A letter to my grown daughters ~

My dear girls:

Thank you … for never coming home with green or purple hair, stretched earlobes, shaved heads or excessive piercings and tattoos. I would have loved you just the same, but still….

Thank you … for not bringing home too many stray cats, dogs, guinea pigs, hamsters, pot-bellied pigs, parrots or fish. You know how hard it would have been for me to turn them away.

Thank you … for keeping me in the dark about things I did not want to know.

Thank you … for sharing with me all the things I did want to know.

Thank you … for not bringing home a baby before you were ready to raise it yourself. It would have been loved, of course, but life is easier this way.

Thank you … for making me laugh so often.

Thank you … for not making me cry too often. Continue reading →

Ghost Writer

www.ghostwriterwriting.com

Once upon a time I thought I’d like to write picture books. After all, I loved reading picture books and was sad when my children became too old to enjoy them with me. My first attempt was a story called The Noodle Monster and it was based on the antics of my two-year-old daughter who refused to eat anything but noodles ~ noodles for breakfast, noodles for lunch, noodles for dinner. I had great fun imagining the illustrations for this story as this little girl slowly begins to turn into a Noodle Monster, her hair growing in like fusilli noodles, a cannelloni body, a tortellini nose, macaroni ears …. you get the picture. However, after many, many rejections from publishers I realized that I was not going to become the author of a picture book. Not yet, anyway. Continue reading →

Why Love One But Eat the Other?

Hats off to The Vancouver Humane Society for this powerful and thought-provoking ad campaign. Their position is that any movement toward eating less meat is to be encouraged. In other words, a heavy meat-eater who reduces meat consumption or a ‘flexitarian’ who becomes a vegetarian or a vegetarian who becomes a vegan should all be applauded. They are all on the same path and they are all making a difference.

Bliss!

Yesterday I completed a 30-day yoga challenge – one yoga class every day for 30 consecutive days. And it was a challenge… just to get myself to the yoga studio some days! But I’m glad I did it. The practise of yoga is not only good for physical well-being, but mental and emotional well-being too. There would be days I’d arrive ‘on the mat’ feeling frazzled or out of sorts but by the time the class was over I’d be feeling blissful once again.

Breathe…..

Gift From the Sea

I rarely read a book twice ~ there are just too many books to read ~ but I have read Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh three times, over 10 year intervals, and I have loved it more with each reading. It shocks me that it was written in 1955, before I was even born. Lindbergh’s reflections on youth and age, love and marriage, peace, solitude and contentment are as relevant today as they were then. I kept a highlighter pen beside me as I read to note the wisest passages and now my book is filled with bright orange lines. It is a short book, but I have highlighted dozens of passages. A couple that really spoke to me are these:

But I want first of all – in fact, as an end to these other desires – to be at peace with myself. I want a singleness of eye, a purity of intention, a central core to my life that will enable me to carry out these obligations and activities as well as I can. I want, in fact – to borrow from the language of the saints – to live “in grace” as much of the time as possible.

Only when one is connected to one’s own core is one connected to others, I am beginning to discover. And, for me, the core, the inner spring, can best be refound through solitude.

How I would love to have known this wise, articulate woman.

Thank you School Library Journal…

… for this lovely review of Allegra!

…” but the intensity of creating music and the increasing time she spends alone with Mr. Rocchelli start to make everyone, including Allegra herself, wonder if there could be something more to their relationship. The musical creations – whether through a rock-band jam session, playing a classical harp, or composing with a digital program – are described with loving detail but a light touch, appealing to both veteran musicians and neophytes, who will relish this opportunity to better appreciate the power of music. Allegra’s artistic pursuits – and intense commitment – will resonate particularly with equally passionate teens, while her social anxiety and strained home life might be familiar, albeit painfully so, to a broader audience.”

The Pause Button

My yoga teacher looked uncharacteristically rattled as she settled herself onto her mat.

“I’ve learned a lot in these past few days,” she said. “It’s not what life presents to us, it’s how we react to it, how we move through it.” She sat quietly for a moment, preparing herself for the practise, and then she looked up and said, “How many of you wish there was a pause button for life?”

Thirty hands shot up, and there was laughter as we all recognized exactly what she was trying to say.

Later on, after some vigorous yoga, we moved into a child’s pose, which is a resting pose. “This is the pause button in yoga,” she said.

That started me thinking… I’ve recently read that introverts are people who need down time to recharge their batteries for the next ’round’ of life, as opposed to extroverts, who regain their energy through stimulating activities. Identifying as an introvert based on this definition, I love the idea of the ‘pause button’. We each have to find our own personal ways to ‘pause’ our lives. I suspect meditation is a form of ‘pausing’ for people who practise it. Restorative yoga works for me, as does reading the newspaper with a cup of coffee on a quiet Saturday morning, or walking alone on a forest trail.

Where do you find your pause button?

Book Club Junkie

That’s where the book club comes in. You are not alone with your reading experience. You get the chance to share how the story made you feel, why you connected with it, why you didn’t.

I am a book club junkie.

There. I’ve said it.

It’s an addiction – I belong to three. Each one has a different focus. In one we read only young adult fiction. In another we are a group of men and women, bringing our different perspectives to stories. The third is a large, social group of female friends. In each group we enjoy the fact that the book choices encourage us to read books we might otherwise have missed.

“Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another’s skin, another’s voice, another’s soul.” — Joyce Carol Oates

Through book club discussions we learn more about ourselves and our book club friends. The themes of the books are springboards for conversation, but the dialogue become so much more as we chew away on the ideas that the books present. We reflect on different ways of living, on different circumstances, on different reactions to events. We are challenged to open our minds to other ways of being. Without a chance to discuss books, the ideas they present have much less impact. I usually like a book even more after the discussion as I learn how other people connected to it or why they felt it was so meaningful.

Book club evenings are the most stimulating ones of the month. They are also the most fun.

The 4 stages of Writing

Not very scientific, but perfectly expressed.

Is there a writer out there who doesn’t go through these stages?

Probably not.

Documentia Epidemic!!

Yikes!

Are you at risk?? Here’s the description:

“You can help prevent documentia – an epidemic that sees millions of people around the world taking photos and making videos of things rather than truly experiencing the moment. This illness compels them to snap shots of restaurant meals before tucking in to enjoy the chef’s creations. They feel the urge to film birthday cakes instead of simply watching the candle flames go out in a puff. They tweet about being at parties instead of truly interacting with the other people present. At its most debilitating, this illness makes people think they can’t sit down at a dinner table without checking their phones every couple of minutes. Entire families are at risk of this affliction…”

(Philip Solman and Debbra Mikaelsen, Publisher/Editor Edible Vancouver Magazine)

Yes, this is tongue-in-cheek, and because the writers care passionately about food (and families) they go on to encourage their readers to turn off their phones during meals. I worry that our electronic devices are creating an even worse epidemic, a disease which causes us to completely lose our ability to make polite conversation. I’m not sure what I’d call this affliction (small-talkitis?) but I could see the symptoms of it as I stepped onto the gondola to head back down Grouse Mountain on a recent May morning. Continue reading →

Shelley Hrdlitschka