Introduction

In Wheatberries Coffee Shop, Sechelt BC, Canada, the following message is posted:

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy. The chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans:

that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too.

All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred.

A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no one could have dreamed would have come their way.”

Whatever you do, or dream you can,
begin it.

Boldness has genius

power and magic in it.

Begin it now.

                                          -Goethe

In the August of 2010, this message awakened a long dormant need for adventure within me. The seeds of a book were summoned forth and with them a move across the world to a new way of life and meaning of living.

As I read those words my heart began to beat faster, my breath held suspended in my chest and my ears filled with a chant that stays with me still:

Begin it. Begin it now. Now begin it!

Awareness 1.65: Flowing in the Current

A teaser from the writing project I'm working on:

As I was chatting with a friend today, the subject of Awareness came up. She told me a beautiful story that I would like to share.


Driving down the street, my friend stopped as a man ran out into the road. He took up both lanes of traffic in his frenzy, all the while racing around in circles looking skyward.

It took her a moment to realize that the man was chasing a runaway kite. Far above the beeping horns, speeding bikes and racing cars, he had his gaze set upon his prize.

It’s moments like this that we miss when we are focused on our own narrow plot. Lovely chance encounters with life that will easily pass by those who walk with their eyes to the pavement.

The movie consumes us. We begin in control; the creator, the designer, but quickly the plot becomes the director, shuffling us about rather unconsciously.

Awareness is the art of stepping into the current that is already flowing all around you.



I find it often serves the imagination to approach an idea through the wide open eyes of a child.

Picture a hot summer day. You and your friends have trekked to the local watering hole to swim and splash and cool down. A large inflatable inner tube rests across your shoulders. You lower it into the water. A lazy current threads past at your feet, calling to you with the silvery flicker of fish and a shimmer of pebbles beneath the surface.

You test the water. It’s warm and inviting.

You step into the tube, clutching the sides with both hands. You drink in the scent of sun-warmed rubber, fresh water and blue skies.

The current is friendly with whispered promises of adventures yet to be written.

With a smile across your lips, you wriggle yourself into the centre of the tube, take a deep breath and close your eyes.

Your feet lift off and the water pulls you smoothly into its flow.

This is what it is to be Aware: a gentle surrender into the flowing eddies of life.

Two Legs Are Better Than Six

Winter has come to Ubud. This is meant to be the dry and cool season, though you wouldn’t know it by stepping out your door. Maybe the cold wet season. Damp and moldy season. Season when bugs literally come out of the woodwork.

Due to the, I’m told, unseasonable rains we’ve been having lately, I’ve been experiencing more than my casual weekly encounters with the multi-legged beings with whom I share my home.

Usually when the sun is out in full strength, the daily heat keeps insects far from sight, burrowed into whichever hellish corners they prefer to abide. A sort of tentative agreement is struck between this temperate zone Canadian and the jungle natives: they stay where I can’t see them, I pretend they aren’t there, and no one gets hurt.

The recent turn of bad weather has tipped the balance. My can of multi-purpose Baygon bug spray stands at the ready, promising to kill or maim spider, mosquito, midgie or roach. I scour my room each time I return home, fingers anxiously poised on the trigger, shuffling boxes and clothes just waiting for a scuttle, a skitter, the smallest sign of insect life.

This is war.



Any Last Words?



Three cockroaches have met their fate in as many days. There was Jandle-geddon by the rubbish bins on Thursday when the enemy made a last moment attempt to storm the kitchen before being decimated by my flip flop. The battle of Meg vs Roach-Under-My-Sink on Friday, where a generous cloud of Baygon was employed to rouse the enemy from his foxhole behind my toiletry bins. Today, I returned home to find my foe boldly resting in plain sight, practically sneering at me from fractured eyes until my dust pan came crashing down to seal the victory in my favour.

But I know they’re out there. It’s an uneasy truce as I tuck into bed at night, my electric mosquito repellant dispenser plugged in beside my bed. They know I am momentarily subdued with the lights out, vulnerable in the dark where by nature they conduct the majority of their business.

On top of the issue of unwanted houseguests, my human friends and I are also battling the silent threat of mold. Many of our homes have been built in areas any first rate engineer would shake their head at. Beside rivers. Over rice fields. Nestled into hill sides below Balinese family compounds with questionable water drainage practices.



A soft white fuzz has begun to flower from the base of my walls. I have set in face covered, bowls of bleach and sponge in hand, only to return three days later to find that any ground gained has been reclaimed.



All of my personal possessions have taken on the musty odour of jungle living. A clean dress hung in the wardrobe for more than a week requires a rewash. My most recent purchase is a bamboo unit, where at least in the open air my folded clothes have the potential to extend their shelf life. My ceiling fan, blackened around the edges of its blades, spins guard every day, trying to keep the air circulating and the humidity of my room at a minimum.



One begins to long for the hot heavy days of months gone by, when clothes could be hung from lines in the sun to bake to a crisp in half an hour. When mattresses could be leaned against a house to air, and a good stiff breeze was all you needed to reclaim scarves and sarongs alike.

As I write, an uneasy peace has been temporarily negotiated. The rains have subsided. It’s 5:30am, a time when the house is usually given over to its night loving occupants. My bedside lamp stands guard as I type. For the moment, its artificial rays cast a glow of protection around me.



The floor is littered with bodies that did not survive the night. For various reasons, their insect lives have escaped them. A final fluttering of wings. A cessation of multiple creeping legs. Whether they met their fate in the fumes of my plug-in repellant, or became the half eaten snack of my beloved nesting geckos, their blood thirsty whine will shiver my spine no more.



For now, all is quiet.

But peace can’t last forever.



"The only problem with bumping into a cockroach on Friday, is the fact that you have no idea where it has been on Wednesday."









What did I learn?

The teacher had never liked my Down Dog. It had been a subject of much contention over the week I had spent in her 100hr Advanced Teacher Intensive. Too long. Heels too high. Not stable enough. Shoulders slouching. Jaw clenched. That day in her class, I made my way into a pose I had taken hundreds of times and waited for her to walk by me. I steeled myself against the coming critique and breathed deeply.


But the correction didn’t come. She didn’t pass by. She stopped. I waited. Then to my surprise, as all of the decisions I had made about this woman imploded around my ears, instead of a cue, the teacher kneeled down beside me and lowered her voice to a whisper, “Now that is a Down Dog I wouldn’t fuck with.”



When you take a yoga teacher training, veterans will often warn you that it may take months, even years, to sift through what you’ve taken in. An intensive 30 days or even a week require time and patience to slowly unpack. Even at this stage, almost seven months since my 100hr teacher’s intensive, I am only just beginning to see what I learned about yoga and myself in 8 short days.

Short days. Let’s be honest, they were long and hellish on levels I cannot even begin to describe. Grueling. Testing. Trying. Every single one without exception ended with me bursting into the family compound in tears, involving hours on the part of my dear friends to slowly piece me back together.

But not for a moment have I felt that those days were lacking in worth.

The hardest part of the training for me was that I was surrounded by tried and tested instructors who had earned their battle stripes in studios and workshops around the world. Many of the students who didn’t carry this merit badge had taken hundreds of hours of training more than I had. Those that did not fall into these two categories benefited from a pre-existing student relationship with the teacher. Immediately, this put me at the bottom of the pecking order I’ve come to realize is an insidious part of the yoga community. I felt like I was starting behind the eight ball.

The teacher I chose to take my 200hr training with a year ago on the west coast of Canada is a man whom I have come to love and respect for both his ability to teach and his broad knowledge of anatomy, yoga history and philosophy. His world view is classic Tantra at its finest: a compassionate non-dualistic perspective of the world that I very much honor and continue to deepen in my own life and practice. Plus, he has a sense of humor and plays a mean guitar.

Because he does not claim a singular tradition, but instead chooses to draw from many, his credibility was called into question in many situations during my week long intensive. I found myself stuck in the precarious position of defending a teacher I admire while trying to prove my own beliefs.

Differing philosophies aside, I appreciated the opportunity to dig deep into the reasons for what I claim to be true, and the chance to begin to defend them to my peers. It became good practice for being able to teach my own methods as a teacher to students who by the nature of their position will (and should) question me. In the end I am grateful for the debates, the challenges and the critiques of the foundation of my world view and teaching style.

It is not my desire to resolve the conflicts of that week in this essay. Many have evaporated in the months since the training as I have tried my ideas out in the arena of the classroom. As I become more confident in the seat of a teacher, I am able to chalk up disagreements about philosophies and teaching styles with my peers as part of the multi-coloured tapestry of the origins of our art. To the rest I can apply one simple phrase that my mother imparted to me the first week of kindergarten, “Meg, not everyone is going to like you.”

My desire here is to share what I learned. Allow me to preface by saying there are many things that I gained in the training, but the most important of these, the most helpful to me now seven months out, is the ability to communicate more clearly in the classroom.

Just as not a single one of my faith or practice beliefs were left off the discussion table, each over used phrase, flowery transition, and “ing” word were singled out before the class and called into question.

The most effective exercises with dialogue in the classroom involved the teachers using only 3 short cues to transition their student through various poses. I started to ask new questions of myself: did the cue help or hinder? Was the language necessary to convey what I wanted the student to do? Is it really important in parsvakonasana to ask a student to feel the light of the world shine forth from your heart to all the happy enlightened beings of the divine creation?

I learned that in an effort to make a class more artistically pleasing, teachers often confuse and muddle students, detracting from whatever experience might organically be developing on the mat. I have witnessed examples of this in studios time and time again since those 8 days, and find myself thinking how much that teacher could benefit from a week long intensive.

As I began to apply these distillation methods to my teaching post-training, I began to realize other truths as well.

For example, who am I to tell a student what they should or should not be feeling on a subtle level in a pose? If a student is entering into a space in agnistambhasana where they have suddenly realized they have a piriformis muscle and are communing with it on an intimate level, telling them to picture sunshine and lollipops while they go deep into their centre is going to make them feel as though they are missing the mark.

I have become more prone to give cues about anatomy than about philosophy, and to allow my students to have their own individual experience from that jumping off point. I think yoga instructors often run the risk of becoming like religious preachers to a captive audience.

My job is to teach them yoga.

My job is to not get in their way.

So every time I reach for a word that ends in “ing”, and choose a more direct cue instead I think of Denise. Whenever I take a moment to choose three words instead of 20 that might help a student struggling with a posture, I thank Denise. And each time I observe a student in a strong, individual expression of a pose that is in every way safe and effective, yet not exactly how I would do it, all I can think of are a few simple words that changed my practice forever, “I wouldn’t fuck with that Down Dog.”

Wahe, guru. Wahe.

Restorative Transformation

As a teacher a deep compassion arises in restorative yoga
    for the being in the body that is reclining there before you
    you begin to realize
    that their body is just like your own
            with aches and pains that plague it
            with trials and gains that aged it
                    threaded by victories and misses
                    stained by tears, peppered by kisses

A moment arises for the teacher
      where separation disappears
      it is now you reclining there on that mat
      it is your own self treating your body with care
            and it is this student
           who lays there at your feet
                   who transforms by the light of compassion
                   into your teacher

Where Palm Trees Make Way for Pines

Growing up in Padang Bai


I live in Bali.

Sometimes I forget that- like the way you forget that you have a spleen, or that a large percentage of the population has never watched Dirty Dancing.

Driving home from work, it will hit me- I’m looking at palm trees. It’s February and there’s no snow on the ground. That conversation I just had was in Bahasa.


It’s when I realize that the foreign has become familiar that it really sinks in. This country has taught me so many things about life that I now take entirely for granted. I’d like to share a few of my favourites.

Driving past a group of fierce looking local boys, hanging out in front of a local warung, I fully expect their faces to turn to me and break into a row of warm, flirtatious grins.

When I pass by an Ibu carrying 85ilbs of cement building blocks on top of her ancient head, I know that a smile, a nod and a softly spoken, “Sore, ‘Bu,” (“Afternoon, Mother,”) will be rewarded with a proud presentation of five perfect teeth.

I have learned to expect that a beep of my bike horn will not make a Bali dog get out of my way, but that barking wildly will make a pack scatter from the street.

That a laundry lady you can trust is worth her weight in gold.

That taxi drivers chorusing, “Taksi, taksi!”, who frequently annoy visitors, are often just lonely or curious and always appreciate a conversation as much as they do a paying customer.

That good quality alcohol is a luxury most of the world cannot afford, right up there with fine dark chocolate, cheese, and anything electronic beginning with an “I”.

That modifying an order at a restaurant is absolutely never worth the confusion that will ensue. Trust me on this. The craving you have for extra cheese might cost you an extra hour of your life.

But I have also learned that a people who were alien to me a year ago can quickly become neighbours.

That the passage of days bend and warp until you cannot recall a time when you lived in another place. That accents blur, memories fade, and it quickly becomes difficult to fathom a land where strangers faces don’t always bloom into smiles and where palm trees make way for pines.


A random happy face left behind on a coaster by the condensation on my water glass

Karma

I awoke to the sounds of our peaceful garden home in chaos. Julie and Honey were barking wildly, despite efforts to hush them. I arrived on the scene to find Murdi speaking with a pair of guests. In her outstretched hand was a puppy, soiled and scared. The couple had heard it crying out last night, trapped in a rice field ditch. They had taken pity on it, wrapped it in a towel, and nursed it through the night. In the light of day they didn't know what to do with the puppy and had, as we all do in a domestic crisis, called on Murdi.

Murdi cluck clucked and tried to comfort all involved. In one hand, the soiled towel, in the other this tiny scrap of life. Despite Murdi's soothing tone, I knew this kid had very little chance of seeing the sunset. This corner of the world is absolutely packed to the rafters with four legged threads of life barely tethered down. Our own complex feeds and cares for four dogs. A fifth mouth to feed? Unlikely.

An interesting background to this story is the Balinese view of dogs. They believe that these street urchins are people who didn't live well in their last life, (gamblers, drunks, wife-beaters) and have returned in a lower physical form to serve a sort of penance. They also believe that since these beggars munch on the ground offerings in the streets, which are made to the lower gods, that they are somehow in cahoots with those deities. A resounding strike two. It's a double-edged lesson in humility.

Because the Balinese believe these dogs were once their relations, they do tend to care for them more than other non-human forms- there is a definite effort not to hit them with a motor bike or car, most of the street dogs are fed and housed at night, and there is a general sense of compassion towards them for their lot in life, sort of like we would have for a convicted family member in prison.

But they also believe this is the soul's chance to make amends, to sort out unfinished business from the last trip around the sun.

All that is maternal in my nature took one look at this little monkey and began to quiver. There is a place in the centre of my chest that physically feels as though it's falling in in these moments of intense cluckiness. Murdi was heading off to consult Ketut on the matter and I stopped her, reaching out for one of the soiled packets in her hands.

A set of brown, intelligent eyes gazed up at me. The way Murdi had been holding the dog had convinced it that it wasn't long for this world. Now that it was snuggled in against my heart, hope began to wash across it's eyes. The skinny little stick of a tail began to wag hesitantly, then finally picked up speed.

The scrawny body was wet and bony. Weeping sores and gashes covered him where fur should be. I can only guess they were the tell tale signs of mange and lost battles. I've never seen a dog in that condition up close. The smell was one that people of privilege are unaccustomed to- death, decay, disease.

Murdi returned, “He very sick.”
I nodded, “Yah, I smell him.”
“I give him to Ketut. Maybe he help him.”

We shared a look. Ketut is a sensible, compassionate man who feeds as many mouths as he can. But another puppy would need a lot of special care and attention, not to mention the possibility of infecting the other dogs in the complex. Maybe one of the western animal shelters in town would take the puppy in. Maybe...there was nothing I could do. I felt powerless. Helpless. Like I had let those brown eyes down.






Julie, a lucky Bali dog







I handed the pup off to Murdi and walked back to my house to sort out my emotions. As I changed my stained t-shirt and showered off the feeling of chest cave and tears, I wondered about the theory of reincarnation, and the Balinese version of the story.

If I am to believe that life on this planet is all part of a bigger wheel where we slide up and down the spokes each time around in a body, who exactly is metering out the justice? Does this idea not taste of the same hell and heaven of which most westerners have at least a passing familiarity?

And then a thought crossed my mind that hasn't shaken free. Instead of contemplating karma as some universal slap on the wrist for bad behaviour, perhaps the key is to look at this place as a life school for advanced learning. As long as we're breathing, the potential for growth is there.

That pair of hopeful eyes and I each took in a few advanced placement lessons today. He learned in the arms of the guests who rescued him that the world wasn't an entirely shitty place. He saw in my teary blues that the world is absolutely full of tall two-legged bleeding hearts. And I learned that the idea of universal punishment doesn't sit well on a falling in chest.

If I ever see him again, I think I'll call him Karma.



http://www.facebook.com/balistreetdogs

The No Plan Plan

I arrived in Bali with a game plan that has long since blurred around the edges and vanished in the bright light of the sun. I was hell bent to get somewhere, be someone, do something of import.

As usual, this beautiful country took my carefully laid plans and laughed at them, it's deep rich belly laugh rolling in off the rice fields like thunder.

I spent the first weekend reuniting with my deeply missed friends, promising my mind that Monday I would begin to be productive. Come Monday, I woke up to find that my immune system had utterly checked out, leaving me with wave after wave of systemic symptoms and total exhaustion.

I lived a week of tending to my body, laying low and revisiting the practice of napping. My strength returned on the heels of the realization that Bali had done it again: completely shaken me free of all of my ideas and goals to leave me in a state of just being.


So here I sit. Totally at home in my little Lotus cottage, tapping away at my computer as the seasonal rains drum a familiar beat on the leafy green foliage of the garden.

A few prospective opportunities are nibbling away at the corners of the future in my mind, but all I know to be true is here and now in this moment. I am surrounded by people I love in a land that literally sings me to sleep each night. The mornings bring such a heavy hanging seeping surge of life that I'm drawn from my bed and into yoga, meditation, or the delicate art of just sitting, taking it all in.

I'm not too fussed about where I'm going or where I've been. I only know that in this moment I have found my bliss. All of those nagging questions are daily packing their bags and heading back to a western world where they make sense. They are foreign in this space, and like an old pair of faded jeans, don't quite fit me anymore.

Baby, I just ain't worried.
As my buddy Ryan says, “I'm on the No Plan Plan”.

Insufficient Words

Today is the birthday of a dear friend. My preferred method of honouring a loved on their day is to fill a pretty card with all of the words I can hope will convey how important and dear they are to me. My mother, for example, has boxes of such cards, from assorted special events, where I have attempted to distill my love for her in that moment.

It helps me to take stock of the depth of my gratitude for being able to relate with the fabulous human being at the centre of my focus, and it helps to communicate all of those feelings of love and appreciation that somehow get lost in the day to day.

But this friend stops me in my tracks. For the first time in my life, I have no words to describe how much she means to me. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. My hands cramp and refuse to produce verse. My heart gets too full to sing a pure song. I am left without any of the tools of communing that are familiar to me.

And how perfect, as that sort of sums up my relating with this woman.

She knocks me free from my moorings, shakes me loose from each and every one of my comfortable thoughts and habits. She sets the bar higher than I have ever been able to see, and then barely seems to notice when I fall far from it. She is always ready with a smile for me, a motherly word of advice, a friendly laugh. A simple cup of tea becomes a sacred space, a meal a special opportunity.

She will laugh and roll her eyes when she reads this, I am certain. I can just hear her saying, “Is that so?” but I feel it must be said. I feel I have to try.

I read a piece of Osho this morning that I think sheds more light on the tune of my heart than my own words are able. It's a quote from the Buddah:

“Do not ask me about the truth, about the divine, about nirvana, liberation. Do not ask me anything about such things. Just ask me how to reach there. I can show you the path, but I cannot give you the experience, not even in words.”

Don't ask me about Janny, about what it's like to sit with her, play with her, live within her garden walls. Don't ask me what it's like to know her through her children, to see how she loves her family and friends so completely. I can introduce her to you, but I cannot speak of these things with any quality. In order to know her, you must experience her friendship for yourself.

I am so delighted to share your day with you, Janny. Enjoy the shit out of every moment in that lovely shiny form of yours. May all of your days be today.

I love you.

Bali 2.0

Five Degrees

I am blessed to be part of a loving supportive family. Now, don't get me wrong, we go to great efforts to maintain that love and support. It's important to us. Last weekend I hung out in Whistler with my twelve of my close and extended family, raising toasts, breaking bread, catching up. It was such a loving time.

Back in White Rock, working at Saje Aromatherapy on West Beach, I have been trying to love my customers the same way. Every person that walks into the shop is, after all, some body's husband, wife, mother, daughter, father, brother, cousin, friend. But this is a difficult thing to wrap my head around, even though the theory is sound. How to look at a stranger and see family?

Yesterday I had the pleasure of introducing a new friend to yoga through healing massage. That may surprise some people: how is massage yoga?

Yoga is the practice of learning the language of our bodies

Ailments are our bodies way of asking us to please pay attention- something is out of sync. Nerves in the afflicted part of the body literally send a message to our brains asking for a diagnosis and solution. Yoga can help us to decipher these messages, and finally get back on common ground with our bodies.

As always after sharing yoga with another person, my own practice knows a revival. For the first time in weeks, I started my day with some simple moves to reintegrate my body and brain, and reintegrate and relax my muscles so that I could sit in meditation.

And this is what I learned:

1. With my hands placed palms together in front of my heart, I bowed my head to my own body, heart and consciousness and offered love, peace, compassion.

2. With my palms together, I extended my little fingers and thought of those family and friends in my immediate support circle. I offered them my love, peace and compassion.

3. With my palms together, I extended my little fingers and ring fingers and imagined the people who my people love, some of whom I have met, and offered them love, peace and compassion.

4. Palms pressed together, I extended my little, ring and middle fingers and offered love peace and compassion to the people my people's people love.

5. Palms pressed together, thumbs against my chest, fingers fanned out, I offered love peace and compassion to the people my people's people's people love :)

And I realized. Those customers in my store are only five people away from my inner circle.

Try to see the world that way today. I dare you.

Namaste,

Meg

"May The Forest Be With You"

The trees again have centred me. I return home relaxed, filled; Meg.

Why is it that people are moved to exhibit a silent reverence in a cathedral, but amongst trees they forget to listen?

Trees, in fact, are perfect mirrors; living reflective pools for the deepest places in your soul. A tree in it's silent being is able to draw voices forth from heart to teach and encourage you. To strengthen you. To remind you of who you were always meant to be.

If only you listen. If only, as one famous teacher once said, “You have ears to hear...”

They speak of majesty. Of being vulnerable enough to admit that you are small, mortal, finite. They teach that to know this weakness is to know true power. That in understanding your true state, you may be wholly fulfilled in it.

Strength.

Immortality.

Reverence.

Trees will draw forth what is most beautiful from your being, if only you pause and let them.

I do not walk often enough through the forest. When I do, I'm usually in a hurry to exercise my dog before I have to make it to the next appointment; the next job. The list for the day piles up. I bring my mobile phone with me in case anyone needs me while I'm walking. In case I am unable to face solitude that day.

When I come seeking, willing to find and be found, I am never disappointed. I always return home, my thirst quenched, my spirit overflowing.

So why do I forget?

Because the world around us in no way resembles a forest any longer. There is an absence of awe. A lack of reverence. Nothing is sacred. Humanity has become the highest rung of divinity. With science and religions formed by man we have lost our childlike wonder.

We no longer have “ears to hear”, and so the world becomes at once very loud and yet with nothing of value to say.

And we forget. We forget the murmurings of our ancestral places We forget our roots and the strength that comes from the deepest pools of our souls. We forget that silence is healing, and that only in knowing our own selves may we ever be able to help others.

Even now the trees wait. Quiet sentinels of our past, guarding truths that were once commonly accepted; eager to share. Eager to draw truth from you. They will wait until all of humanity is of an age again to listen. They will wait until again we search for awe.

Dear Winter

Dear Winter,

Today I tried, I really truly made an honest attempt to embrace your return to my life. The softly falling flakes are beautiful, thank you. My friends and family are all so pleased with the delightful gift of fresh tracks that you have presented this March. It was...unexpected, what with the Spring birds and the crocuses and all.

I had every intention of traveling up the gondola to play in your gift, I swear. I woke up early. I caffeinated. I even lovingly stroked my snowboard last night before bed and whispered all sorts of promises about the Sunday we would share together.

The truth is- I'm living a lie. I just don't love you like I did in December.

Remember December? When our season was young and all of the grand dreams and possibilities wrapped us in a euphoric state? December, when my first turns of the year were exciting and fresh, and I couldn't wait for all of the powder days ahead.

I'm sorry, Winter, I'm over you. I've moved on.

You see, while you were away for the last couple of weeks, Spring and I fell in love. I know it's hard to hear, but please, let me explain.

It started as a casual observation that I didn't need to shovel snow, or scrape ice from my car anymore. Then I realized that I didn't need to put on so many layers in the morning. Some days I didn't even need a coat!

Maybe Spring wouldn't have been so enticing if I didn't work outside, but I won't change for you, Winter.

I think what finally drove me from your mountain play lands was the first time I laid eyes on grass. So green and alive and glistening in the sunlight. I was instantly seduced, swept away by distant memories of long lazy days spent lounging on the dock at Alpha Lake; camping, hiking, riding my bicycle...

And it was hard when you left me, Winter. All of that confusion- would you return to me? Were you gone for the year? Would it be days before I saw you again? Weeks? Months? And then there was the terrible mess that you left. The slush. The half-frozen snot falling from the sky. I don't want to go through that again.

So it's over, Winter, at least for me, anyway. Maybe we can give it another try next November, when we've both had time to find ourselves; to analyze our shortcomings and really think about what we could bring to the table in a new season.

It's been real. It's been fun. It just ain't real fun anymore, darlin'.

I'll think of you when I put a thick coat of storage wax on the Arbor. A tear will come to my eye when I get frostbite reaching for a popcicle in the back of the freezer this Summer. I will look back at all of our pictures together with only fondness.

And hey- we'll always have December.

The Truth About Stars

I am living my perfect life. I have become everything that I so passionately wanted to become when I was eight years old. It is only now, laying beside my parents fireplace, curled around my dog, that I see it so clearly.

I am everything that I dreamed I might be. I am becoming this blooming mystery even to myself.

It makes me giggle.

I makes me laugh out-loud.

Last night I stood beneath the stars and twirled around trying to see them all at once. When it dawned on me I began to laugh. With my head thrown back I stood there twirling and I laughed with a heart full of joy at the stars. They twinkled merrily.

Stars love to have a good belly laugh.

(That is how planets are born, my dear one.)

I have, for years now, chosen to sleep beneath the stars. Because I live where it is cold or pissing rain eighty per cent of the year, often my stars are the fake plastic glowing ones stuck to my ceiling with tack.

No matter. The small pin pricks of light are eerily similar to their real living mentors. The mimicked glow stirs something in my heart. Whispered memories of the peace and the joy that stars call out of my soul fill my ears.

After throwing back my head and laughing with the stars, I crept inside to my teeny tiny room. Getting undressed in an unfamiliar house is always a little nerve racking for me. I feel vulnerable, a little scared.

Eight years old again

As I wrapped myself up in my familiar little bed, and curled around my familiar dog, I found myself grinning at an unfamiliar ceiling because of one tiny familiar little star.

You see, when I was packing up the room that has sheltered me for the last two years of my life, one little star was left behind on my duvet cover. Before I left, I went to gather my purse and there was the pointy green plastic star. I felt badly that she had been separated from her constellational family network, but I wasn't about to search through my car to find them. So she came to live in my purse.

After hitching a ride to my new temporary home, she also became the first to be welcomed to my tiny new bedroom. I promptly forgot in the stressful following hours that she had made her way to me at ail.

Until much later, when our grinning face found one another...

...and we threw back our heads and laughed.

The Peak to Peak

The first time I rode on the Peak to Peak, I felt like I had never been in a gondola before. Considering I've been snow sliding for twenty-six years, this is saying something. From the moment I stepped booted foot on board, I was hooked.

Not only does the gondola shorten the commute from Whistler Mountain to Blackcomb from nearly an hour to a mere fourteen minutes, but it opens up a whole new experience for our sightseeing and summer visitors.

In the summer months I was privy to seeing first hand what the good folks behind the Peak to Peak had in mind when installing this signature piece. Employed with the passenger train that travels into Whistler from the Rockies and Vancouver, I found that more than half of my guests had come just to see our new lift. Many of these visitors were only in town for three hours and they chose the ride on the Peak to Peak over any other activity.

The scenery is beyond breath taking. On a clear day the entire valley opens up to you, revealing her lakes, forests and other gems often hidden when you're exploring far below. At a vantage point of over 1400ft above the Fitzsimmons Creek you get an all access pass to a view that previously required wings.


There are many local stories that go along with the Peak to Peak, and most people I know can easily recount their first ride on the gondola. My favourite local story is of opening day, when three generations of one family rode together on the first car.

Access to the first car was a coveted position. People wrote in to Whistler Blackcomb and nominated individuals who they thought should be on that car, then from the names provided a lucky 28 were chosen. Of those, three were from the Huxtable family. In his nineties, Grandpa George, a well known local fixture, was accompanied by his son, Gord and his grandson, Ryder. Between the three of them their family have had roots in Whistler since the sixties. With the arrival of Ryder and his two sisters to the family clan, it looks as though those roots will only deepen and grow.

It makes me wonder about the conversation that Ryder might have with his own children on the Peak to Peak gondola some day. I wonder what he'll remember then about all of the fuss of the ribbon cutting and the photographs. I wonder if he will remember that his community was watching, hearts on their sleeves as he and twenty seven others rode the fourteen minutes into engineering history.

I am proud that people from all over the world have heard the rumors of our fabled gondola and come to experience it first hand. It is without a doubt a welcome wagon worthy of their journey.

First Snowfall

I was lucky enough this year to be home from my seasonal wanderings in time to catch the first flakes of snow drift into Whistler Village. In the month that lead up to this auspicious day, there had been a number of teasing snowfalls in the upper reaches of the mountains, but it wasn't until that beautiful October afternoon that we felt the white stuff on our faces outside our front doors.

After the first snowfall every year, the emotional climate of Whistler changes. The air becomes electrically charged with the collective current of excitement for the coming season. From that day on, whether it rains to the top or delivers a record breaking amount of powder, the mood of the Village has turned from mourning summer to waiting for Opening Day.

Opening Day, those magical words, is usually forecast far in advance leaving us salivating in anticipation. The most devoted of snow sport fans will already have their sliders of choice waxed and tuned to perfection, their boots waiting by the front door long before Day One.

Always beneath all of the planning is the hope for that “Early Season Start”- that precious gem that comes along once every few years, where Mother Nature delivers and the good folks at Intrawest decide to start up those chairlifts a week or two in advance of Opening Day.

There is a great deal of speculation every November- will it be Remembrance Day long weekend? Will we be making turns before our neighbours to the south are feasting on turkey? I do recall one blessed year where I was busily waxing and sharpening my gear late into the wee hours on November first because of a rumor that Whistler might open the next day. Standing in the lift line at seven-thirty the next morning, my devotion was rewarded with one of the first rides up the Gondola.

All of the new arrivals in our town are bursting with the energy of their First Whistler Season. Many of them have never seen snow before. You can tell them apart because they are the joyful people rolling around in the first three inches of the stuff while the rest of us more seasoned veterans look on. For the record, I don't believe it's a look of disapproval- it's just that we're deep in the memory of our own first Whistler snowfall.

And so, new comer and long time local alike, we join our hopes and hold our breaths, waiting for the grand start of the 2009/2010 winter season. Will this be the year that all of our previous snowfall records are blown out of the sky? Will this be the year that the park is, decidedly, in the best shape it's ever been? Will this be the year I finally get airborne and land a 360 switch?

The best part of the waiting is that everything is possible. This season has yet to be written. The collective hopes and dreams of the masses will carry it forward into life. All too soon we'll be sitting on a patio on the other side of April reveling in the memories.

I'll see you in the lift line on Opening Day.

My Best Day

I have been blessed with a lifetime's worth of perfect memories riding these mountains, but there is only one that stands out clear and deep like a track you've had to hike to earn. My memory is of the day Debbie Clifton “Danced”.

I once side lined as a Snowboard Instructor on Whistler Mountain. I had many students through the seasons, but Debs is unforgettable. It's not that her feet were born knowing how to turn, this young lady's secret was 100% great attitude. She wanted to snowboard.

What followed were days of riding side by side and on-mountain bonding. As we grew closer, we started to share more personal conversations and I discovered something about my new friend that shattered me. Debbie was living with Cystic Fibrosis.

“C.F.” is a genetic disease that is most famous for attacking the lungs. Eventually the disease wins and the lungs stop working. Debs explained that to gain the lung capacity to ride each day she had an exhausting two hour routine of physio therapy and treatments to preform.

All so that she could do something I often take for granted.

Inspired, I decided to teach Debs something I had never had the courage to share with another student: The Philosophy of “The Dance”.

“The Dance” is what results when the rhythm of your turns and the energy of the mountain merge into one fluid motion. You find that you are no longer conscious of your body. From your toes to your fingertips your fear melts away.

It's awesome.

I took a few chairlift sessions and attempted to explain The Dance to my young grasshopper. Debs grew quiet as I spoke. I was certain that I had scared her with my new age mumblings and quickly changed the subject.

The next afternoon as we made our way down a run, I darted ahead to watch Debs so that I could give her a few pointers on technique. And then, around the corner above me she appeared, turns linked, in total control of her board, her movements fluid, her face relaxed into a huge grin.

My Debs was Dancing.

Pride oozed from me. I was witnessing a new sureness, a Debs-only style of The Dance. We laughed. I cried. I bragged about her all week to anyone that would listen. I brag about her still.

Debs and I kept in touch for a time, but I'm sorry to say that eventually we lost contact. That's a risk you take living in a resort town. The people you love often slip away. I was left with a few photos, a handful of brilliant memories and a renewed appreciation for both the paradise I live in and the sport I love. Her gift to me was My Best Day.

Wherever Debs is now, I hope she is winning her fight. I think of her every time the cold air fills my lungs and my feet strike up The Dance.

Guarenteed: by Eddie Vedder

On bended knee is no way to be free
Lifting up an empty cup I ask silently
That all my destinations will accept the one that's me
So I can breathe

Circles they grow and they swallow people whole
Half their lives they say goodnight to wives they'll never know
Got a mind full of questions and a teacher in my soul
And so it goes

Don't come closer or I'll have to go
Owning me like gravity are places that pull
If ever there was someone to keep me at home
It would be you

Everyone I come across in cages they bought
They think of me and my wandering but I'm never what they thought
Got my indignation but I'm pure in all my thoughts
I'm alive

Wind in my hair I feel part of everywhere
Underneath my being is a road that disappeared
Late at night I hear the trees they're singing with the dead
Overhead

Leave it to me as I find a way to be
Consider me a satellite forever orbiting
I knew all the rules but the rules did not know me
Guaranteed

Merci Beaucoup

"...start sharing: whatsoever you have, share it. Share your beauty, share your song, share your life..." -Osho

My dear Marjolaine. The First Frenchie I Ever Loved. Watching you in the context of the home you have built has been such a joy for me. Every now and then I catch a glimpse of you, talking with your friends and loved ones in one of your three languages and I am filled with happiness.

I always remembered you as a strong, beautiful woman with intelligent ideas and interesting points of view. You taught me so much- how to make guacamole, how to swear in french, how to find a smile when there was very little in my sight to smile about.

You were always so patient with me, always so kind. You opened to me a whole new world of thought, of love, of life. My passionate hippie, my Quebecois beauty. I have always felt so honored to be your friend.

When I travelled to Montreal, you were there, too, teaching me your culture, helping me with your language. You protected me like a mother and loved me like a sister, never making me feel like I was a burden to you.

Over the years in between we both have climbed a few mountains. Our feet are blistered with the long walk we each have taken. It amazes me how similar our stories are, and yet how utterly different, too. Through your eyes I have seen a new grace for my mistakes, and I hope beyond hope that I have helped you to do the same.

As always, your generous hospitality and your light spirit have washed me and warmed me while I have lived in your tropical home. I am amazed by the beautiful bamboo creations that your fingers have spun. But everything is made beautiful by your touch. The bracelets that you make, all of the furniture and paintings and lovely lamp shades of your home. Your friendships. Your loves. All is touched and made better by your presence.

And I am so very happy that you are so very happy. That you are in love with a very good man who is so obviously in love with you. That you have such a beautiful home that you have helped to build. That there are people who care for you and enjoy you around your table, and that you may be the welcome to multitudes of weary travellers who come through your door.

You are walking a life fulfilled, and it is a testament to listening to the heart and following your own spirit. I am blessed to be a witness, and I am grateful that you call me friend.

Oct 21st- Christina

Each morning of my stay at this beautiful hotel begins a ritual which I dread. I am a creature that awakes, rubs her eyes, and is instantly starving. I like to have breakfast immediately. Often before I shower. Usually before coffee. In fact, coffee is more like a breakfast dessert to me. On an empty stomach it becomes an enemy to the general peace I try to maintain in my digestive system. Especially since I prefer it black.

There exists one tiny hindrance to achieving this goal here at the hotel Eldorado. I don't speak Spanish. And the breakfast cook doesn't speak English.

The breakfast area also serves as the bar in the evenings. Three rows of bar stools are set up around three sides of the bar and cooking area, facing into the centre. This is the hallowed ground where the lovely Christina cooks the lightest crepes, the fluffiest huevos, the most divine omelets. It is into this haven of delicious smells that the guests call out their requests for breakfast.

This is also where my coffee is hidden.

It is a testament to my love of coffee that I have been able to learn the words “cafe” (coffee) and “negro” (black). If you mix these with “gracias” and the early morning perfunctory “MUCHOS gracias”, you almost have conversation.

But food is difficult. One technique is to find the solo menu and sit expectantly with it in front of me, waiting for Christina to notice. Then I will point shyly at the item I want to order, and she will try not to roll her eyes. Christina is a saint. She is a wonderfully patient woman.

Once, I saw Christina reach for a container of plain yogurt (“nature”- I deduced that this meant “natural”, or plain) and I was so excited! At home, this is what I eat. I really am not fond of sweetened, flavoured yogurts. It's akin to having ice cream for breakfast. Just at the last minute, before the beautiful pure yogurt was added to my bowl, she lovingly dished some out into a separate vessel, and carefully stirred in maple syrup to sweeten it. Oh well. Christina was so pleased when she placed my meal in front of me. “muchos bueno, mi amiga,” I smiled shyly. “De nali,” she replied, confident that she had prepared it to my liking.

After the first five mornings of employing my menu technique, we ran out of yogurt. Or fruit. I'm still not sure which it was. Christina was trying to explain to me the trouble, and I had no idea what she was saying. It was very frustrating for both of us. She tried shaking the granola bag followed by a string of Spanish. Yes. Granola was not the problem. That's about as far as we got that morning, and I drank three cups of coffee and waited longingly for lunch.

When the stocks of yogurt and fruit and granola were replenished, I started to get embarrassed about always pointing at the same thing on the menu. Now, this is silly, I know, because the technique was working just fine, but I somehow got it in to my head that to point at the same thing every day was somehow retarded. So I began to say “same” and grin wildly, and then Christina would reply “same!” and laugh, and then I would laugh, “same, same!” and we both would laugh. It was a genuine moment. We were bonding! The boundaries of language were veritably falling away! I could have cried with joy.

Two days later we ran out of fruit. This time Marjo and Oli were there to walk me through asking for two crepes (which quickly became three as I could not resist their light airy yumminess). This is why I do not order crepes. “I should have two,” becomes, “I will not be satisfied until I've polished off seven.”

I chose to have them with fresh squeezed limes and a light sprinkling of sugar. Instead of attempting to ask for all of this, I scurried around inside the bar, trying to keep out of Christina's way, gathering a small lime, a knife, a spoon for my sugar, and securing a refill of coffee at the same time.

Meg: 1, Language Barrier: 0!

I was half way through the absolute heaven of my first citrusy crepe when I realized I was being watched. I looked up, and my eyes met with the liquid brown pools that are Christina's eyes. She was shocked. Or horrified? I settled on amused and shrugged sheepishly, offering a crepey grin, “moo-ey bueno!”

She laughed (thank you, God, she laughed!) and began tidying her workspace, shaking her head at this crazy gringo that eats the same thing every day, and then has LIME JUICE on her crepes instead of syrup like regular folk.

It is now my last week here at the Hotel Eldorado. I still have not learned any Spanish, but Christina has learned that, “fruit, yogurt and granola?” means the breakfast I am always so grateful to receive. She giggles at me, and busily chops three kinds of fresh fruit, sprinkled with a lovely granola containing tiny yogurt bits and tops the whole thing off with a small container of the yogurt of the day. Today it is strawberry.

I am not sure how it became so important to me that Christina likes me, that I not offend her, but this desire was almost instantaneous. Maybe it's because she is pretty in that somewhat exotic way with her lovely caramel skin and chocolate eyes. Perhaps it's because she speaks fluent Spanish, and I feel like an ass already, coming to her country so linguistically ill-equipped. Maybe it's because she is the keeper of my morning eats, and it is best not to bite the hand of the one that feeds you.

Maybe it's just because she's cool, and I would like her to be my friend.

Whatever the reason, I am grateful for her gracious smiles, for my morning bowl of yummy food, for my daily pot of cafe negro. And this bar stool with a view of the crashing surf, surrounded by the laughter of my friends, has become my favourite restaurant on earth.