I didn't get the job. Spent most of last night in a bitter stew of disappointment and self-recrimination for getting my hopes up. Up way too early, so I got dressed and knit instead of trying to sleep. The worst part was going to be this morning, when I had to tell people the news, and share how I felt about it. I did not want to share.

It was better than that, though. There had been not one job offered this week, but two. When I got in, another teacher who had tried for the other job-and failed-looked at me seriously for a moment, and then knuckled up.

"My eyes are puffy," she complained.

"Me too."

"Why didn't you call in sick today?" asked another teacher.

"Oh, that would've looked great," she said as I simultaneously said, "We thought about it."

"Separately," I added.

But with that out of the way, my day got better. Now I'm hiding from my brother's disappointment as a crummy stomach is keeping me from the gym. Seriously, though. Am I supposed to be made of stone? Tonight's for drinking and vaudeville-style performance art, not health.

Labels: angst, bat masterson

Blake is back home, and the Mommy Clock has resumed. I can't say that I maximized my time, although I did buy a lot of crafting supplies that weren't yarn (and also bought yarn) and I did go to the gym until it made me violently ill. I shall have to complete the remainder of my marking in the dim hours after Blake goes to bed and before I collapse, which – hey! – makes my life exactly the same as it is when I'm working. Except I don't have to wear keys around my neck or pack a lunch, I suppose.

New Year's Eve was low-key, as befits the end of a decade that began in such fear and hope. When I showed up to Stacy's house ahead of the crowd in 1999, I was wearing a green velvet evening dress, a month-old engagement ring and a prominent hickey. When I showed up to Stacy's house ahead of the crowd in 2009, I was wearing a BSS t-shirt and my rings were at home, awaiting refinement to become some more relevant piece of jewelry. I left Mason sick in bed, but there was very little guilt; I was pretty sure that nuclear silos weren't about to malfunction and separate us forever. I limited myself to one beer, so that I could get home to hold hands for the countdown. And I brought knitting.

New Year's Eves in the new normal are a mixed blessing. I always have Blake until Christmas, but lose him on Boxing Day until the next year. I appreciated the chance to "cut loose" or whatever, but I still miss Blake in the midst of it all. Especially when I'm around other parents who have babysitting for the night, and didn't have to wait a full week to see their children.

(I'm not even going to get into how depressing it is to see all of my friends from ten years ago with or expecting a second baby. I can forgive the Boy many things, but I still have trouble forgiving the shuck-n-jive of so many years before he admitted that he never wanted kids in the first place. He's not the only reason why I still have just one kid, but he's a very convenient scapegoat.)

I wouldn't have left the house at all if it weren't Stacy's birthday the day before NYE, and if I hadn't spent the better part of two days working on her present. A last-minute inspiration really elevated this; who wants a regular elder god when they can have Cthulhu Bride? Behold!!

(We went to my grandfather's for lunch yesterday, and I was sewing on limbs as we visited. Everyone but Mason was puzzled by the project but I decided not to explain; what is it? is a better question than why would you bother? Stacy understands, I'm sure.)

The feature no one was asking for: a decade in review! Let's begin.

2009 was all about getting healthy. Lots of exercise with my brother, taking vitamins and oil of oregano (which for us was a game-changer). Lots of dancing in the fall, our troupe moving on from one-performance wonders. Lots of good food and cutting back on all the great beer. Greatest teachers: Valizan & Nic.

2008 was being single, really single. A single mom with a mortgage and a full-time job. Turns out I liked it a lot. Started bellydancing in January, discovered ATS, met Juuki, fell into her troupe. Started dating Mason in May; the summer was a whirlwind of late-nights, early mornings, new music, incredible food, and kissing. Visiting his condo was like taking a vacation from my suburban life. I fell in love with a current band, then all the associated bands. Lots of concerts, taking advantage of new custody agreements. A dance performance that didn't suck. New, local friends with common interests. Greatest teachers: Mason & Juuki.

2007 was splitting up with the Boy and fighting it with every particle of my being. Therapy, self-help, biting my tongue, lowering the bar, going to bed right after dinner, starting depression meds again. Bought a new house and had two months to enjoy being out of the fucking basement before everything else fell apart. Helping with Poppy's twins, trying to get pregnant to forestall the separation. Lots of crying. Greatest teacher: the Boy, who made me find myself again.

2006 was a new job in the best school I'd ever been in. Feeling like a good teacher again, being in love with my department and my job, meeting people who were more than colleagues and became friends. Camping with Blake & the Boy at StanFest. Social knitting for the first time, and getting hooked on monthly get-togethers. Greatest teachers: all the other knitters I met, celebrity and otherwise.

2005 was my first year as a working mum. Redefining work and home time, learning how to parent a person and not an inarticulate doorstop. And tonnes of knitting, once I learned how. Oh my god, the knitting. Greatest teacher: Debbie Stoller, via her books.

2004 was one word: mother. Making and losing friendships with Toronto mothers, trying hard to connect despite my new basement address. Trying out local mothering groups and feeling lost. Seeing old friends and being the first with a baby. Lots of frustrations, lots of love, very little sleep. Greatest teacher, again: Blake.

In 2003 I was adrift. I was recovering slowly from the previous year, but not losing weight or feeling happier. Got pregnant and went to Holland, in that order. Got off the depression meds and then spent the rest of the year reading up on parenting and getting used to the idea of living with my parents while my husband finished his undergrad degree. Greatest teacher: Blake.

2002 was the worst year of my life. Starting in November 2001, my teaching degree started to shake as my host teacher and evaluator treated me like an idiot for completely opposite reasons. Help appeared from every direction, but I barely squeaked through to the spring with my sanity intact. My new job in Ontario seemed heaven–sent, but after our exhausting August move cross-country, the Hosgboro administration in my new job made my host teacher look like Glenda, the good witch of the North. The camel's back being broken, I tried therapy and finally lots of drugs to get through the day. The new drug took away some of the depression and gave me twenty extra pounds in return. Started exercising, stopped eating meat and tried to turn it around. At the same time was trying to fit ourselves back into the social scene by clubbing with the young kids who now surrounded the Boy in university. But also there was Convergence 8, the last great dress-up, travel, punk rock bender of my youth. Greatest teacher: Theresa, who made me feel normal.

2001 was all about church. Fell in love with Wolfvegas and built a social life around the local United Church. Halifax visits for fun and sushi. Returning home, we were showered with love and glory for days. Discovered that the train was truly the best way to travel after 9/11 cancelled the planes. Slowly becoming a wife. Greatest teacher: Rev Robyn.

2000: Prepping for the big day, living in my parents and taking extra courses so I could go to teacher's college. Going to the city on weekends, living in the Boy's increasingly-shitty apartment. Married two weeks after my birthday and moved to Nova Scotia two weeks after that. Intense loneliness and even more intense bonding with the Boy. Slowly discovering the local community, and how supportive it could be of outsiders. First student-poverty, then the Boy's new job, and his days away on the back roads of New Brunswick. Missing pizza, clubbing and all of our friends. Greatest teacher: the Boy.

Labels: angst, blake, family, friends, nostalgia, the boy, triumph

I wonder if anyone else gets the feeling that there's a baby they should have had? And that nonexistent baby is following them around through the holidays, inserting thoughts of "should have been" into some very strange places?

Today was my first full day off, and I slept in, went to church and went to the gym. None of that would have been possible if ghost baby were real.

Sorry ghost baby. Maybe next Christmas.

Labels: angst, christmas

Painting the basement with Mason has been exceedingly quick and painless. This would be a good thing at any time; now it's an especially good thing because Blake comes back tomorrow and all this stuff was supposed to be done in his absence. That's just my own personal anxiety, though: he'll be thrilled to see the basement all re-arranged, with painting to be done. I'm not sure how I'll keep him away from the worksite. Long, exhausting play dates? Extended periods of time in the backyard? Bribery?

At any rate, it all has to be done before the end of the month, when my brother may be moving in. Why do my summers always begin with infinite space to grow and end up squinched up and stressed?

Labels: angst, house

Nine years ago yesterday, I got married. This year, with my divorce slowly working its way through the legal system, I celebrated my union and subsequent abandonment by getting a tattoo influenced in equal parts by old sailors and Oscar Wilde's letter from prison, "De Profundis."

It's big.

In tattoo tradition, the swallow is a harbinger of the approaching shoreline, and is used to commemorate 5000 nautical miles navigated. In lieu of sailing experience (except for that afternoon when I was 18 when I caught my first and last fish), I choose to use it to represent the romantic passage of the last eleven years, and the hope for a safe homecoming at the end of it. Hence the scroll, which is Wilde's imperative for those who are loved.

Most people live for love and admiration. But it is by love and admiration that we should live. If any love is shown us we should recognize that we are quite unworthy of it. Nobody is worthy to be loved. The fact that God loves man shows that in the divine order of ideal things it is written that eternal love is to be given to what is eternally unworthy. Or if that phrase seems a bitter one to hear, let us say that everyone is worthy of love, except he who thinks he is. Love is a sacrament that should be taken kneeling, and Domine, non sum dignus should be on the lips and hearts of those who receive it.
- p. 82

I promise, that's the last time you will see my write about Special Meaningful Meaning of this tattoo. I may be pretentious, but I hope I'm well aware of the depths of my own pretention.

It's still Too Hot. I'm getting a false sense of coolness when I move quickly from room to room, which instantly evaporates as soon as I sit down. Ugh. At least I managed to figure out the bathing thing: hair requires baths, tattoo requires showers, but it was time to wash the hair so I put the tattoo first today. I need an old fashioned shower cap. And a quilted bathrobe, maybe. I already have a wooden rolling pin.

Labels: angst

Saturday's free Broken Social Scene concert was probably the best concert of my life. I say "probably" because it was operating on an extreme handicap: Mason & I had a dumb fight on the way in, and when I stalked off in a huff, the crowds of people guaranteed that I lost him for the night. I was sorry about 10 seconds later, but by then it was too late. Shit. So I spent a good deal of the next four and a half hours wondering how I was going to find him, and what I would do if I couldn't.

BSS concerts are supposed to be about Mason & I being with people who like what we like, not to mention surreptitiously stalking band members* while remaining too terrified to get close enough to wave. They're supposed to be about screaming and dancing and getting chills of beauty and howling lyrics to "Major Label Debut" in each other's faces. They are not supposed to be about stupid half-second decisions that make it impossible to concentrate on any of the good things. So this concert was under a cloud. The worst event is still a good one with Mason at my side; that this one managed to edge into the top spot is a testament to how many delights were on offer.

And there were a mind-blowing array of delights. This concert was very much a valentine to the fans, with each surprise wonderful on its own; overwhelming in the aggregate. The first thing that was awesome was that they were all there, with very few exceptions (Bill Priddle, Ohad, Leon & Torq were all I could think of). The core was there, of course: Kevin, Brendan, Charles, Justin, Andrew & Sam. And I've seen them with guests before. But this was the first night I've ever seen when nobody seemed able to leave the stage. Evan and Jimmy were there for the whole night, rotating between guitars, brass and percussion whenever possible (they always make me smile). Julie Penner stayed onstage after her violin parts were done, and rocked the percussion with a big grin on her face. Jason Collett was there, freakishly tall as always. All of the original three ladies--Feist, Emily & Amy--were there, plus Lisa Lobsinger who has her own songs at this point and more than held her own. There were also people I'd never seen up there, like "founding non-member" John Crossingham who was there playing percussion for "Fire Eye'd Boy," just like their Letterman appearance. I kept a running count, and by the time they played "Major Label Debut" for the third encore, there were 19 people on stage. It was unbelievable.

What made it more exciting than just the sheer numbers was the obvious way that they structured each appearance for maximum impact. First Kevin brought out Feist, who (with the exception of the NXNE gig) hasn't performed with them since '06, and who is on record as saying she might never play with them again. Then Amy, who performed a solo song with Evan doing the hiphop drums behind her. The two ladies traded off vocals on "Shoreline," a song I never thought I'd see with Feist at the mic. (She couldn't get it loud enough to suit, so she ripped off the cover early on. Still wasn't loud enough.) All of the girls backed Emily in "Anthems," a song so beautiful that it sends shivers down my legs.

The best part was that it wasn't just about Broken Social Scene songs. I could have gone home happy with a pure BSS concert, but clearly the idea was to give us a revue-style performance with each solo project getting their own moment of glory. This was first obvious when Kevin & Feist quieted it down, trading verses of "Past in Present" "Safety Bricks" & "I Feel It All" in beautiful, stripped down harmony. Then Emily, "the ninja" came out to sing a gently rocking acoustic "Gimme Sympathy," led by Jimmy and backed by the entire band. (Feist singing along with the rest of us, completely away from the mic and for the pure joy of it, made me love her even more. Amy's still my favourite, but Feist in front of BSS, wearing a skirt with pockets that she stuck her hands in from time to time when she danced like a five-year-old, was magic.) Collett came out and sang "I'll Bring the Sun," which is the loudest song I've ever heard from him and inspired some deep back bending that I haven't seen since the Heads' Tina Weymouth. Andrew and Lisa blasted us out with "Soul Unwind," which I last heard in a stripped down, essential oil version at the album release and which was a thousand times better with a gang behind it. Brendan and Lisa sang "Chameleon," chilling us all out.

It was like a dream of a concert, a show that had could go in every direction and might very well never end. I know that I didn't want it to end, and it was pretty obvious that no one on stage wanted it to end, either. The encores went on forever, full of Brendan's scissor kicks and the crowd screaming for more. Kevin kept trying to go home, but he was continuously overruled. Right before the third encore, he attempted to say goodbye.

"Who wants to hear KC Accidental?" Brendan yelled, cutting through Kevin's farewell.

"Okay," Kevin sighed. "But I'm going into the crowd for this one. I'll come up and sing, but I'm going into the crowd now." He did, and the band played through the fanfares without him.

It was overwhelming. It was a hundred plates of food from the best buffet in town. I was feeding song titles to a sweet group of kids on my left, one of whom had only heard BSS the day before, and trying not to dance-collide with the couple on my left, whom I later found out, met at a concert at the Drake in 2003. Free concert audiences are full of weird people, and I saw my share (like a woman who pestered for a close-up seat and sat, head down, the entire performance), but there was a lot of positive energy all around me and it elevated the night.

I needed that, worried as I was that I would miss Mason entirely. When Kevin led us in screaming apologies, and assuring everyone that "[we] still fucking love you," I choked. So, despite the parade of hometown heroes and despite the beautiful moments that threatened to crowd each other out, my best time was walking to the car in the dark, and seeing Mason walking toward me.

At the very first part of the show, Bruce Macdonald was there, to announce that he was filming the concert for an upcoming documentary. They want fans to submit footage from the summer, to piece out the story, and I wish I could recreate that reunion, to put it alongside the glory that was that show. I have the feeling that even if I figure out a way to do it, it won't get into the movie. That's okay. At the very least, I can buy the DVD and watch the whole thing over again. It's only been two days, but I can't wait.

* (And, just for the record, I managed to overcome my feelings for a spot of shy stalking when I looked around for Mason and found the Spearin family getting food. "It's Ondine!" I thought, and then I saw Lisanne, an original member of my prenatal group. By the time we were done chatting, I lost the target. I also approached Kevin's mom & dad after the show, as it seems I'm only shy normally. After a concert I appear to be flooded with endorphins and will ask anyone anything. It's probably a good thing for the Spearins that they didn't have to deal with two small children plus an insane fan while balancing plates of food.)

Labels: angst, mason, music, outings, triumph

As the truly long-time readers will have noticed, Sunday marked my twelfth anniversary of keeping this journal online. Twelve years and no domain to call my own! To celebrate, I uploaded a funkload of pictures, correlating to the appropriate entry. Yesterday I made the first setting change since I added Blogger comments, which is that I disallowed anonymous posting. I've been noticing that when people want to tell me that Mason is creepy, they do so anonymously. Feel free to judge our attractiveness, just tag on a name from now on. Also, have you noticed how fat I'm getting lately? Discuss.

To address an (anonymous) comment from the last entry: yes, I am surprised that the Boy has served the papers. His only action thus far has been to leave; I've been cleaning up the legalities ever since and have been paying the bills of nearly 3 grand. Perhaps in retrospect I should have expected that he would jump on the cheapest, easiest step…but I didn't. Be clear: I don't consider myself a victim here, but that doesn't mean that I can't acknowledge when things are done suddenly and without warning. It was a shock. Wondering why is not productive…although it may help to know that I dream of reconciliation 3 nights out of 5, and wake up feeling worse than ever. (Last night I dreamed of a Christian rockband that solved mysteries, so it's not always like that.)

A lost anecdote from Renfaire day:

On the way home, we discovered that Sage could "sing" "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," although it was a lot like listening to Frankenstein's monster & Tarzan sing holiday greetings. He skips words, syllables, lines…sometimes he'll produce 6 garbled sounds before awarding himself a flat "yaaaaaay."

It was far past his bedtime, and halfway through the long drive home he became incredibly tired and cranky. He started to produce the long, sustained crying that doesn't stop until a bed is produced…but if asked, he would still "sing". So we sang with him, over and over and over. Near the end of this litany, Blake turned to him and asked, in all seriousness, "Sage, do you know any other songs?"

Um. Stats? Of a sort.

• So. I suppose that, except for waiting for my heart to numb during brief custody hand-overs, I can reasonably claim that my relationship with the Boy is now completely over. That means that I get to add another milestone to the journal stats, which is that I have written of the birth, the flowering, the withering and the death of my marriage, all in one series. Yee haw.
• I have developed an interest in photography, and am starting to be able to (sometimes) produce the pictures I've visualized since I was a child.
• My child has gone from a surprise union of two cells to a fully literate boy who dresses like Spiderman, demands his own copies of Neil Gaiman books, and sings hooks from Apostle of Hustle songs in the other room while I'm making dinner.
• I have accepted my occasional nature, and stopped apologizing for it. To compensate, I make sure that my feed links are working, and I have Facebook trolling for notes as well.
• I have redeveloped a love of music not really present since my earliest journal years, and spend much more time at concerts and listening to new music than I would have thought possible five years ago.
• I have permanently lost touch with Poet (by his desire), Palaver is too sick to venture out much of the time and Preacher lives in another country. Of the three, I am closest with the one who lives farthest away, and our sons get along famously.
• I have added a third person to my monogamy series. The first is getting married sometime soon; the second will be divorced from me in about three weeks.
• I finally found a job I loved with friends, love, yarn, and mutual respect; these elements have disappeared or been co-opted so that I am more than ready to move on next year. And yet I can't imagine being anything but the World's Worst Teacher. (A label to which Blake strenuously objects, by the way. He thinks I should get it changed to World's Best. I already have the t-shirt, though.)

two years ago

five years ago

seven years ago

eight years ago

twelve years ago

Labels: achievement, angst, blake, comments, mason, music, nostalgia, on-line diaries, photos, the boy

Last night I had a plan. I would go home, get Blake ready for his weekend, and once he was safely dispatched I would run up to the bar near work, pick up Mason, and go to Drunken Knitting. This plan was fraught with small perils. First, that I had to go help do a dry run of DDR in the school caf to get ready for the Fun Fair on Monday. (Sigh. This – and telling 15 year olds who just consumed a box of Popeye's chicken in the 5 minutes it took to introduce today's lesson that I don't have napkins because I'm not a full-service eatery - is my life.) Second, that during the pick up, I would be seeing my mom for the first time since she bad-temperedly asked if I would be losing my job for co-habiting with Mason. Two days is a long time to build up invective, and I was spooked. Third, Blake's clothes were washed but not packed, leading to a frantic run-around that I've just about perfected at this point. Fourth, I had to ask for Blake an hour early on Sunday so I could help Jessamyn produce nudie photos (of her, natch.) But after that, I looked forward to smooth sailing all the way to a yarny harbour.

It was after I'd navigated all of these petty problems that the Boy pulled out a wad of papers to "serve me." The husband whose only decision in the past two years has been to leave half his crap behind has initiated a divorce. And just last week I was assuring Effie that he would never have the motivation to do this, as I was the one who had spent almost three thousand dollars on the separation agreement and mortgage re-titling. He was so passive that he didn't even get council for any of that. Ha ha ha, joke's on me.

So after I told my parents, called my lawyer, cried explosively for a few minutes, and ripped up one of his pictures while screaming invective, there was little left to do but go find a beer. Thank heaven for Drunken Knitting and my sympathetic ladies Soho, Mad Hattress and Needle Addict. Still, it would have been much better if I wasn't driving home. Then we'd truly see the meaning of the phrase "drunk and disorderly." (Usually when I drink we just see the meaning of "if she can't hold her liquor, you'll have to take her home sir." Sorry, Dav's wedding night.)

Last night and this morning I've been sleepily pondering the last thing the Boy said to me, a vague, "I'm sorry." The part of me that is truly the Queen of the Harpies is more than ready to compose a vicious list of all the things for which I am sorry, of which the mildest would have been, "that I assured you you were an adequate lover." But that's not really productive for either of us, and he wouldn't care anyway. I mean, that's why he moved out, right? So he didn't have to listen to my jive.

The following is a list of things for which I am truly sorry, not just because I'm mad.

• I'm sorry that my beautiful son will never know the uncomplicated boredom of a stable marriage between his parents.
• I'm sorry that I painted the bedroom a washed-out blue because it was his favourite.
• I'm sorry that this breakup has made it impossible for me to truly believe that anyone will love me as long as I love them.
• I'm sorry that I bought him all those expensive toys, because I could have used that money for retail therapy (I already bought a limited edition Neil Gaiman poster, and was glad to be going to a place last night where I couldn't do too much damage with the credit card.)
• I'm sorry I spent so much time at my inlaws when being ignored by my husband and choked by dander and cigarette smoke to the point where I couldn't breathe.
• I'm sorry it took me so many years to figure out that I would never have another child as long as he was involved in the decision-making process.
• I'm sorry we lived in a shitty Etobicoke neighborhood, threatened and abused by our neighbours, so that we would be on the subway line for his university.
• I'm sorry I submitted to the pain of living with my parents after having Blake instead of insisting that he man up and get a decent job.
• I'm sorry he felt it necessary to deny that he ever loved me.
• I'm sorry this list was neither coherent, funny or insightful.

Labels: angst, the boy

This hasn't been a good week, and I'd like to write it off and try again. Can't, though. It started going downhill on Tuesday and hasn't really recovered. Or maybe it has, and I'm just sulking.

But! Saturday was awesome. Some months ago Souzan told me about a medieval fair to which she brought her K8 every year. Blake's obsessions include, in no particular order: knights, lego, dinosaurs, Rubbadubbers, the Tick, Batman, Spiderman, small animals, cooking, crafts and the jokes on the back of Chirp Magazine. Since his father had already taken him to Medieval Times, I figured this was my best chance to enjoy his hobby with him (bonus: I don't have to go to Medieval Times). So we went. And it was awesome. The drive was really long and we started quite late, but we made it by lunch time and were sufficiently distracted by the various goings-on that we didn't even stop for lunch for a solid hour. Sage was in an excellent mood, and Blake bounced from distraction to distraction with hardly any pause. It was an excellent way to spend a Saturday, and I didn't even think about the TTC Knitalong. Not having pegged myself as the renfaire type, this is high praise.

only those of honour bright shall click through for more...

On Monday I benefited from Stacy's amazing foresight with the chance to attend a Neil Gaiman reading at Luminato. When she asked a few months ago, I was typically vague, as my ability to make future plans is usually undercut by parenting or work (in that order). She went ahead and got a ticket anyway, which I was grateful for at the time but much more so when we were told in the introduction that the event had sold out in 3 minutes. I've heard Neil read before and I've stood in a signing line before, but never have I had such an intimate experience as this reading. Five hundred of the faithful filled the theatre and you could hear a pin drop (as evidenced by Stacy asking me to stop knitting because the clicking of my needles was disproportionately loud). I was glad that I'd finished my beer before the reading began. (Also: beer in a theatre? Where was the hotdog cannon? The Morpheus-themed plush mascot to get the crowd going? The scorecard? And most importantly, the collectible bubblegum cards? There is some money being left on the table here.)

It was probably good that the theatre was so focused, as nobody noticed me grey out when he announced that he and Amanda Palmer were dating, had, in fact, been dating for almost a year. Since I don't regularly read his blog, excellent though it is, I assumed that everyone else knew. Turns out that this only broke in a national way on Saturday, so I'm still on some part of the curve and not behind it yet. I don't have an opinion of the Dresden Dolls, really, but it's probably not fair that my first impression of Amanda is "try not to hate her because she is a) dating the hottest author ever and b) the innocent beneficiary of a breakdown of a marriage in whose solidity I had taken an apparently fatuous solace." That can't bode well for an unbiased listening, although she gets points for writing an upbeat song about abortion.

The signing afterward was long, but nothing close to what you can reasonably expect at another Gaiman gig. I'll have to look this up, but the first time I waitied in line I was seven months pregnant and it took the better part of the afternoon. The second time, the Boy & I went home when it became obvious that we were never going to see the front of the line before the two of us crashed (that night's signing is reported to have lasted until 2:30am). This past experience makes it seem that 1 1/2 hours in line is a positive treat, a zip through the signing autobahn. It was so comfortable that I didn't even get nervous when I got up there, and was able to tell the story of Blake demanding a personalized book without stuttering or getting weird. (We have a copy of "Wolves in the Walls" that is signed to "Sprout." Blake takes exception to this, as he denies ever having been a Sprout. "You should get it signed 'to Blake,'" he insists, and last night I got a copy of "The Graveyard Book" inscribed to appease him.)

The other neat thing about the book line was bellowing a conversation across the loop to Amy, who was patiently waiting for her first encounter with The Neil. I spent a good deal of my stay in line making up for lost auditorium time by knitting my February Lady sweater, which is huge and unweildy and if I want to knit it standing up I have to wad up the sleeves and yoke and keep it in my armpit while I work the bottom section. A few knitters in the crowd asked me about the pattern and the yarn, then showed me their own knitting projects which were all small and discrete. By the time Amy and I were within shouting distance, I had worked up a good head of steam and was more than ready to talk and knit and stand and wait at the same time.

Now. Amy has...this item. It is a rare and beautiful item that was a generous gift from some wise marketers who clearly know the value of viral, grassroots marketing. Amy is a wonderful person, a fabulous knitter, a fun lady, a smart cookie, and more than generous in her own right. But when I found out, via her blog, that she had received a box of antique doll-making props used by the Other Mother in Coraline...well, I had to iris-shut my heart like an airlock. I refuse to covet what is my sister's. I refuse to curse the fate that made her the receiver of such a present. I turn my back on generations of my relatives who would, at the very least, gossip about her shoe choices (impeccable, by the way). I was so sure that I had this under control that I was even willing to let myself ask to see it, to open such a fetishistic delight and gently touch the scissors, sure that I wasn't going to burst into tears or snatch it and run away to start a new life in Venezuela. I had not thought about what it would mean to uncover such a thing in the middle of people who have been waiting for going on two hours to see the author that invented Coraline. People who had run out of things to say to their companions. People who were trying not to think about how late it all was. Bored, focused people.

There was a tiny little riot.

I shooed them away by hurriedly closing up the box, my pleasure evaporated in a mist of "oh God I promised her I wouldn't hurt it what if they break the box??". Photographers sighed, frustrated. People began to question Amy, and a knitter came out of the woodwork and started a conversation about Fetching. I was suddenly relieved that I was not in charge of The Box. Too much responsibility for a girl of my temperament.

Labels: angst, blake, books, friends, outings

I'm home from work today, as last night I realized that my glands were so swollen that I couldn't blow my nose without feeling them. Scary. (This may or may not have had something to do with the hour of garden time before dinner, in which I pulled enough weeds to choke several horses.) I feel better today, but I'll be going to the doctor's later; if nothing else than to get a legitimizing note. Getting sick the day before the Victoria Day weekend is just a little too convenient to be believed.

"Hey you! Get out of the…uh…mayor's office!"
- Quimby yells at an itinerant steel drum player, who has wandered into the shot.

On the upside, I've finally achieved this week's goal of not working. On Tuesday I wanted to spend the day with my camera. On Wednesday I wanted to spend the day with my copy of This Book is Broken (about which, more later). Yesterday I had no real draw, I just wanted to stay home. And today I'm in the study with a lukewarm Diet Coke and glands that elevate my already-thick-to-begin-with neck to comedy status.

Before I got sick, though, there was Knit Night. Mason & I continued our bizarrely blessed knitting life by wandering into a book launch (free cupcakes!!) and were encouraged to start drinking before we had a chance to eat supper. This may have been why my credit card got a workout: I bought teal yarn for a February Lady (the It sweater of the moment), Mason bought supplies for a fair isle baby sweater, and together we bought a copy of Vintage Baby Knits, the book launched that night. It probably wasn't the beer, though. Spring makes me manic, and when confronted with a book of vintage baby patterns (and the teeny samples hung everywhere) I am likely to go a little nutty.

As you can see by the above, we also got a chance to play with the new camera, which saved Mason from concentrating on the fact that, until his finger heals, he won't be knitting his new yarn. How did he hurt his finger? Chasing a gorgeous shot, he tripped up the stairs and went down protecting the camera. This is the second time this year he's broken a digit protecting something precious while on a staircase, which is two times too many if you ask me. Still, the camera must be protected. Always.

Last night Mason made dinner while I whined piteously about my throat and tried to do soothing things. My vow to leave my new yarn alone until I'd finished my other projects went out the window, and I cast on for the F-Lady while reading Berman's opus.

(For those who don't know my real name, you should know that the guy who wrote the book on Broken Social Scene was my Arts editor at the Varsity in 97-98. My strongest memory of him is from the day that Lady Godiva wanted to seduce him and we ended up feeding cheesecake to a random writer whom I later married. Archives? There we go.)

I've been looking forward to this book, and much of it is the kind of late-night party reminisces of the Old Days that I craved. No punches are pulled about who was fucking whom, which is something they've been coy about putting on the record before, and this makes it an impossibly intimate book. I loved that. I loved all the details about the making of the records, and how terribly screwed up the last record was to make.

But, there are a few bones to pick.

1. Remedios gets way too much space to talk about how awesome his record label is, which is an important topic but not as important as he seems to believe.
2. Most of the narrative weight is on the band's formation and early days, which, to be fair, is what Stuart is most versed on having been there the whole ride. I wanted much more about the successful period, but other than "everything sucked, everybody was breaking up" there wasn't much. To be fair, this perception may be because I read the first few chapters over a couple of days, whenever I could get a minute, and the last half all at once while sick, knitting all the while. This may have artificially speeded up the timeline for me.
3. Dave Bookman needs to stop making snide remarks about 90's alternative fans, who have been allowing him to avoid real work for over ten years. It's not the fault of 15-year-old Nirvana fans (circa 1991) that CFNY sold out to corporate obnoxious crap.

My biggest issue isn't so much a complaint as a plaintive wail. This book makes you nostalgic for Torontopia, a time when I was too far away in Nova Gothic or consumed with staying alive in my stupid job to care about music. I missed it, as most of us did, and that's the problem with rock in general: you're always made to feel false nostalgia about a golden age, a perfect show or a watershed moment that you could never have known about. Knowing Stuart makes it worse; why was he allowed to live this cool life while I put aside my university days and went on with the next (boring) part of my life? I feel like I was just close enough to have really and truly missed out, and I don't know if that is the rock n' roll trope or my own sense of frustration.

Or, as Ophelia once said after a night of watching her boyfriend reminisce with a friend from home as they lit match after match…

"There is nothing more deadly than listening to stories about the Old Days when you weren't there." – march 17, 1997.

But how can you argue with a book that closes with a photo of Ohad's kid reaching out to Charles' while the parents look on proudly?

Labels: angst, books, health, music

Hey, look at me: not dead. I've felt sick even unto death for a good long while, which put a serious crimp into my extracurricular activities, but I'm better now. My getting-better started with a long doctor's appointment on the 20th, and the very next day everything was at least 300% better (despite struggling to get my reports in a day late, with all the stress that implies. Stupid double-damned report cards, from the fires of hell I stab at thee.)

The next week was devoted to the nature problem in my house, which started with the fact that I haven't felt well enough to do chores since February. Everything took a sharp turn for the worse when I discovered mouse leavings in my kitchen cupboards at the beginning of April but was too nauseous to deal with it until after the 20th. I still haven't cleaned out all of my cupboards and my cutlery is on the counter, but I'm pleased to report we caught a big fat mouse in the crawlspace and that may be the end of the problem.

Oh, and a determined skunk has been ripping up my lawn all spring in search of grubs. One night I watched the skunk fight off a raccoon and another skunk - apparently I have quite the delicious lawn grubs. Dealing with this has involved lots of cayenne pepper, but not a lot of results. So I'm mad at my house right now.

I'm continuing to surf the ups and downs of medication withdrawal. I'm discovered the rather unpleasant fact that all of the work I thought I'd done on myself and my dead marriage was apparently contingent on chemicals. Now that I'm on the other side, I'm angry, sad & anxious once more. Clearly I need to revisit this, but I'm not going back to my counselor. It's not his fault that the marriage counseling didn't take - I know that - but as a solo counselor he didn't inspire much confidence either. The problem is that, unless I get a prescription from an MD, I have to go through my employee program, and I've already burned through two out of their three pet docs. I'm not all that certain that the third will be any more useful than the first two.

Yesterday, while I was home from work, I ran a few long-overdue errands, including paying off both of my lawyers. Now I'm wondering if my separation lawyer can give me a counseling referral; she did, after all, like the black linen scarf I made her, and she must know a few counselors in her line of work. I can't be the only separated chick who needs her head shrunk.

Labels: angst, health, house

Took the night off and devoted it to pizza, beer and the second half of My Own Private Idaho. In bed by 8. Still exhausted; sapped by the February blahs.

Today is my first PD day without knitting. It makes it harder that one of the facilitators saw me knitting at Hogsboro and today immediately asked me what I was working on [but much more awkward two weeks from then when the facilitator was the Boy's mother and asked me the same question – far-seeing ed.] Waaah.

I feel a bit like a recovering addict, in that I suddenly need to reframe my entire professional life. Trying to remember how this used to work, this whole not-filling-my-hands-with-yarn. How I used to work. My uncle had to give up coffee to give up smoking for real. Maybe I just need to give up teaching.

I've wondered why I'm bothering to comply. Surely the punk rock part of my personality will kick in at any minute, and I'll be using my dpns to flip the bird.

Part of it may be just a mild Stockholm Syndrome, a desire for my new overlords to praise me (or at least not punish me anymore). But I think it's more likely that my masochistic streak has been uncovered by their drilling. I tend to think of myself as soft, decadent, luxury-loving and generally corrupted by bourgeois comforts. This self-contempt makes me take risks: hike Cape Split, take a bellydance class, join strangers in a downtown bar for a knitting circle, carrying my baby and my groceries home slung about my person, and so forth. Part of me is curious to plumb the depths of my fixation on knitting. I want to find the limits of my desire, if they can be found. Much like a voluntary fast, I'm hoping that the suffering will be instructive.

But I'll still keep a close eye on the job postings. I may know myself to be a bottom, but I also know that eventually I'll need a safe word and my new overlords are unlikely to heed it.

Also, She Who Must Be Obeyed may think that continual writing is less rude than knitting, but I have to assume that when I'm writing during a conversation that clearly doesn't call for note-taking, that I'm giving the impression writing down what people are saying. Yeah. That's not weird or impolite at all.

Labels: angst, bat masterson, knit

Day one of life After Knitting. I'm getting nervous and restless. I'm frustrated more easily. I'm hungry (which could be due to a delayed schedule that's kicked back my lunch forty-five minutes). I'm chewing my nails and fingers. But I'm trying. I need to give this a decent try. Maybe I've never gotten over being an apologist for the regime, and even though la reine est mort, vive la reigne.

Last night Blake asked me, "are you allowed to knit at home?" When I told him I was, he asked if "she could find out." God, I hope not. Because I'm going to need to catch up sometime.

Labels: angst, bat masterson

Today was a pretty rotten day. We started the new semester on Friday, and I can't seem to shake the anxious, horribly unprepared feeling I've had for weeks. Even though report cards are done, even though my semester started with relatively few problems, I can't seem to get over the cornered, trapped feeling. So I've been trying to spend the weekend resting as much as possible, but it's been hard to do. On Friday we all went to my department head's retirement dinner, which was very emotional for me, and another source of heartbreak is that I won't be teaching with him anymore. (More about this later.)

Early Saturday morning, Mason went off to pick up Sage for the weekend, and I tried with little success to root myself out of bed while Blake made repeated sallies into the bedroom to help me get up. I think I'm coming down with something, which means that I haven't really been well for weeks. By the time I got out of bed, I had an hour to shower and clean the house for the troupe. I also have no internet this week, so I had no idea how many people would be arriving come the noon hour, or if I was on the hook to pick up Juuki. I had to resort to that most antiquated of communication devices, the telephone.

After practice, Blake & I drove to my parents, got in their car, and drove to my grandparents' house for dinner with my uncles and their partners. It was a roast beef dinner, and very good as these things go, but it was a melancholy night all the same. I kept turning around, wondering when my grandmother would emerge from some hidden recess to greet us and fuss over Blake. The roast beef as overseen by my uncle's husband, was lovely and rare, though she would have roasted the crap out of it. There were small, neat stacks of papers and things in the corners of rooms, mess she wouldn't have tolerated. I looked at the photo frame I gave her for Christmas, filled with pictures from my summer vacation, that she'd never had a chance to put up. My grandfather complained about the Stephen King book I'd lent him two weeks ago, giving it back with all possible speed. Blake ate too many treats and had to be put in time out twice. I ran out of knitting 20 minutes after dinner. It was not one of our best visits.

Today Blake misbehaved in church, the little toddler I was watching in the Nursery became inconsolable 15 minutes before the end of church, and then my mother called me into another room to tell me some horrible secrets from her childhood that shed some albeit irrational light on why she is so suspicious of Mason. By the time I got downstairs, Blake was bragging about eating four sugary treats although I'd told him that we'd have to go straight home to help take care of Sage. When we finally got home, Sage was in a wretched mood, refusing to sleep and bursting into inconsolable and messy tears at frequent intervals. I started to cry. Then I went to my room, took off my church clothes, and huddled under the covers until I'd cried myself out.

I feel so far from recovered that it's a joke. I feel pounded down, mistreated, smooshed up and reconstituted at half my original dilution. I can't wait to see my new students tomorrow.

Thoughts on the retirement of my department head:

When I left Hogsboro and started at Bat Masterson, everything took a sharp turn for the better. It took me months to realize that my new department head wasn't simply part of the package, but a powerful reason why my days were a dance of joy.

I could go into his office in the morning with any crazy story of my weekend, and he would smile appreciatively and make some comment – wry or kind, depending on the circumstance – and I would always go away feeling better. Information on new book talk on the CBC was greeted as warmly as a rambling anecdote of a weeknight concert where the balloons dropped from the ceiling after midnight. He loved good food, good theatre, good alcohol, good books, and good cities. He went to sophisticated art galleries with his artist wife and he could be counted on to dance wildly to "Lust for Life" if you were lucky enough to get the DJ to play it.

One of the people who spoke at the retirement gathering said that my department head lived the golden rule, treating others as he wanted to be treated. I disagree. He never worked by this kind of justice, meting out kindness as a social contract. He was wildly generous with his time and attention. His enthusiasm was lavished on us all. He treated others as a happy baby might, delighted by novelty and easily comforted by familiarity. He was loyal to a fault, and we all went to him with our problems, no matter how minor or embarrassing. He always had our backs with students, parents and administration. He was a father figure, a wise professor, an epicure and a crazy hockey punk all at once.

I don't feel that I will ever get over the thought of not having him in his classroom, ready to bail me out, prop me up or let me stretch. It hasn't even been a day, and I'm already crushed.

Labels: angst, bat masterson, blake, friends

So, I've been putting off marking ever since I returned to work, as I binged on marking in the days leading up to my return. The problem with my self-voted vacation is that I had even more marking to finish that was sidelined by a combination of procrastination and my grandmother's stroke. My classes want mark updates and I have none to give. Today I decided that I had to apply the Pavlovian screws, and deny myself social knitting tonight if I couldn't mark at least one set of essays. Earnestly, I opened my folder. Frustratedly I realized that I had no marking sheets. The relevant file is at home. I can't mark. Darn.

I'm stuck with rifling through Ravelry for a carrier bag for my new SIGG bottle and a suitable present for Hestia's upcoming birthday. I'm thinking that 4 should be the year of GIR.

Speaking of goth geekiness, I suppose I must at some point face the last night of Savage Garden. For some prosaic reason, Pale is closing the club. (I choose to believe that they're trying to hush up a new virulent social disease that somehow mutated in the toilets, or that Pale has to return to England to apprentice to the last Master Cooper before he dies.) I tried to make it out to the last retro night, as I'm not keen on the industrial vs. really industrial playlist in Revolution vs. Machine on Saturday nights. (Or as Zub put it, the really industrial room sucks but in a more pretentious way - a cybersuck.) Unfortunately, that weekend the heavens dumped a tonne of snow between me and Retro Night, and I was forced to curse my luck loudly and often. Stacy, who made it out that night, tells me that Pale finally achieved his dream of the post-apocalyptic nightclub, as the Garden was the only thing open and thus the only thing packed with people in the still, snowy streets.

I met up with Zub & Stacy at their house and had a lovely late dinner before we began primping. I was in my Classic Gothgirl Clothes i.e. the Dress I bought when I turned 21, the Fishnets my grandmother gave me when I was 20 and going to the Rocky Horror for the first time, and the Fluevog 8-holes Mason gave me last Mother's Day. Stacy, in her rush to get out, forgot the first rule of dressing: boots, then corset. Zub worried that he had a spiked pompadour, but I assured him that he just looked like his DNA had been crossed with a pufferfish. Very cyber. As Stacy made herself beautiful, I knit and Zub distracted me with an audio tour of his cracking joints. This pretty much set the tone for the evening.

We got to the club shortly after 10 and were confronted by the First and Last Line Up to the Garden I Have Ever and Will Ever Stand In. Twenty minutes of sub-zero temperatures, speculating on the luck of those who intended to "drop by" later and watching the cyber bikini bints was enough to dampen our spirits, and we slithered up the stairs subdued (if you can call such a motley assemblage of elders "subdued"). Lotwyr, Monstre & Dav were already there, which was good because we saw very few familiar faces until we'd cleared the door. Once inside, I felt like I was in the middle of an old-fashioned anatomy textbook with layers of clear overlays to show the blood, the musculature, the bones. Instead of tissues, I saw all the modifications of the past 11 years jostling uneasily with the doomed reality. The DJ platform was the raised place where Dav, Anne, Sheila & I had eaten candy for hours. And farther back toward the bathrooms was where we'd sat the night Dirk wore his 3-piece seersucker. The cage was tiny, half the size of the place where a variety of amateurs would try their luck in spooky cage dancing. The paintings on the walls were different from the concentration camp silhouettes that seemed to move when it was late and you'd been dancing in the strobes for hours without a break. The front section, in its majestic cybersuckage, was just wrong. No pool tables with players to annoy the hell out of everyone not playing. The autopsy table that replaced our own personal coatcheck in 2001 was the dj booth. The booths where I'd met so many people were full of strangers and off-limits. The view from the front window burned down last summer. Most of my friends have moved on or couldn't get in. The place was too full to navigate and I didn't know enough of the bodies I rubbed against.

It was something less than tragic, something more than portentous. It made me cranky. Dav, too.

And I was weighted with the unacknowledged guilt of my grandmother's stroke, compelled to share, quick to deny feeling and yet anxious about something I couldn't get a grip on. I cried in frustration. I became disconsolate and tried to find a hug. My claustrophobia kicked in (or as I think of it, agoraphobia because agora means market and this was panic in the midst of a meat market). Loftwyr and Josh found me a wall to lean against, and that helped. Josh also helped by starting a conversation about Mason, and if that weren't enough, helped me to jump the girls' bathroom line by using his bouncer skills to wave me into the men's when it was clear. I hadn't realized that a men's bathroom could be that bad without being attached to a gas station. In any case, I was glad for the help, as I always love to feel like I'm part of some secret elite.

Which is, I suppose, what we were all mourning in our imperfect ways that night: we were saying goodbye to membership in a tiny, hidden circle of those in the know. Those who knew how to get Pale to play a request and not laugh in one's face (and those who can take the second in good humour.) Those who know how much to tip the bartenders, and how to get out of Doug's way without being obvious. Those with the manners to greet Pale & Brenda on every visit, if only with a wave, because that's what you do when you visit someone's place.

And despite the lows I felt that night, I'm still happy that they let us come over so many times, for so many years.

Labels: angst, bat masterson, dancing, friends, outfits, outings

Today I started to recalibrate emotionally from the intense high I’ve been on since the Folk Festival. Even coming home, I’ve been listening to loud music, seeing friends, spending a lot of time with Mason and out with Blake doing fun things. Today was a humid, frustrating day that followed hot on the heels of another fun but late night at the ZubHaus. Around dinner time, when Blake accidentally kicked over one of Mason’s decorations, I finally lost it and started sobbing.

It’s probably good that I’m getting into this right now. This is always a weird time for me, as summer starts to wind down and people make mischievous comments about going back to school. Have I done enough? Lazed enough? Crafted enough? Slept enough? Seen friends enough? This year the answers are maybe, no, yes, no and never. I have a few more days to work on the first one, and I have the rest of the year to work on the last.

And yet, despite driving home with my eyes sore from weeping and my shoulders slumped from sleeplessness, watching the pink sunset to a soundtrack of Broken Social Scene was just about the most perfect moment of my life. Guess I’m not quite recalibrated yet.

Labels: angst, music

So, for just about all of my Blake-less summer vacation so far, I have been vegging. I had thought that it would be really hard without him for so long, and I did cry the first day when I saw a little guy splashing in a public wading pool, but mostly my angst has been reserved for me. Since the first shock faded in January, my loneliness and feelings of abandonment have never been as strong as they have been this month. I find that more than ever before, I long for the Boy. The interesting thing is that despite this desire, I don’t particularly want him back in the state he was when he left. I can recognize the nostalgia in my thoughts and I’ve decided to give it free reign. As long as I don’t get maudlin and start drunk dialing him and begging him to take me back, I’m going to accept these feelings as part of the process.

I’ve been telling people that getting separated is like getting ready to eat a pie. People like me tend to think that they’re smart enough to avoid certain pieces and they can throw away a bunch of the pie uneaten. The bitter truth I have found this summer is that I have to eat every damn piece of sadness, every piece of nostalgia, every piece of insecurity and fear. I do not get to skip a slice because I’m clever, or because I’m aware of the dangers or because I’m trying very hard to sympathize with the Boy’s decision. The pie has to be eaten regardless. And no, it does not come à la mode. (Unless the ice cream is made of tears, that is. Salty salty ice cream of tears.)

But! On a happier note, my mood has improved in the last 3 or 4 days, and I’ve mostly gotten over the hump of inactivity. It took a lot of aimless wandering, but it seems to be over. Yesterday was the first day that I felt normal and even happy to be out and scooting around the city. Which is a good thing because there were so many good things yesterday that it was more or less my birthday: first, a matinee of Die Roten Punkte that had me wishing for even more rock, then dinner at the Corner House for Summerlicious, and then a long and happy Stitch n’ Bitch at Lettuce that incorporated Little Mousling’s search for anonymous sperm donations (“just go to the Brunny and stand for a pitcher,” I counseled) as well as the memorable phrase “reach-around colonoscopy.” And Denny wasn’t even there to hike up the smut levels…we did it all on our own. I blame German performance rock and really good wine and the never-ending medical talk that practically begged for a punch line to lighten the load.

Yesterday and today I prepped Blake’s room for painting, and I hope to be done my taping in time for Saturday. I even bought him a fan, so that when he insists (as he does nightly) on going to bed in long pants and snuggling under a comforter, he might not die of heat exhaustion. (I find myself in the curious position of begging him to wear less clothes now that we’ve hit the warm weather. “Come on,” I whine, “don’t you just wanna wear your undies? Or nothing?” He makes me sweat just looking at him. And yet he springs up every morning refreshed and ready to snuggle in my bed. I don’t get it.)

I’m feeling a little guilty for taking advantage of his absence. Blake has been quite vocal about his desire to paint his own room. He’ll probably have a freak out when he finds it’s been done without him, and small wonder. Still, my guilt can’t quite overcome the sheer lunacy of single-parenting a 4-year-old while I paint his room. No dice, Blakers.

I really should have taken some “before” pictures; his room is usually a cluttered mess of epic proportions and almost all of it has all been transferred to the closet. I wouldn’t have thought it possible if I hadn’t done it myself. I even vacuumed the baseboards tonight, seeing as I’ll be getting up close and personal with them before long. And if this painting job is anything like my last one, I’ll still be painting when he comes home. He’ll like that.

I’m also finishing projects every couple of days, with recent standouts being the De Profundis pillow (which combines knitting with cloth strips of text so that Mason can decorate his couch with one of the most depressing bits from Oscar Wilde’s letter from prison) and an amigurumi Strong Bad. I’m madly in love with Strong Bad, and have to stop myself from saying the same thing over and over: “Dear Strong Bad, How do you crochet with boxing gloves on? Yours, Rocketbride” I think the people around me are finding it old.

I got my big box of prize yarns yesterday. There is something absolutely magical about a box of yarn that is for me and me only. It’s a pretty interesting assortment; not a lot of anything I would choose myself, which means that I’ll have to stretch and do a lot of new things. And there’s nothing wrong with a big old stretch, especially when I haven’t done yoga for months. Did you just hear something crack?

In final crafty news, I’m wondering if I have the fortitude to enter the Summer Ravelry Olympics. I committed to doing a lot of amigurumi toys this summer for my co-workers, and it would be kind of nice to plow through them in 17 days. On the other hand, I’m going to the Ottawa Folk Festival in the middle of the run, and I can’t imagine that it’ll help my time. Still, a dozen toys in 17 days would be pretty cool. We’ll see.

Labels: angst, crafty, friends, outings, the boy, victory

Some pictures, peeps. I made a Cthulhu toy for the cool home ec teacher/game store owner who got a new job for September. It was half farewell and half payment for getting me started re-lining my favourite spring coat (translation: she traced, cut and sewed it together; now I get to sew it in. I'm cool with that.)

For those who worry, I am seeing a counsellor about once a month. I'm also reading some good books about CBT and one called Rebuilding After Your Relationship Ends which sort of makes me mad but has some good stuff buried among the patronizing points. Last night, when all I felt like doing was crying, Mason came over and made us supper. Good, healthy, fresh food does wonders for my mood. I even had the energy to clean up the kitchen before he arrived, which was an insurmountable horror when I was weeping into the tissue Blake so kindly provided. My parents are worried that I'll scar Blake with the tears, but the truth is that I cry very infrequently around him. Yesterday was a big exception. I worry more about the time I disengage, although I don't suppose it's any worse than what the Boy was doing this fall. I'm hoping to use the next two weeks to recharge and find my joy wherever it's hiding.

Labels: angst, crafty, health

It’s been a rough week. The end of the school year is always a bad patch for me – at its best I just want to sleep 24 hours a day, and at its worse I feel like my life has been a total waste. I’m at that second extreme right now. It’s like the school year puffs up my days full of air, and once that air is gone my life collapses into a new, shrunken state covering the odd, small shapes that lurk below. Every year I wonder how I could have let my life become so impoverished, so flat, so lonely, so boring. For the last few years I’ve also had the feeling that I’m a failure as a mother for not being able to shift into full-time mom mode as gratefully as everyone else seems to. The Boy has been my bulwark against the worst of these feelings for eight years in a row. This year he is gone, never to return, and suddenly that pain is breaking over me in waves that make me feel like this summer will drown me.

It’s pretty dumb stuff, too. This afternoon I dragged myself to the grocery store, and I was overwhelmed with thoughts of every trip we ever took to stock up. Every meal we ever botched in Nova Scotia, every pint of cherries we ever ate on the way home from the farmer’s market, every discovery we ever made in cookbooks and at the houses of friends: I’m the only one with that stuff still sloshing around inside me. From the way the Boy would talk in our last month together, it was pretty clear that he remembered our past as one unbroken stream of unhappiness. I’m the only one on earth left to think about the meals we cooked on our tiny hibachi and remember being in love. Sometimes I feel that the worst part about losing him is that I’ve lost my back up memories, and without my back up, how can I know for sure that I spent those years well? I thought we were happy but look how wrong I was. Why couldn’t I be wrong about everything else?

It was just as bad when I was shopping for Blake’s summer clothes. This is the typical, boring job we would have done together, late in the season and rushed. Every year we got to pick out the clothes we would get to love Blake in this summer. Now I get to pick out the clothes myself and think dismal thoughts about the Boy’s reaction.

Some people who used to be my friends got married this month. I’m in the awkward position of finding out through the internet, which doesn’t make this time any easier to bear. I just hope that they do better than I did. Than we did.

Labels: angst, blake, the boy

I am closing in on the end days of my sixth year as the World's Worst Teacher. This has not been one of my better years. I am profoundly disappointed in my time management, and my deep, deep procrastination reflex has never been exercised quite as much as it has this year. Of course, I have an automatic: this is the year the marriage sprung a leak, foundered and sunk. Still, I'm going to need to rise above it sometime, and that's going to have to be next year, I suppose. Next year I will have to learn how to balance the single mum thing, the teacher thing, the crafty thing and the dancer thing with the venerable closet intellectual/weekend goth thing. I think I'm going to have to get one of those books on how to sleep less at night.

And yet, I haven't done too badly this year. I had grave doubts about my ability to deliver term marks before exams were written (because marking term work and exams together is hot, crispy death), but it happened. All I had to give up was lunch yesterday, and while I am not one of those people who can skip meals without noticing, it all came right in the end. I was able to go to my exam supervision with a clear conscience, and once the whanging headache subsided, I had an awesome evening that included two dinners. Sweet.

Last night was a costuming session for my troupe, and I was all ready to skip it on the grounds of not enough good health and too much the Blake (who was not misbehaving, but who is not a kid you can safely park in a corner while you do something else). As Blake and I left the house to run an errand, a tiny bell clanged in the back of my mind. Hadn't I promised...something? To Juuki? About giving her a ride tonight, oh crap. So I went to her house, drove her to the meeting and was prepared to turn around again when Blake asked if we could go in.

"Just to say hi," I said, thinking he'd lose interest quickly. After all, he hadn't eaten dinner and we were on borrowed time. I hadn't counted on the amazing attraction of a new male friend, all to himself, in the person of Jessamyn's husband. The two of them played video games in the basement while the troupe ate freely of the potluck feast (to which I hadn't contributed, of course, not that it stopped me from eating away) and worked on our costumes. Blake was awesome for two hours, and the only reason we went home is because it was my bedtime. By this point, Blake had tried on my skirt and demanded his own so that he could dance with us.

He definitely has moments when his cuteness threatens to overwhelm existence and snuff out life as we know it.

Labels: angst, bat masterson, dancing

something nice

I paid for yesterday's storm day of leisure with the worst case of cabin fever I've ever experienced. As soon as I got home from church, I was certain that if I didn't get out of the house again that I might die. I was vibrating so fast that I could barely think straight. Unfortunately, all of my regulars were busy or we have a date so soon in the future that me rushing over right now would be pretty silly. Even Dirk, my soi-dit lazy friend, was very resistant to inviting me up to his parents' place. (I think I'll have to stop being a brat for the next little while, because Dirk's current incarnation just isn't finding my shit funny. Unsettling.)

So I called Preacher, and found him at the airport with the family, on their way to Palm Beach. Good thing I hadn't gone through with my plan to just drive to his house, Dirk or no, which was my original plan two months ago.

We've been talking today about the small still voice of God, and I figured that if it was this hard to find something to do, then I must need to do something here to make myself settled. I sat in the study, thinking, and I suddenly noticed something: of all the rooms in the house, the only place still haunted by the Boy is this room. Every other room, from the living room to the basement to the bedroom has been reorganized, altered, shifted so that the holes are no longer obvious and wounding. This is the only room that still has piles of his shit on the shelves, in the closet, under the desk.

Today I purged.

It's all sitting in piles by the door, and the Boy has promised to pick it up tomorrow. He didn't sound to pleased with my "pick it up or I'm throwing it out tonight" message, but I don't actually care. As I was packing it up for him into nice, convenient crates from my dad's company, I had second thoughts. What if I blow it because I won't be nice to him now? And then I realized that it didn't matter. This week I asked him twice if he would reconcile, once with a joking tone in the driveway of Casa Nova and then privately in my doorway. Both times he was more than happy to refuse. If he's going to point to this latest ultimatum as proof positive that I'm unreasonable, well. Actually being nice never goes to my credit, so why not play the bitch?

At least I'm not borrowing a trebuchet from Team Sundridge to fling flaming JUMP workbooks at his apartment windows, which was my first plan last month.

cosmic pluto's socks pose with the boy's crap

Labels: angst, house rich, the boy

"You do stupid things that I don't like!"
- Blake, this morning, when the rage subsided enough for him to speak

I had a really great entry for Wednesday, but then I thought better of it. As I learned from the great Q & Stacy Rumour Disaster of 2002, sometimes I need to think twice before publishing something on the Internet. It will see the light of day eventually. All we need to say for now is that I cried myself to sleep on Tuesday and made all of my co-workers join my pity party on Wednesday, whether they wished to or not. Everything got better when I made it to my knitsibs, big fat burrito in hand and wool fumes buoying me up. I only had to tell a few people before I was okay again. I even got a phone call, which left me gobsmacked because only one person knew where I was going that night and I thought I was moving renegade, under the cover of the eclipse. Not so much. But being found was pretty terrific, too.

Tonight I pack up the Blake's stuff for the weekend and spend the night making something for Hestia's b-day tomorrow. I love a good kids' party, and between Andrea and Opera Sarah, I've been invited to some of the best lately.

Labels: angst, blake, knit

My Grade 12 class has a summative project that involves designing a utopia based on the principles they've absorbed throughout the semester. Then they make a presentation designed to sell us (or more importantly, me) on this idea of utopia. One group last month did a slide show about their institutions of higher learning, and partway through my startled voice proclaimed, "hey! That's my college!" Good old UC. And when they argued, I said, "I know that place. I was up on the roof once." Then they laughed at me.

Happy 11th anniversary, ridiculous Fireball. Happy anniversary random nudity, stolen ice cream and impossible love. It was worth the cigarette burns, the ruined stockings and the pictures in which my underwear was clearly visible. It was all worth it for the view from the top of UC.

Yesterday I offered to drive Mason home because I was going down for Drunken Knitting and we haven't had a chance to hang out since he came back to work this week. I didn't realize that being with a friend would make the handoff of Blake to the Boy that much harder. This is because I couldn't encase myself in the customary ice that cloaks my recent dealings with the Boy. So when the Blake had walked off into the snow with his daddy, I started to cry for the first time in weeks. Sometimes I am terrified by the amount of denial I use to get through the day. Watching the two of them walk around the corner made me realize that on some level, I'm just keeping my life warm for the day the Boy decides to come back.

This week was an especially hard one, because the blessings flowed in and there was no one to share them with. Asked to join a belly dance troupe – wait until work to cautiously tell anyone. Love bombed by Stacy – private and wonderful and no way to share why I'm smiling. Cosmic Pluto wants me to test-knit a pair of socks for her book – wait a day and a half until I can share the news with my knitting protégé Mason. It's really really hard to be missing the person who tried to understand my obscure flashes of joy.

But if emotion is the sickness, Drunken Knitting is the cure. By the time I made it down to the Dick, everything was in full swing. Sophie buttonholed me outside the door and we traded angst (not only are we goths, but we have actual troubles this winter, which makes it easier to mope convincingly.) I ordered food as fast as I could, then spun my head around when Mason, Kristen & Sage walked in. Yay! Between eating and talking and listening and playing pass the Sage and soothe the Zoë, I might have knit 8 tiny rows on my scarf. Maybe. It was one of the good nights, one of the best. I only went home when I was too tired to keep my mouth closed from yawning.

Conversation in the car on the way to K8rs' party:

Blake: I don't love Daddy anymore.
me: Yes you do, sweetie.
B: No. I don't love anyone anymore.
me: I feel like that sometimes.
B: No love for anyone. I'm not going to save anyone from dying.
me: I feel like that sometimes, too.

Labels: angst, blake, friends, knit, nostalgia, outings

The Boy & I continue to bicker about access. It's complicated by the fact that this is the only issue he's bothering to pursue, so all of his energies are focussed on wringing extra minutes from me. Plus it's the only thing he can do and get any sympathy from anyone, so I'm sure it's helping his self-esteem to be as pugnacious as possible. (As pugnacious as he can be without actually paying for a lawyer himself, that is.)

I'm not happy about this for a host of reasons, including but not limited to the strong feeling that this is creating an unstable environment for Blake, the Boy's douchebag attitude, the lack of attention to any other relationship issue, the amount of running around I have to do preparing Blake & driving him around so that the Boy can have a visit, and the loneliness I feel when Blake is away. Everyone I talk to, from my parents to Palaver & Preacher, is aghast that he is demanding so much, which makes me feel worse for every concession I make.

On Friday I fought the rising tide of weekend-related claustrophobia by driving to Parkdale and visiting with my favourite chat-based superhero: Dirk Nightshade. The agenda was typical of a meeting with such a man: excellent dinner, light conversation and perambulation about town. The walking was slightly sullied by the facts that it is wicked cold on the streets and Blake's sidewalk speed is set at "pokey," but we muddled through. And one of the best things about the trip was that it gave Blake a chance to play with Dirk's toddler roommate Ivy, the Gothest Little Girl Of All Time. I often wish for friends in the town where I live, but I have to admit that these nights in Toronto, when every part of my social life come together perfectly for Blake and myself, are all the sweeter for their rarity.

Thanks to the recent thaw, my house is under siege by some of the biggest spiders I've seen since my last B.C. vacation. The most obvious are the four who have claimed my upstairs bathroom, an occupation which means that I need to do a cursory check of my surroundings before taking my clothes off or reaching for a towel. It's especially fun when you're as nearsighted as I.

I generally have a policy of live and let live when it comes to spiders, as they take care of some truly horrid insect roommates. But their sheer numbers are starting to get to me. I mean, how long will it take until they start eating each other? The weather is cold again and I have to think that they've already eaten most of the bugs on offer. To my mind the cannibalism can't come soon enough.

The other neat thing about my house is that my bamboo have become an interesting emotional barometer. Joyce gave me three pretty stalks as a housewarming present, and they are pretty damn hard to kill. That being said, as soon as the Boy left, I noticed that one was…failing. Sure enough, one stalk is now completely withered, while the others go on. I'd take a picture, but I can't find my camera. Bamboo: innocent agent of feng shui or sinister agent of destiny? Mua ha ha ha.

Labels: angst, blake, the boy

Yesterday I got up at 4:45 to mark my final 8 essays (I just go crazy like the good old days). At about 6, I heard a little voice coming from the next bedroom.

"The S is for socks! (clap clap) The S is for socks! (clap clap)"

Hee! Only Blake truly understands why I need to listen to a good Homestar song over and over, because he wants to do the same thing. And in honour of our earworm, I changed the banner.

Things are pretty static around here. The Boy & I have switched to email negotiations, as talking to him in person about anything of importance makes me pretty angry pretty fast. He showed up on Sunday to drop off Blake and he wasn't wearing his wedding ring. As soon as he was gone, mine went into the china hutch. I find myself touching the place it used to be on my finger a lot.

I'm having a hard week. I keep waking up and wondering who I am. I wonder if this is supposed to be my life. I wonder if I'll always feel this dislocated. I wonder how long the Boy was faking it. I wonder if this is for real or if I just have to be patient a little longer. My hands stay in motion, ringless. Busy is all I have.

Labels: angst, blake, the boy

Today has been a fucking disaster. No, I guess it hasn't. When I think about Abortionpalooza Weekend I realize that my life can – and has – dropped much further. Still, I've been pretty brave lately, and I feel especially tested. The sequence, for your consideration:

1. Clean the house in preparation of a visit with Poppy & the twins. Get a call from Poppy asking for a rain cheque because everyone is sick sick sick. This wasn't so bad: at least I vacuumed my couch.
2. Go grocery shopping with Blake during lunchtime. Watch his fuse shorten. Insist that we visit Chapters before going home for lunch. Watch him have a complete sobbing meltdown over a mitten in the parking lot. Drag him to the Chapters, to find that the book is not in stock. Drag him back to the car.
3. Bake brownies for Stacy to make up for lack of present yesterday. Yell at Blake for gouging at brownies with knife when I left the room.
4. Go skating with Blake and parents at large public park at the centre of the town's New Year's Eve celebrations. Have a good time. (Wait for it.)
5. Go for dinner with family friends. Have an excellent time. Realize as I am about to leave that my wallet is gone, probably during skating. It is now full dark.
6. Go with my mother's friend to find wallet. Spend an hour discussing my separation. No wallet.
7. Go home to find a message from the police: wallet was turned in! Go back downtown to fight crowds and find police officer. No officer.
8. Find another cop, who tells me to phone the station.
9. Phone station. No wallet. I am told to phone tomorrow.
10. Go home. Realize that it's now 10 and I can't drive to Toronto without my licence. Further realize that I will be home alone on New Year's Eve, as Blake is sleeping at Camp Grampa. Think about eating all the brownies. Write journal instead.

So here I am. I figure that if I can live through this night completely alone, cheated & stuck – then I can live through fucking anything.

Bring it ON, 2008.

Labels: angst, family, friends, outings

The last few days I've been doing stuff, filling the time with wholesome activities. Moving books around so that the gaps are less visible. Skating with my parents & Blake in the pretty pretty snow. Transferring my clothes from the craft room to my bedroom. Making sure that the kitchen is tidy and the laundry up-to-date. Taking Blake to Christmas stitch n' bitch at Lettuce Knit, because I don't even have to mention it to anybody. Keeping busy. Trying to feel good about myself. Distancing myself from the pain by excelling in domesticity.

I keep tripping over things that he left, and they are just as inexplicable as the things he took. Why did he take the Vince Gueraldi Peanuts CD and leave his R2D2 phone? I suppose that I need to be a little less diligent about trying to figure it all out. The lack of logic fits in well with the whole breakdown of the relationship, anyway.

Preacher phoned me a couple of nights ago, and I found it soothing that he was as baffled as I was. Besides, trying to explain it to him meant that I didn't have to try and live with it alone, at least not for that hour. I saw Ian today, and the same applied. I think I crave people who knew me before I started dating the Boy, because they're a link to a time when my whole identity wasn't this relationship. I realized today that I got engaged and dumped within a week. There's something about this season, I guess, something that really and truly makes it the cruellest month for me.

Speaking of wholesome activities and cruel months, I managed to see Sweeney Todd on Boxing Day with Stacy, JimZed & Death. Thank heaven that in my time of need I am given Johnny Depp in a striped bathing suit, Helena Bonham Carter in black corsets and jet upon jet of arterial blood. That, and the snowman tray, made it all worthwhile.

"I eat out of a snowman. Do you eat out of a snowman?"
"I eat out of plates with my family."
"Oh."

I also tried taking Blake to the ROM for the reopened dino exhibits, but it was a bit of a bust. The first part was good: I met Ian as planned, he whisked us in with his employee pass (swank! I'm with the video producer!), and the new galleries are truly dino-tacular. Blake, however, was completely over-stimulated by the swarming crowds that blanketed the fossils, and it was a struggle to keep him with me and focused on the exhibits. The real descent began when we were in the bird displays and I realized that Blake's Buzz Lightyear had been AWOL for some time.

If you ever want to see my kid collapse in grief then you should know that a defecting father isn't going to do it: it takes the disappearance of one of his 8 Buzzes in a public place. He reacted exactly as if there had been a death. First he clung to me, sobbing weakly. Then, when made to move, he marched tragically with a few tears slipping down. He accepted a free granola bar on a street corner, but when he realized that it made him happy, a new fit of tears wracked his little red face. Like so much of my recent life, it made me want to laugh and cry at the same time, while leaving me with a pounding stress headache.

Despite this reckoning, I did enjoy getting out to see Ian. He is, as ever, a quirky mix of rockstar privileges and honest integrity, which meant that I could cry my eyes out in the rotunda for free. And his reaction to that will be telling me that he made his sister cry on Christmas, so it's been the Worst Christmas Ever in a few places. That made me feel better. I guess I don't mind being in pain as long as I can be the Queen of Pain. Plus, unlike most of the people I meet in my day, I can say all of the crazy shit that I'm thinking and he'll just return the serve as if it was normal to refer to yourself as "the spores of relationship poison." I miss that.

Labels: angst, blake, friends, outings

"Merry Christmas, yer arse, I pray God it's my last."

Well, I'm officially a single mom in a paper crown. Queen, if you will.

The last two days were pretty awful. The Boy's insensitivity verged on satire at times, and I found myself wondering how I could have been married to a complete stranger for so long. I'm learning to keep my expectations extremely low. And even as low as they were, it hurt that he spent most of Christmas morning clicking away on my computer (his is already gone) and seemed surprised that I would have any objection to dropping another load of his stuff at the Casa Nova on my way to Christmas dinner. It hurt that he waited until yesterday morning to tell me that his mom was coming in an hour to move his bed. It hurt that after I fled the house for 5 hours to give him space, he asked to borrow my car as soon as I walked in the door. It hurt that he skipped what would have been Blake's first Christmas Eve pageant, if Blake hadn't been felled by a sudden fever, and came home without notice near 11 p.m. It hurt that, as soon as Blake had unwrapped his many presents from Daddy, Daddy packed them up to take to Casa Nova.

And yet, there were bright points. Yesterday's church was the first Christmas Eve in years that I haven't attended under a dark cloud, fresh from an argument about why we had to drop everything and see the Boy's mother later that night. Seeing everybody's excitement, singing the carols, reciting the well-worn litany: it all seemed good and proper last night. And my family have been very helpful and kind, which is awesome while it lasts. Last night after I'd been jilted with a feverish baby, my parents came home with me to wash dishes and bake cookies. I haven't enjoyed a night like that since they used to visit in Wolfvegas. Today, when dinner got boring, Nic & I snuck away downstairs. If we were a normal family, we might have smoked a cigarette or downed a shot, but instead Nic showed me how to maximize my flexibility with isometric stretches. It's all about the clench & release, people. Really.

So, yeah. The new phase starts today. I wish that the Boy were able to look into our marriage and see something worth saving, but part of me is glad that I'll have a break from being invisible in my own house.

Labels: angst, family, the boy

Yesterday was hard. Today has been hard. I can't imagine that Monday or Tuesday are going to be anything but hard. Still, I haven't been in the depths of despair since Wednesday night (our last visit with the marriage counsellor), so I believe I'm doing what they call "hanging in there." My worst problem is finding reasons to stay out of bed; although my activity level has been pretty normal, I'm having more trouble than usual in keeping myself busy. The urge to give up is strong.

Yesterday I found out that the Boy has been using my car to make runs over to his new apartment while telling me that he's grocery or Christmas shopping. When confronted, he mumbled something about not wanting to upset me. When that didn't work, he tried telling me that we had a "don't ask, don't tell" policy that I've been unaware of. Refusing to admit that there was anything wrong with what he's been doing, he told me that he'd just load his stereo into the grocery cart and walk it over. Fine, I said. While he was loading up, I sat in the kitchen, eating oranges with Blake.

"Blake, should we drop off your Daddy at his new apartment, or should we let him walk over with his stereo?"

Blake considered. "Let him walk."

I have to say that the Boy's reaction to that judgement was almost worth the argument that preceded it. It actually made me feel sorry for him, and so we loaded up the car and set off to see the new flat. (We'll call it the Casa Nova, after the singles complex Kirk Van Houten moves into where he sleeps in a racecar.) The Casa Nova is about 10 minutes away from the house on foot. It's an ageing building, kind of crummy. The Boy has moved into the 22nd floor, and when I tired of waiting for the elevator, I started walking down the stairs. One landing was entirely full of garbage: half-eaten hotdog, pizza boxes, a bread bag with slices in it. I'm really looking forward to Blake spending his formative weekends in this smelly, stained rattletrap.

On the other hand, I couldn't have picked a better place to contrast a life apart with a life shared with me.

Anyway, the evasiveness continues, unpleasantly. I keep stumbling over things he's done, or getting surprise requests. I have to ask him directly, often repeatedly, when things will be moved out, or where he's going with Blake. It's like living with a war censor, or a particularly mulish teenager. The best part is that when I ask for full details, he starts telling me that he doesn't need to submit itineraries to me for approval. This is such a helpful attitude when coupled with a sudden request to take Blake out for hours, I can't even tell you.

Other than that, Christmas continues, my friends and family are supportive, and Blake is still Blake. Last night I went to a party thrown by NotAnArtist and wallowed in both sympathy and shortbread. Today I learned that Mason has a baby. I'm going to let him pick the pseudonym, but I can say that everything looks a-ok: fingers, toes, and that put-out expression particular to newborns. This year my Christmas present will be snuggling him.

Labels: angst, bat masterson, blake, friends, the boy

One of the things you may not know about me: I'm thirsty. When I started this journal I pretty much stuck to the Diet Coke at all times, not realizing that I was further dehydrating myself. When I started teaching, I switched to gigantic bottles of water, often carrying two 1L bottles on either side of my backpack like a mule. Now that I've been teaching more than 5 years, I find that I'm still not smart enough to drink water on the weekends – and switching from 1 – 2 litres a day to nothing is hard on the body (no wonder I'm so cranky). The problem is that I come home from work thirsty, and having drank water all day I search for something that I can drink that won't keep me up all night. I've been plugging this hole with beer, but I'm afraid that's not going to cut it now that I'm going to be the only parent around at night.

I guess it's time to start fooling around with those fruity teas. Sigh.

Sorry for the boring; it's just this or a pointless lament on the effect of seeing all those Phillip K. Dick books gone. I always kind of thought that he loved them more than me. It's tough to have that confirmed.

Or I could talk about the talent show. Today was the last day of school, which means that it was time for the Bat Masterson Non-Denominational Concert. This year distinguished itself from last year in two major respects: 1) the audience was not filled with drunk, surly misfits, and 2) some of the staff did a number -- that was all dancing. I felt remarkably similar to how I once felt as a camp counsellor: impossibly proud to be a part of these people, and sad that I hadn’t the guts to participate. Next year for sure.

Labels: angst, bat masterson, dancing, health