Reminiscence

Back when I was a kid, prior to my family's move to Canada, we lived in my birth country, Romania. Growing up, every so often, we would go to get-togethers where families and friends would gather for a night of barbecuing, heavy drinking, and catching up on their lives. Us, the kids, would generally hang with each other while occasionally annoying our parents with whatever concern we may have had.

My mom has always been a social smoker. She never really smoked outside of having someone to smoke with and when she did, it would generally be in these social settings, at a gathering of some sort. She enjoyed having a cigarette with her drink and dose of gossip, as most European women do. I never really minded it because she never smoked outside of these social gatherings. In that sense, I guess I always have associated smoking cigarettes with social gatherings.

This past Saturday, I was hanging out with friends and one of them had a little venting to do and asked to go outside on the balcony to smoke and vent. We each lit up a smoke and began listening to our friend's frustrations. With each drag I was inhaling, a reminiscent feeling was forcing its way into my mind and I couldn't shake or process through it. Even after the venting session had ended and the advice was exchanged, I felt as if something was pressing on my chest. Hours later, once home and in bed, I thought about my mom and how she used to do that exact thing where she would go outside on the balcony with a friend and a smoke and pour her heart out for the duration of that flame burning through the nicotine.

I suddenly was sitting on the other side of things, no longer a child just watching her mom take a drag of her smoke, but rather the adult woman having a cigarette of her own in a social setting, with a coffee in hand. It was a weird sort of coming of age moment, even though I don't actually smoke, it was more so that the setting was just perfect for it. Did I just romanticize smoking a cigarette with friends? Yeah maybe.

It truly is sort of endearing having these moments reminiscent of the things my parents once upon a time did and coming to the realization that I really am growing up and I no longer am the young girl with no care in the world. It was as if I was now watching myself be an adult and coming to the realization that one day, there will maybe be a mini me looking at me the way I looked at my mom.

I really don't know if this makes sense but I truly hope it does cause although it wasn't some groundbreaking moment, it was kind of special to me.

As always, thanks for coming to my Cez talk xo

"HOME FEELS"

I'm an emotional person which I don't mind because I've never really wanted to be closed off with what I feel. I'd rather feel what I need to feel and move on. But, there are times when I hate feeling. It can feel like something is eating away every fibre of your being and it almost hurts in a strange non-physical way. This type of hurt, hurts more than the physical I'd say. It truly takes over every part of you and puts you in a state of numbness so deep, that you are left with only the thought of hoping that there will still be light at the end of the tunnel. It consumes you so fully that you are left feeling empty at the end. Nothing else, just empty.

I feel that way sometimes when I finish a really good book. Since I generally mostly read contemporary romances, I tend to fully immerse myself in the story that I know will eventually break my heart because it's supposed to, because the book eventually ends.

I've been reading a lot lately and I'm not entirely sure if it's because I truly have been enjoying it, or if it's because I'm trying to escape the reality that is my own. The books are perfect cause they introduce me to a reality that is so different from my own and yet so familiar, I just sometimes wish I could be a fly on the wall and keep playing the story on even after the book ends.

I'm feeling a little homesick lately and I was telling a friend today that when him and another friend came to visit me for a weekend, it felt like they had brought home with them. I've always thought that the concept of "home" is fluid and it doesn't necessarily mean a place, but I had forgotten how at ease I can feel around people that are ...home. It's like a cozy and familiar feeling and you just want to hug everything.

I'm in my feels heavily tonight and I miss home. I miss my dog, my friends, the late night tims runs. I miss the walks at the river and the late nights in Leddy. I miss beers with the boys and 29 on a Saturday night. I miss getting ice cream and jamming out ,and jamaican rolls from niko sushi... I know some of you might not relate at all to any of what I said in this last paragraph but it weirdly all constitutes a feeling of home to me. A feeling of warmth.

It's kind of weird to think that although a lot of what home is, is really more so made up of moments and people, it's also made up of places since most of what I mentioned is in Windsor. It's weird that I feel like I have heavily outgrown Windsor and I can't see myself living there again maybe ever. The irony of it all is that my home-sickness is technically tied to Windsor because of those moments and people so even though I don't necessarily miss Windsor, I technically do by proxy. This is probably a huge mind fuck for you all but if you're still reading and don't think I've completely lost it, thank you LOL.

Maybe I'm just a little in my feels. Looking forward to going "home" next weekend and I think that's just what it is.

Non-negotiables

I've been wanting to get back into the gym lately. My problem with the gym is that I'm lazy and quite frankly, I just genuinely do not like to workout. Everyone says that if you implement it as part of your routine and go, it will eventually stick and it will eventually become enjoyable. I can tell you right now, in the many years I have gone on and off to the gym, I literally never enjoyed it. Even if I go with friends, I still don't like working out. I just don't. The thing with routine is that it gives you the option to stick to it and I most often don't.

Unfortunately, as many others my age, my metabolism is starting to get crappy and especially as a hormonal woman, I most often eat food that is not good for me. That's another thing, I hate eating healthy too. So, as you might deduce from this situation, shitty eating combined with a lack of activity just packs on the pounds. Hence the need to go to the gym.

I suck at routine unless something is a non-negotiable. Work is a non-negotiable, waking up and going to bed at a certain time are non-negotiable. Everything else, is stuff I do sort of as a part of a routine but I don't really beat myself up over it if I don't do it. I do skin care stuff often but not daily cause I'm lazy. I take my vitamins most days but if I feel like it. I vacuum my apartment weekly but on no particular day and sometimes not exactly weekly. They're still technically routine things but I don't follow them religiously.

Now the answer to this might become pretty obvious to you but I don't know why it wasn't obvious to me until recently. I guess when you really look at the root of the problem, you start thinking about things differently and can find a solution that perhaps was in front of you the whole time. It's a mental thing.

How about making the gym a non-negotiable? Hear me out.

The gym is dreadful to me as a routine item and it never stuck because I gave myself the choice not to go. But what if I didn't give myself the choice not to go and it was something that I programmed myself to think was just something I have to do? I go to work, come home and change, and then go to the gym. It's just something I have to do, that's just how my days go - a non-negotiable.

I'm not sure if this strategy works yet cause it's still in my testing period but I actually have been going to the gym because I don't give myself the option to be lazy. I tell myself that I can go for as little as half an hour, so long as I go. Once I'm there, I usually will stay for longer just because I'm already there and in the event that I really am not feeling it, I sit my ass in the sauna. Either way I do it, I go to the gym because it's a non-negotiable.

Keep in mind that this is just an example of a non-negotiable but this strategy (which I'm sure someone out there patented and copyrighted the shit out of already but on my blog we'll call it my idea) can really be applied to anything your heart desires.

I was talking to my friend the other day about how she often gives chances to dudes who most definitely do not deserve her and in part that's just cause she's a pure soul, looking for love and most often, these chances she gives leave her heartbroken. I told her that I stopped doing that once I made my list of non-negotiables in dating because I'd rather be alone and focus on me than to put myself through red flag after red flag after red flag. I know what I want and don't want to settle for less and my non-negotiables keep me accountable in the dating world. I'm just not dating in general because I don't have time to waste on people who are only half of what I ultimately desire.

Whether your non-negotiables are in dating, fitness, or whatever else, try to remain accountable to yourself as to what is important to you and where you need to set those boundaries. Only you know what you are deserving of and you should govern your life accordingly. Don't be afraid to put those non-negotiables in action.

As always, thanks for coming to my Cez talk. I am totally going to the gym today.

xo