The Week Ahead, The Month Ahead

Happy Friday folks!

Time to wrap up a week, settle into the weekend and look ahead at what's on the horizon. And it's looking like a pretty cluttered horizon.

Today after work, Doug and I are hopping on the highway and heading to Toronto to meet up with my cousin and her fiancé.  They are getting married in July and asked the two of us to be their wedding photographers. So we're scouting out the church and the reception hall and planning out the details for the big day. Doug and I love any kind of photography and we have worked together on things before but never a wedding. I'm looking forward to seeing how we do as tag-team wedding photographers.

Saturday morning means a 20k run. To be honest, when I created my training schedule for the Niagara Falls Women's half marathon, I wasn't sure how far I would get. When I entered 20k into the schedule, I was still only running 30 minutes. The thought of running for over two hours seemed completely foreign. I might as well have been planning out the details for a trip to the moon. An ambitious goal to dream about but not feel defeated if I didn't attain it. A mere two months later, here I am sitting at my laptop laying out a 20k running route for myself. On one hand it's pretty unbelievable. On the other, it feels perfectly natural. I think that's the part that makes me happiest. Running 20k tomorrow almost feels like no big deal.

Almost.

Two months ago, I announced that I would be working from home for the month of March. I would be sitting at my kitchen table updating our agency's entire policy and procedure manual. Well, the best laid plans of mice and men...often go awry. So I sat at my kitchen table for two months - and got them half done. Policy writing - as it turns out - is a ridiculously slow process. Particularly when there are many cooks...

On Monday, for better or for worse, I'm headed back to the office. There are other responsibilities on my plate and policy-writing will no longer be my only priority. Heading back to the office, to constant noise and people and interruptions and distractions will be a shock to my system after two months of absolute quiet, homemade coffee...and yoga pants.

In other news, on Monday night I will be meeting some new friends. A bunch of people in Niagara have formed an online type 1 diabetes group. Monday night will be our first live meeting. Nothing major - just a Starbucks date to introduce ourselves and plan a potluck dinner. Still though - it will be pretty neat to meet some local T1s and sit at a table where everyone just 'gets it'.

Wednesday night, I'm meeting up with a friend I never see enough of. We'll sip wine, laugh our heads off, catch up on all the gossip and I'll feel so much better for it. Wednesday cannot come fast enough.

I'm finding it a little shocking that it's May next week. Wasn't it just Christmas a few days ago? May, according to the calendar means lots of running, outdoor cycling, sister dates in Toronto (we're going out for octopus salad!) and the Cabot Trail Relay Race. It's going to a busy four weeks - full of things that make me happy, motivate me and inspire me.

The Cabot Trail Relay Race is four weeks away. I'm looking forward to the race but, even more, I'm looking forward to seeing the ocean again.  I'm an ocean girl and I never get enough of it. I cannot wait to smell the salty air, perhaps spot a whale tail on the horizon and feast on lobster and scallops. For those of you who know me - being by the ocean is as close to heaven as is possible for me to get.

Four more weeks...

I Dreamed a Dream

When I was a little girl my family and I would hop in the station wagon and drive down to Cape Cod Massachusetts for our annual two week camping trip.

My younger sisters would stretch out in the back of the station wagon (seat belts?  what seat belts?) and I would take over the middle seat. We would drive down with the car loaded to the gills and pulling a camper behind us.  Our ever resourceful mother would head to the public library to get books on tape and would pack a bag full of activity books and other educational slash fun things to keep the wee ladies entertained.  Jacob Two-Two and the Hooded Fang was the family favourite and we listened to it countless times as we headed for the coast.

We always camped at Peter's Pond, a campground with, you guessed it, a large pond that we could swim in.  Every day we would leave the campground and head out exploring.  We spent days on the beach, drove to Boston and visited the aquarium, drove to Salem and visited the horrifying Salem witch museum, ate saltwater taffy and went whale watching.

One summer, we found a beach where people were clam digging and we joined right in, collecting buckets of them.  We returned to the campground and my parents prepared a dinner of clams and spaghetti-o's. They had horrified looks on their faces because they had not realized that we needed a licence to dig for clams and we had horrified looks on our faces because they were ruining a perfectly good can of spaghetti-o's.

My birthday often happened during the trip and it was a challenge for my parents to find a cake for my birthday dinner.  Creativity was the name of the game.

My birthday bread loaf is still a family joke. 

Summers spent by the ocean gave me a love of the sea.  The ocean is where I feel at home and at peace. The smells, the waves, the ocean wind - they are in my blood.  So much so that, in grade three, I decided that I wanted to be a marine biologist.  That dream did not fade through the rest of grade school or high school and I headed to university to make it happen.  I did.  On paper, I am a marine biologist and I can pull out my degree to prove it.  I have dissected sharks and chased whales.  I understand ocean currents and think estuaries are fascinating.  Give me a tide pool and I'll be engrossed for hours.  Give me a snorkel and mask and I won't be home until supper.

My marine biology dream ended the day I walked into my current place of employment.  I was looking for a summer job to tide me over while I figured out the next step in my journey.  During that summer I discovered that I like working with people and that I'm pretty good at it.  I've never left.  Most days, I'm quite ok with that.

But the closer I get to the Boston marathon the louder the ocean is calling my name.  It has been a long long time since I've tasted the salty air.  I'm ready.  I'm ready to visit my old aquarium, chase whales, sit by the sea and dream the dreams that a long haired little girl used to dream.