Krystal got us tickets to Corteo - Cirque du Soleil as a gift for being in her wedding... It was INCREDIBLE!! The acrobats were amazing, but my favourite had to be the tightrope walker - she was concentrating so intently and barely faltered as she walked, unicycled and hoola-hooped across a tightened wire metres in the air... I think most of the artists were Romi - so dark and mysteriously beautiful - besides being listed as from Belarus, Romania, Bulgaria, etc... I was reminded of the days when I was young and always wanted to run off and join them in the circus - back in the days before "Cirque du Soleil" became a thing of intrigue and wonder for the uppity upper class of society - back in the days when the circus was complete with freaks, rejects and losers... when I was young, that was a world where I could understand and be understood, fit in and freely accept those around me for who they were and what God made them to be... it was very cool to see that in Cirque they have that same community feeling - and yet without the stigma of 'outcast' labels associated with their existence - they are truly beautiful, weird and wonderful, different and desirable... (except for maybe that one guy who can fling his leg over his head, stand on one hand, swing the other leg over his head, sit down like that and then juggle - that was just wrong)...
The story was a morbid comedy of acrobatics and sideshows and clowns attending Corteo's funeral. Corteo had been an Italian Clown at the circus - and he was very much in denial of his own death throughout the presentation. But he finally came to grips with this - the end of his life's journey - and made an exubberant exit into the sky. The music was magical; a melee of cultural instruments blended with sultry, strong and stinging vocals, a gipsy flamenco, a haunting celtic tune, a passionate latin ballad, a stern funeral march...
You have to see it... to hear it... to fear for the man on the free-standing ladder... to gasp with the dares of the señorita on the tightrope... to experience escaping to the wonderment of childhood before you realise... it's almost as good as joining the circus, yourself...
On our way out there was some guy (ooh too cool for himself) who was like: "yeah, it was okay, I guess, but I was kind of bored" and I felt like ripping his shirt off and saying, "oh yeah, tough guy? show us your muscles - let's see you do a spring-free double flip or stand on another guy's head while juggling ten rings!" - anyways, it wasn't worth it, the guy was trying to impress whomever he was with - personally, I hope she dumps him... ;)
Check out the website - www.cirquedusoleil.com - and if you get a chance to see any of their performances, take it! It is by far the best show I have ever been to...
Thanks, Krink!
Shannon xx
13.8.05
9.8.05
...journeying together...
The following is a post from Tom's Journey - a blog I have recently stumbled across - thanks to Jessica (yes, that is the same 'amazing Jessica' with whom I work...) and it is cool because Tom is currently in Thailand (where I'm hoping to head in just a short year) and I can follow his journey, relate to some of the cultural struggles he's encountering now and use his experiences as a learning and preparation tool before I head out. I like the questions he raises in the short blog below...
thats not enough!?!...and so I was thinking about this in relation to my own life when I discovered that this is exactly how I desire to live: Fully for Christ in all areas without regard for myself, trusting that he will provide every need when I live in obedience to him - and even when it looks like I'm not 'being provided for' to take a step back and honestly assess the situation (usually that helps put things into perspective) ... so what's holding me back...? It may be how I 'really' want to live, but let me tell you, I have a long way to go before this is remotely true...
What do we mean when we tell God "All I need is you"? Do you we really mean..."God I need you and some money and then I'm prepared to go wherever you take me"or "I can do anything with you - and qualifications"or what about "I can go anywhere and speak your truth, just give me better public speaking skills first" ...how many times have we told God "I will follow you Lord, just let me do this first" (let me go bury my father) ...we always find some excuse ...But being reliant on God nullifies our excuses for being inadequate for the job. We will always be inadequate unless we rely soley on the One who is so much more than adequate!" I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me"Phil 4:13 ...God all I need is you...
In the Midst of the Journey,
Shannon xx
7.8.05
Church on the Porch Steps...
I started out this morning in a cushie pew listening to music I didn't 'love' and trying to control the 'ants in my pants' feeling that had been creeping all over me all morning. Finally, I just got up and left the building with a quick, "I'll be back," whispered to my parents.
I drove up the highway to the ridge of the city where subdivision meets corn fields and pulled into the parking lot of my old high school. This is where my French teacher lives. She's been on my mind for the last few weeks and every time I think I might drive up to see her I somehow talk myself out of it with some excuse that she'll be busy or sick of guests. Never really any good excuses, though. Today the feeling was so strong that I could not ignore the pull.
I've realised something (for the 'againth' time) - you should never never ever push those thoughts and feelings out of your mind and make excuses. Always listen to the little voice in your head. Always live with the ability to obey the seemingly spontaneous whims. They come for good reasons...
I rang the doorbell and her 10 year old answered the door. When I asked if she was in I followed his gaze over my left shoulder, across the field to the porch steps of the high school.
She had noticed me, risen from her spot on the steps and was making her way barefoot across the field. The wind brushed her green dress in carefree strokes that flowed into the wildly neglected grass. She walked slowly, a broad smile appearing over her teeth when she recognised me and she called out, offered me a cup of green tea, a bite to eat, to step indoors... But I had only come for the peace and presence...
I didn't want her to get up - to bother herself with anything for my sake - she asked me to join her on the porch steps, to sit in the warm breeze and gaze out over the yet untouched sunsoaked farmlands in shades of green. There we sat for a while, shared thoughts and blessings, truthed about frustrations and joys, took advice, laughed a little, reminded each other about stories and poets of scripture, silenced to the gentle tune of the wind and trees...
This is potentially the best church service I have attended in quite some time. It was honest. It was painful yet somehow healing. It was to the music of nature, to the words of scripture, in the fellowship of the real...
I don't know how to say thank you to a French teacher, who in her weakness and imperfection and illness has welcomed me into her life for moments of sharing that have done far more for me over the last few years than lessons in any classroom...
As I left, she told me that if I ever feel the urge to come and visit her to always listen to that urge and obey. I think I will...
I spent the rest of the afternoon among my fellow youth leaders. Inside I felt renewed, repowered, strengthened and whole. My prayer is that my sentiments washed over into the lives of these colleagues as they also struggle through life and press on in what is right.
I did not arrive back home until after 10pm but my parents didn't seem concerned - they understand that when I say, "I'll be back," that this promise is not confined to any time limit...
Shannon
I drove up the highway to the ridge of the city where subdivision meets corn fields and pulled into the parking lot of my old high school. This is where my French teacher lives. She's been on my mind for the last few weeks and every time I think I might drive up to see her I somehow talk myself out of it with some excuse that she'll be busy or sick of guests. Never really any good excuses, though. Today the feeling was so strong that I could not ignore the pull.
I've realised something (for the 'againth' time) - you should never never ever push those thoughts and feelings out of your mind and make excuses. Always listen to the little voice in your head. Always live with the ability to obey the seemingly spontaneous whims. They come for good reasons...
I rang the doorbell and her 10 year old answered the door. When I asked if she was in I followed his gaze over my left shoulder, across the field to the porch steps of the high school.
She had noticed me, risen from her spot on the steps and was making her way barefoot across the field. The wind brushed her green dress in carefree strokes that flowed into the wildly neglected grass. She walked slowly, a broad smile appearing over her teeth when she recognised me and she called out, offered me a cup of green tea, a bite to eat, to step indoors... But I had only come for the peace and presence...
I didn't want her to get up - to bother herself with anything for my sake - she asked me to join her on the porch steps, to sit in the warm breeze and gaze out over the yet untouched sunsoaked farmlands in shades of green. There we sat for a while, shared thoughts and blessings, truthed about frustrations and joys, took advice, laughed a little, reminded each other about stories and poets of scripture, silenced to the gentle tune of the wind and trees...
This is potentially the best church service I have attended in quite some time. It was honest. It was painful yet somehow healing. It was to the music of nature, to the words of scripture, in the fellowship of the real...
I don't know how to say thank you to a French teacher, who in her weakness and imperfection and illness has welcomed me into her life for moments of sharing that have done far more for me over the last few years than lessons in any classroom...
As I left, she told me that if I ever feel the urge to come and visit her to always listen to that urge and obey. I think I will...
I spent the rest of the afternoon among my fellow youth leaders. Inside I felt renewed, repowered, strengthened and whole. My prayer is that my sentiments washed over into the lives of these colleagues as they also struggle through life and press on in what is right.
I did not arrive back home until after 10pm but my parents didn't seem concerned - they understand that when I say, "I'll be back," that this promise is not confined to any time limit...
Shannon
2.8.05
Waterlogged Waterskiing
I was getting around to posting this blog when all that craziness happened before heading home (see last entry) ...so where was I...? Oh, yes, the weekend - the LONG weekend - in Ontario...
I was invited up to 'the cottage' on Shadow Lake just near Norland, Ontario for the weekend. It was perfect timing for me - even though I didn't realise how perfect the timing was... See, this is the week that my Granda died last year (actually, it was one year ago today) - some of my other family spent part of the weekend at the graveside. It is also my first weekend without my sister around. I know, she's been away other times, but this is different; she's in Hawaii on her honeymoon. Just the thought of that is crazy. I hope she's having a fantastic time and taking lots of pictures! But I missed her, among other things - so even when I didn't know it was going to be hard, it was a bit of a difficult weekend.
During these emotional times, where better to be than at the cottage with the Roberts family? The whole clan was there (including all the dogs: Jake, the 130lb. Alaskan Malimut who thinks he's a lap-dog, Ridley, the 65lb. Golden Doodle who insists he's a lap-dog and Harry, the 4lb. Yorkie Poo who actually is a lap/crux-of-your-arm/palm-of-your-hand -dog...)
We had lots of relaxing time, got properly sunburnt, waterskiied, spent too much time in the water, got waterlogged, spent too much time in the sun, watched National Treasure, caught a bunch of fish and threw them all back, ate like crazy cos the food was so good, waterskiied some more, got downright pooped out and finally made it home last night around 9:30pm. It was a fantastic weekend!
Oh, and I did some work too. Hard to believe, I know, but I did. Then I went and left my power cord up there and ended up working from the Server computer today. Oops. It's a nice break from the norm, though - not having my laptop. I'm sitting under a sky-light rather than in my darkened dungeon of an office, I have a 20 inch screen that surrounds me rather than the 15 inch that sucks me in, and the company is different - as in, I'm actually out in the open here with about seven people to mingle with rather than tucked away with just two people (but the two people are great people, don't get me wrong...) ...Good times.
Wish I had a photo of my slalom skiing expeditions. One of these days I'll get one - for now just imagine it - I feel it, that's for sure (left hamstring, right quad, biceps, forearms, shoulders and neck... oooh...)
Tomorrow is our Chinatown day...
For now, into the smokey outdoors I go...
Shannon xx
I was invited up to 'the cottage' on Shadow Lake just near Norland, Ontario for the weekend. It was perfect timing for me - even though I didn't realise how perfect the timing was... See, this is the week that my Granda died last year (actually, it was one year ago today) - some of my other family spent part of the weekend at the graveside. It is also my first weekend without my sister around. I know, she's been away other times, but this is different; she's in Hawaii on her honeymoon. Just the thought of that is crazy. I hope she's having a fantastic time and taking lots of pictures! But I missed her, among other things - so even when I didn't know it was going to be hard, it was a bit of a difficult weekend.
During these emotional times, where better to be than at the cottage with the Roberts family? The whole clan was there (including all the dogs: Jake, the 130lb. Alaskan Malimut who thinks he's a lap-dog, Ridley, the 65lb. Golden Doodle who insists he's a lap-dog and Harry, the 4lb. Yorkie Poo who actually is a lap/crux-of-your-arm/palm-of-your-hand -dog...)
We had lots of relaxing time, got properly sunburnt, waterskiied, spent too much time in the water, got waterlogged, spent too much time in the sun, watched National Treasure, caught a bunch of fish and threw them all back, ate like crazy cos the food was so good, waterskiied some more, got downright pooped out and finally made it home last night around 9:30pm. It was a fantastic weekend!
Oh, and I did some work too. Hard to believe, I know, but I did. Then I went and left my power cord up there and ended up working from the Server computer today. Oops. It's a nice break from the norm, though - not having my laptop. I'm sitting under a sky-light rather than in my darkened dungeon of an office, I have a 20 inch screen that surrounds me rather than the 15 inch that sucks me in, and the company is different - as in, I'm actually out in the open here with about seven people to mingle with rather than tucked away with just two people (but the two people are great people, don't get me wrong...) ...Good times.
Wish I had a photo of my slalom skiing expeditions. One of these days I'll get one - for now just imagine it - I feel it, that's for sure (left hamstring, right quad, biceps, forearms, shoulders and neck... oooh...)
Tomorrow is our Chinatown day...
For now, into the smokey outdoors I go...
Shannon xx
More Thunder - or was that an explosion...?
It's been a crazy day of thunder, lightning and pouring rain here in the t-dot. We've lost power twice in our office and my computer shut down both times (thankfully didn't zap me) but we plug away. Around 4pm I heard an amazing boom of thunder - but moments later, we were receiving reports that perhaps that boom wasn't thunder...
This is what happened just as I was contemplating leaving the office:
I work near the airport - just a few kilometres to the right of where this photo was taken. You can't see it from this photo, but the highway I take to get home is just in front of the nose of the plane. Passengers were escaping and finding themselves wandering out onto our major highway (401) during rush hour! They quickly solved that problem and closed down the 401 getting as many people off the road as possible and getting emergency crews to the scene at all angles.
At this hour (6:15pm) they say that all of the 309 passengers are okay and off the plane with only 14 minor injuries to be reported. As to what happened, there are several speculations; skidding on wet runway, a strike of lightning to the tail and over-shooting the end of the runway - but nothing is yet confirmed. That poor pilot...
It was an Air France 737 Flight 358 coming directly from Charles de Gaulle, Paris. Thankfully, we're a bilingual nation and will have French-speakers on hand to help out (despite cultural/dialectic differences, we might be able to work it out during this traumatic experience). Peel Memorial hospital is going to be packed out tonight - apparently, they are already on code orange...
I'm thinking about heading home on the back roads in a little while. I just had a dander out in front of the office and the black smoke is beginning to clear a bit. It's floating (somewhat being smothered by the persistent rain) over our office and to the East... where the wind is blowing the smoke to the right in this photo - my office is somewhere under that big smokey patch:
What a mess... Merci à Dieu que cet accident n’étais pas plus tragique pour les passagers…
Well, this brings to mind a few things. Pray for the people of France and while you're at it, visit Jer & Shaelagh's place to learn about how they are setting up in France for the cause... parce qu'un piece de mon coeur reste là...
Á bientôt!
Shannon xx
This is what happened just as I was contemplating leaving the office:
I work near the airport - just a few kilometres to the right of where this photo was taken. You can't see it from this photo, but the highway I take to get home is just in front of the nose of the plane. Passengers were escaping and finding themselves wandering out onto our major highway (401) during rush hour! They quickly solved that problem and closed down the 401 getting as many people off the road as possible and getting emergency crews to the scene at all angles.
At this hour (6:15pm) they say that all of the 309 passengers are okay and off the plane with only 14 minor injuries to be reported. As to what happened, there are several speculations; skidding on wet runway, a strike of lightning to the tail and over-shooting the end of the runway - but nothing is yet confirmed. That poor pilot...
It was an Air France 737 Flight 358 coming directly from Charles de Gaulle, Paris. Thankfully, we're a bilingual nation and will have French-speakers on hand to help out (despite cultural/dialectic differences, we might be able to work it out during this traumatic experience). Peel Memorial hospital is going to be packed out tonight - apparently, they are already on code orange...
I'm thinking about heading home on the back roads in a little while. I just had a dander out in front of the office and the black smoke is beginning to clear a bit. It's floating (somewhat being smothered by the persistent rain) over our office and to the East... where the wind is blowing the smoke to the right in this photo - my office is somewhere under that big smokey patch:
What a mess... Merci à Dieu que cet accident n’étais pas plus tragique pour les passagers…
Well, this brings to mind a few things. Pray for the people of France and while you're at it, visit Jer & Shaelagh's place to learn about how they are setting up in France for the cause... parce qu'un piece de mon coeur reste là...
Á bientôt!
Shannon xx
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