Day 12 Resolution- Experience

I just had an encounter with a man named Ryan. Right beforehand I was in a real funk, was told something that really stung, made me wonder if my life would change in a way I didn’t want it to. I began to fill my mind with stories which were not helpful. I knew I wanted to pull out of this way of being,it is too painful, too familiar. I set myself a game plan, go to Sidewinders Cafe, take my tools to doodle, to write, get tea, be with me, rest, find ease. As I walk in I smile at a man who passes. I find myself inside talking to him, he inquires about sharing my table. I say yes but quite curtly let him know I need to write, that this is my time to be with me.

Who am I kidding? We end up talking, going outside so he can have a smoke, I held his coffee, he asked me to. It seemed a little funny, too close, too soon, but I let that go, I was just holding his coffee after all, not meeting his mother! He told me I was kind, said “we like kind people better than assholes”. When I inquired about who “we” were thinking perhaps he meant “men”, he told me that it is just a habit, something that he started a little over 11 years ago, he refers to himself in the third person. I may have scoffed at this before, remembered the infamous Seinfeld episode where “Jimmy” refers to himself in the third person, where Jimmy is made out to be full of himself. I didn’t think of this though, not now. Not now that I understand better what a head injury does to a person.

Over a decade ago Ryan spent 6 weeks in a coma, he was never expected to live. His new friend, a boy he had met a week earlier didn’t survive the crash. Ryan was 18 at the time. He tells me about the sunny side of his situation, calls himself “semi retired”, speaks of the home that he will inherit since he still lives with his mother. The sadness seeps out though when he talks about the care worker who fell in love with him, and him her, how she left and how he doesn’t blame her, says he wouldn’t have stayed as long as she did. She lives in Toronto now, with someone new.

My funk, the words that stung, had a new perspective. Not so much that “things could be worse” or “there is always someone who has it worse than you!”, these two ideas don’t help me to honour my feelings and have me judging others situations as “worse”. More it was just experiencing the company of this man, my new friend Ryan. I was present and not living in the past thinking about the painful words of loved one, or in the future constructing how it may unfold. Nope, I was in neither place, I was just here, with Ryan, listening to the stories and ideas of another. I was practising my New Years resolution. To truly experience the moment, without stories from the past or future, as much as possible to just experience any given moment for what it is. Ryan helped me to remember this today, when cane in hand and nearly paralysed on his left side he had the courage to ask a beautiful womyn to share a table. He told me later that he knew his “stick” (meaning his cane) and his pretty face would win me over. I told him that I had learned from him, learned from the way he owned his glory. He laughed and said he had no idea what I was talking about but liked the way I spoke. It was a beautiful moment and I am proud to say I fully experienced it, and will continue to practice this for the rest of the year making it a life long habit.

“How fully do you experience life?” is the question in 12 days journal #274

Day 11 Community Support- Rocks!

Today I am cheating a little bit. Tomorrow is a very special day, for a number of reasons. This has me doing my current 12 days commitment a little differently. I will be passing out 2 journals tomorrow. To help you understand why, let me tell you a little story about a boy and a girl.

Nearly 17 years ago a very handsome boy met a very feisty girl. They had a lot of fun together. After about 3 1/2 years they were joined by a sweet baby girl. When this baby girls was 1 and a half the boy and the girl decided to get married. This happened in secret, beside a waterfall with only 3 witnesses, the baby girl was one of them. This was 11 years and 364 days ago. The boy and girl hid that they were married. Then a year to the day later they had a big party, with a white gown and a uniform and cake and flowers, all by the same waterfall.

The family of 3 then moved to a town called Slave Lake in northern Alberta, they didn’t like living there but they were in love and were best friends so having each other was enough. While living there another sweet baby girl was born in the couple’s living room. That night they all snuggled in bed, a lucky family of 4.

Some years later they moved to Pemberton, British Columbia. A beautiful little town in the mountains. The family was very happy about this, and very happy also that 3 months after moving there arrived ANOTHER sweet baby girl, born in their new living room. Now they were a family of 5.

Years passed, and things took a turn for the worse. The family was mostly happy but the boy, who was now a man, was sad a lot. He was having a hard time with all the sadness and pain he saw everyday in his job. The girl, who was now a womyn didn’t know how to make it all better. They still loved each other, but sometimes they wished they could have back the days when there was more fun and less pain.

The family moved again, this time to Nelson British Columbia, a place where the girl who had become a womyn had dreamed of living her whole life! The boy who had become a man moved there first while his family stayed behind to finish school. This was 1 year and 364 days ago. He didn’t like being in their new home alone, there was too much time to think about all that he had seen in his very violent job. He had been sick for a while, sick with a pain in his heart that was beginning to affect his head. Once his family moved to Nelson the womyn decided she had to leave for a while. She was quite angry at the loss of the fun loving boy she had married. She didn’t know what to do with his anger, didn’t know how to make life fun again. So she ran away for 2 weeks. She told her family she was going on a surf trip with a friend for a 40th birthday, but really she was going to yell at the ocean, ask God to make everything the way it use to be. When the womyn was away the man decided he couldn’t take it any more. He rode his mountain bike down a steep hill and ran into a big big rock. He wanted the pain to stop, he found a way to make that happen. The man broke his leg and hit his head. The womyn came home and was happy! This broken leg meant a break for the man from work, a chance to be away from death and unhappiness. Neither the man nor the womyn had any idea what troubled times lay ahead. The mans brain was injured in the crash. He was very angry all the time, he couldn’t think straight, he forgot things. He lost his sense of humour and didn’t laugh anymore. He was in constant pain and was irrational. The crash did not take away the pain in his heart, it made it worse, because now he was too confused to understand any of it. The womyn thought she should leave the man for good, take the kids and go. The man thought she was probably right. But the thing was they still loved each other. What were the man and womyn to do?

Well they struggled, and they fought, and they loved, and they cried, and they went on day after day. They learned to ask for help, and they got it too! Mostly from very unexpected places. The man saw some wonderful doctors and counsellors. He worked very very hard to heal the damage done, not only by the rock, but also the job where he wasn’t taken care of very well. He worked SO hard. The womyn worked hard too, to get him the support he needed and to tell his truth when the damage done to his brain and his heart meant he could not stand up for himself. They just kept on loving each other and supporting each other even when sometimes they made choices in their marriage that others did not understand, that was ok, because THEY understood. And so it is now 11 years and 365 days since this boy, who became a man and this girl, who became a womyn were married. Tomorrow they will go out for dinner at Fusion, a restaurant run by the most talented chef in all of Nelson. The womyn will take 12 days journal #44 with her and give it to the chef and owner Jamie. Inside will be the question “Can you think of a time when you stuck through something really difficult , and later were very happy you did?”. They will eat delicious food, prepared by a talented local, to celebrate their commitment to one another, through “better or worse”. She will drink wine while he drinks something fruity and fizzy, because he is committed to healing his mind and his soul and this means not drinking alcohol. She will get a little silly and flirty on her wine and he will think this is adorable, because even after 17 years she is still the most beautiful womyn in the world to him. I know this because the boy, who has worked very hard to become an absolutely amazing man, tells me, the girl, who is now very much a womyn, this very thing nearly every day.

Happy (almost) anniversary my sweet, loving, devoted husband. I love you with all of my being. Thank you for all the hard work you have done; In raising our children, in the work you did for the force, you were the most amazing member I EVER knew, and for all the work you have done to get better, including choosing that rock.


Taken 10 years and 364 days ago, when we were married the second time. Very few people know this wedding was a “fake”. Well until now!