this is why it’s hard to leave: your friends will turn the bike shop into a dancefloor, your lover will supply an amazing sound system, you’ll set up your computer with an eclectic collection of indie electronica and hits from the 1990s, and your community will devote a saturday night/sunday morning to laughing, talking, drinking, and yes: dancing.
5 days left. i’m going to miss y’all.
i remember when playing a video game meant pong or a text-based james bond mission.
i learned how to make mix tapes at the age of 7, and recorded most of my music from the radio onto cassettes.
i grew up using dos prompt commands to run computers.
when i did photos for my high school year book, i used 35mm film, mixed chemicals to process it, and spent hours inhaling fumes in the dark room.
i sew with a cast-iron 1941 electric flywheel singer machine. i ride a single-speed steel bicycle with cork handlebar grips and a coaster brake. i’d rather salvage solid wood furniture than have anything made of particle board. i like leather, wool, copper, ceramic, linen, tin, paper and a good façade of old-fashionedness. i like things i can make, things i can fix, and things that will last. call it steampunk, call it neonostalgia, but i’m thrilled by the power of wifi internet, cellular phones, and tiny digital storage because it means that i can easily hide away all electronics and wires. if i can’t have an old thing, i’m happy with a new thing that effectively captures the appeal of the old.
which is why i’m so charmed by poladroid. i never had a polaroid camera, but a lot of my friends did, and they played a large enough role in my youth that i find comfort in the familiarity of odd hues, dark vignette effects, slight blurriness, and fingerprints. now i can recapture that aesthetic by transforming my photos with free and easy software! there’s even appropriate sound effects. sometimes, it’s the little things.
remember how i upset i was over the breaking of my red teapot, some months ago? my houseguests of this past weekend gave me a new one, because they are just that fabulous and loving. more importantly, they seem to think i’m pretty great, which is nice, because i honestly haven’t been feeling quite as rad as usual. it could be stress, it could be hormones, it could be any number of things… all i know is that i spent some time on sunday evening crying and asking my lover if i’m a good person. rather melodramatic, i know.
on sunday afternoon, while working at the bike shop, a longtime acquaintance came by to fix his bike. to be clear: i think this guy is lovely, and i always look forward to talking with him at parties. having said that: as we chatted, i was reminded that he is friends with a couple of my exes as well as a few other people who don’t like me (such as the partners of exes, and the exes of partners). it’s not that i didn’t know this, but rather that i’d never thought about it before, not until we were at the bike shop and these folks were being referenced throughout our conversation. it was… overwhelming, to say the least.
basically, i think i’m a good person: i mostly live up to my core values, and i try not to be a hypocrite. i don’t expect everyone to like me. also, i know that relationships (and specifically, the end of relationships, as well as the start of new relationships) are complicated beasts that aren’t always easy or comprehensible. still, it’s hard, especially in a town like this: small enough to be incestuous, large enough to feel alienating. we inevitably end up dating each other’s roommates, exes, and roommates’ exes. cold shoulders freeze, and it’s not as easily ignored as it would be in a bigger city, nor as likely to be forgiven nor overcome as it would be in a smaller community.
my life used to be so much more public. even a year ago, i was more invested in socializing than i am these days. now i’m just not that interested in seeing and being seen. it doesn’t feel important anymore. i still enjoy my volunteer commitments, and i love my friends, but i don’t crave to know *everyone* like i did in the past. maybe it’s cuz i’m getting older, or maybe it’s because of the changes of the past 12 months. even though i’m happier and more satisfied and excited about the future, i still feel… worn out, and more than a little bit sensitive about my place in social networks.
so it’s a balm on my angsty soul, to be given a gift that is a replacement for one that i broke and mourned while depressed this past autumn. the first red teapot was a much-loved object that i bought for myself when i moved into my last apartment, the first home in which i’d lived alone. for a couple days, it was just me and the teapot, because i’d broken all my bowls and everything else was in storage. at that time, i felt strong and giddy and out of control but very optimistic. i’m hoping i can recapture some of that energy now, with this gift reminding me of friendship and community and stories and adventures: it’s a risk to place so much importance on an inanimate object, especially given my habit of dropping anything ceramic, but i don’t care because i’m so thrilled by it.
[photo: dear em and mimi, thank you.]
Filed under: Family Member, Friend, Homebody, Insomniac, Nostalgic, Queer
the clock has only hit midnight, but i feel like it’s about 5 am. i’ve been having trouble sleeping, to the point that even when i eventually drift off, i wake up again within hours and lie there, stressed about work/plans/the fact that i am not asleep. mornings, i am up and about by 9 am at the latest, driven in part by the noise of my family. we are a noisy people.
it’s totally fucking me up.
i’m struggling with visiting all my friends and family here in toronto because i’m so out of it, and that makes me feel even more stressed. it’s a cycle, fed by my huge issues with what i see as me “letting people down”. i just need to get over myself, but that can be damn hard when you’re a zombie.
also, let’s be honest: it’s damn hard when you’re used to living alone in a large space on a quiet street in a small city with a mild climate, and habitually are able to control your routine/environment/interactions. i’m eating too little fresh/home-canned fruit, this house is too dry and hot, and these people are all too loud. how could i have come from this place???
le sigh.
cue the violins; exhaustion makes me melodramatic.
minutes ago, i went digging through my dad and stepmom’s medicine cabinet, looking for a headache remedy. i found painkillers with a drowsiness warning, and took two.
~~~
in other news, today i got a manicure. ha! no, really. i’m serious. i was hanging out with my 18-year-old sister in london, where she’s at school, and we had a couple hours to kill. she made some ignorant/obnoxious remarks about a panhandler, and i called her on it rather harshly, and then felt bad (though she deserved it). i offered to get her a drink at st@rbucks (surprise surprise, she’s a HUGE fan) in order to buy her love, and one thing led to another, until we were at the nail salon at the shopping plaza next to the bucky’s.
it was okay. i decided that i was having An Experience.
my nails/hands are rough and ragged, my friends… winter makes the skin crack, and i confess that i nervously pick at the tips and edges of my nails. also, i’m always cutting/bruising/staining my hands with tools/bike parts/art stuff/grease. so it looks kinda funny, to have rough skin and short imperfect nails with tidy cuticles and glossy pinkish polish. i don’t think it would be worth it for me to do such a thing on a regular basis, but i suppose that if one had nice hands of which one took great care, it would be an investment…?
besides which, my kid sister was pleased, especially because she’d gotten me to do something that i’d never done before. to be clear, there was also a hint of gloating on her part, that was definitely linked to her ability to conform to gender/class/sexuality expectations in ways that i simply *don’t*. it is what she uses against me now: at some point, she realized that i am not the norm, and it changed our relationship. my opinions don’t count for nearly as much as they did before she learned that the hair on my underarms would be unacceptable to her friends.
i remember the day she was born.
ah well… she will change too as she ages, and we will see what happens.
in the meantime, i will be glad that i did not completely freak out and she did not get in a snit after we left the nail place, when she made a vaguely racist remark with regards to the manicurists being asian. instead i deflected into a conversation about the universal dangers of fumes in unventilated workplaces, from nail salons to swimming pools to stained glass studios. she is a lifeguard and knows the effects of chlorine: score one point for attempting to bring home our connections to those we construct as The Other!
Filed under: Bike Geek, Critic, Dreamer, Friend, Nostalgic, Queer, Reader
i had tea with a couple of friends this afternoon, and one of them asked me if i could recommend any books for queer teens. this friend has been mentoring of young person in need of some guidance, and has been having a hard time coming up with appropriate reading material. in response i immediately went off into an enthusiastic description of the presentation of sexuality and gender in laurie j. marks‘ elemental logic novels (fire logic, earth logic, and water logic). i’d recommend them to anyone, at all, ever, because they are such incredible books; however, they’re also exactly the sort of thing i wish i’d read when i was in high school because they normalize queer relationships and show them as equally loving, committed, and complex as straight partnerships.
i wasn’t so lucky back then.
however! i was luckier than the queer teens that came before me and for this i am very grateful. i can’t imagine only having queer YA novels such as annie on my mind (1982), which is queer-positive but still pretty fucking depressing. at the second high school i attended, the head librarian was a wonderful (though stern as hell) queer man who made sure that our bookshelves had at least some glbtq titles. it was there that i picked up working parts (1997), which still amazes me because not only is the protagonist unapologetically queer, she’s also a bike mechanic. yay, bikes!
going to a public high school in downtown toronto had other perks: diversity was valued enough that in my grade 13 writing course, i did a group project with the-first-girl-i-was-in-love-with on the topic of queer YA fiction. sadly, i can’t remember what books we read, except the aforementioned annie on my mind, and this terribly sensational book called the crush which involved a boarding school and unrequited love. we had to do a presentation for the class, and the basic gist of ours was that it was difficult for a queer teen to find literary characters to whom they could relate.
the really cool thing about this assignment was that we got to select a short story for the whole class to read and then discuss. there were some real assholes in that course, and i remember being so glad to have this opportunity to make them uncomfortable. i wish i could find the story we chose, because it was sweet and romantic; i can’t even remember what anthology we took it from. at any rate, the story title is new york in june. i’ll keep looking through my files… i want to read it again myself.
what else did i read? i found rubyfruit jungle on my mom’s bookshelf and loved it, not even realizing that it was a classic. i’d still recommend it now, actually.
another book that i suggested to my friend during our conversation this afternoon was audre lorde’s zami. her descriptions of her first romantic and sexual experiences are tender and funny, and they express a great deal about how peoples’ perceptions of one another’s roles affect the way we treat one another… both in bed and out.
i’ve been thinking about this all evening now, and the idea that i keep coming back to is that even with a supportive teacher/librarian, it still wasn’t okay to be queer in high school. all the books in the world couldn’t change the way that everything was focused on heterosexuality (why am i using the past tense? everything is focused on heterosexuality). i wasn’t out enough to be persecuted for my queerness, and the safety of that position kept me from developing a community of other queer teens. i dated boys and had amazing friends whom i still love to pieces, but we never talked about sex or gender or identity. a couple of them were queer, but mostly as silent as i was on the topic. how would my life have been different if i’d had peers to talk to about these things?
i digress.
as an additional recommendation, i suggest interested folks check out Gaydar: ScarletTeen’s Virtual GBLTQ Oasis. i went to a workshop last year presented by scarleteen’s founder, heather corinna, and she has the right idea about healthy sexuality for all… including queer teens.
so, dear readers who used to be queer teenagers, what did you read at that point in your life? have you any recommendations, books you wish you’d had back then?
Filed under: Animal Lover, Cynic, Family Member, Homebody, Music Lover, Nostalgic
i know i complain about gamin a lot, or at least make many disparaging remarks about his penchant for biting me in the wee hours of the morning and leaving the bloody remains of small fragile creatures on my bedroom floor, and so i feel a need to state this fact: if i didn’t have the cat living here with me, i think i would have gone quite crazy by now. just having him squawk his horrid meow at me every couple of minutes goes a long way in keeping me grounded and distracted from otherwise overwhelming melancholy.
it’s saturday night, i’m listening to the national (band, not news show) and rearranging my bedroom. yesterday i broke my beautiful red teapot, and the impact of losing this favourite object suddenly just hit me.
as much as i’d never wish it wholeheartedly, some part of me wants to go back to where i was, who i was, when i bought it. 2 years and 5 months ago, to the day. yes. fuckin’ hell.
***(two hours later)***
i just spent 38 minutes and 42 seconds on the phone with my kid sister, and i feel a million times better than i did when i wrote the above. oh, except for the fact that she told me our dad’s cat has gone missing… that’s really shitty, especially since it’s been cold and snowy out east, where they live. still, i’m hopeful.
also, no longer desiring regression.
yesterday morning i woke up with a song in my head: “knowledge” by operation ivy. nodding my head to keep the rhythm, i sang it as i showered and got dressed, then spent a precious 15 minutes digging out my crate of cassettes and searching through it until i found the tape. i was late for work, but managed to listen to the first half dozen songs from the album.
this was the music from my high school years, punk to which i rawked out almost every day… it’s been a long time since i sought it out. back then, the cassette lived in my walkman. it features the 27-song self-titled 1991 release from lookout! records, with extra space on the b-side filled by part of the 1997 skoidats album, the times.
funny how the lyrics never meant as much to me at the time as they do now, over a decade later. singing while biking to work, i felt kinship with almost every word… i’m dealing with a job that is becoming exponentially more stressful each day, the end of a relationship/domestic situation, an attempt to sneak in the back door of graduate school, volunteer commitments that mean the world to me but take up a great deal of my energy, and did i mention that i broke my toe, and it has now become a painfully swollen purple sausage? every thing in my life is feeling very heavy and grown-up, in the worst way possible.
and yet, these complaints are easily tempered by some electric guitars and off-key melodic yelling. not that i know much about such things, but it seems kinda zen: all i know is that i don’t know nothing… and that’s fine. even on the roughest days of this emotional rollercoaster i’m riding, it makes me feel better. ah, the lasting power of punk rock!
*********
I know
That things are getting tougher
When you can’t get the top
Off the bottom of the barrel
Wide open
Road of my future
Now…
It’s looking fucking narrow
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
We get
Told to decide
Just like
As if
I’m not gonna change my mind
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
Whatcha gonna do with yourself?
Boy better make up your mind…
Whatcha gonna do with yourself, boy?
You’re running out of time
This time I got it all figured out
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
All I know is that I don’t know
All I know is that I don’t know nothing
And that’s fine.
- “knowledge” by operation ivy
remember this time last year? i was freaking out over a rent increase notice. I couldn’t sleep at night, because $22 more each month was a terrifying prospect. I was making plans to move in with friends, ready to give up my apartment because it suddenly seemed expensive.
Which of course it was: all housing is expensive in this city, particularly so when you’re the only one paying rent.
However, my apartment was also a great deal, considering its location and size. It took several friends to convince me of this, and I’m very grateful that they did: now that there is two of us living in it (plus two non-human freeloaders), I really appreciate having this cozy home.
Looking back, my panic reminds me of that first time when i didn’t have enough money to pay off my monthly visa bill. prior to that day, i’d never used my credit card for more than what i actually had in my bank account. when i realized that i couldn’t pay the whole bill, i cried and felt guilty and was certain that I was about to start down a long road of debt and destruction. Now that debt has been normalized in my life, I realize that what freaked me out wasn’t the amount of money, it was the idea of not being in control of it.
Which I got over, just like I got over rent increases. another one arrived this past week, and i almost forgot to mention it to b. “oh,” she said. “yeah,” i replied. then we went on to talk about something interesting.
[photo: all of b's possesions in my porch, from a lovely day in august when she moved in with me]
this is what happened when i found my current home: i was housesitting down in cook street village, spending a lot of time at the beach with a dog or two, and trying to deal with feeling depressed and lonely. it was may and i was looking for somewhere to live for june first, which was proving harder than i’d thought it would be, given that it was the annual spring exodus of students. my main trouble was the incompatability between my budget and my desires to live alone, to have space for gardening, to have a bathtub (instead of just a shower), and to have a full kitchen (instead of a bar fridge, a microwave, a hotplate).
i was early for my scheduled appointment to view this apartment, and i killed time by drinking a coffee at the san remo cafe and deli on the corner. i sat in a seat by the window, and looked at the neighbourhood: a lot had changed since i first moved to victoria, when i lived just up the street. there were new stores, and they looked busy. second-hand furniture, smoking paraphenelia, a money mart, a rubber stamp craft store. the carribean bakery was still there, and now a halal butcher shop too. best of all, the empty furniture store that used to anchor the shopping strip was being replaced by a fairways market. not only would there be groceries close by, but there would always be cheap cilantro (the fairways chain has excellent asian vegetables too).
i was still early, so i went for a walk. up quadra, past the house with the apartment for rent. was dismayed by its dingy appearance, but decided it might not matter. turned right on summit, up the hill to the park. was only just at the top and about to climb the path to the reservoir when i checked the time again. i had only a couple minutes to get back to the house, and i ran. there were two of us looking at the place, and the other girl didn’t even take an application. i did, and said i’d think about it for a couple days.
that night i realized i didn’t have my slingshot, my dayplanner. which had just about everything important in my life written on its pages. slept badly, went to art class the next morning, left early and took the bus to quadra street. retraced my steps: the barristas at san remo hadn’t seen it, but at least were very sympathetic. up quadra, past the house, eyes scanning the sidewalk. turned at summit, grew tired in the hot sun. felt frustrated. was about to turn around, find somewhere to curl up and cry, when… yeah. there it was, sitting on a planter at the side of the road: my dayplanner.
you know when you’re feeling so low that it kinda just becomes normal? it’s a crappy state to be in, except for one thing: sometimes, it gets to the point where something that wouldn’t normally make you think twice has enough power to jolt you to your very core.
i found my dayplanner, and decided that i’d found my new home as well.
i called the rental person and we met the next day. she didn’t even want to call my references. which was good, because one was a friend faking it for me, and the other was my ex-landlord whom i’d told i’d moved to california.
**********************************************************
now. the question is, how do i know when it’s time to move on? i have a great opportunity for a fantastic new home, and i don’t know if i want to take it. and… i hate indecision.
(photo-> march harvest from my garden: bundles of mint hung to dry in my kitchen)
i gave up my post office box yesterday. it wasn’t a very difficult decision, because i simply don’t have the $100 fee for the annual renewal. yet it still feels like a very big step. taking my keys up to the counter to fill out paperwork and get my deposit, i was glad to be served by my favourite postal clerk. she’s the one with the long wavy black hair and the cheerful smile, and the kind of laugh that people would call infectious. she’s passionate about surfing, and is probably in her early 30s. i’m going to miss her.
i started renting the box in august of 2001, when i first arrived in victoria. there were two reasons: one, because i anticipated moving a lot over the next several years, and two, because i’d always found the idea of post office boxes very romantic. they have a certain mystery and aura of intrigue around them, or at least they do in my eyes. i liked the fact that i could live anywhere and still get packages from my mom, and that i recognized the faces of the different postal clerks. i liked picking up my mail and taking it to the bean, and reading letters while drinking good coffee. it made downtown feel like another home, a comforting place outside of whatever neighbourhood i was living in.
but. having a post office box was also part of my problem with attachment. i did not want to feel tied down to any one house or apartment. i might put up book shelves, but i would just as easily take them down and polyfil the holes in the wall. i might plant a garden, but it would probably be in pots. i did not trust landlords not to evict me, lovers not to leave me, roommates not to go crazy or move away.
i still don’t trust my landlord, but at least now i don’t depend on anyone else to help pay the rent each month. so, i have more reason to believe that i’m staying put for as long as i want to. from now on, i’ll be using the little mailbox in the front hallway of my house, and put that $100 postal box renewal fee towards next month’s rent on my apartment.
[photo: random beauty in winnipeg, captured when the lovely anna m. was showing me around her hometown last december]
