Thank you.

A year ago today I was embarking on the most hungover 8 hour drive of my life. It had been a weekend to remember, Thanksgivings have a tendency of being like that the last few years. I had swam in Kootenay lake (freezing), ate very well, and caught up with friends. I closed the book on one part of my life and opened another, that thanksgiving weekend is in fact the reason why my favourite iPhone contact ends in a question mark. This year has been dramatically different. In fact I just finished my "Thanksgiving Feast": a bowl of pasta with a spicy homemade sauce, a bottle of (GF) beer, and episode of trash TV before hitting my tiny laptop running with projects and exams to get finished. But I have gotten used to my life being flung far and wide and those who mean the most to me, my family live scattered across more time zones than I would like to acknowledge. That being said, yesterday was a very un-Alberta thanksgiving Sunday, spent with my favourite tiny family on a boat in the sun and then with my surrogate family, those who have seen me at my worst and hopefully at my best as well, my classmates, in our ugly sweaters.  So tonight, being physically alone on Thanksgiving Monday isn't as unnerving as it might have been twelve months ago.

With all this what I am thankful for this year is mostly new and wonderfully exciting. I am thankful for all my new friends/MBA family, who I would not have survived the last year without. I am grateful for the Kerrigan sense of adventure which leaves us scattered across this country, and me on my way to Spain in 4 short days. I am grateful for the challenges of this past year that have proved to me, finally, that I can really do it all. I am grateful beyond words for skype, facetime, Facebook chat, email, and international texting plans and would be THE MOST grateful if flights we just a little (lot) cheaper. I am thankful for 10 hour power dates and long walks home from Gastown. I am grateful that Jay still works... please Volvo gods, keep up the good work. I am grateful for my 'old' friends who have stuck with me through this all. Most of all I am very thankful for all the opportunities just over the horizon. For jobs yet to be secured, for wintery moves, for new lives, for adventure.

Thank you.

Photo Credit: Teresa Edgar

Photo Credit: Peter Edgar

Photo Credit: Skye Lee

The light at the corner of Davie and Granville

I haven't been taking pictures as of late. I didn't notice until I was walking home from the grocery store today. There is a spot at the corner of Davie and Granville that if you look one direction it is all sunset and abyss over the bridge. If you look the opposite, it is urbanity then mountains. Of all the random, inconspicuous, non-beautiful places in the city this one is my favourite. The light is almost incomprehensible and as I stopped before crossing, I was vividly reminded I was missing something. The lens. The way in which i used to view my hold world. This must change. Tomorrow, and the days going forward, my camera comes with me everywhere. 

And just like that, it's Fall again

And just like that it's fall again. I've felt it seeping into my bones for a while now but today she made herself know to all. While some dread the end of the summer I am happy for the weather to cool down (I am a prairie girl of course) and for it to be the season for hot tea, cozy sweaters and high boots.

Fall and I have been trying to coordinate for a while but today as I FINALLY settled into school work and long hours at my little second hand desk she decided it was time too, filling the Vancouver sky with grey and rain and an unmistakable chill. For me this comes at the end of a summer that felt like a blur. Surgery, recovery, trips across the country to ease the distance and longing in my heart. New beginnings, new friends, long office days and short summer nights. Excitement and exhaustion. Fall is a welcome reprieve and one last go at this MBA program I am so very fond of!

Fall also means the begging of the end for all I've become used to over the last year and that's ok too, as it makes room for new beginnings and all that comes with growing up a little. But not too quickly as there are still wonderful adventures coming up like a little trip across the pond in October and 3 months of debauchery!

So with all this in mind I apologize to all you Vancouverites who mourn the end of the ever too short summer as I excitedly dig out my favorite fall clothes!

Too stubborn to ask

Holy smokes! Looks like writing = reading, thanks team for the little shot of love!

So to me feedback you hear once should be always taken with at least a grain of salt. Feedback you get repeatedly from a variety of sources probably holds a little more weight. When it comes from people who care about you... maybe take that a little more seriously. This has been my last few weeks. At first (until a few hours ago...ok less than that) I took it pretty hard. The last thing I want is for people to notice something is wrong, even worse is for them to worry. I guess I seem to fool myself into thinking I am good at covering up all the cracks and looking shiny on the outside but that facade can be hard to hold up and from time to time people see the gross, insecure, scared, or sad parts we all try to gloss over with bright smiles, quick laughter or what ever else seems to work at the time. I'm not going to lie, the last two years have been ones of constant change, big change. They encompass many of my highest highs and a few of my lowest lows. I've been the best version of myself and the worst. I feel it in  my bones though that the time for change is not over and I have two options, rise and take advantage of all that this great world has to offer me or, slip into what has held me back in the past. It is evident to those who know me best that I am struggling with this. It is good though for me to recognize that I can't hide it and that I have to take steps, ask for help, and play the bigger game.

So thank you kind friends and family for not letting me get away with shit. Thank you to holding me to something far greater than mediocrity and for challenging to strive for something far more than what I often expect of myself. I am sorry for being snappy or defensive when you offer suggestions or ask me to step up. But at the end of the day isn't that what everyone really wants? A moment or so to let go of the mask and to allow yourself to be known to others, fears and vulnerability included? As much as I live in dread that this will result in a very lonesome existence it always tends to work the opposite way, it seems that almost every time these sorts of conversations just turn into a deeper friendship, a greater bond. I think what I am trying to say is that I am really grateful. I am grateful that my friends and family have the courage and or good sense to help me when I am far too stubborn to ask.

Life as we know it.

Ok, here's the deal. I am going to write again and I am going to do it whether I like it or not. I am going to do it because it takes discipline and it is good for me and I love to do it and I have just been lazy and chicken shit as of late.

Life as we know it is strange for an MBA student as I am finding out, both the easy and hard way. Our program is a little exercise in Change Management, something that as a student of Organizational Behaviour I should be perhaps more competent and open to dealing with. This is not always the case. I am a creature of habit, habits that can include adventure, but habits none the less. After a long summer of learning and adapting and trying many new things and learning to see silver linings and opportunities I was ecstatic, giddy even, to be thrust back into student life. I longed for days of jeans and flannel and TOMS. Of 4 hr class days and late starts. Of Thursday night pub nights and Friday morning group meetings and the people... oh the people. I am blessed, as always, to be surrounded by smart, funny, kind, generous and very good looking people in this program and it makes going to campus and holding up in our little building very very easy. The funny thing is, and this happens every 4 months or so for us, everything is subtly different. We are changing gears, slowing down ever so slightly academically and shifting up for getting jobs, moving forward, moving on. We are gearing up for our "real lives".

The funny thing is I have never had this exercise in growing up before. I have lived a life where money and status had always come second to pursuing something that I felt passionately about, that I loved, places with cultures I embraced wholeheartedly and was desperate to be a part of, even at the cost of drastically lower wages than my friends were making. I had worked training teenagers to be leaders, shaping a region's hiring and training practices, inspiring those around me and demanding the same inspiration from them. I lived life where all my worldly possession fit in the back of a navy blue volvo station wagon. I lived with little or no savings in the bank and with a firm belief in pronoia . Things had always worked out in the past and I have always had faith that they would continue to do just that.

With this in mind, a value firmly rooted in my belief system, life as we know it has already started to change. Some classmates have already  moved on, flung far to other sides of the world for the last few months to pursue exchange programs. And we are left behind to finish off with a flourish. Talk has shifted from the spring. Our conversations are no longer so Vancouvercentric, so academically focused. "After Christmas" now drives our ambition.

For me it is a feeling of surrealism. Like almost everything is as it should be but there is something missing. I hear it in my voice, notice it in my subtle mannerisms. The honesty of it is evident. I am missing my best friend. It is hard to be in a place with out someone that carries so much weight of memory. As strange as it is the halls are fuller than they have been since we started. The class rooms packed with first years, our classes added to with faces we've only just met. It is strange and wonderful at the same time.

With all this in mind I am excited to pursue the next step. New classes, new friends, and life after school. I'll give you a little hint... I am heading to where I said I'd NEVER live. Truly a shift in life as we know it.

Maybe check this out too. It's pretty cool. If you like sweet tunes and maps and such.

Legacy.

It is hard to imagine the legacy you will leave when you are in it. Without hindsight it is next to impossible to understand the impact you have, how you will be remembered when you move on. The olympics always spark this idea in me. I believe that most athletes go into the games with the hopes of medals, personal bests, experiencing what it means to compete on the world stage. Few, I imagine, come into the games with the legacy in mind that they may leave beyond that. It might be years before Captain Sinclair truly understands the impact that she and other ladies will have on Canadian soccer. Memories of Bolt's epic victories will live on, remembered for games decades from now. Our 4x100 relay team leaves the legacy of sportsmanship, and the spark for the next group of young men to know they can compete with the fastest men on the planet. This is why we watch, not so much for the desire to know who won or lost, but for the stories, the impact, the greatness, the legacy.

It has been a year and half almost to the day that I stepped out of the life I thought would push me through my 20s. I was always aware of the legacy I wanted to leave when lululemon was no longer such a part of my life. When I left last February I thought that I had failed that legacy. That I had not lived up to what I had wanted to do there. Today I sat in the sun with 2 of my peers from my time there, two unbelievably talented and powerful women. They spoke to the legacy I left behind. A legacy that was still alive, still strong. Of young women who were taking on stores, who were still with the company, who were doing great things. This warmed my heart and re-instilled the understanding that everything we do can affect what we leave behind. That even when we think we have moved on, left, that our hard work, our good intentions live on.

Did I say too much, did I say enough

I would like to blame my restlessness and inability to find sleep on the fireworks lighting up the night sky hardly a kilometer from where I rest my head. I would like to blame it on the vivid colors I know are exploding over the water and the resulting pops that are almost like the thunderstorms of the praire only with the opposite effect. Sadly it is in part the feeling that I am beginning to recognize as normal. A hesitation that all the choices are the right ones, that the risk is worth it. That they are right. I brush it off during the day. More confident in my future, in my plans. More confident that playing big has paid off thus far and that not doing so has always left me feeling inauthentic and empty.

For some very human feeling the nights are harder, it's easier to question it all, harder to believe that all the pieces are going to fall in place. It's easier to feel alone in this city. Home feels farther away.

In certainty of a long day tomorrow and the uncertainty of " far down the line" I was thrown for a loop. I asked myself, Julia, do you want an adventure tonight or should you try to get some sleep? It seems, funny enough that I have picked neither. In part I believe it is the exhaustion of having to spend too many hours playing a part. I am energized by authenticity and drained by a lack of it. It is true, for those of you who don't know me, I will never be one who plays by all the rules. Tell me "what to do" and if your reason isn't good enough or there is no value in the process or practice for the sake of something good or beautiful, just in an end, I will likely smile, nod and go back to doing exactly what I was doing. It's not for disrespect but it is for a resistance and resilience against doing for the sake of single minded efficiency or streamlining. Sometimes the long way holds merit too.

My restlessness comes from more places than normal and that is it as well. I can't seem to find the calm I normally have. I am back to where I have been, craving more, chomping at the bit with little patience for the in between. It all is a little bit big these days. Life is on the brink of being "real" and for a girl raised on stretchy pants and fleeting crushes real life is both terrifying and spine tinglingly exciting. On one hand I am increasingly nervous I will never discover that niche in the world that is the centre of the venn diagram combining what I am great at, what I am passionate about, and what will pay the bills. I am also hesitant to put words down describing the aching fear that I will move across the country and failing to make a place there, come back west with tail between my legs to the place I started a little more than a year ago. On the other hand everything I've ever wanted is laid out before me, I just have to take the opportunities as just that and have faith that my luck has not run out, nor will it. I must stop thinking this could all be too good to be true.

I know there must be countless others, likely armchair dreamers like myself, who see their world in front of them and who are hesitant about the expectation that comes with taking that on. I'm not sure what little push shifts it into action I just know that sometimes writing it down makes the difference.