Don't let MGM distribute a film you care about.

But cancer has also ushered in new ways of being alive. Even when I am this distant from Canadian family and friends, everything feels as if it is painted in bright colors. In my vulnerability, I am seeing my world without the Instagrammed filter of breezy certainties and perfectible moments. I can’t help noticing the brittleness of the walls that keep most people fed, sheltered and whole. I find myself returning to the same thoughts again and again: Life is so beautiful. Life is so hard.

Before I was diagnosed with esophageal cancer a year and a half ago, I rather jauntily told the readers of my memoirs that when faced with extinction I wanted to be fully conscious and awake, in order to “do” death in the active and not the passive sense. And I do, still, try to nurture that little flame of curiosity and defiance: willing to play out the string to the end and wishing to be spared nothing that properly belongs to a life span. However, one thing that grave illness does is to make you examine familiar principles and seemingly reliable sayings. And there’s one that I find I am not saying with quite the same conviction as I once used to: In particular, I have slightly stopped issuing the announcement that “Whatever doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.”

That there is time. I doggedly prioritise and pursue tasks, and the day seems to open out and everything does get done. Chill.

I did work in retail while I was getting into presenting and the hours were long and you were always on your feet. It was good vibes, though.

That I wouldn’t be successful. Joke’s on them, I guess.

I can be properly stubborn sometimes – but that’s me being a classic Leo.

Euphoria, passion and feeling like nothing else in the world matters.

As someone who loved her family and friends, worked hard, got successful and had a lovely time in the process.

Probably missing out on roles I really, really wanted, but I’m a big believer that if it’s for you, you’ll have it. So those clearly weren’t for me.