17 Monday Aug 2020
Posted in family, life, loss, moments, Uncategorized
was just in the bathroom and was thinking about how blessed I am…
the fixture has an odd bulb which I can usually remove when one burns out, but for the life of me, I cannot install the replacement…
this is just one of many things that my son-in-law and grandson help me with on what feels like a fairly regular basis…
I am learning and doing more on my own, but it seems there are always things I need them for…
such a gift;-)…
20 Saturday Jun 2020
Posted in family, life, loss, moments, Uncategorized
Tags
beloved, big girl pants, father figure, Father's Day, figure, friends, grief, hard, memories, photos, remembering, support, traits, widow
Father’s Day… remembering my beloved…
I’ve been thinking a lot about all those who are missing that special person… the one who fits as the father figure… whether a father, husband, brother, son…
it is over eight years since I lost my beloved… you’d think that enough time had passed that it wouldn’t be hard, but today is hard… time doesn’t matter…
this picture popped out in my photos the last week… I’ve been going back to it ever since, lol…
he had many of the same traits as my dad… honest, accepting, caring, hard working, supportive, kind, generous…
good traits for everyone;-)…
if you know someone who has lost their special person, check in with them;-)…
08 Sunday Mar 2020
Posted in business, life, moments, Uncategorized
Tags
big girl pants, blessed, empowering, equal, Famous Five, flowers, friends, hands, International Women's Day, leader, matriarch, memories, mentor, moments, Ottawa, raise up, remembering, support, widow, women
I have been so impressed with the responses to International Women’s Day this year…
businesses and individuals have made concerted efforts to share information about the number of women in their organizations or focussed on amazing women they know or work with… watching women lifting up other women is so empowering… there is much to do, but a positive sign as we continue to raise one another up and work toward an equal world…
this has made me think of the women in my life who have been excellent role models, mentors and friends…
the matriarchs in my family: my great grandmother Josephine, my grandmother Violet, my mother Audrey… the women who have lived through life with me: Janice, Naomi, Marlene and Pat… those who I have spent time and learned from and with over twenty-five years as we studied and reimagined the church, religion and spirituality…
my neighbours: Ellen, Lorraine, BA and Lynn… the wide range of women I have worked with over the years who have demonstrated what it means to be a leader… the young women in my life who have taught me so much…
as I was searching for just the right photo I found these three… the first is hands working together… the second is from the Famous Five statue in Ottawa… the last portrays all of those who circle me with their knowledge, support and love…
Happy International Women’s Day…
14 Thursday Nov 2019
Posted in food, life, moments, nature, Photography, Uncategorized
29 Tuesday Jan 2019
Posted in family, food, health, life, loss, nature, Photography, technology, Uncategorized
yesterday, mid morning, all of sudden the display on my Charge 3 stopped working… my battery was fully charged and it continued to record and buzzed at appropriate times… just couldn’t see anything… Fitbit foibles…
so I called the Fitbit support line and they told me to hook up to the charger and push the button for 8 seconds… sadly I didn’t have the charger at the office, but connected it when I got home… that didn’t fix it…
it was late when I emailed the person who had sent me the directions, but I got an email back this morning… another set of directions… this time held the button for 15 seconds…
it worked… hurray… don’t realize how much you depend on it until it isn’t working…
hope this isn’t a sign that it is going to have problems… the kids gave it to me for Christmas and I love it;-)…
15 Tuesday Jul 2014
Posted in life, Uncategorized
was talking with someone a while ago about so much illness around us…
reminded me of the switch when the girls went from being the ones we supported to the ones who supported us…
our final parent, George’s mom, died and we were all together at the hospital… we came home and the girls organized pizza for supper…
they then proceeded to see what we needed… how they could help us…
up till that time we had been there to support and protect them…
but we moved from being the protectors to being the protected…
both George and I saw and felt the change and we talked about it quite a bit…
from then on they took on the role of supporters…
we went from being the meat in the sandwich to being the bread, lol…
since then, they have been looking after us…
and now they are looking after me… from checking in and seeing how I am, where I am, what I’m doing, what I’m eating, to calling one another and sharing how they think I am doing…
I am one lucky woman to have such wonderful kids…
04 Friday Apr 2014
Posted in Uncategorized
this morning I heard about the birth of friends’ first grandchild… they have been waiting for a while now as she was a little bit late… very cute, she looks just like her daddy… my friends are “over the moon” as they start down the path of the new and amazing world of grand parenting… so much more fun than parenting, lol…
at the end of the day, got some very disturbing news as another friend discovered that she has some serious medical issues to overcome… not even sure I heard all of the information, as my head stopped processing at the beginning of the conversation…
daffodils from a friend…
what can I do for my friends… completely different events, but likely will need the same types of support… listening and celebrating each step of their new journeys, sending prayers and healing vibes…
really, where would we be without our friends…
02 Tuesday Apr 2013
Posted in Uncategorized
was talking with a woman who is coming up to the anniversary of her husband’s death… her colleagues have not been at all understanding or supportive of what she has gone through this past year…
made me realize how blessed I am to have such a wonderful work place… my colleagues have been there for me from the very beginning of this leg of my journey… I think about the visits by small groups of them during those first days, and how they brought all my favourite foods to try to temp my appetite… how they offered to do anything that would make our lives easier… how they welcomed me back into the fold with open arms when I returned to work…
and how they have been there for me every day as this year has unfolded… how they wore purple on the anniversary to let me know they were all thinking of our family on that fateful day…
wow… I wish that everyone worked in such a supportive environment…
10 Monday Dec 2012
Posted in Uncategorized
my youngest grandson asked to see my scar a couple of days ago… it brought back some memories…
George died March 5th… following that I had some fairly serious medical symptoms which ended up with a biopsy… on May 22nd I received a phone call at 4:20 from a gynecologist advising that I had uterine cancer… I was supposed to go into a board meeting at 4:30…
I didn’t have George to talk to… that is what I miss the most…
my colleagues quickly stepped in, organized someone else to take minutes of the meeting, and a couple took me home…
we had been waiting since September of 2011 for my ventral hernia repair surgery, but the process kept going very slowly… once I saw my doctor after George’s death and described recent symptoms he advised we could not proceed with the hernia surgery as I might also need a hysterectomy, and he didn’t want me to go through two separate surgeries…
after she told me I had cancer, the gynecologist advised that she was turning me over to CancerCare, and someone would give me a call… serendipitously a colleague mentioned my situation to one of our suppliers (which was very unusual) who contacted me the next day with her niece’s phone number… her niece was one of the gynecological surgeons at CancerCare… after numerous calls my surgery was set for July 18, 2012…
I made copious arrangements for the time of the surgery, arranging schedules for those who would sit with me in the hospital, and when I got home… of course without George to look after me, I had to find others to help me…
the surgery went well and I was released from the hospital just 3 days later, and had family and friends stay with me for a while before I could manage on my own… I was home for ten weeks because of the enormity of the surgery…
a beautiful stem of orchids with an amazing dragonfly… two of my favourite things…
a number of weeks following the surgery I received a phone call to advise that there had been one small cancerous polyp but everything else was clear… it was a miracle that the gynecologist had biopsied the one spot that had cancer cells… the doctor advised that I was cancer free and would not need any follow-up procedures… I had thought I wasn’t worried about the results, but when I put the phone down after the call I burst into tears… another small miracle was that a friend arrived just moments after this news to take me to a quilting group where my friends acted as my sounding board…
my grandsons had different ways of dealing with my surgery – particularly after having lost their grandpa so recently… two of them wanted nothing to do with seeing the scar, but the youngest was quite enthralled with Grandma’s owie… every time he came to see me he would want to see how the owie was doing…
I believe that George saved my life… the symptoms I was having had been minor and I might have gone for years before getting this dealt with, but the stress of his death brought on symptoms that couldn’t be ignored…
not having him to talk to when things happen – little things, bad things, good things, whatever, that is what I miss… for 41 plus years I could pick up the phone or turn to him and he would be my sounding board…
I have new sounding boards for different things now… someone at work, or a friend, or my daughters, depending on the situation… it is a part of the new reality of my life…
once my grandson checked out the scar, he went off happily, although I think he was a bit disappointed that it was all gone…
