V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #40: Things My Father Said*

March 18, 2019.Reading time 2 minutes.

(* or any male of influence growing up.) I can’t count the number of times my father’s words hover over me, even though he’s been gone since 2005. He was the king of platitudes – constantly quoting (and making us recite) the works of Dale Carnegie, or Norman Vincent Peale. “Mind over matter,” he’d say […]

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #39: Unanswerable

March 11, 2019.Reading time 2 minutes.

“I always start with questions that I can’t answer. Otherwise you get bored halfway through if you already know the answers. If you’re asking what seem to be unanswerable questions, then you have to keep showing up.” – Barbara KingsolverFrom A Talk in the Woods, by Kevin LarimerFeatured in Poets & Writers, November/ December 2018 […]

What Is In a Name?

March 10, 2019.Reading time 2 minutes.

A touch of history, a personal insight, a vision – all of these form the basis for how we have chosen to name our blogs. Reading the back stories has made this one of my favourite challenges. Each of us has put thought and care into finding names, an act that speaks of our dedication […]

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #38: What’s In a Name?

March 4, 2019.Reading time 2 minutes.

As I type up each week’s summary, creating links to various blogs, I am struck by how different blog names are, and compelled to ask: what’s in a name? Specifically, your blog name. Mine, One Woman’s Quest, comes from a lifetime of searching for knowledge, understanding, and deeper connection. Left mostly to my own devices, […]

Together a Tapestry

March 3, 2019.Reading time 2 minutes.

Across the miles, our wordsconvene, threads of our livesintertwining to form a tapestry. Stories of sorrow and kindness,humanity restored –of observation and empathyof inspiration through resonanceof brilliance and artistry. Each thread as colourfulas another, delicately added,thoughtful ponderings Of generations and legacies,misunderstandings contributing to tragedy,of infatuation and love’s fallacy,of childhood and noses in booksand entanglements leadingto […]

Texture

February 21, 2019.Reading time less than 1 minute.

This crumbling foundationa testament to character –hard battles fought and won. I built fences, long ago –tried to bury my fallaciesbut all that decays, too Structures either maintain or not,but life continues, a constant flowlike a river, softens our perspectives. (Images for Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: texture. Words penned for my ‘wild card’ challenge, my […]

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #36: Wild Card

February 18, 2019.Reading time 1 minute.

This week, I am giving you a carte blanche…well, sort of… there’s a catch. Go back over the last week’s worth of posts or so, and notice any words or phrases that repeat themselves. I’m talking adjectives, or verbs, maybe nouns. For example, when I look over my posts leading up to writing this one, […]

Restoring Balance

February 17, 2019.Reading time 4 minutes.

Fog has dissipated, as has the rain. Hallelujah. Although it is still overcast, we decide to take a drive, cameras in tow. Goose Island State Park is our planned destination. It has just the right combination of driving and walking trails. This is also where we saw the Whooping Cranes, so maybe we’ll get lucky […]

In The Maze

February 14, 2019.Reading time 2 minutes.

I read once that when obstacles present themselves, it means you are on the right path. I think it was Caroline Myss. Of course, I’m paraphrasing, and from memory at that. What’s important is my takeaway. Life isn’t meant to be easy. It is meant to challenge and encourage growth, just as the gardener who […]

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #35: Balance

February 11, 2019.Reading time 2 minutes.

I don’t think I’ve possessed good physical balance since that time I went down in tennis and cracked my kneecap, despite physiotherapy’s best efforts. Now that chronic illness has been added to the mix, I’ve learned to live without that certainty. I’m wobbly; what can I say? Balance in other areas of my life, however; […]

Resilience

Boxes are filling up around us. We’re making a dent in our to-do lists. Doubt seeps in. Are we doing the right thing? Then I remember all the reasons behind making this choice and affirm: We are dismantling one life to build another, purposeful existence.

Monday Mood: squirrely

The movers need to be arranged, and the closets sorted and packed, and when was the last time we bought groceries…. Head and attention are going in too many directions at once, and I’m exhausted before I get started. Might be a little cranky too. The stress of moving is real.