these mended bones

Change

2011-05-11T16:47:00.000-04:00

my blog has moved to the heart right life.

visit me there!

I Wanna Be Your Friend

2011-05-10T00:27:00.006-04:00

Spring has finally come to Calgary.

I have so much optimism, hope, and positivity now, especially when I compare to a month ago... I quit my job, the weather got nice, I started riding my bike again, I feel like I am coming back to myself.

I had a glorious visit to Toronto and Peterborough a couple weeks ago, and it was such a welcome change. It opened my eyes to how I want to live my life and how far I have to go until I get there. It also confirmed the important relationships in my life and spotlighted the very bits that don't fit anymore. I found it hard to believe someone could change so drastically within a year, but I witnessed it firsthand and can't deny that I was disappointed. /life goes on and all I wanna do now is dance. I think I've perfected my spring cleaning techniques, at least for this year, and I am so looking forward to what's ahead.

I think back to that one night, April 22nd... music, people, drugs... the feelings I have from that are unreal & so nostalgic, delicate, sad, lovely. (light you up)

These days- finishing up at the job I hate, long hikes in Nose Hill Park, Drew, Charlie, and all the little bits in between. Music highlights my days, photographs, the sun on my face, the smell of grass and moist fresh air first thing in the morning.
------------------------------------
yeasayero.n.e.
No
You don't move me anymore
And I'm glad that you don't
'cause I can't have you anymore
But I thought you should know
You don't move me anymore
And I'm glad that you don't
Because I can't take it anymore
(....dance.)
--------------------------------------
sister crayon SOULS OF GOLD
.. ..
Woke up in the sevens,
A strange last night
My thoughts are furious, in the thousands tonight
Keep your head down, keep yours
And rewrite tonight
Woke up in the sevens,
A strange last night
.. ..
You are a recluse, you always were
I’m a recluse, I always was
You are a recluse, we always were
Primal, in fact we fall in time
-------------------------------------
memoryhouse caregiver
There's a ghost in my living room
In silent sets, moving through
The attic in chemicals
Dissolve in two
There's a flaw in my chemistry
The chill swells and follows me
In choirs of cold machines
And their smoking skin
These bones reside within
A crack spool of medicine
The distant hum that blooms as we run
No way to displace
-------------------------------------
and, of course, we can't forget the most satisfying relationship in my life right now:

music:
sister crayon
yeasayer
the acorn
memoryhouse
local natives
the republic tigers
pretty lights
st. vincent
the naked & famous
forest city lovers

Phewf....

2011-02-10T23:01:00.005-05:00

This is my last month in a nutshell:

It's been very hard to get anything done, much less write! however, life has gotten bigger and more interesting since January. Moving, winter hinting that it's leaving, Charlie, everything is changing.

More to come.

Manners

2011-01-16T23:13:00.003-05:00

[[[these are what I dream about... (courtesy my friend Kirsty Eckhard)]]]

Well, here I go neglecting my blog again. Being on a computer all day at work insures that I don't have the urgency to get back on the computer once I get home, and days melt into weeks... either way, I promised myself I wouldn't be too hard on me about writing. Writing is supposed to be something I do when I feel the inclination and have the motivation, otherwise it's crap! Right? CRAP.

So anyways.

With that off my chest.. I have been feeling lighter these days. A conscious decision to make myself happier. Doing things I love. Using my senses as a tool, a connection to life. I long to feel the warm breeze on my face, to hear a nighttime's worth of rain dripping down the gutters and along the curb, to go for a long bike ride on a sunny afternoon. These are the things I dream about, but even reality isn't too bad- beautiful winter sunsets on the iciest of days, luxuriating in Friday evenings by myself, treating myself to just a few little things that bring me joy. A haircut. An afternoon at the mall with a friend, an afternoon with a book.

I hope this lightness lasts. It feels like hope. Hope for a better job, the sun to shine, for so many more memories.

Music of the week:
La Roux
Icona Pop
Passion Pit
The Phenomenal Handclap Band
(anything with a good beat and lyrics...)
(if I walk to work with this stuff on.. my whole day is better.)

[[[but this is what I got.]]]

just a thought-

2011-01-11T17:04:00.001-05:00

-imagine how awesome life would be if we all spoke in Ebonics?

I know, right?

Hello 100.

2011-01-06T22:34:00.002-05:00

Blog number 100 today. I have been blogging since 2006 and every year so far has diminished. Aiming for change this year. "The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--
Of cabbages--and kings--
And why the sea is boiling hot--
And whether pigs have wings."

Listening to this week:
Junior Boys
Dreamsploitation
The Banjo Consorsium
Ministry of Sound - Chillout Sessions 10
Andrew Bird - Noble Beasts
Laura Barrett

Bon soir, mon amies. It's payday tomorrow!

eyes closing slowly

2011-01-05T19:16:00.004-05:00

almost falling asleep in the chair as I write this- listening to The Signal Podcast from CBC, waiting on this dark night to bring my boy home, and waiting for sleep. I must confess- I'm addicted. My life, moving or still, revolves around this music right now. And also- the weather today was warmer than usual, the wind stronger, the very kind of day where one's heart could be held aloft.

The Depths of January

2011-01-04T23:39:00.002-05:00

I can so clearly remember this time last year- it seems like no time has passed. Except now, I've graduated, I live across the country, I live with my boyfriend, my friends are far away, and my life has taken a 180. I still feel the winter blah (mindnumbing fist clenching quiet loud darkness with no hope) that I did last year, though not to the same degree. I am so grateful to not be sitting in the library trying to write papers, thinking only of other things, trying to force myself to focus. I don't miss the dry dusty snowlessness of Peterborough last winter, where the only entertainment was located inside nearby houses on weekend nights, or the softly lit and loudly sounded bars downtown. It's so funny how that sad winter blossomed into one of the most beautiful and hot summers in Ontario since I was a kid- as if the world were fighting back.

I now yearn for spring to come, daring the sun to rise before 8:30am, when I have already been awake for 2 hours in complete darkness- like an unreality or alternate life my netherself would be living... And for a warm breeze on my face, the sun, bare legs, beers on patios. And beautiful dawn..

Oh, Oh, Oh, How I've Done Myself In

2011-01-03T22:54:00.004-05:00

Sometimes, all I can think about is the past. Nostalgia has its way of creeping into my life for minutes at a time, and all I can do is bring back the feelings I had there and try to re-live it. I'm trying hard to work on the present, and let go of all that's behind me, but snippets of Peterborough still filter through. And it's not even as if I want to go back, right now, because if I did, the life I would experience there would not be the same as then- and I want to preserve then as well as I can.

The things I miss can't really be put into words. Is it the smell of the Quaker factory on a winter's afternoon? Is it the breeze through the maples in our old backyard, or the rain through the oak tree that I used to love? Is it sitting in a dimly lit bar on a Thursday night, nursing a drink and having the best talks with my best friends? Is it walking home alone as the snow falls all around, dreaming of others? Is it the fall nights when I used to run through the neighbourhood, the breeze on my face? Is it sitting at Natalie's or Sheena's, getting ready to go out, talking, excited, wine in hand? Is it biking to summer school along the river, feeling so free, feeling so alive? I can't pick just one of these- it's a culmination, and so many other moments besides.

It's the ones where I get a half-memory from a song I once loved, a memory of a certain touch, a certain feeling. A boy I was in love with from afar, trying to remember the night before, trying to remember that kiss. Trying to remember how it felt to be alive then, when my life could have blossomed any thousands of ways. The music I lived, the tastes, the smells.

Time now for me to live as I did then. To live with my eyes, heart and mind wide open to what I can feel and hear. And maybe if I think positive, I will get myself to that place again.

it's okay...

2011-01-02T21:22:00.002-05:00

and I can't get these out of my head:

One way road, don't care what I find
A little thunder's good, thought maybe you would
but it's okay, we all feel left out
sometimes growing up, it can get you down.

I give you something that no one's gonna give you
my sleeping skin and my heart deep down in you
I'll never tell you, but you're my little scar
Goodbyes are hard and they're hard and they're hard

The First (okay, second) Day of the Year

2011-01-02T20:49:00.002-05:00

I made a decision, amongst many, that I would write in my blog much more often this year (in fact, I decided to write in it every day). As luck would have it, I completely forgot to write in it on the first day of the year. However, following with my newly adopted attitude to "just do it", I am totally fine with just starting today instead.

There are a few reasons why I've decided to do this. First, I noticed a sadly declining amount of posts since 2006 and thought "I can do way better than that!". Second, I noticed that my writing in general has declined in quality and quantity and I am hoping to change both.

So- happy 2011! 2010 was a sad year in so many ways, not necessarily for me, but for the world. I, like many, am hoping that we have some good news this year. Personally, I had a ton of "big life changes" happen and am only now starting to recover. I've made the conscious decision to change my outlook and work harder at, well, everything. More on that later.

So now, I bid the world hello again, I'm here. The world is bright.

It's Been So Long

2010-10-30T16:33:00.003-04:00

I can't believe it's been since January that I've written here. Life has been all over the place for the last 8 months and I will very soon provide an update!

Until then.

the newest year so far

2010-01-04T14:22:00.004-05:00

2010.

I realized that I have remembered this entire decade for the first time in my life.

I can't articulate how things are changing, but they are, and I need to remember how things were.

I don't really have any resolutions, but I stumbled upon this list, excerpted from a Jack Kerouac publication.

1. Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for your own joy
2. Submissive to everything, open, listening
3. Try never get drunk outside your own house
4. Be in love with your life
5. Something that you feel will find its own form
6. Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind
7. Blow as deep as you want to blow
8. Write what you want bottomless from bottom of the mind
9. The unspeakable visions of the individual
10. No time for poetry but exactly what is
11. Visionary tics shivering in the chest
12. In tranced fixation dreaming upon object before you
13. Remove literary, grammatical and syntactical inhibition
14. Like Proust be an old teahead of time
15. Telling the true story of the world in interior monolog
16. The jewel center of interest is the eye within the eye
17. Write in recollection and amazement for yourself
18. Work from pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea
19. Accept loss forever
20. Believe in the holy contour of life
21. Struggle to sketch the flow that already exists intact in mind
22. Don't think of words when you stop but to see picture better
23. Keep track of every day the date emblazoned in your morning
24. No fear or shame in the dignity of your experience, language & knowledge
25. Write for the world to read and see your exact pictures of it
26. Bookmovie is the movie in words, the visual American form
27. In praise of Character in the Bleak inhuman Loneliness
28. Composing wild, undisciplined, pure, coming in from under, crazier the better
29. You're a Genius all the time
30. Writer-Director of Earthly movies Sponsored & Angeled in Heaven

Somewhat intended for writers, but as a list of things to consider in life, it is beautiful and a little mysterious.

The Darkest Season

2009-12-02T23:17:00.000-05:00

December, December, how is it December?

The flowing current that is life has sucked me in and not returned me to dry land. I lose hours under fluorescents in the library, trying to will myself to complete what I’ve started, by any means possible. I long for nothing more than sleep. I wake up unmotivated to leave my bed, and often, because I have nowhere else to be, I succumb to the soft warmth.

Aside from sleep, I long for the wind on my face. I forget to go outside, and I miss the day. Daylight leaves early. Rain doesn’t abate. Snow has yet to appear. I miss moving quickly. I miss doing everything.

It's the same time of year that I crave my desert winter city, the warmth of my love, the depth of snow and time to lose myself in.

From the Depths of the Night, Alone

2009-10-05T23:16:00.002-04:00

Dreams of tornadoes and lightning and old friends and water everywhere

the air is filled with moisture, as it has been for days, and sticks to my skin

everything I touch in this house is damp, everything under my fingers or toes

I don't think about you until I can't stop myself anymore.

You know we all want to let go. You know I wish I'd been that for you, that fearless, part of you there, part of you somewhere, a place where you'll never let me go.

I want these pieces of myself to disintegrate and cease

I want me to be less, to feel less, more bones and less skin.

Dreams of it never being me, always everyone else. I am just a bystander.

Dreams of me sinking.

fall came early

2009-08-15T13:11:00.003-04:00

Apparently summer has just disappeared in a haze of nights and afternoons. Three completed summer classes (!!!!!), beach days, wandering around Peterborough, one flight to Calgary, one change of house, two new roommates, one new boyfriend, lots and lots of nights out.. It's been fantasmical. Crazy, busy, filled with friends and summerness. Lots of bike riding and late night runs. In fact, it might even be the perfect summer. I have one month of freedom before my final year of university begins, and less than that before I turn twenty-three. I think I'm becoming a real life person.

Calgary is chilly and rainy, and it feels like it would in Peterborough in late October. Part of me is glad, because I love fall, and when I return to Peterborough it will still be full-swing summer. I won't be able to wear jeans and new flannel shirts for a few more months, and if you're anything like me, you love wearing flannels, jeans, jackets, sweaters, and feeling cozy inside with a cup of coffee. Sigh.

I dream in mountains and cold, damp mornings. I dream whole.

My Sleeping Skin

2009-05-15T19:11:00.002-04:00

It's begun again- my summer skin, the summer breeze, lying out in the sun and biking like hell to school. The lilacs are almost out again. I'm hoping for some things, other things, certain things, wonderful things. I think I'm optimistic. I want to be optimistic. I want more nights on balconies, with guitars and drums. I want more dewy grass and streetlights. I want more cool beer and good conversations and possibilities. More house parties. I just.. can't wait.

The Trouble With Wilderness

2009-04-06T22:19:00.002-04:00

"No pain here, no dull empty hours, no fear of the past, no fear of the future. These blessed mountains are so compactly filled with ~~God's~~ beauty, no petty personal hope or experience has room to be. Drinking this champagne water is pure pleasure, so is breathing the living air, and every movement of limbs is pleasure, while the body seems to feel beauty when exposed to it as it feels the campfire or sunshine, entering not by the eyes alone, but equally through all one's flesh like radiant heat, making a passionate ecstatic pleasure glow not explainable." - John Muir

In this death trap that is exam time, with an overdue essay, white stuff on the ground and coming from the sky, experiencing hours that are not explainable. It's nice to think of an escape, although sometimes one's own hell has its own nostalgic beauty. It would be nice to think of good things, but it's always easier to dwell and wallow. The pathetic weather is a direct mirror of my inner state, this me who can be the only me to dig myself out of this hole. I dwell in hours lost, I dwell in so many nights gone, I dwell in the wishes that they will happen again, only better. I yearn to stop caring about insignificant things that are impossible to change. Dwell, yearn, wish. These are all symptoms of inaction.

Afternoons in the park, with a blue sky and the sun warming the brown grass. The murmur of my friends' voices, the smell of the Quaker factory, the rush of the river. These are stuck in my mind, a place I like to go back to as often as I can. It's all changing, it will be different for better or worse, and I'm preparing myself. A year ending, a season of change, and perhaps this time I'll have to learn again how to be alone.

Tick.. Tock.

2009-03-10T15:32:00.003-04:00

It is always my philosophy to do the things I love, even while I'm doing things I hate, so that the things I hate can be more bearable. In this afternoon's case, I'm writing an essay while searching for new music. Or searching for new music while writing an essay, on a day that might rain, in an afternoon that is all mine. In the midst of planning a new trip, while trying to finish the year, while trying to live, and breathe and eat and sleep- these months slip by. The weather is finally changing. There seems to be so much to do, always, and never enough hours. There is so much to distract. Dreaming of Spain and points unknown is easy, finding new music to get lost in is easy, committing oneself to sitting and writing is quite another story.

Listening to Ultre.

Back Alleys in Quiet Cities

2008-12-31T01:17:00.003-05:00

Working in a mall in a money-obsessed city around Christmas gives me uncountable moments of existential crisis. I wonder, why do people need to shop all the time? Why do all 16 year old girls look the same? Why do they have to unfold all those t-shirts I just meticulously arranged? Why am I here, what is my purpose on this earth? If my purpose here is to shop, just like all these people, then get rid of me because I don't need to be here.

Obviously, I am counting down the days until my life feels real again- I can't even be bothered to hide it. One week till Peterborough time!

I was again listening to CBC Radio 2's the Signal (10pm EST), and discovered yet another gem that I am unable to download anywhere: LEIF VOLLEBEKK. Montreal'er, musician of greatness, unsigned, addictive. Visit him at his myspace and have a listen. He takes stress away almost as well as a bout of hot yoga.

Long Exposure

2008-12-17T21:44:00.003-05:00

"Before I open my eyes I hear the river, and I know that I'm waking up in his bed. Not yet dawn, but I can tell that it's near by the way I can just make out the shape of the chair where our clothes are piled, the long, inky band that must be one of my stockings. Before I knew Sam I would have thought, it's dark, but now I see the shades of it. Know that if I keep my eyes on it that chair will begin to emerge, slowly but ever steadily, until it is finally just there, the thing that it always was. I should get up; I should be gone before there's anyone about to see me carefully closing the back door. But it's warm in his bed, there's the sound of the river and the sound of his breath, and I turn and curl myself around him, my cheek on the smooth skin of his back, I breathe in the smell of him and all that is more important than what anyone might say." Page 123, The Boys in the Trees by Mary Swan.

I am here again, the place where snowflakes fall softly in the sunny mornings, icy lumpy streets where cars slide past as I wait for the bus. I haven't seen the mountains yet, the icy crystals have shielded them from me- much to my disappointment. I have the time now, my time in this frozen city by the mountains.

I find stories in the news touching me in ways I am surprised by, things I've never experienced bringing stinging tears to my eyes for brief moments. My eyes are otherwise dry, between the arid Prairie atmosphere and the cold blasts of wind. The world is small. I know this time won't last, and simultaneously I want January to come right away or not at all.

Glowing Morning Dreams

2008-12-14T00:57:00.003-05:00

I love walking past churches at night in the snow. I love walking under streetlights while it's snowing, letting the snow fall on my face and hearing the snow fall on branches, sidewalks, powerlines. I wish I could curl up with you on one of these nights, walking in the quiet hand-in-hand, getting home and falling into each other. I love my neighbour's singing lights, the house Christmas lights that blink in sequence to Christmas tunes. I love walking home alone.

Without and Asleep in the Snow

2008-12-07T17:53:00.004-05:00

Luxuriating in a weekend of post-struggle, pre-exam relaxation, I can reflect on a month that has passed by far too quickly. It's cold here now, after a long bout of snow, freezing and windy and full of stars. I'm not sure how I feel these days, mostly happy, but without something- I can't put my finger on what.

Truthfully, I think I need a good night of dancing, fun, and letting loose. I need to be filled up again as these lonely days stretch on for far too long.

The Quiet City

2008-11-24T23:36:00.005-05:00

Sometimes there is nothing I enjoy more than walking around late at night, as the snow falls thickly and there is no sound. I like seeing the city at night, shrouded by white. I like feeling like the only one awake. It kind of makes me nostalgic for a time I never lived, when the country was endlessly quiet and isolated, and you could truly be the only one around. If you've never seen The Snowman, go rent it or buy it or something.. I've watched it since I was very young, and it is the epitome of how I wish to feel on winter nights. It's kind of Christmas to me, if I lived in the English countryside. Nights like tonight, where there is little traffic on my road and even less people to be found. Quiet. Endless.

It's almost December- where has the time flown? School has kept me so busy I have barely had the time to notice the date, and now November is leaving me too. Soon I'll be in the air again, 3 more weeks until the West calls me back. Then it's 3 weeks of busy Calgary life, until the new semester starts and life evolves yet again. I hope for many more nights like this one, perhaps more filled with laughter and wine, crazy nights with those I can't live without, and who knows what else? I think, because last January, February, and March were so enjoyable, I will enjoy this time around too. I could only hope for so much.

An Aside

2008-11-16T13:23:00.003-05:00

The other day, while walking to the liquor store, I realized that I am always in a good mood when I am walking to the liquor store.

A Remembrance Day Moment

2008-11-11T11:08:00.004-05:00

As I sat in the library preparing an essay, the sound of a trumpet filled the air at precisely 11am. Of course, it's November 11th, and in some provinces people get a holiday to remember the fallen... Although here in Ontario.. we don't. I digress. As everyone in the University library, no matter what they were doing, stood for a moment of silence, I felt an odd combination of emotions- shame, sadness, hilarity. A minute passed, then another, and another, until I couldn't figure out if the man running the show had either fallen asleep or was so deep in thought about the fallen that he forgot to tell us the moment was over and we could sit back down. At any rate, as I stood observing those around me in our collective many moments of silence, I looked to the left and noticed a large hickey on the neck of the girl beside me.

It was a moment to remember. On this Remembrance day, I hope you remember something, too.

The Week That Was

2008-11-02T21:39:00.005-05:00

What was that? A mess of days and nights, glasses and bottles, sounds and colours... Unlikely yet completely true. And everyday, it's changed since then, In every way, I've changed since then.. I think I miss the confusion and excitement, but understand that I can not function forever in that state, and, well... essentially, being in that state for too long would turn me into a dry husk, useless and empty.

It's funny how, in hindsight, events build to stack a situation a certain way. It could be within the space of a few years, with chance meetings and sightings and little bits of observational knowledge tucked away for future use. These chance meetings have been preceded by, in fact, years of preparation without any one person realizing it. Random acquaintances leading to random conversations leading to new revelations. These revelations are things I still can't quite decipher in my mind, and indeed, are now making me a little nervous. I fell into something that is now over, at least for the time being, and I'm kind of reeling, wondering what life would've been like if this had happened any earlier, if I had made different decisions, if I had followed a different path.

Instead of living in the week that was, I must now move ahead, although not too far into the future. I should not expect, nor desire, anything more to happen than it already has. That would be dangerous.

Weather Systems

2008-10-22T10:23:00.006-04:00

I find it weird how, because I don't have a cell phone, I'm essentially shut out of the lives of people who don't have time/desire to email me or make a phone call to my actual house. I suppose it's a product of our culture, but truthfully I find it makes a lot of my friends completely lazy and prone to excuses- "Oh, but I couldn't call you because you don't have a cell." Who cares? Call me at home. I'm sick of being the only one to bother. It bothers me a lot that our cell phone culture has made it seem acceptable to do what they do- drive while talking, text while driving, talking or texting while being around other people that should technically matter more because they're in the room, physically present. Among other things, of course.

I think that being stagnated, like I feel now, affects me in ways I don't realize. I wish to be away from everything now. I love it here, but lately I have been dreaming of the green hills of Ireland,

forests,

and even cities of dubious proportions.

I think there is also a chance, since my friend just left for a company-paid trip to my homeland (the Wild West), that I am just embittered and envious. It doesn't help either that I'm off school for the week, and yet have not the money nor the plans to go anywhere or do anything other than read textbooks. I should be done lamenting... now.

I accidentally deleted some of my favourite music yesterday on iTunes, so I acquired more, and my latest is Andrew Bird's previous albums- Weather Systems and The Mysterious Production of Eggs. The man is talented. Haven't I always said that the man of my dreams plays the violin? Well, this guy has a degree as a concert violinist. Hot damn.

What's The Storm Called?

2008-09-30T13:25:00.005-04:00

It is my perfect sort of day- almost October, raining, cool, leaves turning.. And amazing new music in my ears. I've been on a bender of searching out progressive new music and classic old stuff to match my life as it circumflexes and twists and changes. European music is really hitting the spot now, like Germany's The Notwists and Sweden's Lykke Li, who actually has my perfect life (check out her story on Wikipedia). New York's Tv On The Radio and its new album Dear Science, killer as well, with a really unique sound. Classic is Nick Drake with an emphasis on Pink Moon.. Hard to believe he was around in the late 60s.

More than anything else, this time of year is perfect for getting me into school mode. Saying that, I have to admit that I am getting brain-deep into school this year; and heart-deep into greater world issues that I have the opportunity to think about, thanks to the things I am learning and those who are teaching me. The only constant is change and I would love to be a catalyst for that change. I am seeing new ways of opening up my life and the world around me.

"Fuck your war, cause I'm fat and in love and no bombs are fallin’ on me for sure. But I'm scared to death that I’m livin' a life not worth dying for." -Red Dress, Tv On The Radio

Vote Obama '08.

Rings In My Heart Like A Bell

2008-09-27T15:31:00.002-04:00

While walking the early autumn streets of this quiet day, I wandered and pondered the lives of others and my continuing love affair with this city. There are streets to the west of here that are beginning to colour with leaves, tall houses, windows, and mysterious gardens. Sometimes I gaze with shock, as these houses seem to belong somewhere else in another time. I wonder if I'll be able to part with this city, if I really want this autumn to be my last here, and if I'll ever get it all to myself. My life here is still, as always, poignant and nostalgic and endless. I like the quiet stillness of my bedroom at twilight, my kitchen warm with coffee, my busy street and hidden mysteries. I relish the continuation of close friendships, glasses of wine by the water, rainy nights.

What good's a mirror without a face?

Four Seasons in One Day

2008-08-31T21:57:00.003-04:00

Upon my return to the cities filled with people and their things, my nose filled with the smells of burning exhaust and endless desperation. Oh, how I yearn now for the clear air of the North, the dark lakes, and that endless time of green and grey.

"As if you could kill time without injuring eternity." -Thoreau

I live for those times, when my eyes were fixed level with the surface of the lake and all around me only silence. At night, with the dock at my back and the Milky Way up above, the loons haunting with their calls. I could see so many stars out there that I felt smaller than a pinpoint and way more lucky. My next yearning is for time away from everything, in that place, with only me and my memories for company. I will make that a reality soon enough.

To The Moons of Elsewhere

2008-08-05T01:12:00.003-04:00

It comforts me to know that my eccentricities are not just normal for individualism, they are also expected, and that everyone has them. I think I've tried so hard in my life to be someone that knows, someone that does, so much that I forgot how to be myself. And finally, finally, it's happening, it is really happening. I am learning how to be myself, with no excuses, with no reasons, just because. Because I can.

Another thing I've noticed- I have lived enough years now that I have preferences about everything. I used to be open to a lot, which I still am in a way, but now I know what I like or what I don't. I can make decisions. Perhaps I will always read books in the evening after work and dinner, in a quiet corner chair with a light, listening to music like Sigur Rós loudly and without pause, eating grapes or drinking tea. I have begun to find things that I enjoy, because I enjoy them, and not because I have learned to enjoy them from anyone else.

If you're in the mood for sultry, moody, exquisite sounds- listen to My Brightest Diamond's latest, A Thousand Shark's Teeth. Listen on a big stereo with big speakers, in the evening, the lights low, a glass of pinot noir in hand. Close your eyes.

All The Roads & All The Miles

2008-07-31T22:21:00.008-04:00

There is so much to be said about how iconic mountains are. Not ironic or ionic, but iconic (today while looking at blow-dryers, my mom goes "This one's iconic!" and I said "No, mom.. it's ionic.. or maybe.. ironic.." but that particular blow-dryer was probably not iconic. I bought it, maybe it will get iconic later in life). In any case, whenever I first get back to Calgary, I am desperate to get a glimpse of the Rockies. Furthermore, throughout my stay at home (whether it is days, weeks, or months), every opportunity I get, I drink the mountains in. If I can see them, I feel as if mountains are water and I have been dead thirsty for months.

I identified this feeling today while driving out on Stoney Trail, the highest point on the Northwest end of the city. With the sun bright, the sky blue and dazzling, and a summer wind blowing, I would've been satisfied to sit there all day and gaze. I further attempted to quench my thirst with a run to the top of Signal Hill, which lies between downtown and the mountains, at sunset, but got chilly quickly and had to run home again. I think that if I were really rich, I would build a house that was in the most perfect position to view the indescribable vista on the edge of the city and at the highest point. And also away from everyone else.

If there was an apex to reach in one's life, would you only realize it after you'd passed the apex and were on the descent? Or does the apex last as long as you can manage it? Another question I could think of is how do people view infinity, or do they even think about it? In truth, I think we all have the capability to make anything last forever, but we get bored, tired, or complacent before forever even gets to happen. I used to love plane rides, airports, checking in, waiting... But lately, after approximately 47 (so not kidding) plane rides later, the novelty is beginning to wear off. It doesn't help to have strange, odd, weird, or indescribably so, men sitting beside you, ensuring you will not sleep, take a deep breath, blink, nor visit the bathroom on the entire 4-hour flight. At least it wasn't a Greyhound.

Sometimes I feel as if I try too hard in my writing, and if I could just manage to let myself go, I would finally be happy with what comes out of my fingers when I type. I read things like http://chinesebroccoli.org/adventures/ and wish, for once, that what I write was interesting and endlessly readable. I wish I could express how I view the world more accurately with words. So far in life, I am only minimally satisfied. Perhaps it will get easier with time.

Calgary is always my place to be, an ultimate of ultimates. I feel like this arid city has brought me into my own, and for that I will be forever grateful. Sometimes I believe it's how people feel when they think they've found God in heaven on Earth, except I've found myself and apparently myself was in Calgary at the time. I'm so glad I got a chance to catch up.

The Time Has Come

2008-04-11T18:27:00.003-04:00

Because I have not had a job since early January and have been paying rent for the past 8 months and also tuition, I have not been able to spend any money. On anything. The list is as follows.

I can't afford:
§ Starbucks
§ meals out
§ clothes
§ movies
§ shampoo
§ haircuts
§ books
§ magazines
§ meat
§ cheese
§ new headphones
§ new running shoes
§ tattoos
§ bus tickets
§ getting my bike fixed
§ cell phone bill
§ plane tickets
§ debts
§ furniture for my new room
§ cable, phone or internet bill
§ concert tickets
§ alcohol or other substances
§ developing pictures
§ yoga class

I CAN afford:
§ fruit, yogurt, cereal, veggies, pasta, milk
§ bulk food provisions (dried fruit, nuts, coffee)
§ small quantities of coffee
§ scones
§ free stuff (often given to me by friends or loved ones)

All in all, you can see that I have been living frugally since January. I have dreams about shopping for things like shampoo or large quantities of books, and cannot wait until I can get more money from the government and live like a queen.

And by queen, I mean being able to afford a nice cut of chicken.

It Wasn't Me on Those Church Steps

2008-04-06T22:04:00.006-04:00

It doesn't seem like April. My life has been passing at alarming speeds over the past 2 months, so fast that I fear I won't remember a thing. I am one essay, one quiz, and two exams away from being done my school year, although I am starting again in less than a month. I will be in school for the next year with only a month and a half of rest. Sometimes, all I want is to flee again and begin a new adventure, but I know this is for the best.

It hurts more than anything to realize that at this time last year, I was wrapping up the planning stage of my backpacking trip. There was so much to look forward to, and sometimes I wish I could've done more and spent more time on that trip- perhaps the effect would have lasted me longer. However, I am truly happy about my accomplishments so far this term, as I have been doing better than I ever have in university. One last push-

And it's spring. It's unbelievable how long this winter has been, and I'm not just jaded and bitter about it. It was one of the longest, hardest winters I've ever experienced. If I was an indoor person, it would've been fine, but I'm really not. There is nothing I love more than being outside, walking, running, biking- without slipping all over the place and wearing 2387283 layers of clothing. The snow is finally starting to melt, although I fear it will be a week or two before all the snow is gone, and even more time before the winter dirt has been washed away. This past week, the weather has been getting better and better, and I'm even starting to get some sun. I am anticipating thunderstorms and steamy days. It's so much nicer to feel the breeze on your skin, the sun warm on your face... And it's finally good to be Canadian again.

I am ready to keep building, perpetuating success, and flourishing. Things are coming together slowly. I can't wait for summer. I am excited to go back to Calgary for a few days, not long enough I fear, but I need to finish this chapter of my life first.

Every Greyhound Station

2008-02-17T20:44:00.002-05:00

On Friday afternoon, as she was on her way to pick us up to begin our journey, our ride to Florida got hit by another car. Four hours in the police station lead to the destruction of our adventure. We had masterminded the plan when we learned our friend Sheena would be running a marathon in Ft. Lauderdale during Reading Week, and realized it was the perfect opportunity to have an official road trip.

Once we realized the car in which we were supposed to drive 4800km had become crippled, our disappointment almost overtook us as we mourned the loss of our dream. Sand, sun, and surf, once so close, now became impossible. The other terrible thing was that we wouldn't be able to support our friend, who now would have to run 42km on a Sunday morning surrounded by strangers and not one familiar face to greet her at the finish.

Disappointed as we were, DR and I immediately moved to Plan B. We checked Greyhound schedules and decided to take a long, long trip to Indianapolis, where his family resides. At 1:30pm on Saturday afternoon, 24 hours after we were supposed to leave for the beach, we boarded a bus to Toronto that would begin our journey. 23 hours, 4 transfers, and 5 big cities later, we arrived in Indianapolis.

The difference between America and Canada begins the moment you cross the border. DR and I were among the only Caucasian, middle-class people on the trip, signifying that the American Greyhound experience is mostly frequented by those who live at the poverty line. At our 1 hour layover in Buffalo, I got to enjoy one of the most disgusting bathrooms I've seen yet. Cleveland had an almost eerily clean, neat, Americanized feel to it- and I could barely believe DR when he told me our bags would be fine sitting in line for us. By themselves. And no one would steal anything. At 3am.

Columbus was busier, as it was nearing dawn and real people had begun their day, and we had coffee to sustain us. We got a total of 5 fragmented hours of sleep, each hour punctuated by aching knees, tired necks, and every so often, a stop and layover to change buses. In Springfield, Ohio, the strip mall we stopped at to collect more passengers (including a midget cowboy) boasted "Hung Lung Chinese Food" and "New and Used Furniture".

My American experience is now just beginning. We spent today hanging out at DR's parent's house in Indianapolis, where we got to sit in the backyard on the swing in t-shirts and bare feet, soaking up the sun. We went to the grocery store, Kroger's, in which there are so many choices for every product imaginable. There is something limitless about America. There are always choices, always roads to take, always options. Always more, bigger, better, faster.

To the south lies Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee. I sometimes can't believe how different the world is, even just 12 hours or 900km away. And yet, I somehow found someone who grew up in this different world but is so much like me.

Morning Yearning

2008-01-30T10:56:00.000-05:00

Lack of posts: due to extreme life-living and lack of complete inspiration. I spent the rest of 2007 in Calgary, working long hours at the godforsaken mall, with brief interludes of hot vinyasa yoga and long runs along the cold Bow River. Christmas was good this year, full of family and warmth. I haven't been happy at Christmas for a few years now. It was a welcome change. Nothing was extraordinary in December, I was facing the future and looking only toward it. I spent many hours on my own, blissfully and wonderfully (as is only possible when I am in Calgary). New Year's was spent in the company of my friend Miranda, who is leaving for Australia very soon. We were also accompanied by copious amounts of liquor. It was grand.

After working 7 solid weeks in a mall, I flew back to Toronto on January 4th to return to University for the first time in a year and a half. I was very excited and looking forward to learning, drinking, being with my friends, and my melancholy room. So far, things have been just as I wanted them, and better still.

My transition back into student life has felt seamless, as if I'd never left. It is even better now, too, because I have a firm idea of what I want out of my life here, and I am going to achieve it. I feel like I've become fully conscious, and I lived previously as only a fraction of my real self.

I love Peterborough. 30km runs to Lakefield and back, on beautiful grey afternoons before twilight. Walking Milo in the snow with a coffee in hand and music in ear. Waiting for the bus to take me to school, reading his thesis paper in the morning while he's in the shower, listening to José Gonzáles. Making amazing meals out of the few things in the fridge.

This is right now.

The Darkening Sky

2007-11-16T01:16:00.000-05:00

I love Calgary in the fall. I've only been back for a week now, but everything I love about here, everything new to love is almost overwhelming in how happy it makes me. It is my own city, something that I've molded to my liking. I've made my own memories here. There are evenings in my backyard, where the sky is a dark blue with the sun almost down, the tall spruce tree whispering as the wind caresses every single needle. It is so quiet in those moments that my entire life is clear to me.

Today, on the bus on the way to work, I looked out the window and noticed the snowy mountains to the west, only visible in that moment because we were traveling on an overpass. Nowhere else would that view be an every day occurrence. Calgary has it's own special meaning to me. It's quiet kitchens with a good book, CBC radio, and a cup of tea. It's wind-blown grey days when every molecule is electric. It is me often alone, but never lonely. I found my soul here. It keeps me grounded and every piece of me is magnified, prepared for constant healing and creativity. Calgary is my balance.

"(59) Tell her how you feel while you stand at the foot of the huge bed and look upon her sleeping body, while cursing yourself for being a ghost whose words cannot be heard by the living."
- One hundred ways to say I love you

Cue The Bibles

2007-10-30T19:50:00.000-04:00

My life during these past few weeks has been: Ridiculous: A Tale of Woe, Success, Passion, and Everything In Between. I have garnered myself two new jobs, one at a wonderful, comfortable boutique hair salon called Catalina, and the other at the prestigious and renowned Peterborough clothing store, Flavour. I suppose with anything good comes anything bad, as well. For example, my new job at Flavour? It's probably one of the hardest jobs to get in downtown Peterborough, which makes it awesome that I got it, but they're also only giving me one shift a week so far. And that, my friends? That will NOT pay my rent.

I've been trying to go for as many runs as possible, lately on a new night-time route on the outskirts of downtown Peterborough, to East City (across the river) and through a beautiful park. It is so freeing. The moon is often out and I can finally see the stars. There is truly nothing like it.

This past week has shown me that there are so many things that I want, and so many things I can have. I just need to find a way to match the two up.

Nothing Without Sacrifice

2007-10-02T00:44:00.000-04:00

There is a cafe across the street from my new house, one that I can see from my attic bedroom's window. I can see the people inside, chatting and laughing and evidently enjoying their moments. Everything I need is a walk away, whether it's milk or a shoulder to cry on. I am starting to love my life here. Peterborough is more full of interesting shops and restaurants and cafes than ever before. It's become a catalyst for my new life, where I've met new and wonderful people, and where I finally feel that I've found my niche. All I need now is a job.

In the afternoons, I like to sit by the river with a coffee and ponder my fate, read a book, or just listen. I like being surrounded alone on the edge, where nothing can touch me and time doesn't pass. New music is constant. I love living on my own again, and having my own time and space; although at times there is too much of both. No one expects me to wake up at any particular time, because I am not expected anywhere. Of late, I have enjoyed random hang-out time with any variety of people from my past or new to me recently. A new way of living has touched me, turning me to gold like the hands of Midas. I feel as if the world has opened up to me, that there is so much I have yet to learn and feel, and I have only barely skimmed the surface.

My bed sits under the slanted roof of the house, which is at an appropriate attic angle, and is a cozy nook where I can dream freely. My bed creaks, the window has no screen, and the street I live on is often noisy, which I am beginning to get used to. The sun streams into my room in the afternoon, and there is often a wonderful breeze flowing through. For October, the weather is unreal and so, so welcome. Almost every day has been completely spectacular. I must get out with my camera before the leaves are gone and the sky has turned to slate. I am living so perfectly right now.

Oh God. Oh God. Oh God.

2007-08-22T01:55:00.000-04:00

I honestly never thought I'd come to this conclusion, this decision, this totally fucking crazy reasoning... With hardly any money, wanting to move back to Ontario! I've loved my year of adventure, of course I would, but recently I've discovered that I miss my friends even more. Perhaps it's part of growing up and realizing that it's okay to need something or somebody or numerous somebodies. I've been looking back lately, and have realized that everything memorable happened with the people I care most about. In the places that are the most familiar and even though it's Ontario, there is something about it. Perhaps that I grew up there. Perhaps that most of my family is still there. I'm not sure. All I know is that this decision is scary, wonderful, flawed, and somehow unchangeable. This is what I want. It won't be easy, or all perfect.

But right now? This is what I need.

Paper Hearts & Photographs

2007-08-07T01:58:00.000-04:00

The thing with photographs is that sometimes you can tell exactly how the photographer is feeling the second they take the picture. Some photographs are so filled with love or intensity that they are visible to the naked eye, so obvious that it's impossible to ignore. As a photographer, I wish I was never capable of disappointing myself. For example: for every one photograph I've taken that I love, there are about 15 more that I feel are a waste of film. I know it's impossible to be perfect, or to always get it right, but it's still so crushingly disappointing. I can't stop, though. I will always strive for that perfect picture.

Summer is very quickly coming to a close. A week ago, I drove to Vancouver with my friend Miranda, who is moving there, and flew home last Wednesday night. It was such a welcome reprieve from my daily life in Calgary, which is at best satisfactory, and at worst monotonous. I got to take almost 3 rolls of film during the trip, most of the pictures hurried and uninspired, but even just using my camera again felt fantastic. Lately, the hot weather has subsided, and in its wake is a gorgeous midday temperature and a completely bearable breeze.

We move again in 3 weeks. It seems September is always a time for reinvention, for the change I thrive on and long for. This time last year I was still at camp, getting ready to go home and face the task of moving across the country. This year, I am enjoying random weekends and nights out, camping in places called Ghost Lake, walks through the city on summer evenings, time spent by the river and in noisy brewery-style restaurants with cold beer in hand. If you ask me, quite auspicious. I like the sounds of this.

Deserts & Darkness

2007-07-19T13:40:00.000-04:00

It's another one of those mornings where I have an endless pot of coffee at hand and time to myself. It's one of my rare days off. I'll be working 45-50 hours a week for the next month, with some days off here and there, until I give my notice. That's right! I'm quitting! The last 10 months of my life have been spent (with exception, of course, for my month away) in a consumer-driven, artificially-lit, stale-air circulated mall. It feels like some kind of waste. But what else is work? Ideally, I would've been working outside this summer, as a camp counsellor, landscaper... Anything, really. I've been so starved of the lovely summer air that I take any chance I get to be outside.

Last night, I walked my dog as the sun dipped behind magnificent thunderheads to the west. The air in Calgary has been uncharacteristically humid (which does NOTHING for my hair) and I watched carefully for coyotes as we walked through a school field. I love that spot, because I can see the lights of downtown, the mountains, Canada Olympic Park, and so much more, like a 360 degree IMAX movie. I watched the lightning gather as we walked home. It's been hot and stormy here for the past 5 or 6 days, with houses in the city getting struck by lightning and flash-floods.

I have a hard time believing that it's almost August. Time has been flying. I'll be 21 in less than 2 months, and as of September 6th, I'll have lived in Calgary for an entire year. I'm hoping to get back to school sooner than later, but there is so much more I want to do. It all comes down to money, of course, and I will have to decide. I'm hoping to visit Ontario for a couple of weeks in September because I miss my friends so terribly. That is the only thing I don't like about living so far away: that I'm so far away from almost everyone I care so much about.

And, last but not least:
Saturday, July 21st: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
Even that's enough to make me quit my job.

Infinity's As Near As It Is Far

2007-07-06T00:48:00.000-04:00

Here I am, back after a long hiatus! I apologize for the lack of blog entries for the last month... I've been working, uninspired, and otherwise occupied. It feels like eons since I was in Europe, and I miss it more than is humanly possible. Even though it seemed like work and was so exhausting at times, the monotony of everyday life is even more so. I'd love to be away again, even if it's just in a lakeside cabin with good food, friends, and some old-fashioned partying. It's summer.

This week begins the Calgary Stampede! People have started rampaging the store where I work for plaid, denim, and cowboy hats. It's nice to come home after a full day of hard work and have a rest, because I know I'll be back at it soon enough (for example, tomorrow morning. Work, eat, rest, sleep, work)... I've begun an obsession with crossword puzzles (usually I try to fit them in at work). I'm trying to keep afloat with all this activity, as well as get in some quality runs and time to myself. I haven't even been writing or photographing (both of which I hope to catch up with soon).

Last night I watched Donnie Darko (647th time for me.. probably) and I got this wonderful, reassuring feeling from it. I think I've accepted fully that it's true, every human being on this earth dies alone, and I'm not afraid. What if the world were empty? We live our lives so entertwined.. But what else is there for us? I've been questioning my existence lately and as always, am experiencing several existential revelations. Watching Donnie Darko helps.

It's one of those hot summer nights where I'd love nothing better than to fall asleep under the stars. I don't know where my life has gone, how is it already July? What's next? I want to keep this month the same, live it a couple times before I'm ready to let it go. I don't want my summer to disappear. Come, friends, and we'll go live in a cabin by the lake, days in the sunshine and summer neverending.

There's Only Now, No Ever After

2007-06-03T13:29:00.000-04:00

Hola mi amigos.
I haven't had time to write a fascinating new blog post, however, I HAVE had time to update my photoblog.

Life in Colour

I'll be posting new photos every couple of days. Enjoy!

Home Is Where The Heart Is.

2007-05-25T20:43:00.000-04:00

Hi everyone!
I'm home now. For now. I will update properly very soon!

Wales

2007-04-25T18:26:00.000-04:00

Here I am in North Wales. On orange juice, instead of saying "with pulp", it says "with juicy bits". And HobNobs are "Nobbly, Oaty Biscuits". NOBBLY. I love it. Also I've been up for an uncountable amount of hours. Goodnight.

Here I Am

2007-04-19T00:20:00.000-04:00

So the official countdown is on. I have four more days of work, one day off (tomorrow), and then on Tuesday at 3:40pm, I'll be in line at the airport to check in for my flight.

Calgary is a miserable mess of blowing snow, a cold wind, and the dreariness of having to be here for another 5 days. It's a terrible feeling, knowing I'm going somewhere, not being able to speed time up, and knowing I have so much to do before I go. The real problem, though, is not really knowing WHAT I need to do. I think about it, I come up with no real answers, and the feeling remains.

Another thing. What does the word "backpacking" even mean? To me, it's wearing myself into the ground by exploring cities top to bottom, an espresso at a corner cafe, sleeping anywhere that's soft-ish and horizontal, writing in my journal between cities on the train, eating baguettes and cheese and local fruits from the market in the square, keeping my eyes open, and having my camera ready at all times. Not to mention meeting people from around the world and drinking myself stupid on local wine. That is my vision. However, I get the distinct feeling that my traveling companions will have a different idea of how things will be done, and also that "sleep" and "utter relaxation" is on their top-5 list. Am I right? I sure hope not!

Of course, we'll try to shower as much as possible, and maybe sleep some (although I know I will.. get me tired enough and I'll sleep standing up, with my eyes open, while having a conversation with you), and real meals may or may not be a regular part of our lives. Sarah, I hope you learn to like pizza. Because I will be eating it. A lot.

Fare well.

We Gathered In Spring

2007-03-31T17:18:00.000-04:00

I've spent the last week in my own version of Vacation Planning Hell. Don't get me wrong, I've enjoyed this Hell immensely, but every small detail about this trip has begun to consume my being. When I get home from work, I go to the hostel website and compare. Or I go to a travel website and look at Tips (oh, I love those tips.) Or I talk with one of my compadres on the trip about the trip, where we're going, and

Today, on my day off, I went to the travel/adventure store and bought all sorts of random accessories (accessories are right up there with tips) and just spent the afternoon trying to figure out minute details.

I've received my Eurail pass by FedEx, and I think it's about time I had a vacation... From planning my vacation.

Wish me luck.

It's Rolling

2007-03-22T11:02:00.000-04:00

I've finally booked my flight to London. Up next on my travel planning agenda is:
+contacting all of my British friends
+planning a route
+purchasing rail passes
+acquiring supplies
and
+LEAVING.

I fly to London Heathrow on April 24th.

Also, stay tuned to my photoblog site (http://renataphotographs.blogspot.com), as I will be posting a couple updates (photos from my trip to Texas!).

Keep it real, dawgs.

So Begins Our Alabee

2007-03-14T19:17:00.000-04:00

College Station, Texas
6:20pm Central
Wednesday, March 14th 2007
Thunderstorming rain

You're my only softness, you're my only pleasure, it's true
And I never want to be your little friend, the abject failure.

I Still Remember

2007-03-02T01:12:00.000-05:00

I am continually stunned by how quickly time passes. I resolved to make a post every week, at the very least, and I've failed myself already! It's still been puking snow here in Calgary, every day filled with fluffy snowflakes that get caught in my eyelashes as I walk to work. It's March now, and I'm crossing my fingers and shaking my bum and hoping that the weather will clear, I'll have good luck when I go to Houston on the 11th and get some sun, and that I'll be able to find the answer to my various dilemmas. I hope the answers will come to me in my sleep.

I leave for Houston in just over a week to visit Ashley, who I love like a sister, and I can't wait for the vacation from work. I'm just so tired all the time. I need to be refreshed somehow. I need something new, and exciting, something new and exciting that I can't buy with money. Believe me, I've tried. My store has started getting in tons of fabulous spring clothes, dresses and shorts and tanks and cute wallets and oh, I can't even begin. The short of it is that these things give me hope. And oh, I need hope.

Open Season

2007-02-13T02:04:00.000-05:00

It hasn't stopped snowing in Calgary for the last week. All day, every day, it's been this fine, light snow that covers everything and refuses to stop. Yesterday, the boys and I drove up to Lake Louise to snowboard in the mountains. We got there just after the sun rose and rode all day, among the first 10 people to get on the chairlift. The best part was taking two lifts to The Top of the World, which is about 3000 feet above sea level, above the fog, and peaks all around us rose above the fog like islands in the sea. I feel truly at home here.

Tomorrow is the day I get my wisdom teeth out. I'm loaded up with three (3) bottles of pills, I have three (3) days off, and I'm prepared to eat soft foods and watch movies for those 3 days straight. Happy Valentine's Day, Renata. Here's some codeine. Drown out the pain.

On Saturday I bought three new CDs. This is a new thing. I haven't bought CDs for probably a year or two, which is a damn shame because gosh, buying CDs is fun! I just remembered this. I bought The Dudes Brain, Heart, Guitar, Feist Open Season, and Swan Lake Beast Moans. This is the cold comfort of the in-between, a sad sorry state as I'm waiting around for you.

I want to be able to get out of my comfort zone and to stop being so afraid of real life that I pretend I don't care. Because I do, I really, really do. I can't even begin to imagine what's ahead for me.

And now:

To a friend,
...It's only taken you 3 months to realize that I still exist, that I'm here living and breathing just like you. You always do this, and expect me to just come right back, when it's convenient for you, when you need me again. But what happens when I don't need you anymore? Do you remember those days we spent? I always wonder how much any of it meant to you, those nights we'd go to Hockley and sit under the stars, and talk and talk. The endless miles in the car, crossing the country. The time was ours, always ours... I knew the day would come, the day you'd ask me in not so many words to bring you back into my life. I don't know anymore. You're never who I think you are. You're a master of your craft.
I'll stay in time, and watch you pass by.
Love, Renata

Isn't it just? Maybe one day I'll get to actually send this to you.

But Sometimes

2007-01-31T02:06:00.000-05:00

Sometimes it all just hurts too much.

Last Night, I Had A Dream.

2007-01-30T12:39:00.000-05:00

And in this dream, I got to freak out at and confront my former best friend (ooooh, you say, an EX-BEST-FRIEND?!) and oh, it felt good. Unfortunately, I'll most likely never be able to do this in real life because there is a very small chance I will see him again (which, in itself, is disappointing). Never has a confrontation felt so good, albeit unsatisfying. Maybe one day I'll get to do it for real.

Lately, I've felt very reclusive and hermit-y, although (or because) I work in a mall 50 hours a week, and haven't felt like doing much of anything that includes other people. Even emailing and messaging and telephoning are too much for me. I feel bad about this, because usually I am the queen of communication. So if you are reading this, and haven't heard from me in a while, I apologize. The best I can offer is that I hope I'll snap out of this soon. Otherwise, it was nice knowing you?

I'll be in Houston, Texas from March 11th until March 17th. Yee-haw!

One Fell Swoop

2007-01-19T00:13:00.000-05:00

I think the thing that scares me the most is how serious he seems sometimes, and if that seriousness was directed at me, I would vaporize. It's what I can't see that affects me the most. It's that seriousness, and his age, and how much I want it to happen. Those are the worst. And the worst of the worst is having a tongue tied, horrifying, unending moment where I can't say what I want to say. That moment will exist forever in my nightmares.

There is a place at the top of my neighbourhood (it's hilly, imagine it) where at night, I can see downtown and Canada Olympic Park and all of the neighbourhoods and streetlights in between. I like to go there when the wind is blowing, so that I can pretend that it can help me fly.

I'm still enjoying life now, more than most days, and I'm so glad to feel alive again. I wish it weren't so easy to be selfish.

Playgrounds Are Graveyards

2007-01-11T01:02:00.000-05:00

And all of our scars are permanent.

I've returned from Toronto (on Monday morning, in fact) after sleeping in an airport, lots of eating, seeing Emily Haines & the Soft Skeleton on the Danforth, so many buses and trains and planes that I couldn't even keep track.

It's 2007, everybody, so let's begin anew.

I've been thinking hard about my next tattoo. I've found an artist that does excellent work, and am seriously considering getting a picture this time (unbelievable, I know), so I just need to decide what. I usually get flashes of inspiration and am always completely happy with what I get, but this time I have none and thus will be unhappy with an impulse. I'll keep you updated.

It's terrifyingly cold in Calgary, again, and although I am going to hate myself tomorrow morning, I am going to walk to the gym in the snow and give 'er. After the wind-down from Christmas, work is mind-numbingly boring and I've been spending somewhat regrettable amounts of money in the mall in compensation (lululemon, half-price calendars, a new flatiron, a new bath loofah, why? Why? Why?).

Considering my many useless and somewhat overambitious ideas of late, I've actually come to a conclusion: I love Calgary. I am staying in Calgary. I am going to go to school here in Calgary starting in the fall and I may or may not have a 3 year plan that begins and may or may not end in Calgary. Within this 3 year plan is a few months of travelling, lots of months of schooling, and hopefully at the end an actual career. We'll see how this goes. It's actually horribly exciting to have a firm plan that might take me somewhere, and I can't think too much about it or I might explode into little tiny atoms of excite!

And now, as I shiver alone in my room, typing and listening to the Donnie Darko soundtrack & score, I leave you with this:
Is the past automatically better than the future, or vice versa? And why?
Thanks, Emily.

Goodnight, moon.

If Only In My Dreams

2006-12-21T00:07:00.001-05:00

I like waking up before the sun rises, getting ready for work in the dark, and arriving at the bus stop just as the sun touches the horizon from below. The clouds light up in shades of purple and red and orange, and I am alone at my stop, dressed and ready for another day. I like being on the bus with everyone else, feeling as if I am a part of the greater picture, a small person in a large world, going about my day.

I suppose Christmas is coming soon, although I can barely feel it. I spend my days catering to the needs of others, whether it's a t-shirt for the boyfriend, denim for the son, hoodie for the granddaughter. I write out gift receipts and put collapsed boxes in bags, reassure anxious buyers that yes, the hoodie will fit, and yes, if it doesn't, you can bring it back (as long as it's before the 7th of January and you have your receipt!). I always feel cold inside. I wish I knew how to warm me up. I wish I could feel Christmas.

I leave for Toronto next Thursday, to see my favourite people and favourite places. I'm hoping this New Year's Eve will be better than the last (oh, isn't that what we always wish for), or, at the very least, that I will remember it this time.

There are days like today where nothing really makes sense, and I can imagine myself in a million other scenerios, ones in which I am capable of complete, utter happiness. These moments have been happening far too often. This is where I can see the years behind me, so far away, and the years ahead stretched out so that I can't see the end. And yet it seems, there is never enough time.

Renata's Bests of December (so far):
+Crave
+Band of Horses
+Oolong Tea House
+Air Canada
+my new cell phone
+christmas lights
+eggnog

Merry New Year and Happy Chrismukkah, everyone.

In The Devil's Territory

2006-12-10T12:12:00.000-05:00

Sunday morning.

My mother is sick in bed, has been for a couple days now, and she may need to go back to the hospital. I hate being here all alone with her like this, it's depressing and upsetting. I can handle it, but I don't want to live it alone. Now I understand why it helps to have people around to support you, why family is so important.

Tonight is my work Christmas party. I am planning on drinking as much as I can in order to numbify my circumstances, my shortcomings, and my disappointments. I miss my friends. I am strong, but sometimes I feel as if I am not strong enough, not enough to bear all that is bestowed upon me. I wish for an escape. A rescue, even. Something to take me away from it all.

I sometimes forget to eat enough, between working, my almost daily visits to the gym, and my now-often anxiety. I've realized that I am getting too good at being distant and cold, because it hurts less. I need to be careful to not get too thin. It might just happen one day, I'll realize that a part of me is missing. And by then, it'll be too late.

Fred Astaire

2006-12-02T13:27:00.000-05:00

Last night, I discovered the Documentary section at Blockbuster. Before this, I had assumed that only tiny, independent movie stores had such sections, and that only tiny, independent movie stores could fulfill my inherent need for independent films, foreign films, and documentaries. I am both overjoyed and disappointed by this revelation.

I also discovered Twinings tea at Safeway, which basically means that I will be enjoying authentic Irish Breakfast and Earl Grey whenever I feel the need. On my to-do list is a visit to Oolong Tea House in Kensington to top up my stash of Market Spice black tea and take a long walk along the river.

On Tuesday night, the girls and I went downtown to see our manager perform with his band at the HiFi club. It was the coldest night of our cold wave, and your typical indie-rock scene: bottles of beer and tables lit by tea lights, tattoos and awesome hair among the 20-and-30-something sceners. The club itself had the perfect artistic touch, murals on the walls reminiscent of your favourite iPod commercial.

The mall I work at became instantly busier yesterday, it being December 1st. The collective consciousness became aware that yes, it is December, and yes, Christmas is imminent, and if you do not start your shopping now, death will come swiftly and painfully. I haven't started my shopping.

Peacock Skeleton With Crooked Feathers

2006-11-27T01:19:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I don't even recognize myself. In pictures, in the mirror, from this summer and summers past, sometimes in my own writing. Not because I look any different than usual, but because it's as if I never really knew me. These days, nothing much happens, and I am letting weeks go by without even noticing. Christmas is in less than a month now, and that means I am even closer to my Ontario trip. By the time I get there, it will have been 4 solid months away from Ontario. 4 much needed months away.

It's snowing a blue streak here, extremely cold with a snowfall warning in effect. I didn't leave the house today. Instead, I cleaned my room, read a book by the fire, and ate cookies. Glorious.

Every day, I look more and more like a 15-year-old boy. I don't really bother with my hair anymore, which of course only makes it look it's best, and working at a clothing store only further improves my style (and expands my wardrobe). I now own 17 pairs of jeans. That I wear. I won't even try to count the number of t-shirts I have, because obviously a jeans-and-t-shirt girl will have a lot of jeans and t-shirts. And really, really cute shoes.

I digress.

Christmas is coming, and I've sold my soul to the devil. I am the retail whore, in chains and fire and brimstone and on the road to perdition.

I present my newest tattoo (from September 10th, 2006):

Alone Together

2006-11-19T03:17:00.000-05:00

We can never have it quite good enough. We can never keep it, no matter what. nothing in this life was meant to last forever; even the tiniest particle, the largest indestructible force will collapse someday. To my left sits a book on quantum physics, Miles Davis' album Kind of Blue (the essential jazz recording), photographs, unopened bars of dark belgian chocolate, and unused rolls of film. Right in front of me sits a large, glowing, white screen that is full of promise.

I want to write tonight. A want is very different than a can, a want is an impulsive, fleeting feeling that could logically pass at any given moment. I can. I can write tonight. "I can" is too ambitious. I want to can. I wish the can were so easy.

Another one of the things I wish I could can at this very moment is photograph. I wish my camera worked tonight. I wish everything that was ever possible and open to me was possible right now. I wish every opportunity for me to do the right thing presented itself right now: I should look you in the eye. I should say something. I should do something. I should leave the house. I should place that phone call. I should send that email. I should write that letter. I should've kissed you. I should be there with you. I should, I should, I should. I would. I will. I shouldn't be afraid, not even once, up to the very second before the second I die. In that last second, I will allow a small amount of tangible fear to flood the second before I no longer am awake.

It's this moment of beauty, the endless hours before daylight where only the photographs on my wall keep me company. The loneliest time of my life is yet to come, I've decided. I'm sure anyone could be more alone than me, now or then. or later. But for now, I can't comprehend that. I can only hope it won't choke me for too long.

Sometimes I feel that movies are more real than real life. Silly, I know, but it's sometimes only in movies where everything about a scene is noticed and recorded and utterly meaningful. What happens to the details in real life that no one sees? Are they lost forever in the vacuum of space, or are they recorded somewhere and kept as archives? It's this and other things that plague me from day to day.

I dedicate this time in my life to all those who will never read this, from the cute guy who works at the Y, to the boy i know who lives far away and far off in my mind. To everyone else that will never know me. Perhaps one day this will all mean something, perhaps there is a reason I have no reason. I have no direction, and no way to know for sure. But I lay my trust in the rush of fate.

I Am One, But I Asked For Two

2006-11-13T00:16:00.000-05:00

I've become mind-numbingly complacent over the past couple days, and my mother is in California so I've been alone for the most part. I can't understand why I feel nothing, I do what I have to do but don't care about anything else otherwise. It sucks. At the very least, I went snowboarding with my Aussie friend in the mountains yesterday, remembered that I'm alive and why.

Sometimes I hate the past more than I love it and miss it, but I can't hate it because it's what's made me. The last two years of my life have been huge, but I'm completely positive that the next 10 will be just as crazy and lonely and full of adventure.

I miss my friends. There are many certain other things that I do not miss. And I need to move on.

Seeking Solace In Science

2006-11-05T02:22:00.000-05:00

Tonight, I walked home 2 hours straight from the mall, in the soggy snowy streets and with the foggy sunny sky turning into moony darkness. I walked for no reason, I could've taken the bus or gotten a ride, but I mostly needed the time to think and wallow. I needed my feet to keep moving in order to keep from imploding. I stopped at Chapters and bought a book on quantum physics and another on syncronicity, and got a soy peppermint mocha. I got home, felt a bit better, burned an awesome CD (track list below) and sat down to read by the fire.

I've become quite depressed recently and sometimes it feels as if nothing will make me happy again. It feels as though there is nothing keeping me afloat except for my friends, because I know they care about me. I feel really numb most of the time. So, technically, I don't feel at all. I can only hope it will get better with time. I hope I won't continue to sink deeper.

Wallowing Playlist (good for wallowing, depression, or just enjoying being melancholy):

1. World Waits by Jeremy Enigk
2. It's In Your Blood by Lydia
3. Lovely & Blue by Ryan Adams
4. Golden Star by My Brightest Diamond
5. Crowd Surf Off A Cliff by Emily Haines & the Soft Skeleton
6. Hold On, Hold On by Neko Case
7. Summertime Feat. Billie Holiday & Louis Armstrong
8. Set The Fire To The Third Bar by Snow Patrol Feat. Martha Wainwright
9. Waltz Moore by From First To Last
10. Trouble by Coldplay
11. Slow Dancing In A Burning Room by John Mayer
12. I've Been Thinking by Handsome Boy Modeling School Feat. Cat Power
13. December (Demo) by Regina Spektor
14. You Could Be Happy by Snow Patrol
15. Lines Bleed by Pony Up!
16. Airbag by Radiohead
17. Radio by The Silent Years

Guten nacht. I'm ready for a sleep. I'm ready for nothing at all.

This, I Never Knew.

2006-10-30T21:16:00.000-05:00

I'm back from Halifax. I had a fantastic time in an old, old city, nestled next to the stormy Atlantic. Sushi, drag queens, cruise ships, late night talks with heron birds on the waterfront, drives to Sydney and back. Our road race in Cape Breton was cancelled due to weather (Sunday morning), so we went for a run anyway and called it a day. We visited Eamonn in Antigonish, and I'll never shake the feeling that I went back in time about 20 or 30 years when I went to Nova Scotia.

We saw Marie Antoinette (bad, bad, bad), ate a vegan dinner, went for a few twilit runs in the park on the point (along that ocean again), drank wine, laughed, laughed, laughed. I have a new BFF, naturally. Or not so new, just newly.. confirmed. Dalhousie University is gorgeous.

I thought a lot on this trip. I had lots of time to think, as I had connections in Toronto and Montreal, and lots of idleness. I thought about us, about me, about my future, about my friends and future endeavours. I'm tired of thinking now. I would like to stop.

And I would like to be alone for a long, long time. Not completely alone, but I don't want to date anyone for a long while. I'm happy now. Happy. Alone.

It's Officially Official:

2006-10-23T01:06:00.000-04:00

I am backpacking Europe and the UK this spring! Tentatively from the middle of March till the middle of May. We shall see what comes of those dates for sure. Cities I am planning on visiting:
Ireland:
Dublin, Belfast

Scotland:
Glasgow, Loch Ness, Edinburgh

England/Wales:
London, Cardiff, North Wales

Spain:
Madrid, Barcelona

France:
Paris*, Nice*, Avignon*

Italy:
Florence*, Venice

Greece:
Athens

Portugal:
Lisbon

aaaaand, if possible, Switzerland and The Netherlands. And Belgium for good measure. This list will most likely expand.

I leave for Halifax on Tuesday night.

Candice, this site needs an update. If you can help me with my archives and layout (whenever you get some spare time! If ever!) I'd absolutely love it.

* denotes somewhere I've already been.

Set Fire

2006-10-21T16:59:00.000-04:00

My boss (the coolest manager of my life) got to see the New Pornographers for free the other night because he's got friends in the band. If only. I leave for Halifax on Tuesday night, and I'm so excited by oh my god also nervous.

I have the whole weekend off! I don't know what to do with myself!

And last but not least, I think I am going to travel this coming year instead of going to school.

That is all.

Baby, You're The Only Light I Ever Saw

2006-10-17T21:50:00.000-04:00

This past Sunday, something momentous happened.

I got some baaaaad news. And it makes me feel lost, anxious, relieved, terrified, free. How often does your quasi-boyfriend tell you he thinks he's gay? The boy you spent your whole summer with, shared awesome and sometimes perplexing memories with?

It all makes sense now. The only problem is, where does this leave me?

And better yet, how is the trip to visit him next week going to go?

Sunnyside Station

2006-10-12T02:00:00.000-04:00

Today my heart feels sick. I feel unwanted and unmentioned, I crave a good cry and wish I could remember what to write and why. I'm missing everything all at once, so much that it is caving in on me and if feelings were bricks, I'd be crushed instantly. I can't even pinpoint what it is that I need, it's just a vague space right in the middle of my being that is screaming out in agony.

I feel unnaturally angry, although only at times, flaring and so much more painful. I wish I could feel like I was doing more in the world. I wish I had time to do more in the world.

I wish I could be so much more.

Today I was sitting in a tea house, staring straight down a long stretch of road that comes right from the foothills, thinking only of later and feeling so calm that it was almost unreal.

Today I was standing on a moving train, forming a million thoughts and ideas and concepts and plans in my head, while the afternoon sun faded into darkening clouds.

Today I remembered what I thought I had forgotten.

Today was an epiphany, and taken one step further, it would have been all of my recent dreams crashing into each other and becoming one.

But now, when today is almost tomorrow, I have forgotten everything I'd remembered. I forget those perfect ideas and almost forget how beautiful my world can be. I wish I had someone here to remind me how it was.

Cursed With

2006-10-01T21:08:00.000-04:00

It's the afternoon I spent months ago, a year ago even, in a house where the early morning light slid across the ancient wooden floor. I burn the same incense on the same afternoon, sliding into oblivion in my cozy little bed, for I no longer wish to be conscious. I do the same activity to reach the same result, knowing I only want to pass the time. A few things are different in this place, for a year ago I couldn't watch the sun slide below the mountains any night of the week, or hear my mother move around downstairs in the kitchen. I used to enjoy my solitude, where the melancholy could sink in, and where I could let it. I miss my old house where I could be alone. I miss the quiet uncertainty of my life there, where my life was entirely up to me and I allowed my time to go to waste.

I still love this time of year, it's so completely me that I should walk out and sink into the fallen leaves and never return. I wish I could disappear so easily.

And tonight, while I lay in bed, listening to the clock ticking and wishing I could sleep, I will hope for the rest of this month to pass as quickly as possible. It feels like my life is on hold now. I'm so far, in time and in space, from all I hold dear. Everything that I fear will go away in just a matter of time, whether I want it to or not.

Well, This Is IT

2006-09-24T21:21:00.000-04:00

Welp, guys, tomorrow I start my brand new job. I am now going to be a full time retail worker, paid to work in retail full time. Full time? FULL TIME. It kind of sounds like I'm devoting my whole life to it. Am I? I think so, probably, yes.

Also, this is a new thing sort of, not really, but I may very well be heading to Halifax in about a month, because, because, there is a certain person there that I really miss and would like to see, Thus, Halifax. Halimafaxination.

Otherwise, this weekend has been way too sunny for my liking, and I am sooo Ikea'd out. No more Ikea, please, not for a while.

And don't forget, my photoblog is still alive and kicking and freshly updated too. So check'r, okay?

Ungh.

2006-09-19T13:15:00.000-04:00

I woke up this morning almost ready to face the day. For some reason, everything seems harder and more sentimental on this grey Calgary morning, where I feel most alone. There are a few things keeping me afloat: the package receipt pinned to my bulletin board from yesterday, the pictures on my wall, the coffee I just drank. The rest of my fate rests on my shoulders today, dependent on whether or not I can leave the house. Part of me wants to collapse on my bed and sob for a while.

Sleep doesn't come easily anymore. I don't know what I'm worrying about or why I can't stop tossing and turning. It's all on me now.

And my heart is fit to burst.

Check It, Check It OUUUUTTTT

2006-09-18T15:17:00.000-04:00

My photoblog is officially now updated!

http://renataphotographs.blogspot.com

Feel free to comment- and I'll be putting more up soon!

This Is The Last Night Of The Rest Of Your Life

2006-09-17T01:51:00.000-04:00

Photograph courtesy The Lifetime Collective sans permission.

There is a sound I can hear from here, it's a sound like the wind blowing a million leaves and blades of grass and into buildings and across roads. I can hear the snow on the mountains half an hour from me, the moody Rocky Mountains, who became snow-covered and intimidating yesterday with the drop in temperature and rise in precipitation. Yesterday, after a lunch at the unbelievable Fairmont Banff Springs and the purchase of a new coat (see below) from Creme featuring the lifetime collective clothing line.

The Palms.

This is a million hours in the making, every moment I wish I'd had and everything in between. I can run for hours and hours and not get tired, listening to the Blood Brothers and getting anger out with every step. It's a cold night in Calgary, Alberta, and soon I'll be cozy in my bed. I'm just tired of thinking about life and am prepared to start living it. I'm the opposite of weepy and nostalgic this time. I'm ready again for public transportation, human interaction, being cold and watching people. Goodbye direction.

You'll Never See A Finer Ship

2006-09-13T12:58:00.000-04:00

This was the lull I'd longed for. A full week of intensity, or rather, a full summer of intensity. I'm finally moved, finally inked (again), finally 20 (egh, egh, egh), and now it's being alone and finding a job and becoming immersed in music, because there is nothing else for me to do but to dream of dying again. Last night I was building my new Ikea furniture and listening to American Analog Set, and realizing I know no one in this city and that everyone who will ever love me is far away, and perhaps gone forever. I'm being dramatic, I know this, but I have every right. I just couldn't breathe.

Now this morning is the ultimate type, rainy and dark and perfect. After a whole week of sunshine, this city is matching my mood. Jacob and I drove across the country this week, 3380 kilometres, to my new home and my new life. He left yesterday on a plane, while I stayed here. I am staying here in my new life, until I figure out something better for myself.

I'm 20 years old now. I'm a twenty-something. I don't like it. I'm alone, and although on a new adventure, it's leaving me in such a precarious position.

This is it, though. This is where I must rise to my challenges and move on into brightness, for there is no more for me here than that, nothing but wide open opportunity. I still miss you all, for I'm away from you all again, all of you.

In the next couple days I'll be posting on my photoblog again, photos from this past week. Check it out at http://renataphotographs.blogspot.com.

This week, I'm listening to:
Emily Haines - Knives Don't Have Your Back
Grizzly Bear - Yellow House
Alexisonfire - Crisis
Interpol - Antics
American Analog Set

Not Worth The Worry

2006-08-29T18:41:00.000-04:00

This morning, everything in my house was moved onto a truck and carted away. You'd think that such a thing would be sad, but in my mind, it's progress. I'm already thinking Calgary. Part of me is already in the west, ready to start a new chapter in my life and write more cliched analogies. Since being back from camp, I've seen and talked to so many of my new and old friends it seems almost ridiculous. But it's not ridiculous at all, oh no, it's wonderful because I miss all of them and wish I weren't leaving them behind. Leaving them behind?

Am I afraid to move to a new city, where I know no one?

Truthfully, I'm mostly not thinking about it except for vague plans like getting a job and training for a marathon. I'm sure that once I get there, and once I get settled, I'll miss here so absolutelyfreakingmuch. It's all a part of this, though. I accept the risks, and I am so ready for the highs and the lows that I'll experience.

The only thing left here now is me, and once my parents fly out on Saturday morning, I'll no longer have a home in Orangeville. I won't have a home in the only place I've really ever known. One week short of my 20th birthday and I am uprooted and flailing. I am worried that I'll forget to say goodbye to someone or something. Is everything I love here imprinted in my mind, ready to bring back to memory if I need it? Have I fully absorbed every bit of this?

Of course. I've lived here for the last 20 years of my life.

And as for him, as for him... I really don't know. The only thing I know is that I hold him in high esteem and I don't want to let him go. Not completely, not yet, not ever? I just wish he'd let me know where he is, how he is, and if he ever thinks of me.

That is all.

Everything's Not Lost

2006-08-24T21:21:00.000-04:00

The weather is already cooling, and camp is turning into a dream. I find lately that I prefer my camp friends over my old friends, not for any real reason other than the fact that I just spent the last 9 weeks of my life with the same people, the people that know me now, and know the real me. We have a whole summer in common, a summer that tried our patience, left us perpetually exhausted, and thrilled us. We revel in the memories of that time, and the memories of each other, and wish we were together again. Camp allowed us to leave our external worries until the end of the summer, and allowed us to leave the real world behind for a while.

The thing I'm really struggling with lately is not loneliness, as I'd feared, but rather balancing those summer relationships with current life. I forget how far away everyone is, and when I remember, it's like a punch in the chest. I don't know when I'll see most of them again, and it's even harder when I know I'll be moving even further away. I still dream of them. I still dream of the breeze at camp, off the lake.

I'm listening to Coldplay's Parachutes tonight, and it reminds me of the fall of Grade 11, when I first starting listening to this album obsessively. Before they were lame and the next big thing. It's the cool weather and the sweaters, and reminds me of high school and cross country team practice. And chocolate Vector bars, which used to eat on the 20 minute walk to school as breakfast.
The one thing that this cool weather makes me wish?

That I was going back to school. Moving into my new place with my roommate, preparing for classes, partying before the real work begins. Can't have one without the other, and that realization helps me understand the full brunt of my decision to leave school for a year.

UP NEXT:
Why My Camera Deserves To Burn In Hell.

You Could Be Happy

2006-08-18T08:22:00.000-04:00

I've been home for 12 hours now- listening to the same 11 songs on speakers I've set up in the bathroom, eating 1% cottage cheese out of the container BECAUSE I CAN, and lying on the floor sobbing my eyes out. I made Winter White Earl Grey tea with soy milk, got a phone call from Texas, and am trying to get used to being back home.

I can't cry now because I've put makeup on, even though I barely wore makeup all summer. My hair never got flatironed and very rarely blowdried, and I didn't even wear sunscreen all summer (gasp!).

My house is filled with packed or half-packed boxes, and all the art is off the walls. Mum is making reservations to ship our cats in a plane, and I am going to start mapping my driving route from Orangeville, Ontario to Calgary, Alberta.

Saying goodbye in a parking lot is always slightly romantic, but all I could say to him was "this isn't goodbye, this isn't goodbye". The lights were bright at this particular gas station, and of course I couldn't cry- I saved my tears for when I got to be alone. I haven't been alone in the last 9 weeks- how am I going to handle it now?

My bed seemed too big when I crawled into it last night, and all my dreams were of my camp people, crazy dreams that didn't allow me to remember where I would be waking up:

Home.

I Am Here.

2006-07-10T10:24:00.000-04:00

Starrucca, Pennsylvania.

Working at a summer camp. I am tanned, I am buff, and I am happily exhausted.

I miss y'alls. (and have gained a strange accent from being around Texans and Oklahomans and other assorted international voices).

But I love here.

A Spinning Top

2006-06-11T23:16:00.000-04:00

There is a place I go near my house where I can sit and feel the world breathe in and out. I go here at night, while walking my dog, and listen to my ipod. And I take a break from the purgatory that is my daily life. I hate waiting more than I hate
"president" bush (and that's a lot), and it's been all I've been doing lately. My house is thisclose to being sold, and if it is, we will be moved out by September first.

I sit in my place, which is at the top of a steep hill on my old high school's soccer field, and look at the life moving within my line of sight. Usually it's a few cars, late at night, and the breeze on my face. It's streetlights and traffic lights and the sky, which is, as expected, dark and expansive, oftentimes filled with stars obscured by light of the town. I sit here and ponder, and I'm truly alone, so much that I can feel it surrounding me like water.

Tonight, as such nights allow, I listened to nostalgic songs from last summer. It made me feel complicated and sad and hollow and wonderful and hopeful and unattached. It reminded me how quickly things can change, and have changed, and how I hate missing more than I hate waiting, which is a lot.

Tonight, I could see time rush by, till I could see the fall, a new neighbourhood with a new place to sit. I only hope that there, I won't feel my hollowness as much, and I hope I'll be able to forget the sadness and move on in my life. Because there is nothing I hate more than regret. I hate regret more than I hate missing or waiting or president bush. and those are a lot.

Down and out, guys. I am down and out.

Next up: Why I Am An Escapist.

Wrong At The Worst Of Times.

2006-06-07T13:19:00.000-04:00

Emotional highs really are a curse. Perhaps I need the other kind of high, the kind that comes from breathing in and holding. Emotional highs make me think I'm really all right, that everything in my sphere is working seamlessly, and nothing will ever be wrong again.

I was wrong when I thought that.

This morning a For Sale sign went up on my lawn. It's a relief, it is, because it means that hopefully soon we will be able to make our plans for the move. But it's the end of an era. It's the end of my life here, although not completely so, because wherever there are things I love, I will be there in spirit. The things I love about Orangeville are many, and right now the thing I love the most is the breeze from the backyard, with it's Ontario lush-feeling, farmer's fields and the smell of hay on a bright and beautiful sunny day. I'll miss the trees here.

It is just one of those days. Stay tuned for more Ontario nostalgia, coming at you from Orangeville, Ontario.

And I leave for camp next week.

Jesus H. JAMBA JUICE!

2006-05-28T12:11:00.000-04:00

Just a litte update. J actually was pretty "sweet like that", it took him less than 24 hours to call me back. Then I saw him, and it was awesome, and I feel awesome now. And other things happened that were a little less than awesome, like telling him that I'm moving (and I got the "unpleasant surprise" face with that), but otherwise, it was pretty darn lovely. Oh, J. Juicy Jalopy Jamming Jauntily. Jemima.

And I got some new clothes and a new pair of sunglasses, both of which I don't need at all, and spent some quality time with (as Candice puts it) my marmela.

Orangeville is still lame, and I believe Jess will agree with me on that one. Mary, you suck because we didn't hang out this weekend. Sarah, you suck because you're not home yet. Everyone else, you suck because you're not in Orangeville enjoying the lame-osity of it with us. I'm just bitter.

Back In Eastern Standard Time (DST)

2006-05-27T02:27:00.000-04:00

The jet-lag is causing me insomnia, but boy oh boy is it nice to be back in rainy Ontario! I bet my tan is going to fade QUICKLY, quickly and wonderfully, until I am back to my pale, unhappy self. I called J, who according to his machine message would call me back as soon as possible because he's "sweet like that". J, you are totally not "sweet like that". I'm being honest here. Maybe you should consider that, too. Maybe you should be honest and just say "You've reached J! I've obviously missed your call, so I will call you back when I feel like it, be it 2 hours, 2 weeks, or hell, even 2 years, cause I'm sweet like that".

I guess he doesn't know I'll be leaving the country again in 3 weeks (for 2 months), or that I'm leaving the province for good at the end of the summer. I haven't mentioned those little niggles to him yet. I would rather not go through this again. I don't like being in limbo, it only makes me angry and violent and throw things until I get what I want, or what I need. And believe me, I have good aim. I'd like to see him. It is that simple. When I see him, I will be able to decipher my feelings, sort through them, and toss all the useless feelings into the garbage (where they belong!).

Otherwise, home is pretty good. Mum missed me, and Lionel misses me, and California cried the morning I left. Orangeville is still pretty lame (oh, suburbs. I hate that you define my existence), and we're putting our house up for sale in 2 weeks purely because Orangeville is lame. Oh, and did I mention that Orangeville is lame?

Tonight there was a spider in my room. Thank god for my cat Rosie (she who ensures I'll never be alone, or lonely, while she's with me) who likes to eat spiders like people eat candy. So the spider is now well-eaten and in Rosie's stomach, and I love her for it, lest a spider end up in my ear/hair/nose/esophagus tomorrow morning.

Rosie likes to flirt with a handsome black tomcat that comes around sometimes, until I tell her he's not good enough for her, and then she grudgingly gives up.

I love that cat.

Lines Bleed.

2006-05-23T01:06:00.000-04:00

Put my best foot forward, knees buckle and hurt. Now it's official, and I don't know how. I think I'm too small now- to look you in the eye. Walk a tightrope on my way home, keep looking over to fall over, and I know everything's my fault. Stay here until I'm finally caught, wait and see... Who will get here first? Why is everyone so rehearsed? Tell me why the only lines I like bleed, and I'll meet you at the bottom- along the coral reef. If you left on a Saturday, I swear I'll never forgive you. Don't leave me here. But if you leave on a Wednesday...
Put my best foot forward...
-Lines Bleed by Pony Up!

I only wish I knew what I wanted. I wish I knew what I could have. That sorrow fills me up again, and I can't remember why I breathe. I hang in limbo so I can forget to feel, pretending life is good without my heart (and even better, without you). I'd love to get away from my blue, J, but you never let me. Without even knowing, you've unpeeled me, and it scares me to death that you can see me from the inside out.

Trees, Trees, Trees.

2006-05-20T22:49:00.000-04:00

Driving along the freeway from Dublin, driving through Crow Canyon in the rain. This weekend it's Muir Woods and Berkeley. The sunset falling below the coastal fog and my face in the breeze, the eucalyptus along the 680.

Walked among the redwoods, trod along the Golden Gate Bridge. Hairpin turns and switchbacks, beautiful earthy boys running steep trails, the downtown San Francisco's Pacific Heights. Multi-million-dollar homes. The place movies are made.

I'm exhausted. And I hate my stupid-ass face.

PICTURES!

that's me among the trees, I seem so lost.

This Is The Way Things Are.

2006-05-18T03:11:00.000-04:00

dear whoever rules the universe:

thank you for allowing my brain to go on vacation, for the first time since I can remember. not only is my body relaxing in the California sunshine, but my mind is taking a break as well.

Lionel's apartment complex houses many interesting creatures, such as the large black woman who softly sing-songs "Lionel!" as she walks past the screen door. The young man who teaches himself karate from a book in the courtyard during daylight hours, and reads in the cafe across the street at night.

The pool is lit up in the evenings, beckoning, even though there's a sign that says "No Pool Use After Dark". What, then, is the sense of having the pool lit at all? So offenders can be caught?

I go for walks in the afternoons, where i can smell every kind of blossom and rose bloom, citrus trees and the Santa Ana winds from the desert. Palm trees and hemlocks. I sun in the courtyard, and now that the pool is open, I'll be swimming. After that, I'll head to Starbucks and get a Grande Iced Green Tea Latte With Soy. And then maybe I'll head to the Mexican Phone Company (Taco Bell) to get some cheap eats. But only because I'm here.

I stay up late. I think about hardly anything, and I am so grateful for this.

Streaming Stream, Life's Dream.

2006-05-13T01:42:00.000-04:00

We are here face to face not only with pain as a condition of redemption, but rather with absolute beauty as one of its consequences.

californians can be quite a nice bunch. the air here is heavy, yet the heat is dry and the sun pours down, clouds in the sky or not. consumerism is rampant, yet normal people are all over the place. i might be beautiful here. love can happen. i only need half of what i have, i don't need anyone else and i'm getting more comfortable, in my own skin and all over the world. music is what i need. my life has been focused on independence- now it's about change, i'm changing now, and that is how i no longer need you. i need stream-of-consciousness, eye contact, and for any sincere moment. ahead of me is fire, hope, and an egg. helping and distracting are hoping for changing. fountains, gates of freedom and living with my eyes wide open.

sirens for the inevitable, the sky stretches out towards the ocean. the sky falls no more softly when the world ends as any other time. living is easy with eyes closed. stains and scars i can't explain, hoping that my mother will be able to finally realize herself and realize that she doesn't have to live in fear. fear is wasted energy. fear is nothing to be proud of. pride is vain, pride ruins people, and pride makes insecurity valiant. vanity is poetry and never allows for inadequacy.
this body is my vessel, my temple, and the reason i can survive. this face can be a curse, for it can make me assume i am being treated fairly, when in reality, fair is as negotiable as cost. cost is weighed heavily. what is the cost? why must money be a deciding factor?

no one person is better than anyone else. being a white girl does have it's advantages, but it also can make me stand out in ways that make me vastly uncomfortable. because i am a white girl, i am accepted most everywhere, but it disallows anonymity. trying even halfway gets me noticed in ways i'd rather not be. next time, i will allow my hair to do as it pleases. i don't want to be done. i am so glad for my freedoms, i am so glad i have what i have and that i am constantly changing. to be the same forever is worse than a death sentence. change is constant. fire is welcoming this time, i'd walk into the fire without as much as a glance backwards. i already have. but i will not burn, and i haven't.

today i heard my name at the drugstore. there were two little girls standing behind me as i marveled at the selection of chocolate and chocolate-related items, and one called the other one Renata, i'm so sure, and it was startling because i was meant to be there then, out of all the moments in these girls' lives. i was there then.
i am in that place i'd always dreamed of. i am here, i am here, and everything goes my way because that's how i expect it to. it's turned into a camera lens and careful days.

i step carefully every inch i go, i accept and move on and wish i could live without attachment. you are the favourite of my dreams. my every dream boy, you live in my alternate world and it is there that we are together. we begin the odyssey. we live in the foothills, we walk along the boardwalks and the beaches. we swim with our lungs full of air, floating in the sea of love, floating like we'll never forget. floating as we walk the streets of the whole world, the small town of our past colouring every new adventure. i'm only like this with you because i'm far away, and it is easier to dream here without you. i'm in love without knowing. i keep everyone at arm's reach, it is easier to live that way, it is easier to fall. it keeps the knot in my stomach alive. it keeps me awake and cold.

living is a dream

Hrmm.

2006-05-10T16:31:00.001-04:00

I just hope that my plane doesn't crash while flying over the Midwestern United States, LOST style. Surviving out there would sure be a bitch!

Probably worse than the Bermuda Triangle.

I suppose I will start packing now.

Loved, Lost, Losing, Lying, Loving, Crying.

2006-05-08T16:13:00.000-04:00

This week is blowing me away. It's funny how the more you let go and the more you try to forget, the more surprising things can be. The cast of characters in my life have proven to be recurring ones, much to my astonishment, and now I know that we'll see where this can go.

I missed him so much. I missed him so much that I had to let go before my love for him rotted me inside. I let go. I still dreamt about it, but I let go.

And then? Just when I least expected it. Now it's flowers. Now it's something that we can maybe patch up, maybe we can forget what we saw in each other that was nothing but disappointment. Maybe we can be us again. Maybe we can be the unstoppable.

Maybe it'll never be the same. But for this, I am prepared. I won't let all the walls down, but I'll try to not be so cold. All I know is disappointment, so if there is something other than that, my life turns to nothing but roses.

And yes, I do believe I'll call you when I get back.

Blue & Orange.

2006-05-06T18:08:00.000-04:00

I've been ripping holes in all my pairs of jeans. I've been dressing like I've been left on a desert island for weeks. I've been braiding my hair and decorating myself with warpaint. My mind has gone on vacation. I've been obesessed with the show LOST. I've watched 20 episodes in 5 days.

My week has been one of relaxation. The seemingly never-ending trauma week that was exams, funerals, moving, and retribution is OVER. I've been eating ice cream, doing laundry, assembling furniture, and making peace with myself and my circumstances. Even being in Orangeville isn't ruining me yet.

I haven't even begun to prepare for my trip to San Francisco- a place I'm hoping will continue to allow me to move on. I know it will never completely stop affecting me, I just hope I can stop dreaming about it. I leave Thursday morning. Will two weeks be enough? The last thing I want to admit is that all I want is to be with you. It's the truth, but you'd have to twist my arm and force-feed me foie gras before I'd ever tell you.

Yesterday I got my US work visa in the mail. As of June 15th, I will be a legal alien in the United States of America. Has a nice ring to it, no? It's still one of the most random things that has ever happened to me. Among a LOT of random things. Whatever- I can go with the flow.

The kettle still works, despite being thrown across the room and smashed by a frying pan. This means I can still have my daily Earl Grey. Hot, not cold.

And since this entry has been the most LiveJournal yet (barf), I'll add that this Tuesday is the season finale of Veronica Mars (my absolute favourite television show for those of you who aren't familiar) and I will probably have a heart attack while watching it. Just a head's up.

I am continually exhausted.

The Funeral.

2006-04-26T16:39:00.000-04:00

Without death, life would be meaningless. It is what makes life so fantastic, so precious, because death can come at any time. Any moment could theoretically be one's last. What I am leading to with all of this drivel is the fact that I dealt with death this week. I did not look death in the face, but merely basked in it's dark light. My 83 year-old grandfather died suddenly last Thursday morning, at the tail end of a glorious week, with nothing but joy in his heart, I'm sure. My grandfather suffered from Alzheimer's, a devastating degenerative disease that affects the brain. The second last time I saw my grandfather, it was the middle of last summer and he did not recognize me. The very last time I saw him, it was July 8th, and he commented on how I'd changed my hair. I think I hugged him goodbye. And although I said goodbye that day, I wasn't aware that it would be the last time.

The guilt I suffer now is crushing me with it's weight. I could have visited him more. I could have had a last goodbye. I could have enriched his life, no matter how minutely, and made him a little extra happy for a little longer. He liked to talk. Near the end, he didn't really have anyone to listen. He may have repeated his stories, and tired those around him, but any bit of patience would have made him happy. I have taken my time to mourn his loss this week, but truthfully, he was gone long ago. The real essence that was my grandfather slowly disappeared over the last couple of years, and although bits and pieces of him remained in his strong body, he was no longer the man I knew. In a way, I'm glad I didn't see him at his worst.

The viewing and funeral, Sunday and Monday, were made worse by the fact that my family is feuding. My mother doesn't talk to her siblings at the moment, except through lawyers. The past few years have been ruinous in the monetary scheme of things, mainly concerning my grandfather's money and who is doing what with it. He gave up control of his accounts a few years ago when it was decidedly silly for him to continue running things. His Alzheimer's got worse. My mother and her siblings took control, and that's where things get fuzzy. The main thing is that they quite detest each other now.

I, of course, am stuck in purgatory.

I am fiercely loyal to my mom, but at first it seemed extremely hard to put the relationships with my aunts, uncles, and cousins on hold. Then I saw them again. Their behaviour was primarily childish, disappointing, and fundamentally shameful. They seem to have regressed back to childhood. They treated me as if I was invisible, smelly, and astonishing all at once. This behaviour suddenly made it much easier to think about life without them.

Needless to say, it was a tiring couple of days. During the funeral service, I was almost shaking with rage. That the family my grandfather had created could not put their differences aside and unite in their grief sickened me to the core. His life could barely be celebrated while his progeny was busy hating each other's guts. It is love we needed to share, not hate. I only hope that, with time, my aunts and uncles will realize what they have thrown away. They have severed ties with their blood, people who would love them given the chance, and have maybe forever lost something incredibly important. And why? Money. A common reason these days.

When did it become okay to choose money? When did money become more important than anything else in life?

What I Hate The Most.

2006-04-23T01:41:00.000-04:00

If I am alive this time next year,
will I have arrived in time to share?
Mine is about as good this far.
I'm still applied to what you are.
And I am joining all my thoughts to you.
And I'm preparing every part for you.

I do refuse to spam my blog with sappy stupid song lyrics, but unfortunately Sufjan Stevens is sitting in my psyche and won't leave until I express some of my ~~pain~~ anti-joy. Maybe we just need the ones we love to love us back just as much. If ______ loved me like I love him we'd be together, no questions asked. But it's because we're not and it's because he's so elusive that I like him so much. If I had him, I don't think I'd feel so strongly. What if I had him and I wished he were someone else? It would be ruinous, and devastating, and heart-breaking. I wish I didn't dream about him all the time, I wish I could end this feverish state.

For now, though, my only plan of action is to be as elusive as he, be as elusive as I can, so that he will miss me and miss everything that is me.

Anyway, although I'd love to write something else, I find it's just about impossible. I like to have a theme with my entries, because it's the easiest for me to categorize.

I wish I hadn't seen you drive past me tonight. I wish I had ignored the fact that it was you, and I wish I hadn't walked every street with my headphones off in an attempt to a) see your car and b) hear the sound of thrashing guitars to lead me to you. I wish I wasn't here, and that I hadn't known you were jamming tonight. I wish your band didn't practice in my neighbourhood. It would be so much easier to ignore you that way. It would be so much easier to ignore you if I was far away, far away from all the pain you cause my heart.

I'm sorry if I've Renata'd you out.

Please come to me one day, and not only in my dreams. Come to me with love, with all the love you have in your heart, and make it mine. Give it to me with the earnest sincerity about you that I hold so dear. Please don't lie to me. I'm going to stop now. I hope you come around.

Wake Up.

2006-04-20T17:21:00.000-04:00

I'd like to say that there could be nothing more than this, my blue screen life and one-meal days. Want to sit out in the sunshine?

Contemplating how I still can't have you and how nothing has changed. I don't know what you are to me, half-closed eyes and falling asleep holding hands, waving goodbye.

Last night was my last night of the school year to drink and be merry with my most favourite people. The pattern continued, a pattern that started at the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve, something that was sure to shape the course of my year. And so far, it has proven to do exactly that. However, patterns break, patterns falter. I'm sure this one will be no different.

This day is one I'd wish to spend outdoors, the April breeze on my tired face and the farmer's tan I collected yesterday evened out, so that I can wear sleeveless shirts again. Sometimes I am reminded of things that happened at this time, years ago, like when I find the CD my boyfriend made for me in Grade 11, to listen to on our way to prom. The songs from that CD remind me of that summer.

And I've been writing this for hours now. Time to send off.

This Is My Syntax.

2006-04-13T13:05:00.000-04:00

The ones I liked the most, I couldn't keep. I live my life expecting minimal things- from others, that is. I assume that if it's happened once, it will never happen again, and if it does, it is completely unexpected. I remember moments forever. Sometimes I remember them too well, for too long, until I'm sick inside with longing and the feeling of intense inadequacy. I am often a hater. And for that hate, I wish that all I had was love, I wish hate wouldn't consume me and turn me inside out. If I could go back to every lovely and wonderful moment in my life and live them again, over and over until every last ounce of disappointment and the almost-regret were gone.. If I could only make things the way they were before.

Never have I felt such raw emotion. It must be this time in my life- and I'm sure it's just the beginning. All of the sorrow my heart can hold fills me up now- the more things I try to fill up on, the less I feel, and the more I understand. The less I think, the less I sleep- trying just brings more. I can't sleep anymore for the worry, the wondering, the planning and the hoping. I need to be the most authentic. I never want to pretend, or to bend, I want to be me and no one else. I want to grasp the concepts of life- the living breathing dying moments everyone shares.

I hope everyone's eyes are open, I hope they see the world instead of needing to block it out. I need to believe that everything happens for a reason, and that the people I love will never spiral into a big black hole and give up on life. Because there is so much to see. There is so much to look forward to. I hope to always be the bigger person, even though I hate them for taking what I love away from me.

Cat-Lapped.

2006-04-12T12:59:00.000-04:00

Again, a jazzy morning with my black cat and black coffee. It's raining. I recently discovered that I have been having an anxiety attack for the last week- I haven't been able to sleep or really enjoy life, I've just been worrying about my future and current problems. I am at my mother's house for a while. The best thing about this place is my animals (and the food). My cat Chloe is essentially attached to me at the lap, every time I sit down, she must be on it. Like right now. And last night. It is so comforting to have a warm little vessel keeping me company at all hours of the night, as my eyes glaze over from the glow of the computer screen, and my face starts twitching from lack of sleep. She has a kind heart. I need a kind heart during days like these.

I'm pretty sure I won't be able to return to my university next year. I'm pretty sure that I'm 19, and having a mid-life crisis. The future freaks me out. Will I have a good job? Will I meet someone? Will I be fulfilled? Sometimes it seems to be a bleak and empty road. It's hard to not push myself, to not stress over what I cannot control. And it's hard to make everything sincere.

During days like these, my absolute favourite thing is to take my dog for a walk at twilight, the spring breeze on my face. Even though my suburban neighbourhood is comparable to a hell with sidewalks, where the neighbours walk around at 8 on a Tuesday night with Budweisers in their hands and their kids left to wither away, the trails nearby are still tolerable. My dog can get her fill of pond-smells and muck, and I can take a deep breath.

During days like these, I can finally take a break without feeling guilty. I can watch movies, television, and read real books without feeling guilty. I can take a step back. I can assess.

During days like these, I have too much time to think. I have too much time to worry. I have too much time alone, and far away.

Look Me In The Eye

2006-04-07T21:57:00.000-04:00

They say dark moments only happen in dark times in life. Rarely. It is hard to be darkly optimistic, the two just don't happen frequently at the same time. Am I the only one who experiences dark moments even when things are going reasonably well? I'm sure I am not. I'm sure everyone has their fucked-up moments. I am having one of those right now. I am sitting at home alone, drinking gin and juice and feeling sorry for myself. It's Friday night, the week that classes are over, and everyone is partying. I am sitting at home doing laundry and writing a blog. This is a dark moment- I am thinking, and I am not being normal. I enjoy partying. I am not often anti-social. And reader, I apologize if my entry goes downhill. I am getting more tipsy by the second.

I am listening to Tegan & Sara. Getting emo. Thinking too much. Thinking about everything I've lost, everything I've ever wanted. Everything I have.

And I just broke a glass. I should stop writing. I think my roommate, who had just been at a kegger, was less drunk than me.

Who'd have thunk?

I hate the word thunk.

Grown Up.

2006-04-06T15:30:00.000-04:00

This week, all my bills are paid up and the dishes are washed. Our utilities are cancelled for the end of the month, and there is no more rent to pay. Homework is done, essays are finished, and my next month is planned out. I ate horrible, stale Mr. Noodles this afternoon, and decided that I have finally done the Student Experience. I'm ready to go home for a while. I'm ready to have groceries provided for me and to have a dog to walk again. I'm ready for a real couch and a 27 inch TV. I'm ready for a water cooler and large glasses. I'm ready for material comforts and no more stress of bills, essays, or What Am I Going To Eat This Week? (starring peanut butter and frozen bread).

I am ready to move out. I am ready to pack my things and head back to where I came from.

But when all is said and done, I can't say I won't miss it here. I know I will. Living in this house has been the turning point in my life. I have gone from High School Student, to First Year University Student (living in residence), to Second Year University Student (living on her own!). I have cooked for myself, budgeted myself, done my own laundry, cleaned my own living room, scrubbed my own toilet. All of those things are what dreams are made of! Domestic bliss. Domestic, studenty bliss.

I have one and a half more assignments to do for the year. I have 4 exams, but basically have the next month off. The next 4 or 5 months off. And, depending on how my marks are this year, I may have the next year and a half off. Which is frightening, and really deserves it's own story.

Next up: Why I Might Fail University (This Year).

Take All You Can Find In Me

2006-04-02T23:09:00.000-04:00

I can't listen to music while I try to write down what is going on in my brain. I get lyrics and rhythms in my head, I get the feelings of other people in the space where mine usually are. Instead of writing how I really feel, I'll start spouting lyrics from The Smiths, Radiohead, The Shins. Whatever I'm listening to. Although sometimes, it would be nice to live life with a soundtrack. I hate silence. I sometimes enjoy silence while I'm asleep, or perhaps..

No. That's it. I only like silence when I'm asleep. What a realization. I think of it almost as a curse. I can barely enjoy silence for what it is anymore. Silence here means that I can still hear cars drive by, my roommates walking or talking or breathing. I can still hear creaks in the house, and wonder if the mouse is back to eat my chocolate. I can hear doors slamming, sirens, car horns. Sometimes yelling. My silence here is the music of the city.

It's unfortunate that our culture has become one of seclusion. Going out in public no longer means interacting with the general public- for today's hipsters, it's yet another time to squish in or slip on the headphones and shut out the world. I am guilty of this. I can't say I don't enjoy it. I just wish it weren't so easy to retreat into ourselves so often.

One last thing for tonight: TV shows and their ending scenes, complete with heartbreaking music, make me reconsider my decision to cut myself off from feeling. For a few minutes, at least, and only because they remind me that I once had a heart beating somewhere inside my chest. That, of course, has been lovingly discarded, and I am now the proud owner of a hollow soul.

This Is All New.

2006-04-02T03:47:00.000-04:00

Thanks to Candice, I now have a lovely new layout! And I am hosted on her site, Suburb-Queen.com.

Dreams do come true!

Alone In Kyoto

2006-04-01T20:11:00.000-05:00

It is the weekend close to the end. I am so close to the end that I can almost taste it, dream it, feel it. I can imagine my assignments and essays done. I can imagine the April rain on my face, sliding deliciously down my throat, my toes squishing in whatever lies beneath my feet. I can't even decide which season is my favourite.
If I love spring so much, I really should be outside doing things instead of laying in bed, eating too much, listening to my top 52 melancholy songs playlist, and wasting my precious, precious time. There is nothing time can't heal. I just wish it would work faster.
When the sun comes out again, you'll find me here:
Sitting on the threshold of the door to nowhere, taking pictures with my manual focus Konica.

But I digress.

I can't unwant him. I wish I could press the Undo button. I don't want my heart anymore, either. For sale: My Heart. Free, or best offer. Any takers?