Best: Saturday Edition

Categories: Adoption

Trying To Be Good Enough

Adoption Journey — Day 70

Last night was our first visit with our adoption practitioners who will be doing our home study. I think it went pretty well. Well, except for the fact that we talked their ears off. But that’s not surprising, is it?

I have to admit I am finding the home study process a bit daunting. So much is weighing on “passing” the home study, that I am nervous about so many things. I don’t want to screw it up, so I don’t want to say or do or be the wrong thing. And I suppose that is what has me on pins and needles.

That’s not to say our adoption practitioners have anything to do with that nervousness. Oh no. In fact, they are lovely and warm and friendly. From the moment we arrived we were put at our ease. So that part bodes well for the process, because there are a lot of questions to be asked and answered, and it will be so much easier in a friendly environment. And a lot of the process is intensely personal, and so if we were not comfortable with our social workers, it would be excruciating.

But there is something stressful about having someone else decide your fate. It’s especially hard when it’s a decision about something you want so badly. I am afraid I will say something wrong, or our decisions will be wrong, or my house will not be clean enough or child-proofed enough, or our finances will not be good enough. I know that the decision is based on everything all together, because nobody is perfect, but you still want to do everything just right. You don’t want to jeopardize your chances. Our social workers were really good about saying there’s little “right” or “wrong” — it’s all sorts of factors put together that they base their decision on. But still, I worry.

We’ve been denied the chance to have biological children, which has hurt so badly and has been so hard. To be denied the chance to have any children in our family through adoption would just be crushing. It would be heartbreaking. And so, the tendency is to try to be perfect.

All we can do is be who we are, and hope that who we are is good enough. Because we cannot be any more or less than that.

Mar

3 Comments

Categories: Adoption, Cats, Fitness and fatness, Friends and Family, Good News, Infertility

Lessons Learned

Yesterday was full of learning experiences. I learned many things.

Wearing comfortable shoes does not stop blisters from bleeding all over your socks. Only band-aids will do that.
It is a bad idea to do your financial paperwork for your homestudy JUST before you go to the doctor who is testing you for high blood pressure.
The pain and grief of infertility never goes away, even when you are adopting. No matter how much you like her or how happy you are for her, when your neighbour tells you she is pregnant with twins it will make you cry for hours afterwards.
Looking out the window is no way to tell how warm it is outside.
If your garage is peopled with Adventure Mice, it’s a good idea to wear gloves when cleaning it out.
If you get rid of cable or satellite, you don’t miss it. But if you get rid of your DVD player, you’re nuts.
Our neighbour really IS wonderful. She took the time to come and tell us about her pregnancy privately, because she knew we were struggling and wanted us to hear it from her first.
There is really no other option but to lose 30 or 40 pounds.
Cats really ARE nocturnal. Turning off the lights makes no difference to them, or to how busy they are, or how noisy they are.

I hope today involves a little less learning. I could stand to learn a whole lot less today.

Mar

Categories: Adoption

These Shoes Were Made For Walkin’

Adoption Journey – Day 68

Yesterday was a pretty productive day. We had a few things to get done in terms of paperwork yesterday, and with the warm weather, running errands was a welcome task. I don’t mind getting out and doing things when the weather is fine, especially since I was able to walk.

Part of the process for an international adoption is getting fingerprints and police checks done. We did the local police check earlier, and got the fingerprints done the same day. But the fingerprints have to be sent off to the RCMP where they make sure you’re not some big-time international criminal. (Yes, that WAS me they based The Italian Job on. When I am not busy being a domestic house goddess, I spend my leisure time as a safe cracker doing international heists and capers. Of course, I chose Charlize Theron to play me in the movie because of our strong physical resemblance…)

So yesterday I decided to get that done. I also needed to send a copy off to the States because you need a check from every country you’ve lived in since the age of 18. (For Japan, I have to check in at the Japanese consulate in Toronto, which is a job for another day.) I wrote letters to outline what I needed and why, and I put them all in envelopes with INTERNATIONAL ADOPTION written in red in big, bold letters on the front in the hopes that would expedite the process. And I put everything in a knapsack and I started walking.

First stop: the bank. These police organizations don’t do this stuff for FREE, you know. I had to stop in and buy some money orders, one for each request. Now, I had just walked a couple of kilometres in the bright sunshine, so I was a bit warm when I got into the bank. And when I walk, I walk for exercise, at a fair clip — I don’t just stroll along. I was also feeling pretty upbeat because of the fine weather, and because I was getting more tasks done. So I was a sweaty, smiling sight standing there in the lineup waiting for a teller.

I got up to the teller and although warm and sweating, I was very cheerful. The bank ladies thought I was a freak. Miserable old farts.

After picking up a couple of bottles of water at the corner store, my next stop was the post office. I had cold water and my iPod, so I was off. By the time I got there, I was warmer still, but still enjoying my walk. I went into the post office and stood in line, and I swear they still had the heat on. They were bringing out an electric fan to cool things down, it was so warm. I began to melt. Seriously. I was dripping. All the cool water did nothing to cool me down. I couldn’t wait to get up to the counter, just so I could buy my courier envelopes so I’d have something to fan myself with.

I stood at the counter, melting, writing addresses on envelopes and trying not to sweat all over everything. I got everything addressed, sealed, and sent. And I headed for home. The walk home was so warm I was wiping my face on my t-shirt, but it was nice to have gotten everything accomplished AND gotten in some exercise as well.

At home last night, we managed an hour and a half of work around the house. I got all the garbage from the weekend’s cleaning out for today’s pickup — here’s hoping they take it all — plus some house cleaning. BDH started to tackle the horrible garage of DOOM, and by the time he finished for the evening, we could actually see some of the floor of the garage! Hurray for progress!

Today is thankfully less busy. I have to go back to the doctor for another vaccination against more strange tropical diseases. I plan to get a bit more housework done. I also hope to go through more photos to find some fun ones for our family photo pages. And right now, Opus is happily burbling away in the sunshine, and chatting and playing with Lucy (which doesn’t happen often, trust me). So it looks to be a promising day, all things considered.

Although today, I’ll be driving instead of walking. I have blisters from yesterday.

Mar

4 Comments

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

Spring Has Sprung

Signs that spring has really truly arrived:

The heat’s turned off.
We had our first lawn treatment of this year yesterday.
I’m planning on walking to do my errands today.
There are robins sitting on the fence out back.
There’s green poking up from my gardens.
We can hear the loud neighbourhood mom out on the street with her kids.
Neighbourhood cats have returned to use my vegetable garden as a great big al fresco litter box.
The day care parade of toddlers has started to walk by.
Ugly bugs have started to come out of hibernation.
We have a bunch of windows wide open.

Updated to add:

It’s too warm to wear a jacket. I went to the store wearing a fleece over my t-shirt and I was melting!

Mar

Categories: Random Thoughts

Cake

I’m craving cake. With icing. A really good piece of cake, with a cream cheese or a lovely not-too-sweet butter icing, would go a really long way right now. I have no idea why I am suddenly craving cake. I am not even a big cake person. And yet…

When I have dessert, cake is usually far down the list of options. I’ll go for something cheesecake first, or a pie, or something custardy. That’s just who I am. I mean, my love of the pie is well documented. I am, as we all know, the original Pie Stealing Bastard. I love a good piece of pie. And cheesecake is next to godliness in my book. So this whole craving of cake is completely out of the ordinary.

It can’t be cheap cake, mind you. Not that manufactured, heavily iced, lacking-in-substance birthday cake. Oh no. I’m craving something with some teeth, something dense and rich and decadent. Something chocolate would be lovely, of course. But a nice heavy slice of a buttered almond cake, or a wonderful piece of carrot cake from the bakery in St. Jacobs — they’d be perfect. With a big mug of tea.

But there’s no cake. Nary a slice, Not a crumb within shouting distance of this place. Le sigh.

Mar

Categories: Adoption, Friends and Family

A Collage of Us

Adoption Journey — Day 65

One of the things we have to do for our adoption is make some photo pages about us. We need to gather together some photos of our family and our life to show the Ethiopian decision-makers who we are, what our lives are about, and why we’d be great parents. I suspect it will be another one of those tasks that will ultimately be really rewarding, but right now is a little intimidating.

I am both dreading the assignment and feeling a bit excited about the prospect. I dread the work involved, because I am a bit of a perfectionist about these sorts of things. I just know I will pore over photos and futz over the task endlessly to make it perfect. But I am kind of excited too. I like the thought of going through all our pictures again, and reliving moments as I go. I am looking forward to choosing pictures that represent us and our family, and the hopefulness that comes with presenting yourself in the best light you can. I’m also hoping to get some pictures from our family and friends that would be fun to include. And I am also kind of excited about trying new software and making a collage with pictures and captions and having a really good time with it.

Yesterday in our cleaning frenzy I found all sorts of old pictures — wedding pictures, pictures of the cats, vacation photos, some shots I took when I lived in Japan — and started to feel a bit excited. It’ll be fun to go through them again, and see people and places I have not seen in a long time. BDH wants me to go through the photos and put them into albums, and record names and dates and notes on the back of each picture if I can remember anything. (See? There’s one of those tasks that comes out of cleaning that I was talking about that doubles your work.) Maybe I’ll get to that, but probably not. I’ll be contented just to select some pictures for the collage, and get the rest of the photos put away.

Another reason I want to do a good job is that all these things are part of our child’s life. The collage will be something to put in their life book. We’re starting to think about keeping these things now, things that our child might want in future to show how he or she came to be part of our family. Even this blog will be part of those keepsakes. So I want something special, something that our child can keep as a memory of us and how very much we wanted him or her in our lives and all that we went through to bring him or her into our hearts. So the collage has another, deeper meaning.

I’ll keep you posted as we start putting photos aside, and perhaps I’ll post the collage somewhere when it’s all done. Likely, though, like a lot of these tasks, I’ll just try to get it done as well as I can before the deadline and along with all the other tasks to be done before our file is complete.

Mar

Categories: Adoption, Everyday Life Stuff

And So It Begins

Adoption Journey — Day 64

It begins today. All the cleaning and throwing out and bickering over what to keep and piles of crapola in the hallway.

Today we started cleaning in the bedrooms. That might seem a silly place to start, but the bedrooms have often been a repository for miscellaneous stuff that we didn’t have another place to store, or piles of blankets and other miscellany associated with the convalescence of one cat or another. So we just dug in, and spent the afternoon going through and either putting stuff away or throwing it away.

One thing I dislike about this sort of cleaning is that it gives rise to more cleaning as a result. For example, now I have to deal with a ton of wedding stuff that was heretofore stored in the master bedroom. I mean, I know it has to be done, but it seems sometimes that the work occasionally doubles instead of diminishes.

Oh well. All for a good cause.

We can only go in fits and starts because I am so allergic to dust. Even folding laundry — even freshly laundered clothes — kicks up enough dust to bring on an asthma attack, and so we can only work for a couple of hours at a time. Still, it’s progress.

And few things make me as contented as a clean home. So I expect that the further we get through these tasks, the happier I’ll be.

Mar

Categories: Adoption, Good News

A To Do List On A Grand Scale

Adoption Journey – Day 63

Yesterday, we booked our first appointment of our home study. Now it all starts in earnest.

It’s great news for us. It means that we are getting into the biggest part of the adoption process, the part that takes the most time and patience. If we get it done and successfully, we will be allowed to adopt a child. It’s the key to a future with a child in our lives.

I must admit I am intimidated. Not so much by the home study process, because I think answering the questions won’t be such a big deal. But I am intimidated by everything we have to get done before we can have someone in and “inspect” our home. There’s just so much.

Our house is day-to-day clean, in terms of what you’d expect from two busy and not-so-neat adults living together. And having 3 cats, one of whom is elderly and pees on stuff from time to time, certainly doesn’t help. But although it is tidy enough for everyday, there’s no way it’s clean enough to pass inspection, and it’s going to need work before we bring a child home.

We have here the clutter of 10 years of busy life together, 10 years’ worth of stuff accumulated by two pack rats. And precious little storage space. So, one of the first things we must do is start throwing things away. We have to be ruthless. We have to just bite the bullet and start getting rid of stuff. I have to learn to throw away my Canadian Living magazines and my craft stuff and clothes I’ve been holding on to that I will never realistically wear again. And BDH has to learn to part with his old computer components and gear, most of which is useless, and his hobby stuff. We have to chuck the lot.

And don’t even talk to me about the garage. I shudder to think about the work that will be required for our garage, since it has been impromptu storage all these years. That’s going to require days of work in itself.

We have to get rid of old furniture. We have to throw away dishes we don’t use and bikes we’ll never ride and tools that never get used. We have to just learn to live with less clutter. And we have to buy storage to put away all the stuff we do need to keep. We also have to replace any of our old not-child-friendly furniture with brand new stuff. And since we have only one income, we have to learn to be realistic about what we need, since we cannot take on any more debt than the already painfully expensive cost of the adoption itself.

We have to wash windows and paint walls and mop floors and vacuum carpets. And then we have to get the carpets deep cleaned. We’ll likely have to hire someone to come in and clean the house and deep clean the carpets professionally after we do it, just to be sure.

And, one of the hardest things of all: we have to put Opus in her cage overnight and when she is not supervised. Granted, we’re putting a little 7 pound kitty in a huge Great Dane sized cage, so she’s got plenty of room and a comfy bed and food and water and litter — she has everything she needs. And she really doesn’t mind it so much, because she is so old she sleeps all the time anyway. But it hurts to take away her freedom and her ability to run around, especially now that she’s so healthy and happy. But we cannot have her peeing on stuff.

And then, once we get all the cleaning and general maintenance done, we have a long list of baby-proofing things that must get done. There are things I expected, like getting cabinet locks and outlet covers. And there are things I had not expected, like buying escape ladders for the bedrooms and carbon monoxide detectors and bolting our bookshelves to the wall. I don’t know one single person who has ever done these things in anticipation of having a biological child, and yet, we are required to do so to adopt. So we will cheerfully buy outlet covers, and escape ladders, and fire extinguishers, and gear to hide all our electrical cords, and put a cat-flap in the basement door for the cats to get into and out of the basement.

Before, this was just an item on a list, something that had to be done sometime. It was in the future. But now, it’s immediate. When I think of everything we have to do, I get so overwhelmed. I want to just sit down and cry. Paperwork I can handle. Bureaucracy I can handle. But this is just so much to do, and all on my own essentially, since BDH is at work all day.

I just have to remember why it is I am doing all this stuff. I just have to suck it up and get it done. And when it’s done, it’s done. It’ll all be worth it in the end.

But I don’t even know where to begin. Hell, I don’t even know where to begin my list.

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

Incomplete Me

If you believe in astrology, then my birth sign has doomed me to be someone who starts many projects and never finishes them.

It’s true, in a lot of ways. I don’t know if it has anything to do with my astrological sign — I don’t believe in that stuff. But I admit that it is one of my character traits. I do start a lot of projects with enthusiasm. I love the planning and dreaming that comes with a new project. I love to imagine what could be. But when I actually get into the thick of a project… well, I often lose interest.

Our house is littered with projects left half-done. I have bags and boxes of crafts that are unfinished, almost-completed knitting projects, and fabric waiting to become something useful or pretty around the house. I have furniture waiting to be refinished and revitalized and reused. Walls are taped in painter’s tape waiting for me to finish painting the trim, and a gallon of paint for the spare bedroom sits waiting for me. I have years and years of back issues of Canadian Living that I had planned to go through and get recipes from. I have endless files on my computer of recipes I’ve never used nor catalogued.

I don’t know what it is that makes me dream of these things I will never do. I imagine a life as dictated by home magazines and self-improvement magazines and housekeeping magazines, and I think about how lovely it would be. And sometimes, I actually take steps and start these plans. And yet, they never come to fruition. Sometimes I think that it’s the other projects that I start and never finish that get in the way. Sometimes it’s just that real life gets in the way.

Perhaps I am readily distracted. I need to remind myself constantly as I do things in my day to finish what I start. I will be in the middle of a task and think, “Oh, I need to…” and I am off to take care of the next task. Or maybe it’s that I am good at multi-tasking. When I was working, I was good at juggling multiple timelines and projects and demands at once. I am not sure which it is.

But now that spring is coming, and our home study looms throughout the spring, it’s time to get myself together and get a lot of projects done. I won’t have time to waste, and we cannot do things half-assed. There’s too much at stake.

And so I hope you’ll pardon me, but I have to finish writing now. There’s laundry to be done. (And cleaning. And painting. And throwing stuff out. And…)

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

Clean

This morning I got up and did my usual Wednesday morning running about — it’s garbage day, and the garbage truck either comes at 7:05 am or sometime after noon, and you never know which, so you MUST get up and get the garbage out early or risk holding on to your stinky garbage until next week. And you can’t put it out the night before because we live next to a conservation area, and that means raccoons, skunks, porcupines, and other garbage-loving critters, and you risk a raccoon party with garbage strewn all over your front lawn if you do. So, up I got.

I stole a look at myself in the mirror as I got dressed. I am surprised the mirror didn’t crack. I had that post-sick-just-woke-up look. You know the one. You wake up with those crazed hair bumps that come from sleeping hot — strange cowlicks everywhere. And your hair isn’t the cleanest, either, because being sick, who had the energy to shower? Your face is all puffy. Your teeth feel like they are wearing sweaters. Your nose is red from blowing for days on end (and in my case, one side is rubbed raw). Your eyes are bleary and red. And you’re wearing “sick clothes” — usually a comfortable old t-shirt or pyjamas or sweatpants. No one is beautiful when they are sick. Face it. It’s an irrefutable law of the universe. And who am I to flout the laws of the universe?

I tried shoving my bizarre bed head into a ponytail. I put on some clean-ish clothes. I trudged downstairs to clean the cat litter. I trudged back upstairs. And I started hauling garbage out to the curb.

I’m sure the moment I stepped out on the porch, small children would have screamed and run away, old ladies would have recoiled in horror. Fortunately, the street was empty. When I came back in, I made a big pot of coffee and then decided to go upstairs to have a shower.

Oh, the feeling of a nice, hot shower after you’ve been sick — it’s like nirvana, I tell you. I think there is nothing more delicious than stepping into a shower when you really, really need it. The water is so warm. The soap feels so clean. And shampoo is like the most magical invention ever. I stood under the shower extra-long this morning. It was luxurious. And now, post-shower, I feel so much more human. The world seems a lot more pleasant when you’re nice and clean. You’re more optimistic and ready to face the day.

It’s a nice day, so far. The sun is shining and spring is trying so hard to come and stay. And not only have I thrown out the garbage, but I seem to have chased out most of this cold as well. Not bad for the first official day of spring.

Mar

Categories: Random Thoughts

Enough

Everyone has limits.

I’ve had enough of being sick. This has gone on for too long, and I am tired of the whole coughing and nose-blowing thing.
There’s not enough really good Italian restaurants in town. We need some really good Italian restaurants — not chain restaurants, but family owned and authentic.
One season of The Ninth Doctor of Doctor Who was not enough.
We definitely haven’t got enough storage space in our house. Or maybe we have more than enough stuff. Possibly some could be thrown away.
Winter can be over now. I’ve had enough of the cold and the snow, and I want to start going for walks outside everyday again. I could certainly do some of my errands on foot.
I can’t get enough of those Chapman’s fudgesicles these days, the no sugar added ones. I could eat a billion.
Sometimes it feels like it will be forever until we have completed our adoption work and have a child, and other times, we haven’t got nearly enough time or money to get ready.
I’ve had enough of Opus yelling, already.
We haven’t got enough money to finish our basement now, which is a drag. It’d be great to have that space finished.
I’m hungry enough for both of us right now, I tell you.

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

The Shop Around the Corner

I love living in a town that still fosters small businesses. Our town has always discouraged the big box stores in favour of small business, and I think it’s part of the charm of living here. Yeah, we don’t have a Wal-Mart or a big box mall, but we still have every amenity. And I prefer the small-town feel.

Like today, for instance. I am still sick, only now, to compound matters, my glands are swollen and ache like mad. And my nose has been rubbed raw from blowing, replaced with blisters and redness. So BDH (who is also sick) and I headed out in search of pharmaceuticals.

We tried finding what I was looking for at the drug store in the local grocery. But they didn’t have exactly the drug I wanted, the only thing that seems to be working for me right now. So we headed off, and stopped at the local Subway to get BDH a sandwich. In the same plaza, there was a tiny little hole-in-the-wall pharmacy. So while BDH got his sandwich, I went in.

I’ve had good luck with this little pharmacy in the past. In desperation, I have occasionally gone in there, and gotten some brilliant advice and wonderful products. And today was no exception. I was too sick to spend a lot of time faffing about, but there was no need. The pharmacist came out from behind the counter as soon as I arrived to assist me, took me around, advised me what to buy — and also, when they didn’t have what I wanted, knew exactly which product to recommend that was the same as what I wanted. I was in, out and done in 2 minutes. And every time, it’s the same.

They don’t have a huge pharmacy, but one thing they have in spades is customer service. And that’s the thing about the small stores vs the box stores — we could have spent 15 minutes in the big store and left empty-handed. Or at the very least, left with something that wasn’t quite want we wanted, or didn’t quite fix the problem. But in the 2 minutes it took the pharmacist to chat with me and give me advice, I got everything I needed, and he got a repeat customer.

Yes, it’s nice sometimes to have all the big stores, everything you could possibly want, at your fingertips. But sometimes, it’s nice to just get what you need. And on a day like today, the extra TLC went a long way.

Mar

Categories: Adoption

So Much To Learn

Adoption Journey – Day 58

I have been reading quite a few international/transracial adoption blogs these days, as we slowly move along in the process towards one day meeting our Mystery Baby. The more I read, sometimes I feel, the further I have to go.

Today, thanks to that wonderful voice of adoption experience and wisdom, Mary, over at Owlhaven and Ethiopia Adoption Blog, I read a post on Mayhem and Magic in which Amanda discusses the unique challenge of raising black boys in the U.S. Amanda talks about what parents face raising their boys to be black men in American society, and the challenges those boys and men will face. And it got me thinking.

Potentially, BDH and I could be one day raising a black man here in Canada. I read the posts and have to admit, my first reaction was to think “oh, that’s so hard”, but ultimately that it’s THEIR problem. I mean, it’s the U.S., and there are so many more racial problems in the U.S. between black and white, and Canada is so much more racially accepting, right? We’d never have those problems HERE, right? And that’s when it hit me how woefully unprepared I truly am.

I must be incredibly naive. I honestly, truly, have NO IDEA about the black person’s experience here in Canada. I mean, I associate with black people in my everyday life, and because my dealings with them are just as people — medical professionals, work associates, friends, neighbours, business people, students — I had never really given thought to the fact that their experiences here living in Canada would be any different than my own. I expected just the regular human differences of familial culture, religion, and family. Any differences I had considered certainly never contained any sinister undercurrents, any danger, any fear.

But where I live, here in small suburbia, the black community is small, so I would imagine there is a feeling of apartness, of difference. But is there more to it? Is the black person’s, and more specifically, is the black male’s experience here in small-city Canada — in Canada in general — one of disadvantage and discrimination because of the colour of his skin? I really, truly do not know the answer to that question.

I have so much to learn if I am going to raise a child, any child. And initially, when I considered adoption, I was aware that as a parent in a multiracial family, I’d have to become more culturally aware, more diverse in my thinking and teaching and experience. But until reading these posts, I think I was still in the honeymoon phase. I thought only superficially of the little things that would have to be done. I had never truly considered that there may be these sorts of obstacles in my child’s life. I had never encountered thinking like that, never experienced it, never thought this way myself — and so never considered it would be something my child would face.

Now I realize just what kind of research I have to do. How much learning I have ahead of me. How many people I need to meet, and talk to, and ask questions of. I cannot just look at my OB and see a wonderful, professional black man and just make assumptions about the respect he receives in his job and his daily life. I need to ask questions about what it is like to be a black man in Canadian society. I cannot just expect when I see the young black teenage girls at practice that their experiences are typical of all teenage girls I know. I need to ask questions about what it’s like to be a teenage girl of a different race in a predominantly white high school.

I assumed that if we raise our child with love and self-respect and values and humour, that he or she will be alright. That they will be prepared to face the world, and go out and play their part in it. But there may be so much more to it than that. Because it may be that once they walk out the front door, the world is not as we assumed it to be.

I have so much to learn. It is so scary. I am so not ready for this.

We have so much to learn.

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

Not Quite Spring

It’s mid-March, and this weekend I was hoping to get started on my garden.

Here where we live, that sounds like a preposterous idea — there’s still snow on the ground, and the temperature is below zero. We won’t get warm, spring-like gardening weather for another two months. We can’t really go out and do some early maintenance on the gardens for at least another month, since the ground will be wet and spongy with all the melting snow. But there are some things one can do to get started, even this early in the year.

One thing I like to do is plant seeds. I try, as much as possible, to start my gardens from seed. For one thing, it’s much, much cheaper than going and buying flats of plants each spring. And when it comes to my vegetable garden, it really is quite easy. Many of the veggies I grow — tomatoes, peppers, onions — are quite easy to start from seed. I also enjoy having my little greenhouse set up in the patio window, watching the plants sprout and grow and reach up towards the sun.

I also try to start flowers from seed. Often times, that’s a bit more of a challenge than vegetables. Flowers can be much more finicky and delicate than vegetables. And there is the question of perennials vs annuals to contend with, which presents a whole different set of challenges. But I continue to try. I try every year to raise perennials from seed, and most times, I fail miserably. They’re just so touchy, right from the start. If things are not exactly so, they won’t even sprout at all. And if they DO sprout, you sometimes get these little weedy plants that just die within days. But, hope springs eternal. Perennials are just so much more expensive to buy from the garden centre, but they sure do save you time each spring if you can get a garden full of them to thrive.

Another thing I like about growing flowers from seed is the element of surprise. In the past, I have purchased seed packets and mixes that contain seeds for a variety of plants — a wildflower mix, for example, or a cut flower mix. So, what I do is take a few of the seeds and start them off, and see what I get. I am not so much of a horticulturist that I can identify flowers by their seeds, so I never know what I will end up with. It’s bachelor’s buttons and coreopsis one year, zinnias and sweet Williams the next. And if you’re really lucky, the ones you get will grow and self-seed, and voila! Riot of unplanned flowers the next year.

Unfortunately, though, the weather and my cold seems to have scuttled my plans a bit. I was hoping for warmer weather this weekend, so I could go get all my tools and seeds out of the garage and get soil from the bins I keep in the back yard. But the weekend is cold and not very hospitable. And, since both BDH and I are still sick, the idea of even that small bit of manual labour to get everything set up is unappealing. I need his help to get the little greenhouse set up, but I don’t have the heart to ask him for help while he’s hacking and coughing.

So, I think I’ll put my gardening plans on hold for a few days. Perhaps I’ll read through my gardening books and plan and dream instead.

Mar

Categories: Cats

The Benefit of Experience

Do you know those paper wrappers that you get when you pick up straws at a fast food place? The ones that the straws come wrapped in, like a little sleeve?

You know how when you roll around on the carpet you get all static-y? And you know how static makes things stick to you?

And you know how paper can sometimes get static-charged and stick to you?

And you know how hard it is to get something stuck to the middle of your back? How it’s sometimes just out of reach?

You know how frustrating it can be to not be able to see what your back looks like? And if you have something stuck to it, you might not even see it?

You know how, if you run around in circles a whole lot, you get dizzy and fall down a lot?

Lucy doesn’t.

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff, Music Notes

Up All Night

It’s 4 am, and I am still awake. Since sleep seems to be not an option — lying down just leads to coughing — I figured I may as well pass the time until morning doing something useful. (And quiet, so as not to wake the rest of the house.)

When I have trouble getting to sleep, which is rare because sleeping is what I do best in life, I have a couple of strategies I try to help me fall asleep. And then, when they all fail abysmally and I am just frantic with exhaustion and pleading PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF DOG JUST LET ME SLEEP, that’s when sleep usually jumps up and clobbers me over the head. (Tonight, I am so pumped full of various medications, the frantic part just never came. I was pretty mellow and just resigned myself to the fact that, meh, if I’m awake, I might as well get up.)

So, while I was lying there, shifting into wonderfully warm, comfortable positions, just SO, only to be rudely discomfited by hacking up a lung, I was listening to my iPod. I will sometimes listen to music as a means to distract myself, and also to drown out any a) excessive noise or 2) excessive quiet. I started doing this in high school, and let me tell you, an iPod is way better than a big old tape player and clunky headphones. I have the Shuffle model, which is nice and compact. Also? The batteries last much longer. Hurray for progress!

There’s something that has always appealed to me about listening to music in the dark late at night. I have always enjoyed it. I tend to actively listen more than I do in the daytime, so I catch more lyrics and more layers of music. And I daydream more, which is I suppose why I find it to be such a good distraction when trying to fall asleep. When I was younger, my favourite album to fall asleep to was Avalon by Roxy Music. I made a tape (remember those?) with that on one side, and Rio by Duran Duran on the other, and I would usually be asleep before the tape flipped to Duran Duran.

But my iPod holds so many different songs. I load it up with a variety of songs from the 4000+ that I have on my hard drive, and I am all set for working out or walking or sleeping or whatever. It’s often a fairly eclectic mix. I have 2 iPods, actually — one for working out and one for sleep. Lately, the one for sleep has been loaded with mellower stuff, not my usual retro alternative favourites, but still an interesting mix.

Tonight, as I lay staring up into the darkness, I got the gorgeous Leonard Cohen song Song of Bernadette, done by Jennifer Warnes and her flawless voice. I listened to U2’s song for Aung San Suu Kyi, Walk On, which gives me goosebumps. I got the incomparable Stan Rogers, his beautiful Northwest Passage. Quite possibly one of the most beautiful songs I have ever heard. And I heard Fake Plastic Trees by Radiohead, quirky and lovely.

So, a perfect slumber mix, full of wonderful imagery and gorgeous voices. Not enough to help me sleep, however. Still, if you’re going to be up, listening to songs like that is a nice way to pass the time trying.

Bah. It’s 5 am. I guess it’s time to break out the big guns. Warm milk. With honey.

Mar

3 Comments

Categories: Blogs, Good Reading

30 Posts In 30 Days

The challenge, should one choose to accept it, is to write 30 posts in 30 days.

As I read in Shane Nickerson’s blog via Wil Wheaton’s blog via my newsreader (got that?), this fellow Shane posted a few days back that he has decided to do a 30-blog-posts-in-30-days personal challenge. He came up with this 30-in-30 plan, it seems from the rules he laid out for his challenge, to motivate himself to write more regularly and with more thought to content than he has recently. And Wheaton spread the idea along through one of his posts, and challenged people reading his blog to do the same. It looks like people are taking up the challenge.

Writing a blog doesn’t always come easy. Sometimes it’s really hard to think of something to write about. A lot of times, especially on a blog like this where stuff is more personal, there are enough things going on in everyday life that I can always manage to put pen to paper, metaphorically speaking. But some days, I draw a total blank. There are days when I get up and I have nothing. Nada. Zero. Zilch. There are days when I am so NOT motivated to write anything. Days when I am sick, or tired, or busy, or whatever. And on my other blogs, where research and forethought are required, it is much harder. I really struggle sometimes to find content that inspires me to write or, in the case of my volleyball blog, write something in some way that doesn’t bore people to death.

So I think it’s an interesting challenge, and I’m going to do it, starting tomorrow. I think it will be a good exercise for me. I’m usually pretty good at writing most days and not skipping too many, but there are things I’d like to improve on. I need to do it for a few reasons, not least of which is the continued motivation. If there’s a goal, I want to try to live up to it. But also, it’ll help with keeping my focus. Instead of coming to my computer and faffing around looking for a topic or inspiration, I hope this will get me into a better routine of writing and research.

But I am going to need to set some of my own rules for myself. Maybe “rules” is the wrong word; possibly “ideas” or “guidelines” would be better. I don’t want this challenge to be a chore. I want it to help expand what I am doing now and make me a better writer.

So, 30 posts in 30 days. Could you do it? If you have a blog, give it a try.

We shall see if I can. (Eep. No pressure…)

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

Pity, Party of One

I am so sick of being sick. I always get sick at this time of year, and it sucks.

This cold has hung on for a few days now, and I am really sick of it. I am sick of breaking a sweat just moving across the room — I am sweating just sitting still here in my chair. I am sick of blowing my nose, which is starting to get all raw and peeling. I am sick of my sinuses draining with that whistling, bubbling noise. I am sick of the bubbling and wheezing in my chest keeping me awake.

Being sick gets in the way of things that I want to get done. I have a lot of stuff to do, and I can’t do it while I am sweating and dizzy and coughing up a lung. I am getting behind in my housework. I have errands to run for the adoption paperwork. I was doing so well exercising each day. Now I have to just rest and recover, which I don’t do very well when I have these “to do” lists playing in my mind.

It used to be really bad when I was working. I just had a very hard time taking sick days. I always felt guilty for taking time off sick. I was the workhorse on my teams and things would not get done if I didn’t do them. And there was always this irrational fear of getting fired for being off sick too much. (As it turns out, I learned you can lose your job even when you are the most productive and reliable person on the job. So there you go.) Now that I am not working outside the home, taking a sick day means stuff does not get done, and I feel like I am not pulling my weight around here. When you’re not bringing in an income, guilt is a huge motivator.

Plus, being sick just magnifies everything else that makes me peevish. I missed going to see some musical theatre on Saturday because of my cold. It has been warm, early spring weather and I haven’t been able to go outside. And as I read about Angelina Jolie parachuting into Vietnam to adopt a child while foregoing all the usual wait times and paperwork, and I look over at my pile of stuff still to be done for our international adoption, I get peevish. And a little resentful.

Everything just seems to suck when you are sick.

BDH has been great though. I am the most impossible person to live with when I am sick, and he has been so tolerant of my irrational stubbornness, and very patient. He has been wonderful, doing the laundry for me, bringing me soup, making me sit and direct traffic while he cleans. Because of my asthma, if a cold settles in my lungs, even the slightest exertion like laughing or climbing the stairs leaves me breathless and panting and coughing until I gag, which is really frustrating, so BDH has just been cleaning around me, without complaint.

Even Opus stopped yelling at me this morning. She’s been ever so nice to me, talking so sweetly and pleasantly to me, not shrieking or hollering. It’s been nice and quiet for my headache.

And now, BDH said he thinks he’s coming down with this cold too. But he’s much more pragmatic about getting sick. He said, “That’s what happens when people live together… when we have a little one we are going to get everything going.”

Poor BDH. In a year’s time, when cold and flu season rolls around, he’s going to have to deal not only with a crabby big person, but a crabby little person too. But I am expecting this is the last year I will get to be “irrational sick woman”, and I will have to find a new superhero persona, one that is slightly less peevish and considerably higher functioning when sick.

I suppose that’s alright. This sick crabby person is getting a little tiresome anyway.

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

Random Fandom

Things I like. Today.

Are breakfast pitas NOT a very magical food? Tasty, all-natural AND healthy. I discovered them the other day in my grocery store (after seeing people eating them for years, but never knowing where to get them). I tried the muesli kind. YUM.
When I get a cold, I like how my voice gets all low and gravelly and “come hither” (as compared to the nasally tones I normally have). But then I’m too sick to do anything about it, sadly.
My iPod shuffle has been so handy. I use it for so many things: walks and running on the treadmill and travelling and drowning out annoying people. It’s also nice and small and easy to deal with. Recently I have taken to wearing it to bed to cover the noise made my the Shrieking Kitty O’ Doom. Although last night, I got up in the middle of the night and the thing swung around and smacked me, so I kind of have to remember to take it off when I am falling asleep.
Caramel Cinnamon popcorn, with almonds and pecans, from Shoppers Drug Mart. OH. MY. DOG. Addictive and so very tasty. Try it. Seriously.
Come to that, I love the new Shoppers Drug Marts, all bright and sexy and 24 hour. They have all kinds of nifty new products and are all boutique-like. I LOVE them.
Temperatures over 0. Because it means the snow is melting and spring is not far behind.
The Office. BBC edition. It’s like a car crash. I cannot look away. I worked with some of those people.
Lucy. She was sitting on the back of the chair behind me. She decided to have a bath. And used my face to prop up her foot.

Mar

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff

Rum and Regret

UGH. Can you BELIEVE I am getting sick AGAIN?

I’ve got that pins-and-needles scratchy wheezy feeling in the back of my throat and the top of my lungs. Some BASTARD out there has given me a COLD.

YOU! WHOEVER YOU ARE! You are my SWORN ENEMY!

(Nah. That’s not really true. I love you, man.)

I hate the colds. I hate them because when I get one, and it settles in my chest, my asthma acts like it’s a “get out of jail free” card, and I hack and cough and wheeze like a little old man who chain-smoked bad hand-rolled cigarettes since he was four years old. AND worked in a mine. With ASBESTOS.

Also, I am getting the peevish. Nobody likes that.

I went down and made myself a cup of Holiday Chai tea (Stash Tea ROCKS) which tastes like gingerbread and rum. And I put in lots of milk and honey, and a wee bit of rum to warm me up. Which is a nice thing if you’re sick, but makes it a little hard to clean the bathroom effectively. (Mind you, probably if I am having lung issues, working with chemical cleaners is not the best idea anyway. But still.)

I guess I should have taken more notice of the hand sanitizer dispensers all over the police station when I was in there earlier in the week. Or possibly kept my distance from the receptionist at the vet on Tuesday with her cold of doom.

Too late now.

I think something szechuan is in order for dinner. Or maybe chicken soup, ordered in from Swiss Chalet.

Definitely more tea with rum.

Mar

Categories: Cats, Everyday Life Stuff

Kitty Alzheimer’s

My cat has Alzheimer’s. And so none of us are getting much sleep.

I suppose it’s not REALLY Alzheimer’s. It’s a loss of cognitive function that comes with age, when a cat starts to get older and their eyesight and hearing starts to fail, and they wander off and get “lost” and wonder where everyone went, so they start howling. Opus wanders downstairs and starts yelling for someone’s attention. We’re never sure which someone it is, although it’s usually me. Sometimes it’s Cinnamon she wants, but normally, she wants me.

She bellows for me to come and play with her. She howls for me to come and open a door. She has this bloodcurdling, from the diaphragm, other-worldly gurgling howl that she unleashes when she’s really, truly concerned that she can’t find someone or she thinks she is alone. And while I try to be sympathetic to her old-kitty-ness, and try to be understanding… sometimes, she just bugs the crap out of me.

At 2 am, when she stands outside the bedroom door and lets one of these bloodcurdling howls go, I find it hard to be sympathetic. At 4 am when she is walking through the house bellowing, I have a very hard time being understanding. At those times, the kitty tends to have a very uncomfortable meeting with the squirt water bottle.

Sometimes, she is like a small child who is crying, and begins to sob, and then the sobbing continues after the tears have stopped. Even though she is standing directly in front of me, she seems to get herself so worked up that she can’t stop. And that’s when it really frustrates me. There’s nothing wrong with her; she’s got me standing right there in the room with her. And yet, she keeps yelling. And so then I yell at her to stop, yelling over top of her yelling. There’s a lot of yelling here at our house recently. My throat is hoarse from the yelling.

At least I take consolation in the fact that she’s healthy enough to do all this yelling. I mean, at her vet checkup the other day, she’d put on a half a pound, and she’s almost back up to her ideal weight. She’s bright and happy and playing a lot, and the wonderful Dr. Germain says she looks like a completely different cat. She’s never seen Opus when she’s healthy, so she was genuinely pleasantly surprised with her yesterday. So yeah, the upside is that she’s healthy enough to yell. When she was sick, she could barely muster the strength to get up and eat, let alone walk around hollering like a weenie. And the fact that she’s happy and healthy enough to be yelling at me to chase her and play with her? That’s gold, right there. I really cannot complain about that. So, I have to learn to be more patient, and play with her when she wants it, and pick her up and cuddle her when she wants it. Because in the not-too-distant future, she won’t be with us to cuddle or play with any more.

One thing the vet wants to check is her blood pressure. Sometimes cats who are hypertensive do a lot of yelling. And since we are concerned about my blood pressure these days, maybe the two of us can work on our blood pressure together. Sure beats yelling all the time, I can tell you.

Mar

Categories: Adoption

Check

Adoption Journey – Day 48

Things are getting checked off fast and furious on our adoption checklist. Checkitty-check-check.

Yesterday, we got a call that our police checks were complete and ready to be picked up. This is just days after we went and arranged to have them done. Originally, we’d been told that it takes 2 weeks or so, and that they’d call us when the reports were ready. So, I was as pleasantly surprised as anyone when I got a call yesterday to come and pick them up.

I went down to the police station today in much more hospitable weather circumstances than when we got the reports ordered last week. Unfortunately, the front desk sergeant, a young fellow, wasn’t nearly as friendly as the people that had been working that first time. Oh well. And it was not as quick a process, either, but that was because a very old woman in line in front of me was ordering police reports but did not speak much English (despite living here for 42 flipping years!!) and so it took longer than normal to get an address and phone number out of her. But once she was out of the way, it was quick as could be and I was out of there.

You’ll be happy to know I got the all clear. No criminal activity on my record. Because I know you were all wondering… it was up in the air there for awhile…

Mar

3 Comments

Categories: Everyday Life Stuff, Friends and Family, Volleyball

The Flexibility of Age

As you know, I was at the men’s national volleyball championships this past weekend. The last time I went to Nationals was almost 20 years ago; it’s been hosted too far away for us to go in the last few years.

I love the atmosphere of Nationals. It’s like a big party full of fans. Lots of really loud music, lots of good volleyball. Everyone there, for the most part, loves volleyball. There are so many knowledgeable people there, so many students of the game. Sometimes it seems with volleyball like it’s a fringe sport, because it never gets covered on TV, never gets media attention, and so unless you are “in the know” you never have any idea that these events are going on.

I love the fact that the teams play their best volleyball on this weekend. These teams come from universities across Canada after their conference playoffs. They all want to win, and they all have a shot at it. And that makes for some exciting matches.

I went this year to cover the sport for my volleyball blog, and BDH came with me to take pictures. We sat down to watch warm ups, where the players were hitting balls as hard as they could and the fans were “oooh”-ing and “aaah”-ing over each big hit. We got familiar with player names, heights, that sort of thing. I told BDH who the big stars were, who he should watch, what teams I was cheering for. The first night, we watched two very good matches. It was really exciting. Really excellent volleyball.

Sunday, we went back for playoffs. We watched my favourite team, Dalhousie, win 5th place. Then for the next match, we found ourselves surrounded by UBC fans, and the father of their best player was sitting in front of us. He was very proud of his son, and with good reason: his son had an excellent match, and was probably the best hitter out there. But they lost.

And then, a strange thing happened. The son of the fellow in front of us came up into the stands to see his family. And I realized: Oh my God. He’s just a BABY. He’s so YOUNG. I actually gasped. I hadn’t realized — well maybe I had, but had forgotten. In the excitement of watching in the stands, seeing these great athletes do exceptional things, I had forgotten that they are just university students. These athletes are so powerful, hit the ball so hard, jump so high. But they are so very young. I started to look around at these boys. They’re 18 through, say, 24 or so. They are men, sure, but they’re just starting out in life. They have young, fresh faces and pimples and bad fashion sense and still have the gawkiness of boys. I was just so surprised by it.

And then, during the intermission, I looked around at the fans. There were fans of all ages and shapes and sizes. I looked at the young university girls, some of the girlfriends of the players. So young! So tiny! This is before middle aged spread starts to hit, clearly. Parents, friends, relatives — all sorts of people.

The P.A. was playing all sorts of songs, mostly classic rock songs. An AC/DC song came on. I continued to look around. And then I noticed, over among the Winnipeg fans, and older fellow, probably mid-to-late 50s, dancing around a little bit. TO AC/DC. He was grooving in that Older Man sort of way, that you only ever see at weddings. And then I realized: This song was probably popular when he was young. This is a song of HIS generation. No wonder he was rocking. This is HIS music. And then Ozzy Osborne came on, and the B.C. Dad in front of me was dancing and shaking his tambourine in time with the music. This was also a song of his generation.

Cool.

And then, I looked over at the guys broadcasting the event. One of the men was a guy I had known for a little while, many years ago. I was 18 and he was probably about 21 at the time. We met at tournaments and hung out with the same group of people and partied, and at a national championships just like this one, too. He was a man that, when I was a teenager, was one of my heroes, one of my big crushes. And then I met him, and he was a regular kid in university (albeit with an incredible athletic career), just like me. And now, there he was, salt and pepper hair, not so big and muscular as he once was. A nice looking man, married now, probably a dad. Probably also marvelling at the youth of these boys. Tapping his feet and grooving a little when “Ice Ice Baby” came on. A long way from the party boy and Olympic athlete he once was.

And so I realized that age is a number, but youth is in your mind. All these people were of all these different ages, and yet, they were right in their element. They were just the age they were supposed to be. How old or how young they are depends on perspective, how they feel inside, and who is looking at them. I didn’t feel all bittersweet that I was no longer young like the players, that myself and the sportscaster were no longer in our prime. I didn’t find it odd that the older folks were rocking out to Trent Reznor.

It all fit, just fine.

Mar