I’ve been thinking a lot about dreams lately.
Not the ones that come and go while we sleep, but the ones that stay with us—the quiet kind that sit just beneath the surface of our everyday lives, waiting for the moment we decide to listen. I’ve never been drawn to the kind of dreams that look good on paper. Big houses, fancy cars, the polished version of success… none of that ever really spoke to me. What I’ve always chased is something a little harder to explain. I’ve wanted to know how far I could push myself before something gave out. Not in a reckless, self-destructive way—although I’ll admit, sometimes it’s probably looked like that—but in a way that felt like testing the edges of who I am.
I grew up learning how to find my own way. Being the youngest of eight meant life was already in full motion by the time I arrived, and somewhere in that space, I found a kind of freedom. No one was really standing in my way, which meant I got to decide who I would be and how I would move through the world. Maybe that’s where it started—that belief that if I wanted something, I could go after it. Not perfectly, not always wisely, but fully. I don’t remember ever questioning whether I could do something. The answer was always yes. The only real question was how.
Last year, that question took shape in a very specific way. I had planned to run the Bruce Trail for my 49th year. It felt like the kind of challenge that made sense to me—something long, demanding, something that would ask a lot and give just as much in return. But life doesn’t always line up with our plans, and mine shifted in the direction of a total hip replacement. Even then, I wasn’t ready to let go of the version of myself that keeps moving forward, so I ran as much as I could right up until the surgery. Looking back, I can see the stubbornness in that, but I can also see the refusal to let something I loved slip away without a fight.
When running was no longer an option, I didn’t stop. I changed direction. Somewhere along the way, without overthinking it, I found myself on a bike. It wasn’t something I had planned or trained for in any traditional sense. The idea just arrived, the way these things often do for me, and once it was there, I knew I had to follow it. So I gave myself seven weeks to prepare after years of being mostly inactive and set out to ride over 630 kilometres. I did it on a junior bike, on a hip that had been quietly failing me for longer than I realised, and somehow, I made it through.
That ride stayed with me. Not because it was perfect or fast or impressive in any traditional sense, but because of what it asked of me. Long days, steady effort, pushing through discomfort and doubt, finding strength in places I hadn’t needed before. It was different from running. Less explosive, more enduring. And in that, I found something I didn’t know I was looking for—a deeper kind of resilience.
I carried that from Delhi to Gravenhurst over a series of weekends, showing up each time with whatever I had left to give. Some days it was motivation. Other days it was sheer determination. And if I’m being honest, there were moments where it was nothing more than raw, unprocessed emotion pushing me forward. But I finished it, and shortly after, I stepped into the next chapter and got my new hip.
And everything changed.
Healing didn’t feel like slowing down. It felt like being given something back. Within weeks, I was moving again, working again, and by the time my birthday came around, I was dancing without hesitation. There’s something powerful about realising your body can meet you where your spirit has always been. Since then, I haven’t really stopped. Early mornings, long days, full schedules—it’s a rhythm that feels like home to me. It’s not about being busy. It’s about being alive in what I’m doing.
And now, I feel that pull again.
It’s familiar, almost quiet at first, but steady. The kind that doesn’t go away. So I’m listening. I’m going back to the same route I rode before, but this time I’m not breaking it into pieces. I’m riding it straight through, day after day, letting the experience unfold in a different way. I want to see what’s changed, not just in my body, but in me. I want to feel the difference, to understand what this next version of myself is capable of.
And the truth is… I already know this isn’t where it ends.
Because somewhere in the background, there’s already another idea taking shape. If this ride goes the way I feel it might, next year I won’t be stopping where I did before. I’ll keep going. Past Gravenhurst. Past the point where it once felt like enough. I’ll follow the trail all the way to New Brunswick—over 2,600 kilometres, on the same bike, with the same quiet determination—just stretched across something bigger, something that asks even more of me.
I think from the outside, a life like this can look chaotic. Maybe even a little unpredictable. But there’s a kind of clarity underneath it all that I’ve come to rely on. It’s the understanding that time isn’t something we have endless amounts of, even though we like to pretend we do. It’s the awareness that the things we keep putting off, the dreams we keep quiet, don’t disappear—they wait. And the longer we ignore them, the heavier they become.
I’ve lived on both sides of that. I’ve told myself there wasn’t time, that responsibilities came first, that maybe certain things just weren’t meant for me anymore. And all it did was slowly take something away that I didn’t even realise I was losing. So I made a choice, at some point, to stop doing that. To stop negotiating with the part of me that wanted more.
Because the truth is, this life we have is the only one we get. And it’s not meant to be lived halfway.
So if there’s something calling to you—something that keeps showing up no matter how many times you push it aside—maybe it’s there for a reason. Maybe it’s asking you to trust it. To follow it. To see where it leads.
That’s what I’m doing.
Shifting into second gear… and going.