Category: Prizes
Friday, Jan 24, 2025 | Adventure, Art, Big Thoughts, Books, Confessions, Exercise, Friends, Fun, Girl Runner, Good News, Lists, Music, Organizing, Peace, Prizes, Publishing, Spirit, Success, The Candy Conspiracy, Weather, Winter, Word of the Year, Writing |
My to-do list for the next hour—
roast a pumpkin
write a blog post
Soooooo… the Canada Reads adventure is over for Girl Runner. It was truly lovely while it lasted. Here are the books that were chosen for the 2025 shortlist. Check them out!
I had advance warning that I wasn’t on the shortlist (call it reading the tea leaves; nobody reached out to inform me otherwise, but there were logical signs).
Ergo, my plan for “surviving” yesterday’s announcement (and I do say that tongue-in-cheek!), was to throw myself with gusto into my usual Thursday routine. I walk with a friend at 6AM, head to a pilates class at 7AM, spend the day at work in the library, come home for a bit of a nap and some laundry, then return to the gym for the evening with my daughter who is also a gym rat. We do weights, spin, and blissful slow flow yoga to finish it off, then come home to eat a late supper and completely unwind. I love this routine. It’s the only evening I spend at the gym, and the physical exertion helps me grind out my emotions about the week, empties my mind, and takes me deeper into my body, which connects me to the world. I feel very alive and purposeful on Thursdays. So I wasn’t worried about the residual effects of announcement, in all honesty.
And then. My day took a turn. Literally.
Midway through our walk, my friend and I dashed across a busy street to beat the traffic, and I stepped in a pothole, turned my ankle, and heard a series of snaps and pops. Having turned my ankle before (playing soccer), I knew exactly what was going down. The walk home was painful and longer than we would have liked, but my friend entertained me with conversation and it felt okay to keep moving and putting some weight on that foot. At home, in the front hall, I briefly debated continuing to pilates class, as planned, and then a voice of reason spoke (strangely enough, it was my own voice, out loud), and I said, “What would I tell a good friend in this situation?” And I replied, “Do not go to pilates. Take off your boots and take care of yourself.”
So that’s what I did.
To summarize, that is how I spent yesterday. I took care of myself.
I booked off work, made an appointment to get the ankle checked, dressed in comfortable clothing, elevated the leg, iced the ankle, surrounded myself with reading material, snuggled with the dog, drank tea, did not do a scrap of laundry, and rested. A day on which I’d strategized to distract myself from potentially painful feelings became a day of reflection. And it was good. It was needed, I think.
For years, when I “failed” to achieve some goal, particularly related to writing, I’d be overwhelmed with shame, expressed like this: I’ve disappointed everyone. I’ve disappointed my publisher, my editor, my agent, my family, my friends, basically everyone who cares about me. Yesterday, this thought rose up, in ghostly form. You’re a disappointment. You’ve disappointed people [in this instance, by not making the shortlist of Canada Reads].
“That’s interesting,” I replied (out loud! As if talking to a friend!). “Tell me, assuming that’s true, what could you have done to avoid disappointing them?”
After a pause, during which I scrolled backward in time through all the choices that were mine to make regarding this particular “failure,” I said, “Not write the book?”
How funny that sounded.
“Maybe,” my wise interlocutor self said, “maybe you’re the one who is disappointed, not everyone else?”
Hmmm… And in that moment, I gave myself permission to feel disappointed.
Ahh. That’s what it feels like. It feels different from shame. It’s sadness, a big sigh, letting go of what could have been (the imagined version, of course, which is never the same as what is).
“What are you disappointed about?” my wise questioner asked.
And out poured my feelings of loss: I thought it would have been really fun … to get to experience new things, meet new people, have some interesting conversations, make new connections … add a little zing of adventure and the unknown into my comfortable routine.
“Yes. That sounds disappointing. It’s okay to be disappointed …. Did you know that?”
Maybe, in fact, I didn’t know that. Maybe this has been a valuable revelation.
It’s disappointing, but it’s not the end of the world, or the end of my career as a writer, of the end of anything, except this potential experience.
Relief and ease poured through me. I read the opening chapters of On Freedom by Timothy Snyder, learning about the German words for body: Leib and Körper, and feeling seen and known. (As I understand it, in Snyder’s reading, a Leib is a body that is alive, limited by mortality, yet free to choose; a Körper is a body that is dead, or seen and treated as an object by others or even by the self; there’s so much more to these ideas and as soon as Kevin got home from work, I peppered him with observations, which I tend to call “revelations!” As in, “I’m having a revelation!” Which happens far too often for them to qualify as such, see above; but that’s how I reslish seeing things—as constantly changeable and unfolding and re-forming and illuminating.) Anyway… I also napped for awhile. My ankle ached and turned purple.
By evening, I was restless.
Today, I woke wanting my ankle fully healed. Revelation: healing doesn’t happen overnight.
Slow down, dear friend. Take it one step at a time. Literally.
xo, Carrie
PS If all goes as planned, the roasted pumpkin will be turned into a peanut stew by suppertime.
Sunday, Dec 8, 2019 | Adventure, Art, Big Thoughts, Coaching, Confessions, Friends, Fun, Good News, Prizes, Soccer, The X Page |
I’ve typed, deleted, and typed anew the first sentence. The problem isn’t that there’s nothing to write about and reflect on. The problem is there is so much! And I’m struggling to identify the theme that would bind these disparate aspects of my week together.
On Wednesday, we held the open house for the second season of The X Page workshop, which will begin in January, 2020. It was an emotional evening, a familiar team of women gathering to meet new candidates for this collaborative, cross-cultural project. I was reminded of the small miracles and many challenges behind and before us. The energy felt familiar: a bubbling sense of adventure, curiosity, wondering, nerves. The desire to hear each other’s stories. To connect on a deeper level. Wondering what we would make together? Wondering, also, where we might go wrong, would we say the wrong thing, make an assumption that would be hurtful, misunderstand one another — this, too, is part of the project, part of any project that transports us out of our comfort zones. This may also be the greatest intrinsic potential in the project: that it may teach us how to sit with discomfort, express it, feel our way through it, forgive and be forgiven, and learn from being challenged, because we often (unconsciously) try to avoid all of this, in our ordinary spheres of reference, our primary contexts.
On Thursday, my emotions were at a low. I felt unworthy in all aspects of my life; I’m not saying it was rational, only that it was what I felt. I mention this because I want to be honest about the ways my emotions can bottom out, sometimes. I was feeling profound despair, weakness. Thankfully, instinctively, I didn’t cancel plans/routines and hide away, even though I wanted to. Friday morning, I got up early to run. I went to visit a friend. Two poultices for my spirit: exercise and friendship. My emotional trajectory could not help but rise.
On Saturday, I received an award that five years ago would have been unimaginable — I was named Youth Coach of the Year for the district in which my team plays. To be honest, this was one of the things I was beating myself up about on Thursday; I didn’t feel deserving of this recognition. I kept listing all of my limitations as a coach. And then, on Saturday, it came to me — my limitations have been my strength as a coach. Or perhaps, more accurately, awareness of my limitations has been my strength. I prepare for practices diligently. I do my homework. I ask lots of questions. I’ve surrounded myself with assistant coaches whose technical skills are stronger than my own. I’ve benefited from thoughtful mentorship and coach’s education. I was very green when I first volunteered, and I’m grateful to the club for trusting me to learn and grow alongside the players. More clubs should do this. Give moms the benefit of the doubt, the vote of confidence, the support needed to volunteer.
I’ve invented my idea of what it means to be a coach almost from scratch, because I didn’t play competitive sports as a kid — I didn’t have a role model in mind. (Here’s an exercise: picture a coach. Did your mind conjure a red-faced man pacing beside a field, square-jawed with tension, or yelling at his players?) There were almost no women coaching at my soccer club when I started, and there still aren’t many. I wonder whether a lack of role models actually gave me freedom to develop my own coaching style. It’s not punitive, it’s not authoritarian, and it’s definitely not angry. Honestly, it’s kind of goofy. My approach is light. I think out loud, ask questions, admit when something isn’t working the way I’d hoped, ask players for feedback to see whether we can figure this out together. I enthusiastically admire players’ creativity and technical skills. I try to highlight moments when a player has pushed herself out of her comfort zone to try something new — regardless of whether or not it worked. What I want to create is a collaborative learning environment for everyone. I think and hope this creates an atmosphere of trust and shared knowledge, where players are comfortable saying if they don’t understand something, where they can ask for help, even just tell me that they’re having an off day and they don’t know why.
I want to be the kind of coach, the kind of leader, who is also a participant, a collaborator.
Here’s what I believe. I believe that strength comes from (not despite) vulnerability. I believe that trust is earned by working through challenges, being human together, sometimes failing, sometimes succeeding. I believe that knowledge is not fixed and top-down, but ever-curious. I believe that almost all of what we know can be learned only by experience: experience is the source of expertise. It’s also painful, and hard, and sucks sometimes. So we need each other to remind each other of our potential, as individuals, and as a team. I believe we should be seen for who we are, not asked to change ourselves fundamentally to fit in. I believe it’s the coach’s job to position players for success, to see and believe in them, so they can see and believe in themselves.
I believe that your team needs you to be you. And my team needs me to be me.
Last but not least — it’s not worth it if isn’t fun. That’s the glue that sticks all of this, all of us, together.
xo, Carrie
Sunday, Dec 7, 2014 | Dogs, Kids, Mothering, Parenting, Prizes, Running, Writing |
This happened on Friday (see above).
Friday was one of those days, which feels, at the moment, like all of the days, when every must-do is done slightly behind schedule, and therefore with ratcheting tension; that was Friday, especially so. Friday included an early-morning physio appointment, a work-related phone call wherein the phone wouldn’t work, marking assignments, work-related emails that couldn’t be ignored, taking care of the sick kid (who as of this writing is still sick!), and answering the door regarding incoming packages. It was the kind of day where I was reminded that working from home is convenient for everyone except for the person working from home. Need someone to sign for your package? Carrie’s home! Sick child needs attention, feeding, and care? Carrie’s home! The dogs are disastrous bundles of anxiety and need walking? Carrie’s home! I can hear the bitterness accumulating in my tone now. I guess I haven’t gotten it out of my system.
Not running right now (injury) isn’t helping. I’ve been walking on my treadmill regularly. Helps a bit. Doing my physio exercises faithfully. Hoping the exercises help the hamstring issue, because they ain’t helping with the excess of nervous energy.
Back to Friday. I was late heading out to pick up CJ. AppleApple had arrived home and wanted to come along and bring the dogs, who needed walking, as mentioned. Dogs proceeded to stop at several amazingly inconvenient locations and moments, en route, to relieve themselves, including once in the middle of a street (!!), which required some quick work with the plastic baggy. Anyway. We were late. I ended up leaving AppleApple in charge of the dogs near the school grounds, and running (remember how I’m not supposed to run?) all the way around the school in an effort to get to CJ before the bell rang. I was not successful. This was totally my fault for leaving so late plus bringing the dogs, mother-guilt, mother-guilt, mother-guilt, sprinting across the playground. There he was, panicking and near tears. Also, my hamstring hurt a lot, after just that short run. Which seems like not good news. But it felt like a day of not good news; or, more precisely, off-kilter news, not-quite-right news.
As we were walking around the school to reunite with AppleApple and dogs, CJ smiled at me, having already cheered up, and I said, “Oh, and look, you’ve had a big day! You’ve lost your tooth!”
His face simply fell. “What????” He reached into his mouth to feel for the tooth.
“Did you not know you’d lost your tooth?”
“No!” He was near-tears again. The tooth had been dangling by a thread when he left in the morning. I’d offered to pull it, but he was hesitant and Kevin was in a hurry, and so we didn’t try. And now the tooth was gone, lost for real. First baby tooth of my last baby. The Tooth Fairy in me was grieving. And CJ was really worried about the Tooth Fairy too. Would she deliver without the goods?
“I think I swallowed it,” he said solemnly. “But not when I was eating my apple. I didn’t have an apple today!”
Later that evening, we problem-solved. CJ composed a note. It went something like this: “Dear Tooth Fairy, I lost my tooth. I can’t find my tooth. Next time I will let my mom pull my tooth. I hope you find it. Love, CJ.” [Note: certain portions of this letter may have been dictated by a certain mother…]
In the morning, he came running find me, clutching the note, on which the Tooth Fairy had made her reply. “Mom, the Tooth Fairy really is magical!!!!” [Note: the Tooth Fairy focused her message on brushing. Certain portions her letter may have been dictated by a certain father, who is in charge of the dental portfolio, in our family…]
On another subject, sort of, I’m wondering how much longer to sustain the Santa Claus myth for my Fooey, who, at age 9, is seriously suspicious: “When I move out of this house, you’ll have to tell me if Santa Claus is real!” Um. Okay. I don’t even particularly like carrying out these illusions, a part of me feels deceptive, but the other part knows that the kids love and even crave the illusions; my older two were crushed when, as a novice parent wanting to be honest, I told them the truth about Santa Claus, when they asked me, around the ages of 3 and 4. Crushed! They reminisce about it to this day (not around the younger kids, however). “Oh, Mom, you just didn’t know any better,” they say, rather fondly. They’ve forgiven me. But they’re careful to make sure I keep things going for the younger two. In fact, it was AppleApple who stepped in and took charge when Fooey demanded to know why the pyjamas from Santa Claus always come from Land’s End…
This post has gone in a direction entirely unforeseen. From griping about working at home to the realities of the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus. How can I be a fiction writer and be so ambivalent about sustaining illusions? Honestly.
xo, Carrie
PS This Obscure CanLit blog has been shortlisted for two prizes at the Canadian WeBlog Awards, in the categories of Life and Writing & Literature. I’ll admit to being slightly baffled about this, but nevertheless pleased and flattered.
Wednesday, Nov 5, 2014 | Adventure, Big Thoughts, Prizes, Publicity, Spirit, Work |
I’m home.
This is good. I’ve got the third load of laundry already spinning in the drier, I’ve swiped mud and leaves and dog fur off the floor with a rag, focusing on a few critical areas, and I’ve been through every room and soccer bag and countertop looking for dirty socks, library books, and notices from school. The house is in good shape and everything looks under control. My family is awesome!
I still haven’t seen the kids. I can’t believe I have to go out and teach almost as soon as they’re home after school, but we’ll get through it. It’s a PD day on Friday, so we’ll have time to reacquaint ourselves before this weekend’s events take me away from home again. (It’s the Wild Writers Festival here in Waterloo, and I’m going to Uxbridge to read with Frances Itani at Blue Heron’s Books & Brunch).
I had a lot of fun yesterday evening. I did not win. The prize went to Miriam Toews’s All My Puny Sorrows. I’d expected her book to win, and therefore did not approach the event with any expectations of my own, aside from the desire to be intensely present, open, and filled with gratitude at being witness to this moment in time. I was so grateful to have a ceremony to attend, no matter the outcome. All of my publishing people were with me from House of Anansi, my agent Hilary, and Kevin too. We went out for a feast afterward too. It felt like the moment had been marked, when all was said and done.
I do like to mark the moment. So thank you, thank you, those who helped me mark this one. I am blessed.
I’m glad to be home.
I had a thought while sorting laundry in the basement, just now. I thought: “this hasn’t been life-changing.” Then I wondered what that meant, and what exactly “it” might refer to. I think I was thinking of the prize and being a finalist. It isn’t life-changing, not in the way we think of things as being life-changing, and I wonder, would it have been life-changing to have won? I’m not convinced. Maybe it’s because I do not wish or want my life to be changed. Maybe it’s because I’m certain that prizes do not define any of us, that to be who we are — more precisely, who we want to be — is a constant commitment that is poorly served by reliance on external recognition. The peak moment fades. We go on, you know. We do.
I think life is as it is, and I am who I am, no matter what scenes I move through or what clothes I’m wearing. Don’t misunderstand, please: It’s been loads of fun. I take none of it for granted, and I’ve relished every opportunity to be here now. I’ve met or been reacquainted with many many many writers, and have had many memorable conversations, be they funny, happy, silly, serious, insightful, kind-hearted or all of the above. I feel a part of the “class of 2014.”
Now I want to get back to the work of writing another book. I want to get back to discipline and routine, family and friends, soccer and music. That’s not contradictory, I think, I hope.
xo, Carrie
PS Calgary’s Wordfest produced an audio play of the first chapter of Girl Runner. It’s beautiful. If you want to hear Aggie’s voice, young and old, listen here.
Tuesday, Nov 4, 2014 | Adventure, Fun, Girl Runner, Kids, Prizes, Work |
View out hotel window.
In a little over an hour, I’ll be walking across the street in my high-heeled clogs to attend the reception and ceremony for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Prize. Today has been a really lovely day, just infused with loveliness, and I want to sketch out my thoughts and observations, because it’s the little things that get lost. And I want to keep the little things.
* I was woken by a fire alarm. I hurriedly dressed and then did not leave my room, confused by an announcement repeated every thirty seconds or so, telling us not to panic, that an upcoming announcement would let us know what was happening. So I stayed in my room, completely not panicking, as instructed. Until the next announcement, about ten minutes on, which informed me that it was now safe to return to my room. Ah. So that message about not panicking did not mean “do nothing.” It meant, in an orderly fashion please leave your room, as there is a fire alarm going off. Survival of the fittest, I tell you.
* I was asked last night if I was feeling nervous about today’s announcement. No, I replied. I feel happy. It will sound like a cliche but it’s true. I am happy to be here. I am happy to be marking this moment with a ritual, a ceremony, no matter what happens. I get to be here, doing this, now. And that makes me happy.
* Walking up the street today, I passed by a performing arts centre. School buses were lined up out front, and children were being organized and sorted into their various groups in preparation for boarding the buses. My heart kind of cracked open. The children looked to be in grade seven and eight. My children. I actually started to cry because I missed my kids so much. I’ve been burying it in busyness, and I’ve been having a lot of fun, don’t misunderstand, but I miss them so much. Why was this a lovely moment? Because I felt enormous affection for this age group of kids just bursting from me. They’re on the cusp of great change. They’re vulnerable and confident and awkward and real.
* I had a lot of feelings today. Still having them, it seems. I walked around town in the rain feeling all kinds of feelings, and I was happy. I am happy.
And that just about sums it up.
xo, Carrie
Wednesday, Oct 1, 2014 | Books, Girl Runner, Good News, Prizes, Uncategorized |
The long-shot has happened: Girl Runner is a finalist for the 2014 Rogers Writers’ Trust Award for fiction. It feels like a lightning strike, which is what I was thinking about prize lists this morning, before hearing the news. And when I heard the news, via a tweet that my cellphone casually blinked across the top of my screen, it felt like a zap, an electrical shock. I guess that’s where the phrase “feeling shocked” comes from. Somewhere real.
This is what the jury said about Girl Runner in its citation:
Carrie Snyder’s Girl Runner delivers us one of the most memorable characters in decades. In 1928, Aganetha Smart won Olympic gold for Canada in track. But at 104, she is confined to a wheelchair in a nursing home, forgotten. In plumbing the depths of Aganetha’s story, Snyder has this incredible woman whisked away on one more adventure, during which she brilliantly explores the twin natures of memory and loss. Girl Runner is a witty, poignant, and finely plotted novel that offers us a character possessed of the wisdom that arises only from a life well-lived.
To which I have nothing to add. I’m speechless. This could all be very bad for my ego and my super-ego and whatever other subconscious unconsciouses are floating around inside a person, but then again, maybe it’s just all good, today, right now. I’m going to go with that. Gratitude for right now.
xo, Carrie
P.S. To celebrate, I’m considering splurging on a celebratory ukulele! That way I can join my girls, who’ve both taken up the ukulele recently, and have been singing and playing together in the evening (there is literally nothing more heart-warming than hearing them sing and play together, and I do mean literally) … look out for a red-haired sisterly folk duo in about a decade or so ….
