Even if the skies get rough.

One of the things I enjoy about writing is the feeling of being unleashed. Like, being set loose after a long time in confinement. The need to write and create. The feeling of the keys beneath my fingertips typing out every little thing that pops into my head. Every word, every descriptive paragraph and every scene. In a way, writing makes me feel alive. It gives me a reason to get through the day, so I can come home and type out two measly paragraphs. That might not seem like such an accomplishment, but after a long and exhausting day at work, I’m lucky to even make it past my couch to get to the computer chair. It’s an effort that I’m willing to make, at least, when I’m not partially unconscious.

The feeling of a pen in my hand, the slide of ink on paper, and the easy relaxation that comes from jotting down disjointed thoughts in the margins of notebooks. I can type faster than I can write, but one thing I’ve learned is that some things are better written out by hand. Letters to friends a few provinces over (even though I talk to them regularly over the phone) and little notes that I leave on my mothers fridge when I visit (they make her smile and I know she keeps them all).

Writing, whether by hand or by computer, helps me relax and unclog my mind. It’s the calm in my storm and I love it unconditionally. I’m sure everyone has something they cherish like I do writing. I also think that everyone should take the opportunity to acknowledge that ‘thing’ and hold onto it with all their might. It’s the thing that you do everyday because it keeps you sane. It’s the thing that you think about doing while you’re at work or stuck in traffic. It’s the thing that you gladly give all of your attention to without a second thought. For me… that thing is writing.

What’s yours?

There’s never a dull moment here in my heart.

I promise that I’m still alive and kicking, although ‘twitching’ might be marginally more accurate. Life has succeeded in chasing me up a tree (again), but it won’t keep me there. No sir. Not while there’s awesome music happening!

I’ve been a busy bee lately and this brilliant week is no exception. If you have no idea what I’m talking about please click the above picture and educate your-fantastic-selves.

I’ll be giving a full, and proper, update sometime after the weekend. Actually, it might just end up being a post full of pictures because I’ll be partially dead due to exhaustion and lack of actual food (strawberry flavored vodka counts as fruit right?).

And on that note – have some amazing music:

Luck o’ the Irish

The sneaky monster known as ‘Real Life’ had finally succeeded in eating me alive the past few weeks, but I managed to escape just in time for one of my favorite holidays.

HAPPY ST PATRICK’S DAY EVERYONE!

There is a running joke in my family that since I’m of half Scottish and of half Irish descent that I should be continuously intoxicated all the time. Sadly, because of responsibility (and lack of alcohol) I’m not, but I usually make up for it on St Paddy’s Day. This year, however, I’m stuck working, so I want all of you (of legal age) to go out there and have a green beer for me. I’m sending all my Irish Luck to all of you today, so make the best of it!

You don’t have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great.

Lets talk about health.

I have an average body with a few extra pounds; I am not overweight but I’m not healthy. I don’t shy away from physical activity but I don’t exactly push myself either. I have a passionate relationship with junk food and crave take-out like a crack addict craves a hit. Essentially, what I’m trying to say is: I’ve decided to make a lifestyle change.

Last Monday I was talking to my mother and I can’t exactly remember how the conversation came up, but I found out that there are a lot of bad things running in my family genetics; cancer, diabetes and lung disease, to name a few. I won’t say that it scared me, but it did put a few things into perspective for me. If I were to change and become a healthier person; thirty years from now, if I develop a dangerous disease, I would have much better chances of fighting it off than I would if I stayed the same as I am now.

Changing my eating habits was the hard part. I cut junk food (ie: candy, ice cream, chips, pop, desserts, etc) out of my system. I will admit it was like overcoming a drug addiction for a while there. I also stopped eating after 8pm. These are apparently two very good steps towards living healthier, so I was happy to be heading in the right direction.

The next step was digging my (slightly old) exercise bike out of the closet, cleaning it off, and setting it up in my living room. Once that was done, I managed fifteen minutes of cardio before I felt like my legs were going to fall off, and then did ten minutes of muscle-building. I survived my first work-out and did it all inside the comfort of my own home. I’m also going to say that I’ve only been at this for a week and I can now do thirty minutes of heavy cardio and twenty minutes of muscle-building. Improvements are important and they’re going to be super small at first, I know, but they’re so nice to see.

Food is important. I love food, so I made a list of healthy things that I like and some healthy things that I should try. I found out that I DO like caesar salad, despite hating it for years, and that hard-boiled eggs are actually quite good. My fridge is now full of fruits and some veggies, as well as some soy milk that I haven’t tried yet.

Working out is something that’s coming easier to me than I thought it would. I feel really good after a work out, despite my aching muscles; I suppose that’s the endorphins talking. It’s the ‘not eating junk food’ bit that’s pushing my self-control, however, every time I get a craving for something sweet I eat an apple or drink a glass of water. It seems to be working very well so far.

Winning the little battles feels good. Like, turning down the cookie a co-worker offered me despite the fact that I was staring at it with open lust, and pushing myself to pedal that bike as hard and fast as I can for the last five minutes of my cardio despite the ache and heavy breathing. I may just be starting to change my life style and it’s sometimes so very difficult, but those little accomplishments keep me going because they mean I’m improving. That little voice in my head that says I can’t do this, is a liar.

Hot water.

I love tea. In fact I probably love it more than most people. If I could have a romantic relationship with tea, I would and we’d already be married with kids.

I’m drinking tea as I’m typing this. It’s good for you, it can relax you when you’re stressed, put you to sleep, boost your metabolism, clean the toxins out of your system, make you feel better when you’re sick and it tastes great. I have yet to meet a tea that I hate. Tea comes in so many tastes and varieties that I have too many favourites. It’s a brilliant beverage and, since I really can’t stand the taste of coffee, it gets along very well with my taste buds.

I also have a crazy mental thing, where I buy accessories for my tea.

This giraffe kettle being the most awesome thing I have purchased in a great long while. It makes a ‘hum’ noise instead of a whistle when the water boils. It makes me happy and feel slightly ridiculous all at once. Personally, I think that there should be at least ONE thing in every persons home that makes them feel that way. It’s a delightfully giddy feeling that everyone should experience. Plus the object in question would be a wonderful conversation piece, or it would create awkward silences. Either way.

Putting the kettle on in the morning is much more fun.

“An idea, like a ghost, must be spoken to a little before it will explain itself.”

Happy 200th Birthday Mr. Dickens! If only you could have known the affect your writing would still have on the world two hundred years later.

“Nature gives to every time and season some beauties of its own; and from morning to night, as from the cradle to the grave, it is but a succession of changes so gentle and easy that we can scarcely mark their progress.”

“Have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts.”

“There are strings in the human heart that had better not be vibrated.”

“It opens the lungs, washes the countenance, exercises the eyes, and softens down the temper; so cry away.”

“To conceal anything from those to whom I am attached, is not in my nature. I can never close my lips where I have opened my heart.”

“Life is made of ever so many partings welded together.”

Charles Dickens – 7 February 1812 to 9 June 1870.

Let’s talk about libraries.

I have always loved books. My earliest memory is of my father reading me Dr. Seuss before bedtime and I distinctly remember begging him to read me ‘just one more’. I also remember my first time in a library. My hometown has a wonderful public library and I spent the majority of my summer holidays curled up in there with all the books. During my first visit, I was with my babysitter Aunty Barb, a kindly old woman, with arms the size of tree trunks, whom I drove partially mad and quite frankly she had a very strong heart for the amount of times I almost gave her a heart attack. I was an awful kid, but I always behaved myself in a library.

I was enchanted. There was a lot of people, but everyone was quiet; talking in whispers, and it was as if the whole building was sacred. I remember being amazed at all of the books; I’d previously had no idea that so many books could exist in one place before. Aunty Barb was holding her breath and watching me like a hawk, waiting for the trouble to start but none did. I just stood there and stared with my jaw somewhere near the floor. Aunty Barb returned her books and picked up some new ones, all the while staring at me like I had grown a second head. For the first time in the four years of my short existence I was behaving myself.

The atmosphere of a library is singularly unique and I’ve never encountered anything quite like it. I’ve seen a library turn the most rowdiest kids into well-behaved darlings the minute they walk through the door; I was one of them. In my childhood it was the ‘magical book place’ and now it’s a safe haven, a quiet place to think and write and research. It’s a place of right answers and facts. It’s a place of sanctuary. My best friend became my best friend in a library. My grandfather met my grandmother in a library and they fell in love there. Libraries are capable of bringing communities together and contain more knowledge than most people will read about in their lifetime. Libraries can open doorways to different worlds and places; they can help you expand your imagination and they will always welcome you with open arms – much like the books they house.

Disney ruined relationship prospects for me, or rather, they raised the bar of my expectations with ‘Beauty and the Beast’. In the middle of the movie The Beast gives Belle a library. HE GIVES HER A LIBRARY. My seven-year old self couldn’t understand why she didn’t propose to him on the spot. If a person gives you a library, you marry them. I still stand by that ridiculous piece of logic today and if I had been Belle the situation would have gone differently:

“Marry me?”

“But I’m a monstrous beast!”

“Honey, you just gave me a library, your excuse is invalid. Now go see if the candelabra knows someone who will marry us.”

Clearly I should just go to rural France and find myself a cursed prince to love so I can get my own library.

I’m sure you could tell but this still needs saying: I love libraries. It’s an unwavering and fierce love, the kind that never truly fades away. I hope that everyone reading this visits their library today because they deserve more love than they are getting. If you’re open-hearted and love your library it will love you back a thousand times stronger.

Awkward bookish fun, anyone?

Sometimes all you need to have a bit of creative fun is a black Sharpie and an old newspaper. Poetry isn’t really my thing, and I don’t think this actually counts, but if you want to see some really amazing stuff you should go here:  http://newspaperblackout.com/

This is a brilliant way of beating writers block, and yes I am speaking from experience here. I think it has to do with trying to find the right words that go together within someone elses words. After doing three of these my block vanished and my creativity was back. Fun and therapeutic should go together more often (like bubble wrap).

Hello Winter.

Mother Nature got her winter on, big time, over the last few days. It’s starting to feel like a normal winter instead of a messed up spring. So, I thought I would clarify some Canadian weather terminology.This is the temperature I woke up to this morning. Luckily there’s no wind chill. I recently learned that when the weather people say “wind chill warning” it means that wind chill temperatures are hazardous to life within several minutes of exposure. That’s basically fancy terminology for “go the heck back inside or you’ll get frostbite everywhere”. Welcome to Canada; home of mounted police, hockey and temperatures that can eventually kill you. Despite this, winter is still awesome.

This happened on Wednesday and made me glee and make snow angels and pelt the neighbour kids with snowballs because they’re the only ones who can appreciate it like I do (despite the fact that there was five of them and one of me, and I lost horribly). That’s what makes me love winter so much. That childish feeling you get when snow starts to fall and it makes you think of hot chocolate and warmth and stuffing snow down your friends pants. Winter makes me remember that it’s perfectly okay to be a big kid sometimes. Even if it makes my mother roll her eyes.

I’m going outside now to make another snow angel simply because I can. Have fun, where ever your winter is.

Letters To Authors: Tamora Pierce

Dear Ms. Pierce,

You probably get this all the time, but I thought I’d write an open letter to you so I can let you, and anyone else reading this, know what a wonderful human being you are.

I was eleven when I was introduced (quite forcefully, by my future best friend) to Alanna and I ended up devouring her quartet. I, swiftly, moved on to The Immortals series and got to know Daine; it was fantastic. There I was, a tom-boyish eleven year old who finally found, not one, but TWO series of books with female leads who were absolutely NOT damsels in distress. This was very much like finding a million dollars on the sidewalk; I was telling everyone, who would listen, about your amazing books.

My mother noticed the change in me (mostly because I was failing math, but then again I was ALWAYS failing math) and wanted to know exactly what was so interesting about these books that I kept not returning to the school library. My mother is a brilliant woman, but fantasy is not her genre of choice – she loves fiction and thrillers and Stephen King. Adequately giving her a description of your wonderful books was very hard for eleven year old me. It involved a lot of jumping and flailing arms and adjectives. I have no idea how she managed to make sense of my pre-pubescent fangirling, but she got the gist of it: relatable female heroes being awesome and kicking a whole lot of bad guy butt. I didn’t know it at the time but my mother understood exactly how awesome it was for a young girl to find a series of books like that.

Prior to finding your books, I was reading a lot of books where the heroes were always male. Redwall, Harry Potter, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Lord Of The Rings, The Hobbit, James and the Giant Peach, and a whole lot of Xanth Novels, to name some. There is absolutely nothing wrong with any of those books, I adore each and every one of them and most of them have some very strong minor female characters in them. There were also a few fiction books (most notably by Kit Pearson) that featured female leads and were very good, but there was no action. The female leads were sort of dainty and they were never put in any situation that required a fight or flight reflex. They were awesome books but they were lacking the fantasy and action that I preferred, which is probably why I was always reading novels with boy leads. I can say with great certainty that there is something very special about being a young-lady-person and reading about grounded and brilliant girls doing the butt-kicking instead of the boys. This was something that my mother never had growing up and I think that was why she encouraged my reading. She was the one who bought me Protector of the Small when it first came out in hardcover and every one of your books thereafter.

I guess what I’m trying to say is this: Thank you, Mrs. Pierce, for all the effort and time you’ve put in to write the books that have had, and still continue to have, a great amount of influence on my life, even fourteen years later. Thank you for all the books you’ve yet to write and thank you for inspiring me to write about my own lady-folk heroes. You are amazing and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for giving my eleven year old self her absolute favourite books.

Sincerely and affectionately,

Nuki

———-

Everyone, click the link if you’re confused. If you aren’t confused, click the link anyway. —  http://www.tamora-pierce.com/

Please note – Ms. Pierce’s books are fantastic for all ages, her writing style is brilliant and realistic and if you give her books a chance they will eat you alive (in a good way). If you’ve never read her books before, I highly recommend starting at the beginning (Song Of The Lioness Quartet) and working your way though all the series. If you were looking to start with some of her more recent books without much complication, you should probably start with her Beka Cooper series; Terrier is the first book. If you have children, and they enjoy reading, then you should definitely think about seeing if their school library carries these books, or if their birthday is close – buying the first series as a gift. It will be the best birthday present ever, I promise. My nephew will most likely be reading these books once he’s old enough.

(I know this letter isn’t perfect, but it’s my letter and I’m a fangirl. Basically, that should explain everything, right there. I’m just happy it came out semi-coherent and not all “ASDFGHK! YOU’RE AWESOME! I LOVE YOU!”)

I plan to make a series of blog posts like this; letters to some of my favourite authors. I think I might be setting myself up for failure here, but it’s always good to have goals!