"The time has come, to talk of many things..."

Once again, I know, it's been so long since I last found the time to write and post on this here blog o' mine... Alas. It's not for lack of things to write about... No, it's certainly not that. In fact, it's probably the exact opposite.

I know, I know, it's not exactly news to hear that I am "busy" here (or wherever I seem to be!), but maybe I can make my busyness in to some form of "news" to share - I mean, isn't that what this blog is all about?

Well, I guess I'll start a few weeks back... Probably just a mere few days after my last post on here, I decided that living in the suburbs of St Louis County in a two bedroom apartment with three (albeit lovely) roomates/co-workers was driving me INSANE. So I made my great escape to the city.

Yes, that's right, for my two days off in the last week of July, I booked myself a room for a night at The Hyatt Regency Downtown St Louis Riverfront, and spent a glorious 48-hour date with myself in the city... It was definitely among the best choices I've ever made...

ABOVE: My hotel, as viewed by me at dusk on Sunday evening as I walked through the Riverfront-Archway park to take myself out to dinner in the historic 'Laclede's Landing' area...

BELOW: Sunday Morning in my hotel room; Upon being dropped off downtown by my generous co-worker/roomate Adam, SnoBear and I checked in to our hotel room and got excited about our KING-SIZED bed!!!

BELOW: The View from my hotel room. Thank goodness it was this good, because later this evening I would be stuck in my room during a black-out with nothing to watch but the thunder and lightning and storm outside my window... Well, thank goodness for this view and for the bottle of red wine that I packed!

AND BELOW: This picture (of the famous St Louis Archway) was taken by me while standing right in front of my hotel. Yes, that's what they meant when they said riverfront!

So for my first day (of my two-day long date with myself in the city), I first made my way over to a great little neighbourhood called the Central West End. Which made me think endlessly about my new friend Jon, because he was the one who told me about this area in the first place. I eventually found myself at the St Louis Cathedral Basilica, where I spent at least an hour or so... You see, I've never really been a religious person, but I absolutely love churches and sacred spaces, I just sort of lose myself in their beauty and safety... Or rather, maybe I find myself...

After my visit at the beautiful Cathedral Basilica, I made the long, hot and sweaty(!) trek through the nearby Forest Park (bigger than NYC's Central Park) to the public Art Museum. Granted, walking for 45 minutes at the hottest time of the day in late July in St Louis might not have been my best plan... When I arrived at the art museum, I went to the public restrooms because I was so hot and sweaty that I had to go in to a stall and I actually took my dress off and literally wrang the sweat out of it. I looked as though I had been dumped with a bucket of water! (I only wish it had've been water - I was sooooo hot!!!)

Anyhow, I spent some time with an incredible exhibit of photographs by Gordon Parks... With the help of good ol' Wikipedia, I will tell you that "Gordon Parks (November 30, 1912 – March 7, 2006) was a groundbreaking American photographer, musician, poet, novelist, journalist, activist and film director. He is best remembered for his photo essays for Life magazine and as the director of the 1971 film Shaft." Basically the exhibit was totally inspiring and reminded me how much I love photographs and people's stories.

After the Art Museum in Forest Park I made my way back downtown to my hotel, but just a mere few blocks away from my hotel I heard something... A protest or rally maybe? I followed the sound and it turned out to be a sort of 'Block Party' sponsored by one of my favorite St Louis radio stations (The Beat 100.3 fm) showcasing young talent in a 'youth against violence' sort of effort. How apropos for me to end up there, hey?!?

So, after spending some time listening to the young MC's do their thang, I ravenously made my way back to my hotel room where I showered (okay and had a glass of red wine and called my best friend Devon in Toronto for a quick chat) and then made my way to take myself out to dinner in the historic 'Laclede's Landing' area. The walk to the landing was lovely; It was sunset and I walked through the park below the archway. Then I sat on a patio in the historic, cobblestoned Landing neighbourhood (think like 'Gastown' in Vancouver) and treated myself to a lovely meal. I walked home (okay, yes it was dark and I walked home alone through the park, but I'm fine so what of it?!) and just as I returned to my hotel room, the power went out in my hotel! So I had no choice but to sit by my window and watch the thunder and lightning while sipping my red wine and doing pretty much nothing... I think it was a blessing sent from The Universe!

The next day I had to check out of my hotel around 11am, so I did but I was able to leave my bag in the custody of the concierge for the day because Adam wouldn't be picking me up until 9pm that night, after my crew returned home from work. I made my way to my favorite place in St Louis - The Missouri Botanical Gardens! I spent a lovely few hours there before heading to 'The Loop' (a hip sort of neighbourhood) where I caught a matinee of the movie 'The Wackness', which I loved.

My '48-hour date-with-myself' ended with me making my way back to my hotel to collect my bag and to wait for Adam to collect me. Then I took him out for pizza as a thankyou for driving me in and out of downtown and enabling this oh-so-important date with myself to happen!

As I write all of this, I am actually on another sort of 'date-with-myself'... The aforementioned date happened during the last weekend in July, I think, and was followed with what feels like a real whirlwind of our last few weeks of full-time performing in August. And now we are just doing weekend shows. We had the weekdays off last week and this week. So this week I decided to treat myself to a four day 'date-with-myself' in New York City! Okay, it's really just four days in NYC because I have been spending quite a bit of time socialising with others while I am here.

Tomorrow, Friday, I will fly "home" to St Louis for our last three days of shows, then it will be time to pack up and head back to Toronto. This time next week I will have been home (at my real, Toronto home) for two nights already! Oh my! It's all happening so fast, I can hardly see the trees for the whirlwind, or, uh... whatever! My life is a whirlwind. But next week when I am back in Toronto I think that I will have some time and I will do some more long-overdue writing and reflecting and picture posting on this here blog of mine!

But for now, this will have to do!

a july valentine

Check out this July Valentine that The Universe just sent me:
"If you were a princess,
how would you decorate your valentines?"

Yup, that's right, I said The Universe just sent me a July Valentine! You see, just a few minutes ago, I was on facebook updating my profile status to say "Meghan is sending out love... take what you need!" And then my roomate/colleague Adam walked in the door from his run and handed me the above pictured Valentine and said "This is for you. It had a hard time getting here. I found it on the road while I was running." And as you can see, it is clearly adressed to MMM! Amazing isn't it?

As I look more and more for synchronicity, I really seem to find it...

Now, I like to pride myself on the fact that I am not some stereotypical young woman with starry-eyed deluded visions of love being something like 'A Cinderella Story' or something like that, but I do love Love - y'know that beautiful sentiment of caring and giving and receiving and feeling valued and special and magical...

And Love has been a little bit of a theme for me lately... You see, one of my new Six Flags friends, Audry, lent me this great book last week called 'Other People's Love Letters: 150 Letters You Were Never Meant to See' and I've been loving it. It's even inspired me to begin composing a 'Love Letter to The Universe' in my head...

Furthermore, one of my personal goals right now is to consider/explore/discover ways to care for myself, treat myself to joy and luxury and abundance. It was only just this morning, after meditating, that I realised that the biggest treat that I can give myself is the luxury of self-love and self-care. So I took a little time to write myself a nice, encouraging little note in my journal...

And then, feeling full of love, I decided to send some out in to The Universe...

And then, it seems, The Universe decided to send me some back:

"Hope your day is filled with sweet dreams and happy endings"

An Ode to the Joys of My Life This Summer (aka Family Fun & Fond Memories)

Just in case there was any doubt in your minds, I wanted to be sure to let y'all know that I am truly having a FABULOUS time here! Both at work and at play... Though sometimes it's hard to distinguish between the two!

For all the crazy physical, mental and emotional stress that I have had to weather over the past few weeks, I have also managed to squeeze in some seriously fun times. And for all the wistful wishing that I've been doing for my dear ones who are far away, I must say, I have met some incredibly lovely new friends here. They are fun, kind, caring, compassionate and I am quite certain that at least a few of them have worked their way so deep in to my heart that they will be there forever - no matter how far apart we will be from one another in the not-so-distant future.

So, what follows is a little pictorial ode to the joys of my life here in the wacky land of working in Entertainment at Six Flags St Louis (where their staff goal statement is to create "Family Fun & Fond Memories")...

Here we are with 'the performance fam' at the special employees-only preview of the new Evil Knievel rollercoaster the night before it officially opened to the public! Ah, the perks of being on staff!

Ladies and Gentlemen, 'TEAM ST L':

Or, 'The Canades' as we are most commonly known as.
Hosting a Canada Day Eve party at our condo, of course!

And below: Me with my new friend Nathaniel, whose sincere appreciation for all things canadian makes him an honorary 'Canade' in my books!

And on Canada Day itself, my sweet, adorable, abosolutely LOVELY young friend Emily took me along with her and her mom to see 'High School Musical' at the MUNY - a gorgeous, and giant, outdoor amphitheatre in St Louis' (gorgeous and giant) Forest Park:

After Canade Day comes America Day (aka the 4th of July)!
And what better way to celebrate Independence Day than with a costume party?!
Our american friends showed us a GOOD TIME!

Below: Me with my Best Bestie Evs - JON! (He's def. better than all the other besties)
Dr Jon and Enviro Girl: "Here's to saving lives and saving the planet!"

PS - I made my costume using our recycling! The body piece is made from forzen pizza boxes, the mask from a box for soy protein "fake chicken" and the belt from flyers!

And below: My friend Evan dressed up as Jordan and my friend Jordan dressed up as a Jabbawockee (a dance crew, from the show America's Best Cance Crew, who performed at Six Flags a few weeks ago)

And then, after discovering the nodes on my vocal chords, I had to take a bunch of extra days off and not speak at all. So one day I put my energy in to making dinner for my team for when they got home from work. And thus, "Family Dinner":
(Josh is absent because his ACTUAL family was visiting that weekend. I guess I can't blame him for wanting to spend some time with them...)

Look at how Kat and Adam put on their nice clothes to eat my meal!
(I was even inspired to change into a nice dress once I saw them)

Oh, and our lovely friend Justin sure knows how to brighten my day... Here we are, as his adoring fans, after he performed an interpretive dance to Pocahontas' "Colors of the Wind" song on our stage one day after our shows were done:

And then there was the Entertainment Department Luau after hours at Hurricane Harbour (the Six Flags water park). Here's 'Team St L." gettin' beachy with it in our dressing room before we head to the Luau:

And one last shot with my besties, Kat & Jon, glowing post-Luau fun:

Awwwww,
HEART!
XXXXXXX

Rapids and All

One of the things that 'The Artist's Way' keeps instructing me to keep an eye out for is synchronicity - that is, the events, emotions, thoughts, ideas, etc. of my life aligning themselves in sometimes surprisingly coincidental sorts of ways. When this happens, according to 'The Artist's Way', it is not coincidence, but rather the universe unfolding exactly as it should be.

As I walked home this evening (okay, it's not evening at all, it's 2:00 in the morning! Anyhow, as I walked home just now...) I found myself reflecting on the fact that it seems like everything that happened to me today was very emotionally synchronized. Perhaps it's simply that I needed an emotional release so much that it was just bound to happen, but I think it was more than that...

One of my favorite quotes from 'The Artist's Way' came from the chapter that I am currently working on and it goes like this:

"Recovery is the process of finding the river and saying yes to it's flow, rapids and all."

And I feel like I have really been trying lately to accept all the currents of the river that I am journeying upon these days - despite the fact that the waters have been less than pleasant.

Today I really tried to just accept that and move forward. Live my life. Or whatever semblance of a life it is that I am living here. I'm not trying to sound pessimistic or complain, because I am actually quite happy in many ways, doing what I am doing, where I am doing it. But I have also been struggling. In any case, I was able to have two really necessary, and really grounding, telephone conversations with two of my best friends today. Followed by a good, however brief, chat with one of my colleagues/roomates here in St Louis this evening, followed by a really good 'movie night in' with two of my new american friends here, where we watched a very cathartic movie.

The details of all of these events is really where the synchronicity lies, but it is my synchronicity after all, so for now I'm keeping it to myself. Suffice it to say, I've had a few good cries today, expressed myself some and felt a little more connected to others and a little more like me than I've been feeling lately.

AMEN!

Finding My (Artist's?) Way

Here I sit, on a sunny Friday morning, aware that yet again it has been nearly a week since my last post on here! Such a clear indication that I have allowed my life (and my self, really) to be consumed by far too many outside distractions... Namely: work, and all the pressure and expectations that I place upon myself surrounding my responsibilities to my job (both as a performer and as the show manager)!

Well, it would appear that the universe has had quite enough of my delusion, distraction and self-destruction these days... I am presently about to serve the second of two days of imposed/prescribed days off from work, during which I am taking the time to attempt to reflect upon my seriously self-destructive habits. You see, I have been having voice problems for the last four weeks and my boss in Canada finally ordered me to see an Ear, Nose & Throat specialist, which I did on Wednesday morning. The diagnosis was that I have two small nodes on my vocal chords, which is serious but nothing permanently serious, thank goodness! So the doctor prescribed me a TONNE of medication and ordered me to take the next six days off from work - HA! So, obviously that's not gonna happen. But my boss in Canada (and my colleagues here) did order me to take yesterday and today off at least, in addition to my usual upcoming Monday and Tuesday next week. So I'm trying to rest. And I'm not speaking. At all. It's hard, and interesting...

I've been reflecting a lot on all the crazy things that have happened to me since I've been here... The black eye I got, my finger incident, and now my vocal nodes...

And if I really and truly listen, I think that I can realise that the universe is desperately trying to get me to pay attention to and take care of myself! And I can almost hear all of you regular readers out there rolling your eyes and groaning about the fact that I seem to be presented with this lesson over and over again, and shouting in your heads: When will she learn?!? When will she learn?!?!

Oh, I am trying. I am really, really trying now. But it's hard. Not being good at taking care of myself is definitely my greatest weakness! But it's interesting to note that the week of 'The Artist's Way' that I am currently working on is all about reflecting on our self-destructive nature and our tendencies to put the needs of others before our own. They might as well re-name the chapter "The Meghan Tendencies."

In any case, it is nice to have the book/program as a companion to what I am going through right now. It is asking me the right questions and helping me to reflect on all of the joys of life that would be so much better for me if I just took a little more time and care for me!

It's still hard though. I am struggling so much, even now, with feelings of guilt about not working yesterday or today. I worry that my colleagues here think I am a weak performer who doesn't know how to take care of her voice, or that I am simply a weak person who cannot handle the responsibilities of performing and show managing. I hate not working. It leaves me without a feeling of purpose. I hate not being able to talk - I rely so much on my voice and my verbal self expression! I practically define my own existence with it! I hate that I don't feel healthy right now (whether I am sick or if it's just side effects from the medication that I am taking)! I hate that all that I really should be doing today is resting - I want to go out for a run, make phone calls, write letters, do paperwork... be productive! But I know in my heart that the greatest challenge for me right now is to simply rest and take care of me, so I am going to try to rise to that challenge...

So on that note, I guess I ought to sign off from here and go do... nothing... ugh.