Jennifer W
Joy
Down in my heart… I’ve been thinking about writing about joy, but I have been avoiding it. At times I have trouble finding it. This Christmas season the words “Love, Peace and Joy” pop up in greeting cards and in stores, but they are hard to find in the news, in the day-to-day reality of war and injustice. The news is evidently not where I should look to find joy. Lately I have been noticing little ones who readily embrace joy. I love doing science experiments with my kindergarten students. They see the outcomes of our experiments with wonder…
Read MoreChange
I am in a certain stage of my life as a woman in her late forties. I am a Gen-Xer; I smirk, but also reminisce when I see something deemed retro from the 80s and 90s. Today, I received my first mammogram, something that will become more routine because that is part of life as a woman who is “midlife.” Despite the discomfort, I want to know my body. I will soon face what some have dubbed The Change. The moniker for menopause seems a bit much in my mind: isn’t that life, change? King Solomon’s words come…
Read MoreBare Beginnings
By Jenn Wallace So many of our beginnings start this way—two individuals who were bare and vulnerable, who trusted. There is something attractive and exhilarating in allowing someone to know you—it can feel like a big risk, opening to someone’s touch, gaze and trusting that person. The vulnerability in partnering and building trust is so needed in parenting. Whether or not a couple is able to conceive, raising a child requires naked vulnerability. If living with someone does not bring out all the details, good and bad, then raising a child certainly does. Babies produce all kinds of emotions…
Read MoreToo Zoomed In
By Jenn Wallace Now that I am in my forties, I am experiencing more and more phenomena related to aging; recently, I experienced yet another. I was reading the label on a pill container and had to move it further away from me than I am used to in order to read it: too close and the words were blurry. I was a little bit perturbed thinking, “Do I need bifocals already?!” I have since seen my optometrist who says for now I can lift my glasses but the time is coming. I’ve begun to commiserate with friends who…
Read MoreA Letter Was in the Works
By Jennifer Wallace A letter was in the works. It was there playing hide and seek in my mind for 5 years. After seeing women speak out, I wanted to be that brave. I wanted to own my nieces’ middle names, “Courage,” and “Worth” while still holding onto my daughter’s middle name, “Grace.” So, I went there: I went back 5 years and I opened the wound and I wrote the letter. Alone in the office, in front of the computer, a blank screen. I do not hear anything: not the kids downstairs watching YTV, not John breathing, asleep…
Read MoreBeautiful Ugly
By Jen Wallace When John proposed to me, I cried. It was an ugly cry. In this beautiful moment the woman he was proposing to was sobbing—“So, is that a yes?” he asked. My response to his first question, “Will you marry me?” and the subsequent one was a resounding, “Yes! Yes!” I am still not entirely sure what all my tears meant. Years and memory tend to colour the retelling of events. But I think a part of me knew that he would now have a chance to really know me. He would see it all: the good, the…
Read MoreIn Training
By Jen Wallace For the past year, I have been working towards getting my black belt in judo; I am not quite there. I have had my brown belt for 14 years and I thought it was time. I needed to start training with a black belt goal as my focus. I have to schedule my practicing and I cannot do it alone. My head sensei, the club instructor, also needs to see that I am ready. One of our instructors quotes Bobby Robson, an athlete who said, “Practice makes permanent.” Being in training is not easy and neither is…
Read MoreHello/Goodbye
By Jennifer Wallace “Hello/ Goodbye” is a show that airs on CBC that grips my heart; it taps into emotions that are so quick to surface. The interviewer is good at what he does. Without being obtrusive, he asks questions and strangers open up their lives to him in these beautiful reunions and departures at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport. There is something intensely attractive and universal about hellos and goodbyes. They are the moments we remember. It was summer. John and I and the kids were driving out to Ontario. We were excited for the road trip, excited to see…
Read MoreYour Body is Mine
Jennifer Wallace “Your body is mine! Your body is mine!” I hear my son singing a song that sounds…well inappropriate for a five-year-old or anyone to be singing. I ask him about it and he tells me he made it up. “And where did you hear this? Where did you get the idea?” I ask concerned about what I might hear for an answer. “You, mom!” “What?!” I respond. “…‘Member when you told us that everyone in the family thinks your body is theirs?” I do remember and it is all making sense now. I was laughing and slightly exasperated…
Read MoreLove Story
Jennifer Wallace I love a good love story. Always have. When I heard that Jonathan Crombie died, the actor who played Gilbert Blythe opposite Megan Follows in Anne of Green Gables, I was genuinely saddened. While I did not know the actor, Jonathan portrayed Gil so well. He represented a character that I, and many other girls, had loved so much. Gilbert was a boy and then a man who was undaunted by a strong and feisty Anne. He was not intimidated by her but liked being challenged by her. He encouraged Anne and even admonished her to do what…
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