Where the Heart Is
Sweet anticipation perfumes the air today, my daughter is coming home. I’ve stocked the fridge with her favourite things, her sheets are clean, her room is tidy. It’s this moment of tender expectation—her arrival, our reunion—that brings me such pleasure. I want to...
What is it Good For?
Outside the Russian embassy, across the street from where my only child lives, mayhem. Over two hundred protestors, red paint and anger, demands and outrage. Outside the Russian embassy in this Canadian city, outside the Russian embassies in all Canadian cities, and...
Resolving Doors
The chickadees peep relentlessly, a reminder to put out more birdseed. It’s been a hard cold fortnight, how they have managed to survive is a wonder. How our ancestors survived long prairie winters is a wonder. It’s warmer now, only -15 and I imagine going for a quick...
Unfinished Business
I’m writing this on a blustery morning, the springtime sun is obscured by cloud. This past weekend, with the help of my friend the Plant Whisperer Audrey, I finished the garden. We dug new soil and compost, peat, and worm castings into the earth; planted the last of...
Moment by Moment
Hi. Are you okay? The world is changing so quickly, and yet time has slowed right down. A day seems like a week and a week, a month. All we have is this moment, now brought sharply into focus. Which, of course, is all we have ever really had. This moment: Over in the...
The Truth at Seventeen
The thrift store find last month: six vintage Seventeen Magazines from 1974. Right now, they are eating up a substantial chunk of desk space, large format, full colour editorial and advertisements; timeless teen content that predates the internet by a generation. The...
To the Single Mom at Christmas
You are enough. You have enough. You do enough. This can feel like the ultimate Noah’s Arc time - two by two couples march through the season, decking the halls and checking lists twice, conspiring over boozy eggnog for the perfect gifts for their kids. It’s a hard...
A Walk in the Park
This morning was one of those glorious fall mornings: beautiful full frame sunrise, crisp clean air, the changing landscape of an ever kinetic autumn. (Today’s trees won’t look the same tomorrow). In short, it was a day that shouted, “let’s get going people.” And yet...
Imaginary Ages
My Mom feels 36 and is shocked every time she looks in the mirror and sees an old woman. Coincidentally, my imaginary age is also 36. While I don’t see an 87-year-old gramma, I do see wrinkles and renegade hairs. (That is, when I put on my glasses). Time marches on,...
That and Ten Cents
There’s a dime on my desk, sitting on the book proposal I’ve been struggling to finish. I asked my daughter, who was working at my desk last night, if she had put it there. “No”, looking at me in that special way only a 14-year-old can. A look that says, “Hey crazy...
Grime and Punishment
There is something about cleaning that goes beyond just pushing a vacuum around, deeper than getting rid of dust and debris; cleaning the physical space invites clearing on other levels. Tidy the basement, clear the subconscious. Ages ago I created a television pilot...
Game of Crones
You’ve seen them: The women in grocery stores who pilot their carts like walkers, taking every aisle as exercise. They drive slowly, park uncertainly, and chatter to strangers. We see them, and one day we may become them. “Welcome to the wonderful world of aging!” my...
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Who do we become when we explore what it is to be more fully ourselves?
I started asking that question a few years ago, at the end of one career and the beginning of something else …read more
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