(my suitcase in my best friend)


super sexe
Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

Architecture to stretch out in without scraping my fingers on roughly green glass walls. There are no mountains to hem people in here, no ocean to swallow their gaze completely to the exclusion of culture. I blend in. In Vancouver, I stand out in the street as something odd to look at. It’s like a weight lifted, all those people looking elsewhere. I don’t feel like a bare gallery of this hat, these clothes. Instead, beautiful pieces of public graffiti sprayed onto the brick skin of buildings a century old reach out to me and remove weight from my shoulders.

My trip to Toronto is confirmed: I leave on Monday, Dec 19, at 6.15 on train #69.
I return to Montreal on Friday Dec 23.

I’m living with James at Sherbrooke and St. Laurant. It reminds me of the first time I lived in Toronto, when my apartment was at Queen and Spadina. There’s a similar sense of being exactly in the right place downtown to properly chase dragons. It’s like Sigur Ros is playing underneath every creaking step I take on snow, lending me magic and grandeur. Tkch, tkch, tkch. Everything is dusted white. I don’t pad around here. It’s impossible. My feet are encased in big clunky shoes. My feet are clumsy. My feet are walking somewhere they’ve never been. Every curb is a cliff leading down to some improbable country where I’m glad I don’t know the language.

Yesterday, like the day before, I walked for hours. I haven’t done anything yet, but I’ve seen.

I’ve got salt in my eyelashes

There are plumbers here. They’ve been taking a quiet forever of time to fix a little leak we found in the kitchen last night. I don’t speak french, so everything they do has been like a pantomime. Over exaggerated explanations of what they’re doing every step. Wiping up water like sins, tightening screws. I don’t care. Just torture the pipes until they stop, alright? I keep nodding okay and trying to get them to ignore me and get on with it. My head still aches as sharp as a judas kiss, I don’t want to have to pay attention. I want to turn the shower on as hot as my skin can take and stand in it for a thousand heartbeats, then find my way to wherever Michel is hiding in the streets of this gloriously chilly city.

I keep checking my fickle in-box, hoping for some distraction past this waiting. I suppose I could say Screw It and have my shower in spite of them, but I feel that would be awkward. I don’t like the idea of hiding damply away from strangers on the other side of a thin apartment door. I would rather jump the queue and have some privacy.

Ah, and there they leave. What a relief.

Red Cross picks a new, neutral, symbol: the red crystal.

Now my hair tastes like towel fluff.

saint street ell


read straight
Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

We walked four hours, returned, and subjected ourselves and Michel to Guitar Wolf. My head is splitting, the result of a nasty accident between it and the fridge door. An explosively loud japanese rock god movie might not have been the most wise decision. Over my shoulder, James is in his bedroom reading a book I cannot see. Tomorrow he goes to work early and I am left alone in the city.

Tomorrow.

I will spend time discovering the schedules required between here and Toronto. (I promise, these words are a rudder for you as much as me.) The train takes five hours. Ryan North tells us that the Secret Swing is gone, torn from the chains, but I still want to go. I suspect I will leave early Tuesday morning. Jessie will be meeting me there, she flies to Halifax Wednesday evening, and I have a holiday present for Katie that still needs to be wrapped. (Darren has yet to get back to me.)

My eyes feel as if they have cracked.

beautiful like it’s going to break me


Jhayne
Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

The cab driver, a black shadow in a dark cab, asked us where we wanted to go, then turned on house music so loud that the seats reverberated with the bass. “Iz thise alright?” Perfect.

We’d walked to far, my sense of direction ignored for James‘ right of way. He lives here. That way is North. There is snow on the ground, dry powder piles of it that shine into crystal when I throw them in the air. When I laugh, it’s with a new voice. I’m like a child. I love this place. How in every direction, there are people.

There was no grand entrance. They were late, as I knew they would be. Flight times, arrivals. Different than what actually happened. I sat and shared an anemic sandwich with a boy who didn’t speak any english. I liked his clothing, military pants, a coat with antique clasps, a fall coloured tuque. He liked my hat full of feathers. I put it on his head and he smiled. He was gone very quickly, so I left my luggage within sight and went outside and threw snowballs at taxicabs. The drivers liked me. They waved and kept driving. One of them offered to take me for free, but I had no address.

Gladness. Finally meeting Michel, finally being somewhere I don’t know the language, finally having to fend for a little of nothing with people. I was handed a leather satchel. I’m not sure I’d ever handled an object that was ever so clearly a satchel before. We talked about nothing, catching up, explaining computer problems, where in town the chinese food is, how to find, how to, how are you?

We went to a party. Games industry, half of it. Someone from work, his wife’s friends, she said. The women, I don’t know to talk to. They nodded and smiled and pretended they knew what I meant when I said, “Yes, but what about?” In the livingroom, we played games. Hold this, pretend it’s a guitar, now rock. Long convoluted streams of referenced consciousness. Michel left early. We’ve come home closer to three in the morning.

It’s not cold like everyone’s been saying it is. It’s warm here, the chill is a soft thing that covers the city like an expensively sugared blanket.

there is no higher ground

Does anyone knows where to find a copy of Useless by Kruder & Dorfmeister? I’d be happy for any of their music. What Do You Want Me To Say? by Dismemberment would be good too. I’m running out of downloaded music I like, and Pandora, though useful, runs itself into the ground when left alone too long. I set it to play Lamb and when I came back from a shower it had decided TATU would be a good idea. That I have no iTunes account merely adds to that particular annoyance. When I find enjoyable new music, I have no access to it.

  • Anti-teenager sound weapon.

    Day by day I have nothing planned. There’s a gentle tick tick tick in the back of my head. I’ll be gone in two days and I’m still uncertain what I’m doing. My house is cleaner, my room tidied, but my suitcase is sitting like a guilty house-pet on my bed, mouth open and half empty. I expected a call from Ray this morning, but the phone’s rung once and it wasn’t for me. Nicole tells me I have to face down a mall somewhere. Living in Vancouver doesn’t prepare a body for anything cold that doesn’t come out of a gelati parlour. I mostly have slim pieces of tie-on velvet and little black t-shirts with subtle line drawings of aliens on them. Nothing ready for snow, except for my scarf, and honestly, I’m not sure how many times I can pack that.

    Speaking of aliens, darling theramina posted this link to a video of a contortionist woman with especially extraordinary flexibility that is worth watching if only for the reminder that humans are capable of the weirdest things.

    Part of my shopping dread stems from the time of year I happen to be doing this in. There’s christmas lights in every display window and piped in “holiday favourites” in every store. Fake plastic trees that grab at nothing, offering hope only to little kids and people with real families. (And how many of those have secrets tucked away in sad apartments the other side of town?) I used to make stockings out of silk organza and taffeta edged with rhinestones as an attempt to fight against all the tacky red fake fur and gummy white fluff. This season though, like last year, I should be lucky to find a moment of respite in the places I plan on going to. I’ve no weapons against the overwhelming false cheer. All those beautifully wrapped boxes are empty.

  • A NOLA-area mall’s Katrina-themed holiday display has been gaining coverage.

    Nick, the regular godsend he is, has volunteered to take me down to Army & Navy today. He’s a heavy snow boarding enthusiast, so I’m going to let myself fall into his hands as if in a trust exercise. Is anyone else willing to dive into shopping hell with me? I don’t know where yet. The rare times I go shopping, I do it on The Drive. Someone suggested Metrotown, (Why don’t they ever name these places interestingly? I’d rather spend time somewhere called the virgin-whore complex.), which sounds pretty evil. Unless there’s a store marked WARM SOCKS & SWEATERS ETC, I suspect I’m going to be unsuccessful alone.

  • it’s been a busy week


    derek
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    Last year, they said, they were crying. They didn’t know what they were doing, if who they were was worthwhile. I can’t imagine why. They haven’t told me yet. Last year, I was so happy that I ran instead of walked. That my feet were faster than my thoughts. Last year at this time, the boy I was trying to be in love with, he was so far away that I couldn’t sleep, knowing that we were living in the same time-zone wasn’t enough. This time last year, there was a painter. He would trace my body like a sculpture and we could never find enough to talk about. We were just tying up loose ribbons of who we used to be. It was enough. This time last year, I was up until early morning because eight hours difference was perfect. I used to watch the dawn lick the sky when I was talking in fingers. Last year was freedom before I went to L.A.

    This year, I’m going to Montreal. The play I was in has kicked me out for it. I will be gone too long, nevermind I have my lines and planned on forcing Michel and James to play parts for me to work blocking around. I understand. Time is time, and it’s unreal. It only stops in hotel rooms. (It’s like my childhood didn’t exist). This year, I’m pearlescent with the heat of events hitting me, like if I were into that sort of thing, I wouldn’t sit down for weeks. Winter is upon us, fog has eaten the city for three days. Thick ashes of potential rain billowing across every street, erasing the world in portions of thirty feet.

    I walked past a murder scene at two in the morning on Saturday(Sunday). It unfolded like the pages of a book, every increment walked giving me another details. Trees coalescing into police, all the sounds of the city being replaced by a constant quiet chattering buzz of ear-beads and car radios. No one was talking. The street was lined with officially identical cars, every one empty with a laptop glow.

    Last year, they said. Last year, what? Everyone has little stories, it’s our dream. I want to collect them all and make them matter, but I have no idea how to do that. Last year I was living, this year I haven’t been. Last year turns into this year, but when? There’s some period of time, like how August brings change. I think I’ve been partnered, but all I know is that I’ve a lover. I think I’ve found family, but instead they were tribe. I think I’ve found my friend, but I’ve been introduced by others as their significant other. Instead of meaning, I’m just watching. Hoping with a terrified heart that they still like me, that I’m not the imposition that I think myself to be.

    I can’t see the logistics, but I don’t care what’s in my bank account.


    andrew dimmit – urban clowns
    Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

    I leave Vancouver for Montreal on Saturday December 10th, 9 in the morning. I’m returning December 24th in the evening, arrival expected around 8pm.

    These strange anchors in my life, I’m visiting with them tonight. Chains several years long, I’m always the only one. Over in decency, I’m singular, the bed. This one, he cried once. It meant a lot to him that I held his hand. We see each other more now, but less. His computer’s broken, our connection severed. This one, they confessed beautiful things looking at me with eyes like sand, my fingers trapped in his hair. It’s all been waiting for the blossoms to burst into fire. Time creeping along on little cat feet, giving me more reasons to be wanted. This is picking up the pieces I dropped a year ago, two years, three. If this is growing older, I like it. I’m better suited, pin stripe and today a historian stopped me in the street. This will sound ridiculous, but you’re like a chic version of a rich person from the middle ages.

    Sunday night, a group is getting together to go to Lady of the Camillas. 8pm at the Havana, tickets are either $15 or half price if you can pretend to remember the password, some long complicated word beginning with L.

    The picture framed in my closet used to be in a movie theater. I wonder if somehow metaphorically, it burned down this week. Unborn, our friend yelled at us. All of this wasn’t allowed, so instead we held our breath and closed our eyes. Nothing changed but perfect timing. It’s a little rescue.

    Tonight Jason, Jeff, and W. Stretch are hosting a gathering in New West, Benn Neufeld is finally having his house-warming over by Commercial and First, and the Work Less Party are having their Circus party down at the Maritime Centre. I’m going to attempt to hit as many of these as possible, armed with the knowledge that at each place are people visiting who I otherwise would never get to see before I leave. Burrow is up from the States for the Masque, for example, and this is the first time Benn has lived in civilized confines for something like a year. It’s now nine:fifteen. My clock says go.