365

Day Three Hundred and Sixty-Five:  The End

This year began on a rocky note.  I had returned from the great of my life to a cold, unbelievably busyest adventuseester.  My family experienced an incredible, horrifyin in January that changed ourg loss just before my birthyear and our lives, and althgh this time of yr is hard for us we know that we have eachother and everything is going to be okay.  After the term ended we decided to get out of the country for a small vacation, and after two weeks of recovering from what feels like my billionth surgery I was back at work with my kids and planning and in full managerial hiring swing.  This summer I wanted to continue adventung despite my lack of travelling so I ended up setting super goals to get through.  I read ten books, and jumped into light rapids, and spent more time with my family going on small adventures which is much worth it.  At the end of the summer Ceara and I ventured to Toronto alone for our Russell Brand apocalypse.  I visited Wonderland for the first time and in early September auditioned for a role in 1984, which marked the beginning of my renewed love affair with being in the theatre.  After a term of absolute constant chaos, developing friendship and inner peace I find myself on the other side of a strong year of growing for me.  Both creatively and emotionally I’ve had to figure things out on my own, and physicaly have challenged myself beyond what I thought possible.  Besides changing routine for the play other things had to be changed as well, and as the last full term of my undergrad I feel nostalgic looking back.  I have raised money for my kids with ideas coming from my own head, I’ve written almost three amazing plays, I’ve  made leaps and bounds with the soulmates I have as best friends, and most important of all I am at peace with myself on this December 31, 2013.

Last year on this day I vowed to remain positive and strong throughout the year.  My word this 2013 was "Nurturing” and I think I’ve done it well.  It has been one incredibly rough year, rough doesn’t seem  to cover it.  It was challenging and new and dark at times, but it’s been a fascinating ride.  I continue to surprise myself as does my family for their grace, and my friends have never stopped supporting me.  Looking ahead at 2014 I expect more travel as I already have a trip to Peru planned, and I want to get out of Ontario a bit and look around more.  I haven’t decided on a word for 2014 yet but I’m leaning toward Proud, capital P.  This year is my year to truly kick ass, as if I hadn’t done that enough in the past five since I lost my sight.   I am going to make myself proud of this year, and being positive doesn’t even cover what I’m feeling.

This year h to be incendiary, and I will make it so.

Thank s for reading if you have been checking back all year, it means a lot to me.  The content has changed since my first Project but I still enjoy writing them.  I decided to make this one more personal and I think I succeeded without getting too much into my life.  I am looking forward to new projects that I will broadcast accordingly, when I am ready to, but for now, I will thank you again for reading, sorry about the grammar, spelling mistakes, and rambling.  Someday y will get me back I’m sure.

This is the last time I’m going to say to keep on keeping on.  If there’s one thing I’ve learned since I was diagnosed is that you really only have the life you have, and there’s nosense wishing it was something else.  Get off your own ass and do what you want, because that’s how things get done.  Don’t expect anything, and hope for the best.  Be smart, enthusiastic, and smile.  Don’t wallow about love, don’t take things for granted, and always have a friggen great time.

x

364

Day Three Hundred and Sixty-Four:  Demanding Creativity.

I always hear people say that they are not creative, or that they wish they could be more creative, and something that always confuses me is that being creative is not dedicated to art.  My mom is creative when making solutions to scheduling conflicts within the family and that hardly as anything to do with art.  People are creative when they design the magnets on their fridges, or how they organise, and those could be defined as art but I don’t think that Creativity, capital C, can be confined.  Creativity permeates all areas of everyday life.

Creativity is meant to be challenging, and since I’m in the business of challenging myself I find myself attempting to be creative more and moe, and within everything I do I don’t mind that heart-pounding moment of terror right before I take a risk, because in that moment I learn that I have the ability to actually go ahead and do something, and that’s courage, and that’s pretty coo.  So as next term is my most creative semester I want to try and do things a bit differently in the spirit of being creative in all aspects of my life.

Maybe I just believe that Creativity is important because I believe that everyone is their best at their most spontaneous and raw moments, even the people who work better with structure could use a little creative thinking in their day, problem solving is just a way to be creative, and we all do that on a daily basis.

It may seem simple, and useless, but just incorporating a small creative change to your routine might make a change that will benefit you.  And maybe this whole bust is bust, but I honestly don’t care if no one takes m advice about creativity, because being creative is the only thing that keeps me sane sometimes, and that alone is worth it, even just for me.

x

363

Day Three Hundred and Sixty Three:  The beginning of the end

As I sit down to write this I recognise that this marks the third last post of my very long project and the beginning of my last semester of my undergraduate degree.  These things used to scare me, but now I am just…excited.  It is thrilling to be starting new adventures, it is, it’s so amazing to get that feeling when you’re doing something for the first time.  Like the first time you kiss someone, or the first day at a new job.  But the best feeling in my opinion is when you finish something.  The satisfaction alone is…beyond any other feeling.  The feeling of accomplishment trumps all.

We all have piles of notebooks half full and that  summer candle project you started last year that’s sitting in the back of your closet half finished, that novel that began kind of okay but took a wrong turn and a laundry list of things that never got done.  Some things are okay not to finish, but it always feels good to be done.

It is also intimidating. I mean, where do I go next?  Do I start applying to jobs in the city?  Do I apply to interships abroad like I planned?  Do I move to BC for the summer and broaden my Canadian horizon?  Where do I go?  There isn’t a google that can tell me what I need to do with my life and this has become very frustrating.  Yes, it is true that finishing things is good, but the preparation for the next start is terrifying.

But I’m ready, and that’s all that needs to be said at this point.  Cheers to endings!

X

362

Day Three Hundred and Sixty-Two: Eye Lash Curling Machine

I received my first eye lash curler yesterday, and to beshort I am quite excited.  I don’t do the makeup thing often but it fascinates me, and I have fond memories of being a very little girl in my grandma’s bathroom while she did her hair and makeup, we would listen to golden oldies on her tape eck and I would dance and beg to have my own eyelashes curled.  She gave me my own yesterday, and I have no idea what to do with them but I am determined to learn for the sake of the three year old Jessie inside of me.

It is funny to think that so many things from my childhood influence me now.  When I played coed soccer when I was four and the boys wouldn’t pass to me so I was put in goal and let in the balls just to make them angry…Needless to say, I don’t play sports much anymore, that’s not the only reason but was a contributing factor.  Or when my brother turned one and I accidentally blew out his candle I felt so bad that now I am hesitant to be around anyone’s birthday candles, I literally hold my breath when a cake that isn’t my own is brought to the table.  This may remain since my brother and my’s birthdays are so close that it was always a struggle to differentiate between cakes…

I just wonder how the decisions and experiences that I’m having now will influence me in twenty years.  How are they going to change the way I do business, or am a mother, or interact with my friends.  I think the strangest part of life that everyone gets frustrated with sometimes is not knowing what you are going to become. 

I think what I strive for in my everyday is to just be proud of who I am in the future.  When I look back at my younger years I see a very naïve girl, and a girl who made mistakes, and hurt people and lived differentl, and that girl has made me the girl I am today (or young LADY, ugh).  Inn twenty years I want to look back and e proud of the Lady I am today.  I think that’s the only way I can come to terms with getting older at this point, and that’s fine with me…for now.

x

361

Day Three Hundred and Sixty-One:  Favourite Songs

For the longest time, since eleventh grade I have had two favourite songs.  I got so sick of answering people with “there are too many” and just chose two that fit me perfectly.  I’ve mentioned them before,

Tiny Dancer by Elton John

America by Simon and Garfunkel

And I am about to add two more to the list, because let us get real here, if you’ve been around me in the past twelve months you’ll probably know who and what I’m about to put, but they cannot be left out, and they contribute to me, strongly.

Gimme Shelter by The Rolling Stones

Starman by David Bowie

And I dig it.  I mean, there are tons of songs.  Songs that I come back to to describe myself, to listen to in the mornings and when I’m trying to cool off.  There are songs that I know I will want at my wedding, to expose my children to, and to drink to in the future.  There are songs that have my name in them, that take the words out of my mouth, and that speak to me directly.  There are songs that I am protective over and wish no one else knew about but everyone would know and just not tell me they did.  There are ongs that I hate but are important to the strong influences in my life so I love them anyway.  There is a Pearl Jam song that I know only for AJ, and a stupid dubset one for my sister.  I break down my music to help me get through life, and my ipod is my little carrier for these things.

The two new additions to my favourite songs are there because every time I hear them I don’t just stop and listen, the world stops and listens.  Actually that’s not true, because I am selfish when it comes to my music, and I wish no one but me ever heard these songs, but when they come on, when I sing them, I get this feeling in my chest like they are MINE.  They KNOW ME.  How can a piece of music know you?  IF you have a favourite song you’ll know.  There are tons of potential favourites, but those four are there for the sole reason that they stand out for me, and that’s just it.

This had to be said for my own mental health.  That is all.

PS I wrote this and then turned on my itunes and I need a special mention because it doesn’t quite fit my favourite songs list, but it’s a song that gets me every time.

Rollin’, Rollin’, Rollin’ by Joel Plaskett

Which, if you want to know, is on my top five most played ever, because I just continue to listen to it over and over.

“I’m yours to keep, oh, won’t you keep me, I’m a keeper.”

 Brilliant.

x

360

Day Three Hunred and Sixty:  New Project

So, it is settled.  I am moving to wordpress.com. 

Don’t hate me blogspot, you have served me for over four years now, and I will still have some soft blogs on here where I do some writing and some diary-ranting, but for the most part this next project (or two, or three) is going to be settled, nested, into wordpress.  I’ve already mentioned the first project that I’m going to be doing which is for my Independent Study on the Modern daptations of Macbeth which will be chronicled over the next four months on that blog, being updated twice or three times a week.  But there is another project that I’ve been cooking up.

It will NOT be a daily blog, because as much as I’ve liked the two 365 projects I’ve done I have had trouble writing relevant things of quality this year.  It might be because I’ve been so busy or other things, but for the most part this new project is going to be an every few days or whenever I feel like it thing.  I am going to start it this weekend, and it will have set days to be posted on (for example every Tuesday and Friday might have new for-sure posts) similar to popular youtubers posting videos routinely.  I am going to make posts about, well, categorized things that I’m interested in and want to try out.  I’ve been really into different beauty and ski products lately so I might do more extensive looks into those type of things, or about recipes, or meditation or anything really that I like.  Reviews of books, films, tv shows maybe, but honestly just going to be things that I enjoy and want to write about.

I might make a schedule at first but to be honest I want it to be more organic than this blog where I mandated a post every single day on the dot.  I want to have the freedom to write diary entries and advice and reviews, and have CONTINUOUS developing series, instead of me writing one when I feel like it and just giving up on it.  I think this blog in general is a good testament that this kind of project is possible for me, I am quite determined to fill my notebooks, to use an old-school term for this project.

I think that’s what I’ll call it, too, or something like it.  Like My Cosy Notebook or something of the like.  Someone once told me I kicked ass at making names for blogs, maybe I should do that for a living?  I could get paid lots of money to sit in a room and think of cool names for things.  Off topic, but sort of relevant.

Needless to say I am excited about it, and so I hope you all will be too.  I will post the new link on New Year’s Eve, which traditionally ends each of my 365’s with a thankyou and a plug for my next project.  How lucky am I that I end up finishing these?  They are one of the only things that I ever finish, I’m proud of myself.

X

359

Day Three Hundred and Fifty-Nne:  Christmas Day is Today

Spending any day with family is a wonderful day, but spending a day where you’ve thought out gifts and given them and seeing the reactions is even better.  Having good meals, good laughs, it’s all been such a whirl.  I love Christmas for many reasons but the top is spending time with my family.  Today I’ve seen my domestic and extended Watkin family, and on Friday we are heading to my hometown to see my Park family, and then its smooth sailing until New Year’s, where I will be (weather permitting) joined by some wonderful best friends tor ing in the new year! 

This Christmas has taught me a few things.  To round off a few:

-how to have grown up conversations with family about not just what’s going on in school, but working life, commuting, how it feels to have benefits, and what to have conversations about.  It’s all been quite illuminating, having actual conversations with family as opposed to the standard “How’s school?  How’s your job?  Do you have a boyfriend?” and moving into more interesting things.

-I actually can’t eat as much pie as I used to be able to.

-I desperately need new music on my ipod if I am ever going to enjoy a commute again.

-Homemade gifts are in high demand when you are a busy 21-year-old blind girl who knits during her Dr Who binge sessions.  This has come in very handy for next year.

-Note for next year:  Clean room before Christmas day so when moving gifts from the main floor to your room there isn’t a massive floor of crap everywhere.  I honestly can’t see the floor.

-sleep is essential but can be sacrificed for certain outstanding circumstances.

And among all else this season has brought me up to speed with the depth and extensive work an adult has to do in order to have a successful Christmas.  Coordinating work schedules for gatherings, communication with the rest of the family for food and gathering details, finding a gift for everyone and all at the same time also having time for yourself so you don’t get insane on anybody.  These things are important, but have been a joy to learn.

Except for feeling quite ill after all of that pie.

I am fortunate to have lots of my family still around me (this year) and the ability to spend time with everyone important to me this season.  I had power, which was lovely, and received many awesome gifts at the same time being so excited to give my own.  Friday is my tinsel Christmas, which only completes the holiday for me.  I hope you all had a warm, safe, and appreciated Christmas this year, and celebrated accordingly.

X

358

Day Three Hundred andFifty-Eight:  Merry Happ Ho-Ho Time

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house Christmas music from the third OC Christmacka mix played loudly as I got ready for the day and wrote this.  Parents were out, children were sleepy, all building up to this great Christmas evening (slant rhymes, they’re the big craze today).    Now that I’m a grown up (ick) I find myself sitting around reading, writing, drinking in dresses.  Today is Christmas Eve Dress Day, which means the beautiful, expensive plaid dress I bought earlier this December is on, “Christmas Apple” moisturizer, candle from Scotland and Roots Christmas hat in toe, and I will eventually get to spend the core of my day with my family doing our favourite loving traditions and eating our spiral ham.  Not quite our “Roast Beast,” I think we’re saving that for later this week.

I think I’m going to let myself have a few cookies today, all day, it is quite necessary.

I’ve got to be off, but to all a good, safe, happy, and loved Christmas Eve.  Don’t be stressed just be merry, and may it be a full evening for you.

Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas…now.

x

357

Three Hundred and Fifty-Seven:   Wide Awake and Looking Ahead

This evening while on skype with my lovely Jude she asked if I wished it would just hurry up and be Peru time already, and I thought that I was, but after a minute I really just…I’m not.  I’m ready for tomorrow, Christmas Eve, and family time, and seeing my family’s faces when they open my gifts and having good meals together and spending time with close friends and having good glasses of wine and the exciting things to happen in the next week and a half, and getting back to campus and having my play on stage and taking the last four courses of my undergrad and going to parties and hugging my friends and smiling and enjoying these last four months.  I am looking forward to eevery day in the upcoming term because I know that things are about to change as they already are in my life right now.

Of course I am looking forward to Peru, but I think I want this term to pass like it did in London:  with just the right amount of speed.  A balance.  Not too fast in the aazing times and sped up a little in the hard ones.  The nights I can’t sleep I hope I will be able to get through them quickly and without hassle, and to the nights I am awake on purpose with my best friends drinking wine and watching Al Pacino |(HOO HA!) I hope those times are the perfect amount, staying up until our eyes are droopy and our heads rest on eachother’s shoulders.  The mornings spent at the breakfast place, in the library, at the gym, in the theatre, I want every moment to stay with me like it did in London because every moment is another one ticking by before I leave.

I tell everyone who will listen to me to not take anything for granted in their life, do not take any evening, any family dinner, any shift at work any conversation on the phone any silent moment alone any moment any thing in your life for granted because it flies away from you.  Every smile from a best friend or loved one, because they could be gone.  Any moment standing alone in the biggest city in the world watching the beautiful river beneath you slide away and your breath escape you in the setting sunlight and the silence of your own head but the bustle of the world around and just being in any moment, don’t take those things for granted.  Moments are a priveledge, someday you won’t be able to remember them, so appreciate them now.

Forgive, love, live life, and most of all let yourself be happy.  Smile, for the love of Pete just smile.

x

356

Day Three Hundred and Fifty-Six:  Quality.

My dad and I made soup today from scratch and it was lovely.  It’s beena  while since I’ve found my own recipe and followed it and made something actually worth eating, and that was nice.  I think I just like knowing what goes into my food, and I’ve been so full all evening…Macdonalds fries have nothin’ on me!  But seriously, creating from a recipe has such a  satisfying touch.  Like I look at a page, go through take the time to buy everything, chop everything, put it all together nice, instead of just quickly throwing a bit of materials together and maybe eating it afterwards.  That need to know everything, the process of everything, remains.

Moving forward I hope to make some different things this term.  Some simple things that I won’t have to plan too much for or take too much time to make, but some delicious healthy things, because we all know that frozen lasagna gets old pretty fast.  I wish I had my own kitchen to work with, and a proper kettle and a radio on the counter to listen to music at the same time.  When I grow up and have a house of my own, am I right?

And a garden to grow random fruit and vegetables in.  I want to get a birdhouse too I think, and make it like my grandparents had when I was little.  And a clothesline.  I feel like my dream house is actually a stepford house from the nineteen-seventies, but forgive me I can dream big, can I not?  I’ve been finding myself thinking of the future lately and what I actually do want, and realising that my life is right in my hands at this point.  I can do whatever I like with it, I just have to make the right decisions and let them fall into place.

So here’s hoping that the next few decisions work out in the end, and wishing you all the best on your decisions this holiday season and beyond.  

x

355

Day Three Hundred and Fifty-Five:  Semi-Flawles

Sometimes I worry that I have high expectations.  I sometimes worry that I worry about too many things, and that I eat too much sugar.  Sometimes I worry that I don’t sleep enough or sleep in too late.  Sometimes I wish I was more driven, and other times I wish I went with the flow more.  Sometimes I go to bed ready to wake up for the sunrise, and sometimes I never want to open my eyes again.  Sometimes I like watching intense tv shows and sometimes I just want to watch Sex and the City.  Sometimes its too late.  Sometimes I wish people knew what I was thinking and then sometimes I’m like Thank God No One Knows What’s  Going On In Here. 

And sometimes I have some posts to write and I can’t think of anything than this, so, you’re welcome.

X

354

Day Three Hundred and Fifty-Four:  White Christmas

Since the next five to seven days are consumed by Christmas cheer for me I am going to try to either tone it down in every post or leave the overly Christmas posts to Christmas Eve and Day, but what I wanted to chat about today was my love for a “White Christmas” in all of its glory.  Up until I was maybe fifteen I had known nothing but White Christmases, getting snowed in at Grandma’s, a light snowfall to watch on Christmas eve as we go around on our Christmas light watch as a family.  There has alwys been a white blanket of snow covering my lawn around the holiday season, but for the past few years there hasn’t, and not just because I spent my 2011 holiday season in Costa Rica, there just hasn’t been any snow.

So when it snowed early last week I got very excited.  December, and its snowing?  Not since I was a freshman in highschool have I seen this, and now it is  freezing rain and warming up, and I swear if it isn’t a snowy Christmas I am going to be so disappointed.  There’s nothing like waking up Christmas morning to snow, and bundling up for Christmas Day travel and needing a warm beverage when you arrive. 

The funny thing is is that if the snow disappeared January first I would be happy about it.  The month of December is the only time where I crave the snow.  All I’m dreaming right now though is that the snow sticks around for another five days at least and then enjoys a short stay before heading off before my birthday.   My odds are looking good, but who knows!  Canadian weather these days has become unpredictable at best.  Here’s hoping!

x

353

Day Three Hundred and Fifty-Three:  Sometimes a Girl Needs a Half

Sex and the City has taught me…well, has guided me through lots of things, and there is an episode where Carrie talks about just needing a half sometimes.  A point-five that makes or breaks it.  For me, that comes in many ways.  Sometimes it is that point-five of an hour laying in bed in the morning in order to not feel super groggy.  Sometimes its point-five percent on a grade that breaks the Dean’s list.  Sometimes it can be half a glass of apple juice, which I associate with relaxation (believe it or not) and if I’m mucking about campus and need to slow down I find apple juice and it seems the same here, I’ve become accustomed to that taste.  Sometimes a girl can get away with a half and to that fact I am eternally grateful.

Well, that’s a hyperbole, I guess not eternally, but that extra half sometimes makes or breaks my mood.  There was this tshirt when we went to Disneyworld for the first time when I was twelve that had Tinkerbell (my favourite) and it said “Little package and big mood swings” and my dad wanted me to get it.  I didn’t understand why then, but now in hindsight I can feel the effects of mood swings from the people around me and I am fully aware of them within myself.  Sometimes it is uncontrollable, and sometimes, like today even when I am on holiday, the difference between a good mood and a sulky one can be as simple as half of a sandwich or a glass of milk:  strangely enough mood swings are broken for me by protein.  Those halves during the moments that get me make al of the difference, and my friends and family now they ARE eternally grateful.  I can get quite grumpy, “hangry” as my dad calls it.

So I tend to really try to check in during the holidays as I am off of my own personal eating schedule and am on my family’s, and sometimes I find myself searching the fridge for a little bit of cheese or yogurt so that I don’t snap at everyone.  There come times though where I think it would just be best to be alone.  Sometimes I think that in order to recharge and avoid mood swings altogether I would need to spend a good amount of time alone.  I’m never going to be able to get married I can hardly have a sleep over without getting anxious about not having alone time for the eight hours I share a bed with someone.  Can you imagine me sharing a bed with someone for the rest of my life?

Half a bed, hah.  Now there’s an instance where sometimes a girl needs a WHOLE…bed.

Needless to say sometimes a girl just doesn’t know what she needs, and that’s alright.  I get frustrated with people who never ask for advice or help, because that’s where your best bet is when needing other opinions.  I didn’t understand why I was so grumpy before realising it was because of what I was eating and now I am so much more happy and well healthy, and it is all for the better.  If you need a half, go out and find it.

x

352

Three Hundred and Fifty-Two:   A Blind Girl in the Suburbs:  A Christmas Tale

We must start at the beginning as many of you should know by now the pained story of how little Jess lost her sight, but when it first happened, the first big time anyway, she lost her driver’s license too.  This won’t seem too big of a deal to anyone who is not old enough to yet drive a vehicle or has had their license for years, but for a young, twenty-something woman not having your driver’s license means immobility and dependence, two things that scared her most. 

Now, at this point in the current story she has fast forwarded four years after her alleged vision loss to a frosty morning before Christmas as she dressed preparing for a long Christmas shop to find all of the last additions to gifts to go under the tree, when her mother calls up asking when she needs to be at the mall to meet her friend, and then it hits young Jess right in the face:  If I bring a gift home for mum she will see it in the car!  There is no way I can shop for everyone today someone is bound to see their gifts!  How frustrating it is to not be able to take a bus because the subdivision I  now live in doesn’t have access and cannot drive a car of my own!  Woe is me!

What a sad thought, is that not frightening?  Imagine the horror of not being able to go anywhere around the holidays on your own and always relying on someone else to drive you there.  You probably remember this from your early teens before your driver’s license arrived, but at least then you might have had the public transit system to rely on.  There were busses running out of this suburb but they were across a large scary road and the rest took a long, long time, ages even, to get to the mall.

So what is a broke blind student to do?  Things must be bought, and even if it wasn’t shopping it would be something else like going to a Christmas dinner or meeting friends for tea,  there always seems to be some obstacle between young Jess and independently living life.  Is the moral of this story allow people to help you if you need it?  It is something young Jess has had to become accustomed to, but that is not all.

Don’t take that driver’s license, vehicle, bus route, borrowed car, mother father guardian for granted that gets you around and you can live life without complaint.  And as for young Jess, she will be departing for the mall on her loving request to her mother, as she is lucky her Mum asks when she needs a ride and doesn’tjust say her own schedule.  How lucky is that?

x

351

Day Three Hundred and Fifty-One:  Grudges.

Why do people hold on to anger?  I can understand when someone causes you pain and anguish and a hassle to be frustrated with them for a time, but when you dismiss your own selfish agenda and realize that we are only on this earth for a brief moment I time doesn’t it make more sense to appreciate the people around you?  And if there is something unforgiveable then let those people go?  What is the sense in worrying yourself over someone that matters to you?  I mean, I have m handful of grudge, I guess, for honestly unforgiveable things, but I am quite the forgiving person.  I do not like confrontation but I believe in communication and above all the importance of the people in my life.  If there is strife I want to deal with it or change something because it makes more sense to me to be on good terms with everyone as opposed to letting things go on and having trouble between you and another person.

Maybe I am optimistic?  Thinking that people would be able to  forgive others easily, and I understand that pain drives strong motivation for dismissing rather than letting someone back intoyour heart, and I don’t just mean romantically but I mean your friends and family, the people who you care about and care about you doing things to make you upset, what is the big deal?  If you love someone, and trust and care about someone, isn’t it more important to spend honest, quality time with them than spending your time being angry?  Is this a part of growing up that few people have mastered?  Is forgiveness even a part of natural reality?

Challenging reality has been an interesting thing to me lately.  I mean, “reality exists in the human mind and nowhere else, it is not external” was a line that I had in the play I was in recently, and every time I said it I believed it even more.  This bed is only a bed because our society and humanity has deemed it a bed, but by the confines of reality and out-of-the-box thinking anything could be a bed if we as humans believe itt o be so.  A bird’s nest is that bird’s home, but it wouldn’t be for us.  So then why do we deal with things in such abnormal ways?  What is normal is everything we know to be true is just true because we say it is?  Ugh, confusing.

All I’m trying to get through here is that reality is not as complicated as we think it is, but the complexity comes out of the relationships we have with one another.  “If we all could just get along…”  I understand that some people are mentally insane, and that some people believe other things and some people have strife with things because of pain, but is it all that important in the grand scheme of things?  We are all going to die eventually, and wouldn’t everyone rather spending the time we do have living on things that are beneficial to our quality of life?  What good is it being mad at anyone the whole time?

This didn’t come out how I wanted it to, but I am still confused about it all.  Maybe this is just the way that I look at my life, because I appreciate the people in it and try to be patient when I am angry and understand that life is honestly the most fleeting thing there is.  Just, you don’t have to get along…but atleast appreciate the fact that you have people in your life, okay? Okay.  Good.

x

350

Day Three Hundred and Fifty:  Just sitting together and texting.

Years ago, when I was in ninth grade and just got a phone, during the summer time Ceara and I went to the beach with our families and I wanted to text a boy but felt bad because I was with her and we both decided not to text while we were together and focus on eachother.  Through the years, after countless sleepovers over coke and eventually wine, we casually texted other people, but this evening we sat on my bed not talking and focused on our phones.  We laugh about it, and that’s something that has changed in most relationships I think.  Uma Thurman’s character in Pulp Fiction says that she wants to be with someone who she can sit with and say nothing and be omfortable.  That is what I want, but I have a feeling Ceara and I’s relationship has reached the level of texting and sitting in eachother’s company and being fine with it all, comfortable.

Fifteen years seriously changes a relationship, doesn’t it?  God, best friends are great.

But I’ve been irkied off about technology lately.  My phone has been freezing, my computer restarting on its own, and the amount that it frustrates me honestly scares me.  I rely on my ipod, my phone, my computer, my ipad so much that it worries me.  We all rely on our technology to such an extent that they become a part of us.  We decorate our phones to match us and our personalities, we protect our privacy on these machines to the death, and we carry them around with us like our own intentional puppies.  This technology scares me because it has become a part of our live as much as belts or hair ties have:  the accessories of the ages.

And sometimes it isn’t so bad, I mean, technology gives so many people access to so many things, puts people in communities that they otherwise wouldn’t, but what is so fascinating is that no one has a problem with the fact that they are becoming an actual part of ourselves.  I feel naked going anywhere without my phone, how warped is that?  I would feel weird without writing this blog and seeing it posted to my twitter account, and I would definitely cringe at the thought of missing someone’s birthday on Facebook (for the most part).  What is it about this medium that has caught hold of us?  It’s like a friggen infection.  And we aren’t trying to cure it for the most part.

I challenge anyone reading this to take an entire day away from the internet, their cellphones, and try to take some time away from social media and being constantly connected to everyone.  I haven’t decided what day I will be doing it, but I will be doing it sometime over the break, and it will probably be scary, but for the most part I believe it will be liberating.  We do it when we go on vacation and lay on the beach for a week, why can’t we do it while we are on holiday?

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Day Three Hundred and Forty-Nine:  It is finally here!

The season!  The season that everyone just smiles a lot!  Or they are grumpy in a mall but mostly smiling!  Today I have done a number of seasonal things.  First, I slept in and woke up to my best friends face!  Second I got home and made a tea, and then shoveled the drive!  Then we got materials for dinner and now my mum and I are baking her special shortbread cookies!  We are watching Home Alone, and while we are in the cookie lull I have now had the first warm cookie, which is my favourite kind of cookie, freshly baked with loooove!  Oh Christmas, there you are!

I am spending the afternoon baking with my mom and then probably making a gingerbread house later and watching more holiday specials, which will be fabulous!  I donèt mean to say that my Sunday will be better than yours, but it is definitely full of holiday cheer!  I also get to sleep in tomorrow, because I am done my coursework and am on holidays and donèt have to work on much for the next few weeks!

Iève got my handy Christmas jumper, tea mug, Christmas Whittardès tea, cookies, films, family, needless to say I am fully immersed in the holiday and loving every moment of it.

Except for the snow in my mittens, thatès always a buzz kill. 

I wish everyone knew what it felt like to look outside and have a loving family, friends, snow, and a wonderful Christmas ahead of them.  I remember writing Santa letters and always asking Santa to stop by all of the kids who never got presents for a change, and maybe giving them something too.  I feel like this Christmas Iève spent more on donating to people in need and made more of my presents so that I could.  So donèt forget about those in need this holiday season. It’s just as important as the perfect gift, no?

An another warm cookie bites the dust…into my mouth.

IF you don’t get a cookie package from my mom let me know and I’ll bring you the bestest cookies evar!

Take care, night.

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348

Day Three Hundred and Forty-Eight:  Semi-Flawless

Good friends are hard to come by it seems, hard to have stick around, and hard to support.  I had a snuggle fest last night which is why I’m late on this post, but it was definitely worth it.  There were moments where we would just sit and watch bad sixties Marilyn Monroe and not talk (or snooze) and we didn’t need to.  Something about the comfortable-ness of best friends makes it okay to do these things.  It’s okay to stand in a garden full of snow uptown and yell “I’M IN THE GARDEN!è OVER AND OVER WITHOUT THEM  GETTING ANNOYED.  The Thing about good friends is that they know when snuggling is a necessity.  Oh Zo, what a lovely night we had. 

I miss the days in highschool where we could spend afternoons and whole entre weekends together without missing out on schoolwork and having the obligation to go to parties or anything like that, but where we could just hang out and go to the Farmerès Market and have picnics in the backyard.  It is harder  to coordinate the time and place of our get togheters nowadays, but it doesnèt mean that our friendship is any less.

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347

Day Three Hundred and Forty-Seven:  Naked

We all find beauty in the things that we appreciate.  We find beauty in things that we find attractive or alluring.  We find beauty in the people we love.  But we hardly find beauty in ourselves.  The thing about body image for me right now is that I don’t kno what to think about it.  Is there a time in your life where you end up actually liking the way you look?  Is this new?  And why does it matter so much to me if I have a little tummy or not?  Self satisfaction and being okay with who you are seems as unattainable as ever at this moment, and nothing I do seems to change a thing.

When I look at my friends I  find them all beautiful, but it is hard to look at myself and see the beauty in me without someone telling me.  I shouldn’t have to have validation from someone else it is true but I can’t help it.  And that’s something that frustrates me to no end.  I can complain about my body to anyone who will listen and say that I can’t help the fact that I feel this way and they scoff.  But everyone feels this way.  Everyone is self conscious, and we know it is stupid and we continue to do it anyway.

Bodies are supposed to be different.  How else would we tell eachother apart?  And people who worry about men finding them attractive or not in my opinion are attracting the wrong people.  Yes, I’d ideally like to find my own Ryan Gosling who seasonally age like Hugh Laurie, but if I end up with a compassionate, fun, caring man then that is better in my books.  I would rather be loved for my insides than my outsides, the latter is an added bonus.

So why does it bother me so much?  My body, I mean, why can’t I just accept that I could get more cardio and I could do more ab workouts but at this moment right now this is me and deal with that?  Why be so negative?  Its essentially neurological and I can’t help this negativity, but I wish I could shove it away.  IT comes in bouts, where some days it sticks longer, and sometimes I think I look cute and I just wish I could look that way forever.  Looks are so….irritating.

Not everyone can look like Emma Watson and Kate Upton,, but we can try to channel their confidence.  Everyone has something they don’t like about themselves, every person is vulnerable in some way it is our job to find the right people to surround ourselves with who do not allow their vulnerabilities to hinder their ability to love.

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Day Three Hundred and Forty-Six:  Frost

If I said I wasn’t sitting at my desk bundled in more than one blanket I would be lying.  I have emailed my landlord, because it is actually freezing in here.  There is no difference between my bedroom and a garage right now other than the wireless connection.  When I get into bed I am a snuggle bunny, and I do not enjoy getting out from the mountain of blankets that hold me in at night.  I return home for the holidays tomorrow and it is back to the wonderful bed that I so dearly miss, and television and food I do not have to pay for and it is very exciting to me.  Oh the holidays, they truly begin when you say goodbye to the things that have your mind full of stress.

I want to go skating this holiday.  I haven’t been skating since I was diagnosed with my eye condition and different kinds of physical things could trigger issues with my sight, but I think if the ice was empty and I could be with a confident skater like my dad I’d be okay.  I used to be a good skater, and I think that I want to try again.  Is that strange?  I like to watch people skate if no one will help me, with a hot chocolate and music.  Finally I feel like I can enjoy the hoilldays and the season.

Busy sidewalks, city sidewalks, dressed in holiday style.

The streets lined with lights, trees and stars, the snow coming down… The cold is okay, I guess, if it means that the holidays are here.  I just would like to be able to feel my face and hands while I enjoy it.

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Day Two Hundred and Forty-Five:  Lipstick

I bought Kate Moss lipstick today.  It wasn’t expensive, and it is the colour I wanted, and it is one of those things that transports me from being a little girl trying to make “plum” lipstick work with my gold hair mascara and jsie and the pussycat ears/boots/dreams to the somewhat put-together, smart, young lady who wears tights and conditions her hair.  Sometimes I go months without wearing make up, but I have a very good feeling about lipstick.  It is a staple that can go with anything, including a clean face.  What can I say?  I’d prefer a pop than a mountain of articial chemicals. 

I once took this magazine quiz about how the shape of your lipstick defines the kind of girl you are.  Is it sharp?  It means you are organised and strong.  Is it rounded?  It means you are flirtacious and spontaneous.  Curved?  I can’t remember, but it seems so strange to define who you are on something that is not connected to you other than softening your lips with colour.  How would lipstick know what kind of person you are?  The interesting thing about all of this too is that lipstick lasts, which means that the plum lipstick I stole from my mom when I was younger is probably still sitting in a drawer in my room somewhere and it is probably shaped the same way, but I am a very different girl now.

How about this, you shape the lipstick that you use.  Is it sharp?  It means that you probably don’t press too hard when it is applied.  Is it rounded?  You probably wipe it all over like a caveman.  Is it curved?  My point was not to define yourself by stupid obsolete objects. 

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Day Three Hundred and Forty-Four:  Things To Know Before You Stay

While parousing tumblr on a “study break” I found this honest post that had a bunch of notes and it was just a list of things people should know before they “stay,” and I think it was meant for a romantic relationship but sometimes I think that just people who are getting to know me and want to be my friend should know some things.  These are things I would want to know about anyone else, too.

-I am very stubborn and really like to get my way, but I can compromise if willed to.

-I don’t really like dressing up for Halloween but I’ll carve pumpkins!

-I’d prefer a tea or coffee date over doing  just about anything else.  I have friendships solely based on the amount of refills we have of our tea when together.

-I Sometimes I don’t want to talk about what’s wrong, but if I do eventually I just need someone to listen to me, I don’t need advice unless I ask for it.

-I don’t like to be the only one contributing information/leading conversations, it’s exhausting, put a little effort in.

-Lord of the Rings drinking game is totally an acceptable drinking night.

-Alternatively if we go to a bar and you haven’t had a Rocky Mountain Bear Fucker you are going to have to try one, sorry about that, it’s just how it goes.

-I am sometimes a wall of sound and could talk for an hour without stopping if let, but if you want to say something I will listen, I’m just full of things to say, always.

-And if I don’t have anything to say don’t be offended, it means I like to listen to you/just sit with you.

-I talk about my siblings a lot, if you’ve never met them you will soon feel like you know them well.

-I dig music, I’m protective of the music I love, and am judgment of the things I don’t like. I like to sign and dance and am an ADD on my itunes.

-I enjoy being a student but complain about it a lot.  Learning is so cool, but I’d rather be challenged than bored.

-Yes I’m a Blackberry and no I don’t want to fight about it.

-I have a big sweet tooth but a sensitive tummy, so if you’ve made me cookies and I only eat one or save them for another day I’ve probably already had my share of sweeties today.

-I am terrible at parties.  I never know where to be or who to talk to unless I specifically go with someone.  The last few parties I’ve been to have been not so great, and it all depends on what happens before or how I feel I’m fitting in.  If I don’t want to come to your party I am sorry, it’s not because I don’t like you, it’s because it’s more stressful for me if I do.

-I sometimes think I am brilliant and other times think I’m the dumbest person alive. It’s all relative.

This was just a weird idea I had last night, looking back it is kind of still weird, but, well, that’s just how it goes now I guess.  Thanks to all of the friends who make it worthwhile to leave the house.

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Day Three Hundred and Forty-Three:  Day of Study

Being blind and a kinesetic – visual learner is difficult when it comes to doing well in school.  I learn a variety of different ways, which is why I love working through unconventional learning, but it also means hwile studying for high-intensity exams I go through a package of thick paper and two boxes of markers.  I enjoy playing around with the colours, but black and blue are the best.  All today has been is trying not to be distracted (and failing) and studying.  Things are going well, and in the next twelve hours I can officially focus on the OTHER to do list I have for the holidays…  Which is probably longer than the one for the finals week.  But, that’s okay because it will be worth it because it means I am done my semester!

I’m off to wind down before sleeping, then waking up, writing my final exam of my undergraduate degree, and then dancing around like a fool.

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342

Day Three Hundred and Forty-Two:  Finals

Fifteen minutes ago I handed in my two final assignments for the last two classes, and come Tuesday noon-time I will be on holidays, finally.  I still have items on the to-do list to attend to, as that list seems to go on forever, but it will be significantly less stressful, and exciting, and full of seasonal things and future implications.  One thing that I do love about finals week is that my tumblr flourishes, and everyone want to chat because no one wants to be studying.  Oh the sociality of finals, you get me every time.

But now that I’m done my Macbeth study (well, the research, and honestly only a tip of it) I must look forward to next year.  Resolutions?  It’s a time of wrap up and new beginnings around university students everywhere, and as for next year I will NOT be doing a 365 blog, but I will be opening two new blogs on wordpress.com.  Blogspot has been a good friend these past..holy, four years, and I will continue to use my Diary blog, but wordpress is a bit sleeker, and the projects I will be beginning need that sleek look, ot at least that is what I have convinced myself.  When those are made I will post them on here.

Other resolutions for 2014?  At the moment I have a short list.  I want to write every single day, which means that with my two strong creative classes and my new drive to write every play that comes to mind I think will be an easy one.  I also want to complete a bucket list of pre-graduation items that I intend to finish before convocation.  What else?  I have  afew personal ones, for example I want to stop chasing the people in my life who do not put the same amount of effort in as I do, and I would like to learn how to look a bit.  Maybe 2014 should be my “Twenties Creative Year” where I try to make my own clothes and write poetry and wear berks with socks… Or it could just be My twenty-second year of living (yes, I turn 22 in just over a month) and it will be the year where I am the most fabulous I’ve ever been.  I think that’s a super resolution for anyone, really.

I am sure my resolutions list is going to grow leading up to New Year’s Eve, as for now all I can think about is Romantic Literature, Doctor Who and Christmas gift lists.  Also transcripts, man, things are complicated lately. But it’s all worth it, right?

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341

Day Three Hundred and Forty-One:  London-Dreaming.

I miss London severely today.  I haven’t talked about it in a while, but not a day goes by where I do not miss London.  Today I am missing High Teas and Christmas shopping and the markets, but there is something new every day that I remember and miss.  It hurts that I can’t be there and go to my favourite places and enjoy it, but I can’t right now, and that part of my adventure is on hold for a while.  That’s the hardest part about being an adventurer, you can’t be off adventuring at every moment, some moments must be a little nudane.

Like making cue cards for an exam that will be your last written final for your undergraduate degree, and then you remember that time you had mulled wine and could only drink half because it was so gross but it was on the Southbank so you kept drinking it anyway and giggling around the Christmas market because that makes everything better.  And then it hits you that you are in a small bedroom in Guelph and not a small bedroom on Pentonville lane and that you can’t look out your window and watch fireworks most nights but you can see random snow-drifted trees.  Thigns like this bother me sometimes.  Most of the time?  Every day all day.

I have booked my trip to Peru today, and have been coping with my separation anxiety from England by planning other travel things and thinking about my grad applications that will get done the moment this exam is finished, and I know that this will all work out.  I love it too much to be away for too long.  Canada is great and all, but it’s supposed to get to negative fourteen degrees on Tuesday, and that is a bit chilly for me.  Unless it means that the snow is going to stay for Christmas, in which case freeze ‘er up all I want is a White Christmas this year!  THAT is the only thing that could make up for Christmas shopping not happening in Covent Garden this year.

Ugh, Covent Garden, I have to go before I cry again.

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340

Day Three Hundred and Forty:  The Food Network

A lovely thing about being home has been the food network.  While finishing an assignment today I listened to my father watching Gordon Ramsey’s Christmas meal guide, and it was hilarious and so wonderful, man, I want to be able to cook properly and make meals that aren’t just throw tofu in a pan with mushrooms and put on rice that was made in the microwave.  I think that’s the one thing I got right from being a student, the eating thing, I am surely eating like a student.  But when I have the time and money I plan on learning how to make delicious things, and then eating them all up.

I love watching breakfast guides, fancy French toast or omelettes, breakfast is my favourite meal of the day, and it would only make it that much better if I knew how to make it fancy on my own.  My dad likes to make nice breakfasts when I am home which is lucky for me, we usually drink baileys and coffee and then watch football in our pajama’s all morning.  This usually only happens on weekend days.

But then there are the meals we prepare as a family.  The lasagna we made this summer, or the thanksgiving dinner I helped peal EVERY potato for, or the recipes that we create together.  These are memories that I am thankful to have, not only because they are and taste awesome, but because it helps me learn how to make my own food, and that is always a skill everyone can work on.

So, with one week left of not having cable and paying for my own food, not only do I look forward to the seasonal happenings that come along with post-exams December, but the television that I will be enjoying when I get home too.

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339

Day Three Hundred and Nine:  Not late no way no how!

This evening was wonderful.  You know those moments, those wonderful mental photographs that you take of the moments you know you will remember?  Mine was today, when my whole family actually smiled and put ornaments on our tree and decorated the house together.  The lights were on, we went through four different Christmas mixed cds, and now we have a beautiful home to show for it.  These moments, these small bickering and jokes, sing-a-longs and irritations, are the moments that I will bring with me as I continue on my journey that is beginning to drift away from this house.  I lay now, in my bed in my parents’ house, after watching a live version of Sound of Music and a long father-daughter chat about life, school and theatre, I reflect.

What are we fighting for? In life, what is it that we want?  A good job? Maybe.  A family? Sure, to be happy? Absolutely. To help people?  If I can.  But more than anything I want to continue to have wonderful moments, and if that means travelling, surrounding myself with wonderful people, and working hard for things that I am passionate about then so be it.  Exams are worth it, because they challenge me and bring me closer to that goal.

So I am trying to take every moment for what it is. My grandma called today during a commercial break but the conversation lasted a little longer than the break, and I got a little irritated, but then, after twenty seconds of it, I realised how lucky I am to be talking to her on the phone, and felt guilty and cherished that conversation.  How lucky is it that I get to spend December 8 9 and 10 in Guelph drinking copious amounts of tea and humming Christmas carols while I study?  I mean, it could be worse.

What a cliché, but it honestly helps me work through my life.  My situation could honestly be worse.  What kind of ingrate am I complaining about my life being hard?  I mean, to be fair, I have a lot of obstacles to climb over to even start studying let alone function properly, but I have a house and clean water, and a ton of other wonderful things.  This life, no matter how many silly exams, is worth it.

And it should be worth it.  What’s the point, otherwise?  And to anyone who is confused, or lost or having a hard time, change.  Change something.  I don’t mean change yourself, but make a small change that could help you get to where you want to be.  No one has it all figured out ever, but we all want to feel like we are worth it.  And you, friend, are worth it.

X

338

Day Three Hundred and Thirty-Eight:  Puppets,

My first theatre class at Guelph was with Jerrard, and he came out with a clown nose, and I took my notes with green and blue markers in the front row.  Four years later, after working on numerous shows with him and experiencing the many visages of Jerrard he and I are both leaving.  Today I helped organise and participated in his final lecture here at Guelph, and I learned how to make and create characters with puppets.  This was fascinating to me, and I spent a lot of time today reflecting on what I had learned in that first class and what I have no learned through my undergraduate degree in Theatre Studies.

I remember Jerrard explaining the structure of theatre in Canada, as well as a variety of other theatres around the world.  How performances work and how to write a review.  I remember my final exam for that course and writing an analysis and my top five plays experienced through that course.  I remember our first performance was at Theatre Aquarius in Hamilton and I was separated from my friends and I had to ask another patron to help me find my seat, and I was seated beside Jerrard, and I was so nervous, and he asked me at intermission how I liked the show, and was so nice to me.  He’s always been so nice and supportive to me, and I am grateful.  He met me in a strange time in my life.

I feel like most people in this program met me in a strange time in my life, but I think we get along.  I am so proud to say that I got my undergrad here at Guelph, we have a fabulous program, and we have fabulous professors who care about learning and not just grades, and we have a fabulous theatre, and despite neglect from the university I am proud to say I go to Guelph.

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337

Day Three Hundred and Thirty-Seven:  Bodies

  Are so strange.  They are wobbly, and imperfect, and stretched and mismatched, and every person is different.  I like to take a picture from a magazine into the hair dresser’s to have them do the same thing to my hair and It never comes out the same.  The thing about looking like someone is that that isn’t yourself.  I struggle with my body, because on some days I love it, and am grateful for the amount of shit that I put it through, the places I make it walk, the alcohol I make it endure, and for what?  To live life?  What is life without your body?  And sometimes, not often, I love it because I look beautiful in a little dress, or my eyes actually match in a picture, or my shoes and colours all match.  And then there are the times where I can’t stand my body because it just doesn’t look right.  The thing about bodies is that it is up to us to determine FOR OURSELVES what is beautiful.  And if you surround yourself with other people who think you are beautiful then I think you’re okay.  Or atleast that’s what I tell myself anyway.

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336

Day Three Hundred and Thirty-Six:  Performance

After the show finished I thought a lot about what I want to do for the rest of my life.  I don’t think I’m a stage performer, per se, but I do think that I am a story teller, and I prefer to tell my stories orally, so, we will have to rethink what I want to do in particular.  The thing about performing right now is that the moment I look out at an audience I do not even know if they are there.

For example, today there was a staged reading of our playwrighting classes’ work and I went first, and I got up behind the podium and looked out at the people in front of me, literally three feet before me, and  I was blinded, and it…felt…interesting.  If one can feel that way.  I think I felt strange because I knew the people around me.  Weird thing about performing while blind is that you are heightened to the sounds the audience makes… I know exactly when they laugh, when they sigh, and when they don’t know what’s going on.

The thing about growing up for me is that I am putting my own work out there.  I mean at jobs you are judged on your own merit, but like… This is my own work, things that literally came from my own head, and having people hear those things and they will be judged.  I spend my whole life avoiding judgment and here I am throwing myself into the pit and allowing vultures to either spit or fly over me.  This, my friends, is terrifying.

But it’s worth it, I guess.  Performing your own work is different I guess than performing at all, but we will see.  I am protective of every performance, of my performances, my work, as proper people usually are, and I am afraid that if I open my arms and reveal my honest feelings about my work that people will not be so supportive.  Is this me revealing that I actually do care what other people think?

I think it’s more that I want to matter.  I want to make a difference, and I want to help people.  Is there anything in this mess that could do any of these things?

I hope so.

X

335

Day Three Hundred and Thirty-Five:    Let’s Go to the Mall

My first Christmas shopping trip to the mall was today and baby it was impossible.  There was a massive line for Santa Claus, the parking lot was insane, and the sales were absolutely obnoxious.  I don’t really know if I am happy about the Christmas music or find it irritating, is this me growing out of my Christmas phase or just growing an ear that is tuned to low patience at this time of year?  Whatever it is, being at the mall today was a decent break from the work that I’ve been chained to all day and will be for the next ten, and it was nice to get out of a pair of pajama’s for once this weekend.  Funny thing about finals week it makes me want to hole up in my bed and never leave.

But the mall, despite the people and the music, was pleasant.  It reminds me of home, and I am missing home a lot today.  Usually I would be home putting up the Christmas tree this weekend but due to all of our busy and clashing schedules decorating has been moved to Thursday.  It will be a lovely day, I am sure, but until then I have to be in overdrive to compensate for all of this work.

In the mean time I have found myself becoming nostalgic of the days when I lived in a small town.  This was fifteen years ago, but it was wonderful.  Christmas there was wonderful, we were near our families and very good friends, and our house was always so cosy.  The things about those Christmases aren’t as clear as they used to be for me, the memories have begun to slip away, but little things remain.  Candles on the stereo and bookshelves, Esmerelda pajama’s, the cat, and being close to family.  Guelph isn’t so far, but it’s just far enough to make me wish for the upcoming holidays more and more with each passing hour.

I’ll be home for Christmas, soon.

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334

Day Three Hundred and Thirty-Four:  Flawless

Strength it seems is in the details.  It is in resolve, and the ability to focus.  But it is also available in other venues, the vulnerable, the undecided, the needy, the helped.  I think strength is about resolve, absolutely, but it is available to everyone.  I feel strength when I walk through a puddle or finish a paper, the quality of the paper or the water all over my shoes does not phase me, it remains my confidence in myself that gets me through.  So, does it matter how you deal with things if you feel strong in yourself?  Strength is relative with a common concept.  And I believe in the strength in everybody.

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333

Day Three Hundred and Thirty-Three:  The Moment

Today has been a whirl.  I mean a little intense whirl of emotions and energies.  I am so tired, and so relieved, and so amused and satisfied, and it feels so nice to just lay in bed with a candle and my hot water bottle and enjoy the evening.  Isn’t it lovely to think that the holidays are approaching?   There are a ton of things in my way before relaxing, a ton, but I am finding it easier to balance and cope as I cross more things off of my list.  I am increasingly becoming more Christmas-y, and I also am enjoying the cold, finally.

So what can I say to you all on this Friday night?  Keep going.  It’s just beginning, this exam week, but we are going to get through this.  I love university, especially when I am studying useful, challenging things, and the next week and a half will prove to be both challenging academically, motivationally, and also mentally as I prepare to apply to graduate programs and book a trip to Peru.  My life, it seems, is growing around me, flourishing, and embracing the opportunities in which I have been given.  This is wonderful.

And terrifying.

But mostly wonderful.

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Day Three Hundred and Thirty-Two:  Behind

In the Bookshelf today I picked up a book by Nora Ephron that described how it feels to be a woman.  Does anyone really kow how it feels to be anything for sure?  When I think of how I feel when I am a woman I think that it is sometimes very difficult and other times easy but mostly difficult, and I feel uncontrollable negativity and uncertainty and anger and sadness and pleasure and desire and love and maternal feelings and all kinds of shit all at once.  I feel conflicted often, and it bothers me.  But most of all I have a hard time defining what being a woman actually means.

So, being a woman to me means attempting to be confidence despite your own mind fighting against you and believing in yourself enough to trust that you are beautiful, smart, and wonderful despite your mind continuously forwarding negative thoughts to your consciousness.  Being a woman means standing up for yourself, and people that you care about, and things that are important to you, and being super badass, fabulous and classy all at the same time.  Being a woman means wearing what you want, when you want, because you are beautiful.  And being a woman means saying what you want, because what you have to say matters, despite what your mind attempts to trick you sometimes.

Being a woman is complicated, and I wouldn’t trade it for, what I told my mother once: “to have a dangley thing between my legs and smell, like a boy,” if I had the chance.

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Day Three Hundred and Thirty-One:  Atwood, Margaret.

I wrote this title this morning thinking I would write after I saw Ms. Atwood this evening, and I was skeptical if I was going to have anything to write about. 

I was right about being skeptical, because now I have so many thoughts that I don’t know which to write.

So I’ll choose only a few of my favourites, because something that I love about my own thoughts is that I am privy to the entirety of them, and I can choose to share what I want, and otherwise they are for me.  Thoughts are fascinating, alright on to my other fascinating moment of the evening:

She opened her mouth, and I was captivated from that moment on.  It’s something about grace, that a few lecturers that I have seen can master, to remain intelligent but also courageous and fun, and still have their finger on the pulse of the room.  Margaret Atwood knew her audience, she knew her own thoughts, and didn’t give two FUCKS about what everyone thought about what was coming out of her mouth she just said it and demanded attention and respect.  Demanded is the perfect word for Ms. Atwood, as she did just that, but in the most graceful way possible.

I can’t explain it any better than that right now.

I bought her book and she signed it, and I told her that Alias Grace was the last book that I read with my own two eyes before going blind.  She gasped, and looked up at me, and smiled and told me that the first book to the series that I was carrying had an audiobook.  I haven’t told many people about Atwood’s book being the last before I lost my eyesight, because it’s a sticky subject for me, and my final exam I wrote literally while I was losing my sight was written on foolscap in the back of the library with a pen that I could not see the lines on which I was writing a full-on analysis of something about class status and the perfectionist woman in the late nineties novel.  It’s a sticky subject, because I loved that novel, and it has clung to me as the one novel that I remember clearly because it was my last.

Interesting that Atwood is so involved with writing dystopias at the moment, how fascinating, how important, how poignant, I’m having trouble forming different words. How incredible it is to hear someone so inspiring speak.  If I don’t write an entire 20-paged play tonight I will be surprised, because that woman has knocked the inspiration right into me.

She’s spread her vinegrette onto my greek salad, graciously.

Only AJ and Cleo will understand that, but if you think about it….nah, you wouldn’t get it, sorry about that.

But seriously, I urge you all to read some of Atwood’s work, or maybe like read anything, get in touch with yourself, and read.  It’s important, and being an English major it’s all I do but also I do it over the summers, holidays, in any spare time.  I love poetry, novels, blogs, nonfiction essays, these things are interesting just do it guys, okay?

Okay.

I am on such a high right now.

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Day Three Hundred and Thirty:  Regret

I assume that everyone thinks about this.  Thinks about things they would change if they could go back in time, things they would or would not have done or said, things they regret not doing, opportunities lost, chances taken and fallen, and the biggest thing about ‘regret’ is that we are taught not to.  I think this concept is bullshit.

Not the concept of regret, but being told to live “without regrets.”  Mistakes are great, but I believe in taking a chance and regretting it rather than regretting not having taken that chance.  Maybe regret is something we need to feel to understand the weight of our decisions and truly understand and learn from our mistakes.  The thing about regrets is we must learn from them, and not dwell on them.  I am making a motion to move on from my regrets and learn from them.  It’s proving to be difficult.

But, what I wanted to really say here is that humans make mistakes.  As much as you think other people are perfect, and a lot of people give off the attitude that they never make mistakes they do, they do.  People make mistakes, and you should never be hard on yourself for it. 

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Day Three Hundred and Twenty-Nine:  I want a garden,

  And it may sound kind of silly because I don’t even have a lawn or house to have a garden near, but I await the day where I can plant my own flowers and vegetables and work in the garden.  I have fond memories of my childhood with my mom, grandma, close family friends and neighbours and wearing gloves and kneeling before plants.  I want to have my own hanging planters, and take care of perennials and learn about when its best to plant certain things and when to pull weeds and when to do all of those things.  I don’t know why, but I find it fascinating and all I want to do is just have a garden.

I was talking to one of my campers this summer about his own garden that he had, and he had beets in his garden and squash, and that was so cool to learn.  I want to have tomatoes and cucumbers and peas in my garden, and learn how to make pickles like my Great Grandmother, and have a bird house near by, and a water fountain, like my grandma’s, and a small bench like my and Rachel’s backyards, and take care of them.

Do I sound like a housewife yet?

I just have fond memories of Saturday afternoons spent out in the garden, it was a thing we would do, and I just loved it.  I want to be able to make a salad from vegetables that I grew.  I know I am really cool, and I don’t care.

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