A Cellular Experience

 July 20, 2023 

Today I went for the first intentional walk alone in a very long time. It’s been a whole trip around the sun since I started the journey into this journey of learning to relax.

The coffee supplies at the hospital had been depleted and it’s my job to keep them stocked. Normally I would drive to the co-op and pick up what we need but today I decided to walk.

It was cloudy with dappled patches of blue sky. The scent of the breeze changed with the scenery as I walked closer to town. For a moment I could smell the salt and seaweed of the ocean, then the clover flowers blooming in the grass at the side of the road.

Dandelion imposters bloomed in the browning grass. Brown grass is a rare site here on Haida Gwaii and one I find concerning. For most of the summers we’ve lived here the the ground has gone squish when you walked on it. This year there’s more of a crunch.

My goal this week was to unwind the tension I had allowed to collect within me before I start a more focused fitness program next week. Yesterday I had found my shoulders had climbed up my neck and were residing beside my ears. Consciously through the day I took breaths and asked them nicely to return to their natural habitat closer to my breasts. It was difficult at first but eventually we got the hang of it and by the end of the day my neck was feeling freed from its prison of tension.

Taking that one step further today I moved my body while I continued to relax.

Letting my eyes go soft I absorbed the view. My gaze wandered out towards the water in hopes that the black fins of the killer whales would return again today. They didn’t but the calmness of the water helped me feel even more at peace.

Taking another deep breath I dropped the tension from my shoulders and let the tissues of my body release the motion of my movement. I could feel them relax and stretch out. They stretched like they had never stretched before. Not the kind of stretching that I had warped myself into attempting yoga or trying to develop more flexibility, this was so much deeper. I could almost feel the individual muscle bundles relax and stretch out. It was a more cellular feeling one that felt like they had finally gotten to put down a weight that they had been carrying for far too long.

My limbs felt longer and my gait lengthened.

Losing weight has been important to me for the primary reason that I would like my joints to last as long as possible. It seems only reasonable that the less weight they would carry the longer they would last. Today I found myself contemplating how much damage I was doing to my poor joints by asking them to work under this much tension. Most of life I’ve been a massive ball of stress hurling at ridiculous speeds into whatever stimulating adventure has grabbed my attention.

Pondering this I continued to move and breath. I realized that this is what the horses must feel like when we work on moving out relaxed. For many years as an equine sport therapist I talked to people about the importance of relaxed movement. This thought made me feel like I had treated myself to something precious, I had unconsciously taken as good a care of myself as I do my horses.

The walk carried on for most of my lunch hour with breaks to stop and snack on the various berries that grow in abundance on the islands.

After work I made my way out to the paddock and let the horses into their dinner field. Punkin cantered off into the field and I watched to see how much tension she was holding as she trotted around tossing her head in true Andalusian style I noticed a little tension in her gait. Just enough to protect herself from another embarrassing wipeout in the field. Knowing she was keeping herself safe I took another deep breath and enjoyed the new state of relaxation and connection with my horses.

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Killer Whales At Work

It was a nice morning the world was quiet and you could feel the the darkness starting to take back it’s place in the day. There’s a shift I can feel in the world around me as we begin our decent into the darker half of the year. 

There is just as many days in darkness as there is in light and just a few weeks ago the days were the same length only getting longer. I can’t complain really, it’s light out at 5:00 am and stay that way until well after 10:00 pm but I can feel it in the air. We’ve begun the decent into darkness. 

I worked on my writing this morning compiling all the old bits and pieces that could make up a story to see if there might be a chance that somewhere in the wasteland of words there might be a story. Then it was time to hit the gym. 

This week I have decided re-embrace the rest based lifestyle that I had worked so hard on a year ago. My heart has told me that it’s time to learn to relax or become permentenlty broken. My body however needs to move so we’re learning to come to an agreement. 

Today I put on my Fitlist and danced with my hoop. Setting up the space and getting my head back into the game I’ve decided that this will be the week I get my sustainable routine in place and my head an gym ready to begin the works outs again next week. 

All too soon it was time to go to work. The drive was dreary and I was already missing the brief moment of summer. A summer that seems to have slipped away into the dreary days of another wet season in the Great Bear Rainforest. 

I drove the windy gray road and noticed that the tiny set of twin fawns close to Masset still wasn’t with their mother. They seemed to be gumming the tender grass at the side of the road. They were small and their spots seem to be clinging to them more so than the fawns with obvious mothers. 

Everyday I see them alone my heart breaks a little, at least they have each other, I tell myself. It;s so hard not to interfere with wildlife so tame. Understanding the importance of colostrum and mothers milk in the infant stages I find it hard not worry about their health. 

Brushing off my concerns for the orphan twins I kept on my way to work. It was a day full of endless things to do. That is one of the things I love about my job, there is no shortage of things for me to keep busy doing. Then as I was busy working away from me a I heard “I saw a killer whale”.

I dropped everything and ran outside. Everything stops for whales in my world and they were the first whales I had seen all year. They were also the first killer whales I had seen on Haida Gwaii. 

The moved fast with the currents of the tide. Their black fins coming up out of the white caped water. Excitement and awe filled my being. What a special treat. 

Killer whales are ominous of death in the Haida culture, or so I've been told. 

Today I watched some of my old habits wither and slowly collapsed under the weight of the new hope I carry. Maybe that old life I’ve been fighting to shed has died and been taken away. 

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The Doorbell And The Gate

 

The Doorbell And The Gate 

July 12, 2023

Pain seared through the right side of my head leaving me almost blinded for less than a second. It rang down into my jaw and the sounds of the room faded in and out like I was listening to them from under the water. 

Deep breath in, I told myself, we can do this.  

Normally I go home when my migraines start to set in but today we had the Ear, nose and throat doctor visiting our community and I am the lucky girl who gets to be their clerical support while they’re here. 

With the hospital reaching a level of criticall staffing there was no one to fill in for me.

44 people or more from our community can benefit from a clinic like this. In a community of 1500 people thats a significant amount. Without the wonderful specialists we have that come to visit us people would either go without or would have to go off-island. 

Going off-island is a real challenge for many people. Even though when we leave for medical reasons the cost of the eight hour ferry ride from Haida Gwaii to Prince Rupert is covered, the expense involved is still pretty incredible. With tourist season in full swing it’s very difficult to get on the ferry making it even harder to get to medical services on the mainland. 

Making sure we continue to have our visiting specialists come to us is a personal mission for me and not one that I am willing to let a migraine come in the way of. I had to suck it up and keep working. 

Thankfully my family doctor was working in the emergency room and I was able to talk to her about some better drugs. She gave me one to take when now and one to take when I get home. 

I took the one for now and it turned the volume down enough on my pain to get me home. 

Punkin and Tonka met me at the gate, excited to see what kind of adventure we were going to have today. 

I looked at them sad that every time things start going well enough to get into a good riding routine something like this steals more time.  

Too much life has been stolen from me by migraines. 

Apologizing to my equine friends I packed their buckets into them. They were disappointed they didn’t get to go out but happy to see their fancy dinner buckets arrive early. 

After spending a few minutes with my husband I laid down and let the sleep wash over me. 

DING DONG…….. DING DONG….. ……… DING DONG 

“The horses are not out” I told my husband. 

He looked down the driveway at the sensor. Nothing. 

DING DONG…… DING DONG… …… ……. …. DING DONG … DING DONG .. DING DONG… 

It sure sounded like the horses were out. 

“Did I leave the gates open?” I asked my husband who was looking for the culprit who was very persistently setting off our doorbell sensor. 

“Yes the gates are open” he told me. 

“CRAP! The horses ARE out!” I exclaimed while jumping out of bed. 

I scrambled to find enough clothes to leave the house in and straight to the barn for the cookie bucket. 

“Hey Ponies!!! TREEEEATS!!!” I called out in my sweetest , most fun sounding treat voice. 

“TREEEEAAATS” I shook the cookie bucket. 

“Punkin Tonk come get treats” I called while looking down the driveway from tier return. 

My head raced, all I could think about was one of them being hit by a car because the driveway gate was also open. 

They weren’t coming up the driveway and the thought of putting out the energy to chase them around the neighborhood just about broke me.

I turned to look beside me there they were, on the inside of their paddock, happy I had changed my mind about tonight's adventure. I gave them both a cookie and told them how good they were. 

After closing the gates I had left open I went back upstairs and closed my eyes.

This time sleep took me hard and fast. I slept the whole night with no more interruption from the doorbell. 

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Dinner With the Wild

 

Dinner With the Wild 

July 12, 2023 

Salmon berries were on the menu for dinner tonight. It wasn’t so much that I didn’t want to cook, I simply didn’t really feel like eating. 

The day had been long and stressful and it was everything I could do to muster the strength to take the old man out for a walk. Tonka had sulked a little more than usual last night, even though it had been almost a month since I was able to do anything he was keeping score like ponies do. Last night should have been his turn. 

With the weight of today's stress clinging to my skin I mustered up the strength to head outside to take my pony for a walk. 

He greeted me at the gate. His copper coloured coat glistened in the sun and wind had swept his forelock to the side just perfectly. He really is a stunning pony and was looking less and less his age everyday. My mind wandered to the fantasy where his cart is welded back together and we drive off into the sunset. 

I put on his halter and we started down the driveway. The connection of a 20 year partnership sizzled comfortably between us. I thought about all the wonderful things we had done together and how grateful I was to have him in my life. 

We slowly made our way down the road where the forest opened up to the ocean. The blue sky draped over the distant mountains that were green with the rich forest. An eagle circled above the shallow waters as the tide slowly drained the inlet leaving behind a swirl of shimmering greens, blues and browns. 

Opening my ears to let the texture of the sound in I heard the calls of small birds hidden away from my sight. The grass rustling in the gentle breeze and the buzz of the horse fly that had followed us from the barn. 

Peace washed over me and ounce by ounce the weight of the day let go of the grip it had on my skin. 

A large red berry glistening in the sunlight caught my eye. I slipped it off its home on the salmonberry bush and into my mouth. It was juicy and sweet. 

Tonka took the opportunity to enjoy a sweet treat of his own. The smell of clover mixed with salt air drifted by as he blew with approval. 

We continued down the road stopping at all the berry bushes to fill both our bellies with the goodness of summer on Haida Gwaii. 

2.13 Km we walked today snacking and enjoying the wild world around us. Some of the local deer were cautious when they saw us even though they often spend time visiting the horses in the pasture.They seem to pretend they don’t know them as soon as they’re out in public. Tonka doesn’t seem nearly as bothered by the shallowness of this friendship as Punki is, so they barely acknowledged each other as we all wandered about snacking on the bounty of the season. 

One human crossed our path, I suspect this was most likely a tourist. They seemed almost shocked to see a woman with a small pony doodling down the road looking like an eccentric old lady with her giant pet. We nodded politely and went back to experiencing the nature that surrounded us. 

When we arrived back home one of the ravens was here to reluctantly greet us at the bottom of the driveway. I thought about all the wonderful animals that share their space in the world with me and the last bit of stress fell. With my belly full of berries and a happy pony we hiked back up the driveway ready to face another day tomorrow. 

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Riding My Dragon

July 11, 2023 

It’s a good thing that the weather on Haida Gwaii has been cool enough for some people to think of it as being cold. Because today Punkin Pie was hotter than Hades on a Sunday afternoon in August. 

The last time I rode her was close to a month ago and that ride had been part of a trifecta of misfortune that had led to a week-long migraine. After that came a visit off-island with family for my grandfather's 90th birthday, then the necessary time to recover both in my home life and professionally.  

Life in the clinic has been a test of passion and endurance these past few months and thankfully the more work my endurance the stronger I get and the more I can endure. The more I can endure the stronger I can feel my passion fill my soul. 

Tonight though I have reclaimed my nights. I love the nights. And nights on Haida Gwaii in July are light into late hours making the perfect time to ride. 

I tacked up Punky at 8:00 and headed down to the arena while tonka screamed in protest. It was technically his turn but I really wanted to get out and ride my dream horse. The dream horse that was bred special just for me. 

Knowing better than to just get on and go I asked her to do a few circles in the arena on the lunge line. 

Trot, trot, troooooo BUCK!!!

And just like that I knew tonight was going to be a bit of an adventure. 

The excitement stirred inside me. There was a time that I would have been afraid to get on but I work hard for nights like this. 

She continued to buck and snort and jump obstacles in the arena. Her jumping was starting to look less awkward and possibly even rideable. That could be fun , I thought to myself and tucked the thought away to save for later when my passion might need a little fuel to get me through the next big push of life. 

Punky had bucked herself out and dropped her head to the ground and started to relax. This was her signal to me that she was ready to go.

And off we went.

She left the drive driveway fire breathing dragon chasing the hobbits away from her gold. 

It’s okay, I told myself, we’re fine, everything is fine. For moment I wondered if we really were but she seemed to be doing okay and I let her ride it out. After all I like going fast and she was running away with me she was just really excited to get out of the gate and get going. 

A few driveways down the road she started to relax, then it happened. 

There’s only 3 other horses in town and one of them came running down his pasture to see what was going on. The thick salmon berry bushes had hidden him and we had no idea he was coming to greet us until he was right there. 

Punky flew sideways and my body being slower at moving sideways and having less notice about moving sideways left there like a cartoon suspended in the air with only a fraction of a second to think. 

Crap I might fa…

I didn’t even have time to finish the thought and my muscles snapped into action on their own. For the past two years I have been working on developing the right fitness routine for me and my lifestyle and tonight it did not disappoint. 

My legs remained soft enough to prevent the hot blooded mare from continuing her lateral outburst while my core and my arms coordinated themselves amongst the chaos and kept my already broken enough body from hitting the ground. 

It took a moment to regroup and there was a little conversation about pace but not even a minute later Punkin was walking on a loose rein and I was having a grand old time feeling safe on my fire breathing dragon. 

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