38 of 365x35: mr. evans

you summoned me all stern into your office. i soiled myself when you said my dad would be informed of the whole smoking-in-the-girls-room incident. the deal you offered totally sucked, as did my negotiation skills.

[i am doing x365]

37 of 365x35: mr. s

there was consensus that you were one of the most amiable teachers in the school, but also that your breath smelled like hot garbage – none of us appreciated when you’d lean in for close instruction.
[i am doing x365]

36 of 365x35: smc

your laid-back, throw-back, peacenik-ness turned me on, not off. i used to imagine us climbing back to the 60s where we’d live out of a converted school bus, write poetry and manifestos, strum, dream, love.

[i am doing x365]

35 of 365x35: janice

i was supposed to want to study piano under you because you were the best. awesome instruction, but your notations in the margins of my music were awesomer – my handwriting still mimics your funky script.

[i am doing x365]

34 of 365x35: sb

ours was a fleeting acquaintance but of toe-curling impact, thanks largely to footsie during 'friday night videos'. you were the kind of compelling that renders a teenage girl tongue-tied, like your beautiful, unfriendly sisters did.

[i am doing x365]

33 of 365x35: gladys

everyday after school, you’d bake yummy things with me like those cookies with a maraschino cherry poked in the middle. i loved flanking you as you'd belt out Yellow Rose of Texas at our piano.

[i am doing x365]

32 of 365x35: shaun

when you turned to me during yet another of our raucous laughing sessions and said ‘don’t look now, but i think our personalities are dating’, i felt like i’d been body-checked, winded on the ice.

[i am doing x365]

31 of 365x35: norah

you’d chuckle, as good sports do, whenever i’d call you ‘captain, my captain’, but i'm sure you've no idea how much your mentorship and friendship kept this flailer afloat during that amazing year, and still.

[i am doing x365]

30 of 365x35: j

you wanted to marry me one day, but we could never quite steady the thing on the right rails. that plate waiting in the fridge whenever i got home from revolution plotting was sure nice.

[i am doing x365]

29 of 365x35: z

you cried beneath the table of chips and pic-a-pop because jason refused to dance with you. you even threatened to play “total eclipse of the heart” (extended version) repeatedly until he would. tragic scene, imprinted.

[i am doing x365]

by my nails, sometimes

a few of the things keeping me from curling up in the fetal position at the bottom of the bell jar (this time around):

my youtube 'favourites' folder -- fans of project runway (season 2, to be precise) surely appreciate the wetting of pants inspired by those legendary santino-does-tim-gunn moments, without which my prospects of making it through a day would be dodgy, at best. in this one, santino channels tim channeling nine inch nails - i wail irrepressibly every time i see it, just like daniel v himself:







minor meds -- sure, there's pretty much always a dull ache in some corner of my head, but even when there's not, what's the harm in a wee maintenance program? my daily dose of choice:















the volcano -- coffee lovers the world over well understand the elixir that is a good, strong cup of espresso. after inadvertently breaking two bodums in two months, i have returned to my beloved volcano to get me through. she's been with me a long time - she's reliable, doesn't judge me, and never disappoints. ours is a groovy kind of love.
















chris cillizza and 'the fix' -- a blog that serves up some of my favourite political punditry of the american variety (the geek in me don't sleep just cuz i'm in a funk!). let's face it - having something consistent on which to focus while dangling is a good thing. and if that something regularly speaks highly of my boy obama, is fresh, AND well written? well hell, for an armchair political observer, that's a special brand of endorphin rush.

35x365: 28 nelson

your talk of inherited loyalties to castro melted my heart. we embraced tightly for most of the drive back to havana, but who’s to say if i was holding you or if you held me.

[i am doing x365]

will the chill

been spending more time outside than usual lately, breathing deeply – partly as per some tweaking of The Routine, but also in anticipation of winter. little bits of snow have fluttered around confusedly once or twice this past week, but there’s yet to arrive our first official snowfall. when it does land, that’ll be quite alright with me. breathing in deeply that sharp november air in the park today was good. having the likes of missy elliott and earth wind and fire along for the walk was good, too. but inhaling the intoxicating sunny chill couldn’t shake loose this feeling that something just ain’t right in me (again? still? always?) dammit. snow please come! make temporary tombs of things. cover shit up with your shimmer. cool this whole mess down. bring all the fluffy whiteness and freshness that is known to occasionally – temperature and location depending – signify hope.

35x365: 27 tim

i hated your t-shirt that said “prague – czech it out”. otherwise, your presence was comforting. i recall making many sandwiches and dumb jokes with you. but you gave away little, so i remember little now.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 26 julie

i think you were from reno. hideous though it was, you landed the only single bedroom in our house, floral wallpaper and all. which meant you could host overnight guests freely. and you sure did.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 25 jane

everything about you butted against my desire to live beyond shallow impressions. but i couldn’t get past your permed mullet, acid-wash jeans, big pink nails. sadly, no compelling personality to make up for it all.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 24 ken

cigarettes and coffee and tarot, oh my. you: a medical anomaly, artist, teacher. me: a bumbling fake, ally, sponging off your aura. if only you lived here to administer – regularly – your special brand of care.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 23 kathy

i’m fairly certain you violated all kinds of camp policy when you handed me my first cigarette, taught me to inhale, and assured me i was “born to smoke.” the coolest counsellor then, creepy now.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 22 unnamable

you’d say jump, i’d leap. we laid our relationship down on a bed of clichés and hovered awkwardly around it like at a wake. you didn’t love me enough, you finally confessed. neither did i.

[i am doing x365]

anecdotal evidence of the precariousness of my mental health, of late

i have taken to shouting in an aggressive and decidedly unladylike manner at invisible raccoons who i am convinced have established basecamp below my deck based on one backyard sighting of a couple of unfazed, lumbering visitors over a week ago.

each of my itchy bright-red burn blotches (mentioned last week) have been assigned a name, and i find myself making conversation with them in a manner not unlike, i realized today, that of tom hanks and a certain volleyball in that movie.

i am giving very serious consideration to a g.i. jane haircut – a full chop that would suit neither the shape of my cranium nor my personality but feels like a dire, urgent need all the same.

35x365: 21 giles

you were among the first of many boys who would find the giggley gawky girls annoying and me fascinating. sang our hearts out at music camp, then wrote them out in letters until we forgot.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 20 ian

i asked to rub your bald head, you wordlessly gave it over. by the time we’d met, i felt proficient in Gay Men. later, you fell in love with a woman, and i knew less.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 19 mr. pace

better than the highest grade of my senior year, you gave me reason to believe i could write. that i must. that i might even be good at it. not to mention all the funny.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 18 seema

hardly older, yet light years away. i found you ethereal before understanding what that meant. you dared impart the secret password to a world of art, kate bush, poetry, Power of Women, of new knowing.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 17 victor

your pants were always too short and no one understood the stupid plastic bag you carried absolutely everywhere, by bike. but it's your brains, enthusiasm, and unwielding faith in the revolution that make you matter.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 16 dale

felt slightly intimidated there. when i caught you playing piano one night, i felt safe. what you whispered during that emotional hug after we brought the house down at that silly concert touches me still.

[i am doing x365]

sask, i still love you

the next saskatchewan legislature
will be led by a sask party majority.
oh god.






things to which i freely admit at this point:

i am sad. i am not surprised. i wish a fifth term wasn't such a big fucking thing to ask for, from any electorate. i wish the sask liberals could have offered a remotely viable alternative so those nose-holding voters who somehow desired change could have at least gotten it done the ontario way.

i am mildly disappointed to have not gone there to work the campaign. at this moment, i'm feeling a wee bit homesick.

i am no blind loyalist and have certainly disliked many moves/decisions made by my chosen party - especially the sask ndp, good christ - but it is a sickening notion that they should be voted out based primarily on malaise. i am not excited to see which of its seriously whacky and dangerous ideas the sask party will roll out first [more of that heavy law and order agenda, anyone?]. i confess to liking wall's idea for fixed election dates, though.

i am gushingly relieved that my old friend warren held onto his seat (and a few others i particularly admire). i shed more than one tear during calvert's concession address - i really do agree with him that saskatchewan is the best province in canada.

i'm a bit pissed right now, but can't stay mad at my people. i really do love where i'm from. we should all be so lucky.

dear saskatchewan

you, my homeland, will decide today on your provincial government. the polls will close in about an hour, and i have to get this off my chest as we countdown to a result.

frankly, you’ve got me worried. i’m not a poll obsessor, but the numbers look bleak for the beloved new democrats and promising for dapper brad wall and his conservative team.

[as an aside: a bright and worldly colleague of mine confessed cavalierly last week that he had never heard of the saskatchewan party. i was a bit surprised, but then again, does anyone from ontario really give a shit about what goes on elsewhere? although in the case of saskatchewan, we’re hard pressed to find someone in neighbouring alberta let alone the centre of the universe (aka toronto), who could say much about sask politics. but i digress. so anyways, i shared the story of the sask party, how it came to be, what it has meant for saskatchewan politics, and what it could mean today. this colleague of mine quite correctly pointed out the oddity of that party and its relationship to the federal conservative party, but we both agreed that what’s not an anomaly is the steadily-climbing popularity of the sask party, given the current political climate both in the prairies and at the pan-canadian level.]

look, like any unapologetically ensconced politico, i’m a huge proponent of change when it’s time to replace an incumbent government with the party you support. in your case, my home province, the ndp has governed for the past 16 years, during which time you have given them strange bedfellows during some shaky minority periods, while sometimes allowing them comfortable stretches of clear power. last time around, you barely put them on top. today, we all see the calvert-led npd shuffling sheepishly into e-day with disturbing poll numbers and grave uncertainty. point being, can we really blame you for choosing change? isn’t that just how things go – even you should conform to natural political tendency to turn over governments after 2-3 terms, no? and never mind electoral norms, do we not find ourselves staring straight into the evil eye of current political storms? how can you be expected to re-elect the ndp One More Time when every last political breeze in this country is swaying you – and everybody else – to the right?

ok, i know what you’re thinking: ‘we’re saskatchewan, dammit! whatever the so-called political climate is in this country, we defy it! we sway by a different wind here [a demonstration of that go-our-own-way-ness being that you remain the only place in the hemisphere (world?) that flips the bird to daylight savings time]. we contradict even the most consistent of political tendencies. for awhile there, we were pretty much the only place in the western world that didn’t consider socialism an indictable offense!’

i hear ya! but here’s why i’m worried. even in the province that birthed medicare, canonized tommy douglas, and has rallied consistently against the mighty tides of neo-conservativism, maybe you’ve possibly fallen victim to The Harper Era? maybe it has gotten its hold on you, too?

the rabid right will be dutiful and do what it does. so will the loyal left. in between those two extremes, my homeland, you have an oft-analyzed long history of weird voting patterns. contemporarily speaking, the ndp knows of its debt to urban ridings for steady provincial success. but many of your staunchest ndp supporters have long followed the bizarre logic of my parents: vote ndp provincially (and in the case of my mother, donate money and even sit on your mla’s riding executive), but vote liberal federally. and it’s that tipsy, substantial slice of the electorate that has me concerned tonight.

it pains me to name the obvious, saskatchewan. your traditional ndp base has become awash in disheartenment and disenfranchisement (for reasons we shan't get into here). and since there is no provincial liberal party to speak of (sorry mr. karwacki, A+ for earnestness, shame about the stunning lack of traction), my concern is that the sask party machine might have managed to tap into far more than just an anti-ndp sentiment. i’m talking about those forces of the right that have assumed deft control of public and political discourse under The Harper Era (with gratitude to george w.).

and so it is with heavy heart that i implore you, saskatchewan, the province i love: DON’T DO IT. DON’T GET SUCKED IN. prove me wrong and Go Your Own Way. and to you disillusioned centrist voters who dependably vote left but today may be flirting with the idea of putting your checkmark next to a new box: RESIST. don't buy into the sort of hype and rhetoric that confused voters in ontario, quebec, newfoundland/labrador, et al. BE STRONG.

holding out hope for at least another hour,
pam

35x365: 15 chad from pre-school

we dove into the costume trunk and staged an earnest little wedding. "adorable", apparently. i kept the raggedy ann necklace you gave me for a hundred years, fantasizing we’d meet as grownups and consummate things.

[i am doing x365]

oh mUGGod

day three of this headache. i swear this hasn’t happened since my early 20s when i was experimenting with various birth control pills, pharmaceuticals, and a coca cola addiction. i also swear that these have been the worst few days i’ve pushed through in quite the while. yesterday, i (accidentally, of course) splashed hot grease from the stove and now have three unpleasantly red toonie-sized burn blotches on my stomach. yes, stomach. let me assure you, other than maybe the eyelid or nipple (i wouldn't know), i propose the stomach is the worst place to be burned by cooking grease. the ensuing pain and discomfort of that dumbass kitchen manoeuver coupled with the headache made for a rather shitty monday. i suppose it was within that rawness that i found myself susceptible to a mini meltdown [my keep-it-all-in-check-o-meter is clearly on the fritz]. a simple question during a simple phone call opened the floodgates to a rush of pent-up feelings related to stress, loss, fear, You Name It. it was hearty and apparently necessary, but that sort of cry sure doesn’t help a headache.

and so my burned and achey self fell in and out of a bizarre sleep of dreams about comas and missing car tires and bunk beds and road signs and footwear. found myself surfing the net in the middle of the night for some good winter shoes. i need not slip-slidey shoes, nor clunky boots. i need in-between footwear. my winter boots have served me well for ten years will do so again when the time comes to trudge through volumes of snow on mini hikes. they keep me from falling thanks to a complex tread pattern down below, are ultra-lined, and lace up to the top of the ankle so are toasty warm. great. but what i really need is footwear for the daily grind that’ll get me from house to car to [insert random urban destination here]. but i don’t want one of those weird leathery jobs that go to the ankle but are actually quite gapey up there. and i don’t want anything with a girlie heel, as if those women aren't one steel grate away from a face plough when racing from taxi to highrise to nightclub – high heeled boots would be SO not me. i’m surely no fashionista, but i find myself confounded by what is lately passing as stylish. like honestly, when the hell did tassles come back? and what is the story behind this line of boots that has somehow managed to convince (dupe) the hipsters into annointed them cool? oh mUGGod. basic winter wear? sure. fashion hype? c'mon.

35x365: 14 girl from mass comm 201

we strolled from class to a bench in the quad. within minutes, there was disclosure about various sexual traumas and scars yet to heal. though fleeting, i remember that intense solidarity. just not your name.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 13 lisa

upon seeing your bumper sticker (‘if you can read this, thank god your mother is pro-life’), i damn near ejected you - vigilantly - from my house. plus you whistle and talk too much while you work.

[i am doing x365]

35x265: 12 jack

i stopped breathing when you sat next to me in that intimidating auditorium. people always stared – those absurd curls, piercing eyes. that swagger. i got to see the inside of your bedroom, and vapid mind.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 11 alejandro

guiding me through pulsing latin rhythms, i was the sexiest woman alive. our bodies sizzled, though we went no deeper than ignited flesh. i wanted to fuck you forever. then i heard about your wife.

[i am doing x365]

35x365: 10 mrs. s

your house smelled of salve, white people food, and inertia. doilies, plastic covered furniture, and antiques from out of my world. mine were more than lessons in piano - early intro to old-fashioned culture, into knickknacks.

[i am doing x365]

redecorating

not that anyone would notice because, let’s face it, the room hasn't exactly been operating at full capacity for a Long While, but i figured it time to make some changes around here. those obligatory links on the left have been updated and a new (coincidentally ndp orange) button has gone up which points innocent clickers to my desperately low vote count for a pipe dream prize. oh, and woot woot - ‘lost people’ now found have suitably gotten the strikethrough treatment. thanks, internet, for all the reunioning.

perhaps most importantly (hey, it’s all relative), i decided to give up on the multicolouredness of the posts and just let the grey hang out. less stress, more soothing. or not. whatever. i have seven thousand choices to make on any given day, so at some point it becomes appropriate to give no shit whatsoever about the colour of one’s blog posts. because i’ll tell you what, users of prefab annoying cheapo creatively-uninspired blog templates, NO ONE CARES. so i don’t. grey like me it is. at least until i manage to get my crap together enough to learn me some wordpress or some other newfangled set-up that might show some love to my own bona fide page somewhere off on its own away from this stepfordy blogspot zoo. wide open spaces and i gotta be me and all that.