Gifts

When SB and I visited Paris last May, we spent a while roaming around the Louvre. It was a hot day, and we had already been to the top of the Arc de Triomphe and had walked all the way down the Champs Elysees, past the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais, through Place de la Concorde, through the Jardins de Tuileries, only to end up at the Louvre for free entrance night. It was a lovely, lovely day, and would have been perfect but for my highly disappointing Merrell flats that gave me blisters all over.


Our evening at the Louvre was a timed event. We had a very limited amount of time to explore, a very diverse list of items to see, two feet nearing the status of "massacred" and a throng of enthusiastic tourists to maneuver through.

Obviously Eric's girlfriend La Jaconda was first on the list:
Then we hit up as much else as we could. I believe we were actually on the hunt for Venus de Milo, who was actually just alright, when we stumbled upon a most unexpected treasure.

This photo does not do her justice. Because when you first see her you are climbing a staircase, and she is placed in the middle of the landing, so it's like she's rising before you. I remember we both gasped. Her full name is Winged Victory of Samothrace, but they call her Nike. She is from Greece, and is over 2000 years old. They found her in pieces, many, many pieces, but they put her back together. She is strong, imperfect, bold, incomplete. I was so drawn to her, I didn't want to leave. I could have sat for hours admiring her.

For my birthday, SB gave me something extraordinary, without even really knowing. He found a foot tall reproduction of Nike. And while I know that she is special for both of us, since it was one of the most memorable, striking moments of our whole trip, I feel like it is so apt that when I am feeling so deconstructed and lost and broken that this is the gift he chose to give me.

Keeping on Keeping on

Thirty years and one week and things are still the same. But I think I am getting better at accepting the status quo. Either that or I've just been really busy.

Wedding planning is coming along swimmingly. While my mother was visiting recently I had my final dress fitting and am absolutely delighted with the whole thing. I feel like I will want to wear this dress once a week. I just love it so much.

We also finalized all of our honeymoon travel plans this week which is super exciting. I am starting to be more excited for our travels than for the wedding itself, mostly just because there is much less stress involved. SB had insisted we wait to book our flights for our January trip because Air Canada was having some union issues. We waited until he was comfortable, and lo and behold we saved $500! I'm so stoked!

This weekend we are heading to Burlington to see the Tragically Hip for the second time this summer. I'm really looking forward to it, not just for the concert, but to be going somewhere different and taking a weekend out of the city. I'm just hoping that for once the weather will cooperate.

On another year gone

Turning 30 is not doing much for my quality of life. In one way, the day-to-day way, I am completely indifferent. I don't feel 30, and I don't feel like "turning 30" is going to change anything in my daily life.

In another way, I feel heartbroken. Is this really what my life is? I feel so inadequate, so unaccomplished, and so useless. Like all this time has been wasted, and what's stopping me from wasting the next 30 years too?

I am happy to have people that I love, and who love me. I'm thankful for every single individual that I have met and what they have made me see in myself.

I am happy to have travelled, both alone and with SB. We have seen some pretty great things, and we plan on seeing many more as time allows.

I love my critters - even The Woodge - and am grateful that SB puts up with us. They make me smile every single day, and sometimes they make me laugh out loud.

But I am terrified to set goals anymore because I have failed so many times. I am tired of letting people down.

And on one hand I am desperate to get out of my day to day, doing a job that I shouldn't hate but that I do. And on the other hand I wonder why I can't just do the job and be happy. Billions of people do jobs that they hate, but they go home, and they make their life, and they are happy with it. Or they can sustain some kind of level of happiness. So is my job the problem, or is it just me? Which is it, and do I really want to find out? Because it's one thing to feel trapped in what you do but it's quite another to feel trapped in yourself.

I want to ignore this birthday. I want to ignore the passing of time. I want to ignore that I have fallen behind in so many ways and that I feel like I'll never catch up.