myself to blame. Have a beautiful, flower-filled week, my friends. xo

Nifty, Fifty

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Today is my fiftieth birthday! I can finally say I’m Nifty and Fifty!

When I was very small, I had the thought process shared by many small children with regards to what “growing up” entailed. What do you want to be when you grow up is a ridiculous question to ask a three-or-four-year-old, and yet it’s incredibly common. I mean, preschoolers really do not have all the information with regards to career paths.

But when I was that age, I had a really firm idea about what I wanted to be when I grew up, and that was a flower.

I don’t think it’s that unusual for a small child to equate “growing up” with a species-shifting free-for-all. I loved flowers, therefore I wanted to be one. I wanted to be a pink daisy-like flower, my face would be in the centre, and my arms would be the leaves. I can still picture it, myself as a flower, bobbing along in the breeze.

I also remember exactly when this future flower plan came to a screeching halt. It was when I realized that flowers die in the winter. I remember crying hysterically about it; I was a very emotional and dramatic child, and so my complete devastation probably didn’t register much to my parents. I recall my dad saying but flowers come back in the spring, which made me cry harder. I would miss Christmas! I would be dead! When I was a flower! I’m sure my parents did not understand the depth of my sadness, because what adult would be like right, right, well I know you think you’re going to be a flower, but that’s not actually going to happen, so you won’t die every year and miss Christmas. They were probably more like oh my god why is this child crying again?

My dreams of becoming a flower evaporated into the ether, along with my tears.

When we moved here, my husband and I redid our wills to reflect the new province and property, and, because the children were now grown, to eliminate the guardianship clause in the case of our sudden demise that would leave them orphaned. As we spoke with the lawyer, she asked if we had any burial preferences, for when we shuffle off this mortal coil, and my husband was quite surprised that I did have a very strong opinion on this subject. I exuberantly informed the lawyer that I wanted to be composted and planted with a tree, which she dutifully wrote down.

I think it’s very important to have these strange and difficult conversations – open and honest communication is always the best – and so I informed the children of my plan, should I suddenly expire. Oh Mom, my older son said, That’s so great! You’ll be one step closer to achieving your childhood dream of becoming a flower!

It seems a little macabre to talk about my future demise, may it be many decades in the future, and also becoming human compost on my birthday of all days, and well, it is. But it also strangely brings me happiness to think that perhaps one day I’ll be one with the earth while my soul flutters around, hopefully inhabiting a bird or a butterfly, and not something that will immediately get squished, like a fly or mosquito.

In the Ask Me Anything that I had posted months ago, Kyria (HI KYRIA) asked how do you want to be remembered, and that to me is an incredibly difficult and complicated question. I think the way we remember people is specific to the time periods in which we were the closest, to how well we know them, to things we did together. Someone from my youth will remember me very differently from someone who knows me now; certain songs might spark memories, certain movies, certain places.

That said, I think I would like a park bench, just like my pretend friend Lloyd Forest, but instead of reminding people when the park closes, I would like to tell them to return their shopping carts.

Of course, when I told my kids that, they demurred. Turning their mother into compost, that’s fine, but putting a shopping cart reminder on a park bench was not. That makes you sound like you’re a grumpy old person! my son said, I think it would be better if you had Putting the OM in OMG.

Well. I guess he’s right. My tagline really does describe my life so far, and I hope it describes the next fifty years.

Weekly Reading

What’s Mine and Yours. This is what I would classify as a Big Book, and I’m not talking length – it’s just over 300 pages, which seems average these days. But it’s big in concept and it deals with big issues: race-related tensions, redlining, integrating school districts, and intergenerational trauma. There is also a big cast of characters and they all have big problems. There are several time periods as well. I will say it’s very well-executed, thoughtful, and smart. However, it was not what I would consider a pleasurable reading experience because nearly all of the characters were deeply, deeply dislikeable. Even the one main character who I thought was pretty decent turned out to be not so much in the end. It really says something about the nature of pain and trauma, and how hurt people often lash out. Still, I was looking for a redemption arc, which never really happened – but maybe that’s the point. Maybe the point is that people with pain and trauma often never get that redemption.

The Book of (More) Delights. I picked this up while Christmas shopping last year, entirely because of the cover and the name. I had no idea until my friend Laura (HI LAURA) mentioned a “Ross Gay moment” that this was a book by an acclaimed author. To further the Laura confluence, in the recently read Bite By Bite, the author, Aimee, mentions going to a watermelon festival with her friend Ross, who was working on another book about delight, and it was this Ross. THEN, near the end of this book, Ross mentions going to a watermelon festival with Aimee, and I just exploded with all the life/ reading intersections. Anyway. This is a book of 81 essays on everyday delights over a span of a year, and it starts and ends on Ross’ birthday, which felt serendipitous for me, finishing it just before my own. I have been reading an essay before yoga most mornings since January, and his style of writing is – as one might expect – delightful. He has more digressions than anyone I’ve ever read, sometimes six or seven in a SINGLE SENTENCE. I loved it.

It’s certainly been a week of delights for me: my darling friend Sammi (HI SAMMI) hosted the most gorgeous girls’ lunch you can even imagine, complete with tiara and sash, which I’m wondering if I can get away with wearing everywhere for the next year. It was truly the most wonderful afternoon with such an incredible group of women, I am SO lucky, so so so lucky.

My parents were here for the weekend to celebrate, and we had a great time with lots of wine and more cake. I hosted Easter dinner for both sides of the family, and it turned out great! I hope you all had a lovely weekend with all sorts of treats. xo

Tell Me Something Beautiful About You

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It is the last Monday of my forties! I’m celebrating by sending off the third draft of my novel to my trusted beta readers. It’s exciting and oh, so scary. I vacillate between it’s a draft, relax, and what if it’s terrible and everyone hates it? Not every book is for every person, and I wrote a book I would want to read – and I have read it many, many times now in the editing process.

The whole point of writing this book has been for pleasure, for a challenge, to see if I could do it, and in that spirit, it’s an accomplishment. And I honestly do not think it’s terrible, although it won’t be everybody’s taste. What book is? In any case, I did it, and I’m excited to get feedback from my very first readers (HI READERS, YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE).

My very favourite thing on the internet, bar none, is when friends post photos of themselves, particularly selfies. I have heard selfies disparaged in many times and in many ways, but to me, they are nothing but happiness. I love seeing my friends’ faces; I see a selfie and I think there’s my beautiful friend! Seeing a photo, especially when I haven’t seen that person in a very long time – or, in some instances, ever – makes me feel closer to them.

There is something else about selfies that I love, and that is that I know the person felt good about themselves and their appearance at that moment in time.

A few weeks ago I read an article on Cup of Jo entitled What Do You Like About The Way You Look, and the title alone gave me a real visceral reaction. I think it’s universally uncomfortable for women to verbally express what they like about their appearance, for fear that they will sound vain or that they will trigger dislike or eyerolls from others – often other women. Who does she think she is? Instead, we are conditioned to really make ourselves smaller, lesser; to deflect compliments lest we are viewed as being too inflated, too big for our theoretical britches.

I, for one, was raised in an environment in which vanity and a preoccupation with one’s appearance was to be not just discouraged, but extinguished. And that upbringing resulted in the exact opposite outcome from the intended: I am as vain as the day is long. I put on mascara and tinted lip balm to walk the dog at seven in the morning, I wear a full face of makeup and do my hair every single day, I spend a lot of time on my wardrobe and my skincare routine and, most of all, my hair. I probably think that song is about me.

I do like the way I look – not every single aspect of my appearance sparks joy, of course, but in general I do. However, I feel very awkward saying so. The very idea of proclaiming what, specifically and particularly, I like – love! – about the way I look makes me nervous and sweaty. Some part of me seems to think that verbalizing my satisfaction about my appearance will lead to an immediate loss of friends and intense dislike from everyone around me.

That’s stupid. If a friend or loved one said she loved, for example, her breasts or hair or skin, I would probably say yes! I love them too! You’re gorgeous! Why should it be different to say such a thing about ourselves?

We should be able to celebrate every aspect of ourselves, including our appearances. We should be able to say what we love about the way we look without immediately following it with well, in every other way I’m a troll. We should be able to take a compliment without saying no, no, YOU look great, my roots, my god, I need to colour them. We should be able to post a photo without saying felt cute, might delete later. No! If you feel cute, DO NOT DELETE!

I guess this is why I love selfies so much, because they show what we can’t tell. They show that we like the way we look in them, even if we can’t say it. A selfie tells me that my friend thinks she’s beautiful, at that moment, even if she can’t say it aloud.

We should take away the stigma. What do you like about the way you look? What in particular? For me, I think I have a really beautiful smile. I also think that – and this is a recent development – I have a nice, shapely ass. I immediately wanted to type something disparaging about my body as soon as I wrote that, friends! Immediately! But I’m leaving it as is, and I’m challenging you to chime in and celebrate your own appearance.

Weekly Reading

I had an epic reading week, thanks to a) short books, and b) a lot of rain. I don’t think these books could be more different from each other if they tried.

Forever…Another Judy Blume and this one was the spicy favourite of my youth! I honestly think this is the most real book I have ever read about the intensity of teen relationships, the ups and downs of sex and love. It was so resonant for me when I read it as a teen, and it is a nostalgic read now. It mirrored a lot of my own experiences, except for the ones where Kath has open conversations with her parents about sex. I would have rather died. Also – interesting note – Kath’s grandmother in this book is a nearly seventy-year-old social justice lawyer who gives her information on Planned Parenthood and disease and pregnancy preventions. I mean, this could not be less like my own grandmas. However, I loved this book then and I still love it now! Also, and this will make sense only if you have read this book, one of my friends as a teen had a boyfriend named Ralph and it was really hard to look at him.

Foster. I really admire this author for her ability to convey such incredible emotion and storytelling in such a concise way. This incredible little book details a short time in which a young Irish girl is taken to stay with elderly relatives while her long-suffering mother has yet another baby. It’s a story within a story, and it’s a book that leaves a lot to the reader’s imagination; I for one will be thinking about it for a long time. I also will be thinking of the absolute misery that was women’s lives when the power to control their own fertility was not theirs; the desperation and poverty from such situations cannot be understated.

Loved and Missed. Woof. This is a truly brilliant piece of writing; so evocative, so moving. It’s also so very sad on so many levels. It has to do with a woman who is raising her granddaughter, as her daughter is an addict. There are so many themes of secrecy and shame, inter-generational trauma, pain and love. It shows what it is to love an addict, betrayal, and endings. So good and so very sad.

Five-Star Stranger. This was such an interesting concept – and well-executed as well. This follows a man who is a Rental Stranger, meaning that he can be rented for social occasions; think escort, but for all kinds of occasions and without the sex. He has had a long-term client who has rented him to be her daughter’s dad once a week, and her daughter has no idea that he isn’t actually her father. It’s a really interesting statement on loneliness, artificial relationships, and what happens when we don’t live in an authentic way. I really enjoyed it, thanks Julie (HI JULIE) for the recommendation.

I have a lovely, busy week planned for this, my last week in my forties: I have time with The Squad and a writing date, my parents are coming for a visit this weekend and I’m hosting an Easter dinner for nine. There will be cake involved, and mini-eggs in nests, the forecast is for sun, and my little spinach and kale seedlings are thriving. I’d love to hear about what you love about yourself, friends, but if that is too difficult, then I’d love for you to look into the mirror with love. xo

Let The Music Play

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Turkish Delight, On A Moonlit Night

I am currently in a delightful chapter in my life in which my children are grown and my husband and I are healthy and mobile, and so we have big plans to do a lot of travelling. It’s a big world out there and I want to see as much as I can for as long as I can; no one knows what the future will bring, and so I want to experience as much of other countries and cultures as I can.

Recently we have been talking about Türkiye, which I briefly visited as a teen on a school trip, and would love to see a lot more of. Unfortunately, the planning for this trip may be the undoing of my sanity. Every time I hear, see, or even think of the word “Istanbul,” I immediately follow it up in my head with was Constantinople, now it’s Istanbul not Constantinople, been a long time gone, Constantinople. And that’s the best case scenario; frequently I will go through the entire song in my head before I can rest. Why did Constantinople get the works? That’s nobody’s business but the Turrrrrkkkkksss. Istanbullll.

I don’t know what percentage of my brain is dedicated to song lyrics and other quotations, but it’s significant. I wonder what incredible things I could accomplish, were I able to clear my mind of Getting Jiggy With It, a song that went through my head incessantly when I was writing my very last exam in grad school. I got an A in that exam, so I guess it all worked out, but I’m not sure I’ve ever really recovered from scribbling down equations to the mental chorus of no love for the haters the haters mad cuz I got floor seats at the Lakers see me on the fifty yard line with the Raiders.

Speaking of which, one only need say to me here’s the situation before I mentally reply my parents went away on a week’s vacation.

Does everyone’s mind work this way, or is it just me? One of my favourite scents from Bath and Body Works is Butterfly, and every time, every single time I select that body lotion post-shower, I hum to myself See the dog and butterfly, up in the air he likes to fly.

Seriously, if I could rid my mind of song lyrics, random quotations from movies, Seinfeld, and the Simpsons, along with toxic diet culture, I would be a fresh book waiting to be filled. Staring at the blank page before you…

It’s Not Easy Being Green

We’ve had quite a bit of rain lately, which means that everything is greening up. It’s also likely the reason Kermit was hanging out on my door last week. In any case, it’s officially Garden Season, so prepare yourselves for an onslaught of Garden Updates for the next six months or so. I planted my first rows of kale and spinach on the weekend, the berry patch is all budding, and my husband and I went to the plant nursery. It is way, way too early to plant tender veggies like tomatoes and peppers, and yet I came home with exactly that.

I’ll be bringing these in every night for the next month.
Housewarming gift from the incomparable Suzanne, (HI SUZANNE), relevant to my interests.

Oh, and on the topic of green things, I have an update to my avocado woes. I bought a bag of avocados at Superstore, and, like a person completely beaten down by life, expected nothing out of them. Why did I buy them then? I don’t know. Maybe there was a shred of hope left in my soul. But then when I cut them open, every last one was perfect. It was enough to restore my faith in the world.

Ladies, Leave Those Umbrellas At Home!

My dear friend Sandi (HI SANDI) invited me along with her sister to a paint night this week, and as usual, it was so much fun. I did have doubts about my own skills, however, when I saw the sample painting. My initial thought was no way, this is going to be a mess, but you know what, it turned out pretty well!

I will say that the teacher, as well as anyone else who walked behind me and observed my painting, said repeatedly oh, that’s so interesting, what you’re doing with the skirt. To pull a quote from one of my favourite Seinfeld episodes, WHAT? I HAD A DIFFERENT INTERPRETATION! And if you can name that deep cut episode off the top of your head, let me know and I will send you a prize. What will the prize be? I have no idea.

It reminded me of my probably long-deceased childhood piano teacher, Mrs. Rechel. Along with exam pieces for the Royal Conservatory, I was encouraged to choose some “modern” pieces to play for fun. Frequently I would be playing these pieces of choice for her, and her mouth would just be a thin line. Oh, that’s very interesting, she would say, or, in some cases, Hmm. It’s certainly different.

Hot Carl In The City

Speaking of things that are different, I was reminded this week of the day back in 2012, when a car parked in my neighbourhood had a license plate HOT CARL. I remember wondering about the owner of this car, if his name was Carl and he had very high self-esteem, and then someone pointed out to me that a Hot Carl is a sex act that involves feces. To this day I think about this. Was the car owner really into Hot Carls? Or was he just a guy named Carl who thought he was all that and a bag of chips? Or – and here’s another deep cut – was he a fan of The Simpsons? This mystery is one for the ages. It will never be solved. Unless, of course, he (I assume that this person is a he) reads this and chimes in. Carl, are you there?

I came across this thought circuitously, because Jenny (HI JENNY) had posted an interesting photo of a car, a Range Rover no less, that proclaimed across its rear window Make Money Not Friends. You know what, I admire that kind of honesty. I would rather see that then some asshole who is cutting people off and behaving badly with a bumper sticker saying Choose Kindness. At least with the Range Rover, you know where you stand, and you would also expect to be cut off in traffic. Although I guess it’s not comparable after all, since we don’t know where we stand with Hot Carl.

Speaking of traffic, on my walk the other day I saw a man on a motorcycle wearing a mascot head in the shape of the Easter bunny. I wish I had the wherewithal to take a photo but to be honest, I was too stunned. I hope he had a helmet on underneath.

Mom? Mom? Was that a giant rabbit?

Weekly Reading

Girl, Woman, Other. This book blew me away; it is a work of art. I love women’s stories and I love short stories, and this really delivered. Each of twelve chapters is the life story of a different woman, and all of those short stories are interconnected in some way. The women are Black and British, and all their stories are unique and yet universal. It’s incredible to me how a good short story writer can convey so much with such an economical use of words. The writing style of this book is powerful and moving and adds to the emotionality of the experience. Loved it!

Tiger Eyes. My reread of Judy Blume continues with this, which was absolutely not a favourite of mine as a youth, but it’s a really fascinating read as an adult in 2025. The premise is very sad; a teen girl’s father is shot to death in his corner store, and her family transplants to New Mexico to be with relatives during the aftermath. The town in New Mexico is Los Alamos which is famous for being the place in which the atomic bomb was developed, and which itself was populated by physicists who research that and other weaponry. It’s a wild setting for a YA story, particularly one that was published in 1981 during the Cold War. This completely went over my head when I read it around age 11, as did the themes of grief, loss, and depression. Blume is such a master of weaving such heavy topics with those of sex, alcohol use, and family troubles, topics of deep interest to young readers. It was great on the reread, and there is quite a bit about Oppenheimer and American foreign policy, as well as changing ideas about Native Americans. There is still a bit of dated language which is unsavoury for the current climate, but it would have been still ahead of its time.

Bite By Bite. My friend Laura (HI LAURA) has never steered me wrong yet. She said this was her favourite food memoir, and the words “food” and “memoir” perked up my ears. Wow, was this a joy to read. Every chapter focuses on a different food – the majority are fruits, many exotic fruits, but she also waxes poetic about foods as varied as black pepper, gyro, waffles, shave ice, and lumpia. This book focuses on the joy of eating and how foods build community and celebration, and it is truly a delight. Talk about leaving toxic diet culture behind – this just made me want to celebrate the many delicious flavours in this world. Now, did an essay about pawpaw – a fruit I have never seen, let alone tried – bring me to tears? It sure did.

On the topic of joy and food: the grapes have all been pruned and tied and are ready for spring. Please enjoy Rex enjoying the prunings! Happy April, friends. xo

Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (a meal plan)

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I had the most delightfully social week, with visits and connections and gatherings every day, culminating in the most wonderful girls’ night out on Friday night: a candlelight tribute to ABBA, as played by a string quartet. I love music generally, almost all genres, but I really love disco, and ABBA specifically. We all dressed up in our most disco outfits, and when the audience was encouraged to sing at the last song, Mamma Mia, we got it started. Actually we might have been the only ones singing. It was a fun concert followed by snacks and rose at my friend Joy’s house (HI JOY).

Joy’s kitchen, photo by Joy!

In a move that I did not see coming, and was not mentally prepared for, my older son is not moving home for the summer. I’m luckier than most in that he lives fairly close by, and comes home every Sunday night for dinner. On occasion, he’ll text me to say he’s coming by for dinner on a weeknight; my friend Sam (HI SAM) was driving me home on Friday, and we were talking about this. She asked if on those random weeknight visits I make him a special dinner, but that’s not the case. I have a meal plan, and I rigidly stick to it; he knows this and is happy for pretty much anything I make.

Do you meal plan? I don’t know how I would live without one; the thought of not knowing what to make for dinner at 5:00pm gives me waves of anxiety. I meal plan, I shop accordingly, almost nothing is wasted, except for the occasional mini cucumber that goes mushy. Why is it only one cucumber? You’d think I’d be able to account for this by now. In any case, here’s what we ate last week.

Monday

This was a stir-fry with rice stick noodles, tofu, cashews, broccoli, carrots, and the lone half pepper that was left in my fridge.

Tuesday

Wednesday is grocery day, and by Tuesday things were getting a little Mother Hubbard-y. I made coconut rice with roasted sweet potatoes and the last of the broccoli. The guys also had air fryer chicken breasts.

Wednesday

I baked a loaf of the no-knead bread that I mentioned last week and served it with The Big Salad. It’s a big salad! With lots of stuff in it!

Thursday

This was a very busy day and so I made one of the easiest and quickest meal around: black bean tacos!

Friday

Since the ABBA concert was early, I had my favourite meal – Greek salad with pita and hummus – all by my lonesome at 4:30pm, just like the senior citizen I aspire to be. My younger son made breakfast for supper for himself and my husband; this is their standard Guy’s Meal, since it isn’t a meal that’s great for me to eat.

Saturday

Another quick meal as my husband and I were out drinking wine with friends in the afternoon (well, I was drinking wine). Crispy cauliflower fajitas with red pepper and the only bit of the CRAPPY AVOCADO I could salvage. Friends, I have had the worst time sourcing avocados since we moved here in 2023. The farm market is a good place, but they are not open in the winter. Costco has been nothing but a disappointment; every bag of avocados I buy ends up being completely unusable, and if I wanted to throw away $12.99 I would not choose to do so while hoping to have guacamole. This particular avocado came from Superstore, which is a hit and miss avocado source. Local friends, help! Or should I just give up my dreams and wait until the farm market opens in May?

Sunday

Sunday dinner is the only one that actually centres around meat; I made a roast beef dinner with lots of veggie sides that I can enjoy. Asparagus is in season right now, so we are enjoying that in all its roasted glory, along with roasted potatoes, roasted broccoli, and homemade Caesar salad.

Sunday is also my day to make a dessert, and I decided to make frozen strawberry daquiri pie, made with evaporated coconut milk. Typically I don’t hoard food anymore, but I had grabbed several cans when they were on sale at Christmas, and I’m glad I did as Superstore is no longer carrying them. I’m hoping this is a seasonal thing and I will have enough to keep me going until next Christmas. Just when I thought I was out of the hoarding habit, they pull me back in.

Weekly Reading

Didion and Babitz. I have long admired Joan Didion’s writing, which is what attracted me to this book. I knew next to nothing about Eve Babitz, also a writer and a visual artist, and wow, now I know too much. I did not like this book AT ALL. The author proclaims that she is obsessed with, loves and adores Babitz, and that bias comes out wildly in this book that is supposedly about a feud-like, frenemy relationship between two writers. Instead, it reads as a confusing narrative about a 60s party girl who lived the messiest life you can imagine, and who died in extraordinary squalor. Babitz accidentally set herself on fire, is what I’m saying. There is little about Didion and what there is, is mean and scathing and tends toward body-shaming. The author says of Didion’s grief after the death of her husband and child, that it was disingenuous and unfelt, as an example. Mostly, though, this book is incredibly hard to follow because there are so very many names involved, randomly dropped here and there with zero context about who these people are. I found this boring and confusing and honestly, so biased and mean. I would have DNFed but the part about Babitz having sex with Jim Morrison (while he was with Pam, god, the Sixties were a gross time) and being a “regular at the clap clinic” was semi-interesting, so I kept going. I wish I hadn’t. 

Her First Palestinian. This short story collection, by a Canadian author born in Kuwait to Palestinian parents, has some really great stories, and some that really didn’t do it for me. For the ones that I didn’t enjoy, it was the writing style that did me in; the author’s attempts at creative POV and styles just did not work for me. However, the stories that hit really hit, and all of the stories were extremely interesting in concept, if perhaps not in execution. They centre around Palestinian immigrants and refugees, the difficulty of living a life in which your existence is questioned, and the experience of working in an unnamed but powerful kingdom in West Asia (Saudi Arabia, perhaps?). It’s well worth the read; the last story in particular is very nuanced and moving.

Isola. I think that historical fiction is the most difficult genre to write; it’s so rare that an author can really capture the time and place in a way that is captivating and realistic. This is one of those rare novels. What an incredible work; this compelling page-turner is based on the true story of Marguerite de la Roque, who in 1542 is coerced into leaving France with her guardian, sailing to New France (now Quebec, Canada) in search of riches. She angers her guardian by having a romance with his secretary; her guardian then MAROONS the two of them, plus Marguerite’s servant, on an island between what is now Newfoundland and Quebec, just south of Labrador. The island is deserted and they have few supplies; and if you know that area at all, well, winters are brutal even if you DO have shelter. She survives for two years, eventually all alone. It is an incredible story and an epic work of art. This was definitely worth the hype!

I’m looking down the barrel of a much quieter week, which will be great for my writing. For those of you who have asked, thank you! It’s going well, I’m on my third draft of my novel – still as yet unnamed, I’m hoping I can figure that out soon – and am in the thick of revisions and edits. I also wanted to check in with everyone who is participating in Yoga Club! I hope to get a new little video up soon but in the meantime, keep doing your one (or more) pose a day, keep practicing loving-kindness toward yourself, and remember that we are all in it together. xo