Blue Collar

It's easy to miss that everyone has their own story. The most boring, most banal people in our lives and the lives of our friends and families have their own path that led them directly to where they are right now. A person you see in a mall or on the sidewalk or in a restaurant, even though they might fit a discernable pattern or stereotype, have their own histories. 
When we were down in Mexico, Cousin Mike invented someone: the disgruntled husband. A personification of the trodden-down husband; a man who thinks marriage is a life wasted; who rocked out in his youth, married his high-school sweetheart, and has been regretting everything that came after. A disgruntled soul who spends his time warning young men, young men in whom he sees himself, that "whatever you do, don't get hitched. Ol' ball and chain is right. I've been tied down for almost 30 years. What I wouldn't give to be your age again."
Briefly, as I was in a moving vehicle cruising through a neighbourhood of small houses with small yards, I saw that man. All I caught was a snapshot, but it was enough for me to realise who it was I was looking at.
What I saw was a white, late 40's man in a faded muscle shirt and sweatpants, working on his car. On the surface, not really much to remark upon. What struck me was the state of the car. Not the family car, but one he had bought 20 years ago, just for himself, maybe in an attempt to hold on to his youth. Up on blocks, not because it was an old, abandoned beater, but because he was rotating the tires. Hood up, not because something had gone wrong, but to make sure nothing would go wrong. Tools scattered about, not disorganised, but close to hand. Man, car, and driveway were all dirty. Not the dirt of laziness or of being slovenly, but of hard work and elbow grease.
I had the feeling that, despite occasional frustrations, a couple bloodied knuckles and aching muscles, this guy would sleep the sleep of a man who spent the day working hard at something with which he was completely at peace.
Maybe his wife doesn't make his eyes pop like she did when they were 18. Maybe he doesn't like his job or his kids, or his best friend is his dog. But that doesn't mean he couldn't still set aside a day to do something he loved, something that reminded him of his youth.
And maybe, hopefully, this guy walked into work on Monday morning, and once he got past his buds bullshitting about how lousy it was to be back at work on Monday morning, he got to see the look of envy and respect on their faces when they asked him, "So, what did you get up to this weekend?" and he said nonchalantly, "Not a lot..."
"Worked on the Car."

The Summer Of Staying Young

God am I sore.
Earlier this week I vowed that by the end of the week, I would own a longboard. Monday was a bust. Struck out on Tuesday. Wednesday and Thursday were over before I knew it, and Friday I threw out my back, so longboarding was pushed back in my mind. But I had made a promise to myself, so on Saturday morning, I met up with Mike and he helped me pick out a beautiful board. Big, fat, wide wheels. Not as long as others, but stout. Obviously my board.
Today was the first time taking it out. Met with Mike and Mikey at Assinaboine Park and tried to learn how to skate. And I'll be damned if I wasn't getting the hang of it pretty soon. Of course, there were the obligatory bails; I fell directly backwards, feet up in the air above my head, and landed hard on my ass and the heels of my hands. Jarred myself pretty hard. Pieces of asphalt embedded into my palms. And one fall where I managed to slam down on my already bruised heel.
And you know what I say? So what. Who cares? Bring on the pavement. Last summer was a complete wash. I didn't bike enough, camp enough, buy enough, hang out with friends enough. I was broke and felt useless just about all the time.
No more. I've decided, with some very encouraging and motivating words, particularly from Cousin Mike himself, that it's time I get off my fat, lazy ass and put some miles behind me. This is the Summer Of Staying Young, and I fully intend to take advantage. I've got a bit of cash in my pocket, and I think if I play it right, I will be able to afford to have a fuck of a lot of fun this summer.
I have a lot of practice on my longboard to do before I'll be able to hit the road and not constantly be worried about how to fall. I'm thinking about a new bicycle. Hell, I'll even look into how much it is to go skydiving. Not because I'm afraid of feeling old. Because I don't want to stop feeling young.
Because I know I can longboard, and it's been a long time since I've learned to do anything like this from scratch.
And because I want to go out and own this summer.

Not Even A Blip

Tonight I realised a succinct way of putting into words how I feel towards many people I've dealt with in my life.
I'm not on your radar.
I guess it kind of goes hand in hand with my acceptance of my ugliness. It's not that I think I'm horrible looking. I'm not. But I know where I am on the 1-10 scale. And when I meet up with a person that, for a long time, I used to try to impress and to whom I would attempt to appear attractive (sexually or otherwise), I no longer care.
Does that make me a hipster, but in a pure sense of the word? So be it. I'm over you. And thank God, too, because who in their right mind wants to live their life by someone else's standards? I don't need to follow someone when they get up and leave the room, in the hopes that they want to talk. I don't need to act, dress, or behave in a certain way because it will make me cool in someone's eyes, and particularly when I see these people so infrequently.
It's less of a "Fuck you, because you hurt my feelings/(so-called) masculinity/ego" than a "Fuck you, I don't have to play by your rules."
God, it's freeing, knowing that someone you used to go out of your way to see is beyond you. It's freeing seeing someone and realising that you no longer care whether that person thinks you're cool or if they even think about you at all. It's freeing knowing that I have people in my life that, despite my many flaws, care for me and think I'm worth hanging out with; that when they try to get me to do something differently, they're not doing it to stroke their ego ("Let's see what I can get Creaky to do for me this time,") but to make me a better person.
And it's freeing knowing that those people I used to try to impress are exactly the same people they've been for years, and that I have no desire to be on their radar any longer.

I Learned A Word

Anybody remember the specific moment when you learned a new word? Not as in new to the English language, like so much computer jargon; a word that has been around forever, like 'joule', or 'fig', or 'posthumously'. Or, in my case, "Nee."
I even remember where I was when I learned this word. Just coming down off the overpass on Lagimodiere Blvd., heading north right before you hit Regent. I was young. (I remember the moment, but not how old I was.) It was dusk. We were heading home and my mom and I were playing the license plate game. You see the letters on someone's plates, you have to make a word using those three letters, in the order in which they appear. They don't have occur all together, but they do have to remain in order. For example, a plate with EDL would mean EDUCATIONAL was allowed, but not ELUCIDATE.
The car we saw had NEE. Easy. I said "Knee!". My mom said, "Or, nee." And she explained that when a woman is married and changed her name, she would be said to be First Name Married Name, NEE Maiden Name. As if a word for that actually exists.

introducing the maiden name of a married woman, 1758, from Fr. née, fem. pp. of naître "born," from L. natus, pp. of nasci "to be born" (Old L. gnasci; see genus).

The Future

I work at a public place. I have a job description, but even on the busiest of days, I spend the majority of my time people-watching. Because my work place is a cultural hub, and because it's downtown, I see Winnipeg's entire gamut of social class. And when I look at both the wealthiest and the most destitute of families, I see something in common: lousy kids.
I can't count the number of times in a day where I have to hear some parent yell at their kid, "Conner! Maximillian! This way! Over here! Keyla, don't touch that! Over here! Come this way! No! No, you can't! Come here, Sheena! Come here, Braydon!, Come here!"
I look at the kids running around and I don't see doctors and engineers and teachers and paramedics. Most of the time I see young adults run ragged chasing after some snot-nosed rugrat. Like they thought it would be a good idea to pop out a couple mouths to feed. I get that the desire to have kids is very strong in a great many people, but seeing it day in, day out has made me realise that the large majority of parents look fucking miserable having to take care of their kids.
But that's just most, not all of, the time. There's a young couple that regularly comes by with their couple, few kids, and they've got their shit together. Hep folks, well-behaved kids, dance lessons, eating with cutlery, the whole nine. Good. More power to them.
I also see the other side. People that have kids for the welfare cheque. 4-,5-,6-,7-year-olds in strollers because they're too fat to walk, mouths red from the syrup they're sucking back. Unhappy, crying brats that look to my eyes like they're just waiting to grow up so they can become junkies. And everywhere, too many kids!
I know that seeing kids as drug users-/hookers-/bullies-in-waiting is a terrible, cynical way to think. And I acknowledge that about half of that opinion comes from me being exposed to it all the time, and that when this job is long behind me, I'll think differently. But the proliferation of kids is not an opinion where one can just argue their case. There are too many damn kids. Fact.
No one in their right mind can tell me that having 6+ kids is a responsible thing to do. Unless you were born on a farm and your parents had a dozen kids because they needed help milking the cows and harvesting, you don't have an excuse. Octomom? Appalling publicity stunt. John and Kate? 5 too many. The Duggars? A shameful and embarrassing example of using Christianity to eschew birth control. (Catholic Church, I'm looking at you.)
It's not like I believe in over-population. I've heard, and believe, that by most scientific estimates, the world's population will level off at about 10 billion. But it's the old argument: "Oh, what difference can I make? I'm just one person." Well, if a million single people did one small thing, it adds up. No, you having one or two more kids isn't going to make a huge difference. But look at it a couple of ways. 1. Large scale: if a million couples decided to have one or two more kids, that's pretty significant; and 2. Small scale: if you're a couple, two more kids will increase your family size 100%.
I'm winding down, because I know I'm not making any sense. I just think that there should be more and better access to contraceptives, more education, more responsibility, fewer kids. Not that the world can't handle them; it can. But because I fear that their parents cannot.

Thanks, Mike

Everybody know the feeling of wanting to express in words something that they feel, something that they know, but at the same time, no matter how hard they try, the proper language escapes them.
I can't properly express how it felt to put my hands into the Atlantic Ocean. That moment changed my life. Or looking down on Ottawa from the peak of the Peace Tower. I can tell you it was impressive, that emotions welled up in me, that I felt so blessed just to be there! that I nearly wept, but the old saying holds true: words escape me.
But every once in a while, you manage to hit the nail on the head. Well, I put my finger on it today. It's not a major, cataclysmic life-changer like traveling to another part of the country or sharing a once-in-a-lifetime conversation with a stranger on a completely different walk of life than you. It's more of a river eroding a rock type of change. Slow. Intentional without being aware.
I know why I like listening to podcasts. Some reading this will be disappointed that that's all I've got, that's my whole revelation. A long life of being a disappointment has prepared me to not care.
I was simply sitting in a food court, listening to an awful show, and I realised why it was that I was such a fan, even of the bad stuff: because it's new. And on the back of that happy discovery came a dawning realisation, one much grimmer. Sometimes, alas!, music can stagnate.
How many bands do I like? A fair number. But I want more. I want to be touched by more bands, I want to discover new music, I want to find another band that speaks to me the way Coheed does, or The Mars Volta, or mewithoutYou. I know it's out there, that music. The sheer law of averages commands it. So while I wait for that music to come my way, and believe me, I want to start making advances into more and new music, podcasts afford me the ability to listen to something that I haven't heard before. I get to know the people sitting on the other end of the process, and I've been lucky enough to even participate a couple of times in the creation of said.
It feels like, and is, a case of me knowing so much about the person on the podcast and them not knowing a thing about me, much the same as a fan of a band can tell you the lead singer's first high school band and what their EP was called. How well do I know Sanchez? Pretty well, I would say. Of course there are blank spots, but look at it relatively. How well does she know me?
Podcasts offer me a look into someone's life, I hear stories about how they were raised, and by whom, and trouble they got into, or didn't get into when they ought to have, or the music they like (which is great) or the sex they've had, the places they've camped, the cars they've driven, the conversations they've had. I hear highs and lows. And I know that as much as I am One Among The Fence, being part of a band's fanbase is nothing compared to being part of the Whorde.
I don't want to belittle music. Music is one of the most important things to me in my entire life, and I would hate for that to change. Even writing this, I can recall seeing bands live, sweating in a pit, screaming at the top of my lungs for hours on end, and let me tell you, God, there is nothing, NOTHING like that. But when you're stuck in a bit of a rut, new music-wise, as I seem to be, you strive for something new.
I want new music. I love the feeling of getting absolutely lost in 'Day Of The Baphomets' or 'Cassandra Gemenni' or 'The Willing Well' or 'The End Complete' or 'King Beetle On A Coconut Estate'. But it doesn't happen everyday.
Now, listening to a story teller stringing one hell of a yarn? Yeah, I can do that every day.

Better People

I get that I come across wrong. I want to.
I don't want to be understood, anticipated, or expected. I don't want to be predictable.
I am easygoing. I see the big picture.
So when I give advice, it's know it's hard to not come across as condescending. Honestly, when I give advice, it's usually to condescend to someone.
Which leaves me in a difficult position. I want people to take what I say as the gospel truth. Fact is, I know better than you. However, I want people to be as easygoing as I am, to have the freedom to tell a person to fuck off.
I think the best case scenario for those situations is that a person will listen to what I have to say. I may be condescending, but I'm right.
Second best case scenario is that the person just laughs me off and says "Buh, whatever. Don't care." That way, even though you're not listening to me, you're seeing the big picture, which is that a person should live their life for themselves. That's not a selfish thing to do, not if you're me. Some people will associate a person living their life for themselves as being inconsiderate of others. Those people are shallow, misguided, and probably a little bit retarded. Have you ever given gifts to someone? Christmas time? Birthday? Just because? And doesn't that feel good? Don't you want to keep giving yourself the pleasure of pleasing other people?
I'm getting away from myself.
What I most certainly do not want a person to do is fly off the handle and get offended. Listen, if I didn't like you, I just wouldn't talk to you. So if I'm talking to you, we're friends. I want you to be better.
I will never stop correcting people when they say or spell something incorrectly. I know a couple of people, jacks of all trades, master of none. I'm a 6, 7 tops, at the best thing I know, which is language, so I am going to hold on to that with all my might. I realise I misspeak, I misspell, I use improper syntax. But when push comes to shove, and I'm sober, I can be one eloquent son of a bitch. I can write like a man possessed (when so possessed).
So get off your fucking high horse and either listen to me, because I have your best interests at heart, you ungrateful sniveling masses, or just laugh me off, tell me to fuck off, because what I'm saying is just going in one ear and out the other, water off a duck's back, and you're not going to change because you don't care to.

I'm bad with money

I have bills. Phone bills. Internet bills. But I don't have an income. And I'm shitty with my money.
When I get money, yes, I'm good about paying my bills. But in my perfect world, I'd spend all my money on my friends.
I don't give a shit about money. It ruins people. I hate when people say they can't go out and do something because it costs too much. Especially when it's a person I know has a good job. I have no job, and I'll do everything in my power to make sure I can go out and have a good time with my friends. And if it costs me my last dollar, so be it.
Telus is expecting $90 dollars from me tomorrow. Guess what. Last time I checked, I had 52 cents in my bank account. Sorry, Telus, looks like you're going to have to shut off my phone.
I always have this perfect scenario play out in my head, one that I am determined to make happen, but one that leaves me with no money for an extended amount of time. See, I'm taking a trip in the middle of November. I justify not going out to look for a job before then because it wouldn't make sense, nor would it be appealing to an employer, for me to say, "Hey, hire me! Oh, and by the way, I'm going to need two weeks off right away." So my plan is to wait until I get back, make an effort to find a job, once I have that job to begin my TESOL course, work to pay off my approximately $6000 debt (which is peanuts compared to a lot of people I know), and by the time I'm done my course, I've paid my debt, maybe saved up some coin, and I can fuck off to another part of the world. God didn't put me on this earth to work a boring job just so I can save up to buy a house to work to afford my car to drive to work to pay for my house and car.
Listen: I do not want a house.
Listen: I do not want a wife.
Listen: I do not want children.
What I want is to go out and teach, make a person's life better, grow as a person, learn, experience different cultures, eat weird foods, expand my horizons, make new friends, look at a different set of stars. I was put on this earth to make a difference, and I've done a piss poor job of doing it here, so I might as well try my luck across the world.

Clean Up

So, as part of my job, I have to make sure that when people move out of their apartments, they clean up after themselves. Typically, it's not so bad. People want their damage deposit back, and they know that I'm a bit of a hard ass, so they do a decent job of making sure that the scuffs on the walls and the skrim in the tub gets cleaned off.
Sometimes, however, I run across some son of a bitch who thinks that using their foot to push a bunch of shit into the corner of the living room is a suitable excuse for cleaning up.
Such was the case today.
It's the last of the month. I have people moving in tomorrow. I already spent about 4 hours today cleaning up after people who had already 'cleaned' their apartment before they left. They don't realise that there's a floor under their fridge, that there's dust on the mantle, that if you're a bastard, and smoke like a fucking chimney in your apartment, every fucking surface will be coated in a yellow scum.
They take off, thinking, "Yeah, that deposit can just be mailed to my new address, this one's in the bag." Nope. I got news for you. If I don't say your place is spotless, you don't get your deposit back. If you don't spend several hours making sure your apartment is in the exact same condition it was when you got it, which, for many of my tenants, is brand fucking new, because we had our building renovated, then don't expect that cheque in the mail.
So late this evening, I had a guy from downstairs hire someone to come do his cleaning for him. "Great," I thought, "this will make my job easy." Wrong. After this clown was done 'cleaning',  I realised that the walls were damaged, the floors were dirty, none of the drawers had been wiped out, and there was an unknown, sticky film on most everything. I'm having a couple move into that apartment tomorrow morning at ten o'clock at the latest. What the fuck am I supposed to tell them? "Oh, sorry about your fucked up walls. Sorry about all the dirt and shit in your new home. Welcome to the building." Fuck.
So now I have to wake up at, like, seven o'clock tomorrow so I can try to get at least some semblance of cleanliness into this apartment. But there's only so much I'll be able to do; the walls need replacing (and they're feature walls, too, not just some cheap plaster shit). Some blinds are totally wrecked, I'll need to get those replaced.It's exactly the last thing I want to have to do. Not because it's a bitch to clean. I don't mind the cleaning part, I'll blast some music and sweat buckets, but I'm a fucking champ and I'll get it done. No, what bothers me is that people have a duty, as tenants, to respect both the property, and their caretaker. Don't leave the job in the hands of some incompetent asshole who will sell you up shit creek.
Poor people moving into that place are going to have a lot of shit to deal with right off the bat, and that's just plain unfair.

My Last Grandfather

Last Wednesday, June 6, 2011, my last grandpa died.
I was out at the Winnipeg Folk Fest. I was minus a phone. My dad had to call my uncle to get my friend's number, who texted another friend who was with me, to let me know that I should phone home.
I was sitting at the Bird's Hill Beach when I called my dad. He asked how things were going. I told him great. Then he said, "Are you okay right now?" And I knew right then what had happened.
He told me that grandpa had gone outside into the back yard to do some gardening. When he didn't come back in, my grandma went to check on him, and when she saw him lying there, went to the neighbour's to get them to call an ambulance. It was from the earth that he was formed, and to the earth he did return. So it goes.
I will forever be grateful for the people that were with me when I found out. I have the very best friends.
My grandma will have to move into a home. There's no way she can stay in that house. She can't go up and down the stairs, she can't get in and out of the bathtub on her own, she's starting to get a little bit senile. She's deaf as a post.
I've been preparing myself for this for several months now. Ever since my grandpa started having a couple of strokes, I knew this day would come. I've been hoping that, now that my grandpa's dead, my grandma will die soon as well. Sounds terrible, but after being married for 63 years, you get to the point where you can't live without one another. My grandparents are/were stolid, practical Mennonites. Used to the idea of death. Not afraid of it. I'm not afraid for them. I'm afraid what it will do to my mom. Who knows, maybe grandma will adapt nicely to a new environment? (Doubt it. She's a crotchety old woman set in her ways.)
I've been coping fairly well. Using humour a lot. Joked that I was going to tell my grandma that I'd have to miss grandpa's funeral because I was going to go watch Hobo With A Shotgun instead. I've toyed with the idea of telling people that don't know me very well that he died of auto-erotic asphyxiation.
I guess some might see it as callous, but really, I'm saying these things because I'm not devastated by his death. A couple of months to mentally prepare will do that to you, I guess.
The funeral was on Monday. The first words my grandma said to me when I gave her a hug were, "Your grandfather is gone."
It was a fine funeral, I guess. As far as funerals go. Half in German. The pastor leading the service sounded like he didn't really know my grandpa that well, and yet, knew stuff about him that I didn't. His leadership roles in the church. Driving other seniors around for doctor's appointments. So on.
My grandma wanted me to say grace for the meal. I had absolutely nothing prepared when I stepped up to the pulpit. I thanked God for giving me the time with my grandpa that he had. I thanked him for giving me a grandfather that taught me the value of hard work, of patience, and of humility. There were times when I didn't know what I was going to say next, and I had to remind myself that I was allowed to take a few deep breaths to compose myself. Not a dry eye in the house.
My dad said I made him proud. My other grandma said I made her proud. I don't think my grandma whose husband just passed away heard a single word of the service.
Afterwards, we went to the cemetery. His casket was lowered down into a hole that was shored up with a steel box frame to keep the ground from caving in. There was another wooden frame around the casket. No bottom, the casket rested on earth. My dad and I climbed into the grave and laid 2x6's across the top of the wooden frame.
Placing that last plank down, the one that forever covered my grandpa's casket from view, was one of the most difficult things I've ever done. My dad and I stood on that box and cried and cried, and I told him that I loved him.
Who knows what will happen now? I'll miss my grandpa telling me about how the calculator was the downfall of my generation. I'll miss him beating the piss out of me at Anagrams. I'll miss him telling me about pickling, and working at Griffin Steel, I'll miss his shirts, I'll miss seeing a toothpick hanging out of the corner of his mouth. I'm going to miss his laugh like hell.
He's in a better place now. Guess I'm just being a bit selfish.

I love you, grandpa.

Verdant

Yesterday was a beautiful day. Just amazing. I decided to take a bit of advantage of it.
I dressed up and hopped on my bike. I rode to Assiniboine Park. It's been too long since I've been to the gym, so pushing my body very hard physically was a treat. It felt good.
I rode to the Leo Mol Sculpture Garden and went for a walk. Ran into a woman who lives on the east coast, and she told me that she used to live in Winnipeg, and remembered when Assiniboine Park used to be just one building with a bit of green space around it. Now, she said, she came back to experience the Park and how much it's grown and flourished.
I got some good pictures of the gardens. Some dragonflies. I love dragonflies. I think at one point, I could have had one land on the arm of my glasses; as it was, all I saw out of my peripheral vision was a large bug flitting directly towards my face, and I made a kind of panicked, seizing spasm. The dragonfly landed on a branch and I took some pictures of that too.

I went for a run, the first run in, again, too long. As I was running down the path, I ran past some bushes. There was such a green smell coming from them. Reminded me of picking berries right off the branch and eating them right then and there. Hot from the sun.

I call bullshit

Some background: the NHL is back in Winnipeg.

I don't think people that don't support an NHL team in this city have really thought out their reasons very clearly. There are some people, like Chris, who are kind of gay (sorry if you ever read this, Chris), who just don't care about sports. They'd rather post a million fucking pictures of their kids on twitter and talk about gardening. That's fine. You're excused.
But the people who are sports fans, and who look at the situation, and say, "Hm, no, don't think Winnipeg can support a team," I don't think those people are right.
At first, I wasn't crazy about getting an NHL team back in town. We had the Moose, whom I loved (still do, always will; they're going to be our farm team in St. John's). I was worried that ticket prices for crappy seats would be $70+. I worried the city couldn't afford it.
Now that I've spent some time thinking about it, I realise that I was wrong. Graeme made a good point when he said that it would be exciting to see current NHLers playing in our very own Phone Booth. I saw Sidney Crosby play for Team Canada in the World Juniors. It was great. Now I've got an opportunity to see players like Luongo, Foote, Iginla, Toews, Brodeur, Gretzky, Lemieux, Thomas... You get the idea. The Moose are great, but world class hockey they are not.
When the Jets left, there was no salary cap. The cost of keeping a team in a "small" market city was too unmanageable. Our dollar was weak, our team was losing money and losing money. A critic's argument that the same thing is bound to happen is bunk. Yes, the Thrashers are moving from a city of over 5 million to a city of 750, 000, but you'd be mad to say that ATL wants hockey more than Winnipeg. And where there's a will and all that. Plus, we've got a very strong dollar on our side, a province that has seemed impervious to the recession, and a salary cap that makes affording an NHL team a realistic endeavor for a city Winnipeg's size.
The only conclusion I can come to is that you heard Winnipeg was getting an NHL team, remembered that we lost the Jets 15 years ago, and responded with a knee-jerk reaction of "Oh, it'll happen again," and therefore just count out the team before they've even had a chance to win you over.
If you're any kind of sports fan, and you're saying this because you have 'good intentions' or whatever for Winnipeg, I call bullshit.
I say go to a game, any game, within the first five years of the NHL being back in Winnipeg. Sit in a seething, cheering crowd of people in the midst of a white-out, and then get back to me.
Tell me then that we can't support a team.

Another long and depressing day.
I was about to go to bed.
I was undressed, I drank a glass of water, phone plugged in, charging.
It's not when your home is quiet that you can hear everything that's going on around you, it's when you are.
I was about to go to bed, and I really became aware of how much lightning and thunder there was outside my window. So I put on a pair of shorts, grabbed my camera, and went out on the fire escape to see just how much rain was coming down.
A fair bit, actually. I stood at the rail and felt cold rain against my skin. I thought about how pretty much any other person would feel cold, but I wasn't. I noticed the yellow-orange tint of the sky, the black silhouette of the trees, the blue neon light shining from the window across the back lane. The mist as the rain bounced off the pavement in the parking lot the next street over.
It's raining so much harder right now. Pouring.

 Nights like this are made for sitting down on the steps, just outside the rain, and having a couple of cigarettes. The smell of rain is so strongly associated with having that one last smoke before going to bed. It was always the sweetest smoke of the day.

I very much value the Saturday mornings I have. Very regularly go to Starbucks, meet up with friends, do the Free Press crossword. Extremely cathartic. I'm pretty sure that a big attraction to it is that Heather and I are easily the best cruciverbalists, and being better than someone else at anything is always an ego boost.
The riddle hidden in today's crossword, themed 'National Pastry Favourites' (or something to that effect): "In a mideastern country south of Saudi Arabia, which variety of pie filling is preferred above all others?" The answer: "Yemen meringue."
On another note, have a meeting today with Nathan, Chance, Steve, and Graeme. Time to discuss plans for Jeremy's bachelor party. We're planning on a fair degree of debauchery, but not of douchebag proportions.

With No Preamble

I was planning on hanging out with a combination of Steve, Chance, Jeremy, and Nathan last night. I called them, asked what they were doing. We made plans.
Then I felt like hanging out with Tom. Just Tom and I. So I called the others, begged off, and called Tom. Like I was meant to.
Tom was free and eager to hang out; he had something he wanted to get off his chest, and I was the one from whom he'd get nothing but encouragement. I support anyone who is thinking about quitting Mat Master.
So we got together, and he vented a bit, and then we got together with Steve who told him about the job opening at his work. It would be great for Tom. Steady, virtually the same job minus the heavy lifting, which is the main reason Tom's looking to leave Mat Master, decent wage, etc.
I was meant to call Tom yesterday so he could vent to me, get something off his chest about which he'd been stressing quite heavily, and so that I could serve as a go-between for him and Steve talking about a new job opportunity for him.
Good work, kid!
Then over to Tom's place, where, once again, I felt compelled to help out in his kitchen. Abysmal is not an understatement. (Tom, if/when you read this, I feel fairly confident that you'll agree, and that even it you don't, no offense is intended.) I made supper and washed a shit-tonne of dishes. It felt good to be hanging out one-on-one with Tom, and to be helping him out like this. Again, I was meant to be there right then, helping out a friend.
One gigantic serving of perogies with bacon and onions later, Tom and I were full, contented, Nathan and Heather came over and we watched a movie...
It was a good night. Very good.
And then, DISASTER.
Being woken up at 4am with a violent, paralysing agony in your chest really fucks with one's sense of reality. I was fairly confident that a baby alien was going to burst forth from my chest cavity. Or that a seething bolus of acid was eating its way through my organs. Seriously considered calling Graeme, seriously considered going to the hospital/calling an ambulance. Tried to sleep on the bathroom floor, froze. Stayed there for an hour, half delirious.
Was it the food? Was Tom experiencing the same crippling, torturous affliction? Was it something medical, like a burst appendix? Would I live, but Tom die? All thoughts that ran through my anguish-raddled brain.
Was finally able to drag myself back to bed, and thank God sleep took me.
Feel better this morning, but I don't think I'm out of the woods yet.
What happened to me? I spend the first part of the evening literally as a conduit through which God can work to help Tom, and I pay for it by experiencing agonizing pain?
Hm, somehow I don't think the two are necessarily related.

LiveJournal, Part 2

At the behest of one Vagabond, I figured I'd put into practice what I've been telling myself I'd like to do for a while now.
I figure I'll use this whenever I feel like ranting, or maybe to give a bit of insight into why I think and behave the way I do.
I'll do my best to not edit myself. I imagine that A.) I could lose some friends, and B.) I don't really need to worry about that, because I'm not sure how good I'll be at not editing myself.
Oh, good. I already sound prepubescent and emo.