Well it’s a Pentax actually.
I’m going to pick it up tonight, then in two days I’m going to use it to shoot Cherry Blossoms in Washington D.C. and hopefully come home with something pretty enough to hang on my walls.
I am excited.
I love trips; the packing, the planning, the overspending.
A
In two more days I’ll be in the air. Two long and endless days.
What I don’t love?
Waiting
I cultivated it as best I could. Actually bothered to scrub the schmutz off my feet in the shower, used the blow dryer, wore nice pants. And it seemed to blossom. Yes today was a day I would get something done.
I left the house one coffee to the good and with the anticipation of a sausage McMuffin bolstering me along. I brought along Virginia Woolf for the streetcar ride and managed to get lost in it despite the chatter of morning commuters.
As I entered the last leg of my journey, breakfast in hand, I checked the pulse of my purpose. Still there, stronger even then it had been an hour ago.
But somewhere between the elevator and my desk, it vanished. I don’t know where it went. I don’t know why. But it was gone entirely. Almost instantly I was nonplussed by my fragrant greasy snack and immune to the good news that my computer was functioning properly for the first time in weeks.
Even the crossword hidden deep within my Toronto Star isn’t tempting me.
When you can’t even bother to slack off at work… that my friends is what I call terminally blasé.
For the record I did not create the character itself. A friend of mine (who also new more than everyone else) created him during a particularly uninspiring English class because she was beyond bored, she was Bo-Red (clever huh?).
He was a stick man with one arm and a huge head who could only be conjured with a red BIC pen by slightly caustic 16-year-olds who felt their time was wasted listening to the words of their elders.
He was conjured a lot.
But it was I who gave him a back story, made him a super hero, created him a woman to love and a nemesis.
In one particularly memorable story, Bo-Red saved Harry Connick Jr. from a lifetime of Vegas sideshow acts after he was tricked into signing a contract by the evil Black Jack (clever huh? Vegas… Black Jack…. Get it? It’s CLEVER).
This one stands out to me because it’s the one I actually submitted for grading in an arrogant and childish fit of “you’re so out of touch old man you won’t even get I’m being (what I think is) Ironic” pique. Earned me an A.
(Channeling arrogance and childishness is a key step in the creative process. Discuss.)
Anyhoo, I mercifully grew up a bit, realized how little I actually knew and school began to interest me again. Bo-Red was relegated to the back passageways of my memory.
But several frustrating days of server shutdowns, invalid pathways and multiple corrupted file copies have left me unable to do anything remotely productive at work. I’m feeling irritated, unfairly put upon, and about five years old.
And ol’ Bo is glowing in my mind’s eye.
Will he make his grand return today? Will the next chapter of his life unfold?
Find me a red BIC pen and we’ll find out.
Of all the terribly tacky traditions
A frosty mint delight, in its heyday the Shamrock Shake was a St. Patrick’s Day must. Though its colouring was slightly putrid and mint is a sorry substitution for chocolate, this was the IRISH shake and we were proud to have it and to call it our own.
It was extra special for this Irish Catholic girl stupid enough to always give up sweets for Lent. You see, giving up fighting with my brother was too difficult, and my HILARIOUS suggestions I give up smoking never went over well with my mother.
No sugar for 40 days in a row… well 6 days at least (everyone knows Sundays don’t count) was tough for this addict… very tough.
Evey year, just when I thought I’d never survive it, came St. Patrick’s Day. A day smack dab in the middle of deprivation in which ethno-cultural obligation meant my parents, and God apparently, looked the other way as I sucked back 12 ounces of sugary goodness.
The Shamrock Shake, a reminder of life’s little overindulgences just when the endless days of sacrifice may have led me to forget.
You were a true hero of hedonism in a puritanical time and I salute you.
And I haven’t forgotten you. Yea, though the cruel masters of the McDonald’s Corporation decided that among all of the high fat, though not particularly high quality, items on their mighty menu, you (along with the McLobster) would have to go, I have not forgotten you.
I searched for you even today in fact, at the McDonald’s at
Good thing too -- It’s freakin’ freezing today.
For those who have, Yow! No?
I spent most of last week recovering from having my eye split open on a leisurely trip to the nation’s capital.
I will spend a good deal longer recovering from the knowledge that my eye was at one point actually SPLIT OPEN. Ugh.
This happened in the midst of shopping for wedding dresses with a friend. I am her maid of honour and while it's sad I had to abdicate my shopping duties to lay alone in a dark room, it's not all that surprising considering my past actions in positions of honour.
Here’s a sampling:
It’s not that the joy of my friends and family ALWAYS makes me sick, just more often than not.
This time at least I got my trauma over and done with over before the big day….
I hope.Back in high school (the day as it is oft’ referred) my friend’s uncle used to make her mixed tapes.
Now this was not your “Old Time Rock ‘n’ Roll” lovin’, Molson drinkin’ uncle. This was the only slightly older uncle, the one who was away at university, and lived with his girlfriend, and drank Heineken. This was a cool uncle.
Anyway the tapes… He used to send her collections of songs from time to time in an attempt to wean her off the sugary pop tunes that made her, and all her friends, waste our meager allowances and fill our brains with lyrics like: “I spend my money on lottery, My favourite number is 1 2 3”. (Thank you Calloway)
His tapes were full of songs by Joy Division and the Smiths and the HouseMartins.
I loved these tapes.
Now I can’t tell you I loved them because of the music. At the time, I knew very little about music and had, at 15, only just concluded (thanks my brother’s constant derision and numerous forced listening sessions of Led Zeplin IV) that the New Kids on the Block really did SUCK no matter what all my friends and Much Music seemed to think.
Instead, I loved them for their cases full of cramped male handwriting, because they came by post from the big(er) city, because listening to the music of grown-ups made me feel grown up (because at 15 I thought 21 was grown up.)
Listening to these tapes made me feel like a little kid staying up at the end of a dinner party when the adults start talking about politics, or neighbourhood gossip or other topics they wouldn’t usually speak of in front of the kids. I was mesmerized by the dark lyrics, the angry guitars, and melancholy. I felt myself getting wise listening to those tapes. I felt myself getting older.
There was one tape in particular I remember. I think it was the first one I liked for the music, not the idea of the music. Some of the songs I heard for the first time on that tape are still my favourites today. I can’t remember all of them. (These weren’t the cheezy 60 minute tapes you know. These were the 90 minute Memorex tapes. These were hardcore) but I do remember a few. Go give ‘em a listen won’t you? You’ll be glad you did.
These two facts may indicate to some people that it's time to stop reading lest they become blinded by the white hot rage emanating from the anti-love diatribe that's sure to follow.
But rest assured your eyes are safe. I love love. And I love Valentine's Day.
I love it in all its shiny, ruby, candy-hearted, sappy torch-song glory. I love the grandness of it. The cherubs. The sparkle. I always have.
I love the idea of little tiny cards and wee presents. The thoughtfulness of it. The carnations from your father, the candy hearts left on your desk.
I love the sumptuousness of it. The rich, dark chocolate, the silk and oysters and wine and roses.
Those who feel it unworthy due to its commercial nature be damned. No it's not necessary to do something for the people you love just because it's February 14th. But it's nice. It's nice to tell the people you love that you love them. And it's nice to hear it. Any day, even that day.
Whenever I hear people bemoan the tawdriness and tackiness of V-day I am reminded that the single most romantic gesture of I have ever witnessed happened on a Valentine's Day.
When we were 19, a friend of mine fell for someone. He had a girlfriend and there was no indication that that was going to change. But she fell anyway, the way you sometimes do. She decided she wanted to let him know, and Valentine’s Day seemed the right day to do it.
Many of her friends tried to dissuade her. It wasn't going to end well. It would be embarrassing. She wouldn’t get anything out of it. But she didn’t want anything out of it, except to let him know she thought he was funny and perfect and wonderful because she thought he might like to know.
So she found the perfect card (simple, beautiful and blank) and hand picked and arranged a dozen white flowers. And she wrote a message sweet and simple and signed her name and brought the flowers over to his house herself.
And when she knocked and found he wasn’t there, she left them on the porch. Left them there for him to laugh at, or groan at, or throw away or brag to all his friends about. But he did none of those things. What he did was tell her that it was the sweetest thing any one had ever done for him.
And he stayed with his girlfriend and her life didn't change, but she had spoken truthfully about love. At 30 I can't say I've ever done that. Not so earnestly or with so little to gain. But every time I think about it I'm inspired to. There's
So I was listening to Michael MacDonald this morning (there is NO shame in it) and all of a sudden I could see in my mind's eye my 3rd grade K-Way jacket.
(Navy blue, with the white and orange stripe, and a Participaction patch sewn on the front.)
I could actually hear the swish it made when I swung my arms. I could SMELL the nylon.
More importantly I felt the ripple of pleasure I used to get when I flipped it out of its pouch and slipped it over my head. I LOVED that jacket. I thought it was cool. I thought I was cool in it.
I feel cool now just thinking about it.
It's not a terrible way to feel at
So a problem arises in your life. Not a major long-term problem, but problem enough cause you to worry over it, then and worry some more and figure and plot and fret.
And you come up with a variety of rash solutions, more drastic than necessary. But immediate action seems the only option. (Operate, operate, that limbs gotta go!)
But you hear this tiny little voice in your head, the one that refuses to shout saying “Just relax a minute. Take ten minutes to just sit on in it. Everything will work itself out.”
And it seems like the worst possible response to this mini-crisis. But for whatever reason you don’t just hear it, you listen.
And shortly thereafter things work out. Easily, perfectly, almost as if by magic.
And in the words of DodgeBall’s Peter La Fleur: “It feels phenomenal”
The intellect is forced to choose: Perfection of the life, or of the work. -- W. B. Yeats
To be happy is to be content is to be satisfied is to desire nothing more.
But if you don’t desire more than that, you cannot hope to achieve it.
But to desire more than that: more than a happy life, good friends, nice surroundings and a true appreciation of all these things and what they mean to you, seems vain and ugly and greedy.
Is it better to accomplish something great at the expense of being unable to savour it; Or to leave no mark at all except the small happy dent of a tiny little life?
It's not really a question for the mind Willam, it's a question of the heart.
For years I believed in signs. I could read them like sailors read stars.
I’d take jobs because of them, quit jobs, write letters, move cities, speak up, take action.
I would do these things with confidence. They were the right decisions and I knew it. I could see the path I was supposed to take lit up by these beacons, these signs. Decisions could be made in an instant.
I still see signs. And I know what they mean. But I don’t trust them anymore.
Not wholeheartedly.
There’s no reason for this, that’s the tragedy of it. I didn’t make a wrong turn or endure some spectacular failure. Doubts simply started to arise about them, slowly over the last few years.
“What if this isn’t the right choice?” “What if I believe in it and it doesn’t happen?” “What if it makes me stop believing?”
And that’s all it took, damage done.
I don’t know if that confidence is merited only by the young, or if perhaps I’m replacing belief with knowledge or wisdom.
Maybe it’s the natural order of things. One day Peter stopped coming to Wendy’s window, and Christopher Robin stopped visiting the
So I’m beginning to wonder when the signs will fade, and I won’t be able to make them out in the midst of the commotion of life. And I wonder what I'll believe in then?
I was sitting on a street car in the early evening when it was overrun by youngsters scrambling for seats and making as much noise as possible under the watchful eye of a parent/teacher/scout leader type.
As they settled and the din quieted (marginally) I heard the kid behind me inhale sharply before shouting:
“Hey! I’m already ON the adventure.”
I don’t know where those kids were headed, or why. But I do know that the little Dan Eldon disciple behind me was going to have the best time of all of them.
Wisdom imparted by a ten-year-old is not something to take lightly.
Little dude, I’m already on the adventure too.
I would like very much to say I would be George Harrison. Because come on that guy is awesome personified.
A beautiful songwriter and spiritual Journeyman he loved a woman so deeply he could pen a song like “Something” for her.
Then he survived losing her… to a friend.
And the friendship survived too.
My Sweet Lord.
In the end, however, I think I’m actually more of a Tom Petty... Which is still pretty cool.
“Now and again I get the feeling. Well if I don't win, I'ma gonna break even"
Of course it will happen.
I am refusing to believe that I actually believe that Stephen Harper is about to be my new Prime Minister.
I am very good at refusing to believe realities of this sort having had much practice in refusing to believe that Cardinal Ratzinger is now the Pope, and that GWB was elected. AGAIN.
I don’t know how many of life’s realities you can refuse to believe before you are no longer a functioning member of society. But as the list of crazy leaders incomprehensibly (re)elected continues to grow, I am afeard that I will eventually find out.
Better to be crazy than utterly depressed though init?
The reason she got out of bed this morning was this: She knew that if she didn't emerge from that womb of flannel and brushed cotton at the very moment she did, she may have never left it again.
This was the same reason she got out of bed most days. She knew this didn’t reflect a positive life outlook.
Crossing the cold pine boards on the way to the bathroom she remnded herself she was really very lucky. She had this gorgeous room to call her own, the air was crisp and clean, the sun shining through the window, the coffee was on and so strong she could already smell it wafting up from the kitchen.
She hated when she did this, this roll call of blessings.
She didn’t feel lucky. She felt defeated. And this sense of despair in the face of so many good things made her feel sulky and childish. She hated that too. She had never been one for looking at the bright side when she didn’t damn well feel like it.
She fumbled for the bathroom light and swore when the fan came on instead. The noise was too much, too grating after such a short time awake. Switching the switches she was greeted with silence and light.
The thought entered her head that ‘silence and light’ would be a great title for a song, or a book - if she ever wrote a song or book. She immediately pushed it out. It was too early for that kind of noise as well. She began the process of greeting the world.
She stared in the mirror taking stock of what she had to work with. She looked good. Tired and pretty. Maybe a little fragile -- a bit dark under the eyes. It suited her and she reached past her oversized makeup bag for her toothbrush and headed back to her room to investigate the closet.
She knew she wanted to wear a sweater, a heavy one. She needed to feel encased. Her skin didn’t seem to hold her these days and she wanted reinforcement. She had the desire to feel small, a little lost. It seemed to her it might be endearing to walk about with her hands peeking out of too long sleeves, the line of her neck accentuated by an abundance of worn wool.
Who she wanted to endear herself to, and why, she wasn't ready to contemplate.
She tugged a cabled sweater over her head and slid worn jeans over pale legs examining the result in the mirror.
Good. She didn’t want to care.
She pulled a wooden brush though her unwashed hair. Twenty strokes, then thirty. She had planned to pull it back, but as it fell it kissed her neck until she was seduced and allowed it to stay there running long and fluid down her back.
And she wanted him to see her then. She wouldn't be the same later, with her cheek colour too high and a smile exploding on her face.
She would not be so perfect. So accessible.
I began to wonder what this Wednesday business said about me. How had I been shaped by this arrival day? I immediately turned to the science of nursery rhymes for my answer.
Turns out Wednesday’s Child is full of WOE.
This, on top of the fact that Wednesday is THE hardest day of the week to spell...
Unacceptable
I have decided and now officially decree: Wednesday’s Child is full of WOW.
For those interested here’s the rest of the original rhyme --I highly encourage editing some pizzazz into unsatisfying descriptions.
Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace,
Wednesday's child is full of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go,
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child works hard for his living,
And the child that is born on the Sabbath day
Is bonny and blithe, and good and gay.
There was a poll conducted recently by a national media chain to determine which of the current Prime Ministerial candidates was the most handsome.
This poll was done by the same media chain that offers pinups in its dailies.
This is the same media chain I recently applied to work for.
Shudder.
