Category: Family
Monday, May 26, 2025 | Big Thoughts, Birthdays, Confessions, Family, Friends, Peace, Source, Space, Spirit |
A few months ago, I took a four-day “circle training” workshop. Rather than writing about it immediately, I let the experience just be. I wondered whether it would change me, and how. What happens when you sit quietly and listen, as a talking stick makes its way around a circle of strangers? What happens when it’s your turn to speak?
Time slows down.
Attention shifts.
The stories that came out of my mouth seemed to rise from some quiet place that was longing to be told: this is precious material too.
I miss writing here as often as I once did.
I miss the instant reflection on the happenings in my life.
And to be truthful, I’m less at ease sharing these fractured, fragmented, intangible impressions publicly. It’s not exactly about being right or wrong; but the impression given of a moment in time, a moment of experiential data, is by its nature unstable. It will change. Change is our constant.
It’s interesting to observe what changes, from week to week, month to month, year to year; but probably also impossible to pin down. There’s a tendency to assume change is for the better; and to compare with past versions of self in ways that inflate the present version. Yet, so much of who I am, especially in those tendencies that limit my potential or cause harm (to self and others), seem to have changed far less than one might hope.
For example … (confession time)
I have a tendency to …
… fill every minute with doing, even better if it’s hard task, or menial, or can be framed as helping someone else or improving upon myself
A story from the circle. One of the participants shared about being the friend who their friends could call in a crisis. Needing to be that friend. And not knowing how to stop, or even pause, to catch a breath, or listen to their own inner voice and emotions.
I felt as if a mirror were being held up to my own need to do, do, do. Act, act, act. Carry, carry, carry. Make, make, make. Hold, hold, hold.
I can’t seem to let myself write down what I understood in that moment…. I saw that being needed gives me worth. No. More than that. Gives me permission to feel worthy, permission to believe that my life is worthwhile. And without that, without the dependency created by being needed, I feared, no, I fear, abandonment.
Who would want the un-needed, the unnecessary version of me?
Who would want to spend time with the version of me that I can’t even articulate into being, the version that is … that is shimmering forth, I feel it, like a butterfly, like a tree, like a calm shady summer afternoon … the version that does nothing and is fully present, achieves nothing and is fully present, raises nothing and is fully present.
The mirror in which another person, anyone, stranger or friend, can see themself in full flourishing. And then the world will be too beautiful to hold, or even to grasp. And I will be able to let go, and let go, and let go of needing to do, act, carry, make, hold, hold, hold.
xo, Carrie
Thursday, Sep 5, 2024 | Art, Big Thoughts, Current events, Death, Family, Library, Play, Source, Space, Spirit, Summer, Work, Writing |
There is so little to say, and so much.
I want to express the ways in which I’m changing, the shifts occurring in my mind, and in my outlook—but it’s not entirely clear … I’m floating along a deep wide river. The way I understand my own identity is changing, changing, changing. For most of my life, I was focused on being a writer. And it became my defended self, a self that required defending because I had no sustained confidence in its heft or even its existence—prove yourself, said the voice in my head, over and over.
That voice has grown so gentle.
Now that voice in my head says, there’s more and more and more—more life, more love, more space, more time than you’d ever imagined. Soak it in. Float. Spread out of your arms. Watch the sky, the leaves and branches moving on the trees, listen to the wealth of stories pouring in. This generous world.
And how I wish and hope to be a generous being while I’m here.
Spaciousness.
I feel it within me, surrounding me, available at all times. So much spaciousness. A lack of pressure (not a lack of challenge).
How can I explain what is impossible to describe? It is not that I have more time, but that time itself expands to accommodate so many threads and layers and textures of experiences. When I am restless with my environment, the voice in my head says, be where you are right now.
And I breathe differently.
It is not always easy to be where you are right now. It might involve challenges like boredom or pain or discomfort. Yes. And when I am here right now those challenges shift and become otherwise—boredom may be a conduit to concentrated observation; pain may invite breath; discomfort illuminates emotion; love and patience and depth of understanding weave into the experience of being.
I have been learning this my whole life, with my whole body, which offers its sensations and movements and feelings to the interpretation of my mind, and which acts as a container for my spirit, that droplet of essence that connects me to all beings.
I arrived here on earth to learn, to soak in beauty in its rawest forms—taste, smell, touch, light and shadow, sound, rhythm, anchors to my place of being. I arrived with the desire to push my body to its limits (not always in healthy ways, but that’s part of learning). I wanted to feel everything. I wanted to experience everything.
The impulse to make things, to respond to and to express all of this wonder at the beauty of it all—that has also been in me since the beginning. I arrived here on earth with the desire to make things (and make things up). I learned to nurture that part of myself—I practiced observation, through writing, playing with language and grammar and imagery. And I learned that to record requires of me a bifurcated attention, attention that must split itself between observing and recording (and interpreting). And I continue to learn that sometimes, sometimes, yes, I do not want to record or interpret what is happening, I want simply to be in the happening. I want to be in it and learn from being in it.
This summer has been a summer of being, not so much doing, and very little recording or interpreting of the doing and being. Hence, very little blog writing. But not never. Why lean on never, ever? There is time, there is time.
I arrived here on earth to learn.
When I notice all the spaciousness around me, through which I move and breathe and live, I learn in ways that resist expression. I settle myself in deeper. Everything shimmers. Time expands. I am, you are, we are. Learning together.
xo, Carrie
Monday, Jul 15, 2024 | Adventure, Art, Family, Fire, Friends, Fun, Peace, Source, Space, Spirit, Spring, Summer, Yoga |
In April, I embarked on a “spring burst”, aka return to the gym, with the initial intention of spending a month trying out spin and weights classes, in an effort to boost my cardio and strength.
I was a runner for many years. But it’s high-impact, and I am a woman well into middle age, and no amount of yoga seemed to help with the pain that would flare while running, even relatively short distances. It’s hard to stop doing something you love, and there is no replacement for the runner’s high, or being outside on a misty morning before the world has woken up. But. I’m trying to listen to my body and be softer with myself, so I let the running go (mostly). As of this spring, I’d been doing yoga twice a day for at least a year, and meditation regularly, and an occasional weights class with friends. Sometimes I’d bike to work. But suffice it to say, there came a moment in my weights-class-with-friends when I was gasping for air, my heart racing, and the thought arose: gee, I could really use some more cardio in my life.
Ergo: Carrie’s spring burst.
The first spin class damn near killed me, mostly because I go hard, no matter the challenge. I almost fell off my bike. I was light-headed, panting, dripping sweat, and not even close to keeping up with the instructor’s choreo directions. Yes, I go to a gym where the spin classes have choreo; and yes, this adds a certain soupçon of danger and thrill to each sweaty, fast-paced, rhythmically pumped up class—but that’s why I return, to be frank: to be challenged, mentally and physically, to occasionally reach a goal I’ve set or smile at myself while trying. I also look forward to the moment in each class where my worries vanish into the effort, and my mind goes quiet.
My spring burst has stretched into a summer of strength, or maybe a summer of sweat (haven’t come up with a title yet).
I’ve tried every available class, from weights to power to pilates to yoga to the hilarious humiliation of a what seemed like an aerobics class to boxing. As mentioned, I throw myself in deep, and am therefore currently in gym rat mode. It’s not that other things aren’t happening, social and emotional. But this is the place I’m returning to, as a form of a vacation, to give my mind rest, and to enjoy my body. Weight training is apparently critical during the peri-menopause / menopause era; and that’s me. Age happens, and with age, limitations; yet my body and mind can adapt and learn new things.
Summer loving. Bougie gym summer.
We aren’t travelling very far this summer. The kids are all living at home. The schools are closed, so I don’t have a job in the library for nine or ten weeks (haven’t done the math). I’m trying to revise a book manuscript, but honestly, if I do so, it will only be because it makes sense for my mental health, and not any other reason. The costs of artistic ambition seem altogether too steep; and this is not a new Alice-Munro-revelations-thought for me either, though has probably been somewhat cemented by that. I’ve long wondered and worried about the wisdom (for myself personally) of pouring so much energy and time and attention into what amounts to a series of personal passion projects—at times I would feel possessed, as if I was trying to cure an obsession or compulsion with novel-writing. And maybe it did help, for awhile—I have no regrets. I’m proud of my accomplishments. And—and! I hope for something quite different: a humble legacy of love and care, for strong and lasting connections and relationships, built on trust and kindness and open doors.
That’s my aim. That’s my over-arching goal.
What I’m finding is that if I prioritize connections, serving and feeding relationships, including paying attention to the the feelings and sensations in my own body, I can’t go wrong. The discomfort and disorientation of being disconnected, not in a right relationship, is a powerful cue for change. This might mean entering into difficult conversations. This might mean being open to hearing hard truths. This might mean hearing “no,” when I’d prefer to hear “yes!” It might mean shifting direction, allowing my priorities to shift too. Whatever possibilities lie before me, I hope to choose connection.
Summer delight. Summer solace. Summer song.
xo, Carrie
Sunday, May 26, 2024 | Art, Big Thoughts, Family, Fire, Job, Lists, Parenting, Peace, Play, Sleep, Source, Space, Spirit, Spring, Success, Work, Writing |
If all your dreams came true, what that look like, can you even imagine it? I recently had fun ruminating on this question with one of my children, hearing what their dreams would be. They wanted to do more things; I was thinking about doing fewer…. Because if all my dreams came true, I’d need several extra lives.
This is a perennial issue for me. Come to think of it, it’s how I approach a buffet — I spoon a little bit from every tray onto my plate till its overflowing and incoherent, as a meal. And that’s how my life feels, sometimes, too. Incoherent, as a life. I get it on a micro level — I’m going to taste all the things! Yay! — but on a macro level, it’s exhausting. So many things to taste.
Projects have coherence (and I love them for it!).
But life doesn’t, really. Life is a series of overlapping layers that can’t be peeled apart. I’m playing all these roles, different roles in different locations and spaces and relationships; but am I not always myself? To be sure, it’s a changing self. Hopefully a learning self. Why then, do I need to learn the same lessons over and over?
What values shape my dreams and goals, and my beliefs and choices?
Maybe I don’t even recognize these values as my own, much of the time. Maybe these are beliefs that run through my DNA or that I’ve accumulated through being a human in the world. Here’s a theory, or framework, I’m considering: that there are (at least) three pools of values from which I draw, and they don’t necessarily agree or support each other (or my decision-making).
One pool is represented by my Grandma Doris, and her lifelong belief that a person’s purpose is to serve, no matter who they are, or what their skills and gifts may be. She served the church, and God; and I might have warped this value into a more secular iteration, but there’s a big part of me that believes whatever I do must be in service to something larger than myself — serving the well-being of others, preferably humbly, quietly, and invisibly, in order to strengthen the community.
A second pool of values is represented by the somewhat amorphous but powerful North American cultural fever-dream of self-reliance, earning a living, and being rewarded monetarily for one’s labours. Though I’m less attached to this pool of values, it’s a bit inescapable — also inescapable (at least so far) is my fear of being unable to earn money, of not being qualified or capable of earning a living. It’s the fear of being unable to provide for my family and for myself. Come to think of it, this is more of a DNA-level value system too. Our beliefs about abundance and scarcity (represented through money) are passed down generationally. In any case, I harbour a fear-filled desire for security and independence. (Note: a life of service does not provide either security or independence, so this value is in direct conflict with the previous one; and also with the next.)
Which brings me to the third pool of values: my devotion to and trust in art and the arts. My relationship to this one is super-complicated by my fidelity to those other values, above. I’m filled with shame at my own attempts at art-making. I know that sounds terrible, and maybe judgemental. It doesn’t apply, however, to anyone else’s art-making; just my own. I value and admire those who devote themselves to a life of artistic pursuit. I envy them too. (Maybe I envy anyone who gives themselves unabashed permission to devote themselves to their art.) Truth is, I’m probably also romanticizing this life in a way that is childish because it is child-like—because it’s a value rooted in my own childhood, when I devoured books and had the nascent notion that I would be a writer too. I believed, as a child, that being a writer would mean, well, writing and writing and writing—I imagined that devotion would lead to reward, and that reward would simply be to become very fluent in the art of making beautiful things. Beautiful books, I guess.
In some strange way, I think the imagery has remained in my mind’s eye, stubbornly unchanged. I admired (and continue to admire) the element of the mystical, in any artistic pursuit. How it couldn’t really be explained to anyone else. It would be a calling. The thought of questioning it as a calling didn’t even occur to me, as a young person. Yet I’ve spent the bulk of my adult life questioning it as a calling. That’s been the ratty old tired old thread that’s woven its grey little self through my life as a writer—a question of faith, maybe. A lack of faith?
Or, a question of where I should be placing my faith, and what values to trust, and on which to build the foundation for this incoherent slurry of experiences I call life? Do I place my trust in serving a higher purpose, like God, or a church, or community well-being? Or do I place my trust in the ethics of earning a living, being independent, and not being a burden to anyone else? Or do I place my trust in devotion to the utter mystery of trying to shape beauty from fragments of experience?
Can and do these values fit together? The joy in building community connections with the necessity of earning a living with the inexplicable need (compulsion?) to make things up, to live these other lives through invention, imagination—imagery.
How does it all fit together?
In practical terms?
In the choices I’m making and the things I’m doing (and not doing)?
My obligations and my joys are mingled: the activities that I long to balance, the people I want to nurture and not to neglect, the beauty I seek to perform and hold in my hands. If I try to untangle the threads, or even to count all the points of connection to others and to the world—which are my labour and my love—I am overwhelmed.
Yet, it does make sense, too. I just take one step and another. I text one friend and another. I cook one meal and another. I read one book and another. I write one sentence and another. I hang one item of laundry on the line and another.
I’m seeking coherence to this grand brief project called life.
I may not achieve it.
But I hope at the end of it, my mind will remember and relive on repeat not fear, despair, shame, but goodness and love and a great deal of laughter.
xo, Carrie
Friday, May 17, 2024 | Art, Big Thoughts, Family, Feminism, Fire, Library, Organizing, Peace, Reading, School, Space, Spring, Word of the Year, Work |
As much as I long to find just a little more rhythm to my writing life, damn but it’s taken the pressure off to work in a school library. Childhood is bursting with magic. To be with kids is to be in the presence of pure creativity. When I was a child, we would visit the Nashville public library for their puppet shows. I remember being utterly entranced by the puppets. How were they speaking? Who was making them move? They seemed real — in some fundamental way, they were real to my imagination.
Now, on a very small scale, I get to participate in magic-making with the children who come into my library — it’s homemade, it’s improvised, it’s nothing fancy, but even the smallest surprise is sufficient to spark delight, curiosity, questions. Children are not fussy; the youngest of them pay the closest attention to the tiniest details. If you’ve ever read a picture book to a group of kindergarteners, you’ve been blessed by the deepest attention you’ll ever hope to receive. “Oh, those aren’t raindrops, those are tadpoles!” “How did Curious George jump higher?” “Why did he let go of the balloons?”
On my story time bulletin board, I add characters or objects from books we’ve read. The seasons change. Nothing is static — things move around. Somehow, it’s more magical because it’s tactile. It isn’t digital. It isn’t online, or on a screen. It’s present with us, to be experienced and observed by all, as we gather in the same moment and place in time and space. We experience it collectively, from our different positions around the room, our different heights and ages. Like the magic of the puppet theatre, I don’t think this is repeatable, really, online. We don’t live solely in our minds; we live in our bodies, as sensory creatures.
In truth, however, my main job in the library is to maintain the collection — a tactile mode of interacting with this most beloved of mediums (beloved to me!): text and illustration bound up in pages. The sensation of handling books affects me similarly to doing a puzzle; it’s soothing and peaceful to create order.
As for the other hours in my days and weeks, I’m currently on a “spring burst.” I’m going to gym regularly to spin, sweat, lift weights, stretch, and take good care of this deep-into-midlife body (and mind). The X Page is entering its final month of preparation (!!): mark your calendars if you’re local. We’ll be performing this season’s stories on Sunday, June 16th at the Registry theatre in downtown Kitchener (more info coming soon). And my writing life is bursting with beautiful blooms too: seeing a dear friend’s book project come to fruition, editing stories, and dreaming up a new novel.
Come summer, I’ll have a two-month break from the library — writing sabbatical??? And time to repair, restore, relax, too. It’s been very non-stop. I keep thinking I’ll catch up, but there’s no up to be caught. The routine swings round and round.
My instinct is to maximize efficiency on tasks. But more and more, I’m focused on making space to maximize enjoyment, no matter the tasks. What do I love doing? Mostly, really simple things that are easy to call forth, that don’t require a lot of extra planning or resources. I love sweating and the rush of endorphins. I love meeting new people and diving in deep. I love collaborating, learning new skills, appreciating the strengths and techniques and wisdom that others bring. I love grappling with text, creating narrative sequences on both the macro and micro scale that maximize pleasure for an audience. I love eating supper with my family and hearing about their days. I love stopping to smell blossoms on trees. I love blasting songs on the radio when I’m driving alone. I love making magic — out-of-time experiences, opportunities for surprise — through the simplest means possible: a drawing, a story, a group exercise. I love taking care of people. I love cooking (but only when I’m not rushing). I love being outdoors, walking, biking, running. I love creating order out of chaos. I love living in my imagination, in my many imaginary worlds. I love to dream.
Nothing is ideal. I love that too, the reassurance of it. I mutter this phrase to myself a lot — “This is not ideal!” —- and not negatively, but encouragingly. I mean it as a form of freedom. Nothing about this is ideal. (And it does not need to be.) This thing you’re doing, this thing you’re creating, this solution, this story, this hard conversation — whatever it may be — you’re doing it to the best of your abilities; be reassured. There are many possibilities, many directions, many discoveries, of which you will try one and then another and another, testing things out forever and ever, amen.
xo, Carrie
Saturday, Feb 24, 2024 | Art, Big Thoughts, Confessions, Family, Feminism, Friends, Fun, Meditation, Organizing, Parenting, Peace, Publishing, Sleep, Space, Spirit, Success, Weekend, Winter, Writing |
Life feels softer, fuller, rounder. Sometimes this feels just right—for my age, my ambitions. Sometimes my eyes ache behind my glasses. I am softer, fuller, rounder. I don’t like this so much. It’s partly body dysmorphia and partly not—I am larger than I used to be, objectively speaking. I have had to upsize my pants. There are days when I don’t even go for a walk, because I can’t squeeze it in, let alone one of those hard runs I used to rely on to keep me sane, and fit, and possibly also fitting in those pants of the past. My body has fluctuated and changed over these nearly five full decades on planet earth. Pregnancies will change a person’s body. And endurance training. But so will mid-life hormones, and aging, and a myriad of other factors that are beyond my control. Out of control is what I feel sometimes, when squeezing into my upsized pants. Yet, since when am I in control?
Control is an illusion, a fable told to comfort myself—that I am choosing for my body to be the way that it is, at any given stage in my life and development. Our bodies, ourselves—caught in time, turning and turning.
But my head, my outlook, my mind—softer, fuller, rounder? Yes. And how do I feel about that? I don’t entirely know. I’ve had practice accepting change, loosening my hold on expectations, letting go, you might say, or holding lightly (parenting gives a person practice; being a writer, too). But practice doesn’t necessarily ease the challenge, in real life situations. It is easier to breathe when there’s breathing room. It is easier to accept what’s happening when it’s pleasant or hoped for.
I try to go into new situations without writing the script beforehand; but how does that fit with my love of plotting and planning and dreaming big? Maybe it’s both/and, not either/or.
Which brings me around to the softness in the structure of my life right now, its curves and rounded edges. There is time for all things, but not all at once. This new year, I’ve completed two workshops in conflict management, and I’m considering working toward certification as a mediator. But I don’t know where it might lead, in truth, nor how these skills might be applied. At the library, I pad around in my “librarian sandals,” and enjoy creating moments of surprise and delight and welcome for the students (and maybe for the teachers too, at least some of them!). I’m building relationships there; but also trying to apply boundaries, and keep the job easy and light, as it should be. I’m on board for another season of the X Page workshop, starting very soon; I’ll be an editor and lead some of the writing exercises, but others are taking on the more substantial leadership roles; I felt a lightness at our recent planning meeting. This has given me room to take on more of a leadership role at my church, which is small and relies on volunteers; this Sunday I’ll be preaching—a new genre for me. It took me weeks to write a 15-minute sermon, but I enjoyed the layers of exploration that came from a close reading of text.
Where in this is my fiction writing? Still very present; just not occupying my mind as an identity that I should be fulfilling at all times, lest it slip from my grip. Hold lightly. I’m approaching writing no differently from these other facets of commitment, responsibility—I want to enjoy myself while doing all these things, even committee meetings! And the quickest path to enjoyment (in my experience) is full immersion.
Dive in.
Basically, I put my phone away. Often it is out of sight, especially when I’m in a meeting or at work or writing. That limits distractions. Any task on which I’m fully focused is a task I’ll genuinely enjoy, or find interesting in some way—my brain is hungry for the details, for sensory information, for connection. Often, this actually feels like I’m leaning back in a comfy chair, taking everything in, hyper-aware of the nuances, the emotional tones; or my mind in its relaxation will see big-picture structures as clearly as if they were architectural drawings.
I love structure so much. Design. Sequence. Noticing how these things work in practice, or do not work, and investigating changes to systems. I like figuring out the pacing and rhythm; how these ephemeral/practical/felt structures support the why of what is being made—its desired outcome—whether it’s a worship service, or a novel; there’s not a single or “right” answer, of course, which is what makes it so fascinating. Endlessly fascinating.
How does writing fit into the systems and structures of my life? Like any task, I need to make room for it, make practical plans, and I need to seize the moments. Occasionally, I’ve been able to write with focus after work, or into the evening, but that requires a) being well-rested, b) someone else cooking supper, c) no evening meetings or obligations. It’s rare. So mostly, I’m setting aside chunks of time—like last weekend at the farm with my writing friends. Nothing on the schedule except writing, eating, talking, sharing our writing. I love when we read to each other in the evenings. Our times together are so cozy, so warm and peaceful; conducive to writing, but also to fostering a relaxed state of mind in which creativity thrives. I might not get to do this very often, but it’s a wonderful state in which to write. As proof, each of us has finished at least one major book-length project during our several years of writing together that we’ve either published, or will be publishing soon. Amazing!
Blogging, when it happens, fits into the in-between times. Like this post, written almost entirely on a Friday afternoon, sitting overlooking an indoor soccer field, feet up, travel mug of tea nearby, and my laptop open; but finished the following afternoon, because the previous sentence is where my writing stopped, when I turned to chat with a parent—a dad who was open to talking soccer with a woman, which is not, I must tell you, always the case. So I relished the opening, and went with it.
xo, Carrie
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