Life is Your Story

  I remember the sound of the ball coming in contact with the bat. The wood bats had a hallow kind of smack, while the aluminum had a ping. I remember the lamplights turning on, slowly, hesitantly flickering before reaching their full strength, the moths dancing in the warm spotlight. I grew up in a small white house, along with my two brothers, on a one-way street called Wentworth. The park was our backyard. It’s where we learned how to play basketball, baseball, hockey and how to look out for one another. Our parents worked several jobs to make ends meet. We lived a simple yet fulfilled life. We were kids with 3 baseball diamonds, two basketball courts, a shack to play “wall ball” against, a jogging path behind Diamond 2, a playground beyond that, and our very first school, Wentworth School across the street, beside yet another landmark, Blossom Pool. We had a neighbour who talked to the bus drivers, whose rest stop was in front of our house. His name was John “Babe” Learie. He a...

The friendships you create and nurture when you are younger are different than the ones you establish later in life. The friends who grew up with you knew your entire family. They played in your house and sometimes their siblings and your siblings and a whole gang of neighbourhood kids joined together for a game of baseball or hockey or just to hang around in the park doing nothing and doing everything. They also knew things that friends you meet later in life will never know like the smell of your house/family. You know the way every family has their “smell” They also knew if your mom was a good cook and enjoyed her best meals and desserts and they knew what type of food was in your fridge and in your pantry and how much of it they could get away with eating without feeling uncomfortable. There was that one house where everyone hung out either because the parents were away often or they just didn’t care if there were 20 kids in their basement doing whatever they were doing....

People fall apart when they lose a sense of who they are or come to the realization of who they are not. Some people never delve this deep and never really change. They glide through life on a straight line - wax on - wax off. People who lose themselves are also people who look for themselves everywhere and in everyone they meet. They look in all the right places and they lose themselves in all the wrong places. Some of them eventually do find themselves and that allows them to settle down and walk that straight line. While others flip and flop and fly and crash and repeat the process again and again to no avail. They are tired, worn souls and although both they and their loved ones wish they could follow a straight line; they don't know how -mostly because they can't see straight. What makes people fall apart? Well sometimes they feel alone without support, love or empathy and other times they aren’t alone rather they are surrounded by people who care for them deeply; ...

Alone - it's an awful word. I meet people often who spend day in, day out alone. Some are fortunate to have a pet but most can't because it's not affordable or they live in a rooming house that does not allow it. I know them well. They participate in support groups that I facilitate for those suffering from mental illness. They have lost their mental health, jobs, financial independence, in some cases their entire family support, their friends, their pride, their dignity and inevitably themselves. These are the people you see on the "side lines" when you go about your every day routines. They are sitting alone in cafes nursing a cup of coffee and a muffin while reading or writing hoping that someone will look their way and perhaps smile or say hello. They are the ones walking - always walking because it's free and it takes up time and they have no where else to go and nothing else to do. They are also the ones who may look as if they are staring right pa...

Think of the park where you played when you were young. It was probably the closest one to your house. Back then, you could walk to the park, meet your friends there and play all day without much worry at all. So you've taken yourself to that place and you are accompanied by all your childhood friends and the bonds have been casted in plaster. Bonds that are perhaps or even likely the strongest you have ever formed beyond family and partners. Everyone is there even those who have exited this life. They are all smiling, healthy and you can reach out and touch them. Today in this flashback, in this park, everyone is very much alive and safe. The mission of the day - simple - have fun, laugh, chase one another across an open field, or a basketball court. Learn something - how to throw a Frisbee or pitch a strike or do a lay up. Gather that endless energy that has returned to every molecule of your being and put it all out there for everyone to see. Express yourself without an...