which words changed your life??

"One day you knew what you had to do, and began." - Mary Oliver

I am a collector of quotes. I love them. I read them over and over again, letting them sink deep into my bones. I write them down in books and journals, print them and put them up on my walls, and underline them in books. I am drawn to a beautiful phrase or a profound thought like other people are to paintings or clothes or shoes. I am an addict.

Sometimes you read something and it resonates and you really really love it. You write it down and read it several times and go back to it sometimes and read it again. These are great quotes. Other times you read something and it hits you really hard. You catch your breath and read it several more times and you begin to live it. These are amazing quotes. Then there is the last kind. The last kind is the kind that doesn't necessarily seem like much when you read it for the first time. You might scribble it down or live with it a little, but you don't realize what effect it has had on you. Then it begins to whisper to you. You hear it in your head out of the blue. It actually begins to speak to you and in the end you realize it has changed your life. These are the best quotes.

My life-changing quote was from Women Who Run With the Wolves. If you read my blog much you won't be surprised. This is the passage that made me change the way I wrote and the book I was writing:

"We find lingering evidence of [the Wild Woman] archetype in the images and symbols found in stories, literature, poetry, painting, and religion. it would appear that its glow, its voice, and its fragrance are meant to cause us to be raised up from contemplating the shit on our tails to occasionally traveling the the company of the stars." - Clarissa Pinkola Estes.

It isn't a normal quote but it really echoes inside of me. I'll often be thinking something really yucky and suddenly the last bit pops into my head: stop contemplating the shit on your tail and start traveling in the company of the stars.

My writing is about that.

So as an avid collector I am asking - no, begging - you to use my comments to share with me the quote/ passage/ book/ poem/ lyrics/ words that changed your life. Which words were strung together in just the right way at the right time to make you shift? I would love to add them to my collection!! (And this time I will reply in my comments!)

xo

Good Things.

1. Having a visit in two weeks from two lovely bloggers!!!
2. This new blogger who I am loving getting to know through her beautiful words and photographs.
3. These amazing pictures which I just received in the mail. (I am completely enchanted! Thank you Maddie!)
4. All of the kind words you all left about my book being finished! (Well, the first draft anyway!)
5. Buying plane tickets to go home for MY WEDDING. (Yup, still weird.)
6. A brave, inspiring woman!!
7. This piece of poem:

...one night
there's a heartbeat at the door.
Outside, a woman in the fog,
with hair of twigs and dress of weed,
dripping green lake water.
She says "I am you,
and I have traveled a long distance.
Come with me, there is something I must show you..."
She turns to go, her cloak falls open,
suddenly, golden light... everywhere, golden light...

-Clarissa Pinkola Estes

xo

So what's next then?

"So often a woman feels then that she lives in an empty place where there is maybe just one cactus with one brilliant red flower on it, and then in every direction, 500 miles of nothing. But for the woman who will go 501 miles, there is something more. A small brave house. An old one. She has been waiting for you." - Clarissa Pinkola Estes

This is the quote that started my book. This is the quote that gave me a peculiar tingle on the back of my neck. I had read it a dozen times, but then the 13th time I read it, it gave me a nudge. I wrote it down and thought about it a little. I scribbled notes about a book I wanted to write. This was all about 2 years ago. Around this time I was also trying to meditate for the first time. I was not very good at it. I squirm too much. After one particularly squirmy meditation I opened my eyes with a clear full picture of the book I would write. I sat down at my computer that day and started to write. A year and a month or so later I finished.

I write because if I don't my head gets crowded. Stories and characters line up and tap their toes waiting for me to notice them and give them a voice. I feel like this book has been the one I have always been preparing for. It is an unusual book that is full of traditional symbols and archetypes, but then I have always been a slightly unusual traditional girl.

So what happens next? Well now that I have written the end I need to go back and change the beginning. Then it needs a pretty big rewrite followed by a gentle reading by friends and family. In the meantime I will research agents and ask people if they know agents to see which one might be a good one to approach with my chapters. Then I make the first 50 pages as good as they can possibly be and then I send them to an agent to see if they would like to help me get it published. It all sounds terribly complicated, but I really believe in this book. I think that people - and women in particular - will really like it... i hope...

Thank you for all of your kind words on my last post!! It's so nice to just have people say 'Well Done!' and let you bask in an accomplishment for a little while. Thank you for that gift.

xo

one year and one month later...

"You were made and set here to give voice to this, your own astonishment." - Annie Dillard

Does anyone remember that scene in Romancing the Stone when Kathleen Turner's character is finished writing her book? There are tissues everywhere and her hair is slicked back and everything around her is generally in a state of chaos? She sits back and for just a moment the look on her face is calm. She's done.

My Mom reminded me of this scene this afternoon when I called her to tell her THAT I FINISHED WRITING MY BOOK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I giggled because I feel just like that. Mark has been away this weekend and I have been a woman possessed. I have hardly eaten, I haven't washed and there are dishes and clutter everywhere. But it's DONE. It's DONE. The words are echoing in my head. I can't really get my head around them.

Creation is a messy business no matter how you look at it, and I need to go and sort out the mess I have left behind this weekend. I've been so far down and so far up this week I don't know where my head is anymore. BUT it's DONE. I have written my book. It is there in black and white. No matter what else happens, I did it.

I've just spoken to my parents and one of my peeps and I am going to try to get my head together with a glass of wine and a bath full of sparkly bubbles.

SIGH.

writing

"To be strong does not mean to sprout muscles and flex. It means meeting one's own numinosity without fleeing, actively living with the wild nature in one's own way. It means to be able to learn, to be able to stand what we know. It means to stand and live." - Clarissa Pinkola Estes.

I'm not here for long. I am writing. Madly. My book has been pouring out of me in the last little while. I have been reminded this week of the preciousness of time. It's a cliche but like most cliches it is there because it is true.

My book is nearly done. I am writing the last few chapters now. It is a strange and unusual thing, but for me it pulses with energy and familiarity. I hope that it will also do the same for the readers it will eventually have. I am in love with it and it has finally opened itself up to me. I see where it is going. I feel like I have been preparing for it my whole life. I feel like I know it and it was waiting for me.

Tell me - what is pulsing with energy and familiarity for you? What is bubbling beneath the surface of your life? What are you creating in your psyche? What do you know you will create?

grief.

Did you know when
you went to bed
on Friday
that it was the last time?
Did you somehow hold
him closer or
whisper a prayer?
Or were you as surprised
as we were?

Do you know when things are about to change?
At the end?
Do you hear voices you
don't understand?
Does your skin
quiver as the
angels draw near?

Where do we go from here?
Where are we
when the shock wears off?

There are so many cliches around death.
None of them
make any sense
when your heart breaks
inside of your chest.
Not one of them will heal it.

I know that if you could
you would say
It is so precious -
this life.
I know you would want
just one more day
as much as we do.

(A friend of mine passed away last night. I don't know where to put the feelings I have right now except here. Even though you don't know them, please send good wishes out for her husband and family - and then squeeze the one you love very very hard tonight. Tell them that you love them and thank them for being in your life.)

xo

It's coming!

“We do not believe in ourselves until someone reveals that deep inside us something is valuable, worth listening to, worthy of our trust, sacred to our touch. Once we believe in ourselves we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight or any experience that reveals the human spirit.” - e.e.cummings

Six months from TODAY I will marry my best friend! This picture was taken (by me if you can believe it) while we were at the Colosseum in Rome last June. Mark took me to Rome for a long weekend as a surprise and proposed at 5:30 am in front of the Trevi Fountain. Could he be more romantic? I don't think so.

Six months to go. I'm going to be a bride... I'm going to be a MRS!!!

I feel like I have a lot to do in the next six months. I don't want to go into the rest of my life dragging any baggage. I want to stand beside him as whole and healthy as I can be. I want us to be full partners. I am madly in love and I want to use my energy to take us forward into our dreams instead of worrying about boring things like weight and guilt.

Six months to go.

I can't wait!

methinks she doth protest too much.

"Love relaxes and releases all unlike itself." - Louise Hay (This is the affirmation to use for bursitis.)

I have always maintained that I know what my issues are. I know that I am a procrastinator, I know that I am messy and selectively lazy. I know I comfort eat and I know I am really sensitive and easily hurt. (There are more but you get the idea!) I have often thought, "Well, if I already know what the problem is, why don't I do something about it? What's wrong with me? Am I just lazy?"

Well I had a mind-changing experience yesterday. I was standing in our kitchen talking to Mark and his mom. Over the course of the conversation I brought out "Heal Your Body" by Louise Hay and we were talking about symptoms and what they mean. I jokingly said that it couldn't always be right because according to Louise, the bursitis pain in my shoulder means: "Repressed anger. Wanting to hit someone." I protested that I didn't want to hit anyone. Mark said, "Oh I don't know, I can think of someone!"

As I protested that I didn't want to hit anyone, both he and his mom said that in fact, I often use the word 'punch' in relation to people who are bothering me. I have absolutely no memory of ever using that phrase. But as I denied it all I realized that I was protesting too much. I want desperately to be a ''nice' person, but when I stopped and looked and listened to what they were saying, I realized that I do have a lot of aggression inside. I am angry at some people and some situations. In fact, I think I am downright furious.

Mark laughingly stuck a pillow in his shirt and told me to punch him. I couldn't do it. I really couldn't. I was a pathetic puncher. The longer we tried, the better I got, but I think that I have a huge huge block there that I need to get past. We are going to try again today.

I never thought that this journey into my body would bring something up so fiercely and so quickly. Maybe it has nothing to do with my shoulder being so sore, but just maybe it does. I asked my body to talk to me. Maybe my shoulder just didn't want to wait for me to get up there. And just maybe the reason that I am not fixing the parts of me that I know are wrong is because there are blocks I don't know about in the way. Maybe I am not just lazy!!

But it cracks me up that I have to punch my fiance to find out!!

(P.S. Talk about reclaiming yourself - check out this post by Michelle - what a POEM, what an amazing statement. RRRrrrOooooAAaaaaaaRrrrrrr!!!!!)

guess who's blogging!?

There is a wonderful new blog out there. It's called "Teach me to Paint." This post explains what it is all about, and this is the link to the blog itself.

Please go and have a look! (Especially if you paint or you would like to paint!) This is an amazing idea and the blogger just happens to be MY DAD!!!

xo

skin

Hi there -

I am still typing with one finger so it's going slowly but I wanted to give you this. I was sure I had shared it before but I can't find it anywhere, so here it is! It is one of the quotes that set me on my body journey. I think it is delicious (if you'll pardon the pun!)

"It is rare that the summer lets an apple go without
streaking or spotting it on some part of its sphere. It will
have some red stains, commemorating the mornings and
evenings it has witnessed; some dark and rusty blotches,
in memory of the clouds and foggy, mildewy days that
have passed over it; and a spacious field of green
reflecting the general face of Nature - green even as the
fields; or a yellow ground, which implies a milder
flavor - yellow as the harvest or russet as the hills."
- Henry David Thoreau

ouch.

A funny thing happens when you start listening to your body. It starts to talk to you. But you don't always know what it is saying.

My shoulders have been getting more and more sore over the past little while and I woke up yesterday in a lot of pain. A trip to the Dr. this morning ended with a diagnosis of some sort of 'itis' (I can't remember the technical term.) The tricky part is that it is my right arm and it hurts to write or type! So I am typing this with one finger!! (Ridiculous.) I don't know what my body is trying to tell me but I am going to have to stop my reporting until it doesn't hurt to type.

On another note, I have an interview tomorrow. I would love the job. I would be really good at the job. It would change a lot of things for the better! If you feel like it, please send good thoughts my way!!

[Update - I didn't get the job. I know that means something better will come along but it still sucks. AND I am still typing with one finger - sigh!]

xo

YES! YES! YES! (updated!)

I found this on Sera Beak's blog and HAD to share. I haven't felt so good for AGES.




RRRrrrroooOOOOOoooooOAAAAaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrRRRRRRR!!!

YES!! YES!! YES!!

This is the link to the movie. (It's only playing in a few places. There is a place on their website where you can help them get more screenings of the movie!!)

UPDATE: I just found this too:

hips are scary things.

"Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death." -Anais Nin

I've chosen this picture because it's so cozy and warm! Mark made (yes, you read that right) bagels last weekend. They looked so pretty, I had to capture them.

It's been a crazy week in many ways. I know I was supposed to reconnect with my hips, but I found dozens of reasons and excuses not to. (This is what I am talking about.) I would sit down and tune in and get really distracted, or just not do it at all. I have been working very hard, but that is no excuse. The interesting thing is that they have been talking to me. They have been creating a symptom that until this moment I hadn't connected with this process.

Hips, I think, are going to be the hardest part of me to talk to. There's a LOT of cultural crap hanging around this area. The hips hold all of the most dangerous parts of our body. They hold the parts of us that excrete waste - three different forms of it if you are a woman - and they also hold the parts of us most attuned to physical pleasure, and the parts that create, hold and give life. Sex, pee, blood and poo are the aspects of our human body we are the most troubled/ embarrassed/ in denial about. EVERYONE goes to the bathroom and EVERYONE farts, and yet we are apologetic or embarrassed when we have to go. An awful lot of people have sex, but we don't really want to talk about it or we blush when we think about it. You can show someone being shot on television and people accept it. But show two people making love and it gets an 'R' rating. We are okay with violence but ashamed of intimacy. What does that say about us?

I think I have been going about this all wrong. As I wrote the above paragraph, I had a feeling like my hips wanted to move. I have been trying to sit still to listen to them. Today I am going to shake 'em up a bit and see what they say. That's the biggest lesson I have had so far from all of this - my body wants to move!!!

"My feet danced and my arms moved, not in a dance that I had learned from others, but in a dance that moved and lived in me. My whole body moved in joyous ecstasy." - Mika Walteri

P.S. Please if you have a moment, go send some love to these two brave ladies. They were two of my very very first blogger friends and are two of the fiestiest, most amazing women out there. I love them both very much and they could use some lovin' right now.

brave dancing legs

"What I really want to say is, could you come and play with me around the blackberries and dipping sun. Gold on our faces. Creasing, smiling eyes. Could we grab hands and run dashing to the lake in gusts of laughter and blushing? I believe that loving fearlessly is the bravest thing in this world." - Sabrina Ward Harrison

I realize that this is more a picture of my feet than my legs, but my camera and I are in a fight, so this is what I've got for you. My legs had a bit to say this week! If you don't know what I am talking about, this is the explanation.

Just like my feet, my legs were quick to pull up a chair and have a chat. I sat still and thought, "What would you like to say?" The words 'brave' and 'strong' came to me almost immediately. Funnily enough, I knew exactly which part of me needed those words. My knees are the weakest part of my body and they clearly needed me to write 'strong' on them. Writing this just now, I got the clearest feeling that I need to do it again tomorrow. One day wasn't enough for them. They would like a bit more attention!

I wrote 'brave' on the top part of my legs. I often feel like I am a weird mix of brave and terrified. My legs are what carries me forward into my world. They move me more quickly when I am afraid of the dark. They stick with me when I try to run away. They hold me up when I dance. In the past two weeks we have made a lot of plans for the future - really really big ones - and I have been feeling really restricted in my current situation. Since I started tuning in, my legs have been quite literally itching to move! I have walked into more corners and stumbled over more things this week than I have in ages. I get the distinct impression that I am outgrowing my space and my legs know it. Very wise.

I am going to listen to my hips next. I have a feeling they will have a LOT to say.

meet my feet.

"What would it be like to know, in the deepest part of you, that every part of your anatomy and each process of your female body contained wisdom and power?" - Christiane Northrup, M.D.

(For those of you who don't know what I am doing, here is the explanation.)

I'm not sure what I expected. I think I expected that it would take a long time to have a connection with my feet. You need to know that there is a deeply practical side to me that I have had to tell that this is an experiment to get it to be brave enough to put this stuff on a a blog. That side of me expected to sit there and have nothing really happen. The other part of me thought that I would get these profound messages from my body, and that I would end up writing something deep and eternal on my feet that would change everything.

Well I washed my feet and changed into some comfortable clothes. I sat down, smudged the area around me and lit a candle. Then I sat and held my feet. I talked to them. I thanked them for all of the adventures that we had been on together. I apologized to them for wearing the mean shoes that caused me to have awful ingrown toenails when I was younger. I apologized to them for hating them for being so big. I told them about all of the adventures we were going to go on in the future and about some of the not-so-fun things that we were going to do. I rubbed them and stroked them and held them until I was done talking.

Then I sat very still and asked them if they had anything that they wanted to tell me. I honestly thought I would sit there for ages waiting for something to happen. I got a message IMMEDIATELY: "Put us up." I thought I was just thinking that myself, but the message came through loud and clear a second and a third time: "UP!" So I moved around and lay on my back with my feet propped up against the chest of drawers.

After a few moments, I quietly asked them what words I should give them. Again, the answer came immediately. "Ready? Set! Go!" Came my answer. I remember shaking my head a little. I had been hoping for something a little deeper. I waited again, but the answer was the same. I asked what other words I could given them. That answer also came out loud and clear. "Be still."

I lay still for a little while longer, but my my feet did not. My toes would not stop wriggling. When I sat up I rubbed my hands over them again. Usually there is a place on the inside of my instep that is excruciating when it is rubbed. I instinctively moved my thumbs to that place. Nothing. No pain. For the first time I can remember, that spot didn't hurt at all. (I'm embarrassed to say that I even pushed really hard just to make sure!) Amazing. So I wrote their messages on my feet and then tucked them into cozy socks (because they asked me to.)

So what have I learned? I've learned that my feet are a whole lot more exuberant than I have given them credit for. They want to move. They want to wriggle. They want to race. They want to dance.

I'm listening. Today we are going to dance!!

So far it's been a very interesting experiment! I am going to keep working up. Tomorrow I am going to introduce myself to my legs. I wonder if they will have as much to say.

xo

"What would it be like if you reclaimed the wisdom of your body and learned how to trust its messages?" - Christiane Northrup, M.D.

back home to me...

"A thought held long enough and repeated enough becomes a belief. The belief then becomes biology. Beliefs are energetic forces that create the physical basis for our individual lives and our health." - Christiane Northrup, M.D.

A little while ago I had an idea. Within moments of accepting the idea I was visited by a messenger telling me to do it! I, of course, procrastinated. I have been feeling extraordinarily powerless in my life lately. It makes my throat ache to write that, but it is the truth. So I haven't started even though I know it is exactly what I need to do. This week my body has rebelled by giving me a long, lingering case of hives and an IBS attack.

I took this photograph in a cathedral (where I wasn't supposed to take pictures!) These steps are made of stone and you can see how many people have walked up them by how worn they are. It's actually quite difficult to climb them now without slipping a little. The interesting thing about these steps is that if you move just a little bit to the right, the step is unworn and quite a lot easier to climb. I watched for a little while, and everyone still climbed up the worn bits. It's the path that seems the easiest, and the path that everyone else has taken, so it's where they all go.

Well, I have decided to step to the right. Inspired by this, and this, and a scene from this and the experiment behind this, and by this and these, I have come up with a way of returning to myself.

Starting at the bottom - closest to the earth - I am going to begin to climb back into myself one piece at a time. Today I am going to meet my feet! Today I will have a bath, give them a wash, and then spend a few moments listening to them. I haven't really even thought about them for a long, long time. Then, once I hear what they have to say I will write something on them. I am going to reconnect myself to them and to the earth they connect me to. If it works with water crystals, then I am sure it's worth a try on my nearly-all-water body. I'll let you know how it goes.

"Imagine yourself whole, healed, and deeply in touch with the wisdom of your female body. How do you feel? What do you know in your bones? Nothing is more exciting than knowing that our bodies and our feelings are a clear, open pathway toward our destinies." - Christiane Northrup, M.D.

Starting today I am going to work towards getting all of me on the same side.


P.S. I have just found this. Oh, I would do anything to be there. Wow. How can I make it happen?

some days...

Some days I can get up at 5:30am, exercise for half and hour or more, drink hot water with lemon and then green tea, take my vitamins, have mini shredded wheat with soy milk for breakfast, and vegetarian green thai curry or a chicken salad for lunch, drink a litre and a half of water while getting on with work, come home, and have a healthy supper, a few squares of dark chocolate, do a little work and go to bed (admittedly after watching something rubbish on tv.) I honestly, honestly do this about 80% of the time.

Then there are the other days. There are the days when I drag myself out of bed, get through work, and then find myself on the couch eating chocolate covered Hobnobs (which are DIVINE by the way!) and hoping that Mark won't mind if I suggest having hamburgers or something equally decadent for dinner. (My newest favorite thing to eat is a sandwich with bacon, avocado and tomato, a tiny bit of spring onion and black pepper - bliss!!)

I am currently living through day number two. I was fine until I had texturized vegetable protein in a sauce with the consistency of snot for lunch. After eating half of it, I leaped off of the healthy living wagon with both feet. While I do feel that we all need moderation in all things, I can feel this turning into a night of debauchery. There is wine chilled, after all, and I am off for nine whole days...

Do I get back into healthy land or do I turn to decadence? Tricky. I think I'll take a glass of chilled white wine with me while I read Oprah in a bubble bath. Then I am sure I will know what to do!


(The rock above was painted by a mermaid! The coaster is from my Mom & Dad. Have a wonderful weekend!)

watch this space.

"You must ask for what you truly want.

Don't go back to sleep.
The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep."
-Rumi

This is what I used to see when I sat down and worked at my desk. If you look closely some of you might recognize your own work, inspiration you have sent me, or things you might have seen on other sites. I am addicted to ribbon and glitter and wings of all kinds and quotes and pictures of people, places and things that are dear to me.

BUT.

Sometimes I think that I need to focus (tough word for me) a bit more. So a few weeks ago I cleared the deck. Now when I sit down to work I have less chaos and more clarity. (Have no fear! I could not take my treasures down - the whole board was merely relocated!)

I have a WHOLE WEEK OFF starting on Friday and I am so excited about the possibilities!! A clean desk, many projects and NINE WHOLE DAYS... bliss. My toes and fingertips are tingling in anticipation!!

xo

unbelievable beautifulness

i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a true blue dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes
- e.e.cummings

I don't know if "beautifulness" is really a word but it's the one that comes to mind when I see what's going on in the world around me. I thought I would share it with you. Spring has sprung here and the Magnolias are the first ones to celebrate!

I hope you are having a beautiful day - wherever you are.

xo

Hawk Medicine

The strangest thing happened to me the other day! You've heard this from me before, but you are about to hear it again: I've been inspired. I know, I know, I say that a lot, but THIS time it actually came as a moment of clarity about a couple of other projects I have been mulling over. The idea came as a flash of how I could fuse them all together into one project.

I was sitting at my desk scribbling in one of my notebooks when it happened. I was so excited about it, my pulse started to race and I started to write down all of the ideas that were flowing through me. The Universe was offering me inspiration. I accepted.

For a moment I allowed myself to pause in my excitement. I looked out the window and lost myself in the branches outside. As I looked, a hawk landed on the branch that was less than a foot from my window. He had bright yellow legs and even brighter yellow eyes. He landed and then looked right in the window at me. We stared at each other for a moment and then he turned his head to the right and flew away.

I sat still for another moment before I realized I was still holding my breath. I felt like I had been visited. I felt seen.

When I told the amazing Jessie about this she sent me this from Medicine Cards: (I've edited for length!)

"HAWK
-Messenger-

Hawk is akin to Mercury, the messenger of the gods. Hawk medicine teaches you to be observant, to look at your surroundings. Observe the obvious in everything that you do. Life is sending you signals.

Life is the initiation. If you have pulled the Hawk card, then right now a clue about the magic of life is being brought to you. This magic can imbue you with the power to overcome a currently stressful or difficult situation. The test is your ability to observe the nuances of power lurking nearby. Is power the talent you have and are not using? Are solutions always hard to find because you have lost the broader vision of Hawk? Or is the Great Spirit displaying a gift that you need only to receive? Have the colors of the morning inspired you to create? Or has the gloominess of a present situation left you earthbound, unable to hear the voice within the raindrops splashing on your window? Pay attention! You are only as powerful as your capacity to perceive, receive, and use your abilities."

Lately things have been difficult here. I am feeling really stuck in a lot of ways - but I feel like I have had a sign. I am only as powerful as my capacity to perceive, receive, and use my abilities. What a great message.

Here I am!

"You have to recognize the demons or else they'll annoy you like
mosquitoes. But if you acknowledge their existence, if you say, 'All right, here's a cookie, go sit in the corner,' then you can go about your work and you don't have to go into depression because of it." -James Broughton

I don't know what to say to leap with both feet back into this strange world except to say that I've missed you! I have lurked around your sites; keeping up with you but trying to avoid talking about what has been going on with me. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your kind words and emails. I'm okay. I really am. It's the world around me that seems to have gone mad. It's amazing what we can deal with when we need to.

This crisis has really opened up my eyes to the strange way we human beings have of destroying ourselves. We know right down to the tips of our toes and the deepest part of our souls what we SHOULD do to make our lives better right this moment. We KNOW everything we need to know to do what needs to be done. Why don't we do it? Why do we cling to rotten, stinky, ridiculous, harmful habits? Sometimes we even brandish those habits like a sword, feeling justified in our choices because we are CHOOSING them.

Sera Beak says: "Sometimes what makes you lick your lips with easy excitement might not actually be the best thing right now. Whereas what challenges you or frightens you a little or even ticks you off the most is what your spirit needs the most."

Today I dare you to be brave enough to ask yourself this question and then answer it honestly: "What would be the best thing for me right now?"

(P.S. And when you are finished that, I recommend that everyone read Bee's beautiful post!!)

taking a little break

“All we see of someone at any moment is a snapshot of their life, there in riches or poverty, in joy or despair. Snapshots don't show the million decisions that led to that moment.” - Richard Bach

I've written this a few times now, hoping it would sound less weird. I am not trying to be dramatic but I needed to explain what will be my absence for a little while. Things are hard here right now. It's not my place to put them here in public, but I need to pull back and be there for people that I love. I'm okay, but I need to focus. I'll be back reading your blogs as soon as I can.

xo

just read the quote at the bottom.

“The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.” - Franklin D. Rooosevelt

So I almost did it again. I almost wrote another post about self-help books and being where I want to be and blah blah blah blah blah.

Hear this now: I will not write another post about NOT being where I want to be or about how I am ready to start getting there. I am only going to write posts about how I am getting there.

I subscribed to the 'be gentle on yourself' and the 'you're okay just as you are' modes of thinking for a long time. The problem with those modes is that they keep you warm and cozy and justified in your RUT. Then I read "The Secret" and thought if I just thought about something enough that it would happen. The problem with that is that you are still stuck in the rut but now you are stuck in a huge pile of delusion at the same time. If you pay attention hard enough when you read any of the cosmic ordering stuff, they actually mean that you need to think about what you want, never doubt that you will get it and then get off of your ass and work hard for it.


"I have been and still am a
seeker, but I have ceased to
question stars and books; I
have begun to listen to the
teachings my blood whispers
to me."

-Herman Hesse

watch this.

I admit that I found this link on Swirly's new site but I loved it so much I wanted to make sure more people saw it. It's 18 minutes long, so watch it when you have a minute. I was really inspired.

Isabel Allende

the book that chose me

“And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don't believe in magic will never find it.” - Roald Dahl

The weirdest thing happened to me today. Anyone who reads my blog regularly will know that I am completely addicted to books. I am obsessed by them. The only part of my 'dream home' that I have ever really concentrated on is the library. When I go to people's houses and they haven't got any books I get a bit freaked out. I have piles of them beside my bed, bookshelves full of them and a desk covered in them. I also write them. I have written two (not publishable) and am writing a third (hopefully very publishable.) Books are everything to me.

I often buy books and then don't read them. I believe that a book finds me and then waits until I am ready for its message. Shortly before we left for Canada I walked into a bookstore and bought a book for my book group list. I didn't really think about it much after that. The write up on the back didn't draw me in but I needed a book that I hadn't read. I put it on my bookshelf and left it.

Yesterday in the airport I was looking through the books and one caught my eye. The cover and the write-up made my mouth water. I put it down and went through airport security, believing that I didn't really need it. It called to me though and I searched through the bookstore on the other side of security. I finally found one copy tucked underneath another pile of books. I bought it and started devouring it on the plane.

Today I was looking for another book and realized that those two books were the same book. Different covers, completely different write-ups on the back, but the same book. (I've never ever done that before - I always remember my books!) I now own two copies, but obviously I am meant to read it now. I've read a third of it and I am feeling both madly in love and woefully untalented. Delicious.

I love books.

off again!

"...you've got to stop wearing your wishbone where your backbone ought to be." - Richard from Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Well, we are off again. This time we are flying back to the UK on an overnight flight. We should be home sometime tomorrow night. In the meantime I want to leave you with:

One quote to make you think (top), one last Christmas angel to protect you (above) and a bit of Canadian winter to inspire you (below.)


See you in another time zone!!

P.S. If you are looking for something to really make you think this year, go here and take the Real Age test. It's really interesting (and free!)

xo

ghosts (this is a long one!)

"People come and go in life, but they never leave your dreams. Once they're in your subconscious they are immortal" ~ Patricia Hampl

There is a closet in the room that was once mine that is full of my things. Every time I come home I cull it a little bit more. Each time I arrive I have changed a little bit so some things have greater meaning for me and others have lost it. I am amazed at my former self when I do this and ask myself WHY I still have a baseball cap from high school or a broken piggy bank? Why have I not thrown them out during the twelve other times I have done this?

This time I did something I have never done before. This time I tackled my letter box. Since I was about fifteen I have kept every letter I have ever gotten. The box was full of letters, old photographs, school notes still folded up to look like stars, birthday cards, and post cards. I thought I would just throw most of them away but as soon as I opened one envelope, I was transported. That box didn't just hold paper. That box held ghosts.

There were letters from friends who I can't even picture any more. There were birthday cards from my grandparents. I teared up when I read, "We love you, love Grandma and Grandpa" because I will never get a card like that again. There were letters from two of my friends who are now gone. Their ordinary lives and youthful exuberance filled the pages and I cried, knowing what I know now about their future, and realizing how much of my time I am wasting.

There were love letters there, too. One set were from a particularly horny boy who I can't even picture any more. I laughed when I read them because my naive teenage self had no idea what he was writing, but I sure do now! There were others too. I shake my head because I always felt lonely and ugly and awkward as a teen. I had mad crushes on the boys who would never love me, but didn't realize that there were boys who had mad crushes on me. How sad that part of being young is.

One set of letters and notes was from the boy who adored me and who I loved back. I know now that I was too scared of those feelings to tell him or act on them. I was scared that he might want to (gasp) have sex with me and I was terrified and not ready for the hugeness of what we could have been. I know I hurt him dreadfully and I will forever be sorry for that. I hope he has forgiven me.

There were notes and letters from my family and from people I am still friends with. All of this childish angst and excitement and energy was contained in the box. I felt overwhelmed by the spirits and memories swirling around me as I opened each envelope and revealed what was inside. All of what I was and who was important to me washed over me and I felt wobbly and shaken when I was finished.

I kept some of the most precious things but I admit that I threw a lot of it away. It may sound strange to you but I feel lighter and older since letting those energies free. I feel like somehow I was carrying all of that stuff around with me and now it's gone. I've chosen what to keep and what to remember and what to let go of. I'm so excited to get my teeth into a new year. I feel like I have made a space in my life for new spirits to enter. This year I am going to marry my best friend, finish (and hopefully sell) my book, be part of a website launch (with global domination, of course) and hopefully change this world a little bit for the better.

I'm ready.

Dear 2007,

I just wanted to write and thank you for everything.

*thank you for my family - for my Mom and Dad and my brother and sister-in-law and my gorgeous little niece, and my extended family of aunts, uncles and cousins and one Oma. Thank you for their health and happiness and just for them being here in the first place.

*thank you for this blogging community. I'm not very good at it anymore, but people still come to read what I have to say and I appreciate that. Thank you for all of them. Thank you for their honesty in their own posts and comments. I hope they all have love and happiness and that they know that their words matter to someone. (I won't put links here because I don't want to hurt anyone by forgetting them.)

*thank you for the tribe of women I have encircling me. They know who they are. It's been a difficult year in a lot of ways. You gave us a lot of work to do and some pretty big challenges. We have made it through and are stronger than we were in 2006! Thank you for their presence in my life.

*thank you for the roof over my head, continued health, a job, and for constant inspiration and challenge.

*thank you for the most romantic moment of my life - so far.

*thank you for other adventures - for Bath and for London and for Bournemouth and for walks around reservoirs, and for Dartmoor, and for the beautiful place I live.

*thank you for my parents coming and seeing me where I live and for every ounce of unending support they continue to provide - even when they don't understand their unconventional daughter.

*most of all, thank you for another year with the love of my life.

Thank you for everything, and I look forward to meeting your successor.

All my love,
meg
xo


Dear 2008,

You are going to be the best year of my life - so far.

(Just thought I'd better let you in on that so we are both on the same page!)

LOVE, meg. xo



(Happy New Year everyone!! Make a good wish tonight and I'll see you in '08!)

into my pail

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.” - Dr. Seuss

I had "one of those days" yesterday. Things have been strange and difficult here so yesterday I finally dropped out. I had one of those days when I put on clean pajamas in the morning and then go right back to bed. I read Oprah, ate soup, napped, but mostly found myself staring off into space for vast stretches of time. I haven't had a day like this for ages. If I paid attention I could literally hear the index cards falling into place as my mind filed and sorted through the accumulated bunf that has been filling my head lately. I felt sorry for myself, I cried, I sighed, I understood, I held my breath and at some point in the evening I came up for air.

I'm writing this because there are people out there who read blogs and think that other people have it all together. There are people out there who compare their dark sides to the sunlit sides that we allow ourselves to put out into the world. Sometimes life gets too hard, but hard is important in our stories too.

Today I am feeling a little better. My Mom calls days like that "going into your pail" after the character on Star Trek who used to have to go into a pail to regenerate every once in a while. Sometimes we need to retreat into our pail and let our filing system get to work. I'm going to spend some time with my oldest friends tonight. That's another kind of regeneration. Between the two I should be ready by tomorrow to take on the world again.

xo

my Christmas rant.

“The only real blind person at Christmas-time is he who has not Christmas in his heart.” - Helen Keller

I need to warn you, this will be a little bit of a rant. NOTHING bugs me more this time of year than people saying that they hate Christmas. HATE CHRISTMAS?!? HATE CHRISTMAS?!? Well, if you fall into that category, I'm sorry but you just don't get it.

Now I understand about hating the commercialism and the crowds and the pressure. I understand about being sad and lonely during this time of year. I understand about the weather and the traveling and feeling overwhelmed. I get that. I understand all of these feelings, and often feel this way myself. But I am here to tell you that it's not CHRISTMAS' fault that we feel this way. It's our own. WE create our reality. If you spend Christmas worrying about the perfect present or having the right amount of baking done or whether or not you can spend one more moment in the company of someone, this is not Christmas' fault either.

One year I spent Christmas in bed. I worked at a Christmas craft show at the end of November and came home on December 5 with a socking great case of Mononucleosis that kept me in bed until nearly March. I was completely bed ridden and semi-conscious for much of the month and when you are in bed in December there is not very much on television except those specials. Being in bed meant I didn't help with the preparations or the shopping and I got out of the hoopla by having a neck swollen out past my ears.

When you watch nothing but Christmas specials for 20 days you begin to see a bit of a pattern. Whether it is The Grinch who Stole Christmas (the original one!) or Frosty the Snowman or The Year Without a Santa Claus or Rudolph or any of the nine million other Christmas specials that are on, the message is exactly the same. The point of Christmas is to be nice to each other. To love each other. To believe in magic. And most of all, the point of Christmas is to "keep Christmas in your heart" for the the rest of the year. KEEP believing in magic. KEEP being nice to each other. Believe in love.

So go ahead and hate the crowds, the pressure, the multiple family crisis', and the commercialism, but don't blame Christmas. Look at what you are doing that makes you hate Christmas and for heaven's sake, DO SOMETHING ELSE. Hatred is not the way to move into a new year.

So I wish you peace and joy and warm cookies and angels. I wish you warm legs to put your cold toes on. I wish you laughter and calm and love. I wish you help getting everything you need to get done. I wish you a perfect moment of peace. I wish you belief in magic. I wish you a moment of clarity. But I don't just wish this for you today. I wish you a whole year of these things. I hope that you can keep love and joy and magic in your heart until I can wish it for you again in 2008.

Ho Ho Ho.

(If you are need of a little bit of Christmas cheer, go onto iTunes and download Stuart McLean's "Dave Cooks the Turkey" or any other of his Christmas stories. It'll be the best .99c or .79p you've spent this Christmas! I promise.)

OFF to the Great White North!!

Yo Hosers! (Canadians'll know what that means!)

We are off right now for the two day trip to Canada (don't ask!) where they have been snowed in already!!

Yay!

See you in North America!

Sigh.

homeland here I come!

xo

weirdness!

This little fella is a "Pink Fairy Armadillo." Strange little guy isn't he? Kind of makes you wonder about evolution and how and why it works. In fact, if you go to this website, you will find LOTS of reasons to think twice about evolution!!

Mark and I saw one of these at the Natural History Museum in London when we went there at the beginning of December. If you are ever in London, GO to this museum! Even if you just walk in the door and walk out again, you will feel just like a little kid. It just looks so much like a museum you might find in a movie. There are monkeys carved into the walls and every single surface seems to have detail on it. Our overwhelming impression of this building was, "they don't make 'em like this anymore!!"

We went to London to see the exhibit of Terracotta Warriors at the British Museum. (This picture is from their website.) This is the largest exhibit of these statues that has ever been outside of China. It was really amazing. (If you don't know what they are, go here.) We marveled at the scope of one man's power and need for immortality. It's interesting that 2000 years ago a megalomaniac was able to create an entire world for himself and be in control of an entire nation and achieve a kind of immortality. Our modern megalomaniacs (Michael Jackson, for example) create their own worlds (Neverland) and we think that they are crazy, (and I suppose he also has achieved a kind of immortality.)

Funny isn't it?

On our trip we also slept (as Mark says) in Tupperware (open the 'small rooms' link near the bottom of the page), shopped in our dream grocery store, and ate in a most unusual place! We had lots of talks about what we want our life to look like and where we are going and what we are going to do. Things are tight right now, but we are really going places. I have been inspired by beauty and potential and the unusual this month. I hope my eyes stay this open.

earliest memory

“It's surprising how much of memory is built around things unnoticed at the time” - Barbara Kingsolver

Do you know what your earliest memory is?

I think I figured out what mine is today, and I don't know if it's good or not!

We were talking about chickens at lunch and I was recounting a story about when I was a child and my parents had chickens. When I was just a tot they decided that they were going to (with a bunch of their friends) kill and butcher the chickens themselves. There is a photograph of me at about 2 or 3 kneeling on a table in my navy jumper and tights and cute little blue cardigan sweater looking at a half butchered chicken. I don't remember that part very well.

Today when I was telling that story, though, I had a vivid memory of our friend Lawrence showing me an egg that was still inside one of the chickens when he was cutting it up. I remember that it looked just like an egg but that the shell was still soft and squishable. I can see it as clearly as if it was yesterday. I have a few other memories, but it's getting so that I don't know if the memory is actually mine or if I have seen a photograph of it and it has turned into a memory. So I think that this is my first honest to goodness memory.

A dead chicken and a squishy egg. What does that say about me?

What is your earliest memory?

bigger and bigger

"Feel the light caress your fingertips.
You have just begun, the word has only left your lips.
Maybe in time, you will find
your arms are wrapped around the sun."
- Deb Talan (Big Strong Girl)

When I saw this ring on Thea's blog (and then her Etsy) I knew I had to have it! It's my new writing companion. It's a tangible reminder that FROM NOW ON my intention is to be so much more than I currently am!

RRRrrrrrroooOOOOoooooAAAAAAaaaaRRRRRrrrrrrrr!!!

big day!

I keep three wishes ready,
Least I should chance to meet,
Any day a fairy
Coming down the street.
I'd hate to have to stammer,
Or have to think them out,
For it's very hard to think things up
When a fairy is about.
And I'd hate to lose my wishes,
For fairies fly away,
And perhaps I'd never have a chance
On any other day.
So I keep three wishes ready,
Lest I should chance to meet,
Any day a fairy
Coming down the street.

Annette Wynne


Mark's Mom let me see her copy of The Wish Book a few weeks ago. According to that book today is one of the few days in the year when all of the cosmic forces are aligned properly and you can make a really big wish! Apparently the powers are strong all day, but most powerful between 3:18 & 3:22pm today. (Now, I don't know about time zones... that one is tricky! I'm just going to go with it!) It doesn't matter if you subscribe to the idea of cosmic ordering or not, it's a lovely idea that today is a powerful wish day and that all over the world, people are believing in the power of magic, the universe and their dreams.

I used to wish the same wish for everything. It used to be a wish for my Grandfather, but now that he is gone I am a lot less focused. If I met a fairy or a genie walking down the road, I'd be all flustered while I searched for something. So I think that today I am going to come up with my BIG wish and wish it at 3:19. It can't hurt, can it? You NEVER know!!

Do you have a great big wish ready?

testing the waters

"Hopefully the era of gurus and other benevolent dictators is over. Ultimately we have to learn to draw our own lines." - Gabrielle Roth

(Can you see the face in this picture? He has huge eyebrows and the big rock for a nose!)

I am sneaking out of hiding to dip a toe back into the world of blogging. I feel quite different after a month off! I have come to terms with some things, discovered some others, come up with a new project (yikes - another one?!) and found that, like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, I have been looking for all of my answers outside of myself. A small physical blip has pulled back the curtain and I realized that I have been totally living from the neck up.

So I am warning you now - things are about to get a little messy. I'm climbing back into myself from the ground up. For the first time in a long time, I am taking very deep breaths.


P.S. When I was away I spent some time with the gorgeous Susannah. She took the picture of me that is in my new banner (and she took the picture of the leaves too!) Look at this AMAZING shot from her photo blog!!!

...please leave a message after the beep.

“Each of us has that right, that possibility, to invent ourselves daily. If a person does not invent herself, she will be invented. So, to be bodacious enough to invent ourselves is wise.” - Maya Angelou

I took this picture one afternoon at the cottage in Canada. I love it because it's not a black and white picture, it just looks that way. The world at that moment was very much in black and white. (With a teeny tiny bit of blue sky peeking out over the trees.)

I'm taking a break. I found a link for NaBloPoMo last week and then I remembered that it is November and that means NaNoWriMo is happening too. I got all excited thinking about which one I could do. Then I took a good long look in the mirror and realized that I ALREADY have A LOT to do! So I giggled a little bit at myself and shook my head and decided that rather than leap out into a month of imposed deadlines, I would pull back into some work of my own.

So I am taking a blogging rest. I need to get out and live some life so that I will have more to write about. A year ago I went on an amazing journey and met some wonderful women. The months since then have been a whirlwind of good and bad and creative and dry and friendship and loneliness. I decided then that there was a lot I wanted from my life. I think that the anniversary of that trip is a good time to pull focus and get back to the heart of what I want and what I need to do to get there.

Keep me posted on you and know that I will be back in a month. I hope to have an exciting project started and a book nearly finished by the time I return. But until then I will be 'out of the office.' I'll see you when I get back!

33 years.

"A few years back… not so long ago, heaven and earth erupted into a major celebration with the news of your impending adventure into this very time and space. You see, someone like [you] doesn’t come along all that often… in fact, there’s never been a single one like you, nor is there ever ANY possibility that another will come again. You’re an Angel among us. Someone, whose eyes see what no others will EVER see, whose ears hear what no others will EVER hear, and whose perspective and feelings will NEVER, ever be duplicated. Without YOU, the Universe, and ALL THAT IS, would be sadly less than it is." - my birthday wish from the Universe

As this is MY blog I will not feel one eye-ota (I don't know how to spell eye-ota!) guilty about wishing myself a happy birthday!! I am 33 years old today! It's been an interesting year and a lovely day! I woke up to a sweet version of 'Happy Birthday,' had some lovely presents and birthday wishes, spent the day shopping with a friend and had a nice meal out with Mark and friends. I feel ready and willing to walk boldly into my 34th year with gusto! Watch out universe - this year is going to knock your socks off!

sharing some niceness

The more you flow you into existence
The more existence will flow into you
It is always in the same proportion.

Whatsoever you sow, you reap,
And whatsoever you give, you get.

So, if you want to get more energy,
Give more energy.

If you want to get more love,
Give more love.

If you want existence to shower on you
Great torrents of Bliss,
Then make people Blissful
Wherever you go.

-Osho

I've been surfing the web and found the most yummy site! Amazing deliciousness... maybe someday they will deliver to the UK!

(The photograph above was taken near the cottage Mark and I went to with my parents. This stump is usually submerged but the water is so low this year, it was standing on the beach - beautiful!!)

Hope you are having a good week, wherever you are!

xo

hello there!

We're back!!

(We were actually back on the day before yesterday but required some time to re-boot the system before I attempted anything coherent!!)

Canada was wonderful! We managed to see nearly everyone I am related to. (At nearly 100 people, that is no easy feat!) But they were kind enough to have big family reunions while we were home, so it was easy! In fact, I also managed to spend some time with my oldest girlfriends too! Now that I sit here and think about it, I saw A LOT of people over the last two weeks!

When we arrived we stayed over night in Brampton so that we could visit my Oma and our possible wedding venue with my parents the next day. And I am so glad we did because we booked our wedding for next October!!!! (weird!) It's going to be at a conservation area that does sustainable energy education programs. The food is all Canadian and "realistically organic" (heh heh heh) and any profit that they make from us goes straight back into programs at the site. We are keeping our fingers crossed for "sunny and warm" for next October because we hope the ceremony will be outside under the fall colours!

Then we had family reunion number one, and then we went to the Norwood Fair (the second photo of the taffy pulling) with my brother and sister-in-law and our niece (the cuteness in the picture at the top!)
THEN we went to a cottage for the middle week with my parents. It was very rustic, very relaxing and very cold. Both Mark and I went swimming, we all went canoeing, I slept and read in nearly equal amounts, and we ate lots of barbequed food. Despite the body count (one mouse and one worm) it was a great few days!

It's strange to be back here again. Even though the flight was only 8 hours, we were traveling for more than 18. When I walked in, I couldn't rest. I needed to fuss and open the doors and windows and unpack. I always feel like our house shifts a little while we are away - like it begins to slide away from us - and I need to make a little noise and bustle to bring it back to us again. I always feel like things are in a different place from the way I left them. I can't explain it any better than that. I've forced myself up early this morning and it feels like it's all back in focus again now.

Sigh! So that's where I've been. I'm feeling quite jet-lagged still, but excited about our year ahead. On Thursday I turn 33!! In less than two months I will be back again for Christmas. A year from now lots of things are going to be different! When I turned 30, my friend Karen gave me a card that said that 30 was going to be MY year. I didn't believe her. But for some reason that card has been haunting me over the past few weeks. I hear it whispering at me. Yes. You know what? I think that maybe it's THIS year that will be MY year!

So how have YoU been???

Powerful/Canada!

This is going to be a multi-layered post! I am leaving for home this week so I need to make it good!

The prompt this week at Sunday Scribblings is 'powerful.' This is a topic that I have been mulling over an awful lot over the past few weeks. The novel that I have been working on so much has this as one of its underlying themes. It's about female power; about learning to listen to yourself and to get past some of the barriers that a shocking number of women in the western world have up around themselves. It's about where we put that power and what we allow to have power over us.

It's such an intense thing to be thinking about all of the time. A little while ago I decided that I needed to stop writing about all of the ways that I wasn't good enough. I decided to stop writing about all of the ways that I was frustrated and unhappy. Out of that decision came the most productive writing time I have ever had. Writing about power has shone a light into my own perceived lack of it and I have spent some uncomfortable moments realizing what that means.

We are surrounded nearly every moment of every day with the message that we aren't good enough. We aren't thin enough, we aren't rich enough, we don't have enough toys, enough gadgets. We aren't creative enough, we aren't eating the right foods, we aren't using the right products. We are so frightened we have stopped listening to ourselves. We listen to the false internal voices of self-doubt and the mean external voices of discontent. Happy, contented people don't buy lots of things to fill holes and gaps. Frightened, discontented people do. Marketing companies want us to be afraid. They want us to believe we are somehow lacking. They want us to spend money to make up for that perceived lack. They want us to believe that we need their product to make us feel good again. Type 'diet' into Google and you get one hundred and sixty-two million hits. WHAT are we DOING?!

I have a group of dear friends who I think are among the most beautiful women I know. They are creative and beautiful and strong and feisty and fierce. Every single one of them also worries about her weight. Not one of them needs to. If we each took back every ounce of energy that we waste being AFRAID (of being too fat, too thin, not good enough, not strong enough, not lovable, not worthy, not beautiful enough, not creative enough, not, not NOT), things would be different. We could reclaim our power. We could change our lives. We could change our world.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I am leaving for Canada this week! "Oh Canada, [my] home and native land!!" We are going home for two things that aren't happening anymore, but we are doing three different things. We are going to two huge family gatherings and spending the week in between at a cottage on a lake. I am going to lay on the dock and canoe with my parents and play with my niece and hang out with my brother and sister-in-law, and play in the autumn leaves and (hopefully) book a wedding venue (eep!) and relax.

We are kind of dashing home so we won't get a chance to see everyone, but we will be home again at Christmas for longer, so that visit will be better. THIS one is about actually having a holiday - YAHOO!! I've told you before how much I love October! When we get back it'll be my birthday and then my work changes and then before you know it it'll be time to go back again. I miss Canada with all of my heart and soul. It's been 9 months since I was there. I'm very excited to reconnect with my landscape.

I'll see you when we get back! Take care of you!

xo

quickie post!

Hi there - only time for a quick post but this made me laugh out loud.



Have a marvelous Wednesday!

xo