Nancy Love’s Weblog

I know that I have written about the relationship between time and space before but tonight, as I sit back in my apartment after a week away in Edinburgh and  an extended (30 hour) journey home, I am once again struck by the feeling of never having left.  Traveling is weird… and wonderful.  There is so much I enjoy about it and so much I tend to endure rather than savour.

It seems like yesterday that I was at the Royal Edinburgh Tattoo, at the spectacular Edinburgh Castle enjoying the precision of pipes and rums and dancers from around the world with thousands of other souls braving the wind and rain and the bitter chill of a Scottish evening.  When EVERYONE stood up, joined hands and sang Auld Lang Syne it was a sight to see and to etch into the memory banks.

It seems like yesterday that our tour van turned a corner and my eyes welled with tears at my first glimpse of the Old Course at St Andrews.  The medieval town with its impressive university seems a fitting backdrop to the birth place of golf.  St Andrews has always been there and I can only imagine how many duffers like me have been moved by the site of the place.

AND Doune Castle where Monty Python filmed The Holy Grail. So interesting and LOL funny. The visit took us back to the medieval times but also to 1975 when the silly, preposterous film was produced there.  The visit was just days ago, close in time yet so far away in kilometres from where I am right now.  And don’t even get me started on time zones and jet lag after 30 hours of travel through seven time zones. 

Now I am sitting at my dining room table remembering.  There are new images and sensations in my brain forever to be associated with Scotland. And I have a new appreciation for where I come from and why I am the way I am.  Scotland, like Nova Scotia, gives me the sensation of home, of fitting in, of feeling welcomed and appreciated for my sarcastic humour and my firm believe in democracy, the rights and responsibility of each individual in a well ordered and unique society of wonderful, fun loving human beings.

We didn’t get to Skye where Clan MacKinnon last held land but I always feel as if I have already been there.  The etheral beauty and the warm welcome in a cold climate are part of who I am as a Love, a Highlander, always willing to fight for a cause, never satisfied until the enemy is defeated.  The enemy for me has always been ignorance and the Scots were the first to wage that battle and fight that fight with introduction of mandatory schooling for young children and free university for its citizens and lending libraries before it was done anywhere else.  Education at an early age produced many unlikely scholars in Scotland.

Tomorrow I am back in the education saddle here in western Canada as I prepare for Wednesday’s free webinar sponsered by UVI PULSE at the University of the Virgin Islands’ Institute for Leadership and Organizational Effectiveness.  Here’s the link to register. 8 am Mountain and 10 am Eastern time on Wednesday the 12th.

http://www.uvi.edu/administration/president/initiatives/ILOE/pulse/events.aspx

Many of you will have already recieved an invitation to attend.  I am excited to be sharing the GHOST protocol “wi’ ye” and look forward to the opportunity. Now to bed … to dream of the banks of Loch Lomond.

When you hear the letters CPR you most likely associate them with Cardio Pulmonary resuscitation, the lifesaving procedure that is done when someone’s breathing or heartbeat is stopped. The heart and lungs are made to work by compressing the chest and forcing air into the lungs.  CPR is used to maintain circulation when the heart has stopped pumping on its own.

I watched a team of medical professionals perform CPR on my mother in the hospital after she coded last year.  It was not pretty and although they tried for more than 20 minutes to revive her she was gone.  I knew she was.  In many cases where hearts are younger and stronger than hers CPR can be successful at resuscitating the patient … bringing them back to life.  It is miracle work really.

With PULSE we use the acronym to represent Content, Process and Response, the three aspects of conversation.  Content is what we are thinking about.  Process is what we are doing.  Responses is how we are feeling.  Keeping all three balls in the air is complicated in conflict resolution and absolutely necessary if the relationship is to be saved and given new life.

This week, The University of the Virgin Islands revived PULSE. To me it feels like another chance at life for all of the PULSE professionals out there who still use the tried and true skills associated with PULSE conversations for change.  We have been resuscitated.  This new life could be even more exciting and invigorating than we could have imagined.  The Content will be enriched. The Processes revitalized.  The Response felt more deeply.

Affiliated with the Institute for Leadership and organizational Effectiveness at the University of the Virgin Islands, UVI PULSE has a second chance to make good on its promises to change the world one conversation at a time and one conversation after another.  Like many people who are resuscitated, we will look at life differently.  We will see the opportunities and seize them with new energy.  We will be Sharp and Happy and Independent and Fit and Trusting in ways we may not have been before, grateful to be alive and optimistic as never before.

Exciting times for UVI PULSE and for you as the opportunities to learn and work together continue.

Thank you.

Yesterday I attended ANOTHER Dance competition.  I have lost track of how many my two daughters and my two granddaughters and I have danced at this year.  You kind of lose track of time.  Another theatre, another group of dancers and parents, another adjudication, more medals.  At this point it is all a blurr.  Dont get me wrong.  I LOVE watching the girls perform, but we are all tired right now and its almost over.

You know you are tired when it is Monday and as your daughter tries to figure out the quickest way to get to the festival from work on time the next day you chime in with “Well there might be more trafiic tomorrow.  It is Friday.”  Blank looks. Then “Mum… tomorrow is Tuesday!” I had to think.  Then smiles turned into belly laughs and then uncontrollable giggles for the rest of the evening.  Every time she looked at me in the car on the drive home we laughed out loud.  It was comical because the other lady in the conversation thought about it too.  You could see her thinking “Is tomorrow Friday?” but she didn’t say anything to correct me.

I guess we will add this event to the family lore.  The ‘times that Mum made us laugh’ file has a new entry.  Not to worry.  The list is long but so is everyone elses.  Glad I could contribute.  AND glad I found out what day it was.  I might have missed my Tuesday Yoga class.

Have a day full of laughter….