30 Things for 30 Years

My 30th birthday is here, and if I’m being honest with you, this time last year I didn’t think I would be alive to see it. Depression was heavy and with a significant weight loss and things feeling dark, I feel like it was a long haul to get here. Last year in my birthday post, I wished for twenty-nine to treat me well and I am so glad and thankfully that it was easier on me and actually even better than I could have ever expected. It was still difficult in a lot of ways, but it was definitely a lot better than the previous year. While my depression isn’t gone, it has thankful eased, I’m back to a healthier weight, I have a lovely partner who brings a lot of joy into my life, I have friends who care so much about me, I have family who love me so much, so life isn’t too bad. The year still had difficulties, with the global pandemic still going, working in a job where people have lost their kindness, and the loss of my grandfather.

I’m very thankful for the thirty years that I have been here, even during the times that I didn’t think I would make it or didn’t think I wanted to. Over that time I have learned a lot of important lessons and I just wanted to reflect a bit on those things that I learned.

1. Openness and vulnerability will get you far. Some people believe that being open and vulnerable is a weakness but in reality it’s actually a strength. It is incredibly freeing being able to be open with people who care about you, and when you’re going through a rough time, actually letting the people in your life know what’s going on and help carry your burden with you. It is uncomfortable at first, but it’s nice not feeling the full wait of the world on your shoulders.
2. Like the things that you like without fear of judgment. I remember being a young girl who loved comics and superheroes, but they weren’t stereotypical “girl” things so I hid that part of myself. As I got older, I started to be a little more open about it, and then shortly after, Marvel released Iron Man, liking comics was cool. While things because more widely accepted, that didn’t stop the gate keeping and boys trying to test my knowledge to prove that I really liked comics rather than just saying that I did. Eventually I reached a point where I didn’t have to justify my love for it or anything else that I enjoyed because their opinions didn’t matter to me anymore. I like the things I like, and I only want to engage with people who wouldn’t treat me poorly.
3. Love comes in it’s own timing, but that doesn’t mean you give up on it. Love is one of those things that for me, I couldn’t force it, I couldn’t just go out and find it, and when I thought I had it, it would leave. The thing that a lot of people say that it will come when you least expect it, and for me it did. My friends encouraged me to get out of my comfort zone and just see what was out there, no expectations, and because of that, I reconnected with my now partner who I had met a few times years ago through a mutual friend. If I wasn’t willing to get out of my comfort zone, I wouldn’t have connected with him.
4. Other people’s expectations of you are a death sentence. Letting the expectations of other people dictate what you do with your life is a good way to slowly die. I found when I tried to live my life living up to what other people thought I should do added to my depression. I wasn’t this or I wasn’t that, I missed on this thing so I’m no good. Those thoughts kill you and who you are from the inside. Don’t let their expectations dictate how you want to live your life. Life is worth living, just not according to other people.
5. Loving people exactly where they are is incredibly difficult sometimes, but watching them flourish under that love is worth it. I have found that just loving people wherever they are in life is one of the best things you can do for another human being. Giving them the freedom to be exactly who they are and the space to express themselves, even if it’s not something you understand is a way to truly love someone. I have tried to just love people, with all of the issues they have going on, the things that they see in themselves and obstacles, and I watched them see that they are worthy of love, and that is so rewarding.
6. We all have inherent biases and prejudices, and it takes active work to come back from that. The way the world works, it is built on systems that like to oppress minorities and while you may not actively put those systems into place, they are upheld and if you’re white, you benefit from them. It takes a lot of work to acknowledge and truly understand what that means, and it also means listening to those that these systems of oppression affect.
7. Be humble and gracious when someone points out your biases. One of the things with our internal biases is that sometimes we don’t even know that they are there. They are so ingrained in us and the society we live in, so when someone points out yours, don’t take that as a direct attack on you, take it as an opportunity to learn and grow and see a perspective other than your own.
8. Be gentle and allow yourself and others grace when there is a call out. With those internal biases that we often don’t realize that we even have, sometimes being called out comes with shame. The thing to keep in mind though is that sometimes you just don’t know what you don’t know. Be gentle with yourself and commit to doing better.
9. Things in life are not as linear as we would like them to be. Growth and recovery in particular. Steps moving forward can sometimes feel like steps in the opposite direction. Relapses happen, becoming a better person means seeing the things in yourself that you need to change before you see the results. Just keep putting each foot in front of the other, and even if you have to stop, step back or to the side, you only fail if you give up on the journey.
10. Sometimes a heartbreak can feel like the end of the world or your life, it’s not. Just trust me on this. There is so much more to life than the pain that happens after a break up or ending of a friendship. It takes a bit of time to get there, but you have to do the work to get there and you will see that life is good.
11. Grieving is a form of love and it’s not something that should be glossed over. When you’re grieving a loss, whether it be the death of a loved one, the loss of a friendship, or the ending of a relationship, take the time you need to grieve that. It’s proof that love existed within those lines and it’s important and healthy to allow that to come.
12. Learn to manage your expectations and learn how to differentiate between not having them met if someone set them for you and not having them met when you self imposed them on someone else without their knowledge. Sometimes I find myself disappointed by the people I care about in life who don’t meet these expectations that I set that they have no idea about. Like, I expect to do something with someone, but without them actually making plans with me, and then I get disappointed that they didn’t have time to see me. This is something I’m learning to acknowledge and learn to be more forth coming within myself when I disappoint myself by setting expectations on other people.
13. It’s okay to let people in and it’s okay to let them help you carry your burdens. I have always been that person who thought she could do all of these things in life by herself and never shared my deepest hurts with people who loved me. That is neither healthy for me or the friendships that I have in my life, and learning to allow people to help carry those heavy things, being open when I’m depressed or hurting quite literally saved my life.
14. Enjoy art in whatever way you like and don’t let people tell you that something isn’t just because they don’t value it. If you love playing video games you are consuming art, even if Karen doesn’t think it is, and that it’s just a waste of time. It’s not. I have seen so many wonderfully compelling and complex stories told through video games (check out The Last of Us & The Last of Us: Part II) I have played games that have complex puzzles to solve that gets my brain going, I have played games that were just cute and relaxed. They are all art. So whatever way you like to consume art (as long as it doesn’t harm anyone else of course) enjoy it. Don’t like people tell you how to enjoy it.
15. Gate keeping of life’s joys is incredibly stupid, don’t participate in it, challenge it. Telling people that they’re not able to like this thing or that thing because they haven’t consumed every ounce of media for it is gate keeping. It’s telling people that they can’t like the things they like because they’re not this or that, or whatever thing they want to use to not include someone. When you see something like this happening, open up space for people and challenge those around you who are trying to say someone can’t participate.
16. Really, like the things you like. I know I wrote this earlier, but I felt like it was important enough to put it in again. Lately I have been seeing this word going around on social media, cheugy. And it’s basically a word to describe a person liking things the way we used to say a person was basic for liking them. It’s just a new way to guilt people out of enjoying things in life like pumpkin spice lattes, Taylor Swift, Ugg boots, etc. The thing that gets me though, is that the things that make something cheugy are stereotypically more feminine things, and it’s incredibly misogynistic. Let people like whatever it is they like and the things that bring them joy. It’s not harming you so mind your own business and start undoing your internalized misogyny.
17. You can absolutely gaslight yourself and it takes time to be aware how you’re doing it. I have a habit of getting myself worked up about things and then going, “no wait Bethany, you’re crazy, you shouldn’t be upset about this.” when actually it’s totally okay for me to be upset and feel whatever it is I’m feeling. There is this fear that if I’m upset about something that I don’t actually have a right to be upset about it and then I gaslight myself. It’s taking time and work to realize that this is not healthy for me and that I am allowed to feel whatever it is I am feeling.
18. You are responsible for your own feelings. Eleanor Roosevelt very famously said, “No on can make you feel inferior without your consent.” and it’s completely true. When we allow people to dictate and affect our mood on how they think of us, we do a disservice to ourselves. It allows room for us to feel less than about ourselves. And when we allow and put their opinions of us above those we have of ourselves, we lose our power and let someone unworthy take up space in our minds. Being able to be responsible for our own feelings gives us power and sets us free.
19. The people in your life will go through difficult and traumatic things, the best thing you can do for them is be there, love them through it, and listen. You don’t have to fix them or their problems, they just need for you to be there and listen to them as they go through whatever it is they are going through. That’s it really. Just love them through it, because that’s what you do for people you care about.
20. Societal expectations are bullshit. Don’t allow society when you should be married, when you should have kids, when you should stop doing this or start doing that. It is literally all bullshit, and if you don’t allow yourself to fall into that, you will feel so much freer.
21. You cannot love someone into being something that you wish they could be. This was a difficult lesson for me to learn, it was something I didn’t want to accept but had to. Unfortunately, love is not always enough, and it’s used as something to be selfish and changing a person in a way they don’t want to be changed. Sometimes you just need to walk away, and they need to let you.
22. Take the damn picture and also be in the pictures. Don’t worry about looking perfect or looking a certain way. The memories attached to them are precious to someone and when the time comes, you may be happy you have them. You won’t live with the regret of, “I wish I had more pictures with them” after it’s too late.
23. Having friendships that span over different age groups is incredibly beneficial. Having friends who are older than you who have been where you are now and can help guide you through and help you learn. Having friends that are younger than you allows them to learn from you but also helps you learn and see the world differently as well.
24. Take up all of the space. Be too much. Be extra. Be cheugy. Be basic. Never let people take away your brightness. Don’t shrink yourself into spaces that weren’t built for you. The world needs you to.
25. Don’t stay in toxic places. Whether it’s a family, a friendship, a relationship, a work places, don’t stay in something toxic. It will kill you from the inside out. Learn when and how to leave, and then do it. It’s not healthy for you to stay in that.
26. Letting someone love you and know you completely is a level of vulnerability that will make you uncomfortable but it will be worth it. Yeah some people will use that vulnerability against you, but the right person will see it as a gift and do what they can to protect you. It’s also a huge part of a healthy relationship so it’s something worth working on.
27. Find a partner who will talk about all of the things with you. Even the tough stuff. Especially the tough stuff. But also the fun stuff too. Pick a partner that you want to eventually share all of the things and build a stronger emotionally intimate relationship with.
28. Don’t let the fear of missing out cause you to miss out on the things in life. Sometimes we live with this fear that we are going to miss out on something amazing, and what really happens is that we stay in that fear even when we are participating. It takes you out of it. And sometimes you’re also just going to miss out on things, and that’s okay. Don’t let it make you feel like garbage. You can’t be apart of everything.
29. Learn the ways you like to be shown love and the way the people in your life want to be loved. I’m note quite sure I believe in there only being 5 Love Languages, but understanding the basic foundation and intention can help your relationships, and not just the romantic ones. I love spending time with the people I love, and I would much rather that then gifts. Like, I feel unloved when there is quality time designated to me and the person I’m with and when something else takes priority over that time, that’s when I feel that. My partner feels unloved when he can’t do things for me, he’s very much a “acts of service” type person, he likes to fill my gas tank, or make me dinner, or take me out, and while those are things I can do for myself, if I don’t let him do that sometimes he feels unloved.
30. Learn your life lessons in your own time. Don’t let some list (like this one) be your only blueprint for learning life lessons. Things that I learned by now may have happened before you were twenty five or you won’t learn until much later, and that’s okay. Your life has no set schedule for the things you will learn, just don’t give up on it.

I have learned so many things in my life from meeting new people, living through some very difficult losses, some traumatic events and just by being human. It’s hard to believe that I have had to learn so many difficult lessons before the age of 30, but I’m so thankful for the ability to and the fact that I’m still here to write about them. I’m looking forward to continuing to learn more about life, how to deal with what it throws at me and to live a more joyful life. I’m thankful that I’m here to see it all, it’s been a love road getting here.

The End of an Exhausting Year

2020 was a difficult year for almost every one of the 7.8 billion people on this planet. With a global pandemic that essentially tore through our lives and ripped everything we knew to shreds, I am amazed at the resilience of every person that I have met. In terms of control of the pandemic, we here on the East Coast of Canada got relatively lucky with the way our leadership has been handling it, though obviously not perfectly, but I must say, it was handled relatively well.

As the end of the year posts come, a lot of people are going to lament about how this year was incredibly difficult in many ways and how they triumphed or overcame some of the things that made this year so hard. Mine is probably going to include some of that because I have worked really hard to land on a slightly higher note than last year, though the bar for the ending this year better off than last year is pretty low. One thing I want to remind all of you who feel like you’ve barely escaped 2020 alive, that you still did it. You’re here and that is absolutely more than enough. You do not need to have a list of things you that made you stronger this year, you do not need to talk about all of the tragic, traumatic or hard things that life hit you with and try and come up with a comeback story to feel like you succeeded in anything this year. If you are still standing, even if it is beaten down, bloody, exhausted and not sure how much longer you can go, you did it and I’m proud of you. Remember that you are incredibly loved, you have people cheering for you, and I hope that you can renew your hope that things will get better. If you’re struggling, reach out, we are not out of this yet, and we need to continue to hold each other up.

My year was a mix bag of things. Complicated entanglements with an ex, extremely poor mental health, trying to set important boundaries to make sure that my mental health was no longer as much in jeopardy and so many other things. I was very fortunate though that I still had a job that I could go to, to leave my house for, which not every one was able to do. I could get the socialization that I needed while being at work during a pandemic, still make money, so I know that I am very lucky in that regard. I was also able to build closer relationships with some of my coworkers that are now really good friends. We have laughed so hard, been there for each other when things got too much to handle, and made each other our “bubble” so that we always had a group to lean on. Made this year a little brighter.

Instead of talking about all of the ways that I have triumphed this year, I think I’m just going to make a list of things that I am thankful for this year:

• Family that made sure how I was doing when I wasn’t good
• Really good friends who check in on me and let me know I’m loved
• A job that allowed us to still work, despite being closed to the public for about 2.5 months
• Technology that allowed me to connect with the people I love in safe ways (including Animal Crossing, the real MVP of 2020)
• The place I like to get ramen from, because it’s a small joy to be able to treat myself with
• The new people that I have met that have become a big part of my heart
• The times that I was able to actually spend time with people out in fun social ways despite the pandemic
• Being strong enough to set the boundaries I needed to make sure I was okay
• Friends who encourage me to go after the things I want
• A really sweet, kind guy who makes me feel safe, happy and cared for
• Dogs. Like what would we do without dogs?
• Cats also. Those furry little paws and the tiniest of toe beans…worth it
• Surviving a really dark, several month long, depressive episode
• Entertainment, between really good books, incredible video games, and movies/tv shows. Things that really helped us connect with each other or kept us occupied
• The beach being so close to my home so that I could go sit and listen to the waves crash
• The way that the pandemic was handled here in Nova Scotia (despite some challenges)
• All of the memories I made with the people I have in my life
• People helping each other out while everything feels like it’s on fire
• Everyone who put themselves at risk during this pandemic, including health care workers, front line workers, people who work with the public, teachers/EPAs/TAs/principals/educators, restaurant workers, and so many more
• People who created or had their works released this year, you made it so much better with your art

There are so many more things that I am thankful for despite this year, but I think by then it would be a really boring list so I think I’ll stop there.

I often list some of my favourite reads of the year, and this year, I didn’t read much. Normally I read between 20-30 books a year, but I hardly read at all. Like if I finished 5 books this year, that would be amazing. Though I did have a few that I really loved out of those I did read.

Untamed by Glennon Doyle, a memoir/self help book about how she started to try and let go of how society has caged women and finding her true wild authentic self. While it’s not for everyone, I really came out of this book with a lot to think about and maybe apply to my own life.

The Midnight Library by Matt Haig, a fiction book about a young woman who decides that she doesn’t want to live anymore, and is brought to the midnight library, where she experiences what her life would have been like if she made different choices. It’s a book about hope, and realizing that life is worth living.

Know My Name by Chanel Miller, the extremely difficult to read memoir of the young woman is the survivor of a rape as well as the public scrutiny of it and the trial, because her rapist had such a “promising” swim career at Stanford University. I’m still in the process of reading this one, but it’s incredible, despite how difficult it is to read her thoughts and feelings over one of the most difficult periods of her life.

Because of the isolation/quarantine/social distancing, video games have been a really great escape for me as well. This year, I finally bought a Switch and a PS4, and have been enjoying so many wonderful games. My favourites that I have played this year:

Switch:
Animal Crossing: New Horizons, are we really surprised by this one? This was one of THE games of 2020.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, a stunningly beautiful addition to the series.

Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town, a remake of Harvest Moon’s Friends of Mineral Town and More Friends of Mineral Town that were originally on the Gameboy Advanced.

Gris, a beautiful and emotional indie game.

Florence, another beautiful and emotional indie game.

To the Moon, a strange but really well thought out indie game.

There are a few games that I have downloaded or are planning to download from the Nintendo eShop to play in 2021 including Bastion, Transistor (which I have already started), Hades, Coffee Talk (which I have already started), Moonlighter, When the Past Was Around (which I have already started), What Remains of Edith Finch, and so many others. I have found that I just really love the games I can play on the Switch, both on my TV and in mobile. Definitely one of my most played systems.

PS4:
The Last of Us Part II, the long awaited sequel to one of my favourite games ever. Lots of people have mixed feelings about this sequel, but I loved it.

Spider-Man, one of the best Spider-Man games that I have ever played. Beautiful, and great story.

I didn’t play as much on PS4, though Horizon: Zero Dawn is on my list as well as some of the newer Assassin’s Creed games, so hopefully those will be played in 2021.

Finally, to round out the post, I wanted to share with you all so photos of my year with people that I love and care for so much. The friends that I have in my life are some of the best, and they made this year so wonderful.

I hope that 2021 for you will be a good year, that we keep holding each other up because we all know that this pandemic isn’t over. Keep taking care of each other, keeping loving each other and doing what you can when you can to make the world a brighter place, okay? The world needs you, even if you feel like it doesn’t, it does, because you add an extraordinary amount to light to it, even in your darkest times. I love you all and I will see you in 2021, masked up and ready to go.

Twenty-Nine, Please Be Kind

Twenty-Eight was a hard year. I experienced a lot of loss and hurt, and my mental health has been on the downward side of a roller coaster. That being said, it wasn’t all bad, there were a lot of good things to come from this past year, and one of them is the fact that I have found so many people who love me so much. I don’t know how I continually get so lucky to find people who just love me and want the best for me. I’m so used to giving so much of my heart to people and getting nothing in return, but lately, I have been getting some parts of the hearts of the people in my life back.

I don’t really want to make this post too long, because there was a lot of the hard things going on, including a family death, a break up and a global pandemic that I really don’t want to relive, but I just want to quickly thank everyone who made twenty-eight a little bit better. Thank you for loving me friends, thank you for picking me up with I fell down, and thank you for encouraging me to take care of myself. I love you all and I’m thankful for all of you.

As for twenty-nine, this one is going to be a rough year I think, but I hope it will be a good one. I hope that it’s a little gentler with me than twenty-eight was, but I suspect that it is going to be another hard one.  I hope it’s one that I will bloom in though. With my mental health being what it is, I’m making steps to feel better, to ease my anxiety and depression with some help, and I know that is going to be tough, but I know I’m resilient. I’ve got this, but I still hope that this next year will be kinder to me so that the journey back to being happy and well will be a little bit easier.

Thank you friends for hoping for me, praying for me, loving me. Thank you for listening when things got hard, for cheering me on and for encouraging me. I look forward to every hug that I get from you all in twenty-nine. Love you.

Bethany

Diversify Your Reading – A Call to Read Outside of Your Life Experiences

Hello friends,

A while ago I had made a post about how we need more read more diverse books and watch more diverse shows. I was sharing about how I wanted to engage in content that had perspectives and experiences completely different than my own, because I find for me, that’s how my heart changes the best. That the deepest parts of my empathy comes from consuming things that allow me to read or see the thoughts that reflect the experiences of people that I could never have the possibility know. With how everything is going in the world right now, I think that it is incredibly important to continue to share these stories to help us all build more empathy and to make some real changes in the way we treat those who society has deemed less than.

As a former bookseller and forever lover of books, I thought I would compile a list of books for you to check out by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Colour). This is by no means a complete list, there are so many incredible books and stories told by people of colour that I could never possibly know them all. Some I have personally read, some I had customers tell me that they loved, some are just from the hours of research that I have been doing to compile this list because I want to find something for everyone. What is so beautiful and wonderful about books, is that they tell stories with hard hitting conversation starters in so many different ways. It could be a memoir, it could be a contemporary fiction, it could be a poem, sci-fi, fantasy, anything. And the thing is, if you’re reading a book by someone who is BIPOC that isn’t directly talking about race, if you look hard enough, pay attention, you may just find their life experiences tied into their stories.

So, without further a do, my non-definitive list of books that you should check out by Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour authors. I have only included some of their works, there are some authors who have quite the collection of stories not listed that you should also check out. I have my list organized by age group, because I also firmly believe that a lot of these important conversations start very very young, but that anyone of any age can get something from almost any of the age groups. For example, the beautiful thing about children’s picture books is that it helps start those conversations with our little ones, but they also break it down easy so we adults can blatantly see something to get us thinking. Children’s books are magical like that.

I should also note that I have put in brackets a general identifier for each book’s author to help you find a perspective that you would like to learn a little more about. There are so many cultures, differences and everything in between within each group (Ie. for Indigenous folks there are Mi’kmaq, Cree, Maori, Cherokee, and so many others, within Asian there is Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, Filipino, Indonesian and more,) so for the sake of simplicity and as not to speak on more of what I am still in the process of being educated on and do not want to speak out of term, I have left them pretty general. Please forgive me if I have missed something or been a little off the mark. I’m trying to do as much research as possible, but I’m also learning as I do this, and it has become far bigger than I could have ever dreamed.

Baby & Toddler Fiction & Non-Fiction (0-5)
– A Different Pond by Bao Phi (Asian)
– Wild Berries by Julie Flett (Indigenous)
– Lii Yiiboo Nayaapiwak lii Swer: L’alfabet di Michif / Owls See Clearly at Night: A Michif Alphabet by Julie Flett (Indigenous)
– A Day with Yahyah by Nicola I. Campbell (Indigenous)
– Shi-shi-etko by Nicola I. Campbell (Indigenous)
– We Sang You Home by Richard Van Camp (Indigenous)
– I Got the Rhythm by Connie Schofield-Morrison (Black)
– Hair Love by Matthew A. Cherry (based on the Oscar winning short that you can watch here) (Black)
– Carmela Full of Wishes by Matt de la Peña (Hispanic/Latino)
– Please, Baby, Please by Spike Lee (Black)
– Joy by Joyce Carol Thomas and Pamela Johnson (Black)
– Whose Toes are Those by Jabari Asim (Black)
– Welcome Precious by Nikki Grimes (Black)
– Baby Blessings: A Prayer for the Day You Are Born by Deloris Jordan (Black)
– My Papi has a Motorcycle by Isabel Quintero (Hispanic/Latino)
– Bee-Bim Bop! by Linda Sue Park (Asian)
– Dim Sum for Everyone by Grace Lin (Asian)
– Sometimes I Feel Like a Fox by Danielle Daniel
– Hiawatha and the Peacemaer by Robbie Robertson (Indigenous)
– Turning Pages by Sonia Sotomayor (Hispanic/Latino)
– Thundermaker by Alan Syliboy (Indigenous)
– Dear Juno by Soyung Park (Asian)
– Hot, Hot Roti for Dada-ji by F. Zia (Indian)
– The Name Jar by Yangsook Choi (Asian)
– When We Were Alone by David A. Robertson (Indigenous)
– Coyote Tales by Thomas King (Indigenous)
– The Great Wall of Lucy Wu by Wendy Wan-Long Shang (Asian)
– Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin (Asian)
– Mango, Abuela and Me by Meg Medina (Hispanic/Latino)
– Imani’s Moon by Janay Brown-Wood (Black)
– You Hold Me Up by Monique Gray Smith (Indigenous)
– I Am Enough by Grace Byers (Black)
– What’s My Superpower? by Avaiq Johnston (Indigenous)
– Alma by Juana Martinez-Neal (Hispanic/Latino)
– Islandborn by Junot Díaz (Hispanic/Latino)
– Malala’s Magic Pencil by Malala Yousafzai (Middle East)
– Just a Walk by Jordan Wheeler (Indigenous)
– Up Home by Shauntay Grant (Black)

Young Readers Fiction & Non-Fiction (6-8)
– Jasmine Toguchi, Mochi Queen by Debbi Michiko Florence  (Series) (Asian)
– Shai & Emmie Star in Break and Egg! By Quvenzhané Wallis (Series) (Black)
– Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History by Vashti Harrison (Black)
– Anna Hibiscus by Atinuke (series) (Black)
– Little Sister Is Not My Name by Sharon M. Draper (Series) (Black)
– Allergic to Girls, School, and Other Scary Things by Lenore Look (Series) (Asian)
– Ruby Lu, Brave and True by Lenore Look (Series) (Asian)
– Meet Yasmin! by Saadia Faruqi (Series) (Middle East)
– Sarai and the Meaning of Awesome by Sarai González (Series) (Hispanic/Latino)
– Lola Levine Is Not Mean! by Monica Brown (Series) (Hispanic/Latino)
– Little Shaq by Shaquille O’Neal (Series) (Black)
– Bobby vs. Girls (Accidentally) by Lisa Yee (Series) (Asian)
– Clara Lee and the Apple Pie Dream by Jenny Han (Asian)
– Fatty Legs by Christy Jordan-Fenton (Indigenous)
– A Stranger at Home by Christy Jordan-Fenton (Indigenous)
– Mindy Kim and the Yummy Seaweed Business by Lyla Lee (Series) (Asian)
– Juana and Lucas by Juana Medina (Series) (Hispanic/Latino)
– Book Uncle and Me by Uma Krishnaswami (India)
– Get Read for Gabí by Marisa Monte (Series) (Hispanic/Latino)
– Brand New School, Brave New Ruby by Derrick Barnes (Series) (Black)

Middle Grade Fiction & Non-Fiction (9-12)
– Amal Unbound by Aisha Saeed (Middle East)
– Other Words for Home by Jasmine Warga (Middle East)
– Aru Shah and the End of Time by Roshani Chokshi (Series) (Asian/India)
– The Sky Under Our feet by Nadia Hashimi (Middle East)
– One Half From the East by Nadia Hashimi (Middle East)
– Dragon Pearl by Hoon Ha Lee (Asian)
– Sal and Gabi Break the Universe by Carlos Hernandez
 (Hispanic/Latino)
– Betty Before X by Ilysah Shabazz (Black)
– Tight by Torrey Maldonado (Black)
– The First Rule of Punk by Celia C. Pérez (Hispanic/Latino)
– Marcus Vega Doesn’t Speak Spanish by Pablo Cartaya (Hispanic/Latino)
– The Epic Fail of Arturo Zamora by Pablo Cartaya (Hispanic/Latino)
– The House that Lou Built by Mae Respicio (Asian)
– Harbor Me by Jacqueline Woodson (Black)
– The Science of Breakable Things by Tae Keller (Asian)
– The Stars Beneath Our Feet by David Barclay Moore
 (Black)
– Blended by Sharon M. Draper (Black)
– Genesis Begins Again by Alicia D. Williams (Black)
– Ghost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes 
(Black)
– A Good Kind of Trouble by Lisa Moore Ramee (Black)
– My Life as an Ice Cream Sandwich by Ibi Zoboi (Black)
– Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky by Kwame Mbalia (Series) (Black)
– Amina’s Voice by Hena Khan (Middle East)
– The Crystal Ribbon by Celeste Lim
 (Asian)
– I Can Make This Promise by Christine Day (Indigenous)
– Makoons by Louise Erdrich (Indigenous)
– I Am Not a Number by Jenny Kay Dupuis (Indigenous)
– Indian No more by Charlene McManis and Traci Sorell (Indigenous)
– Keep It Together, Keiko Carter by Debbi Michiko Florence (Asian)
– The Year of the Dog by Grace Lin (Series) (Asian)
– Ghost by Jason Reynolds (Series) (Black)
– My Fate According to the Butterfly by Gail D. Villanueva (Asian)
– This Book is Anti-Racist: 20 Lessons on How to Wake Up, Take Action, and Do the Work by Tiffany Jewell (Black)
– Malala: My Story of Standing Up for Girls’ Rights by Malala Yousafzai (Middle East)
– I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World by Malala Yousafzai (Middle East)

Young Adult Fiction & Non-Fiction (13-18)
– The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (Black)
– On the Come Up by Angie Thomas (Black)
– The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo (Hispanic/Latino)
– With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo (Hispanic/Latino)
– Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Aceved0 (Hispanic/Latino)
– American Street by Ibi Zoboi (Black)
– Pride by Ibi Zoboi (Black)
– Black Enough: Stories of Being Young & Black in America edited by Ibi Zoboi (Short Story Compilation) (Black)
– Opposite of Always by Justin A. Reynolds (Black)
– A Very Large Expanse of Sea by Tahereh Mafi (Middle East)
– Love, Hate and Other Filters by Samira Ahmed (Middle East)
– Emergency Contact by Mary H.K. Choi (Asian)
– Permanent Record by Mary H.K. Choi (Asian)
– Dear Martin by Nic Stone (Black)
– Jackpot by Nic Stone (Black)
– Odd one Out by Nic Stone (Black)
– Shuri: A Black Panther Novel by Nic Stone (Black)
– To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han (Series) (Asian)
– When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon (Series) (India)
– From Twinkle, with Love by Sandhya Menon (India)
– Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi (Series) (Black)
– A Song of Wraith and Ruin by Rosanne A. Brown (Black)
– The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta (Black)
– Parachutes by Kelly Yang (Asian)
– American Panda by Gloria Chao (Asian)
– Calling My Name by Liara Tamani (Black)
– Frankly in Love by David Yoon (Asian)
– Everything Everything by Nicola Yoon (Black)
– The Sun is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon (Black)
– Descendant of the Crane by Joan He (Asian)
– Girls of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan (Please note that this book deals with rape and sexual assault) (Series) (Asian)
– The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline (Indigenous)
– Saints and Misfits by S.K. Ali (Middle East)
– Love from A to Z by S.K. Ali (Middle East)
– Once Upon an Eid edited by S.K. Ali (Short Story Compilation) (Middle East)
– A Girl Like That by Tanaz Bhathena (Middle East)
– The Beauty of the Moment by Tanaz Bhathena (Middle East)
– The Field Guide to the North American Teenager by Ben Philippe (Black)
– Miles Morales: Spider-Man by Jason Reynolds (Black)
– Loveboat Taipei by Abigail Hing Wen (Asian)
– This Places: 150 Years Retold by Kateria Akiwenzie-Damm & others (Indigenous)
– Give Me Some Truth by Eric Gansworth (Indigenous)
– Hearts Unbroken by Cynthia Leitich Smith (Indigenous)
– Fire Starters by Jen Storm and Scott B. Henderson (Indigenous)
– The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (Indigenous)
– Monday’s Not Coming by Tiffany D. Jackson (Black)
– Anger is a Gift by Mark Oshiro (Black)
– Dread Nation by Justina Ireland (Series) (Black)
– A Blade so Black by L.L. McKinney (Series) (Black)
– The Way You Make Me Feel by Maurene Goo (Asian)
– Somewhere Only We Know by Maurene Goo (Asian)
– Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir (Series) (Middle East)
– Spin the Dawn by Elizabeth Lim (Asian)
– Watch Us Rise by Renée Watson and Ellen Hagan (Black)
– Piecing Me Together by Renée Watson (Black)
– Dealing in Dreams by Lilliam Rivera (Hispanic/Latino)
– We Are Displaced by Malala Yousafzai (Middle East)
– Americanized: Rebel Without a Green Card by Sara Saedi (Middle East)
– Becoming Maria: Love and Chaos in the South Bronx by Sonia Manzano (Hispanic/Latino)
– The Distance Between Us: Young Reader Edition by Reyna Grande (Hispanic/Latino)
– Speaking Our Truth: A Journey of Reconciliation by Monique Gray Smith (Indigenous)

General Fiction
– Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng (Asian)
– Swing Time by Zadie Smith (Black)
– White Teeth by Zadie Smith (Black)
– Secret Daughter by Shilpi Somaya Gowda (India)
– The Golden Son by Shilpi Somaya Gowda (India)
– A House Without Windows by Nadia Hashimi (Middle East)
– The Pearl That Broke Its Shellby Nadia Hashimi (Middle East)
– The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende (Hispanic/Latino)
– The Japanese Lover by Isabel Allende (Hispanic/Latino)
– The Color of Our Sky by Amita Trasi (India)
– An American Marriage by Tayari Jones (Black)
– Everything Here is Beautiful by Mira T. Lee (Asian)
– The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill (Black)
– The Illegal by Lawrence Hill (Black)
– The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang (Asian)
– The Lost Girls of Camp Forevermore by Kim Fu (Asian)
– Beloved by Toni Morrison (Black)
– Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison (Black)
– The Bluest Eye By Toni Morrison (Black)
– The Color Purple by Alice Walker (Black)
– Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (Asian)
– One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez (Hispanic/Latino)
– Pachinko by Min Jin Lee (Asian)
– Miracle Creek by Angie Kim (Asian)
– Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan (Series) (Asian)
– Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams (Black)
– Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal (India/Asia)
– The Break by Katherena Vermette (Indigenous)
– Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese (Indigenous)
– Son of a Trickster by Eden Robinson (Indigenous)
– Birdie by Tracey Lindberg (Indigenous)
– Daughters are Forever by Lee Maracle (Indigenous)
– Difficult Women by Roxanne Gay (Black)
– An Untamed State by Roxanne Gay (Black)
– Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston (Black)
– Washington Black by Esi Edugyan (Black)
– The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (Middle East)
– The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu (Series) (Asian)
– The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin (Series) (Black)
– The Black Tides of Heaven by J.Y. Yang (Series) (Asian)
– Song of Blood & Stone by L. Penelope (Series) (Black)
– Certain Dark Things by Silvia Moreno–Garcia (Hispanic/Latino)
– The Tiger’s Daughter by K. Arsenault Rivera (Series) (Hispanic/Latino)
– Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse (Series) (Indigenous)
– Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones (Indigenous)
– Future Home of the Living God by Louise Erdrich (Indigenous)
– In Arabian Nights: A Caravan of Moroccan Dreams by Tahir Shah (Middle East)
– Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed (Middle East)

Adult Non-Fiction
– Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teaching of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer (Indigenous)
– Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City by Tanya Talaga (Indigenous)
– The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America by Thomas King (Indigenous)
– One Story, One Song by Richard Wagamese (Indigenous)
– All the Way by Jordin Tootoo (Indigenous)
– The Reason You Walk by Wab Kinew (Indigenous)
– The Right to be Cold: One Woman’s Story of Protecting Her Culture, the Arctic, and the Whole Planet by Sheila Watt-Cloutier (Indigenous)
– Bad Feminist by Roxanne Gay (Black)
– Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body by Roxanne Gay (Black)
– Not that Bad: Dispatches from Rape Culture by Roxanne Gay (Black)
– We Should All be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Black)
– Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and Politics of Empowerment by Patricia Hill Collins (Black)
– Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower by Dr. Brittney Cooper (Black)
– Heavy: An American Memoir by Kiese Laymon (Black)
– I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou (Black)
– Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson (Black)
– Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love and so Much More By Janet Mock (Black)
– Sister Outsider By Audre Lorde (Black)
– So You Want To Talk About Race By Ijeoma Oluo (Black)
– The Fire Next Time By James Baldwin (Black)
– The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration In The Age Of Colorblindness By Michelle Alexander (Black)
– The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism For The 21st Century By Grace Lee Boggs (Black)
– This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Racial Women of Color by Cherrie Moraga (Hispanic/Latino)
– How We Fight White Supremacy by Akiba Soloman and Kenrya Rankin (Black)
– Decolonizing Academia: Poverty Oppression, and Pain by Clelia O. Rodríguez (Hispanic/Latino)
– Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present by Robyn Maynard (Black)
– The Skin We’re In: A Year of Black Resistence and Power by Desmond Cole (Black)
– How to An Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi (Black)
– On the Other Side of Freedom: The Case for Hope by DeRay Mckesson (Black)
– When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and Asha Bandele (Black)
– Black Lives Matter in the Great White North by Syrus Marcus Ware (Black)
– Unapologetic: A Black, Queer, and Feminist Mandate for Radical Movements by Charlene Carruthers (Black)
– Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali (Middle East)
– The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World by Dalai Lama XIV (Asian) and Desmond Tutu (Black)
– More Than Enchanting: Breaking Through Barriers to Influence Your World by Jo Saxton (Black)
– Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God by Francis Chan (Asian)
– Rescuing the Gospel from the Cowboys: A Native American Expression of the Jesus Way by Richard Twiss (Indigenous)
– Woke Church: An Urgent Call for Christians in America to Confront Racism and Injustice by Eric Mason (Black)
– United: Captured by God’s Vision for Diversity by Trillia J. Newbell (Black)
– The Color of Compromise: The Truth About the American Chruch’s Complicity in Racism by Jemar Tisby (Black)
– Be the Bridge: Pursuing God’s Heart for Racial Reconcilation by LaTasha Morrison (Black)
– Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi (Middle East)
– I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai (Middle East)
– A Good Wife: Escaping the Life I Never Chose by Samra Zafar (Middle East)
– Becoming by Michelle Obama (Black)
– I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You: A Letter to my Daughter by David Chariandy (Black)
– Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates (Black)
– Latinx Superheroes in Mainstream Comics by Fredrick Luis Aldama (Hispanic/Latino)

Poetry/Essays/Etc
– Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur (India)
– The Sun and Her Flowers by Rupi Kaur (India)
– Love Looks Pretty on You by Lang Leav (Asian)
– Love and Other Misadventures by Lang Leav (Asian)
– North End Love Songs by Katherena Vermette (Indigenous)
– Embers: One Ojibway’s Meditations by Richard Wagamese (Indigenous)
– The Winter We Danced: Voices from the Past, the lFuture and the Idle No More Movement by The Kino-Nda-Niimi Collective (Indigenous)
– #NotYourPrincess: Voices of Native America by Lisa Charleyboy and Mary Beth Leatherdale (Indigenous)
– Native Poetry in Canada: A Contemporary Anthology by Jeanette Armstrong (Indigenous)
– Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine (Black)
– Don’t Call Us Dead by Danez Smith (Black)
– Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson (Black)
– Maya Angelou: The Complete Poetry by Maya Angelou (Black)
– Inward by Yung Pueblo (Hispanic/Latino)
– A Psalm for Us by Reyna Biddy (Hispanic/Latino/Black)
– Corazón by Yesika Salgado (Hispanic/Latino)
– Love Me Like the Stars by Alesia Carter (Hispanic/Latino)
– Love Poems by Pablo Neruda (Hispanic/Latino)
– Tell Me How it Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions by Valeria Luiselli (Hispanic/Latino)
– The Essential Rumi by Rumi (Middle East)
– The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran (Middle East)
– Mind Platter by Najwa Zebian (Middle East)
– The Nectar of Pain by Najwa Zebian (Middle East)

Graphic Novels
– They Called Us Enemy by George Takei (Asian)
– American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang (Asian)
– Ichiro by Ryan Inzana (Asian)
– Black Panther, Vol. 1: A Nation Under Our Feet by Ta-Nehisi Coates (Series) (Black)
– Black Panther: World of Wakanda by Roxanne Gay (Black)
– The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi (Middle East)
– Embroideries by Marjane Satrapi (Middle East)
– Moonshot: The Indigenous Comics Collection, Volume 1 by Hope Nicholson (Indigenous)
– Pemmican Wars: A Girl Called Echo Vol. 1 by Katherena Vermette (Series) (Indigenous)
–The Outside Circle: A Graphic Novel by Patti Laboucane-Benson (Indigenous)
– Maggie the Mechanic by Jaime Hernández (Hispanic/Latino)
– Teen Titans: Raven by Kami Garcia (Hispanic/Latino)
– Teen Titans: Beast Boy by Kami Garcia (Hispanic/Latino)
– Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide by Isabel Quintero (Hispanic/Latino)
– The Many Adventures of Miranda Mercury by Brandon Thomas (Black)
– Still I Rise: A Graphic History of African Americans by Roland Owen Laird Jr (Black)

There are so, so many more books by BIPOC, but this compiled list is a place to get you started. And I want to thank my fellow former book sellers and close friends Abbey and Keri for helping with some of these titles, as well as the countless blogs, libraries and GoodReads lists that helped me in my research for these books.

If you have other books that you know of by BIPOC that are great, please let me know. I think that learning about other perspectives is incredibly important in building empathy and loving those around us.

Stay safe. I love you all.

Keeping Busy

Hello friends,

I hope that you’re keeping well with all of this physical/social distancing and staying home. I know that some of you are working, and on the front lines no less, and I hope that you are taking care of yourselves. And not just physically. This is a strange time where everything seems to be off kilter, so I hope that you are all taking care of your mental health as well and taking the time to rest and do the things that you enjoy and love.

As for me, I have been keeping very busy. I’m very happy to say that I have still been working. What my days at work look like are very different from when we’re open. I’m a sales co-worker so on my usual days I deal with customers, and since we have closed to customers completely, it’s been a huge shift. In fact, it gave me the opportunity to be cross trained in a department completely different than my own, and I have been loving it. It’s given me the chance to see the other side of the job that I don’t see. Instead of setting up deliveries for customers, I’m picking up the pieces for their orders, I am processing them to go out for delivery, I’m seeing what these other teams are doing to get everything ready and keep the job flowing.

On top of all this, I’m getting to know my co-workers in these other departments and starting to make more friends. I’m seeing all of the hard work they do, how willing they are to teach me, help me when I make a mistake or get that heavy thing off a shelf for me. I’m chatting to the girls who are supposed to be graduating high school this spring, who are wondering if they’re going to get a prom, let alone be able to walk across the stage in front of their families to get their diplomas. I’m talking to the retired dad who jokes about this job being a gym membership but the bonus is that he’s getting paid for it. I’m watching as the guys who are basically like Thor, picking things up like they’re nothing, that I straight up struggle with, and seeing just how helpful they are when I need it. It has just been really a great experience, and helps keeping some things consistent when everything feels like it’s changing every five minutes.

I have also been socializing with friends through phone calls, video chats and video games. It has been a little strange not being able to just hop in the car and meet them somewhere and wander around, but instead logging into Facetime and just checking in to see how they are. I mean, my friends Kaitie and Abbey tried the Chrome extension for the Netflix Party a couple of times with me and we had a blast. We watched Twilight and New Moon and we laughed so hard and made so many inappropriate jokes and we’re going to watch Eclipse soon and probably the rest of the series too. It has been so fun being able to connect with my friends this way, even though I would much rather be with them in person.

Abbey and I also watched Tangled together through trying to sync our movies by saying “ONE, TWO, THREE, PLAY!” while on Facetime as well. It was so much fun to sit back and enjoy one of my absolute favourite Disney movies with one of my favourite friends. On top of watching movies with my friends, I ended up buying a Nintendo Switch Lite to play Animal Crossing: New Horizons (and a few other games) and knowing that the game has a social aspect made it so much more fun. I’ve had friends come and visit my island, I’ve gone to visit theirs and just being able to sit on Facetime with Abbey while we both play whatever game we wanted, but still got to “hang out.” I found out that the Nintendo Switch Online app for my phone allows me to video chat through the game as well, so I was able to chat with my friend Mike, who I had gone to camp with, for a while.

Having bought the Switch, I have spent so many hours playing games. I suppose because I can’t really go out and spend time with my friends, or go anywhere really, I’m getting some quality time paying my dues to a capitalist raccoon (I know Tom Nook is a Tanuki, shshh), saving Hyrule, bringing colour back to a girl’s life and diving into the deep ocean and exploring. I have found that it has been a really great distraction from everything going on when I just need a little bit of light and fun in my life. And it’s helping keep me occupied and from feeling the need to escape my house for unnecessary reasons. If you want to be my friend on Switch, send me a message with your friend code or ask for my code, I’ll add you*.

*I am only adding people that I know in my personal life. If you randomly found my blog post and I don’t know you, I probably won’t add you. Sorry.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Gris

Abzû

Finally, before the State of Emergency was put into place and we were told we weren’t allowed to go to provincial parks or public beaches, I had spent some time at Lawrencetown Beach, one of my favourite favourite places. I brought my camera with me, and it was so nice and honestly felt like coming home, out shooting. It didn’t matter to me if I got anything that I liked, I was just really happy to be out in a place I love so much, that has so many memories, good and bad, with my camera. It felt like I was letting out a sigh, relaxing back into myself and who I am.

Friends, what have you been doing to pass the time? How are you spending time with the people you love? How are you taking care of yourselves? I want to know it all. I suspect this will be going on for a while longer, and honestly, part of me is sad that it is, summer is my favourite time of year. Part of me though, has really appreciated having the whole world slow down for a bit and get back to some of the more important things, like the importance of the people in our lives, how the world can and will still turn if we’re not out there hustling all of the time, and just appreciate the significance of letting the people we love in our lives know that we love them.

So friends, I want you to know that I love you, and when it is safe to do so, there are a lot of you that are going to get a really big hug. Right now I think I could really use one. I love you all.

Self Isolation: An Introvert’s Dream, An Extrovert’s Nightmare. Things To Do To Keep Yourself Busy.

I know a lot of us are probably going a little crazy being cooped up inside with self isolation, and even struggling with our mental health with it all as well. With everything going on, it is important now than ever to isolate ourselves physically from one another to prevent the spread of this virus. I know a lot of people are talking about it, it can seem scary and daunting, but we all have our part to do, so let’s do it. People that we love depend on us to keep them safe during these times. Your grandparents, your immuno-compromised friend, your immune suppressed co-worker, your diabetic parent, etc. So, what can you do during a time when it’s not encouraged to be around people? I’m glad you asked, I have some ideas.

I know this one is a lot of what people are doing, and it’s binging shows and movies on Netflix. Sometimes I find it hard though, to choose something to watch, or I just rewatch an old favourite. If you find you’re having a hard time picking something out on Netflix or if you just want to try something new, I’m here to give you some suggestions and ideas. Why not try something in a different language than you speak? Did you know that Netflix Canada has a wide selection of tv shows from various countries throughout the world, even ones from other English speaking countries? I have watched a few from East Asia and found some ones I very much enjoyed and there are a few others that from other places I have been thinking about trying. If you’re stuck, here are some of my favourite East Asian dramas:

My First First Love – South Korea – This is a story that follows a group of friends, four of which all live in the same house, and the dynamics of friendship and falling in love. It’s sweet, funny and cute with a whole lot of cheesy to it.

Love O2O – China – This one is for all of your online MMORPG lovers out there who like some romance in your life. It follows the relationship of two computer science majors who both love playing the same online game who meet in game to fall in love outside of it. It is incredibly cheesy, there are moments that I laughed so hard because it was awkward, but I genuinely enjoyed it.

Accidentally in Love – China – This one is a little ridiculous but full of antics in falling in love. When a girl ends up running away from her own engagement, runs into a pop star fleeing from the wedding of his father, they end up trying to save each other for the night and then go their separate ways. Except they end up going to the same university and they feel like they can’t stand the other. Of course, you know what happens, but worth a good chuckle.

It would seem that they have taken my personal favourite off Netflix AGAIN, but if you get a chance, watching Strong Woman Do Bong Soon/Strong Girl Do Bong Soon, I highly recommend it. It’s from South Korea, and follows a young woman with supernatural strength that has been passed down from mother to daughter. When she is hired at her dream company to protect the CEO from a threat, she will do what she can to make her dreams of becoming a video game developer come true. To add on to it all, there is a man kidnapping young women in her neighbourhood and when he makes an attempt on her best friend, she is determined to catch him. This drama has EVERYTHING. It has comedy, romance and a mystery/thriller aspect. It’s so phenomenal and totally worth a watch.

I have had my eye on some other foreign shows/movies on Netflix recently, and these are the ones that caught my eye. (The synopsis’ are taken straight from Netflix):

Elite – Spain – When three working-class teens enroll in an exclusive private school in Spain, the clash between them and the wealthy students leads to murder.

Isi & Ossi – Germany – A billionaire’s daughter fakes a relationship with a cash-strapped boxer in order to coerce her parents into letting her pursue her culinary dreams.

Oh My Ghost – South Korea – She’s been able to see ghosts since childhood. Being possessed by one might be the best thing that has ever happened to her.

Baby – Italy – Fed up with their families and classmates, two teen girls from a wealthy part of Rome are drawn to the city’s underworld and start leading double lives.

Luna Nera – Italy – In 17th-century Italy, a teenager learns about her destiny among a family of witches, just as her boyfriend’s father hunts her down for witchcraft.

The Valhalla Murders – Iceland – An Oslo detective with a painful past returns to his native Iceland to help a dedicated cop hunt a serial killer with a link to a mysterious photo.

Some other recommendations for you if you want something more North American, I have plenty of those as well.

If you enjoyed The Umbrella Academy you might enjoy:

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency – The first season is so great. Dirk Gently is a holistic detective. He believes that everything in the world is inter-connected, and that coincidences are clues. Incredibly strange, and quirky, this is one that you have to pay some attention to because you are following a long with a mysterious murder that no one knows much about. It’s based of a book series by Douglas Adams, who also wrote The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

Locke & Key – Based on the graphic novel by Joe Hill (son of Stephen King) and Gabriel Rodríguez. This is another mystery series that follows the Locke children as they move into their ancestral home with their mom after their father was murdered. There is something strange about this house though, and there are all of these keys that do all of these different things. There is something more sinister going on and it’s another one that you really have to pay attention to. Bonus, is that it’s partly filmed in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia.

iZombie – Another one based on a graphic novel, iZombie follows the story of Liv, a young woman who is studying to be a doctor who ends up at a party she doesn’t even want to go to, where something strange happens, and she ends up turning into a zombie. Everything in her life has changed, from her personal relationships to her career to her eating habits. She ends up getting a job at a morgue, which enables her to feed her hunger, but she soon finds out that she can help solve the mysteries of these murder victims by seeing their memories after consuming their brains.

And if you’ve never watched The Umbrella Academy, it’s about a group of people who all have abilities, brought together by this eccentric man, who they called their father. Each of the children were born to women across the world, who the morning of the day they gave birth, they weren’t pregnant. Built as a superhero team, with one being left out, and felt as if she was not special because of her lack of abilities, starts a rift in the family after the passing of their father. Except, the world is about to end, and they need to band together to try and stop it. Incredibly weird, and quirky, based on the graphic novel by Gerard Way (of My Chemical Romance) and Gabriel Bá.

If you like some drama in your life you might enjoy:

Gilmore Girls – I’m sure most of you know this one, but you can binge this mother/daughter drama on Netflix. If you don’t, it’s the story of Lorelei and Rory Gilmore, a mother/daughter duo who are basically estranged from Lorelei’s parents. Except when Rory gets into an elite private school that could help her get into her dream University, Lorelei has to make the hard choice in reaching out to her wealthy parents so that she can send Rory. There is so much more to this series than just this, and there is so much to it. It’s just an easy binge type show that you don’t have to pay too much attention to but still find it entertaining.

Gossip Girl – Another popular one, an easy binge. This follows the lives of New York’s elite teenagers going to an exclusive private school where rumours, drama, and scandal are all exposed on a website hosted by someone mysterious who seems to enjoy letting out all of their secrets.

Jane the Virgin – This one is by far one of my favourite series. Another that is incredibly easy to binge, it follows Jane Villanueva, a young woman who has vowed to save herself for marriage who ends up getting pregnant. She was artificially inseminated and it turns her whole world upside down. Between who the biological father is, her relationship with her boyfriend, and her family dynamic. There is so much that happens in this series and it’s so incredibly well done.

Atypical – What an incredibly touching story of a young man who is on the autism spectrum, and wants to find love. This one is a tug at your heart and your empathy series at times.

Grace and Frankie – Two women who hate each other are gathered by their husbands to be told that they are leaving each of them for each other. This starts a wonderful friendship and a business between the two. This was a show that my mom and I sat and found ourselves laughing so hard at times that tears were rolling down our faces.

Schitt’s Creek – A very niche comedy type show, this one follows the wealthy Rose family as they find out that their business manager stole all of their money and they are forced to live in a town the father had bought as a joke called Schitt’s Creek. As the family adjusts to having no money, living in conditions they are unfamiliar with and meeting the strange people in their new town, it’s not for everyone, but some might really enjoy it.

Below I listed some shows in English that I have found myself quite interested in watching lately, that have been added to my list:

The End of the F***ing World – A budding teen psychopath and a rebel hungry for adventure embark on a star-crossed road trip in this darkly comic series based on a graphic novel.

Altered Carbon – After 250 years on ice, a prisoner returns to life in a new body with one chance to win his freedom: by solving a mind-bending murder.

Dracula – The Count Dracula legend transforms with new tales that flesh out the vampire’s gory crimes — and brings his vulnerability into light.

Peaky Blinders – A notorious gang in 1919 Birmingham, England, is led by the fierce Tommy Shelby, a crime boss set on moving up in the world no matter the cost.

The Witcher – An epic tale of fate and family. Geralt of Rivia, a solitary monster hunter, struggles to find his place in a world where people often prove more wicked than beasts.

I Am Not Okay With This – Angsty Syd navigates high school awkwardness, family drama and an unrequited crush on her best friend while trying to rein in her budding superpowers.

Dead to Me – A hotheaded widow searching for the hit-and-run driver who mowed down her husband befriends an eccentric optimist who isn’t quite what she seems.

The Stranger – When a stranger makes a shocking claim about his wife, family man Adam Price becomes entangled in a mystery as he desperately searches for answers.

Tidelands – Ex-con Cal McTeer’s return to her hometown of Orphelin Bay blows the lid off a generation-long conspiracy of silence around murder, drugs and Sirens.

I’m not sure why, but I haven’t been huge on movies on Netflix, but here are a few that I have watched that I really enjoyed.

Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Dystopian/Action
Ready Player One – A dystopian future, where the mass majority of people are not well off, a virtual reality game connects people, and after the passing of it’s creator, launches an in game competition for ownership. Based off the novel of the same name by Ernest Cline.

Snow Piercer – A revolution breaks out on a train that has the remaining humans, where the boxcars divide the social classes from one another.

Romance/Rom-Com/Hit you in the Feels
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before – Lara Jean has written out five love letters to boys she had previously had a crush on. Somehow, they find their way out into the world and changes her quiet existence.

To All the Boys: PS. I Still Love You – The sequel to To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, another recipient of Lara Jean’s letters makes an appearance, causing some trouble in her personal life.

Dumplin’ – This is the story of a teenage girl who’s mom is an ex pageant queen and is still involved with the pageants, who doesn’t feel like she really fits in with her mom because of her weight. She decides that she wants to start a revolution and join up in the pageant to see how far she can go. If you love Dolly Parton, you’ll probably love this movie because there is A LOT of Dolly songs. Based off the young adult novel Dumplin’ by Julie Murphy.

Love Rosie – Complicated relationships between guy and girl best friends, this movie is about two friends, Rosie and Alex, who may have always been secretly in love with each other but life never seemed to work out for them. Between going to a dance with the wrong person, to unexpected life changes, it’s about two people who are in love finding their way back to each other. Based off the book Where the Rainbow Ends by Cecilia Ahern (author of PS. I Love You).

Wonder – Auggie Pullman has been home schooled for all of his life. Auggie has Treacher Collin’s Syndrome which is a genetic disorder that deforms the features of his face and he’s had multiple surgeries to help make sure he’s healthy. Now, at 10 years old, he’s going to a public elementary school, and he’s worried about how everyone will react to his face. This movie shows had cruel kids can be, but also, how kind they can be too, and it will probably make you cry. Based on the middle grade novel Wonder by R.J. Palacio.

Flipped – Things get complicated when a young boy moves into the house across the street from Juli Baker, and she’s convinced that she’s in love with him. As for that young boy, Bryce Loski, he finds her incredibly weird and annoying. After overhearing him say something incredibly mean, Juli’s crush starts to wither, but Bryce has seen a new side to her, and then things get complicated. Based on the middle grade novel Flipped by Wendelin Van Draanen. This book has one of my favourite quotes that they also used in the movie, “Some of us get dipped in flat, some in satin, some in gloss; but every once in a while, you find someone who’s iridescent, and once you do, nothing will ever compare.”

Soul Surfer – An aspiring professional surfer at a young age, Bethany Hamilton is on track to become that. A sponsorship from RipCurl, and going into highly competitive competitions, everything is going smoothly, until it’s not. Out surfing on Halloween morning, Bethany has her arm bitten off by a shark, and her whole world and life plan are flipped upside down. With struggles and her faith and family to push her through, Bethany will continue to try and make her professional surfing dream come true. Based on the true story of Bethany Hamilton, it’s one of my favourite actual stories of faith and perseverance.

The Little Prince – I was worried when in initially heard that they were going to be making The Little Prince (or Le Petit Prince) into an animated movie and let me tell you, it’s everything I wanted any more. The Little Prince is a short French novel (translated into English and many other languages) that can be read as a children’s story or a philosophical one reflecting on the world. The movie though, is a pure delight and totally child friendly. It follows a young girl who’s life is scheduled down to the minute, and her friendship with her eccentric old neighbour who tells her the story of The Little Prince. The animation is gorgeous and it’s a feel good movie.

There hasn’t been a lot of movies that have caught my eye, but here are a couple that I might try:

Irreplaceable You – A stunning cancer diagnosis spurs Abbie to seek a future girlfriend for fiancé and childhood sweetheart Sam, who’s clueless when it comes to dating.

The Edge of Seventeen – When Nadine’s best (and only) friend starts dating her detested older brother, the teenage cynic’s life becomes even more unbearable.

I know that these are scary times that we’re living in, and it’s okay to feel cooped up, overwhelmed and even missing the people in your life. I know a lot of people have mentioned it, but a great way to connect with your loved ones over a movie on Netflix is using the Netflix Party extension for Google Chrome. I have yet to try it, but I did try using Facetime and watching Tangled on Disney+ with my friend Abbey recently, and it was so much fun.

If you feel like you’ve watched just too much on Netflix and you’re looking for something else to do on your own why not try some of these:

• Find a colouring book or free colouring pages on line, print them out and colour until your heart is happy. Colouring really helps me with my mental health. It keeps you focused on something, you feel productive because you can see an end result and all of the colour can help remind you have happy things.
• Do crossword puzzles/sudoku/word searches/etc. A great way to keep your mind sharp while keeping you occupied.
• Take a drive. Roll down your windows (unless it’s really chilly that day) blast your music and just go. Don’t go anywhere where lots of people could be, just go to get moving somewhere other than your house. I like going for a drive along the coast, stopping at a beach and just enjoying the sounds of the waves crashing. Very therapeutic.
• Go for a walk around your neighbourhood. Put some headphones in, and just go. It’s good to get your body moving. Just because you can’t be at work, or go to the gym doesn’t mean you have to stay inside all of the time.
• Grab a garbage bag and some gloves, pick a place in your community and clean it up. It’s a great way to keep yourself productive, helping out the planet and keeping your community clean and beautiful.
• If you have it, dig out an old video game console that you may have hidden around, hook it up and play those old games that you loved so much. I would list all of the old video game consoles I have, it’s quite an extensive list, but it’s something I have been thinking about doing lately.
• Do some spring cleaning and find some things that you can either sell in a yard sale or donate. This is a great way to make space, make a little money, do a little good in the world and/or help the planet.
• You know that book that you have sitting on your bookshelf that you’ve promised yourself you’d read eventually but never had? Pick it up, this is a great time to get lots of reading done. Also, I’m not sure if many of you know this, but you have access to lots of books through your local library digitally. The two apps I know that The Halifax Public Libraries use for their digital content are Overdrive and Libby. All you need is your library card number, and voila, instant access. I do imagine that there are a lot of books being borrowed digitally with all of this going on, so there might be some wait times, but you might also find a secret treasure book you never thought you’d like. And if y’all need some book recs, hit a sister up. I got you.
• Take time to learn a new skill. There are plenty of websites that allow you to learn many new skills. One that I recently signed up for was Skillshare and I am learning how to use Adobe InDesign better. There is so much that these websites have to offer when it comes to learning.
• Write. Write a blog post, write a short story, or be more ambitious and write a novel. Write to get your feelings out, write a letter, write anything at all. If you’re not sure what to write, look up writing prompts, and go off that. It doesn’t have to be incredible, just get yourself using words to express things. Write a love letter to yourself or one to your past self. Write a letter to a future self or lover. Just write.
• Do a photo challenge. You don’t have to have a fancy camera, the majority of us have phones that are able to snap pictures. You don’t have to be a professional, just keep an open mind, use prompts, or don’t. Just snap, snap, snap. Make it a project.
• Have a Skype/Facetime/Whatsapp date with your friends. Though you can’t be in the same space right now, doing this will allow you to connect with the people you love while still keeping that social distancing. Plus, when you’re tired out, all you have to do is say, “Goodbye” and log out. Easy.
• Youtube definitely has lots work out videos if you find that you need to get yourself moving or exercising. Use them, or, y’know, make fun of the ridiculous videos because you need a laugh.
• If you are self isolating with your family, your roommates, your partner, etc. have a board game night. Even if it’s one you make up. Just make sure it’s one where you don’t have to be too close to each other.
• Make a playlist of songs that you can have a crazy solo dance party with.
• Not everyone will get this one, but if you’ve ever seen a Studio Ghibli movie you might. Write about your day, or a perfect day, or whatever that makes you feel like when you watch a Studio Ghibli movie. Describe even the most mundane things in your life as if Hayao Miyazaki animated it. Make it feel whimsical, or like you were romanticizing your life. Get creative with it.
• Learn to crochet or knit. There are TONS of videos on youtube to get you started. My mom taught me how to crochet a while ago with just some basic stitches, and when I wanted to learn how to make a really cute little whale, there was a stitch she hadn’t taught me how to make, so I used youtube to watch someone walk me through it, and it was great.
• Use youtube to learn a bunch of new things. How to cook, how to draw, how to solve a rubiks cube, how to do almost anything. We have so many great resources around us.

There are so many other things that you can do to make this a little bit easier, and share the things you’re doing to keep occupied so that other people can get ideas too. I would love to hear some of yours.

And what can you do if everything seems like it’s just getting too much for you and your mental health? Here are a few options for you:

• Reach out. You may not be able to see someone physically, but even talking over the phone to someone who loves you or text messaging them can help a little bit. Don’t let yourself feel so isolated that you can’t get yourself out of it. And if just calling isn’t enough, and you want to physically see someone, keep some things in mind: social distancing. This is very important. Keep AT LEAST 6 FEET AWAY FROM ONE ANOTHER. As much as physical touch can be reassuring, you do not want to pass this virus on, and you do not want to get it. If you both drive, drive to the same parking lot somewhere, stay in your cars, and call each other. Do what you need to to keep yourself both physically and mentally well.
• Turn off the news. We all know that everything seems to be really dire right now, but that doesn’t mean that you have to be constantly bombarded with it. Yes, it’s good and important to be informed, but it’s also okay to take a break from hearing about it all the time too. It’s okay to take a break from hearing about the things that are making you feel bad all of the time.
• Use online resources. An app that I have personally used for my mental health stuff, Sanvello (previously called Pacifica) has all of their premium tools out for free during this time. Use them. Take care of yourself.
• If you have a doctor/psychologist/therapist/whatever, see if they’re able to have an over the phone appointment with you. Talk it out.
• Use your local mental health foundation’s website for help. For us Nova Scotian’s you can use Mental Health Foundation of Nova Scotia. They have a ton of resources, including numbers for crisis lines, local support, tips to keep yourself well.
• Exercise. Go for a walk or run. Get your body moving. Or if you have any type of work out equipment, use that.
• Don’t forget to have some time away from a screen. As much as our screens can connect us, they can also make us feel very isolated. Take some time to do something away from your tv/phone/tablet/computer/etc.
• Get enough or a proper amount of sleep. Your brain needs sleep to function properly and if you have too little or too much, it can affect your mental health.
• Keep your routines as best as possible, or make new ones and stick to them. With everything going on, your normal routines are probably out of whack, so if you have to make new ones, make them easy so that you can be consistent with them. It helps ease the stress when you know what/how your day is going to look.
• Do get outside. Even if it’s sitting on your back deck, your patio, outside somewhere. Get some sunshine. This time of year is tough enough as it is, so make sure you’re making that effort.
• Eat healthy. It’s easy to just eat snacks and easy to grab/make things, but eating nutritious food helps your body function best, including your mind. Get some fruits and veggies in, get your protein, get the things your body needs to feel nourished.
• Stay hydrated. Very important. Drink some water, or juice. Helping your body function properly can help your mind function properly too.

Remember, even though we’re self isolating and practicing social distancing, you are not alone. You are loved, valued and cared for. This will pass, but in order for it to pass as quickly as possible, we all have to do our part to keep each other healthy. And keeping each other healthy means also keeping yourself healthy too.

I love you guys, stay safe ❤

Resilience

I’m always amazed at how resilient people can be. After being knocked down time and time again, then still getting up and moving forward, it’s incredible. Up until recently, I didn’t think that I was all that resilient and was in complete awe of the people who went through hard thing after hard thing after hard thing and still had a smile on their face. After these last few months, I’m starting to see just how resilient I am when I didn’t think I was at all.

If I’m being completely honest about it, I’m exhausted in so many ways. If I make being resilient look easy, then wow, because it has wiped me out completely. Part of the problem is that like many people, I struggle in the winter months with my mental health, and this winter has been one of the worst. I have found myself just sitting there in tears wondering why I’m even alive and if it’s actually worth it to keep going. The thing that keeps me holding on is the fact that I know that this feeling is temporary and that it will eventually pass, but guys, it has been incredibly difficult fighting my brain on the daily.

I think maybe it would surprise some people who know me that I struggle with depression. Like my anxiety, it is manageable and I have tools to help when it’s not as manageable as usual. But the reason why I think that it would surprise some people is because most people see me with a smile on my face, good mood, bubbly personality. I have become a master chameleon, and the only time people know that something is wrong is when I either purposely let them know with my words or letting my true mood show, or if they know my telltale signs well. When I don’t show these things, I think that maybe it’s hard to tell when I’m struggling.

I look at all of the things that I have gone through in my life, let alone the last few months and sometimes I wonder how I get up everyday, put a smile on face and walk out of the front door. Sometimes I cannot even fathom how I’m going to find a place where I feel better, those are the really dark days. Those dark days I often describe as ones where I feel like I want to lay face first in a snowbank and just stay there until things feel better. And yet, I wipe the tears from my eyes, or I just go with them running down my face and I keep going. It’s getting exhausting, and I wonder when I will eventually collapse under the weight, and yet, I just keep moving forward.

I keep fighting, and I’m always amazed that even though sometimes get really heavy for other people too, they keep fighting as well. It gives me some hope. I have seen time and time again how the people in my life are also resilient. A friend of mine is going through a really hard time right now, and I cannot talk about specifics of his story, but he has been in a really bad spot for a long time. Some situations have changed that have given him two options: to break or to go to war and fight for himself. Guys, you don’t even know how proud I am of him for starting to put on armour to get ready to fight for the happiness he deserves. He has proved to himself that he is stronger than he could have ever thought possible, and with this road, it’s going to be long and difficult, he is going to prove his resilience.

I have another really close friend, and she too is going through some really tough stuff. Again, I can’t talk about specifics of her story because they are not mine, but I am also so proud of her. I’m cheering her own in her quest for a happier and healthier life. I have heard about her struggles with getting the help she needs, and I’m not sure if she knows exactly how proud I am of her that she’s doing what she needs to to get to a better place. She has told me about how difficult it has been even going through the things that she has to to be healthier, but what I don’t think she sees is that she is showing just how strong she truly is.

It makes me wonder what motivates us to keep going when everything feels like it’s crumbling down at our feet. I think maybe we all find a different reason, or something to believe in to keep us going. Some choose to turn to faith, some choose for the people that they will become in the future, some choose the people in their life, some choose to find anything at all just to hold on to. It also makes me wonder how some people don’t even realize that they have this insane way of building themselves back up after a storm knocks them down, and then back up again when another one hits. That is resilience to it’s core, and if you look at your own life experiences, I bet that you will find moments where you were far stronger than you ever thought possible and that is something to be proud of.

So if you ever found yourself in a position where you didn’t think you could get back up again and you did, feeling like life wasn’t worth living but you kept living anyway, found yourself feeling like the whole world was crashing down around you and you built it back up again, found yourself with a broken heart and you kept going and filled the cracks in with the gold of self kindness and love, then you are resilient. I am in awe of you, because it is often one of the hardest things to ever do it pick yourself up again. And when those days come when all you can do is lay face down and do nothing, but you still remain here, know that I am so proud of you for trying, for being here. I know that it’s not easy at all, but you’re doing it and you should be proud of yourself too.

 

Threads of Connection

Recently I watched Netflix’s highly anticipated sequel to To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, To All the Boys: PS. I Still Love You based on the book series by Jenny Han. I had been patiently waiting for the sequel because I actually loved the first movie so much, and I wanted to know what happened next. I suppose I could have read the books, I’m usually a “read the book first” kind of girl as it is, but I don’t remember loving the first book as much as I loved to movie, which is really strange for me because I almost always love the book more.

About midway through the movie, Lara-Jean talks to Genevieve, her ex best friend and romantic rival, about her insecurities when it comes to the relationship that is still shared between Gen and Peter. She talks about this Korean word, jung, and the definition of it and it really hit me how we don’t really have a word in English that fits this thing that I have found in my life with many people. After looking more into the definition of the word, and finding that it has another spelling (jeong) I’m finding that it’s hard to really pin down an exact translation or definition, but for the sake of simplicity, I’m going to pull from the quote from the second book.

There’s a Korean word my grandma taught me. It’s called jung. It’s the connection between two people that can’t be severed, even when love turns to hate. You still have those old feelings for them; you can’t ever completely shake them loose of you; you will always have tenderness in your heart for them.

– PS. I Still Love You by Jenny Han

This word doesn’t even just refer to a romantic connection, it is also used in friendships and when I look over the many people that have crossed through my life over the years, I see this feeling of tenderness for them. I think back to a friendship that didn’t end particularly well, we’re not in each other’s lives anymore, and I heard that she had gone through a divorce. I felt so much sadness for her, and if she had reached out to me because she just needed a friend or someone to talk to, I would have been there because I believe that we have had jung in our lives.

I think about the friends that I have in my life right now too, the ones that are great, and how this jung, this connection, has been built with them. How if we lost touch or if we grew apart, or any of the many reasons why friendships end, that I would never be able to shake them loose from my heart. That if I got that phone call at 4am because their life was falling apart and they didn’t know where to turn, that I would still be there. That I would hold their hand and help them get back on their feet again, even after time apart.

I find that I tend to build a lot of my relationships with the mentality of jung. I, to my core, love people. It’s just who I am, and I know that my love for the people that cross my path often come with this kind of connection built into it. I don’t feel this connection with everyone that comes into my life though, and honestly, I think that’s probably a good thing. I’m almost completely all heart, and it is both painful and exhausting to allow this type of connection to form with every single person. It’s not that I don’t care about those people, because I totally do, but the way I understand jung, is that it’s a very special kind of connection that you only share with some people, and for whatever reason, I’ve been lucky to feel it with built with so many wonderful people.

The more I explore the idea of jung, the more I’m reminded of another type of connection that comes from East Asian culture that I’ve read a little bit about. It’s known as The Red Thread of Fate. This type of connection is based on a romantic type of love, and is pulled from Chinese legends but is seen throughout a lot of the East Asian countries and cultures. It is said that two people are connected by a red thread, from finger to finger, and in certain countries from pinky to pinky, and it’s said that they are meant to be. That they are destined to meet in a certain situation and that they are supposed to be each other’s true love. It’s also said that this red thread may be tangled and stretched but that it can never be severed, that this connection was destined by the gods.

There are stories that come from this legend where the matchmaker god reveals to someone who their red thread is connected to, and often leads to that character rejecting their person, sometimes causing them harm. Later in the future, they unknowingly marry the person and find out that the deity showed them the truth and they realize that they’ve hurt this person that they love so much. This leads to them asking for forgiveness, and finding it. These stories try to show that human connection can be strong and that life just finds a way to bring people together, even when there is hurt there.

I’m not really sure I believe in this idea of a Red Thread of Fate, but I definitely believe that my journey when it comes to love is tangled and stretched thin. That each person that I have dated, especially in my adult life, was put in my life for a reason. I learned something from each one, and I found that a lot of my growth in that aspect of my life came from experiencing these tangles. I suppose I like the idea of The Red Thread of Fate, that someday the being stretched thin and tangled up in a mess will lead to something beautiful and amazing. That all of this learning and growing will be what prepares me to work hard to keep the relationship that I will one day have for hopefully, forever.

As I think about it more, maybe I do believe in The Red Thread of Fate a little bit, or at least hope a little bit for something like it. Like, crossing paths with someone when I was younger, not really knowing anything about them, maybe we went to the same college at the same time, or maybe they used to be a customer at one of my previous jobs, and then meeting later. Realizing all of the ways throughout our history that we were connected, a location here, a person there, the crossing of paths, and then finally coming together. Maybe part of me wants to believe in that, because as much as I don’t show it, I’m also a little bit of a romantic at heart, but that’s an easy way to get a heart broken.

Regardless, whether it’s jung or a red thread of fate, or any of the other numerous ways that we try to explain the human experience and connection, I’m so thankful for the people I have had cross my path over the years. Maybe with these connections, if we fall out of touch, if we’re separated in some way, that maybe we can be reconnected. There are a few relationships throughout my life that I hold onto and hope that we will cross paths again and our friendships can be built again. That we just needed time to grow away from each other to come back to where we need to be. I think at the end of everything, the idea that everyone that comes into our lives take a little tiny piece of our hearts with them is something I believe in.

Maybe someday, if we get lucky, we will connect again. Just maybe we are tied together with a red thread or jung. I’m starting to hope so, because isn’t it magical how life just threw us together? How out of all the times, places and circumstances that life has put us through, that you and I found what we’ve found? Even if we don’t, I’m still happy to have been connected with the people that I have been, I’m thankful for every single one of you.

A Heart’s A Heavy Burden

One of my favourite animated films, Howl’s Moving Castle from Studio Ghibli, based on the children’s book by Diana Wynne Jones, has this scene that I resonate with so much. After Howl receives his heart back he wakes up and says, “I feel terrible, like there’s a weight on my chest.” and Sophie responds with, “A heart’s a heavy burden”. Sophie’s line hits deep at my core because it’s incredibly true. It’s something that I relate to so much. I know I’m not very old, I still (hopefully) have a lot of life left to live. I mean, I’m only twenty-eight, but sometimes I feel older (and sometimes I feel younger,) but as I go, I feel like I keep finding new things to mourn and grieve. I keep learning that there are so many different ways to have your heart broken or mourn a loss.

When you think of grieving, you often think of the death of a loved one, it leaves this heaviness in your heart, a hole in your chest. You ache in ways that you didn’t know were possible. I’ve experienced this one quite a few times, more then I would have liked to, it’s just a natural part of the cycle of life. A few weeks ago, a writer I follow on Twitter put out this tweet that made me really think about the other types of losses that I have mourned in the last few years. It made me think of the grief I didn’t expect or knew I was really experiencing. The loss of friendships or the loss of romantic relationships.

Know that there are many varieties of grief, one of which is grief for the living—the estranged relative, the lost love, the friend who is still alive but is no longer in your life. Honor the relationship by honoring the loss. Keep moving.

— Maggie Smith (@maggiesmithpoet) November 8, 2019

I remember after high school I had this friend. She was one of my best friends and we hung out all of the time. We had both turned nineteen that year (which for those outside of Canada is the legal age to drink/get into bars). She was starting her first year of university, and I was working to save up money to go to school. Every weekend was spent going to parties, or to a local bar known for it’s questionable patrons, and that wasn’t really something I was interested in. When she went away to visit her family for Christmas, I had reached out on Facebook to let her know that I had her Christmas gift for when she got back. She ignored it, and any message I sent to her afterwards.

When she got home, she didn’t reach out to me, but would contact our mutual friends about me. I would get messages from one of those mutual friends saying, “She misses you and wants to hang out.” but would never actually contact me herself. I always suspected part of it was because I didn’t ever want to go to this questionable bar where the guys are gross, the floors are sticky with who knows what and there is likely some questionable bodily fluids around. After three months waiting for her to contact me after multiple attempts from my end, I decided to cut her off and remove her from my life.

Why would I want someone in my life who clearly didn’t want to be there? What I didn’t expect was the feeling of loss that followed. My heart hurt, I had lost the ability to talk to someone that I had previously trusted with my secrets, my crushes, my dreams. They were now a stranger to me, and one of the things that hurt the most was the fact that she didn’t even try to reach out afterwards. She missed out on some of the hardest things that I had going on in my life, and I missed out on some of hers. It wasn’t easy to walk away, I had to grieve the fact that we would never ever share secrets like we had before, that we wouldn’t be there to stand in each other’s weddings, that we wouldn’t get to send goofy photos of ourselves again.

This loss in my early adult life shaped the way I would let people into my life. Prepping my heart for the inevitable time that someone will want to walk out again. I’ve had people drift in and out, and the losses stung a bit, but I’m so thankful that I have chosen really great people who don’t ghost me when things get hard. I have a circle of close friends that stick by me that I stick by even in our hardest of times. I’m so thankful for them.

The loss I have felt after romantic relationships have been just as bad. A few years ago I had fallen in love with someone intensely, quickly. Then later they did a 180 and didn’t want to work on it anymore. It left me shattered, with my heart put in a deep freeze. The way I move into romantic relationships is with intention of making a future out of it. I don’t date just to date, I choose partners that I see having the potential to be around for a while. So after being destroyed by someone, grieving the loss of the future I had seen with them, I decided that I didn’t want to put myself in that position again unless I felt like it was worth it.

I didn’t realize that after having my heart broken that I would also be mourning the “could’ve been”. I’m a plan maker, it goes hand in hand with my dating with intention. I’m not out here looking to waste my time with someone just because they’re cute, I did that a little bit when I was younger, and I’ve found it doesn’t work for me. So I move forward believing and working towards the goal of it being long term, but with that comes the mourning, the lost dreams, the lost futures, the could’ve beens.

When the guy who broke my heart and I broke up, I was crushed that I would never get to bring him to my family’s cottage in the summertime, spending Christmas together and with each other’s family’s. It was so hard to walk away from those dreams that I held deeply in my heart. It was surprising to me how much grief I was feeling afterward laid heavy on my chest. It was the price of falling in love, a price I wasn’t sure that I wanted to pay again.

Then I met someone who slowly melted the ice from around my heart. Each heartbreak or heartache is unique in the way it feels I find, and this most recent one hits in a different way than the first. I’m crushed, but there’s a comfort of knowing that I am not the only one who is grieving this loss. We didn’t stop having feelings for each other, we both dated with intention hoping for an incredible future together. The problem was, that our plans for our futures were very different from each other’s. It was something that we both tried to find a compromise or work around because we cared so much for each other.

Unfortunately the plans, the things we wanted for our futures couldn’t be budged on. We held very different beliefs for things, our timelines were off, and the way we approached some things were just too different. We both agreed that it was best that we ended our romantic relationship, because as deeply as we felt for each other, these were things that neither one of us could compromise on. I’m in the process of grieving, mourning this relationship. The future I had hoped for, the dreams we were working on together, the work we both put in.

I’m trying to figure out what I want after this loss when it comes to this person. It’s not like things ended badly and that we hate each other. One of us didn’t stop having feelings for the other, we just wanted different things. In fact, we got pretty lucky that it ended the way it did, because it leaves room for the possibility of friendship. After I mourn the possibility of falling in love, the future I had hoped for, I have to decide if I want to have them in my future as a friend. There is still a deep and genuine care for each other, we have checked in with each other after everything, making sure that we knew that we were there for each other even while we were hurting. I’m just not sure yet if it’s good for my heart to have them in my future, but that’s something that I will have to figure out with time.

After all of the losses that I’ve had in my life, sometimes I wonder if it’s worth having a heart as soft as mine. Sometimes it’s a heavy burden to have, but so far, I feel like even though it’s hard to carry, it’s worth it. I’m not going to stop loving people, I know the price of it is high in grief and mourning, but I still think it’s worth it. I hope that someday that I’m lucky to fall in love with someone, where I don’t have to mourn their loss until we’re old and wrinkly and one of us has passed of old age. That’s the goal. Until that happens though, I’m going to keep going, I’m going to keep moving forward.

The Wrap Up on The Summer of Cute

Earlier in the summer, I declared that this was going to be The Summer of Cute, and it has been everything that I thought it was going to be and then some. There have been so many moments of joy, feeling confident and with the sweet moments, came some bitter moments as well. That being said, it meant that I lived, that I put myself out there and felt way more confidence in myself then I have in a long time.

So what did I do? Well, I’m glad you asked.

I spent an obscene amount of evenings at the beach, whether it be with friends, the person I was seeing, or just on my own. Sitting, listening to the waves crash, chatting, just quietly reading a book or letting a few tears flow. Evenings, (and even late nights/early mornings) at the beaches near me have become a bit of a safe haven to just let everything go with the tide. A type of therapy where there was a lot of moments of pure joy and others where only the ocean knew about what was laying heavy on my heart. It’s true what they say, ocean air really makes you feel better, it heals. The salty sea spray sands away at the sharp edges of whatever it is you’re going through. It makes you softer, smoother, and brings a little extra peace to your heart.

As I was starting my job at Ikea, my beautiful friend Sarah came down from Ontario to visit. It was incredible being able to spend the day with her, Keri and Abbey. We shopped around at a really cute store, Sarah and I bought matching hippo socks, joked around and laughed until our stomachs hurt. Then we went to one of our favourite places to get together and have fun, The Boardroom Cafe. It doesn’t happen often, but when we all get together, it just makes me incredibly happy. I love hanging with these girls, they brought a lot of joy to the beginning of The Summer of Cute and continue to bring it to my life.

In July I traveled to the Valley with a friend where I showed him some of my favourite places. I took him to this secret little beach in Harbourville, a place that I love going to and sitting on the rocks. I don’t get there very often, but it was lovely being able to show him this cool spot. We drove around for a while, visited his grandparents and grabbed a burger at Jonny’s Cookhouse, one of favourite places in the Valley. It was really wonderful just spending my time getting to know him even more. What’s a better way than driving, singing and dancing in the car to ridiculous music and just chatting to get to know someone? Nothing.

 

I hung out with with some favourite people that I don’t get to see as often this summer as well. From shopping at one of my favourite used bookstores, to walking the Halifax waterfront, to eating delicious ice cream, to trying something new like milk tea, to sitting and just talking to a friend with a cup of tea when you’re feeling sad. When you work so much, fun little outings with friends or having them sit there and listen when you’re hurting make those days off well spent. As I get older, I realize that I have an incredible circle of people that I have surrounded myself with. I am so thankful for the laughter, the hugs, and the chats.

I spent a few weekends at my family’s cottage which was really nice. There was swimming and bluberry picking, and one of the weekends spent there, I had my friend Keri with me. We made it a girls weekend with relaxation, movies, snacks, blueberries and really good conversations. There is just something about being down there that makes me feel so relaxed. I always love when I get to spend time at the cottage, I find that I sleep really well, I spend more time outside walking through the woods, and I find that I can just breathe easier without as much anxiety hanging off of me.

I started at Ikea at the beginning of the summer/end of spring and I have had a bunch of really great moments. I didn’t know that I would make so many friends in so many different departments and how much I would genuinely enjoy them all. I only thought that I would make friends within my own department, but the longer I’m there, the more people I meet, and the more people I meet the more friends I make. I also didn’t know how much I would love the little extra things that the company does for it’s staff. My particular favourite, the visit from therapy dogs, only for staff.

Then, having one of my team leads inviting me to a giant party with her family and friends was really great. It was so much fun being able to laugh until my stomach was sore, getting to know the people I work with daily better, and being made to feel like I was part of the group and team. One of the guys who works in a completely different department than me told me that he couldn’t believe that I hadn’t been with the company since the beginning because it felt like we had always been friends. It’s things like that that make me feel like I’m exactly where I need to be right now.

I also had a really great week before my birthday where I threw a birthday get together at the Boardroom Cafe, then my friend Kaitie threw a going away party for herself/birthday party for her brother, and I was able to see my friends Tim and Brandon’s band Good Dear Good. For my birthday get together, it was really cool mixing some of the people from other parts of my life to just be surrounded by people who bring so much joy to my life. It was also hilarious singing Fergilicious in my tiny five seat car that was jammed with six people.

The pool party at Kaitie and Chris’s was so much fun despite a few moments of overwhelming anxiety. It was really great getting to see everyone though, and rocking a unicorn in the pool. Then having a great chat with Kaitie in the gazebo in her backyard. It was really sad having to say goodbye to her though, I’m really excited for Thanksgiving weekend when she comes home for a visit.

Finally, the cute part of The Summer of Cute. I didn’t take a lot of pictures of the new outfits that I bought, but I did take a few. I felt incredibly confident this summer. I know that new clothes didn’t make me cute, they were just a a medium that helped me feel way more confident then I had in a while. This summer did involve a lot of cute outfits though, and it involved a change in my mindset on how I viewed myself. I’m excited to bring this view point into the fall (or as Abbey calls it, Hot Nerd Fall) and into the rest of my life. It was so nice waking up, picking out my outfit and thinking to myself, “Even if you don’t always feel it, you’re cute. You’re awesome. You’re going to have a really good day.”

Overall, this summer was incredible. There were some moments that were hard, where I was hurt, but there were so many moments that I had where I just fell in love with my life. There were great moments with friends, feeling great about myself and some personal moments and changes that have made me incredibly happy. I am excited to see how The Summer of Cute bleeds into the rest of my life.