cheep cheep jack

be thou my vision.

2011-02-01T14:00:00.000-08:00

my sister and i were talking about van morrison today, so i decided to listen to hymns to the silence.

we grew up listening to him all the time. probably because he's from belfast and so is my dad. some of the places he sings about are places i've actually been to. listening to "be thou my vision" today made me get a lump in my throat and blink back tears. i miss my dad so much. i'm scared i won't get to know him the way i want to. he has so many secrets, my daddy. so much secret pain i've only been allowed glimpses of.

this is my solemn promise to get to know my dad better. i'm writing him a letter this evening.

i have a real comfortable workspace

2010-10-31T11:02:00.000-07:00

...but i am still typing this from the couch instead of my desk. To be fair, my desk is currently smothered in paintings/paints, drawings, sketchbooks and pens, but still. This is why I have old-lady back pains.

I love being able to work on art every day. It's the most amazing feeling. I don't have a "real" job (still working casual, same place I've been at for almost three years), but I make enough to pay rent and buy groceries, and that's really all that matters.

Despite not having very much money, I recently made a somewhat extravagant (for me) purchase: a trip to Montreal for my birthday. My lovely boy will be in his ancestral homeland for both of our birthdays (two days apart), and I didn't want to be lonely, so I planned a trip. What makes it extra special is that it's the same weekend as Expozine, so I will get to see a bunch of my zine-pals and perhaps even make back some of the money I spent on travel!

I'm really excited for this trip for multiple reasons:

1. ZINES!
2. I will get to see my dear friend Jim, whom I very rarely see. And by this I mean we've only hung out three times in person. But I'd say Jim has been one of the biggest and most positive influences in my young life. I doubt I've met a more patient, understanding, and generous human being.
3. I get to see my friend Maude, who always brings out my famous drunken bravado (last time I was with her, I saw Michael Cera dining in a restaurant on Queen W. and she had to physically restrain me from running in and beating him up. why did i want to beat michael cera up? i will never know). She was the first person to ever encourage my drawing/zine-making, for which I am eternally grateful.
4. I will meet a new zinester-friend with whom I have plans to make a split zine about being an anarchist who is also religious. An acquaintance of mine made reference to the fact that "she is Christian and an anarchist...which i still can't wrap my head around" and i thought: i should contact her and ask her if she wants to make a zine about religion and anarchy! So I did, and she was totally into it which makes me so happy.

I think it will be one of the best birthdays yet. I might wear my purple prom dress (which I sometimes refer to as my "Grimace's Girlfriend Dress", because I honestly do look kind of like Grimace in it...you know, hips).

Birthday trip aside, everything else is really great, too. As I said before, I'm making more art than ever. I'm starting a new zine and retiring Little Gardens for Invalids, which was a really difficult choice to make, but ultimately one I'm happy with. AB and I finally set up our studio and it's lovely - our desks are back-to-back right beside the enormous bay window that looks out onto our street with its huge, ancient maple trees and aging brick houses. There are books crammed everywhere, which makes it feel super-cozy. There's also a couch (upon which I am sitting as I type this) for friends to crash on, or for one of us to nap on when we get all tuckered out from writing or painting. Life is paradise!

One last thing: AB and I really love to read aloud to one another and right now I'm reading him The Wind in the Willows, which is one of my favourite books. My dad read it to me growing up, and he gave me this beautiful illustrated edition of it for my birthday last year. It's so lovely to share it with my dearest love. And I do really good voices, if I do say so myself...Mole is my favourite one. He has a scratchy little high-pitched snuffly British accent.

nice to come home.

2010-09-07T14:40:00.000-07:00

Early in January, I predicted that this year would be one of the best.

Shortly afterward, I was dying to take that back.

But now? After the summer I've had and the fall I'm beginning, I know that my prediction was right. I come home from work to a beautiful house which is quickly becoming a beautiful home. Or if I don't work that day, I see my friends or draw or go for long, long walks through the city...or I just sit quietly with myself and when my dear love comes home (if he is working that day), we eat dinner and curl up and always tell each other just how much we love one another.

Things are so very, very right.

if i could, i'd get lost tonight.

2010-08-20T14:17:00.000-07:00

everything, everything, everything.

i'm so very lucky to have the friends i do. Cat, whose clockwork gears of vast intelligence and unconditional compassion and forgiveness, of brilliance and innumerable ideas seem to whir audibly when i'm near to her. Alison, whose careful thoughtfulness and reflection, whose intricate logic and precise ability to name the unnameable cast unwavering light for my thoughts to become clear in. Steph, whose nonjudgmental nature and tiny beautiful creations, whose selflessness and bravery quietly make themselves known through a glowing, crackling cable from her heart to mine. Ferron, whose deliberate words and never-closed embrace, whose never-blushing laughter allows me to speak uncensored when i'm seated next to her, our touching knees a tiny physical manifestation of our ability to always be together in one way or another.

and beyond these friends, there are the acquaintances who have taught me things i didn't know i needed to be taught. Rachel, my very first love, who i reunited with a week ago. we spent hours in the sun by a hill we once tumbled down together in the thunderous rain (holding hands and unable to contain our cackling laughter). she told me to not be afraid of doing things differently than i thought i would. told me that i didn't have to tie myself to half-promises i made to myself as a teenager. she spoke about her life and love in a far-off country and how, with nearly nothing, she has become unwaveringly happy and peaceful. even in the worst of times.

Adam, who i barely knew, spent a night with me on a fire escape and showed me that i am not alone - in my hatred and fear of my body, in my need for forceful reminders to reunite my body and my spirit, in the aimless and wandering annals of my strange brain. we said goodbye feeling healed and whole.

thankyouthankyouthankyou.

unexpected fortune.

2010-08-11T11:09:00.000-07:00

has it been long enough since i last wrote in here?

this has been the best summer of my life. which seems totally naive, i'm sure, as a non-friendly acquaintance accused me of being when i expressed my joyful anticipation of starting a family.

but it's unbelievably true.

my last few months in toronto were hellish. my eating disorder was symptomatic. i couldn't muster the courage to end a relationship i hadn't been present in for months and months. i begged so many psychiatric institutions to help me and was repeatedly turned away and ignored to the point where i ended up in the hospital on more than one occasion. i don't mean to sound precious or melodramatic - this is not an exaggeration. i was so, so miserable.

i went to my hometown to live with my parents because i couldn't simply couldn't survive in toronto anymore. after three days in saskatoon, i checked myself into the psych ward and was handed a new diagnosis and two new meds by two almost comically cold and stoic psychiatrists. much to my surprise, they helped me enormously.

my parents took me to israel for my sister's wedding. i spent four days in a beautiful, weird, and scary country with my beautiful, weird sister. it became apparent to me just how much she has taken care of me and taught me so much. her and her husband restored my ability to believe that a caring, mutually protecting relationship is possible. i ended my unhappy relationship the next day - perhaps not under ideal circumstances, but in a way that made me feel unexpectedly whole.

i returned to saskatoon with my dear brother-in-law's assurance that my basherte or basherter was on her or his way. while appreciating this very much, i was pretty confident in spending an undetermined amount of time alone.

then, through a guilty and heartfelt apology to a potential acquaintance in toronto whom i had repeatedly snubbed, i started building a careful and strange long-distance friendship. we sent letters with hastily scrawled drunken post-scripts; silly half-confessions that neither of us could confidently disclose in sobriety. and then there were phonecalls, midnight phonecalls during which we'd read to one another and shyly, metaphorically scuff our feet in embarrassed tenderness.

and then, we were in love. unashamedly, we planned our future children's names. our home together. he came to visit me and we spent every waking moment with our hands interlocked.

in a little over two weeks, we'll be living together in a beautiful old house in toronto. i have no delusions that it will be easy: i'm not exactly financially stable and toronto life will once again be taxing and anxiety-inducing. but i am completely sure that we will be okay together; that we'll keep each other safe and close.

i can't believe my unbelievable fortune in finding this person who i love so wholly, who makes me feel that i am capable of navigating adulthood, no matter how much struggle there will be, financially and emotionally. someone who makes me feel confident and competent, as an artist, a creator, as a future wife and mother. someone i am able to help feel less anxious, less self-conscious, and more confident in his unbelievable skill and genius as a writer and human being.

i've never felt so beautiful and strong and safe in my entire life.

2010-06-28T07:46:00.000-07:00

First of all:

http://lexgill.com/2010/06/28/urgent-conditions-at-629-eastern-ave-illegal-immoral-dangerous/

Second of all. This G20 stuff has filled me with so, so much rage that I can hardly breathe. Yesterday i felt my bones itch with the painful, desperate need to be in my city fighting alongside my friends and comrades. Several of my nearest and dearest were detained, threatened, and clubbed. The reports of their safety are now pouring in, but it doesn't undo the horrific amount of police brutality that went down this weekend.

But: lying in bed with the phone cradled to my ear, scheming and plotting protest hijinx with my long-distance lover until we both fell asleep? That. That made me feel stronger.

smaller, smaller

2010-06-22T14:30:00.000-07:00

I have a guilty admission to make.

I shaved two days ago. It was an act of desperation; of scraping off as much of myself i could without hurting myself, without bruising my knees on the bathroom floor and retching up the contents of my stomach.

It wasn't premeditated. It just...happened.

Not shaving is a point of politics and pride for me. It has been a way for me to reclaim my body and show myself that I cannot and will not adhere to standards of beauty that are, to me, obsolete and ridiculous. I don't judge women who do scrape the hair off their legs and armpits and cunts, but it does make me a little sad. When I see other women with hairy armpits and legs, my heart does a bit of a leap and I feel loved and hopeful. This is maybe naive, but it's honestly what i feel.

As i watched these tiny hairs make their way down the drain, i felt this stab of pain and regret, my level-headedness returning to me. What the hell just happened?, i thought.

It was like being in a trance of utter self-loathing. I'm glad that I didn't hurt myself physically, but this really does hurt my heart. I feel weak. Personally, I mean. I don't think other women who shave are weak by any means - but this is something i have spent a lot of time thinking about and have decided is important to me.

it'll grow back, of course.

we had hot caramel sticking to our teeth

2010-06-18T14:40:00.000-07:00

I got a letter in the mail today from Lisa.

Lisa appeared in my life when I was 15, wandered right on in, all wild curly hair moccasins the faint scent of patchouli patchy jeans little girl giggles and calligraphy-penned notes passed through boring classes.

Lisa knew how to find beautiful lace slips and paisley-printed vintage tunics, ancient beautiful wedding dresses and pocket watches, even in the most picked-over of thrift shops. She knew how to scent her letters without getting grease stains, knew how to make moonshinish strawberry wine in secret, squirreled away in parents' attics.

We were, in many ways, the most embarrassing white-girl cliches. But I loved Lisa so hard. Her and the girl I fell in the sort of deep love reserved for in-the-closet-highschool-girls, would always joke that they were stripping me of my innocence. But to me it felt more like they were carefully undressing me, exposing me to the sunlight in ways my pale skin hadn't yet felt.

I can't remember the last time I saw Lisa, with her untamable thatch of hair that made her, with her long slender body, look like a dandelion in the breeze. But hearing from her like this, as she writes to me from across the country - still the same Lisa running with horses and tending farms and feeding the birds and bedding brown-eyed musicians - makes me feel more glad of her existence than ever before.

She is robed in strength and dignity; she smiles at the future.

2010-06-06T06:10:00.000-07:00

It's been almost a month since I last posted and an almost comically large quantity of things have changed in my life since.

Disclaimer: This is a somewhat ridiculous post about marriage. Not for those who can't stomach the sickeningly sweet.

A week before I left for Israel, Gab and Ferron and I lounged on the hardwood floor of their apartment, sunlight filtering through the windows in bars that bisected and trisected our lazy bodies, warming us in selective stripes which made me keep taking off and putting back on my cardigan.

"I can't see any reason for getting married," said Gab. I expressed some sort of tepid agreement, mildly acknowledging that I had enjoyed some weddings - they were just not something for me. It seemed like a waste. Of money, of time. Having a huge expensive party for myself? It seemed like it would be lovely and thrilling but also embarrassing and as if it might accidentally tread into the valley of the selfish.

Then, little more than a week later, I found myself chewing my lip with great concentration, willing tears to roll back within me, as my new brother-in-law sang to my elder sister at their wedding. A friend who I had made that day - a brown-eyed bespectacled henna artist with a laugh that hit me tenderly right between my ribs - whispered a translation in my ear.

Eishes chayil is a song from the Book of Proverbs that describes what a virtuous woman should be like. From that description, one might expect something painfully outdated and possibly offensive.

But it is the most beautiful song I have ever heard in my barely-over-two-decades life.

And watching my sister leaning her face on her palm as she listened to my brother-in-law sing to her gave me more happiness than anything I have felt to date. This is no exaggeration.

Anything that can give someone that degree of happiness, completely inadvertently, cannot be anything but good.

And I decided then that marriage is totally a party that I can get behind.

worst suit EVER

2010-05-14T17:42:00.000-07:00

One of my least favourite things: body hate.

Being crazy (clinically speaking, anyway) and having an eating disorder (though currently asymptomatic) is like wearing an enormous full-body suit with lead hands and feet which cause you to stoop forever, which causes chafing because the belly of the suit is made out of steel wool. Oh and the suit has built-in goggles which are always dirty and made of frosted glass. Also, the suit is way too warm and you want to take it off SO bad, but you can never ever ever take it off.

So today at my parents' house i tried on a dress my aunt gave me two months ago and when i zipped it up it was decidedly snugger than it was then. I started to freak out, verbally, while my mom was in the next room. "Oh, it's probably your new meds, honey!" she said.

To which my only thought was: ohgodohgodohgod i have lost control over my body i gotta get it back NOW

and what really tops this scenario off is that two of my most special, best supports for body stuff are 1) a health professional i can no longer see because she's in another province and 2) someone who recently has demonstrated that he cannot or will not be a support to me through his complete lack of condolence during another time of need.

i am going crazy (crazier) in this fucking suit, you guys!

taking pictures of a girl who's in a wheat field

2010-05-06T11:07:00.000-07:00

My dreams have been startlingly sad lately. I choose to think this the result of the new, sleep-inducing medication I've been prescribed.

Last night after I closed my eyes I desperately wandered a nameless New York metro station, rocking forward on tippy-toes looking for a tall figure in the crowd. Wandered into an underground symphony hall where a beautiful orchestra was practicing Brahms. I sat alone in the huge theatre and began to weep into my bag of candy. I tried to call out a request for Sibelius but my voice wouldn't emit anything but a pale squeak.

When the orchestra took an intermission from rehearsal, I stared into the familiar brown eyes of a cellist and my heart didn't flutter but stung like bitten fingers; itched like a new sunburn. We leaned in and didn't kiss but breathed gently into one another. He pressed two new HB pencils into my open palm and then I was alone in the metro again as trains rushed by.

with your silent brand-new sneakers

2010-05-04T10:38:00.000-07:00

In the eight days that I've been here, there hasn't been one day where it hasn't rained (or snowed, in today's case).

Not to be overly dramatic, but I've also already been to the hospital. It's all okay right now, in the immediate sense, but I can't shake this feeling of doom.

She said, in her completely public blog.

On the positive side of things, I have already been to the liberry (liberry! LIBERRY), the statue garden, the teen sex cove, various drinking establishments, the quasi-vegan bakery, and the roastery.

My drawings haven't been very good lately.

Last night Steph and Cat and PD and I curled up in blankets and read out loud to each other whilst drinking peppermint tea. It was really lovely.

That's really all I can report. I'm hoping for feeling better once printmaking starts.

you hear me now.

2010-04-28T14:31:00.000-07:00

I am visiting my hometown, which i have been counting down the days to forever.
I have seen three of my dearest friends (feminist posse!).
I have had the opportunity to hang out with my parents quite a bit.

And: I am, of course, unsatisfied. But more than that. I feel as though I'm wrapped up in a soft but strangely itchy veil, and i'm completely naked underneath. I need the veil's protection and it is inhibiting everything, at the same time.

we don't have to be anything quite so unreal

2010-04-16T16:24:00.000-07:00

So, school...is done.

I'm strangely not even that ecstatic. But I am really glad it's over. OVER!

My past few weeks have been really lovely and weird. I've been house-sitting at this house with an ungodly loud refrigerator and a suspiciously uncomfortable bed and super loud upstairs neighbours, but somehow this hasn't upset me too much. Instead, I have fitful sleep punctuated with bizarre dreams about refrigerators. It's kind of fun.

I shaved a small band of my head. On the left side of my head. It runs from my temple to the nape of my neck and you can't see it unless i wear my hair up. It feels like a newborn kitten, and I can be seen absent-mindedly stroking the patch behind my left ear (handy because I can adjust my glasses with my right hand at the same time).

Ten days from now, I'll be in Saskatchewan. Before that, I have a tonne of zines to finish and photocopy (on a real tight budget) and a festival to attend. Oy. I need to stop by Midoco and pick up some new pens, as I've been wearing them down like a fiend with everyday drawings. I feel like I'm finally getting somewhere. Maybe.

This summer I want to shriek with giggles and kick my feet, wholly delighted with something ridiculous. I wanna sit in the Cooleymobile at the Teen Sex Cove eating blood orange sorbet and talking shit and listening to silly music. Ohhh and drink baby duck by the Meewasin eat five-cent candy on the rooftops of Broadway listen to new order while i get ready for art shows.

Things are going to go well. I know this.

tummy rumblings.

2010-03-29T18:03:00.000-07:00

Your fragility is so destructive.

your dreams blindfold you by the light you make.

2010-03-27T11:25:00.000-07:00

The end of March is hard for me.

The anniversary of J's passing is creeping up. I've been having dreams about his dark brown (almost black eyes) set in his thin face. About how his nostrils flared ever so slightly when he was anxious. I've been thinking about how when he burst into a grin at one of my silly jokes, it never reached those almostblack eyes, and how guilty I feel that I never noticed this fact until after he was gone.

J...if you can read this through some magical afterlifey powers...please know how much I've been thinking of you. Don't feel guilty or sad; I know you had to go and the decision would have been hard enough without having to think of how others would take it. Maybe I was just some peripheral figure at your hellish workplace, but J...you made me happy. I looked forward to heading into that cramped, cold chart room because I knew you'd be there. I knew you'd do your hilarious Ali G impression or tell me about Derrida or that we'd talk about Einsturzende Neubauten. You were truly special to me. I hope you're somewhere, full of light and love and that your beautiful dark eyes are part of your smile now.

On a separate note, late march is also when my stomach starts clenching with the remembrance of love. I don't try to push it out of my mind; I gently allow myself to push at my own swollen heart. In wonder.

not forests but gentle trees

2010-03-24T21:04:00.000-07:00

Here's a factoid for you, tiny readership, which I will now ask you to help demonstrate:

How old are you?

What number sprung to mind when you read that? According to my (mumbles under breath) psychotherapist, if this number is not your actual age, it is often an indicator that part of you is stuck in a traumatic or momentous event that happened during the (inaccurate) year you instantly think of.

I find this fascinating and touching and mildly depressing.

Lately my head has been in my sketchbook and in the clouds. I've been having strange thrilling nerve-wracking dreams. I've been drawing my friends' faces and thinking about how I do and don't want to spend the summer outside of Toronto. I think it will be a good break, but I will miss it terribly. I have a problem with romanticizing whatever I've left or am leaving. Nostalgia addict.

Everything makes me anxious and/or excited these days.

yours truly, jens lekman

2010-03-07T17:13:00.000-08:00

(note: i am not jens lekman)

Today I had a four hour rehearsal for my reading-theatre-class final, then promptly spent the rest of the day changing my clothes every five minutes, bursting into tears, breathing weird, eating a sammich, listening to jens, trying to get people to go drinking with me... and finally watching an episode of kids in the hall, during which i felt like crying because it looks like they are having so much fun at the party in the opening credits (shot in Toronto at the old Guvernment...season 4).

What with my wildly oscillating living arrangements, emotional turmoil(tm), etc., I've been a very silly basketcase lately. I sat down in my poetry class the other day and everyone looked at me expectantly. It turned out I had a seminar presentation worth 1/4 of my final mark. I had no idea. I hadn't done the reading. I didn't even know what day it was; it was amazing that I managed to get there at all.

(Note: it was fine. I did it the next class, and did very well I think.)

I've also forgot doctor's appointments, plans with friends, my age, etc.

The good news is that I've been offered a position as an artist-in-residence in Halifax for a few weeks this september. I'm thrilled at the prospect. Also a little nervous.

Lately my heart feels like a terribly wound up elastic band that keeps being plucked and shot around the room. This is a second-or-third hand metaphor I picked up a coupla years back.

Unfortunately, I suffer from an illness that has the ability to either make me incredibly eloquent or incredibly incoherent. Today it's the latter.

Goodnight.

lump.

2010-02-24T12:57:00.000-08:00

i am a lump.

today i went to my new coffee shop. drew a bit, worked on my zine a bit, and then lay on the couch watching Larry David make an ass of himself.

made some vegan chocolate chip cookies.

please please please let me have more energy and happiness tomorrow.

the swans are all huddled together

2010-02-23T20:24:00.000-08:00

This little robin doesn't have a nest anymore.

I'm living out of a suitcase in a cramped basement suite that isn't mine. And it's fine and I'm lucky I have someone I can go to. So lucky. And the home I left behind was broken and fucked up and it's good that I'm gone, but...

I don't have a room anymore.

My stuff is still at the old house, and I don't know when or how to get it.

I don't know how to tell my parents about the chamber of horrors the past three weeks have been.

My body is extremely displeased. So is my bank account.

But I'll be in a much safer place in 61 days and We Will All Be Well, etc.

I'm okay, everyone!

ampersand after ampersand

2010-02-02T17:36:00.000-08:00

Do you remember faux-swingdancing with me in the streets at night when no one else was around?

I've been doing the following: swilling beer with my roommate, wearing a million different colours of tights, thumbing through 18th century novels lazily, showing off my armpit hair in cramped bars, seeing lots of plays for class, chomping down on fruit bandits (a no-name equivalent of runts, i think), and spending hours in waiting rooms and specialist offices. I'm actually doing considerably well. The trick is spending extremely little time in my mind and lots of time finding other things to occupy it.

Drawing and writing have been hard lately. Too much in-my-mind time. Blogging clearly isn't helping the situation...but i wanted to anyway, since last post wasn't especially cheery.

I want to spend the summer in cotton dresses and wool socks, cycling through the streets of my hometown with a fisherprice tape recorder blasting my themesongs (I mentioned this to V at the Only and some guy at the bar turned around and told me he liked the idea...eash). I want to finish a million unfinished art projects and drink on the river landing. I want to drive far away in the Cooleymobile, eating blood orange sorbet.

Oh, that living in the future. Doing my best to live here right now. Magnetic Fields this month, possible zine trip to Chicago, and visits with the lovely M.E. are all on the horizon.

2010-01-26T12:28:00.000-08:00

oh, how quickly optimism is quashed.

i'm reminded of this scene in Shortbus where Severin, the dominatrix, bursts into tears in front of Sook-yin Li's character. "What if I can't afford to live here anymore? I can't go back!" She cries and cries, then, sniffing, tries to convince herself that she can just stay in New York City and make art all year.

that scene touches a nerve. i know i know, those fucking Torontonians comparing themselves to New Yorkers when they couldn't be more different...but i'm genuinely struck with fear when it comes to this city. it's too expensive. as far as employment, i live contract to contract, in constant fear of where my next paycheque will come from. how long can i stay in Toronto before it chews me up and spits me out?

and i'm sick. i don't want to scare anyone, but i am really sick right now. i can't tell my parents, provinces away, because i just don't want to cause more confusion and concern. my eyes burn and my stomach has stopped growling for food, knowing there isn't any more coming. i sob out of nowhere. make late-night teary phone calls when i'm so delirious that i might as well be drunk. Not Good.

i'm going to go to a facility tonight, and i'm not going to tell my family. i need the people who read this to help make sure that this remains quiet. i promise i will seek help, but i really do need to do it in privacy.

absolutely cuckoo.

2010-01-17T09:10:00.001-08:00

Against better judgment, perhaps, I am having the best day ever. I should be working on an essay or something, but i'm instead sitting on my floor drawing and drinking boozy coffee in shortshorts (a.k.a. little boys' swimming trunks from sears).

This summer is going to be fucking awesome. Saskatoon (feminist posse!), Israel (my sister's wedding!), and maaaaaybe if I'm lucky Halifax. Yesss! 2010, I had no idea you were gonna be so fun. At least for the first while.

My new roommate is lovely. On my first night here, he gave me a ticket to see the Magnetic Fields and kept me company while I started unpacking. Our third roommate (his partner) will be here in a month and I imagine the awesomeness will only increase exponentially.

Goodmoodgoodmoodgoodmood.

wonderful and odd; our memories are all we've got.

2010-01-15T19:04:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting on my mattress and listening to my new roommate singing along to an unidentifiable singer/songwriter. He has a nice voice and it pleases me that I will probably have a soundtrack most of the time we're both here.

The thing about gathering everything you own is, you reexamine all of it. I've found journals, so many journals. Thumbnails of so many potential comics. Half-started drawings. Reading and seeing who I was when I first came to this city is sort of heartbreaking.

"My life is about to fucking supernova," I told Jen on the deck of Red Rocket Coffee on the evening of her departure.

Thinking about the future means you want something.
-Douglas Coupland

i don't know what i can save you from

2010-01-14T20:20:00.000-08:00

okay, disclaimer.

it's 11:20 p.m., there's a party at my house, i'm drunk, and i'm packing up all my possessions.

dear goodness, has it only been 19 months since I moved here?

i came here in april. my heart was broken. i had short hair and i was wearing birds on my shirt. alone: that was how i felt. andrew t came over on my 2nd day here and in my peripheral vision, he reminded me of someone i loved.

i scooped out dishes of ice cream for him.

why am i moving? for cheaper rent. for a change. to be on the west side.

sometimes i think about the word "sublime": originally, feeling the sublime meant you felt tiny and insignificant; a speck of dust on the marred face of the universe.

that's how i feel tonight. in a happy way.

i think about slaughterhouse 5 too. about the aliens who see time as happening all at once. being happy about each moment of good, all the time. is there a reason humans don't do this?

of course.

would i go back tonight if i could?

do you even need to ask?

i'm ready for an adventure.

2010-01-11T12:04:00.000-08:00

The past three days have been the best days of my year so far. And yeah, the year just started, but I think this is significant anyway.

So what have I been up to?

1.) Making coffee at home, to save money. This is my usual ritual:
-Put the coffee grinds in my 1-cup French press. I drink 10 000 Villages Fair Trade Peru Dark Roast, and sometimes various Intelligentsia beans from Manic Coffee
-Add a sprinkle ground cloves and 1 tsp ground cinnamon
-boil ze water
-brew for exactly 3.5 minutes
---->simultaneously, i heat up about an inch of soymilk and a splash of vanilla extract
-pour the coffee into the soymilk/vanilla mix
-DRINK UP! It's like delicious Mayan chocolate. Without the chocolate.

2.) Drawing. I've accomplished so much in the past 3 days! Cover for my next zine, 3 complete illustrations, 3 illustrations underway. How is that possible? Well, I haven't been called into work, and I've been acknowledging that I love hanging out by myself. It's so satisfying to sit in my room, drawing whilst...

3.) ...Listening to This American Life. I know I'm the last person on this bandwagon, but I don't even care because I've fallen so deeply in love. This weekend alone: 9 hours of TAL.

4.) Applying for a residency. Don't want to get too into detail, because I don't wanna get my hopes up.

5.) An excellent 59-minute phone conversation with Cat.

6.) Going to a sweet knitting group. I am getting pretty darn good at knitting.

7.) Plotting several textile projects. Eeee.

And now: back to packing my stuff up and trying to get in line with Academia. Note the capital A. Eeesh.

weekends away

2009-07-22T14:33:00.000-07:00

Today is my day off.

It's 5:33 and I'm too coffee-jittery. I drank two really great coffees today, so thick and oily that they sparkled (even when I added soymilk) but now I'm paying the price. My insides are all chattery and impatient. Adding to my general discomfort: I put on Paris Je T'aime hoping for some background noise but just got drawn into all the sad plots. I don't think I really like it. It seemed awesome when I saw it at the Broadway whenever it came out, but now...not so much. I like the one with the Spanish-speaking mom-nanny, but it's ungodly depressing. And the one with the little dead cowboy...but that's also depressing. I guess I am just not into sad stuff right now.

What problems!

Just kidding. It's really my fault for not using my day off more productively. I knit a few rows of the sweater I'm working on but that's about it. And got a new bank card. And went to therapy. I read Be Good in the tub. Wrote Maranda a letter and posted it. Maybe it wasn't so unproductive after all?

Last night I slept exceptionally well. My room was exactly the right temperature and pitch and I drifted off snuggled against CB. When he woke up and left for work I slept for another hour. I prefer sleeping in together, but this was a close second. Anyway, after an hour I got up and had bran flakes with soy milk and raisins (I pried them out of three of those little red boxes they come in: raisin fiend). And that oily delicious coffee I mentioned earlier.

My posts are always so mundane. I think mundanity makes me nice and calm, a good antidote for all the anxiety I have. "Mundanity" is not a word, and I think that's a problem.

Anyway...I hope everyone's doing well. Now it's time to put some food into my belly.

xoxo

let me show you girl that i know wrong from right

2009-07-16T04:55:00.000-07:00

So, I went to a doctor for my once-a-year-complete physical (which I probably haven't had done in years...I think my last time seeing a family doctor was when I was 17. YIKES). She was the most doctorly doctor ever - extremely calm, cool, and collected, her reaction to any distress I was in was not to reassure me but to offer suggestions, etc. I think the stereotype of doctors as problem solvers and nurses as caregivers is not too far from the mark, in all reality. While sometimes I think I'd prefer to just see a nurse practitioner for all my medical needs, there is occasionally just something about someone who gets to the facts with or without your total emotional ease.

Anyway, it turns out that EVERYONE WAS RIGHT: taking a daily B complex is actually necessary. So I've started taking a B complex! I've never taken supplements in my nine years of being veg (except for a brief period last summer where I chomped down on Flintstones multivitamins like they were candy)...it turns out that B deficiency can actually make you - get this - MANIC. And depressed, irritable, etc. I'm looking forward to being a more pleasant person (well...potentially).

My mom is visiting for the summer and so it's meant long, awesome hangouts where we make pizza or strawberry jam, knit up a storm, traipse around the better coffee shops of Toronto and where she meets me for lunch when I'm at work. It's been pretty fantastic. I'm looking forward to next month when I'll get to see Cat and we'll do many similarly wonderful activities.

Today I'm wearing a totally ridiculous dress that I'm not entirely sure I can pull off at work, but we'll see. I hear bright blue gingham is due for a comeback.

xoxo
clara bee

a nightmare + the end of the academic year

2009-05-27T12:21:00.000-07:00

I had a really terrible nightmare last night. Or maybe it just seemed terrible because I rarely have nightmares. Anyway, the details are vague now, but I do remember a rooftop party, a girl going missing, and sneaking away from the party when cops and ambulances showed up. I didn't know why I was leaving. I was afraid they would think I did it (not sure what).

The dawn approached, and I found Alison on the empty streets of Broadway. Blood was running into all the storm drains, flowing red. I asked in a tiny voice what happened, and she said "Everyone with running water has seen it this morning. Her blood." I felt so afraid and I asked Alison to hold my hand. She did and we walked up Main street. I wondered why I had left, and if they were going to think I killed her. Alison's hand was reassuring in mine. I could hear sirens in the background.

I awoke, shaking. My bare arms were very cold. I woke CB and whispered "I had a nightmare, can you please hold me?" He was still mostly asleep, but complied. Wasn't able to shake the feeling until the alarm went off at 6:40.

Tomorrow will be my last exam at school. I'm very much looking forward to this. My friend Michela and I studied for four hours this morning. I've done all the stuff necessary for CB and my trip to NYC, and am feeling much calmer than I did this morning. Right now I can't imagine anything better than going to museums and bookstores and zine libraries and vegan restaurants with my CB.

xoxo
cbl

the middle of things

2009-05-11T04:24:00.000-07:00

Ah, school. I dislike it so much, yet it follows me around like a wheezing puppy I can't ignore. Actually, I think I'd much prefer a wheezing puppy to school, but I certainly wouldn't have the cash to pay for its vet bills. Anyway, one paper and three finals to go.

This weekend was TCAF, but I honestly spent very little time there, which is a bit of a downer. It happens every two years, I suppose, but I would've enjoyed going to some readings and panels. However, I had a pretty wonderful weekend anyway. CB and I slept in super late, ate falafel, were the hapless victims of an insane, unexpected thunderstorm, then came back to my house where he patiently sat next to me and kept himself occupied while I typed away at an essay. We ate pad thai at Jean's Vegetarian Kitchen (don't worry, I specified "no eggs") and returned, quietly keeping each other company until I decided to stop for the night and we fell asleep like exhausted kittens.

It sounds kind of...normal, I guess, but it was actually a really lovely time. What I'm looking forward to even more is when we can spend time together but I won't be doing school work. When we can chill and do creative stuff. CB is a top-notch person. For real. Risking sounding mushy, my day is always best when he's a part of it.

Anyway. It's time to get ready for work, if I don't want to be late, which...naturally I don't. By the way, I'm thoroughly enjoying the company I have at work, in particular two amazing individuals who laugh at my ridiculous and often nonsensical jokes and in turn tell equally ridiculous ones for me to giggle at.

Remind me to tell y'all about my hilarious Star Wars: A New Hope dream later.

xoxo
cbl

2009-05-08T04:36:00.000-07:00

I'm wrapped up in a blanket on the couch before getting dressed for work as I write this, sipping a vegan breakfast smoothie that is kinda changing my life.

From Nicole Georges' Invincible Summer, Vol. I:

1 banana
1 cup soy milk
1 handful coconut shreds
1 heaping tablespoon almond butter
honey, to taste (I left it out, personally)
Blend it all up!

Seriously. Amazing.

School's been a bit of a bummer as of late, but I think I can handle it. Two more papers and three exams in the next three weeks, which is sort of horrifying, but totally doable. My self-confidence was bolstered by an academic adviser I ran into at a book launch (which I attended with the ever-lovely Jess) who remarked that my grades were very good. I mean...I guess so?

What else. Two of my zines got reviewed in Broken Pencil, which was unexpected and awesome. Unfortunately, the site doesn't have an online version of the print version, so you can't read it unless you have a copy. Anyway, this is really the shot in the arm I needed to start working on stuff again. This week, I sat at a little table in our backyard with my typewriter working on a new zine while Jess sat on a blanket in the (soon-to-be-mowed) grass, catching up on Canadian culture with a pile of arts magazines. It was a really fantastic feeling...one I hope to have again, as soon as finals are ooover.

Work has offered me some extra hours, which is good and bad - good because I need the cash, bad because it'll interfere a mite with studying this week. I think it'll end up being fine, but nonetheless I feel a shade nervous. I'll be so glad when school is all wrapped up and done with.

Anyway. I'd best be off, but I promise to try with more regular updates.

xoxo
cbl

this song you just learned

2009-04-24T12:02:00.000-07:00

A year ago today, I arrived at Pearson International Airport with one big suitcase, knocked numb and hazy from Cat's wisdom tooth surgery painkillers she had given me to soothe my nerves for the plane. The reality of the move sunk in as I rode in the stiflingly hot backseat of my aunt's car.

That night, Felizia and I walked to the Big Carrot. I bought juice and vegetables to calm me. I got out a little piece of paper and called Andrew, asked him if he and Paul were still coming to visit me the next day. I put on the new shoes my dad had bought me. I cried as quietly as I could.

I thought of the little calendars I had kept in my room for months, counting down the days until I moved. I thought about how I stopped ticking the boxes towards the end. I thought about excited whisperings to Cat and Alison at Louis' one march night.

There are so many ways this place has become home, big and small: heartbreak, building a map of the city in my head, making fantastic friends, a shitty job, a great job, the discovery of beautiful tiny city secrets, getting lost and found on public transit, falling in love.

Tonight my roommates (upstairs and downstairs) are having a barbecue (and don't worry, there will be veggie burgers, and they will be grilled first) and I couldn't imagine better timing.

It is a good time for me to be alive.

2009-04-05T15:13:00.000-07:00

I know I haven't updated in almost a month. For most of March, I just couldn't think of anything interesting to say (not that that's ever stopped me), and this past week has been of particular difficulty. It's been very hard to talk to anyone or make myself do anything.

On Monday, March 30th, I, along with all of my coworkers (some friends, some strangers) was informed that my dear friend and colleague had passed away. Out of respect to him, who was always a very private man, I don't wish to say too much about his role in relation to mine at work, but suffice to say we worked together every day since I began working there. I feel uncomfortable disclosing his cause of death, but yet I feel I must, for I'm simply not up for telling everyone separately now, and it is an important factor. He took his own life.

He was a big reason why I enjoy my work. Every day between ten and eleven (depending how busy it was), we'd make earl grey tea together. He did a perfect Ali G impression that made me laugh every time. There are never enough pens where we work, and they always go missing, so we'd routinely re-enact the "My Pen!" sketch from Kids in the Hall. He was a deeply spiritual and religious man, and right before he stopped coming to work, he lent me a fantastic book, which I wrote about here (the one about Islam and the West). He always wore birkenstocks, and up until the end of this week, they were still there in my workspace, tucked under a table. I kept staring at them and thinking "dead man's shoes", a phrase the origins of which I can't recall. It made me feel guilty. He is not a dead man, but my friend.

One time we discussed the band Einstuerzende Neubauten, him mentioning he had seen them in concert. After this friday, I had one of their songs stuck in my head and thought of how much it described this friend. Particularly, the line "it's in the open, but it doesn't get stolen". In a way, we all recognized how beautiful and amazing he was, but at the same time we never really got it. He was underappreciated. I never asked him if anything was wrong, because it never seemed like anything was.

My dear friend, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry I didn't ask. I'm sorry I didn't tell you everyday how helpful you were to me, sorry that I didn't thank you for your patience and hard work. I miss you so much. We all do. I hope you found what you were looking for.

before we knew it

2009-03-08T19:20:00.000-07:00

I'm in a super nostalgic mood today. Oh brother.

Lately I've found myself missing lots of people lately, particularly the very special and unique friendship I am lucky enough to share with Alison and Cat. Remembering the three of us at the Living Room or walking to J.S. Wood singing Tom Petty songs or driving in the green sedan to Jerry's for sorbet and then the Weir, shrieking with laughter.

These two women are so important. I wish I could properly convey that to you all. And I think we are made better by hanging out with one another. Sure, we're all cool girls on our own, but somehow we're better and brighter together. We are, as Vonnegut would say, of the same karass. Spring is coming and I know that around this time last year we were running down Lansdowne, no sweat sneakers hitting the snow-melty pavement, giggling like hell. I love those girls.

I also have been having some little pangs for other feelings that were developing around this time last year via Canadapost. Yeah...listening to MGMT and MIA and elaborately drawing monsters in shirts and ties on parcels. Before that other dude came along.

Oh, and I have it on good authority that at least two of my exes read this blog, which is sort of embarrassing, but more so for them, I think.

This is a really busy month for me. Lots of essays, etc. to finish. And lots of involvement! I'm going to a teach-in that No One Is Illegal is putting on and plan on attending their meetings more regularly. Also, *fingers crossed* I might be doing some art for a cool store I frequent. AND! Food Not Bombs.

Last night, after a big day of International Women's Day madness, I went to Dance Cave with my roommate and friend Jen and met up with some other good folks. Age of Consent came on and I dragged everyone to the dance floor, even though it wasn't the "cool" time to dance yet.

Doodle doo do d-d-do do do d-do...woooon't you please take me home...

Felizia and I went for brunch today. I made friends with this really great couple and mentioned to them that I have an irrepressible love of fake '50s diners, but can never find satisfying vegan options there. They referred me to Sadie's, this fantastic place on Adelaide and Portland. It has the perfect combination of total kitsch, great vegan food, and totally affordable prices. I can even go there for BRUNCH, an amazing meal which is too often only for omnivores and vegetarians. Felizia, a fairly hardcore meat-eater, also enjoyed it. We've agreed that it will be the Numero Uno Post-Hangover Destination.

And now: goodnight. There are more adventures to be had tomorrow, and with each passing day I know we are closer to spring.

this is just my own little unscientific inconsequential post-script

2009-02-25T18:44:00.000-08:00

I think I'm getting sick. You know that feeling?

Last night, neither I nor my CPA (close personal associate, not certified public accountant) could sleep. Out of seemingly nowhere, he sat up in bed like an actor does in a movie after the character has an alarming dream and began, "If you were on a desert island..."

Among the things to decide were: what basic meal you would choose for the duration of my stay, what album you'd bring, and who you would get a yearly phone call to. The rest I can't really remember.

Anyway, I said tempeh and avocado sandwiches on whole wheat bread, Blonde on Blonde, and Cat (he chose chicken fried rice, Graceland, and one of his uncles). I don't consider Blonde on Blonde my favourite album of all time (in fact, I'm not entirely sure it would even be my favourite Dylan album or even on my top ten albums of all time), but I think it would be good desert-island music. Probably. Tempeh-avocado-sandwiches and Cat, on the other hand, are definitely two of my favourites of all time. There are other foods and people I love, of course, but nothing satisfies me like a tempeh avocado sandwich, or a more-than-an-hour-long phonecall with Cat.

The reason why I'm writing this seemingly inconsequential post is because I'm sick of studying for my final, even though said studying mainly consists of reading comic books, an otherwise enjoyable pursuit. I'm sorry for being such a slacker.

I am really looking forward to summer. Nightly, I dream of bicycle rides and evening walks and cotton dresses.

grand pianos crash together

2009-02-15T12:33:00.000-08:00

For one reason or another, I just cannot get started on an essay today. It's totally beautiful outside and the perfect weather for a bicycle ride. But...the essay isn't gonna write itself, and it's on a book I like, so I should really just hop to it. After this...obviously.

I'm drinking instant coffee with cinnamon and brown sugar and it's pretty stellar, surprisingly. I'm insanely broke right now, so I cooked up a huge amount of beans in tomato sauce, which I will be eating with rice for the next...long time.

Lately I haven't been into straightening my hair or shaving my armpits. Two new habits I hope I can keep up. But I've been feeling as though I'm in highschool again...Monster Days. I know I'm not a monster but a human being, but it can be hard to believe sometimes. York girls all seem to have inexplicably long, shiny, perfectly styled hair and flawless clothes. I mean, it's not a style I aspire to, but none of these women look remotely awkward...their pants aren't baggy at the knees, or too long...they don't look uncomfortable in what they're wearing. Their (incredible expensive) shoes don't have holes or salt stains (how is that possible?!) and they all carry these huge-yet-unridiculous bags.

Meanwhile I'm wearing over-washed jeans that are way too baggy at the ankles and knees and shirts I've had since highschool with my frizzy hair tucked into a hat. But I speak a lot in class, so maybe they think I'm really confident and totally down with looking the way I do. Someday I will be!

Okay, for real, I'm going to start this essay so I can go for a bike ride tonight.

SIDENOTE: If you were wondering, Hallmark Day came and went with a trip to No Frills, a homemade meal, and an episode of Carl Sagan's Cosmos. So pretty much a typical night for my Close Personal Associate and me.

no one looks too surprised

2009-02-10T19:53:00.000-08:00

I'm drinking green tea and listening to Billy Bragg, taking a break from this really good book my co-worker lent me. It's a conversation between Jacques Derrida and Mustafa Cherif and it's amazing. About Islam and the West, how there's no one Islam, how there's no one West, and how everyone needs to chill the fuck out about attacking religion. Haha. Oversimplified. It's a very graceful consideration of many important things. Not one-sided or anything at all, if that's how I'm making it sound.

Tired as hell. School is lots of reading. I might take a highschool chemistry class next year at night...the idea of doing a highschool course makes me nervous, but I think I might need chem 20 in order to do any programs of interest to me apres l'anglais degree. I'm so excited!

My friend Steph sent me a beautiful parcel with gifts from her and Maja. I may have mentioned this in my last quasi-drunken post. When I grow up, I want a submarine-themed Jacques Cousteau bathroom. And a pink office. Yeah, pink. Cotton candy-like. With ornate white frames with Steph's art in them.

(Oh and...by "office", I mean my own room, if I share a bedroom with someone. I think it's important to have your own space.)

Tonight CB and I supped on the finest stirfry: banana peppers, broccoli, carrots, tempeh, and red bell peppers in a thick homemade peanut sauce over brown basmati rice. I would like to be able to dedicate lots of time to every meal someday. Not just some pb & j every lunch, but something with actual vegetables and stuff. Don't get me wrong...I love the pb & j. But still.

YEAH I know I talk about food a lot, and "when I grow up". Sorry.

Things are good in the present too. I love everyone around me and work and even school is developing a faint spring-y glow when I hear sparrows chirping in the reed-thin young trees at York.

i am finally seeing

2009-02-06T22:07:00.000-08:00

Tonight at the Red Room, Paul and Emma and Jessica and I drank so much sangria and then they started playing "The District Sleeps Alone Tonight" by the Postal Service. And everyone in the pub cheered so loud when Ben Gibbard sung "Smeeeaaaared black ink". Unbelievable. I used to listen to that song so much when I was 16, lying in my hammock, brittle hair snaking out from me. You know.

I also got a parcel from Steph today with the most beautiful things in it, including a silkscreen she named after me and a pair of earrings Maja made for me. It almost hurts (it does hurt) how wonderful most people are.

School is going fine, if you were wondering. I'm getting all As and A+s. After I finish this degree next year, I will do something with less theory and more practice. Like putting needles into people or listening to them talk about their problems...it depends on which program jumps to accept me first. And whether or not I'm a total flake.

Oh and...I called Ernest Hemmingway a "pretentious misogynistic blowhard" in my tutorial and my T.A., the ever-plaid-shirted Dave, laughed uncomfortably. It was awesome. I'm glad I got that off my chest.

bread and roses. i mean, essays.

2009-01-31T09:29:00.000-08:00

So.

I'm going back to school this week, which will be weird, to say the least. I've been trying to do some work to lighten the feeling of total anxiety that will doubtless strike (haha) once I return to that Suburban Campus O'Doom. This morning I finished the longest essay that'll be due within a few weeks, only to find when I checked my email that it's due almost three weeks from now. In all reality, this is a good thing, because I'll be able to refine it and whatnot.

Later today: the starting of a short but kind of pain-in-the-ass paper on gender and power in The Bacchae and Antigone.

In other news, I've been crazy broke (croke, if you will) and thus trying to come up with Creative Kitchen Solutions (registered trademark). Last night I made some pretty good whole wheat soda bread, and currently in the oven is some raisin soda bread using the less-hardcore all-purpose flour. In case anyone doesn't know, soda bread is not filled with cream soda...it's a really dense Irish bread that doesn't use any rising agents (like yeast). So it's delicious and requires little-to-no patience! Oh, and usually it can be made with 5 or less ingredients, which is ideal.

I've also been eating a lot of rice and tempeh. Seriously looking forward to having the dough for some fresh vegetables and possibly some juice or something.

So, uh...this is likely not interesting to anyone else. And is poorly written, due to the fact that I've squeezed out an essay recently. My apologies.

Tonight I'm going to an Unsuperbowl Party. Not sure what exactly said party will entail. Meanwhile, my Close Personal Associate is going to be in small-town Southern Ontario watching two dudes beat the crap out of each other on TV. I'm thinking my time will be better spent.

little red wagon, little red bike.

2009-01-24T14:53:00.000-08:00

I feel like if my heart was playing a board game, it would be RISK, and I'd be losing really, really badly, because all my little pieces would be spread out on different, unconnected areas of land.

Snerk snerk.

My school is going to be back in session soon. I'm prepping myself for numerous anxiety attacks.

Lately I've been drinking a lot of genmaicha tea and getting up like six times a night to pee, waking up everyone in the process. And eating vegetables. Too many. If I have to eat cauliflower or broccoli again in the next 48 hours, I'm going to hurl.

A couple nights ago, as I was falling asleep on a cramped single bed, I remembered sitting outside The Outhouse (not an actual outhouse, but a big white house on Clarence that several of my friends have lived in at various stages of my life) after a living room show with Rachel and having one the most honest conversations we had ever had. Then her and a boy who she had dated walked me home, and I remember feeling like her and I had a weirdly powerful secret.

We ended up having a secret, but it wasn't weird or powerful.

Secrets and suspension and uncertainty are usually things with a lot of potential, but that potential doesn't always arrive. That's why they're so fun and scary in the first place.

I'll post something more concrete someday.

dishes and last week's papers

2009-01-12T16:28:00.000-08:00

V and I were talking on the phone. She was telling me about how so many of our highschool friends are in or applying for med school. How some of them aren't and are horrified with themselves.

We were in a group for "accelerated learners", which is to say, there were 40 or so of us (in a graduating class of about 200 kids) who had all our classes together and were continually told what stereotypes we fitted and given continual tips on how to stick with them. I'm being unfair. There were some great teachers. Maybe the wretchedness of highschool just casts such a program in a grisly pall.

Anyway. "Everyone's just at a crossroads, I guess," V said.

"I'm not. I'm not even at the crossroads yet."
"Me neither."

In all honesty, I don't even know where to go right now. I've been out of school since November 6th because of this bloody strike and I honestly can't imagine going back. The very thought makes me feel queasy. Working three days a week certainly isn't enough, and I'm becoming increasingly unmotivated with my own pursuits.

I need to kick my own ass.

Then again: is it so bad to be the girl who wears braids and reads books but maybe doesn't get all the metaphors and references, who works at a clinic for a decent wage (knock freaking wood) and makes her friends big vegan meals, the girl whose schedule is so flexible that when you call and say "My back hurts", she actually says "I'll be over to fix it in a moment"? I mean, I'm happy. I have more money in my CPP than anyone else I know who's my age. I feel kind of like a grown-up Pippi Longstocking.

In other news, I got a tiny parcel from some eBayer from Maryland today. Three sweet as hell E.T. necklaces that cost under $5 (shipping included). Currently sporting one of E.T. and Elliott where E.T. kind of looks like a disgusting giant penis (watch as my blog counter goes up by 2000 for use of the phrase "giant penis").

Awesomely, The Weakerthans are touring with the Constantines for the first time in four years. It's twenty-five bones, which is approximately $15 more than I've ever paid to see them, but for their sweet highschool meaningfulness, it is worth it to me. I will likely be attending with my favourite set of brothers.

If anything, I just want to hear them bring Reunion Tour alive. It's a good little album, but just didn't quite get me like, say, Left and Leaving. I know, I know. Blah blah they're poets not musicians. Whatever. They are so good at making beautiful things.

2009-01-08T18:57:00.000-08:00

What would you say is the most thrilling beautiful process in the whole world?

I would say something involving skin, because skin is such a beautiful, thrilling organ. When I was a young teenager and had never even kissed someone or held someone's hand, I would often daydream of how I would just like to touch someone's face. To feel how someone else's anatomy fits together, I think, or maybe just because I was a painfully lonely kid who felt utterly starved for contact.

But anyway.

I'm reading Kurt Vonnegut's Galapagos at the moment and it, too, is thrilling and beautiful. Feeling a little bit worried about my "big brain". Something in his writing has this ability to push (gently push) at a highly sensitive point in your chest, even with the silliest things.

My bedroom is so cold. I haven't slept here much at all this week and I'm re-acclimatizing. No warm extra body for me tonight! But I'm planning on an early sleep before work tomorrow.

Incidentally, it has struck me how very very lucky I am to work where I do with the people who also do. I know that someday, when I leave that tiny chart room, I will dearly, dearly miss it.

you can scoop out my brain

2008-12-28T13:28:00.000-08:00

I'm going to go home soon. Home to Toronto, I mean.

This trip to the homeland has been horrifically, tamely painful. I guess what I mean is that I didn't cry, but I did shake a tonne, sitting alone at a table in the Roastery with my back to the biggest heartbreak of my life. I had a short conversation of polite, bitten-off sentences punctuated by a terse goodbye.

Oh and then I wrote a fucking ridiculous pseudo-cryptic paragraph about (above).

I was going to say "I don't just think about the gradients and shades and mechanics of feelings", but that actually is all I do. And I'm not even good at it!

My beautiful friends opened their arms and let me run into them. Thanks guys. Seeing these people really scared me, because I love them so much and I kind of forgot that I did until I laid eyes on them. Until we were halfway through talking about how much the students' union sucked and even though it was a totally mundane conversation I wanted to burst into tears and hug them. Until I got home, nose frostbitten and jeans frozen from cold and understood that I had just seen them for the last time in months (maybe longer).

Maybe best of all, I made a new friend. A beautiful girl who makes beautiful things and is vulnerable in the same way I am. A girl who, last night, snuck a camera into my face, the flash blinding me in an unsuspecting expression, then threw her head back and laughed maniacally. She is six years older than me and that partially makes me sad, because it is going to take me six years, probably, to get wise(r).

I will be back in four days and I will need familiar faces and potlucks and lots of hand-holding to make me feel sane and whole, okay?

but there's no way we can relive our youthful past

2008-12-23T17:18:00.000-08:00

Maybe I should save this for the zine, but there's something that's been hounding me for awhile, and I want to write about it now.

My sister said, "I think there's a certain degree of permanency we expect from love, whether we're conscious of it or not."

I thought about an unerasable memory: kissing on a creaky futon and seeing the boy's eyes trace my unclothed skin. "Please," I whispered, "Don't," turning his chin up with a hand. He laughed, not a mean laugh, a laugh that was bewildered and sweet and said my name in the gentlest voice I have ever heard say my name.

I thought about this, and then thought: We're Not Friends. Not in a mad way, a vengeful way...not in any way except a profound and sad puzzlement. Something that at once seemed so big is now so gone.

what is the light

2008-12-11T15:31:00.000-08:00

I feel more and more tired every day, which likely has something to do with goodbye parties and wine and mimosas and sleepovers. I just have to get through this weekend moderately alive. Come on team come on.
Vanessa and I saw Wilco and Neil Young, and it was awesome. Wilco didn't rock nearly as much as I expected them to, but they did play "Company in my Back" and "I'm the Man Who Loves You", which was really good enough. Neil rocked out, but not in an embarrassing Mick Jagger (i.e. wizened strutting peacock) kind of way. Just really pure, as cheesy and idealistic as that sounds.
I got a cellphone. Or rather, Vanessa is moving, so I'm taking over hers for nine months. It takes me half an hour to send a text message. My ringtone is the Star Wars themesong. Badass.
Lately I've been listening to the Flaming Lips' The Soft Bulletin and it's perfect for the weather/time/etc.
I am pretty happy and I don't have trouble sleeping much anymore.

right this way to the museum of love

2008-12-02T14:04:00.000-08:00

Today I sang "Alison" by Elvis Costello. With relatively little irony.
ALISON, I miss you. Also, I heard you let that little friend of mine take off your party dress.

Snerk snerk snerk.

In excellent news, my work contract has been renewed, so I don't have to face employment-related anxiety over winter break. I'm taking two weeks to go visit my parents and friends.

My drawings have been bad lately. The shoulders. Always the shoulders, where the shoulders really connect to the arms. I never feel as if I got it quite right...like I've somehow just lied and cheated my way to making it look alright when it does turn out.

Everything I've written and thought has been fragmented, too.

But in general, things are good. I have security (for now) in my job. I have a favourite Vietnamese restaurant (with two things I can actually eat on the menu). The zine I contributed to is for sale in actual comicbook stores in Toronto (two of my favourites!). And of course, my friends are wonderful as always.

Sorry that I use parentheses so much.

getting dumb

2008-11-16T17:49:00.000-08:00

Things are pretty good with me right now. My roommates gave me money for new pens and markers and a new sketchbook for my birthday. Today my aunt and uncle took me out for lunch and bought me expensive French peasant bread from some classy place in Yorkville (somewhat ironic).

The strike rages on, and only one prof made demands that we stick to deadlines. I started the essay for his class today and banged out a little over 1/4 of it in a little under two hours. I can't tell if it's any good or not, but it came fairly effortlessly. Maybe because it's for a course about comics and cartoons (therefore of interest)? Anyway, what I really wanted to say in regards to this is that while I don't really like school, I'm pretty good at it and it seems a lot more interesting when I don't have to haul my ass to campus. After a couple of years, it's probably safe to say that I'm not the academia-lovin' type (most of the time I want to scream and throw things at everyone), but at least I'm not struggling super hard.

I finished my portrait of Jean-Luc Godard today. Not that much time actually went into it, I just kept getting bored and wanting to do other things. It didn't turn out as charmingly as the Jacques-Yves Cousteau one, but I think it's cute. He ended up being hunkier than he was in real life. I totally suck at using these new brush pens, but I'll get it eventually. These pictures are just going in our kitchen, anyway.

Last night I had a miniature panic attack when I looked in the mirror and some pictures of me were posted to that dreaded facebook thing. Lately I've been feeling really ugly and weird looking, like a squishy alien with tiny watery eyes and a permanently stupid expression on her face. When I was in highschool, this girl I knew said "Do you ever feel like you're watching yourself go through your everyday tasks and all you can think about is how stupid you look doing them?" Like, gosh, how succinct. That's exactly how I feel. Bumbling and stupid and ugly. So last night I sat in my desk chair, terrified and horrified and feeling absolutely paralyzed.

Trying to not get like that too often. It happens less than it used to. It still happens though, and it's still scary when it does.

Today is my Birthday

2008-11-14T04:21:00.000-08:00

(credit: PBF comics (http://www/pbfcomics.com))

So far, I have received a very sweet birthday e-mail from the CBC offering me $5 off my next shop purchase. This means I am seriously considering buying either season one of The Newsroom or all of Twitch City.

I've also eaten a bowl of cheerios and cornflakes combined.

It's a big day, people.

post-script

2008-11-10T16:18:00.000-08:00

My friends and the people I used to know are all becoming insanely beautiful and falling in love and going to big cities to look at art! Help!

he had crashed the t-bird twice

2008-11-10T15:47:00.000-08:00

After work and dinner I made some tea and put my hair up and sat in the bathtub reading this book that Kash introduced me to when we were 15. The Weetzie Bat books? Sure, google them and look at the trashy-looking glitter teenage covers with '90s photography and pink fonts. I secretly was unimpressed and a bit embarrassed when Kash handed me Weetzie Bat. Then I, you know, read them and they were filled with beautiful magical realism prose and the most beautiful things.

Anyway. Along I went with Weetzie and Dirk through the streets of L.A. and their little cottage with the aqua room and the rose room and the rose bushes and lemon trees and, you know, punk rockers and babies and taffeta dresses, and I felt comfortable and familiar with the words, with my green tea and flower-smelling bath, but...

I also felt a bit bummed. I think that's normal.

After my bath I looked in the mirror and saw pale skin and hair and eyebrows and mouth, almost stupidly dark glasses frames. Highschool ripped band tshirt and the underwear that I've had every first time in (inadvertently). Part of me wanted to punch myself in the gut. The rest of me just wanted to shake some sense into that pale shell, that baffled-looking weird face.

I'm working on a series of portraits of old French dudes for our kitchen. I think they are going to be pretty swell.

no false claims

2008-11-05T18:25:00.000-08:00

Over a year ago, I kind of had this thing with a nice dude who sent me lovingly assembled parcels filled with incense and mix cds and national geographic collages and homemade comics. When we finally united, woke up holding each other on his cramped single bed, something was different and cold and slimy in my stomach. I went home and he said "I am still in love with someone else - I'm sorry. I thought you were my ticket away from all this; I really did."

--> and I was pretty steamed.

(but I got over it----------and we didn't talk again)

Then yesterday I got a message from him saying he finally read my favourite book and he loved it.

I feel like boys are constantly deciding I'm not their ticket away and then cold-shouldering my feeble attempts at friendship.

----> so I didn't want to cold-shoulder this boy, even though he was sort of irresponsible with my feelings. he is a genuinely nice person who cares about people

I sent a short, polite message back. I'm glad he enjoyed the book.

I'm not trying to say "SO I'M A MODEL HUMAN BEING", because I'm not. But I think I am trying to say that it isn't so hard to forgive people. It's actually easy. Maybe too easy? I don't know. I don't like to be mad.

looking for a robot to teach object lessons

2008-11-02T06:38:00.000-08:00

This is my first encounter with Daylight Savings Time. I don't know have to change my watch, a (lovingly used) gift from someone seemingly no longer into talking to me (not to be melodramatic, but it is true), so that's sort of a problem. But problems are something I've been trying to not think about too much lately. Yesterday was All Souls Day and it was maybe the best time of my life in quite some time.

Vanessa and I had an incredibly anti-climatic Halloween the night before. We went to go see the Deep Dark Woods (a band from our hometown), but unfortunately we were both so tired and the show started so late that we were literally nodding off midway through the first set. We were planning on going to a party afterwards, but we just ended up going home. So I had an excellent sleep and woke up super late, ate some granola and soymilk, made some vegan chocolate chip cookies, drew a little... Then V came home and we ate a fairly magnificent lunch of nutted couscous with fresh tomato sauce (parenthetical aside: I know I talk about food a lot; that's a post for another day).

Then I realized that I wasn't going to get much work done at home and I went to my friend Chris' house. We listened to Marvin Gaye's What's Going On while I drew and he did homework. It was comfortable and we asked each other some important questions, like:

What three albums do you know best, like, start to finish?
What were the albums in heaviest rotation in your house growing up?
Is it weird to have an all-time favourite song?

Soon it was getting to be dinner time and I booked it to No Frills (after going to wrong way), bought some salsa-ingredients, and shuffled home. Vanessa, Adil, and I made salsa and pita chips, and then the roommates + boyfriends embarked on what would be the awesomest night ever.

1. We went to our old flatmates Edith and Sarah's new house-warming party. They are the nicest people ever and had an enormous (vegan!) feast ready for the insane amount of people there. There was hardwood flooring and halloween lighting and So. Much. Dancing. We didn't stop for several hours, dancing to everything ranging from the old school ska of Edith's university days to Spanish rockabilly. Edith is a fantastic dancer and so was pretty much everyone there. A bald dude and a tall blonde woman and their baby cut up some serious rug. It was this experience utterly lacking in pretension and it was wonderful. And! Everyone was sober. Which made it even better.

2. Adil and Vanessa and I went to Dance Cave, a local hipster dancing establishment. No cover charge and good music = I don't care what kind of people go there, and they all seemed nice anyway. We danced on a beer-sticky floor to The Pixies, New Order, The Smiths, and pretty much everyone else wonderful. Our last dance was Paper Planes by M.I.A. and then we walked a block or two and ate the best Lebanese food of my life. They had a big sign outside that said "VEGAN COMBOS" and I was sold. Everything was cheap and insanely delicious.

By this time it was past two, so we hailed a cab (one of my favourite things to do, but obviously something I can't do more than, uh, twice a year) and vamoosed home.

Study Summary

1. I should go dancing more often.
2. Dancing is way more fun when you are not with someone you have a crush on/are dating and therefore feel shy dancing around.
3. It's pretty easy to dance without being drunk, contrary to popular belief.
4. Marvin Gaye made a really good album in 1971.

running returning

2008-10-28T13:42:00.001-07:00

I'm going to stay put.

Or at least, I'm not going to think about leaving. The past week has really convinced me to stay in this city and not flee back home. I went to Canzine and learned about starting a distro. A guy named Tim asked me to illustrate some of his wheatpasted posters. I went to a meeting with the comics collective I recently became a part of and we all drew pictures of each other and planned the upcoming launch party. My friend Tyler sent me a message asking if V and I wanted to go over and play Settlers of Catan on thursday.

--> Sidenote: Tyler and I met on the 196 Express Bus. He was facing away from me, wearing a Turning the Tide bunnyhug (Turning the Tide = revolutionary bookstore in Saskatoon). Immediately, I thought "Oh my gosh. We have to be friends." When he turned around, I recognized his face because I went to his thesis-defense-afterparty with Meagan W. That week he came over for political discourse and vegan chocolate chip cookies. He is our PhD-seeking, married, real-life-living friend.

So really, what I'm trying to say is...I feel like I'm falling into place here.
I'd like to stay.

hmm.

2008-10-27T14:22:00.000-07:00

I wish I had a scanner or a digital camera so I could show you guys the more interesting facets of my life, like:
-the amazing pie I made last week
-the excellent loot I got from Canzine (some for free!)
-the drawings I'm making

I even trekked down to the library on Pape the other day (and by trek, I do mean a 15 minute walk...) in search of a scanner. No such luck. My sister informs me that Robarts has excellent scanners, so I guess I'll have to venture over there this weekend.

You know what else I wish?
I wish that I had super cool stories to impart to you, my small readership. In all actuality, my life has been relatively normal, other than kind of horrifying financial problems (which I mention constantly, because I have this stupid idea that by talking about them, it'll diminish the gravity of the situation). I've been slacking off at school, as per usual, and working my shifts at the medical clinic. The rest of my time is allotted to drawing, cooking delicious vegan dinners or studying with V, baking, knitting, and occasionally hanging out with *gasp* friends!

Yesterday I was hanging out with my friend Chris and his brother Rob, and Rob actually physically injured himself mocking Coldplay's performance on SNL. Seriously. I wish I could describe it in its full glory, but I cannot (p.s. the rest of the visit basically consisted of watching Rob re-enact every episode ever of South Park).

Lately I've been feeling a bit more conviction about being a vegan. Not that I was cheating before or anything, but I recently read some fucking awful stuff about factory farming and my disgust is kind of renewed. Seriously? Overfeeding pigs and chickens and cows until their legs break under their enormous weight?
--> anyone who says eating meat is natural should go for a little tour of a corporate farm. unless you're hunting your own wild game, there's nothing 'natural' about it.
(and p.s. guns aren't exactly natural either)

I don't want people to brand me as "that cranky vegan bitch", but seriously? Seriously.

(P.S. Don't worry, I still think PETA is fucking stupid. Anyone who compares anything to the Holocaust repeatedly and without realizing their error = moronic.)

Oh, and...

V and I were studying (she was reading about greenwashing; i was reading about the industrial revolution) and we kept reading passages out loud to one another. Basically, it resulted in an evaluation of how capitalism has repeatedly made our lives miserable. My current complaint: dear capitalism, thanks for making me hate my body and spend years of my life feeling you owned my very being.

Oh, except that anxiety disorders and eating disorders and any sort of ailment of the mind is clearly the result of chemical imbalances. That's why so many places other than the Western world have these problems!!

Quitting before I get too steamed and ridiculous,
c.

fuck starbucks

2008-10-18T13:24:00.000-07:00

Today, conversing with my dear friend from home, Chris G, I was informed of a truly upsetting fact: The Living Room, one of my favourite coffee shops in Saskatoon, has closed down after a few years of struggling to compete with a Starbucks that had moved in two doors down from them.

The Living Room was located on my favourite street in the city, very close to the house I grew up in. It's been a fixture of my life for long enough that I can't remember when I started frequenting it. As I got older, the atmosphere became a little more formal, but for a long time the Living Room was all about mismatched mugs, squashy, beat-up armchairs, and comfortably dim lighting. Gradually, they bought a new set of mugs and fixed up some of the chairs, got classier-looking menus, etc, but it was the same place. It always retained that air of comfort and the coffee was always good. And the sandwiches! Were huge. And delicious.

Here are some of my favourite memories of The Living Room:

15 years old, with Nassim, Daniel, and Bailey. During outdoor school. We were cold and had just seen a play at the Broadway Theatre (which I would work at four years later). I was feeling jittery and sick and Nassim seemed to get it and said "Just drink this peppermint tea," very kindly and quietly.

16 years old, meeting my friend Ryan for the first time. I had seen an ad he put up looking for folks to join a post-rock band, pounced on it, and called the number. We met on a school night and sat near the back (left side, Saskatonians, closer to the kitchen). I was wearing a Spiderman t-shirt, and he asked me if I had ever heard of Animal Collective (I hadn't at the time). He showed me his sketchbook and told me about this girl he was madly in love with (soon to be my friend, because that's how Saskatoon rolls). We were friends fast, and although our band (Kingdom Protista) was short-lived, we did play a few good shows.

17 years old, skipping school with Lisa and Orlanda. Eating huge sandwiches with hummus. We laughed a lot but wondered if we were going to drift apart (we did). Going down by the Meewasin afterwards and getting our shoes dusty. We didn't go back to school that day.

19 years old, on an afternoon after a sleepless night. Luke and I met and talked about Before Sunrise/Sunset and Annie Hall at the table closest to the coat rack. I felt nervous about making too much or too little eye contact. It was a sunny-shivery day and we went to sit on Nutana's fire escape after and got too cold.

I've never set foot in that Starbucks, and I never ever will.

like a bull with its horns

2008-10-15T20:48:00.000-07:00

I am sometimes kind of abrasive.
Sometimes I sound angrier than I am.

(Most of the time I'm just scared.)

In a bit, I'll be done school and I'll just take conversational french classes, make tonnes of zines, wear braids most of the time, bake and cook delicious vegan food, read excellent books, work a sweet minimum wage job, and hang out with my mom. That sounds pretty good to me.
So Saskatoon, if I come back in like half a year, would you put in a good word for me at the theatre I used to work at?

Toronto, I love you, promise. You're what I needed, f'sho. My mom said to me on the phone:
"Maybe you need a year of feeling sad and lonely and uncertain about your life,"
and I thought: Fuck yeah (not ironic or sarcastic)!

So, yes. I can probably survive.

oh dear.

2008-10-11T21:55:00.000-07:00

1. "But we were stupid then," Alison and I used to say, citing our possible ignorance as our reason, half-jokingly, half-desperately. Alison is kind of amazing (kind of=totally).

2. There's this line that goes "Holding you at night/doesn't feel quite right/and that gives me a fright".

3. Whatever, I don't feel good about you anymore. It feels like you're holding a big secret far from me. I'm so tired from trying to get you to talk to me about anything meaningful. In your parents' car, you said "Really? Sharpie? I always thought sharpie looked tacky."

4. I have grass-is-greener syndrome and I'm not sure if it's curable.

5. I used to sleep on one side of the bed, lying stiff as a board. Now I curl up as small as I possibly can in the middle, between the pillows.

how do you change a tire? do you EVEN know HOW?

2008-09-19T18:06:00.000-07:00

I was in need of counsel; real, no-bullshit counsel. So I sought the advice of the coldest of the cold, asked for assistance from the iciest being I know.

"Lake Ontario," I said, alone on the beach save for a couple far down on the other side making out in the lifeguard stand. "I feel lonely and sad and scared all the time, and I don't feel like anyone or anything can help me."

The lake was a loud listener, gushing freezing blasts of waves that receded with harsh hisses, but a listener nonetheless.

"I mean, I don't know. I kinda feel like a big fake moron for telling you this," I continued.

Roar, recede. Roar, recede.

"Do you want me to come over there and prove I'm not a wimp?"

Roar.

"Because I will."

Recede.

I rolled up my pant legs and ran into the frigid waters. "Look, Lake Ontario, I'm not afraid to get my feet wet. Ha, ha."

I watched some aeroplanes go by and made some wishes. Only vague things, because wishing for specifics doesn't work.

I looked over my shoulder at the CN Tower in its ugly lit-up glory and wished on it, too.

Then I wished on the dim light of the lifeguard stand.

And then, I said goodbye to my attentive friend and walked home.

"Life is, and is not, a gentle bore."

2008-09-13T07:52:00.000-07:00

So:

1. Lying on Vanessa's bed listening to Moonshiner, I ask "Was this your song?"
She answers, with tremendous bravery, "It was his song, I think."

2. Holding hands with a dear dear friend on a wednesday morning, I remembered us doing the same in Saskatoon while an enormous flock of bohemian waxwings took flight the morning after it rained. This felt different, but not jarringly so.

3. Swaying with Vanessa last night while a band from our hometown played at a tiny little country bar, I felt like I was home. Then I started worrying about where home is, if there's more than one, and where I should really be.

4. I finished Microserfs and it was perfect.

hit the low note

2008-08-21T06:37:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Alison and I ate a delicious vegan dinner at Fresh on Bloor. She's in town for a brief few days before she skips off to Ukraine for 1/4 of a year, and I got to see her, which wasn't entirely expected and was completely wonderful. We wandered Harbord Street and Kensington and Bloor at night and it was magicmagicmagic to sit under the protruding glass of the ROM and talk about what we're afraid of and what we love.

I don't head in to work until noon today, but I arose early nonetheless to sort out some questions I had about my university courses and to call the bank to pay tuition. Of course, the guy on the phone at York assumed I was a total idiot and had no idea what I was talking about, but once I finally convinced him my concerns were legitimate, he was pretty nice about it and we figured everything out. Looks like I'm attending courses on two separate campuses, but uh...that's just a cool challenge.

I'm doing slightly better financially than I thought I was, but I was definitely under the impression that I was completely fucked. Looks like I'll do okay if I limit my expenditure a bit more for the next two weeks...and um the rest of the year.

Apologies for this fairly uninteresting information (re: school and banking). A neurotic's got to get this sheezy off her chest.

here comes the crash (we have tiny friendly parachutes)

2008-08-18T20:30:00.000-07:00

Vanessa was here this weekend, and she's going to be my roommate for a semester, starting two weeks from now. She is incredibly dear to me and has this supercapacity to make me feel safe and whole.

To give you an idea, in the following picture, Vanessa and I were both at a time where we pretty much hated our lives. There had been death, heartbreak, and scary work-and-school-related things. And we look happy in this picture, because we are. Because we were together:

photo credit: Jess Lewis
(pay no heed to my cockatiel hair. it was like that for months.)

Seeing Vanessa for the first time in a few months on friday morning was ordinarily perfect. I ran into her room, she bolted straight up like she was a '30s actress, I glimpsed her tattoo (we have matching ones and i refuse to be embarrassed about this) and felt like I would burst with happiness.

I have a feeling things in my life are about to get a lot scarier. Vanessa will be here, though, and we're kind of champs when we're together.

surreality

2008-08-14T04:32:00.000-07:00

Last night, I had a dream that my friend Jim and I were gambling (not for real, but with real money). I had three twenties in my left hand and a handful of change and a key(?) in my right. We were listening to a mix c.d. he had made and the Magnetic Fields were playing.

"Jim," I asked, my voice defiantly swallowing any threatening tears, "Why does everything suck so much?"
Jim adjusted his linen suit jacket and looked down at his cards, shrugging. "I don't know, friend. I guess that's just how it happens."

I opened my mouth to say something more, but then "Crazy in Love" came on and I started laughing. "Hey, did you know Chuck Klosterman wrote about this song in Killing Yourself to Live? He said that he almost died when listening to it and - "

Then I woke up.

and i turned 'round and there you go

2008-08-13T04:37:00.000-07:00

When I moved here, I made a page-long list of various tasks to perform and things to accomplish. Each item varied greatly in terms of difficulty, i.e. "get a job", "buy coffee and tea", "locate a cheap photocopier", etc. About a week ago, I finally got around to obtaining a library card (second last tickbox). By this point, I had forgotten all about said list until the helpful librarian actually presented me with the card. Upon my return home, I checked what was left on the list, and was pleased to see that there remains only one item ("develop promising talent"...clearly something I could quantify :P).

So, um, goodgood. Makes me feel a bit more settled, I guess.

Adding to my relief is that I won't have to spend many weeks crying over finding a part-time job, as my current work place is planning on extending my contract. This is a Big Deal to me. I feel fairly insanely lucky.

There are some difficulties that have been arising in other sections of my life, but I feel this is pretty typical and to be expected. We will see, I suppose, and hopefully I keep my chin up no matter what.

Tonight Nadya and I are making artichoke and sundried tomato pasta. Tomorrow night, Vanessa-dearest will be home (albeit for a few days, then off again, then back for the semester). This is hugely wonderful. I've missed her a great great deal and we have much to discuss.

And now: to work to work.

Is it a crisis or a boring change?

2008-07-30T15:16:00.000-07:00

Jen and I went to see Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind in Yonge-Dundas square last night. It didn't rain like it did for Annie Hall, but it was chilly and I wrapped myself up in Jen's enormous penguin-patterned blanket that we had been using as a beach blanket earlier that evening.

(The beach is a whole other matter. Let's just say there is a reason why I got teary-eyed and shaky from purchasing a swimsuit.)

Anyway, obviously it was enjoyable, but I seem to feel sympathy for different characters with each passing viewing, and to various degrees of intensity. The time before this, Joel seemed like a heartless pushover and Clementine like a hostile and selfish jerk. More intriguing were Stan (Mark Ruffalo's character) and Mary (Kirsten Dunst's). I recall feeling quite moved by Stan's teary nose-wipe as he walks away from Mary's car. They both get super unresolved endings, and this somehow really struck something with me.

This time, however, my heart was back to Clem, despite her hostility.

"People need to share things, Joel. That's what intimacy is. I don't constantly talk! I'm really pissed that you would say that about me!"

The contrast of such solemn sweet words and anger is irresistible.

you ain't going nowhere

2008-07-27T17:05:00.000-07:00

"Tumultuous!"

That was Vanessa's word to sum up 2007. 2008 has hardly begun, even though it's more than halfway through (for me, the real year starts with the commencement of the academic year), but I'm trying to find a word for it already. Dense, maybe.

Among today's adventures were an unnecessary-but-fun car trip to Red Rocket (a twenty-minute walk away, but the lure of Jen's car is irresistible approx. once/month), morning cartoons and sugary cereal with Andrew, and...an extremely daunting outing with my roommates to find a swimsuit.

I haven't owned a swimsuit since I was twelve, which is almost eight years ago. I borrowed a hideous number from a friend for canoe-camping in Outdoor School when I was fifteen, which was the last time I ever wore such a garment.

The trip was a difficult one: we trudged through racks upon racks of scary floral one-pieces, stacks of impossibly tiny patterned bikinis, and finally: Jen emerged holding up something simple, in two modest pieces, with a small rip that somehow warranted it being fairly inexpensive. Drawing a great breath, I took it into the changeroom. After much lip-biting, face-covering, and nervous-opinion-asking, I was red and sweaty and shaking, but relatively triumphant.

I am so so glad July is coming to a close and school is around the bend. At the same time, September looms sinister with unconfirmed-employment, a new university that may have different expectations than the last, along with other strange, shadowy unforeseeable changes.

But there's August in between, and even that doesn't start until Friday.

Watching The Third Man this evening makes me crave transparency and truth above all else, which are alas quite often elusive things. This is something I can deal with rationally, however. My immediate concern: Obtaining a functioning alarm clock. This biorhythm shit ain't always reliable.

patience, patience.

2008-07-23T04:31:00.000-07:00

Last night, Jess and I went to see Annie Hall(!) for free(!!) outside in Yonge-Dundas Square. About four scenes in, it began to drizzle. Within the next ten minutes, it was full-on raining and some guys passed around big black garbage bags to those of us who decided to tough it out. As everyone struggled with their bags to discover the style in which they would receive maximum protection from the rain, lightning occasionally struck and Alvy and Annie continued on, oblivious to our amusing plight.

I forgot exactly how much I like Annie Hall. The first time I ever watched it was after a night of being utterly unable to sleep - I had things on my mind and consequently stayed up to watch Before Sunrise and Before Sunset (also excellent films). After watching these, I went for a walk around Saskatoon, ending up on the fire escape of a highschool drinking a cup of shitty 7-11 grade coffee and watching the sun rise. When the sun had come up, I shuffled home and watched Annie Hall, which proved to be my favourite of the movies I'd consumed over the past 24 hours. The quietness of seeing it alone, when no one else was around or even awake, somehow made it even more perfect.

Sometimes I really miss the feeling of knowing my city; of knowing the best spots and having memories attached to so many places - of having an effortless map of the city in my head and feet. Tomorrow, I will have been here for three months. I'm beginning to piece the fragments of Toronto I know together and build an internal map...it will just take time.

is your sweater on?

2008-07-22T04:48:00.000-07:00

I think I might be the first person to have a diaper-related-injury.

And now before you all run screaming away from me, let me explain: Yesterday, for work, I was instructed to purchase $250 worth of diapers (which ended up being $274.04) for some care packages I'm making for prenatal mothers. I don't drive, and I don't carry a shopping cart around with me, so I got to take all of these shoved into four ENORMOUS bags for a bit of a walk to the subway station, then on the subway, then on a crowded streetcar. I have never received more looks of deep pity than yesterday, waddling down College Street, plastic handles twisting into my hands and occasionally pausing to attempt to secure my bangs off my forehead. Oy.

So when I woke up, my arms were incredibly sore and my shoulders feel as if someone has sliced through them with rusty breadknives.

But it's kind of hilarious, and I'm not too broken up about it.

On Sunday morning, Andrew and I ate Lucky Charms and watched cartoons, which has clearly inspired the entire house. Last night, we watched an almost-embarrassing amount of YTV programming, and Jen informed me that she, too, had succumbed to the deliciousness of the marshmallow-y goodness of a certain cereal. Basically, we're the perfect house.

And now, it is time to see what new delights await me at work.

yes, this really is an entry about alternatives to cheese.

2008-07-03T15:01:00.000-07:00

Ah yes, there is but one working day until the weekend. Megan and I stepped on out for lunch today (we both brought one, but got coffee from Wanda's) and spent the entire (unpaid) hour bitching about how little work we have to do/how that makes the time a-drag. Miraculously, upon our arrival back, my boss had come up with a few things for me to do, which should also keep me busy all tomorrow morning. Holla!

After work, I scooted to the health food store and picked up what has ultimately restored my faith in vegan cheese. Back in Saskatoon, there were precious little options when it came to this: there was a brand available at Superstore that contained casein (really, why the fuck would you bother making soy cheese if you're going to put a milk protein in it? seriously guys), and another hideously overpriced brand at Steep Hill called something along the lines of Vegarella or Veganrella. Vegwhateverrella was not only overpriced, but slimy and seriously untasty.

Toronto is clearly a far more veg-friendly city. I can't recall the name of the brand I bought today, but boy howdy is it ever delicious, non-slimy, and completely lacking in secret milk proteins! It doesn't melt great, but nothing soy-based does, I suppose. Anyway, thanks, soy cheese, for a trip to tastytown (I had it in an olive bun with tomatoes and cucumbers).

On another note, thursdays are great, because they are often my "day-before-travelling-day", which is my favourite kind of day (other than travelling days). DFTDs get me super organized because I've got laundry to do, showers to take, delicious things to bake, and bags to pack. So I'm forced to be on the ball! Yyyyay! And I have something to look forward to! Yyyyay!

I'm off. Have a lovely weekend, everyone.

I wanna spread my dementia

2008-07-02T19:55:00.000-07:00

Zine: done
Photocopying at Kinko's: cheap
Dinner tonight: cornflakes with the very last of the soymilk and raspberries and blackberries that were ultra cheap in the Annex

Jen and I went for a long walk to clear our heads. Then I finished sewing a skirt and read for a bit and felt sad about my utter lack of involvement in the feminist scene here. I need to get out more and find where the resources and programming and volunteer stuff is.

I guess I just want some ladies to strategize with re: smashing patriarchy, who can also tell me "YEAH, radical cheerleaders meeting wednesday" or "I wholeheartedly support your attempt to destroy beauty standards" or "Is Leslie Feinberg not the most wonderful person imaginable?"

Being more proactive is clearly the situation. Note to self: read last sentence only once more; then do as it suggests.

it's just a joke, man, it's just an interview

2008-07-01T11:54:00.000-07:00

My triumphant steps to the 24-hr-Kinko's (a photocopying place, not a porn shop, incidentally), zine in hand, were somewhat dampened as I realized in horror that I had forgotten my wallet.

So it gets put off for another little while...which makes me infuriated, because this shit should have been done in december. It's not like I've done any real work on it since, for goodness' sakes.

What made my venture out worth it was that I was listening to Le Tigre and wearing my boy scouts of america shirt. Most days I don't really want to go outside because I feel pretty ugly and gross and getting anywhere in this city requires you to sit down for about half an hour with a bunch of people, then walk for another half hour with a whole new bunch of people, all of whom are ridiculously well-styled and dressed. BUT when you have Kathleen Hanna fighting the good fight in your ears, you feel a little better.

Oh, and I stopped wearing makeup. So far it hasn't gone over well, as I've alternately wanted to cry and scream for the past three days. BUT WE'RE DOING OK, FOLKS! I'm also giving one last shot at the vegan life, which has made me feel significantly happier, because it means I make a lot of vegetable-based and delicious meals. Tonight: potato-carrot-curry soup.

Now, off to make comics and soup now...I'm a productive person with interests and personality. You believe me, right?

you've got this thing with walking

2008-06-20T14:32:00.000-07:00

Today on my lunch break, I bought my usual insanely cheap and delicious coffee from Cuppa Joe and then headed to Wanda's Pie in the Sky for a gorilla biscuit (the tastiest vegan treat on the block for under $2). As I sat there doodling in my notebook and listening to one of my new favourite songs, a woman and her two children came in and hung around waiting for a birthday cake to be ready. One of the kids was a baby in a stroller wearing a hat. The stroller was facing me, as was the baby, so I smiled and the baby returned it with the best smile I have ever seen in my two decades of living. I can't explain it entirely - it was slow to come across her face, as though she were blushing, but at the same time it was such a beam that I thought she must be consciously acknowledging that she was so very worth smiling at and that she thought I was, too.

I continued doodling and writing, but kept on feeling the compulsion to look back at the baby. Every time I did, she met my eyes and we smiled at each other. Finally, I caught her mother's eye and said, "You have a wonderful baby," to which she responded "Oh yes, she gets a lot of attention," laughing a little.

"She's very charismatic," I volunteered, unable to keep from beaming as I looked down into the baby's wonderful face.

I've only been truly intrigued by babies at one point in my life, which was during Mrs. Johnston's grade twelve biology class genetics unit, and that was 99% based in awe that humans are capable of manufacturing miniature versions of themselves. Other than that, I've never wanted children, and I still don't. My exchange with this baby was not based in maternal need or instinct. It was simply an exchange with another human being grateful for life and it made me remember to be thankful for the rest of the day.

Thank-you, charismatic baby, for the little reminder. I hope you grow up strong and excited about everything you can do and be.

blasphemy

2008-06-16T17:59:00.000-07:00

I'm updating for once, mostly because Jen commonly utters the phrase, "Oh man, I can't WAIT for you to blog about this!".

That being said, not too much is noteworthy.

I was feeling not super great in the self-image department for the past few weeks, which was quickly getting to be a huge downer...until, as I walked home from work one night this week, I found a glorious treasure in someone's recycling that had been set out for pick-up: a 1980s rerelease of Our Bodies, Ourselves. Jen and I read it aloud for awhile and it was kind of awesome in its early-third-wave empowerment.

It's going to be my best friend for life.

Here's a list of things I'd like:

Glasses that never get dirty
Darker (or even existent) eyebrows
A full-time position at not-the-wine-store (this free bottle of wine every week is getting to me)
My imaginary friend from when I was five, whose name was Bowie (as in David Bowie)

Rock on, Captain Planet(s),

ctron

faced with the dodo's conundrum

2008-06-05T10:51:00.000-07:00

My friends, gather 'round and rejoice, for today is a most glorious day. Sing praises to the heavens; I am motherfucking employed.

Not only that - I have not one, oh ho, not one but TWO sources of income: being a vest-sporting lackey at the liquor store AND short-term work at a community health centre. Is there something vaguely ironic about this? Can I get a witness??

(To which you heartily respond: "TESTIFY!")

Anyway, I don't start until saturday, which means I have to milk these last days of unemployment for all they're worth (and trust me, brothers, they are worth oh-so-much). To begin this veritable milk-fest (worst phrase ever, I'm sorry - and I know these parenthetical asides are irritating, so I'll stop), I went to my Aunt Rita's house last night to sup with her, my cousin Emma, and her friend Melanie. After our most delicious meal of vegetarian lasagna and ridiculously excellent homemade cheesecake, Emma and Mel and I wandered down to the beach just as it was getting dark. The fog was a-rollin' over the lake and the tide was roaring in and smacking against the rocks and we sat ourselves down to take it in.

"It's sort of an 'edge of the earth' type of feeling," Melanie said. Emma was quick to agree, and the two of them talked about how the water stretching on forever was majestic and beautiful or what-have-you, but also kind of eerie.

Conversely, I found the sensation comforting. I think it's because I grew up being able to see forever - not water, but wheat ("Wheat. All there is in life is wheat."). So looking out into the gaping endless maw of Lake Ontario felt not overwhelming or spooky but...actually kind of like home. As I thought about this, I remembered Ferron saying a similar thing about when she saw the ocean in Honduras: she was overcome with an oddly strong sense of homesickness.

As much as I felt an acute ache for the prairies, I'm incredibly happy to be here now. Oh, and - having a job lends it a sense of permanency it didn't quite have before. I think I'm here to stay, comrades.

dispatches from the unemployed

2008-05-26T20:20:00.000-07:00

Number of job interviews today: 1
Number of jobs applied for today: 5

I'm just going to keep telling myself that something will come along eventually. Someone has to offer to hire me at some point, right? Right.

Reading Breakfast After Noon this morning probably didn't bolster my confidence that much, but it's sort of my own fault.

Guys! I am being a bright-eyed optimist! (But never a bright-eyed optometrist)

there's no riot...

2008-05-22T12:44:00.000-07:00

My, my, what a day it's been. I woke up obscenely late and hauled myself up the stairs to eat some cornflakes and talk shit with my wonderful Southern Belle roommate, Jen, for a solid hour. Note: Jen may or may not actually have a Southern accent. I've been told I have a very vivid imagination when it comes to how people's voices sound (which is code for "I completely fucking make it up").

Following this, I patched a shirt and gave myself a haircut. I was sort of trying to hold out with my hair, but it was already pretty drastically layered from March and it would've grown out strange anyhow. This whole cutting-hair-business is kind of Bad News Bears because summer is coming and my hair tends to look reeeeally bad in the summer, especially if it's short. But uh...you know. I didn't even do that much; it's just shorter on one side now.

Thrilling, I'm aware.

What other wondrous things have I spent my time doing? Uploading CDs onto my new laptop. It's tedious, but weirdly satisfying. I'm mostly just killing an hour before I make delicious delicious vegetable stirfry.

all good things

2008-05-20T07:24:00.000-07:00

Photo credit: Jess Lewis

Well, team...my laptop didn't make it. It seems that the Great Coffee Disaster affected more than just his feeble keyboard. My roommates, my dear friend Cat who was visiting this weekend and I had a quiet service for him in the backyard on Friday evening. Cody was an excellent partner in crime and I'll always have fond memories of him.

Besides this tragic event, the long weekend was awesome. AND: I have two job interviews in the next week. Holla!

bonefish

2008-05-14T12:46:00.000-07:00

Sweet merciful zeus.

Today's dramatic episode: I spilled coffee on my laptop keyboard. At first, it appeared that the only casualties were the navigation arrows in the bottom right corner, but it soon became apparent that none of the keys were working. Now, for someone who does nothing all day, use of a keyboard is pretty fucking essential. I *am* reading three books right now, and I did spend this morning drawing, but I have an intense attachment to my computer. It's where I do about 80% of my writing, plus I fritter and waste away like 10000% of my life blogging and instant messaging my roommates who are approximately ten feet away from me on it, too. So: problem.

I called some computer repair dudes, who clucked their tongues softly and said,

"Well, there's not a lot we can do."
"What do you mean?!"
"Well, we can come over for consulting...if only the keyboard was hit, we can order a new one and install it...for the consulting, hardware, and labour, it'd be about $300. Or we could just set you up with a USB keyboard and it'd be more like $130."

Anything with three digits preceded by a dollar sign turns the stomach of a jobless weirdo.

"Uh...I need to consult my, er, financial advisers."
"Do you mean your parents?"

I called my father, who proceeded to lecture me on how coffee + work areas = always a disaster, which was well-deserved. As I began my feeble defense, Felizia, my roommate, came into the kitchen carrying a still-in-the-box USB keyboard and slammed it on the table triumphantly.

"Dad? Can I call you back?"

It turns out only the keyboard was boned by the Coffee Nightmare of '08, and Felizia is graciously allowing me to use this USB-wonder until I'm totally employed and replace this piece-of-junk-of-an-ancient-Toshiba-laptop.

If I've learned anything from this incident, it's that being unemployed would suck more without proper computer access. Oh yeah, and don't drink coffee near the keyboard. ~~But in all honestly, I probably won't abide by that rule.~~ Will be super careful about that one.

Wow! My life sure is one drama of a rollercoaster.

Scrabbled down the hallways yelling "Yahtzee!".

2008-05-13T15:52:00.000-07:00

Ohmygosh. I've applied for a ridiculous number of jobs (I'm too embarrassed to list the number here), and someone called me today. Maybe I'll be working for a temp agency. I can't believe I'm excited about this.

That's my bicycle, by the way. His name is Orde-Lees, after this fellow:

(thanks, wikipedia.)

...who was a surly German fellow aboard Endurance with Shackleford back in the day. He used to ride his bicycle on the icy surface of Antarctica, much to everyone's chagrin, and once got lost (they sent out a crew and found him, though).

Are you guys proud of me? I'm almost making progress. Today's been kind of a downer and I feel like melodramatic grumpy gus, but uh...I'm all about being irrationally cheerful in order to convince myself it's going to be peachy.

Oh, and I updated my flickr. Visit me.

Oh, and also...I've been thinking about Jan Von Holleben a lot lately. Visit him, too.

the beat of the gestetner

2008-05-12T09:16:00.000-07:00

Oh boy! Oh boy! Here are some things I like about my new city:

-TTC tokens, because they look like magic money for a sweet videogame world
-Getting parcels from my parents (they pity me and sent me tea and drawing pens to cheer me up)
-Museum Station
-And the Museum, ok
-People not being assholes to cyclists (...yet)
-Legitimately missing home (the Weakerthans haven't sounded this good since I was sixteen!)

There's more, but y'know. I don't want to get too repetitive or predictable.

This week's the week I get a job. I, uh, just know it.

2008-05-09T08:32:00.000-07:00

I feel like a total deadbeat. Filling out job applications actually just makes me want to fork out my eyes at this point.

On the bright side, being unemployed has really freed up my time for watching movies.

The only reason I'm still at home is because I'm waiting for my only pair of pants to dry.

2008-05-07T09:20:00.000-07:00

"Great," I said, as I heated up some day-old coffee. "Now my coffee is going to taste like microwave popcorn."
Andrew stared at me for a moment before stating confidently, "Wow. Unemployment suits you."

I've almost been here for two weeks, and I'm still trying to find a job. However, I'm now a card-carrying member of an employment agency...and I applied for EI. This is pretty much cripplingly demoralizing, but also kind of hilarious.

It's hit me that I actually moved here and that I'm probably not going back any time soon. This feeling is possibly the result of spending $153 that I don't actually have on cheap Swedish furniture, but hey: my room is one fine looking room.

Most of my time has been spent madly searching for a job, but I've also been working on my zine (slowly and infrequently). It should have been done months ago, but I'm a lazy bastard, I guess. Also, I have a stack of books that I've irrationally promised myself I'll read by the end of the summer.

Once I procure an inexpensive camera, expect self-indulgent picture-posts showcasing my awesome secondhand yellow bicycle and the other things that are making Torontonian life worth it.

Until then, paix, mes amis.