12:34

multiple times over the past two months or so, i've looked at a clock at exactly 12:34. once it happened for the fourth or fifth time, i started to wonder if there was some hidden meaning or message. by the eighth or ninth time, i mentioned the seeming phenomenon to my mom and YB, who both found it interesting.

and it's kept happening.

this morning, i decided to google it to find out if there really might be some meaning to it.

and, per numerology, THERE IS.

every site i checked says that seeing 12:34 (or the numbers 1, 2, 3 and 4 in sequence anywhere) is a magical thing. 1234 is an "angel number," meaning it equals "one" when you add the numbers until you reach a single digit.

that is: 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 = 10. and 1 + 0 = 1

turns out, "1" isn't the loneliest number – it's one of the most powerful.

the short version of everything i read says that seeing 12:34 is a sign that you're on a journey of self-discovery, and that the universe wants you to know you're supported. more specifically, it's a sign of two key things:

1) that you're in a place where you need/want to "declutter" your life (either literally or metaphorically) to better facilitate clarity

and

2) that you're on the right track to finding your life's true purpose

i find it fascinating that this whole 12:34 thing started shortly after my contract ended at work, and i decided to get back into my creative writing. i've started to work on a screenplay again, and move back towards the direction of creating movies or TV series. it was the path i was on years ago, and one from which i was diverted for a fairly long while.

admittedly, i've been questioning this "new" direction a lot and trying to silence (or ignore) the inner voice of anxiety, which frequently whispers, "whaaaaaaaaaat?! are you sure you should be taking a few months off? without ANY paid work??? WHAT IF YOU NEVER WORK AGAIN, THOUGH?!?!?"

hush.

for now, i'm going to take that 12:34 and run with it. thanks for the vote of confidence, universe. :-)

pulling on a thread

spotted on a walk. january 2019.

the operating system on my computer is woefully out-of-date. i should have upgraded years ago, and again multiple times since, but i did not. doing so would have meant that much of my software – including oft-used programs such as Word – would then not work, and would need to be replaced because it wouldn't work on the newer OS. i scored much of my current software for free way back when, from someone i no longer know or keep in touch with, so purchasing anew could be a costly endeavour.

replacing the software would, in turn, mean that i would need to buy a new printer (well, if i wanted to ever print anything, anyway), since the one i have – a fabulous compact laser printer purchased about 19 years ago – was long ago discontinued by its manufacturer, and patches/drivers long since scrapped. toner cartridges are no longer sold for this printer, but i'm about 85% sure i can get the existing one refilled. haven't had to cross that bridge yet.

the thing is, everything still works fine. sure, there are websites that don't quite function properly because my old OS means an old web browser that's no longer supported on many sites, but for *work* purposes, all my equipment and software works.

and herein lies the dilemma. upgrading one thing will mean updating EVERYTHING. so, do i take the plunge or just carry on until i HAVE to take the plunge?

this pulling-on-a-thread quandary has come up often in the past couple of years. there's work i should do in the condo – new pieces of furniture to buy, repairs and updates that should probably be done – but i can't just cherry pick. most of those tasks would mean OTHER stuff needs to be done (either before or after). if i finally sort out the storage solution for my microwave and kitchen wares, i can move the filing cabinet in my kitchen where it belongs: in the office. but before i can move it into the office, i need to find a tall(ish) dresser onto which i can sit the office TV, so that i can then get rid of the plastic storage unit *it* sits on. and so on and so on.

soon, everything snowballs into an overwhelming avalanche of to-dos barrelling towards a wall of "oh nevermind, it's fine as is." and nothing really gets done.

all of this reared its frustrating head again this week when i decided to explore whether my old version of final draft – a popular screenwriting software i'd purchased sometime in the mid-2000s – was even installed on my current laptop. (it was not.) turns out, like everything else, that software has since undergone multiple updates and, say it with me, is no longer supported on my OS.

because if i'm going to turn any of my current ideas into a screenplay, i need screenwriting software.

so, what to do?

and then it hit me: was the software maybe still installed on my ancient iBook, which had been sitting on a shelf – and not even opened – for about the past nine years? did that iBook even still work? and where had i stored the power cord????

i found the cord, plugged in the iBook and the familiar apple chorus played as it booted up. okay, step one: complete! (as an aside, i'd forgotten how comparatively loud the iBook's fan is and how tinny its speakers are.) once it had booted, i searched for the FD software and, lo!, there it was. but would it work?

YES!

this iBook still works with my existing printer and, though i can't really use it for much else (it's now sort of like an old word processor), i CAN use it to write my screenplays, save them as PDFs and transfer those PDFs to my new(er) computer for sharing purposes via a flash drive. problem solved!

and then i realized: is the problem really solved? or am i just postponing the inevitable?

gracie: four fun facts

1. she makes "paddle paws" when she's happy. paddle paws are pretty much what they sound like – she moves her front paws in a paddle-like way, as though she's swimming. she'll do this when she's getting cuddles (usually when she's flopped over on her back), or when she WANTS cuddles (again, flopped over on her back), and it's extra-cute when she's sitting in what i call "loaf pose" with her front paws tucked in but poking out from her chest. i'll start talking to her quietly ("are you ready for suppertime? do you want your supper? do you?") and just the very tips of her toes will begin to get paddle-paw-y. it's adorable.

2. she LOVES routine. in fact, she knows our daily routine off by heart and will move from spot to spot in the condo as we progress through various stages. she knows when she gets breakfast and dinner, and when her daytime and overnight kibbles are put out. she knows when we have brushies and when mummy needs to get work done (at which time, she settles in for LONG naps). she does exactly two pees and one poop every day – a pee and poo overnight, and another pee sometime in the afternoon. when her routine is disrupted, she gets snoofly. not sniffly, snoofly... which involves her sneezing and then seemingly trying to blow something OUT of her nose by snoofling. fffffft. ffffffft. FFFFFFFT. once the disruption is done, the snoofliness goes away. (turns out, nasal issues are a common stress response in cats.)

3. she likes watching TV. it's hilarious. she will sit next to me – or, more often, ON me – on the couch and actually position herself so that she can look at the TV. it really is like we're watching it together. and when i put on one of her favourite "shows" (the aquarium channel, or youtube videos featuring birds and squirrels), she is MESMERIZED.

4. she has a new favourite spot in the condo every couple of months. for some reason, the spots change and, as new spots are selected, the old ones are kicked to the proverbial curb. some of it obviously has to do with the seasons – sitting on the window sill, looking out at the world, is much nicer in the warm summer months than it is in winter when the ledge is cold and the panes are frosted over. but others are a mystery. for a while, she loved curling up on an orange cushion on my bed... but she abandoned the cushion a couple of months later in favour of a folded-up blanket. she used THAT for a couple of months, and then opted to just curl up on the bedspread. no cushion, no blanket (both of which were still available). she has a hidey-hole box in the foyer that she LOVED for about two weeks – it's dead to her now. currently, her fave spots are the plush cat bed in the living room and the fuzzy green footstool in the office, both of which she uses for long, LONG naps every day. (and, yes, i realize she is using neither spot in the nap photo accompanying this post.)

looking back

when i stopped posting to this blog several years ago, i pretty much abandoned it outright. i didn't write anything new and didn't come back to reread entries. it went completely dormant.

i even forgot my password and, for a fleeting moment, panicked that i'd actually never be able to log in again. 

now that i'm trying to get back in the habit of (semi-)regular posting, i looked at the archived-posts list in the sidebar. i started this blog TWELVE YEARS AGO! at the time of the first entry, i was living in (at the time) a fairly new location for me, having escaped the horrors of hell house months earlier. i was freelancing, but not steadily. i didn't know many of the people i know now, and many of the people i did know at the time are no longer in my life for one reason or another.

today, i decided to randomly pick through some old entries to see what i'd written.

wow.

for the most part, i say "wow" in sort of the same way i'd say "yikes" or "geez." 

there are people i wrote about whom i can't remember. this is what i get for giving people nicknames! i was reading one post about a friend who gave me a box of questions – something she was going to throw out as she was packing up her place to move – and i racked my brain trying to figure out who the heck it was. "who was moving? to whom would i have given that nickname? and what did i do with that box of questions?!" (i did finally figure it out, thankfully. and i remembered giving the box of questions away when i was packing up MY place to move where i am now.)

throughout, there are comments from my dear friend moob – funny and loving and smart-assy and insightful – who's no longer here on this earth, but always here in spirit.

there are events that i've forgotten; periods of time or incidents that are still tucked away somewhere in my brain, but which i wouldn't have even thought to recall were it not for looking at an old post and going, "OMG! i totally forgot about that day/trip/moment/movie!"

there are also some haikus, poetry, some informative lists, a few entries i remain very proud of today... and a whole lot of rambling.

[i'll admit i also went through old posts and removed a few. too self-indulgent and ridiculously navel-gaze-y and cringe-worthy. yes, i'm sure there's value in having that record of who i was at a given time, but the world doesn't need to read it.]

i wonder what i'll think looking back on this blog in another 12 years. 

atomic habits

sometime back in december, i was eating my lunch and watching The Social – a canadian television talk show akin to The View, featuring a roundtable of four or five (depending on the day) co-hosts of varying backgrounds – and one of their guests was james clear, author of a book called Atomic Habits. the purpose of the book is to help readers accomplish goals by developing good habits and/or breaking bad ones.

the key, according to clear, is to start small. choose your habit and then set out to nurture (or destroy) it one tiny step at a time. for example, if your goal is to be a runner, you need to develop a running habit. or even just an exercise habit. doing so doesn't mean jumping into the deep end and heading our for a 5K right off the bat – you start slowly. incrementally. you maybe that means all you do is aim to put on your running shoes, and walk to the end of your driveway and back, once a day. after a while, maybe you walk to the end of your block and back. then around the block. and so on and so on.

the point is building a habit (however wee) into your routine. ideally, at the same time or same place daily. then, over time, you build on that habit – nurturing it, making it stronger, embedding it more and more deeply into your everyday.

so.

back on january 1st, i decided i wanted to exercise my creative muscles again. to blog again. to start taking photos again. i wanted these things to become habits in the same way that, say, flopping on the couch and losing two hours to reruns of Ridiculousness every evening had started to become habit. (true story. i can watch that show for HOURS.)

because i'm habitual by nature. i like routine. i like consistency. i like structure. but i'd noticed that my "routine" was getting less and less productive. my work contract ended in mid-october, and in the months that followed wasn't really getting a whole lot done. certainly nothing creative. i hadn't been using my time well, and had nothing to show for it, so i decided to turn that around starting on january 1st.

happily, restarting my 365 photo blog has forced me to take my point-and-shoot camera with me everywhere again. i'm redeveloping the habit of looking more closely at the world around me, looking for great angles or cool shots or just weird and interesting stuff at which to train my lens.

i thought that daily habit would somehow naturally cascade into writing a blog post every day, or at least every few days, too. ha! it's now two weeks later, and despite having many blog-post ideas pop into my head since the start of the year, i haven't posted anything.

because i'm not yet back in THAT habit.

part of it is lack of motivation, i think. part of it is apathy. part of it is figuring out when (during the day) to write -- sometimes, i feel inspired while i'm out and about, but by the time i get home i think, "meh. it's 8pm. too late to sit at the computer now."

so, i'm going to try working blogging into my morning routine somehow. right now, i give myself until 10am for personal stuff (exercise, eating breakfast, feeding/playing with gracie, meandering around the internet, whatever). from 10am to noon, if i'm at home, i try to sit down and write – creative writing, i mean. i've currently got what i think are two very strong screenplay (or novel?) ideas, and am working on those. i've got two more, less-developed ideas in the hopper.

anyway, once lunch hits, the afternoons typically get a bit derailed with distraction. watching a movie, cleaning the condo, doing laundry, whatever. and i try to be off the computer by 7pm.

that means blogging, if i really want to get any done, should happen in that up-to-10am window. (i say this as i type right now, at 12:48pm!). i'm gonna give it a shot. we'll see if i can make it a habit, even if the posts are short.

the uncertainty of change

change of any kind has always made me anxious. it doesn't seem to matter if it's a big change, like a career move, or a small change, like choosing where to put a shelf, the side effect is consistent: anxiety. doubt. endless weighing of options and rethinking of ideas and worrying about outcomes. yes, even about shelves.

as the new year gets underway, i seem to be eye-deep in change or perceived change. i'm basically unemployed again – the magazine of which i was editor-in-chief has been in limbo since october, and i'm pretty sure it's dead. even if it were to resurrect itself somehow, i'm not sure i'd go back. our department was purchased by a new company and, as a freelancer, i was not part of the sale. my full-time colleagues have had nothing but terrible things to say about their new overlords and the working environment, so i don't know that i actually want to go back if an offer were to be extended to me.

all this to say, my life has changed. i now have a lot of free time on my hands... and, for me, that's often not a good thing, as it gives my brain way too much time to conjure up new things about which to (often needlessly) stress. while i don't *feel* particularly worried about my professional prospects, i do feel somewhat directionless at the moment.

where do i want to go from here?

what do i want to do with my life?

yes, i've made a very good living in content marketing for the past eight years, but is that *really* how i want to spend the next fifteen or so years? what kind of contribution am i, or is my work, really making to society?

where will i be a year from now?

and how/where/when do i take that first step... and towards what???

all these things start to spiral into a vortex of self-doubt and worry and regret if i'm not careful. i spent 2019 getting back on the meditation and mindfulness wagon, at least more than i had been in the preceding few years, so i'm a bit better at catching myself before i feel like my mind's too spun.

while i work on figuring out a plan before possibly making a professional change, i've been trying to focus on making small changes. stuff that makes me feel like i'm making progress of some kind in some way.

for example, i moved into my condo almost six years ago, yet there are many items i had on my to-do list in 2014 which have remained undone. some of it is very minor (fixing a loose, screwless switch plate where the TV cable meets the wall) to more significant (figuring out how to replace the wonky old shelves in the living room and what should be installed – and where – in their place).

i remember shortly after i moved in, a friend of mine cautioned that i should get everything fixed/replaced/done as soon as possible, because the more time that passed the more i'd simply get used to everything as is... and the more likely it would be to stay exactly as is in the long term. and he was right! six years on, and i've gotten used to the place as it is, with loose switch plates and wonky shelves.

"why bother changing it now?" i tell myself. "it's fine! i'm used to the way it is. i'm comfortable with things where/the way they are. if i change it, i might ruin it all!"

and therein, i've just discovered, is the lesson: my condo has sort of become a reflection of myself and my life. in my life, i'm comfortable with the way things are, i feel "safe," if i make any big change i might ruin it all.

but without change, there won't be any growth. everything will be the same... which may sound OK and soothing to the anxious part of my brain, but isn't actually healthy for the rest of me. i want to keep growing as a human being.

so, small changes which will hopefully beget easier big(ger) changes. it started on friday: i bought a new desk and some new shelves for my guest room/office. they're the first items on a very long to-do list of tasks, which i wrote up a couple of days ago. i took inventory in each room of the condo and wrote down whatever still needed doing/fixing/buying/moving. bit by bit, i'm hoping to get most, if not all, of the items checked off by december 31st. assembling the desk and installing the shelves will happen over the next couple of days.

in the process, and as i chip away at the list, i'm hoping the side effects will be:

• gaining confidence in my decision making ("THIS is where that shelf is going!")

• an improved sense of ease with/acceptance of change ("okay, it might feel weird now, but i'll get used to that new shelf")

• a speedier exit from change-related anxiety ("huh, i can't believe how quickly i've grown to love that shelf!")

• comfort in knowing that almost no change is permanent ("if i don't like that shelf or where i put it, i can just move it, and then patch the holes and just touch up the paint – not a big deal")

• a gradual decrease in anticipatory anxiety over change

hopefully, all of the above will cascade to the other areas of change in my life, too. we'll see.

2020 and time to revisit the blogosphere

that's right.

after almost five years of dormancy, i think it might be time to get this puppy going again.

because i'm essentially unemployed and a brand new year is stretched out before me, full of potential.

and my own personal, creative writing has pretty much evaporated since i last posted here.

so i need to exercise those muscles again.

we'll see how it goes. how long it lasts.

but, for now, it's january 1st and i've posted an entry.