Do what you have to do

I was moved this week by Outlaw Mama’s blog about Blue Baby, and her adult understanding of her grandma’s motivation for throwing out her beloved friend.

My parents grew up during the Great Depression. They both knew how to make a dollar stretch but even so, when I was growing up in our farm family, we didn’t have the reliability of a regular paycheque (or even the guarantee of a profit at the end of the year) that many of my classmates from town had.

I was acutely aware of this as a child. Town kids had Christmas oranges in their lunches as soon as they were available in the store; my mom tried to hold us off as long as she could before buying them, because they were expensive.

The one thing in the Christmas catalogue that I longed for but feared was too expensive at $19.99 to even ask for, was only one of several gifts a classmate got from her parents. (By the way, I got it, too, to my everlasting wonder and delight. I remember looking up at Mom and asking with my eyes if it was really okay to have it. She smiled and nodded and I could feel her joy even though neither of us had said a word.)

Then my mother got a job, which I eventually grew to understand she disliked intensely. She didn’t hate teaching as far as I know, but this was one classroom with several grades. The students were not raised to respect private property, or a woman in any position of authority, and they all spoke a second language that Mom did not. It wasn’t fun for her.  

But my brothers and I started getting small store-bought treats in our lunch, and we got our Christmas oranges earlier, too. We still watched our pennies, but we knew there were a few more of them around.

Fast forward 20 years.

When my first daughter was still a baby, we were juggling bills, putting one off this month so we could pay the one we’d skipped the month before, always a couple of steps behind (obviously, still farming!). So I went to town and dropped off resumes, and ended up demonstrating vacuum cleaners (which was always my career aspiration).

When I demonstrated them at Woolco, they gave me a part-time job, too. When the man from Eaton’s found out I worked at Woolco, he complained to the vacuum cleaner company, and I lost the demonstration job. With Christmas coming, I was able to pick up more hours in Woolco Hardware and Paint (because mixing paint was always my back-up aspiration, second only to demonstrating vacuum cleaners).

Eventually I got the household bills up to date. But I still didn't buy Christmas oranges as soon as they came into the stores.

Fast forward another 30 years.

When I get too worried about money (my hangover from those early married days), my husband says to me, “It’s always worked out before; it will again.”

He’s right. I know I worry too much. Both he and I have always had a we’ll-do-what-we-need-to-do-to-get-by attitude that has resulted in sidelines, side jobs and sacrifices to make it work for our family.

Now I wonder how much of that attitude in me is a result of Mom taking that job she so disliked when farming just wasn’t paying enough no matter how hard Dad worked, way back when I was lusting after Barbie and her big wardrobe in the Christmas catalogue.

Today I was in the produce store and, after considering the price because I am still my mother’s daughter, I bought out-of-season mandarin oranges. When I peeled one and bit into a sweet section of it at home, I thought of the hard times our own family has survived and how we made that happen, and I thought, “Thanks, Mom and Dad, for showing me that you just do what you have to do.”

Happy Canada Day!

I’ve just returned from an enjoyable and educational trip to the U.S., where I was able to connect and re-connect with lots of American and international colleagues.

But as much fun as it was, I am always glad to come home, and I appreciate it more than ever today, Canada Day.

A few of us were teasing some American colleagues at the conference* I attended last week in Chicago, giving them a quick test to see if they could attend the annual Canada Party, famous as a highlight of the annual international event.

They figured if they just added “eh” to the end of their sentences, they were in, and knowledge of hockey and Canadian hockey teams was a bonus. A few of them knew what poutine was (although I’m not so sure they could identify perogies), but when I asked one of them who won the War of 1812, she said, “The what?”

It didn’t matter – they were welcome at the party anyway, another typical Canadian attitude, along with extreme politeness and a tendency to say we're sorry (which rhymes with Lori, by the way).

It’s always seemed fairly representative to me that the Americans celebrate the Fourth of July with so much more fireworks than we do Canada Day. We’re more understated; no less patriotic, but less apt to wear it on our sleeves.

Our loyalties run deep, and are often invisible to the eye until challenged. It can take a lot to get us riled (Stanley Cup riots being the exception to that generalization), but we’re a formidable force when we decide to take a stand.

All of which (riots excepted) is part of why I’m proud to be a Canadian. That said, I think we could step up a bit more in recognizing our own brilliance and promoting our own achievements, if only so people – ourselves included – stop underestimating us.

Don't underestimate us. Please.

I’ve always considered myself a typical Canadian, and I believe I would do well to take that last bit of advice on a personal level, too.

So I’m treating this Canada Day as if it were New Year’s Day, complete with resolutions but without the overeating and too-many-seasonal-parties hangover of January 1.  

Beginning now I am going to give myself recognition for my talents and achievements without worrying that I’m bragging. I will take credit where credit is due. If nobody else will blow my horn (and why would/should they?), I will.

And I hope that somewhere along the way, I’ll stop underestimating myself. As the commercial says, I AM CANADIAN. And damned proud of it.

*For info on things we actually learned at the conference, I can do no better than to refer you to my colleague, Martha Myzychka, ABC, and her Tumblr feed.

Facing ... something new ... I think

I’ve been heard to quote the saying, “Some days you’re the pigeon, some days you’re the statue.” I’ve had a few of what I call statue days in the last while.

It started with unexpectedly being laid off from my job. That’s never fun, especially when you don’t see it coming. The fact that my personal calendar (entered on my work one to keep it all in one place) and some significant industry association email documents disappeared with the job further complicated my life for a few days.

Change is never easy. There’s a reason why change management has become a legitimate need in industry. People naturally resist change, even when they know it will probably be good in the long run – like the saying about preferring the devil you know to the one you don’t. 

Is there any fear greater than the fear of the unknown? Probably, but it’s hard to think of it when you’re facing a big, gaping stretch of unknown.

When you don’t know where the change is taking you, it’s even scarier. Is there any fear greater than the fear of the unknown? Probably, but it’s hard to think of it when you’re facing a big, gaping stretch of unknown.

Through my life, I’ve faced many changes, some chosen, some thrust upon me. They’re all scary. And they’ve all opened new doors for me, some of which I may not have envisioned at all without the forced change. I enjoyed some of the new rooms on the other side of those doors more than I did others, but they all taught me something.

So I’ve promised myself that I’m going to use this down time, however long or short it ends up being, to relax, concentrate on my health, and think about what I really want to do with my work and life. I may even decide what I want to be when I grow up.

Of course, not having a job will raise other people’s expectations of my available time, too. I guess I'll have to give in and take down the Christmas tree in the living room. (I’ll get to it, but it’s still not at the top of my priority list.)

I will ignore the well-meaning relatives who ask me how many other jobs I’ve applied for so far, and use the short-term safety net I’m lucky enough to have, to concentrate on me. When I’m ready, then I’ll apply all the good tips in my friend Kristen’s recent blog about job hunting.

Because even if this change was forced upon me, I am determined to make it a good change. As everyone’s favourite animated green ogre says, “Change is good, Donkey.” I’m going to see that it is.

What tips do you have for handling change? All hard-earned wisdom welcome!

All in the family - or not

It’s been a while since I wrote – it’s funny how life and death and all the emotions and tasks associated with them get in the way of the other things you really want to do. But it’s not like I’m the first person to ever figure that out. Some people are just better organized than I am. (Go figure – I’m a Libra and we’re supposed to crave order in our lives. Well, I do crave it, I just don’t seem capable of achieving it!)

This weekend is the celebration of life for the friend I told you about in my first blog entry. Her illness, and her death, have got me thinking about family.

Families are strange creatures, or collections of creatures. Despite the shared DNA, there always seem to be people who view life from radically divergent perspectives. Different priorities, different loyalties, and different life experiences – both in childhood and as adults – contribute to what is often more like a forced meeting of strangers. Have you ever reminisced with family members about a specific event and found out that they have a completely different memory of it than you do? Perspective, then and now.

All too often, you hear of the ferocious fights that break out in families over estates when a family member dies. With some families it’s about the money, with others it’s about the memories associated with the disputed items. I bought my first flatware set when I left home at an auction sale where sisters were bidding against each other for their mother’s silver. That’s a sad way to settle an estate.

Most of my late friend’s family is in England, with only her children and their families here in Canada. Yet I know that her celebration will be full of people who loved her and mourn her passing. Not family by blood or law, but by heart.

I have a few friends whose families put the “dys” in dysfunctional. What contact they have will never qualify as Hallmark moments.

In their lives, the people they choose to surround themselves with are their real families. Friends who build them up, who help them when they need it, who call on them when they need help, who trust them with their thoughts and feelings, their love.

There’s an old saying that you can choose your friends but you can’t choose your family.

I disagree. I believe the families of our hearts that we build up over our lives are often more vital to our wellbeing than our families of blood. And I’m very grateful to have them in my life.

On a happier note ...

A while ago one of my friends commented on Facebook that she missed my gratitude posts.

Last year I posted one thing I was grateful for, every day for 30 days.

So here are a few things I'm grateful for right now:

• that I finally remembered where I'd written down the password (that I wrote down because I knew I'd forget it) so I could post a new blog. I keep telling people, I can cover the roots but the grey moments still happen.
• that my cats are so curious and well-educated. I came home one night last week to find 138 windows of GoogleChrome open on my monitor. Think of what they must have learned! And just this morning I discovered they'd converted my keyboard to French characters again. I don't know who they're corresponding with en francais but I'm impressed by their ability to do so. (Of course, it makes it difficult to email anyone who's not already in my contact list, since I now get a star instead of an "at" symbol when I hit that key.) 

This is Mika, one of the world's most educated cats thanks to GoogleChrome, who also thinks he can drive a tractor but hasn't succeeded in getting it out of the driveway. Yet.

• my ability (which some may describe as closer to an attention deficit disorder) to notice random interesting things in everyday life. Like walking past the checkout lines in the supermarket and seeing a toddler who'd reached behind himself into the shopping cart and was contentedly munching on a bulb of garlic while his mother unloaded groceries onto the checkout belt. She didn't smile when I commented, "No fear of vampires in your house!" But then I've been grocery shopping with toddlers and it's not usually a smiling affair.
• another random item: I saw a truck last week that was XX Gutters (gutters meaning eavestroughs for those who grew up in the same time/language continuum as I did), but what really got me was the line underneath: "For people who care." Sorry, but that sounds like a tagline for an ethical investment firm or an assisted living residence, or maybe even a funeral home. But for eavestroughs? Put it in perspective, XX Gutters!
• that the abscess, reaction to antibiotic, root canal and crown installation are all now in the (recent) past. Who knew that getting the crown would leave my face sorer than getting the root canal did?
• that said root canal and crown weren't located further back in my mouth - I don't think I could have stretched my jaw open even a fraction more! Although you can't tell it by the volume of words coming out of my mouth, I actually have a smaller-than-average jaw. Dentists are not my friends right now.
• sales at clothing stores. Sales in grocery stores are just part of strategic shopping on a budget, but sales at clothing stores are a big-time BONUS! (If you live in or near Vancouver, BC, be sure to check out the closing-out sale at Babs Studio Boutique, before this amazing designer moves to online and shopping channel sales only. And say hi to Jemma, Babs's dog, who likes to play tug-of-war with her rope and a customer on the other end of it.)
• an honest friend who tells me what I don't want to admit the mirror is telling me about the really-cool-but-not-necessarily-flattering-to-me clothes I try on in my sale state of mind. 
• that the toddlers who used to make grocery shopping hell have grown into mostly (we all have our moments) mature and responsible adults . And that they're my friends as well as my children.

What are you grateful for?

Call it what it is, so we can deal with it

Feb. 8 came and went this week, and with it Bell Canada's campaign about mental health. For every text or long distance call made on its network that day, it donated a specified amount of money to mental health services (although, to be honest, I couldn’t tell that’s what it was doing from the ads, but that’s another blog on the topic of clear language!).

The ads featured Clara Hughes, a Canadian multi-medal winner at both summer and winter Olympics, talking about having suffered from depression and ending with, “On February 8, let’s talk.”

I say let’s talk about it every day. Let’s make it a common topic, so there’s no more judgement or stigma to “She’s mentally ill” than there is to “He has cancer.”

Recently someone from a previous generation was telling me about a friend with a recurring illness. “He’s had trouble with his nerves for years,” she said. “Now he’s hearing the voices again.”

I’m sorry, but hearing voices isn’t just “nerves.” She doesn’t want to say he’s crazy, and in her mind, those are the only two options, “nerves” or “crazy.” No acknowledgement of the breadth and depth (and boy, does it have depth) and power of mental illness.

The Canadian Institute of Health Research says one in five Canadians will suffer from mental illness in their lives, although many of them are afraid to talk to anyone about it. The Depression Awareness Community, an online support group for people suffering from mental illness, including depression, puts that number at one in three. I believe it.

I like this quote from their Facebook page: 

"Depression, anxiety and panic attacks are NOT signs of weakness.
  They are signs of having tried to remain strong for way too long.”

I appreciate their recognition of the struggle. It reminds me of a question I’ve often pondered: how do you define a mental breakdown? Does a person have to pull out their hair and run screaming into the night to have suffered a nervous breakdown?

So I finally looked it up; Wikipedia says it’s “a specific acute time-limited reactive disorder, involving symptoms such as anxiety or depression, usually precipitated by external stressors.”

Oh, “time-limited.” So all the people who long to run screaming away from their lives but can’t because their spouses, their kids, their parents, their pets, etc. all depend on them too much for them to give up, don’t qualify as having mental or nervous breakdowns because their condition lasts too long.

So they suffer longer, and even if they're willing to talk about it, they often don’t even get the recognition of being ill. That sucks.

Just like mental illness sucks. Let’s just say so, and then try to do something about it. It's not an easy job, and it takes more than one day to deal with it, as anyone who's lived with it can attest. 

But it starts with acknowledging it as a legitimate illness, something we can do every day.

Now THAT's a wonder

“How are you feeling?” The question was more than a standard greeting; I was talking to a friend who’s in the last stages of a three-year battle with a fatal disease.

Her answer was stilted, as her speech had been affected by either the disease or the treatment a year or two ago. “I ... feel ... wonderful!” The last word came out in a rush, the exclamation point evident in her delivery even over the phone.

That she can go from days when she wonders “Is this it?” to “Wonderful!” in the same week astounds me. Her determination to control her own medications and treatment, her surroundings and her attitude are as courageous as any act I’ve witnessed.

We had a good chat in the visit that resulted from the phone call. She confided that things were changing fast; she realized that in spite of her many rebounds over the past few years, it wouldn’t happen this time. She’s talked to those of her children who are willing to hear and has made her peace.

She will stay off heavy painkillers as long as she can, because once you start taking them, in her words, “you just drift away. You’re not YOU any more.”

In the meantime, she is still teaching her early-20s son how to cook, him chopping and sautéing in the kitchen, her calling out orders from her full-time bed in the living room, and examining things with a critical eye (only one, the second now being covered with a patch because the tumour has caused double vision in it) when he brings the pot or pan in for her inspection.

“Fold … the … pastry … over … more,” and she’ll try to do it herself with swollen and splitting fingers.

Or, “That’s done,” with a nod of approval.

On a good day, she’ll entertain visitors like me and other friends until she’s forced to take the relatively mild 

painkillers she’s allowing herself. We’ll bring things for her kitchen – because her mind is still the excellent cook she’s always been – and we’ll talk.

Another good day, she and a friend might drive to the beach and eat lunch in the car with the windows open. She can’t get out and walk along the sand or on the grass, and the short outing will exhaust her, but she can breathe in fresh air, smell the sea and watch other people playing or strolling in the park.

And it will make her feel wonderful.

It makes me think that we need to re-examine our personal requirements for wonderful, and figure out what really are the wonders in our lives.