Love Letters

It has been 113 days since I last hugged another human being. I shall never again have to face The Commute. My mental health has been under attack since the middle of March. I can bring my Doodle Layla to work with me every day. After more than three years of hard experience Being Alone, the lockdown should have been easy for me. I am leaning in to Virtual Community opportunities - which are everywhere. All of our Systems and Processes are up for debate. New, important, Conversations are provoking Change. Some of my old Beliefs are ready for Revolution. Where are we going from here....??

State of Emergency The premier has just declared that Covid19 pandemic control – “flattening the curve” – requires the implementation of emergency measures. Bars and restaurants must close to patrons, and go to take out and delivery only. All St. Patrick’s day public celebrations have been cancelled today.  Schools have been closed for the next three weeks. Our own PM is self-isolating, modeling “working from home” for a country of knowledge workers. Specially-scheduled shopping hours are being established for vulnerable populations. Interest rates are dropping to zero. These are strange and unprecedented times. It’s consuming the news cycle: stories on how to cope; sharing acts of community kindness; collectively watching and worrying about our friends and family scattered around the world, trying to get home. # caremongering  is trending on Twitter, as a uniquely Canadian-bred movement to keep the lights shining through the darkness.  Lessons Learned. T...

One year ago yesterday, my husband and I officially signed our Separation Agreement, in the presence of witnesses, a Notary, and shared a ceremonial slug of the “special whisky” Greg brought in honour of the occasion. Turns out, the whisky was awful – but somehow, its nasty burn seemed more fitting than a smooth scotch would have been, given the intensity and jarring impact of that moment on my life.  I had picked October 20 th  as the date for the paperwork, as I reckoned that was the day Greg first left our bed and moved out to the studio the year before that. From that moment to the clink of our whisky glasses, my whole world was turned inside out. I come from a long line of introverts. Apart from the kids who would come to visit me, my mother did not socialize with the neighbourhood folk much. She preferred to keep her private life, well, private. When Greg and I were courting, one of the songs he wrote for me that truly clinched the deal was called “Hermit Wife” ...

Happy Canada Day from a proud Canadian. Facebook – which I use only judiciously and strategically – likes to remind me what happened on this date over the years. I can completely turn it off if I wish, and for a time, those daily trips down memory lane had the power to completely undo me. So much so that I completely stopped Facebook for awhile. Then I learned how to build my social media bubble: I “unfollowed” a whole community of people; I changed my notifications and trained myself to leave the app alone. And I went away to focus on healing. Walking. Music. Talking. Sharing my story. Yoga. Weight lifting. More walking. Sleep stories. Mindfulness. Journaling. Gratitude. Random acts of kindness. And embracing all of those who gathered around me in my time of need. I called on an army of helpers, and made myself my Mission: to once and for all see me for the magnificent creature I am, and lean into Just Being Me. It has been a project more daunting than any other I hav...

Good Friday. A day wrought with symbolism - and for a storyteller who embraces ritual as a way to integrate life's experiences, this weekend is always special for me.  Last year at this time, I was living back in my old bedroom at Dad's house, nursing my shattered heart and dealing with the business of dissolving my marriage. As I walked by my old friend the river that Good Friday, I embraced Ritual. I began by shedding pain-laden artifacts, giving them to the mighty Ottawa (which was about to overflow in the great deluge of 2017). Then I sat on its bank, and imagined a future for myself as this new being, separate from Greg. And the only place I could see living that life, was in my beloved little blue house on the river - the home we were preparing to sell. The moment I made that choice, I began a love affair that might never have come, had I not had to fight so hard for my life throughout the long cold winter from which I was emerging. And here, a year later, I stand s...