Time to reminisce

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I’ve been at a cottage with friends I haven’t seen in a couple years… and a couple I hadn’t seen for a couple decades until the start of my holiday 3 weeks ago. As we tell stories of the past it is interesting what we remember and what we don’t. We’ve had some wonderful laughs at each other’s expense… but never to anyone’s hurt. It’s all in fun.

Embarrassing stories are not really embarrassing around good friends. This is really interesting to me, the way we can laugh with each other even when we are laughing at each other. A good bond removes the harm, with the intent being to hold onto the funny moments in life that make life worth living.

For most of these people it will be at least a year before I see them again, for others it will be more than two years. And when we get together again the space between our visits will disappear, and again the funny moments of the past will reappear to be shared again… and like this trip, sometime shared again for the very first time.

Cottage life

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When I moved to Ontario Canada from Barbados, I didn’t know about cottage culture. The idea of living in a city and having to drive for more than an hour and a half to arrive at a cottage on a lake was completely foreign. For me the beach was a 5 minute walk away, and I’d never sat in car for more than an hour to get anywhere. So being invited to a cottage was a totally new experience.

What I quickly learned was that part of cottage life was chores. There is always some way to contribute your labour to help out at a cottage. I’ve helped with launching boats, cleaning decks and deck furniture, digging drainage, moving equipment, felling a tree, clearing brush, moving rocks, and doing many other things required to keep and maintain a cottage.

These chores are a welcome expectation after being invited to a cottage… how can I help?

Last night I travelled to a friend’s cottage and this morning we removed the ladders from his dock. There are just two of us and my friend did most of the work, but more friends arrived and tomorrow we will pull out the floating deck for the winter.

Today, after a wonderful walk to a waterfall, we also drove to another friend’s cottage, helped him get his boat out of the water, and stored away all his deck furniture. Then we had a fabulous bbq dinner and spent the night having drinks by the fire with a few more friends who arrived later in the day.

Chores are not payment for the invite. They are not a job you feel obliged to do. They are something you eagerly offer and want to do because you understand that maintaining a cottage is hard work, and doing the work gifts you the feeling of contribution to a wonderful experience… and you get to share these experiences with the cottage owners and fellow guests. The chores are simply part of cottage life.

Feeling music

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I’ve had some pretty powerful experiences with music recently. I never learned to play an instrument, and I don’t have a good ear, so I don’t sing well. That said, I’ve started to feel really connected to some music that has not been in my usual repertoire recently.

My newest obsession, Anoushka Shankar. I keep finding performances of hers where she highlights other talents… and her sitar playing is exceptional on each performance.

This was the first song where I discovered her. This next set I found hypnotic. And here are another 2 song that I can’t get enough of now.

One of the things I enjoy beyond the exceptional music itself is that I can feel the connection she has with the other talented musicians. In a way, she makes me understand the joy of being a musician who is connected to other musicians through the music. That’s a feeling I never really understood as a person who doesn’t play music myself… And that’s a very new experience for me.

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(One more, I can’t get enough of her right now!)

Giving myself a break

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I haven’t worked out in a week. Yes, I’m on holidays. Yes, I give myself some slack on holidays and don’t expect to work out as often as I usually do… but I haven’t missed 3 days in a row in years and years, and so this is very unusual for me.

That said, I’m not going to beat myself up about taking this break. I’ll get a couple workouts in over the next week, and I’ll be back on track next week when I’m home. I think a lot about habits, I like maintaining streaks, and I am usually really hard on myself when I miss two days, much less a full seven.

So what’s different now? I think it’s knowing that this break won’t change what I do going forward. I have the confidence that not only will I get back to my routine, I also won’t make this a habit on holidays either. This has been an anomaly, not a new pattern. Knowing this allows me to be kinder to myself than I normally am. I’d say that has to be one of the first real benefits of retirement that I’ve noticed. Feels good.

Good to see

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I’ve been interested in the results of the Alberta referendum, particularly item 10: Remain in Canada, or start the process for a binding separation referendum?

It was fantastic to see 76.4% of Albertan’s voted to remain.

The fact that this even went to a referendum scares me though. I think this is a time to feel and be united.

Through our eyes

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I often wonder about the parts of the world we are oblivious to. We don’t see infrared light, we can’t see see the fast moving wings of an insect. We don’t sense an earthquake coming like some animals do. We can’t pick up ultrasound like dolphins. We don’t have a sense of direction using the magnetic field like butterflies and birds.

A cat is fast enough to avoid the strike of a snake, a dog’s smell is magnitudes more sensitive than ours. The greater wax moth has the best hearing of any known animal, able to detect ultrasonic frequencies up to around 300 kHz, far beyond what bats and other animals can hear.

We walk around perceiving the world with less than perfect senses. And even though we can use tools that can measure things we cannot detect on our own, even with the most sensitive tools, we don’t know where our consciousness comes from. We know that we have imperfect brains with imperfect senses only partially observing the world around us, but we don’t understand who we the observer really is.

Am I my own thoughts? When the voice in my head asks a question, who am I asking? When I change my mind, what exactly is happening in my physical body? Is my consciousness more aware of things my senses don’t pick up? Could it be?

I think of our consciousness as far more capable than our faulty human senses allow, but it is forced to observe the world through our eyes, through our faulty, inaccurate, and oblivious senses… which limits its power and potential. The great filters are our senses. They aren’t so much faulty as limited, and they ultimately limit us.

On the move

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I spent 3 nights in Tofino, a night on the West Coast Trail trailhead, 7 nights on different beaches on the trail, 8 nights at home, and now 2 weeks in Ontario, spending a maximum of 4 nights in any one place. In the coming 9 days I’m going to be visiting 6 cities and sleeping in 5 of them. Then I finally head home.

My sleep schedule is messed up, I’m not getting enough exercise, and I’m not eating regularly. That said, I still feel like things are going well. My mom and I had a wonderful visit with my uncle, his daughter and her husband for dinner today, I had a great conversations with both daughters and my wife back home, and I’m ready to spend 3 hours travelling to my next destination tomorrow.

It’s weird how I can feel a bit home sick, and also enjoy what I’m doing, while feeling like I’m constantly on the move. Am I going to enjoy my upcoming schedule? Absolutely. Am going to be excited to be back home when this is all done? Absolutely.

I was at a buddy’s house and he had a motivational quote on his wall, “Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.”

I feel like although my schedule is a bit haywire, I’m on the move and somehow keeping balance.

Thief or Inspiration?

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We’ve all heard that comparison can be the thief of joy. However, it can also be the inspiration for success.

As of April 2026, only two runners have officially completed a marathon in under two hours: Sabastian Sawe, who set a world record with 1:59:30 at the London Marathon, and Yomif Kejelcha, who finished second with 1:59:41. Previously, Eliud Kipchoge ran a sub-two-hour marathon in 2019 during the Ineos 1:59 Challenge, but this was not under official race conditions.

Like the 4-minute mile barrier, now that the elusive 2–hour marathon barrier has been broken, we will see more athletes achieving this in the coming months and years.

Comparison can steal joy, compassion can inspire greatness. Even before you make a comparison, you make a choice… You decide why you are making the comparison.

Thief or Inspiration?

Open software, open apps

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In 2 years, who is going to pay Adobe or Microsoft for a fleet of software tools that they can get for free? Who is going to pay an app subscription when we can ask a swarm of AI agents to build us our own personal app that meets more needs than a purchasable one?

Will Adobe and Microsoft be modern versions of Blockbuster video stores, losing out to another model of delivery? With the difference being that the Netflix replacement will be open sourced and free.

Now, any and all software can easily be reversed engineered and cleverly replicated without infringement on Copyright Laws. This fundamentally undermines software/app by subscription companies.

And I’ll emphasize that this is happening now! This is a massive disruption to the status quo. Large, successful companies will see profits plummet. Companies relying on subscriptions for software will lose a significant number of end users and subscribers.

What happens to our world when open software and open apps take over? We are about to find out!

See: Someone Just Rebuilt Adobe for Free, and Claude Can Run Them All (7 apps tested) – Jay E | RoboNuggets

The big question about everyday moments

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It’s not rocket science. It’s a simple concept, easy to understand, and yet hard to live.

A lot of life is mundane. Cleaning yourself, your dishes, your clothes, your bathroom… preparing food, getting dressed, lawn & garden care… Commuting, grocery shopping, vacuuming…

So much time is dedicated to small things that take our time. Mundane things that we have to do regularly. Since so much time is dedicated to these moments that make up most of our day, a big question to ponder is, how do we find joy in everyday moments?

Doing laundry can be a chore, or it can be a chance to sing unabashedly, or to engross yourself in an audiobook. Cooking can be a boring set of tasks like chopping vegetables and measuring cups of flower, or it can be a labour of love that brings as much joy as eating the delicious end product.

The big question to ask yourself is if you choose to see these tasks as mundane and necessary but uninteresting, or if you choose to embrace these moments as opportunities to appreciate your life, and to find meaning in doing the tasks that you need to do. Because these tiny moments add up to more life experiences than the things you normally look forward to.

Why not choose to appreciate everyday moments?