Fitting square pegs in round holes

Look, I’ll tell you this – sometimes, often in fact, I have these moments of clarity where it occurs to me that I don’t fit in, neatly, like, I mean. I admit that I’m a bit odd, even for my tastes and about half the time I’m not even sure what I’m talking about.

Then -

I got into work yesterday and one of my colleagues greeted me over the interoffice chat application and then he said, here is a rhyme for you:

Roses are Red

Dead Flesh is Green

When the Dead start to Rise

I want You on my Team

He said that a friend of his sent it to him and it made him think of me.

Nice, right.

It made me feel like..someone here gets me. It made me feel like…I belong somewhere, here, in fact.

I don’t think I told you, but during my lunch hours I’m learning how to make origami cranes – I finished the paper my niece gave me for Xmas so I went out and bought some new stuff. They are pretty ok, I mean I’m not mangling them any more. My fingers are learning. Slowly, very slowly.

And you know, people come by to see what I’m up to and chat or come over to my desk where the cranes and sitting around, watching things and I figure “Hey, take a crane or two so you can them at your desk!” and people really like them.

So, later the same day, yesterday, another one of my colleagues (who has 4 cranes) suggested the CEO of our company that we take the cranes that I make and put them in a bowl by reception and when people visit us, they can take a crane home with them. Once he stopped laughing, the CEO loved it!

And I had another moment of “People here, they get it.”

And today, today another colleague came over to my desk and asked if I had met his doggie. I hadn’t, so he took me to where his doggie was hanging out. And guess what! It wasn’t a doggie at all! It was a puppy!!!!

A 10-month old, American Eskimo puppy, who was sooooo happy to see us.

I have to tell you, I really felt like, “People, they get me here.”

It just makes me feel so good. About everything.

Today is the first day of…wait a minute…

Today was my first day of the new job.

Yep!

You heard, umm, you read me right. My new job.

It all happened super quick time, so good-bye salon! Hello office job!

Have to tell you – I love being back working in an office. I love that office-y feeling. And I love wearing my dresses and heels and knowing that no one is going to ask me to shampoos anyone’s hair.

It is a good feeling.

New place is opposite my gym. And my movie theatre. And that place I like to meet people for drinks.

So, now I have no excuses to not do any other those things.

Tonight after work, it was gym.

They changed the “Yoga Basics” class to a “Hot Yoga” class. Imagine me, wanting something slower, relaxed, ready to concentrate on my poses, instead I end up in a warm-ish room, doing very few poses in very fast ways. Checked out the rest of the schedule and you know what? They have changed almost every yoga class to “Hot Yoga”. Blerg.

I tried it out tonight and you know what? Even though the room isn’t all that hot, it was still too hot for me. I didn’t even have water or anything! ‘cuz I wasn’t expecting a “Hot Yoga” class.

And you know, I do get it. People want to do “Hot Yoga”, but the gym doesn’t have the proper facilities for it and me? Well, I was just fine with “Room Temperature Yoga”.

They even changed my Sunday class to “Hot Yoga”.

So, doubled checked the schedules at the other gyms I can go to and you know what? Most of the yoga classes are now “Hot Yoga” classes.

So, I sum up today – work = awesome, gym = too hot.

Gimme back some non-Hot Yoga classes. Please?

The work of grief

The plan was to get up and go and attend an airshow party.

Troubled sleep made the day grumpy and introspective.

Again.

“What if” thoughts swirled around most of the night and some time today was spent trying to organize my old emails into some sense – if I can archive it, if I can file and save these old messages, if I can sort them and read them, perhaps I can find my own piece of mind with all this.

I want to find my own piece of mind with this.

I am not a perfect being, a perfected human, I am messy, flawed, but, ok, I accept these flaws, this little imperfections in me, in my heart. I’m learning. What hurts, what kills me the most is this believe that somehow, someone, me, that I could only love a perfect thing, that only a very particular someone, a person should be, what, worthy? of love.

I don’t know how to make sense of all this.

Perhaps this is the cruelest of all, that maybe, maybe, maybe there is no sense to be found, no reason. That between lines of written words, they is actually only space without meaning.

Maybe I’m going to wake up and everything will look different in the morning light. Probably.

Orchids, owls, Mickey Mouse and assorted animals, oh my!

Final Friday.

Critical moments, sobs over-take me. Cards, more prezzies (meaning more off my shopping list – thank you!!), phone calls, surprise visits and lovely emails.

Yeah, I cry.

If you were me, if you felt how I feel, you would cry too.

I’m leaving home, I’m leaving people who love me, love me, love me.

More importantly, I love them.

I carry them with me. With me, with me.

We go together.

Yes, stayed late at work – last-minute details, things I forgot! I forgot things. I know I’m going to wake up at 3am and need to send an email “One more thing…”

I’m going on my Next Great Adventure.

I keeping thinking, feeling, misquoting, John Guare‘s Six Degrees of Separation: “…I am Columbus. I am Magellan.  I will sail into this New World.”

It feels like I’m going into a New World.

So the Great Work begins…packing.

Books first. Four.

I leave Aristotle. Leave Foucault. Leave Freud – was there ever any question? Killing me – leaving all Vonneguts. Leave all plays. Leave both Hoffs – ouch. Take Watts,The Watercourse Way – in being true to myself I become a sterotype…Leave graphic novels, ditto all Pratchetts. Light fiction stays. Take Inquiry into the Good – Nishida. Only fitting, right? Also been 3 years since the last read, so it is time for another go. Leave Nin and all cookbooks *sigh*. Take What the Buddha Taught – I am a stereotype!..Take Becoming Bamboo by Bob, you never know when you will need a friend. Leave Saul.

Create a new page based on conversations and ideas with you and you. Re: book lists. Yeah, you too.

I dither over The Mysticism of Music Sound and Word.

Remove and discard packaging from gifts – who knew that this travel stuff came with so many throw-aways?

Considering what to pack, what to carry. I have to fill carry-on containers.

Doing laundry.

Ignored the world last night and did some work on the Flickr stream and the old blog. Why are my albums not working in Flickr? How are people supposed to know when they are looking at Havana and when they are looking at London?

*sigh*

I’ll go lightly and put things down as often as I can. I’ll carry those I love with me.

Can you imagine me? Climbing Saturday, Yoga Sunday and Last Minute Stuff Monday and then…poof! I’m gone.

Magical, mystical me…I’ll stretch out time and make the nanoseconds count. I’m making the nanoseconds count.

Climbing in the am and there is so much to do!

I think. I think through this whole thing, I think my heart grew a little. It made some more space.

My heart is growing.

 

Thursday, January 27, 2011: What to say, what to do?

Another day, another that ended with me in tears at my desk.

Received a lovely “good-by, we’ll miss you” card from the awesome guys and gals at head office. Everyone signed it and took a moment to give me a good thought and their best wishes.

I hold good thoughts for them too.

My bags are partly packed!

Unfortunately, they are the bags under my eyes.

Oh, that I could be one of those people who doesn’t have fear or doubt and to whom things come easily.

I’m not one of those people.

The change is painful, the Becoming is painful. I know, I know – perseverance, right?

I think of the Zen Buddhist monk who said to me “Perhaps your lesson is to learn perseverance?” I agreed then, I agree now.

Have to laugh a bit too, when I think of that – I was the only one he suggested I had something to learn from the pain of sitting. Everyone else, he nodded and said “Yes. It is painful.” Me – I have something to learn from the pain.

Ok, ok, I become someone who learns perseverance.

My brain is still downloading. The knowledge coming out it…hurts. Next time I need to download some knowledge, I’m just plugging in via the port to my brain.

I don’t have a port to my brain.

I should probably get one. I could download all sorts of things!

You could get one too and then we wouldn’t even have to talk to have a conversation.

Only.

I like talking.

So never mind.

The Last Day – Friday.

When I have a Last Day at work, usually I like to make a little speech.

Here is my speech:

Look, I hate good-byes and you hate good-byes. Everyone hates good-byes. They suck rocks. So instead of saying good-bye, lets just pretend that today is an ordinary day at work and not say good-bye at all. At the end of the day, I will leave and, as always, say “Have a great week-end! See you Monday!” but we will really know that we won’t see each other Monday. We can meet at the bar and have some drinks and pretend like it is just like every other time we get together and have drinks. I want to leave smiling. I want to see you smiling. No matter how we are both breaking up inside. Ok?

Not sure how common it is to love the people you work with. Me, I don’t want to be around people I don’t love. I love the people I work with – they are funny, interesting, intelligent, filled with awesome ideas, have solutions to problems, creative, funny*, witty, lift me up when I’m feeling down, they create space for me to be the person I am and welcome me with open arms. They are tolerant of my quirks and return my emails and phone calls promptly. They have amazing taste and have opened my eyes to so much. They have helped me in times of trouble, allowed me to lean on them when I’ve stumbled, picked me up when I’ve fallen, helped me through my failures and doubts. They “get” me. They encouraged me in my inquiries and encouraged my passions. And so much more.

They have changed me. I like how they’ve changed me.

I’m lucky, I’ve been very lucky to have these people in my life.

Lucky too, ‘cuz I carry them with me. Where ever I wander, where ever I roam**.

*Yes, I realized I listed “funny” twice – I work with a lot of people who make me laugh.

**And, yeah, I totally and shamelessly ripped off a Disney song for that last sentence there. I expect to be hearing from Disney’s lawyers anytime now…

 

 

“Ok to bend” – package in my mailbox

Coincidence: I am “ok to bend” too!

Knitted water bottle holder for me in the package.

It is beautiful – my friend chose a lovely purpley-pink colour, I think of raspberries. I love it, it is soft and strong and fits perfectly across my shoulder. It was completely handy for toting my water bottle from climb to climb tonight.

Getting something knitted in the mail makes me feel so very loved – my gram used to send me knitted things in the mail and a few times, so did my mum.

I don’t feel that my friend is either acting as gram or mum to me – it just makes me loved and so very secure and this is the best way to explain.

Business idea: Let’s sell made to order knitted water bottle holders.

I don’t knit, so I will take care of the sending stuff, you can knit.

Yay!

Of course, if I were a smarter person who was less tired, I would take a pic and put it up on the new Flickr account. I’m pretty dumb and very tired, so we have to wait – you will love it when you see it.

Incredible Useful on The Adventure.

Climbing: 6 routes = 2 x 5.8, 2 x 5.9 and 2 x 5.10-

Both 5.10-s = best ever (for me) – couple of rest stops, but no big falls, my feet were working tonight and did the cross-overs smoothly and the fingers were gripping just right.

I’m giving off “Talk to me” vibes.

Today, in the lunch line, everyone wanted to tell me things, ask me things and discuss things. Fun things, funny things.

Tonight everyone said “hello”, one person recognized me from one of our regular brunch places so much I was asked if I go there – I do – it was our fav waitress! She climbs! How cool is that? I knew I liked her for a reason.

Another climber chose tonight to ask me all about how the climbs went.

Chatty cat = me.

Second last day of work coming up. Killing me to leave – I feel like I’m just about to have a couple of really good ideas…this is problem, yes, letting go of things we care about to do something else we care about = dilemma.

On the upside: I’m so tired right now that I’m forgetting to be afraid.

Another upside: It is nice to have a break from the fear.

Also an upside: It is almost sleepy time!

Swiss cheese brain

At this rate, I will have no brain left.

People keep dropping by, inviting me to meetings, asking me for answers and generally requesting to “pick my brain”.

It is quite flattering.

And kind of worrisome. I mean, I use my brain almost daily for stuff!

I like to think of myself – ok, I don’t actually like to think of myself, allow me to rephrase…I like to think that I am the kind of human who readily shares information and ideas. There is something interesting about someone who gives knowledge freely and ideas to others – to make connections between people.

Leaving gives a different perspective.

Re-introduce people who may have lost touch or never been given a formal introduction. Give some ideas that I’ve waited to ripen. People, suddenly, have extra time for me, time to sit down, hear what I have to say, listen to a few new ideas and be re-connected.

Am I most valuable as I walk out the door?

Is this willingness to show urgency a fault of mine in not sharing more information and solutions and making those re-introductions as I go?

I think I do this, I like to do this. Exciting things happen when people get together.

An hour at the gym and organized putting the membership on hold. Today is a day where I’m charming – the gentleman helping me put the membership on hold for longer than he allowed. Go me and thanks very much!

Tried my best to convince my yoga-buddy to make it to Sunday’s class – we are both flying out on the same day! She is going somewhere warm. I am going somewhere. Our flights are hours apart, so no change of bumping into each other. I’m charged as a messenger if she doesn’t make it to class.

Shopping after the gym – I have things in the house to eat! (Beside Bonus Cookies – did I tell you I found more Bonus Cookies – seriously, there must be an inter-dimensional portal where they keep coming in.) I was getting down to the nitty-gritty. Even got some soy milk – water is great in the mornings, but I missed the soy.

Is it a faux pas to wear a red and white polka-dotted underwear and bra set with a white and black houndstooth dress? Or just a fashion crime?

This bothered me all day long.

(I feel very Canadian when I wear red and white.)

(Stop imagining me in my underwear.)

In other news – something odd is going on with the political landscape of Alberta. The Premier is stepping down and isn’t running in the next election – he is afraid that some ultra-right-wing party may personally attack him and take power.

I laughed my brain to bits when I heard him say that.

‘Cuz like…he is a member of “some ultra-right-wing party”!

Just – there are parties that are further right than his!

Man, Alberta, I shake my curls at you in disbelief. You have one of the strangest political landscapes around this place. No party should be in power for 40 years. Not one that is “democratically elected”.

I do miss the mountains, though.

Not the bears, but, yeah, the mountains.

You know, I feel like a bit of fraud. (I have a few things to tell you about fraud – all over the news yesterday, more on that another time.) All these people keep telling me how brave I am and how smart and whatever.

And I’m not.

I’m just me.

Trying to do my best at this thing.

Failing sometimes.

Other times failing not quite so badly.

This thing about the trip – it isn’t brave. Brave would have been to do earlier, when I originally planned. Doing it now is…weird. I mean, I feel weird about it. I leaving a lot of things – friends, family, job I love etc. etc.

What am I thinking?

I’m thinking – I don’t want to let fear stop me from doing things, fear doesn’t control my life. I’m human, I have free will, I can choose. I exercise my free will and make my choice.

Ok.

See, how I talk myself through that? Clever, yeah?

As I’m getting self-congratulatory I know it must be bed time.

Wednesday – plenty to do and then fighting gravity. Gravity always wins, but the fighting it is fun.

Hey – I wonder if there is a way to vote new words into the WordPress dictionary so they don’t come up as spelling errors. If someone could design an ap for this, we could sell it to WordPress for like…some amount to be determined later. I get 15% ‘cuz it is my idea.

 

 

How to make a wonderful Tuesday even better…

Clean the house.

The place is neat and ordered, sense of calm and, dare I say?: sanity.

Weather was a bit grim – slush fell over night – is this sleet? – and made things…messy and a bit chaotic. I don’t mind a bit of chaos, but not on the highways, there are some questionable drivers out there and they all seemed to be going my way today…

Ok, I don’t mind a lot of chaos.

Ok. I like chaos.

Some people are just wired like that.

I am wired like that.

Days are getting harder as things at work draw to close for me. “Good-byes”, “We’ll miss yous” and “Good lucks” make my little heart ache. My tear ducts fill and something spill. I feel loved and connected.

This is probably not a normal thing to feel about colleagues and a “job” – but the fact is that I’m in love with the people I’ve found doing the thing that I do to pay my bills. It hurts to know that I am loved in return and I’m leaving. Little heart breaks. Developing scar tissue.

And who needs this “normal” anyway.

The breath after – knowing that I love and am loved in return gives me this crazy confidence that yes, I can go out there and have an adventure. It can get into me, change me, knock me down, pull me up and I will still have these connections. I’m leaving, but I’m not going anywhere.

Invisible threads from my heart and from my belly button to people in my life. I am part of this invisible spider web. Haha – “network”.

I’m not sure why I feel love from my belly button as well as my heart. I hope it isn’t an ulcer.

This whole thing about the trip has really made me think about, feel, fear. How scary it is to go out into the world, into the unknown alone. I’m ready to learn some things. I feel like I’m about to begin my first day of school. Again.

I don’t feel alone.

A part of me feels like when I’m climbing on the wall. There is someone holding the rope, so when I fall, I don’t fall far. But getting to the top – it is all me. Strength in my little fingers. Strength in my little toes. Strength with every beat of my heart. Thoughts fly away and there is only straining to go up and not look down.

I want to sooth away the sadness of the people I’m leaving – not emotionally leaving, but leaving the day-to-day of them. People are looking sad around me.

The ‘fraidy-cat in me just wants to disappear in a puff of smoke so I can avoid these good-byes. I’d skip right to the…”Hello Agains”, “I’m homes” and “Here I got this for yous”.

I think of the process.

Of stepping in running streams and babbling brooks.

Sea changes and tides.

These good-byes and farewells, they are part of my heart now, change me moment by moment, word by word. I am becoming a different person even as I’m preparing to become a different person. I am a different person.

There is this place of confidence, of happiness that grants me the strength to risk it – to walk away from people I love, from a place I love, from a job that I love – to just try to do something different. There are many ways to live life and I’m just trying another way.

I am pebble dropped into a still lake – rings out around me, intersecting with other rings.

Years ago I remarked to a close friend that I was done, I had met all the people in my life who would matter and made all the friends that I would make in my life, my heart was filled up with as people as I could care about and there was no more room for new people. No new friends.

How lovely to be wrong!

I can get used to being wrong like this.

I met more people – and my heart, my heart grew. Still growing. Gets bigger with every person that I meet. Someday my heart will be the size of the entire universe. It will be as big as the multiverse.

I keep meeting people who know people who want me to visit them on my Great Adventure. It is like, other people love me so much they are lending me their love to keep me on my journey.

So, yeah, I don’t worry so much about aliens and whether there is life “out there”. I’m far too preoccupied with life right here.

 

 

Tides change Friday

What happened:

I put in a “Leave of Absence” request so I could take time and do that whole trip thing.

The LOA didn’t get approval. Too bad for me.

I did some serious thinking. I thought some more. Then I thought more.

Then I decided.

Booked a plane ticket and handed in my resignation. My last day of work is two weeks from today. Two weeks and four days from today I’m flying away and landing in Seoul.

The Next Great Adventure Begins.

Honesty: I’m scared. I’ve just decided to leave a job that I love and people who I love more. While at my current position, I’ve managed to work on some cool projects and work with even cooler people. I’ve learned a lot. Laughed a lot and yes, even done some crying. What is laughter without tears.

People have accused me of learning from me too!

My life changed because of this job, so, yeah, it is hard to leave. Go off into the blue and see what the world has for me.

Honesty: I’m excited. Anything, anything, anything could happen. It could be brilliant. It could be horrible. It will probably be a mix of the two. – “brilliorrible”.

I imagine the senses will wake to new things all the time and it will be hard on the body. The mind will be nourished.

It is like that moment before starting a climb – the first hold pulling off the floor and putting everything on the wall or rock. Scary, thrilling. Wanting to go in two directions – up and down. Reaching and not-reaching. Getting there and sometimes not-getting there. Trying. Fighting against gravity.

It is a good feeling.

I think, for me, there is something right about this. Something right about the risk. Something right about knowing I can still take a risk.

Thoreau on my mind a lot the past few days – don’t want to die without having ever really lived.

I will perish, having lived a life of no regrets.

And great plenty of great hair.

In other news: the dinner I brought for my friend was a hit! She really liked it, so I’m really happy that not only she didn’t go hungry, but I was finally able to introduce one of my fav people to some of my fav food. Roti and curry.

Upside: I’m going to have an Adventure!

Upside: I can still take a risk.

Upside: We just invented a new dessert name “Blackberry and Zombie”. My friend and I figure it would something with meringue.

Upside: Snow storm starts at midnight. Oops, I guess that isn’t so much an upside as a…side.

Today, my life changed.

Singing in the lunch line

Incredible meeting – my agenda item to share with the group – we got approval to use the checklist I’ve been working on. Congrats all the way around, most directed at me.

Funny.

‘Cuz I didn’t believe, at any point during the project, that it was needed.

I guess I was way wrong. I have to laugh about it.

Next steps – the Group wants me to present at the first meeting with all our colleagues and teach the information and present the checklist to everyone.

Yikes!

I’m not sure how I get myself into these things.

Lucky for me, I’m ok with presenting during a videoconference. I have some good clothes to wear for it and I always smile and nod during these things – you never know when you are on camera.

Feels good to get a project finished.

The way upside: This means I can get back the project that I like more! Yay!

Also way up there: The checklist is going to help. I like things that help.

Bonus – today in the cafeteria they were playing one of my fav songs. I sang along, out loud and made like I was having a free concert. I’m not sure how the audience (my colleagues) enjoyed, but no one threw rotten tomatoes at me or anything, so there you go.

Yes, I blew off the gym to shovel the driveway. Yes, I blew off shoveling the driveway to…drink tea. At least I’m keeping up with one of my New Year’s Resolutions.

Tonight – early, ok earlier, to bed! Up in the morning to climb some walls!