Fear of Flying

Renee (second row, third from left), Rose (front second from left). 

When you meet someone from your past, a curious thing happens --they set "fresh eyes" on you.

My friend Renee hadn't seen me in nearly 45 years when I took her to the lake.

In high school, I was five foot six and weighed 130 pounds. Today, I weigh as much as my older brother who is six foot two. He likes to remind me of this fact on his regular phone call every ten years or so.

Renee hasn't changed much at all. She's tiny with a big wallop of wavy hair. Because she strictly attends to her diet, and an exercise regime, she still reminds me of the girl who took the bus with me everyday so many years ago. The only wink to old age is her decision to let her hair go grey. She likes to sweep it back into a messy bun that gives her a slight bohemian vibe.

In high school, I would rather go pantless than be caught without my lipstick and full make up which included an unfortunate foray into blue eyeliner. Today, I rarely wear any makeup at all. It isn't that I'm against makeup, it's that I live in constant Rocky Balboa mode -- like I have a chronic case of the meat sweats. The makeup literally slides off.

My hair is a complete write-off -- though I still dye it, like who am I kidding? It's in a ponytail. Who cares? I'm rarely seen in public anyway unless I have a doctor's appointment or have to take Pearl to the vet.

For a decade now, I've bought my clothes to hide the fat -- t shirts mostly -- at Value Village while Renee shops the vintage stores and favours bright floral dresses that flatter her curves. And unlike me, she's totally committed to eyeliner and lipstick, even if she's going to the village for supplies.

We are so different in many ways. She has had a successful broadcasting career while I've had a spotty freelance career. I have dogs, she favours pets of the feline variety.

Perhaps the only thing that is the same between us is our choice of husbands. Her husband works in construction and renovation while mine was a cameraman now toiling in the security industry. Both guys are good guys, who are just as capable of whipping up a salmon meuniere as they are cutting the grass. They're men's men with hearts of gold. When Renee admitted to not feeling well, and dreaded the drive back to Toronto, her husband dropped everything and hopped a train to meet her in Ottawa. That is stellar male performance in my book. Similarly, Scott would do anything for me and my kids -- and has -- and I owe him a debt of gratitude and the occasional bottle of Single Malt.

That's about all that we have in common.

Back to fresh eyes.

Over the course of three days, we shared our hopes and dreams, and our fears. I have a terrible habit of over-sharing, which gives other people the idea that I need to be rescued, like a kitten found in a bag in a dumpster.

Truth is, I just like to complain.

And that's where I get into trouble especially when it means spending three days with a person you knew in high school.

"You should write a book," she said.

I looked at her.

"But I don't want to write a book."

"But you should write a book," she said. "You could make a lot of money."

I explained to her that writing a book in Canada, even a best seller, usually paid enough to get the repairs done on a used car. I went on to describe the bookshelf I have at home that is filled with well-intentioned memoirs, poetry, cookbooks, great tomes of fiction and picture books all written by my good friends. I buy them to support their writerly aspirations, but I've hardly cracked the spine of any of them.

I haven't even read my own son's books cover to cover.

"I'm a blogger," I told her. "I don't write books. I don't have the attention span or interest to write a book."

"Maybe you could put the blogs together into a book."

"Maybe, but I don't want to."

I felt like the kid I was in high school, faced with a French exam, knowing that I was going to fail it. Did I tell you Renee is fluently bilingual?

I felt my skin flush, hot with anger and embarrassment. It wasn't Renee's fault. I get this advice from nearly everybody. Most folks just give up on me after a while but Renee wouldn't let it go.

Truth is, I am afraid to write a book. Afraid it won't sell. Afraid it will be panned. Afraid that it will become a rock bottom remainder if it even gets into a book store.

I tried to change the subject but every time I did, we would veer into another uncomfortable area like weight loss. Renee admitted that she had been overweight and had joined Weight Watchers, and learned to swim, and that she walked home from her job nearly every day, and ate mostly whole foods and jarred her own ingredients.

How, I thought was that possible?

I look after a toddler, and I can't even get the dishes done til the weekend -- unless Scott does them.

Exercise? I threw my iWatch into a drawer because at the end of the day it reads "two hundred steps".

"Don't worry," I told her reaching for the Jose Cuervo for nerve. " I have a plan."

I do have a plan, you know. It's sitting on this very computer with unchecked boxes. I have a gym that's half assembled in the basement. I have kale.

And then talk turned to self-care and Renee's beautiful skin.

Fortunately for me, my dead friend Jennette left me two hundred tubs of expensive skin cream that she had bought from some Internet company that billed her credit card every month.

Of course, you have to use the cream for it to make a difference.

Renee has a strict regime, and she makes her own skin cream.

Of course she does.

She handed me a lovely bag filled with body and face cream, as well as a fragrance she made herself.

It didn't smell like my cream, that apparently is made of lilacs ripped from their branches at first bud. It seemed rather greasy compared to the Internet stuff Jennette left me, the $200 a bottle stuff that resembles the top of a lemon meringue pie.

Look, I'm not stupid, okay? I know the store bought stuff is full of preservatives and additives, and possibly essence of squirrel.

Renee's is made of natural ingredients, and it obviously works so how could I not use it?

Maybe she did have some good ideas after all.

Certainly, I reasoned, it couldn't hurt to take some of her advice. Nothing I'd done so far had worked.

At the end of the night, I was exhausted, as if I'd binge-watched Oprah Winfrey's entire career and was headed into Deepak Chopra territory, with a side of Dr. Oz.

But then something happened.

The conversation turned to Renee and her hopes and dreams. Renee confided in me that her greatest wish was to sing opera on the big stage with a big opera company, She's taken all the training, and she's great at it. She even gave me an impromptu performance while we were sitting at the bonfire we'd built during the black out.

It was nice to hear her lovely voice echoing through the Gatineau hills like some kind of half time show for the fire works.

She told me she worried that she was so preoccupied with work and food and kids and keeping the home fires burning that she might have missed the opportunity to realize her dream.

"Ah ha!" I said. "I might be able to make that happen for you."

I told her about a show called Now or Never! on CBC Radio. It's the same show on which I confessed that I wanted a boob job. That never happened, of course because, well, the weight thing. And my fear of flying without a 42H underwire.

Anyway, I was pretty confident that I could get her on that show. And I'm going to try, once they've come off hiatus.

Suddenly, I felt better. I'd found something I could do to help her.

I felt empowered.

I put down the Jose Cuervo.

That's when I made a decision. I was going to get off my ass and join Weight Watchers.

And I'm even contemplating, you know, the book thing.

I just need a boost that didn't involve Tostidos and video games.

Sometimes it take fresh eyes to realize it's time to stop complaining and do something.

I feel like Dorothy perpetually stuck in Oz getting unfortunate make overs and smelling lion farts. I've spent the last few years, yearning, hoping, pining for a different life, for something big to happen.

Maybe if I click my Sketchers together three times, I can make something happen.

Something small.

I've already started. When I got back from the cottage, I tried the skin cream.

It works beautifully.

Sometimes it take a small person who used to ride public transit with you to tell you it's time to get off the bus.