Category Archives: On Being Me

Happy Father’s Day to My Dad

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Here is something I published for my Dad in 2008. I think it is still relevant and I shall cheat a bit and post it again.

Happy Father’s Day Dad. See you next week!!

XO

J

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It’s a little late in coming today, I know. AND I have absolutely no excuse. None what-so-ever (that the blog entry is late). But here it is…a blog entry for my Dad.

Boating down Miles Canyon

And now, I am just going to take this moment to tell the world I love my Dad. We had our ups and downs and for awhile in the late 1990s, and we weren’t talking. But we figured it out. And we are talking now. And we actually have a pretty good relationship. He’s a real person. That’s what I like so much about my Dad. He’s real. He doesn’t pretend to be someone he’s not. He doesn’t apologize for who he is. He just is.

One summer when I was home for my parent’s 40th wedding anniversary, we were talking about what (and maybe who) people believe in. And he stood at the kitchen counter and looked over at me and said: “Jennie. Know what I believe in?”

He motioned outside at Golden Horn Mountain. “I believe in those rocks.”

He motioned out another window, “I believe in those trees.”

He motioned out to the back yard, “I believe in your mother’s garden.”

That’s one of my favourite quotes from my Dad. “I believe in those rocks. I believe in those trees. I believe in your mother’s garden.”

Dad and me

I think his quote means that his beliefs are more tangible than most. He believes in what he knows exists. He knows that the mountain will be there tomorrow. It’s going to be a mountain tomorrow, standing as tall and firm and as steadfast as it’s ever been. He isn’t expecting that the mountain will be anything more than a mountain tomorrow. And the mountain is not expecting him to be anything more than he is today. Can you have a more healthy relationship?

The same with the trees. Respect the trees and they will respect you.

My mother’s garden. Now. I know how much they both work on my mother’s garden–so I don’t just think that the garden just belongs to my Mum. As much as they attend to and nourish that garden, it nourishes and attends to them back. In the brief growing season in the Yukon, they will harvest enough vegetables to get them through the summer and a good part of the winter.

So here’s what my Dad has taught me:

Believe in what you know exists. Believe in yourself. Know where your roots are and what you believe in. Be firm, strong, and steadfast in your beliefs. Don’t pretend to be somebody you’re not and don’t apologize for who you are. Have respect for others but don’t forget to respect yourself. And, give as much as you want to receive.

Oh. And laugh hard along the way.

Laugh hard the way

Click here for all the blog entries about my Dad.

25 random things about me

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From the meme thing going on in Facebook. Once you have been tagged, write a note with 25 random things about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. Tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you it’s because I want to know more about you. (To do this, go to “Notes” under tabs on your profile page, paste these instructions in the body of the note, type your 25 random things, tag 25 people (in the right hand corner of the app then click publish..)

(FRIEND in Yellowknife, I would tag you in Facebook, but you are not there and prefer to remain known simply as THE FRIEND. You can join another one of my friends (Ludovic in Switzerland) who are members of the secret and private “I-am-not-a-member-of-Facebook” club.) Still, you can write your 25 things and send them along. I’ll publish them here–if you want me to.

With no further adieu: here are 25 random things about me:

  1. I am messy, but absolutely HATE  living in my mess. I get tired of my mess every so often (but not often enough) and clean it up.
  2. I spill things all the time. ALL over the place. I trip going upstairs.
  3. And even though I’m a messy person in the physical world, I’m hyper organized in the virtual world. I  blame GOOGLE for my lack of physical filing habits.
  4. I love radio3.cbc.ca. I love Indie music and discovering new music to add to my music collection. The airwaves in the States are pretty stagnant. Filled with bubblegum pop and no texture.
  5. I love the This American Life program produced by Ira Glass. I dream of meeting Ira Glass in person one day and having a cup of tea with him in my kitchen (his wife is invited too of course).
  6. I get loud, obnoxious hiccups if I drink pop, but not if I drink carbonated water.
  7. I grew up at Mile 906.8 Alaska Highway, Whitehorse, Yukon. 15 kms from nowhere.
  8. I am passionate about technology and the internet. It sometimes consumes me. And teaching others about how it works consumes me. I am grateful for the entire notion of blogging.
  9. I want to create and produce stories at the same caliber of This America Life, and The Vinyl Cafe.
  10. I have never visited New York City.
  11. I twiddle my hair. I used to have long hair and twiddle incessantly, but I have shorter hair now. I twiddle less. It still drives people crazy.
  12. I would like to stop doing so many things and stand still for awhile.
  13. When I was a kid, we had a dog we’d named Dr. Bear. We called him Bear for short. When we took him for walks in the campground across the highway from our house (Wolf Creek Campground–for those of you who know it), we’d call out Bear! Bear! to get him to come. And the campers would think we were announcing a real bear.
  14. One summer, my sister was crossing a tree across the creek, and she got to the other side and called, “Bear! Bear! Come here Bear!” and there really was a bear rooting around in the undergrowth.  She hightailed it home and found our dog waiting for her.
  15. In the summer of 1994, I almost got eaten by a grizzly bear up in Kluane Park. (ALMOST might be a slight exaggeration, but there was a grizzly announcing to us that we were far too close for his comfort–which is a 200 metre radius BTW). We think we were lucky he had already eaten his dinner.
  16. I have hiked the Chilkoot Trail seven times in my life. The first time when I was 12. The last time when I was 35.
  17. I still have the first book I ever read: Danny and the Dinosaur. I started reading when I was five and fell in love with language. I love words. I keep two or three dictionaries in the house so I can refer to the dictionary when I feel I need to. Now, I have the internet, but I still love my dictionaries. And get lost in them when I open them up. Too bad my spelling sucks. I have to do something about that this year.
  18. I like snowboarding, but since moving to California, I don’t go as often as I could and I suck.  One day on the ski lift up at Heavenly, some young kids looked at my board and exclaimed: “Wow. Hard core boarder, man. Those are original bindings!” Then they looked up at me, and were immediately disappointed. I laughed and said, “Not hard core fellas, just old!”
  19. I have a fire hydrant in my garage. Remanent of former tenants, but it’s too heavy to move. And what do you do with an extra fire hydrant?
  20. I love public radio. CBC.ca. BBC.co.uk. NPR.org. I love that on the internet, I can stream all of my favourite shows ANYTIME I want them. From any country. I should probably try to discover what Australian public radio is like.
  21. I like gingersnap cookies the best.
  22. For my Christmas present, I bought a Jack Lalanne juicer. It makes great juice. It also makes a huge mess. Or maybe, pursuant to item 1., I make the mess.
  23. In 2000, I took a sabbatical from Nortel Networks for six months and travelled to Central America and Europe. I spent a total of $10K from my retirement plan. My colleague reprimanded me for taking money from my retirement for what she considered to be a frivolity. By the time I got back from my memorable travels, my colleague’s retirement funds had plummeted more than $50K.
  24. I have approximately 50 GB of music on my hard drives from my music collection. I used to buy CDs. I now have iTunes.
  25. I started rollerblading in 1994. I used an entire paycheque to buy my blades. I still use them here in Healdsburg. Most people look at me oddly. But, I can go forward really fast on them. Really fast. And I love the feeling going forward really fast. I’ve been stopped by the Healdsburg police. They didn’t want me rollerblading near the town plaza. Also, a lady stopped her car once and reprimanded me for rollerblading in the street. I’ll be 37 this February. I think I’m a bit too old to be reprimanded.

If you were a piece of winery equipment, what would you be…

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Charlie told me about an interview he once had. He’d been asked this question: If you were a piece of winery equipment, what would you be? He answered that he would be a pumpover device. I had to ask what a pumpover device was. Apparently, it’s the piece of equipment that pumps the wine over the skins in a fermentation tank.

And he had reasons for his answer. But I can’t articulate them, because I didn’t write them down when he told me and because I don’t have the vocabulary of the wine industry. But I thought about that question and wondered if I were a piece of equipment, what piece of equipment would I be?

I don’t feel like I can identify with any piece of office equipment. Especially in telecom. I guess that says something right there.

I sort of felt like I could be a big piece of JCB equipment (excavator maybe)… I feel more comfortable with that. But, in the end, I decided I completely identified with a Swiss Army knife.

If I were a piece of equipment, I think I would be a Swiss Army knife.

Small.
Compact.
Incredibly useful in any (or almost any) situation.
Functional.
Practical.
Low maintenance.
High performance.

I’m not talking about the all-in-one Swiss Army knife. I’m just talking about a regular one. The run-of-the-mill Swiss Army knife. The one you would throw in your backpack for an expedition. That’s me right now. At least, that’s what I was thinking on the way home after lunch.

A while ago, I blogged about being Chardonnay. I remember I liked that description. I’m still working on it.

The Swiss Army version of me would definitely have a corkscrew.

On Being Chardonnay…

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My friend and neighbour Paul Brasset has been a winemaker in Sonoma County for over thirty years. Over those thirty years, he has won the Sonoma County Sweepstakes award for his Chardonnay (more than once). He has recently started selling wines from his own cellars, but has started with only Syrah and Zinfandel. I asked him why he doesn’t sell a Chardonnay?

According to Paul, Chardonnay takes more. It takes more to grow the grapes. It takes more to harvest the grapes correctly. It takes more to process the grapes and create the wine. Chardonnay takes more energy. Chardonnay takes more refrigeration. Chardonnay takes more attention. It simply takes more to create a good Chardonnay. His Chardonnay leaves a clean, fresh, crisp palette. Unlike the robust, meaty, lingering palette of a Zinfandel, it takes more to be less.

When I heard this explanation, I decided that I was going to be Chardonnay. I was going to do more. I was going to be more. I was going to ask more (of myself and of other people). I was going to be a good Chardonnay. Clean. Crisp. Now.

When I tried this theory out on a few people, one person mentioned in an email:

>”…I wish you all the best with your quest to become
> chardonnay. When all you drink is fine wine it may
> seem as common as tapwater. Some prefer water to
> kool-aid. Some crave pure glacier water much more
> than kool-aid, or the finest of wines, chardonnay and
> champagne included…”

So, then I started thinking about my experiences with glaciers and glacier water. Now, I’ve been thinking I might aspire to be glacier water instead of Chardonnay. Here is what I think when I think about glacier water (based on specific visuals of the Dyea River, Skagway Alaska, the Yukon River and the Kluane River, Yukon Territory): Pure. Natural. Rich in minerals and nutrients (substantial but crystal clear). Earthy. Honest. Firm but fluid. Flexible. Travelling. Moving. Independent. Enduring. Essential. Real.

I tried my glacial water theory out on a few people. Yet another person considered that, effectively, I should be Chardonnay made from glacier water. Maybe I’ll open a winery in the Yukon…

Choose living. Choose being alive. Choose life.

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In no particular order and being a work-in-progress…..one of my first blog entries EVER. Originally published 26 April 2005.

Choose life. Choose a lifestyle. Choose your friends. Choose family. Choose your future, your career, your adventures. Choose how you spend your days.

Choose spending your nights in a different place for six months. Choose the two-hour lecture in Spanish because you were trespassing in a tropical rainforest. Choose the back of a pickup in the sweltering heat of Central America, covered in dust, with nine other people because you are NOT chained to your desk creating mountains of information for the unaware, clueless victims.

Choose what makes you happy. Choose fun. Choose being involved. Choose your instruments. Choose your voice. Choose your rhythm. Choose pissing your nights away at Zebulon’s in Petaluma. Choose live music for the soundtrack for your life.

Choose the characters in your life. Choose constructive relationships, and connection, and intimacy. Choose honesty, integrity, and being a whole person. Choose emotional maturity. Choose chardonnay. Choose glacier water.

Choose health. Choose pushing yourself up the mountain until you explode from heat and exertion. Choose papasean chairs and pianos. Choose caution and curiosity and conversations. Choose poetry and books and movies. Choose moonlight paddles, and mulled wines, and music, and wildflowers. Choose your lovers. Choose kissing for hours.

Choose living. Choose being alive. Choose life.

As Lesley Choyce says in his poem Best Minds– “Ginsberg was right: ‘Holy supernatural extra-brilliant intelligent kindness of the soul”. Let me know if you like it. I’ll send you info on where to get the CD….