Sunday 24 June 2012

Why does letting go hurt so much? or, I shouldn't care, but I do

It shouldn't. It really shouldn't. Maybe if I keep telling myself, I’ll eventually believe it. If there was a time when he was mine, that was fifteen years ago, and I could probably argue that he never was. It would be so much easier to do this if I didn't have a living, breathing fourteen-year-old reminder with his eyes. Deep down, I’m happy that he's found someone and I know that his deliriously giddy behaviour is perfectly normal for that fresh-in-love stage of a relationship. Lord knows, he's had his share of the crazy girls and the psycho bitches. At forty-two, he deserves some happiness. I know it can't be with me. I've got a happiness of my own that grew out of the ashes of him and me. But it doesn't mean that I haven't harboured a secret hope that all these years he looked back with regret at what we might have had if we had both had a little more courage.
I've only had a few relationships in my life that have had profound and lasting effects, although my feelings have been engaged more often than that. The ruin of the first one taught me the importance of compassion. The second taught me that sometimes it is necessary to cut ties when they become destructive. It was a long time before the third one, he whose happiness I am now mourning. From that ending I learned the importance of courage over comfort. There were so many missed opportunities that I saw but talked myself out of using. Now I am learning the importance of dedication and devotion -- and yes, I know that sounds like the chorus of "Walk of Life" by Dire Straits -- and finding myself awed and humbled that someone thinks me worthy. Let me tell you, unconditional love, wherever you find it, is an amazing, awe-inspiring, humbling gift.
It shouldn't hurt, not any more. It really shouldn't hurt like it ended all over again. Maybe if I keep telling myself, I’ll eventually believe it.

Tuesday 19 June 2012

Names and reasons: or why I am here

"Why start a blog now?"  someone asked me the other day.  "The personal blog is dead, or at least dying."  It's a good question, one to which I'm not sure I know the answer entirely, but which also finds its reflection in a friend, who is a student of, and lecturer on, technology and media, putting an end to her personal blog this past week. 

I think it has to do with needing an outlet, one which may or may not have an audience, but which allows me to put my thoughts and ideas out where someone might see them.  And even those posts which I don't immediately publish, because they need polishing or contain content that just would never tie in with anything I would ever want to be known about me, allow me the opportunity to learn more about myself, my surroundings, and my voice as a writer.  On some level, the urge to blog now, as opposed to  three or five years ago, is probably also related to the urge that led me, in my late teens and early twenties, to essay my hand at writing sonnets.  I live in the times in which I live because I must, because some twist of fate placed me here, but I am not completely of these times.  Some of it may come from being a chronological member of generation X, but one whose parents, unlike those of many of my peers, were not baby-boomers, and their parents were all born during the Victorian era.  As a result, I sometimes feel as though I have a toehold in three different centuries. 

The blog, therefore, is an attempt to bridge my nineteenth-century compulsion to write, my mid-twentieth-century yearning for structure and change, and twenty-first century technology. 

As far as the title of my blog, it was something that occurred to me only at the instant of having to input it.  I have always had the urge to travel (the proverbial "itchy foot"), but the circumstances of my life and finances have always conspired to limit my ability to do so.  Combined with my having been a stay-at-home mother for the past decade, the lack of travel contributed to a raging case of cabin fever.  Hence the name. 

Despite the name, however, this i.s not strictly speaking a travel blog, although I have since moved to one of those places I always wanted to explore, and I have started work outside the home.  I'm not one hundred-percent certain of what direction I will take this, but I can hazard a guess that it is at least as much about internal journeys and limitations as it will be about the literal. 

I do find it odd, or perhaps serendipitous, that, while I have always wanted to travel but never been able to do so to the degree which I would prefer, that I have found a career in the hospitality industry.  I actually fell into it when I was still young. 

I was a student looking for a summer job, and I spotted a hiring ad in the campus newspaper (don't laugh, this was 1990) for a hotel that I had seen in a calendar picture and had always thought looked like a really interesting place.  Since I did not want to go home and work in either of the family businesses, I typed up my resume and cover letter, and sent off my application.  I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, exactly, but on the basis of some previous cashier experience, I was hired to work at the front desk.  My mother dropped me off at the beginning of June, and after a week, I was hooked.  At that time, I thought hospitality would be a good way to earn my way through university, but I had no intentions of spending my life working in business. 

Fast-forward two decades and five babies, and I found myself looking for opportunities outside of the home.  After a fruitless attempt to find employment in the regular business world, I decided to return my focus to the industry in which I had found the most professional happiness.  After a year spent at school gaining credentials to back up my experience, I launched myself back into the world of gainful employment.  Three weeks after starting my new position, I can honestly say that I have come home.  This is the work where my heart is, and I have the opportunity to travel vicariously through my conversations with guests. 

I may not have left the cabin yet, but the windows are open and it feels like Spring.  And that's a damn good feeling.

Thursday 14 June 2012

Meditation

This afternoon, I took a short trip to pop in on my friend Phil, who works at Old Tyme Candy Shoppe in Radium Hot Springs.  He didn't have much time to chat, being in the middle of putting a large shipment into inventory and out on display, so he suggested that I go for a walk on the trails near Sinclair Creek, which I did.  The weather today was warm, if a little dodgy on the precipitation front, but it held off while I was down in the canyon, for which I was grateful.  While I used to be an avid day hiker, it's been well over a decade since I've done much, and fourteen years, four kids, and forty pounds have taken a toll on my stamina.  Add to that, I'm still getting used to the altitude here in the upper reaches of the Columbia River after fourteen years near the coast.  Sending me on the local equivalent of the Bear's Hump in Waterton Lakes National Park, or the Grouse Grind near Vancouver, would not have been a very wise idea. 


Time in nature

Once I made my way down the switchbacks in the trail to the bottom of the canyon, I found myself moving differently.  I was no longer a middle-aged mother of five with a weight problem, but a creature of the woods, setting my pace to the rhythm of running water, listening to bird calls (I heard a raven, and I saw a small songbird, about the size of a finch, with a tuft of bright feathers on its head), and watching for dragonflies and caterpillars. 

On trails lined with trees and underbrush right up to their margins, I experienced an almost atavistic sensation that I was walking through a fairy-tale wood, perhaps even Little Red Riding Hood's forest, a sensation that seemed at odds with the warmth of the sun beating on my shoulders and back, with the groomed gravel of the trail beneath my feet, and with my overall sense of well-being.  In some sense, I believe that I was experiencing what Clarissa Pinkola Estes describes in her wonderful book, Women Who Run with the Wolves, as the "selva subterranea", the forest deep in the soul where the true nature lives.  The child in me, as well as the woman who watches "Grimm" for the references to the unsanitized fairy tales that strike a deeper chord than anything I ever read as a child, half-expected the "big bad wolf" to leap out from the underbrush, even as I knew I would be more likely to encounter a bear or cougar.  Yet, as I climbed my way back out of the canyon, I felt stronger, more sure, and grateful for the opportunity to undertake the soul's journey in such a literal way.


Things I learned

I had time to listen to myself, too, and relearn some things about who I am and what I like.  This is some of what I found out.  I am a writer and a dreamer (above all a dreamer), a mother and a culinary experimenter.  I like chocolate, especially good quality dark chocolate, silky and slightly bitter, but I am in love with milk chocolate like an ex-boyfriend, the one who you know is bad for you, but whom you can't quite manage to eliminate from your life, and especially milk chocolate-covered almonds.  I like perfectly ripe strawberries with vanilla bean ice cream and just a drop of balsamic vinegar.  I like sitting in front of a blazing fireplace on a wet day, and I love watching the weather roll over the peaks.  Mountains speak to my soul like nothing else on earth, especially these Canadian Rockies.  I like trains and hotels, and especially hotels whose history is tied up in the history of trains.  I like men in their forties, because they have enough experience to make them interesting, yet enough youth to maintain boyish charm.  I am a romantic, and I spend a great deal of time wondering about used-to-bes and might-have-beens and might-yet-bes.

Speaking of used-to-bes, I also realized that one of my ex-boyfriends (yes, the milk chocolate comparison does apply, but not literally) and my husband are a lot alike in many ways.  It's not just the similar height, or the blue eyes, or the buzzed hair.  it's the way they know me, the way they are both youngest sons and touchy about their competence when they feel it questioned.  I'm not sure if that guy was the dry run, or if I chose my husband because he reminded me of that guy.  Interesting question.  All I know is that guy is the only ex-boyfriend for whom I would do battle if he were hurt by another woman. 

Thursday 7 June 2012

Old Friends, New Friends

Faced with the rare, unaccustomed luxury of a day entirely to myself: no work, no appointments, no one to answer to for anything, I found myself in a dilemma: should I be sensible and go grocery shopping, checking out the amenities of my new home, or should I take advantage of a beautiful sunny day (with more than a hint of a breeze) to explore a little farther afield and possibly take the chance of running into an old friend. 

Being a woman of rare good sense, I opted for the more nerve-wracking option.  Courage is always a good thing to flex. 

Having missed the local shuttle bus, I gambled on my thumb.  The risk paid off fairly quickly, as I was picked up by two women on their way home from grocery shopping.  They dropped me off just a couple of blocks from my friend's workplace. I swear that he must have every kid's ultimate fantasy job, especially every kid who ever read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: he manages a candy store.  And not just any candy store, but one that sells every type of candy you ever loved or heard about as a kid and can't find any more.  You name it -- salt-water taffy, every kind of penny candy you can dream of, chocolate, liquorice, giant lollipops, a dozen different kinds of fudge, most of it arrayed in plexiglas bins and apothecary jars.  Candy cigarettes, PEZ dispensers of every possible variety you could imagine.  You name it, they stock it.  And if they don't stock it, they will most likely source it for you. 

After fourteen years, it was gratifying to see the look on his face when I walked in the door: the shocked surprise, followed by the instant recognition.  I spent the afternoon hanging out in the candy store, or just out front in the sunshine, catching up, and marveling at the sensation that almost no time had passed. 

When it was time to go, I had once again missed the bus, so I had to use my thumb.  The first car to pass, stopped.  As I got to chatting with the driver, it turned out that her husband works for the golf course right next to the hotel where I work, and that they have a basement suite available for rent, just as I am looking for accommodations.  She then invited me to her home to check out the suite, introduced me to  her husband, fed me tea and cookies, and then they drove me back to the hotel.  I think I may have made a new friend.  And all because I decided to reach out to an old one.

Sunday 3 June 2012

Itch scratched, fever abated

At least for now. 

After months of looking, I finally landed a position, doing what I have done before, for a company I’ve worked for before, and in the same general geographical area where I worked before.  It looks as though I truly have gone “back to the future”.

I am the newly hired night auditor at a five-star resort in Invermere, British Columbia, Canada. So while I am working graveyard shifts (yuck!), it looks as though I will still have the opportunity to put my stamp on things, as a number of key people in the front and back offices are looking to move on in the next little while.

Things could get interesting, as several staff members are apparently leaving in the next couple of weeks, that number including the front office manager who hired me and the girl who is training me.  She was apparently supposed to leave in mid-May, but agreed to stay on until they hired and trained a full-time night audit.  The accounting assistant is also leaving soon, and I have heard rumours that the relief audit is also looking to move on.  Most of the staff rumoured to be leaving are those who have been here since opening last year, many of whom are unhappy with the GM, who apparently has only been here for a few months. 

I am working with a lot of staff who were still in diapers when I started in the hospitality industry (got my start back in 1990). It is an interesting dynamic being the trainee when most of my frontline co-workers are only a few years older than my eldest child, but I don't intend to be the trainee for long. I have every intention of moving up the ladder. My decade out of the industry has only served to put a keen edge on my hunger to excel, and to drag everyone else along to success, kicking and screaming if need be. Of course, being a lady, I will do it in the most gracious way possible.

Adventure awaits.