Welcome!

The other day I got a piece of mail from Revenue Canada. Not just any piece of mail, but a total shocker, advising me that I owed them an ENORMOUS sum of cash equal to roughly all my life’s blood.

During the tooth-gnashing melt down that ensued, one of the things I said, no wailed, was that I had absolutely nothing to show for my life. And when I said that I really really believed it.

Because judging by certain yardsticks, I don’t have much. No house, no car, no kids, no husband, not much in the way of income at the moment…I don’t even have a TV!!! (Not that I want one) Sounds kind of dire and rock-bottomish, doesn’t it?

So let me get quickly to the next point.

And that point is that I lead an incredible and extraordinary life. I’ve been brave enough to ship off on my own and live half way across the world not once but three separate times (and counting). I’ve traveled to some of the most amazing corners of this beautiful planet. I’ve slept in the open desert beside the camel I rode on all day, trodden the stones that Aristotle and Plato walked on, eaten things I couldn’t identify on sweaty street corners, written a novel or two, worked in jobs that are fun and fulfilling….. well, you get the point, right?

But I realized that in judging my life against the normal conventions, I’d forgotten how amazing my life has been and continues to be. How screwy is that?

I vowed that I would never again judge my life against the yardstick of anyone else's expectations. And I'm finally going to get around to doing something with the pictures and the stories I've been accumulating during the expat life I've lived for most of the last ten years!