Red Cedar
More apocalypse, less angst
A twenty-year perspective.
One thing I always become highly aware of when I do job searches is that really, with all consideration, I don’t have it all that bad in the employment department. Occasionally there are jobs of interest to me out there – with lower pay and/or job security – but for the most part an environmental scan reminds me that I’m doing pretty well.
Going to my twenty-year high school reunion this past weekend had a little of the same effect. Despite my misgivings going into it, I reflected to Brian on the drive back to Vancouver that I finally get the point of these reunions (which I haven’t attended in the past): an exercise in measuring our current lives against our earlier selves. In the same way we touch on birthday milestones, but collectively in front of the mirror of each other. Not to say that my reunion was all about comparative judgement of others, because what I realized is that no single accomplishment means very much in the final summary. What really stood out to me was the difference between people who seemed happy and directed in their lives and people who didn’t. Which has very little to do with success as defined by our society, and a lot to do with purpose and intentionality.
I take for granted the inborn purposefulness that I possess, the craving for intellectual and social engagement which has taken me far out of my comfort zone and into some pretty strange territory over the years. I have often assumed that the inquisitiveness which makes me crazy is equally posessed by everyone. How could it not be?
But it’s not. And I’m surprised often at the low level of basic engagement so many people seem to have in the world outside of their families. The narrow path from work to home, made even narrower by gated suburbs, the home office and a 54-inch plasma-screen television set. Which means that once you’ve exchanged the basics – married? how many kids? where are you working? there isn’t a hell of a lot else to say. Even the vacation plans seem tragic as the costs of packages and the trouble with travelling with kids is detailed with self-deprecating humour. For those of us living in Vancouver, the cost of housing is another safe topic and so we skate around it until we move onto the next drink and the next reconnection.
It’s not a critique of anyone I’m mounting here, but a reflection: what makes me who I am is not possessed by everyone. And not only that, I can’t imagine living without my excitement and engagement about and in the world I inhabit. I may work for the federal government to make a wage – and I may keep the same boring job until I retire eighteen years from now. Who knows? But it’s not who I am anymore than the degree I hold or the number of kids I have. My definition of myself is so much greater, a sum of millions of actions and questions I never write or speak about. An innate tendency to get excited about a gamut of skills and ideas.
Which doesn’t fit into the 2-minute-what-are-you-doing-now answer – for me or for anyone else. What comes across instead is how many people just seem resigned even as they profess great things in their life. Weary at thirty-eight, longing to be eighteen again. Those years I am glad are long left behind, I am so much less trapped now than I was back then. So much more who I was always supposed to be.
A little vacation update
I left Vancouver yesterday morning in the aftermath of the so-called “hockey riot” and came here to Lincoln City. The house my parents have rented overlooks this beach. A very basic house in a spectacular location.
The train ride down was awesome and relaxing – renting a car in Portland was simple and the drive out to the coast not a problem. Mostly I was just glad I didn’t have to go into the city and listen to everyone on the bus going on about the stupidity of the night before. Though I do think perhaps the US Customs Agents were nicer than normal because they seemed really sorry for us.
I haven’t much to say about any of this except I really am glad to be on vacation and feeling burnt out by Vancouver at the moment. And I’m glad that East Vancouver is my home and not the target of assholes from all over, and that besides the smoke in the sky Wednesday night we didn’t see a thing of how mindless our city can be.
Oh, and I’m also glad the hockey is over for another year. Really, it’s been way too wound up in Van for a *long* time.
Going grey (one year later).
I like this picture, taken last month at a fundraising dinner in support of Opt sexual health services. Even with grey hair, pigtails really do take the years off!
Although you can see that there is still brown dye at the tips of my ‘do, I have recently realized that the grow-out process is almost finished! Not only is the dye mostly gone, but my hair is back at the length it was when I started the process a year ago. Early on my hairdresser cut of four inches to stimulate the process, but recently we’ve been just trimming and I’m finally digging the length again.
The process of going grey at thirty-eight has been an interesting one – and although I still worry (I really do) that people are going to mistake me for twenty years older – I’m not sorry at all that I’ve done it. No more chemicals, no more fussing every four weeks, no more hiding the fact that women go grey at all different times in their life and can look good doing so!
What’s been most interesting to me is the overwhelmingly positive response from women and men – even strangers – to the new hair. With the dye mostly out it now ringlets at the bottom naturally, and the variation in colour from dark brown to silver gives the appearance of streaks in the right light. Even though grey hair is coarser, without the continual chemical assault, it is not nearly as dry and damaged – especially if I treat it right. I am of course always nervous about the pouffy dry look that grey hair can have, which happens to me only the day after I wash it and only if I don’t blow-dry it.
It’s definitely different – and I do realize that letting it grow out is part of being “aged” in our society – that I don’t look as young as I would with a dye-job. But do I need to? Do I need to look twenty-five even though I’m pushing forty? I don’t think so. I don’t think I have to make my life about being “attractive” in the most superficial ways to strangers. This doesn’t mean I don’t want to look good, and yes I do realize that the more attractive we are the better we get treated in society. But I don’t to have to compromise my health, the environment, or my sanity in order to get there.
As it is, I think I do okay with what I’ve got. And besides that I like the life I’m giving. Going grey feels like an alignment of what I believe with what I project in a way that’s healthy and not self-hating. So hooray for grey!
Interlude before travel.
I spent my morning updating union memberships, contacting people and fowarding on cards to be signed and returned in my absence. It’s the kind of thing I do before going on holidays – tidy-up tasks – getting myself set-up for moving ahead on my return. I was a horrible insomniac last night as well – so simple busy tasks are a lot easier for me today than anything which requires a lot of concentration.
At the moment I’m blocking out the office sounds with some John Zorn (Book of Angels Volume 10, Lucifer) which is some sort of dreamy klezmer-inspired jazz. It’s been awhile since I’ve turned to anything out of this Zorn masterwork, but when it happens I am as intrigued as pleased. It’s incredible stuff really, and even seventeen volumes later I can’t say that there is one album that reminds me of any other except in that they tie together similar klezmer/jazz/prog-rock themes, scales and harmonies.
Apparently there are five more releases into this series expected by the end of 2012, bringing the Masada Book Two series to a total of twenty-two volumes. Zorn is nothing if not prolific: he wrote a hundred songs a month at the start of this project which features his compositions performed by a variety of incredible performers. When I first wrote about this series way back in 2007, I had no idea any composer could sustain across this many albums – and I am really very happy to discover that it’s not over yet.
I have much to be done before I leave Thursday, and no energy within me to do it. Be done. Be done I say.
A summer get-away.
Despite the weather, we are heading out on our first summer family get-away this week. Lincoln City, Oregon here we come!
(By way of explanation – my parents rent a condo in Lincoln City for a month every year because they love the Oregon Coast and this year they rented a house and invited us to come down for a week.)
We have decided that instead of driving the 10 hours (most of it on the I-5 in traffic) we are going to Amtrak to Portland and then rent a car to drive out to the coast. This makes for the same length of travel time – 10 hours, but I only have to drive for two of them. Which makes for less travel stress; I am looking forward to the journey as much as the arrival for a change.
Because we have an impending journey, I have focused the last few days of sewing on an overnight bag that I have had on the project pile since February. An Amy Butler bag pattern (Cosmo) made from Amy Butler Fabrics – I can truly say this is the nicest bag I have made for myself. Two outside pockets, four inside pockets – this will be my computer/book/craft bag for the upcoming trip. It really does have enough room for a weekender – which means I can now get rid of my overnight bag with the shredded lining.
Funny thing about this project – when I bought the fabric for it in February I was completely daunted and unsure about my ability to succeed. Just a few months later I’ve learned that any pattern can be followed with enough patience. This bag took about seven hours to construct – most of that time in the cutting and interfacing stage – and I’m pretty sure I could cut that time down by an hour now that I’ve done it once.
So satisfying to start out on a journey with a brand-new bag 🙂
Red Cedar 