For about a week before things locked down due to COVID-19, I was heading to the Adventure Canada office daily to help with PR. Times were already looking tough, and we needed to keep our spirits up. At one point I quoted something the hockey broadcaster Harry Neale once said: “The secret to success in this league is to be good on your bad days.”
Now it’s even more abundantly clear that these are “bad days” in lots of ways, for sure. And yet such an opportunity to focus on what matters most: presence, principles, and patience.
I put “bad days” in quotation marks because in truth, they are only different days. Hard days, to be sure… and yet the sun is rising brighter than ever; the stars are easier to see at night.
I was out in the backyard for most of the day yesterday with Meghan and the kids. I put out my rain-barrels just in time for today’s sloppy weather. For the past few years we’ve managed to use no municipal water for our extensive butterfly habitat and food gardens. We had a campfire. Meghan cooked pizza over the fire for lunch. I did some carpentry.
These are all things we’ve always done because we felt they were important, because they feel good, and also because we knew the world wouldn’t always be the way it is now.
Now they feel a little less of an eye-rolling whim and a little more like a way forward. But above all, it feels right — to be together, to be working peaceably with the land, to be planning for the future and give thanks for what we’ve got.
Baby’s bumping nowadays. We are healthy and well. We have everything to look forward to–and just a few things to let go.
Change is the only constant. The campfire teaches that.