Hello world. It's me. Bernardine. It's been swell traipsing around the sun with you for another year. What a tough one, eh? Someone smarter than me wrote that no one promised life would be easy all the time. And yet we only get the one life to fiddle around with, so I have to say I'm grateful for the last 12 months of discovery. I'm not going to reflect on it too much, because it seems to me that looking back is the sure way to becoming a pillar of salt. On such a day as this, with so … [Read more...]
The Life Changing Magic of Mess: Waking Up Alive!
My house is usually immaculately clean except for most of the time, when it isn’t. Once upon a time I was fanatical about cleaning in preparation for the afterlife. Mine. I didn’t ever want to walk out the door without having cleaned, in case it was someone else who had to come back in and deal with the madness. Kind of like: Always wear the good underwear in case you get hit by a bus. I didn’t want anyone else to have to clean up … [Read more...]
Waking Up Alive: How to eat your cake and have it too.
A piece of my house is dancing merrily down the road and I wonder if I should chase after it, but that would mean I’d have to put down the piece of cake I’m eating. There’s a certain kind of buttery icing that melts my heart, sets my teeth to tingling, and rivals sex. It tends toward the creamy side, rather than the sweet, and you just know that if a drop of it spills on your clothing it will leave a grease mark that will never come out. After … [Read more...]
Waking Up Alive: How to Weigh Nothing.
I’m obsessed with a video of two humpback whales floating beneath the ocean surface, observing a miniscule diver, who is in turn observing them through a camera. These living monoliths hover, float, enigmatic, barnacle covered, taking a tiny break from orbiting the earth from within. I thought of them yesterday while I was standing in line at the grocery store. The elderly lady ahead of me was struggling to get her 123 items checked through the Express Lane, so I had plenty … [Read more...]
Waking up Alive: Adventures in Living.
I’ve noticed this thing that’s been happening to me a lot of late. I’ve only gradually become aware of what a phenomenon it is, a gift I never appreciated until now. It happened to me again this morning. I woke up alive. I’ve been waking up alive my entire life, of course, but never woke to what a miracle it is until recently. I don’t know why the entire world isn’t in a mad fever of celebration every single day, when we all wake up … [Read more...]
Killing Time in Airports: And a seat for my lobster.
The man behind me in the line-up for security is not respecting the invisible electronic fence of my personal space boundary. He keeps bumping into me with his box of lobsters and inching his wheeled carry-on forward so that it looks as if it and I are going steady. If I lean backwards into him (and I just might oh why don’t I and show him) my knapsack will come to rest against his box of lobsters and together we will form a new type of interstellar being. Or, better yet, maybe I will grab his … [Read more...]
My Life as a Crêpe.
I wanted to buy a face cream. A little treat to help with the winter flaking. I went to my favourite drug store. Twenty minutes in I was standing stupefied before a dazzling array of lotions and potions. Do I need the revitalizing lift serum? If I buy the rejuvenating mask for my cheeks do I also need to get the under eye brightening treatment? The 8 in 1 miracle drops promise sculpting, firming, and toning. Is it a face cream or a gym … [Read more...]
Vain and Undiluted!
Envy will get you nowhere in life. Many people ask me: Is your gorgiosity natural, or is it fake? I tell them the truth. It’s fake. My face takes work. I’ve got a face like the road less taken. It’s always got a hole in it somewhere. Every morning when I get up I’ve got to lay down the asphalt. I plaster on the foundation, the powder, the blusher, the concealer, the eye shadow, the eyeliner, the mascara, the eyebrow pencil, the lip pencil, the lipliner, the lipstick, the lip gloss. … [Read more...]
Do I Look Fat In This?
The phrase ‘Do I Look Fat in This?’ was never originally spoken by a woman. It came from an ad campaign specifically targeting women, to get them to go out and buy a girdle. Which is an archaic fashion torture device that women used to lace and strap and cinch themselves into every single day. It was the original form of birth control. Thank god, we’ve come past that now. Now that we can go Spanx ourselves. Yes, people often want to make lifestyle changes … [Read more...]
Arse to 5 K: Prelude to a Miss.
A small flotilla of ducks regard me serenely from the lake as I begin a vigorous set of calisthenics to warm up. There are three of them, and all are still watching ten seconds later as I sit on a bench to pant and rest. One of them, whom I have dubbed Little Waddler, swims ashore to plop next to me, in expectations of Bickies. No, I say. No Bickies today. Today we are turning over a new leaf. Nay, not merely a leaf, … [Read more...]