Truth, Dare, Doubledare: Woot!
science presentation, in progress
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News to report: I have an essay in the just-announced anthology, Truth, Dare, Doubledare: Stories of Motherhood, a book conceived, curated, and edited by Kerry Clare of Pickle Me This, one of my favourite Canadian book blogs. Read more about the deal here. Other contributers include Heather Birrell, Alison Pick, Zoe Whittall, Marita Dachsel, and my friend Deanna McFadden, whom I first met at the University of Toronto in a grad class called Restoration Women Writing. (Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure we took another class together called Victorian Women Reading, which seems oddly symmetrical).
This anthology is going to be an excellent collection of work, guaranteed. I just can’t wait to read it myself. I also suspect the launch party will be memorable.
Now the bad news: The pub date is Spring, 2014, so we’ll all have to be patient until then.
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Somehow I lost an hour off of my work day, and I’m not sure where it went. Vanished. I was supposed to be sitting down at my desk at 10am, and it’s very nearly 11. I did drive a large posterboard (pictured above) up to the school for the boy who has a science presentation today (yes, I drove the posterboard, not the child). That took up about 14 minutes. There was a load of laundry. The dogs kept wanting to go in and out of the back yard. But I’m pretty sure the time-sucker was email.
Messages replied to this morning: 12.
Book clubs I will be visiting in the next two weeks: 3.
Social outings I attended yesterday: 2.
involving coffee: 1
involving beer: 1
Words written in new book yesterday: 388.
goal for today: 1000.
which would bring the total word count to: 80,000.
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And …. GO!
The vague urge to slow down
Woke up yesterday to this: silvery wonderland, trees covered in what I remember being called hoar-frost. I walked the dogs, then came home for the camera. By noon, or sooner, the long white shards had melted off the branches.
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I had the urge to slow down this weekend. It didn’t happen, but I wondered whether I might find a way to shift my habits and routines, even just a little bit, in order to allow myself to alight in the moment, and rest. I alight in many moments. It’s the rest part I can’t seem to locate. I parented alone all weekend and sprinted from task to task, from must-do to must-do. At one point yesterday, I realized that I was using precious adrenalin to whisk bread dough into greased pans before racing out the door to soccer — it struck me as oddly wrong. The slow preparation of bread, the two long rises, the “simplicity” and genuine goodness of homemade set against my relentless schedule — shoe-horned into my relentless schedule. What is the cost of operating at such high levels of intensity? Is it my health? I definitely feel like I’m aging more rapidly or visibly these days — rogue white hairs squiggling out of my scalp, facial wrinkles deepening.
I laid the bread into the pans and forced myself to breathe deeply.
But, oh, worth it. That’s why I can’t seem to stop. Homemade bread. And a really fun soccer game.
Last night, before bed, I applied a face-mask of yogurt and grains: maybe the sloughing of a little dead skin will help with the rapid/visible aging problem; maybe not. Still, I took the time.
Snow day in Canada
Yup. It’s a real snow day, school cancelled, library cancelled, extra-curricular activities cancelled, children playing in snow drifts, people walking by in the street because the sidewalks are too messy, snow, snow, snow coming down, down, down.
I’m happy for the kids, who were praying for a snow day, but oh how I really wanted to keep on writing in my new book. Yesterday’s hair-pulling session netted me 1800 new words, bringing the book to 78,000 words, and three new scenes. (Scrivener has handy “project targets” and “project statistics” features to which I am utterly addicted. I do realize that stats mean nothing if those 78,000 words do not work together to move the reader. But it’s comforting to quantify my efforts.) I have about four new scenes to write, plus another six or seven to revise before this draft is complete. I’m not looking for new material, I just need the time/space to write what has already been plotted out in my head. Unfortunately, my current situation is not conducive to scene-writing: two children and two dogs crowded into my office, dogs to sleep, and children to chew gum, sit in dog beds, listen to songs, and generally disrupt the quiet every two seconds with requests, wonderings, and commentary. The smallest is at this very moment stamping his feet for some perceived wrong I’m not entirely clear about. Maybe it’s the typing I’m doing on this here computer.
So … here’s what I plan to do with the rest of our snow day.
* bake cookies
* make yogurt
* make dough for homemade pizza
* shovel the sidewalk since I won’t be running tonight (no soccer skills means that my regularly scheduled Friday run, which I do no matter the weather, is also cancelled)
* pull smallest on sled while we walk second smallest to play date
* put in movie for part of the afternoon and sneak in some writing
For the purposes of reality checking, here’s what I’ve actually accomplished so far.
* chatted with sister-in-law on the phone
* almost finished one cup of coffee (gone cold ages ago)
* fed everyone breakfast, and a few people lunch
* tried to talk husband out of leaving for his boys’ cottage weekend in the middle of this storm (doesn’t seem to be working)
* put in load of laundry
* cleaned up dog poop in upstairs bedroom (c’mon, DJ, if Suzi can go outside, you can go outside!)
* read front section of newspaper
* answered a few work-related emails
* took photographs of snow
* puttered. Really, mostly I’ve puttered.
Measuring the weight of a day
celebrating a birthday
Sometimes it’s best to measure a day’s success by values other than productivity. Sometimes, rather than thinking about what I’ve accomplished, I notice: I’ve connected with friends and family today.
I appreciate that on most mornings, when I get up early, I’m meeting a friend. A surprising amount of ground can get covered during this sleepy, short time together.
I appreciate the drives to and from swimming and soccer and piano. I especially love finding myself one-on-one with a child. We don’t have to talk about anything big or exciting. We’re just happy to be together. There’s a sense of purpose as we head toward our destination, but there’s no sense of hurry.
I appreciate saying yes to crazy projects/events with friends. Yesterday morning, I was running through a snow-covered farmer’s field with a friend. Yesterday evening, I was eating smores beside a campfire under a dark and starry sky. In between, I had lunch with a friend, ferried children to piano lessons, ran fast at an indoor track, hung laundry, washed dishes. I also got zero new writing done. How to measure yesterday’s weight and meaning and worth?
On Tuesday night, instead of reading in bed, I stayed up to listen to my eleven-year-old enthuse about a school project (who knew he could be enthusiastic about school?).
Sometimes I text a friend (or my sister) whom I miss, but don’t have time to meet face-to-face. These disjointed abbreviated back-and-forths feel oddly conversational, like we’ve been with each other during that time.
I am often rushing from task to task, moment to moment, place to place. But in between, sometimes even amidst the rushing, I recognize that I feel quiet, stilled, present, at ease. I feel connected, strongly, to the ones I love. I feel solidly, persistently myself.
I’m not necessarily being productive by worldly measures. I’m not making anything. I’m not earning anything. I’m not going anywhere. I have nothing visible to show for my day’s labours. So it might be asked, why bother throwing yourself in deep, whole-heartedly, if there is no apparent goal being forwarded or accomplished?
Ah, but you know exactly why, I’m sure: because. Just because. This is life.
Cleaning out the cupboards
February, out our window
Update on eating down the cupboards: Made hummus! Used up two mostly empty jars of tahini! Now we only have two jars of tahini left! (This emptying the cupboard project is revealing certain inefficiencies in our shopping/storage system.)
Also, and basically unrelated, I made yogurt on the weekend. It had been awhile. I got discouraged after making a batch that scorched and stopped for a year or so. But it’s easy! And we’re eating lots of yogurt again, due to my renewed breakfast mandate: no cold cereal. Somehow, somewhere along the line this fall, we got into the habit of having boxed cereal around for snacks, and from there we slipped into kids eating boxed cereal for breakfast, too. (In our family, cold cereal has traditionally been considered a junk-food-type treat, bought only on occasion.)
The complaints regarding this change were loud, but brief.
February’s Every Day Breakfast Menu:
* yogurt with pearsauce and bananas (chia seeds optional)
* eggs made to order with toast (homemade bread)
* toast with peanut butter and jam
* porridge (not instant)
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I met with my word-of-the-year friends last night. We are planning to meet more often throughout this year for reflection. I came away from our conversation with the renewed intention to be in the world without judgement. To quiet my critical inner voice, whether the criticism be negative or positive, and simply to be present.
This is not necessarily the easiest task for a writer. But I do think there are ways to be attentive to the world without setting myself apart from it, or above it, or wishing I could alter it.
On “stretch,” my word of the year, I realized last night that I’d already lost track of my intended usage of the word, which was to take time to stretch — to become more flexible by slowing down. Taken literally, I am indeed doing yoga once a week and stretching after running and spin; it’s the metaphorical stretching that confounds me. Instead of stretching, I find myself stretched, a bit, and wondering: do I say yes more often than I should? I love yes. I love exploring possibilities. I love remaining open to experiences.
Therefore, I stretch myself to be many things all at once. Question asked by friend: Will you stretch until you break?
Answer: I hope I won’t break. And yes.
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Lost-and-found, the neverending story:
* one red mitten: lost
Child climbs off of school bus. “Where is your mitten?” “Can’t find it!” “When did you lose it? Could it be on the bus?” “No, not on the bus.” “Did you lose it at school?” “Yeah.” “Did you have to go all day without a mitten?” “Yeah.” “Was your hand cold at recess?” [Shrug] “You can wear my mitten.” [Tries mitten, takes it off] “Too big. I can go like this!” [Covers exposed hand with mittened hand, chats cheerfully all the way home]
* one black Celtic hat: found!
In Kevin’s hat bin. Pink mittens still missing.
* one grey hat with ear flaps: found!
Found before we even realized it was missing (well, AppleApple knew, she just didn’t want to mention it, considering how many of her personal belongings go missing; I don’t blame her, really). Hat was left at soccer field, and kind observant parent (not me or Kev) recognized it. Now we just have to pick it up.