Five Years a Writer

On a recent international trip, I misunderstood my cell phone’s data plan and ended up exceeding my limit. The result? I was marooned on wifi, my internet reach limited to the distance the nearest network gave me. My initial response was dismay and, I’ll admit, a bit of angst. I’ve had a cell phone for only six years, but it took less than one weekend, back in August 2013, for me to be hooked on what was, for me, an extraordinary new toy tool that put the world of information and inter-connection into my hand. I don’t understand how it works, but I surely understand the benefits those invisible points of cellular connection grant me.  Sure, sometimes I dislike being so easily ‘getable’ — by those who have my number and by those that have my meta data. But, mostly, I love being able to access information that I want (and sometimes genuinely even need) whenever and wherever I am, and I really love being able to take a photo and share it via social media or email it to my f...

School's out for the summer. Yay!   Holidays have begun and that means time...glorious time to enjoy having time to do what I want when I want. Yay! This may include putting up posts on this blog, when I can figure out 'hotspots' with my phone at the cottage. Stay tuned, dear Reader. Stay tuned.  Sources : Woman + typewriter: unknown author. Coffee cup image  by  Danielle MacInnes  on  Unsplash  

A while back, I wrote about being at the point of no return with a project at the cottage. This weekend we got to where we were going with that work and, let me tell you, arriving at the planned destination is pretty sweet.  We arrived there after a lot of sweat and toil (mostly very enjoyable), at least one detour (what a waste of time) and not a few swear words (par for the course), but we arrived.  The painting went smoothly -- one coat of primer, two of the pretty pale green Val had chosen. In fact, it was such a simple job that I ended up doing the final coat. That is unheard of in our partnership, as I am not the perfect painter that Val is and I don't really enjoy the work. But, last weekend, time was moving along and the grass needed cutting, too, and so we divided and conquered. The lesson? Suck it up and just do it. Listen to the radio while rolling on the paint, and it might even be pleasant.  Next up was the installation of the carpet. It had been ...

Every morning when I leave my house for work, Greta Thunberg reminds me that I must do my bit to make the world a better place. She is the remarkable young woman from Sweden, who has rallied people to the cause of climate change. And we have her picture and exhortation in our front yard. It was our friend's idea. In my social circle, Deborah was an early admirer of Greta's and she spoke of her frequently and with deep admiration. "I want to make a sign for Greta," said Deborah. And so we did. It's not a big thing to do, but it has impact. And that's the point. Greta's call to act on climate change is a call to each of us to DO SOMETHING. We cannot bury our head in the sand: DO SOMETHING. We cannot ignore the daily small reminders that climate change is the big issue of our time: DO SOMETHING. The sign in our front yard is us doing something. It's out there, every day, all day, large enough to draw attention from the dog walkers, joggers and ...

I have really enjoyed the Post a Day challenge that I set myself for the month of May. Some days, I thought I would have to throw in the towel because coming up with the idea and then writing the post was just so difficult, but others I happily and easily rose to the challenge, and overall, it was terrific for me — a major booster shot in my writing arm.  It’s true what they say: If you want to be a writer, you have to write. Self-evident, of course, and proven time and time again by any number of wannabes who don’t do the work.  Thanks for coming along on the trip with me. It was comforting and inspiring to know you were out there, dear reader, waiting to see what the next post would bring, and your enthusiastic and thoughtful replies to my writing were wonderful to receive. Thank you.  My readers don’t number in the dozens yet (never mind the hundreds or thousands), but I am gaining confidence that, with time and persistence, I can get to where I’m going: To fe...

I have pledged to write a new post for this blog every day in May.  "Michelle had been setting her alarm five minutes earlier every day...She needed more time, there simply wasn't enough of it. This was the only way she could think of making it..." This character struck me when I first read Kate Atkinson’s Case Histories more than a decade ago, and her approach to time management has remained in the back of my brain ever since. Today, I realize that I suffer the same problem and have a similar solution: not enough time and getting up earlier — and earlier — to try to rectify it.   Photo by  Jon Tyson  on  Unsplash   I used to think that 6 a.m. was early. Ha! What did I know? Not much, until I experienced 4 a.m. Man, did I get a lot of marking done between 4:15 and 6:30 a.m. I was actually ahead of the game that (one) time. I hadn’t planned to wake up that early, but once I was awake I took advantage of the opportunity to get a jump on the day...

I have pledged to write a new post for this blog every day in May.  Many summers ago, our friend Laurie was never in town. She seemed to be on a perpetual canoe trip — or returning from one or packing up for another. Her whole summer appeared to have been spent on the water. When I asked her about it, she said, indeed, she had been on many canoe trips, and loved every minute. Mind you, she said, nothing else got done. She had made the decision to spend the summer on the water and that’s what she did. The house suffered, the garden was neglected, the mail was ignored, and Laurie had the summer she wanted.   Photo by  Laura Lefurgey-Smith  on  Unsplash I often think of Laurie and her approach to that one summer, and I try to bring a bit of that single-minded focus into my life. For me, the challenge is two-fold: managing the mountain of priorities, obligations and chores that litter the everyday, and not letting the full-time job I have overshadow all e...