Bless You!

So, yesterday was Earth Day, and what have you been doing? Vancouver was elected the greenest city in North America, not speaking about the amount of nature, but the effort of people doing their part to be “green”! Yes, it is indeed a huge planet and we cannot change the world all at once, but if every one of us do a little then a lot can be done!

From turning off the TV when you’re out of the room to taking a walk instead of the car, you are already doing something to save the planet for the next generations to come, I confess sometimes commodity keeps me from doing all I can, but I do, indeed, try to do a bit everyday to conserve all this beauty that I love so much!

We did have a bit of a reminder, couple weeks ago, when a “sneeze from God” as the newspapers here were referring to got all the European flights grounded and the economy shaken, events like that come to show us how fragile and small we are before this massive planet we live in.

The perfect day for me is to walk on the green grass barefoot staring at the oceans and mountains, to lay down and breath the fresh clean air, and I don’t ever want to take this all for granted, and I do want my children, grandchildren and on… to have the same green days I have right now… so with that in mind… Happy Earth Day! It’s everyone’s home.

Greenest City!
http://vancouver.ca/greenestcity/cityservices.htm

Show us your Backyard!

Getting too much fresh spring air can set your brain off to wonderland, and although I did not meet Hatter, much to my disappointment, I did find inspiration.

It doesn’t matter what inspires you, as long as you do something about it… so my partner in crime Marina and I decided to start a project. Because we are not naïve enough to think we can indeed change the whole world, we decided we’d change our world, and whoever’s world this all rubs in to.

http://startinyourbackyard.blogspot.com/

“Start in your Backyard” has its motive to change the world indeed, starting from wherever you are on the planet, no matter what country, city, if you are with friends or alone, it just take a bit of will to take the first step.

Our project has its action and purpose, we will go around Vancouver’s beaches, parks, trails, mountains, cleaning up any garbage someone could have left behind and we will also and most importantly spread the message of love for nature, for your city, for your backyard…

We do truly hope that the people we meet along the way can be touched in any way by our message, even if it brings them only a smile it was worth the cause!

There's this side of me...

Laying on the greenest grass at Kits beach this evening, with the sun shining down on me and letting all the noise around me fade I couldn’t help but breathe in and out the life inside and around me. It’s so good to be alive!

See, couple months ago, most precisely when I came back to Canada after visiting my family back home I entered a weird mode of transition in my life, a thing that have been inside of me since always but that would only sometimes come to surface, started to boil and brainstorm my mind when the airplane left the Sao Paulo ground.
Don’t ask me what trigged it, I wouldn’t be able to tell you and I stopped trying to find out. It doesn’t matter what thread it hangs on go to, but how I would roll it back in. The mortality fact in life caught up with me, and I have no flipping clue why. Maybe it was the fact that I live far away from my family, it is what it is I guess. It caught up with my mind, not with me, per say, I am very much alive thank you.

This fear of not being able to control time and hang on forever to people around me give me a sensation in my belly like someone is pressing really hard on it and I can’t get off…my throat closes up and I cannot take any deep breathes anymore. Panic mode on.
But then, you open your eyes, look around you…breathe…and realize it has always been like that in all the history of humanity, that life is a circle and it will always be, you only have one life (that’s what I believe) and you have to try and live it as much as you can. Now I also believe that there’s more to it after this Earthly life. But that’s nor here or there…and I won’t get all after-life in here today, but that my friends, is the power that got me over all this nonsense I was feeling.

I, then, stopped trying to understand wonders and powers that are greater than me. And just had to learn to trust, again, in the One that I have as my guidance and protector. I don’t know if you do, or do not believe in a greater power, but we do indeed need to live our lives to the fullest, every single day, spending our time with people that really matter.

And anyway, I wasn’t even going to write any of that, but the laying down on the grass today made my writing cells wake up. I would like to add here, that there is a side of me, a big-pounding-heart-fan side of me, that few know…and because it is only a part of me and not my whole self I decided to share on a blog, the journey of being a fan. And I come here, to share with you my readers from around the globe, a bit of my sidekick and most well paid therapy in the world…

http://mysweetjovilife.blogspot.com/

The more you live...

The more you want to. Spending my mornings talking and seeing the world through the tired and beautiful blue eyes of a ninety-seven years old has made my days. It seems like every sentence spoken is out of a book and the wisdom is hidden between the lines. “So is everything that is worth” was the first thing she said to me while talking about how life can be hard and funny that way. It’s something completely different than anything I have ever experienced. I’ve never been around such a sweet, alive and smart old lady in my life, I think I am in love with her and all she has to tell me.

Life is funny that way, as she says all the time, you end up going through things you never thought you would have to, you wait and worry about things that then will resolve themselves, you fight and cry but then you lay your head and see everything was worth the climb. You will wake up to days that all you want to do is close your eyes but still you know you love to live. The use of the word “funny” as oppose to “bad, weird, unfortunate, hard” awe me a bit, I believe that looking back on her life now, the good times stuck more than the bad ones and she has learned how to deal with them. I hope I do as well. I believe I am doing a pretty good job so far, except some self-hysterical-inside-my-mind episodes of WHAT AM I DOING IN MY LIFE, yeah so far so good.

The hardest part of having a long life like she did is to see people around you go; it really pretty much depends on what you believe in life and whether you think you will then see them all again, but still it is so damn hard. Once someone asked me what my biggest fear was, and after giving it a thought too many I came to the conclusion that I have no fears, I only dread the day I will have to face people around me going. And just the thought of it makes my stomach hurl. I guess I rather go than let them go, but eh it is not up to me and I will just trust completely.

I don’t know why exactly I am writing those words today, it’s been a very cold and dump April so far, life has been taking good turns, so good I am afraid to look at it and scare it away. It seems that Easter has brought new life indeed, including to my life. Things are back on track and I am following it, except today at 7am in the morning when I let myself, once again, get a bit crazy, but as Helen my new old friend says… “Life is too short, when you wake up one day you are ninety-seven so live it”. Couldn’t have followed her advice any better today. Not worried about it!

Oh, and here are some pictures of the Vancouver Olympic Village as promised ;)

John Mayer, Vancouver April 1st 2010

Why Georgia

I am driving up 85 in the
kind of morning that lasts all afternoon
just stuck inside the gloom

Four more exits to my apartment but
I am tempted to keep the car in drive
and leave it all behind

Cause I wonder sometimes
about the outcome
of a still verdictless life

Am I living it right?
Am I living it right?
Am I living it right?
Why, why Georgia, why?

I rent a room and I fill the spaces with
wood in places to make it feel like home
but all I feel's alone
It might be a quarter life crisis
or just the stirring in my soul

Either way, I wonder sometimes
about the outcome
of a still verdictless life

Am I living it right?
Am I living it right?
Am I living it right?
Why, why Georgia, why?

So what, so I've got a smile on me
but it's hiding the quiet superstitions in my head
Don't believe me
Don't believe me
When I say I've got it down

Everybody is just a stranger but
that's the danger in going my own way
I guess it's the price I have to pay
still "Everything happens for a reason"
is no reason not to ask myself

If your're living it right
Are you living it right?
Are you living it right?
Why, tell me why
Why, why Georgia why?