the end is here

Well, we are coming to the end of my adventure here in Kugluktuk. It is hard for me, reflecting back on the past 2 years, as they are filled with a lot of laughter, love, and hardship.

I fell in love with this community as soon as I moved here. The spirit of the summer, everyone embracing the never-ending sunlight, despite the swarms of mosquitos. The spirit of fall as everyone is eager for the snow to fall so that they can use their skidoos to get out on the land. The spirit of the Christmas season as the community gathers for season-long celebrations. And the time when spring finally arrives, marked by the sunrise and the Nattiq Frolics.

Sadly, the love that I had for this community was not reciprocated, and that has been damaging for me. It becomes so excruciatingly difficult to care, to get out of bed, to put in any effort when time and time again, everything that I have actually accomplished is ignored, or even worse, put down and crushed. However, I did care, I did get out of bed, and I continued to work hard despite all of that. I know that even though very few people may acknowledge the difference that I have made, however big or small, or however long it might last, that I did something good and at least made a positive change for the children here.

I know that there are many people who actively despise me, who don't respect my efforts as an outsider coming in, who believe that things will improve once I go. I suspected that it would be difficult, as someone from somewhere else, from a different culture and a different lifestyle, to fit in and to find common ground with the parents and the families here. I am so thankful for the parents who welcomed me, who encouraged me and who stood behind me and held me up when I was ready to just flop down and stay there.

Don't get me wrong - it wasn't all bad. This place is so beautiful. I have learned so much about Inuit and the North, and I have experienced some unforgettable things, like walking on the ocean ice, building an igloo, having my breath taken away by the Northern Lights..

I have learned a great deal about myself, my ability to overcome obstacles that felt impossible, to persevere in spite of those who were actively discouraging me from pressing on,

I have learned how thin I can be stretched before I break, and how to come back from being broken.

I have learned the importance of self-care and self-love and how to say no.

I have learned how very important it is to disregard those who are toxic and mean only harm.

I have learned how to maintain professionalism, even when the parents are acting like children, being bullies, being rude.

I have learned to stand up, really stand up for what I believe is important, what I believe needs to change, what I believe should be the priority.

Most importantly, I have learned that it's ok for me to walk away, to continue searching for something to make me happy, and that I am not obligated to be miserable just because there are some people who are relying on me and depending on me for their own convenience.


What will happen next? No idea.

The feeling is unsettling and unnerving. I'm the kind of person who prefers to have control, to know what's going to happen next, to have a plan. Though I am certainly someone who knows that life rarely goes according to plan, it still provides me with peace of mind knowing that there is a plan. So, I am taking a giant leap way out of my comfort zone and trusting that things will fall into place and work themselves out. As long as I continue working towards my goals and live responsibly, everything should end up ok, if not great.

I will continue with professional development through online programs. I have been thinking about also doing Children & Youth Human Rights and Addictions Studies certificates while completing the Children's Mental Health certificate. I may or may not pursue grad school for next fall. I'm not sure now that I've found the right program for me, and I need to do a bit more self-discovery and more exploration of what my options are. The plan for now is to move back to Toronto, to find work I enjoy, and to spend time with the people I love, for I have desperately been missing the life I left behind. Though I am not returning the same person I was who I left, I am excited to get back to some normalcy, to city life, to access to malls and restaurants and fresh produce.

A HUGE thank you to the people who have been with me every step of this journey and telling me to keep my chin up during the hardest of times: Mom & Dad, Laura, Jesse & Sol, Geraldine, Zachary, Chris, Steve & Kerry, Peter & Amanda, Wynter, and Lena.

Off I go - into the next part of my life, doing whatever it is I will be doing and going wherever the wind takes me!

Impulsive changes

I have always been the kind of person to make impulsive decisions that end up changing my life dramatically. Just over a year ago, I made the radical decision to move to Nunavut to be a daycare manager in a small hamlet.  Over the last year, I met an amazing man, made tons of awesome friends and have learned an enormous amount about who I am personally and professionally. I have developed many new skills, improved my ability to adapt to new environments, and learned that I can't do everything, I don't know anything, and with an open mind, life can take you anywhere. 

Despite all of the things I have learned, and of all the ways I have changed, I am still one impulsive girl. 

Over the last few weeks some major changes have taken place in my life. 

I decided to sign a new contract with the daycare, this time with changes to my position.  My new title is the Administrator. After spending a year being responsible for all administrative, operational, human resources and programming duties, I learned that it is too much for one person to handle and to maintain any sort of life outside of work.  I was taking work home with me every night, constantly feeling stressed and that there were never enough hours in the day. Now, I'm responsible for the administrative side of management, including bookkeeping, payroll, invoicing, developing policies and procedures, researching and completing funding applications, and ensuring that we are in good standing financially as well as complying with all legislation and regulations. It has only been 2 weeks since I started in this position, and I every day it's is becoming more and more evident to me that I have a passion for policy development at the organizational level, but also territorial and federal levels. The contract is for another year, ending July 7, 2015. 

Another big change that was also rather impulsive, was to rent a beautiful 3 bedroom house across the street from where I'm currently living.  My nephew is just abou big enough to be needing his own room, and I have been craving to have a space of my own. The lease lines up perfectly with the end of my contract, and the house is close enough that I can still see my family whenever I feel like it. Though I will be seeing them every day, as my nephew will be attending the daycare full-time starting in August! 

Joining me in my new house will be this adorable pup (and major impulsive decision #2):

He's a mini schnoodle (schnauzer poodle x). Right now he's living in Hamilton and will be ready to come home to me August 2nd....

...which leads to impulsive decision #3:

Instead of simply having him shipped up in live cargo, this girl decided in the spur of the moment to book a two week holiday to go pick up little McGuff. As a bonus, I'll get to see most of my immediate and expanded family, a great number of friends, and run some errands that are impossible to run in the Arctic! 

I take off the 27th and can't wait for my summer getaway from all the mosquitos and limited bandwidth! 

Reflection

In school we were always taught about reflective practice - looking back at what we've done, considering what went well and what didn't, what we could try to make it even better or to address the parts that didn't go as planned, asking more questions and taking different approaches.

Before I got here, I expected my main challenge to be motivating the staff to get excited about their work and finding a way to work in an environment where I was surrounded by a culture unlike my own. When I got here, I quickly learned that the two biggest issues would be 1) to get the building in a state where it is safe for children to spend a day, and 2) actually getting the staff to show up for their shifts. Mind you, the summer is very different from the rest of the year, as most people would easily ditch work for the day/week if the weather was nice and they would rather be out on the land/at the cabin.

The task I thought would be the hardest - finding staff who I could count on to show up for all of their shifts - didn't end up to be the most difficult. It took some time to find them, but for the past 5 weeks that we've been open, the staff have showing up to work with positive attitudes every day and working extremely hard for the children.

What has actually been the greatest challenge is feeling a huge lack of support from some of my "bosses". The centre is run by a society/board of directors, so all of the major decisions concerning the Daycare's spending, policies, etc., must be voted on before the changes can be made. I've been experience a lot of resistance to some of the changes that are necessary to keep the centre open and to improve the program, for no clear reason and without explanation. Without the support from the Board, I am extremely limited in my ability to do my job and to do it well, so I am constantly running in to obstacles. I never thought that those who hired me to come and bring change to the Daycare would be the ones standing most in my way.

It has been really tough, but I can look back and see that I have made some positive changes:
- the building has been renovated, cleaned and set up in a way that promotes exploration and play in a safe way;
- brand new appliances, building and renovation materials were donated;
- a group of ladies who enjoy their work and show up for all of their shifts has been assembled;
- the Daycare passed the inspection, qualifying for a renewed license with very few changes to be made; and,
- a program has been put in place.

I hope this isn't all the change that takes place, but even if it is, I know I can say that I contributed to the improvement of the program.

There is still a lot of work to do, and I still have a lot to learn about managing and working under a Board of Directors, but I feel like we are well on our way.
I am so incredibly thankful to those of you who have been a constant support to me, providing guidance, challenging my perspective, offering ideas, and just being a friend. Thank you for keeping me accountable for the work that I am doing and for helping me reflect on the reasons why I am here and what my capacity is to doing this job. I have and will continue to persevere thanks to you.

Sneak peek

The curfew siren sounds every night at 10 pm now that school has started again. Children are off the streets during the day, and home much earlier at night. The temperature has dropped from the high 20s to hovering just above zero. The hot breeze has turned into a cold, cold wind blowing snow around gusting at 50 km per hour. The sun sets before midnight and doesn't begin rising until almost 6 am.

With all of the changes happening so rapidly in the community, it feels like that is being reflected within the walls of the Daycare. We finally started painting Wednesday, and only have two small rooms left to paint once the main area is set up. It feels so refreshing to finally be able to see all of my hard work making a difference. Since you are my special audience, you get a sneak peek of the new walls. I thought about holding out and making you wait until everything is cleaned and set up, but the volunteers we had in today did such a great job cleaning the floors that I just have to show it off.

Before:

After:

Before:

After: 

Before:

After:

And a bonus shot from a brand-new angle: 

We still have to set up all the shelves that are gathered in the giant mass on one side of the room, then getting all the materials in place before we can paint the office and the sleep room, but we are well on our way!

What do you think??

Make it better

Despite all of the hard work over the past 3 weeks to get the renovations going, it doesn't look like we're going to meet our target to open by the end of the month. We've only had a few volunteers here and there, and with all of the repairs needed on the building, progress is way too slow.

I haven't been doing much aside from work, and life has been fairly uneventful since Mom & Dad left just over a week ago.

The teachers did get to town last week, so hopefully I'll get to know a few of them and maybe make some friends.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about how I can bring the best of who I am to my new position. One professor told me before I left that since she's known me, she noticed that I was always able to take something and make it better. I hang on to that now as I feel the struggle with the slow progress and I have to force myself to think about how it will be better, even if the process is taking longer than we expected. It's important that I keep in mind that change is an extremely slow process, and that not all change is going to happen when or in the way I would like it to.

There are some changes that are happening quickly. It's starting to get darker earlier (around 9:30), and the sky even gets completely dark for a few hours during the night. The sun still starts rising around 5 am, but the day and night light is becoming much more like what we're used to in the south.

I'm anxious to get the programming done for at least the first month so that I feel at least somewhat ready for when we finally get to re-open. I'm also anxious for staff training. It is so far out of my range of experience to do week-long training on every aspect of working in an early learning setting. I definitely have a lot that I need to learn before I can train the new staff. The training is such a crucial part of implementing a new program and making change, so I'm definitely open to any tips or advice from those of you who have experience in this area!

Changes

We had a VERY exciting day today at the Daycare. There's quite an expensive list of repairs and aesthetic changes to be made before we're able to reopen, and today we were able to cross off many items from that list!

This morning I got a call from one of the members of the Board, announcing that we've received a donation of 10 gallons of primer and 10 gallons of white paint, and that if we needed more, it would also be donated. This was great news, since the sale we had this afternoon was meant to raise money to buy the paint. Only about 15 minutes later I got another call from her saying that one of the mining companies up here is donating a brand new fridge and dishwasher (and paying for shipping, which would have been REALLY expensive for us). This is SO exciting because the dishwasher we have now is not functional and we don't have an in-house cook, so the caregivers are responsible for washing all dishes. When it's tricky to meet ratios, the least amount of time spent on dishes is exactly what we need.

Then this afternoon we had our sale! Within the first half-hour, almost half of everything was sold! We ended up raising almost $500, which will be used to pay for the paint tint and any of the materials we need for painting, like the rollers, painter's tape, etc. Another company is donating the mud we need to fill the pin holes in the walls, so this weekend we are getting started on that in order to get painting!

Here are some pictures of the time just before and just after the sale:

 Before: 

Woohoo!! A really terrible photo of the paint and primer donated to us today!! 

The room where we are storing what we're keeping:

After! 

It's almost a blank canvas! Just a few more books and outdoor toys to sell (and some pretty old and dusty construction paper..) and we'll be well on our way! 

This weekend we are starting to get ready for painting, which is so so so exciting for us!

If you have any ideas about how to set up the space, colours to paint the walls (I'm thinking 2, and maybe painting a mural at some point), things to put up on the walls, etc., please share them!

P.S. if you read my sister's and BIL's blog, you could check out my guest post! (theirs is an invite-only blog)