And That's A Wrap!

 Hi,

And just like that, the bike rides, movie nights, slip n' sliding, making new friends, playing at the park, with countless rounds of snacks and band-aids are over for another summer!

It's never lost on me how privileged I am to spend the summer with my three youngest grandbabies. So many don't get this kind of time. Time that allows conversations to go from chatting about favourite shows, books, and how school is going, to places that explore big concepts of how to be a good friend, how the world works, the things they feel could be better, how history has affected how we live, how the way we live now will affect the future, and how we fit into all of it.

Don't get me wrong, there are also plenty of conversations about music, what makes a movie good, the pros and cons of different cheeses, and trying to get me caught up in "Airbender" something or other. 

The summer is seasoned with laughter, games, and lazy mornings. They are old enough to understand when Grandma has to work, which I am lucky enough to be able to do from home, young enough to still like going for walks with me, and, well, just awesome.

If we are very lucky, we get to experience about 85 summers. We don't remember the first few, then way too many are taken for granted... living just on the short side of sixty, I'm not taking them for granted any more. 

I look forward to the Fall, but will miss the munchkins as they go back to their busy home life. 

As the leaves begin to transition from green to gold, as we start to see the big yellow buses lumber down the highways, as pumpkin spice invades the ethos, we say farewell to a summer well spent.

Savour the seasons. there are fewer than you think. 

Spend the time. Best investment you'll ever make. 

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Embrace Without Judgement...

 

Hi!

Fancy centerpieces  adorning the dining room table, a pristine yard, spotless lightswitches, door handles, fingerprint-free-fridges, absolutely no games of "how does a hand towel get this wet this fast," a complete absence of persistent mystery puddles in the bathroom, and absolutely no endless choruses of "I'm hungry."

This has never been something I've strived for. Good thing, because that's not my life.

My life is embracing the sticky, wiping the puddles, and keeping the laundry monster in check as I work our business from home.

A wet rag, an imaginative homemade snack arsenal, and some patience is all it takes. It always boils down to this, for me. What is our house for? What is our yard for? How do we want it to feel?

When the grandkids, kids, or anyone, for that matter comes to our house, what is more important? That it looks like a magazine cover, or that it feels like the hug you've been needing for a while?

How your home makes people feel, I think, is a definite reflection of how you make people feel, in general. I have one friend, in particular, whose home is spotless, modern, and absolutely fabulous, it should feel like you can't touch anything, and standoff-ish, but it makes me feel welcome, calm and completely at peace. I've been in homes that are decorated with every cozy option, yet feel cold.

It's easy to get caught up in decorating our homes according to whatever is trending, whatever the 'in' things are. Finding the stuff, then buying the stuff, doing everything we can so our homes don't get labeled the dreaded..."outdated." 

Your home should be precisely as you like it. If that includes cleaning clean things, so be it. If it means putting off cleaning until you absolutely need to, so be it. If it's somewhere in between, that's great too. Just do yourself this favour.

Create the home that suits you and yours best. Not the one Instagram says you should, not the one you torture yourself over because of "what people might think."

Obsess over your yard, if that's what blows your skirt up, have a yard full of wildflowers, if that's what you prefer, hell, just have dirt, or cement, or all trees... that's the beauty of it. 

Whatever you do, however you like to live, that's what's right for YOU!

We don't have to like or understand why people like what they like to embrace it without judgement. When we walk into someone's space, see a representation of how they see themselves, who the hell are we to tell them that there is something wrong with it?

They love what they love, and have every right to dress it up as they see fit. They don't owe anyone an explanation, they get to live in whatever way makes them happiest. It's not causing any harm, other than the odd lifted eyebrow that has no right lifting.

In case you missed it, this is about more than houses. 

Whenever I hear or see choruses of "If you can't explain the way you live, or who you are as a person to me in a way that fits into my narrow way of perceiving the world, then you are just wrong, and don't deserve my respect or consideration." Don't kid yourself, those attitudes and beliefs are alive and well... It just makes me sad.

"Tolerance" is just a way to justify rejection.

No one wants to be "tolerated". Embrace, include, accept. 

What if who you are was the 10%?

How would you want to be treated? 

Tolerated, or embraced? 

Would you like to have heinous acts attributed to you with no founding in fact? Would you like to be told that you should never be married or be a parent just because you love someone from a different gender? Would you like to be questioned regularly about if you are sure you are straight? When you "decided" to be straight, or cis-gendered?

Embrace without judgement. 

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A Life Well Lived...

Hi!

I've said before, and I'll say it again, coming from a family as big as mine carries with it a ton of great things, but also some heartbreak.

When you have so many people to love and call family, there are always so many things to celebrate, new babies, weddings, reunions, career accomplishments, birthdays... you get the idea. When you have so many people to love and call family, the heartbreak of losing someone happens far too often. It seems you barely get your feet solidly on the ground, the steps feeling just a bit less heavy, when you find out another loved one has passed.

One such heartbreak happened again this week.

The top photo depicts our Aunt Betty. She had the privilege of turning 85, and the last time I saw her, a few years ago, the grin that always promised just a bit of mischief, was definitely and completely intact. I didn't get to know her as well as I would have liked, as she was one of a kind. 

From my experience of her, this is what I do know.

 She and my Uncle built an incredible life and home, full of adventure, great times, hard times, and absolutely everything in between. She was a wife who worked outside the home before it was the norm to do so. She mothered a gaggle of boys that loved to dip their toes in trouble every now and again with the assistance of a pretty capable right hand, the sole daughter at the head of the group. 

She was so small in stature, but so strong. A tiny badass, with a heart as big as the sky. So much can be learned from her, and those like her, if we allow it to happen. We just have to be ready to let it in. No one reaches 85 without scars, some they speak of, most they don't. 

Times like these bring with them opportunities to mend fences, heal scars, embrace and support each other as family should. It brings chances to celebrate a life well lived, the legacy left behind, and what that can look like. The gift of swapping stories, sharing memories, reconnecting our roots. 

It's an opportunity not to be wasted. 

We are never guaranteed time to reconnect, to laugh, to cry, to mend, to heal. 

Young hearts can only follow the examples they are given, they watch, they observe, they absorb. They learn how to grieve through us, they learn how to handle loss, they learn how to say good-bye to those we love. After the dust settles, they are still there, watching and learning. 

Grief, stepping through it, living in it, and beyond, looks different for everyone. There are no rules, no deadlines, as no two people feel it the same way. In grief, the soul is so heavy and so full, leaving no room for judgment. 

Grief is a privilege only those who know real love are able to experience. The heartache, proof that they mattered. The tears, a gift given exclusively to the lucky who have been blessed to love someone enough to warrant them. 

When we get to the place where their memory brings smiles more than tears, we begin to heal. The grief, though never gone, feels more like a warm embrace, no longer the dagger it once was.

*******************************************************************

May you be embraced by those who went before you, arms outstretched to catch you, hold you.

You will be missed more than can be explained. Rest well, Aunt Betty.

 

Pivot!!!!!!!!!

 Hi!

You know, if life didn't slap us upside the head every 10 or15 years, we'd probably get lackadaisical, a little too comfortable, a bit complacent.

Anything this side of life and death is doable. 

At the light end, this shows itself at the Olympics. These young people commit so much time, effort, suffering injuries, enduring the stress, sacrificing social lives, and, sometimes after all of that, they get to the event, the heat, the set, the jump etc, just to trip, fall, pull a muscle or have something else happen that turns their dream into a nightmare. But they live to fight another day, if not in the same capacity, as a coach, commentator, or in some other way.

In life stuff, there are surprise babies, surprise losses of careers, health situations that are just serious enough to force hard decisions, storms, both natural and of the shit variety. All kinds of things that cause a shift in trajectory.

The ability to pivot, to find resilience, to keep putting one foot in front of the other is simply a skill necessary for survival. Does that mean it's easy? Ever? Nope! Sometimes you need to ask for help, even if that's something you struggle with. It's important to never underestimate those who care about you and their willingness to extend a hand. It's okay to lean into and on those who are willing and able. It's okay to not have all the answers, all the solutions, nobody does. 

When pivots hit, we don't get to see what's around any corner. We can give it our best guess, prepare for best and worst case scenarios the best we can, and then, there is nothing left to do but jump. 

We try to take the least treacherous route, prepare for stumbles, slippery surfaces, and curve balls. 

We determine what the worst of worst-case scenarios could possibly be, if that's survivable, there's no reason not to do it, whatever it is. 

Some pivots are minor, requiring merely a slight shift, others hit like earthquakes. 

Spoiler alert. We don't usually get any warning about where or how it will hit, or how hard.

Now, knowing all this, we have some choices to make. We can live in fear of the unknown, which is even scarier when you learn just how little we actually know. This guarantees a life of anxiety, sleepless nights, some stomach aches, and, if smart, a lot of therapy. Or... we can acknowledge that the pivots are inevitable, develop the skills of resilience both within ourselves and in those we have a hand in raising, and go on to live life as big and wide and open as possible, confident we can handle whatever comes, embracing the adventure. 

No two lives are meant to be lived the same way. Even within a marriage or long-term relationship, the way you live within that will be different, even if only slightly, it will still be different. 

That's why you have to do you, you have to be you. Your authentic you. Always. 

Your path has always been, and will always be meant to be uniquely yours. 

Live it like you mean it. 

 

Before The Sun Sets...

 

Hi!

When we were children, each day felt new, we jumped from our slumber eager to see what the grown-ups in our lives had planned for us. When we enter the educational system, at least where I live, routine becomes just that. Everything is planned for you, the time you get up, the food you eat, when you eat it...if we are very lucky, no decisions of any real consequence are needed from us just yet.

Our preschool freedoms become stripped-down, condensed, and squeezed to fit into school breaks, now accompanied by a sprinkling of chores and responsibility. The high school days we longed for/dreaded seemingly drag, but when complete, we get to look back and recognize them for the blink they were. 

Then we become adults. Some continue in their academics, others jump right into the 9-5, yet others... explore.

We become busy, now making those crucial decisions almost every single day, we get married... or not... we become parents... or not... no matter how we spend our adulthood every lane has at least this one thing in common...

Before the sun sets this... this... and this... need to get done. Garbage needs taking out, meals need to happen, bills need paying, toilets need scrubbing, laundry is a neverending relentless beast, relationships need nurturing... We continually try to make it seem like we know what we are doing... after all we have the photos all over social media proving just that... don't we?... don't we??? We do so, fooling most everyone... but ourselves.

A sense of overwhelm becomes the normal we learn to live with. It truly is amazing what you can get used to.

Before the sun sets, we do our best, but inevitably, there is always at least one thing... that thing that didn't get done, and that will be what we beat ourselves up about while we struggle to get to sleep at night. Not all the things we DID do, but the thing or things that didn't make it.

Time passes, and life progresses, whether or not we accomplish all of the things. And, as life would have it, barely anything turns out the way we thought it would, we end up going down paths we didn't know existed, curve balls are thrown... hard... good things, bad things, seemingly impossible things happen, creating detours, sometimes permanently altering our trajectory.

Not that that is necessarily a bad thing. Most times, I believe, it's the curve balls and detours that lead us to exactly where we are supposed to be. 

As time passes, perspective shifts, and what we want to accomplish before the sun sets becomes a bit less about what we want to do, and more about how we want to feel.  

The overwhelm gets old, the chasing of the tail gets stale, the juggling becomes pretty exhausting, and we start fantasizing about a feeling of real and actual peace. 

We get spoonfed from childhood that ambition, drive, and the accumulation of stuff is what we have to strive for, if we don't, we are lazy, unmotivated. Do I believe each of us needs to support ourselves financially to the best of our ability? Absolutely, and for the most part, most people like the sense of accomplishment that comes from doing just that. But not everyone is built, wired, or has the natural talent to accumulate. Some are wired more for giving than getting, and some can do both successfully. Some walk through the world covered in butterflies and rainbows and simply don't see the point of stock-piling stuff. Some like the security that comes with big bank accounts, and some live by the seats of their pants, content with having their basic needs met. Some love the adrenaline rush of chasing the brass ring, while others like to float along covering their needs as they go. Yet others have the want to, the work ethic, all the things, but are unable to physically make it happen despite their herculean efforts.

Before the sun sets... we want serenity. I think that's fairly universal. I just think that serenity is defined differently depending on how you are wired. 

As humans, time is our only commodity. We exchange it for what matters most to us. What that is, will, and should be different for everyone. No matter how hard I try, I can't possibly know for sure what brings someone else peace. I can guess, I can surmise, I can assume, but that's it. 

Before the sun sets... find a piece of peace for yourself... even if it's small... for now.

This will read very differently depending on the Country and Culture in which you spend your time. Unfortunately, I can only give the perspective from the life I live, and where I live it. Cultures are unique by nature and therefore, define success differently. As technology has thrived, spreading pretty much worldwide, I hope we can share our good habits instead of our bad. 

I would love to tap into social media and see more good deed hacks than greed hacks. Less effort put into the buying and selling of stuff, more put into helping those who have it rough. Fewer photos through perceived perfection filters, more emphasis put the beauty of what's real, less on fillers. 

Before the sun sets we need to find, accept, then learn to love unconditionally, our entire, authentic selves. then allow ourselves to flourish, joyfully, and completely, in the absolute comfort that can come from being swaddled within our own skin. If we give ourselves permission to do so. 

Before the sun sets... breathe.