Buzz words

There are a lot of buzz words and sayings kicking around the internet about how you should treat yourself and treat others. We went from a society that is supposed to respect others to demanding that respect is earned and not given. I hear it a lot, you have to love yourself first. Which is true, and I always have. I may not like my outward appearance but every day I can look at myself in the mirror and see past my physical appearance. I look myself square in the eye and know that I am an innately good person, and I each and every day I make the active choice to be a good person, to do no harm and live my life the way I have chosen to be.

People who know me well know that people tend to take advantage of me and I let them repeatedly. You might think that this is a masochistic behaviour, but it isn't. The way people treat me says more about them then it does about me. It is this broken world we live in. But I will not allow it to change the way I am. But what people don't realize is that the first time you break my trust it is gone forever, the first time you lie to me I won't believe a word that you say again, but you might never this is the case because I won't treat you any differently. Why? Because I treat others the way that I wish to be treated. I am the change I want to see in this world.

Don't get me wrong, it isn't easy. It's not a natural state of being, it's an active state of being. It would be all too easy for me to take the “me first” path, but that's not the way we are supposed to be. In order for us to evolve as human-beings, we have to take an active roll each and every minute of each and every day until it becomes habit. Oh I'm far from perfect. I try hard not be schadenfreude. I try hard not to love karma, because in actuality I really hate to see anyone suffer regardless if they deserve it or not. It is in the little things that is the exercise, the big things come a lot easier when you have battled the small things.

When you give in mentally to the little things it is like death by a thousand cuts. Each one stings but a little and you don't really consider what damage you are doing to yourself until you are hemorrhaging blood from your body. It is the little things that lead us astray. It is in these little things like treating others the way I wish to be treated that I don't fall into the paper shredder of life. So when people treat me poorly I don't get angry, I feel sad and pity them because they haven't evolved as humans yet and I hope that my actions might help them to evolve later on in life.

It's not enough to talk the talk, you gotta walk the walk. It ain't easy, but the view in the mirror is priceless. Start today, the journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.

Peace and love my friends.

Good fences make good neighbours!

Happy Pride everyone! There is a lot to celebrate! The Supreme Court of the U.S. Of A. Has ruled in favour of same sex marriage. It's about time! The strange part is that it is still legal to discriminate against LGBT folks in some states, so today they celebrate tomorrow they could legally be fired. Hopefully it will change very shortly!

This week end has been wet and soggy. I watched my neighbour to the right of me try and prop up his fence that is ripping my fence apart. I don't think the 2 foot sticks he is using is going to be adequate, but hey it proves the old adage right. Good fences make good neighbours.

I've also started up a new account on Plenty of Fish again. Dear Lord save me from the crazies. I'm not sure which will be funnier, watching my neighbour try and dig a fence post with a screwdriver in the pouring rain or the epic fails I'll get emailed to me on the dating site. Although I have reconnected with a long lost friend which makes it worth the while already.

Stay dry folks!

Crossing Oceans

“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.”

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

A friend of mine was having a hard time. She had been hurt again. She had expected something different this time. I've often said the definition of insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting a different result (quote attributed to Albert Einstein). But I think that quote takes the humanity and spirituality out of things. It's fine when you contribute it to science, but when it comes to people it doesn't work so well. When dealing with the human factor it should probably be: definition of insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting a different result, but hope for something different and have faith in humanity.

Change comes with the want to change, the want to be something more than what is expected. If you expect things from people then inevitably you will be disappointed. If you hope for something different from them, but expect nothing you won't be disappointed. When people hurt you or disappoint you do not become bitter. Ironically Al Capone said, “Don't mistake my kindness for weakness. I am kind to everyone, but when someone is unkind to me, weak is not what you are going to remember about me.” I think perhaps he meant it in a little differently than I do.

I want people to remember that even when people hurt me it does not change me. It does not change the way I interact with the world and it doesn't make me bitter. Change starts with one, Gandhi said, “Be the change you want to see in this world.” It is a quote pasted on my bedroom wall that greets me every morning. I remember that sometimes the simplest act of kindness can change a persons life. It changed mine.

I used to work with homeless and impoverished people years ago. One of my clients was a drunk. He had lost his entire family due to alcoholism, his career and eventually his life. 2 weeks before he died I wondered into my old place of employment to say hi to my former co-workers. As I left he stopped me outside, reached into his wallet and pulled out the only money he had, which was a five dollar bill. We were not supposed to take money from clients for any reason, it's a conflict of interest thing. “I want you to have this”, he said holding it out to me. “You know I can't take money from you ****.” “I know, it's not for you it's for your daughter, I want you to put it towards her education fund. Please take it.” I looked into his pleading face and as hard as it was I said, “I really can't take this from you, you know that it is against the rules but it is a really sweet offer and very kind.” He wouldn't put it away. He begged me. “Pam, please take this, start an education fund for her, please for me, don't let her become what I have become, let me help her in the only way I can.” Something inside me broke as I took the five dollars from him and choked out the words thank you. You see it was all he had. He literally had nothing. 5 dollars would have bought him a weeks worth of meal tickets at the local soup kitchen. 5 dollars would have bought him a couple of beers that maybe would have staved off the delirium tremens for another day. 5 dollars didn't make that much of a difference to me, but to him it could have made a huge difference perhaps the difference between life and death. He knew this well and still chose to give it to me for her. When I found out he died 2 weeks later I went home and cried. Perhaps that 5 dollars would have saved his life. But he had his dignity. Something money couldn't buy.

It was a completely selfless act. I decided that no matter what I had to be selfless.

If everyone were selfless then we wouldn't have the need to put ourselves first. The only way we can change this selfish world we live in is to be the change we want to see in this world. Change starts with one. You. Expect that people won't change, but never give up hope that they will. You might change someone's life. I know that **** changed mine. Perhaps my actions will cause one other to change some day.

It just doesn't rain on June 20th

Today I made the annual pilgrimage to my parents yard. It was 17 years ago today (June 20 1998) when I walked down the isle a blushing bride of 20. We had been together 4 years by that time. I rained that morning about 8 am and I ran to my mothers arms sobbing. “Don't worry.” she said soothing my already frayed nerves. “It's only going to rain enough to freshen everything up and make brides cry!” That it did! About 5 minutes later the rain stopped, it had taken all the humility out of the air, perked everything up and the lake was completely calm and looked tropical. It was a beautiful day, a perfect day for a wedding. Every year since my divorce I go down there or at least to the lake and remember and I cry.

I can't tell you if the following June 20^th's while I was married were nice days. My anniversary never really stuck out. We never went on another trip, not even over night to the city. Actually we never had another vacation again. Ever. Nothing really remarkable happened on that day again. But I can tell you every year since I have gotten divorced it hasn't rained. Not once. Not even enough to freshen everything up and make brides cry. I checked two almanacs and not one drop of rain fell on June 20 since 2007 in the city where I live, where I got married so many years ago. It feels like a life time, but on June 20^th I can still hear the violins playing, hear the people talking and it's a fond but painful memory.

Ever since my divorce it is always the same ritual. June 20^th rolls around I and show up unannounced at my parents house. I usually make myself a coffee in the mug that says “aged to perfection” and marvel how it hasn't really worn in all those years since I drank coffee out of on my wedding day. I walk out to the lake, stand in the very spot that I swore my vows on and stare out over the lake. Then without fail I cry. It may seem odd that years after my divorce I still cry, but it's true.

There are several reasons I cry. I weep for the lost dreams and hopes of a young bride, for the potential and life that I was so richly blessed with. I weep for my daughter who had to grow up in a broken home. I weep out of relief because although I left, he divorced me, something I don't know if I would have ever had the strength to do. I weep for him that alcohol has stolen any chance that he had to be a family. I weep for him, alone after all these years, bitter and consumed by anger. I weep because alcohol killed the man I once knew and loved. Sure I loved him. I know it sounds odd coming from a lesbian. Really the word husband feels foreign on my lips. I loved him, I don't think I could have ever loved him the way I was supposed to, but I did love him and I swore an oath to him. I cry because he doesn't realize that if he could have only admitted he had a problem and gotten help his life would be completely different. I cry is because his life could be so different if he quit drinking today.

When you stand before your family, friends and (if you believe) your God and swear and oath that you will love, honour, and cherish them until death do you part it is a serious commitment. People just don't take it as seriously as they should. The fact that I am a lesbian didn't even factor in me leaving my husband. It really wasn't a consideration. It fell into the category of better or worse part of the deal. The reason I left him was because no matter what oath I swore then couldn't top the oath I swore as a Mother to keep my child safe, loved and healthy as best as I could. I didn't want my child to grow up in an abusive, violent, alcoholic home. I didn't want her to think that it was normal and I sure didn't want her to marry a man that treated her the way her father treated me. I had no other choice.

In terms of myself it really was a lateral move. I was horribly lonely when I was married and the only thing that has changed is that now instead of laying in bed next to someone who wasn't there for me I go to bed alone. I traded the insults and belittling for silence, begging for help and receiving none to doing it alone still. Nothing much changes. Except... I wish it would rain.

True beauty is in the eye of the beholder

I was never really comfortable with myself. It's not something people often see, actually quite the opposite really. It's a face I put on for the public. I could blame childhood bullying for it, but at some point I grew up and out of childhood and became a woman. Those words always seem to stick like some sort of psychic glue to the back of my mind. Although cognitively I knew they were false I really wasn't ugly, stupid, fat and disgusting my childhood brain just couldn't get over that mental hurtle.

My friend Jess came over for a few hours yesterday. It's probably been 4 or 5 years since I've seen her. She lives in a different city is happily married and has 4 kids to worry about. We touch base sometimes, but it always seems like no time at all passes. I look at her and I see her at age 12.

I never knew what Jess saw in me as a friend. She was shorter than I was (which is quite the feat), skinny with long hair, she was naturally beautiful. She knew how to wear just enough make up to look pretty, and never seemed to have a problem making friends or finding boyfriends. I felt comfortable in her shadow. Even other people asked what she saw in me. “What do you like about her, she's so weird!” Her reply was, “That's exactly what I like about her, I don't just like her I love her!”.

Even as an adult I wasn't very comfortable with my appearance. My ex girlfriend used to say, “You know that your skin fits you funny.” It was her way of saying that I was awkward and uncomfortable with myself. I never felt beautiful. It was always her that got the compliments, you look so pretty, you're beautiful, I just love your hair. Pam your hair is too short and why are your clothes so baggy, you know you would look so much better if...” I also stood in her shadow. I suppose it's easy when you are as short as I am, you always tend to look up to people.

While reminiscing yesterday about the bodies we used to have and complaining about our grey hair I hauled out my guitar. She was friends with me long before I could play guitar and quiet honestly she forgets. I suppose I am 12 again when she see's me. She happened to snap a candid photo of me while I was playing. I had taken off my glasses as they are tinted and it was hard for me to see the lyrics under my back yard gazebo. It wasn't until later that it made me cry. “This is a really good photo of you!” she says smiling at her phone. “Oh ya, well text it to me I could use a good photo!” I said snickering. She texted it too me and I didn't bother to check it for a while until she was leaving. It really was a good photo of me.

It wasn't until she left that I read the inscription on the picture. “True Beauty”. I felt a tear trickle down my cheek. My friend Jess has always been a girl who tells it like it is without pulling punches. When she said “True Beauty” I knew she meant it. I never really felt beautiful before, sure there were times that I kinda felt that way, but it was always due to something else. Those brief moments were just that, I felt beautiful in the moment, but outside of it, I was just the same old person. She took a picture of me in one of those moments where I am truly me and called me beautiful. I don't know if she will ever understand what a gift to me that was, because I woke up feeling beautiful. It will probably fade and I will forget. But I have that picture saved. I knew that it wasn't just in that moment that I was beautiful, it was that she had always seen me as beautiful and that made even more tears fall. My friend with such natural beauty called me beautiful and meant it. So today I wear those words like a suit of armour. Today I am beautiful.

Giving up vs letting go

Those who know me well, know there isn't anything in my life that has come easily. It was this fact that that got me motivated when I was pregnant with my daughter, completely paralysed on my left side and laying in a hospital ward. My Mother said, “Pamela, when you were born you had a 1 and a 100 chance of living...” she never got to finish the sentence. I responded with, “Yes those 99 are dead, and I lived, so I should make the best of it, life owes me nothing.” It wasn't exactly where she was going, but it motivated me so who cares.

I am an MS Warrior. I fight every day. A lot of days people wouldn't know anything was wrong. That even though I'm smiling, there are terrible things happening in my body, soul and mind. I don't give up. I can't, I won't, I don't know how. I think giving up is easy. To submit to an enemy that is so overwhelming is a lot easier than fighting a loosing battle.

There is a difference between giving up and letting go. There are lots of thing that I have had to let go of because of MS. It's the letting go that is hard for me. Ambitions I once had are no longer possible. Plans and goals for myself have long been abandoned. Sometimes I held out hope for so long my fingers didn't want to let go of them. But inevitably I had to. It's the letting go that is hard. I haven't given up.

But still I dream. These things I have had to let go I still dream of them. I close my eyes and hear the roar of the wind and the jump master screaming “JUMP RUN” and my mouth still gets dry. I'm still for a moment and I can almost feel the lean of my motorcycle and the feeling of wanting to ride down endless roads. I remember the feeling of freedom my scooter gave me as I tried to keep up with traffic. I recall the feeling of accomplishment I got from being paid to help people, knowing I did a good job.

But it's more than that, I hear the laughter of all the family and the children I never had, wake up and hold my daughter more tightly in my arms. I hear the music of the band I was in that never was and play alone for just me. I dream of the career that might have been, the life that might have been, and the person I might have become. Sometimes I dream of the arms that hold me that will never be.

MS has taken a lot from me. I fight, I don't give up, I dream. I let go of things, even though it's hard.

Life is hard. It would be easy to give up on it. It's much harder to let it go a piece at a time. I fight to the bitter end because that's just who I am.

O' Canada Please stop with the BS!

Canadians are so polite! I hear it all the time. It's something I'm proud of! Something I'm not so proud of is the complacency of Canadians. I suppose it's part of our politeness that we endeavour not to offend anyone, but we've taken that to the nth degree. Right now we are having a debate about O' Canada. It's our national anthem. A few people are taking offense to the lyrics for a couple reasons.

Firstly, some people have a problem with the lyrics “in all thy sons command”. What about the women who serve and all the women who have sacrificed some people protest. Okay, well in 1913 the line was "True patriot love thou dost in us command" and was changed to what it currently is. One could speculate that it was because of the suffragette movement, or the fact that we were on the brink of a world war and we needed our sons to serve. Personally I'd like to keep it as a reminder that really it was our sons that bled and died for our country originally. I'm glad that women are now able to serve our country in the army, but I still believe that we have to honour our past. But that is just my humble opinion.

Secondly, some people take offense to the “God keep our land” part. Some of us believe in God, some of us don't, some of us call God something else. Take it out! Make it equal for everyone.

It is equal to everyone. But what about the misogyny and the religion, I can hear it now. If you don't like that version then sing the french version! Wait what? Isn't the french version just a translation of the English version? I thought so too, until I really thought about it. Okay, I took french in school and can probably order a hamburger with out offending someone. (If someone could tell me how to order it well done that would be great because I found Quebec tends to under cook their burgers). I digress, the French version is NOT the same as the English one. I actually feel like a terrible Canadian for not knowing this. Here is the French Version:

Ô Canada!
Terre de nos aïeux,
Ton front est ceint de fleurons glorieux!
Car ton bras sait porter l'épée,
Il sait porter la croix!
Ton histoire est une épopée
Des plus brillants exploits.
Et ta valeur, de foi trempée,
Protégera nos foyers et nos droits.
Protégera nos foyers et nos droits.

O Canada!
Land of our forefathers,
Thy brow is wreathed with a glorious garland of flowers.
As is thy arm ready to wield the sword,
So also is it ready to carry the cross.
Thy history is an epic
Of the most brilliant exploits.
Thy valour steeped in faith
Will protect our homes and our rights.
Will protect our homes and our rights. 

No sons no God, it's the original version of the anthem which was written in French.  So my solution is you don't like the words in the English one, sing the French one.  We have 2 official languages in Canada.  Sing one of them and STOP COMPLAINING!

Elmer fudd just isn't cool

I have jumped out of an air plane at 11,500 feet. I have learned to walk on numerous occasions. I have gotten up in front of a room filled with strangers and reduced them to tears with a song. I have gone through protest marches, been in the news and had no fear. Every week I don my angry white pajamas and have men who are well over a foot taller at me throw punches at me. I have been faced with my own mortality, but these things don't frighten me. But if there is one thing on the face of this earth that can reduce me to a state of shear panic it has to be women. More specifically, women whom I find attractive and think there is a remote possibility of dating.

My friends call it “elmer fudding” and the name sounds a whole lot cuter than what it physically looks like. I know I've probably blogged this before, but it really is a serious problem. It goes beyond the “boy she's awkward” realm. I am an articulate, decently educated individual, but when I'm around a cute girl all that goes out the window and I turn into a drivelling idiot and I mean beyond walking into a pole, or falling down stupid. I have friends who say, ah don't worry about it Pam, but the truth is that it is a big concern with me. If you look at the numbers, I'm a lesbian, 10 percent of the population is supposed to be gay so 5 percent of them are women. That is a tiny portion of the population. Now lets couple that with the fact that I am apparently incapable of approaching women and the numbers thin out a lot more. Now lets take the “fudding” into consideration. No one wants to approach a woman for a date when it appears as if she needs medical attention when you speak to them.

Another thing that really hangs me up is that I don't “speak girl”. I know I'm a girl. I've lived with the parts for 37 years now, but I just haven't be able to pick up the subtle hints. If perchance that a girl does happen to hit on me, I will have no clue. They tend to interpret this as disinterest. I am just really very clueless. I need an interpreter.

This week is pride in my local city and I'm actually considering barring myself inside with some popcorn and netflix, just so I don't have to go through the painfully awkward situations and spend the next 6 months trying to remove the taste of shoe out of my mouth.

Perhaps since I've taken up religious studies I should just make a vow of chastity and not have to worry about the situation. That way when anyone asks why I'm single, I can use it as an excuse. Nah I'm too honest for that!