This is the fourteenth draft I’ve written for today’s post over the course of the last week, each talking about something completely different. That right there is my busy and bizarre ADHD brain at work – many things started, and even more things left unfinished – because they just aren’t good enough. I didn’t finish or publish my book for nearly a decade – because it wasn’t good enough. I didn’t turn my passion for baking into a business – because I wasn’t good enough. I found any and every way to escape reality – because nothing was good enough. Especially myself. This is what stop ..read more

I’ve been plugging away, both passionately and diligently, at my new book '‘There Will Be Weeds’. To say I’m tangled up in it would be both a pun and a truth, as when I immerse myself in anything it has a way (and admittedly, I allow it) to wrap itself around me entirely – whether it's writing, cooking, or drinking – you name it. Moderation has never been my forté, and it’s an ongoing struggle I’m getting better at identifying as I find myself knee-deep in whatever it is. Lost in it, vines and weeds obscuring my vision and pulling me inside itself, whatever it is. I like to call it passion – b ..read more

It’s no surprise to those who know me that I’ve been laying awake since 2:37am. Again. Sleepless. My years of sleepwalking through my nights – and days – have luckily drawn to a close, coincidentally right around the time I came to admit I had a very serious problem and that I needed help. Funny how that happened. The sleeplessness, though, the endless, drawn out solitary nights however, have not left me alone. The only thing that have left me are all the frustrated sheep I’ve been counting for decades, finally having given up and tired of being numbered night after night after hour after hour ..read more

Share This or Save it! I was cooking last night, as I do almost every night. It’s my happy place. A place to not only lose myself in the concocting of flavours and music, but of spending much-needed “after work” time shifting gears, regrouping, and relaxing (I know, some people find cooking stressful and enjoyable – I am much the opposite). There’s something about having a change in scenery, your train of thought switching tracks and heading in a new direction after rabbit-holing your day, however you spend it and whatever you do. Last night, I was making a slow cooker pot roast – I find ridic ..read more

This is a piece I wrote about 4 years ago while on a personal writing retreat in Washago, Ontario, and I stumbled across it in my journals, and felt a little ashamed I never shared it. It’s, in a roundabout way, a guide to how to survive the first few days of not drinking – or to correct myself – of getting rid of alcohol. Please consider sharing this with others who may be starting out, or thinking about, being brave enough to once and for all get rid of alcohol. It very well may help or inspire them, and everyone who loves them will be grateful. Share This or Save it! Everything you nee ..read more

Sometime last fall, I bought one of those cute little money trees at the local grocery store. His trunk was all twisted and braided, with maybe 6 or 7 sad looking leaves total springing from the entire plant. He wasn’t well. What can I say, I have a thing for underdogs. I’ve taken good care of this guy (who for some reason I’ve never named, and I tend to name everything) and he’s slowly been growing into himself, a canopy of leaves now springing proudly above his knotted little trunk. It was roughly at the same time that I bought him and brought him home that my home itself felt twisted and fu ..read more

I’m “supposed” to be more concerned with admitting that I’ve had a tonne of partners in my life – but that whole “shame-thing” got old the moment I got sober. Moderation – of anything – has never been my forté. I was young, confused, tormented, experimental, melancholy (and maybe a little bit slutty) – you know, a typical teenager / early-twenty-something in the late 1990’s who just left the small town for the big city. I fell into what I thought was love easily. I see now that what I was falling into wasn’t even close to love, resembling more of a waterbed of approval I would sink into o ..read more

Share This or Save it! Yesterday, I was assembling a new desk for my office. Luckily all the pieces were there, most of them fit, and the instructions were passably passable. Long story short, the new desk is assembled and I love it. (I’m sitting at it now as I type this). Life, however, doesn’t always work like that. Life isn’t a neatly packaged pre-fabricated piece of furniture. We all arrive with a pile of pieces, many of them mismatched and not threaded correctly, certain things don’t line up, you’re missing half of them and the customer service department is next to impossible to reach. F ..read more

Share This or Save it! It’s a bit of a HEAD–trip to think that all books (in the English language) and all the moving prose that stir your dusty soul, all the soaring lyrics to songs that resonate deep into the core of your being – are just TWENTY-SIX letters, juggled, rearranged, and in turn, redefined. Twenty six letters that when properly arranged hold the power to change lives or destroy them, to build up or tear down, to enlighten or delude and confuse. Often, the small, everyday things we take for granted and overlook harbour the most power if we can learn how to use them skillfully. The ..read more

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