2013 in Pictures

Nostalgia.

Some people stay away from it; I embrace it with obsessive fervour.

On a glum day, my favourite thing to do is to put my head on a pillow, and click through old albums of London or the first year we moved up here, or that time we roadtripped all summer throughout BC.

Sometimes, I pretend I'm a stranger as I glance through these photographs, and imagine what I would think of this girl and her boy and their adventures if I really were to be looking through these for the first time. I am aware that this is fairly self-conscious, if not outright vain. I guess I find it intruiging to view my life through the lens of another.

I already know this collection of photos will comfort me in future grey times. The stranger in me agrees that whoever this girl is, she is lucky to have had so much love, ocean, woodland, friends & family and parades this year.

Happy nostalgia-ing and your last days of 2013, everyone.

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Today, it was -40.

On the eve of November 30th, I breathed a huge sigh of relief because December was on its way, and with it, a brand new month to spill our colours on.

November was a trying month. Lots of hard moments at school, colleagues losing family members, young people in pain. And it was dark-- you can't forget about the dark. It gets so confusing to leave your house in the morning darkness, only to return to the same inky darkness as you are trudging home, on the slippery ice.

We are now only two more days until the Christmas Break, and I don't know that December fared much better.. it has been a strange semester. And, like with every year, the impending holiday never seems soon enough, even though the days zoom by (seriously, how is it that Christmas is seven days away?), and everyone gets a little more squirrelly in their core, the finish line seeming so far.

But. The end is near. (She says to herself.)

The snow is fluffy, and pristine, and untouched.

The four minute walk to school lights my hair on fire, turns it white, and I can't think about anything except for the present moment because it's so cold.

This Friday, if I collapse in a heap of adrenaline that has exhausted itself, at least it will be in the company of friends.

We feed our woodstove lots of food, and in return, it licks our haunches back from the brink of hypothermia.

48 hours left between me and the rest of it. Wish me luck.