a peek inside the fishbowl

Part of our New York Times subscription includes access to some interesting and informative e-newsletters. A recent edition had a bit about downsizing our New Year’s resolutions. (I’m not sure if you’ll be able to access it, but try this link.) I loooove the idea of making small promises to ourselves instead of bigger resolutions that might overwhelm us (and let’s face it, are less unlikely to be kept).

When you think about it, small things can have a HUGE impact. e.g. Drinking a big glass of water before dinner. Taking vitamin D at breakfast. Touching your toes when you get out of bed every morning. Deciding NOT to complain about the weather. So maybe it’s a good idea to make a smaller promise to yourself instead of a big one?

My tiny resolution this year is to make the bed every day.

My internal rule about our bed has traditionally been: “The person who gets out of bed last shall make the bed.” I think this is fair. HOWEVER, this directly clashes with Mark’s outlook, which is: “I’ll do it eventually if I do it at all.” Let’s just say we’ve never quite been able to reach a compromise on this issue. :)

I’ve been through many phases of bed making. There have been times I’ve (a) refused to make the bed (b) made the bed or (c) made my half of the bed. (Yes, you read that right.) I’ve had enough of this so I’m making the bed every day and sticking to it.

I’ve written about this before. Now, I try to frame it as fitness instead of a chore. Stretching! Lifting! Lunging! And there’s a pretty good payoff as well. Making the bed feels productive even though it really doesn’t take a lot of time and effort. I’d forgotten how good it feels to walk into a tidier bedroom. It makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something, like I have a handle on life.

I’d like to hear your thoughts on bed making!

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Did you get books for Christmas this year?

The pandemic has left some people unable to concentrate enough to read, while others are consuming record amounts of the printed word. I am on Team Readsalot. Maybe one of your small promises is to carve out more time for reading? Last year I resolved to read 85 books and I finished the year with 88 (!) and I hope to meet or beat that goal again.

I try to go to bed a little early so I can squeeze in more reading at night, but now I often find myself gravitating to my book after dinner, or sometimes over my lunch break.

My mantra is: Less time online is more time to read books. 

I first wrote on the topic of reading more books back in 2015. (You can read that post here. The sad thing about it is that when I first looked at it I thought it was a post from 2005 because of how fresh and young I look in the photo at the top of the page. Sigh.)

In that post I made a long list of suggestions – and I stand by them – but if I was writing it again I would move the one about the Goodreads app up the list because it’s probably my main source for book recommendations right now. Goodreads is an app/website that helps you track your books but it’s also a network of book lovers. You can follow other people and tap into what they are reading as well. It’s a fabulous way of finding recommendations because they’re ultimately from people you trust.

As soon as I see something that interests me I make note of the title and head over to my library app. If they have it, I’ll put it on hold.

Another idea is to make use of mini libraries, you know, the “take a book, leave a book” type. There are a few in our neighbourhood. These libraries make a good destination for a winter walk, and they are also a way to get rid of books you don’t want anymore.

p.s. If you’re on Goodreads or signing up for the first time, you can follow me right here.

In late 2019 I received a gorgeous wall calendar as a gift. An Italian import with creamy thick paper and beautiful illustrations, it’s the kind of calendar that begs to be framed instead of recycled at the end of the year.

In January 2020 I hung it up in a prominent place in my Actual Offsite Office so I can see it while I was working at my desk.

In March 2020 I was sent home because of the pandemic, along with a lot of other people from my workplace. I remember packing up a few things and when closing the door, thinking, how long can this thing last anyway?

HA. Obviously it has lasted quite some time. It will be a year in the blink of an eye.

About ten days later I returned to pick up my laptop charger, office plant, and some notes. (FYI I found a dead banana on my desk and a container of egg shells, so it’s a good thing I went back when I did.) A few months later I returned again. This time I picked up my collection of office shoes and at the last minute I plucked the pretty calendar off the wall lugged that home as well.

I had missed a few months so I chose MAY and propped it up on the shelf in my home office.

I’ve since decided to reuse my calendar, for another calendar year. It’s still on the shelf in my home office but right now I’m looking at January 2020. Maybe the second time is the charm?

Welp. Christmas has come and gone. I’ve been enjoying the company of our Christmas tree since the end of November but I’m suddenly no longer as keen to turn the lights on now.

I realize I left a pretty downhearted post up here at the top over Christmas for longer than I had meant, but don’t take it as a sign of sadness. I haven’t been here because I’ve honestly been too busy doing other things, none of which require writing/editing or much thinking. Truth is, by the end of 2020 I was very tired and desperately needed to recharge my batteries. And this was the first year in forever that I’ve actually had Vacation Days to use up, and so I did. And it was glorious.

I am happy with how Christmas unrolled here at Casa Fishbowl. It didn’t look that different from Christmases of our past, when I think of it. It was small, close to home, low-key.

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When the girls were small they always begged to open one gift on Christmas Eve. I’d make a show of acquiescing to their demands. “Okay,” I’d sigh dramatically. “You can open ONE present.”

It took the girls a few years to figure out that the one present they were allowed to open happened to be pyjamas and ever since then it’s become a standing joke around here. This year was a little different. On Christmas Eve I sent the girls upstairs to find and change into their “one present” as usual. While they were doing that, Mark and I changed into the identical holiday pants. The look on their faces when they came back downstairs was… perfect. And YES! DAD WORE LOUNGE WEAR.

Personally, these are my new favourite pants. They are cozy and warm and have deep pockets (!):

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Last Christmas was our first without Mark’s mother, Mary. Part of our Christmas tradition was of her making, something she started who remembers when. Every year she made Land of Nod Cinnamon Buns (which I briefly wrote about here). They were always a favourite part of our breakfast on Christmas Day.

After she died I decided this was a tradition I wanted to keep. If you aren’t familiar with this recipe, you might be surprised to learn that it is entirely based around frozen dinner rolls. (Yes, seriously. I didn’t believe it at first either, but they are delicious.) Over the years Mary told us many times how and where to obtain these. “You have to ask the people behind the counter at the grocery store bakery,” she’d say. “They will sell some to you, but you have to ask.”

Perhaps the reason Mary explained this process so many times is that buying them actually feels slightly sneaky, like ordering something that isn’t off the menu. This is something that isn’t made available to People Who Don’t Know, and so it feels strange asking someone about it. (“Psst! Can ya sell me some buns?” Wink wink!)

Last year I went to the Superstore bakery and asked the fellow behind the counter. He said he couldn’t sell me any rolls. I can’t remember the reason, but I do remember how crushed I felt at the thought of a Christmas morning without Mary’s cinnamon buns.

I left and drove to Metro. By this point my feelings of panic/sadness/exhaustion were quickly filling up and on the cusp of overflowing. I’m sure this was written all over my face. I did a desperate tour of their frozen food section. Nothing. I asked someone behind the deli counter and she waved over the bakery manager. I asked him whether I could obtain some frozen dinner rolls, he said he’d check and see what he had left and would I mind waiting a minute? (Did I mention that I was shopping on Christmas Eve? Ugh.)

He was gone for a couple of minutes. As I stood there I thought about Mary and how much we all missed her. Christmas was probably her favourite holiday, but because of some past hurts that I won’t get into here, it was probably also one of the hardest. The bakery manager returned, buns in hand. I thanked him profusely and RUSHED away because I knew I was ON THE VERGE. (The poor guy, I’m sure he wondered why I was getting so emotional about frozen bread products.) I may have told him that he saved my Christmas but I’m not sure if I actually said that out loud or if I was just thinking it at a very high volume.

The end of this journey to obtain dinner rolls was almost at an end. I was in a busy express checkout and when I spotted someone I knew – not a super close friend, but someone I like and admire and call a friend nonetheless. He asked me how I was doing and that’s exactly when I burst into tears.

I think of Mary often, but especially when I take the cinnamon buns out of the oven and turn her beaten-up red ceramic bundt pan upside down on a big serving plate. The caramelized sugar pours out the edges and stray raisins inevitably miss their mark and end up on the kitchen counter. She’d be the first person to scoop them up and pop them in her mouth. It’s the chef’s prerogative, you know.

This year, Mark bought the frozen dinner rolls at Metro. There were no tears, but they were enjoyed just the same.

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New Year’s Eve 2020 was spent eating lots of food all day long (charcuterie board, veggie trays, Christmas chocolates, trays of frozen appetizers sourced from the grocery store etc.). We drank Prosecco and watched Soul, which I heartily recommend, and half of Princess Bride before the countdown started.

I wanted to spend the first day of the New Year with intention. (I could see my family’s eyes glaze over when I actually used the word “INTENTION” to describe why I wanted to go ice skating on Mud Lake but it was easy to let that slide.)

Thanks to a confluence of freezing temperatures and lack of snow, the lake was frozen over and prime for skating. I bought new ice skates this year with the idea of using them a bit more often during a pandemic winter. Breaking them in wasn’t great but I persevered. Instead of focusing on my sore ankles, I thought about how amazing it is to be able to skate on a frozen lake.

As it turned out, a lot of people had the same idea. It is cheesy to say that it felt low-key magical but it did. I fully expected the music to rise and someone to ride out on a Zamboni sponsored by Canadian Tire or Tim Horton’s. It was so Canada, it was practically a caricature of Canada. It was a living love letter to this place we have chosen to live, even though it gets so cold that it could actually kill us.

People sat down on logs and rocks to lace up their skates; leaving their boots and duffle bags and thermoses by the shoreline. There were families of all shapes and sizes, teens playing hockey, parents pulling sleds. Many brought shovels to clear out small “rinks,” many of which were connected by icy paths. Someone had thoughtfully cleared a path that looped around the edges of the lake. I saw quite a few hockey sticks, either in use or in a snowbank, along with discarded children’s coats because FUN makes you hot and sweaty if you’re doing it right.

I overheard one little girl shouting to a similarly sized snow suited friend: “IT’S LIKE A DREAM COME TRUE I AM ON MY SKATES AGAIN.” You said it, kid.

When we’d had our fill we went home and watched Live Free or Die Hard … we watched the three previous Die Hards in a row on Boxing Day and I think this one was probably the best. Yippee ki-yay!

And now, I am looking forward. Looking forward to my workday routines again, looking forward to what the year will bring, looking forward to skating on frozen lakes and making memories.