march

march, as a month, was, in a word, muddy.
I did a lot of inhaling this month; taking things in and mulling them over but not necessarily doing anything about them.
I didn't feel terribly creative this month, which disappointed me.  over and over I lamented about my life and its mundane-ness.  I am a person who craves activity (and simultaneously complains about how fried I end up feeling because I am too busy).  I go in spurts.  for a while I will literally be going from one event to the other with no time for overlap and then, suddenly, I will claim exile and retreat into my shell for a bit, rethinking my methods of execution.  I know we all get the same 24 hours, technically.  sometimes I just don't manage mine well.
no surprise.
if my life were a dog breed, I'd definitely come out with heinz 57. 
I wanted to settle on some things, though, so I have been quietly working it out, observing and taking notes along the way.  I'm trying to absorb the truth that I have a pretty good gig here during the day.  I work, yes, and I love it, but not so much that I can't take the time to pursue other artistic interests. 

april is my month to exhale.
slowly
confidently

getaway

You've got one hour to pack up everything important to you and get out of town. What do you pack and where do you go?

ah ... there must be something wrong with me cause this prompt is so up my alley it isn't even funny.  oh for it to be my reality!
don't get me wrong (I say that too much), there are lots of things I am plenty thankful for right where I am, including my job (when it happens) this little town, my house, my cats, my freedom etc but I crave adventure.  there is still so much kid left in me, so many places I want to explore, so many experiences I need to yet have.  the idea of being told I gotta high-tail it out of here would surprise me, for sure,

but.I.could.so.do.it.

leave the furniture cause, let's be honest, it all came from pete's anyway.
take the bose.  precious, precious sound producer.
take the guitars.  if I can only take one for myself, I take martin.  sorry pink lady and art, but that's the truth.
take my top ten books bracelet so if I forget, for some bizarre reason, what my top choices were, I can re-purchase them.  it would be hard to leave my books.  man.

is there a time limit on packing?  I think no.

take my therapy stuff.  all of it.  lots of my fellow therapists travel anyway, without the luxury of an office like mine, so that should work.
take only the clothes I really love.  that doesn't leave much.  I still haven't put together a complete wardrobe in the last two years anyway.  who cares.

take my converse and my flip flops.  all other shoes are inferior.
take my mascara and my moroccan oil.  so addicted.
take my cats.  (one is sleeping with his mouth open.  I hope he doesn't drool.  he also accidentally urinated on my son's backpack last night.  full out gusher.  he better not pee on my stuff)

take my iphone. 

I'm taking quite a lot.  this isn't a desert island, though, where I am necessarily condensing my life into ten items in my pocket.

as for the rest?  I don't know where I'm going, but I sure know where I've been ... 

e-mail

From: Kristina
Sent: May-22-10 1:58 PM
To: Kerrie
Subject: dont ask me how ...

but I ate ¾ of what I think was a bad muffin … now I am washing it down with water and pop rocks.



From: Kerrie
Sent: May 22, 2010 2:04 PM
To: Kristina
Subject: RE: dont ask me how

Did you find it under your bed? Word to the wise: do not eat food that has fallen under your bed. EW. lol



From: Kristina
Sent: May-22-10 2:11 PM
To: Kerrie
Subject: RE: dont ask me how

No no ... it was in a Tupperware bin of other muffins, only somehow an old one was in there, too. I don’t even know how it got there. I was eating it and thinking it tasted different but thought I was just being paranoid, so I kept eating, and I kept thinking that it tasted like bad apple juice or something. I just kept smelling it, crinkling my nose and eating. Then after ¾ of it, I finally said, out loud: “I don’t like this” and threw it out. Then I realized there was one more muffin left in the container and it was a different kind all together and not old.

So I ate it.
Then the idea of water and pop rocks came to me.
The end

 
 
From: Kerrie
Sent: May 22, 2010 2:15 PM
To: Kristina
Subject: RE: dont ask me how

I’m LOL at the fact that you had to talk OUT LOUD to get yourself to stop eating the muffin. HAHA!!!!



From: Kristina
Sent: May-22-10 2:16 PM
To: Kerrie
Subject: RE: dont ask me how

Oh my stars.
I should not be left unsupervised.

conundrums

I honestly wish I was one of those kinds of people who just don't think too hard.  I believe life would be, at least, a mite bit simpler from day to day.  and, no, I am not about to give examples of what I mean for fear that I should come across as judgemental or haughty.  I think it must be the large livingroom windows that do it to me.
well, maybe not, cause in the firehall, though we had large windows, we couldn't stare out of them and just think a while due to the large but very cool antique shutters.  loved those shutters.  ever so glad my friend loves them, too (or at least has been too lazy to change them over for something else).  I smile every time I drive past that home.  I am so completely happy with having lived in it for a short while then passed it on to a beautiful young family.  I love everything they have done to change it into their own.  I do not miss it in the least.  I just don't seem to attach myself to buildings that way I guess.

but I do attach myself to other things I am noticing.  sometimes my attachment can almost be described as ferocious.  lately I have been mulling some ideas around in my wee cranium.  I am interested to see which ones win out and which ones are re-filed, perhaps for future use, perhaps for memory alone.

in any case, here is what my oldest progeny did for "free pizza" this saturday.

he and two school friends entered an engineering competition at the local college.  he told us about it a few months ago, when he first had to sign up.  he failed to mention we had to drive him to the college by 8 am on a saturday until the friday night before. 
unfortunately their project was an epic fail (his words, not mine) but the pizza was good and he knows now, emphatically, that he

• does not want to attend this local college
• does not want to become an engineer
• does not want to only eat two slices of pizza for lunch

1993

I always find it interesting that schools require their graduates to have pictures taken in september.  how do they really know we are all going to graduate the following april?
and would someone actually frame and hang a picture of their graduation if, for some reason, they didn't?

I didn't purchase any pictures so this is the only one from that momentous occasion. 

I have, actually, been challenged on the pride of hanging my degree on the wall.  imagine that.  like I should somehow be mortified that I used my brain for good and not evil.  It didn't rile me up, much, but in response I made sure the person left with the understanding that, yes, I AM very proud of that accomplishment.  It cost me a lot, in more ways than just one.
I will always been extrememely glad I went.
I will always be grateful for every single experience while there.

my graduation itself was anti-climactic.
in fact I didn't even attend the ceremony, though it is always held at the beautiful st. peter's cathedral basilica in london, ontario.
see, I'm allergic to roses (I'm pretty sure), and one of the requirements is that each graduate carries her own dozen (which each graduate is, of course, required to purchase after already having spent thousands of dollars the previous three years).

the cap and gown would have been cool.

definitely four of the best years of my life.

cheer

How do you cheer yourself up?


this is only one way. 
but it's one of my absolute favourites.

I was in the shop for 5.5 hours yesterday, though we didn't spend that whole time tattooing.  we talk, we tattoo, we take washroom breaks, we tattoo some more.  we eat some, drink some, laugh some and tattoo until we are satisfied.  it's bittersweet to arrive at the 'end '.  my tattoo, obviously, still has to heal so the true, intended colours show themselves. 

the shop has a bunch of framed pictures on its walls, and having spent quite a lot of hours in the shop from january to now, I have picked a personal favourite; let me paraphrase:

you will marry and make a woman happy for a while, son, but then she will discover men who are ten times better than you will ever be.  these men are called tattoo artists.

it's ok
neal took a picture of it.

snow

it doesn't matter how hard I try to hate snow ... I just can't. 
I know that this winter has been hard for driving, has been hard for moneymaking due to cancellations and stuff, and hard for nerves at times, but in all honesty, I love all the seasons.
I know spring will come
and summer will follow it, in regular succession, like always.
and in a matter of weeks, I will be splayed out on a beach, soaking up the sun, exempted from regular duties, sharing life with friends.
I love slowly coming to, of a morning, with a smile on my face, knowing there is absolutely nothing on my plate but to follow my heart's desire (within reason of course, as always)
and finding my day filled with sweet surprises.  I got to finish reading the poisonwood bible, got to gobble strawberries, got a little choked up at an unexpected comment, got an unanticipated package in the mail and got to spend some time staring out the window, thinking uninterrupted thoughts.

exercise

used to be one of my favourite sayings was "I row" only because people never believed me, in the first place, or doubted my ability in the second place.
I remember directly being laughed at when I announced my intentions of trying out for the rowing team.
some people just know me far too well.
but I am also my mother's daughter in many respects, and if you tell that woman "you can't", well, you'd better back off baby cause she'll be kicking the dust off her heals faster than you can dial the phone to gossip to the neighbours.

well, as the story goes, I made the team AND we won W.O.S.S.A. for our school, thank you very much.  I think our victory was due, in part, to the fact that most mornings we found ourselves competing for space in axford's gravel pit with voden's senior boy's team and they thought we were irritating little pipsqueaks who ought to be shown a lesson or two.  it was either sink or swim.  I think their invitations to "eat our wake" only served to fuel us on to greatness.  it was unexpected, though.  I must admit that.  so unexpected, in fact, that our own coach failed to enter our team into O.F.F.S.A. because he never in a million years thought we would get that far.  serious dang.

so, after an exercise absence of about 20 years, I decided I had really better start back at fitness.  I bought zumba for the wii.  then I got sick again and felt it was in my best interest to wait it out a bit.  last night I decided enough was enough and I was going to finally make something of myself.  I baited neal, suggesting we try to work out together, which generally translates into me sitting on the loveseat watching him workout while I make suggestions for improvement or try desperately to hide my laughter behind my bony hands.

last night was no exception.

we borrowed a new game from friends and set out all energized.  I made neal go first.  (of course).  you had to do a series of "test" exercises so your current fitness level could be analyzed.  jumping jacks were up.  I think he hit around 30 when he started to fade a bit and claimed his calves were killing him.  I couldn't do it anymore.  I made a sound.  that's when he knew I was laughing at him, from the safety of my seat of love.  he started to laugh, which made jumping jacks look even stupider and utterly impossible to stifle any more snorts.
reality, however, was coming to bite me in the behind.
it was my turn.  I made exactly 25 jumping jacks and 4 girl pushups before I started making up numbers to add to the profile.
then I weighed in.

let's just say that the current level of sedentary activity combined with my new again habit of drinking homo has helped me gain approximately 3 pounds in 13 days.  un.stinking.believable.  it was a great idea when dad casually mentioned he had started drinking the milk again, recently, and found that it was helping him out.  I mentioned it to neal and he thought, sure, what can it hurt?  let's buy some for the boys.
it honestly didn't occur to me that,by having only one kind of milk in the fridge, I was inevitably going to "benefit" too.

good times.

home

Where do you belong? Where in the world is the place that you want to, or do, call Home.

is it ironic that whoever typed this prompt capitalized the word 'home'?  I think so.

this is a subject that comes to my mind from time to time, and I honestly struggle with it very much.  I think my perception of home is different than perhaps it should be ... well, no, because that would be me caring more than I ought to about how other people define the word.  I suppose that what I really mean to say is that I don't often think of where I am as either home or not home, if that makes a lick of sense.  I tried to write a song about it once.  whenever I perform it, I inevitably get 'lost' and struggle to play the best ending. it is my only truly unfinished song yet I am compelled to continue playing it.  strange.

see, last weekend I went to what I can affectionately refer to as 'home', if for no other reason than it happens to be the town I was born in.  but my parents don't live in the same house they did back then.  I am not even entirely sure which house it was, to be honest.  I think it was william house, but I could be wrong.  I have no memory of that place.  I have been inside, though, once.  a friend owned it for a brief period of time.  I toured it, but it meant nothing to me, and why should it?

as a kid, we moved a fair number of times.  all in the same city, mind you, and I only changed schools once as a result, so nothing traumatic for me.  in fact, it was all this moving around that grew under my happy skin and made me love moving and change and starting over.  I get restless easily.  nothing inherently wrong with that, unless you talk to someone who has never moved and then I can see the charm and assurance that can come with that life, too.  not that I would want to trade, just an ability to appreciate the ebb and flow of life and how it differs for everyone.

when I went back 'home' last weekend, it was more about seeing my mom and dad, being in their current house, eating familiar food, having familiar conversation, then having the chance to see some friends I haven't laid eyes on since we graduated high school, 21 years ago.  it was fantastic, surreal, and comforting, like picking up where we last left off, only now we are all grown up ... mostly.

I have said it many times before but I keep coming back to the same phrase whenever I find myself nostalgic, staring out a window, not really thinking, just feeling things.  my heart truly rests in myriad places.  some I may never go to again, though if I have my way, I will revisit each and every one and breathe them in until I feel full again.  what would life be without longing?  I simply cannot imagine mine any other way.

home, to me, is not found in any one place.
home is found when I rest in the presence of the people I love, whether they are present physically or indulged in reminiscence.

home is not necessarily where I am, now.
Home is where I am going.

1992

1988

cupcakes

have I ever told you how insanely happy cupcakes make me?

detecting

 I always thought that if I had to go and do my childhood over again, I should like to become a dancer.  People often assume that is something that I do, because I have arms like a gorilla and legs like a giraffe.  Sadly, the only dancing I do either resembles the mid eighties or comes out as a mean polka. 
I really can polka.  It's perhaps the only thing that hung over from taking gym classes until grade 13.

When I went off to study english and psychology at university, I began to discover an inkling toward art therapy.  I forgot about dancing (not much had changed in styles since I first hit the dance floor and it's not like anyone was going to challenge me on my moves anyway) and moved on to considering what it was going to take for me to become a therapist.

huh.  funny that.

It took many more years than I originally envisioned and my therapy involves only a smattering of art evaluation, though that is part of it, initially, but here I am, 39 and on my way to being a certified educational therapist.  Maybe I didn't stray too far off the beaten path after all.

Until this weekend, when I tried on the detective hat.  Let me just say that I will not be quitting my day job any time soon.  That's all I am going to say on that topic.

40

this is the year all the cool cats I went to school with turn 40. 
this is the year I am in denial.
this is also the year that I apparently look more like I'm going to lick the camera while the others stick their tongues out at it.
... never the brightest bulb I tell you

nervous

I am not sure I ever remember being so nerve-filled in my life but on this night I honestly expected to pass out cold any minute ... for all 22 songs.

here for your listening pleasure is a recording of my opening song.  Jewel's You Were Meant For Me

word

I dig words like:

penchant
 catharsis
enigma
 aesthetically
perchance
 quixotic and
succor

but I believe my current favourite word is inane.
I remember reading something this very week where the author used the word and was, initially, offended almost ...
I honestly thought "that is my word ... wow!"
this morning I even spent time searching things I have read thus far in the week, hoping to stumble upon the piece I read it used in but to no avail.

I got over it, because, really, it's kind of inane.

memory

Do you have a good memory for some things and not others?

um, yah ... there's the rub.

fear

I read a favourite blog of mine today that really spoke volumes to me.  I struggle with perfectionism in some areas of my life big time.  but I like what he said, in his post, let me paraphrase ... 90% perfect and out there is way better than 100% perfect but still in your head.

so the question today was: what's one thing that scares you right now, and why should you make a real effort to face that fear and do it anyway?

there are actually a lot of things that scare me right now, but there was one thing I decided to just go ahead and do, already, last weekend, and that was to play my guitar and sing in front of an audience for more than just two songs.

in fact, I performed 22 songs, some covers, some covers of covers that I composed, and some originals.
I felt sick with nerves the whole stinking time but I did it.
and the author of that blog I like was right ... doing the thing that you are passionate about is always better than just thinking about doing the thing ... even if it means that you only get A- on delivery.  how can anyone tell you how what you did made them feel if it always stays stuck in your head?  how can someone tell you, heaven forbid, that they may even have enjoyed what you did if you never share it?

and lately I've been thinking I might even be brave enough to try it again.

wordless weekend

wordless weekend

guilty

What's your favorite thing you love to waste time with right now? A guilty pleasure.

I love these prompts because they take my mind off what I'm really thinking about and help me focus on something inane and smile-inducing.  I tend to be a little on the intense side too much.

so, it's a toss-up for sure.
two favourite things I love to waste time with, right now, in this phase of life:

my iphone
my large barrel curling iron that I borrowed from lindsay

sadly, even after much experience, I am still lacking talent in both texting messages that are spelled correctly and make sense AND using the weird handle thingy on the curling iron thus requiring visits to lindsay to have my hair look like I'm not still in the 80's.

I also am having a difficult time believing it just took me the whole length of 13 Going on 30 to attempt a curled head and I ended up with a mix between farah fawcett and poison.

home

How far away do you currently live from where you were born? How did you get there?

currently I only live about an hour from where I was born.  not too far, really, all things considered.  I am pretty sure I have moved no less than 20 times in my 39 years.  some places I lived at for a short time, some on more than one occasion, but I only counted those places once.  I wish I lived somewhere with a lot more culture and some hills and closer proximity to water thrown in for good measure.  some days it really just bugs me how flat and white this part of ontario can be. 

i asked neal the other day: " if it suddenly decided to snow all the time, like perpetual winter, would you consider moving?"  yes ... I bother him with questions like that all.the.time.

he answered "yes" and not just to placate me, either.  I could tell he meant it.  and I was relieved.  at least I know what my evasive maneuver would be in that nearly apocalyptic scenario.

as to how we got "here"?  well, work.  work has a way of enticing you to stay put so you can buy things like bread and milk and cheese and pay for bills like iPhones and internets and tattoos. neal has a ton of family around here, too, and it seemed like a good idea to try and spend time with them.  that was the intention, anyway.  not so sure about the reality.

I still talk about moving all the time, though.  I think it's just in my blood, and I really like change.

"I was born very far away from where I am supposed to be, so I'm on my way home." Bob Dylan

milestone

yesterday Jonam took the test for his G1 license and passed.

wow. 

not that I am surprised that he passed, just that, well, he is old enough to be writing it in the first place.  I swear it was just a few years ago that I found out I was pregnant, and yet so many days have been lived since then. 
I got a little choked up, cause I'm like that.  I was so proud.

and so it begins ...

catharsis

sometimes I am struck hard with the thought that I neither know what it is I really want or even need.
and, like neal reminded me late last night, it's ok to cry
even when you don't understand your emotions

or why