Seven Wonders

What Is Healthy?

2012-03-02T14:35:00.003-05:00

Sometimes it seems to me that every couple of months, I hearabout another study that has found another food or health product to be dangerousto our health. Moreover, I’m pretty sure that over my lifetime of 30 years, somefoods or health products have zig-zagged from being deemed “healthy” to beingdeemed “unhealthy.”

For example, a few months ago, I read an article that a few people on my Facebook had posted: “7 Things You Should Never Eat.” I don’t know about you,but my reaction as I scanned down the list of untouchables was, “Oh, crap. Oh,crap. Oh, crap.” I think I was guilty of eating all seven things, and on aregular basis. I figured that some of the items I could replace with the healthier alternative, but some of them I would probably continue eating (like regular apples and regular potatoes--those are healthy foods themselves, right?).

Then, my mother-in-law told me about how Johnson’s Baby Shampoo was found to contain an ingredient that releases formaldehyde. Myreaction again was, “Oh, crap.” I promptly went upstairs after reading thearticle to toss my bottle of Johnson’s Baby Shampoo in the garbage. I decided I’djust stick with the organic baby shampoos and washes that you can get at theSuperstore and be done with it.

Most recently, my mom told me about an article she readabout a study that found high levels of arsenic in cereal bars and baby cerealsthat contained brown rice syrup. As someone on a gluten-free diet, which limitsmy options for “healthy” cereal bars to the organic kind that generallycontains brown rice syrup, I threw my hands up in the air and said again, “Oh,crap!” That made me the most angry. Seriously? What next? I am reallylimited with what I can eat already, and now people are saying that a majoringredient in a ton of organic, gluten-free products is poisonous? What’s worsefor me? Eating gluten or eating arsenic? Or eating neitherand further limiting my options like a chump?

I wouldn’t call myself one of those 100% organic,super-health-conscious people that will go raw or vegan or whatever just to behealthy. I still buy meat at the grocery store instead of buying organic. Although I use some beauty products that are organic, some still have the odd paraben. However, I would consider myself relatively health-conscious. I havestarted reading labels on beauty products and will avoid those that contain aBILLION parabens. I figure that being gluten-free steers meinto the organic section of stores often enough that I eat pretty well when itcomes to “carb” foods like cereals, cereal bars (although not anymore?),pastas, etc. I love trying new recipes for smoothies or baked goods that havesugar alternatives or tons of health benefits. I often have to bribe my toddlerwith fruits and vegetables to eat his other food, and so I am hoping that I’mmaking a good impression on him since we always have a wide variety of healthy food to eat.

Being a pretty average person, then, when it comes to myfood and health care products, this kind of rigmarole associated with what’sbeneficial and what’s detrimental this week is really frustrating. Should we becutting out every single thing that someone calls “bad for you”? Is that beingresponsible, or is that being extreme?

Take coffee for example. I think that over my lifetimecoffee has been in the good books and the bad books several times over. (For the record, coffee will always be in my good books.) So whatthen? Will we find out ten years from now that the arsenic levels in organicbrown rice syrup are actually OK, and no harmful effects have been discoveredfrom regularly eating foods sweetened with it?

Also, if we take the attitude that we should avoid what thelatest research tells us we should avoid, does that not create some level ofparanoia when it comes to food selection? I mean, who’s to say that anotherwell-known, well-trusted, often-consumed food or health/beauty product might becomelethal in a few months? Until extensive research is done on every product andevery food out there, how will we ever know if everything we are using andconsuming is free of health hazards? How will we ever know?

Where do you draw the line? Do you react to every scare outthere? Or do you figure that if we’ve been using these products (like Johnson’sBaby Shampoo) or eating these foods (apples that aren’t organic) for decadesand we’re fine, that we should just keep consuming/eating them? After all, if I learned anything in my Biology 101 course in university, there are no "causes" for cancer. It's always a combination of events that result in cell mutation--right?

Although these articles frustrate me, I do try to keep somebalance with my decision-making. Some products are easy enough to discard andreplace with something better. Others aren’t. While I can appreciate the choices of somepeople to go completely organic, I am not sure that’s right for my family. Could we afford to go completely organic? Do we have the time to drive to every different place to get all the different organic stuff? Where do you stop? Where do you draw the line?

After all, sometimes I wonder if certain healthy choices are so beneficial thatthey far outweigh the potential detriments of other choices.

If I use bath products that contain parabens and/or mineraloil, but I eat a lot of broccoli and drink my full quota or more of filteredwater every day, then am I at lesser risk of being negatively affected by thebath products?

If I buy ground beef that isn’t organic, but I exerciseregularly, is my body then better equipped to face the potentially harmfulingredients in the beef?

If I eat apples that are covered in pesticides, but I wash them, then doesn't that at least reduce the amount of pesticides I'm consuming, and aren't the health benefits of the apple itself enough to counteract the harmful effects of the traces of pesticides?

I hope I don’t sound like I’m just trying to compromise. Iam trying to consider these facts and balance them without having tosubsist on less and less options (that are often more and more expensive) astime goes by.

What do you think? What is your opinion on all of this? Do you get as frustrated as I've gotten?

A Really Good Gift

2012-01-27T13:16:00.002-05:00

When we first listed our house for sale, someone told methat she would pray for the right buyer at the right time, and for everythingto work out so that afterward, we could say, “Wow, that was totally God atwork.”

Well, that did happen, and so I must share with you what Ilearned from the whole experience because I believe that without God, itwouldn’t have happened this way.

We basically listed our house to downsize to something alittle less expensive and a little more affordable so that I could continueworking part-time for the next few years when our kids are small. Our house wason the market for almost 3 months.

When we started looking for houses, we went through onehouse in particular that we both really liked. We had a really good feeling aboutthe house, and I genuinely believed that it was “our house.” It wasn’t perfect;it needed lots of work, yet I still found myself really liking it. I figuredthat since I really liked something that I wouldn’t expect myself to like, itmust be God giving me peace that it was the right house, if that makes anysense.

We put two offers in on that house, and both were rejectedbecause we had a house to sell. We figured that if it was meant to be, ourhouse would sell and that house would remain on the market for us to buyeventually.

That didn’t happen. I was kind of crushed, and I wonderedwhy that house had seemed so perfect. We began using that house as a benchmark,and honestly thought that there wouldn’t be any other house like it out there in our price range. Thethought that something better was still out there didn’t seem possible, so Idenied that thought permanent residence in my mind.

As for selling our house—if you’ve ever had a house on themarket, you know how frustrating it is. We developed a “code” for preparing fora showing, and we kept to the code, even when we didn’t want to. As my pregnantbelly continued to grow, washing the floors continued to get more difficult. Wekept on with it, though. I remember the sound of the vacuum cleaner turning oneventually made me cringe with distaste because we had cleaned our house somany times without selling it that I hated the sound.

There were several potential buyers whom we thought wouldend up being “the one.” We even had a person who had previously lived in ourhouse for 20 years come through! If anyone was going to be the right buyer, I’dput my money on that person! However, we saw no offers.

Then one day this month, we got an offer. We accepted. Wehadn’t found a house yet, so we had to act fast.

Somehow, our discussions with our agent turned to aparticular house that we had seen on the market but originally weren’tinterested in. After a series of events, we ended up very quickly buying thathouse. A further few events led us to make a decision and take a risk in orderto keep the house, and I know we ended up making the right decision.

There are two thoughts that have resonated in my mind thesepast few weeks:

First, if events hadn’t transpired exactly as they had, we never would have ended up with the house webought, which is a really good and perfect house. Now that I’m on the otherside of this experience, I can see and understand how God has masterfullychoreographed a series of events to take place to bring us to where we endedup. Even the disappointment we experienced in losing out on the first house weloved was necessary to bring us to our new house. Moreover, He choreographedevents and decisions that would grow us spiritually and teach us some reallyvaluable lessons.

Second, during this whole process, we vocalized countlesstimes that we would have to end up making a sacrifice somewhere. We assumedthat buying a house in a lower price range required a sacrifice—whether it besize, quality of construction, location, number of renovations/repairs needed, numberof features, etc. Here’s the big “however”: Somehow,we ended up “downsizing” to a house that requires no sacrifices whatsoever. In other words, we’re “downsizing,” butwe aren’t.

I grew spiritually through this experience because I learnedfirst-hand the generous, giving nature of God. He gives us gifts “justbecause.” He gives us gifts with no strings attached.

What was the most amazing gift you ever received forChristmas or for your birthday or just because? In my opinion, the greatestgifts are not the ones you ask for and thus expect, but the ones you neverimagined you’d ever receive because they were too perfect to imagine—the onesyou never expected because they were too good to expect. The greatest gift isthe one that you can marvel over for days, weeks and months after receivingit—in awe that someone put so much thoughtabout you into it and really did findthe perfect gift just for you.

My house-selling, house-buying experience is just one littleexample of how God loves to bestow gifts on His children. I can’t comprehendthis situation in any other way than being a gift. We didn’t ask for it. Wedidn’t deserve it. We didn’t know it existed or was possible. We even grumbledand complained and were frustrated so many times, like immature children whowant to make sure they get something good for Christmas and get upset when theyfind out they aren’t going to get what they thought they wanted. Thankfully,our childish complaints and tears of frustration didn’t deter God from handingus such a wonderful gift.

Sometimes receiving a perfect, amazing, valuable, specialgift can be really difficult. I think many people would prefer to ask forsomething and know what’s coming. I think many people would prefer to get whatthey think they deserve—no more and no less. I think many people, includingmyself, think they know what they want or need and stubbornly tend to rejectany other ideas before they’ve even seen or heard them. Maybe it’s human nature.

Through this series of events, we had to decide to take arisk and accept the gift God was laying out on the table for us, even though wedidn’t feel we deserved it.

God has an abundance of specially-selected,better-than-expected gifts for all of us because He loves us completely andunconditionally, but it may take some time and experience to grow accustomed toreceiving them. Why not start today and open yourself up to receiving andaccepting gifts from God—especially the gifts you may not feel you deserve?

James 1:17: Every good and perfect gift is from above,coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, Who does not change likeshifting shadows.

Perseverance

2012-01-15T09:23:00.002-05:00

I had been doing so well at blogging consistently everyweek, and then life just got in the way. However, my lack of blogging over thepast few weeks does not reflect a lack of wondering or thinking or questioningthings; in fact, I think I have been doing more mental processing lately thanusual.

Over the past few weeks, I have been contemplating the conceptof perseverance.

Here’s why I’ve been thinking about perseverance: Ihave been rigorously exercising what I hope is perseverance over the pastcouple of months while my house has been for sale. If you’ve ever sold/bought ahouse, you understand completely: it’s not always a fun, easy, straightforwardprocess. It really necessitates perseverance—how else could you handle sellingyour house (unless you’re one of those lucky people whose house is snatched upa couple weeks after being on the market)?

To share with you my thoughts on perseverance, Ihave to explain my thoughts on bravery.

I’ve been reading A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin (yes, another greatmedieval fantasy). Near the beginning of the book, the character Bran iswatching his father, Eddard, execute a criminal. Bran is only seven years old,so naturally, he’s a little afraid of what he is going to see. He asks hisfather if you can still be brave even when you’re afraid. His father replies, “Thatis the only time you can be brave” (Martin, 1996, p. 18).

I thought that was interesting. Before reading thatchapter, when I pictured someone who is brave, I pictured someone fearless whenothers would be afraid. However, Martin has presented a very differentperspective: we can only exercisebravery in the face of fear—when we are afraid. This suggests that a braveperson isn’t necessarily fearless; a brave person just recognizes the value orthe necessity in facing his/her fears and not letting those fears get in theway of things that are more important (in Bran’s case, keeping his eyes openand watching the execution so as to prove his strength as a “man,” hispolitical standing as a Stark and his likelihood of becoming a knight). Thewhole situation scared Bran, but he controlled his fears for the sake of somethingmore important, thus exercising bravery.

I wondered if the same logic can be applied toperseverance. I have been starting to wonder whether you can really “persevere”if you are frustrated, disappointed and in the middle of throwing up your handsin the air and exclaiming, “That’s it! I give up! I can’t do anything aboutthis anymore, so I’m just going to let things happen as they will.”

What is perseverance? I found two dictionary definitions:

1. Steadfastness in doing something despite difficultyor delay in achieving success.

2. Continuance in a state of grace leading finally toa state of glory.

Before this week, I always thought that someone whopersevered basically had a calm smile, faith and patience and experienced peaceno matter how long something threatened to last for or how frustratingsomething threatened to be. I pictured someone happy and calm as ever while aseries of stormy, time-consuming, challenging events kept appearing and tryingto break that person’s resolve to remain steadfast in patience.

In light of what Martin’s characters said aboutbravery, I wondered whether the only time you can truly persevere is when youare faced with a long, frustrating wait. Maybe perseverance only comes once youhave waited longer than you thought you ever could. Down the rocky, seeminglyendless road called “Waiting,” maybe there is a point where the maps stopplotting the route, where you’ve done all you could do to navigate yourselfthrough the territory of Waiting, you have thrown your compass in the woods offthe road in frustration so that you have no idea where to go, and you pass asign that reads “Congratulations, You Have Persevered!”

What do you think? Can we still persevere even whenwe are ready to give up? Then what?

Perhaps a state of perseverance can only beachieved once we have passed the point of patient waiting and peaceful faith andhave come to the point of panicky stress and precarious bewilderment. Perhapsat that point, at which we have gone further than we thought possible, we have reached that state of grace (like in the definitionabove)—that state of grace in which we stop hoping or trying for somethingspecific to happen, boldly walk past that sign that reads, “Congratulations,You Have Persevered!” throw our situation up in the air and let God have achance to catch it in His hands and do something about it. Is that whereperseverance can be found? Is that how we reach a state of glory?

“You’re blessed when you’re at the end of yourrope. With less of you, there is more of God and His rule.” Matthew 5:3, TheMessage

What's In a Name?

2011-12-16T15:09:00.000-05:00

I’ve been thinking a lot about names lately.

For one, Joel and I have been periodically brainstormingnames for the upcoming arrival of our new baby. We aren’t going to find out thebaby’s sex, so we need to come up with a boy’s name and a girl’s name. Naming ababy, a baby we will have just met, is very challenging.

The first issue is that there are two people picking a name—twopeople with different opinions. Many of the names I have loved for years havebeen vetoed. Many of the names Joel likes have been scorned. I suppose,however, that as frustrating as this is, you have to eventually narrow down alist of names to one or two anyway.

There are a lot of politics involved with baby names. Forexample, one question all parents-to-be ask themselves is, “Should we tellpeople what we are going to name our baby?” Some think this is a good idea—thattelling others about their baby name is placing “dibs” on that name so no oneelse takes it. Others prefer to keep the name quiet, for that same reason—so thatno one accidentally repeats the name and then somewhere along the line, someoneelse uses the name. Some figure, “Well, we’ve picked our name, so why not tellpeople? That won’t change anything” while others reason, “I want to surprisepeople with our baby’s name!”

Following the above issue is the question of how far removedshould someone be from you for you to justify using the same name, if youreally like the name? Acquaintance? Someone you’ve never met?

Parents-to-be need to ask themselves a lot of questions,such as:

· Do I want a popular or an unpopular name?

· Do I want a standard or unique spelling of the name?

· How does the first name sound with the lastname?

· How could kids potentially use the name to pickon my son/daughter?

· How does the name sound with my other kid’sname?

· Do I like the meaning of the name?

Moreover, it’s always a good idea to have some names in mindmonths or perhaps years in advance so that you can find out whether the namestands the test of time. If you like the name 9 months after you pick the name,chances are it’s a suitable name.

As stressful as all of this sounds, these daunting challenges have started to look somewhattrivial to me over the past week. Why? Well, as a lover of medieval fantasy, Ihave had my nose in a fantastic book called Inheritanceby Christopher Paolini. This author has created a fantasy world, in some wayscomparable to J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth (but with many differences)—you know,elves, dwarves, humans, etc. Anyway, one of the concepts Paolini hasincorporated into his world is that everyone has both a given name and a truename. Their given names are just that—names given to them at birth.

Their true names carry a different meaning altogether: eachcharacter has a true name, but many don’t know their own true name, let alone anyone else's. If anyone discovers theirown true name, they have no choice but to guard that information with theirlives, for if anyone else discovers someone’s true name, they could use itagainst them, controlling them or manipulating them because someone's true name represents the very essence of that person.

The protagonists, in Inheritance,need to figure out what their true names are. Naturally, as I was reading, Istarted wondering what my true name is.

Now, you are probably wondering, what comprises one’s truename?

Well, it’s not just one or two words, like given names. Truenames could be a sentence or two long, and must explain someone’s essence—thatperson’s strengths and flaws, inner character, and perhaps might describe wherethat person came from or where that person is going.

Of course, we aren’t living in Christopher Paolini’s fantasyworld, but I still wondered if discerning our true names might be a helpful exercise in understanding who we truly are.

I have also been reminded of the many names that God has: Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace (among others). I wonder what names God has for us?

What about you? What are your strengths and your flaws?Where have you come from? What have you endured? How has this changed you? Howhave you grown and developed through life? Where are you going? What is yourdestiny? What is your character and personality? What has God planned for you? What are the gifts God has given to you?

As you can see, all of a sudden the profound nature ofselecting a given name for my baby means much less to me than what God has alreadynamed, predestined and purposed for my baby. Our true names are of much greatersignificance.

Given names are still fun to sift through and deliberate,but I suppose Shakespeare said it best in Romeoand Juliet:

“What’s in a name? A rose, by any other name, would smell assweet.”

“Rose” is the sweet-smelling flower’s given name in English; however, the essence of the rose (what it looks like, how it grows and blooms, what issmells like, what it means to us) supersedes the arbitrary four-letter wordthat we use to refer to it.

You are much more than your given name, or even its meaning; you have a name created by God that describes your very essence.

Just Do It

2011-11-25T19:45:00.001-05:00

For about a year, I had felt like I should be getting to know one of my neighbours. The thought, "You should make an effort to befriend her" and "You should do something nice for her" kept coming to my mind. No matter what excuses my mind came up with, I still felt, deep down, like I should be making an effort to get to know this particular neighbour.

Well, a year went by. A year. I put it off and delayed it and kept making those "logical" excuses for why I shouldn't bother. Here are some of them:

I'm sure I'll randomly run into her some time in the near future. (This didn't happen.)
It's too late now.
I missed my chance.
If I was going to do something, I should have done it months ago. Now it doesn't matter.
(Both last winter and this fall): It's cold now, and people aren't outside much anymore - I won't run into her.
(When it was warmer): She's busy talking with someone, so I can't wait around to talk to her...that would be awkward.
(She had a baby): I could bring her a meal, but what if they are vegetarian? What if they have food allergies that I don't know about? I don't know what they like!

Once I figured I had missed my chance and it was too late, it became easier and easier to put it out of my mind and think about it less often.

Then, last week, I realized that since we will be moving in the near future, I may never ever make that connection. The finality of that thought finally drove me to action.

I went to her house and talked with her, and made that connection. We had a great chat, and have purposed to get together again in the near future.

I felt lighter, as though a little burden that had been pressing upon my shoulders was finally lifted. I did what had been impressed upon me to do for a year.

I'm telling you this because if you ever feel that same feeling - like you should make an effort to get to know someone, or that you should do [this] or [that]- don't wait as long as I did. Procrastinating and trying to justify not doing something (because it would pull you out of your comfort zone) won't benefit you one bit. The longer you put it off for, the harder it is to eventually motivate yourself to action.

Sometimes opportunities (that, who knows, could change our lives in one way or another) pass us by, and we don't have the luxury of taking the opportunity up at a later date. Often, however, those opportunities are still there, and while the longer we wait, the more difficult it is to take action, it's not impossible to take action. Often, it's not too late. Often, we haven't actually missed our chance.

Don't sit there and formulate excuses for not doing what you know you should be doing. Just do it. After all, who knows how you could impact the lives of others by taking the action you know you should take? Who knows what kinds of doors could be opened, what kinds of opportunities await, or what kinds of changes or effects certain connections, relationships or actions could create?

Just do it.

A Personal Gift

2011-11-20T19:37:00.001-05:00

Have you ever read, or heard of, the book Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of aWoman’s Soul by John and Stasi Eldredge?

Captivating was recommended to me as a helpful book to readwhen I was going through a difficult time in my life. I read the book fouryears ago, and I want to share with you a consequent experience I had relatingto the book.

For those of you who haven’t read it, or if you have andneed a refresher, Captivating stressesthe value of a woman’s heart, the things that a woman needs and thus, the typeof relationship she has with God.

I’m going to take you straight to pages 116-118, where Stasiwrites about an experience she had:

At this point in the book, the authors are describing awoman’s desire to be romanced. Accordingly, our relationships with God oftentake that sort of position—God desires to show His love to those He loves, justas a woman would be romanced by her lover.

One day, Stasi’s husband John had experienced God’spersonal, intimate love for him while he was on a beach. He had the privilegeof watching the rare sight of a beautiful whale blowing water out of itsblowhole, and to John, this was a special experience of God’s love for himpersonally.

After John had told Stasi about what he saw, Stasi asked Godfor the same thing. She said, “God, I want you to show me a whale, too.” Sheended up walking the beach herself, but instead of seeing a whale, she saw ahuge expanse of beach covered with starfish—she had never seen anything innature like it before. She knew that was God’s personal gift to her.

The book goes on to explain that as God loves each of us somuch, on a very personal level, we can open our hearts to “hear His whispersand receive His kisses.”

Well, what do you think I did after reading that section? Atthat time in my life, I desperately neededreassurance from God that He did in fact love me enough to take the time to give me my own gift, and I desperately needed to feel as important to God as these two well-known authors clearly were. I figured, it doesn’t hurt to ask, and if the authorsare right, then I should be able to get my own gift from God. Perhaps this wasa little selfish and testy of me, but given my state of mind at the time, I amnot surprised that I asked God for my own gift.

I don’t remember how many days later, but shortly afterreading that section of the book, on a dark, cold Saturday night, I spent myevening grocery shopping (probably the best way to spend a Saturday night,right? Please note my sarcasm here).

When I was driving home and pulled onto my street, myheadlights caught some movement. At first, I thought it was a dog, but when Ilooked again, I realized this animal was way bigger than a dog—it was a buck—a full-grown male deer, completewith a huge set of antlers. I had never seen anything like it before.

I slowly followed it down my street. He was casuallygalloping along the side of the road until he got to an adjoining cul-de-sac,which he turned down. He didn’t really seem scared; I think he could have run muchfaster than he did. I kept following him until I watched him make his way upsomeone’s driveway and past the garage into the backyard. The buck’s antlersreached up to the roof of the garage he ran past.

To see something so majestic, so wonderful and so rare in themiddle of a street, running into someone’s backyard was very, very awesome. Icouldn’t believe my eyes.

Yes, I do live across the street from a ravine; the housesacross the street from me, and on that cul-de-sac, back onto a nice ravinewhere perhaps many deer live. I have not, however, ever seen a deer on mystreet (apart from this incident) in the five years I’ve lived here. Also, Ihave never seen a buck before in my life.

When I have seen deer out in thewild, I’ve only ever seen a group of does (or at least, young deer withoutantlers). Even hunters who are specifically in a deer-riddled area, watchingand waiting for that prize buck with majestic antlers adorning its head maywait for days and never see one, let alone hunt one down. This deer I saw wasrare enough of a gem to me that it really impacted me, and I knew beyond ashadow of a doubt that it was my gift from the One Who loves me so dearly. Now,whenever I see a deer out in the wild, I’m reminded of that fantastic buck and ofGod’s love for me on a very personal level. That gift was, as Stasi calls it, “anintimate gift from an intimate God.”

Stasi finishes that section with, “He has many for you aswell.”

I would never, ever share this story about what Goddid for me if I wasn’t certain that He would do the same for you. Maybe Healready has, many times.

Of course I know that God loves me. I would have believedthat even if I had never encountered that buck. I believed it before, and I still believe it. God didn’t need to prove His love for me by providing thatgift from nature any more than my friends or family would ever need to provetheir love for me by giving me presents—I know love without physical gifts.

Even though we don't need gifts to know love, aren't gifts still fun to receive? Aren't gifts fun to give to the ones we love? Don't actions like the giving/receiving of gifts make relationships sweeter? God feels the same way!

What's more, I believe is that sometimes in life, our hearts may befragile, our emotions may be unstable or our situations may have placed us in aprecarious position. For whatever reason, we may just need to be shown, in ourown personal, intimate way, just how much God loves us. We may just needsomething tangible, in our world, to give us that boost we need to grow strongagain—to heal our hearts. Sometimes we need something to hold onto. Please becomforted that God knows what you need and He is willing to give.

If you’ve never done so, I encourage you open your own heartand see what kinds of ways that God can show His own intimate, personal lovefor you in a beautiful and impactful way. He knows when you will need them and why. As Stasi wrote in Captivating, He has many gifts especially crafted for you, ready and waiting tobestow on you, too. Just ask and be open to receiving them.

The Impact of Remembering

2011-11-11T12:34:00.001-05:00

When I wasat the grocery store last night, and a very sweet elderly man very carefullypinned a poppy on my coat lapel, I started to think about Remembrance Day. Veryquickly, I started reciting “In Flanders Fields” in my mind. I still rememberan elementary school teacher very painstakingly (and patiently) teaching us thepoem so that we could recite it for a Remembrance Day assembly. I’ve neverforgotten the poem, thanks to that teacher.

The wholepoem is beautiful and moving, but the lines that jumped out at me last nightwere:

Take up our quarrel with the foe

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high

If ye break faith with us who die,

We shall not sleep…

[We shall not sleep]

Howimpactful is that? As a kid, I never truly understood the significance of thoselines. I just remember our teacher coaching us to say, "The torch; be yours to hold it high" loudly and with gusto. Now, those somewhat haunting lines to me serve as a commission, a decree or a perhaps even desperate demand to not only remember but also act.

Of course weall know the purpose of Remembrance Day: to remember that many, many, many peoplehave fought for the freedom many of us were born into today. We must remember,lest we forget, and forget at what cost?

The more Ipondered Remembrance Day and the above excerpt from John McRae’s poem, however,the more that commission to act impressed itself on me:

All thepeople who fought for our freedom have done their part; now, the torch is oursto hold high.

In terms ofwar and freedom, we must remember the past so that we can perpetuate ourvictories now and into the future, until we are ready to pass the torch to thenext generation. We are the now generation; we are the ones responsible now forcarrying forward our ancestors’ dreams and successes and fights; we are theones responsible now for preparing the way for the next generation’s life onthis earth. This commission is much broader than just war and freedom, though: thisdoes not just have to apply to politics. What about society, culture, philanthropy,technology and the environment?

What can wedo—what are we doing right now—for future generations?

“In FlandersFields” is certainly a strong and passionate decree for the people of today toremember the past in order to impact the future.

Change

2011-11-04T13:02:00.001-04:00

How do you feel about change? Do you welcome it, or do youresist it?

Do you rearrange your living room every few months, or hasit stayed the same for years? How many different hairstyles or hair colourshave you had in the last five years? Would you be happy working for the samecompany until you retire, or do you feel the itch to do something new every sooften?

The more I think about “change,” the more I realize howcomplex a word “change” really is. There is, after all, positive and negative change,major and minor change, permanent and temporary change, and several other typesand variations in between.

There are two aspects of change that intrigue me the most,and the first is the way it makes me feel. When something changes, it feelsforeign, different and far from ordinary. It causes me to feel different frommy usual self—like I’ve distanced my mind from my actions, or my perspectivefrom my body, or something like that. When things change, sometimes I don’tfeel like “me”; psychological gravity has a lesser effect on me; I don’t feelquite as grounded as usual.

Here’s an example: Joel and I have put our house up forsale. That simple action will produce so many changes that to comprehend themall at once is overwhelming. Some of these changes have already made me feel alittle “different” just being at home. Other changes I know are imminent, and I’ma little nervous about how they will make me feel when they happen.

Our house feels different because I’ve staged it to sell byremoving all personal effects such as knick knacks and framed photos. Clutternow lives in cupboards, and our dog now temporarily lives at my in-laws.

At some point in the near future, we will be living in adifferent house.

At first, I probably won’t feel at “home” there. The layoutwill be different, and our things will be in different places.

I will be sleeping in a different room, and showering in adifferent bathroom.

The house will have its own different smell and will producedifferent “house sounds” like certain creaks when you walk across certainsections of floor.

I will be driving a new route to all the places I go; someplaces will be closer, and others will be further away.

All the nuances of living in a certain house will becompletely changed; all the little details that I don’t ever notice will becomeextremely noticeable because of their difference from my norm.

So much of myself is entwined in my home, for “home is wherethe heart is.” I will be uprooting my heart to plant it elsewhere. Of course Iwill be taking the memories of the years I spent in our house with me whereverI go, but they will always play themselves out in my mind in this house. Moreover, I will be entrusting my home of five yearsto another family, hoping and praying that they are able to make this a realhome for themselves, enjoying and appreciating and loving it like I have.

I like the idea of change, especially if I know it’sultimately for the better. Change can be refreshing, but adjusting can beclumsy and challenging. The initial period of “newness” can be awkward, makingyou feel as though you’re in a different country instead of safe in your familiarhomeland.

Change feels strange.

When something changes, everything feels strange, but thankfully,that feeling only exists for a little while. Familiarity slowly overcomesforeignness, and eventually, to move away from that newly-found familiaritywould denote another change.

This brings me to the second aspect of change that bafflesme: Sometimes I wonder at the capacity of human beings to adjust and adapt tothe countless changes of a lifetime. As our bodies grow and eventually start toage, we are continuously met with changes and are faced with decisions. Ourrelationships grow and develop, and life happens, and we are met with morechanges that feel strange at first. We live in different houses, experiencedifferent financial situations, work at different jobs, become part ofdifferent communities of people, are blessed with life and suffer death. Isn’t it amazing that for the most part, we are able to take changeand transform it into familiarity? Sure, some adjustments take more time andeffort than others, and some we may never get used to, but generally speaking,we are resilient creations that can eventually get used to situations that havechanged—and maybe even get used to “change” itself.

Do we grow accustomed to difference because it’s the onlyway to survive (and humans were created with a will to survive)? In otherwords, do we adjust to change because we have a survival instinct? What aboutpositive change? We still have to go through an adjustment period even when weexperience a change for the good, right? So regardless of the type of change,generally speaking, we adapt, adjust, endure a period of awkwardness and thencarry on—move on—continue on through life, eventually getting used to the newstate we’re in? Take all of those questions and throw in the fact that as our environment and circumstances change around us, we ourselves also change, compounding the effects of difference in our lives! With all of this change, how do we remain stable and balanced? It's a wonder, isn't it?

I wonder if humans are able to adapt so well because of thefact that there is something in this dynamic universe that alwayspromises to remain the same: God, His promises and His infinite love for His adaptablecreations. The more I change and adapt to changes, the more I realize how solidand unchanging He is; no matter how much life changes around me, I have aconstant and unchanging God at the center, Who is familiarity, Who is home and Who is light,even when nothing else is.

Friday

2011-10-21T15:07:00.001-04:00

I'm sitting here, and it's Friday at 2:30, and by now I usually have my weekly blog post written and sometimes even posted, but for some reason I just haven't come up with a noteworthy idea or topic this week.

This week, however, I feel like maybe instead of delving into something philosophical or psychological or motivational or inspirational, I am just going to tell you a bit about what has made me happy over the past couple days.

Watching Boardwalk Empire with Joel. He got really into this show about a month ago, and was halfway through the first season when he finally thought that there actually was a possibility that I might like the show. I started watching, and I loved it, and he caught me up on what I missed, and it truly is an interesting show (of course it is; Martin Scorsese is one of the show's executive producers). Somehow, though, whenever Steve Buscemi's character walks into a room and opens his mouth, I can't help but think about the homeless guy he plays in Mr. Deeds who loves pizza with Oreo cookies and gummy worms on it. I am still trying to work on getting past that.
Watching Emmett constantly grow. Last night, I went to a Norwex party at my aunt's house with Emmett, and he kept walking up to my cousin's daughters (he really liked them), putting his head down shyly and awkwardly looping his arms around, and I wondered at how someone so young (he's a year and a half) seems to inherently know when to be bashful and how to show it. Sometimes I wonder how much he learns from observing others and how much he just does instinctively (yes, that ongoing nature/nurture questions is a doozy).
Cleaning my house (finally) today. All week I had either no time or no motivation to clean my house, and I guess I was in a kind of disconnected "I-don't-care" mood, so I just cast resentful glares at the dust collecting on my fridge and water spots spreading across my bathroom counter and the dog hair on the floor, and then pretended they didn't exist. I don't know if it was the Norwex party (even though I don't have any Norwex stuff yet), or if I just started to get in a cleaning mood today, or if it's because my sister and brother are coming over tonight, but I went off on a cleaning rampage today--you know, not the typical, standard weekly cleaning, but the super-charged, intensive cleaning. My house is now making me feel happy. There are few things I love more than existing in a clean and tidy house. It is a thing of beauty.
Chatting with friends and family. You know you have amazing friends and family when your friends start to feel like family and your family starts to feel like friends. When does that happen? How does that happen? It takes some extremely wonderful people and considerable quality time to build such strong and rewarding relationships; that is what makes them so amazing. When I feel tired or a little melancholy, nothing cheers me up and makes me feel really happy than a great conversation with someone--particularly a friend or family member.
Eating. I'm not kidding when I say that for the past week or two, I have been having food dreams every single night. I'm always eating or making food or watching someone else make food or talking about food. I love to even just think about food. After weeks and weeks of hating the sight of food and dreading opening the fridge, I am finally relishing the thought of eating. I'm glad that when I feel this way, my family can benefit because I start to put more thought into what we eat, and so I've been making some really delicious meals now. (But what am I going to make tonight???)
The anticipation of Christmas. I love Christmas. Now that the weather is getting colder, I'm starting to sense those little Christmasy, wintery nuances here and there that make me feel at home: the smell of the furnace coming on, the feeling of wearing a thick sweater, breaking out the boots, burning fall- and winter-scented candles, making applesauce (I often do just because it makes my kitchen smell so good), baking (or eating what other people have baked for me) and waking up very warm but for my nose, which is usually cold.

I Never Knew That!

2011-10-14T12:46:00.003-04:00

As my adult years continue, I am continually amazed at how many things I keep learning.

In one respect, "the more you know, the more you realize you don't know" becomes more and more true and relevant. You learn as you live. You grow as you experience. Giant values and concepts become more understandable. I write about those kinds of things a lot.

Today, however, I'm thinking more about little things like useless facts, the pronunciation or definition of certain words, and the reason why something is the way it is.

Every couple of weeks or so, I find myself exclaiming, "I never knew that!" Every couple of weeks or so, I learn something that I never knew.

For example, less than ten years ago, I found out that Rabbit from Winnie the Pooh is actually male. For my whole life, I had thought Rabbit was a girl. He was always cooking and cleaning, and he kind of had a high-ish voice. Then one day I saw a picture of Rabbit wearing a bow tie, and my whole world came undone. I couldn't believe that for over 20 years, I was wrong about Rabbit's gender. Life-altering? Well, not really, but this realization was still pretty shocking to me.

Here's another example: I've always been a reader: if you've been reading my blog, you can probably tell. Just look at my Books, Books, Books post. Anyway, there are many words that you read in books that you may never hear anyone say, or at least, never pay attention to anyone saying it, or even, always think that everyone else was wrong pronouncing it differently. Consequently, I have thought that many words were pronounced a certain way, when it was me that actually turned out to be wrong. I had always thought that "basil" had a short "a," that "cantaloupe" was pronounced "cantaloop" (I still say it that way because it's more fun, and I also partially have my mother to blame for this one), and that "barrage" was pronounced "bear-idj." Then one day, the adult "bookworm" says a word completely wrong and becomes the laughingstock of the group (that's OK; I'm over it).

I started learning to drive when I was 16, but a few months ago when I went for an oil change, one of the guys asked me to pop the hood and I had to really think about it and look around before I could find the latch! How could I not automatically know that? I sure felt like a doofus, but seriously, I don't remember popping my hood before, or maybe I've only done it once and didn't remember where it was. This situation seems impossible, but guess what? It apparently is possible to have been driving for almost 15 years and still be uncertain about how to pop the hood of your car.

Isn't it amazing that we can go through so many years of our lives without knowing certain little things? Isn't it ironic that we can spend 4+ years of our lives completing post-secondary education and still somehow never hear anyone say the word "lapel" during that time (thus assuming the "a" is long)? Isn't it incredible that we know why deciduous trees' leaves change colour and then fall off every autumn, but we may not know if ornamental pepper plants' peppers are edible? We can write essays on the objectification of women in today's magazines, or we may write policies and procedures for the companies we work for, but maybe we can't quite remember for certain, now that we think of it, how exactly frogs fertilize the female's eggs and how long before they become full-grown frogs. I can bake some pretty amazing oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and make a mean chili, but I sometimes still have to think about and perhaps even look it up to know for sure which nuts or fruits or vegetables or legumes grow from vines, little plants, shrubs or trees.

Not only am I constantly discovering little facts all the time but also there are things I still don't know or haven't experienced. I have only seen a small part of one of the Star Wars movies. I have never seen The Godfather. I have ridden a camel, but never a horse. I've never been to Florida. You might be thinking incredulously, "Seriously? You've NEVER seen Star Wars?"

Maybe all the things I never knew until recently, or still have never experienced, are things you feel like you've always known, or have done a million times (like gone to Florida every year during March break). Or, maybe there are things you've never known that are "old news" to me. Maybe "useless facts" are actually "useless" to you, so you don't really care to know why the wind allows you to see the bottoms of trees' leaves just before it rains.

Why is that?

I always assumed that in our learning lives, we start with certain basics and move on to more complex knowledge...in other words, certain information and facts are like prerequisites to other information and facts. Like if you've been driving for 15 years, you know how to pop the hood of your car. Or if you've had a childhood, you've probably been to Florida. Or if you're alive, you've seen Star Wars. Apparently, that assumption is incorrect.

Do our experiences and personalities and passions lead us to certain information, and perhaps shy us away from knowing other things?

Or is some of what we know, or don't know, completely random? How much of what we know do we unintentionally stumble upon? How much of what we don't know is just based on the type of family we were born into?

How big a role does inquisitiveness play? Do those with the most questions learn the most, or do people who don't really question things still learn just as much, just indirectly?

I am really inquisitive, but there are still so many facts that I don't know, and am looking forward to finding out! I love the fact that no matter how much I know, there are still so many little bits of information and facts that I have yet to discover! Learning, to me, never gets old.

So, thank goodness for Google. And the Discovery channel. What did people do without these wonderful information outlets years ago???

Thankful for "The Whole Love" of Music

2011-10-07T13:56:00.002-04:00

Over the past few years, I have developed quite the affinityand respect for Wilco. Jeff Tweedy and the rest of Wilco together createextremely interesting, varied, sometimes energetic, sometimes just plainemotional music that sometimes carries on for a long time (they have sometracks in excess of ten minutes)—different than anything else I’ve ever heardbefore. Some of Wilco’s songs are perfect for fuelling the energy of a party (“HeavyMetal Drummer,” “I Might”), and others are the kind you need to listen to byyourself in your car, so the lyrics can be tucked around you and all of the interestingsounds can serenade you alone (“Country Disappeared,” “Ashes of American Flags”).

Emmett in his Wilco concert merch from Joel: "Wilco Loves Your Baby"

Wilco just released their new album called The Whole Love on September 27. I loveit. I was thoroughly impressed and have thoroughly enjoyed listening to thealbum. I thought that I would write a post about Wilco and their new album thisweek.

I started with going to their website, and the first thingmy eyes locked on was a large link that read, “Please Read Henry’s Story.” Ithought, How nice; probably a story about some fan. I complied to the site’srequest and read Henry’s story.

Well, Henry’s story ended up being an emotional one about aboy named Henry. He was a musician at heart, inherently, from birth, and healso happened to love Wilco.

He died when he was 18. His mother wrote this beautifulstory about him, and her story ended with a very moving description of the waythat Wilco and The Whole Loveimpacted her, in light of Henry and his way-too-soon death.

Having read that story, I have decided to turn down anotherside trail (which leads to a huge general expanse of meaning instead ofsomething smaller and specific), instead of just reviewing Wilco’s new album.Yes, it’s awesome. Yes, you should listen to it. Yes, you should listen to allof Wilco’s albums because they are all awesome.

There’s more. Down the side trail I’ve decided to take, Isee the bigger picture. I see how many of us, in many different ways, respondto music that our fellow human brothers and sisters have created—it impacts us.

We were created to react to music, to feel rejuvenated bymusic and to be inspired by music.

I have always known that people connect with some music, butperhaps not others, and that’s maybe because of the way we were wired “musically.”In some way or another, we were created to connect with music.

What Henry’s story reminded me of is that music also brings us together (just like Henry and his mother connected with each other in a certain way through Wilco’s music). Music creates community. Music can facilitate connections between people that would have never existed without it. Lyrics can “hit home” and make the listener feel like he or she is not alone but instead connected with others who feel the same way.

Because of Henry’s story and its connection with music, many people haveconnected with Henry’s mother. Many people have been inspired by the story; infact, Wilco also has a link on their site to donate to Henry’s fund, anon-profit organization that provides help for youth age 12-20 who have drugaddictions.

The impact of music doesn't stop there. Not only are we wired to connect with certain music, and consequentially, with other people through that music, music lives on past those connections to play a significant role in perpetuating itself:

Music facilitates a passionate cycle of creativity.

Songs impactand inspire souls to create something—like more music—that impacts other soulsinto reacting another way, and the cycle continues. Songs can dig down to yourguts, strum your heart strings, make your head tingle and your eyes water andyour soul feel more alive than it has in many months, or perhaps many years.Emotions and inspiration and passion can be transformed into music. Musicbreeds feeling. Feeling grows into love. Love keeps us alive.

Wilco in particular is doing exceptionally well in connecting stories, experiences and people by creating music and lyrics that envelop the soul, excite the mind and inspire others to action.

This Thanksgiving, I’m very thankful for music – I’mthankful that God added music into the mix when He created us and this world.

Three Cheers for Thirty

2011-09-30T13:21:00.004-04:00

This week, I thought I'd share a few reflections on turning thirty because as of yesterday, I am thirty years old.

My first thought about turning thirty has always been, "That's so OLD!" I guess to enter a new decade can be quite a shock. For ten years, I've been a twenty-something-year-old, and now I'm a thirty-something-year-old.

When I dug a little deeper into my thoughts on thirty, however, I started thinking back to everything that happened in my twenties, in my last decade of life, which is the first decade of adult life, in which a lot of important, life-changing events happen and important, life-changing decisions must be made. Have you ever realized how much happens in our twenties? For many people, at least one, or maybe all, of the following experiences are generally standard:

Going to college or university (which means deciding what career path you want to follow - although many of us end up changing our minds on which program we want to take)
Getting your first "real" job or starting your "career" (and we all hope that the program we took in college or university ends up being applicable to this first job)
Moving out of your parents' house into either a place you rent or have bought (either way, paying for your living space)
Falling in love, dating seriously, and/or getting married (which means thinking about and deciding who you want to spend the rest of your life with)
Having children (which, if you are the mother of said children, often means taking time away from the job you invested schooling and experience into to do something completely different - taking care of a baby, which is more important than your job, but ironically, you likely didn't take college courses or gain work experience in child-rearing)

There's five major, life-changing, significant circumstances that are the result of major, life-changing, significant decisions we are often prompted and prodded to make in our twenties.

Sure, being twenty-something is fun in a lot of ways: you're young and in your prime (so you look great), you have lots of energy, you are constantly facing a new opportunity, life is constantly changing, even as an adult, you are constantly growing up and maturing and gathering new responsibilities, and you are experiencing some pretty amazing life events.

When I looked back at all the firsts and all the new experiences and all of the changes I experienced in my twenties, though, I kind of felt tired afterward (maybe it's because I'm thirty and I'm getting "old," so I tire easily). Either way, I felt tired. I felt the trauma of all of the thoughts and emotions and experiences and change, I felt the stress of the many decisions and transitions (wondering and hoping beyond hope that I made the right decision each time), and I felt the dizziness of the ups and downs: the continuous rising of emotional reaction to a major life event, and the subsequent dip of emotion when things went back down to normal, only to rise up again to meet a new opportunity or change. Yes, I sure felt tired to think back on all of those things.

I learned a lot in my twenties. I experienced a lot in my twenties. Thankfully, though, I feel quite refreshed to be in a brand new decade of my life. I hope that my thirties hold many new opportunities and excitement in my life's journey through the decades, but I am looking forward to a sense of stability and balance that only comes from having established a lot of things in my life prior to turning thirty.

Thus I must say, "Three cheers for thirty!" I'm really looking forward to what God has in store for me next.

He Never Leaves

2011-09-23T13:04:00.000-04:00

Last Sunday at church, we had a guest speaker who talkedabout coming back to your First Love.

Not until I was digesting thesermon afterward did I realize how much I needed to hear those words. I wasthen further inspired to write this piece about the striking difference betweenliving life when God is at our centre versus living life having drifted away. Iam and will be eternally grateful for having a God Who never actually leaves.

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I was sitting on a couch in a huge, white room. It was bright and light. It was really nice. I could always hear soft music playing, and no matter what it was, it restored my soul.

As I reclined on big red couch, my feet resting on anottoman, circumstances walked into the large, roomy room and played themselvesout. They usually did some kind of dance. Sometimes I felt a little elbow nudgefrom my spirit, and then I knew that a certain circumstance should not be permitted—soI would ask him or her to leave. Other circumstances I allowed to waltz in, andif my spirit poured a pitcher of peace over me, I knew the circumstance was allright, and that there was no need for me to worry. I therefore let thecircumstances do their dances: some wore caps with feathers, some worebeautiful flouncy dresses and waved silk wraps around as they waltzed, and somethat may have seemed a little dark or unwelcome at first ended up brighteningup by the end. In fact, sometimes one circumstance (often a pretty lady) wouldpair up with another (a handsome gentleman) and they would end up in the moststriking, unexpected dance routine—one I could never have imagined in the mostperfect world—and the ending blessed me in some way: I was given by thecircumstance a gift of peace, joy, provision, life, abundance, mercy, joy oropportunity.

Artist: Sera Knight

Sometimes my spirit would prod me to also give something tothe circumstance. Sometimes I would give them a gift of my own. Sometimes Iwould suggest that he or she dance a little differently. I would then get upand dance along with them in complete alignment with their choreography. I wasalways happy to do so; happy to be living and happy to be giving my spirit somuch control.

This was my life for some time. I accepted certaincircumstances as God’s almighty intention for me, and I acted on nudgings bythe Spirit to influence and change other circumstances, however God hadpurposed or planned, and God absolutely permeated that white room—which was whyit was so incredibly white—a warm, glowing white. It couldn’t be anything else;white was the only colour pure enough.

For some reason, one day, a circumstance that I didn’t likeat all came in. I resisted it. I didn’t want it to dance for me. I may havefelt a still, small voice telling me that it was OK, but I was so unhappy with the attitude--the colour--of the circumstance that I let my emotions run rampant. I grabbed a cord hanging from theceiling and pulled a dark screen down to block out that circumstance. Thecircumstance continued to dance, and its wild arms and legs often knockedagainst the screen. This frustrated me even further, and so I spent the rest ofthe day with my arms crossed and a cross expression on my face.

A similar situation happened the next day—anothercircumstance came waltzing in. This time, it was a beautiful, talented dancerwho seemed to have the perfect combination of moves. However, I felt deepinside that something was not right with the dance—something needed to be adjusted.I did not feel any peace run over my head and down my back. I should have donesomething, but I didn’t. I should have acted, but I didn’t. I instead ignoredthat feeling because I wanted to be mesmerized by the dancer. I let the dancercontinue, and as she did, as I remained entranced by the dance, I didn’t noticethat my hand had found its way to the pull cord hanging from the ceiling, and Ibegan to pull, which brought down another screen. Now I had two screens,blocking two of four sides, and the spacious white room was starting to feel alittle small.

I woke up the next morning feeling unhappy. I couldn’treally blame any circumstance, for life is always full of its ups and downs. Iwas still in that glorious white room, but it felt a little colder where I was.I was still in that glorious white room, but I didn’t feel as fulfilled as Ishould have felt just by being there.

Did I ask God about it? Did I tell Him about how I wasfeeling?

No. I just moped and wallowed in this feeling of dissatisfaction.To be honest, as soon as those screens appeared, I seemed to think a littleless about God.

Two more circumstances came in that day, and both warranteda pull of the cord—my decision of course, not influenced by Anyone else. Now Iwas fully surrounded by screens. I was screened in. Although the screens wereextremely thin, they still did the job of blocking out any advice or insightfrom God. Moreover, I thought less and less about God anyway, because I justcouldn’t feel His presence the same way.

The only things the screens couldn’t block out were the actualcircumstances themselves. They kept barraging the screens so that day afterday, hour after hour, I would hear the circumstances, I would feel thecircumstances, and I would see the circumstances’ arms and legs making arm- andleg-shaped indentations in the screens. The circumstances, even the beautifulones, all seemed terrible to me from my perspective.

Before I had time to realize just what had happened, or justhow much time had passed, I was thoroughly discontented. Nothing was happeningthe way it should. Circumstances that should have been denied at the door werelet in anyway. My spirit lost control. It was rudely pushed to the back of myexistence by my soul, who just didn’t have the patience or the self-control orthe insight to make the right decisions. I was stuck in my screened-in,darkened little space, within the expanse of the white room and all of God’spresence, and I had no one to blame but myself. I continued to wallow and feelterrible. Even when good circumstances came in, and even when my friends cameto visit me, I still felt depressed.

When I reached the point of quiet desperation, I thoughtthat God must be miles away. Yes, I know that God has said, “I will never leaveyour nor forsake you,” but a little flicker of doubt flashed in my mind, and Iwondered if He had actually gone away this time. I sure felt alone, and nothingwas going right, and as much as I tried to do things my way, in my own timing,I was only getting more and more frustrated.

So I broke down. Down on my knees I went. The tears startedto flow and I said, “God, I want you here.” I felt terrible for having tried todo things on my own when I knew by experience that God’s advice was alwaysstellar. He always knew what the right decision was, given the fact that Healways knew exactly what was going to happen next.

Before I knew it, there it was: that sharp tingling behindmy ears, the quickened beat of my heart, the warmth of emotion pairing up withthe re-emergence of my spirit to the forefront, the feeling that I’ve finallycome home. The feeling of home.

In worship and surrender, I gave it all up to God, for theseemingly hundredth time in my life, and with that release, the screens werelifted, and I felt the light presence of God dripping down all the walls,running across the floor and thickening the air with an invigorating, misty,minty vapour.

I was shocked to see the walls disappear. I had felt milesand miles away from any notion of God, yet there He had always loyallyremained, a giant presence, just on the other side of a paper-thin set ofscreens that I had put into place myself. I imagined looking into the room fromabove, peering down and seeing a pathetic girl hovering within four screens, feelingaway and alone, while she was actually still in the huge, glowing warm-whiteroom with the same presence of God and the same love permeating the atmospherein the room.

To me, at that moment, I wondered how I could have everthought I was far away from God, when He was right there the whole time,waiting for me.

Two Definitions of Success

2011-09-16T17:21:00.000-04:00

Every so often, I wrestle with the concept of “success.”

I start to wonder, “Am I successful?”

Today I looked up the dictionary definition of success on four different online dictionaries: Dictionary.com, TheFreeDictionary.com, Merriam-Webster.com and Oxforddictionaries.com, and guess what?

They all provide two different definitions of success:

1. Accomplishing an aim or purpose

2. Gaining fame and fortune (or popularity and wealth)

Because there are two quite different ways to view success, the concept of success can be a difficult one to wrestle with.

What’s more, guess which definition of success is the prevalent one in society? If someone asked you what success was, which definition would you automatically respond with? Which definition of success do the media bombard us with? Which definition of success are we faced with, no matter which way we turn?

Definition #2.

On one hand, success means having a dream or a goal or a passion and then seeing it develop unto its full potential. Well, that’s easy enough: with a dream to make life exciting and keep hope alive, and with a passion to drive the dream into reality, anyone can be successful. Everyone ought to be successful.

However, the other definition of success appears to be much more selective. Definition #2 is much harder to attain, and for many, may seem impossible. For example, there are thousands upon thousands of musicians out there, but only a handful are chart-toppers and only a few more gain enough of a fan base to make a good living out of it. Millions of people start their own business, but not everyone gains substantial wealth from it. In fact, don’t half of small businesses fail within the first few years? I don’t know how many little girls dream of being movie stars or celebrities, dressing up in old gowns and putting on lipstick and mom’s high heels, singing into a brush (I sure did), but how many of them actually went on to become celebrities? Not me! Not many.

To be successful via fame and fortune is unrealistic and difficult. We can be made to feel like failures because the product idea we had didn’t end up making money, or the business we started only provided us with an average income, or we didn’t end up using the costly education we invested in to start a financially rewarding career.

It would also seem that “things” are an indicator, or measure, of success in the wealth/popularity sense. There are always new cars, new phones, new clothes, new TVs, new furniture, new vacation hot-spots, new hairstyles…it never ends!

For me, this creates a lot of pressure. Although that lovely Definition #1 of success still exists, the pressures of gaining Definition #2 of success and having all the products and things associated with it seems to always make their way to the forefront.

I am often made to question myself: If I’m not making x amount of money, have I made a mistake somewhere in my career or life choices? Since I don’t have a flat screen TV (gasp!) an iPhone, a Blackberry, or any other “smartphone,” and I don’t have an iPad either (OK, pick yourself off the floor), does that mean I’m not keeping up with the times like a “successful” person would? If I haven’t gone on a fantastic, overseas vacation in the past year, does that mean I’m not as “successful” as the people who have because that’s what “successful” people do?

All of these questions pertain to Definition #2 of success. I feel like I constantly need to click “Send to back” to put those fame and fortune ideals behind more important things in my mind.

I thought about success some more, and realized that based on logic alone—that not every single person in the world can be a famous person because how could everyone actually be able to know over six billion other people by name, and because there are enough competitive, greedy capitalist giants that there’s no way the entire world could be wealthy by first-world standards—I don’t like Definition #2 because it’s just not realistic. It’s not a fair definition because shouldn’t everyone have an equal opportunity to gain success? As much as I would love our next Zusters album to go platinum, or for Joel’s band to open for Wilco or Sam Roberts Band, or to be randomly discovered by some agent while I’m out grocery shopping, or to win $10 million in the next Lotto Max, although not impossible, these things are not quite as likely as pursuing a personal passion and positively impacting people with it.

There is often a struggle between trying to stay focused on doing what God put us on this earth to do (Definition #1) while being constantly distracted by the magnetism of fame and fortune (Definition #2).

Here’s what I remind myself of: When you are doing what God intended for you to do, you will be the happiest and feel the most fulfilled.

We should be asking ourselves questions like this instead: What am I really good at? What do I love doing? Am I doing that—whether it’s part of my career or something I do in my free time? Do I feel passion for a cause? What do I feel like I should be doing with my life? What kind of mandate can I live by? Am I acting on my dreams, passions and the calling that I believe God has on my life?

Don’t let yourself get distracted by Definition #2. Become focused on learning and living out what God has lovingly selected for you to do—and don’t look to the right or left. God will entrust us with what we have proven we can handle, so personal growth and development in both a practical and spiritual sense are important to success. In the creative sense, awaken your passions, and in the practical sense, grow wise. That said, if you become famous and gain fortune by doing what you were purposed to do, there’s nothing at all wrong with that—God knows what He’s doing—just steward those gifts wisely. There’s nothing wrong with being successful in the Definition #2 sense. I think the problem occurs when that becomes the main goal because reason tells us that it’s just not possible for everyone, so you may be setting yourself up for disappointment.

Don’t compare (or I should say, contrast) yourself with someone else who has more than you do, or is more “successful” than you are—you have no idea what that person has gone through, is struggling with, or how hard that person has worked, and you have no right to question what God has intended for that person versus yourself.

I believe that God wants us all to be successful in terms of Definition #1, and whether that means changing society through politics, changing the way people think about something through a book, handing people change as a server or changing your children’s diapers, when you are doing what God created you to do, when you are following your passions, when you are acting upon opportunities and when you exercise patience and can wait for the timing to be right, you can legitimately refer to yourself as successful—even if you aren’t well-known and don’t have a fat bank account. (Click “Bring to front” to bring that image of success to the forefront of your mind.)

Just because Definition #2 has found its way to the forefront of society doesn’t mean it deserves a place in the forefront of your mind. Make room for Definition #1: it’s realistic, it’s the way God sees success and it will bring the most happiness and fulfillment to your life.

The Song in Your Head

2011-09-09T12:51:00.000-04:00

Do you have a song in your head right now? I do: “Gold Lion” by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Since this morning, I think I’ve had about four or five different songs in my head.

When you get a song in your head, are you usually annoyed by it? Does it get on your nerves because your brain keeps replaying the same few phrases? Does it make you start to strongly dislike a song that you originally loved?

On the other hand, perhaps you love having different songs playing in your head. Does your mind give you enough song variety that it’s kind of like a personal radio station that serves to entertain?

Personally, I usually don’t mind having songs in my head. They are usually pretty good songs (since I only listen to good music!), and they seem to trade off with a new song often enough.

For me, the most interesting part of having a song in my head is how the song got there. Sure, sometimes I hear a song somewhere, and then it sticks with me long after the song stops playing. Sometimes, however, a song seems to just appear out of nowhere in my mind, which usually happens in the morning when I wake up.

When I wake up with a song in my head, I often wonder how it got there. Did I dream about something that pertained to the song? Did someone in my dream say something that sounded a lot like a lyric I know? Did I fall asleep with that song in my head but just don’t remember?

Seriously, it seems strange to get a song in my head when I know that I didn’t listen to it recently. It seems like a little surprise that my mind presents me with several times a day; however, I am reasonable enough to figure that there must be some sort of explanation for it. I just don’t know what it is.

I’ve looked at a few sites about getting songs in your head, and it’s kind of interesting. Here’s what I’ve found:

· When someone has a song in his/her head and cannot get it out, this phenomenon is called “earworms,” or “ohrwurms” in German. Basically, getting a song in your head might start with a mere phrase, musical stanza or lyric, and then your brain develops the itch to fill in the gaps with more of the song, creating a repetitive cycle of music.

· Catchy pop songs are usually the culprits that overstay their welcome in our heads and become just plain annoying. They are the simplest in structure, so they are easiest for our brain to replay over and over again.

· Musicians (oh, seriously? I never would have guessed), women and people under stress tend to complain of songs being stuck in their heads longer and more often than others (according to research conducted by marketing professor James Kellaris).

· Dr. Kellaris has also said that the songs we get in our head are typically repetitive, simple, or incongruent (i.e. having interesting rhythmic variations). His research has further led him to believe that people will get songs that their brains somehow find extraordinary or interesting or unusual stuck in their heads. Thus the need for the brain to repeat the song over and over—in an attempt to make better sense of it.

· According to Cecil Adams’ article on earworms, one theory that could explain earworms is that they are a side effect of our brains consolidating our memories, which is similar to what happens when we sleep and dream.

· According to Oliver Sacks in his book Musicophilia, we get songs in our head simply because we constantly hear music, here and there, at home, at the mall, on TV, in movies, at concerts, in the car, and so on, and so forth. We can’t really get away from it.

I also found a web site called unhearit.com, which helps people get the song that`s stuck in their head out of their head, using different music. However, the site has a disclaimer that reads,

“Using the latest in reverse-auditory-melodic-unstickification technology, we've been able to allow our users to “unhear” songs by hearing equally catchy songs. So really all we're doing is making

you forget your old song by replacing it with another one... sorry.”

Only use this site if you are in desperate need to change the song! I had a bar of an annoying techno song in my head for a few hours after just being on the site for less than 30 seconds! Maybe it should be called hearit.com!

There isn`t much credible information online about the science of music in our minds, so my wonderings have kind of gone unanswered. If you can shed any light on my questions, please do tell! In the meantime, I will just continue wondering at our human brains, which keep proving themselves more and more complex, the more and more I think and learn about what they are capable of doing.

The way our brains work is amazing, constantly drawing from information stored in our memories to play certain songs at often seemingly random times, sometimes to annoy, sometimes to surprise, and every once in a while, to unexpectedly inspire and move the soul.

http://health.howstuffworks.com/mental-health/human-nature/perception/songs-stuck-in-head1.htm

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2901/why-do-songs-get-stuck-in-your-head

The Significance of Seasons

2011-09-02T10:16:00.000-04:00

Last week, we were on vacation in Tobermory. As I am every year, I was again stunned speechless by Tobermory’s absolute beauty: the perfect trifecta of rock, coniferous trees and water; the magnificence of the high places overlooking Georgian Bay; the mesmerizing sound of waves invading the stony shore of Lake Huron.

On one particular hike out to see the Fathom Five islands, as I was surrounded by effortless nature, soft beams of sunlight and tangible peace, and as I began to realize that summer was coming to a close, I started wondering about the significance of seasons.

Tobermory is far enough north that it’s one of those touristy places that essentially closes down in the winter. People come to Tobermory to work there all summer and then leave for the winter months. Not much happens in Tobermory during the winter—nothing except for harsh weather and layers of snow.

As we hiked through the forest that particular day, I felt honoured to be in the middle of so much natural beauty. By natural I mean that things have been largely left alone to grow and die as they would. Bright green moss thrives on dead, fallen pine trunks. Promising saplings arise from the decaying wood chips of their elders. Life and death mingles to create countless natural wonders.

Up north, where the growing season is short, the beauty of summer and the blessing of life is valued and appreciated as a fleeting state-of-being, soon to be destroyed by a ruthless winter. Would Tobermory be as striking and as calming as it is, if it thrived 12 months of the year? Would any place that has four seasons be as beautiful in its transformations as a place that stays the same? Or do the seasons create the opportunity for a more fulfilling experience of wonder?

Let me quickly say that I wouldn’t be completely opposed to living somewhere that is warm all year long. Places like California definitely have their perks. However, the “just as I am” natural occurrences that build the visual splendor of northern Ontario (and Ontario in general) are a product of seasons.

As much as most of us dislike winter (or maybe even hate winter?)—months indoors without sun; driving in the snow or sleet or slush or freezing rain; being perpetually cold—we would not get to experience the miracles of spring if we didn’t first endure the winter. We wouldn’t appreciate the warm summer breeze on our faces or the exhilaration of jumping in a cold pool for the first time or soaking up the sun as much as possible or shopping for new light, airy summer clothes and shoes if we didn’t first experience the exact opposite.

I wonder if the same logic applies to life’s seasons. Would the summers of our lives be as bright and light as they are if they hadn’t been predicated by difficult winters?

Perhaps if nothing ever went wrong—if we had the choice and could live in a California or New Zealand climate without ever knowing that winter or hardship exists (because we’d probably all choose that, right?)—we would thrive in and love the constant sunshine and happiness.

Alas, however, that’s not the world we live in. It seems that a prerequisite to being human is to endure hardship and experience suffering at some points in our short lives. We can’t seem to escape it all, but here’s the silver lining of enduring the winters of our lives:

Spring always comes after winter. (Has it ever not?) Summer always comes after spring. Autumn always comes after summer. We can rest assured that three beautiful, rich seasons are the imminent rewards of enduring the winter. What’s more, we appreciate our seasons of blessing and life so much more after having experienced the human-being hardships of life's winters.

Just as the night is darkest just before the dawn, winter seems to be the most unfair and unforgiving just before the glory of a new beginning. If it were not that way, spring would lose her miraculous glory, summer, her happy shine, and autumn, her striking colour.

Skipping a Post

2011-08-28T17:28:00.000-04:00

Hi, everyone!

I just got back from a really great week away in Tobermory, which is why I didn't post something, as I usually do, on Friday. Instead of rushing and trying to come up with something in a hurry today, I'm going to wait until this Friday, September 2 to post something new.

Don't forget to check back on Friday!

An Honour to Bear

2011-08-19T08:42:00.000-04:00

I have a whole host of amazing and wonderful people in my life: old friends, new friends, old family, new family, colleagues-become-friends, friends-become-family, and every possible combination in between. One of the aspects of close relationships that I love the most is sharing in my family's and friends' joys and excitements. When a friend is engaged to an awesome guy, doesn't that make you feel happy? When a cousin gets a new opportunity for career advancement or a brother-in-law starts his own business, doesn't their joy travel from their heart right to yours? The same is true on the other hand: if you have good news, doesn't the news seem even better and brighter when you get to share it with someone else? What good is personal joy if it stays locked up within because you have no one to share it with?

I have been learning throughout the years that sharing doesn't stop at joy. Just as much as I love to share in the joys of those people who are close to my heart, I need to be equally available to them to share in their sorrows. That is, after all, the mark of a true friend or a true family member: bearing one another's burdens.

How do you share in someone's sorrows?

Think about them and imagine what it would be like to be experiencing what he/she is experiencing. I've done this, and have often started feeling like sorrow is weighing down on my shoulders. You might be overcome with emotion. That's okay: you are bearing their burdens.

What do you do with this burden? Pray for him, or pray for her, or pray for them. Pray fervently and effectually. Pray whenever your thoughts turn to that person--pray on behalf of that person. God is ever listening.

Just as God listens to our prayers, we ought to listen to others' sorrows. I can't stress this enough. Listen, listen, listen. How can you share someone's burden if you are talking, talking, talking? Think twice before offering advice. Sometimes people just need to unload their burden without having someone tell them what they should do next or what someone else in a similar-but-not-the-same situation did, with positive results. Who are we to suggest that we know someone else's situation so well that we can tell them what to do? Listen to the frustration, the pain, the suffering, and extend a shoulder to lean on. Share the weight.

One of the greatest, most beautiful gifts we can give to our loved ones is to share in their sorrows as much as we share in their joys. What's more, when someone gets through a difficult time, or overcomes a challenging situation, the new energy and lightness that person will experience is an even sweeter joy to behold.

To all my special friends and wonderful family, whom I carry in my heart: please know that I am here for you to share in whatever circumstance that may approach you, whether it be joyful or sorrowful.

To all my readers, and anyone who just happened to stumble upon my blog: I sincerely hope that you are able to take something away from this post and be the shoulder someone close to you may need to lean on.

"Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ."

-Galatians 6:2

Weed Wars

2011-08-12T12:09:00.000-04:00

This year seems to be a bad year for weeds in my backyard. Combine the drought with the prohibition of Weed and Feed, and you have a recipe for disaster.

My parents and in-laws all have lovely, lush lawns, and I am always admiring them as they are in severe contrast to my lawn this year.

If your lawn is like mine, you may have had a thick, green lawn in the spring, thanks to all the rain. You may have aerated and seeded and fertilized in the spring, and only had a few weeds to contend with.

Then the rain stopped for pretty much ever, and our grass died, and the weeds were thinking, "Hey, look! We could totally grow over there [pointing to the dying grass patches]"...

I've asked Joel to start chipping from the crabgrass patches.

...and "voila": weeds galore. Specifically, crabgrass. Tons of it. Everywhere. Its only saving grace is the fact that it is always green, so from far away, it looks okay.

I spent a few hours removing some of the crabgrass, but I just ended up getting frustrated at how much work still needed to be done, even after filling about half of a yard waste bag with crabgrass carcasses. Then, I called in the professionals and had two lawn analyses done. The results were unsatisfactory. My lawn needs help!

I'm amazed at how quickly a lawn can transform from a thick, healthy pile of grass to a rag-tag, messy pile of weeds with a few blades of grass in between.

I had one little thought about weeds, and as much as I hate them, I have to give them a little bit of credit:

When grass and plants die, weeds thrive. Weeds grow where nothing should grow (through cracks and cuts in concrete, out of gravel driveways, in the middle of a patch of dead grass). Weeds can live quite happily through the most averse conditions: extreme heat, drought, full sun. Weeds just grow.

I don't necessarily want to encourage you to "be like a weed"--I still have a pretty big vendetta against them, so I won't go that far. However, there's something to be said about their resiliency, strength and determination.

I saw online once (I think it might have been a blog title) the phrase: "Grow Where You're Planted." Isn't that an interesting way of looking at life? Weeds grow wherever they end up germinating, and in that simple phrase above, someone has encouraged people to kind of do the same: to be strong in the face of adversity, to stand, unwavering, on a solid foundation, and to let yourself grow and develop and learn and live life in the place where you were planted. Thankfully, the reason why you were "planted" somewhere (a city/town, within a community of certain people, a certain profession, a certain church), wasn't to be an annoyance or to be destroyed with boiling water or to be plucked out with disgust (like weeds), but to improve, change, inspire and create.

Grammar Matters

2011-08-05T12:57:00.000-04:00

Last weekend, I was chatting with a couple of my friends, and we got on the topic of grammar in today’s society. I started feeling this passionate emotion rising up within me, and I began to sincerely fear the demise of grammar as history keeps progressing. As an editor and a writer, I not only feel obligated but also feel driven to bring this significant issue to your attention.

Ah, grammar: the rules of building a sentence, the purpose of punctuation, the framework within which ideas and opinions and passions are so effectively presented. I love grammar. I am passionate about grammar.

Here are the two main reasons why grammar is so important:

Grammar enables our writing to be most easily understood; grammar provides a means for the writer to explain him/herself clearly, minimizing reader confusion.

When you utilize proper grammar, you will be both taken seriously and respected in the professional world.

Do you want to be understood?

Do you want to be respected and taken seriously?

The two main issues that grammar is contending with today are:

· The proliferation of communication short-forms (such as e-mail, texting, Facebook, Twitter, and any kind of online chatting)

· The ease and ability of publishing on the Internet. Anyone can blog, put up a web site, write about whatever they want, and none of them require an editor to do so.

Grammar has a hard time being respected while facing these two issues. I mean, sure, when you text your friends, not capitalizing “I” is not a major problem. When you e-mail your dad to tell him about your Mexico vacation, you probably aren’t checking to see if the cities you visited were properly spelled. When you comment on someone’s Facebook status or tweet about what you are doing, there are no grammar police who will arrest you if you don’t punctuate your sentences (although if there was such a job available, I would probably consider applying).

There’s obviously a balance here. What I am concerned about is the younger generation, so proficient in chatting and tweeting and texting and all the related short forms like LMAO and LOL and whatever the newest one is—I don’t know—that they start to believe that proper grammar really isn’t that important and really doesn’t have a place in modern-day (or postmodern-day) society. They aren’t required to be grammatically correct in 90% of what they communicate, so they don’t practice grammar. They think to themselves, “It don’t matter.”

Grammar does, though! It does have a place! It does matter!

If you have a passion, or a dream, or a strong opinion, or generally something important to say to the world, do you want to be heard?

Do you want to be understood?

Do you want to be respected and taken seriously?

My dear readers, you will lose credibility if the writing on your web site is full of spelling mistakes and typos. You will not be given the respect you deserve if you talk about your passions using misspoken phrases (“I could care less” instead of “I couldn’t care less”) or the wrong tense in the wrong place (“I lied down” instead of “I lay down”). You may not get your point across with the clarity your dreams deserve if you don’t know how to properly construct a sentence and use grammar to your advantage.

Your dreams and passions are worth the grammar needed to help people understand them and respect you!

Don’t fall asleep during your English or Grammar classes, wondering what the deal is about dangling modifiers, thinking that they don’t really matter. Don’t forget to edit the e-mail you send your boss about summer vacation because a professional e-mail does warrant review and proper grammar, and your boss should respect you more for it. Don’t sell yourself short or allow the causes that you want to pursue to lose the impact they deserve because you think that grammar doesn’t matter.

What you believe in is important; the way you express what you believe in is just as important.

Now let's say you are a self-proclaimed “horrible speller,” or you really don't care to know when to use "there" and "their," or you cannot be convinced that anything other than a regular old hyphen should be used to separate phrases (ahem...em and en dashes). That's OK—I've long since realized that grammar dorks such as myself are few and far between everyone else.

If you would rather focus your attention on your own personal dreams than trudge through a grammar text, that's fine! All I am suggesting is that you understand grammar's importance—the significant role it plays in your credibility—and utilize the services of editors (like me) to make your ideas, arguments and stories shine. If I could assist even one person in making his or her ideas clearer, arguments more efficiently presented, passions more vigorous and dreams more graceful, then I would feel fulfilled.

Why? Grammar matters.

Not so Different

2011-07-29T13:30:00.000-04:00

Have you heard of the documentary called Babies, released last year? Directed by Thomas Balmes, Babies gives the viewer a look at the first year of four babies’ lives—four babies from very different places in the world (Namibia, Mongolia, Tokyo and San Francisco).There isn’t much talking, just snippets of conversations and some baby-talk—no narration—but it’s fascinating.

Watching four babies in four completely different cultures grow in their first year is interesting and really cute. I thought, going into this movie, that I would see remarkable contrasts between the lives of four different babies from all around the world. I thought the movie was going to be all about how differently the cultures of the world have and raise their babies.

I was moved, however, as I saw inherent and somewhat unexpectedly obvious similarities between those babies.

The scene that impacted me the most was one in which the Mongolian baby started crying, and he sounded identical to Emmett crying. I could hardly believe my ears.

Mongolian baby

This got me wondering at how similar babies from all around the world really are. They need the same things, they make the same noises, they all babble “mama,” they love their pets, they are entertained by random objects (toys or things—doesn’t matter), their mothers care for them and love them. Babies in their pure, free-from-insecurities state-of-being, untainted by the pressures and the stresses of this world, are very much the same. If you removed the framework of society and culture from around them, babies are not so different.

We are not so different. People are not so different.

We love our family; we love our friends. We need food and water. We need the security of a roof over our heads to feel safe. We have pets. We find humour in life. We raise up the next generation in the best way we can. We seek fulfillment. We just want to be happy.

Just like those babies are so similar, we are similar. You and me and the next person. My grandfather and your neighbour and the people across the world. Those who have and don’t have, those who live a happy life and those who live in poverty…we are all brothers and sisters, and God is our Father.

As many as there are differences between one culture and another, there are similarities. And I think the similarities are more significant than the differences.

I wonder why, then, does it seem like the focus is always on our differences and what separates our culture from the next culture? Is it in the name of fear or in the name of hate or in the name of separation...or in the name of diversity?

If we could be aware of and focus on the similarities between the peoples of this world, then wouldn’t we be able to appreciate and respect our differences?

And then wouldn’t we be able to celebrate our differences in a positive way instead of highlighting them and separating “us” from “them” using the divisive walls called “I’m Better Than You” or “I Don’t Understand You”?

I'm thankful to have watched Babies because it shed some light on the way I've perceived others, challenging me to rethink my perspective. I learned through watching Babies that that which on the surface may appear to be a marked contrast between race and culture actually served to represent a subtle, stunning comparison:

We are not so different; we are the same in many significant ways.

A New Newton

2011-07-22T12:19:00.000-04:00

Isaac Newton

On the History Channel last week, there were a couple of shows on about Nostradamus, and I was intrigued, so I watched them.

What I ended up taking away from these shows was, yes, a little food for thought about Nostradamus and his prophecies, and even more impactful, a real inspiration from many other people that the featured historians, professors and authors referred to: people like Isaac Newton and Galileo Galilei (their discoveries and theories in relation to Nostradamus etc.).

Galileo Galilei

Isaac Newton lived in the 17^th century, and he is most famously known for “discovering” the law of gravity. Galileo also lived in the 17^th century, and his research helped develop modern science. Mathematics, physics and astronomy were his main subjects. Galileo also invented the microscope.

There are many more people like this: How about Leonardo DaVinci and all of his inventions? He’s my personal favourite; I have his birthday on my Verjardakalendaar in my bathroom (I know, I’m a dork)…

…Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Gregor Mendel (did you notice his tribute on the Google home page a couple days ago?), Pierre and Marie Curie…the list goes on and on…

I started wondering,

[ If these famous inventors, theorists and discoverers had never taken risks or pursued their intellectual curiosity, would they have changed the course of history? What kind of effect would that have had on our development?]

Leonardo DaVinci

OK – I’m sure someone else would have figured out that things fall down if they are heavy enough…and given that law a name. But who? When? In what chain of events? Why?

I am extremely inspired by these great inventors and thinkers. They had questions, so they sought answers. They had passions and dreams, so they chased them. They had to take risks and probably had to make sacrifices—they may have had colleagues or family members ridiculing them for their ideas—but they kept on going, accomplishing much, blazing a trail to perpetuate the course of history and cultural/theoretical/scientific development.

We are the same. Sure, maybe we’re not all going to become great inventors, but we all have passions and dreams…and if you don’t follow your dreams and feed your passions and take a few risks, who will?

You can’t expect anyone else to do what you were created to do. You can’t give up your dreams to someone else. Perhaps there are many other people with the same general dream as yours, but you are the only one who has dreamed that dream in a certain way based on your own personality and experiences...

…and you are the only one who will follow that dream and take those risks in your unique way!

Be your own version of the likes of Isaac Newton and Leonardo DaVinci. Take a long, hard look at that apple that fell from the tree in your life, pertaining to your passion. If you won’t, who will?

Childhood Memories

2011-07-15T10:50:00.000-04:00

The only time I have ever cut grass...with a toy lawn mower!

There is a series of thoughts that has probably worn blisters on its feet from walking through my mind so much (haha - that sounded like a pickup line!). It’s those thoughts concerning the realm of [childhood memories].

In fact, I’ve mentioned childhood memories in this blog before.

We all have certain childhood memories that will stay with us forever. Out of all of the years, days, hours and minutes that comprise our childhood, only some memories last a lifetime (The Stickers), and those ones are repeatedly remembered. They probably still impact us today in some way or another.

I’ve noticed, now that I am a mother, that a lot of the things I do with my child bring back my own childhood memories. For example, last week when I poured a cup of water over Emmett’s head to rinse out the shampoo, I remembered that my sister and I used to call those “dunkovers.” (Maybe that’s a common term; I don’t know.) I also remembered that we used to have a black bottle of bubble bath in the closet upstairs when I was a kid, and I remember bringing it out periodically, asking my mom if I could have a bubble bath instead of a regular bath.

I remember grocery shopping being the most exciting experience. My mom would always say that groceries cost much more in the weeks that she brought us kids with her. We would beg for this and that, and usually come home with some pretty awesome loot. My favourite things to bring home from the grocery store were cinnamon buns from Sobey’s and fresh onion buns to melt mozzarella cheese on in the oven.

We all have lots of these memories. Many of them involve our parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins or whatever other important friends, caretakers or guardians we had. How many times do people recall memories like this:

“When I was a kid, my dad used to take me fishing.”

“My aunt used to wear this really strong perfume and she would squeeze my cheeks every time she visited.”

“When we were little, my sister and I would play Barbies with our cousins.”

“We used to have sleepovers at our grandparents’ house, and I remember one time going shopping with them. They bought me a Treasure Troll. We would have crepes for breakfast.”

“One time, my brother and I made a killer fort in the woods and pretended we lived there.”

OK, you get the point.

Since I had my baby, I started realizing that one day, he would remember things from his childhood.

This is his childhood…my adulthood is his childhood, and it’s happening right now.

The time will soon come that he will start remembering things—and compiling a log of childhood stories to tell other people: his friends, his girlfriend (one day a VERY LONG time from now), and his own children.

Then I started to panic, thinking, “I am going to contribute to his memories.”

[What a responsibility!]

More than that, I have a responsibility to make sure that he has some great memories. I have a responsibility to show him wisdom because he will always remember some of the things I say, especially the things I repeat. I have a responsibility to come up with fun things to do, sprinkled with adventure, composed of variety--the stuff of stories told for years to come. I have to make sure he is safe but has the opportunity to try new things and go new places to experience his life to the fullest.

Yikes.

Maybe you aren’t a parent. Maybe you are an aunt, an uncle, a grandparent or a close friend of the family who spends tons of time with someone else's kids and loves them like they are your own. You have a responsibility, too. What will the child or children in your life remember about you?

What did you teach them? Where did you take them? What did you give them? What did you say to them? How did you treat them? How did you show them you love them? How did you react to situations when they were watching?

I don't mean to make you panic. I panicked a little, but only until I reasoned that these kinds of questions are worth pondering now as opposed to later, when you wished you could have been a better role model.

Children’s memories don’t happen entirely by accident. They are shaped by the people around them. Adults definitely can’t control everything that happens to the children in their lives, but we definitely should realize how important we are in shaping their memories and experiences. After all, those memories have the potential to last a lifetime, impacting them and could even qualify to be passed on to the next generation.

Wow! This opens a whole world of possibilities! I would love nothing more for Emmett to recall certain pivotal childhood memories in his wedding day speech (if he gets married—no pressure!), saying that his parents said or did things that had a positive influence on him. That would definitely get the water works going! Maybe I should start stocking up on Kleenex now.

Little Hell

2011-07-08T07:33:00.000-04:00

City and Colour: Little Hell

Somehow, this has ended up being my third album review in two months. My blog isn’t a music review blog, but somehow, these albums have definitely given me ideas and thoughts to ponder and wonder about, so they just “fit.” Plus, I'm very passionate about music.

Dallas Green, or City and Colour, (I love the name—poetic and literal all at once) released the album Little Hell on June 7.

One of the aspects I like about Dallas Green is that he is from the same city that I live in: St. Catharines, Ontario. I have lived in St. Catharines since 1995. I went to high school in St. Catharines. I am well aware that St. Catharines is a real place—I am writing this post here, in my house, in muggy St. Catharines. Because of this, Dallas Green is more real to me than the next famous person from either “prestigious” places like L.A. or New York or "unknown", "mysterious" towns in the American Midwest or eastern Canada. (I feel the same about Ron Sexsmith because he, too, a singer/songwriter who just released his 12^th album, grew up in St. Catharines.)

The fact that such a great musician and singer came from my city grounds him to reality by offering a refreshing reminder that even well-known, accomplished, visible, talented people are still people, just as you and I are people. They are real.

This whole idea got me wondering about the concept of “celebrity.” We can Google hundreds of pictures of well-known people on the Internet, read about them on Wikipedia and countless other websites, see them in movies or on TV or on YouTube and play and replay their songs. I wonder if society, using this repeatable visibility, or audibility, builds well-known people up until they are so big that we are convinced we would lose our faculties should we ever meet them in real life. We make them larger-than-life.

I like that Dallas Green is not perched on a high pedestal in my mind as some untouchable superhuman (respected, yes; heavenly voice, definitely; unreal, no) because I’m not forced to think worse of myself in the process—instead, I feel inspired and energized.

Moving on to the actual album:

Here are a few of my listening experiences and related thoughts and ponderings about some of the tracks:

You’ve probably heard the awesome single, “Fragile Bird.” I knew it was good because Joel asked me a few weeks ago, “Have you heard the new City and Colour single? It’s so wicked!” (I trust Joel’s musical opinion explicitly.) The music embodies the here and now, while the lyrics pay tribute to Dallas’ wife’s night terrors, making the song sweet, sensitive and intense all at once.

My sister came over the other morning, and we listened to and talked about “Silver and Gold.” In this song, there is a beautiful chord, and I couldn’t figure out technically what it was that made it so pleasing to my ear. Apparently it’s the use of chromaticism that literally adds “colour” to the song by using a relative minor: notes that don’t belong in the key of the song. Little details like this are what makes listeners want to listen to a song again and again—because of those little rewards.

I was listening to the album a couple of days ago as I laid outside in the sun. A thunderstorm threatened the sky, but instead, as I gazed at the sky while being serenaded by the acoustic guitar in "Northern Wind," the clouds passed by overhead—a race between white and dark, in sync with the beat of the next song I heard: “Natural Disaster.” I almost wished that the dark clouds would have rained on me because then I could have said, “It started to rain, but I didn’t notice, the music was so good.” But the clouds blew away. Either way, it was beautiful sky show, made even more dramatic because it was soundtracked by such a great collection of songs.

My favourite song on the album is “Little Hell.” In the MuchMusic interview I watched, Dallas explained that the title “Little Hell” refers to all of the little things that can have such a large negative impact and influence in our lives—things like afflictions, addictions, fears, guilt, shame, weakness, unforgiveness, resentment and memories we wish we could forget. We often carry these with us through life as heavy baggage that threatens to affect the ones we love.

I just so happened to first hear this song in bed before I fell asleep, using headphones that literally obliterated all other sounds but the music, and it was dark. I closed my eyes, and all I felt was the music. I felt the emotion, the sorrow, the truth and the hope of the song. When all the instruments joined the acoustic guitar, “what if everything’s just the way that it will be/ Could it be that I am meant to cause you all this grief,” the sounds became a physical feeling that impacted me. You should try listening to this song in the dark. It's awesome.

Another little note about the concept of “little hells”: I like that he brought up this topic because the more I thought about it, the more I have realized that if we carry burdens from our past, we shouldn’t just shrug our shoulders and accept them as an inevitable weight to bend our backs for the rest of our lives. We can forgive and forget (just as God forgives and forgets), overcome, make peace, deal with those issues that plague us and move forward lighter and easier, with eyes set on the future instead of glancing back at the heavy past.

I highly recommend this album. It’s different, it’s beautiful, it’s poetic (the lyrics would stand alone strongly even without the music), it’s moving—it was a delight to experience and it was my pleasure to write about.

The Meaning of the Greeting

2011-07-01T11:59:00.000-04:00

What do you do when you notice someone in the grocery store whom you haven’t seen in years? Maybe you’re at the mall on a Saturday and by glancing into a store, you see someone you know. Have you ever deliberated the situation?

[Should I go and talk to that person, or should I just pretend not to notice and walk away?]

In a few seconds, webs of logic and a flood of memories can stream through your mind, weighing the options:

“If I quickly glance away, he might not see me. I just don’t feel like talking today.”

“Oh my goodness! I haven’t seen her in absolute ages! I want to say ‘Hi.’”

Perhaps you call out that person’s name in a desperate attempt to greet him or her. Maybe she doesn’t hear you, you feel embarrassed and just forget about trying.

Or if that person is walking in your direction, and is someone you haven’t talked to in years, maybe your memory will recall incidents in which that person hurt you. Or maybe you think that person never liked you much, so you immediately feel self-conscious, your stomach does a quick flip-flop and your face turns red, you pick up a box of cake mix with flustered hands and pretend to scour the ingredients, complete with a deliberate frown.

How do you greet people?

123RF.com

I’ve been wondering about greetings, “hellos” and the like for a couple of weeks. I’ve paid attention to my greetings. I’ve watched complete strangers greet each other. It’s interesting. Very interesting.

This is what I’m thinking: when you greet someone, especially if you are the first one to say something, your greeting can determine the feel, or set the tone, of the conversation you end up having. In a sense, what you say has the ability to steer your conversation into the awkward zone, to build up walls or to create an open, welcoming feeling that covers over any possible assumptions or misunderstandings. You might desperately try to conjure a decent excuse to abruptly end the talking, or you might find yourself in a conversation you hope could last for hours.

I’m sure you know people, who, when you see them, literally greet you with open arms and an enthusiastic, friendly “hello.” Don’t you love that? A welcoming, happy greeting paves the way for an open, friendly conversation. I always feel extremely comfortable when talking to someone who greets me like that. Any misgivings or awkwardness are whisked away and forgotten.

On the other hand, I have to confess that there have been times when I’ve greeted someone in such a way that separated me from the other person. Perhaps I tried to sound too proper and polite, but in doing so, I unintentionally distanced someone with formality. Or maybe my perceptions of that person, or what I thought that person thinks of me, got in the way and made me feel awkward and unsure of what to say.

The more I thought about this, the more I realized that I want to make an honest effort in being relaxed instead of formal, open instead of narrow-minded and speculative, and welcoming instead of avoiding, at the start of every conversation. We ought to take responsibility for our position within every conversation we have. Why not make a deliberate choice to steer communication into the sweet, open air of future possibilities instead of receding into the swampy past?

Of course it’s easy to greet friends and family. Of course you are friendly and relaxed with them. Of course you can easily have fun greeting people you know well.

I’m referring to those people you see in church (they know who you are and you know who they are) but haven’t ever talked to; those kids who were in Grade 12 English with you but you were always worried they didn’t like you; those girls who were in your Psychology seminar last year that you sat next to, but you wonder if they remember you; those guys you were friends with in your teenage years, but then you grew apart when you grew up, so you haven’t talked to them in years and you wonder if they’d actually want to talk to you; the couple you worked with forever ago, and with all the time that’s gone by, you don’t know if they "qualify" as people you would walk up to to say “Hi” if you ran into them…

…all of those people who you have the chance to create positive connections with—just by putting a little enthusiasm into your greeting, by being open and accepting—just by going out on a limb, throwing yourself out there to make a point of saying “hey.” For it is in the relationships and connections we have with people that make life sweet, exciting, spontaneous, pleasantly surprising and never quite what we expect.

Happy Canada Day!

Learn How to Live

2011-06-24T10:15:00.001-04:00

Photo by Brun Gossen. Album Design by Luke VanVliet.

Every once in a while, a collection of songs comes along that just makes sense to your musical ear, to your heart—to you. Every once in a while, you put on an album—sometimes anticipated, sometimes stumbled upon—and the beat moves you, and the words move you, and the music feels good to listen to.

Then the songs remain in your head, waking you from your slumber, sound tracking your day, rocking you to sleep. You don’t mind. Why? Because the music is good. Catchy, honest, real, high-quality, good.

I was very excited to hear the new music that the band, which my husband happens to be in, is set to release in a 6-song EP. Imagine how I felt when my expectations were exceeded so far that the songs kind of crossed some metaphorical bridge from being “cool songs by the band my husband plays bass for” to being “songs I really, honestly love” (in other words: “songs just as good as songs by other, famous and/or well-known bands l love).

How does it feel? It doesn’t just feel “good” anymore—it feels awesome.

This week, I’m going to tell you about this EP.

Learn How to Live is a 6-song EP that was self-recorded and self-produced by folk/rock artist Scott Normandy and the Newark City Band. Scott Normandy released his first album (My Future. My Past.) in 2007, produced by Derek Elliotson. His second album, No Regrets, was recorded in Montreal and released in 2009. Now, because his band has become so tight and solid that they have succeeded in independently recording and producing an EP (mixed and mastered by Derek Elliotson), the band has a name.

The newly-named Newark City Band pays tribute to its hometown of Niagara; Newark City was Niagara’s original name.

2010 New Vintage Wine Festival (Niagara). Photo by Jodi Taylor

In the same way that the band has unified both in name and by working so closely together on their most recent project, the songs also reflect the similar situations all band members have found themselves in, in recent years.

Learn How to Live is a collection of songs about just that: about having growing responsibilities such as families, raising kids and working to pay the bills. Life is full of blessings, challenges and surprises—we don’t know all the answers, and we can’t see the future; we can only learn as we go (or learn as we grow). In the band’s case, the other fundamental theme of the album is balancing these responsibilities and blessings with their innate passions and dreams for writing, recording and performing music. How do you balance both? What I like about the album’s position is that they don’t profess to know all the answers—they are riding the learning curve.

The album begins with “Restless Days,” which sets the tone for the album. It’s upbeat and fun, while the lyrics work to ground and balance the song by lending a serious hand.

“Learn How to Live,” the title track, ties the whole album together. This song is very honest, and I can feel a strong emotion coming through the lyrics: “Well I don’t really know/ Where to go/ What to run to/ What I’m supposed to do…”

“So Cold” closes the album with a raw, acoustic ballad. Even though in earlier songs, Scott honestly confesses that he doesn’t know “where to go, what to run to,” he offers great wisdom and insight in a very quiet, humble song. I have, in my wondering mind, pondered the line, “Everything that you possess/ I’m sorry, but I must confess /It piles up just the rest/ Your status is so meaningless” over and over. In a quiet, humble song, listeners are gently prodded to take a step back and evaluate what really means something in their lives.

One of the qualities in this album that stands out to me is the way that Scott sings certain lyrics. He creatively puts emphasis on unexpected syllables, which makes the words sound really interesting. For example, it took me a few listens to catch what he was saying in the second verse of “Get Close”: “When I’m lawn-mowing, When I’m lawn-mowing/ I think a lot.” I like the way he sings it because it invites you to think about the words a little more. Another example is the way he says “…computer screen” in the first verse of the same song, with the emphasis on the first part of the word (com-puter) instead of the second.

As soon as you hear the electric guitar strumming the first chord of “Restless Days,” it will become very clear to you that the band is comprised of talented musicians. For example, occasionally in the EP, all instruments break down into a Wilco-esque kind of jam (such as in “Feel”).

Every part of every song fits together seamlessly. By actively listening, you can distinguish between different instruments and different riffs, and interesting lines and beats within those instruments, but even after a quick listen, you can tell that each part contributes to a solid whole—a unified band that plays together so well that they sound really impressive live. The album recording sounds quite the same as their live performances.

Scott Normandy and the Newark City Band. From left: Scott Normandy (lead vocals, guitar), Joel Durksen (bass, backing vocals), Mike Tuyp (guitar), Allan Campopiano (drums, percussion).

They’re not trying to be anything they aren’t, and in being true to themselves, profoundly succeed in being the kind of music that deserves to be heard. The kind of music that is light but has heart. The kind of music that is easy and fun to listen to, but also continually surprises the astute listener with Scott’s unique voice, brilliant guitar solos, various rhythms, solid yet active bass lines and effective, strategically-placed harmonies. If you haven’t heard their music, you should check it out. Scott Normandy and the Newark City Band offers something for everyone—especially in the topics they cover in Learn How to Live. I’m sure you will be able to relate many or all of their songs to your own life experiences in some way.

The CD release party is going to be held at the Merchant Ale House in St. Catharines on Saturday, July 2 (next Saturday) at 10:00 p.m. Why don’t you try and make it out?

If you can’t make it, don’t you worry. The album will be available on iTunes (search “Scott Normandy”), or if you’d prefer a physical CD, message me and I can get you a copy.

Links

Web Site
www.scottnormandy.com

(Listen to "Restless Days" by going to the band's Facebook page!)
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Scott-Normandy/6309793821

Scrabble Exercise

2011-06-17T19:07:00.001-04:00

This week, I’m going to share with you a creative writing exercise that I’ve been wanting to try for a while (i.e. every time I’ve played Scrabble in the last four years).

Every time I play Scrabble, once the game is over, I wonder at the interesting collection of words that the players put on the board. Some are simple, and some are great feats of Scrabble smartness. Isn’t it kind of disappointing to destroy the words and put the tiles away after so slowly and carefully considering and creating each word?

So here is a fun way to keep the Scrabble board alive for a little while longer, get your creative juices flowing and practice your writing.

Here’s the exercise:

1. Play an actual game of Scrabble.

2. Make a list of all the words on the Scrabble board, once you're done the game. To make the writing part easier, put nouns in one column, verbs in another, and all the rest in a third column marked “Other” (adjectives, etc.)

3. Write a story using all the words on the board. The story must have a proper introduction/setting, climax and resolution/conclusion.

4. My story, below, is less than 500 words. You could increase the difficulty by creating a story with fewer words (400, 300, 200, even 100 or whatever), or make it easier by writing a story with more words.

5. If you are of a competitive nature, you could even make this into a competition with other people! The person with the "shortest/most concise" story (based on a word count) or "best" story (based on a vote) could be the winner. You could also award bonus points for any Scrabble word used more than once in the story.

That’s it!

This Scrabble exercise is great because:

· The creative side of your brain is used to make up a story.

· The logical side of your brain is used to make reasonable connections between the words by stringing random words into a logical narrative.

· While when you played Scrabble, you had to make letters into words using other words’ letters, in this exercise, you have to turn words into a story using the words played in Scrabble—it’s like Scrabble squared or something!

Variation

If you don’t care to “write” a story, try using the list of Scrabble words and verbally tell a story to your friends or kids or whatever, as you make it up. Cross off each word as you use it. This variation, because it's more spontaneous, would probably be even more hilarious!

Without further ado, here’s my example. The words from the Scrabble game I played recently (with two other people, not just me!) are in green:

The Pointy Poet's Preposterous Plan

Once upon a time, a crazed poet got the crazy idea that he could win the affections of a pure, beautiful dame named Artemisia. He was determined to win her with his wit. He certainly set high goals for himself!

The poet did what he did best: he lit a candle, took up his quill and wrote a poem.

The poet then rode through the ivy-covered gates of the village and into the rural country where Artemisia’s estate was located. With a nod of his pointy head, topped with a pointy poet hat, he delivered his poem to the butler. With a turn of his pointy shoe, he pranced confidently back to his horse. “Ha, ha!” he exclaimed, “She will not resist me after she reads that!”

~ ~ ~

Within the estate, Artemisia received the poem. She read it to herself:

I have run to you

My heart is at war with my head

The web of my quad muscles tightens

As I think of you

As I dream of you

As I ache for you

For you zig through my heart

And you zag through my head

Please come and see me

Before I’m gone…

-your anonymous Lover

With a pale hand to her chest, Artemisia re-read the poem, confused. Who could this beautifully-written poem be from? The mystery piqued her interest. She felt she had a connection with this person. Was it too soon for her to molt from a young woman into a young lover?

The pure, innocent dame noticed a clandestine meeting place and time written at the bottom of the page. #3 Loony Lane. Tomorrow! She had better get to bed early and get some beauty sleep!

~ ~ ~

The next day, Artemisia arrived at the meeting place with jags of nervous energy and a stomach brimming with butterflies. It was a little house, and the only notable item was a sack of fennel in one corner.

As she looked around, she saw two pots coming at her head, felt them hit her and then saw only blackness.

~ ~ ~

Artemisia awoke in bed to the sound of fennel being chopped up with a little herb ax.

“Well, hey! How are you feeling?”

Artemisia turned to see an odd, pointy man standing near the fennel.

“Some less-than-clever men tried to ambush you, but I saved you! I was happy to see them fail. What’s your name?”

Artemisia, quite confused, scared and astonished, found her rescuer to be a little off. Something didn’t make sense, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.

One thing she knew was that she had to leave. So she left, a little unsteadily. She didn’t trust that pointy man. She didn’t even know if he tithed or not.

“Where are you going?” the poet cried, prancing to the door. Unfortunately, as he crossed an uneven floorboard, the pointy toe of his shoe caused him to trip and fall, and thus he was powerless to stop Artemisia from leaving.

~The End~

That's it!

Gone

2011-06-10T14:32:00.000-04:00

As interesting as it is to think about an idea or concept is the thought process (fed by experiences and observations) that contributes to the formation of that idea. Here’s one of these thought processes:

Last week, when I dropped Emmett off at my mother-in-law’s, I noticed that something was missing around their shed. I asked my mother-in-law, and she told me that they had their big evergreen cut down because it had been compromised by the windstorm. I said to her, “Wow. I never really noticed that tree before, but I noticed right away that something was different once it was cut down.”

A couple of days later, when Joel and I were in the north end of the city, Joel pointed out where a few houses had been bulldozed. I looked over, and it definitely looked like something was different (i.e. dirt and bulldozers and nothing more), although I could not picture the houses that had been there, even after having driven by them probably hundreds of times.

Last weekend, one of my friends and I were talking about how much you ache for someone when you hear that he or she has died. For example, she explained that if a loved one goes on vacation, they are gone—as in you don’t see that person, you probably don’t talk to that person, you live your life without that person around—but while you might miss that person, you are reassured by the knowledge that he/she will return, and you will see him/her again. However, if you get a call about a loved one passing away, the finality of death—that you will not see that person again on this earth, although abundant memories linger—makes the absence much more extreme. You might not even realize how much you loved someone until they are gone.

Then, two days after that, I watched Shrek Forever After, and Shrek’s realization halfway through the movie, “I didn’t realize what I had until it was gone,” resonated in my mind.

Since then, “Big Yellow Taxi” has played in my head constantly. “You don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone…”

My thought process caused me to wonder,

When I am gone, my absence will be clear

But will you notice me when I’m still here?

The fact that we don’t realize what we have, or notice what we have, until we don’t have it, and the fact that people often take their blessings for granted, are both old topics of conversation. We’ve heard them before.

I wonder, But why? Why?

If all of these statements are true, do they mean that the wonderful qualities of appreciation and gratitude are not natural but must be learned? How many of you feel the same way?

I get that the absence of something causes us to long for its presence. But I don’t want to wait until I lose someone or something to really appreciate him/her/it. I also want to appreciate who and what I have every day—but I don’t want to appreciate everything by thinking about what life would be like if a loved one passed away or if I lost my house. That’s kind of dark and depressing.

What do you think? What can I do? Do I just need to be more observant? Do I just need to pay more attention to the people around me?

Several years ago, Oprah started urging her audience to keep a “thankful” journal. She told us to every day, write down something you are thankful for, in order to realize how many things we can truly appreciate in life.

The thankful journal is a nice idea. Apart from the fact that it’s unfortunate that some people would have to deliberately keep a journal and make time to write stuff in it to be appreciative of what they have, I would think the purpose of this thankful journal exercise is to hopefully create a habit in people to be thankful—that a conscious act of writing in a journal would eventually become an automatic response and a way of life.

Again, why does it work this way? Why do we have to make a conscious effort to be grateful and observant of our blessings? Shouldn’t honest and sincere appreciation come naturally? Do we fail to notice the wonderful positives around us because we grow accustomed to their presence?

If that’s the case, I don’t want to get used to the great people and things in my life. I mean, I want to expect great things, but I don’t want to take them for granted.

Here’s one idea. Maybe this is because we live in a selfish society. We are bombarded with ads and entertainment that focus on “me.” Society tells us to do things for ourselves, to get recognition for our own efforts and to indulge ourselves via consumerism. This would definitely make it easy to be selfish, right?

Keeping this in mind, it doesn’t surprise me that in order to be thankful for things before they disappear—in other words, taking the focus off ourselves to think about others—we would have to consciously fight to be selfless in a selfish society.

So I guess we just have to accept the fact that many (not all, but many!) people don’t automatically and always notice what exists and what blessings abound around them. I guess to accept this allows the next step to be taken: active appreciation. I guess instead of deploring about how selfish I have been, I ought to start working at becoming selfless.

Let me start now: I am so thankful for all of you—my readers. You are wonderful to me. I am so happy that you have taken some of your time to read this. I hope that I have left something positive for you to ponder.

In Bloom

2011-06-03T18:20:00.001-04:00

Blue centaureas smell fantastic: fresh, fruity, sweet, divine.

Ever since I moved out of my parents' house seven years ago, I have absolutely loved gardening. In spring, as soon as the perennials start popping up from the ground, I become a rubberneck driver, looking at everyone's gardens as I drive along. I definitely like to get my Dutch green thumbs out there in the garden (all ten of them). Yes, I'm OK at gardening, but I'm kind of clumsy and, I work in a slightly haphazard manner.

If you were to drive by my house, you might see me hopping on one foot, losing my balance as I put my other leg inside a yard waste bag to open it up properly. You might catch me randomly pulling a few weeds and throwing them at either the side of the house (so they are hidden by the bigger weeds that grow there) or under one of our mammoth spruce trees out front. You might see me almost lose my balance and almost fall into the pool as I try to duck under the cedar tree that is bent over the pool right now (windstorm damage - we still need to cut it down). You'd also notice that although I usually start weeding and working with gloves on, I usually pull them off in favour of feeling that good old soil between my fingers. Besides, how on earth do you pull the stubborn weeds with clumsy gloves on? How do you really know the soil is properly packed against a new plant with gloves hampering your sense of touch?

These neon hostas are eye-catching even without blooms.

Very old cedars - very hard to walk around and not fall into the pool.

My parents have a nice yard with beautiful gardens, and unfortunately for me, I use their garden as a benchmark, so my gardens always seem sub-par compared to theirs. I have to remind myself that they have been "tweaking" their gardens for over 15 years...and still find something to improve upon every year. Anyway, this year, I finally consider my garden satisfactory.

I think my plants are finally growing into their surroundings, and I have finally learned to major in perennials with a minor in annuals. If you barrage your beds with high-maintenance annuals, you are in for a lot of work.

All this gardening has got me thinking about the lovely blooms that we are now able to admire. I've started wondering about how I only notice many plants, shrubs and trees when they are [in bloom]. Have you ever noticed that?

Magnolias are breathtaking when they blossom, which is only for about a week in the spring. Their blossoms are like eye magnets--you can't help but notice their beauty--but what happens when the blossoms fall off? Do you notice magnolias anymore? Last year, I actually made a few mental notes of where some local magnolias were (i.e. the brown brick bungalow at the corner of such-and-such a street and such-and-such drive) when they were in blossom, so that I could go back to them once the blossoms fell and see what the tree looked like without them. They're nice, but kind of unremarkable without the pink-and-white blossoms.

What about annabelle hydrangeas? They have huge, white, ball-shaped blooms in late summer. When they start to bloom, I see them everywhere. I think, "I didn't realize so many people had these things!" (Perceptual vigilance, perhaps?) When hydrangeas are just leafy clumps, though, our eyes pass over them.

The last plant I always notice when it's in its prime is the burning bush. OK, its glory isn't in the blooms, but the leaves turn from green to bright red in the fall. All of a sudden, I see those everywhere, too.

Plants are the most visible when they are in bloom.

Snowball bush - I love 'em.

I wondered about this.

No, I am not going to refer to how girls blossom into beautiful young women in their teens. Nor am I going to mention the fact that people really "bloom" or are in their "prime" in their mid-twenties (because why would I bring attention to that? According to that statement, I'm past my prime!)

I do think that people bloom, but unlike plants, who have only outward beauty, we all have inward qualities that make us noticeable and different from the next person. We have gifts, talents and abilities, and once they are put to use, they make us bloom and become the best person we can be.

Thankfully, unlike plants, which only bloom for a little while (especially in regions that have four seasons), we have the ability to be constantly [in bloom]. We all have talents and passions and things we love to do--things we are brilliant at doing--and when we do them, we shine. We bloom. We are appreciated.

Don't let your passions dry up. Don't let your petals fall. They don't have to.

A Cry for Help

2011-05-27T18:56:00.000-04:00

Emmett: 2 weeks old. Photo by GingerSnaps Photography

When a baby cries, your heart may break a little. Your own eyes might fill with a few tears.

When a baby is still crying after you have met all its needs, you may grow frustrated. You might cry a little yourself. The sound might grate on your nerves and cause a headache.

Yesterday afternoon, I was trying to get some work done while Emmett napped. Needless to say, he didn’t really nap. We experienced a couple of those frustrating hours in which I tapped at the computer, then ran upstairs, laid Emmett back down with his blanket, then ran downstairs to do a little more work, then ran upstairs, changed Emmett, ran downstairs, typed again for 15 minutes while his whiny cry tensed all my muscles, then ran upstairs, gave him water, gave him Tylenol (he’s teething) and so on. By the time I had given up on any sort of efficient work and was making supper, he had finally fallen asleep.

While I peeled potatoes, I heard Emmett wake up and whine again. I griped and complained to myself, trying to chop up my frustration while I cut up the potatoes and violently threw them in the pot.

Then this thought hit me, right in the centre of my mind:

“To God, sometimes my cry sounds like a baby’s cry.”

When I then heard my baby’s cry drift down to the kitchen from up the stairs—his innocent, small, simple cry for help—I tried listening to it from the perspective of God listening to us when we cry.

As children of God, sometimes we resemble our own children:

· Babies are beautiful—especially to their parents. We delight in recognizing our features in them.

o We are beautiful to God. After all, every human being was created in His image.

· Even when babies disobey or scream and cry about things that seem so ridiculous or insignificant to us, we love them anyway. We can’t help but love them.

o Even when we cry and complain or do things that God would rather we not do, He never stops loving us. Never, ever.

· Babies cry when they need something.

o We cry (or complain or grumble or think accordingly) when we need something, too.

· When Emmett called out to me, I came to him.

o When we call out for help, God hears us, too. When we draw near to Him, He draws near to us.

· Mothers know their babies’ needs better than their babies do.

o God knows our needs better than we do.

· Babies get what they need from their parents: clothes, food, shelter, love. For babies to get what they need themselves would in some cases be difficult and in other cases would be completely impossible.

o We get what we need from God. In some cases, doing it ourselves is really difficult, and in other cases, doing it ourselves would be completely impossible.

· Babies’ needs, to them, are really hard to attain, but to parents, are really easy to meet. It’s easy to nurse or feed a baby a bottle, give them a blanket or soother, change their diaper, pick them up and comfort them when they are crying.

o Our needs sometimes seem impossible to meet to us, but to God, meeting all of our needs (even the needs we don’t realize we have) is incredibly simple.

· Even when we know that a baby doesn’t need anything specific, we still go to the child to offer it love and affection.

o God constantly covers us with His love and is always in a position to gladly bless us.

· In Emmett’s case, as he is teething, I did everything I could to alleviate his discomfort. However, I also recognized that he needs to go through the teething process because it’s part of his development. He can’t eat what he needs to eat as he grows without those teeth. So I helped him to deal with it.

o There are also times and seasons that we need to endure so we can grow and develop as people. While God is always there to help us out (His burden is light), we still have to go up certain steps so that we can get to the next place that God has intended for us to go.

This thought made me realize that maybe in some areas of my life, I should grow up a little. I mean, I shouldn’t lend worry a hand by fretting. I shouldn’t lend negativity a hand by grumbling and complaining about my problems. Shouldn’t I know by now that God is a loving parent, Who meets all of our needs according to His riches (and goodness gracious, is He ever RICH!)

Even so, it’s nice to know that God hears me when I call.

Before I finish, I must mention one large difference between us as adults or parents and God as our Father: while at times we can get frustrated by a baby’s incessant screams, and our patience becomes paper-thin until it threatens to shred away, God is always patient. He never gets frustrated.

Even though yesterday afternoon was frustrating, I was glad to enter the evening with a nice piece of insight about the way God considers us and the way we ought to try to be. There is something comforting about knowing that God tenderly cares for us even as parents care for their little children.

Collider

2011-05-20T14:56:00.000-04:00

This week, at a sunny, quiet juncture in my mind,

the thought: “Wow! I love Sam Roberts’ new album, Collider!"

intersected with the question: “I wonder what I should write about for this week’s blog post?”

The thought and the question got acquainted with each other, and the resulting post was created: a review of Sam Roberts Band’s new album, Collider and some things I wonder about Sam Roberts.

Collider is Quebec-born Sam Roberts’ fourth major label album. I officially became a fan of Sam Roberts when Chemical City (second album)’s single “Bridge to Nowhere” was released. Love at the End of the World (third album) was released in 2008, and I sang its first single, “Them Kids” at my wedding reception. Yes, I totally rocked out while Joel played his electric, with the rest of the awesome band Mosaik backing us. (It was so cool.)

Sam Roberts Band’s music has a “sound” all its own. This belief was confirmed yet again after listening to Collider for the first time. His songs are developed from true rock ’n’ roll roots. His attention to detail is proven in the variety of layered sound surprises and interesting guitar riffs of his tracks. At many points in many songs, many tones are meshed and softened into a bluesy blend. His sound is energetic. Whenever I listen to Sam Roberts, my mood jumps up a couple notches on the “happiness” scale, and I can’t help but start moving around. Sam Roberts’ voice is clear and light—he sings confidence without sounding pretentious. Not only is the music fun and enjoyable to listen to but also the lyrics are snappy and clever (such as those in “Sang Froid”: “We’ve been shining on the front lines burning in the sunshine/ We’ve been dancing in the headlights standing on a landmine”).

Joel and I have spent many summer nights out on our deck with friends, with reliable Sam Roberts keeping the mood light and easy in the background. As perfect as his tunes are for background music, though, they also deserve focused attention—a one-on-one active listen—to fully appreciate his musicality and lyrical intelligence.

When you come to appreciate a musician, his individual sound and the mood his music creates, anticipating the release of a new album is extremely exciting. When your patience is rewarded with a solid album of really awesome songs confirming your status as a fan, a very great feeling of satisfaction results.

This is exactly what I felt when I heard Collider: a great feeling of satisfaction.

Right off the hop, I really liked the songs, “Without a Map,” “Twist the Knife” and “Tractor Beam Blues.”

As soon as “Without a Map” starts, the drum beat and bass line have you bobbing your head. Even Emmett bobbed his head to it. I love the lyrics of the chorus, too. They are succinct, they rhyme, so they were easy to remember and they efficiently tell the listener much.

“Twist the Knife” is a little more serious. I really connected with the opening bars. The guitar just strums a few simple chords, but they draw you in. Then he proceeds to tell you a story that tugs at your heart.

“Tractor Beam Blues” is the last song on the album. Almost always Joel and sometimes I really like the last song on an album. This leads me to believe that musicians deliberately put one of their best songs at the end. Anyway, “Tractor Beam Blues” has a fantastic call-and-response in the chorus, which I absolutely love. (“Is love enough?” “Yes, it is.” “Is hope enough?” “I hope it is!”) Why? I love to participate in a song. I love answering a question that a singer asks. OK, yes, he also wrote the answer, but I think when songwriters provide a call-and-response, they create unity within their audience by giving an opportunity for listeners to participate.

Another quality I noticed in Collider (although as soon as I mentioned this to Joel, he told me that Sam Roberts has done this in all of his albums) is that Sam Roberts sings little (sometimes slightly sardonic) nuggets of wisdom in many of his songs. Delivered in the midst of catchy-yet-quality music, these nuggets pack a shiny punch. Here are a few of the many examples from Collider:

“No one is free ‘till all of us are free.” (“The Band vs. The World”)

“Life will give you what you take.” (“Twist the Knife”)

“The only thing that tomorrow brings is that it will become today.” (“Longitude”)

Sam Roberts Band. Photo courtesy of canada.com.

Now, I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting Sam Roberts or any of the other band members. (Please note that one of my dream jobs would be interviewing and writing articles or reviews about musicians, bands, artists, etc.). One day, if I ever do get the wonderful opportunity of meeting Sam Roberts, these are some of the questions I would ask him:

1. When you were younger, did you expect to be where you are today? Was being an award-winning musician your dream when you were younger?

2. Do you have certain life experiences, places or people that provide inspiration for your song writing?

3. What advice can you give to aspiring musicians today in terms of gaining an audience and getting their music “out there”?

4. What is the most challenging process or part of writing and recording a new album? Why?

I want to end this post with two questions for you:

1. If you have heard Collider, will you please share your thoughts about the album? I’d love to discuss Collider further.

2. If you haven’t heard Collider, will you please give it a listen? I can assure you that you will not be disappointed.

Coffee Love

2011-05-13T17:58:00.000-04:00

I love coffee. Coffee, coffee, coffee.

Sometimes I daydream about the coffee experience.

When Joel gets up for work, he makes a pot of coffee. As the coffee starts to brew, the strong, awakening scent dances through the kitchen, waltzes up the stairs (seriously, three beats per bar), sashays into our room and tickles my nose. Yes, Folgers, coffee is (one of the) best parts of waking up.

About a year ago, when Emmett was first born, our schedule was all over the place. However, I made sure I fit enjoying a cup of coffee in at some point in the day. I looked forward to that glorious cup of coffee from when I woke up to when the first sip burned my eager mouth.

My Oma used to have glass mugs for coffee. I remember when I was a kid, loving to watch my parents, my Oma, my Opa and my aunts and uncles prepare their coffee because I could see everything. I loved to watch the white cream burst into the rich coffee, creating a billowing cloud in the blackness before turning the coffee into a beautiful light tan colour.

As much as I love my collection of various coffee mugs (a Starbucks mug, a Batman mug, a couple of “Emmett” mugs, my go-with-anything-green Zellers mugs, our “New Dad” and “New Mom” mugs and our tiny white Corel “church” cups), don’t you think the adult version of the sippy cup (also known as takeout coffee cups) brings the most satisfaction? My sister makes these little fleece sleeves to put around Tim Horton’s cups that just make you feel like you are in coffee heaven. Warm, soft, happy—satisfaction.

Coffee is so wonderful: I love the look of the different coffee brand labels. The gurgling sound of the coffee maker. The aroma of a fresh brew. The coffee cup selection. The mixing of the coffee with cream (no sugar, please). The little spoon clinking happily against the sides of the mug. The biting taste. Starting to feel more awake and alert. Feeling extra enthusiastic doing whatever I was doing (talking, typing, reading, talking, thinking, talking). The whole idea of the “coffee break.” Having something to look forward to. Having something to look forward to daily.

Atop all of these amazing pros perches the social pro of coffee. I love getting together with someone for coffee. Coffee shared with a friend tastes sweeter. (See, this is why I don’t need sugar.)

“Let’s get together for coffee.” “Let’s meet for coffee.” “Wanna go out for coffee?” “Let’s talk over coffee.”

I started thinking about the fact that coffee shops have become meeting places of all kinds. Going out for coffee is an acceptable compromise for a couple still getting to know each other—it’s still a date but not as “involved” as dinner—more casual, less expectation. Tim Horton’s is a regular meeting place for old friends. Whenever the drive-thru is so long that I decide to go inside, I see people slumped in chairs that look like they live there. Some of them probably do pretty much live there.

What about business? Interviews? Deals? Run-of-the-mill meetings? Many a business idea has been discussed over coffee.

I wonder about all the conversations that take place in a coffee shop. You know the expression, “If these walls could talk”? To hear the walls of a house dictate the conversations had over the years would be really interesting, but what about a place that people go to just to talk? Imagine if the walls of Tim Horton’s could talk. Imagine if Starbucks had ears. What would it be able to tell you?

What kinds of things would it remember? What would it wish it could forget?

Breakups, date interview questions, opinions, funny banter?

Secrets, wisdom, mindless chatter?

Complaints, news, senseless mumbling?

I’ll end this post with an interesting quote I found when I looked around at some sites online about coffee. This one, in reference to those who are dependent on coffee, is from http://www.cofei.com/culture/social-aspects-of-coffee.html (last paragraph):

“As addictions go, coffee seems harmless enough and, unlike some addictions, relatively affordable. And according to a British study, coffee drinkers show a lower suicide rate than non-coffee drinkers, and an even more recent study showed mental functions operated at a higher level when coffee was poured into the cup, though sad to say the study also showed that the coffee drinkers were more easily swayed as far as their opinions went, so happy were they with life.”

Yeah…right. Watch out, coffee lovers! Don’t invite the pushy salesman who came to your door in for coffee!

Moments from the First Year

2011-05-06T17:52:00.000-04:00

My son Emmett is officially a one-year-old!

During the past year—my first year as a mother—I have ridden a dangerously unpredictable hormonal roller-coaster. I have cried tears of joy, tears of frustration, tears of fright, tears of the “Oh-my-goodness-he’s-my-baby-and-he’s-so-beautiful” kind, tears of the “Oh-my-goodness-I-am-responsible-for-a-human-being” kind and many, many, many tears of laughter.

Babies don’t understand humour the way we adults do, so it amazes me that babies can make us laugh so much, so hard. Are babies inherently hilarious? Maybe it's because of their innocence: they aren't trying to be funny.

Or maybe it was just the hormones.

Here are a few memorable moments from the past year in my life as a mother of a new baby:

Baby Doll

One day, I was at my parents’ house, and we were discussing how newborn babies are completely disproportionate. If you really think about it, and compare your proportions to a baby’s, it’s kind of frightening. Their head comprises a startling large percentage of their total size. The length of their torso and the length of their legs are roughly equal. The size of their hands and feet in comparison to the size of their head is very small. Have you ever held your hand or foot up to your head? They are probably roughly similar in length to your head. A baby’s hand or foot? Freakishly smaller!

Their facial features are also really big on their faces.

When I mentioned the facial features, my mom said, “Yeah—they’re like a blow-up doll that hasn’t been blown up yet.”

Before inflation (2 days old):

A little more blown up (1 year old):

Drunk Baby

When Emmett was a newborn, after feeding him, I’d prop him up and laugh at him. He’d always have this super-full-and-satisfied look on his face. He would gurgle unintelligible things with his eyes barely open. I couldn’t help but be reminded of a really inebriated person at the tail end of a crazy night of drinking—someone who could no longer function. One time, after feeding him, pretending to be Emmett, I said, “Man, I shouldn’t have had that last beer!” Then he puked all over me.

Food-Inspired Imitations

You know how when you defrost frozen berries, they get really liquidy? I fed Emmett frozen defrosted berries one day, and he got berry juice all over his mouth, and the dark purple juice happened to form perfect “lipstick” marks around his own lips. He looked so pretty! The first thought that came to my mind was, “He looks like a geisha!” So I took pictures.

Emmett preferred pureed food for a long time. While he liked peas when they were blended into a bunch of other food, he didn’t seem to like whole ones. I tried giving him a whole pea, and he made a face. He just wouldn't give whole peas a chance. The first thought that came to my mind was, "He looks like Gollum from Lord of the Rings!" So I took another picture.

Calcium Deficiency

You know how when you put a baby in the next clothing size up, and their clothes are a little big at first? When I first put Emmett in 18-month sleepers, and he crawled around, he would crawl his feet right out of the sleeper legs. My mom observed, “He looks like one of those people—in that milk commercial—who aren’t getting enough calcium.” I guess as soon as my blow-up doll got a little inflated, he started to look a little deflated.

Babies and Dogs

I thought our Jack Russell, Lucy, was smart enough as dogs go. I mean, she understands some words and some commands. She listens. She obeys.

Then Emmett came along. He seemed to develop at the speed of light compared to Lucy. A few of my friends (who have babies and dogs) have commented that while babies keep getting smarter, dogs just stay the same, which makes the dog seem kind of dense. At this point, Emmett knows Lucy’s name. If I ask Emmett, “Where’s Lucy?” he will look for her and wave at her.

I am not so sure that Lucy knows Emmett’s name. If I ask Lucy, “Where’s Emmett?” Lucy perks up her ears, cocks her head to one side, runs to the front window, looks outside and then starts running all over the house. (Emmett was sitting right by her.)

911 Call

Babies are drawn to electronic devices. If a cordless phone, an iPod, a cell phone or a remote control is lying around, Emmett’s laser-beam eyes zero in on it. When Emmett started grabbing the phone and pushing buttons, I remember saying to Joel, “Um, yeah, we probably don’t want Emmett to do that. I don’t want him to dial 9-1-1 or anything.” Joel said, “Oh, come on! He’s not gonna dial 9-1-1!”

Cut to about two weeks later. Emmett grabbed the phone, pressed the “talk” button, and then dialled 9-*-*-1-1. While under Joel’s supervision.

Another time: 6-1-1. Pretty close.

A third time: 9-9-1.

He’s obviously not so smart that he knows how to do something he never learned. What I learned, though, was that if you think your baby won’t be able to do something, however random a thing, think again.

Life Call

Remember the Life Call commercial from a long time ago, with the old woman who fell down and used her Life Call device to call for help, exclaiming, “Help! I’ve fallen and I can’t get up!”

Life Call Commercial

Well, Emmett had the opposite problem when he started pulling himself up to stand in his playpen and crib. In his case, he got stuck standing up. He would cry for me to come and help him down because he hadn’t learned how to lower himself back down to sitting. In his case, his cry for help was, “Help! I’ve stood up and I can’t get down!”

Dance, Dance, Dance!

We love music at our house. We have music on all the time. Emmett has listened to a wide variety of music in his first year. We’ve really been encouraging him to dance to pretty much any kind of music: from Raffi to the Foo Fighters to House of Pain to the Beatles to background music on CTV news’ weather forecast, and everything in between. I love it when babies dance.

Emmett’s gotten pretty good at dancing. He has a couple of different dances: the torso dance, convenient while one is in the sitting position, and for serious dancing, he goes onto his hands and knees to feel the groove. He’s even found a way to dance when he’s lying on his change table (wiggling like an inchworm and puffing up his chest like a penguin), dancing to even tunes as “undanceable” as me singing scales or “Doe, a Deer.” Here’s a video of Emmett dancing. I love it.

First Birthday

You’ve probably heard this before, but in case you haven’t, I posted a link to Jerry Seinfeld’s comedy segment in which he compares one’s first birthday to one’s last. Indeed, they are very similar. Need I say more?

Seinfeld and Birthdays

Expectations

2011-04-29T19:29:00.000-04:00

Photo courtesy of brickblock.ca

I was all set to write about a certain topic this week when another little idea came knocking on my consciousness’ door, politely saying, “Excuse me, but I have something important to say.” I let this new topic in and entertained it. I liked it. I liked it so much that the topic I was going to write about quietly crept into a corner to patiently wait a little longer for its moment in the blog spotlight.

A few times this week, I have heard people say, “I never expected that this would happen,” or, “I never expected things in my life would have gone this way,” or, “If someone told me a few years ago that I would be [here], doing [this], I would have said, ‘Uh-uh—never. I can’t do that. Are you crazy?’”

I started thinking about expectations. Looking back on my life, many things have happened that I never expected would happen. Many things. If ten years ago, someone would have provided me with a file folder, saying, “OK, Christina, here’s a timeline of events for your 20s: Age 20-30. If you have any questions, well, it’s all there, in the file,” I would have scanned through my file, shook my head vehemently, snapped it shut and thrust it back into the hands of whoever handed it to me. I would have said, “Yeah right! Are you serious? No, no, no. Obviously that file was labeled wrong. Get me my file [thumb to chest]. I want my file.”

Alas, that was my file. Those things happened. Here I am, living proof of the truth of that file.

What about you? Where are you, and what are you doing? Has the timeline of your life, in your file, unfolded just as you expected it to? Ten years ago—fifteen, twenty years ago—did you expect to be where you are today? Did you expect the things that have happened in your life to happen just the way they did?

I started wondering why I even bother expecting anything if my expectations (or lack thereof) don't at all govern or determine the future.

I mean, to some extent, we all must have a sense of what we need/want/ought to live for, such as to be there for and support our families and friends, to carry out our passions and use our gifts and to show God’s love to people. We all must have some expectations—some aspirations and goals and dreams that set us in motion.

Unfortunately, however, we might have such a penchant for certain expectations that we would do anything to protect them from changing. Block walls can be built around expectations: walls that prevent spontaneous, new plans from coming to the forefront of our minds; walls that make the concept of “Plan B” seem unwelcome and inferior to “Plan A.” Unfortunately, I think sometimes my personal expectations have even barricaded God from providing me with His wise guidance.

The timing of our expectations can prevent us from enjoying our current situations. People (including me) will say, “As soon as I get a job, I’ll be able to relax. As soon as we’re done having kids, we’ll be able to enjoy our lives. As soon as [whatever] happens, I’ll be happy.” We expect the next stage of our lives to happen before we can be content. That puts us in a perpetual state of limbo, my friends! So I’m learning that instead of living in limbo until my next expectation comes to life, I should be living.

When expectations grow into colossal Great Walls that don’t let anything else in, leaving us feeling disappointed, or like failures because circumstances manage to overtake the walls, there’s a problem. We resist the change in plans, feeling like our expectations are under attack. We feel like the world is against us or like we can’t do anything right. We fight changes in plans, shooting arrows of resistance at our circumstantial attackers.

I also think this can happen the other way around: by not giving ourselves enough credit as to our potential and our capabilities; instead of expecting “more,” “sooner,” or [this specific outcome], sometimes people don’t expect enough. A lot of people will say, “I never expected that I’d be [insert unbelievable-yet-actually true career path or position or what-you-do here]. Never in a million years did I think I would be doing [this].” In this case, the lack of expectation acts as a barrier to our potential, blocking great opportunities because we don’t even notice them.

I’m learning that I should be dismantling both the brick walls of Expectation and the barriers of Lack of Expectation. They should be more like permeable chain-link fences that can be easily removed, readjusted or hopped over if necessary.

After all, how are we supposed to know what’s best for us anyway? Who are we to think that we will never be good enough for a certain future? We with our finite minds can only form expectations based on our past, our present and other people’s examples. God has expectations for us, knowing everything, especially knowing how important and valuable each person is to Him.

My parents have a simple framed Dutch tile that reads:

(Translation: “For the concert of life, no one gets a program.”)

Or, “The files of your life are confidential and not even you have access to them.”

Our lives are a concert. We don’t know what to expect or when to expect crescendos and decrescendos, fast parts and slow, happiness and sadness, life and death. It’s all in there, but it’s woven together beautifully by Someone Who knows just how to work everything out so that once the last notes have finished resonating through the hall, you can take a deep breath and say, “Wow. That was absolutely amazing. I never expected it to be this way, but it's so...wonderful.”

Don’t let your expectations get in the way of what God has in store for you; just let your expectation be that what God has in store for you is going to be wonderful.

Love that Covers

2011-04-22T19:26:00.000-04:00

One day this week, I sat at my computer, thinking about Easter. I started recalling all I know about Easter by journeying through the Easterland that my mind conjured up. I wondered, What lies at the centre of Easter?

First, I found myself shovelling boatloads of Cadbury Mini-Eggs out of my way so I could keep going. (By the way, don’t Cadbury Mini-Eggs smell amazing?) I then encountered Cadbury Crème Eggs and the kind of chocolate eggs that are wrapped in colourful foil, but don’t taste as good as anything made by Cadbury. I also had to hack through piles and piles of white- and milk-chocolate bunnies, kittens, puppies, eggs and chicks. The hollow ones were a lot easier to move out of my way. Some of these chocolates ended up in a basket that I carried on my right arm.

Once I got through the chocolate, I encountered a beautiful landscape full of spring flowers that looked like they just jumped out of the ground one day. Easter flowers. Daffodils, tulips, lilies, lilies, lilies. Oh, and fields of blue hydrangeas (my absolute favourite). The happiness of their petals contrasted with the damp earth underneath. I walked past both flowers growing out of the ground and flowers planted in pots covered in purple foil. I pushed the leaves of these flowers out of my way and kept on going.

The walking got a little easier once I stepped over the last few white clucking bunnies and the last few beautifully-painted actual eggs.

Everything was colourful—I saw no end to sunny, pastel colours. I continued down a path, surrounded by light green grass—a field, I guess. The breeze gently brushed past me as though it was pressing on ahead.

The path led me into a little stand of trees, and to the east was a tomb. An empty tomb. I hurried along because even though the tomb was empty, it was still a tomb [shudder].

The path started winding up a hill. At the top of the hill were three crosses. The cross in the middle was bigger than the other two.

I stopped and knelt in awe, reverence and thanksgiving for what the middle cross represented. It was splintery, blood-stained and tilted, but it was the most stunningly beautiful thing I had ever seen. The path meandered past the crosses, so I kept going; there was more to discover.

I didn’t have to walk far before I came upon something so large, so infinite that I was made to stop walking. This tangible “thing” at the same time spanned higher and lower than anything I’d ever seen. It was a creamy, rosy pink in colour—the kind of pink that girls delight in and guys set aside their preconceptions to appreciate. What I saw was not so much a wall as it was a dynamic monolith, and it covered me. It covered me with an easy weight, like the weight of warm, fleecy throw blankets in winter time. It covered everything. It covered Easterland. It covered north, south, east and west. It covered the universe. It covered history. It covered time and space, blanketing existence with a creamy, rosy pink life-giving promise. I kind of forgot where I was and how I got there. I felt—I experienced—one thing, and one thing only.

Love.

God’s love.

Oh, how deep the Father’s love for us; a love so deep that He gave Jesus so that if we only believe in Him, we won’t perish but have life that lasts forever—that kind of love. The monolithic kind.

This year, when I pondered and wondered about Easter, I wanted to get the crux of the cross. I walked past everything “Easter” until I got to its heart: God’s love, infinite and beautiful and wonderful.

Seriously. Can you believe how much love is involved in a father giving up His only Son for billions of people who just can’t save themselves? Can you believe that no matter what you’ve thought, said or done, what choices you’ve made or will make that God loves you with a love that is perfect and complete and unconditional? Can you believe that God’s love overrides your current perceptions of Him? Can you believe that God intimately knows and understands everything about every single person who has lived, is living and will live, and that regardless of what each of us believes or thinks of God, He loves everyone anyway? The same love that fuelled grace and redemption drenches every square inch of you. Of me. Of the human race.

I think I’ve only managed to lift the corners of His love; to peel back the golden, pinky epithelial layer enough to sit frozen at my computer, to become lost in that love, to find it hard to comprehend that this kind of love possible, yet knowing that regardless of what I am able to understand or what position I take on it, it’s actually true. God’s love is covering you right now. Think about it. You’ll feel it.

Happy Easter!

Giving It Up

2011-04-15T21:56:00.000-04:00

corbis images

Have you ever noticed that when you are going through something, needing an answer, that all of a sudden you find the same answer, or same truth, resonating from every direction? Appearing around every concrete corner? Soaking you from all sides? I suppose that’s how you know it’s real and really the right answer.

For the past couple of months, I have to confess I’ve been going through a bit of a slump. I decided not to return to the job I had before I went on maternity leave (which is over now), for several reasons. However, I thought that for sure by now I would have found another job, which I really do need, also for several reasons. I have not.

For the past couple of months, I have searched online for jobs daily, applied for jobs, been interviewed, updated and improved my resume three times, had my cover letter critiqued and then updated it twice, acquired very good references, joined LinkedIn, dropped off resumes, went to a job fair, and told literally every person I have had a conversation with that I am looking for a job. I have strived. I have struggled. I have fought a very disheartening battle within my mind daily and hourly, trying to figure out what to do next and who to talk to, trying to decide if I’ve become too choosy, trying to justify whether or not part-time really is the best—essentially trying to conjure up a solution. I have not.

I feel like I’ve been flailing and failing.

I remember praying about this several weeks ago, asking (and I quote), “God, please help me to figure out what to do to find a job.” A still small voice kind of interrupted me (gently), saying, “You don’t have to figure anything out.”

Oh…. Really?

That should have been enough to centre me in God’s grace, but I kept reverting back to my human nature, thinking and analyzing and trying and struggling, using my best efforts to get my own plan together. Thankfully, God didn’t give up on me. Over and over, that same message has been communicated to me—with minor variations—from:

· church sermons

· conversations with friends and family

· reading other people’s inspirational blogs (namely, my cousin Alison’s and my friend Estelle’s)

· reading books

· editing I’ve done for a client (Divine Exchange) (To clarify, I am a self-employed writer/editor, but I am looking for employment to supplement that work.)

The message has rained on me from all sides. As Forrest Gump said about the rain when he was in Vietnam, the rain even seemed to come up from underneath.

So what exactly is this message?

God’s timing is perfect. God’s plan is perfect. Yes, He actually does have a plan for me because He created me (just like He has a plan for you). God’s grace is sufficient. When I am weak, then I am strong; His strength is made perfect in my weakness. When I have done all I can do, I ought to trust God—in fact, I should have started with trusting God. I don’t need to figure anything out. I don’t need to figure out a solution in my own strength because God has already figured it out. My own efforts won’t ever be good enough and they will just end up making me feel frustrated. Rest in Him. Let go and let God. To start thriving, stop striving. When I’m in God’s grace, fulfilling His will, I’ll be the happiest, most peaceful and most satisfied. “Father knows best.”

OK, I thought. Interesting. This must be my answer.

This message is simple and wonderful, but it’s very HARD to carry out.

Why?

I’m not the type of person who can just sit there and relax. I need to be doing something. Work first, play later. If I have too much time to think, my mind becomes oppressive, reminding me that I really need something I don’t have. I feel inadequate and lonely and generally crappy because I’m not doing enough to bring finances into my household. Human nature demands that I will and work and strive and strain instead of resting and waiting. My soul, who tries to figure things out, who wants work really hard and try really hard in this “I-me-self-society” so that I can say that I worked hard and tried hard and got what I wanted (success/recognition), battles with my spirit, who tries to rest in the truth that with God, all things are possible; that God’s grace has provided everything I will never need, without having to strive; that all I need to do is trust in the Lord without leaning on my own understanding. I kind of feel like I’ve been going through “soul rehab” or something. I mean, our souls are important (God gave us souls), but they are often overbearing, loud-mouthed and outspoken. Our souls need to learn how to take the backseat and give our spirits the wheel instead of constantly speaking out of turn.

Thankfully, I’ve also learned that in waiting for an answer from God, in waiting for Him to pull everything together in His perfect timing, I don’t actually need to sit on the couch with my arms crossed, impatiently tapping my foot on the floor. (I couldn’t do that anyway.) There are many things I can be doing in the meantime. After all, how can God guide you if you aren’t even walking? I can still keep my eyes open and be on the look-out for opportunities, network, reach out to people, take care of my household to the best of my ability, give my client my best, pray (pray, pray and pray some more), trust, acknowledge that I can’t figure it out with my own willpower and strength but God can, and most recently, blog about my situation so that it might encourage you—in case you are going through something similar: a conflict between spirit and soul, a period of waiting, wondering what God has in store for you next, sitting at a crossroads or facing a struggle.

This isn’t “giving up”; this is “giving it up”: giving your struggle-that-you-are-trying-to-figure-out-and-solve-within-your-own-abilities up in exchange for God’s grace, strength and wisdom.

Six Months in Review

2011-04-09T08:18:00.000-04:00

Ladies and gentlemen, I have been blogging for six months!

YAY!

Because I love to organize and analyze, I figured that the six-month mark was a good time to reflect on all of my posts and see just what I've ended up writing about.

When I started Seven Wonders, I wasn't entirely sure what direction it would take. I just knew that my inquisitive, wondering mind would figure out plenty of topics to ponder, using a blog as the platform.

If you are new to my blog, this review will assist you in navigating through my older posts. If you have read one or two, a few, several, many, most or even all of my posts (thank you!), you might find what I've found to be interesting.

I was able to divide all of my posts into five categories:

1. How our minds work: psychological kinds of questions I have/phenomena I wonder about (7 posts)
2. Personal stories and experiences (and their significance, and hopefully what you can glean from them) (7 posts)
3. Inspirational posts/encouragement for you (7 posts)
4. Personal poetry/creative writing (4 posts)
5. My thoughts on certain holidays/celebrations (3 posts)

I found that the three topics of how the mind works, my personal stories and inspirational encouragement have shared equal portions of my blog. That wasn't intentional, so it's interesting. I haven't posted much of my own creative writing, but as I mentioned last week, I hope to change that, but still make sure I include in the post what I thought or wondered about that inspired me to write the piece (to stay true to my blog's purpose).

Below are the links to each post under each category heading, in case you'd like to peruse them by category instead of by date!

If you have any comments, requests or suggestions, let me know!

Thanks again for reading,

-Christina

1. How our minds work: psychological questions and phenomena I wonder about:

The Baby and The Dog
Um...and Similar-Sounding Pause-Fillers
The Physical Space Between
Perceptual Vigilance
Smell Memories
Long-Term Memories: What You Didn't Realize You Knew
Gut Feelings

2. Personal stories and experiences:

The Comfort Maple
Gluten Freedom
Head Over Heels for Hayden
The Baby Beacon
Food for Thought
Books, Books, Books
Ironic Renovation

3. Inspirational/encouragement:

The Wonder of the Working Mother
Serenity Now
Balance: Mind and Body
Beautiful, Beautiful, Beautiful
The Choreography of Life
The Definition of You
The Stickers

4. Poetry/creative writing:

Music
Wonderful Christmas: Dichotomies and All
Tribute to the Wind
Poetry Corner

5. Holidays/celebrations:

Wonderful Christmas: Dichotomies and All
Back to the Stable
On the Origin of St. Valentine's Day

Poetry Corner

2011-04-02T08:00:00.001-04:00

I’ve been writing poetry and creative pieces for a long time—i.e. since I was a kid. I haven’t posted much of my own creative writing for you to read, and I’d like to change that. Many of the pieces I wrote some time ago (in my teens) are still very special to me today. I am posting some for you to read. Before each one is a short description of the piece and why it is significant. Please enjoy!

Shoes

Have you ever wondered what you would see if your inside (heart, soul) was reflected back to you? I thought about this for a while, wondering if perhaps we tend to ignore our faults or regrets because they aren’t physically visible. When you look in the mirror, you just see your face and body—not your memories or feelings. What would you see if you looked into a soul mirror? After writing Shoes, I have worked on making a conscious effort to “clean” my heart and soul so that if I were to see inside, I would be content with what I saw.

Wearing the cleanest pair of shoes possible,

I trek down the street, along the sidewalk,

Past rows of trees and groves of people

Head up high, but glancing down to my feet every few seconds or so

-I don’t want to fall in front of all these people

-I don’t want to step in a mud puddle and dirty my shoes

-I just want to get to where I am going, where the wind stopped blowing, where the traffic is slowing because of the sight to be beheld

A crystal statue on a white platform

That is why I wore white shoes:

So as not to dirty the platform

People cluster round, enamoured by the glorious and shining statue

The prestigious work of art on a pedestal before mankind

A regal piece of clear crystal

We look—many people as one

Collectively into the sparkle and glitter and glow and shimmer

We see our reflections

Youth and old age,

Mothers and fathers and sons and daughters

We see hatred in furrowed brows

Bruised self-esteem in curved shoulders

Regret in a slow walk

Bitterness in sour lips

Flashing lightning eyes

I see one million emotions

Almost but not quite hidden behind many wrinkles and few smiles

Nightmares plaguing daytime

Sinking realizations dropping one million stomachs onto the ground…

We see who we are and most are not pleased with the shocking outside turned around

I walk away

My shoes are filthy now

The dirt makes it hard to walk, and I keep tripping over everyone’s stomachs

But I stumble back as fast as I can

Back to my home, full of shoes, full of my past

I need to regurgitate my weaknesses

I don’t want to have to change my shoes…again.

Please don’t make me change my shoes again!

Battles

I was inspired to write this poem after reading the novel Jerusalem by Cecelia Holland. Jerusalem is a fictional story set in the time of the Crusades (religiously commissioned military campaign that took place in 11^th, 12^th and 13^th centuries, aiming to take the Holy Land back from Muslim control). I wondered what it would be like to be a soldier, fighting in battle, knowing he was about to die. I wondered if someone who knew there was life after death would feel conflicting emotions: the pain of defeat and mortal wounds combining with the expectant hope of a heavenly afterlife. I don’t intend for Battles to be depressing: I actually mean for readers to see hope in even the worst of circumstances.

So he sits

Cradling heavy head in blistered hands

Enshrouded in the dusty sands

Wondering, waiting, wishing

Himself

Anywhere but here

All sounds of good and bad

Indistinguishable now

Blended together now

As he cowers, as he falls

As arrows shower on them all

And his light of hope is snuffed out

Only the memory remains in a cloud of smoke

He chokes and chokes

And coughs up his life

He wants nothing more than to smile;

To be assured of something better than this

A way forward, onward,

Toward something bright

Something other than night

He cries and cries and meanwhile

His soul stands trial

He begins to wither

He mimics the weather:

The clouds so thick

They mask the sun

The sun so bright

It glows anon

And then he knows

And then it shows

Death renewed his spirit

The battle is over within him, as his spirit rises up above

As the battle rages on all around his crumpled body down below.

Metamorphia

I wrote this for a creative writing high school assignment. I chose this topic in memory of my much-loved late cousin, who had passed away a few years beforehand. I wondered what the time and space of transitioning into the afterlife would feel like. This piece has received a great response at a couple of poetry readings I’ve participated in. Metamorphia is a little intense, but that’s the whole point.

I am running. I’m running so fast and so far that if I tried to go back, I’d surely lose my way. My feet move so swiftly that I’m surprising myself. The perfect trees are but green remnants of clouds in my peripheral vision and I can’t see the sky. I don’t remember if it is day or night. I don’t know if I hear music out loud or if it’s in my head. I don’t even know for sure if I’m running anymore. Yet it is all so clear to me in one certain way. So crystal clear that as I am, I scream and the blood in my veins transforms into liquid passion. I love…I love deeply…I have gallons of love inside my body and I’m ready to pour it out. I know that the love has to come out soon, or else I will burst and explode and erupt. I am reconciled with myself. I run hand in hand with God. My other hand is extended into the mist or rain or sun or whatever it is. My eyes see deeply and intensely into the intense depths of this place. This place! I finally know where I am and I definitely love it and the music gets louder, and all I want is to rip myself out of this fantasy world and throw myself into my real world where I can have this for real and God for real and myself for real****is this really real?*****A loud bang and little shards of glass shatter on my ears, and I open my eyes, and I am face to face—face to face with eternity. I have changed. I am here.

I have stopped running.

I know the topics involved in these pieces are serious and “heavy.” Hopefully they have produced some positive emotions or feelings or inspiration in you. I’d love you hear your feedback.

The Stickers

2011-03-26T08:55:00.000-04:00

This week, I went through some of my old high school assignments, and I found something really interesting.

On Monday, March 20, 2000, I wrote my OAC Writer’s Craft journal entry about the “U”-shaped bench where my friends and I sat during lunch. As usual, that day, there were so many people talking so loudly that I easily caught snippets of several conversations around me. I wrote down some of those snippets in between paragraphs of my journal entry (I don’t remember why; maybe to add a twist of flavour to the writing):

“Oh no, they’re gonna fight again…”

“Are you getting a tattoo?”

“It’s not a fish”

“…and then you just hear his brother screaming…”

“That’s why I have that pause between steps.”

That the people involved in these conversations remember having these conversations, now eleven years ago, is unlikely. That the people involved in these conversations even remembered having these conversations a day or a week later is also unlikely. These conversational snippets made me think about how a huge percentage of what we say only temporarily registers in another person’s mind…usually to eventually be forgotten. Most things just don’t stick…

…like a gust of wind that hits your face and then blows away.

Wall Stickers: spincollective.wordpress.com

Can you recall all conversations you’ve ever had, how many stories you’ve heard (or told) or how many things people have said or done that have made you laugh? Obviously not. Do you even remember all the “serious” talks you’ve ever had with people over your life—the ones that seemed so earth-shattering at the time? No, we only remember the most “memorable” ones; the top five, ten or twenty (depending on how melodramatic you or your life is); the ones we want to remember; the ones we can’t help but review, repeat and relive, whether in favour of building up or tearing down our own self-esteem; the most extreme events or stories (the funniest, the nicest, the meanest, the most honest, the saddest, the most significant, the most relatable…).

I was too young to remember, but my mom has told me countless times (and has told countless people) about a conversation I had with my grandma when I was three years old. Apparently I noticed a woman on the street, who I apparently found unattractive, and had the gall to point her out, exclaiming, “Grandma, that lady is ugly!” My grandma quickly reprimanded me, saying, “Now, Christina! That lady is not ugly. You shouldn’t say such things.” I quickly replied, “Trust me, Grandma. She’s ugly.”

(I can’t believe I said that! I would NEVER say something like that now! Remember my Beautiful, Beautiful, Beautiful post? Maybe that post was some sort of recompense for what I said when I was three…)

My mom and my grandma probably retold that story so many times, reinforcing its memorability, because it was really hilarious to them. That little story trumps all the other things I said when I was little, so it is The Reigning Story about Christina From Her Childhood. (What’s your Reigning Story?)

That story was a sticker.

Anyway, the point is, there’s no way we could remember all the things we think about, talk about, hear about and laugh about—we only remember the [you fill in the blank with a superlative appropriate to your life and personality] stories.

I wonder, apart from the random things that just “happen” and become memorable without any effort, what can I do or say that could have a lasting positive (of course positive because why would you want to have a negative) impact on someone?

What can you do or say that could have a lasting positive impact on someone?

How can we make sure that what we talk about, or do, is something that sticks instead of something that just floats away as though it was never said, or done?

What do you think?

Here are a few words that came to mind as the starting point for potential “stickers”:

Encourage

Exhort

Compliment

Inspire

Teach

Release

Change

Ironic Renovation

2011-03-19T08:34:00.000-04:00

Over the past couple of weeks, we have been renovating our downstairs bathroom. (By “we,” I mean Joel and some other guys. I “tried” to operate a drill on Thursday to drill in some drywall screws…too bad you weren’t here to laugh at me. It was hilarious. Thank God I have a patient husband.)

Our house was built in the 1960s, and the original bathroom fixtures have lived long and prospered since then. Upstairs, the bathroom and sink are a grayish-lavender purple, and downstairs, the bathroom, sink and toilet were pastel-seafoam green (until a couple of weeks ago).

Downstairs bathroom "before"

We have been talking about renovating our bathrooms for a couple of years. The downstairs (seafoam green) bathroom took priority because there have been several issues with the plumbing and the toilet (including one fateful overflowing of the toilet during a consequentially memorable New Year’s party).

After bathtub was removed. See the lovely green toilet back there?

I originally had an old-fashioned-antique-ish vision for the downstairs bathroom (warm bronze taps, dark, fancy wood, deep red accents), but somehow my vision gradually changed into a less antique-ish and more modern classic look. We even strayed from the safe taupe turf and delved into the land of cool urban purple for the wall colour.

Then last night, I had a thought. I thought, Oh my goodness: we picked a purple paint colour for the downstairs bathroom. Also, oh my goodness, the colour of the bathtub we can’t wait to dispose of (hopefully next year) upstairs is purple, too. Then I brought the paint color chip upstairs and placed it on the side of the bathtub. The new downstairs bathroom colour (Fog Grey) is not at all unlike the old upstairs bathtub colour (maybe just a little foggier-grey). In fact, in some ironic circumstantial twist of fate, the colours are quite similar.

"Fog Grey" (with the "X") is the new bathroom colour. (It's not painted yet.)

Our purple "fog grey-ish" upstairs bathtub. Emmett's strategically-placed arm and leg justify me posting this bath picture.

How ironic is it that in the effort to purge our house of colours that were trendy 40-50 years ago, we managed to select a new, “modern” paint colour that is actually reminiscent of that which we are itching to remove?

That fashion and style moves in circles is very true—we all know that. I mean, with a modern twist, so many ideas from so many years ago have come full circle and are stylish yet again.

So I guess if you don’t renovate often enough, you may not need to renovate at all (as far as aesthetics go).

New bathtub/floor (bathroom isn't totally finished yet)

The Definition of You

2011-03-12T08:30:00.000-05:00

Mount Rushmore

I have been doing a lot of retrospection over the past month or so.

Why? Maybe because I’m turning 30 this year, I’m looking back at everything that has happened in my 20s (and seriously, so much happens in your 20s). I am also job searching right now, so I’m continually poring over my resume and analyzing—or probably over-analyzing—all of my educational and employment decisions to date, revisiting the reasons why I made those decisions.

During all of this retrospection, one considerable change I’ve noticed in myself over the last 10 years (or more) is my much improved ability to be true to myself.

Be true to yourself.

I had heard that phrase many times before I actually learned its invaluable lesson. Once upon a time, as a teenager, I was so caught up in pleasing people and wanting everyone to like me that I can’t say for certain that I was always true to myself. Do you know how easy letting your own personality, preferences and point-of-view fall by the wayside to accommodate others’ is?

I also avoided any types of confrontations at all costs. I resented situations that forced me to decide one way or another about an issue, especially if it meant that I would have to take a side, thereby creating opposition to myself. I could hardly bear that sort of thing!

I have never liked being put on the spot to make a tough decision. I have never liked being confronted with opposition or being forced to choose between two things. I like to keep everyone happy, so even though a decision might be good for someone else but bad for me, I still struggle and tend to want to decide against myself. During every difficult situation that demands a response from me, I spend a lot of time wondering, What is the right thing to do?

Be true to yourself.

As I got older and matured into adulthood, I realized that I would be regularly required to make serious, potentially life-altering decisions, for the rest of my life. We are consistently put in difficult situations and faced with challenging circumstances as adults. How do we survive and still remain strong and completely sure of who we are? By knowing who we are in Christ and by remaining true to that person we know we are.

Picture this: let’s say you are a big, square block of slate-coloured stone. You are plain and have no definition—until life happens to you, and you are met with challenges, and you have to make serious decisions, and you have to confront people who attack what is important to you. Every time you act, every time you form an opinion, every time you stay true to yourself by saying “no,” every time you avoid trouble by walking away and every time you decide how to deal with difficult circumstances, a chisel strikes the stone and creates a new slope, curve, indentation or definition. With every strike of the chisel, you take more shape—you become less indistinct and more interesting.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that I’d rather take some risks; I’d rather stand strong in the morals I believe in; I’d rather stay true to myself; I’d rather square my shoulders and be what I need to be if it means that I can become an individual carving, unlike any other carving there is. Wouldn’t you rather have defined lines than remain an unremarkable block of stone?

Mayan Riviera, Mexico

Embrace life’s opportunities and challenges because they enable you to emerge from the boring blob of rock and become something of shape and substance; for we are defined by the way we handle all of the problems and blessings alike that we encounter.

Books, Books, Books

2011-03-05T00:47:00.000-05:00

I love books. Books, books, books.

What is so awesome about books?

I love the smell of books—the smell of new books, library books, old books you’ve had for years and years and used books at used bookstores. Every book smells sort of different from the next one.

I love the idea of curling up somewhere comfortable and quiet, maybe with a soft blanket wrapped around me (NOT a Snuggie—those atrocious blankets are all wrong because they don’t have BACKS to them—if they have sleeves, they should have backs, too), reading a book.

What about all of those words to look at? I love reading a word I haven’t thought about in a while (and then secretly issuing a word point to the author). I find reading the names of people and places helps me to remember them later (as opposed to hearing them).

Sometimes I’ll read something that pushes my mind away from the book, and I can’t help but ponder or wonder about a larger idea that the story has implied. For example, books set during World War II always cause me to sit there for a moment, feeling grateful that I am living now instead of then. I love reading suspenseful, exciting chapters. Sometimes I get so involved in parts of the narrative that once I stop reading, I feel my entire body relax and realize I had completely tensed up and my stomach had been in knots.

I have mixed feelings about finding errors (grammatical, chronological, etc.): I can’t help shaking my head at whoever edited the book for missing something, and I kind of relish in the fact that I noticed something that someone else overlooked.

Since I’ve been on maternity leave, I’ve kept track of all the books I’ve read.

Here is the list of books I have read over the past year. Most were recommended to me by friends and family, some were recommended by Oprah, and many were lent to me by a good friend who also shares a love for books, and I have to confess that while several were quite educational, many were indulgences:

1. Blink by Malcolm Gladwell

2. Green by Ted Dekker

3. Have a Little Faith by Mitch Albom

4. Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

5. New Moon by Stephenie Meyer

6. Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer

7. Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer

8. The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barberry

9. The Secret by Rhonda Byrne

10. The Texas Legacy by DiAnn Mills

a. Leather and Lace

b. Lanterns and Lace

c. Lightning and Lace

11. The Invisible Wall by Harry Bernstein

12. Shanghai Girls by Lisa See

13. Mini Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella

14. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

15. Freedom by Jonathan Franzen

16. Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

17. In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner

18. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

19. The Host by Stephenie Meyer

20. New York by Edward Rutherfurd

21. The Russian Concubine by Kate Furnivall

22. The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett

23. Eragon by Christopher Paolini

24. Eldest by Christopher Paolini

25. Brisingr by Christopher Paolini

The last few books I’ve read are set hundreds and hundreds of years ago (The Pillars of the Earth takes place in the 1100s, and, well, the Eragon books take place in a fantasy world, but I’d place them just as far back as The Pillars of the Earth, if not farther, if they had existed in our world).

Books set in those far away days, far before technology and immediate information became so commonplace, are usually the ones that attract me. I wondered why that was (other than the fact that I just like them).

Maybe they help provide a little balance to my life.

Do you ever find yourself mentally exhausted by the end of the day—exhausted in the way that only people who live in this day and age, with the accompanying pressures and demands, would?

Here’s an example: One evening, I find myself standing in the living room, typing a text message while answering a question Joel is asking me, as I am pulling my coat out of the closet. I have half an hour free while Joel is watching the baby, so I run out to Wal-Mart for a few things (dangerous) and my cell phone rings and I answer it, thus talking and looking at thousands of products under bright lights around lots of people, all at once (OVERLOAD). I go home, make supper, put Emmett to bed, check my e-mail, then scan the Home page of Facebook, perhaps changing my status. Then I realize I wondered, since watching the Academy Awards, who won last year? Who won the year before last? I don’t remember. After looking that up, I quickly surf over to my online banking to see what payments are coming out this week, and then forget that I was supposed to reply to a certain e-mail, so I have to go back to my e-mail to do that. Then it’s later than I had expected, and my eyes are not focusing so well on the bright computer screen anymore, so I walk away. I walk past rooms and rooms full of stuff. I think, Why in the world do we have so much STUFF? (And we aren’t anything close to hoarders...I’m too anti-clutter for that.) We have racks of CDs and shelves of movies in the rec room, clothes upon clothes in our bedroom, toys upon toys in the spare room, cupboards full of food in the kitchen, papers on the fridge, and the junk drawer… (well, there’s a reason why it’s called the junk drawer – you probably have one, too). Then we watch TV or a movie (I prefer movies because Joel is notorious for watching two TV shows at once, flicking back and forth between them during commercials). Images upon images flash before my eyes and enter my mind.

Then I go to bed, and my mind is so full. My brain hurts. My mind is thinking about something I read about, something I talked about, something I forgot to do, whether I am doing all I can do to be a great wife and a loving mother, and then I realize I haven’t prayed yet, so I begin to pray and then fall asleep at some point during the prayer.

Did that sound a little neurotic?

Anyway, I’m saying all this to say that although of course I appreciate that we aren’t living in the Middle Ages anymore, and that we have great technology, and we have all of the neat and interesting things we have nowadays, and that a wealth of information is immediately available to us through the Internet—even so—sometimes these great things make me feel sort of tired. Sometimes I feel a lot of pressure from the world to succeed and be great at every part of the multi-faceted life I (and everyone else) lead(s). I like to bury my nose in an aromatic book, especially if I am reading about characters who only own what they need, and a few other interesting things like a jewelled belt or a nice goblet. It’s refreshing to read about people who spend an hour walking through town to run an errand (maybe they had no choice but to walk, but still, it makes for a little bit of reflective time, right?).

We have a lot to be thankful for and appreciative of, but it’s still nice to spend some quiet recreational time reading about people whose lives were free of the complications of our Age.

Reading is a great escape. I love books.