The Great Escape

Love, Chris

I haven't listened to Sarah McLachlan in about 10 years but I did own a copy of Mirrorball at one time.  Admitting such things publicly usually results in having your man card revoked but I would argue that real men don't need a card to prove their manhood and implying that listening one of the forces behind Lilith Fair is not a guy thing to do is just genderist... but that's probably a post for another day... Anyway, since KB died I don't think that I've really had the opportunity to grieve.  There were funeral arrangements and paperwork for the federal government, paperwork for insurance people, paperwork for KB's work benefits, banking appointments, endless phone calls, organ transplant discussions, the list goes on and on and on.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining even though the tone of the words that spew out when I tell people sound very much like complaining.  The truth is, I'm happy to do whatever I have to to make sure our ki...

The past 2 weeks (almost 20 days) has been a bit of a blur.  I wasn't sure if I would share this but the more I thought about it, the more I felt that it was important to share yet one more thing that I learned from my beautiful wife.  This is very personal to me and having had time to reflect on my life with KB and this letter, it is a very precious gift and I hope that those of you who read this can understand why.  KB had recently started to do some exercises that were meant to help stimulate creativity.  She wanted to really focus on developing her writing skills as it was something that she wanted to spend more time doing when we made the move out to BC.  One of her exercises was an unblocking exercise.  I'm not exactly sure what the unblocking exercise was all about but the Monday after KB passed away, I checked my mail and there was Christmas card addressed to me from someone right here in my own town.  I thought that was odd becau...

My beautiful wife, K.B., died ten days ago.  I would love to write something eloquent and beautiful but I'm afraid that I'm not quite there at this moment.  I just know that that I need to say something.  I want to express my grief, my anger and intense sadness but every time I try the concoctions of words and phrases that come out fall far short of capturing my feelings. I have decided to post my eulogy to K.B. (with some editing to protect names and the privacy of others): I met K.B. for the first time just a little more than two years ago when our good friends had invited us both out to supper.  I could tell you the story about falling in love with K.B. and I certainly will tell the story to anyone who wants to hear because it’s one of my favourites.  But today I want to tell you about the woman I fell in love with and will miss terribly for the rest of my life. K.B. didn’t see herself the same way I see her.   To me she was strong and...

The title of this post suggests that this is going to be very deep.  Yeah, that's probably true.  In October 2013 I spent the last 7 days learning a number of different disciplines from Grandmaster Nick Gracenin.  For those of you living in Washington DC, I hope you realize how lucky you are to have a martial artist of Master Nick's ability living in your city and actively teaching.  I have learned such an incredible amount from Master Nick that I really need to take some time and reflect and absorb all of it but I feel that I have to share this one tidbit with the folks who might read my blog because it does relate to how we live our lives not just martial arts and not surprisingly has a lot to do with the overall theme of this blog. There is a concept of harmonies in Tai Chi.  There are external harmonies which refer to the kinetic harmonies within our bodies that we need to understand.  The internal harmonies refer to the part of ourselves that we can'...

I'm sure most of you have seen this image floating around facebook and I'm sure you have an opinion.  If you don't that's probably a good thing because maybe it means that you are happy with who you are and have found fulfilment in your life. I get what Maria Kang is trying to do.  She's trying to shock and motivate people by stepping just a bit beyond the typical "Here's what Body for Life did for me" testimonial. The problem is that she comes across like that friend of yours who joined the gym and started shopping at an organic food store and is now telling you all these facts about working out and diet and fitness and you think to yourself, "Could I just get one solid throat punch in and make this person shut up for 10 minutes?" Well, believe it or not, I was that person at one point in my life.  I'm sure I drove my friend nuts with all my blathering on about diet and fitness and working out.  This was probably about 10 years ag...

My lovely and talented wife was honoured yesterday with a long service award.  She has been working in the public service for 25 years and was recognized for her work and dedication.  As we were talking about the award she commented that she wishes she had done more and I can understand that feeling because I've felt the same way.  Although I've never dedicated even more than 5 years of my life to one organization, I can understand the feeling that you could have done more in your career but I don't know if any of us are aware of how much we have really accomplished. My wife is an amazing person.  She is truly the kindest person you will ever meet and that is no exaggeration.  If you asked any person who knows her what they think of when they hear her name I bet the top three would be: Kind, Smiles a lot and Quirky.  These are all qualities that I absolutely love about her.  Anyway, knowing the type of person that she is I know that when she does her...