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I’ve always been one to think a single thought at a time.

Usually I’m cycling through four or five different processes: making plans, rethinking old conversations, problem solving, problem creating, detail fixating, general bananacrackerdom…

You get the idea.

If you ask me what I’m thinking, you’ll get a shrug because the list is too damn long.

I don’t really settle down, ever. Not when I’m falling asleep. Not when I’m actively engaged in a pressing task. Not when I’m watching tv or reading or doing anything where my thoughts should ideally give way to a little bit of fantasy or escape.

It’s kind of crazymaking at times, but I’m used to how I think. I can accomplish pretty much anything I need to over the white noise.

Most of the time.

Some days, it gets so loud in there that the noise trickles down to my heart.

Those are the days when I have a million questions, when I’m wondering what will happen, when I’m torn between things I need to do and things I want to do, when I’m frustrated but holding my tongue because saying something out loud will only turn up the volume inside, when I’m so close to agitated that I can practically see static on a screen.

I’ve had more of those days lately.

I’m tired of how quickly time is passing with so little to show for it. I’m realizing I’ve convinced myself I’m achieving something because I let myself get stressed out.

I’m using the white noise as an excuse not to drill down and figure out my own life.

Today, I woke up so frenetic that I could barely settle on an idea for longer than two minutes. I just kept thinking of lists and ideas and tiny crises and big crises and by the time I got in the shower, I could barely differentiate between the shampoo and the conditioner. I was too busy trying to do a mental budget for February and worrying about a conversation I’d had and cursing my lack of discipline.

What?

I only get like this when I’m unsatisfied. I only get like this when I want to make real connections and real goals and real achievements and can’t seem to get there.

It’s clear that flailing isn’t much of a substitute for living. And getting stuck in your head is like rolling up all the windows in your car on a hot sunny day.

Someone asked me last year if I could name three things I’d like to be by the age of 35. I think they were speaking of roles I’d like to inhabit, but I’d just gone through a major readjustment of my expectations, so all I could think of for a moment was “grateful.”

Now I’d add “peaceful.” Which is different than slow or quiet, because I don’t think my brain will ever be these things.

But a little peace would not go amiss.

One of the strangest things about my blogging experience is the fact that my close friends and family members seem to be learning about me from what they read here.

The internet can assume it knows all or knows nothing about who I actually am and what I go through, but I’m consistently surprised by what the people who actually know me… well, didn’t know.

How did I miss telling you about that? How did I manage to keep that to myself?

Wasn’t all of it obvious? Couldn’t you read that on my face?

No.

I can never figure out if my reticence is a quirk of the introverted side of my character, or a function of bad relationship scars I’ve sustained over the years. And the latter always makes me roll my eyes at myself. Letting your scars define you always sounds so self-indulgent and Garbo-esque.

But there it is.

Once burned, twice shy, I guess?

I think my struggle with infertility has made this strange disconnect more obvious to me in the last year. I’ll get emails or phone calls from people I talk to regularly saying, “I had no idea you were having such a hard time with that, ” or “Why didn’t you tell me that was so difficult for you?” after reading one of my entries.

And I don’t know what to say to that. How would I bring it up in conversation? How would I talk about it without being a downer? How do you dredge topics up in conversation when what you’re going through is in direct opposition to the experiences of the other person… and might make them feel strange? How do you communicate something hard and not feel the need to rush in and say, “But I’m fine, I’m fine. I swear, I’m fine.”

It’s the most awkward topic in the universe to me at times, too, because it combines the utter weirdness of speaking about one’s girl parts with the idea of grieving. Grieving girl parts.

Yeah. Not something that usually goes nicely with a latte, especially when the other person is bouncing a baby on their knee.

Or is, you know… a guy. Who has no girl parts.

Here, I can flesh things out and clear my head and say everything that needs to be said right then, and no one presses me for more or wonders later about the look in my eyes or feels guilty that they couldn’t relate to what I was going through at all. They don’t have to say anything back. They don’t even have to read it if they don’t want to. They can choose to know, or choose to keep some distance.

It does make me a bit of a chicken. Or a big chicken. But it’s a start, and it feels good.

There isn’t a place in my life beyond a small circle of friends and family where everything comes out. And even with those people, I tend to work out the deepest things in the deepest parts of myself, where my thoughts don’t bounce off one other like echoes in a canyon.

I guess to most people — people who can talk about something serious without stumbling madly over their words — it seems impossibly complicated or indulgent to feel your way through life like this.

But the more I write, the more I feel comfortable about bringing my thoughts into the light.

Maybe I’ll learn to do it out loud, eventually.

In the past two days, I’ve suddenly become all passionate about doing the following:

Trying three new recipes per week and getting GOOD knives
Learning about spices
Singing every day
Buying a sketchbook and… um… sketching
Planning out my wardrobe (and wardrobe purchases) so I don’t appear to have chosen my outfits in the dark
Stretching in the mornings
Getting regular massages or something that will make me walk in a less tinman-esque fashion
Learning about colour harmony and contrast in decor so I can make smart decisions about purchases
Paying more than $20 for a pair of sunglasses so I don’t look like an owl

Any suggestions for me on any of these goals?

Today is Remembrance Day in Canada, Australia and the UK, which corresponds with Armistice Day in France and many other countries, and Veteran’s Day in the US.

Groups and individuals across my country will recognize the sacrifice and service of the men and women in our armed forces with readings, music, the laying of wreaths, flyovers, salutes, and a moment of silence.

The felt poppies people wear to symbolize remembrance have been everywhere for weeks. I’ve had the chance to chat with a few of the veterans giving them out by donation, since the pins in the poppies never seem to hold in my clothing. I’m leaving a trail of them across Vancouver.

There’s no way putting my coins in their change boxes compares to what they’ve given, or if any sort of thank you would be enough.

We both know that in the moment, though. And yet still they thank me.

I recall standing in Vancouver’s Victory Square for the annual ceremony a couple of years ago, holding hands for a few moments with an old man next to me who was there alone, just like I was.

We chatted about the day, about how I looked a little like the girl he’d married… and how he still had the chops to pick up 30 year-olds on the street with lines like that.

We giggled. He had a great wink.

Then we were both red-eyed and silent, listening to “The Last Post” and watching the planes soar overhead.

In that moment, the imbalance of my remembrance against his sacrifice made the day more real than it had ever been for me before. But even so, he thanked me at the end for coming out (and laughed at me being all blubbery in response.)

It was my privilege. And not nearly enough, again.

But still important.

So for him and all those like him, and for those that continue to fight in unimaginable places and situations, I commemorate this day.

We remember.

I make a lot of mistakes.

I mean a lot of mistakes.

When it comes to mistakes, I am a leader in the industry.

I’m not sure that’s true, actually, because I know a lot of other people who make mistakes, too. Big ones. Often. With consequences and everything.

I just know it seems that I excel, and I’m all about how things seem.

Maybe that’s a mistake?

Hmm.

There are a lot of different ways to make mistakes. I think most mistakes fit under the same five categories, though:

1. Something you did that you should not have done.
2. Something you didn’t do that you should have done.
3. Something you said that you should not have said.
4. Something that you should have said that you didn’t.
5. The clothing of the 80’s.

My mistakes fit under all of these categories. Hence why I think I’m prodigious.

More often than not, however, I’m a big category 2 and 3 kind of girl. Which makes me sound like a hurricane… and I think that’s accurate at times.

I am a master of inaction and inappropriate words.

Kind of like a large rock spray-painted with a curse that offends people every time they drive by.

(That image reminds me of where I grew up. A category 5 town if ever there was one.)

When I look back on my recent mistakes, I can clearly see that most of what has gone wrong has happened as a result of procrastination and avoidance, coupled with a achingly sharp tongue.

How, you ask?

Well.

I put tough things off to the point where they become traumatic (or merely stupid) and then react badly when people say to me, “Hey, uh, if you’d done that sooner — or at all — you wouldn’t be in this position.”

Not really one for the accountability, you might say.

I also possess this odd desire to let the people that are closest to me know when they’ve hurt me. This is particularly wicked, because a) usually they didn’t mean to hurt me, and b) they’ve already apologized.

Which is when you let it go, right? Right.

But I have to make sure they really know, and then — mere seconds later! — I’m wishing I’d just shut up. By then the damage is done, though, and I’m caught in a stupid cycle again through some misguided effort to be “honest.”

Which is bullshit, really. Because it’s never about honesty at that point, it’s about hitting back.

And we all know how helpful that is. Especially when no one hit you in the first place.

Yeah.

I was looking up quotes on mistakes, because that’s a truly nerdy way to process thought.

People talk a lot about mistakes, I discovered. Famous people. Successful people.

In fact, if you wanted to feel awesome about all the mistakes you’ve made, read these quotes. Because apparently, making mistakes will lead to greater success, mental clarity, overcoming challenges, major discoveries, and massive personal development.

Nice!

Now I have like, ten good reasons to keep screwing up!

But the kind of mistakes I make are not advancing into the wrong country or messing up a digit in a formula or making a movie with Marlon Brando in his later career or trying to sell milk to cows, or any of the other classic successful people mistakes that they recount in inspirational talks at charitable events, or on Oprah.

(Which is a mistake in and of itself, but I’ll leave that alone for now.)

No, the kind of mistakes I make are not ones I learn from, because I keep making them. And I don’t make them in the midst of trying to do something positive, but rather the ongoing effort to indulge my own fears or hurt.

And that’s what needs to change.

Things happen in life and in relationships that suck. They blindside you and leave you at a loss. They embarrass you or scare you or confuse you. They make you wonder if they are going to become patterns, and not just one-time events. They make you think that how you saw the world before was somehow wrong or naive, and that you should have been prepared for what happened.

These things happen to everyone.

But what happens afterwards is what defines us. What happens when the dust settles, and there’s finally something to do besides lie on the ground and wonder why the truck chose to hit you.

I know this is what all those quotes refer to, and that’s why I react so sarcastically.

Because I know what I do.

I lie there in the middle of the road, daring something else to hit me and yelling at the drivers swerving around me. Or I sit in the ditch off to the side, watching traffic go by.

It hasn’t gotten me anywhere, the anger.

Not moving? Well, the results are obvious.

So I want something else now. Badly. Because I’ve finally realized I can have something else.

The past couple years of my life have taught me what’s possible when you take action and deal with your challenges and mistakes in constructive ways. I’ve done positive things that were incredibly difficult for me, and I’m proud of each one of those moments. The people who love me are proud, too.

I’ve also learned how destructive I can be when I refuse to move forward in life. The people who love me? Not such a fan of those times.

It’s overwhelming to realize everything that needs to change, and what needs work in how I communicate. How many mistakes there are to learn from. How many times I should have done things differently.

But it’s no more overwhelming than the thought of losing the people I love and the opportunities I desire by letting things stay the same.

Because I love the people I love.

And there are opportunities.

So I might as well get out of the road today.

I’m a writer.

I’m barely able to say that without giggling at this point, despite the fact that I’ve been professionally employed as a writer since 2005. Well, 2004, really, but I was freelancing at the time, and I don’t know that you could call what I was doing either “professional” or “employed.”

More “poor” and “oh my gosh.”

It seems like such a pretentious title to give myself, because what the heck is a writer? Well, it’s someone who writes.

Do you need to have readers to have the title? Does your writing need to make money to have the title? Do you need to write in a certain place to have the title? Or do you just need to have a pen and a piece of paper? I know plenty of people who “write for themselves” who far outstrip me in terms of writerly skill. They don’t need titles to be good.

In fact, reading blogs by non-employed writers is actually a great way to humble myself, especially when I realize that a lot of dentists and stay-at-home moms and computer programmers could kick my ass at what I do.

But people ask me what I do for a living, and I have to say something, so… yeah.

I don’t think I’m all the writer I should be or could be, though.

I think I should be doing a lot more writing, in different areas, of different types, and for different people. There are a lot of words in my brain yet to tumble out of my fingers onto the screen, and a lot of fresh perspective I know I could bring to different ideas and issues.

I have to start submitting my work to people who can put it places it needs to be. And I have to do that with the knowledge and confidence that I deserve to be read far more than I am right now.

But… whoa.

I’m confident at trivia, at making men over, at standing in front of microphones, in choosing the right melon, and at hugging.

Marketing myself? Not so much.

I believe in my ability. I know I can write. But to stand up and say, I CAN WRITE FOR YOU BETTER THAN THAT OTHER GUY, CHOOSE ME NOW?

That may require the assistance of an anti-inertia bomb… and a full suit of hockey pads to fend off the rejection letters. Because they’ll come, you know. It’s a tough, tough gig.

But I started this journey three years ago without any true experience or understanding of what it would. I left security behind, took the risk and faced all the ups and downs that came with it. And I wouldn’t change that decision.

I just need to find the way to push myself to the next step down the path.

And a bit of inspiration from you.

So:

1. How did you come to choose what you’re doing with your life right now?
2. Have you ever had to motivate yourself to achieve a different kind of success in your work? How did you do it?
3. Do you live to work, or work to live? Why?
4. Do you believe passion is a major ingredient in the work you do?
5. What’s the best career advice you ever received?

And…

1. Do you read often? What do you read?
2. Do you read for pleasure or just information?
3. What engages you in writing?
4. What do you think are the essential elements in “good” writing?

If you choose to answer any of these questions, I’d appreciate it. I think learning from other people is essential, even if you do have to make your own call and kick your own ass in the end.

Thanks!

Stephen Colbert or Jon Stewart?

Sushi or Thai food?

Magazines or newspapers?

Hockey or NFL?

Coffee or fruit smoothie?

HGTV or the Food Network?

Sephora or MAC Cosmetics

Williams-Sonoma or Crate and Barrel?

Starbucks or anywhere else?

Weird, indie movies or Hollywood romantic comedies?

Justin Timberlake or John Legend?

Fresh flowers or candles?

Vancouver or San Diego?

Pomegranate or grapefruit?

David Sedaris or Calvin Trillin?

Long hair or short hair?

Road trip or fly there (if either is an option… I’m not talking Peru, here…)?

Sourdough or multigrain?

Blogging or Facebooking?

Sarah Richardson or Martha Stewart?

Martin Scorsese or Steven Soderbergh?

Jeans and bare feet or skirts and ballet flats?

I know I make the love lists every Friday (just click on love in my categories over there —->) but really, I feel like I need more this week.

My whole face feels like it’s going to explode, my lungs are rattling like maracas, and I’m actually a) getting a new puffer today, and b) going to the clinic to get a timeline on my impending death.

“Doctor, will I have time to write my poetry manifesto? And woo Mr. Cusack? And write all those thank you notes I’ve been putting off? And fathom the appeal of high-waisted pants? And finally leave my heart in San Francisco?”

Probably not.

And that’s why I need…

MORE GOODNESS. MORE YAY! MORE WOOOOOOOO!

We live in such a cynical space most of the time. The media feeds us cynicism all day long, the future of the planet is cynicism-inspiring, the condition of our society is ripe for cynical despair…

Nothing really looks good.

So focusing on the good things seems like a relief to me in the midst of all that.

And a hope.

And a goal.

And a bit of a calling.

So.

THINGS THAT ARE GOOD. REALLY.

David Sedaris anything
Reading a magazine over lunch
Numi Dry Desert Lime Tea
Missing truly good people
Tortoiseshell glasses
Falling asleep in front of the fireplace and the hockey game
Affectionate eye-rolling
Effective staplers
Saying “I love you!”
Chocolate eyeballs
Cooking shows
Eyelashes
Laughing so hard you get a cramp in your stomach
Laid-back men
Red toenails
Carbonara
Hand talkers
Travel mugs (I almost typed Travel Megs and YES! YES! YES!)
People who make fun of themselves
Scrabble en Francais
Halloween costumes that AREN’T excuses to show skin
Men who trust me to choose their pants
Pringles
My superior finger-snapping skills
Rain stopping just long enough for me to get home
Dreams you have when you fall back asleep on a weekend morning
Imperfect smiles
Saying what you think to someone who is listening

Now:

What are four good things in your life today?

What’s the last news story you read that actually made you hopeful, not despairing?

What are you doing to make other people feel good?

Right now, it is 10 C (50 F) in Vancouver, with a rain warning, and lows of 8 C (46 F) tonight.

In San Diego, where I was last week (and the week before) at this time, it’s 21 C (69 F) with lows of 16 C (60 F). No probability of precipitation.

Seriously.

Come on now. I don’t even own any fall clothing. Or a raincoat.

I actually wouldn’t need to buy shoes or fall clothing if I lived there. I could live in skirts and Havis and be done with it, since I don’t work in a corporate environment. Sigh.

It’s not just the weather that bugs me, though. I love seasons in general (although I don’t know that Warm Rain/Cold Rain qualify as seasons.)

It’s that I went to Southern freakin’ California and felt good about myself and my body for ten full days, even though I am larger and don’t have all the “right” clothes — and wore less clothing, to boot!

If men looked at me, it wasn’t to scoff. I literally always felt like I fit in, even in a place often described as one of the more shallow locales on earth. No one ever looked askance at me… not even women with fake boobs in bikinis!

Funny thing, though. As soon as I got back to humble, polite Canada, I felt immediately under scrutiny, and that I didn’t look right or have the right things on. From the moment I arrived at the airport, actually. And ever since.

What the heck? Talk about a chill setting in.

I really gotta figure out why that is.

I’m thinking through 8,000,000 things in my life right now, from big issues to tiny wonderings.

Your answers always give me a ton of perspective.

So!

1. Why do you live where you live?
2. Why do you do the job you do?
3. Why are you with the person you’re with?
4. If you could change one thing about your life today, what would it be?
5. What is the greatest source of happiness in your life?
6. What is the greatest source of discontent in your life?
7. If you were handed $10,000 today, what would you do with it?
8. What is your favourite quality in a friend?
9. What is an unforgivable mistake in a friendship?
10. What is a true relationship dealbreaker for you?