friends

West Coast Ways – Day Four.

A few days ago I raced up Yonge Street on my way to yoga beside a twelve-ish year old girl in the same chucks as me. She carried a skateboard, we both had our headphones in and she wore the cutest little floral skirt. We kept getting stopped at the same streetlights and when I turned left, she turned left, and when I turned right, she turned right, weaving the same path with different destinations. We were most likely listening to different tracks and worrying about different nit-picky problems and daydreaming about different ideals because there are -insert your guess here- years between us. I don’t even know if she noticed me. I just read a quote from John Steinbeck that says, ‘I wonder how many people I’ve looked at all my life and never seen.’ Different intention but cool point. I noticed the girl because she reminded me of myself back then. A little bit of tomboy tendencies while staging the independent women status before the term ‘women’ legit fit into your life.

We spend the first half of our lives planning the future and the second half reliving the past. When does it change from one to the other?

That’s what’s on my mind as I relive the final day of San Francisco in iPhoto. It was my third time in California and each trip has settled into my life where I stood at a fork in the road and had to decide if to go right or left. Ended this trip ‘on top of the world’ in the pics below. Always search for that feeling. Until next time, SF. -k

To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all. – Oscar Wilde

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Hello Summer in the City.

Signs of summer: Now that the windows are open, at this time everyday while working from home, the smell of eggs and bacon comes through the window from the restaurant below my apartment and it’s kind of a comfort thing.

I absolutely love getting up north and escaping the concrete jungle on weekends in the summer. But I absolutely love taking advantage of weekends where there is no concrete jungle escape. So about the last one…

There are far too many choices on the Saturday/Sunday shuffle in the city. This is a trigger for my extreme case of FOMO. (That fear of missing out thing… and my continued case of trying something new. Crossfit started this past Sunday!) This past weekend some friends and I chose the west end, specifically the Dundas West Fest. Street festivals are kinda sorta maybe my favourite summer thing to do in the city. You really don’t feel like you’re in the city; visiting vendors, the smell of BBQ that takes you back to swimming in your Grandparents backyard as a kid and a few cocktails with friends at a fold up table curb side, people watching to end the day. I like it that way. While sipping on a dark and stormy, visuals of acceptance stood out in the little fenced off patio where we sat and it was so refreshing. People expressing themselves through laughter and clothing layers and love with no labels. Being able to be completely yourself and accepted is one of the biggest highs. Being loved for being perfectly imperfect. In a field where you’re ‘judged’ for your looks and presence and what comes out of your mouth daily (which I chose to be a part of), I crave what I absorbed on Dundas West some days. This morning I read this saying on instagram and it’s bang on –> Artists are people driven by the tension between the desire to communicate and the desire to hide. SO TRUE. It was nice to hide this past weekend. And when we all had to move inside the bar at sundown, everyone picked up their own table and chairs and helped carry them inside to put away and that was super cool to me. It’s just a little thing but they all add up. -k

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It’s the holiday season.

My roomie and I looked at each other after the game finished on Friday night (…and a nice win at home it was!) and said “We have an entire weekend off!” First reaction: Where do we begin? Second reaction: Pour a glass of wine and pass out watching movies with the fellas. Sad, I know. But it’s those simple things.

We spent Saturday doing normal Saturday things. On a Saturday. Woah. We baked cookies and treats and decorated the apartment with a little Christmas jazz. Christmas music filling the place all day long, of course.

Then the crew stopped by. The simple things. I told myself this year that I’m going to really enjoy every moment of this holiday season because it goes by so fast and it’s so wonderful. That personal promise started this weekend. And the spirit continued today with endless Christmas movies and some R&R.

Hope you had a wonderful weekend too. -k

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