11Nov / 2011

The Dark Days

In the early days of having two kids, I wondered how it would ever be possible to leave the house.

You know who else needs It Gets Better videos? Parents of newborns. (It does, I promise.) – @jkottke

And it did. After the shellshock of “holy shit, there are two of them!” the summer of 2011 turned into the Greatest Summer Ever. Our days were spent in playgrounds and spray parks, on trails and beaches. While the baby slept in the Ergo carrier, the toddler would sprint ahead wearing himself out for gloriously easy bedtimes. We visited weekday Farmers Markets, coming home with bags full of fresh produce. Painted faces (always Spider-Man) were destroyed by popsicle mess. I’ve never had so many freckles in my life.

September was hot, and the spray parks stayed open past Labour Day. We went blackberry picking and I canned six different types of jam.

Suddenly, October arrived and kicked me squarely in the ass. Everyone got sick. While the sleepless nights never went away, they became longer and more difficult. I was totally exhausted and resembled a slightly less gruesome walking dead. The baby dropped a few naps, and the 3-year-old didn’t nap at all. The house descended into chaos. I dramatically despaired. Kraft dinner.

Well, except the moral of the story is, y’know, it isn’t really that bad. Yes, Vancouver skies often look like muddy dishwater at this time of year, but I think I like to play along with it a little.

A few days ago, I started the morning thinking “I’m going to make it a good day”. Guess what guys? Positive thinking actually worked! By taking it under my own control, it was.

Transitioning to the indoor mindset for dark, wet days requires a little bit more creative thinking – “going to the playground” is so simple – but a prolonged game of Mr. Beaver’s Workshop can be great fun, if you just go with it. It turns out I love nonsensical slapstick improv, which is perfect when playing with a three-year-old.

I also have two large bags of Salt Spring French Roast in the cupboard.

(Contemplation of the Dark Days was inspired by Clara Anne. She rocks. Also #NaBloPoMo? I’m Po’ing Blos as much as I can this Mo. Kidlet drama and no sleep has worn me out.)

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07Nov / 2011

Inked – Take Two

On seeing the title of my last post (“Inked”) my sister sent me a message saying she thought it was about tattoos. She must have thought I’d bitten the bullet. As she well knows, this is something I’ve been thinking about for years and years. I’m definitely inching closer to acting on it.

I’ve always wanted a tattoo, but have never been able to commit to anything. I’m ok with that. I’m glad that when I was 17 and more likely to act on my frequent impulses, I went for piercings and fabulous hair colours. I really don’t listen to the Sisters of Mercy enough these days to warrant a tattoo on my bicep. I accept I’m impulsive and changeable by nature, so I’m really forcing myself to move very slowly.

I know where I am going to get my first tattoo – on my foot, and most likely at Electro Ladylux in Vancouver. Getting tattooed on the foot is supposed to be particularly uncomfortable, but I figure I have given birth twice so it can’t be that bad. Right?

Not long ago, I sent an email to my little sis’ suggesting we get inked together. For some reason she wasn’t willing to shell up the $2,000 air fare to fly from Sheffield to Vancouver, so we could bond. Unbelievable. My own blood!

The image is a fuzzy pixely mess in my head right now, and until it undergoes a cerebral de-blurring action it’ll stay there. Once it reveals itself, I will undergo the six-month “are you sure?” cooling down period. If all goes well, in 2030 I’ll be the 50 year-old sitting in the lobby of the tattoo parlour. Maybe they will have some kind of painless image to skin transfer technology by then.

At that point, my boys will be teenagers and will probably have been inked with something they’ll eventually regret but are really excited about and love dearly. I’m sure they will be very, very embarrassed by my mid-life crisis.

Maybe I should just go for it. I mean, I can always just stick on a pair of socks, right?

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06Nov / 2011

Inked

Oh boy. Day three of NaBloPoMo and I’m already looking at the prompts.

Today’s prompt!

When you are writing, do you prefer to use a pen or a computer?

Other than for hastily scrawling a phone number or making a shopping list, I rarely use a pen. I fear that in a few years I may totally lose the ability to write. Case in point – writing two dozen Christmas cards to my family back in Ireland left me with a painful ache in my hand for days. My ‘writing muscle’ (scientific name) has seen so little pen action since I graduated from university that it has practically atrophied.

I dislike the permanency of ink, and erasers never leave the page as pristine as before. I can’t ⌘f a piece of physical paper. Paper takes up space. The ‘font size’ isn’t fixed and – horror of horrors – should I be using unlined paper I can never quite get the line spacing even.

I have memories of spending a weekend in second year (grade 7) carefully re-copying 30 pages of my history notebook with a new pen so it looked totally uniform. It still wasn’t quite right. So, as much as I love beautiful moleskine notebooks, mine remain empty. I think its the possibility that attracts me to these notebooks, not the content.

(As reach the end of this post, I’m thinking I need to let go of a few things and I, er, potentially have a few control issues. Thanks, NaBloPoMo*!)

*NaBloPoMo – exercise in blogging or the name of a new preschooler TV show? Brought to you by the makers of Waybuloo!

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05Nov / 2011

The Outside

A mixture of croup, non-specific plague and bad weather has meant that we have been confined to the apartment for at least a week now. With a 9-month-old and an active 3-year-old, this is not a Good Thing.

Today, we finally made it outside and it was the perfect, crisp autumn day. We are fortunate to live close to many trails and parks, and we’ve been making the most of them during my maternity leave. It was a beautiful walk. I may have briefly used my iPhone GPS, when I was concerned about the way my 3-year-old was leading us. The “TRAIL IS CLOSED” sign was particularly appealing to him.

I’ll try and forget the inelegant and frantic wrestling of the preschooler into the car, and think of how he told me, with great awe, that we were “deep in 100 Acre Wood”.

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04Nov / 2011

In Which I Give it My Best Shot.

This morning, when I was feeling significantly more awake, even a little chipper, I thought it would be a fantastic idea to get involved in the National Blog Post Month (NaBloPoMo). It’s after ~~9pm~~ ~~10pm~~ 11pm now, and I’m feeling much less enthusiastic. Today was filled with flu shots, snot, barking coughs and getting stuck in horrendous traffic. I honked twice, which led me to call into question my newly acquired Canadian citizenship.

With a gin in hand, I’ll push on. I think NaBloPoMo is an important exercise. I have a lot of half-formed thoughts which, thanks to the chaos of motherhood, are left hanging. (Not unlike my only other post, wherein I talk about my love for the Vancouver Canucks and how exciting it was that fans don’t riot. A post that warranted a follow-up, if there ever was one.)

I have had many homes on the web in the last decade, and the Internet Archive is an unforgiving place. Here is my bio from a decade ago.

CATRIONA… is 21 years old. Lives in Belfast in Ireland but wants to get out of there as soon as possible and start over in Vancouver. Studies Law and works in a small library. Is indecisive, contradictory, hotheaded, generous and excitable. Is madly in love with a certain someone and doesn’t know what she would do without his level-headedness. Has an addiction for converse and skinny tees. Loves her NES and SNES. Likes to take bad photos. Reads an awful amount and buys too many books. Needs a new TV. Lives for Indie-pop, shibuya, synthpop and electropop. Watches lots of foreign films. Likes to make things and shop in thrift stores.

I was very proud of the PHP includes on this site. A quick review reveals that the posts were mainly about being stressed about exams, or updating about not updating. It was all very sincere.

Admittedly, I still only wear converse but the “tees” aren’t on the skinny side anymore (whatevs). I think my iTunes playlist stagnated around about this time. I don’t like to take bad photos. I like to take good photos! I don’t though, and mostly take Instagram shots of my kids. Or my manky shoes…

They always fall apart in the same place, and yet I keep buying them.

Evidently, today is a day where I don’t have much to blog about, but I’ll keep at it. When I moved to Vancouver in 2006, one of the first things I did was attend the Northern Voice blogging conference.

Northern Voice 2006 - Discovering the Blogger Behind the Blog (Photo by KK+)

Despite leaving the conference buzzing with ideas and inspiration, I developed a case of stage fright and stopped blogging altogether. A conference fee well spent. If I can make 30 posts in the next 30 days, I think I can call myself a blogger again. I’ll give it my best shot.

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30Apr / 2011

We Are All… #Canucks

When my husband and I first visited Vancouver in January 2002 – a scouting trip with a view to moving there in the next few years – we enthusiastically picked up tickets to a Canucks game. Ice hockey had recently arrived in our hometown of Belfast in the form of the Belfast Giants. We had been to a few games, and it was truly exciting experience. The Giants had just won the Superleague, and all without rioting and fighting amongst the fans after the games! Fighting on the ice was just a bonus.

The Canucks were playing the Oilers the night we first saw them. I was truly moved by the gusto with which the drunk fans beside us in the nosebleed seats sang “O, Canada”. I didn’t know the words back then, so I stood there awkwardly while the rowdies saluted and solemnly put their hands on their hearts. The team were on a 6-game winning streak and the atmosphere, intensity and speed of the game made me leave the arena buzzing. The overpriced beers may also have been a contributing factor. I had no idea what offside or icing was, and my husband had to explain power plays, but I remember simply thinking “Hockey is awesome! YEAH!!!”

Since moving here in 2006, I have been to about seven games. The cost, sold-out games and organising babysitting make it difficult to get to more than a couple a season, which is a shame.

I’m not sure where I am going with this, except to say it is so exciting to live in a city where a huge number of people are behind the local team. I love seeing the car flags a-flapping. I love when people ask “So how about those Canucks, eh?”. I love the drunk fellas at Rogers Arena shouting “Woohoo! A Canucks baby!!” as a heavily pregnant me waddled out of the Detroit game.

Maybe it is because I am from Northern Ireland, and wearing a team shirt is often viewed as a political statement that can land you a chasing and/or beating as opposed to a gentle ribbing (Blackhawk fans excepted). Maybe, just maybe, I’m a big dork.

2010-2011 has been an amazing season for the Canucks, and I’m very glad to have been along for the ride. I did miss watching one game this season as I was in labour. Just before my son was born my husband helpfully informed me we were losing to Colorado. What timing!

Yes, we may be on the verge of embarrassing ourselves horribly in the first round of the Playoffs – the last few games against Chicago have been on the “look away!!!” scale of cringeworthiness – but I will always have those wonderful memories of the regular season in which we kicked major arse.

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Exact Fare Only

The Dark Days

Inked – Take Two

Inked

The Outside

In Which I Give it My Best Shot.

We Are All… #Canucks

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