Sunny Road

is Osama Bin Laden?

Always a fan of Morgan Spurlock and looking forward to seeing this one!

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4jgwq_where-in-the-world-is-osama-bin-lad_shortfilms

• the music from this beautiful film http://www.foxsearchlight.com/once/
• josh radin’s songs ‘today’ and ‘closer’
• kanye west’s song ’stronger’
• ingrid michaelson’s breakable

Gladys Marie Sills, my grandma, at 19 years of age pictured above.  I wonder what she thought would come of here life when this picture was taken.  What dreams she had, what hopes.  It is so strange to see myself in her face and eyes.  As I stroked her hair and felt her tiny hand in mine, I reminded her of all the stories she had told me over tea or on our sunday drives between LA and her home.  The job at the playing card factory where she would go round and round the table, meeting grandpa at the dance, the time she took the car and ran off to Chatham in a fit of anger and empowerment - the stories she loved to tell.  No words to share left within her mouth, she listened.  She heard.  She knew that her stories would live on and that although her world didn’t exist too far beyond a small city in ontario, that the people who kept them would and have been around the world.  comfortable and warm with a teddy bear in her arms, she heard that she was loved and that she was a good grandmother and that it was now time to sleep and have sweet dreams.

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,
tending, as all music does, toward silence,

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

When it’s over, I want to say all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.

I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.

–Mary Oliver

i am so excited about this new book, crazy sexy cancer tips by kris carr that i have to post something to spread the word before i have even finished.  although a lot of the dialogue is about cancer, it is for any person that wants to be present in their life. 

i wish i would have caught the documentary on discovery health.  it has run twice now.

anyway, buy the book! check out the website at http://www.crazysexycancer.com/

another book that i am still obsessing over is Eat, Pray, Love.  it is another must read.  i am sharing it with people and then i am going to read it again.  good one for your library, especially if you like travel and non-fiction.

these books and other influences in my life right now have insprired me to start thinking of a book concept of my own…..stay tuned!

please read and pass along to your friends!! 

don’t be fooled by some of the misleading articles and new stories being put out by the media regarding the vote oct. 10th.  some of these stories are suggesting that by voting for mmp you would have officials selected for positions that were not known before the election.  this is not true!  please read this piece my brother dave wrote in an e-mail to some of the members of our family that are a bit older and who the media is trying to target the most with their scare tactics. 

Let me ask you this: do we ‘elect’ a premier? Yes, but not directly. Party members choose a premier to lead their party through a tried and true democratic nomination process. No problem there, right?This same type of process is used by other countries using MMP to choose the candidates on their party lists, and it would be used here as well. The party lists with the nominated candidates would be published, in order, before the election and could not be changed during the campaign. The process by which the candidates were chosen by each party would also be published to make it completely transparent. So, voters would elect the candidates on the list much like they elect the premier.

a simple list i made years ago when i was a single gal of the things i coveted in the man of my dreams. 

~considerate

~easy going

~would bring me flowers on occasion

~likes to dance

 Of course I wanted to find someone with similar values, who was smart, funny, all the necessary stuff, but this list comprised the bonus items and ones that were true to just me not just what everyone is looking for.  I made the list because I always find when you write things down they become more real.  The words find a way of becoming more cemented in my mind and even if I forget that I made the list, it lays there in one of the filing cabinets lined up within my brain. 

Something made be think of this list the other day and I thought hmmm..does my new husband live up to this list.  I went down each item in my head.

Considerate – this was a broad term in my head that encompassed valuing my time and others, respecting my feelings, being open to the world.  Jay by far has exceeded any expectation I had for this.

Easy going = jay

Brings me flowers on occasion – yep! i’m so lucky..

Likes to dance – oh no!  jay hates to dance……or does he.  with this list and many things in life it requires perspective and being open to understanding that when you wish things for yourself you may not even realize the true meaning until it comes to you. (and no i am not into ”the secret”)  i wished that the man of my dreams like to dance.  when i wrote that many moons ago, what i meant was that i was hoping for someone to boogie with on the dance floor and someone who would take me in his arms and pull me close during slow songs.  jay is not that guy.  he would prefer to chat with a bunch of people and watch others hit the dance floor.  he does however, love to dance around the house doing all these crazy moves that my little nephew jack inspired him with and especially goes crazy during the office theme song.  he’s got some great moves!! this is something that i adore about jay and it is extra special because he really only does it in front of me in the comfort of our home. 

so my silly little list wasn’t so silly after all and what i really wanted to happen did.  sometimes you just have to look at things from a different angle or perspective to understand it fully.  so make little lists but don’t get caught up in the details of them.  stand on a table.  lie on the ground for a better view of the world.  just don’t be afraid to do the work to make whatever it is you are looking for a reality!

 inspired by mighty girl, my first decade starting from when i can actually remember:

age 3 – loved to sing “going to wash that grey right out of your hair” from that hair product company Loving Care or something. sang it all the way from windsor, ontario to the west coast of canada in the backseat of the buick skylark, right in between my two older brothers who desparately wanted to pull out all of my hair so that going grey would never have to be a worry of mine.

age 4 – would roll out of bed saturday morning and before even rubbing the sleep out of my eyes would be in adam’s basement watching cartoons, sometimes peering out the window at my parent’s house and feeling oh so far away even though i was just across the street. we would build forts out of the pillows and blankets found on the couches.

age 5 – slow danced with lee with jen and matt slow dancing beside us in the basketball circle in front of our kindergarden door wearing my pink striped dress with pink heart buttons. couldn’t believe how wonderful my life was in this place called school. learned a lot about acceptance when playing the elephant game with mrs. collins and putting my tiny hand on where her hand once had been and now was just the end of her arm. i still remember how it felt.

age 6 – sang my heart out to “the muffin man” in the little theatre and couldn’t believe that when we returned to our classroom one day, the easter bunny had left us some treats. was thoroughly impressed that even though she was his mom, if darcy velcroed his shoes one more time, mrs. mcclure would actually throw his shoe in the garbage. realized that when you have to go to the washroom, get down from the top of the monkey bars before it is too late!

age 7 – learned about s e x for the first time from a friend in between sets of our 2 pm performance of wham songs choreographed to our liking at the soccer goal posts. realized that telling my friends about s e x at a sleep over gets one in trouble and instead it was better to pretend you didn’t really know what it meant and that as far as you were concerned it was just kissing. wink wink. learned that sometimes it is better to lie to your parents if it was for their own good.

age 8 – made my mom a christmas decoration that somewhat resembled a snowman and realized i may not be a crafty person but liked the idea of it. had fun dressing up as a pilgram. fell head over heels for my lunch monitor matt. gained a new level of independence with both of my brothers moving on to highschool and now walking back and forth to school on my own.

age 9 – missed a day of roman numerals that cost me years and years of confusion. learned the value of money and how to barter in an auction, holding out for what you really want. received a D in printing on my report card for printing microscopically small because karen did it and i liked the way it looked, causing my teacher to need bifocals and parents to arrange a parent / teacher meeting. realized that if you want your voice to be louder you can make a fist in front of your mouth to project it.

age 10 – slept in a bunk bed at fort malden and ate clumpy porridge in the morning. wasn’t too sure that my mom knew what she was talking about when she said that my hair had a longer piece hanging down on my neck that the hairdresser missed but was convinced it was true when my teacher got out the scissors and told me she wanted to fix it. started pretending i wasn’t interested in answering questions on the board because i couldn’t see them.

less than a month to go and i will be on the other side of this huge experience. i feel like a new year is upon me even though it will only be july when i celebrate it. they say that in your life you will have about 10 pivotal moments or decisions that alter or shape the course of your life. i didn’t realize how many of mine would be in 2005 – 2007. i want to relish in it all before it is a distant memory, but today instead i am just exhausted. filled to the brim with a sleepiness i have never felt before. even when i allow my body to sleep it is my mind that is working overtime. i am usually proud of my active listening skills, but these days as someone is chatting it up with me, i find myself reviewing checklists in my mind. did we get the liquor license, i hope we didn’t forget to put the maps in the invites, my team is waiting for that 20 page report, i should cut the grass, oh i forgot to call my dad today, we need to lower the rent on the duplex. i am thankful that to the best of my knowledge i am not outwardly expressing too much of my stress and i think i have been able to thus far avoid the horrible b word….bridezilla.in life you never know what conversation, what actions you take today that will leave you forever changed. in the moment you can not see the roads ahead being paved and shaped with each decision you make. for me the first step toward any of the happiness that these years have brought me was feeling comfortable in my own skin. spending time with myself to remember what it is that i like to make time for. it is something that most of us have to make an effort to do. time passes so quickly and to just go through the motions is such a waste of our precious and short lived time here. for a while there i had forgotten so many of the things that make me happy. so it was so fun discovering them all again, discovering me again, as i continue to do each day. for so many years i had heard. that you’ll meet someone when you least expect it, when you’re not looking. i thought it was complete bullshit to be blunt. especially when someone in a relationship had the audacity to say that. but, with my tail between my legs, i will admit it is the absolute truth. or at least my truth. just when i was so connected to myself and not actively looking for anything serious to interrupt that, did the greatest thing ever happen to me in meeting jay. when a friend and i were goofing around one night on the computer and he helped me take steps toward meeting jay, it would have been my last guess that a short time later i would be living with someone and then engaged and now headed toward the alter. when sipping a rootbeer in a coffee shop with a dear friend chatting about our futures, i would have never guess i would now be two weekends away from achieving my Masters.

Amongst case competition stress, research on economic gardening and picking between different shades of chartreuse, I have had the privilege to take part in two amazing events and have one more to go tonight that I am confident will prove to be up to par with the other two.Last Thursday, I was at an Innovation Conference in the Tech Triangle or what some of my dearest friends refer to as Wata wata wata loo loo loo. (did i do it right maria/matt?) Not only was the conference thought provoking and full of energy but the last keynote was done by the “most innovative comedian in canada”. none other than, rick mercer! to hear his tales firsthand, sharing the debacles he got himself in while doing “talking to americans” and why jean chretien agreed to be filmed for his show at harvey’s. his comedic quest was innovative and has helped make canadian politics somewhat “cool” and definitely fun. it was great to hear about his adventure in canadian politics and to imagine some of the places he has been and people he has rubbed elbows with. maybe even justin trudeau……who was the keynote for an event on leadership i went to last night.like rick mercer, this man was easy on the eyes and full of charm and wit. (i have a secret crush on both of them) as justin is just entering the official political arena he has chosen to not take part in any media interviews or publicly speakl so he has time to formulate his platform. if what we were able to be a part of last night is any indication of his career to come, then we are all in for a treat. not only in the sense that his ideals for canada are engaging the country’s youth as leaders of today, not tomorrow, understanding that growth and capitalism need to be evaluated on the basis of the environmental footprint we leave, but also and maybe most importantly that people were overwhelmed with excitement. before and after the event he was swarmed with people young and old. our mayor ended up having to take pictures for people who wanted to be photographed with justin which was probably one of the funniest things i have seen in a long time. in the final moments, as he was ushered to his car and prepared to finally leave, the space around him lit up like the 4th of july. it was as if he was britney spears and the paparazzi were just dying for one good shot. but the paparazzi were ordinary people.  this was an amazing sight to see. people, canadians, excited! excited about the possibility of a better tomorrow. about the possibility that someone may be able to engage us as a nation and call us all to action.

now that the weather is finally warming up you may want to pick up one of my friend scott’s groovy t-shirts.  check it out here http://www.groovyts.com/  he offers hip threads to turn heads

congrats to scott on putting this together and having the guts to go out there and not just talk about doing something, but actually doing it!!