the mental mulch pile
Please note that this might be the full Mental Mulch Pile (click here to reload), or it might possibly be just a filtered subpile…
You can also take a look at just the top of the pile here…
An open letter to my choir family
Hey choir fam,
So I’ve needed to take a few days to process last weekend’s retreat, much more so than past years…
Fifty Favourite Things
I was inspired to pull together this list by one of my When Words Collide fam, Erin Weir, and her recent Erin’s Favourite Things post on her blog, A Flimsy Plan. As someone who talks and thinks a lot about gratitude, I thought this would be a nice twist on the usual kind of gratitude list. But what would be in such a list for me?…
The light that is you…
I want so badly to fix the world…
The music that is your soul
So I’ve been pondering a new metaphor for body, mind, and soul… one that has been slowly taking root on the mental mulch pile, growing from a particularly rich little corner of music and choir and community…
You can't put lipstick on a pig
I have now spent over thirty years working in communications, marketing, and branding. The most important thing I've learned... the most important principle for doing this job ethically and well... can be summed up in a saying that's been around about twice as long as that...
the silver lining is gratitude
This was written in response to a social media post regarding an anti-trans protest and counter protest that is scheduled to happen tomorrow, which reads in part “This event has a high potential for violence, especially towards visibly queer and racialized individuals… If you are visibly queer and/or racialized, we recommend that you AVOID this area on that day”…
Unity, Uniformity, and University
Friendly reminder to the Universe that a University is not at its core meant to be corporation but a community...
Being the microbiome
Staring up at the chaos exposed by the renovations in one of the building I occasionally occupy, the thought occurred to me that buildings are very much like bodies… complex systems and machinery barely hidden behind a thin skin…
Wait, where was I going with this?
It’s such a fine balance to try to find and hold, between who you are and who you need to be in this world…
Sometimes
Sometimes you just need to stop paddling and let the water decide…
One moment
I was reminded today, powerfully and profoundly, that while maybe I can’t change the whole world, fix all that hurts and all that is broken, I can do everything I can to change my whole world…
A state of perpetual wander…
I’ve spoken often, and written here and elsewhere, about curiosity as a core driving force in my life. Some would describe it as being in a state of perpetual wonder, which I love.
But curiosity is an outlook, a motivator, a frame of mind. It’s not an action. So what is it to put curiosity to action?
The world is joyously complex
So if there’s one overarching lesson that I’m learning as I study to become a librarian, it’s that the world is complex, but, to me at least, joyously so…
Except when I don’t
I’ve been reminded a lot recently about the difference between looking for someone or something to blame, and looking for lessons to learn…
When is a holiday not a holiday?
So just a heads up to everyone, and with apologies for being a bit of a downer potentially, but I’d never heard of any sort of daughter's day or son's day before this past week, so I did some cursory digging around…
Campus during the fall
For my entire life I have considered the University of Alberta to be my second home. I was born on campus, at the University of Alberta hospital… the result of my parents coming to Edmonton to be students here. Ever since my life has been woven with threads of the U of A in so many different ways, throughout my childhood, my youth, and my adulthood…
Be…
Realized I hadn't really shared our year-end concert video for Kokopelli Choirs, then got to pondering why…
#14daysofkokokopelli
I am part of a choir family known, for at least a little bit longer, as the Kokopelli Choir Association. As part of our looking forward to the fall, we started the #14daysofkokopelli campaign on social media…
Preserve and honour
It's Convocation Time at the University of Alberta and, as much as some people might think little of the tradition and the pomp and the colourful robes, one of my favourite things in the Before Times was going to the live Convocation ceremonies.
This is my Vaccination Selfie
Looks a lot like a photo I took just a few days ago... same spot, same mug, same shirt. But not the same me…