Red Cedar

I have spent this Good Friday in the car, on a ferry, travelling to Parksville and back for a thyroid ultrasound. This is a hangover of a cancer scare from many years ago. There was and is no cancer but we like to check on those thyroid nodules every year or so just to make sure. It’s not how I want to spend this day, it being the first of four days in a long weekend, but I don’t say no when the medical system offers me an appointment. You never know when they will offer you another one. There is just no room in this world to be fussy anymore. Too many people, too few resources. We take what we can get and move on.

This last week has been unremarkable in almost every way except that it started with a power outage, and that meant that I couldn’t work and so I took myself on a walk around my neighbourhood on Monday morning, down to Sandwell Provincial Park where sea lions were rafting in the bay and Canada geese were teaching their young to fly. I wish I could start all my weeks, all my days, that way. I’m grateful for good paying work that I can do from home, of course. I feel very lucky about that. But all things considered, I’d rather have my days to myself. It’s times like this that I remember my 25-year-old self starting work in the government and wondering why my late-forty-something co-workers were so grumpy about it all. It didn’t seem so bad to me then, and I guess it still doesn’t now – but the older I get, the less patient I am with it all. Waiting for budgets, waiting for election calls, conducting performance management reviews, churning through the paperwork required for every small thing. The immediacy of springtime, the crisp wind coming off the strait: that feels real when so much of the digital realm in which I spend my days does not.

My fitness routine after the weird leg incident of last week is pretty much back to normal except that I’ve switched my running to walking for the time being. Everything feels okay again, with a bit of tightness in my ankle, so I’ll see about adding impact in the next couple of weeks. I’m also going to ask for a referral to an orthopaedic specialist when I talk to the doctor next week. I’d like an opinion about whether that bone is healthy or deteriorating so that I can take any measures to help it out before the rest of me is falling apart anymore. I expect it is just one of those things to monitor and that activity, especially activity that supports strong bones and mobility in my joints, is about all that will slow the onset of arthritis at this point. I have noticed since returning to playing the violin in December that the arthritis that had been creeping into my hands has completely disappeared. Which doesn’t mean its gone forever, but I think I have managed to stave it off for a bit by returning to a practice that demands huge amounts of strength and flexibility in my hands.

I suppose I can now make the claim that I have fully returned to playing music since it’s been four months of near-daily practice. This is probably the longest stint of intensive playing I’ve had in over a decade, and yet four months of practice is nothing. I am humbled over and over by the challenging nature of good violin/fiddle playing, the impossible hand maneuvers and dedication to posture required. I feel like I’m just skirting the edge of “hey, I don’t sound half bad” most of the time, and not getting too far beyond that. On the other hand, I’ve learned and memorized several new pieces – two in the classical genre, a couple of Romanian folk songs, and a couple other folk tunes. After a long stretch of feeling like I could no longer memorize anything, I’m finding that it really just comes down to chipping away at it line by line, sometimes very painfully.

If all I get out of playing music is improved hand dexterity and memory skills then it’s worth the effort just for that, but I am currently harbouring secret fantasies about playing chamber music with a couple of monster players who are kicking around. Perhaps with another year or two of daily practice that will be possible!

I am really very impatient to get vaccinated at this point, but not so things can “go back to normal” because there is a lot about my life right now I am loathe to give up. Really, I’m just hopeful for some spring and summer parties – I’m missing the people in my life way too much. Though we have been lucky to maintain some regular friend visits throughout this time (outdoors and so on), I’m ready for a bit more than furtive gatherings with one other couple huddled around the fire! Though I keep hearing rumours that we’ll all be done on Gabriola by the end of April, we don’t have our community-wide vaccination date yet so I’m not holding my breath. At least I can see through my Facebook feed that more and more people I know are getting the shot (frontline workers, older folks) so I know that it can’t be long before we get ours.

I hope all of you out there are kicking off the long weekend without a medical appointment and that you have something chocolate planned for Easter! I’m just on my way back onto the ferry as I write this – and so my long weekend will actually begin for real tonight. If you are looking for some good rootsy tunes – my mini-road trip playlist today has included Goodnight, Texas, The Devil Makes Three, Pokey Lafarge, Crooked Still, and Mandolin Orange – all worth checking out.

One of my neighbours has poems and artwork painted on her fence panels. The image/poem above seemed particularly appropriate to me this week – the growth and ebb of life’s events – always coming forward, always receding and so on.

This week has been a bit choppy, owing to the fact that I started out convinced I had a bone infection on Monday which necessitated a visit to the Doctor, the lab, and finally, the imaging clinic in Nanaimo on Wednesday. Upshot is no infection, but something is going on and I need to talk to my Doctor to find out whether the x-ray shows anything.

This is owing to an injury from eighteen years ago, when I broke my fibula while hiking the Juan de Fuca Marine Trail. It was a pretty serious spiral fracture and so it was fixed with a titanium plate and six screws. Over the years, I have occasionally felt a little ache there, not related to any particular activity or time of year – but it’s always gone away within a couple of days. This time the ache showed up and persisted for a few days before becoming really swollen in a new way and also made my ankle really inflexible. I suspect (and have suspected in the past) that as the bone has continued to grow and change over the years, that the titanium plate and/or screws have been moved around and that is likely causing the issue. My worry is that there could be deterioration of the bone in there, and that this will continue to cause problems in the future. Given the long waiting list to see specialists in this province, my hope is that I’ll get referred to an orthopedic doctor now with the hopes I can have it seen to before it creates a bigger problem in my senior years.

On the plus side, I went to a yarn store when I was in Nanaimo. It was the first time I have browsed in any store besides the grocery since the start of Corona-virus. I felt both guilty and excited and came away with $150 worth of yarn, which was a much-needed pick-up from feeling old and a bit limpy.

I took the whole week off from exercise (for the first time in a year an a half), and it’s probably a good time to think about re-setting some of my goals. The strength training feels right, but I’m not sure about the running or anything particularly jarring at the moment. I think instead I’ll be looking at more walking and cycling, at least until I get an opinion on what is going on.

On the work front my staffing process is now complete, people have been offered jobs (either made permanent or brought on new) and all of them have start dates before the end of April. This is the single-largest HR activity I have ever undertaken. Now I get to turn back to my project management work which will see new twists and turns as we move into a new fiscal year and the budget gets dropped (new priorities). My manager is also coming back next week after a year of family-related leave which will reshuffle the deck somewhat. With her return and the hiring activity we will have a fully staffed team for the first time in over two years.

I’ve decided to put a new tea towel warp on my smaller loom this week. This after being stalled out on weaving since sometime in the fall. I had prepared a very long warp for that loom (13 yards) but then got blocked about putting it on and so it’s sat for months. In the meantime, I need some new tea towels for my kitchen. Rather than remaining frozen with the giant project – I’m currently winding a warp for four towels which I can get on and off the loom quickly. After that, maybe, I will chance a 13-yard warp (so much can go wrong when putting on something that long). I’ve also been knitting a new shawl this week, and I’m plotting for some sewing in the very near future. Apparently taking a week off exercise has freed up my time for making things a bit – something I need to consider as I rebalance a bit going forward.

The latest issue of Comfort for the Apocalypse (#18) dropped this morning as per the last Friday of the month routine. This March mini-essay saw a major pivot mid-month due to the events of last week which made pulling everything together feel a bit more challenging than normal. On the plus side, I have a head start on the April mini-essay since it was half-written when I changed course. I am at the end of a three-month goal set at the first of the year – which was to reinvigorate my newsletter and get back on a regular schedule of delivery. It does help keep my writing in shape, but more than that, it helps me feel connected to the world on and off this island. I’ll be setting a similar intention for the next three months as I look at my quarterly planning this weekend – as well as some other creative goals for springtime.

Although I am still limping a little, my spirits are starting to lift as the weekend draws near. Looking at the spring blossoms right outside my window I am reminded of this haiku which draws on our hopes for this season of transition:

Try to plant
As for a child.
A little wild cherry tree.

I don’t really know what to say about this week except it’s been the saddest one of the whole last year. Between the loss of David Botten (a favourite island musician) to cancer, and the horrific accident which claimed the lives of Chris Straw and Marc Doré, our island has lost some of its most loved people overnight. Suddenly the emerging life of springtime, the sunny patches breaking through the clouds, feel cruel as we struggle to make sense of the new order of things. No longer can we expect to run into these folks on our errands. When Covid is over and we can mingle again, these people will not be among us to become reacquainted with at community events and yard parties. For those closer – the partners, children and grandchildren – this week has changed the shape of their days forever. And the rest of us reflect on the love that we have, selfishly perhaps. Hoping that we will never stand at the threshold of a similar tragedy that takes our closest ones from us.

There is so much more to say, but working my feelings out in writing takes some time, and so I will conclude my weekly update here with this loving kindness meditation and my sincerest wish for all of us suffering souls :

May you be happy
May you be healthy
May you be safe
May you live with ease

Spring continues to unfold around here. Daffodils, crocus, and the arrival of our bare-root fruit trees!

Last summer, Brian and I cleared a fairly large spot on one side of our property. It started when I recognized that the ocean spray (a beautiful native plant, also known as ironwood) had got out of hand to the degree that it was pushing the fence in front of our place over. Fences here are necessary to keeping the deer from destroying everything, so I began clipping and sawing and pulling. Pretty soon, Brian came to help me and he got really zealous about it. Turns out, he didn’t like the look of the overgrowth at the front of our place – and he really wanted some space for fruit trees. Within a week he had cleared it right to the ground. After that we got our machine guy to come and pull up the stumps and then we filled the whole thing with ten yards of garden soil which we supplemented by burying a bunch of guts and heads from the fish I processed at the end of summer.

We had hoped to plant trees in the fall, but I was a bit late to the party and got an order in for the spring. In the meantime I did plant some raspberries along the fence which are showing some signs of having rooted. There is already a single self-pollinating cherry tree on the boundary of this space, and by this weekend it will be joined by a couple of dwarf apples (gala and fuji), a multi-grafted plum and another cherry tree of a variety I can’t recall. We also took a gamble and ordered a fruit salad and a fruit cocktail tree to plant along the sunny wall of our house. These are multi-grafts with apricots, nectarines, peaches, and plums on them. I’m skeptical about these trees because I don’t think we have a warm enough climate for them (we are planting them in the most sheltered, warmest spot to compensate) but also because I haven’t been able to find any pictures of these trees in a mature state on the Internet, which makes me think they are a bit of a gimmick. I’m just approaching it as an experiment for $150. Will let you all know how it goes. The final tree I purchased is an espaliered multi-grafted apple which I want to plan on the outside of our fence where we have a big boulevard and lots of sun. The trick there will be putting some wire fencing up to keep the deer away, but if it works, I would love to put a couple more espaliered fruits in there next year.

It will be a few years before we get any harvest, but long-term commitments like fruit trees are a sign that we are fully settled into living on this island and in this home. Though we occasionally toy with communal living projects involving friends, so far nothing has really made a lot of sense to us, and we aren’t the kind of people to move simply for the “upgrade” in house or yard (especially after installing a sauna, and a songwriting studio!) So we’re definitively here, coming up on six years and not planning to leave anytime soon (this week is not only the covid-aversary but also the anniversary of closing the paperwork on the purchase of this house).

The last few days have gone by in a bit of a blur of work and I don’t even know what else. I got some workouts in, ran a couple of times, made some dinners. My workouts have been pretty intense lately so I’ve been sore a lot. I hope that means I’m growing more muscle (I’m pretty sure it does since my muscle definition continues to increase). Brian and I continue to talk about small add-ons for the home gym, and even though we are talking about going back to the local fitness center once we are vaccinated, we both prefer working out in the garage most of the time (I love going barefoot, cranking the tunes, and having the equipment all to myself).

In my union life this week I took a bit step back from my 20-year role as a union shop steward and let folks know that I’m not taking on any new cases. There were a lot of factors in that decision. The main one of course is succession planning, as I’m not going to be around forever and I need to get folks trained up to take over in the next few years. Truth be told though, I’ve also been feeling a bit exhausted with it all lately – underappreciated (by members and managers who I troubleshoot a lot of problems for), overworked, and a bit cynical about the process. Rather than get bitter I realized that it was time for a change, a turn towards mentorship and the bigger picture which I will continue to fulfill through my role as local president over the next two years. I have a few cases left on my docket, but once those are finished (or transferred to someone else) I will have a lot of my attention freed up for other things.

And that’s the week plus some sewing and violin-playing time! I look forward to outdoor gatherings around a fire in the very near future now that the health orders have changed, and am crossing my fingers that whole-community vaccination comes to us sooner rather than later. If you are subscribed to Comfort for the Apocalypse you’ll hear more from me later this weekend.

Despite the fact I have a decent job, returning to it after a few days off is always a bit of drag. There are just so many other things I would rather be doing than my job! And yet I am grateful to have had the time off last week to do some of them – play music, write, go for runs and hikes, and so on. I even got in some snowshoeing at Mt. Washington.

This week has been all back to business though with a full and busy week of work. I am nearing the end of my months-long staffing processes and pretty soon nine people will have permanent positions on our team. My process was also used by several other government departments to staff their teams (which is sort of not cool because it’s considered poaching from my process, but on the other hand it means that about 15 people are getting indeterminate positions out of a single process and that is for the greater good). Next week I have to spend a couple of days wrapping up the paperwork and then I am officially done with that.

I’ve been working on learning French for the last month, related to some workplace discussions about managerial ability and how I am hampered in moving up by having almost no second language skills. I’m not sure if it will go anywhere (like to full-time French language training), but I have been having fun testing my terrible French and taking online lessons lately. According to my progress map, I am almost graduated from “Entry” level to “Beginner”. From what I can tell, I have already surpassed everything I learned in high school French, with the exception of some more advanced verb conjugation. Since it’s work-related learning I mostly fit it into my work day, though I sometimes do a bit of practice quizzing on weekends to keep up.

It’s starting to feel like spring around here as evidenced by two things – I always cut my carbs way back around this time of year, and I want to sew all the new clothes for the season! This year, my desire to sew is fueled by the fact that I had to retire a lot of clothing last summer due to changes in my body size and shape – and now I have a small and not-very-fun wardrobe. Even though the temperatures have not moved beyond winter, the appearance of intermittent sunshine (not to mention crocus, rhubarb, and garlic shoots) are a reminder that I will want some new seasonal clothes soon. I started sewing a linen a-line dress this week, to be followed by a pair of mid-weight cotton culottes, and then we will see what comes next. I’ve been in a real sewing slump for a few months, and it feels good to have my interest piqued again, even if it is hard to find the time to get it done!

Of course I’m writing lots, pleased to have a daily practice back again, and Comfort for the Apocalypse up and running again with some regularity. I would like to find the time to delve into some of my essay subjects with more thoroughness but I have a lot of interests (and work takes up a third of my day) so I feel held back by that. Musically, I am practicing quite a lot these days and working on some stuff for Brian’s new album. I have a composition in the works, but as I put time into it I’m starting to hate it. Instead of becoming shinier, it feels dull – but I suppose that is part of the process. Mostly I’m learning about writing music and how to use notation software and I’m in the time-consuming phase of trying to figure it all out. I hope that once I find a process that works for me, it won’t be quite as painful.

I’m feeling really ready for a shift in the seasons, not to mention the vaccine roll-out to take hold. As much as I’ve been grooving on the home gym these last few months, I could use a bit more fitness sociality in the form of in-person classes and lifting weights with others at least sometimes. I am also looking forward to slightly-warmer weather for running. This past week I didn’t get my runners on once, and a lot of that had to do with feeling chilled all the time. At least that’s been my excuse. Will try to hit the road again this weekend and get at least a few kilometers of run-time in. Am also looking for any early opportunities to get the kayak in the water – even just for a paddle in the neighbourhood. Restless might best describe my state of mind right now!

But another weekend does lie ahead and with it the promise of some lying in and reading time, not to mention a walk with one friend and a run with another – I’m not sure I’ve seen anyone off screen this week, come to think of it. (And speaking of quarantine… I just noted that a year ago today was the last time I set foot in Vancouver – how I miss my city and its food!)