I went to Vancouver again. Or rather, I’m here right now. Vancouver had fireworks to celebrate!
Category Archives: Life
The City Series
Begun on my cross-country flight(s) to St John’s a few weeks ago, I have been having fun with cityscapes on the phone. Goodness knows there are enough free photo apps available for the iPhone to satisfy my photo-editing needs.
Tweed Riding
Today was the second annual Victoria Tweed Ride.
We all got dressed up in our finest tweed etc. etc. and gathered on the lawn of the Empress before beginning our bicycle ride around town.
It was a gorgeous day.
Sunshine like that makes me happy.
One stop saw us spend some time at the Moss Street Market. It was the first time I’d been able to visit this year and it resulted in me having some magnificent Wicked Dilly Beans by the Food in Jars Canning Co. with my dinner this evening. Yum! I don’t know if I have tried anything pickled that I did not like.
After wandering through back streets and main roads, we made our way to Craigdarroch Castle for lunch and tea.
What a perfect day.
(Well, almost perfect. I broke my saucer as I got home. It is in five pieces so I may be able to glue it.)
Friday Photo
Photos of fog are difficult to capture. They seem to look better in black and white.
I haven’t said much about my trip to St John’s 2 weekends ago. Here is the St John’s bit…
It was the spring meeting of PWRDF youth council, the council for which I am BC/Yukon representative. Since it is a 14+ hour trip to get from this Island on the left coast to that Island on the right coast (and Oh did I ever complain about this a whole heap on twitter!), I went two days early to spend some time in St John’s before the meeting. I was last in St John’s when I was 11 years old and I couldn’t tell you if much has changed. I have some specific memories of St John’s: Signal Hill, Cape Spear, fog, and rain. I was able to experience them all again this trip.
We walked up Signal Hill on my first 
afternoon in St John’s, and proceeded to be nearly blown off of the top (unzipping my jacket and trying to fly may have helped). We were unable to see much of anything. There were many cannons up on the top of the Hill and I’m not sure how the cannon operators could have ever seen their targets for all the fog. The lady operating the gift shop inside of Cabot Tower was fairly surprised that we had walked up the hill. Really, it wasn’t too far, but it was very foggy. From the top, it was as if we were in a cloud with no view of the city whatsoever.
I was booked into a hostel right downtown, in the middle of a street of colourful houses, with the other BC/Yukon rep. We befriended another in the 4-bed room and the three of us wandered around, exclaiming at colourful houses, going into shops, and finally stopping for fish and chips and beer at one of the local hot-spots for fish and chips.
The next day saw us needing to head out to the conference site mid-afternoon. Oh what to do for a morning in St John’s? With Signal Hill down and an iceberg seen (but others, not me… but it was out of our reach for that day), what to do but steal/borrow a van and drive the very hill and foggy half-hour drive to Cape Spear.
Cape Spear. The Most! Easterly! Point! in Canada. (L: The rocks and waves and crashing waves at the Most! Easterly! Point! M: Me contemplating the rocks and waves and crashing waves in the fog at the Most! Easterly! Point! while Tessa takes pictures. R: DANGER!)
The conversation went something like this:
Gillian: If my Dad were here, he would say something like “You’re not really at the most easterly point unless you are touching the water off the end of those rocks.” Mind you, it would mean jumping the fence and climbing down slippery rocks in the fog. Oh look, a Danger sign!
Tessa: Remember that we are the only vehicle in the parking lot right now and you have the keys and we have no cell reception. Maybe don’t go. It would be a long walk and I don’t want to get stuck here.
Gillian: Its okay, that’s just what my Dad would say. I never actually listen.
The End.
Thursday: The Bicycle Edition
Now that I live downtown, I spend less time on my bicycle. However, I also find that I’m doing a little more in the way of “riding for fun”. Since I am mere minutes away from Dallas Road by bicycle, it has become more of a cycling destination for me than anywhere else ocean-side in Victoria (my previous closest ocean involved a heart-attack-inducing hill).
This weekend is the Tweed Ride in Victoria. What is that, you ask? Basically, we’re all going to cycle around town in our fancy tweeds, stopping here and there along route, including tea with fine china on the lawn of Craigdarroch Castle. I’ll update with outfits etc. after the ride.
In preparation, I spent last weekend doing a bit of a tune up on my bicycle, including a full clean, replacement of the handlebar tape – we’ve gone from obnoxiously bright blue to sleek metallic grey, and adding a shiny new bell. I had high hopes of a removable basket for the front, and even cycled to three different shops to check them out, but forgot to take into account that drop handlebars don’t do baskets very well/at all.
In unrelated-related events, I was going through some of my bookmarks and items “favourited” on Etsy this evening and have compiled some pictures of some fantastic things that should probably make their way onto my bicycle at some point!
So I already have this. It is fantastic, though I haven’t yet used it for a six-pack or a polo mallet. For the Tweed Ride, I plan to use it to hold my Beatrix Potter lunch box (who knew I still had that?!? Mum’s writing is on the inside with our phone number from Bleecker, so it has been around for awhile!) which will contain sustenance and my tea cup and saucer. Pretty fantastic invention, if you ask me!
By the same makers, there is 
the wine bottle version. I think this would be very handy for the next potluck bbq or birthday party I attend. Alas, one lovely thing from the Walnut Studio is probably enough. For now (they have a can holder as well! and lovely saddlebags, if I had a saddlebag holder). If I’m not careful, my accessories will soon be worth more than my bicycle!
I’m not too keen on the idea of having a rack on the back of my bicycle with large, unwieldy saddlebags. I swing my leg over the back and I could definitely see myself catching on one. Plus the weight. And it might look funny. Basically, I am very resistant to the idea of saddlebags. But these… oh my! They are lovely! And they come in different colours! I like how they fit right underneath of the seat, attached to its base, so that there is no 
way that I would find it annoying from the foot-swing-over point of view (though I could see myself getting annoyed at it hitting the back of my thigh if that was a possibility). They do, however, seem to be quite spacious and, while I couldn’t do my grocery shop into one of those, it would hold a one-person picnic and book. Really what more do I need on a lovely sunny day.
Just when I thought that I was sold on one of the above bags, I had to go and see this lovely beauty by the same maker. This looks like it is not only more spacious but would be more functional as an off-bike bag as well as on-bike. Unfortunately (or luckily, depending on your perspective), her shop is closed for a few months, so I will have to make do with admiring from a distance.
Lastly, because everything can’t be overly serious, there are the planters. Seriously, how could one not become attached to the idea of having small planters on the bicycle! It is like spring all year round!
But in all seriousness, I love my bicycle just the way it is and am pretty happy with how it rides and with the bits and pieces I currently have attached. It is just fun to dream! The weather is supposed be lovely in this part of the world for this upcoming weekend. I hope it is in your part as well, and that you get to head out for a walk, if not for a bicycle!
(Images from the linked websites)
Last Night There Was a Large Moon
My camera is not brilliant, but we sort of captured that “super moon”.
It may be Easter but it feels like Good Friday.
I’ve been AWOL. It wasn’t a planned blogging break, nor was it a complete social media break (though it was close to complete, the only place I have really been posting over the last couple of weeks has been on Instagram), but it was a break and it felt good to have it. This may be a little heavy for a “first day back”, but it feels like it wants to be written here and not just in my journal.
We may be several days into the season of Easter, but in many respects this last week feels a little more like it is still Good Friday or Holy Saturday. That knife was twisted even deeper last night as I sat through (because I didn’t really feel like participating in) a Celtic liturgy celebrating the resurrection. As I was expressing my frustration at that false-feeling sentiment, a friend gently reminded me that the bleakness of Good Friday is just as real as the hope and joy of Easter Sunday. It is true. But this has been a week of loss and so it feels more like Good Friday.
I’ve heard it said enough to be unclear on the actual origins of the words, “We are Easter people living in a Good Friday world”. That is clearer to me working at the shelter than anywhere else I have ever spent a good portion of my time: In the last three and a half months, we have experienced the death of five of our clients. One of those was yesterday. Really, we should be experiencing it more frequently and it is a testament to the hardiness of the human body and spirit that we do not experience more deaths amongst that incredibly vulnerable population.
**
It was inevitable.
It was an incredibly popular song when it first came out about 10 years ago and received a lot of airplay on pretty much every radio station on the planet. The lyrics are powerful and tell the story of the hope of someone who expects to experience the resurrection. Mum requested we use the song for a slideshow at her memorial service and I spent many hours at the computer with photos realizing that request.
On Monday I went to the memorial service of a client who has been with us for a long time. His family held a lovely service at a local funeral home and I went, almost by accident: I was the only one of us free to go at the time of his service. It is amazing how you can know someone for so many months in a very specific context and have no idea about the rest of their life. It is such a privilege to be allowed to peek inside the past lives of people and catch a glimpse of what life has been like. That can take many forms. On Monday, it took the form of a moving slideshow of his life, set to that song.
It was inevitable.
**
In my last year of my undergrad, I took a random collection of courses to fulfill all of the requirements I had not yet met. In my attempt to find something that both fit my schedule and seemed remotely interesting, I ended up in a philosophy of literature course. In the first days? weeks? of that course, I made friends with a Canadian/Swiss student who ended up also being involved in IVCF with me. We became good friends and she and her family even hosted Nat and I on our European Adventure in 2006.
Her mother had been sick for some time and my friend returned home to Switzerland once she finished her degree. I’ve missed our tea and knitting and haven’t stayed as in-contact as I would have liked to have been… though I could say that for many people and I certainly haven’t helped any in my multi-week withdrawal from the Internet.
On Good Friday, I awoke to an email saying that her mother had passed away that morning. Fitting day. But not, because losing a mother always sucks. In contrast to the lyrics of that song above, this time I can imagine what it is like for her and I would love to be able to have some more tea and offer a shoulder and a hug.
**
I feel the need to close this off by saying that I am okay and that there is no reason for alarm-filled emails to check on that. Really.
Whoa…
My very own podcast! Right here!
(This saves you the hassle of having to read my previous post.)
iPhoneography
If it wasn’t evident before, this page (yes, I only just got around to putting up the February page) makes it plainly clear that I have a new phone that takes incredible photos. All of these photos were shot and edited on my phone. It would probably be more accurate to just call it a pocket computer.
A Human Face
I had an interesting moment the other day.
I was sitting and talking with someone I’d never seen around work before and he was telling me his story so that I could help him to fill out a housing application for him. He talked about siblings, it seemed there were a lot. But one sister killed herself because of a degenerative disease. Another sibling has the same disease. And another sister “was got by Pickton”. That stopped me in my tracks, but he just continued on talking. It was the first time I’ve heard that said in a sentence by anyone that I have actually been speaking with. I am sure it is not the first person I’ve come across who has known someone affected by the serial killer operating on the Downtown East Side, but it was the first time I’ve actually heard someone say it out loud.
I remember when the trial was going on. I was visiting New Westminster and saw the crowds of reporters lining the steps of the courthouse.
The Missing Women’s Inquiry is going on right now in Vancouver. It is mired in controversy as interest groups drop out due to lack of funding and disillusionment with the inquiry.
But here, sitting in front of me, was a living and breathing person dramatically touched by that one person’s actions.
It brings a more human face to the whole thing.
gillian's island 