gretchen's amazing wedding. what a wonderful day of love. celebrating life, love and family. from right to left: rachelle, katie, gretchen, justyn and me.

theater - my passion

hello dear friends and family,
it is 11:04pm on a tuesday night, i just got home from rehearsal. oh i enjoy it soo much. it is sooo cool to be back and a part of a theater production again!!!!
happy yeahs to you all,
jewels

life is good!!! full of..well, LIFE!!

hello dear friends and family, I am getting ready for my trip.
I AM SO EXCITED!!!!
this post is for anybody who is expiriencing a hard time
or dark time:
remember there is LIGHT AND LOVE AND BEAUTY
in this illusion
of life
that we are living in!!!
i am experiencing one of these moments of
pure joy and happiness
and i want to share it with you!!!
love, love and love to all of you!!!
JEWELS

it all works out

hello my dear friends and family,
the sun just set and ended a glorious day of sunshine and blue sky. it was a day of rest and friendship. i went to see my friends at meadowview where i babysit once a week. we had lunch together in their beautiful backyard. i talked to my landlord this morning and she refuses to pay me back the whole amount of money. her opinion is that she had to say no to two people when she said yes to me and now she has to start all over again. i tried to reason with her that i am in the same boat. i didn't mention to her that i can stay at my friend's house for the time being and even rent out a room here. but i still think we are both at the same point right now. and i don't feel responsible for not taking the room in the end cause if i hadn't seen her that drunk, NO if she hadn't been that drunk then i would have moved in by now. but i haven't even lived in that room or even moved anything in yet so why should i pay rent for that? yes it is too bad that she has to start all over again but so have i and i won't charge her any money. so i went to the police station and asked them for legal advice. they gave me a number to call cause they personally won't get involved cause it is too complicated. the whoile landlord/tenant thing. so i will call the number tomorrow and see what they say.
alrighty then, so far from here.
love
jewels

sunny sunday

hello dear friends and family,
i am sitting in the living room of my friend steve's house and am flooded by the late afternoon sun. enya is singing and i just wakened from my second nap today. i had a long shift yesterday at the cornerstone and was pretty exhausted. it is labor day weekend so people like to come for brunch to the cornerstone and therefore it was quite a busy morning/afternoon. the first hour felt like a whole day and there were six more hours to go.:) i was all over the place, washing dishes, making coffee, helping costumers, serving food, pouring beer etc. it was quite overwhelming at times. also giving the fact that i had quite a couple days before that. on monday i made the decision to take a room close to downtown rented out by a nice lady who is also a traveler and former teacher. i gave her my first month rent and was all happy and bought some stuff for my new room. we decided that i will drop off the secind month rent on friday so i went back to the house on thursday night cause it turned out i was able to pay her earlier and when i knocked on the door there was no answer. i knocked again and looked through the window and there she was. my new landlord to be.on the kitchen floor. semi-conscious. i went to the back casue i forgot my key that she gave to me on monday and she was sitting in the kitchen. not responding to my calls. when i knocked on the kitchen door she turned and told me to go away. she opened the door finally and couldn't form a whole sentence. i told her i will be back in the morning. luckily my friend cynthia was waiting in the car cause we came from a movie night and i was able to share this really sad encounter with her. i felt really sad and well...shocked. i mean i know there is alcoholism and such but actually seeing someone that drunk is pretty impressive. it was also the full moom that day and i was struggling with the whole payment for the room for most of the week, again all in my head and well, that encounter was just the last bit. i was pretty exhausted. i have friends here though. wonderful people who help me. i had already moved to steve and he offered me to stay as long as i need to. so i have a roof over my head but the feeling of still being on the move and search is still in me and makes me feel unbalanced and shaky. i went back on friday and talked to the woman, lets call her S. not surprisinlgy she didn't remember anything that happened including me being there when she was that drunk. she was a little embarrassed i could tell and when i broke the news that i don't want to take the room she was really shocked and tried to convinve myself that it won't happen again and that she is going to an AA meeting that night and that she really want me to come etc. i could literally hear the addict in her speaking when she said it won't EVER happen again and she just let herself go cause of all the stress with the house (she is also renovating right now). i told her i will think about it over the weekend and come back to her on monday. i knew even then that i won't take the room casue it doesn't feel like a safe environment for me to be living in. i could have said that right there and then and asked for my money but i am such a good person and well wanted to give her a chance. i won't take the room though. but brake that news to an addict. 'hi, well sorry but i just don't think you are a safe environment for me to live in.'???? it is not my responsibility and all and i know that and yet, i am still a student when it comes to sayting what i want. sometimes i am better sometimes it takes more efford.
so here i am. jewels the traveler, mover. eagerly searching for a longterm housing situation. also not feeling that satisfied with my jopb situation and trying to solve all these challenges at once. and then when i woke up on saturday morning to my alarm clock the radio was playing a song and the line i heart first was 'you will find your place'. boom. right in my face. alright. i surrender.
the whole S.-room-rent-situation was kinda forced anyway from my side. i didn't have the money in cash but rather in a paycheck that i couldn't cash in cause it said jewels on it and not julia k.like in my passport and also becasue i don't have a bank account yet. so i had to ask my boss to cash it out for me. and my second paycheck didn't arrive in time so i had to ask different people to loan me money. so every thing didn't flow around that arrangment. so i could have noticed that right then but i guess i needed to find her on the kitchen floor frist to recognize that this is not the right room. so actually i am quite lucky. even though my mind is trying to convince me that i am not. quite the opposite. cause i have been in guelph now for over 2 months and i am still not renting but staying with different people, hopping from one house to the next. which saved me the rent so far which is a good thing right???:)
oh well. this is it. i am again reading a book ( i just picked it up today and well, it was another 'boom' right in my face. exactly what i needed to hear. in a nutshell: don't panic or worry but let it flow and things will fall into place.) called 'the tao of pooh' by benjamin hoff ( i recommend it to everyone who is struggling with this mind of ours!!) and there mister hoff explains through pooh the bear the idea of taoism. with pooh being that little funny bear who is trying to figure out life and different challenges from a posotve ancle. which turns out to be not that different from taoism. it is quite amusing and eye opening. so anyhow he quotes at one point henry daivd thoreau, who wrote at one point:

why should we live with such a hurry and waste of life? we are determined to
be starved before we are hungry. men say that a stitch in time saves nine, so
they take a thousand stitches to-day to save nine tomorrow

that's how i felt for the last couple weeks actually most of my life. running. to reach somehting i am not quite sure of what it exactly is. but just stopping can't be for any good, right? i mean NOTHING gets done. that can't be any good for the future. so i keep running and looking and figuring out. not only in the physical way like my travels all over canada and part of the us and central america but also in my head. my mind is constantly running. trying to cnvince me to make sure not to stop cause there are so many things to figure out and wrap my head around. strangly enough though if i follow my mind and get all caught up in solving every problem or issue around me there are only more coming up, popping up from nowhere crying 'ME TOO'.
and then i realize what i have been doing and stop and decide not to worry anymore and simply surrender and trust and let go. and things move the way they do. until i get caught up in the next challenge and the spiel starts all over again.
so today i stopped. well, not really i washed all my like-cornerstone-smelling clothes and organized my room. but cleaning can be really helpful. i feel more relaxed and at ease. i spent some time in the sun and reading. and sleeping. so now i am sleepy but happy. i might go to the cornerstone tonight. there will be live music like every sunday. maybe i call cynthia to come with me. maybe not. i feel lazy and that feels good.
so my friends, life is like a stream. if we fight against the currents and waves we just get tired and might sink. if we fload in it at peace and in trust that things will move along and at one point we WILL actually be up over the surface again then we are safe in the arms of the water and it actually CARRIES us. what a wonderful image. we are safe in all the turmoil of life IN life.
love to everyone.
to my sister svenja who is still in vietnam.
to my aunt heike who i am with in my thoughts a lot
and to life in gratitude for all the challenges i manifest
jewels