ABCE

I think it is a very healthy and important thing to recognize the things and people in your life that you’ve outgrown. Often this doesn’t happen, though, and we find ourselves conflicted or in conflict with those things. Sometimes it’s obvious, but often it’s far from it. We will avoid things, facing them, because we don’t know or can’t acknowledge what it is or why you’re feeling a certain kind of way about it if you can even get that far. We often ignore our gut feelings about things in the name of manners, courtesy, obligation, and societal pressures. It makes it very difficult to move on or grow in this world. Some of you have specifics in mind already. You know deep down what is no longer serving your life’s purpose, path or journey. Maybe you have a negative ninny in your life? A job that feels so heavy and pointless that you want to run screaming from the building every day? A friend who only calls you to complain? A person you’ve shared your life with that no longer shares thei

Happy Holidays and almost New Year, everyone! I hope you and your family have been blessed with good food, good times and warmth this frigid season. We’ve been under a cold snap for a week or so and it hasn’t been fun. One morning I walked to work it felt like -41C with the windchill! Hurry up, Spring! Last night we braved the cold and went over to the movies and watched The Greatest Showman, staring Hugh Jackman, Zach Efron, Zendaya and Michelle Williams. Honourable mention to Keala Settle as the Bearded Lady, in which she was wonderful. A lot of what I can say about this movie has already been said; the score and songs are lively and bright, even the more somber pieces, with Hugh Jackman showing us yet again why he is a true Hollywood star. The man can sing, dance AND act, making it seem almost effortless. At one point he’s running through the streets of New York, singing his lungs out, and I believe him. When the movie ended my husband and I turned to each other and said “We have t

I sit here wondering if it is just easier to do it this way, to sort of date myself. Exhausted by the ceaseless emotional labor demanded of me by any potential suitor reaching out through numerous dating apps. I ask each, regardless of gender, “Do you call yourself a feminist?” and their responses have all been the same, save for one (okay now two and I met the second Last Night!). I joke with my friends that I’ve become a sort of feminism 101 professor through these interactions. As many people as I have talked to through these apps, I have gone on very few actual dates because of this. It is the word of the year for fuck’s sake! My new motto: Get with the times or get left behind! Oh, that one, with the right answer? They were a great date! Like, a real and honest, nearly traditional, sit-down date. At an Italian restaurant no less. The date was filled with dazzling conversation that left me with great hope for a future date with them. They’ve traveled back home to visit with family

“You are important and you matter. Your feelings matter. Your voice matters. Your story matters. Your life matters. Always.” When you read this it will be nearly a week after it’s written, and that is only if you read it the day it is published. I’m sitting with some complicated feelings today. I awoke feeling pretty good, but then just felt nothing. I went about my usual morning rituals of ablutions and espresso with milk and honey, and today a special treat of sourdough toast and real Irish butter. I have a pretty consistent issue with access to wifi/internet at home and was not in the least bit surprised to find it down once again. Luckily my landlord was home and able to reset the router fairly quickly. I was able to finish the movie I had watched all but 25 minutes of last night with my BFF, she’s in Wisconsin at the moment. (The movie was “Bright” and in my opinion a hot mess, but I’m a snob.) As I checked my social media apps for updates and messages I was fortunate enough to ca

Women’s Health (Ha!) magazine published an article by Anonymous (Not the cool one, I assure you) entitled, “How Becoming A Nudist Helped Me Accept My Body” (I refuse to link because fuck that magazine and all it promotes) with the following image at the top: (Photo depicts a thin, white, seemingly able-bodied woman from behind with long wavy brown hair coming up out of the water.) My immediate and initial reaction was an overly dramatic eye roll. Not at being a nudist, mind you. Nah, to each their own, live and let live is my way. My reaction was mostly to the photo. My inner thought was a very snarky, “Oh sure, it’s a helluva lot easier to love your body, especially amongst nudists if you are the embodiment of western social beauty standards! Psshht!” Today I decided to examine my own snark and read the actual article. My initial reaction, I found, was not wrong. Ugh! This was written by someone who claimed to already love their naked body, to feel their best when wearing nothing at a

“I gave myself permission to feel and experience all of my emotions. In order to do that, I had to stop being afraid to feel. In order to do that, I taught myself to believe that no matter what I felt or what happened when I felt it, I would be okay.” Iyanla Vanzant I struggled for a very long time to acknowledge my feelings, to feel them, to sit with them, about anything. I would make jokes, “Feelings?! Blerg! Nope!” or make barfing sounds (because my inner child will never die!), but I didn’t recognize this repulsion as fear. I think that is what it was all along. A fear of feeling anything that I couldn’t control or would remind me of darker times I’d survived. It was so much easier to tamp those feels down and pretend all was right in the world.  It’s sad to say, but I even used the whole positive thinking tropes as a way to ignore any emotion that didn’t feel in line with that. I suppose it was my own weird way of coping with what I wasn’t yet ready to process. Our brains are ther