01.22.09
Posted in May the Universe Respond, Sparkle at 9:29 pm by jeci
I am, I think, more belated than ever in posting my New Year’s resolutions this year, and do you want to know why? For the first time ever I haven’t been able to think of any. Not that my life is above resolutions for improvement. To the contrary, actually: I still allow laundry to pile up until the closet door strains against the weight of the mountain of smelly clothes; I still space out at work every day between 3:15 and 4:15 and all but drool all over myself while staring out the window with unseeing eyes (I call it the zombie hour); and I still go for too long between haircuts, have pores that can be seen from space when I go without a hearty spackling of Mac foundation, and my bum, in just the wrong kind of pants, can look like a displaced sack of rocks.
And I’m satisfied anyway.
I have a theory about this: it seems that, outside of the grace borne of living a self-examined life, there is no peace, no contentment to be found in chasing your tail over your own imperfections. So this year, instead of focusing on the things I’m doing wrong, I’m going to focus on the things I’m doing right and simply…do those things more. We all have something perfect inside of us and I want to chase that instead.
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01.05.09
Posted in Drunken Jeci!, Sparkle, The Farm at 4:00 pm by jeci
Go ahead and read Part 1 first, if you’re chronologically inclined.
Between my generalized feelings of dull panic and with the undertow of a long series of deadlines pulling me under time and again, I was remiss in writing about 2008’s key shining moments. I would hate for 2009 to get underway without first paying proper homage to the best of 2008.
I met another blogger
Shannon! She came to visit me in Vancouver for a couple of days (her account is here). In the photo above, I’m about to take her on a three-hour walk. I like to treat all my guests to militant, relentless, boot-camp style tours of Vancouver! I’m not exactly sure how things got so far gone when we decided to go for a walk—we headed to Stanley Park and I just kind of…kept going. We did eventually make it to the Lost Lagoon (after we went fairly deep into the forest at which point I remembered out loud that once upon a time there had been an axe murderer lurking about said forest), where we spent a lengthy period of time cooing over the baby ducks and marvelling at the swans. (There are no pictures of the swans because I was scared of them. Really.)
After we finally made it back to my apartment, I procured some homemade wine and, keeping things classy, asked my guest to uncork it because I couldn’t do it myself.
We proceeded to enjoy an evening of food and drinks and spent a lot of time giggling and chatting and at some point I put on some sparkly shoes and we: went for dinner at a jazz club; had a B-List celebrity sighting (complete with possible working girl) (Shannon played it more cool than I did, as I literally pointed and brayed something along the lines of “Who? THAT GUY?!?”, while Shannon coolly pretended to go to the bathroom on a reconnaissance mission); had an interesting discussion about graphic novels that opened up a new chapter in Kieran’s life; and mostly just laughed and talked a lot. I’d never met a fellow blogger before, but the experience reinforced that kindred spirits have a way of finding one another, even over the impersonal Internet. Had we lived in the same country and gone to the same school, Shannon would have been the friend you sat on the kitchen counter with, chatting and swinging your feet and drinking hot chocolates.
I went to a glamourous yacht party in the Okanagan
This was a weekend-long event for our friends’ anniversary. The yacht party was preceded by a whirlwind weekend of drinking, laughing, going to the beach, swimming in the lake, lounging by the pool, and…actually mostly just laughing. The yacht party was simply a gorgeous cap to what was already a weekend full of hilarity and friendship.
It should be mentioned that I somewhat famously got spectacularly drunk at the party (everyone did, really) (it was one of those things where I happened to be with all my guys friends and they kept buying me drinks). Anyway, I thought the four-hour boat ride was actually taking us on a TOUR of the Okanagan and throughout the night would point at lights on the hilltops and say things like “Where do you think we are now? Vernon?” or “Hey I bet that’s Summerland!”, when in fact we were circling the harbour in Kelowna the whole time. So my friends had to keep saying “No, WE’RE STILL IN KELOWNA.” Still waiting to live that one down.
I went to a family reunion and hung out with my cousins
We ate. A lot. And drank a lot. And sat around in lawn chairs, reminiscing about all the other times we hung out and ate and drank a lot.
There was much cuteness to be witnessed with the wee ones of our clan:
Especially when my cousin Blair busted out the fireworks:
I took a road trip to Alberta for Thanksgiving
First stop was Calgary, where I did the Run for the Cure with my dear friend Karla. Unfortunately, neither of us thought to bring our cameras so we don’t have pictures of what turned out to be a great run for both of us. I’d never done a run before and Karla, ever the good friend, made it a whole lotta fun.
Next stop was Drumheller:
Where we finally got to see the amazing Tyrell Museum, a spot we’d planned on seeing when we biked across Canada but the wind had had different plans for us.
Then to Sedgewick to visit with Kieran’s dad, step-mother, and brother. Behold the DNA:
Then of course to Millet, where I indulged myself in taking pictures of my favourite subject, the farm:
In between indulging in Thanksgiving dinner and visiting with my parents and aunt and uncle, that is.
And, finally, we headed back west by way of Hinton, where, at long last, I got to meet my best friend’s baby:
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Posted in My Life Is Punctuated by Useless Bouts of Panic, Sparkle at 11:33 am by jeci
Because I mostly took to this blog during moments of panic and/or boredom over the last year, one might get the impression that 2008 was a dull year punctuated by self-indulgent anxiety attacks. Which: um, well, yes. That pretty much sums up the bulk of my 2008. I was in transition, in every sense of the word. We’d moved to a new city, I was trying to set my career on a new course, and as is always the case I suppose, the landscape of my friendships and relationships was shifting, a situation that seemed to be brought into acute relief given the instability of every other aspect of my life.
I don’t know if I’ve gone through a transition period quite so long and drawn out (unless time is allowing me to gloss over adolescence), and my overall state of mind skipped along the spectrum of responses: bursting out of the starting gates in Freak Out!, before easing into optimism, which gradually eroded into a sort of wary acceptance of the quiet in-betweeness. For a while things were OK, if a little dull, and then…I leapt over some kind of sick-of-being-in-transition Rubicon and things rapidly declined. And I stopped blogging, mostly because I spent the majority of my time trying to force things into the next step with the unforgiving, pride-swallowing siege known as “looking for (meaningful) work,” which was interrupted only by my bouts of wailing to my girlfriends about my intense frustration. Truth be told, this went on so long that in the weeks before I finally found my current job, Kieran and I had come to the conclusion that we couldn’t stay in Vancouver. Kieran’s job was only temporary, my contract was only temporary, and despite our best efforts, it just. wasn’t. working. Other than the prospect of dealing with the logistics of a move again, giving up and leaving Vancouver felt like the best idea we’d had all year; if there was one thing I was sick of, it was trying to make things work in Vancouver. I was DONE. Kicking Vancouver to the curb was going to feel GOOD.
And of course that’s when I was offered my awesome new job. (Did I mention that I get four weeks’ vacation? And every third Friday off? Because HELLO!) And shortly after, Kieran was made permanent at his job. And a new transition period began, but this transition was different because instead of spooling into nowhere, it was like easing into a warm bath, gently sinking into a pleasant, new routine.
And here we are.
So, no, 2008 wasn’t the best year. It was unpleasant and scary and overwhelming. But it was a good year. We took a lot of chances with all the changes we set in motion when we left behind our lives in Edmonton to follow our dreams and bike across Canada. We willfully cut ourselves off from our comfort zones in order to push through some much needed changes in our lives because listen to this person. I mean yeesh—she was not a person who could stay the course. It would have been easy to go running back to our old patterns, to bury our faces in the petticoats of old habits just because the devil you know is a lot less scary than anything you don’t know. Change is hard, and these big changes seemed to spew forth a never-ending muck into which we became mired for month after month…but hot damn if things don’t feel good on the other side. Getting something is great; achieving something is beyond great.
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