May 10, 2010; this is the posting date.  Yesterday, May 9th, was my niece Elisheva’s wedding; a day of great joy and promise.  I started writing this post 11 days before posting it.  It was April 30th.  It was a day – and I’m going to tell you all about it in a minute – that was full with thoughts of life.  April 30th was one of those days that marks a before/after feeling.  Most of all, it was a day of realizing how precious each moment of our life is and how important it is to honour every moment of it.  It was a beautiful, sunny day and my spirit felt so full as I looked at the cherry blossoms when I passed High Park this morning.  There’s so much incredible beauty all around and it’s so easy to miss it all in the ruffled feathers of the day.

April 30, 2010: Today I went to a funeral.  Her name was Bridget Harrison.  Her funeral was a wonderful celebration of what a fabulous woman she had been; a great mother, wife, colleague, friend, mentor.  I first met her when she came to work at the Ministry of Education in the early 1990s.  We’d begun the process of rewriting all of our high school curriculum at the same time … and within very short timelines … and I’d already been involved with this project for about a year.  Clearly we needed more staff and so a new Manager position was created and I’d applied for it.  I guess that I’d foolishly thought that I was a shoe-in for the position but much to my surprise they’d decided that they wanted to hire somebody from a school board and Bridget got what I’d thought of as my job.  Talk about a set-up for not liking her.  But I couldn’t help but like her.  She was incredibly bright, and sensitive, and kind, and supportive, and artsy, and artistic, and dramatic, and insightful and cheerful.  It was a joy working with her.  She was 63 years old when she died.  Not sick.  Had plans for the future; a date book full of meetings and lunches and dinners and theatre and friends.  They found her dead on the floor of her home.  Just like that.  Gone.  I’m going to miss her and I’m so grateful to have known her; she’s left the world so much better for her being here.

The strangest thing happened at the funeral.  The family had put together a fabulous photo-show of her life, starting with pictures of her as a baby, then as a little girl, and then … Oh My God!  On the screen there was an image of a line-up of children dressed as the soldiers from The Nutcracker and 3rd from the left there was my sister Fran, just 2 behind Bridget.  She was about 10 years old I think and she was in the same production at The London Little Theatre as Bridget and Victor Garber.  So our paths had almost crossed some 40 years before we met at the Ministry.  It’s that strange 6 degrees of separation thing.

There were a number of my old Ministry colleagues at the funeral; indeed I’d gone to the funeral with a couple of friends who I’d met working at the Ministry.  I hadn’t seen most of them for the last 18 months and here’s what I noticed.  They all looked tired.  They seemed a little anxious.  In a chat, an ex-Director of mine who is still at the Ministry was asked – not by me – when she was going to retire.  She answered that if she ever found anything else she could be interested in, she’d retire.  She’d thought about it, but couldn’t imagine at all what she’d do.  I wonder how many people don’t retire because they can’t imagine a life that isn’t full-speed-ahead?  I wonder how many people keep working long after they could retire because they’re afraid to grow into a new kind of life?  I often hear people say that they aren’t going to retire because they love their jobs; I don’t challenge that – there were times that I loved my job too – but I love Mexico but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to travel other places and have other, new experiences.

We talked about this – my friends and I – on the way home and over lunch.  We’ve all three retired over the past two years.  We’ve all experienced some of the same challenges; finding new routines – and then abandoning them; having periods of wanting to just sit and be.  We’re all waking up when we’re ready to.  And … we’re all finding ways to grow.  All sorts of ways.

I think I’ve been holding myself back in some ways by worrying so much that I’m not doing what I’m expected to be doing.  Now that it’s warm out I just want to putter in the garden, relax in the sun, get my kayak in the river, and walk, walk, walk.  I want to keep going to my exercise class and I really enjoy my hour at the cafe afterwards.  I want to meditate in the sun on my upstairs deck.  If I was still teaching at a university the school year would pretty much be over by now and summer break would be starting; time for an academic to spread her wings and pursue research interests … ie.  change the routines and patterns of life for something different  that would enable me to grow intellectually.  That’s how I’m feeling about my own life right now.  It will soon be summer break again.

Anatole France, a French journalist, poet and novelist, wrote that:  ”All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.” So little by little I’m saying goodbye to the things that have been in my life for a long time but are no longer helping me to grow.  I’m inch by inch working my way into a new life, one that I define by what’s important to me without having to consider how much it will pay.  It’s a very special – and privileged – experience and I’m happy to say that although it’s often frightening and lonely it’s a wonderful journey.  I’m glad that you’re here sharing it with me!