Sexism Surprise!

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Today I went with my best friend to the Ottawa Cookie Jam. This is a local event, and I think this was its very first year. Overall I’d say there were pros and cons, but the idea and the vibe have so much potential. I look forward to seeing this cookie party growing bigger and richer as each year passes.

sexism surprise

Anyhow, so we went to look at cookies. Of course, the only problem was that most cookies were already gone by the time we arrived – which was 25 minutes after the doors opened. So no pretty cookie pictures for you, because I was too busy running around trying to get the cookies before they all disappeared!

(Maybe next year they should stage the servings, or have more cookies. There’s so much cookie potential!)

Mind you, I’m not meant to be eating cookies in the first place. Since the diagnosis of stage IV, I’m really trying to cut all the sugar. My latest vacation wasn’t too helpful in this area, but I guess God was looking down upon my friend and I today, and said: No MORE SUGAR! So that I restricted my cookie temptation.

However, we did get our 8 cookies worth, and we brought them back to her brand new home in Vanier for a tasting. I mostly just ate one cookie – maple walnut, which was gluten free, lovely, and not too sweet at all . . . but overall it was lovely. We met some more friends and had dark tea with cookies.

Lovely!

But to backtrack slightly, as we left the cookie event we decided to walk home from downtown. This meant we had to walk pass one of the best schwarma places in Ottawa. [Schwarmas are like gyros, pitas, kabobs, donairs etc.] So I thought, “Hey, I’m gonna get dinner and lunch for me and Zsolt.” Their chicken platter is so big, it can stretch two meals for two people eating ‘not too big’ portions.

Right, so my friend and I go into the take-out place on the way back home. And we go in, there’s no line-up. We go up to the counter where two men are standing.  . .

. . .

. . .

. . .

And eventually one of them says, “Hi.”

So I said, “Hi,” and then—

THEN he turns back to the other guy, both of their backs to us, and keeps talking to his buddy.

So my awesome friend says very loudly, “Can we get a chicken platter?”

And this dude behind the counter turns back and says something like, “Okay.”

He makes the food. I go and pay.

. . .

. . .

. . .

After I pay, I am waiting for my food to be passed over. But he’s helping the next people, a couple. Finally, he gets the chicken ready for my order . . .

. . .

. . .

. . .

Then eventually passes it to me.

And as this is all happening, at some point during this exchange since it’s taking SO much time, the less naive side of myself wakes up from her nap and thinks: he is doing this because we are women.

It’s true. I mean, he didn’t say anything like “You Are Women, Therefore You Wait”. . . but he was quick enough in serving the couple behind me and both my friend and I came to the exact same conclusion.

So where does that leave me? In one of the best schwarma places in town, I encountered something I’d never expected to encounter here in Ottawa .  . . sexism from a guy who isn’t even yet my age. And it wasn’t even your expected body-objectification type sexism . . . it was, ‘you aren’t good enough for me to notice you’ type sexism.

WTF?

Of course, since he didn’t hold up a sign saying “I’m one heck of a sexist jackass” I can’t prove the situation was 100% sexism, but it did feel 100% like sexism.

So it makes me wonder, are we being naive to think sexism isn’t happening all the time around us? Well of course it is! And maybe we’re sexist to men, maybe men are being sexist to us, maybe it’s a cultural thing, or an age thing, or a class thing, or a media thing, or a one-individual-who-can’t-get-his-head-out-of-his-ass thing . . .  maybe it’s a lot of things. But it really leaves me extra unimpressed when it’s an intentional thing.

Anyhow, that schwarma shop isn’t quite so attractive to me anymore. That’s okay though, we’ve got many of these shops in Ottawa from which I’ve received excellent customer service when with girl friends. I love schwarma shops for the relationships you can make with the people behind the counter. Today was just ridiculous – so ridiculous it surprised the heck out of me.

And so there’s a little story about my sexism surprise. Plus, of course, the cookie jam. It was a wonderful Saturday, absolutely perfect in every way despite the dude whose head was too far up his ass. I loved today because it had nothing to do with the drama that has otherwise cast a shadow over my life. I loved the freedom of being with friends, going to events, walking through town and now writing it all down here.

So that’s all there is to that. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go dance with my husband.

~Catherine

Blog Silence Broken

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Ah, radio silence . . . or rather, blog silence. For the past little while I’ve taken a break from the blog. Not because the blog was overwhelming, but because I was overwhelmed. However, we’ve just returned from a pause out west. This fishing trip had been planned ages ago, and so I decided not to cancel – in fact, it’s probably for the best that I didn’t since one thing after another was beginning to grind me down. We needed the break.

Here’s the real, real, real truth: I am not good at this. I’m just plain terrible at it. And of course it will all work out somehow, but I don’t know how people do it – and I’m not just talking about the cancer stuff, though it’s the biggest challenge, but the life stuff too. The highs and lows and curve balls and backtracks and ambitions and workloads. I’m just feeling kinda garbage with all of it. I guess that’s why spas were invented, and tea with friends, and duvets, and hugs.

So that’s all I’ll say about it. It was quite surprising and knocked me off guard as it happened. I’d quite like to stop that from happening again, if I can see the signs ahead of time.

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the moose and the bear

For the past several days Zsolt and I have been on a bear hunt. It started in Calgary and a drive with my friend out to this beautiful lake Kanananananananasksis. Or something like that. We’d packed our inflatable canoe with us, and were ready to sail except the winds and rain stopped us from heading out. So instead my lovely friend took us on a very slow drive through the back-country where we hoped to spot wildlife. It didn’t happen, however. Though apparently the next day they had to close that park because a grizzly was spotted eating a carcass.

From Calgary we took our rental car up to Banff. Banff is a National Park in Alberta, and it’s lovely J There’s a very touristy village with help wanted signs in all the windows – so if you are looking for a rocky mountain adventure, they have vacancies. However, no bears were spotted.

From Banff, we drove up to Jasper – a town embedded in my heart from trips as a child and a summer spent working for their tramway back in 2001. This is a far less commercial village, except for the souvenir shops all selling the exact same crap. We stayed here a couple days and drove from one waterfall to another, all the while going 30km/hour and looking for bears. Still nothing. But, we did find elk, thank goodness for that.

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pyramid lake

Here in Jasper I finally was able to canoe on Pyramid Lake, which had a been a day dream of mine way back in the chemoland days. Except instead of feeling that freedom and lightness I’d so craved, we were wrapped up in layers of warm clothing, praying it wouldn’t rain on us. There’s a strange niggle with this new diagnosis that I can’t shake off even in the best of moments. It’s just there looking at me. And whenever I look back at it, it sticks out its damn tongue.

To be honest, I’m a little exhausted lately – even on the trip I was exhausted – and it can largely be attributed to that tongue sticking-out, shoulder sitting, moment-spoiling little mental reminder I can’t seem to shake off. The way I see it, I’ve already lived 2 years with this bull shit cancer, and they were 2 of the sweetest years I could have asked for. Now that I know it’s there . . . why can I not get back to that sweet spot?

After Jasper – which involved a ridiculous canoe packing episode where we folded, jumped on, climbed over, sat upon and crushed our canoe into the suitcase – we went to Vancouver. In Vancouver we had one day of sunshine where Zsolt and I rode a two person bicycle. Now THAT was fun. 🙂 There’s no being distracted or getting teary when you’re trying to balance a bike between two people while watching the stunning scenery and taking in that ocean air. It still makes me smile.

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stanley park

Following Vancouver, we met up with my parents and little brother (the real purpose of this trip) to go fishing. Okay, I didn’t fish. I went to cafes and had cups of green teas. But the guys went fishing with HUGE results. So even if we never saw a bear, at least he did witness a dinosaur fish.

And now we are back and the real world continues. We’ll see how this goes, and how I manage. One day at a time, eh.  Plus, now that I’m back, I get to enjoy piecing together the prizes and construction for the book. Tomorrow I’ll meet with Ian to talk covers, and I’ve already got an ISBN sorted. When I think of my book – like really think of it and imagine it – it fills me up so much with that splash of goodness and lightness . . . kinda like biking around Stanley Park on a bicycle built for two.

So here we go – moving forward into autumn and the upcoming new year. We will see what happens next.

P.S. Wendy Nielson has featured me on her blog this month as she shares stories of those faced with breast cancer.  Check it out, she’s done a lovely job with our interview. Also, It’s now breast cancer awareness month, and that is fine if not also kinda exhausting. There are places where awareness is hugely needed, and there are places where we could move beyond awarenss. Cancer is a tricky little bugger whether it’s impacting children, women, men, pets or anything. It’s heartbreaking as any other life-threatening illness is heartbreaking. And breast cancer is not what you think it is . . . it’s not six months of treatment and life moving forward. Okay, life moves forward, but for 1 in 3 women like myself, it’s also cancer moving away from the breast area and into other vital organs of the body. There is no cure, and treatment options are shit. So if you want to support a cause this month for BC, that’s wonderful. Please check before you buy pink, so that the money you give (whether you decide to fund research, emotional support, awareness of ‘ahem’ metastic breast cancer, or even better finding cures) actually goes toward those goals and not just people’s piggy banks. That’s all I say here today. Thanks!

CBC radio, IV Vitamin C, and DR CANADA

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It has been quite the week. If you’ve been following the Kickstarter for Adventures of Claire Never-Ending, than you know we might our goal for producing the novel. !!!!!!!! WOOHOO!

If I wasn’t so knackered at this very moment, I’d kiss you all.

It was such an incredible experience, and I want to thank everyone who pushed in and gave, and ordered, and shared, and supported. The campaign is still going, so I really hope to sell more copies over the next month. Are you part of a book club? Maybe you and your friends would be interested in the Claires 🙂

Betwen the tweeting and sharing and thanking, and getting blown-over by YOUR awesome support, I’ve been going to a place called the OICC in Ottawa. This is the Ottawa Integrative Cancer Centre. Twice a week I am receiving intravenous vitamin C treatments. This is meant to help control the cancer. It also works well when coupled with chemotherapy, but let’s not go there in this chat today. Basically the IVC is meant to encourage the cancer cells to breakdown. That’s putting it very simply. It’s not a cure, it’s a treatment. Heck, there is no cure for metastatic breast cancer, they are all treatments. But I want that shining golden prize of No Evidence of Disease (NED) to become mine. If you’ve read some of the comments in this blog, you’ll see it is possible. And even without NED – to keep things under control means good quality of life and no pain. Those are two beautiful concepts.

NOW. Two adventures I have to share with you in this post. First is the interview on CBC radio for All in a Day. (WOOOHOOO!) Second is my visit just this morning with Dr. Canada.

Just yesterday I was at the CBC building in downtown Ottawa. CBC is a national broadcaster and the standard of quality in Canadian media. So it’s huge to be there and was an honour. Hopping off the bus, I rock up to the big CBC location on Queen street. There’s a security guard and I check in. Then,  after a little while, a lady comes out to meet me. She has on a great red shirt, awesome sparkly shoes and such a cute hair cut. Unfortunately I cannot remember her name, but I do remember her excellent style.

Anyhow – we go into the ‘news area’. Surreal!! Think of any news show you’ve watched on television – that is what  this place is like, except for unexpected sensations like the softness of the carpet beneath my feet, the glow of florescent lights and that quiet hum of chatter. On one long wall there is a photo of the earth from space. In the centre of the room – hanging above all the low cubicles – is this massive, circular structure. It’s both a light fixture, art installation, and screen for all the stations. It’s a huge circle, and all around the outside are screens with different channels being played without any volume. Oh, and people look good. Everyone is dressed for success.

The show went really well. I’ll link in an audio clip to the picture below if you want to listen in. You should listen, it was a great experience. My parents and Zsolt both say it was great 🙂 Thumbs up for a encouraging family

Yay!

And then today was the oncology appointment. Dr. Canada was in a much better mood today. That was great. He also said this should be a time for joy. I’d rather focus on joy than dread – so yes, that was good. He also talked about sex, and he spoke quite frankly. Zoladex can lower the libido and dry up the lady parts. I’ve had problems with this before. So he was so great – even though Zsolt was squirming next to me with discomfort – basically saying something like, “this should be a time to focus on what you can do, not on what has been lost. So if you have trouble having an organism, try and focus on how much pleasure there comes from extra foreplay.” And he’s right. And I’m glad he opened the door for conversation. (Of course, he was referring in the bigger sense as well . . . such as having children, a certainty of a long life, etc. I think sharing this concept via intimacy was smart and frankly less emotional, cause you can laugh over sex, no? We did.) Also, one last thing: he wants me to go on a clinical trial that will start early 2014. In his words, he thinks the drug will be a “homerun!” So I’m all in favour of homeruns, even if I’m a terrible baseball player – I’m quite glad to hit a grandslam out of the park in the name of crushing cancer. I’ll just keep swinging till the job gets done, in my game there is no such thing as striking out!

So the language was much better today.

There is so much to say and write, but I won’t go into it all today. Sooner than later, I’ll write you a post about vitamin C. One very definite side effect: I get HYER right after treatment. It wears off. Too bad all treatments can’t work the same way – putting us in good moods.

OKAY That’s it.

Kickstarter is KICKING BUTT. With every single book sold, and more people who are going to read the Claires, it just gets fuzzier and fuzzier with warmth inside my heart. Thank you for your support. In return, I hope you like the novel.

Be well and have a lovely weekend 🙂

Catherine