Category Archives: Celebrations

Celebrations, Rants and reflections

Three times crazy – doing the 2017 Polar Bear Dip

You would think that after doing the polar bear dip once, or even twice, that would be sufficient enough times to cross it off my bucket list of “things to do before I die”. And yet, I found myself agreeing once again in December to sign up for the 2017 Polar Bear Dip. Three times crazy, yes. But all the fundraising proceeds go towards Habitat For Humanity GTA, a wonderful charity helping to address the issue of affordable housing in our city. Thanks to my supporters, I raised over $485 for this cause, and that’s a downright amazing feeling I can get behind again.

Toronto Sunnyside Beach. January 1, 2017, 20 minutes to dip time (11:40am).

The sun was shining brightly. The temperature was downright balmy at +2°C, with only the slightest of wind blowing. I wasn’t nervous at all in the days and hours leading up to the event. Compared to the weather conditions of the last two years, this should be a piece of cake, right?

Unfortunately, my friend A, the instigator and leader of our team, was knocked out by a bad cold and couldn’t join us that day. Without our”Dipping in the Six” team glue, the other members and I ended up scattered through the rest of the crowd of dippers.

Five minutes to dip time

I start peeling off the layers of coats and clothes covering my skin from the elements. Suddenly the day doesn’t feel so balmy after all. There is no fooling your body about being in the Caribbean when you are standing in your bathing suit in +2°C temperature. Shivering commences and your butt cheeks and thighs clench in a failed attempt to save some of the heat escaping. I make my way to the dip entrance area.

Waiting for the countdown. With the sun it almost looks tropical!

Then after a couple of minutes, my body seems to be confused about whether it needs to shiver, or whether it actually is a nice day. There’s not a lot of time to contemplate, however, because I hear over the loudspeaker the countdown.

12 o’clock noon

And suddenly people are charging forward into the lake. I follow at a modest pace behind, until suddenly *splash* my feet are in the water.

IT FEELS JUST AS COLD AS THE PAST 2 YEARS!

My brain is urging  body to go in further. My body is trying to rebel, as it’s hard-wired self-preservation instincts go into overload. Icy pricks are stabbing up my legs as I splash in deeper. I get to waist deep, turn to look at my dear hubby on the shoreline taking pictures, and dunk into the water to my shoulders.

It must have been the fastest dunk ever as he missed getting pictures of me more fully submerged. At this point, my body won the fight of self preservation over my brain’s desire for photographic preservation. GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT!! I hoofed it out of the water to where my kids were holding down our square patch of beach. Numb hands sought out my fuzzy bathrobe, and clumsily pried the water shoes off my numb feet.

Post-dip euphoria

And then a couple of minutes after that, a sense of euphoria settles in. The day does actually feel quite balmy after all. It’s like the dip caused a physical reset. I’m hoping it lasts, to clear away this unsettled feeling of melancholy I’ve had in the last several weeks.

As always, many thanks to my dear husband who is my main support crew and photographer. He is supportive each year of this endeavor. Also thanks to my kids for putting up with this each New Year’s Day, and doing their part being cute. Will I do it again next year? I would be surprised if I didn’t. It seems like this is a part of who I am now, a New Year’s Day Polar Bear Dipper, for better or for worse. Look what you’ve done, my friend A, look what you’ve done.

~Jen

Some Tips for Polar Bear Dipping

  • Have a support person (or crew) to help you get changed, especially if it’s really cold out because your hands will stop working. And they can hold up towels for a screen for you to change.
  • I’m a proponent of wearing what ever is the easiest to get off your body afterwards. For me, that’s a bikini. Sure it exposes a bit more skin than a 1-piece, but really in those brief minutes before the dip and in the water, the extra coverage isn’t actually going to keep you any warmer. The importance is being able to take it off easily with numb hands.
  • I recommend wearing water shoes. Crocs and sports sandals do have a tendency to come off under the water, and it’s not fun trying to fish around the churning water with your numb hands. I would suspect running shoes get bogged down really easily too, and be harder to take off.
  • A nice fuzzy robe for just before and afterwards is soooo nice. Makes it easier to change under too.
  • Bring your own hot chocolate or coffee. Even if the event provides some, it sucks if it runs out and you were hoping for some. (like my first year)
Celebrations, Rants and reflections

Things I am thankful for – 2016 edition

It’s a beautiful Canadian Thanksgiving weekend in Toronto, even as the temperature is starting to dip down. The leaves are starting to turn colours and there is a certain nip in the air. It’s a perfect atmosphere to stop and reflect on the things I am thankful for:

  • Laughs and high-fives with my best friend, confidante, and partner in this venture of life—my husband Tai.
  • That my daughters are funny, decent, curious, imaginative, book-loving little people. Most of the time i do enjoy hanging out with them. I know they are in the honeymoon ages now (i.e. between 6 and 12 years old) I hope I can still say the same thing when they become teenagers.
  • The smooth, round cheeks of my daughters that are still just perfect for kissing. Their bodies barely fit on my lap for long snuggles any more, their limbs poking out every which way like tree branches.
  • My health, and that of my immediate and extended family. Reading the memoir When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi made me contemplate my feelings about my own mortality, and I appreciate how my good health lets me plan for longer time horizons, years into the future. But, it’s a gentle reminder to appreciate the here and now.
  • The companionship and good humour of my friends. We continue to invest in time with each other, and make new memories. Although, the memories are starting to blend together, as the years add up. The bonus is seeing our children become close friends with each other as well.
  • Even after a year of growth at GrantBook, I still love my work and my colleagues in my current job.
  • The joy of watching beautiful dance, and reading many wonderful books this year. It feeds my soul, perhaps as an antidote to the stresses of the daily news. This upcoming year I hope to add some great theatre to the mix. Starting with…
  • Hamilton! Our friends C-squared were able to get us tickets to see the musical Hamilton in Chicago! For Tai and me, this is our 10th anniversary present to each other. Road trip!
  • That the federal election campaign period in Canada is typically only 5 weeks, compared to the nearly 2 year process in the United States. I’ve been horrifyingly transfixed with the US election campaign between Clinton and Trump. Thank goodness our federal elections and leadership races have never been this crazy. Our election a year ago seems so quaint in comparison. Is the Canadian political system is structured in a way that prevents a Trump happening here? I’d love to talk though that theory.
  • And the Jays made the playoffs!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

~Jen

Celebrations, Storytime

A decade of married love

It’s been 10 years since Tai and I held hands in front of our family and friends, and said the words, “I do”. That moment formalized something that I already knew for years – that Tai and I would journey through the rest of life together, hand in hand. jandt_yorkville

A decade of married love later, we are still best friends, still kindred spirits, and still deeply in love. We may have added a couple of kids, a few pounds around the middle, and a lumbering mortgage to the mix, but I still feel the same way with him now as when we first started dating all those years ago in university. I fall in love with him over and over again as he keeps demonstrating his character. Tai encourages me to challenge myself. He supports my different endeavors and schemes, and props me up when I am down. He laughs at my jokes and makes me laugh. He respects all of who I am, even the silly and frivolous sides of me.  He is an equal partner in parenting our two girls. He pays attention.

In short, Tai is a shining example to our two girls of what they should expect from any potential suitor in their future. Winning their love should not be easy. And to illustrate this point, I share the following story from our wedding day.

It’s a Chinese wedding tradition for the bride’s side of the wedding party to put the groom through some various obstacles before he can retrieve the bride to marry her. Because the bride is loved too much, her family and friends will not let just anyone cart her off. He must prove his worthiness to be her husband.

My beloved bridesmaids devised a series of challenges. They did not let me in on what their plans were. As Tai and his groomsmen successfully completed each one, my bridesmaids would let them come closer to finding me. One involved trivia questions about me and my friends. Another involved creating and performing a cheerleading stunt along with a cheer. Yet another involved bribes of cash payments in hong bao (red envelopes). Tai and his groomsmen breezed through these with good humour, until the final challenge: eating a package of nattō, or Japanese fermented soy beans.

Tai had never tried eating nattō before. He was quite aware of nattō though, particularly since he helped organize an Amazing Race-style fundraising event the year prior. The eating challenge station, that he manned, consisted of this particular item. I participated in this race with Team Buns on the Run, and Tai was there encouraging me while my teammates and I struggled to eat the stuff. The taste, texture, and smell all combine to be a truly horrible experience for the uninitiated. But he never did try it himself.

Until our wedding day.

It tastes like f33t and smells like @$$.

The entire time while Tai was going through his challenges, I waited in the bedroom of my parents’ condo, with no idea of what was going on. I could only hear groans and cheers and laughs, and some slightly worrying silence. I stood  in the room, pacing the floor in my white wedding dress, with equal parts of boredom, excitement and worry.

Finally there was a big cheer, and Tai burst into the bedroom, a little unsteady on his feet, the wedding party crowding in after him. He gave me a beany kiss, (ugh) and claimed his worthiness to be my husband! My hero vanquished* the nattō beans! Then after a few words, he went off in search of a toothbrush. We spent the rest of the day enjoying the merriment of our family and friends.

Tai, I love you more than my words can adequately describe. I’m so excited to face the next decade with you, hand-in-hand.

~Jen

*Well, technically he had help from his close friend and groomsman Cort, but details, schmetails. 

Celebrations

Who will be the Battle Axe Champion?

A group date activity involving sharp implements and competition = a dubious decision?

Group date night. My hubby and I are fortunate enough to be a part of a circle of friends that make such a thing a reality roughly every 4 months or so. Among the 7 couples, we take turns planning the dates, involving activity and food. Then on the appointed days, we ditch our kids with babysitters, and enjoy some company, food and  activities with only adults.

This past spring, the planned activity was battle axe throwing. https://badaxethrowing.com/ In general, the point of it all is to throw the axe 10 meters and have it stick in the plywood target as close to the bullseye as possible. The bullseye scored you 6 points, with the score decreasing the with each subsequent ring of the target. To make things interesting, there are two small blue circles worth 10-points located within the 1-point ring, at the 10 o’clock and 2 o’clock positions.

The nine of us split into two teams. Eric was captain of Team Axe FX; Aneil the captain of Team Buns on the Run. The teams battled over the course of 3 different tournaments, each tournament with a different objective to achieve. The day ended with a forth tournament: the individual knockout.

Who will be battle axe champion?

The final two contestants in the final round of our individual Continue reading Who will be the Battle Axe Champion? →

Celebrations

Welcome to 2016! Happy New Year!

Yes, it is now more than a week since the new year started, but we do not need to be technical about that. The sentiment of hope and optimism for this year still holds true. So Happy New Year! Welcome to 2016!

And in the spirit of optimism, here are some of my goals for this year to resolutely work towards:

  • less Facebook lurking, more actual face time talking (via coffee dates, Skype, group outings, and what not). Because I want to model the behaviour I want for my girls to follow and expect from their friends.
  • make exercise a standard part of my weekly schedule again. It’s been over 9 months since I started working, so I can’t use the excuse of “waiting until my schedule is stabilized” anymore. I’ve definitely noticed a loss of strength.
  • volunteer more: at my girls’ school and in my community
  • read more offline materials. Reading articles online is fine, but the ease in which I can switch to yet another article of completely different context means i often don’t ponder over what I just read, the ideas don’t simmer and percolate as it should.
  • keep writing: aim for at least a blog post every two weeks
  • preserve the memories: finish our family 2015 photobooks before Victoria Day
  • keep pushing myself to grow my experiences and my team contributions in my job, but still holding onto my reduced hours schedule
  • set up the basement office properly. Poor T has to suffer through boxes of random crap strewn about while he gingerly navigates to his office chair.

Sorry for succumbing to the cliche of publicly announcing my resolutions, but I feel the potential for shame and humiliation from my peers is an extra motivator. It worked for Anne of Green Gables, didn’t it? Let me know if there’s anything you’d like me to hold you to the fire for at the end of this year, we can press forward to our goals with the fear of mutual shame. 😉 Happy New Year folks!

~Jen

Celebrations

Let’s Go Blue Jays!

“Let’s Go Blue Jays! Clap, clap, clap-clap-clap!”

A confession: my love affair with the Blue Jays has been brief, to date. I’ll be the first to admit, while I know all the rules of the sport, I haven’t been a baseball fan through the years. I’ve been to a handful of Blue Jays games at the Skydome in years past, when the team was mediocre and the crowds even more so. I found the games long and dull, and wished I could be watching hockey instead.

And yet now I find myself jumping on the bandwagon happily into a love affair with the Jays. A late summer-to-fall fling, as it were. I’m even checking to on the scores while I’m picking up my children from daycare, or waiting for their extra-curricular activity to finish. Two years ago I would be hard-pressed to name more than two players. Now, I recognize the names in entire lineup and if pressed, might even be able to put them in their batting order.

Why?

I am happy to give my heart over because of the energy and collective excitement through the whole city is taking over. It’s so exciting and fun to see so many people in the city and other parts of the country rally behind something positive, and so why wouldn’t I want to join in on that? This could be a seminal sports moment in Toronto; I want to participate in and experience it whatever the result, not just read about it in the news.

Even more so, I want and hope for this to be a good news story for those of my friends and family who *are* actually long-time Blue Jays baseball fans. Baseball fans with unrequited playoff dreams.

There are those, like my husband, who were committed fans in their youth. They loved and played the game in the park and imagined recreating the highlight plays from the world championship Jays from the ’92 and ’93. However, twenty-two years of being stood up at the playoff date have made them cynical and bitter, to defend against the pain in their hearts. This is further compounded by the collective playoff futility of all the Toronto’s professional sports teams.

Through August and September as the Blue Jays were having an incredible run, you could see the cynicism and bitterness start to melt away, and they were excited again for the game. Each game.

Then there are my dear friends who are the hard-core fans. They watch the Jays games, listen to the sports talk, and they follow what’s happening with the other teams in the league. They have never wavered in their love of the Blue Jays. They open their hearts at the start of every season with the optimism of making the playoffs by October. And for twenty-two years, they’ve had their heart broken each season. But they brush it off and then look forward to spring training next year. They are those few brave souls amongst us who love deeply and freely and continualy, without reservations, even when they get hurt time and time again.

Well, this year, I sure am crossing my fingers that their love will finally be reciprocated and the Blue Jays win the World Series.

But first they have to win Game 5 tomorrow against Texas. Let’s Go Blue Jays! #‎ComeTogether‬

Celebrations, Rants and reflections

My PanAmazing Volunteer Experience

It’s been over a month since my volunteer experience at the 2015 Pan Am and Para PanAm games in Toronto finished. I signed up to volunteer to be a part of something bigger in my community that would likely be one in a lifetime. And yes, while there were definitely many moments of tedium, uncertainty, and inconvenience to my family and work, it was an experience that I value wholeheartedly—my PanAmazing volunteer experience.

When I put in my application in the summer of 2014 to volunteer at the 2015 Pan Am Games, I didn’t really know what was in store for me. When the organizing committee sent me my assignment in February 2015, I must admit that my first reaction to joining the Fleet Transportation team as a driver was one of disappointment. Knowing up front that I would not be driving athletes, it didn’t seem like a particularly fulfilling experience. Thanks to some insightful comments from other volunteers made on our FaceBook volunteer group, I realized that if I wasn’t volunteering with the spirit of
Continue reading My PanAmazing Volunteer Experience →

Celebrations, Working life

My 3-month anniversary at my new job at GrantBook

Last week was my three-month anniversary with my new company, GrantBook. This is significant since 6 months ago I wasn’t even sure if I’d be returning to the workforce. I was in a limbo land, trying to decide between life as a stay-at-home mom (aka SAHM) and that as a working mom.

For a while in the fall of 2014 I entertained the plan of going into the field of mediation. An information session I attended quickly gave me a dose of reality that it would likely take me 5 years and more schooling for it to become a viable career. Without a background in law, counselling or social services, I would be facing a credibility gap once I finished the mandated mediation training and internship hours. Unless you are able to secure a position with a mediation firm, mediators are essentially self-employed entrepreneurs. I recognize that having a credibility gap would make it difficult to recruit business.

And so that plan faded away.

Continue reading My 3-month anniversary at my new job at GrantBook →

Celebrations

Happy 148th Birthday, Canada!

Happy Canada Day, everyone. I do really love this holiday to be unabashedly patriotic, to reflect on the great country it is, and to envision the greater one it could be in the future.

It is by no means a perfect country: the issues facing many of our aboriginal brothers and sisters are chronic, neglected and ignored; the wealth disparity is growing, putting more of our population in dire circumstances; our inaction on environmental issues is frustrating; many public attitudes and government policies are increasingly fear-based; the list can go on for quite a bit further. But let’s leave that to another day to discuss.

I celebrate that our institutions and most of the population recognize that love is love. Even those that don’t personally agree or condone at least refrain from making it a divisive political issue.

I celebrate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and acknowledge important role the courts play in establishing what the Charter means in a practical sense. It is a long, evolving, strenuous process . I’m also thankful for our strong civil service institutions that is the backbone that enables the government to run. It’s boring, and I take it for granted, until I see what happens in other countries where this is not the case.

I celebrate that we’ve decided as a nation that healthcare should be universally available regardless of ability to pay. The model does mean certain individuals need to sacrifice some convenience or exhaustiveness in care, but I’m glad that the majority of us agree that triaging care based on need, and not pay, is the right thing to do.

I love watching a good hockey game. The speed of action and flow of play is so exciting.

I admit feeling a burst of pride every time I find out about a contribution of note that was done by a Canadian.

I love many of the stereotypically Canadian foods: poutine, Caesar drinks, Tim Hortons coffee for long drives, Coffee Crisps, Swiss Chalet, butter tarts, Montreal bagels. I also love that here in multicultural Greater Toronto Area, I have access to authentic foods from all over the world.

Most of all, today I want to celebrate that it doesn’t matter if you’re born a boy or a girl, you have the same opportunities to pursue an education, any career in any field, to have the sole agency to make decisions about your body, to vote and hold property…in general, to have the freedom to make choices. I look at the bright eyes of my two daughters and I’m just so thankful that in this country, they have the privilege, opportunity and resources to pursue whatever ambitions they have.

Happy Canada Day.

Celebrations

Little joys: May 2015

I think I need a little reminder of some the little joys I’ve experienced this month. More than just the smiles and amusements from things in my FB feed. It’s a balm against the negative news, fear and frustrating experiences I’ve encountered in the last few weeks. It’s something Janice had me do during our sessions together, to just explicitly and deliberately recognize the good things in life. It’s a habit I’m trying to get ingrained into doing, instead of always focusing on trying to fix the negative and problems at hand. So here goes. Continue reading Little joys: May 2015 →