2020 was an absolute circus, but I thrived with a lot of help from my friends

 

As I look forward to the New Year of 2021, I need to reflect on what will soon be the Old Year (and thank F, aimiright?!?).  

I started 2020 newly single and subsequently about to leave the country, funemployed, and living under someone else's stairs Harry Potter style, minus the magic wand.  That's completely untrue - single Sheri DEFINITELY had a magic wand whose powers dimmed the lights for the entire subdivision while in use.  

Leaving the country for nearly two months certainly aided in the process of getting over a boy.  I embraced the balm of space and time and let equatorial sunsets, ocean waves, new travel buds, and the best damn cousin in the whole world distract me from mourning my old life and moving towards one whose shape I could not yet see.  That act, that conscious decision, to let the people that loved me to care for me cemented some feelings of place and security in the town I now think of as home.  

I've been reflecting on home and place and belonging in a landscape for a while now.  No breakthroughs or deep realizations, but a strong confirmation that community matters A LOT to me.  Community as a synonym for town, sure, but more intimately as a collection of people that care for and take care of each other.  

Turns out I'm a social introvert that NEEDS human interaction and touch.  Having physical contact in the forms of hugs from friends and regular massage taken away for months was gruelling and when I felt the loneliest and lowest this year.  Touch, and not even in a sexual sense, is near impossible to replicate and something I find so soothing and comforting.  

Community takes many forms for many people - book clubs, sports teams, coworkers, housemates, family, many besties.  My community, my network, my support is multiple sports teams and clubs, a gaggle of diverse girlfriends, a cousin bestie on speed dial, and coworkers I deeply trust and respect.  It took time and effort to build this for myself in Dawson Creek, but the love, support, and returns I've received have been deeply nourishing in what should have been an isolating and lonely year. 

I strongly credit the role physical activity and conscious exercise played towards positive mental health this past year.  Frequent power walks around town for groceries, dog walks, errands, or just simply to leave the house and get out of my head.  Leisurely bike rides around Dawson Creek's gravel and paved side roads.  Hiking the trails around Tumbler Ridge  At-home weights and HIIT videos that I did "together" with my friend across town.  Swimming.  New sports of curling and cross country skiing.  As an athlete, I know how to care for my physical body, so that's what I comfortingly returned to and simply hoped my emotional and mental health would follow.  It mostly worked.  Most of the time.  

So while 2020 was not what or where I thought it would be, I am still pretty damn proud of a handful of accomplishments: 

• Bought my first place
  
  
• Solo two-night backpacking trip in Jasper
  
  
• Received RPF designation
  
  
• Recerted NL

  

My star of 2020 - Millie. How single people without pets in this pandemic year made it remains a great mystery to me.  She ensured I never slept in, let me hold her as I wept for times past and uncertainty ahead, and is stellar company. 

So, even as I am finishing this year much as I did last - no husband, no job and no f-ing kids - it's in a much better state and headspace. 

I hope 2021 sees you enveloped in community and love - whatever, and whomever, and where ever that means to you! 

Foster cat update

Rarely am I involved in meeting adoption candidates for our foster animals.  Friday I had the pleasure of delivering Ella, a black beauty of a kitten, to good friends in Chetwynd.  They were looking for a companion for their male Pomerian and the male of the couple has always had cats around.  I did not hesitate for a second to recommend them as new owners to On Our Way Home's President.  

From the update I've received, she's settling well into her furever home and getting along with the dog while providing the humans hours of entertainment.  I'm glad she'll be close and we can monitor her maturing.  

Millie and Ella snuggling/battling

Millie and Ella again doing top kitty priorities

Carl joined us the same night we dropped off Ella.  Freshly neutered, he was still a bit dopey and sleepy from the drugs, so we set him up in the basement for a healing, restful night before introducing him to the house and Millie.  She's kind of a bully!  It takes her two to three days to welcome a kitten in and then they're fighting and chasing and having a grand kitty time.  She's still hissing at Carl.  They seemed to have worked out some sort of truce and he'll only be with us until we leave for holidays next Monday.  

Isn't he handsome?!?  I swear there's a storyteller trapped in his body as he's very vocal. 

Carl chilling in the sunshine

This handsome boy loves to snuggle and purrs like a chainsaw

2013 highs and holidays lows

Winter is reserved for dreamtime in several aboriginal cultures around the world.  A time of reflection, rebuilding, contemplation, planning, cleansing.  As 2014 looms on the horizon for the western world, I, too, am meditating on this past calendar year.

Along with my boyfriend, cousin and friends I hadn't met yet, I journey to the Great Continent after my usual months of Canadian employment.  Stunning diving; sunrises over sand dunes; terrifying car hires or, more specifically passing; seeing amazing creatures rumoured to be and actually in decline from poaching and habitat encroachment; coming face to face with the aftermath and rebuilding efforts of South Africa's apartheid; hilarious hostel mates all awaited.

A proposal to move in with my sweetie came while we were in Johannesburg.  I immediately dismissed it.  I reconsidered after my girlfriend that I usually rent from announced she was selling her house.  Mostly in cohabitation bliss, I was keen to add animals to the mix.  Every other week I was dog sitting, feeding cats or checking on fish but I wanted some critters actually in the house.

Enter: On Our Way Home Animal Rescue.  Within two days of expressing interest in fostering, we had two fraidy cats in the basement hiding in the walls, drawers and under the sofa.  They went to a barn where I hope they're chasing mice and snuggling together.  Two kittens (adopted quickly) and another adult female cat (that we'll likely keep) followed.

It has been my favourite volunteer gig.  There's always the 'isn't it hard to give them away when they're adopted?' question from others outside the Rescue.  Naw, I'm pumped that they're desexed and rehomed to loving and worthy owners.  It's also heartbreaking as hell when parvo rips through a foster's home and puppies die.  Despite the setbacks, it has been very rewarding to be a part of this great organization and watch its influence grow.

A few slow starts and underemployment marked this past summer and I finally had the time to take the Level 3 first aid course.  A rewarding and challenging two-week course that currently has me examining options on the way to paramedic.  Sitting on a construction project from Dawson Creek to Chetwynd reading my weight in novels every two week shift has been the reward.  And a fist full of cashola.

Dan and I recently returned from a great holiday that covered off Victoria and Calgary.  I am consistently blown away by the love within and generosity of his family.  I genuinely attempted to make it to Red Deer but Alberta in the winter still has tricks up her sleeve and our bus was turned around when the highway was closed due to REALLY scary conditions.

Bummed I wouldn't get to spend more time with my mother but also pleased I didn't have to watch my brother treat my mother SO poorly, I see it was a mixed blessing.  How much of Kevin's awfulness is brain injury and how much is him truly being an acewipe I do not know.

More cousin visits and playing pictionary into the night instead.

I have two favourite aunties.  One of them kindly and immediately opened her doors in Calgary when Dan and I were not able to make it to Red Deer.  Her father has been doing poorly for years and he finally passed in to the next world to join his wife.  I didn't know him well but truly I felt the joy and release of his ailing, tired and shell of a physical body.

So, thanks 2013 for new places and faces.

2014, Here's to health, fitness, travel, family, friends, job insecurity and animal rescue!

I haven't seen this month in a while

Normally countries and countries and countries removed from Canada at this point in the calendar, my body is rebelling at the temperatures, shortening photoperiod and difficulty of cultivating even window box herbs.  I repeatedly resemble a sleeping bag whenever I venture beyond centrally heated buildings or warmed vehicles.

Last week, as temperatures dipped in the mid thirties on the minus side accompanied by teeth-shattering north winds, I repeatedly questioned "What the F am I still doing here?"  Mercifully I was spared from working in it as I was on my scheduled week off and snuggled under most of the blankets in the house wearing at minimum four sweaters with a cat furnace somewhere in the mix.

Maybe Dan has a firmer hold on my heart than I have outwardly acknowledged.  Perhaps it's that the foster kitties continue to be SO freakin cute!  Or I am pumped to be meaningfully involved in the community as a volunteer, book club joiner, yoga doer, lady who lunches, member of the Chetwynd Outdoors Society and small business advocate.  All of the above in combination, sure.  I may be dreaming of warmer climes to come, but for now, I'm enjoying tea parties and hot meals with friends while gaining some first aid experience.

Well, kinda.  Nobody has needed my services yet.  It's still very puzzling to me that the job I am hired to do/requirement I am to fill I have yet to actually do.  

Visitors

Currently relocated to Dawson Creek for newly found work as a First Aid Attendant on a BC Hydro construction project, I was over the moon when Dan and the current kitties visited last night.  True, I have only been here a week, but a week away from where I'd rather be none the less.

Work days have been slow and the crew has not given me any business (good) I gave myself a goal of finishing one novel every two days.  A few town days and training sessions and I'm still on track.  Yan Martel's Beatrice and Virgil - spooky, twisted ending; Rajaa Alsanwa's Girls of Riyadh that points out the common threads of women everywhere; and Paul Theroux's latest and rumoured last travel memoir The Last Train to Zona Verde: My Ultimate African Safari - a brilliant first hand account of western Africa travel - are on their way back to Chetwynd's library.

When the temperature plunged to -29 with a windchill of -36 I earlier this week, I undoubtedly confronted Theroux's driving question: What am I doing here?

Taking advantage of a bigger center's Arts Scene, I was pleased to drop in on a great acoustic session by Winnipeg's Chris Carmichael.  Dawson Creek's Art Gallery hosts concerts throughout the year and Carmichael visited on Tuesday. Among the sparse audience numbering fewer than a dozen, his original rock, alt/country, blues, surf blues and cover songs were a welcome break from hanging out in my fancy, furnished apartment yearning for my friends and family elsewhere.

Wilma, new foster kitten

Wilma joins us from a busy foster home in Fort St. John where there were three dogs and another cat.  In our comparatively quiet home, her and Millie are now mostly friends.  Mostly.

When not duking it out in the Kitty Battledome, they`re parkouring off the furniture and wrestling on top of our sleeping bodies.

They`re both total cuties and we`re still on the fence as to whether we`ll keep Millie or not.  Luckily we`ve been able to postpone that decision as no one has shown any interest in adopting her.

At the prompting of a well-connected woman, who is quickly becoming a favourite friend in Chetwynd, I attended a volunteer orientation at one of the primary schools at lunch.

Car free and usually care free, I debated the  merits of walking or cycling in a developing northern snow storm.

Both would get me out of the house. Pro.  I could get there faster cycling and read a novel longer.  Pro.  I was going to a school and they would have a bike rack.  HUGE Pro.  A book club mate and the inviter to the event had recently dislocated her shoulder from a cycling fall - on dry pavement - hmmm, possible con.

I cycled there.  It was chilly.  I felt hardcore.  The wind blew snow into my exposed face both ways.  Con, con, con.

There was delicious carrot soup waiting when I arrived at the school and two fun kitties when I returned home. Pro.  

Millie and Mabel photos

There's rumours brewing Mabel (Surerus) is being adopted on Thanksgiving weekend.  I snapped a few photos before we send her on her way to her furever home.

When we received Mabel (our name), she was barely off a bottle and in to wet and dry foods.  Now she's easily doubled in size and Millie has accepted her as a playmate and snuggle buddy.  I think Millie will miss her kitty girlfriend more than Dan and I will.

Dan and Mabel shortly after we agreed to foster her

Millie found Dan's headband

Mabel after morning kitty cuddle time

Wow weekend!

This past weekend has been one of those rare ones where I see the majority of my friends in Chetwynd, rest up and recharge for the week ahead and have a clean(er) house.

Another girlfriend has left town for a promising work opportunity and she called together her town friends and coworkers from the last two years for one last bash on Friday.  Pub-filling laughter bounced off the wooded walls before we spilled into the Indian summer night and wished each other well with intentions of staying in touch.

Happy and (mildy) hungover the next morning, Dan and I set out on bicycles to meet friends for breakfast at the pub we had left mere hours before.  In small-town style, we saw nearly all our friends that morning.  At the post office, thrift store, library, in their yard, ahh.

Mild house and yard work filled the time until we popped out to friends house outside town for dinner.  A stellar meal was in the making - roast moose and garden spuds, carrots, onion.

We resigned ourselves to a sleepover, made arrangements for a friend to come to the house and feed our foster kitties when another friend dropped in after (unsuccessfully) hunting the same animal we had just eaten.  Conversation flowed, laughter filled the vaulted ceilings and we bummed a ride back into town for the night.

A delightfully leisurely day followed with light walks, board games, BBQs and kitty cuddle time.  

Millie Vanillie

Millie Vanillie is our newest foster cat from On Our Way Home Animal Rescue.  She's a black and white short hair kitten (three to five months?) and has been with us for just a half week.  She's a total cutie pot pie that likes window sills, snuggles, hunt-the-feet-in-the-bed game.  Millie is off for her spay surgery on the 25th and she'll be available for adoption a week later.  

Chetwynd is a long way to come for cake

Spring, with a smattering of summer has finally arrived in the Peace!  Apple trees, dandelions and lilacs are flowering in town while prairie crocuses have already gone to seed in the bush as false saloman's seal and strawberries are getting their fragrant white flowers out.

BBQ season is in full swing with at least one invite rolling in per week from various friends around town.  Yesterday afternoon Caity and I sat on the deck under a sunny sky, drink in hand and caught up on the week we hadn't spent together.

Janice, the once-mother cat, will not be carrying on her reproducing ways as she was spayed on Friday.  That means our cutie kitty pot pies will be available for adoption this Friday to a loving furever home.  Will I miss them?  Absolutely.  Will I be pumped to see them come into their full kitty selves as indoor/outdoor cats together?  Even more so!

Our first couchsurfer, Yoko, from Japan was a hoot!  We popped around to the local pub, Murray's, for an early lunch  yesterday and as our sever's special table of her shift, she bought us a piece of chocolate cake for his long-distance visit.  His valiant attempts at English, a delightful tea ceremony with procedures resembling Communion preparations and keen attitude for anything Canadian, Alaskan or First Nations made for a delightful weekend.  

Work is hum bumming along.  I'm waiting for the first hatch of mozzies to start their annual assault but have otherwise been occupied ID-ing juvenile plants, classifying streams, planting lease sites (Seriously! I thought I'd hung those bags up!) cranking out nest surveys and logging some brain-numbing hours in the office reading manuals.  

It's weird being "The Local" on the crews.  It's true this is my fifth summer in Chetrock, but I by no means consider myself part of the permanent residential population here.  A plus of "local" status: I don't have to live in the company house.  

Back on the Alberta front, my extended family is taking turns visiting my brother in the Foothills Hospital after he rolled his truck two weeks ago.  From the updates, he has good and bad days where confusion runs rampant as his brain is attempting to slot info, data, sensory while also healing itself.  I'm beyond immediately worrying about him and much more concerned about how my mother is coping and processing it all.  

A trooper through and through, her state of mind and health are compromised and she openly confesses she is sleeping poorly and I fear that the responsibility of caring for him post-hospital (admittedly a long way off) is more than she can carry alone.  

Blessed beyond belief with a caring Calgary Crew composed of friends and family and a rocking group at her work, Mom says she is getting the support and breaks she needs while gardening and her kitties keep her distracted when she's not in Calgary.  

Kevin's given us substance abuse scares in the past and wonder of wonders he only injured himself with this most recent one.  

Kitten update

After a hopeful false start than one more kitten was moving and being tended to, Mama Janice has moved one of her kittens away from two now-confirmed dead kittens in the drawer.  Dan and I are planning a kitty cremation this evening in the backyard to send them to Kitty Heaven where ample yarn balls and laser pointers have already greeted them. 

They's multiplying!

"Eeeep, eeepp," greeted me this morning as I went downstairs to check on the kittens and open the door to their basement lair.  Thoroughly confused, I went farther into the downstairs sitting room to a sad sight.  Two kittens, unmoving and cold on the floor.  Looking further, I found Kitty Hendrix had a kitten attached to her.

Alyssa at the Rescue Society thought she was taking in two four/five-month-old kittens and had no idea one was pregnant.  More wet food, plenty of available water, she advised as she assured me that Mama would look after her new kitten and I had zero role to play.   

Foster kitty photos

The Lions are progressing!  Leda, pictured on the left, comes out to play laser and take treats.  (S)he continues to be vocal day and night and was even exploring upstairs this morning!  Kitty Hendrix, on the right, responds to catnip, does mild exploring downstairs and otherwise continues to be a skilled hider and champion scaredy cat.  

Animal fostering, maiden voyage

Unable to commit to long-term pet ownership, I signed Dan and I up for the next best thing: fostering.  Between being "dumped" or surrendered or crowded shelters, fostering is meant to be a transition for the animals into their eventual "forever home."

The lag between expressing interest to Chetwynd's local rescue group, On Our Way Home Animal Rescue, and receiving two kitten was merely nine days!  

Chetwynd-based and serving British Columbia's Peace region, they're committed to rescuing, rehabilitating and re-homing abandoned and abused animals to the homes they deserve.  Anti-euthanization, this dedicated group has several cats and dogs in foster care available for adoption.  

Our own two black with white long-haired cats (collectively named the Licorice Lions with individual names still to present themselves) will be ready to go a week after their spay and neuter surgeries on the 17 April.  

Only two nights in, they're still adapting to their indoor lifestyle (it's thought that they were outdoor feral cats previously) and are skilled hiders.  Preferred spaces so far: dresser drawers, a tiny space between the stairs and the wall and behind the sofa.  

We're taking baby steps with them.  The door to their basement lair is now open during the day time while one of us is home, their food is creeping slowly up the stairs to encourage interaction, we visit and chat to them adjacent to their hiding places nearly hourly when home and are initiating contact.  

I will post photos of these cute kitties in the basement when they pop out long enough to snap a non-blurry photo.  

To view available animals for adoption, to donate, inquire about fostering or other volunteer opportunities, visit their website or facebook group page.  

Things I'll Miss

Edmonton has been home for the last seven years. On an off, between summer jobs, international travels and post-secondary education. I doubt I will ever live here again full-time. In no particular order are things and more importantly people I will dearly miss.

Concerts with my girlfriends Chelsy, Jillian, Jen, Krystal

Getting fresh with Orion at Blues and Newcastle.

Aquasizing with Melinda

Winning the furnace war with Sarah

Jennie's paintings

Harassing Hank

Holy Trinity

Visits to Jillian and Kurtis' dominated by babies and beer

Wednesday Wings with friends old and new

O'Connors Sunday sesh

Things I'll Miss

Edmonton has been home for the last seven years. On an off, between summer jobs, international travels and post-secondary education. I doubt I will ever live here again full-time. In no particular order are things and more importantly people I will dearly miss.

Concerts with my girlfriends Chelsy, Jillian, Jen, Krystal

Getting fresh with Orion at Blues and Newcastle.

Aquasizing with Melinda

Winning the furnace war with Sarah

Jennie's paintings

Harassing Hank

Holy Trinity

Visits to Jillian and Kurtis' dominated by babies and beer

Wednesday Wings with friends old and new

O'Connors Sunday sesh