I’ve spent this last week aimlessly writing, figuring out what I should do next.
There’s plenty on my mind:
My career of eleven years that I pretty much fell into and what I do with it some seventeen jobs later
All the content that still needs producing and how to make each one special in an age where we value immediacy over innovation
And, of course, whether I’m living up to my role as a husband, father, brother, friend and son as I try to find time for everyone while sorting all of this out.
Logically, I know it’s all a process. I spend a lot of my time thinking about the things I’d eventually like to accomplish, and none of it’s happening overnight. I’ve long since decided to stop investing my time in content that takes five minutes to make—there’s more than enough on the internet already. What I want to do is create things worth remembering—content whose impact we’ll feel months and years down the road. It’s a slow process, but I’ve made it this far—what’s a little bit more, right?
But that’s enough introspection for one post. Let’s get right to it with The Week That Was… March 18th-24th, 2018, and everything that went down in those seven days. Spoiler alert—lots of it had to do with food.
Several weeks, a few dozen photos and four thousand words later, we’ve finally made it—the Casey Palmer, Canadian Dad 2017 wrap-up, filled with stories aplenty of 365 days spent in my not-so-orthodox life.
After wrapping the year up on a quiet note (because two sick children under five will do that to you), I still felt it necessary to do this. These year-to-year changeovers offer a lot of perspective for me—with so much happening all the time, I often forget what I had for breakfast, so I write everything down. And if the height of the pile on my desk is any sign, 2017 was quite the year. But it’s also the time where I’m the most transparent, looking back objectively at everything I’ve done and celebrating successes, owning up to failures, hoping all the while that I’m somehow growing from the process.
But yeah—let’s do this as we did in 2016: look at the year in excruciating detail, figuring out what’s worth taking with me into 2018 versus what doesn’t feel part of my world anymore.
Ladies and gentlemen, let me present—the 31 things I did well in 2017! Let’s get it!
Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome back to the #Chronicle150, where we strive to find 150 Canadian stories to commemorate this nation’s 150th birthday!
The series took a break for a while—you wouldn’t believe how much is going on here behind the scenes—but it’s high time this project got back on track, and I’m doing that with a piece from Nikki Yeh.
Nikki’s a journalist who was a year above me in high school—I remember seeing her name in print early on in publications like The Mississauga News. Nikki’s #Chronicle150 entry touches on a few themes I’ve returned to time and time again while crafting this series: struggling to develop an identity beyond your race. The multigenerational grind to develop a better future for those who follow. And—of course—some of the reasons why we stay in Canada, like the value we place on family life.
Nikki’s answers hold things many of us can relate to—perhaps they’ll give you pause to reflect on your life and what needed to happen to make you who you are today.
Enjoy the read and until the next,
–case p.
Who are you and what are you all about?
I tell it like it is – many would say I’m honest, humble, a good listener and a huge pop culture fan (Riverdale, anyone?). I wear many hats as a writer, editor, dance and gymnastics instructor, proud wife and Mom. My time’s currently divided between freelance projects, managing my Facebook group Adventures in Baby Savings, playing trucks with my two-year-old son and helping my 6-year-old daughter count nickels and dimes.
What makes you so Canadian?
Nikki on her wedding day in 2009, wearing her grandmother’s Chinese dress for a traditional tea ceremony.
Here’s something many don’t know about me: I seldom cared about being Canadian until a few years ago. I used to roll my eyes at the thought of Canadian history, deeming July 1st as “Barbeque and Booze Day.” But after digging into the history of both my maternal and paternal families, it’s hard to deny my Canadian roots.
Hailing from rural China, my paternal great-grandfather – my grandmother’s father, Gee Sing – was a Chinese labour worker in the 1880s for the Canadian Pacific Railway, surviving in poor conditions to improve the future of his family. My dad’s father, Tin Yeh, was one of the first group of students from China to study at the University of Toronto after World War II. Then there’s my Mom’s family – the Yuens, consisting of my Mom’s parents, two sisters and herself – as the first Chinese family to reside in Brampton, Ontario, in the ’60s. (They were even interviewed for their local newspaper!)
Sure, I’m physically Chinese. But for me, being born in Canada isn’t what makes me Canadian. It’s how my family made sacrifices and overcame hardships so that their future generations could thrive in this country.
So unless you’ve been under a sizeable rock for some time, you’ll know that Starbucks is back with their #StarbucksForLife contest, rewarding droves of java junkies with chances to win several prizes if they complete the contest challenges!
My buddy Zach and I spoke recently about #StarbucksForLife, thinking about the most efficient route to scoring the contest badges in a race to catch ’em all! (Because, you know, who would I be without an obligatory Pokémon reference?)
So, using the information we have so far, here’s a look at how I’d go about getting the maximum impact from the #StarbucksForLife campaign for my fellow Canadians!
The full list of #StarbucksForLife Challenges—likely an early prototype, as Afternoon Coffee Break seems renamed to BRB and This One’s On Me is absent from the current board.
When I became a father, many thought I’d have to give up blogging, too busy and tired to bother with social media and my life associated with it. Through 2013, I worried over everything I was giving up with a kid in tow—the parties, the swag, the food—everything that was part of “the scene”. I thought I’d fade into obscurity, becoming an urban legend of Toronto’s social media scene—a precautionary tale to those trying to mix family and Twitter, to show it’s impossible.
But January seemed determined to prove me completely wrong.
