Color of outdoors blog

Where do I go from here? Where have I been? Today is the fifth anniversary of my blog’s creation. My life has taken so many turns in these past five years that I find reflection rather difficult.

I thought about this event all week, what would I write on the day? These things are important to me; anniversaries, birthdays and random celebrations of life. It makes us reflect on our past and plan for what’s left ahead. It helps us to be thankful.

Every year I typically take stock of the positive experiences of the previous year, but rather than wait for months to go by I’ll point out a couple right now.

1. The completion of an online course on poetry writing: How Writers Write Poetry 2015 offered through Canvas.net from the University of Iowa. This was an eye-opening experience. It was great to be taught by some of the literary world’s heavyweights. The positive and constructive feedback from fellow poets was probably the greatest reward. I found myself becoming inspired during the class and writing immediately afterwords.

2. Tamarack Camera Club‘s invitation of Jeff Ducharme to Goose Bay for photography workshops, and also the Tamarack Camera Club’s debut exhibition at the Lawrence O’Brien Arts Centre. Two things I was so proud to have been apart of. Jeff was my instructor through my days at the College of the North Atlantic’s journalism program, and I’m happy to say we’ve been friends ever since.

Those are just two momentous things from the past month, but I actually post daily to tumblr life’s little joys – feel free to follow along.

I thought about whether I should mention this next part or not, but I think it’s fine that I do. Maybe even helpful. I found myself recently experiencing what the Internet refers to a ‘catfish‘ situation; whereby a person poses as someone else online in order to form a close relationship. Sometimes you never find out the truth and as long as you play along that’s how it’s going to be. My gut told me that what I was experiencing was false even though every single word of our conversations felt very real to me. When you’re being fed exactly what you wish to hear it’s hard to back away from what ‘feels’ genuine. But know this: if something feels too good to be true, 99% of the time IT IS. Ask questions, seek answers yourself if they aren’t answered – you may be blown away by what you find.

So where do I go from here? I don’t know that I go anywhere. I think here is a healthy medium. I’ve been writing so much, making photos, biking and strength training and eating well. Life is good.

It always makes me anxious to say that life is good, because while I know celebrating life is the key to making it even better, sometimes it just feels like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop – I guess the next step is just accepting that… it is what it is.

Take care of yourselves. And thank you for following my journey on Color of Outdoors (Travelling Infinity).

From the writers desk,

M.