Last night I went to my last shin-dig at the Vancouver Crisis Centre. It was a workshop on trans-gendered mental health and it was phenomenal. I wont go into it too much, otherwise this could be a really long post and I don't want people to lose interest. Just a few thoughts, and definitions to start.
gender identity: A person's internal self-awareness of being either male or female
Transgendered/transsexual: A person whose gender identity does not match the sex they were assigned to at birth.
Imagine this... you are a little boy, you think like a boy, feel like a boy, you know you are a boy. But when you look in the mirror, you see a girl...you see yourself in a girl's body, and you feel out of place. You feel lost and alone because how do you explain this? You go through childhood wondering when you will fully become a boy. Then you hit puberty, and your body takes a very sharp turn towards womanhood. You're hormonal and going through the same physical changes and discomfort other kids your age are, on top of that you realize that something is terribly wrong. You do not fit the mold, you do not feel complete... You decide you do not want to live anymore.
This is often when we talk to you, at the crisis centre. It's your last hope, that maybe out there somewhere, someone can help you. Or maybe you feel you are beyond help, but you want to speak to someone who can't see you, one last time.
The suicide rate among transgendered youth is extremely high. This is why we had the workshop, to inform and educate crisis line workers. But I went because I see myself possibly working in this field some day. I have always been interested in gender roles from the psychological aspect, and as a Christian I am aware of the spectrum of beliefs and ideas people have. It's a tough one. And honestly I'm not interested in debating whether it's 'real' or not, because I absolutely believe it is. And if there's something I can do to help these kids who feel lost, then that's what I want to do.
I would like to draw to your attention to the final comment on my Disney post, in case you missed it ;)
"for the longest time i thought it was a p. i seriously didn't figure it out until my late teens. i'm not stupid...but i seriously thought it was silent or something. i just didn't get it. i'm with ya james....i should join that club. ;)"
4 more days until the moving truck comes and our house looks like this..How do we have this much stuff? The act of moving is something I should be used to by now. I did it 4 times before YWAM, and about 50 since... Oh well, it's part of life and new beginnings.
We had a very nice anniversary. Mostly packed and stuff during the day, but at night we went out to the Keg. I had chicken topped with lobster meat and shrimp in a garlic-lemon sauce...yyyum! We decided that we want to take our picture on each anniversary and put them all in a little photo album. I think it would be so neat, when we're old and gray, to look back on that and see how we've changed through the years. It would be something cool to give the kids as well. So here's year 0 and year 1.
I have a question for anyone who grew up with disney movies (the early ones, like sleeping beauty, snow white, etc). Did anyone else not really realize that the "D" in Disney was actually a D, until they were like 15? I'm dead serious, and I know I'm not the only one. I came across a group on facebook called, "When I found out the Disney "D" WAS a "D", it blew my mind" and I immediately joined. As of today it has 114,269 members, all who admit to not really comprehending this as a child. Think about it..when you're little and you're watching your Disney movies, you memorize the logo but you can't read, so you don't see it as letters. And then as you grow up and learn letters, you already know the symbol so much that you 'know' it's pronounced 'Disney', but it looks like a G (or to some, a Q, treble clef, etc). Then all of the sudden you are older and are looking at it...and you realize - It's a D! Wow.... I was like, holy crap I never noticed.
I hate the American version of this show..with intense hatred..but, I saw this clip from "Britain's Got Talent" of this little 6 year old girl named Connie. She sings "Over the Rainbow" and it is absolutely adorable. You will not be sorry you took the 2 minutes or so to watch.
Didn't get a chance to post yesterday, but just wanted to say Happy Fathers day to my dad!
Dad I remember one time during that 'loaded questions' game you said you wanted to be famous for being the best dad. Just wanted to let you know you are already famous for that in my book. i love you.
Well, 24 years ago today I entered this world. That seems like a very, very long time ago. I know, all you people older than I roll your eyes as I say I feel old, but please... I'm sure you thought the same thing when you moved from your 'early' 20s to you 'mid' 20s. Any time you go from an 'early' to a 'mid', or a 'mid' to a 'late', it's hard. It's a big life change..it feels like you got a lot older in that year than you did the last time you had a birthday. Either way, it's not like you can stop it so whatever.
I had a nice day. Laid around, which was great..I love saturdays...every saturday is a holiday to me. It's my sabbath..my day of rest where I can sleep in and do what I want. So today was the same. My favorite part was during the afternoon while Craig and I napped, although napping to him is actually sleeping, while napping to me was watching ER on our new little portable DVD player in bed...so fun..!
I opened presents after that, got season 5 of ER and season 1 of Friends from Craig (I already celebrated my b-day with my parents when I was visiting them in May). Then we went to Langley because I wanted to go to the Olive Garden. Unfortunately though, the entire city apparently also had that desire and when we got there it was going to be an hour and 10 min. wait. So I said no thank you, and we went to Cactus Club. My dear sweet husband would've stuck it out with me, but I couldn't do it. I was bummed at first, but soon forgot as I ate my really yummy cedar-plank-salmon and veggies at Cactus Club!
This day got me thinking though...what is it about birthdays that usually get people feeling worse on that day then they do every other day? It seems like it's supposed to be so special - what you do, where you go for dinner, if people remember, what presents you get, etc. To be honest, I don't have high expectations that people will remember because quite frankly, I rarely remember anyone else's besides my own family. So I don't feel bad in the least... In fact, it was a fine day, and I enjoyed just hanging out with Craig. Jessi also called me from Boston, which was very nice. But, I don't know...something still leaves me feeling uneasy about celebrating birthdays, my own and other people's. I think it's the tension of expectation in the air. Everyone probably has some sort of expectations...how do you know what they are? If you don't meet them, is that your fault, or were they too high to begin with? I just don't know.
Oh well, it's my birthday and I can muse if I want to.
I need something new. I've just realized that I haven't done the same thing for more than one year straight since high school..and even that changed every year. Being on staff at a YWAM base throws all sorts of things at you, keeps you on your toes, changes regularly...and after 5 years of that I got sick of it and wanted something else. Donor Services was a perfect fit...kept me within the YWAM family but much more of a steady job. It made sense financially, and personally.
But now, I need something new. It doesn't help that I had a bad day today.... it was one of those days where everything seems to go wrong..forms go missing where you knew you had it just yesterday, donors get angry because they wanted to be anonymous and didn't get marked that way, the stamp machine runs out of ink half way through sending out around 800 cheques so you have to take the remaining 300 to the post office and stick stamps on them because heaven forbid people's cheques be one day late... ugh...
Anyway, enough ranting... all that aside, I am ready for a new schedule...a new focus, new home, new city. Not saying I wont miss the 'old' when I get there...that's usually a given. Just saying that it's time...which is why sticking it out with a positive attitude for another 5 weeks might be hard. Here's a pic of the house we will most likely be moving into once we get to St. Catherines. Cute, huh? To be confirmed next week!
Last weekend was great...hardly did a thing, mostly just packed and puttered around.
Monday, work, nothing Tuesday, work, went to Henri's new place and ate sushi and blizzards (they go hand in hand for us) and watched 'Children of Men'
Wed, work, and then tonight we're going to go play cards with Joan. For those of you who know Joan, you know exactly what I'm talking about! She's Randy Parizeau's mom and pretty much a spitting image of him x10.
We leave Vancouver in less than 6 weeks! Though I know it will be hard to leave the place I've lived in for nearly 5.5 years, I am excited for this change in scenery. I'm excited to go to school, live in a new appartment, get to know a new city, make new friends (hopefully). Well that's all for my lame post. Just felt like I should write something.
We have started the huge job of packing... ahh life as YWAMer..packing seems to be something you do more than most folk. This is by far the biggest one though - we are moving across the country, sending our things on a moving truck. Yes you read that right - an actual moving truck! Not all to ourselves of course.. but it's still pretty big. It would have been nice just to rent a trailer, but our little car can barely make it up a mountain with the 2 of use, let alone our furniture. So, it was either get rid of and try to sell everything (it's becoming nearly impossible to sell on craigslist these days) or bit the bullet and pay for a moving truck.
We're moving out of our little place here on the 30th of June, and staying with the Parizeaus till around the 23rd of July. Then we'll leave, and take our time getting to Ontario. Big big life changes ahead!! But I'm excited.
The last couple days I've had a few good blogging ideas...but as I sit down to write, I'm drawing a blank.
So I think I'll just do a little review of what it's like to fly with Skybus. I'm sure many of you will experience this company at one point or another, they are the new cheap cheap ticket place. (We paid $105.00 total for me to go direct from Bellingham to Columbus and back).
Since they are very new, in the Bellingham airport skybus didn't have it's own desk where the rest of them were. It was kind of funny...we got in the airport and were looking around for skybus, and then finally saw a little flimsy sign stuck to the wall that said "Skybus ---->". We followed the sign which led us back outside the airport, around to the back, and up a ramp of a portable classroom/trailer type thing. Inside it was skybus!
Now, the thing that's different with skybus is that they do not assign you a seat..ever. It is literally first come first serve. They do put you in a group, as you check in. There's groups 1,2, and 3. We figured out that the only way to get into group 1 is to pay $10 for special check in capabilities. This means you get right on the place fast and quick, and don't have to fight the rush of people trying to get aisle seats. Not a bad thing to do if you are determined to sit with your family or something. This would guarantee it.
That leads me to my next piece of advice - check in online. You can do this up to 24 hours in advance. If you do this within the first 8-10 hours of this 24 hour period, you will most likely get into group 2. After that though, anyone else who checks in online or at the airport will be in group 3. Your chances of sitting with someone you wanted to sit with become very slim and you might end up in the middle of 2 random people.
If you are not taking any checked baggage, then once you check in online, print off your boarding pass and you can go write to security. If you are checking baggage, it costs $5 per bag (up to 2 bags) and you can pay either online when you check in, or at the counter. Either way you will have to go to the counter if you have bags you want to check. **note: if you check any luggage, you have to do so with a credit card..no cash or anything else.
Okay that's all I can think of right now. Just get there earlier than you would for a different airline. Even if you get into group 2, by the end of that group the seats get more sporadic. All in all, I'd say it was a pretty good experience.
Craig and I got home this morning from Ohio. It was a great visit but way to short.. I can't wait till I can drive to my parent's place in a reasonable amount of time (will be around 6.5 hours!).
While I was home, I registered for my classes. This September I will be taking:
Intro to Religion Sex & Gender in a Cross Cultural Society Spanish College Writing
4 little classes! I'm excited.. not sure how much work it will be, but I imagine it will definitely keep me busy! I was shocked though that one of the classes I really wanted to take was already filled by the 4th day that it was open (you can register over a 2 month period..I thought I was on top of things by registering 4 days after it opened!). I really wanted to take digital art and design, but I think I will jump right on that next semester. The first 2 years of school will be a majority of general education classes, so might as well get some of them out of the way anyway.
That's all for now, I've been up since 4:30 am eastern time... (1:30 am Vancouver time!)
Name: jamie Home: St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada About Me: I am an American living in Ontario. I've just recently started going to school again for a BA in Human Services. I like mexican and indian food and watching tv way more than the average individual. I absolutely love talking to my parents on the phone and my brother is one of my best friends. I'm married to a great guy whose pretty much the exact opposite of me but he loves me and makes laugh and we have a lot of fun. I didn't always feel this way, but these days I'm feelin' pretty good. That's my life, welcome to chaos and order. See my complete profile
