Things I should do ........

1) Sew: I have these great ideas, this I should really do.
2) Do more stuff on my own: This shouldn't be a problem, I did all the time when I lived in England.
3) Read all those books I lugged home.
4) Talk to strangers
5) Masturbate more: it would greatly improve my sex life.
6) Learn how to scuba dive: why haven't i done this yet?
7) Go back to school: I really should get my Master's or just take more courses
8) Take some art classes: I shouldn't let lack of basic talent stop me! :)
9) hmmmmm.......
To be continued........

I'm caught in a time warp....

Ok it's 1 am and I still think it's 10 pm........jet lag. I read a book once that had then most beautiful way of describing jet lag. As you fly across the globe your body travels faster than your soul and leaves it behind. Jet lag is the feeling of your empty body waiting for your soul to arrive, like lost luggage. Maybe this explains the torn feeling I experience when I arrive home from traveling; the sadness, the being split in half. It's not the place I feel myself wanting to cling to as I hurdle through the air at 500km/h, it's my soul, the place is irrelevant. Maybe my soul wanted to stay. Or maybe it's scattered all over Canada trying to find itself or experiencing things without my body, so when it eventually does catch up, my travel experience seems more full and positive. When I asked some friends who went traveling about their trip upon first returning they recalled the hastles and annoyances, and now look back fondly on the trip.

Without your soul there is emptiness. With this comes the dread of getting back to your regular life and having to answer the inevitable question "so, how was your trip?" Without your soul this is an almost impossible question to even answer, far less enthusiastically or with any emotion other than sadness. Only mundane details can be recalled, simplistic accounts numbed from the emptiness. Then when you soul does arrive and you are whole again, you remember everything in technicolour and stereo. Vivid sensational memories come flooding back as your soul returns home.
On the outbound journey the emptiness is a longing for home and the familiarity and comfort that comes with that place. You need your soul to fully experience the seeming chaos that is before you, to help you navigate this new place. It is your souless state that makes you want to turn and run, run back onto the plane, return home, give up and abandon your journey. The helpless feeling when you try and find transport from the airport or get hopelessly lost searching for your accommodation or a meal. When your soul arrives here, you are become full of adventure and the new place is no longer chaos but experience waiting to be absorbed; it brings the comfort of home.

As wave of sleep washes over me I feel my soul slowly returning. Maybe tomorrow I will be whole again......or maybe I'll be in Winnipeg.

Why I don't go home more

I just got back from a 2 week stay with my parents in Vancouver. HMMMM, I know the answer to 2 of the most commonly asked questions I get went people find out I'm from there.
1) Why are you here?
2) Why don't you stay for the whole summer?
The answers:
1) apart from the obvious there are no jobs there answer, the other reason........there is nothing going on there!!!!! I was there for 2 weeks and not one semi-descent show, nothing I would go and see, and I'll see about everything!!! Granted there could have been some wicked local band that I knew nothing about playing someplace I had never heard of, but really that wasn't of much help! The is a large segment of the population still stuck to the 90's Celtic music craze. It was also nice to feel that I had never left because the radio stations were still playing the same music they did on my drive to uni everyday.....6 years ago! BLARGH, Vancouver you could be so cool!

2) Well, see the answer above and I hate leaving. I may rant about the lack of culture my fair home town has to offer but there was an overwhelming sense of dread as I left, a sadness of leaving a life behind. The feeling of being torn in half by 2 lives that could be equally rewarding, happy and well not suck too bad. But hell the living on another continent debate is still out.......it may in fact win! France is looking pretty damn good right now. If I stayed the whole summer I know this feeling that passes in a day or 2 would be magnified and I may....actually......cry when I left.

On the bright side it was a lovely visit, saw a fairly descent Rodin exhibit, stared at "The Kiss" for a good 1/2 hour. Ate some good food saw some friends, and their rocks(more on that later). And my friend got engaged to a guy she has not been sure about for the past 4 1/2 years....well done my friend! I especially liked the "I win" look on your face when you told me. How on earth did you win? Who said it was a race? If it was a race I don't believe I ever entered it. And your the sucker getting married!!!! Hahahahah!

I must go do something with my day......
later

random pictures taken on a random hike......with my mum

The crinkley bark of an Arbutus tree, so fragile, like burnt paper.

YIKES!!!!

Yesterday I was rudely (I thought a t the time) awoken by the phone ringing at 6:30 am. I let it ring, the machine will get it, but my mind couldn't get back to it's comfortable sleep. Why would someone ring at such a horrible hour? I had to go check.....was there a message......Yes.....
"Hey Andie (it's my sister), just calling to let you know I'm OK....blah, blah blah......"
Why wouldn't she be OK? What is she on about? And why is there that slight crack in her voice that tells me she's being brave. WHAT IS GOING ON????? The networks are busy? She lives in London.
TURN ON THE TV!!!!!!!!
"6 possibly 9 bombs have exploded in the London Underground and have torn apart a double decker bus." WHAT!!!!!!!
Where? When? I need info.....was she near it, was she in danger?
Slowly I learn it happened on the other side of London, she was no where near it.
After an hour of being bombarded by news it suddenly hits me, she lives on the other side of the world, I can't be with her, protect her...what would I have done if she had been hurt or worse........What would I do? How would I cope without her?

Dying my hair......

Well, it's 11:44 pm according to the computer and I've decided to re-dye my hair. Apparently the lovely pinky-red shade I spent FAR too much money on having done did not like spending 6 hours at a water park or 3 days in a pool.........ya know, I should have known that!!!!!! I am waiting for the magical chemicals to do their work on a strand of hair the instructions suggested I snip..... unfortunately I snipped poorly.

You are probably wondering why I am dying my hair, well large sections of it, pink after reading my rant on the colour. Well I have since grown quite fond of it, it all it's peptobismalness it has a certain charm...or I'm a masochist...your pick.

OOOOO, it is time.......time to see how my poorly snipped locks reacted with the magic.....yeah fushia bliss! Now I must wait......

It has been an interesting few weeks since I last wrote. People are going, some are staying, life isn't really that bad. People once thought lost forever are still there, they were just hiding. It's nice to find someone who has been hiding and realize they weren't lost at all. Friendships in our lives are like a game of hide and seek. It is important to make sure everyone knows it's ok to hide every once in awhile and that when you are found you will be as welcome as you were before. It is little moments like that, that assure you that everything is going to be alright, different perhaps but alright.

I must go and see if the magic has worked!