Having already completed a novel, I wasn’t motivated to start on another ambitious project, but started jotting down ideas anyways. In my downtime, I fell in love with the PBS series “Downtown Abbey”, and particularly the more snobbish characters. How would a wealthy family respond differently to Nazi occupation? How would the lives of a farmer’s daughter and an aristocrat collide? Who would be most able or willing to help a stranger?
Read MoreThere Are Spiders In The Shower /
I’m sitting on an old couch that smells a little like winter leaked through the roof (it did) and looking for a place to put my feet up between the Gilmore Girls box set and a half dozen towels haphazardly folded by my son. It’s summer, we’re on vacation and my body, soul and mind are tired.
I know why my body is tired. We finally decided to do something about the squirrel hotel that is our old cottage shed, and I spent the afternoon hauling shingles to the dumpster. Yes, this is what we do on holidays. It’s more or less like being at home but with a place to swim, paper plates, margaritas and spotty cell service. You know what they say: a change is as good as a rest.
But my soul? My mind? Why are we so tired?
It’s been a year.
Read MoreHow do you know when it is finished? /
Last week, I had the honour of giving an author talk in Thornbury, Ontario. During the interview, I was asked how I came up with the idea for the novel, whether the stories in the novel were inspired by my own family (yes!) and what surprised me while creating the characters. I talked about my interest in historical research and the pitfalls of travelling into too many directions at once. It was a fantastic afternoon.
And then came the questions from the audience.
Read MoreBook Club Discussion Guide /
Celebrating Liberation in the Shadow of Occupation /
In the Spring of 1945, a starving Europe welcomed the news of Nazi surrender after more than five years of brutal occupation. Somehow, amidst the desolation, the tulips still burst into bloom foreshadowing better days to come.
Victory in Europe. Millions of people dancing in the streets. Allied soldiers handing out chocolates to children, strangers kissing in the boulevards, royalty and exiled heads of state returning to their parliaments and castles. We’ve heard the stories so many times. We love a narrative of liberation.
Read MorePlease: Judge a Book By Its COVER /
In her debut novel, Lena Scholman brings us a tale of unlikely allies who must choose between following the patterns of the past or stitching together a future of their own making.
Read MoreWill They Like Me & Other Back to School Adult Anxiety /
The first day of school has always been so full of emotion for me. As a teacher, the night before meeting my new students, my stomach would be in knots that would not release until the last person filed out of the classroom and I could lay my head on the desk for a moment and breathe. Thank you God, we all survived. I was never a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants teacher. Extreme preparedness was my armour, because somehow in the back of my mind I must have believed the classroom was some kind of battleground. In the evening after the first day, I’d always crave KFC; fried food is good for an unsettled stomach, right? It was an unapologetic indulgence I’d earned having survived that first day of teenagers, whom, to my knowledge, didn’t hate me. And, as much as it is embarrassing to admit, no matter what lofty ambitions I might have had about what I was going to teach, I was still very much like a child who just wanted to live through the day, hoping to make a connection and not an enemy. I wanted to be liked.
Years later, without a classroom of my own, the first day of school is still kind of painful.
Read MoreHow to be a woman* /
1.) There is no one way.
How could there be? This is so obvious I’m going to skip ahead to number two.
2.) There is no timeline.
I hardly dare to write this post because what wisdom could I possibly have to share given the limited time I’ve spent on earth? Pre-Covid I spent many beautiful afternoons with a ninety-eight year old woman and drank in her ten decades of wisdom. So let me say a few things as someone who has taken voracious notes, and hopes to live long enough to test these theories in the future.
There is no timeline for learning how to be a woman. I mean, we are born female and we die female and figuring out what that means isn’t a 100 metre dash towards a clear finish line. You may think you have the answer at 35 only to completely revise your stance at 55. Who you are at 18 may not be who you are at 88.
So take your time becoming. I know some love to speak of the maiden, mother and crone trichotomy, but I also know women whose hair is white and whose eyes sparkle like a child’s with the delight of having discovered something new and amazing.
Take your time learning all the ways to be a woman.
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