evening ritual.

this sleeping bag with armholes that some may refer to as a coat never seems to properly protect from any vicious element. scuttle home without any sort of soundtrack save the shuffle of  breaking boots and the whish of endless traffic on quinpool. wonder aloud why the shit there are only, like, two proper crosswalks for the entire street…except for that bit down by planet organic. those guys get all of the crosswalks. lucky.

scream in terror as a cab driver wheels a white 1993 ford taurus gently into your shin. skinny jeans offer poor protection against irresponsible driving. throw violent finger signals and flail arms rapidly and without any discernible direction so as to imply true insult. you could have killed me, man! if i look both ways, you should do the same. think about putting that on a t-shirt. lose that thought after thinking about having been almost murdered by an almost-twenty-year-old shitty ford. what a way to go. good thing yer not gone yet, dummy, ‘cuz there are kitties at home waiting for yer treats.

trip up five out out thirty steps on the way inside of the ugliest little apartment ever. god, it’s dark, okay? stairs are hard for a clumsy bean. ponder one of them narrrsty menthol cigarettes dangling out of last nights’ pocket. have a weak moment and squat with the green blanket on the front stoop. huff and puff and houses will fall. strangers look up, say hello, some smile, some sing to themselves and some have awesome dogs. and you, fine lady, are a soaked, smoking, teeth-grinding stress machine. coooool out.

contemplate cookery and pass on that business for an apple, some cheese sticks, a handful of olives and, if you’re lucky, whatever’s left in that pringles can. ensure more feline face-stomps. they’re never-ending and that’s okay. give the babies soft-worded terms of endearment and pretend like they’re gripped by every coo and caa when really, truly, they know that you’re the human with the treats so givem up, sister. give in and give up and make those cats fat. find bliss in their hyper happy-jumps that always follow treat time. lone bean and two little baby jumping beans. a sweet and strange family.

swap between the news and reddit and facebook and get sick of yourself and end up googling ‘transactional analysis’ for a hoot. turns out it’s not much of a hoot, so change into something more spandex for a stretchy not-run. procrastinate for an hour with a little more news and a lot more reddit and looking up old favorite songs from the 90s on youtube. while the cranberries bray out a gutteral ‘do you have to make it ling-gerrrrr?’, ponder applying to teach overseas. begin application forms and make an ad on kijiji for someone, somewhere, to please learn you up on how to speak arabic fo’ cheap. get distracted by more terrible awesome songs of the 90s. find magical motivation to go outside.

fall down ten out of thirty stairs. they’re still hard but there’s no other option save for laughing it off now. hobble on the good ankle and wander wander wander and two hours later you’re home and you’ve thought about everything and nothing and wintersleep kept you company just like they always have. and your life is truly, in this moment, a slow-moving trainwreck but it’s actually the happiest you’ve ever been so you grin like an idiot for another hour until sleep slowly swallows you and colours your world a warm pink for a few peaceful hours.

apocalypse now.

perhaps you have heard that the world is potentially ending on december 21st? mayan calendar, something about a 5000+ year cycle, maybe zombies, maybe God is real, maybe doomsday…it’s all pretty frightening and harsh. not getting a whole lot of positive vibrations from the days to come. it’s a lot of pressure, is it not? ponder: if the world literally ends, what are you going to do with your remaining days of life? who do you want to spend time with, if anybody, and what sorts of items are on your to-do list?

it’s kind of morose and morbid and fun all at the same time to play the ‘here’s a bunch of insane things i want to do before i die’ game. sitting and really thinking about the most truthful and raw wishes lurking in the deeps of my guts can be a ferociously scary but oddly comforting experience. in one sense, i feel super nervous and anxious about all of the life i haven’t lived yet, or feel scared for the end of life, or feel frightened by the actual urges for experiences i have. but it’s so amazing to me that we’ve all got these quirky secrets and unrealized desires no matter how impossible or kitschy or ridiculous.

while i don’t actually believe the world is ending next week, i’ve composed a list of the 21 things i’d like to try out before we (poof!) end. the timing is realistic, is it not? nine days for self-actualization and pure satisfaction? seems doable. what was less than doable was trying to narrow down this list into something not endless. i feel like i’ll just add to this list every day until i really do kick the bucket. i tried to keep it simple, but it isn’t. i don’t feel that thinking about how you really want to live your life is ever simple.

commence:

1. donate a kidney/bone marrow/a lung/give blood. i can live on one kidney or one lung and i can live with pain and discomfort. someone else isn’t about to live much longer if they don’t find a match for their biological needs. if the end of the world really is coming, shouldn’t as many people as possible be helped through to the bitter finale?

2. learn how to properly use chopsticks. i can’t, guys. it’s embarrassing.

3. go to iceland. learn to read their road signs. take in some hot springs and volcanoes. sing what i can make out of a sigur ros song into a stranger’s cellar.

4. teach just one last high school english class. get a few laughs and a few cries in. hopefully someone thinks about what they’d like their last spoken, written, heard and read words to be.

5. hug and kiss everyone i know. make a backpack that’s cat-friendly so jig and lemmi are always with me for kisses and hugs.

6. cheese up the courage to dance alone, in public, to spoon’s ‘i turn my camera on’ (see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ro95Ns58qSE). i’ve always wanted a soundtrack.

7. convince a few more unfamiliar souls that ‘rootin’ for a bootin’ is the maritimer’s equivalent to ‘cruisin’ for a bruisin’.

8. stereotypical wildchild deeds: jump safely from a high bridge. canyon dive (again). fly a plane! fly a kite (not wild, but still fun). swim for a really, really long time. maybe do some weird drugs? but probably not. i’d like to actually feel my last days of life. so no. i change my mind.

9. go to north sydney and smell the house and my old room and just be quiet with the family. write them something truthful about all of their wonders as supporters and friends and parents and siblings and beautiful people overall. apologize profusely for every selfish thing i’ve ever done. sing songs to pusscat, but only because she likes when i do that.

10. see chromeo play and dance really violently. (see also: http:// http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XCcWlgVqHA). or maybe die antwoord. but that could be uncomfortable. i don’t know.

11. get chuck palahniuk and jonathan safran foer in a room together with endless coffee, snacks and wine. ask them one million and one-half questions about themselves and their brains and books and have a recorder there so i can enjoy myself, too, and not have to scribble everything down. maybe they’d like to spend one of their last days on earth with a lone bean? haaaa.

12. hold a bunch of babies and squeeze their adorable cheeks and hope that maybe, if there’s some kind of cruel cyclical demonic-doer in charge of the apocalypse, that he or she saves the beebees and a few responsible folks to raise them and keep them sweet. but then i guess that’s not a proper apocalypse?

13. go camping in bumcrud nowhere ohio for a little while. bonfires aplenty.

14. rewind time and re-see the highlands in the fall for the twentieth time. eat chowder on the rocks in cheticamp. get salty.

15. read every book on my bookshelf and trapped in my kindle that i’ve been putting off or avoiding for too long. magically absorb every word and never forget any of them.

16. sing something publicly. with a crowd. and magically and amazingly be okay at it? just once?

17. hold amazon jardine’s hand and maybe figure out what this reiki business is all about.

18. skinny dip in fiji! a quick dip trip.

19. see every last one of my girlfriends. relive every memory and laugh about old, foolish jokes and even more foolish decisions. some of us were little babies together and i don’t want to be alone and old and nearly dead if you aren’t near me in my last days. andddd now i’m sobbing. christmas, come soon.

20. learn to drive a car somewhere completely ridiculous…like bangladesh! i hear the driving there is a lot scary. where better to finally bite the big one and be done with it?

21. slowly eat a small pile of clementines or satsumas, while listening to some kind of magically-perfect favorite songs playlist, while having someone read ‘the prophet’ to me, while kitties crawl all over me for snuggles, while also wearing fuzzy knee socks, while also smelling wood chips, while also sipping superdupercold pink lemonade, while also drawing something somehow meaningful, while also covered in blankets, while also somehow inside of some kind of impossible room where everyone i love is there too, while also smiling.

so if today’s december 13th, i’ve got not too much time and a pretty hefty to-do list. if any of my partial do-before-i-die-list resounds with you, let me know! we’ve got some work to do.

timing.

*i wrote this on a bus, spinning from too much of what turned out to be expired cold medicine (thanks, mom!). it’s not supposed to sound preachy. i don’t know if i really feel strongly about anything i scribbled down, but i think it’s sort-of interesting and sad. so i’m publishing it because i can and i do what i wan’.

time has and has not been on my side. what a goddamn neutral, uncommitted statement. i’m truuuly imparting some knowledge on the whole wide world, yeah? i’m talk-writing to myself. isn’t that what everyone who ever writes anything down does? i will take solace.

it does blow my mind, though. say what you will about serendipity and fate and/or luck and it’s all well and fair if your dreams are made and met without your having meant them to. and maybe it’s not so much that it’s about whether or not you really tried to do a particular thing or meet a special person because maybe you tried so hard that your hands blistered and the blood vessels in your nose burst. maybe for years you were the yearningest! yearnest hemingpray. but all of a sudden, serendipity strikes (define serendipity as a freak instance of finding something good otherwise un-looked-for) and somewhat wonderful things or people or who cares it’s something good presents itself to you and the universe nods to you and says “please, small being, enjoy this: a gift.” and you take it because you’ve never been the rude type to stick your nose up at an uninvited offering of Wellness. you were raised right and nature would have it, too, that you’re open. and serendipity is generous and thrilling, most welcome and beautiful. maybe serendipity is a beacon of hope and light in a dark, broke and butt-hurt time. something crazy happened for you to see and experience and feel so you do it because you can’t say no to serendipity otherwise it wouldn’t be called that.

and just as luck/s-dip (yes.) would have it, this situation or opportunity or relationship or connection is ripe and juicy and just waiting for your personal touch and your choices to set it in motion. these are some of life’s most incredible, most awesome times! i don’t believe in God or a god, specifically, but it’s so, so cool to me that there are inexplicably precious spasms of great timing and complimentary ideals coming together.

but serendipity doesn’t really make space for what makes people interesting and complex. it seems like once we expose our malaise and variety store of emotional conditions and bad habits, the dust settles and hearts explode and what felt so goddamn amazing and enthralling and maybe inspiring melts into something sad, then maybe normal, and then perhaps mundane. or upsetting? magical happenings of timeliness and joy can’t tell us or teach us to be wise or safe or even thoughtful before words start spewing out of our throatholes.

so you have your amazing opportunity sitting in your lap, or on the other end of the phone line, or blazing in front of you in blinding neon, or laying next to you as a comfortable nook and representation of home. you dive in or dig in or kiss in or move around or hold on or do as that situation begs you to do because you’re here and now and so is this incredible moment and since you’re here you might as well think it’s yours, special person! so you drink it down, chew it up, and maybe there are some bits that you’ve forgotten to fully masticate. there are some chunks that trundled down your ingrate neck and sit, volatile and dense in your belly. you didn’t appreciate all that was given to you, greedy guts, and you simply took without thinking or thanking or even asking.

time is generous and allows for healing and grief and growth but time isn’t on your side in serendipitous events. rather, the expectation is that you’ll be fully aware of your inexplicable luck and will cherish it so thoroughly that it would be impossible for you to just consume it without cleansing your palate between bites.

so you’ve been given a gift. and you took it. and you’re living through it and with it. and you forgot to think about it and thank it and feel out the best response to the generosity of the universe. should you be so surprised to find yourself sagging with heavy lungs on sunday night?

werk it.

it’s funny how employment can so easily and fully leak into free time and personalities previously intrigued, but perhaps otherwise untouched by current work-related items and interests. as someone who wishes to devote her life to educating and guiding youth to be their most-realistic and healthiest best (wording?), i’m quick to raise my hand and say that i’m someone who absolutely allows work to bleed into ‘free’ time. it’s pretty remarkable, in terms of physical time, how teachers commit most of their waking and worrying lives to benefit their students and colleagues. what’s less remarkable is knowing that teachers really do spend the majority of their time planning to and thinking about their students, their schools and their lesson plans (sidenote: i have no statistics to prove my words. instead, just take a stroll into the nearest school staff room. look.) while i don’t know any teachers who get to truly unwind and escape their career choice on the regular, i do know that there’ve got to be a great many teachers who are amazing at what they do and somehow find time to do, when they’re off, whatever the hell they want to.

what i’ve noticed by working outside of the education system is that expectations of time and effort spent at and on work are pretty similar to those expectations of teachers. as a restaurant manager, unglamourous as it is, i’m expected to have my phone on, loudly, and as close to my hands as humanly possible at all times. when i’m not inside of the restaurant, i get paid to think about it at home, or at the grocery store, or even in my yoga class. i dream of cheesecake and i sometimes brush into traffic thinking of sandwich pricing and staff one-on-ones. 7am brings with it immediate stress and teeth-grinding as i’ve magically received ten e-mails and a scathing voice message overnight. complete strangers know my cell phone number and schedule. and not only that, as i meet more and more people related to and around my workplace, i see that they’re taking on similar roles and stressors within their respective careers.

clearly, i can’t speak for everyone. i wish deeply to know that there’s a cardiac surgeon, somewhere, who likes to come home to whatever it is she likes to do as a person outside of work and does whatever it is she wants to do whilst not in scrubs and whites. but that seems so far-fetched and ridiculous to me. study well into your adult years, learn to save humans from death and disease and go home to jazz, treats and maybe some bad television post day-long surgery? it’s weird. and i’m not at all saying that surgeons are less or more entitled to free time than anyone else. i’m not suggesting that anyone should feel more entitled to free time away from what we get paid to do than any other working person. but doesn’t it seem so…adult…to be constantly wrapped in what happens during our scheduled or on-calls or dedicated hours of living? is work all we really have to live for?

there’s something to be said here of passion. i’d feel more than overjoyed to devote my every waking breath to helping students and families learn and grow together. i’d feel more than satisfied to do it for the rest of my life, but that’s because i truly feel passionate about literacy and writing skills and imagination and combined mental/emotional growth through the written word. and i think it’s safe to assume that a self-made businessperson is probably hot and heavy with their respective field. and the cardiac surgeon. and the writers. and the judges and bloggers and joggers and banana-stand vendors. i don’t know.

but what about those of us who work tirelessly away at a career  we may not have planned for and take on the pressure of its flaws and successes and everything in-between? what of everyone who is disinterested/uninvested/depressed/terrified/inexperienced/vulnerable/naive/etc. with and at their place of work? why do so many people, who aren’t necessarily passionate about their fields, devote their every waking moment (and some sleeping moments, too) to what it is they do to financially support the things and people they truly love? maybe i’m just growing up (pssh.) but there seems to be something deeply unsettling and constantly common amongst those young (and old) professionals i keep bumping into. i can’t say i know for sure that anyone other than myself is completely clueless or unprepared for their line of work…but i’m confident speaking for myself when i say that i don’t think i envisioned this, ever, and that’s okay, but it’s also not.

it dawned on me when i started overanalyzing (everything) something i hear, literally, every day at work: it has something to do with my size, and something to do with the product i sell. essentially, every third business contact can’t help but make a joke or remark pertaining to my body versus the fatty cheesecakes i represent. one might guess that these allies are simply trying to break the ice with me. maybe they think they’re funny or original by weaving weight into a conversation about food. maybe, logically, it’s something people think we should touch on as a desserterie. maybe i’m overly sensitive and quickly offended simply because i’m an irritable mothalova. despite my million hesistations, it seems pretty unprofessional to brush on my body when talking about my work. amirite?

cool fact: i’m not 100% satisfied with my body. i’m happy that it moves me from one place to another and that its health is overall good. it could use some fine-tuning and a lot of strengthening (see last post) and i, like i’m sure most people do, have some pretty major hang-ups about parts of my physicality. i might not be a ‘normal’ person (i’m not. i won’t ever be) but my self-consciousness is normal and sadly, for most women, it’s normal for them, too. if we’re bred and raised to want to paint and alter and dress up our bodies for the sake of being as attractive as possible by definition of someone who probably doesn’t think or live like we do, how could it not be normal (albeit super not okay) to hate parts of ourselves?

anyway, businessperson 1 says to me: ‘how do you stay so thin around all of this day in and day out?’. businessperson 2 says: ‘oh! you’re little!’ and businessperson 3 says: ‘if i was you i’d be a fat pig by now. you’d have to tape my mouth shut’. and so on.

i don’t see myself as ‘little’ or ‘skinny’ or anything along those lines. i look at myself as jenna. i’m allowed to change sometimes and grow and expand and shrink and flex and move endlessly after a few drinks of rum. i like to treat myself but i try to get a healthy meal in at least twice a day and i go to the gym for the sake of creating a healthier mindset about being healthy overall, if that makes any sense. the only people i really talk ‘size’ with are my roommate and my former partner. generally i feel super uncomfortable discussing my dress and physical size with anyone, because i don’t feel that my physicality contributes to who i am or what i know or how i interact with people. i’m also really uncomfortable discussing size with other people, because while it may attract me to a person initially, it has little to do with how i feel about a person as a whole. and i think that, especially in a work environment, referring to someone’s devotion to their job based on their waistline is forever unwelcome.

again with the overanalyzing: not only am i left feeling icky and sweaty after a contact refers to me by size, but i also tend to panic because i then worry that they feel as if i’m not invested in the food i make and offer. and then i fall into a deep well of cold worry that i’m not promoting this business well enough overall. i’m not ridiculous: i don’t plan on overeating my way to making contacts truly believe, thanks to my weight, that i eat the treats here, but i do worry that i come off as disinterested overall, which leads me to trudge home and work about three hours before finally retiring to a twitchy sleep. then, when it comes to reconnecting with whatever businessface told me i could use a honkin’ hunk of burning cake, i feel like i can’t be taken seriously. it’s hard enough being young, female and with a fairly quiet voice amongst a shitton of loud, big-feeling men. it’s challenging in many positive ways and not everyone treats me like a little baby sister. but a grand chunk of new connections make me feel like i should trade my wedges for booties and my phone for a rattle. others make it clear that the only way of cutting through to them is to be vivacious/flirtatious…which is another bag of hammers, and meant for another post, another day.

i’m going to cut myself off here and say that i feel like there’s a lot of us who aren’t married to work emotionally or mentally but do so in terms of time and effort anyway. and rather than pick on each others’ age, inexperience, bodies and other unrelated what-have-yous, we should be supportive of each other, passionate, devoted or no.

fin.

cardio ham.

been takin’ my health real serious and shit lately. for real. learned what my “lats” were and where i might like to find a set of cool triceps someday. it’s a personal goal to torch through my many goopy layers of thigh wobble to find the lean muscle machine beneath. went out and spent pools of cash on tight, crotch-harassing pants and duct-tape tight sports bras so as to properly condition my inner health beast.

just kidding guys. i’m too dainty and delicate for that business. and spending lots of money on fabrics to sweat in never made much sense to me, though i can appreciate a flattering pair of leggings. anyway, i’ve decided that it’s time i start finding exciting ways to exercise so that i can 1. lift the dish tray at work without grunting, 2. run fast in case i ever really need to, and 3. have good habits as a younger adult so that when i’m an older adult, my body will be sturdier and healthier.

this has been a really challenging experience overall. i have no patience, ever, and am bored easily by monotonous, repetitive tasks and motions. i also feel the need to find the perrrrfect music ever to move to, but then my inner retired dancer gets distracted by the music and starts putting imaginary choreography to whatever song finally feels right. maybe dancing is what spoiled me in terms of becoming a dedicated worker-outer. it is so amazing and thrilling and challenging and satisfying for an instructor to think up something beautiful and help guide your body to make it happen. i wasn’t the best dancer ever, but i committed myself gladly and whole-heartedly to dance. dance lessons are motherloving expensive so i’ve got to dance on my own lonely time and find other ways to keep the limbs limber.

so i go to the ymca and i love it. the hallways smell putrid most of the time but if you can get past that and the turbo-creeps that lurk in the basement past 3pm, yer golden. it’s got a pretty sweet community vibe to it. it’s got a pool and it’s never too busy for me to feel choked-up from the discomfort of sweating around strangers. it has free towels for after your terribly awkward and exposed shower (yep) and it’s got coffee made in the locker room in the morning. supercute. it also has a pretty interesting mix of group fitness classes that are included in the price of your gym membership (for more information, please see ymcahrm.ns.ca). after a few boring hours of slugging my own way through bean’s magical mystery workouts, i was so terribly bored with myself…and also painfully embarrassed at having to read the instructions/take serious note of the diagrams on every piece of equipment. i looked through the group fitness schedule and settled on trying african dance. i think it was a tuesday.

i showed up feeling suuuuuper uncomfortable because i am an anxious and self-conscious person. i’m also awkward when wearing sneakers. it just doesn’t feel right. anyway. african dance is cancelled because the instructor is no longer available, so i was thrown into a zumba class instead.

zumba is a word that used to make me think of high-cut neon bodysuits and those crazy pink nike sneakers i see the kids wearing these days. i don’t know why zumba gave my mind an eighties jazzercise vibe, but c’est ca. the people who were in the zumba class with me were all over the map in age, ability and outfit. as the gym filled up, i didn’t feel like such a lonely soul and even made small talk with two people (!). the music didn’t thrill me, and it wasn’t too challenging of a workout, but it was fun and i was laughing at myself non-stop the entire time. especially when i had to do punches. ha!

zumba may or may not be for me. i’ll probably go again, as my stomach hurt the next day from all of the giggling i accomplished in-class. thinking i’m now some cardiovascular hot-shot for finishing one little zumba class, the following week i threw myself into the ‘cardio jam’ time slot, thinking that title ‘cardio jam’ meant the workout would be soft and lame like its title. got foiled. i left the workout session five minutes early when the instructor gleefully reported that it was time for abs. the cardio jam instructor was so nice and upbeat and positive-energy-type awesome. but i hated her for making me do the million squats and for the endless jumping jacks and those really terrible leg kicks. every time she encouraged the class with something along the lines of ‘WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO YOU CAN DO THIS! PUSH HARDER!  THERE YOU GO!” i was a grumbly, hopping mess of ‘fuckyouladyyoudon’tknowmethisshitishardandwhodoyouthinkyouarebodybreak?’. the lesson left me feeling purple, red and sticky. it also made me recognize that i am not a very physically strong person despite the lies i’ve been telling myself. and also that i should probably go back if i want to get any better as bouncing for 60 minutes. so i’ll go back.

but one of the nice women i met at cardio jam suggested i try out the monday night ‘aerobic groove’ (i looove the lame-o titles for the classes. what else would you call them? they’re perfect) because it’s ‘challenging’ and ‘really makes you sweat’. these were her words and certainly not mine. after having nearly collapsed at tonight’s aerobic torture, i will replace ‘challenging’ with ‘impossible’ and ‘really makes you sweat’ with ‘you will literally be a river’. the instructor even had a neat britney spears-type microphone strapped to her fit, little head. but she wasn’t nearly as supportive as the cardio jam instructor. this woman was a mean machine. she literally did not stop jumping or punching. while she did state that if we felt woozy or sore or whatever ails you blahblah you can compromise and just stomp in place for a minute until you can get your shit together. HOWEVER every time i found myself doubled-over and stomping, she’d be all,”WHY ARE YOU STOPPING? THIS IS GOOD FOR YOU. KEEP MOVING FOREVER AND EVER”. it was crazy! and there was still a pretty mixed class in terms of age and ability, but i was clearly having the most difficult time breathing and moving simultaneously. mortified, out of breath and feeling like lying down in the middle of the floor to ‘save’ the others probably isn’t a fair option, i glued myself to an elliptical for the remaining 20 minutes of the class. i then stayed on the elliptical long after i knew the class was over for fear of making eye contact with turbo-torch instructor-bot.

naturally my fear came to life when, at 6:50, as i plodded clumsily up the stairs and into the change room, our eyes locked. she saw me. she felt my fear and she spat it back out of her own eyes into a puddle of shame and irresponsibility which i then had to bathe in. it was actually a lot less dramatic, but i panic when potential confrontation is coming.

i might go back to a few group fitness classes. i don’t think i’ve found the right one for me yet. it could be that i really don’t respond well to getting yelled at (or, i’m a child) or it could be that i’m simply not physically strong enough yet to keep up. either way, i’m pretty sure i felt a tricep today while cleaning the kitchen floor, so things are coming together nicely.