Where you want to be

I like to think that cities have souls. That there’s something that reaches out to us in your favourite cities - atmosphere, feeling, life. Something that draws us to them.

Are you a small town person, a where-everybody-knows-your-name person? Are you a big city, metropolis, crowded subway person? Are you trees and parks or skyscrapers and shopping malls? Are you peace and quiet or lively and happening? Maybe you aren’t these things. But your favourite city is. Maybe it’s the opposite of you. Maybe you’re really shy and quiet but you love a city that screams around you and you just fade into the background?

I love London. I have since the first time I stepped off the tube from Heathrow. I’ve been four times in the last two years, and I have never run out of things to do. I like the feeling of London. It’s a huge city- the world happens in London. But it has neighbourhoods and sections that are basically autonomous.  Like Neil Gaiman said in his short story, Keepsakes and Treasures, “London is mad. Multiple personality problems. All these little towns and villages that grew and crashed into each other to make one big city, but never forget the old borders.”

It’s strange because I don’t generally like big cities. In fact, I normally hate them. I don’t do well in crowded places and I find it very difficult to look past crowded high streets and chain stores to find the character of a big city.

I hated New York City. I didn’t much care for most of Dublin. But I loved Galway.

Galway felt like home. On the bus ride from Dublin to Galway, you pass a beautiful ruined castle on the ocean. The tide was out and there were little tide pools among the rocks. Even though I had originally planned to live in Dublin for the summer, the minute I saw Galway I knew it was where I wanted to be. Galway is a small city, though the third largest in Ireland. It’s cobblestones, small pubs and buskers. It’s the famous Galway Bay of songs. It’s beautiful.

I don’t really feel any attachment to Newcastle. It isn’t, technically, a very big city. But it is a lot larger than I expected and it’s definitely quite crowded downtown. There’s no character in the city centre. There are only chain restaurants serving bad food and big stores. I don’t know if independent business even exists in Newcastle.

I remember, years ago, Fae told me that she was in the car coming back from somewhere, some vacation. When you drive into Pittsburgh, it suddenly appears in front of you from the highway, all hills and rivers and lights. And she said that she knew then that it was home. That no matter where she went in the world, Pittsburgh was home.

I didn’t understand it at the time.

When I was young I wanted to be anywhere but there. Growing up in the suburbs leaves lots of things up to the imagination and provides very little inspiration. I rarely saw Ottawa at all, except on Canada Day or when we caught a bus to go shopping downtown. Yes, my house was home. I hadn’t known any other. But my city was not.

Now, I’m wondering what to think of this city that I come from - the one with snow and the streets I know. I used to think those streets would never take me anywhere. But at least I know where I am.

I’m conflicted about Ottawa. I will always be drawn to it, it’s so much a part of who I am, there are so many memories here.

And feeling drawn to a city is what makes it home, rather than just a place you live.

When I grow up

A little blonde haired girl sits on a grey rug, surrounded by scattered crayons and one subject notebooks, the kind with the map of Canada on the front. Clutching a pencil, she’s drawing ugly unicorns and naming them after the words on her favourite crayons, the sparkly ones. She gives them a history, knows which ones like each other, which ones are good and which are bad. She sits like this for hours, imagining.

When she learns to read music, from a Pocahontas themed recorder book, she pretends that D is the bad guy, that G is protecting A and C from D, and B is unpredictable. In math, odd and even numbers have different characters. On long car rides, she writes songs about rose gardens in her head (and sometimes outloud). She plays elaborate make believe games with her friends, spends Saturdays racing through the park as Sailor Moon or some character of her own creation.

I meet a lot of people in archaeology who talk about spending their childhoods digging in sandboxes and watching Indiana Jones. They always knew that they wanted to be an archaeologist, this is their dream come true. And it makes me stop and think. I wasn’t dreaming of arrowheads and potsherds, digging up my parents backyard.

I was writing and telling stories. Always. For as long as I can remember, writing has been an enormous part of my life. From the role playing games and fanfiction that introduced me to my best friend to the years of emo poems (not all bad) that I wrote in high school. In school, I was always pretty sure I would get a good grade if it involved writing. Because I’ve been doing it since I learned how. I have so much practice of fitting words together, of expressing my ideas. And I love it. Even now, as my fingers glide over the keyboard and try desperately to keep up with my train of thought, the thrill of being able to say what I want fills me with a sense of completion.

Writing, for me, is like breathing. Absolutely necessary. I wake up in the middle of the night to write down sentences and words that are spinning through my head. I can’t sleep for the story I’m creating as I lie awake.

But I tend to forget that. I always say that my dream is to someday write books. But I never let myself fully pursue that dream. I always say that I’ll do it in my spare time, as I’m doing another, preferably well paying, job.

When I went into journalism, I thought I had found the best of both worlds. I would get to write, but I would also satisfy my need for stability, for a “career path” or a Plan. But journalism, while arguably it is writing and telling stories, simply sucked the fun out of writing for me. It’s more of a formula than an art. When I decided to do a Master’s, I went towards my other love, history, and chose archaeology. A more pratical approach that would hopefully lead me to a career in museums.

None of these paths I have chosen have been perfect for me. All because I don’t have the courage to pursue my true passion - to actually become a writer. To live as a writer. To open myself up to the possibility that I may fail and that I may have to live a less predictable life. I don’t know if I have it in me to be that person.

But as I start to discover more and more about who I truly am, about what I want in my life, it’s becoming obvious that I should have taken the path I chose from the very start. That what I really want to do is write.

I don’t know what I’m going to do with this new found revelation quite yet. I still have an MA to finish and debts to pay off. But I’m starting to think about my future and ways of keeping writing in my life, of someday being able to call myself a writer by profession. Right now I’m thinking that after this MA, I will work for a few years and then possible do an MFA in Creative Writing. I think it would be amazing. To finally be in an environment where I am constantly thinking about my writing, about being inspired.

And until then, I’ll continue writing on my own, because that’s what I’ve always done and always will do.

Learning how to fall

I’ve been standing here for almost 22 years, on the edge of this dock staring at the water. When I was little, someone would be standing at the end to catch me. With little floatie wings I’d jump, arms and legs flailing, trustingly towards outstretched arms. When I was a little older, I would run the length. Panels of wood would disappear under my bare feet. Careful not to trip, I would jump in with a determined, triumphant splash.

As I grew older I spent more time on the dock and less in the water. Now I stand on the edge. The setting sun paints the water a golden pink. The still, hot day makes the water calm and inviting. I want to be in the water, I’ve already decided to swim. I don’t want to be standing on the dock in my ridiculous bargain polka dot bathing suit, my hair hastily pulled from a French braid, frizzy and shapeless. And yet every time I take a step forward I find myself hesitating. I try to think of the cool water against my hot skin, or the freedom from the bugs swarming around my head, and yet I still stand. Waiting.

“Aren’t you afraid to fall?” I ask my sister. Terrified of heights and prone to falling from my short 5′3″, I’ve never quite understood her desire to be several feet taller, on stilts, and then proceed to do tricks.

“Why should I be? I stilt as if I can’t fall,” she answers.

I wish I could live life that way, I thought. Unafraid to fall or to jump.

You think after 22 years I’d be used to the spin

I woke up this morning with a funny taste in my head
Spackled some butter over my whole grain bread
Something tastes different, maybe it’s my tongue
Something tastes different, suddenly I’m not so young…

I have a history of being very emo about my birthday. There’s just something about watching another year go by that makes you stop and think about what it’s been worth. In the sum of 365 days, 8760 hours, 525 600 minutes, have you done anything worthwhile?

On August 3rd, 1987, I was born with a red mohawk and bright blue eyes. I was so fair when I was little that people used to ask my mom, who has dark hair and green eyes, whose kid I was. I look like my dad and his side of the family - the Brits and Scots.

And now, twenty-two years later, I sit and think of all of the birthdays that have gone by. I have always been struck by the line from Long December by The Counting Crows, “A long December and it’s easy to believe maybe this year will be better than the last.”

As I stand on the brink of a completely new life, that rings more true than ever. But I’m weary. Because it’s thoughts like these that keep me so fixed in some mythical future, some better life that’s never quite there, and keep me from living in this moment, the today. This year.

It’s taken twenty-two years, but I think I can truly say that this year I am happy with what I’ve done, where I am and where I’m going. So no more birthday emo. Instead, photos of me - featuring my love of cake.

A very intent blowing-out-the-candles face. Birthdays are serious stuff.

An awesome 90s bathing suit, and this time it’s not me making the weird face!

Not only is that an intense expression, but that is one HOT pink and blue baseball-style shirt.

Dear Daddy

Dear Daddy,

To the father of two daughters, content to wander shopping malls in every province and state, to listen to conversations about waxing and sit through dance recitals and basketball games alike. To the man who raised two strong and independent (feminist!) women.

To the one who used to eat Cheesewiz on toast with me at 5am. Who made fish sticks and fries for dinner after skating lessons. Who talked to me endless as a baby, the reason I started speaking full sentences before 2. Whose specialties are hockey puck muffins and Shakey Chicken. Who, 22 years later, still makes me a sandwich for lunch but now hands me a coffee on my way out the door instead of a juice.

To the guy who drove me to Syracuse, Erie and Rochester countless times so I could spend the week with my best friend. Who took us on road trips, dealt with carsickness in Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and countless other places.

To the man who gave me his eyes - the bright blue, but also the ability to see far, and to notice and examine things. To the man who gave me words - the writer, the poet who told me stories and read me books, let me dream and sparked that yearning to put pen to paper, fingers to keyboard. To the reason I know every Beatles song, the reason I love music with every ounce of myself.

To my first boss. Who dealt with all of my stupid mistakes, who gave me my first chance to do something with myself. Who taught me how to load film, print film, talk to customers, use photoshop and most importantly how to take photos, who put a camera in my little hands as soon as I could hold it and let me discover it.

To one of the smartest people I know, who always has answers and insight, who knows a bit about everything. To a person who hasn’t had it easy, who taught me to persevere. Who taught me that you are what you make of yourself, no more and no less. Who taught me to put 150% into everything I do, not for others but for my own self respect. To your ceaseless determination, and the strength I take from that.

For all of this and so much more, Daddy, Happy Father’s Day.

I’ll love you forever, I’ll like you for always, as long as I’m living my Daddy you’ll be,*

Heather

P.S. I love you but I’m not giving you my iPod Touch for Father’s Day. Sorry.

*From the Robert Munsch book he read us over and over when we were little, pictured above!