Author: leaving traces

To be true to oneself. To live with integrity. To be accountable. To say what you mean and mean what you say. To be purposeful, heartful and intentional. To truly listen. To be and stay present. To speak up and reach out. To lift others up. To leave when you must. To speak truth. To call out. To reach up, see up – call up.

I love seeing others living their best life – living out their dreams. Crafting their stories as they see them to be. To reach a goal – to carve out space – to share gifts. To speak authentically and freely, with consciousness but without apology.

To write. To remember. To jot down. To reach out. Speak honestly. Try and practice getting it right. I’m watching this show, Casual, on Netflix – I feel like I may have watched it before – or segments of it. The main character – a woman, is starting to anger me. She has just quit her job as a therapist to open up a wine shop – her dream. Or a dream that she is really excited about. She is led to a retail space with high ceilings, big windows and character. She asks her daughter to come help and she tells her what colour pink she wants on the walls – where she wants a cheese fridge – where to put the pairing section for recommendations on what wines to drink for dinner parties, girls nights, and break-ups.

Then – too soon – she meets with this ‘wine guy’ who knows his stuff – and he begins to ask mouthfuls of reality-jarring questions and gives her feedback not only on wine, but decor, etc, etc.

The vision of hers is gone and replaced by a trendy, cold, masculine vibe.

She doesn’t speak up. She bats her eyelashes and they get into a romantic relationship. It pisses me off because for the times she does speak up for herself in the show – as soon as a man shows interest in her – it’s like she switches to auto-pilot and performs as she believes he wishes her to. In an almost awesome mid-life crisis she shrinks, she quiets, she follows, she submits – I’m assuming this will fizzle out shortly and she’ll finally realize that she needs time and space to herself. To say ‘no’. To set boundaries – ‘I’d like your help but only on this and this’.

I’m going down to my mom’s on Wednesday to learn about family stories. I called her yesterday to update her on one small strata thing, but I’m always the one to ask her how she’s doing first in the conversation – she ended up talking at me for 30 plus minutes before I could get a word in edge wise.

She was excited about the family history stuff she was finding so I didn’t feel right squashing her enthusiasm – but then she went on to huffing and puffing and ranting and bitching about all the legal battles she’s in.

When she ran herself out, I finally spoke up and said the reason for my call. I am worried if I don’t limit the time with my mom – I am going to behave more and more like her.

Avoidance feels like the absence of something. The turning away from. The cold shouldering. The back burner. The out-of-sight-out-of-mind. That dark foggy – seemingly empty space right at the back of our skull.

Resistance feels like an approach toward – charged and spiky like that cat’s hissing state. It looks like, in science class, when the magnet created a fuzzy line of iron shavings. Filing up side-by-side to defend. To protect. To protest. To resist the hierarchy, to critique the institution. To point out flaws, systemic oppressive injustices – to reclaim spaces and places. To actively reverse whitewashing. To paint colours. To embrace all. To rid the parasitic energy growing at our auras like the pot boiling slowly with the frog inside.

Avoiding. What am I avoiding? Am I avoiding sending my resumé out or am I preventing it from being sent out seeking the wrong leads/opportunities.

I resist the status-quo. My stomach is feeling very acidic the past few days – I am calling back eating intuitively – I need to alkalinize my body. Fertilize my soil – temper my pH. Tend to the garden. Income. Income. In-coming.

Meteors enter my thoughtforms as my language becomes less physical – more spiritual – my mind is drifting away. It must have been the bread I ate drifting me away. To be grounded by root vegetables – maybe nettle tea will settle me. Caring for self. Avoiding the self.

Resistant to change of who I was, who I am becoming, who I truly am? Fear of rejection. My partner will laugh at who I am – he doesn’t really connect with the beliefs and practices of spirituality I’m learning to spend time with, to lean into.

Why is our group so small? Has the shell of our collective egg cracked and have the relationships that were starting to form, seeped out?

Kitty cat. Hiss hiss. Animal faces. And crackers. Lion statues at the end of driveways. Flanking entrances. The Haka. Wild. Fully expressive. Small kittens hissing and reacting they cause themselves to jump. Claws outstretched. Fuck you leaf that fell unexpectedly. Fuck you coming around that corner with no warning. A tiger in a cage gets swatted across the face by a stray cat. This is my turf, bitch. How pitiful you look.

I loved the wild symmetry of fully expressed eyebrows on her face as she demonstrated. It was like a painting or a Chinese dragon. How do I continue to dedicate time to dragons and angels and mermaids when I am suppose to live my human life as the run-around stepmom. Become close to the kid, but not too close. Run naked in the woods. Sun topless on the beach. Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. Should I ask my sister what it is like to be free? She said she is ‘pro-poly’ – my filter says that that is afraid of commitment, dedication, compromise, healing, growth, and true connection.

Is she free because she bares her skin? Is she free because she dances on tables at the age of 34? Is she free because she snowboards and parties and doesn’t really put time or commitment into being an auntie, a sister, or a partner?

Should I worry about her? Should I let her come to me? She rarely comes to me… then sadness, then grief, resentment and anger.

I am a one-phone-call-a-month type of relationship for her. A ‘if I’m already visiting a friend on the Island maybe meet for a quick beer’ type of relationship.

The mountain by itself. Then the poet. Do you know of the artsy term relational aesthetics? It’s basically about how a relationship of one entity can change or highlight aspects of another entity when paired, or reflected, or togethered with another. It’s almost as if the space between the objects becomes positively charged. Board rooms in the early 2000s would say something like synergy or the sum of the parts is greater than the whole or some blue and grey corporate jargon like that.

Relational aesthetics helps to describe why a meme containing one Sheryl Crow paired with a split-screen of multiple Sheryl Crows – and calls that a Sheryl murder – and we laugh for a split second while doom scrolling about rape and war and Russia and fiction that is fact and six year old boys with white hair and – oh, a cute pig video… thank god, thank Creator, thank goodness of people and animals and nature and space and time for shining light in the dark corners of the internet – the world wide web.

A giant spider should swallow us whole – spinning us in her web – trapping us – shushing us like duct taped mouths would do.

Okay – needing to close or at least minimize some tabs or windows in my mind.

Chaos and stillness. The mountain and a murder of crows. On my walk on the railroad today two crows perched in two separate trees next to each other. One cleaned its beak and looked at me – I asked them if they were the same two crows I met in the trees in Osoyoos.

This thing is training me to daily break a cycle of the ‘hurt people hurt people’ scenario.

For anyone who has kids or has taken care of someone younger than themselves for a long period of time – the kids really do mirror aspects of yourself back to you.

I ask him how his day was – he tells me all the things – I try not to ask too many questions and leave enough quiet space so he can fill the gaps if he wants to.

I am most-of-the-time consciously avoiding carrying on harmful traits that my mother had.

As her training as a lawyer with 36 years in the government – she was a crown prosecutor – she was trained to see those who weren’t on her side of the table as wrong, guilty, etc – there is no innocence going into a conversation with my mother.

She held resentment and couldn’t communicate to us as kids – so we got weeks of silent treatment and negative comments – any attempts at sharing a different perspective were met with huffs of dismissiveness – volume going waaaayyyy up on the screams – fits, tears, slammed doors, etc.

I would leave and spend time in my room with my 90’s jams blasting because those artists really got me.

Once she put her thorns down I would apologize so things could go back to normal. Never having uttered a word, never truly being at fault – but an apology was the only way to relieve the tension. This was close to a daily ritual. I notice when my anger bubbles up I try the easy out and want to blame someone else. I’m usually mad because I was the one avoiding myself and my intuition – what I truly wanted or needed that day.

Then circumstance comes along to put daily tasks in your life which you so conveniently label as ‘obstacles’ to whatever shit you really wanted to do.

Stretching out like popcorn. Parallel stretching out on the floor – reach, stretch. Lengthen. Lean. Slender. Sprawling. Splayed. Circles. Hugging. Rolling. Back. Spine. Chest cavity. Rolled in and over. Open up. Care Bear Stare pose. Shoulders back – troll belly button jewel shining bright.

“Shine bright like a diamond.” Ri Ri gets it.

Collapsing and reaching – yoga’s ugly step sister. No happy baby here – these are contemporary dance moves – body-led – what is needed? What feels good might look silly. Fuck it. These are the peops. This place doesn’t judge. Feeling weighty. Feeling nappy without needing a nap. Already more grounded – less flighty, more me. This is me, right now. Mother fuckers.

Heavy head. Jaw tension. Hot cheeks. Cold fingers. Gurgling belly. Jelly belly. Moms words – she is ugly so sees ugly. Lol – I don’t think she’s ugly but she must wear ugly glasses to see the world the way she does.

Swimming and the male gaze – swim meets and pre-race diarrhea – without fail. Every. Time. They must have known – they being the pool designers because there was a washroom in the marshalling area right before the race. Sometimes I would go a few times – as my nerves were so heightened at swim meets.

I always had to be the best – my dad said in an intentionally supportive way – my mom demanded in her silent critical way. If we didn’t do well in sports, it was a waste of their time and money. It felt as though their love was conditional based on how and what we accomplished/achieved – cue over-achiever-adult-who-runs-into-burnout-theme-song. Ding, ding ding!

Honestly, the more memories and stories I draw from my childhood – the more fucked up it seems to be.

I mean – we had a privileged affluent life – but I’m noticing that what I thought were parental ‘quirks’ were actually forms of psychological warfare.

I guess swimming is conflicting for me. As a woman whose bush extends onto her legs – it’s a fucking ordeal to just get to the pool. I have to spend $100 to get sugared – the only thing that lasts long enough to be worth it and that doesn’t leave more red bumps in its wake than hairs before it.

Then I swim – with the mostly old cranky men and super buoyant older women who mostly just get in my way.

Sigh.

When my body is in the pool – she loves it.

Reaching and stretching out as long and tall as she can – controlled breathing – 1, 2, 3, breathe. Forming a dent in the water near my armpit to breathe. Leaving a wake as I carve out the water.

Touching the end and pushing off under the water – gliding until coming up for air.

“Is that a new purse?”, she said with a glint of surprise in her eyes.

“Yup. Got it at the hardware store in Osoyoos – the one with everything.”

“Wow! It’s nice. It looks way better than those shopping bags you carry around.” Said with a slap-in-the-face-back-handedness that a critical, judgey mother only could.

To retaliate, I asked her if her hair looked more grey today than usual.

Adornment and style and clothes are a tricky one for me to articulate.

Growing up under the hyper-scrutinizing eye of my mother – any piece of clothing – anything done with our face, our hair – done or not done – wind-swept or combed straight, ponytail or not – all came with comment. Not the types of comments that make you feel safe and loved – the type of comments that build a lump in your throat as a 10, 11, 12, 13 – 17, 19, 25 year old – as you get dressed in the morning.

I have always been tall, well at least taller than average from Gr. 8 on. My feet were size 11 in Gr. 4…

I hated shopping and I sort of still do….

I didn’t much want to be here today. I’m using a large washable marker to write as I couldn’t find another one.

I get staying in your own experience but it seemed harsh that we all witnessed an uncomfortable exchange that wasn’t something we could include in our check-in. I come to this place to practice un-curating my voice – not over-thinking what I say. I don’t always want to talk about trauma. I want to laugh and make fun and connect with others. I’m not here for ‘Blue Mondays’ – I’m just feeling like I’m on the precipice of overcoming or whatever the “awake – anti-woke” word is for feeling more like myself that I have ever felt maybe ever. Holy fuck – let’s just say what we need to say. Holding our breath to speak is counter-intuitive.

People pleasing is going out the door with this one.

I had an art student report me because I called her work OCD – I was trying to describe in an almost flabbergasted way – the level of attention to detail – the meticulousness of all of the perfectly cut angles, the repetition, the tiny objects all formed and crafted in relation to each other. It was also interesting in a paradoxical way because she had administered so much control in her art project which was all related to her own funeral – a thing that she wouldn’t be able to control in the end.

The language of water. The trees needles dip down like music notes on a page. Fingertips outstretched – muscle-free – voluntarily involuntary. Pine scent, a woodpecker’s home. Time of day or time of night. What once was a raccoon’s den is now a bird’s resting place – place to nest. To raise a family. My mind is pulling me towards housing prices and things I’ve heard professors and other experts say on CBC Radio One – it’s not about building more housing, it’s housing type that is the issue. Co-op housing will solve our problems – it was so cool in the 80’s that it flew under the radar. Why is everything a ‘thing’ these days – a ‘mega’ this – an ‘entity’ that. Doom scrolling on our way to coffin city, or urn town, or tree seed pod, or mushroom manure.

My sister hates rich people yet wants the lifestyle. So do I, I guess. Capitalism sucks but lemme have it. We have heart work though, I told her. Those kids you’ve helped, the twelve-year-old who everyone at the care facility seems to be afraid of – she laughs with you, I said. What is the pain one feels to come into someone’s life, especially a kid, and then feel that you are leaving too soon? Before you helped. Before they had support. Before they healed any small/BIG parts of themselves. I can’t imagine spending months with a kid who finally reaches out to hold your hand – to say – this poverty-line living cannot sustain me. This is as far as I think I can go on this one – that pain is big pain. That pain is her pain. I cannot feel her pain for her. I must stay on dry land – answer when she calls – remain calm and level-headed so she can call again, so she can cry, so she can unload some of her pain with me and I can bury it safely in the sand.

She doesn’t know this, but each night, when the tide comes in – her pain is washed out to sea – to be cleansed, to breed life, to twinkle like phosphorescence under a starry sky. To nourish barnacles – the same ones we cut our feet on as kids. To coat the seaweed with plankton to feed, to feed, to feed – all the way up the food chain.

I remind her to clasp her lifejacket as she steps in the inflatable boat, into our tide pool that our dad blasted with dynamite when we were kids.

She doesn’t listen or pretends to ignore me, so I give it a tug and the buckle clicks into place as she steps into the boat.

The rock is round and smooth and grey all around us. The sea is flat and blue and everywhere out front. We pack our butterfly nets to catch guppies and crabs, hermies (as we called them), starfish and bullheads.

The shells lay broken shining light up from the bottom. She caught my reflection and smiled until she noticed I was looking back.