Two Dead Deer

I enjoy writing about death, thinking about death and observing how it affects people. I guess that makes me weird (morbid? #dark?). It's the most natural thing in the world. Yet people still have the worst time coming to terms with it.

I think this is where the terms "naturally" and "easily" diverge. 

In the past week, I've seen two dead deer during my commute to/from work, which may explain my thinking about how things die, and all beauty ends, and oh-my-GOD-I'd-be-terrified-if-I-was-the-reason-for-a-deer's-death mentality.

The first one was a mess. There was a traffic jam on our way home from the train station, rear red lights ablaze. They weren't as red as the animal blood (whooooah, deep) that I saw smeared all over the pavement, dragged a few feet by a sedan. I gasped, my dad shrugged, and we went to go buy almond cookies. 

The second one was this past Monday. Another traffic jam, except it was daytime. I thought the car in question, which had a crater in its metal side, had hit a telephone pole or a tree. No. A buck, which are always so much larger than I imagine, was bent and collapsed in the left lane. No blood this time, but it had a spectacularly broken jaw. All I saw were the antlers. I'm sure I made a blasé comment. 

To avoid being overly-poetic about dead woodland animals, which I can really go on about forever, I'll tell you that my family has been attending a lot of funerals lately. As someone who is so strangely fascinated by death, it must be strange to know that I find funerals a bit nauseating. I don't think I can wrap my head around the idea of "paying respects" to a dead person's family. I always have the impulse to just leave them alone. Why would they want to see half-strangers and too many relatives when they just want to look at the floor?

Last Monday (the last of three), we crowded into a local funeral home for a neighbour.

I read about funerals, the bereaved and cultural funerary practices a lot. Still, there's no way that understand the half-firm handshake grip of a widowed mother. Especially if she's already lost one of two sons. Do they have a term for mothers with dead children? They should.

I grew up in a house where nothing, except high school grades and awful boyfriends, was taken all that seriously. I suspect that, when my parents die, my sisters and I will put in a respectable amount of effort, but we'll remain jovial. That's how they were when their parents did that thing that parents do. I don't think they'd want us to collapse into ourselves.

We had a family friend succumb to (read: die of) cancer recently. I spent a lot of time talking with my mother about it, especially about the children she left. My mom did something resembling a shrug: "All Mommies die."

I don't think I reacted in a bad way. It was something that only your mother could say, really. I probably just agreed with her, especially since her own mother died three years ago.

So when she dies, as all parents do, I know she's left me with the most important thing - the unwavering ability to move on.

Image Source: Flickr

On Quitting Facebook

This doesn't have much to do with anything at all, but I like this movie a lot so I guess it sort of works?

I like the Internet. I like the Internet a lot.

I grew up in AOL chatrooms and a succession of message boards. I'm an early adopter of many social networks (except Ello, heh). I have an opinion (quietly) on nearly every social network and it's one of the few things I feel I'm intelligent about. Most of what I know about anything, I learned on a screen.

I thought about this as I clicked the Deactivate button on Facebook last Friday. Where would I get my news? My friends' witty quips? The platform to share photos, interesting links and, albeit sometimes-selfishly, good stories?

The rest of the Internet - that's where.

Deactivating Facebook shouldn't be a big deal but, to my scorn, it is. I feel like connection is all my generation is about, but it was starting to feel so false and forced that, many evenings, I found myself cursing at Facebook instead of smiling.

It also feels wrong to place blame on a singular (though mammoth) social network. Others have left for their own reasons, but I'm deactivating because of my own personal frustration. I just figured I should write about it.

Facebook was starting to feel like an obligation and, as I hope you know, anything that starts to feel like a heavy obligation probably isn't worth it (friendships, relationships, fad diets). That said, I lacked the willpower to remove myself without something so "dramatic" as deactivation. 

And it was something I realized, painfully, after I literally shouted "fuck you" to my phone screen after looking at someone's profile. I'm sure we've all done the same thing, once or a hundred times.

For years now, I've been absorbing information and other peoples' lives instead of solely focusing and doing my own thing. Facebook wasn't taking all of my brain power (please don't think so little of me?) but it demanded a certain level of social engagement and interest that I just didn't have any more.

I think many people use social media, consciously or subconsciously, for gratification. We like checking our Twitter and Instagram feeds for notifications - a like here, a comment there - because it feels good. I'll admit that for those reasons, and because I generally like the communities better, I've kept Twitter and Instagram.

On another level, I want to challenge myself as a writer and content creator. I like writing on this blog and I like tweeting and I like taking photos. By removing myself from Facebook, which is really just a reaction-based network, I can challenge myself to be a bit more true to me and what my "personal brand" is.

God. I sound like I work in advertising more and more each day.

The Workout Routine

I had a brief dalliance with fitness this summer.

As with many people, I’m still trying to find a routine that works for me. About a month ago, I started a new job that took up most of my time, meaning that I lost an hour or so in the evenings. I also had a pretty terrible cough around then, so it discouraged me from doing anything physical without wanting to line my esophagus in something soothing. Like an anesthetic.

I hate dropping off on any sort of progress. Unfortunately, this is a bit of a habit for me. My parents call me a Jack of All Trades, meaning that if you can think of some hobby, I’ve probably tried it. Or am itching to, at least.

So when May happened, and I returned home from Kingston with both a minor beer gut and a perpetually foul mood, I decided to do something about it. Having avoided the gym through my five years at Queen’s, and after observing how lifting could alter others’  physiques, I thought I’d give it a shot, especially now that I was home twiddling my thumbs from the hours of 5 pm to midnight.

This was when I’d do some standard weight and strength training, often to an episode of Friday Night Lights (Coach’s inspirational yelling and the Explosions In The Sky-inspired soundtrack are, unsurprisingly, pretty motivational). It was a good time. I started to develop the beginning of abs and I could see my butt becoming a bit perkier. That was nice.

But, as with most things, I became bored. It was prime summertime at this point. All along the road by my house, I could see runners with their dogs or their iPods, pounding away at pavement. Some of them were so fast.

I decided that running was something I could do – throwing on a sports bra, shorts and running shoes is simple enough. I didn’t really like running through the park with my fellow suburbanites and judge-y teenagers, so I took to the Humber Trail.

I really did love it. It was a decently-challenging running trail, with hills and mixed terrain (hate concrete, love dirt paths) and the occasional deer spotting. It was also nice to see other runners and cyclists in the evenings who, like me, had probably just returned from their evening commute. 

I’ve grown up near that place for most of my life, but this was the first summer that I really got to know it - fireflies, red wing blackbirds and all. I have running and my semi-regular trail walks to thank for that.

Life has a tendency to get busy though, which leaves you pretty unmotivated to exert energy on anything other than work or your social life. I want to prioritize fitness again. I’ve been getting out to hike, but it’s not giving me the same returns as running or strength training.

Last night, with my pyjamas (sweatpants and a ratty tank) on about to get into bed, I did 30 or so crunches and an embarrassingly small number of push ups. It’s small, but it’s a start. I’m feeling a tiny bit better already.

(The above video, “The Runners”, is by two filmmakers who asked London runners intimate questions during their regular route. It’s a pleasant watch.)