July 10 - gratitude

1) I'm grateful today is Friday and this week is over. Normally I work on the weekends but not this month, so hopefully I wil get lots accomplished around the house and yard! 

2) I'm grateful that it's raining right now and I hope it rains through the night. The farmers need it, the firefighters need it, and frankly, I like rain. 

3) I'm grateful for the birth of my friends baby girl, and that they will be home soon. I've missed them lots and can't wait to see my new minion!. 

July 9 - Gratitude

1) We took the big boys to the skate park tonight to ride their bikes. We were only there three minutes when they collided and broke the front wheel of one bike. I managed to fix it and they rode for two hours. They had lots of fun and I'm grateful they had a good end to this day. 

2) I didn't work out today, I had to be in another town for training. I'm grateful I had a break cause I'm feeling worn out and depressed I'm not seeing changes. 

3) I'm grateful for my mom, who called tonight just to check on me. 

July 8 - gratitude

1) today I'm grateful to live in Canada where there are doctors and hospitals to look after the people I care about when they are in need. 

2) I'm grateful that I can turn on a tap in my house and get clean water to drink, bathe in, and wash clothes and dishes. 

3) I'm grateful that this day is over and I can go to bed. 

Six week frustration

I've been working out for six weeks at a bootcamp which I attend daily from Monday to Friday. 

Today was a huge frustration for me. I don't feel like a single thing has changed since I began working out. My clothing fits the same. I weigh the same. I still can't do burpees or anything that requires me to jump. I am the slowest when we so lunges for warmup. I've reduced drastically the amount of Pop I'm drinking - I haven't had any for days and days and I used to drink up to five cans per day. I've almost completely stopped eating any kind of junk food - I was bad on the nights last month when I was working at the group home because Pop and chocolate bars are easy to take to work when i am not able to stop and cook anything, but in not picking up shifts anymore and so my eating is better on a daily basis. 

I've been keeping a daily log of the food I eat and I honestly don't think I am eating as poorly as I was 6 weeks ago. 

I feel tired , I know I'm not getting enough  sleep and of course I am bloated and blech today. 

I know I need to stay motivated and keep on going but today I am just tired and feel like there have been no results at all and I want to take a break. It sucks to work so hard and feel like nothing has changed. 

July 7 Gratitude

It's technically "tomorrow" but I'm not sleeping yet so here is my list of things I am grateful for today for my month of wellness. I haven't "aligned with my purpose" yet today but I'm having some difficulty with that one and may need some more direction from my the program on how to incorporate that daily. 

ANYWAY - here are my three gratitude things for today 

1)  I'm  grateful for email so that I can still communicate with people I am far away from and missing lots. 

2)I'm grateful that my 7 year old cuddled up in my lap tonight and pretended to be my baby all over again - he even let me sing to him without telling me to stop! 

3) I'm grateful for my mom who called and sang happy birthday to my guy. He grinned from ear to ear. 

The dentist killed my gratitude

This should really be easy for me. I think of people all over the world and the hardships they face and I know in my head that it SHOULD be a whole lot easier for me to find things to be grateful for than I am finding it today. 

I had to go to the dentist and I avoid the dentist like the plague. I won't bore you with the details of my mouth - but I have never (and it was reinforced AGAIN today) had a good experience with a dentist. 

I decided about a year ago I was done. I know my teeth are in bad shape, I literally give myself cavities when I brush them. I have had more root canals than I have teeth, I have had more than one root canal per tooth in my head. I basically decided that I was done with dentists, and when I had a tooth broken enough or abcessed enough I would  just pay to get it pulled. Getting teeth pulled is WAY cheaper than root canals and crowns. (I have actually ground my teeth hard enough to shatter two porcelain crowns.)

Last year I just started having teeth pulled. I had the absolute HACK of a dentist in my town actually pull the wrong tooth, even though I TOLD HIM he was pulling the wrong tooth. He insisted he knew what he was doing and that HE was the professional and pulled the tooth I told him not to. I was back within 48 hours to get the tooth that was causing me agony removed. My dentist luck is so bad that I even get the wrong teeth pulled.

I also have never had the freezing of my mouth properly "take" and I feel everything and have to ask for more freezing EVERY TIME I go in. I make sure to tell the dentist this and they always insist they know and insist I am frozen but I ALWAYS feel it and they have to freeze me more.

I went to a new dentist today because three of my front teeth are getting cavities  and I just cannot justify pulling my front teeth. I only went in out of sheer desperation. 

It is a new dentist and I told them over the phone about u dentist history and woes AND I told them in person about my history and woes AND I told the dentist in the chair that I was extremely anxious and that the freezing never took. 

He was reassuring, he said he understood and would be sure to give me extra and shock of all shocks - he didn't freeze me enough and I was in agony before the first 10 seconds had passed. 

He stopped, froze me more, and proceeded to fix ONE of the teeth broken in my head, but my 1.5 hours in the chair was absolutely brutal. 

My neck and back and shoulders are completely seized. My jaw hurts, my cheek and gums where he gave me needles are bleeding and developing sores. I have such a bad headache I want to throw up - but j pray I don't throw up because it hurts to open my mouth even a tiny bit. 

Then I had to pay. That hurt almost as much as sitting in the chair. 

So right now, through this haze of pain, I'm finding it extremely difficult to find anything at all to be thankful for. I need to find some really good painkillers and try again in a few hours after I'm oblivious.

Supper conversation

 I weighed myself on the scale and I attended a meeting about my retirement plan (more appropriately my plan to work till I die). I was talking about these things at the supper table and Max said "why do you need to work till you are 99?  Because you need new clothes?" 

Wellness program - gratitude

I'm one week into a month long wellness program through my cousins online program. The program has multiple components after you choose which program you are doing ( good, better, or best). I've chosen "better" and some of the things I'm working on for the month include: not weighing myself, drinking more water, reducing the amount of light I expose myself to before bed, performing an act of service weekly, having a regular sleep schedule, and keeping a gratitude journal. In the gratitude journal I'm supposed to write down three things daily that I am grateful for. I actually have a specific journal for this purpose but I can't find it. I have been very conscious that I find three things each day to be grateful for but I need to write them down and be a little more responsible in terms of concretely meeting my goals. Lucky for me I have a blog! Here are the three things I am grateful for today: 

1) I stopped at Dairy Queen today to get an ice cream cake for my son who will be seven tomorrow. I am grateful that I found an orange one AND I am grateful I could just "stop in and grab a cake" - I know my parents didn't have the financial ability to do that when I was seven. 

2) I got a text AND a phone call today from someone I wasn't expecting to hear from. It was awesome. 

3) My four year old whispered in my ear today "Mom, I love you. When can you buy me a unicorn?" I felt loved.  

Bad ideas

Initially when I said I would pick up shifts every weekend at a group home I thought it was a great idea. I would make some extra money, and I would avoid awkward moments at home when my mother in law was here for an extended stay. 

Well the extended stay ended early, and I am somewhere in the middle of a shift in the middle of what I calculated yesterday to be 28 or 29 days of consecutive work for me without a break.

I'm exhausted. I could fall asleep on my feet - if I were on my feet. Instead I am sitting down which is worse. 

Epic fail in decision making - with the end FAR off. https://youtu.be/K3F5rpzo1s4

Fathers Day

ASo it's Father's Day this weekend. I hate Father's Day. 

My dad left our family three years ago and has another family now. A new wife and child (ren)?  

I used to adore my dad. Idolize and love him. Now I don't know what I feel for him. I don't keep in touch with him (mostly my choice I think?) He send emails every now and then telling us which country he is working in. (I'm not sure why?)  He doesn't know my kids, although he met my oldest when he was a few months old. I don't even think he knows how many kids I have?  My kids don't know him or anything about him. He sucks at remembering birthdays. Two years ago he confused my birthday with my brothers, last year he didn't remember it at all. 

He lives in another country and his life and interactions with us are filtered. I have never spoken or written publicly about it out of respect for my mom. I don't disrespect my mom now - but I think three years is long enough for me to be silent about how I feel about him - especially since Father's Day has not been suspended and I have to live through another one, full of people commenting all over Facebook and Twitter and Instagram how incredible and amazing and wonderful their fathers are and I think mines ....well , not. 

Father's Day for me is a reminder of regret,sadness,and abandonment.

I used to list characteristics of my parents and myself and wonder which I inherited from whom. I loved that I was a combination of these completely cool people and wanted to embody the best of both of them. 

 My sense of direction - my dad. My appearance - more my dad. My height - my mom. My religious conviction ( when I had it ) - my mom. My ease in academic areas - my dad. My sense of humour - mostly dad. Work ethic - Mom and dad equally. Artistic skill - dad. Loathe of shopping - mom. Love of travel - both equally. My love of singing and musical ability - my mom. My out of control eyebrows - dad. 

Outside of personal characteristics there are simply personal preferences I have grown up with that I learned at the knees of my parents... Coke - dad. Piña colada Orange Julius - mom. I follow Liverpool soccer team in the EPL - totally a passion of my dads ( and through him also my moms). Movies and technology and staying up late - dad. 

Now I don't know if I want to have anything about me resemble any trait or preference of my dad. I am deeply hurt by his betrayal and subsequent departure from my life. 

 How do I purge myself of my sense of direction, my blue eyes, my DNA?  

Self talk

I know that I talk to myself all the time, sometimes even out loud, but I had a realization today just how negative my self talk is.

I never really thought of myself as being a negative self talker - mostly I talk to myself about what I'm doing, what I need to be doing etc. 

A few weeks ago I started working out at a Monday to Friday boot camp. I love it more than I can express. I wish I had started YEARS AGO. It kicks my butt. I am the heaviest I have ever been in my life and I am not accustomed to doing things where I feel quite so uncoordinated . The person I am in my brain is still as coordinated as I was over 20 years ago when I was teaching karate full time and kicking butt doing kata and fighting. 

The person I am in this current body is someone who can't do burpees and who gets all tied up in my feet trying to do step ups. In spite of my lack of coordinaton I have been working out ( almost diligently ) and I'm passed the inconvenience of not being able to walk for the first few days. 

This morning we did something totally different than we have done before. We started with 100 burpees to warm up. I can't really do them at all . I tried. After warm up we did 10 reps with weights of biceps and triceps and squats all intersperced with more burpees. Obviously I was not keeping up with anyone and I was getting down on myself. I realized as I was having difficulty keeping track of counting that I was repeating over and over in my mind " I can't do this, I can't do this, I can't do this " with every repetition. 

I was completely shocked ! I had never realized before how completely negative I am with myself. I know I am hard on muself but I don't ever remember being so aware of the self talk as I am going through my day - or in this case - my exercise regime. 

I realized there was no way that I would get anything done at all if I kept repeating over and over in my head that I couldn't. Now that it's over and I'm reflecting it would have made sense for me to simply change the "can't" to a "can" and continue with the mantra. In the moment however I was completely stumped as to what to do or how to change what I was thinking except to try and stop myself from saying I couldn't ! I wasn't entirely successful at stopping the negativity , and I was less successful at keeping. Up th the burpees the rest of the class was doing (they did 400 in an hour) - but I worked hard and did a lot more than I thought I could but probably less than I was physically able to. I need to be more aware of my self talk and make a plan for moving forward. I'll never get anything done if I keep telling myself it won't happen! 

June snapshot

Current mood:  chaotic
Current movie: havent watched any movies this month
Current TV Show: TV? who has time for tv?
Current book: Born with Teeth
Current song: Heartbeat song by Kelly Clarkson
Current album: Piece by Piece - Kelly Clarkson
Current food: I have some fruit and yogurt in the fridge, I really want to make a shake but im having blender difficulty.
Current drink: coffee
Current color: blue
Current Beauty Product: Nada - but I dreamt last night I needed to wax my eyebrows again - is that considered a beauty product?
Current celebrity crush: Season 3 of OITNB starts this week, I will get my Alex Vause fix!(Laura Prepon)
Current Project: Masters degree project. I dont think this thing is ever going to end.
Current need: I drastically need to alter the energy in my life
Current guilty pleasure(s): reading the book on the list of NPR's top 100 teen novels.
Current annoyance: messed up wifi connection at my house and corresponding cell phone bill
Current excitement: I was able to get my haircut from my all time favourite hairdresser who moved to Edmonton a while back. YAY!
Current triumph: I joined boot camp two weeks ago. I absolutely love it and I am bummed there is no calss today. I feel like I NEED to go and work out every day - I havent felt that way in a VERY VERY long time.
Current anticipation: Sorting all the boxes in the little house
Photo I took this month: The boys playing with their uncle

Photo of me this month:

Canaries

I learned about the use of canaries in mines when I was about 14. I was at a mining museum in Nova Scotia.

It fascinated me that these little birds were poison indicators. Exposed to toxic levels of poison on the air, the little birds would die - alerting the men around them that levels of gas were dangerously high and they needed to evacuate the dark and hazardous conditions where the dangers were life threatening but invisible. 

I'm in need of a canary - but not to use in a mine obviously. I wonder if a bird could alert me to the imminence of pain? What good would that warning do? How could I evacuate my heart? Isn't evacuating my heart painful in itself? Believe me I have  thought about this ALL night and  I don't know that there is any way  that I could have escaped the pain by knowing it was coming. I'm still questioning if I should have done things differently , not put myself into the mine in the first place so to speak, where the danger is CLEARLY a possibility, but actually invisible to the naked eye. Maybe I don't want a canary after all, perhaps I just shouldn't be a miner. 

Emergency radio announcement

I'm waiting for an alert over the radio that says there's been a most unusual shift in the axis of the earth and everything has been knocked off kilter. 

Surely an air raid siren should be going off. People need to be warned to take cover. Stand under a doorframe or under a table, In a basement or a bathtub. They need to be protecting themselves right now. I want to scream at them as they walk obliviously by - "go home ! Shut the doors and batten down the hatches. Lock away your valuables and secure your precious things!" 

Birds should be flying sideways, grass and trees should be flattened, computers and cell phones should be oflfline from the sonic boom of energy caused when my heart exploded in my chest. 

Did no-one feel that but me? 

How is it possible that the crickets outside this window are chirping, that people are asleep in their beds, the birds still singing in the trees? It seems impossible that anyone survived . 

Pain is such a private thing. 

Operator

There used to be someone on the line when you picked up a phone, who assisted in making the connection. 

I need an operator between my head and my heart to call ahead to the train switch operator. I can see the impending derailment as my brain train barrels full steam ahead towards my unprotected heart. 

Operator? 

OPERATOR? 

Find someone to help me flip the switch... I should never have opened the line. 

There are no operators to assist now. Just electronic voices. 

"To receive service in English press one "  

"In case of an emergency please hang up and dial 911" 

What number do I press to find someone, anyone, to assist me to avoid this deadly collision?  

Operator? 

Great - or not so great - Expectations

"The cause of my suffering can end if I abandon my expectations of how I think things should be." 

This is a part of one of the first teachings  from Buddha after he achieved enlightenment. I believe it somewhat, and I think about it A LOT when it comes to my own expectations of interpersonal relationships. For the most part it helps me to process the interactions I have and occasionally the disappointment I feel. However some things I haven't yet reconciled. 

I expected that I should live my life without sexual abuse devastating my family. I don't believe that if I changed this expectation that the suffering and devestation would be altered in any way - or would processing it be any easier. 

On a "global" level I have an even more difficult time applying this concept. 

I expect that planes will stick to flight plans and not fly into buildings, and it wasn't my expectation that caused the suffering when the twin towers fell. 

I expect that every human should have access to clean drinking water, and my expectation doesn't quench the thirst of people all over the world. 

I expect that men, women, girls and boys will be respected and not trafficked for slavery and sex - and it's not my expectation that causes the suffering of those taken - and those left behind when loved ones are taken.

I expect that fathers and uncles and brothers and other people in power positions won't rape - and it's not my expectation that causes the suffering those who are being raped. 

I have not reached enlightenment apparently. Until such time as I DO become enlightened (what?it could TOTALLY happen!) I will continue to try and use this Buddhist principle as I can to end the cause of my suffering. 

Collapsing stars

Carl Sagan said " The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, was made from the interior of collapsing stars. We are made of star stuff."

The first time I read this I felt as though it meant I was part of something infinite - which is motivational when infinity is a happy place. I believed that it meant I am a part of something that existed before and will continue to exist after I am no longer here. I felt a connection to the universe in an elemental way and the connection felt good.

Right now I am equally convinced I am made from collapsing stars, but not in the way I first interpreted Sagan. 

Collapsing stars are black holes. The infinity of this moment is exquisitely painful - as I would imagine the gravitational force of a cosmic implosion and the creation of a black hole would be. The absence of light, complete destruction. 

My pain feels as old as the stars and as expansive.  It's not a tap root that I can pluck out of my soul. It is Pando, the trembling giant. The largest single living organism, 80 thousand years old and 6 million kg. Heavy, alive and growing. The only connection I feel in this infinite moment is the connection to greater and deeper root system of pain. This infinity is lonely, and dark, and burning cold. What I think I know about black hole's is that nothing that we suspect has gone in has ever come out - at least as we know it in this dimension. It is theorized that black holes in our universe are the beginnings of universes elsewhere. If this infinite moment ends I won't exist anymore - not as I have existed before. Is that creation then?
 

Visiting my family

I had an opportunity this week to come out and visit my mom. She has been ill and it was nice to come and spend some time with her. I always enjoy the time we spend together, and an added bonus to coming here is that my sister and my mom live in the same city. I get to hang out with her and her family as well and this year the timing was right for me to attend my niece and nephews soccer games! 

After a game earlier this week we were trying to get a photo of all the girls and my nephew was trying to photo bomb us. These two little girls came over from another team - total strangers and not even eight years old - and tried to join in on the photobomb ing. They were jumping up and down in front of my brother in law and not getting into the picture frame so they started throwing their water bottles into the air. We could not stop laughing. Making memories with my family is awesome . 

Tomorrow I leave already - I saw the kids for the last time this afternoon. I will miss them - it's times like these I am reminded of how I wish we lived closer so we could see more of one another as the kids grow up. 

I Love my goofy family. 

Our garden plot

We live on six acres so we have enough room for a big garden but have never dug a spot. This year our awesome friend Ben came over and made a place for us so that we can get it started. I'm pretty excited about it - then it snowed.

Mother Nature is not being supportive of my hopes and dreams. 

Alberta Election 2015

 

Yesterday was a provincial election here in Alberta. I believe in voting and I always vote, but living here in Alberta it has always been a bit of a frustration to go and vote because this province has been known as the most conservative province in the country - AND the Progressive Conservative Party has been in power since 1971.

In the past few months I have been increasingly unhappy with decisions made my premier Jim Prentice. I was not unhappy that he called an early election, and couldn't wait to send a message in my vote that I was unhappy. I was fully expecting that he would still be in power, but hoped that seeing numbers cast against him would be a wake up call to him that all was not well in his world.

One of the problems we have had is a lack of good party leadership (on both a provincial and a federal level) I was thrilled to see Rachel Notley take the helm of the NDP in Alberta. Then in my local riding we had a great woman step forward as the NDP candidate and I had hope that people would vote her in because of who she is and what she has done in the community and maybe forget about party lines!

I am happy to report this morning that last night history was made in Alberta. Not only do the NDP have a majority vote, there was more women voted into positions than in any election in the history of Canada! I think that is awesome. it has been 44 years since anyone but the conservatives have had power in Alberta. I have great hope for the future - but I would be lying if I said I wasn't holding my breath a bit.

 Politics is a scary thing and a lot can go wrong!

Please Rachel - don't let me down.