Category Archives: 100 posts in 100 days

Adventures in Tsawwassen

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No blog post yesterday I’m ashamed to realize. I have notes for it. I’ll post it sometime today, but last night was a bad night for writing.
There’s something about waiting 45 minutes in the grocery store in Tsawwassen for a tow truck driver to show up to boost your dead car, then finding the Massey Tunnel down by a lane, detouring to the Alex Fraser bridge (which was actually good for the purposes of recharging the car’s battery) that kills motivation.
We put away the groceries, poured a whisky (Talisker 18 year) and went to bed.
It wasn’t all bad: the river is pretty at night. Traffic was really light over the bridge. It’s the second time I’ve crossed the Alex Fraser which is a treat because I think it’s a beautiful structure. I’m coming to love bridges the longer I live here. Yesterday morning I got off the bus in South Granville and walked to work from there, just so I could walk over the Granville Street bridge.
Even so, last night’s adventure was time consuming. Thrifty Foods, when will you open a store in Vancouver proper? Preferably Marpole area. Even Kerrisdale would do.
We’ve decided to stick to Safeway at Oakridge from now on. And we’ll remember to turn off the lights while we shop.
Also: I need to get out and photograph some bridges.

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Runner’s block

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“Go big or go home” is not really working for me right now. I’d rather go home.

I keep reading about people’s running: someone’s training for Boston, or an ultra, or an Ironman, and I think “I want to do all those things, but here I am signed up for a puny little Half Marathon again this spring.”

I can’t get excited training for it. I haven’t been interested in training since my SI joint injury just after the marathon last May. It still doesn’t feel quite right, and I can’t even get excited about running most of the time. I haven’t adjusted to running life in Vancouver very well.

fatigued runnerI miss running in Victoria. I miss having kilometres of beautiful coastline within minutes of my home.

I miss having trails an easy 20 minute drive (or less) away.

I miss having a challenging tree-lined hill workout in my own neighbourhood.

I miss having training buddies who run at my training pace.

I miss daylight. Maybe it will get better in spring. Maybe I should bring running gear to work and run the seawall at lunchtime.

I know I need to exercise every day, and I manage to get a few workouts in per week. Maybe that’s enough for now. After all, I just moved. Chris just moved in with me. I just want to sit in my cosy apartment with my fireplace going and have a glass of wine with my new neghbours and friends.

Maybe I should just give myself a break. Lean into it, and see what happens.

This too shall pass.

Photo by robswatski used under Creative Commons license

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Being pretty won’t save you from the bullies.

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Unexpected Fresh Year Fresh Face revelation: make-up was a reaction to girl-on-girl bullying as much as it was to make myself attractive to men.

It’s been eight days (one week back at work) without the routine of putting on make-up. I’ve enjoyed the convenience, and the time saved, but throughout the past week I’ve found myself inexplicably having unpleasant flashbacks to my elementary/middle school years.

I wasn’t a popular girl. My family was not involved in our small farming community. When I was in grade three my stepfather had divorced his first wife and shortly thereafter brought my mother, me and my two siblings to live on the farm where he had lived all his life. That was very odd behaviour at the time (mid-seventies); and our social isolation, my mother’s alcoholism and morbid obesity didn’t help. We stood apart: not in a good way.

Then, at age 14, I got glasses, further sealing my fate as an outcast. I was too smart, I got straight-As (a social life-killer then as it is now). I preferred reading to riding horses or joining 4-H or figure skating, activities the other kids did regularly.

Farrah FawcettThere were a lot of mean comments about my mom’s weight, which were designed to also imply that I too was a fat ugly cow, or at least destined to be one (I’ve never been overweight, and my mom was in fact quite attractive). I was teased a lot, and excluded from social activities.

Meantime, one of my mom’s main hobbies for a while was trying to sell cosmetics to friends and neighbours. There was a lot of make-up around, and I was schooled in how to apply it from an early age. This was the seventies, I had a lot of blue eyeshadow in those days, and I tried to feather my hair like Farrah Fawcett’s.

All to no avail really. Not that I cold parse it out at the time, but make-up couldn’t make me more popular, couldn’t make the girls stop teasing and make them invite me to their parties. Even if boys found me attractive, it wasn’t in their best interests to make it known, or they could face social ostracization too.

Make-up nevertheless became a way of pretending I fit in, that I really was attractive. Pretty. Worthy. When I finally escaped the confines of my family of origin and the town where I grew up (to which I’ve never returned, unsurprisingly) the masques of femininity followed, and have carried on well into my adult life. I’m not alone, of course. My story isn’t all that unique. That’s why this poem “Pretty” by Katie Makkai makes me tear up every time:

“This is about the self-mutilating circus we have painted ourselves clowns in. About women who will prowl 30 stores in 6 malls to find the right cocktail dress, but haven’t a clue where to find fulfillment or how wear joy, wandering through life shackled to a shopping bag, beneath those 2 pretty syllables.”

Upon reflection, I’m not surprised that a prolonged period of going without make-up has led to the resurfacing of some uncomfortable memories. At this point in life those deep-seated assumptions are ready to be uprooted. I have a feeling I’ve uncovered more than just a fresh face.

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The Debt

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We rented a fascinating movie last night from iTunes: The Debt.

The story (directed by John Madden who did “Shakespeare in Love” among others)  begins in Tel Aviv in 1997 where Rachel (Helen Mirren – I want to be her when I grow up), an ex-Mossad agent, is reliving a pivotal assignment from 1965 because her daughter has written a book about it. She and her partners David and Stephan were sent to East Berlin to kidnap a Nazi war criminal so he could be put on trial.

It’s clear Rachel is uncomfortable with the accolades, and we soon relive the events of 1965 where the issues of justice and morality, evil and revenge, right and wrong are not so cut and dried as they would seem. The plot to spirit evil Dr. Vogel to Israel to face justice goes awry, and the young agents must hole up with their captive until an alternate plan can be worked out. The agents in 1965 are young and idealistic, there is a crisis of leadership tangled in a love triangle. The consequences of their choices during that pivotal time have repercussions for decades to come.

There are such nuances and layers in the characters, the plot and the writing that even though I was bone-tired, I could not fall asleep during this movie. It made me think. I love it when movies do that, and they do it so rarely, that this one comes highly recommended.

By the way I’d like to thank film critics everywhere. I listened to an interview with Roger Ebert on The Q radio show on CBC recently, where he mentioned that he watches so many bad movies he sometimes laments the wasted hours he’ll never get back. I’m here to tell you that I am very, very grateful to you: you watch all the crap movies so we don’t have to. I’d buy you a beer (or in Roger’s case, a non-alcoholic beverage of choice) or make you a home-cooked meal anytime in appreciation. I’m in your debt for all the hours I’ve not wasted on bad movies you’ve warned me about.

 

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Schmoetry

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I’ve been sitting to write nearly every day since Christmas holidays, sticking my finger down my poetic throat, trying to vomit up some words, ANY words that will sound good.

Sigh.

Just gotta be patient. Upchuck is better than nothing. I just need to find the deep water, break the dam and let it flow.

I’ll keep working on it, in the meantime, I’ve been “Pushed:” http://youtu.be/JgORGvC1dTg

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Shifting goals

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Woke up with a sore SI joint this morning. I’ve been afflicted with it since he marathon training last year. I had a good physiotherapist and soldiered on, getting a 3-minute PB.

But then things just kind of went to hell.

I stopped doing my bootcamp class, I went on vacation for a month. I started to get weak. My injuries just don’t heal like they used to. In October, I put in my worst Half Marathon performance ever. Then I moved to Vancouver,

I’ve seen a PT here, but my last “treatment” consisted of showing me exercises that I won’t do every day like I’m supposed to. I can’t pay $70 per session for that.

I’m starting to wonder if my goal of putting in a sub 2-hour half marathon this year is doable. Getting faster means putting in some consistent fast mileage. Consistent fast mileage means injury. Injury means more time and money to PT and massage, neither of which I can afford right now.

So why can’t I be satisfied with a modest 25-30k of running per week at a moderate pace? Why do I have to set an ambitious goal? (Hey – I KNOW I’m slow. For me, 2 hours is an ambitious goal. I’m not you. Deal with it.) Why can’t I sign up for a race without a goal in mind? Why sign up for a race at all?Target

Well, because the best part about racing is the experience of the day itself: lining up with hundreds, if not thousands, of other runners excited about their performance. Race day is a victory lap, a reward for training, for putting in the miles no one sees. Half the fun is cheering for the other runners on the course, especially team mates you’ve been training with for months.

In racing, my time does not count. I’m just another mid-to-back-of-the-pack runner in a sea of spandex. I’m not even going to place in my age group. Ever.

It’s the journey, not the tape. Hell I won’t even see the tape.

Training hard also takes away from other things I want to do: writing, cooking spending time with my man (who just moved in), maybe even performing slam poetry again.

Someone with ultra-stamina could probably do all that and more. Not me, not any more. I know my energy levels and my priorities.

So, just as I’m reflecting on my priorities for 2012, I’m taking a good hard look at what I really want to accomplish this year, and I’m adjusting accordingly.

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Bring It!

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Looking forward (?) to tonight’s first “official”run with the Steveston Athletic Association training for the BMO Half Marathon in May. Rainfall warning and strong winds expected. Lovely!

I remember a question from a participant at the start of training for my first marathon in 2009: “Will we still be running if the weather is cold, windy and rainy?” to which the run leader replied with a question of her own:

“Will they cancel the race because of rain or wind?”

“Uh – no.”

“Well then, we won’t be calling off any training runs either.”

There’s a sign outside the Mountain Equipment Co-op store in Vancouver that says something like “There’s no bad weather, only bad gear.”

So I’ll be packing dry socks and an extra sweater to change into after tonight’s run, expecting my windbreaker to be soaked through to my bones after tonight’s run. I’ll also be lit up like a Christmas tree with blinking lights front and back. Dark, cold and rainy indeed.

I don’t mind the wind and the rain once I drag my ass out there. If the rain pelts down and the wind tries to knock me over I persevere by envisioning the crossing the finish line with the clock well under my goal time.

I have also been known to laugh in the face of a storm in my own version of Lieutenant Dan from Forrest Gump, shouting: “Is that all you got? C’mon, gimme more!”

After all, I know a hot shower and a dry warm bed await me tonight. It’s all a matter of perspective, passion and perseverance.

BRING IT!!

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Fresh Year, Fresh Face

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When you don’t wear make-up, it’s really nice not to have to worry about getting all the mascara off your eyes before you go to bed.

Mt. Finlayson hike. I usually only go without makeup while exercising or camping

I noticed this yesterday morning because I had forgotten to do just that the night before, on New Year’s Eve. I had been essentially make-up-less since our office closed for the Christmas holidays December 23. Then, December 31, Chris and I reserved a table at La Terrazza for our first anniversary dinner, so I painted my face, as much as I ever do.

I had already grown accustomed to not scrubbing my face to within an inch of raw after a week of going fresh-faced, so I felt the “ick” of make-up left on overnight as I stepped into the shower January 1.

You see, I had agreed, with Janis Lacouvée and a few others, to go without make-up for a month in January 2012, as part of an awareness-building, gender-role exploring, self-reflective exercise called “Fresh Year, Fresh Face.”

I’m a moderate make-up wearer. One of the things that attracted Chris to me was the fact that I don’t really have a need for a lot of “warpaint.” In fact, our first Skype date (Dec. 31, 2010) I had barely made myself presentable after getting home from the Run Through Time 5K race: my beauty routine for that first virtual date involved a quick sponge bath, a quick fix of the hair and that’s it. I had just run 5K, my cheeks were pink, I felt good. Nevertheless, it’s not my habit to be less than carefully made-up for a first date of any kind. It was already 11:30 pm in New Brunswick by the time our call started, and I didn’t want to keep him up any longer than necessary.

Apparently I looked as good as I felt. I did apologize to Chris, explaning that I usually take more care with my appearance for a first date, to which he replied: “So, this is you looking uh – not good – huh? Wow.”

Nevertheless, that little it of makeup I was accustomed to wearing was my “game face.” While crawling out from the depths of my worst depressive episode (over ten years ago now) the routine of putting on makeup in the morning was a healing ritual I needed in order to go through the motions of belonging to society: every day I would force myself out of bed, eat, shower, and while I applied make-up I pretended it was a mask I was putting on in order to appear normal and healthy.

It worked, until one day it no longer felt like a forgery. I had “faked it til I made it.”

Tori pondering life without makeup

So I approach this exercise with a little trepidation. Can I let go of my ritual and still keep my mental health? Will this start down the path of “letting myself go?” These are very real concerns to me, and I’m thankful I have company and an outlet where I can explore these issues.

I should add that Fresh Year Fresh Face is not just about the make-up. I’ve also darkened my hair to more closely match my original hair colour, with the intention of also giving up salon hair colouring. It’s been varying shades of red or blonde for many, many years, and now I have several grey strands coming in. I’ve moved to Vancouver from Victoria, leaving my youngest child to pursue her studies and a life in Victoria independent of me. Chris moved in (at least for a few months) just a couple of weeks ago. That’s a lot of change in the past two months.

It’s safe to say a more apt moniker for what’s going in with me right now is Fresh Year, Fresh Life.

You can follow all the gals participating in Fresh Year, Fresh Face on Twitter, we’ll be using the hashtag #FYFF.

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