on being a woman

some time ago, a woman asked me

who is the most important woman in your life?

i thought long and hard. it was a challenge to sort through all the women in my life and decide which one had the most influence over me. and then it was obvious.

my mum, i said, because she has taught me everything i know about being a woman.

this response got me a cocked eyebrow and a somewhat cynical "hm"

i have never stopped fretting about that response.
it was the truth. the absolute truth.

maybe, i think, it is because i used the word woman so loosely.

what does it really mean to be a woman?

hell if i know.

but i do have a good sense of what it means to be a woman in my bloodline.

we are notoriously strong.
capable. and fiercely independant.
yet we walk a fine line of insecurity. constant wondering. constant worrying.

and this is where i found myself.

walking this fine line of capability and strong-willed to speak my mind

but scared shitless of what it would reveal about me.

too much?
i took a breath.
and i said it.

a rock

i held a rock in the palm of my hand.
a rather unusual rock, it was round, smooth, chosen just for this sort of activity.
for some reason, this rock made me feel comfortable. which, in this context, translates into brave.
like i could say what i felt, and the rock would understand.
even if the other 30 people in the room could not.
the rock in the palm of my hand would understand.
maybe this rock would be friend. not foe.
i took a shot.

i start.

i have been thinking...
about the reprecussions of going to someone...a professional someone
and saying the words


i feel fat.


this person might look at me. might wonder what on earth i could be talking about.
they might judge me. they might send me on my way with a diet.
they might want to prescribe me pills.
these are all things i am not interested in. because i feel like it is unnecessary.

nay, it is just wrong.

to tell me it is my problem is to completely deny that it is, in fact, a sociological problem.

in the lowest low, muddled with confusion and frustration, i confided in another woman

i feel weird. like..i'm fat? but...i'm not?

welcome to my life.

and that, that is the exact moment that i understood.
welcome to being a woman in today's society.
surely i knew this before, this delicate balance between fat and too terribly thin.
and how, as a woman, i was supposed to walk this line.
i did. i knew all of this.
but i did not know a spell of self-loathing would sweep me over in the way it did.
and knowing that myself, an advocate for beauty in all forms, had been duped into believing otherwise
was a guilt trip that hit me like a motherfucking freight train.

the rock in my palm, i looked up. and i saw women on the brink of blinking a tear.

aye, they get it.

it was the very same look i had when i discovered that my four year old cousin feels fat.
she is four. and ashamed of her body.
i swallowed back tears. hard. and i silently vouched to change it.
change it all.
i would not play this game.
i would not give in. or give up.
and, someday, young girls everywhere
will love love love this thing we call a body.

a birthday

at 6 in the morning, a familiar sound rang throughout my room.

a message.
someone sent me a message. at 6 in the morning.
what on earth might one have to say at this ungodly hour?

a wish for a happy birthday.

i should have went back to sleep.
but i didn't. not yet.
i stretched. and then i lay very still. and i thought.

i do not know why i thought this particular thought
but all the sudden i was very grateful for all the women i have in my life.

the powerhouse of women, as i like to call them.
these women inspire me and propel me forward.
they have changed me.
and i, i hope, have changed them.

i meditated on who i am and who i have yet to be.

i truly do not know what will come.

i do not have a plan.

i have my beliefs, my thoughts, my passion and my ambition.

i have a feeling i won't need much more.

i guess we will just have to wait and find out...

revival

i feel like this is what i need to come back.

when i say back that seems to imply that i went somewhere.
i guess i sort of did. just not physically.
my mind was filled with thoughts. thoughts that challenged me, drained me, upset me, and ultimately, carved the path back to me.

i was so buried in thoughts that i wanted to take a step back.
and just observe.
observe the areas of tension in my life.
i must have a role in all of this.
i must.
what do i do? and what should i do?
to say i have the answers would be a fib.
heck, to say i know how to get the answers would be an even bigger one.


but at the very least, i can praise my ability to recognize tension. and to demand a solution.


won't you join me?

mixing colours

lately i have been thinking a lot about that time in elementary school...

unequal blobs of paint sprawled out in front of me.

young, spry, eager, and a whole lot of shy.

we sat at the table in the big art room.

i always liked this room but i was equally intimidated by it.

i, as a child, was an awful artist.

i could not colour in the lines if my little life depended on it.

i tried and i tried again.

each time, i failed.

so when it was time for me to venture into this art room, i felt like an impostor.

here i sat, with blobs of paint on brown construction paper.

the task? mix colours. find new colours.

green and blue make yellow

red and white make pink

pink and blue make purple

and on and on we went. fingers filthy, minds working oh so hard. masters of colour.

now i appreciate the brilliance of it. the mixing. the discovery. the shove to learn on your own.

now that i am shoved into the time of life where people start demanding

pick one thing to do

pick one person to be with

reproduce.

now i crave to be back in that room, fingers covered in paint, mixing colours to my desire.

there was something so holy about that time. encouraged acts of messiness. acts of mixing norms to create new norms.

how i wish to be back.

the truth

i have this tenuous relationship with beauty.
sometimes i grasp it and other times, it grasps me.
and in those times, when i play the slave, i sink.
i have not felt beautiful as of late.

i approach this subject with absolute caution
like a cat approaching it's prey.
steadily, sneakily and with a confidence that proves i have been here before.

aye, i have.

people assume that if i say these words

i feel fat

that i must be irrational.
i must be capable of harming myself.
i must suffer from distortion.

none of this is true.

i feel fat
i am aware that i am not fat.
but that does not mean that i cannot feel fat.
the body and the mind are different entities that try to work as one.
some days mine try very hard.

and when i say these words,
i do not want rebuttals. i do not believe them.
i do not want frustration. i am frustrated too.
i do not want recognition, really.
i just want them said.

i just want people to know why i am here but elsewhere simultaneously.
i just want someone to know that some mornings it is hard to get out of bed.
but that i do it anyway.

in these times, i reach out and grab a book.
a book about women, a book that praises beauty in all of it's forms.
there is a paragraph that never fails to pick me back up.
i read it.

and then i read it again.
and hope with everything i have left, that tomorrow will be better.

on beauty

some time ago i wandered into a classroom.
and there sat a woman. and i, appeased by her beauty, was stunned.
i deemed this woman one of the most beautiful women i have seen.
i quickly noticed her boots. and because i had to know…

where did you get those boots?! i love them.

oh these? my friend bought them at value village for seven dollars and gave them to me when she moved, she said between chomping away on an apple.

swoon.

she was not wearing an ounce of makeup. nor was she beautiful by the societal values we place upon beauty.
she was not particularly thin and not particularly large either
she was blonde but a natural sun-streaked blonde
she was freckled
she didn’t even shave her legs.
but she glowed. My god, did she glow.
part of this was due to the fact that she had just bicycled to this destination.
that post-bicycle sweat. but more so than any of that,

she was happy. she was so gosh darn happy.

i have been pondering beauty a lot as of late.
beauty.
the thing that decides how we feel about ourselves that particular day.

am i beautiful today? no? well maybe tomorrow i will be beautiful.

the thing that young women of our generation obsess over.

am i beautiful?

it doesn’t matter that they are intelligent, kind, powerful little beings
and that their sense of moral justice outshines the sun on the brightest summer days.
no.
if they are not beautiful, if they do not possess beauty then they believe they are nothing.
i was one of these critters. spry and fresh, bopping around life trying to find a place.
any place as long i looked beautiful in it.
people would meet me and say “your job must be being beautiful”and i would happily comply.
forgetting that i was kind, smart, dedicated and caring. forgetting that i was so able to do many things. forgetting that i was able to read a novel with an acute eye for wrong-doing. forgetting that, even then, i was able to hold down my own in a debate
i forgot. And i only focused on one thing: being beautiful.

it didn’t take long to realize that beauty was something i would never possess.
not the society-based ideal.

i dyed my hair. i tanned to a red crisp. i bought make up. and more make up. i dieted. i weighed myself. i bought clothes for the sake of buying clothes. for the sake of being beautiful. i still felt inept. *

finally.
i gave up. not wholly. there are still days, times, moments of days, where i look in the mirror and think

who have i let down today? i don’t look beautiful.

but i am working on it. always working towards this thing called inner beauty. the only kind of beauty i am sure of. the only thing i – myself – can possess. it is tangible. and it is mine. now i am able to leave my hair naturally itself and let the sun do with it what it will. i am able to run, bike and do yoga because it makes me happy. not because it makes my hips shrink. there are days i forgo make up all together because i want to. and there are days i apply a quick coat of mascara because i want to. but i never depend on these things to make me happy. i know better. if i want happy, i look for it in other places.

a book. my garden. a great soup. a debate where i use every intellectual cell i have in my body. a yoga practice. a chance to praise my body however big or small it may be. a cup of tea. a cozy sweater. a bike ride. finding that certain je ne sais quoi in people. beet greens. i do not care to be beautiful.
i care to be happy. the beauty will follow suit.

one of the most beautiful girls in the world rolled out her yoga mat right beside mine yesterday.
i believe i willed her there. i thought so intently about this all for so long, she eventually found her way back into my life.
it was thrilling to move beside her, both of us loving our bodies in their imperfect ways.
and after, i felt happy.
and, if i do say so myself, dewy with fresh sweat

i felt beautiful.


*i'm not saying that every woman who engages in these activities is seeking beauty. for some people, these things make them happy. go be happy.

musings

one.

pickle brine is overwhelming, tantalizing and tangy, an overall unbeatable melange.

two.

just when you think you have plucked all the apples one could possibly scavenge, you find a whole branch more drooping with round, juicy possibilities.

three.

morning soup dates are not only vital to a productive work day but necessary to a better life.

four.

beet greens have never been more scrumptious.

five.

never underestimate an extra 5 minutes of sleep.

with that, you now know what my week has been like.

how was yours?

that one time

inspired by this book. read it not only because it is hilarious, brave, kinky, sad but mostly because it is honest.


it was a musty room.
it didn’t belong to either of us but a friend of his.
we were laying upon the damp bedding like children
as if we should have been swinging our legs and pretending they were swooshing around in a chilly lake, dispersing the minnows as we giggled wildly.
as irony would have it, it became the moment that i stopped being a child.
i realized that i was no longer.

sweaty palms, slobbery kisses and a flickering light.
these are the things i immediately remember.
i was wearing a blue shirt. a v-neck. the colour of the sky.
how i wished i could go see the sky.
but i could not.
i was obligated to be there.
as a certain someone’s “girlfriend”

apparently this label meant he was able to touch me where he pleased.
or so he thought.
his hands felt foreign on my waist.
and as they edged up towards my breasts,
my eyes began to feel with tears.
i lay there, lifelessly.
wondering why he was still touching me as my body refused to respond.
seconds later, i could no longer bare it.
i pulled myself up off that bed and left him alone in that room.

to hell with you and being someone’s girlfriend.

i have never been able to understand why he thought he was automatically given the right to touch me
and why he continued to touch me as my tears flooded the area between our cheeks, my eyelashes thick with dew.
had he not known that my body is mine.
and it deserves more than awkward, fumbling fingers?
i was outraged for weeks.

to hell with you and being someone’s girlfriend.

that certain someone traded me for a cigar weeks later.
the cool grade 5 transaction where someone offers you a cigar
if and only if you dump your girlfriend.



and i am so damn glad he did.

and so it happens

i can tell the story of her last days with a kind of delicacy.

i can recall many things about that time.

after all, as she slept, as she lay there in a drug-induced relaxation,

i watched. i listened. i traced the room with my finger tips.

the funeral was a day to remember.

minutes after finding myself back in that little town,

i felt my heart begin to flutter.

begin to come back to me.

ever so slightly.

i had never been so proud of my lineage.

i had never been so sad to part ways.

and as the words of her eulogy rang out,

i was comforted.

ah, this is where it all began. i thought.

her love of nature. her love of politics. her patience.

this is my lineage.

days later, a friend asked how i was.

she meant it.

she was genuinely interested in how i felt.

how are you

there was such emphasis on the you, i felt inclined to be totally honest.

i am good. i am better. i am at peace.

and i meant it.

and i still am.

but this, of course, is temporary.

grief comes in waves.

it wasn't long ago that i was having a shower.

and as it turned the taps off and the last few droplets of water hit the tiled floor,

i heard my mum speaking on the phone.

it must be gramma, i thought.

it only took a few seconds to realize that it was not, in fact, my gramma.

nor would it be again.

and then i found myself reading,

i read two memoirs and a novel.

each of them tackling death. and the mourning that follows after.

i did not mean to do this.

i was not - really - seeking out these books.

they sort of fell into my lap.

and i, lost in some sort of grieving confusion,

read them all.

last christmas, gramma lived with us for two weeks.

the day she left, to spend new years in alberta, i cried.

as she lay there in her last days, i thanked her for that time together.

those two weeks.

they were lovely, weren't they?

*

the long goodbye - meghan o'rouke

torch - cheryl strayed

wild - cheryl strayed

yes, i recommend them all.