living life Archives - Page 7 of 22 -

Looking Into My Crystal Ball

October 28, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

Evidently I’m somewhat psychic.

My mom has been sorting through stuff and has come across years’ worth of childhood memories. She scanned and sent me this one, because aside from the incredible colouring job (I stayed inside the lines, people!) it’s pretty accurate.

“When I grow up I will go and live in Calgary, Alberta. I will be a teacher and have one dog and a camper. I will have a big house and a big backyard. I will get married and have children. And I will have a pool with a diving board and a slide and we will get a computer. The End.”

Impressive, right? I was born in Calgary, but I have no idea why my elementary-school-aged self thought I would move back here. But she was right. And I’m married and have children and one dog (and a computer, obviously). I’m not a teacher (don’t have the patience for it) and I don’t have a camper (although I wouldn’t say no since that would mean slightly more civilized camping). We have a house with a backyard, and I’m sure my youthful self would have thought them both the stuff (and size) of dreams. No pool though, unless you count the inflatable one that still hangs over our deck.

But who knows? With this much accuracy, who’s to say the rest isn’t still my destiny?

The crystal ball has spoken.

Filed Under: Randomness · Tagged With: living life

Pride and Potential

October 19, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

Honour your children, they suggested. Share how they make you proud.

Easy peasy, as Connor likes to say. (He stole my expression.)

He’s always up for anything involving construction paper and crayons.

“What are you good at?” I asked.

He didn’t hesitate in his answer.

I’m good at building LEGO.

He’s so good at LEGO it actually freaks me out a little bit. He’s going to be smarter than I am. He might be already. He’s good at a lot of things, but the confidence he gets from LEGO is a joy to see. He can do it well and he knows it. And I’m glad he knows it.

“What else are you good at?”

I thought his answer might be painting. (“I have paint all over my hands because I’m an artist like my dad,” he told me the other day.) Or baking. There are lots of things he could have chosen.

I’m good at cleaning up my toys.

But he chose this. It’s his job and he does it (though he occasionally complains about it, and fair enough). But he does a darn good job of cleaning up his toys.

“What’s something about you that makes you really nice?” Last question.

I help you change the baby.

He thought for a split second. Helping change the baby is not just something he likes to do, it’s something he does because he wants to be helpful. And I so admire that about him. He’s a really good big brother.

And then there’s the baby. What to say about the one I’ve only known for a couple of weeks but who has changed my worldview? If life is made up of a series of steps along a path leading us to who we are meant to be, he is a significant one in mine. In him lies so much potential.

I’m brand new and full of potential.

Both for him and for me.

Filed Under: Happy things, Hello, Inspiration, Motherhood · Tagged With: family, gratitude, hope, living life, my wish for you, photos, The

Eight Years

August 28, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

One year ago I was closing doors behind me. I had returned to work after being on leave, had ditched some of the hard-core medication and figured life was returning to normal.

Except there’s no such thing as normal, which I now know and, I think, am better able to accept.

When life spins you around, the path ahead looks different. Even if you end up pointed in the same direction, things are not as they once were.

I thought I would just carry on as before, except that under all those layers of trying to find normal I knew it wasn’t going to work like that. And it didn’t. Instead of carrying on with my job, I quit. We sold our house and moved to another city, another province. I think maybe there was a part of me that thought it would be like sweeping the debris off the path of my past and starting anew.

But that’s not how it works.

After loving the change at first I went through a phase where I felt lost. It seemed as though I had lost not only the stuff in my past but the whole of me. And in that situation, it doesn’t matter which way on the path you’re facing. The road ahead simply looks unnavigable.

Now, though, the road is clear. Or maybe it’s my ability to see it that has improved.

So here I sit, three weeks away from being done with work again as I prepare to go on mat leave for a year. Seven weeks away from my due date with a second child I at one point thought wasn’t meant to be. And eight years from one of the most important days in my life.

Except that important day is in my past.

Eight years ago today I stood up in front of family and friends and cried as I married the man I loved.

At the time I had a very “first comes love” view of what it meant to be getting married and planning a family. We’d carry on, I imagined, simply doing the things we liked to do, eventually adding a kid or two into the mix.

But that’s not how it works.

And in a way I’m glad it’s not. Because if life really was just “first comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in a baby carriage” I think that would be awfully boring.

Today we’ve been married for eight years. And one thing is for sure – none of it has been boring.

Linked up with Pour Your Heart Out.

Filed Under: Happy things · Tagged With: family, gratitude, living life, meds

Finding Inspiration in Athletes

July 31, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

I know, I’ve been a little slack with the posting lately. I blame it on the weather – it makes Hector hot and that makes me tired so I’ve been flopping on my bed in front of a fan in the evenings. Cooler weather is coming soon, right?

The only time I wish we had a TV in our bedroom is when the Olympics are on. But it’s probably good that we don’t because I would stay up way too late watching. I love watching swimming, am awed by what the gymnasts can do, and could watch the synchro divers on endless repeat. Incredible.

I now have the teeny tiniest idea of what these athletes go through to train for something like this. Except not really, because how could you know what it’s like unless you’ve done it? The closest I came was in university when I got all worked up after the 1994 Commonwealth Games, which my hometown hosted, and ended up trying out for the university crew. Rowing? Why couldn’t I have picked something slightly easier? But it was an incredible year and it showed me what I could do if I pushed myself hard enough.

I’m sharing that story on Just.Be.Enough today. Come visit and tell me how you’ve pushed yourself past what you thought were your limits.

Comments here closed. Talk to me there!

Filed Under: Hello, Inspiration · Tagged With: living life

Building Beautiful

July 17, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

This post is part of YummyMummyClub.ca‘s support of the Dove® Celebrate Mom Contest. I received compensation as a thank you for my participation. This post reflects my personal opinion about the information provided by the sponsors.

She is beautiful and I think now she knows it.

It’s not because she’s beautiful naturally, though she is.

It’s not because people tell her she is, though they do.

And it’s not because she’s magazine-cover perfect, because no one is. Not even cover girls.

It’s because she started building her beauty from the inside. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Better world, Happy things, Hello, Inspiration, Stuff I like · Tagged With: living life, spreading the love