A belated thing I like: Fashion blogging

My friend Jodi has just burst out of the blogger closet, and she's doing so with style, verve, and a little advice. Jodi is one of the most stylish people I know, mostly because she holds herself with such confidence. It's not just the impeccable and complete outfits, but the way she wears them.

Check out her pics, tips and guest posts (yes, I do love pink!) at http://day2daywear.blogspot.com/

In the beginning

I started a painting tonight. One for me. One I've been planning for a while but not beginning. I have never once thought of myself as a painter. I've just used paint to make pictures which people may or may not like to hang on their walls. Glassboat liked his, though I wonder sometimes whatever happened to them and on what move he left them behind. I know Freckles likes her - she even leaves them hanging when I'm not visiting. But I'm not a painter. I don't even do it often enough to call it a hobby. It's more of a creative aberration.

Mostly, when people see I have an easel I explain that sometimes I like to paint and then use that as a springboard for writing. I know real painters. People like my mom, and my grandma, and Dj. People who worked at it and studied the art. Who practiced colour mixing and proportion. Who took classes and sought after something. Or who at the very least felt a drive and a desire to regularly get their hands mucky and see what came out.

I much prefer to create worlds with words - I have a sense that I have achieved some mastery there. I have fewer concerns and a quieter censor when words creep across the page to reveal my inner world than I do when I squeeze paint onto a pallette and begin scraping it across a canvas with a knife.

The act of painting, for me, is so physical and visceral. It's a total divergence from my oh-so internal and reflective writing process. I like long slashing strokes, slippery gobs of paint, splashes of contrast, large canvases soaked and dripping. It's messy, and organic, and fluid. Delicate floral watercolours do not appeal to me, though nature and flora are often the subject. Painting, to me, feels like capturing or being captured by the forces of nature. And I'm no Jackson Pollack, by any means. Squiggles and urine and wall-sized abstractions are not my goal. But I do have to do a lot of clean up when I'm done a session.

What's really striking to me in this moment, as I sit across the table from my easel, a canvas 75% full of black and burnt umber swirls staring back at me damply, is how far the beginning is from the end result.

The thing is, we don't know where things are going to end. You could never guess from seeing the canvas as it is right now what I'm actually trying to create. The beginning is no indicator of what's next, let alone a foreshadowing of the final scene. So often I want to know how things are going to go and forget to notice and value and experience each step along the way.

An engrossing conversation can lead to a mind silencing kiss. Or not. A confession of mutual attraction may lead on to further engrossing conversations. Or not. And all of it may lead to an evocative masterpiece, or a scrapped canvas on a junk heap, or - worst of all - a trite imitation of someone else's authentic expression.

I think I know what I'm painting. I have a plan. I think I understand the process of building up layers of pigment mixed with resin to create a finished product. And it may all end up in the dumpster. Only time will tell.

TI♥T: Oh Shoot!

I totally had a Things I Love Thursday post idea all picked out at some point today, and now it's technically Friday, and I really need to go to bed, and I forgot to post.

Life is so good right now it's almost hard to focus on one thing.

And then something came up tonight and I had a couple of conversations that weren't what I expected, and now all I can see is the brown smudge of doubt and cynicism on my otherwise bright shiny creation.

So. As you already know I love my new job. I love my new house. I love my new life.

And, right now I'm frustrated. Probably a good idea to just go to bed and start all over again.

The becoming necessary to the being

Today was my first day at my much anticipated, much celebrated, and very appreciated new day job. And my first activity on this first day (right after oohing and aahing over my lovely office and figuring out which key opens which door) was to attend the monthly management team meeting.

You know you're in special place when the first person who greets you in the morning says "oh, we're all so glad you're here." And when the first question your new boss asks is "how are you feeling - are you nervous at all?" But when your management team meeting starts with a devotional that has you craughing, well, it really makes you wonder.

SC2 shared with us why struggle matters. It's a physical and spiritual imperative. It's how we grow, how we gain strength. How we learn. As Sheila Walsh (the author of the devotional) says,

[I was ] told by an ornithologist that unless a baby bird struggles to get out of the shell it will not have the strength to survive. The very act of struggling to make it to the outside gives it what it will need to learn to fly. I remember thinking, “How brilliant of God to render the “becoming” necessary to the “being.”

What especially stood out for me was the image of the baby bird. Having been wrapped up for the last few months in nudging my fledglings from the nest, and creating my empty nest, the image of the baby bird struggling to break free was especially poignant for me. How often we want to break them out of the egg shell, or to keep them safe inside it. And either option causes only death. Only in allowing the fledgling to find it's own way can it also learn to fly on its own.

It was a good day. And a good reminder. And I'm so excited to go back tomorrow.

TI♥T: Canada Day Edition (With Glowing Heart)

What else could a good Canadian girl like myself write about on a July 1 Thursday than how proud I am to be Canadian, how much I love Canada, and what fun Canada Day is? Yes, we are a flawed nation. We have imperfections and struggles and crises of identity. But there is nowhere else on earth I'd like to call home.

I am capable of writing an in-depth analysis of Canadian culture. Of debunnking stereotypes (I, for one, like neither beer nor hockey). But instead tonight, having literally just stepped in the door from a fantastic evening with my Funk Soul Brother celebrating in our provincial capital, I'm going to keep is short and sweet. Here then, in no particular order, are the things I truly love about Canada on Canada Day:

• a heaving sea of humanity in red t-shirts, maple-leaf capes, home-made red and white costumes, and everyone saying 'sorry' when they bump into you (or even when you bump into them)
• Canadian flags tied to waving hockey sticks
• Fireworks set to music 
• 30 + abreast cops on foot and motorcycle clearing the street, one of whom turned to tell my FSB and I "it's not a good idea to walk behind us in case people throw bottles and such"
• a distinct lack of bottle throwing
• hearing K'Naan's - the Somalian by birth & Canadian by choice rapper - World Cup socer anthem "Wavin' Flag" blasting from TVs, radios, and sound systems throughout the downtown core
• spontaneous choruses of O Canada in the pub and on the street
• knowing that in a crowd of 50,000 people I am completely safe - connected even - with my co-Canadians
• hearing an American tourist say "these Canadians get more excited about Canada Day than we do even for the 4th of July"

So wave your flag and wave your flag and wave your flag - we're getting better and better at this patriotism thing.



When I get older, I will be stronger
They'll call me freedom
Just like a Waving Flag.
So wave your flag, and wave your flag, and wave your flag.

Born to a throne, stronger than Rome
but Violent prone, poor people zone,
But it's my home, all I have known,
Where I got grown, streets we would roam.

But out of the darkness, I came the farthest,
Among the hardest survival.
Learn from these streets, it can be bleak,
Except no defeat, surrender retreat,
So we struggling, fighting to eat and
We wondering when we'll be free,
So we patiently wait, for that fateful day,
It's not far away, so for now we say
When I get older, I will be stronger

I'll make it better, Struggles all over,
When I get older I will be stronger
They'll call me freedom, just like a waving flag
And wave your flag, and wave your flag, and wave your flag.
So many wars, settling scores,
Bringing us promises, leaving us poor,
I heard them say, love is the way,

Love is the answer, that's what they say,
But look how they treat us, Make us believers,
We fight their battles, then they deceive us,
Try to control us, they couldn't hold us,
Cause we just move forward like Buffalo Soldiers.
But we struggling, fighting to eat,
And we wondering, when we'll be free
So we patiently wait, for that faithful day,
It's not far away, but for now we say,