Category — Playing

Dear blogorinos,

I am returned. And there is much to celebrate.

First – my Masters is done. I defended in October.

Second – the night after my Masters Defense, I got engaged.

And finally – the beginning of 2012 marked the beginning of my career as an educator.

There has been much dancing and celebrating these last few months, much joy and relief!

Over the next few weeks I will be bringing us up to speed on all the happenings of late 2011 and the blog-worthy experiences of 2012. I’ll touch on some posts written last year that have since seen some developments. Accompanying these reviews and changes come a slight remodelling of the blog. The title and tag line have changed (somewhat). Additionally, the Abstract and Author Specs pages have been edited…check them out to see what’s in store for this conversation. But for now….let’s dance!

How many times do I need to prove to myself that remaining active is pivotal to my general outlook!? Sigh!

The last few weeks, as mentioned in my eeyoreish previous post, has been void of activity. I justified this with the “not enough time” excuse, a very versatile excuse if I do say so myself, but a valid one at that for many of its applications. A couple of days leading up to my birthday (yesterday), I had the idea to really make it a good one by starting to run again, as I had been feeling like a goopy stick of butter as a result of nonactivity. Because I was CLEARLY taking the day off (no question) I would have the time to be active, and because my wonderful momma is visiting, I have more time even after I get back to work post-birthday, as she is graciously grocery shopping and cooking while she is here.

So I ran and I showered (brilliant combination), and had a nice little birthday. Today, I feel amazing. I feel like I can accomplish whatever I want, I feel pleasant in general, and most profoundly, I am telling myself “it’s okay” about the number one stressor that’s rolling around in my brain at the moment. You see, back at Christmastime I told my friends and family that I will not be returning to Ontario until my M.Sc. is submitted and done. This has been a goal that I have stuck to throughout the year, one I have been excited to keep as if my return to Ontario will be glorious, fraught with confetti, accolades, and celebrations galore…except my friends’ wedding in early August is really throwing a wrench in this declaration and subsequent daydreaming of an epic return. I have been very conflicted about going home pre-defense for a few reasons, mainly because A. I don’t want to go home for a week and risk losing my momentum and B. I said I wouldn’t. And this second reason, totally fucking arbitrary, is much more painful to think about!

I think because of my tiny run yesterday, I am feeling a lot better about this stressor. Who the heck cares if I’m not done when I visit home? If I weren’t within defense-time, I would absolutely go to the wedding. I want to go. It’s just this nagging feeling deep in my body that I failed at meeting this “goal”.

Every day I debate what to do and I usually switch my answer every other day. To be honest, because I am having trouble getting contact lenses as I haven’t had an optometrist appointment in over a year, and because my health card just expired yesterday, I will most likely be going home in August to attend the wedding and take care of these important chores/whathaveyous – or at least that is how I have been feeling in the last 36 hours. What I haven’t yet decided is whether I’m going to make it a 5 day trip and visit with almost no one (more likely and very rude) or make it 8 days and go hide out in my cottage for a productivity-inspiring change of scenery and still visit with almost no one (less likely and more rude). I think the more time I spend in Ontario, the more likely I am to treat it as a holiday and I don’t actually want that right now.  And the more time I stay in Ontario as a hermit, the more rude I am to all my friends and family I really want to see – it’s just this damn momentum I want to preserve! I think the solution is to book my ticket to Ontario, and wait to book my ticket back until I am I know how much I have accomplished and how much time I can afford to spend away, as there are textbooks and ancient desktop computers with necessary software that I cannot transport with me. And I think I shall book my ticket home tomorrow, so that I can end this endless debate.

All in all, I believe this stress has been assuaged by the world’s shortest run. I have learned once again the value of activity. I mean, I was a couch potato for probably 20 years or more, so I’ll give myself a few more years to hammer this lesson home, guilt-free. But it is insane how much difference this stuff makes.

What better way to re-introduce myself after a month-long blogging hiatus then with this video.

I swear, I may listen to this song every day between now and when I defend. My office mate was singing this tune Friday and this morning…and while it was fun to sing to on Friday, it really resonates on a Monday Morning.

This week I am home alone, and so my goal is to make myself miserable with working hard. Thus, I have resolved I will make each day infinitely better by listening to this song each morning to pump myself up! I suspect however, that if I work as hard as I hope to, “miserable” will shortly transform into “awesomeness” as it normally does when I see the fruits of my labour take shape (or is it get juicy?).

Moving on…or rather, backwards. Since the last post, I feel that quite a bit has happened:

I was lucky enough to go to Whistler for a week with my dad, and despite your *holiday* alarm bells ringing, I will have you know that I used the opportunity to work very hard, cross-train for the 5K (“cross” because I wasn’t allowed to run – thus the rower, bike, and elliptical were my poisons) and snowshoe every couple days. The result of that week? My Teaching Portfolio – it’s alive! This is a project I began in the fall and resolved to have “finished” by the spring and ta da! Nothing beats the motivation of future prospects. I say “finished” as a portfolio is always a work-in-progress, so what I really mean is a version that is complete enough to be published online. If any of you readers want to take a look and provide comments or feedback (as a reply to this blog post) I would happily welcome it!

Also completed: the St. Patrick’s Day 5k! I can’t believe I did it. And yes – I did it! I ran the whole thing, minus the forced walking bottleneck about 5 minutes in, which conveniently coincided with when my physiotherapist told me to take a walking break. My time was 36:18 and I am very, very proud. Last Monday morning I went to my physiotherapist to treat my exhausted ankle. It was swollen and sore, and ended up getting taped for 4 days. It made me feel like a REAL athlete. I’m so athletic I get my muscles taped. Bitchin’!

I recommend the St. Patrick’s Day 5k to anyone who is interested in starting to run. It’s not very competitive and instead is focused on having a good time. There are indeed prizes for fastest times, but there are also costume contests, and an irish-themed party afterwards. We had irish stew, cupcakes, lucky charms cereal, and more. It was amazing how much food they provided, especially since this is one of the cheapest races to sign up for! We were also given Granville Island pint glasses with the race logo and year printed on one side. You can pay to fill it up and have a true St. Pats celebration if you choose. The tag line is “Come for the race, stay for the party” – and boy is this true – a group of strangers challenging themselves and then celebrating together (community, anyone? One of my favourite things).

I definitely want to keep going with the running since I’ve come so far, and have picked out my ideal next race. The only snag is that this race coincides with the time I plan to defend, but conveniently I can register up to 2 days in advance of the race! So I plan to train as if I have signed up, but if the race ends up adding stress rather than relieving it during a very important time, I simply will not go ahead with it.

So those are my two very exciting developments. I’ll admit, I’m glad I can disappear for a month and come back with accomplishments under my belt. I will not let another month go by until my next update, but hopefully I can keep this pattern of achievements going. I believe I will – just last week I actually started writing. I’ve been in the “writing phase” for a while as I put it, but that included making an extensive outline for my supervisor, analyzing samples and planning. Now I’m actually writing the darned thing.

Hopefully by the next time I post I will have a significant portion of 1 chapter done (as per usual I will no jinx myself by saying what exactly) and be finished on the microscope. Oh, to be finished microscoping! My neck and general sanity dream for this day!

Until then…dreams of massages and running and general tomfoolery. Have a good few days, all.

Ten days after my anxious last post, and I’m still feeling good. In fact, I think I’m feeling even better.

I feel this great because I’m still in the positive feedback cycle of awesomeness! I was even forced out of it for a few days – as I was skilled enough to re-sprain my ankle – and happily climbed back in my hamster wheel once my physiotherapist-determined healing time had passed.

Things I have learned in the last ten days:

-Don’t clean the shower from within the shower. You will re-injure your injuries.

-Working hard on weekends feels amazing; is worth it

-Working hard all the time feels even better

-The recumbent bike feels like a cop out work out.

Well, those are the hamster-wheel-related things I’ve learned. The middle two points refer to a major success that came together just this past weekend. Nearly two weeks ago now, I had a really motivating Skype date with my supervisor, after which I recovered from here. We decided during that meeting that I would create a shortish (~6 pages) thesis outline containing all the meat – i.e. my data results and discussion points for each of my chapters. At the time, I said something along the lines of ‘will have it done in a matter of days’, which wasn’t what happened exactly. One week passed and I had only started working on the Intro Chapter by that point, so I decided to determine a deadline.

Now, I give myself deadlines all the time but then I let time fly by and deal with feeling guilty after. This time, I decided to experiment by telling my supervisor that I was going to send her my outline by Sunday. Now that lit a fire under my butt. And it worked really well.

Today I feel great. I achieved this (albeit, second attempt) deadline and worked hard at it. I hadn’t worked quite so hard on a weekend for a while and it actually felt really good, when usually the thought of doing so leads to feeling overwhelmed. What’s better is that a sizeable chunk of the time I spent sitting in my wee office was devoted to my data/graphs – I actually furthered my analysis of some data. I wasn’t just passively writing it up. Scientific [good] times had by all!

Anyway, the purpose of this tale is to say: I tried something new, a little more ridged, and it worked. Well! Now I sit here and wait for her read through and response…and by sit here I mean continue to work hard so that I can continue this positive feedback cycle. I’ll let myself do some fun tasks for today as a reward, though. Teaching Dossier here I come!

Over the holidays, I visited home in Ontario and visited my partner’s family in England. Both visits were absolutely wonderful! Being home definitely let me daydream about the future (consult previous post). Though I love my hometown and that marvelous feeling of home in my core, I was very happy to get back to my current home in Vancouver. It’s nice to have my clothes hanging up and fresh laundry when I want it, use my own fridge and kitchen, and bake bread! Yum yum.

While in Ontario, I had the opportunity to give a short re-read to one of the more inspiring books I’ve read in the past couple years, Me to We by Craig and Marc Kielburger. I didn’t go through it all, but in the short bit I covered, I came across a line that really struck me, which goes something like this:

It doesn’t matter as much whether you reach your goals, as long as you have the right ones.

Let’s emphasize less the first part of the sentence, because what resonated with me is having the right goals. This sentence can justify countless graduating class’ yearbook goals to “save the world”, “help the environment” and so on. It’s so true that having a positive attitude and having positive goals can be the driving force in motivating what you do.

Ignoring now my previous post about thinking too far ahead, I have imagined a combined To Do + Goals list detailing the direction I wish my life to take in the next 5 years (justified by the excerpt above). Really it’s a wish list, and I would be so lucky to acheive or touch any of these goals. I realize that life can change in a split second, but it’s fun to plan. Potentially the “funnest” part of this list? I have recently added a goal which is to be on the television show PICK A PUPPY in the next few years. I honestly don’t care about being on television, in fact I know that I would start speaking gibberish as soon as there were any cameras, the goal is that I want to play with various puppies in order to pick the perfect on to fit in my family!

….I caught 10 minutes of that show the other day and I think it would be the best fun. I’m aiming high, people!

Happy New Year everyone!

I am currently sitting at my desk which is covered in plants, a family pictures calendar, countless paper(s) to my right, and wet socks on my left. Oh, and one stress “ball” that looks like a brown bear, which I have just named Beary (for the sake of this blog). I’m also bopping my head around to the sound of the ska tunes that defined my high school years.

In the past few weeks, I’ve identified an academic focusing problem. What I do is put a lot of time and energy into planning what’s next and how to get there and thinking all too often about what I really really really want to do next! Then I look around and realize my thesis is yet to be completed and my plants need watering. I am thinking about the future and planning for it, but have not been as passionate about the present for a while now.

As I said, I recognized this in the past month or so, but as I sit at this lively desk, I have just realized that I also have this problem in the personal aspect of my life.

This morning, I read a friend’s blog in which she discussed how she does not believe in New Year’s Resolutions because any time is a good time to change your life. I totally agree. However, she wrote something right after this that totally struck me. She asked why do people plan to do things on January first and ignore their lives in the present until the next January first rolls around? Do it now. Live your life!

After reading this wise statement, guilt crept in: I have recently been daydreaming about the next steps in my relationships (and I’ll admit it, I bookmarked a baby blanket knitting pattern or two), figuring out where I will live when I live in the “real house of my adult life” and how fun it will be etc., etc.

Wait a second – I live in a wonderful apartment. With my partner. In an amazing city. Let’s pull the daydream reigns in…what’s wrong with right now?

Nothing. It is now my goal, my “new year’s resolution” if you will, to not make “new year’s resolutions”. Live in the present, not in the future. I’ll keep planning, but I’ll focus and enjoy right now to the fullest instead.

Today I discovered what the best job in all the world is:

Answering letters written to Santa – or, in my case – Scuba Claus.

Scuba Claus is what we call the Vancouver Aquarium’s version of Santa – did you know that up until Christmas Eve he feeds fish, whilst swimming alongside them? This year, Aquarium visitors can leave a pledge to help the environment for Scuba Claus, and I help Scuba Claus write his responses back to the letter writers. It is so fantastic.

More broadly, volunteering keeps me sane. I believe strongly in volunteerism (and it’s ability to foster positive and strong connections to community) and have been doing so since high school. My first volunteer experience was required in order to graduate high school (seriously: excellent idea, Ontario school system!), which I spent running my hometown’s Community Services office at night during weekly legal aid sessions. Since then I’ve volunteered for a number of causes over the years, and now I spend my time at the Vancouver Aquarium. Volunteering for VanAqua has been such a wonderful experience; I’ve been able to flex so many muscles: imagination, play, curriculum development, leadership, teaching, learning. Yowza. What could be better?

I take great pride in my VanAqua Volunteer shirt.