I watched a hockey game last night. No, not the English kind with curved…, oh, hang on. I already wrote that post. But I did watch a hockey game last night. I sat with friends on their sofa, enjoying the action on the large-screen tv, my feet up, chicken wings with blue cheese dip to eat and a beer in my hand. There was even a dog at my feet. In other words, a perfect evening with excellent hockey, except that the Leafs lost. This will likely be my last mention of hockey. 🏒😞 

I received a lot of positive feedback from my last post, and I do think that it flowed well, so I admit to feeling some pressure to spin out another well-written free-flowing chapter of my life here in Montreal. But I’m going to turn my back on that need for affirmation from others, and just do the best I can to express some of the thoughts and ideas spinning around my head.

Warning: it’s messy in there.

I feel an urge to write about the weather, which must be a legacy from all those years in the UK.  But it is so extraordinarily different here than London, even though they’re both temperate climates. This time last week we were in the throes of a miserable, cool, four-day inundation of steady rain. I wanted the chance to moan, but then the sun came out on Friday and summer arrived. 

Just like that, the mountain, which only a week ago was a large beige lump with a spiky crewcut of bare trees, became cloaked in a fuzz of green. Leaves unfurled, magnolias popped and people put on shorts and t-shirts. 

Montreal: 6th of April after an ice storm (above) vs 6th of May (below)

This post, in which I was going to weave together the ideas of rebirth and regrowth with the theme of a damp and fecund springtime, doesn’t work so well now that it’s 20 degrees and sunny. So while I’m tempted to skip over writing about the frustration I felt when I tried to apply that burgeoning growth rhetoric to myself, I won't. I am immersed in it. I have to not only acknowledge but embrace this messy middle of a long drawn-out transition. It doesn’t matter when it began and it’s irrelevant to focus on the end. Yeah, I got divorced; happens to a lot of people. And my girls are so far-flung they’re like destination children around which I can plan a whole holiday, but wow! it’s exciting to see what they’re doing. Now it’s time to pull on the threads of curiosity to see what comes next for me.

Why am I finding it so hard?

Don’t get me wrong. I do not expect sympathy in any way; I am fortunate to have the opportunity, the time, the health and the bank balance to follow an inquisitive path. But uncertainty has never been a comfortable bedfellow for me. I’m more goal-oriented. Give me a finish line and I cruise.

Introspective personal development, however, is far less measurable. 

I’ve been so focused on the where, as in, do I want to return to London to live? Is the draw I feel to Canada enough to settle here? And, looking around Montreal, is this it? The Plateau has great energy and character but it’s crowded with millennials and older people who have lived here their whole lives. Nothing wrong with that, but is this my community? 

Which is why I have to stop thinking of the where and to consider instead the what, maybe the how, because I could make it work here if I had purpose. Of course I could. And it might be a great combination with Costa Rica or Mexico as the winter abode.

I need to shift my mindset in order to consider the journey rather than the destination, to take notice of what is confirming my fixed beliefs, both personal and societal, and then toss out those that are holding me back.

I wish it was as easy as putting out the recycling.

It’s a little uncomfortable where I’m sitting but I’m okay with that. Discomfort brings change. As Justine put in the note she gave me to read on the plane last year, it would have been easy to stay put in my exquisite house on the Thames, to enjoy the neighbours, my friends, do more volunteer work, take classes. But it didn’t feel right. I was twitchy.

Change is hard, it takes focused work. And what I’m learning is that it’s more about asking the right questions than finding answers.  

So I'll leave you with a question: What feeds your vitality?

PS - here's a photo of me with Mads at her Rush University commencement ceremony last weekend. I'm so proud of her 💚