Welcome to Surrey

Yesterday, scandal broke in my sleepy little town. Not your garden variety dog-off-leash-on-the-beach, paperboy-late-bringing-the-peacearchnews scandal. This was real, honest to goodness Surrey-style scandal. Yes, my sleepy little town was home to a shooting...a fatal shooting...by the cops.

Now, I'm going to fathom a guess and say that in most Surrey neighbourhoods this type of an event would be met with sighs of acknowledgement and the presence of maybe two cop cars...three if we're feeling lucky. But not my neighbourhood. No, in this lethargic beach town we were lovingly graced with the presence of fifteen police vehicles! It just goes to show how dull, verging on comatose, my corner of the world can be.

Don't get me wrong. This is a tragedy. The police are here to protect us and shouldn't go around bringing the wild west to quaint resort towns. It's just not done. But at the same time...you're kind of asking for it if you walk around brandishing a gun. The people do not stand for such distractions from their yoga and watercolours. They will stand proudly on their lush lawn, brandishing hedge clippers in disgust from behind their white picket fences. They will not turn a blind eye, as they have an opinion on everything.

So, alas, this is what happens when people bring guns and erratic behaviour to a town where the latest excitement was when little Timmy kicked over his sister's sandcastle at the annual festival of the sea. Trigger happy cops and gun-wealding drug dealers. It's nice to feel as though I truly belong to the city on my address for once.

A Challenging Puzzle

I had a really fantastic day at work yesterday. I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but I generally jump around between bussing, hostessing and expediting at work, and last night I was hostessing. Now I'm sure you can imagine hostessing is not usually the most exciting position in a restaurant. It's a lot of standing around waiting for people to arrive and then just walking them to a table. At first I didn't like it. I felt like I couldn't really help out the other support staff because I always had to remain at the door in case someone arrived (it's funny how uncomfortable people are when they get to a restaurant and there's no one there to greet them, but I suppose I'm the same). Anyway, I hated that feeling that I was just standing there and that my job wasn't actually necessary until someone walked up the stairs into the restaurant, but yesterday was one of the good days.

We've been slow the last couple of Sundays, so the manager cut back on the number of servers working last night. That's why it was unfortunate that it was such a beautiful day out and lots of people called up to make reservations at the last minute. It's days like this when hostessing becomes really fun. It's like playing a giant puzzle in my head. I have to make as many people happy as possible using only a limited amount of resources. It's like when I play Sims; I make someone have next to nothing and then I help them rise from the ashes to earn everything they could want or need. I've always loved doing stuff like that. Trying to survive and thrive with so little on my side. It's so much more rewarding than a night that goes by without any problems. I want the problems because I want to be able to solve them and make a difference.

I know it's just a restaurant and maybe it doesn't seem very important, but it's so rewarding to have even just one person thank you for making their evening lovely. There was one table last night and the couple was so patient and thoughtful. They didn't have a reservation, but had come all the way from Vancouver because they love our restaurant so much. I told them that the earliest I would be able to fit them in would be in an hour, so they went for a walk. When they came back I had just had a table open up, so I told them to wait downstairs while I set it up for them. Of course, that was the moment where the phone started ringing off the hook, about 7 reservations came in that needed to be seated, and a very difficult pair of regulars insisted that I find them a table despite their not having a reservation. I think it took me about 15 minutes to deal with all of this before I got around to clearing there table. When I finally got them seated and thanked them for their patience, they were nothing but thankful that I could get them a spot. The whole time they were pleasant and just wonderful to be around even though they waited over an hour to be seated and possibley the worst table in our restaurant. It's things like that, which make me feel happy with what I'm doing. I love to have that challenge thrown at me and see if I can deal with it. The reward is talking to kind people and I love that I work in the kind of place that respects the kind of patient customers we get and rewards their thoughtfulness with complimentary peanut butter pie :-)

Finland in my Future?

I applied to a Masters program in January. It was a relatively spontaneous application, since the information session was around January 9th and the application itself was due at the end of the month. But it looked like a good opportunity: one year at a Canadian school and the second at a European school. Who am I to pass up the opportunity to do my two favourite things: travel and learn?

In my mind this application was a bit of a shot in the dark. This is the first year they've done this program and they only accept two people from each of the schools in Canada. After talking to the other people planning to apply at the information session, I put this idea into the "just a dream" category of my mind. After spending the last two months downplaying this idea as a fantasy that was just not meant to be, I heard back yesterday. I got accepted!

I'm insanely happy and proud about it, but now I just don't know what to do with myself. I made it so that I wouldn't be disappointed when I didn't get accepted to the program, and now I don't know what to do with myself. I'm not mentally prepared to accept, but how could I not? It's such an amazing opportunity, but it completely throws off my plans for the future...however vague they were to begin with.

It's funny how our ideas of the future so greatly influence the decisions we have to make. How we fear to stray off course and explore the unknown. I remember when I was about 15, my friends and I made a life plan for ourselves. We decided how many kids we wanted to have and when we felt comfortable having our last kid (for medical and other reasons). Then we counted back from that age. How long did we want to be married before having kids? How long did we want to date our fiance before getting married. According to that plan, I should have already met my future fiance. I may have I suppose, but, as far as I know, that's not the case. And that's a good thing. I'm not ready to be married in the next couple years and I'm certainly not ready to be following a plan that links my life decisions so closely to someone else's life.

I've always been one to believe in fate. I think that things happen in your life when you are ready to handle them and when you are presented with an opportunity, you should jump at it. So, what nagging desire to follow an arbitrary life plan is making me hesitate before jumping at this opportunity?

Days Like This

I love days like this.

The cold wind blows against my face
Lifts my hair and carries my worries away

As I walk, the cold air brings a sense of reality
Shows me the truth, revealing it gently

I love days like this.

The sun peaks from behind a cloud
Showing it's light; heat hidden by the wind

Days like this bring hope
Show me the fiction of my concerns

I run.
All my troubles fall away
Fall frozen in time and wind

Warmth within the cold
I love days like this.

Rabbie's Lassies

Last night I went to my local legion to celebrate Robbie Burns Day. For those who don't know, and I hope there are not many of you, Robbie Burns is a Scottish poet and folk hero. As part of my youthful highland dance classes, every Robbie Burns day of my childhood was spent dancing in retirement homes to celebrate and avoiding trying to eat the haggis; a dish, which, in hindsight, I actually quite enjoy.

Despite having grown up with such an attachment and appreciation to Robbie Burns, I really didn't know much about him...until yesterday that is. As part of the festivities one of the speakers went up to the podium and told us about Robbie's love of the ladies. I had heard rumours of him being quite the heartbreaker, so it wasn't the extent of his infidelity and scandal that shocked me. After the initial tales of love and lust, the speaker went on to state that Robbie didn't love ALL the ladies in his life and proceeded to recite the following poem about his friend's wife.

Willie Wastle dwalt on Tweed,
The spot they ca'd it Linkumdoddie.
Willie was a wabster guid
Could stown a clue wi onie body.
He had a wife was dour and din,
O, Tinkler Maidgie was her mither!
Sic a wife as Willie had,
I wad na gie a button for her.

She has an e'e (she has but ane),
The cat has twa the very colour,
Five rusty teeth, forbye a stump,
A clapper-toungue wad deave a miller;
A whiskin beard about her mou,
Her nose and chin they threaten ither:
Sic a wife as Willie had,
I wad na gie a button for her.

She's bow-hough'd, she's hem-shin'd,
Ae limpin leg a hand-breed shorter;
She's twisted right, she's twisted left,
To balance fair in ilka quarter;
She has a hump upon her breast,
The twin o that upon her shouther:
Sic a wife as Willie had,
I wad na gie a button for her.

Auld baudrans by the ingle sits,
An wi her loof her face a-washin;
But Willie's wife is nae sae trig,
She dights her frunzie wi a hushion;
Her walie nieves like midden-creels,
Her face wad fyle the Logan Water:
Sic a wife as Willie had,
I wad na gie a button for her.

Isn't that terrible! What a horrible thing to say about someone! I mean...fine! You don't like the woman. It's one thing to tell your friend that you don't like his wife. It's mamouthly more horrible to become a famous, world reknowned poet and write a long poem about all the characteristics and physical attributes of her being that disgust you!

The worst thing about this is that I still like Robbie Burns. I will continue to attend the annual events where I get to eat haggis, sing loudly, and dance to fiddle music. After all, people are human and I wouldn't want my admirers to change their opinion of me based on angry poems I wrote when I was having a bad day. And I can't know that this wasn't the case.

Éireannach

That's right! Is Éireannach mé! My Irish passport has come in the mail and it's all confetti and balloons style official. They've accepted me as one of them for Heaven only knows what reason. Obviously, they thought only of my father's birth place and not of my strong Canadian patriotism. To be perfectly fair, I feel a good deal of Irish patriotism as well. I think I just like being patriotic. It's kind of my thing :-)

I do feel a little guilty about getting the passport. It's almost as though I don't really deserve to be accepted into a culture I haven't really been a part of. I've always been drawn to my Irish half, but really...what do I know about it? I don't speak Irish Gaelic beyond "Slainte!", I've never lived in Ireland, and I have no idea of the political system or pop culture. It doesn't seem fair to award someone with citizenship who doesn't have a real understanding of your culture. Then again, I suppose it happens very frequently in Canada and other countries around the world. It's just a hypocritical aspect of my personality, to hold myself to a higher standard than I do others. I'm disappointed in myself about applying for citizenship to a country I feel inadequately a part of, but I would welcome others to Canada if they were in my shoes.

I guess I'll just have to take solace in the fact that one of my favourite authors is Irish.

The Qi of Tai Chi

Everyday on my way to work in South Africa, I would pass by a group of people practicing tai chi. While most of the students in my complex were fast asleep attempting to relieve their hangovers and life's stresses, five of them stood on the grass at an ungodly hour to do exactly the same thing only much more effectively. Each time I walked past I had the urge to join them. The only things holding me back were a reluctance to interupt their peace of mind, a fear that by just jumping in I would offend more than show my interest in the art, and an obligation of punctuality for my work.

I've never been drawn to martial arts, but tai chi felt different. Up until Monday I had never tried it, but whenever I have been stressed or tired in the last year I would practice fake tai chi moves of my own invention. It would always calm me down and make me feel more relaxed. So I was really excited to see what tai chi was actually like and not my made up interpretation of it.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure if it's the exercise for me. I think I'm going to have the same issue with it that I have with yoga. It's too slow. I like the meditation aspect of it and what little of the history we've been taught so far is really interesting, but there's something about the slow movement that makes me feel restless and agitated. I have come to realize that silence and calm are truely skills to be mastered. It's strange how the ability to not think has become a practiced art over time. That our society is so charged and restless as to need to practice just being. I think that's why I'm drawn to tai chi in principle and why I hope it will capture my interest in practice. I want to be able to purposefully be just present with myself and I think I've wanted this my whole life. When I was 13 I started learning about and playing with wicca. Part of it was because it was unknown and kind of forbidden...what 13 year old isn't drawn to that, but the part that I really enjoyed doing wasn't making love potions, it was the grounding and centering you do before any wicca practice. Just visualizing that you are part of a complex natural ecosystem and connected to everything that is around you. It is very calming and revitalizing. The sad thing is that I feel, as I'm sure many others do, that I no longer have time to take a moment to just be in the moment. Even worse than that, I can't think of what I do that is more important than that...