Every story starts somewhere. Mine began when life didn’t go according to plan — and I decided to live it anyway.
When my forever wasn’t forever, I was completely blindsided. The person I thought I’d grow old with found someone else, and just like that, the life I’d built around “us” fell apart. I was heartbroken, angry, and honestly — lost.
After the shock faded, I knew I had two choices: stay stuck in what was, or start writing a new chapter. So I did the scariest thing — I chose to start over.
Last night, I was flying home from Prince George after supporting an Emergency Operations Centre exercise in Vanderhoof, British Columbia. The winds were wild — the kind that make your stomach drop and your heart race. The plane bounced and shuddered so much that for a moment, I truly thought we might fall out of the sky. But we didn’t. We made it.
I landed, exhausted but grateful, ready to catch the ferry to Victoria to teach the next day. I never imagined that the next morning, the ferries themselves would be the ones calling it quits.
So there I sat, in the Tsawwassen ferry terminal — surrounded by stranded travelers, lukewarm coffee, and the soft hum of frustration all around. I was supposed to be on the 11 a.m. ferry. Canceled. The next one? Maybe 6 p.m.
And yet — something about that moment felt right.
Because this is where it truly began.
This is where Jackie Doing Jackie moved from a spark of an idea to a living, breathing story.
Paris had once been a promise — a dream trip we’d planned together. When I found out he had taken her instead, it crushed me. For months, I wanted nothing to do with Paris. But then I realized Paris was my dream — one I had always wanted to experience, with or without him. I wasn’t going to let him take that away from me.
So I booked the trip. And the idea was reborn in Paris — somewhere between a coffee and croissant near Montmartre, a solo dinner where I toasted to freedom, and a long walk along the Seine where I promised myself I’d start living life my way. Paris reminded me what it feels like to be alive, curious, and beautifully independent.
But that windy day at the ferry terminal was when it became real — when I put pen to paper and words to website.
This is what Jackie Doing Jackie is all about: turning chaos into calm, fear into freedom, and the unexpected into something worth remembering.
It started in Paris.
But it’s being written here — by someone who’s learned that sometimes, the detour is the destination.
Every great story has a turning point.
This was mine.