Post Morbus

I asked Mr. Tucker to buy me this for Winter Solstice & he did!

It’s hard to not think of spring and fall as seasons of transition. Spring still has elements of the winter such as the odd day of snow and fall still has days where the sun is out and it is warm and clear. Summer and winter tend to be more delineated – at least where I live – where winters are snow, darkness and blowing wind & summers are all humidity, long days, and blazing sun. We generally tend to follow the seasons here and mark each one as it transits through the year. I highly recommend books like Mrs. Sharpe’s Traditions for those of you who enjoy Victorian Americana celebrations that fall on the more Christian side of things. It’s full of crafts, poetry and information about the holidays and seasons. I read Winters in the World this year about the seasons in Anglo-Saxon England and it was also a lovely, enlightening read.

After a year of having a broken foot and two surgeries I am eager to get out and about and enjoy the fresh air. Mr. Tucker has fixed up my trike (#bless marrying a man who used to be a bike courier) and we have been going out on walks around the neighbourhood. I hate how much I miss going outside when I am forced to stay inside. Winter is an absolutely tragic season for me because when you have mobility issues it can mean getting stuck inside when it is really icy out. I actually enjoy winter and grew up in the 80s where your parents forced you outside no matter what the temperature was & I also clocked many years skiing. I am seriously thinking of investigating accessible skiing options but I am afraid that like most things for disabled people, it will be cripplingly* expensive.

But it’s spring now! As is our monthly habit, we have done a craft and games night, and because it was March, it was Easter-themed. It was, as usual, amazing. We emailed our orders into Holly’s Hot Chicken (which is great if you need a gluten-free option and/or just like delicious food!) which our friends picked up on their way over, we did some fun Easter crafts & egg decorating and then we played Telestrations. It’s sad to think that in a few short months the eldest two kids in our group are off to university! Until then, we will try and squeeze in as many games nights and pool parties as possible.

Other than that it has been just watching PWHL games, the Women’s World Hockey & I even got sucked into March Madness, rather unexpectedly when it came on right after a WWH game! I got suckered into buying a subscription to The Sports Network to watch the WWH and so I figured, why not? Well OF COURSE I was hooked and watched the final on Sunday (like almost 19m other people). It was just so fascinating! I don’t know if that means I will end up loving the WNBA but I did enjoy it!

I have such a love/hate relationship with sports, namely, hockey. I grew up loving hockey and watching it. Like many other Canadian families, my brother played it and I went to a few of his games as well. In University I lived in an apartment on top of a pub and my friends & I would regularly win tickets to hockey games as prizes on Trivia Nights. When you are a poor student you enjoy any free entertainment that comes your way! But over the years, my love for the NHL lessened. Size-wise, it is an absolute BEAST with 82 games per season for each of the 32 teams – not including the Stanley Cup. But on top of that, the last game we attended we saw them switch out the ads along the boards on the commercial breaks. That was just wild to me. I had grown up with stories of my uncle remembering when tickets were cheap and you could bring a boxed lunch into Maple Leaf gardens. Don’t get me wrong – I grasp the enormity of putting together a pro sports league it is just a shame when the cheap seats for an NHL game (standing room only) are $50 in the nosebleeds. That is just out of range for many families.

Watching the PWHL play, fill arenas and get more sponsorships is a bit of a bittersweet experience: I want this league to succeed so badly, I want them to get advertising dollars! But it also weirds me out to see a paper towel company sponsor a power play. It’s conflicting to simultaneously want them to succeed but hate the price it will take to make it work. I am not an idiot – we live in a capitalistic society, for better or for worse – and the league can’t run just on Mark Walter’s big bucks alone, in perpetuity**. That said, we’re renewing our tickets for next year.

WELP. The condo still hasn’t sold. Lots of great feedback from the viewings but it’s been up for 2 months. I know that it’s been an average of 90 days for sales of condos lately and I am sure everyone is waiting for the Bank of Canada’s rate cuts*** but I am still impatient. It feels like the path forward for us is riding on this one deadweight to be out of our hands. I’m crossing my fingers that I have a better update soon!

Meanwhile, Mr. Tucker are working on a plan for our lives while we wait for the condo to sell. There is no point sitting around wallowing about things not going according to plan when there is so much living to do. Since spring is here and April is a wee break in-between our children’s birthdays I have asked them to not make a ton of weekend plans so that we can sort some things around the house.

Mt Tucker and I are planning some outdoor chores this month but spring is also a good time to tackle things like going through all of the rooms of your house and making a master plan on what to fix, clean, organize and decorate. We also want to plot out our garden bunkies to take advantage of what may be a very hot, dry summer. The plan is to stay home and have myriad pool parties and friend drop-in days!

We also did manage to catch the solar eclipse yesterday! It was 99% totality here which had to be good enough because we didn’t want to drive an hour south. The kids had the day off so they cleaned the house and watched the eclipse. It was a good day!

*I didn’t intend that pun but I am leaving it because it fits nicely
**I mean, he probably COULD afford it but every parent wants their child to leave the nest
***Kept at at 5% at the announcement this morning. Whomp whomp.