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Showing posts from 2011

Mending my Potato-Heart

I'm sitting in the emergency waiting room at St. Mary's. (Yes I can use electronic devices, there's even a sign.). ; ) This afternoon as I was giving an assembly at school my right side felt numb. My feet have been tingly for a few days and my arms go numb at night. I really felt it today so I decided I should get it checked out. This morning I was at an ear nose and throat doctor's office about to pay $250 to have my vocal chords examined; I may have chronic acid reflux disease. My dad does, and he also has poor circulation which led to a stroke, so I better get things straightened out. I decided to see the same doctor at the hospital, where it'll be free. As I sat here writing in my mini-moleskin just a moment ago, it occurred to me that maybe I reveal too much on this blog. Perhaps my throat is so irritated (beyond any very real medical condition), because I share too much. The throat chakra (voice) is on overdrive and I am suffering as a result. So

State of my Union

Let's be honest here.  As much as I might enjoy writing about health and inspiration, I have far more interesting things to say about my love life than my digestive tract.  It's also more entertaining to read about.  So here goes. I've always had reservations about dating a stand-up comic just in case I might fart in public and wind up the butt of a joke at a later date.  Or worse.  So I guess it's hard to date me now, because I'm probably going to write about it.  I feel like I've developed certain standards in posting though, and positivity tops the list.  Even if I have a bad day, I want to find at least one good thing I learned, and that does the trick. I have been thinking a lot about people in my life that "were meant to be."  When I first started dating D, I believed that there was really something worth exploring and that he came into my life for a reason.  Although we have decided to pursue a friendship at this point, I was confused as to

Is Gone

I've been seeing windows where there are none lately.  It's happened to me twice, once today and once yesterday, that I thought I saw a window but it was something else. Today it was in a restaurant and it turned out to be a fridge and yesterday it turned out to be a poster about composting, at Santropol Roulant.  Both times it appeared to be sunny out. What does it all mean friends?  Am I seeing opportunities where there are none?  Do I need to open the blinds and take a real look at what's going on around me?  Do I just need to get out more?  What? That's all I've got for you.  For once... I'm actually stumped by what the universe is showing me.  Maybe I need to get my eyes checked or maybe I need to pay better attention, but either way... Stumped. Thoughts? Sometimes, I really think the music that is lined up for you after a song on youtube is really meant to be listened to. LCD Soundsystem, Katie

burp

You know you've been single for a long time when the restaurants you used to frequent have all changed their menus. This morning Davey and I went out for breakfast at a local diner, B & M.  A little classier than a diner really, but that's the layout.  He ordered a Belgian waffle with raspberries and I got a vegetarian omelet.  It was decent, I was really looking forward to having jam on toast, and that was the deciding factor when contemplating breakfast options.  I guess you don't really deserve toast with French toast... seems kind of redundant. Anyhow, a lot of old people come for breakfast on Sundays.  I'm sure that's the case for most restaurants, but  for this one in particular it seems.  I'm sitting there, alternating sips of coffee and bites of omelet when I watch a couple in their late 80s shuffle past a table with a young family.  2 boys and a high chair.  The old man brushes his hand over the top of the baby's head and continues on toward

Baby La-Las

I made two kids cry today.  It's something to make them laugh, but it's a whole other to make them cry.  It happens rarely but when it does, it's usually over something trivial and they're always in grade one. 7 year olds man, pffff... JUST KIDDING, I love kids.  Especially the little ones, they're hilarious. I walk into this grade one class towards the end of the day, and have them demonstrate "the human knot", where you grab people's arms in a circle and unknot yourself.  I was trying to convey problem-solving.  Undoing it is a challenge, but totally possible. This would be the fourth knot demonstration of the week, and the first to end on the floor.  One kid pulled all the other kids and they went down like dominos.  I took him outside and explained to him why that didn't work and how you have to be patient and calm when I come to visit.  Then his bottom lip quivered and his eyes pooled with tears. Break my heart, kid.  He told me someone

My Life in Bags

Yesterday I discovered a moldy green lemon in a plastic bag on my work table in the living room.  It was my lunch, from sometime last week.  Everywhere I look it seems I notice bags upon bags of my stuff, just littered about.  Bags of myself, organized in their own disorder.  It's a strange representation of what's going on in me. The last few weeks have been pretty hectic at work.  There's a lot going on, and it's pretty obvious I'm not managing very well.  Wednesdays are usually the day of the week I feel like curling up in a little ball under my desk in the staff room and hope no one will notice me.  But there's too much to be done.  I'll save that strategy for another time. I was telling my friend about how I was feeling lately, and it's the hardest thing for me to admit to others, but I know it's very closely related to my health habits.  The thing is, I can't pinpoint which came first; my craving for pizza, or my overloaded schedule.  A

Feminine Mystique

I never have time to read magazines anymore.  I have a friend who's on mat leave that gave me a stack, literally a STACK of magazines recently and I've barely looked through any of them.  This makes me sad. I picked up the October Cosmo last week and came across an article about "How to Keep Your Feminine Mystique," or something like that.  They had 50 tips on how to do so.  I guess they were claiming it's important to keep your man guessing so as not to reveal too much into the world of women.  I wonder if their tips apply to girls who like girls.  "Never let him see you put on deodorant." As if guys don't know we deodorize. The problem is, every time I put it on now, I awkwardly angle myself away from his sight.  Damn you Cosmo!  Damn you!  Maybe I'm oversharing big time, but I think it's funny.  Going from a single girl who wears more denim than anyone should and likes to get gussied up only once a week to pretty-much-taken means

Can I get a Witness

Saw a crime go down last night.  Super sketchy! My *friend* Davey and I took Gracie for a walk around 10 pm last night.  We'd spent the day wandering around the city looking for shoes and adventure.  D bought a pair of Macbeths at Giant Tiger for 29 bucks and later we looked at lizards and snakes at Safari.  We even caught a movie at the Dollar Cinema.  The real adventure came later when we saw two guys and a ladder. NDG tends to have some sketchy folk from time to time, but more often than not, it's harmless hooligan teenagers up to no good.  There have been a number of break-ins on my street over the past couple of months so when I saw the ladder, I couldn't help but wonder, "what the fluck?"  Guy One was climbing down a ladder that was leaning against a building, in plain sight, to the second story window of an apartment.  The lights were on, they didn't seem to be in a rush.  Guy Two was on his cellphone.  They watched us as we watched them, and Dave

18 Wheels of Love

I went to bed last night with one song in my head and woke up with a completely different one in it. I wish you could hear the live Montreal version of the Drive-by Truckers playing 18 Wheels of Love.  That's the song I had in my head last night and it's what I'm listening to right now.  Their singer, Patterson Hood, is an excellent story-teller.  The first 7 minutes of the track is the story of his mother and how she fell in love with a truck driver named Chester.  I was at the show and I cried my guts out. It's a beautiful song. And it's a beautiful story.  If you're someone who's been lucky enough to have woven a love story that inspires others, I hope you know how wonderful it is.  I'm sure you do. I've come to realize that finding someone special shouldn't be a difficult task.  We all know it is, it's painful in fact, but when the right kind of person comes around, things just fit.  It just works.  Or at least so far, that's

Why Control

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Sometimes not asking why can save you some heartache. I realized today that I often use that question to understand people and their experiences.  I have always been curious about the lives of others and the way my brain needs to process stories is by trying to delve deeper into their person.  "What is it like being you?" Sometimes asking too many questions reveals too much information.  I'm a sensitive person and I oversympathize with people, so knowing the details of someone's experiences really gets to me.  It's my own fault. Anyway, I feel like when meeting new "potentials," sometimes less is more.  When you start dating someone, do you really need to know right away why they broke up with their ex?  Why they've dated half the city?  Why they believe the things they do?  You haven't even built a repoire yet.  I think until you can master the art of small talk, you should keep the skeletons in the closet.  Why go somewhere that may trigg

She said butt

I went to watch my niece's hockey game today.  It was at the Canadien's practice arena, so it was kind of cool to check it out, it's very nice.  Regardless of how you feel about the Habs this season, it's something to see where they practice. Sitting in the cold, watching the girls play, sipping a mint tea, I thought about how much I valued the warm spot I created for myself.  I stood up momentarily to help my 2 year old nephew out and had to wiggle around to find my it again when I sat back down.  It was somewhere approximately 6 inches to the right of my tea. You know what I'm talking about, when you sit somewhere cold and your butt warms it up nice, you don't want to stray, at the risk of losing the perfectly warmed location for your tush.  You grow attached to it and it's so frustrating to start a new one. It dawned on me that this was the perfect analogy for relationships. I know it's a stretch, but hear me out. I think at times we grow accu

Professional Tattling

Michael Bebbington's 5-year old face is forever ingrained in my memory.  It was naptime, in kindergarten, and I was hunched over my desk when I had a funny feeling someone was looking at me.  I looked up and saw Michael Bebbington staring at me.  He then stuck out his tongue and made one of the worst grimaces I've ever seen.  Maybe he was a bit of a troublemaker, but I was stunned by his display of disgust at me.  I wanted to tell on him but I knew I was supposed to have my eyes shut too, so I didn't.  I dropped it.  Later on in the year I would bribe him with marriage in exchange for his chocolate chip granola bar, a bribe I've never regretted and my offer still stands if he'll have me. Lately I've been thinking a lot about professional tattle-taling, or in other words, telling on your coworkers.  It's happened in the past that I received a questionable email from someone and my first reaction was to forward it to the powers that be and complain about lac

Purple carrots, purple hearts

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Do you remember where you were the first time your boyfriend or girlfriend said "I love you?"  The first time any boy ever said that to me was in the garage of my old house in Saint-Hilaire.  I think I was walking him out and I recall a double-sided cheek grab and then "I love you."  Surrounded by dampness and tools, it was no surprise that fizzled after a couple of months. The second time was on a porch and it was really meaningful.  I almost said it back but wasn't sure it was time.  He'd dropped me off, and we'd spent every day together for the first 6 months of our relationship.  We're still friends today.  The third occasion was in the backseat of a cab on a drunken ride back to the city from my sister's house, after an incident involving too much booze and a chip on a shoulder.  I said it back.  Shoulda known better. Sometimes we follow the drama, when we're better off following our heart. Yesterday I did a photoshoot involving tw

Heartistique

Watching people take care of themselves inspires me.  Especially artists.  I think it's so important for creative individuals to take care of their needs in order to pursue their passion with a sense of responsibility and ownership.  It can be very challenging when you work late nights and drain yourself of energy in an effort to produce something, whether it be a piece of writing, music, performance or whatever.  It's a personal tax we impose on ourselves knowing that it's for a good reason, to pursue our passion, but damn it can be exhausting. So when I see people heading home early or even munching on something healthy, it brings a smile to my face because I know it takes a great deal of self-discipline to listen to that inner voice and honor those thoughts. To put in the time required to be prepared is also incredibly demanding, sometimes we don't always bother.  But sometimes, others will help.  My friend Sandi made me a tea last night after hearing my hoarse voi

DOUBLE CHIN!

When I was fourteen, my cousin Kate came to stay with us for the summer.  She and I, although living on separate ends of the country, have been close forever.  We used to perform shows for family at get-togethers, Bert and Ernie in particular, she was Ernie because she was short and at the time I was a lot taller than her, so I got Bert.  I could probably still do Bert justice if needed. Anyway, that summer we had a camcorder and made the awesomest of home videos, though sadly it has been misplaced between East and West coast.  We made commercials, sang songs and also moped about our teenage insecurities.  Kate was playing with her hair in one of the shots and began commenting on her double chin.  I never knew double chins existed, or I guess I never noticed.  But ever since then, I've kind of had a complex about my own chin.  It was made worse when I got braces at 19 and my orthodontist suggested plastic surgery to correct the alignment of my face. Bad enough I had to wear bra

I don't know what.

Sometimes I just want to barricade myself in my apartment with nothing but dvds and junk food.  It's been that kind of month so far, the past few are catching up to me and I'm crashing.  I didn't know my feet could tingle after a day's work... can't be good.  I'm falling apart! I spoke to my 85 year old grandfather today who recently did a stint in the hospital due to some emphysema-related symptoms.  The man is solid as a rock, even in his eighties, and he was the one reminding me to take it easy.  I guess that makes sense actually.  :) Tonight as I observed my purchases on the conveyor belt at the Provigo, I realized how loud they were shouting "SINGLE GIRL!"  A frozen dinner, a twist-open bottle of wine (with a dollar off coupon), and a bag of m&ms.  Yep, that's my Friday night, and I wouldn't want it any other way.  The next week is going to be hectic, the treeplanting play "Lifer" is opening at the theatre, and I'm no

It's about potatoes

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This week we returned to Zephyr Farm on week 5 of our volunteer exchange.  The kids are loving it, the farmer's loving it and I'm so totally loving it.  Digging my hands through the earth in search of something intentionally nutritious is more satisfying than anything I've done in a long time.  It taps into a part of me that once layed dormant. Caring about food.  Caring about where it comes from and how it ends up in the supermarket, in our bags, in our homes and in us.  Seeing the potatoes, tomatoes, squash or raspberries I helped pick wind up at the market or in baskets is so cool!  To know I'm directly helping nourish kids and families and people is a really unique experience and one I hope I can continue doing in the future. Everyone involved is greatful.  Showing up every Tuesday has been such a treat, I look forward to smelling the tomato vines and the kale field, seeing how everything looks this week and watching the leaves turn bright yellow and deep red...

Stand Up.

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Sitting in my favorite café at 9:35 on a Saturday morning.  I can definitely say I've never done this before, but have always admired the people I peek in on when I drive by, should I be up this early on a weekend.  I always find people look so cozy inside a café, warm cup of coffee by their side. I spent the night taking pictures of friends and I was too eager to look at them, so here I am.  My friend Lise was doing stand-up at a loft and she asked me to take some shots during her set.  I happily obliged and am happy I went; she was very funny and we ended up hanging out at TSC after with a couple other hooligans, laughing the night away.  Lise and I were talking about standup on the way to the theatre.  It's got to feel like the most vulnerable experience you could put yourself in.  You're on-stage, in front of a group of people, with a spotlight and microphone... being yourself.  All eyes on you.  I honestly can't tell you what makes a successful stand-up, other

HabanerNO!

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Today one of my students ate a habanero pepper.  Apparently he'd asked for a hot pepper and as if in slow motion, from the hand of the farmer, the kid grabbed it and popped it into his mouth.  Whole.  Fresh picked.  Hot shit.  I blinked "did that just happen?" and within moments he started reacting.  The farmer notice right away and quickly told him not to touch his eyes, but it was too late.  I walked over and started sneezing from the fumes.  My mouth and eyes burned, and all I did was walk close to the kid.  He spat it out and another farmer got some goat cheese that he cut up and I fed it to the kid as quickly as possible. WTF. This poor student would later tell me he didn't realize it was a habanero, he thought maybe jalapeno but STILL.  DUDE.  Another student chimed in with the old "don't you put it in your mouth" tune from those drug infomercials, on the drive back to the city.  Hilarious.  The whole thing was quite funny.  But quite serious.

Stress and your Adrenal Glands

So it's been a busy couple of months.  Sketchfest, Fringe, Under Pressure, Tattoo Convention, Pop Montreal plus my full-time day job.  I've willingly signed up for all those but holy blueberries do I need a break. Last night after spending 6 hours wandering around Pop Quarters, taking down posters and stacking chairs, I hit up a couple of shows.  Peter Hook (of Joy Division, playing Joy Division) at Club Soda, TSC post-Sunday Night Improv hangs, and finally The Raincoats up at Cabaret du Mile End to top it all off.  It was the last night of Pop Montreal and I wanted to take full advantage of my all-access pass.  That I did.  Friday I saw The Shaky Aches at L'Esco, Dark Dark Dark at Quai des Brumes then on my way home I stopped by and caught the tail end of Graven at Barfly.  Saturday night was equally fun, lots of bouncing: totally stoked to see The Static Jacks at Casa del Popolo, then caught By Divine Right at O Patro Vys, grabbed a slice of zza and popped on back to Ca

cukes & zukes

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Cukes, zukes, dragon-tongue beans and carrots.  Oh and tamaters, lots and lots of tamaters. Today was the first trip of eight to La Ferme du Zéphyr, an organic vegetable farm in the west island of Montreal.  That's right, an ORGANIC farm right here on our island.  Pretty awesome. I have created an exchange program.  Or at least that's what I'm calling it, "the Eco-Karma Exchange" (kind of cheesy I know, but it came to me on a whim and just sort of stuck).  Once a week, I will be taking a group of 3 or 4 high school students (15+) to work on the farm.  Later on in the year, those same groups will work at Moisson Montreal, the hub of food banks in the city.  And then in April, they'll be volunteering at Santropol Roulant, where they will help make meals for their meals-on-wheels program.  I'm pretty stoked about the project.  Super stoked in fact.  They'll get more out of their volunteerism by being involved in and seeing the process through from the

Fallin' for Fall

There's something magical about the arrival of Fall.  I know it's only early September but you'd be lying if you told me you don't feel it too.  The cool breeze that chills you to the bone in the early morning, the smell of cooking in your apartment building or wafting down the street from a cozy restaurant... How everything feels fresh, how you tackle new projects, how you change your wardrobe, just like when you were little.  *sigh* So nice. Today a colleague came into my office as some students were painting a poster with some dollar-store paint.  He looked at the cup holding the bright blue gouache and held it to his nose.  He time traveled and told me about the time he was in preschool and had to paint portraits of friends.  His friend painted him with blue hair.  Blue like the royal blue paint in the Dixie cup.  He remembered the name of the kid, the plaid shirt he was wearing and the reaction to the painting.  Pretty wild.  Pretty awesome. Sense memory is s

Microwave Might

Today a fuse blew in the staffroom, on the first day of school. Not only did the coffee machine not provide the staff with their much-needed boost, but the microwaves in the kitchen were also affected. For a staff of over 30, lunchtime became a bit chaotic. A slew of people lined their food up on the counter next to a single functioning microwave. A slight panic was felt.  The two others were out.  Everyone kept a light-hearted attitude about it, and even became constuctive.  A student teacher switched the plug of microwave 3 into functioning 2's outlet, but once it got turned out, that fuse blew too.  The lights in the hall even went out.  Meanwhile, across the ceramic tiled-kitchen, a very poised, elegant teacher physically moved a heavy microwave onto another counter to use the stove's plug, all this going on while a few other staffers are arranging their food in the oven.  It was like a perfectly executed lunchtime-fiasco choreography.  Sheer magic.  I was washing my dish

How to Fail Gracefully

Nobody likes to accept defeat.  Especially when you've set something up for yourself and also broadcast it to several people.  A few, dozens, hundreds, whatever the case may be, the hardest person it is to admit defeat to, is yourself.  This blog acts as a sounding board for me sometimes.  I don't always think about who might be reading it, I usually just let the words come out and then revise if it's too risqué.  Notice I've never posted anything that controversial, I'm a people pleaser to the core and my angry rants are saved for actual paper.  Besides, this blog is supposed to be all happy-go-lucky 'n stuff, nobody wants to hear about my depresso days. Every now and then though, I like to recommit to my falability as a human.  I also don't ever want to project the image of perfection or act as though I've got it together on a daily basis, that would be inhuman, and nobody can relate to that. So, let it be known, friends, family and strangers ali

Merkall

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Wedding photos

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I had some fun editing photos from the wedding.. Here are a few.

BEES TAKE FLIGHT

Some bands are able to pack you up and take you on a ride with each album that is put out.   And you'll go anywhere they take you, because you're faithfully devoted to joining them on a new journey, especially with well-respected, reputable musicians.   Collections of Colonies of Bees' most recent work, Birds (2008; Polyvinyl Records), starts off with the promise that you're on your way somewhere interesting, unexplored and spontaneous.   To the untrained ear however, Flocks I soon goes into loop-mode and you feel like your cochleae are stuck in traffic and you're not getting anywhere at all. For a non-connoisseur, Chris Rosenau's riffs sound repetitive and overdrawn, and the album comes across as improvised and all over the map, like something they lazily recorded in a wood-paneled basement, surrounded by Jameson empties and sedative capsules.   But much like a map, music is all about connection, it just depends where you’re going.   If you're looking for s

ChooChoo Yoga

The yoga train has arrived.  It has stationed itself in my life and I'm ready to get on-board.  It's a trip I've put off for years, for fear of the unknown, fear of going deeper in myself and my spirit, but I'm ready.  Yoga has kind of been in-my-face lately.  I went on a great retreat yesterday, with Sasha Matthew, a Sivananda instructor (forgive me if I get the language wrong), and I took the opportunity to open up about my resistance.  He told me what I already knew, that when I'll be ready it will happen and that sometimes you just have to dive in, like one of my co-workers did on the lunchtime break.  Well he dove into the pool, without testing the water.  I've been testing the water for 3 years.  Time for a swim! Sometime next week, probably after pay-day, I'm going to sign up for a week of Moksha.  I think it's 20 dollars and it's unlimited.  If it works out and I like it, then I'll put my name down for the Trades. You put in 5 hours o

Under Pressure TWO

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I've decided that volunteering for Under Pressure was a gateway drug. Now all I see is graffiti, all I want to listen to is hip-hop, and all I've been watching are videos related to those two things, non-stop.  Facebook makes it really easy to connect to all these people, places and things as well.  I'm hooked. Thinking back to when most people get interested in this subculture, my teens, I had great disdain for everything hip-hop.  I decided I had an indie spirit and Wu Tang were gangsters, Eminem was a sell-out and rap sucked.  I even had a poster that said so.  Mind you, I always liked old school tunes, but my awareness consisted of my sister's Rap Traxx compilation tape.  It featured songs from Public Enemy, Tone Loc, and Fresh Prince, among others.  And just so you know, I had to google who sang Funky Cold Medina, so that just goes to show you I still have a lot of learning to do.  But back in high school, something about the late nineties' alternative inf

Under Pressure ONE.

I'm still trying to process everything that went on this weekend, I'm not even sure how I'm still awake at 10:45, the auto-pilot in me is currently in control. Under Pressure, was, if I may use the expression, off the hook.  For those of you who may not know, Under Pressure is Montreal's annual graffiti convention, and an international one at that.  It's also the oldest in North America, if I'm not mistaken.  So, pretty rad right? My friend Joe helps run the whole thing and has been my link into the scene.  I've always had a great appreciation for graffiti but it really took off when I bumped into him serendipitously one day in 2006 when I'd planned to do a small tour and take pictures of Montreal's street art.  I started in the Old Port for some dumb reason but as fate should have it, there he was and a few of us started a long walk that took us across the city and into some pretty awesome spots. Skip ahead 5 years and I finally have gotten ar

High on Light

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I love when a trip to the dog park turns into a mood-altering experience. I've been kind of crabby of late.  Perhaps it's the fact that I'm trying to accept that my 5-week summer vacation is over and I must now return to the daily grind, or maybe simply having nothing to do in particular every day for five weeks has made me a bit bonkers.  I confess it was a heck of a summer, the best I've had since I was a reckless teenager, and I got a lot done.  Went to Winnipeg, did some camping, took a day trip for a car show, all with a smile: it was awesome! But what gives- why the bad mood Katie? Since going on vacation, I pretty much gave up all sense of daily structure, including getting up at a decent hour, forgoing coffee and of course: eating well. I took a vacation from a healthy diet, so what. But now I'm stuck with the miserable wheaty cheesy blahs and I have to admit I'm kind of grateful to be returning to my regular scheduled programming. Part of me, li

Feel The Vibration

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I believe in vibes.  I get them from people, from places, music, from situations and from moments I can't otherwise describe.  Vibes.  There are good vibes, and bad vibes, and that's about as complicated as it gets. What about the vibe we send out into the universe?  The whole "law of attraction" thing.  The way we live our lives, the habits we feed, the actions and behaviors that make us who we are, how do they impact what the universe reflects back to us? I went camping again this weekend and for the first time in a while or maybe ever I felt the universe speaking to me. We spent the night in the gazebo, by the water, laughing over beers, totally overpowering the incredible silence of our surroundings.  I decided to check out early, and on my way to the tent I strained my neck as I stared at the beautiful bright stars above. The sky seemed rounded, alive and pulsating, almost.  I saw a shooting star, made a wish and felt like my night was perfectly complete.