“2013 is going to be about finishing … and beginning.”

That’s what I said to my friend Izad today when we were talking about the year to come.  And it’s true!  This November, I will convocate with my fancy degree in hand, and hopefully by then I will have decided which career path to start down.  These past few months I’ve been neglecting my personal health, and I’m excited to begin again!  After taking a few months off school, I’m doubly excited to get back into a lunch-making routine, and some semblance of an exercise regimen.

There is though, one small problem that I’m not sure everyone else has.  I have an hour and a half one-way bus commute to school.  I also have work most evenings.  Somehow, I have to pack myself both a lunch, and a dinner.  Somehow I have to wrangle a school locker out of the hands of some eager first year.  Somehow I have to get to the gym/pool three times a week, or start hauling my bike places.  Somehow I have to do all this while taking four classes and working!  Somehow, somehow, somehow.

I feel like it’s going to be a lot of quinoa salads, rice and beans, soups, chilis and other delights.  I’ve pulled out my Moosewood Cookbook for inspiration, and may have to satisfy a serious craving for peanut soba noodles sometime in the near paycheque.  I’ve been scouring blogs, trying to think up quick student  meals that satisfy and are easily tote-able.  I’m so ready to tackle this semester even if it is just electives like Pottery and Curriculum Development.

But for now, it’s time for bed.  I have to practice getting up early.  I’m not excited for that.  Not excited at all.  Any tips for a night owl like me?

2013

I am an excellent goal setter.  I’m just terrible at the follow through.  Things and life just seem to get in the way, and I always end up prioritizing others instead of myself.  So this year, with a big smile, and a high five to the world, I am eschewing my typical January goal setting mentality, to embrace my inability to actually complete anything.  This year is about living and being a purposeful me.

This year, I resolve to prioritize myself.
I rarely ever do, and I’ve decided that it’s about time I did.  I know what I want, I know how to get it, so it’s about time I let myself have it instead of settling.

This year, I resolve to be the friend who calls up other friends to hang out.
I tend to drift around, busy with work, school, and my volunteer work and only really go out with friends if they invite me.  Sometimes, because I’m busy with work, school, and my volunteer work people assume I’m just busy, and then I wonder why I’m sitting at home alone watching “Modern Family” re-runs instead of out being a social butterfly.  It sort of just recently occurred to me that I can be the one to pick up the phone and make the coffee plans, instead of just accepting them.

This year, I resolve to have fun, and act my age, not my pant length (33, if you were wondering).
It’s a joke/fact that I don’t act my age.  And then I started to dabble in age appropriate conduct.  I went to my first bar/club, I made friends on my own volition.  I went to a movie in a theatre and bought popcorn like it wasn’t no thang! I’m living on the edge people!  And although I still have old lady tendencies, (I mean, the floors at clubs are sticky.  They are sticky!) I’m happier and more relaxed when I give myself a break and let me be 23.

This year, I resolve to do things that are healthy for my body and mind.
I’m talking about stress here, and cutting back on it.  Giving myself a break and being okay with the things that happen, knowing that I can’t always control them, and knowing that I can only really help myself.

Made Me Smile Weekend Sendoff: I’m a F*kng Champ!

This month has quite literally been hell.  And I’m really okay with not blogging through it.  I think it would be incredibly difficult for me to do, even though all I want to do is scream at the top of my lungs on the internets and throw internet things and link up to different kind of rage gifs like this one.

But I’m totally not going to.  I am a champ, and a princess to boot.  In the span of less than 30 days, I have moved myself and my two cats back to my parents house for the next few months, I have gritted my teeth through people asking if I’m doing okay, and giving me pity nods.  I have restrained myself from murdering my (now) ex-boyfriend and I have talked to my (now) ex-boyfriend face to face and on the telephone, even though he’s a liar and a cheater.  Oops, did I say that?  I have cried for a total of 48 straight hours.  I have slept on my best friend’s couch for a total of seven days this month.  My good friend Gareth died.

I’m taking the perspective of “If I just pretend everything is okay, I’ll start believing it.”  Maybe it’s denial.  Maybe it’s not, but I’m really determined to just get myself through September, finalize my move and the apartment I shared with my (now) ex-boyfriend and start October happy, free and easy.

But on with the Love List!  The things that made me smile this week are:

My Sister

She is the most amazing person ever!  Now that I live with my parents, I now live with my sister who is five years younger than me.  We stay up late, talking and giggling.  And we get up early to talk and giggle.  It’s a vicious cycle.  But the best one ever.  We even look identical!  Guess who is who.

My Bestie

Even though I’ve had a total of 27 meltdowns in as many days, my Bestie is always there.  I went on a date the other day for seriously the first time in over five years, and I stopped by work and Bestie had some very encouraging things to say (after criticizing my blouse, of course).  She’s the lady who is my rock.  And we all know that you’re only as strong as the people who drag you out of your shit.

Laughing at myself

Seriously.  Today I walked a full 25 minutes from my apartment to work with my skirt hiked up to the point where it looked like it was tucked in the back of my underwear.  In my defense, the skirt is very light, airy and summery and it totally feels like I was wearing nothing.  But when I yelped at work after realizing just how high my skirt had come up, I realized that I haven’t had a laugh at my expense in a long time.  And damn, did it feel good.

What made you smile this week?

Finite in my mind and yet infinite in my heart

People can come in and out of your life so quickly, but the best ones always make a lasting impression.  My friend Gareth was someone I worked with for eight months before he moved to Ontario and onto great, and grand adventures all over the world.  This picture is of him on top of a train riding through Zambia when he worked in Africa this past summer.

Gareth always encouraged me to do the things I wanted, even if he wasn’t sure that they would really work out.  He was incredibly patient, and I only ever saw him angry once.  But we were all sort of frustrated then and I’m not really sure it counts if everyone was angry.   He believed in me when no one else did, and when I had lost faith in my abilities.  He always knew when to take a deep breath and take a step back and relax, but even then it felt like he was moving forward.

Gareth died this past Saturday.  He was walking over a railway bridge and fell through a wooden slat.  He was going to graduate this spring.  He leaves behind hundreds of people who loved him, worked with him and who were inadvertently touched by his warm smile.  My thoughts will be with his family and his girlfriend tonight and forever as they struggle through living life without Gareth physically with them.

 

The Heart of Rwanda by Gareth Coombes

The Heart of Rwanda tore through my being
an emotion swept over the hills and my soul contracted.
My mind honed in on one single source that wept for so little joy
that remembered so much lost.
My soul touched this other yet only as an observer
feeling his presence without him ever knowing mine.

An understanding split my core as I shook with the beauty of the moment.
Rhythmic cords in my mind connecting memories unearned;
hearing a past through the emotions of a lost soul.
My life swept away for but only this single moment
finite in my mind and yet infinite in my heart.
Measurements indifferent,
a metric of one or one million it makes no matter.
It was love, it was remorse.

It was Rwanda.

My Most Sincere Apologies To: A Short but Stevia’d post.

My Foodie Pen Pals and my Vegan Food Swapee.

On August 27th 2012 I began a hurried attempt to move myself, all my stuff, and my two cats out of my apartment and back to the farm to live with my parents, in less than three days.  My life is quite literally in boxes and I can barely find pants, let alone the delicious things my Foodie Pen Pals sent, or my camera which has the pictures of said delicious treats to remind me of who sent me what.

So here is my quick post with a list of as many things as I can remember being sent and links to the wonderful people who made the last few days of my August before it came screeching to a halt a million and twelve times better.

Vegan Food Swap:

Jenn of Diary of a Flâneuse and I were paired up together and swapped with eachother!  Click here to see what I sent her and to check out her awesome site where she is generally an awesome person.

Jenn sent me (to the best of my memory) from her local farmer’s market

• Saskatoon Berry Tea
• A tube of handmade lip chap I use it every day, I’m addicted.  It’s the one thing I haven’t lost)
• A package of black rice (or quinoa… I’m so embarassed, I don’t remember)
• Red Pepper Marmalade, that when I find I will immedietly put on everything.
• Something else that I don’t remember!

 

Foodie Pen Pals:

I sent my package to Michelle at Push. Pump. Progress. Click here to see what I sent her.  Her blog is super cool, and she works super hard and it’s super inspirational!  Danielle at Eating Running Living sent me my package.  It contained:

A Trader Joe’s Extravaganza!

• More Cookie Butter!!
• Trader Joe’s Salsa
• TJ’s Black Bean Dip
• I’m embarassed to say I don’t remember anything else … but I was so surprised to see so much TJ’s product from a Canadian Food Swap

My most sincere thanks and apologies to everyone in August’s food swap… way, way, WAY too late.

xoxoxoxox to all.

How to Cope Crunchy-Style

Image via The Baboon’s Guide to the Internet

1) Don’t forget to eat - For the love of Trader Joe’s, don’t do this!  When you are under an incredible amount of stress, whether it is moving, or a relationship issue, or your kitty has run away and he’s usually an indoor cat and you live in the middle of no where with a racoon problem, you need to eat!  Don’t be like me, and lose 14 pounds (and counting) in less than three weeks by forgetting to eat or by being so stressed that you can’t eat.  If you’re not hungry, eat.  If you ate four hours ago, but you’re still not hungry, eat.  If you’re finding it difficult to keep solid food down, get yourself a smoothie, but don’t forget to put nutrients into your body!  You’ll need them to get through the next day.

2) Don’t forget to drink water - When you’re stressed and have a well regulated and healthy drinking habit, it’s easy to turn to the bottle to forget, or to cope even if it is just one glass of wine in the bathtub.  Switch that wine glass for a water bottle that you keep attached to your hip and drink constantly.  You may have been crying a lot, and losing a lot of water that way.  My new unofficial rule (after experience) is every hour I spend crying, I drink an additional two glasses of water.

3) Don’t dwell on what sucks -  Eat a piece of pie instead, chances are you need to eat anyway.

4) Don’t be angry or vengeful - In my particular situation I had and continue to have every right to feel angry or vengeful, used and betrayed.  But I took a deep breath and said “It’s happened, it’s done.  I can’t change anything, I can just move forward.”  You are the person who affects you.  By all means, if you want or need to be angry for a while, be angry.  But don’t let yourself fall into an angry habit.  You might stop smiling, and that’s never a good thing.

5) Don’t Forget to Smile - Even if you’re not happy, smile.  Sometimes you can fool others and yourself.

6) Say “Yes” to Social Encounters - When you’re sad or angry or stressed, sometimes all you want to do is crawl under your covers and never come out ever, ever again.  And while there’s a time and a place for that, that time is all the time.  Even if you’re under a blanket on your best friend’s living room floor, at least you have someone else to support you through your tough time.  And remember, sometimes you’re only as strong as the people who drag you out of it, so choose your friends wisely.

7) Allow Yourself to Break the Rules - If you have a no sugar after 9pm rule, and you’ve had the shittiest week of your life.  Eat the pie.  If you miss going to the gym four days in a row, don’t beat yourself up about it, just get there when you get there.  You don’t need the extra stress anyway.

8) Constantly remind yourself that you’re are a fucking champ, and that no one else deserves the title of “Princess” as much as you do - Seriously, it feels so good to yell that out loud.  And it’s totally true.

A Bit of a Blog Hiatus

Life is crashing.   My tagline needs changing.  I’m taking a quick break from life and all the shit it deals my way.

Be back, stronger and better than ever soon!