Small towns for you

It’s movie date night with my husband tonight (like, the 3rd in 2 years) after putting le Petit to bed. Obviously it’s something we look forward to.

The local theatre has one person at the cash, just one, on a busy Sat night. We wait in line 20 minutes and as SOON as we get to the till, she tells us that the movie we wanted JUST sold out.  We consider plan B: any quiet dessert places nearby that we (ok, I) would feel comfortable going to in flip flops and sweats? Not that we know of, except for ice cream slab place, no thanks. Decide instead to go out for coffee: sigh, all Starbucks in town close at 10pm (or earlier) and Starbucks in Safeway isn’t really an option so no can do and we’ve done Tim Horton’s (like, twice today already). We give up and decide to be productive and run errands at Walmart. Nope, closed, too. OK, fine, let’s go home. Oh, gas is 102 at local gas station, let’s fill up on the way. Oh nope, it’s closed too.

Now I’m home and browsing on Facebook and catching up on fanfiction online.

How I miss urban life sometimes.

Le fromage est beau

Le Petit at 28 months, from the other room:

“Wooooooooow.”

“Mmmmmmmm. Woooooow, c’est beau, le gros fromage.”

“Mmmmmmm.”

Listening closely, I realized Le Petit was watching a segment about a cheese factory on a children’s French program. Good taste.

An ordinary moment in Quebec, extraordinary joy

Prompt: December 27 – Ordinary Joy. Our most profound joy is often experienced during ordinary moments. What was one of your most joyful ordinary moments this year?

In May, we went to Quebec to visit my in-laws and the rest of the (large) French family clan. We try to see them at least once a year, either in la belle province or in our neck of the woods.

Often times, when you visit family, it’s as busy as it can be wonderful – rushing around to say all the hellos, dinner and lunch appointments, old friends wanting to meet up – and this year our visit was the last leg of a trip to New York City, so we were already tired by the time we got to Quebec.

My parents-in-law have a chalet, a cottage by the St. Lawrence River that they move into late spring and stay until early fall – the rest of the year they live in a condo in the city, 30 minutes from the cottage by car.

This worked out for us, because we were able to stay at the condo and still drive out every day to hang out with them.

This time in Quebec, it was very restful, just dithering around at the chalet (which was also the site of our wedding 4 years earlier). After the busy-ness and all the people (and wonder) of New York, it was good to come to the quiet of the St. Lawrence River and to the loving arms of family and people we could just relax with.

Our “activities” consisted of sudoku, reading books, looking at shells and rocks on the river’s shore, drinking lots of wine, eating maman’s luscious food creations, shared conversations and times of silence. It was in one of those quiet moments one afternoon sitting on the deck with a glass in my hand that I realized that this was one of the best times I’ve had, a time of such ordinariness and peace and fullness, with people we genuinely loved and who loved us. The moment passed but it keeps in memory and luckily in this day and age, in digital format.

This skin of mine

Prompt: December 25 – Photo – a present to yourself. Sift through all the photos of you from the past year. Choose one that best captures you; either who you are, or who you strive to be. Find the shot of you that is worth a thousand words. Share the image, who shot it, where, and what it best reveals about you.

Honestly, I’ve always loved to take photos of myself but I really got into self-documenting after I graduated from law school and was living on my own. In my mind, that period is linked with rebuilding and finding myself after living my 20s trying to please others and to win their affirmation rather than really thinking about what I wanted and living with identified purposes and direction.

The photo, taken in June 2010, shows a joyous me – assured, fearless, and not fretting over obstacles – and it’s andy-warholish-pop-arty, which I really like. I’m not always this way, but it is a representation of the woman I have grown into and the best that I can be at times, that I can feel at at times, as me – not just as a friend, colleague, mother, wife, sister, daughter – but as me, alone and with God, in joy and in confidence.

After 10 years, I’ve grown into this skin, am more confident than I was in my 20s, more assured in faith, my own identity, my abilities, and in my sense of belonging in community and family.

The certainty isn’t constant – it comes and goes through the weeks – and for the rest of the time I try to learn and relearn to listen to the inner instinct or Holy Spirit or intuition that prompts me to run after the best.

Hurry uuuuuup, already. Totally unChristmas-like.

This evening, I had a bit of work left to do for school and wanted to get in the mood and cut off home distractions after a crazy Sunday and headed over to a local Starbucks for the atmosphere and for a caffeine fix. I expected it to be super busy, as Starbucks usually are near Christmas time, and was elated to find that when I got there, there was only one customer in line. I headed to the counter, feeling like I just scored, ready to get my drink.

Wouldn’t you know it, the lady in front of me was taking FOREEEEEEVER, asking tons of questions about short, tall, with whip, flavors, sauces, milk fats, and THEN about the music selections, the artists, what the barista would recommend and I found myself getting irritated. Like, just order your drink and move already….my work was waaaaaaiting….

Then I took a breath. And thought: what if it’s her first time at Starbucks? What if this is truly a special indulgence for her? What if she’s asking all these questions because she wants to spoil herself after a long time of not treating herself to anything special and it’s her first time at Starbucks during the season where they have all these special items that may only add to the confusion of choices if you’re not a regular, or because she’s challenging herself to try some new music for a change, or because she has someone special for whom she wants to buy something really special and is being careful about the selection….

As I started thinking about these things, my irritation completely vanished, replaced by remorse and well-wishes towards her selection and towards the super-nice and cool barista, whose name turned out to by Caitlyn, who was helping her.

That was more appropriate for the Christmas season.

And then it was my turn and I ordered a Caramel Brulée Latte and grabbed my seat.

Falling in love with a small city

Yesterday, I stumbled upon a post about my old neighborhood in Vancouver – Marpole, a small, multicultural area at the foot of Granville Street that was still part of the bigger metropolis that is Vancouver – and I was struck by a powerful wave of yearning for….well, the urban life. I MISS it. Even 3 years after moving away from Vancouver to a mid-size city, I always talk about the big cities and have this perpetual leaning towards urban centres. Case in point: our family vacation earlier this year wasn’t to any oceanside, serene natural oasis, it was to uber-urban New York City.

But but but, lately I’ve been thinking, since one of my values is to become more engaged in participating and helping create a sense of community, if I REALLY want to be engaging in and cultivating neighbourliness (admittedly, something I am not very good at), then I need to focus on the community I inhabit now, rather than yearn for the past or any envisioned future location where we may end up living.

I should really learn to get to know my own small city MORE, take more time to delve into its little nooks and crannies. I mean, Kamloops has lots of things to discover and to take part in, some that we’ve already participated in, but I’m sure there is a whole host of other events of which I’ve been oblivious. I know there are community initiatives springing up all the time, like a new Fair Trade Kamloops grass roots movement that my friend is actively promoting, and the arts scene is small but vibrant. Why don’t I be a part of these things more often?

Achjadi, Merapi 2007 (Photo by Diyan Achjadi)

It’s a good city, with landscape that I love and great people that I’ve met through work and other avenues, but I realize that I don’t KNOW the city very well. So, my challenge is to get to know my own city better. Practical things I will do in stepping up to this challenge is:

1. learn about new events around town
2. attend 3 of them before the end of this year
3. volunteer at a community event, hopefully on a regular basis.

And I hope that along the way, maybe I’ll fall in love with my small city  a little bit.