A year and a half before I was born… The way that I love was illegal. In most parts of the world. Loving like me was considered a mental health disorder. It was illegal for people like me to hold hands or kiss their partner in public. Bars didn’t serve people who love, or look,… Continue reading pride: til then, we walk
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lost in the right direction
The surgeon, who for some reason felt the need to tell me she was originally from Kentucky, leaned down as I lay on the operating table in a pretty comfortable stupor and asked: “Do you make a habit of holding things inside?” “ I do,” I said. “ I’m the master of being okay. Especially… Continue reading lost in the right direction
the journey really begins
"Your creativity is a life force within you. You make jewellery for people's minds." I'm a meaning maker. I use my reality as fuel. I tell the stories that seem to demand to be told. I spend a lot of time negotiating my relationship with the spirit that inhabits me, that wants to write. We… Continue reading the journey really begins
coming to life
I’m thinking about the way that life can be so slippery; the way a 12-year-old girl looking into the mirror to count freckles reaches out toward herself and that reflection turns into that of a woman on her wedding day, righting her veil. And how, when that woman blinks, she reopens her eyes to see… Continue reading coming to life
my mother’s shoes
From May 2019. Last Thursday morning I gave a talk to staff about my “leadership journey”. HR asked me to do it nearly a year ago when they were planning this year’s course catalogue and I’d given a hasty yes, thinking I had a whole year to figure out what to say. And then I… Continue reading my mother’s shoes
thank you, i love you, i’m sorry, i forgive you
From March 2019. This shit always happens to me at night. I wear her jewellery, her sweaters, her pajamas, her socks, her slippers. I’ve decided there is one sweater I’m just never going to wash so that it always smells like her. At night sometimes, I silently sift through photographs and the recipe cards written… Continue reading thank you, i love you, i’m sorry, i forgive you
embrace life
From February 2019. Embrace Life. This is the sign that came tonight. A day after I shared with a fellow at work who just lost his best friend to suicide that the best way I’ve found, so far, to cope positively is to cultivate the things I miss about her within myself. To take what… Continue reading embrace life
love letters from my mother
From February 2019. “I’m not afraid to die,” she said. “You’re not? That’s good to know. It actually makes me feel so much better to know that.” “No, I’m not. I know that everyone has to die sometime,” she said, as she sat wilting on the living room couch just seven or eight Saturdays ago.… Continue reading love letters from my mother
there is life before death
From January 2019. A thought stabs up, ripping through me. It's really going to happen. I've never pretended that my mother wasn't going to die from this. From cancer. From creation gone wild. But it's closer now than I ever imagined it being. Funny how you can know something for so long and still not… Continue reading there is life before death
after a long dance with life
From January 2019. My mother has the most beautiful handwriting. A beautiful signature. All my life it has been one of her hallmarks. It is not lost on me that the last thing she will ever sign — a Do Not Resuscitate order — hangs on their fridge now. Just in case. Three days ago… Continue reading after a long dance with life
MeaningMaker 