Say hello to my friend thats been hiding under my bed for a few months.
Mind the crummy picture!
Sunday, July 17, 2011
The Formerly Lonesome Crystal Mountain Love Beast (2011)
Say hello to my friend thats been hiding under my bed for a few months.
Mind the crummy picture!
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Jewels In The Mud
Alas, many moons have passed since I've written last. My apologies!
It's actually a really great thing, as I seem to be getting things done around here. The creative juices are getting dusted off, and that's always cause for celebration with me. It means I have defeated the beast of procrastination once again in a bloody dual! I am juggling a job, a casual-internship with Tom + Gary's Decentralized Dance Party (www.theddp.com) and just embarked on a summer internship with Vancouver's famed Waldorf Hotel (www.thewaldorfhotel.com)!
Working with the productions manager/booking agent at the Waldorf has been a music-lovers magical wand. I get to see amazing acts at my leisure, assist with great shows, meet great artists, and I get to be involved in the underground arts and music scene on the West coast. I have been blessed to see some awesome local and international acts, including but not limited to a last minute ticket (we're talking 20-minutes prior to the show...) to the sold out Fleet Foxes show. I have been SO wrapped up in the Helplessness Blues album for the past few months, re-affirming my love for Robin Pecknold's whimsical lyrics and the bands hauntingly beautiful harmonies. The show opened with the Seattle-based Cave Singers, whom I missed, but coincidentally saw as a headliner at the Biltmore the week prior. The bushy-faced, boot-stomping Pete Quirk is mesmerizing and thoroughly entertaining to watch, if ever you get the chance. His onstage presence is that of a man possessed by music, laughing and chattering away in a vocal style that's reminiscent of blues singers long passed.
Then there was Frank Fairfield! What a treasure! This is a name to watch, people. I truly believe he is here to save our musical souls. Mr. Fairfield fled the monotony of the working-world in his early 20's to ramble and see the American landscape, busking for spare change to whomever would listen until this most-recent tour opening for the infamous Cass McCombs. I was taken aback by his humble, kind, and yes-ma'am-thank-you-ma'am demeanour when I met him at the Waldorf show. Equipped with nothing but a duffle-bag, a beat-up guitar and fiddle, he completely blew everyone away with his bluegrassy style and his toe-tapping rhythms. I felt like I was peaking in on a delicious secret-- or perhaps into the 30s, at a pub somewhere in Louisiana. Frank Fairfield is a man not of this time. His songs are like scratchy old vinyls you listened to at your grandparents' cabin, like a canoe ride on the bayou or something.
It's these moments that are the reason why I love to see live music. I get shivers; I know I am so close to a rarity, and there is a sense of closeness, a warmth in your bones that seems to linger there for days. And then an hour passes and it's all gone in a flash of applause and "one-mores". We un-coatcheck our effects, return to our lives. I guess I'm pretty lucky that I get to do this all the time, because that glitter just keeps caking on, and I can vibrate off that moment continuously.
I guess it helps that I'm also newly in love? WOAH.
Who'd a thought I'd be one of the milky-eyed ones again? I certainly didn't expect it. But like most treasures, it was discovered in a flash. I tripped over it like a hole in the ground, and was suddenly dumbfounded, awake and stargazeringly (I know it's not a word-- don't annoy me) in love. I know I sound like a huge, annoying mongrel. I hate to be that girl: nobody wants to hear about love unless they've found it too. In which case, bragging about it brings up memories of the "ice cream" skit in Eddie Murphys Delirious-- "you ain't got no iiiiiiiice cream, you didn't get noooooone, 'cause you are on the weeeeeeelfare!"
**If you don't know what I'm talking about, that's terribly unfortunate and you should watch the video below.
However, the summer has arrived on the West coast, and everyone knows that summer is made for lovers.
Cupids and heart-thieves are out there passionately hunting it out (I can almost smell it in a bar this time of year, yikes!), while the lucky-ones are busy showering the streets with PDA, cutesy bike rides, hand-holding, flower-picking and being adorable. I feel like falling in love is much like stumbling upon a beautiful song that changes your life, the way you think about yourself. Or maybe your first concert, unless you're like me and can't remember because you got drunk in the parking lot of the venue. A good walk in the park. Either way, the likeness is there.
It's as though you've found jewels in the mud-- a term I first heard used at a Buddhist temple, where the monk suggested the concept as a visual mantra helpful in meditation. The visualization is supposed to connect you with the innermost part of yourself, your true potential, and true peacefulness. I keep remembering it in moments of surprise or awe, when I feel blessed, and it completely makes sense. It's the very moment when all your distractions dissipate, your disenchantments float away like smoke and you're left with complete awareness and wonder. I have a feeling I might have lost some of you at "visual mantra", but nonetheless I think you probably know what I'm talking about. All I'm saying is that, whichever way you experience even a moment of that jewel, drink it up. My vehicles to visit that ecstacy are love, art, and music. Just honour beauty, okay? Besides, t'is the season for merrymaking and joy-- bikinis, patios, cutoffs, beach days and general loveliness.
So what are you gunna do, hey?
Go out there and get some of it!
Cheers!
B
It's actually a really great thing, as I seem to be getting things done around here. The creative juices are getting dusted off, and that's always cause for celebration with me. It means I have defeated the beast of procrastination once again in a bloody dual! I am juggling a job, a casual-internship with Tom + Gary's Decentralized Dance Party (www.theddp.com) and just embarked on a summer internship with Vancouver's famed Waldorf Hotel (www.thewaldorfhotel.com)!
Working with the productions manager/booking agent at the Waldorf has been a music-lovers magical wand. I get to see amazing acts at my leisure, assist with great shows, meet great artists, and I get to be involved in the underground arts and music scene on the West coast. I have been blessed to see some awesome local and international acts, including but not limited to a last minute ticket (we're talking 20-minutes prior to the show...) to the sold out Fleet Foxes show. I have been SO wrapped up in the Helplessness Blues album for the past few months, re-affirming my love for Robin Pecknold's whimsical lyrics and the bands hauntingly beautiful harmonies. The show opened with the Seattle-based Cave Singers, whom I missed, but coincidentally saw as a headliner at the Biltmore the week prior. The bushy-faced, boot-stomping Pete Quirk is mesmerizing and thoroughly entertaining to watch, if ever you get the chance. His onstage presence is that of a man possessed by music, laughing and chattering away in a vocal style that's reminiscent of blues singers long passed.
Then there was Frank Fairfield! What a treasure! This is a name to watch, people. I truly believe he is here to save our musical souls. Mr. Fairfield fled the monotony of the working-world in his early 20's to ramble and see the American landscape, busking for spare change to whomever would listen until this most-recent tour opening for the infamous Cass McCombs. I was taken aback by his humble, kind, and yes-ma'am-thank-you-ma'am demeanour when I met him at the Waldorf show. Equipped with nothing but a duffle-bag, a beat-up guitar and fiddle, he completely blew everyone away with his bluegrassy style and his toe-tapping rhythms. I felt like I was peaking in on a delicious secret-- or perhaps into the 30s, at a pub somewhere in Louisiana. Frank Fairfield is a man not of this time. His songs are like scratchy old vinyls you listened to at your grandparents' cabin, like a canoe ride on the bayou or something.
It's these moments that are the reason why I love to see live music. I get shivers; I know I am so close to a rarity, and there is a sense of closeness, a warmth in your bones that seems to linger there for days. And then an hour passes and it's all gone in a flash of applause and "one-mores". We un-coatcheck our effects, return to our lives. I guess I'm pretty lucky that I get to do this all the time, because that glitter just keeps caking on, and I can vibrate off that moment continuously.
I guess it helps that I'm also newly in love? WOAH.
Who'd a thought I'd be one of the milky-eyed ones again? I certainly didn't expect it. But like most treasures, it was discovered in a flash. I tripped over it like a hole in the ground, and was suddenly dumbfounded, awake and stargazeringly (I know it's not a word-- don't annoy me) in love. I know I sound like a huge, annoying mongrel. I hate to be that girl: nobody wants to hear about love unless they've found it too. In which case, bragging about it brings up memories of the "ice cream" skit in Eddie Murphys Delirious-- "you ain't got no iiiiiiiice cream, you didn't get noooooone, 'cause you are on the weeeeeeelfare!"
**If you don't know what I'm talking about, that's terribly unfortunate and you should watch the video below.
However, the summer has arrived on the West coast, and everyone knows that summer is made for lovers.
Cupids and heart-thieves are out there passionately hunting it out (I can almost smell it in a bar this time of year, yikes!), while the lucky-ones are busy showering the streets with PDA, cutesy bike rides, hand-holding, flower-picking and being adorable. I feel like falling in love is much like stumbling upon a beautiful song that changes your life, the way you think about yourself. Or maybe your first concert, unless you're like me and can't remember because you got drunk in the parking lot of the venue. A good walk in the park. Either way, the likeness is there.
It's as though you've found jewels in the mud-- a term I first heard used at a Buddhist temple, where the monk suggested the concept as a visual mantra helpful in meditation. The visualization is supposed to connect you with the innermost part of yourself, your true potential, and true peacefulness. I keep remembering it in moments of surprise or awe, when I feel blessed, and it completely makes sense. It's the very moment when all your distractions dissipate, your disenchantments float away like smoke and you're left with complete awareness and wonder. I have a feeling I might have lost some of you at "visual mantra", but nonetheless I think you probably know what I'm talking about. All I'm saying is that, whichever way you experience even a moment of that jewel, drink it up. My vehicles to visit that ecstacy are love, art, and music. Just honour beauty, okay? Besides, t'is the season for merrymaking and joy-- bikinis, patios, cutoffs, beach days and general loveliness.
So what are you gunna do, hey?
Go out there and get some of it!
Cheers!
B
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Half-Built Towers
So, two new poems.
The first post is very very new, this one dating back to mid-January.
They both come from polar-opposite places, so I guess it's kind of interesting to read them back-to-back.
Ah, men...
Come to my window
and just softly say my name if
you're afraid to see my face.
Send an echoe wrapped in
notebook paper,
a rapping,
a key on a ribbon in the tree
by the bedside window.
Not a trace of hair,
nor blade of grass out of place since
it all smudged off & happened.
I happen to know about
your body,
and that you must think of me in the shoddiest
of hours
(just to the left of that other woman,
and your half-built towers)
So squeeze it off
if it gives you power.
And
cower at each hour
'till your mouth disguises
sweetness with all things
lost & foul.
Tonight
just stand there
by that light,
by the window,
by the tree,
and tell me
then
that you cannot see me.
The first post is very very new, this one dating back to mid-January.
They both come from polar-opposite places, so I guess it's kind of interesting to read them back-to-back.
Ah, men...
Come to my window
and just softly say my name if
you're afraid to see my face.
Send an echoe wrapped in
notebook paper,
a rapping,
a key on a ribbon in the tree
by the bedside window.
Not a trace of hair,
nor blade of grass out of place since
it all smudged off & happened.
I happen to know about
your body,
and that you must think of me in the shoddiest
of hours
(just to the left of that other woman,
and your half-built towers)
So squeeze it off
if it gives you power.
And
cower at each hour
'till your mouth disguises
sweetness with all things
lost & foul.
Tonight
just stand there
by that light,
by the window,
by the tree,
and tell me
then
that you cannot see me.
This Is My Favorite Part
This is my favorite part.
My heart trips, skipping beats like jump-rope.
I twirl your hair around my
thumb and it's new and
it's my favorite because
it never lasts.
I hate to sound gawdy and crass but
it doesn't,
and I know this well.
My favorite part starts when we're
truthing, and
like dazzling magic you
are just miraculously there.
I tell my secrets in pinky-finger doses
so's not to expose it all.
(thirsting
for the bigger story)
And you
kiss me
on the
crown of
my head
and now
it's just the best.
My favorite part is when I say my "baby don'ts"
and you say "I won't, I won't, I won't",
and your eyes shine in the light, flickering
as you dine on my lips
curling into a
smile.
I'll remember us best this way--
the way we investigate
each other.
The way I want to write this poem on and on and on
about us because it will
pass us quickly,
it will.
I smile sometimes when I think
of the way things'll sting
like a cankersore,
like a tattoo,
like burning hot sweet-tea.
You + me
will have to tiptoe back from this,
and our backs will hurt.
But we don't care, do we?
'Cause this
is
the best
part.
My heart trips, skipping beats like jump-rope.
I twirl your hair around my
thumb and it's new and
it's my favorite because
it never lasts.
I hate to sound gawdy and crass but
it doesn't,
and I know this well.
My favorite part starts when we're
truthing, and
like dazzling magic you
are just miraculously there.
I tell my secrets in pinky-finger doses
so's not to expose it all.
(thirsting
for the bigger story)
And you
kiss me
on the
crown of
my head
and now
it's just the best.
My favorite part is when I say my "baby don'ts"
and you say "I won't, I won't, I won't",
and your eyes shine in the light, flickering
as you dine on my lips
curling into a
smile.
I'll remember us best this way--
the way we investigate
each other.
The way I want to write this poem on and on and on
about us because it will
pass us quickly,
it will.
I smile sometimes when I think
of the way things'll sting
like a cankersore,
like a tattoo,
like burning hot sweet-tea.
You + me
will have to tiptoe back from this,
and our backs will hurt.
But we don't care, do we?
'Cause this
is
the best
part.
Friday, February 11, 2011
The Excorcism of 1462 1st E
When we're kids, we have this idea that when we're older--in our double digits-- we'll know everything.
When I was still in single digits, I'd look up to all the older kids and I'd be like "Woah. These guys have it made, they must know about how to do it all". People who were 23-years-old when I was 8 were Gods and their lives were already all sorted out. 20-somethings were on the same page as my parents; anyone in highschool and beyond were grown-ups. Grown-ups had jobs, could stay up late, drove cars and made phonecalls in their important-sounding voices. They made decisions, and all their decisions must be right decisions, because I didn't see much of a difference between a right decision and a wrong one yet. When I was an adult everything would be easy, and by the time I was one (however it is people suddenly morph from adolescents into adults...) I should probably already have a job, a house, a car, babies, and be going on vacation to Florida or something.
I'm sitting here blogging with you now, and this little pixie of a child is staring at me from across the cafe. She must be about 9, and she seems pretty intrigued by me on my little netbook-- flicking away on the little keys, my fingers sounding like scurrying beetles. I wonder if she sees me like I would see the kids on the back of the bus, gawking back at them with my sticky, apple-juiced lips hanging open. I remember Vicky, with her long, cool hair and her Lisa Loeb glasses, a highschooler-- the one who, in grade 3, I walked right back to and sat on the lap of. I wanted to be like her. I'm kind of laughing thinking about it, because she probably did listen to Lisa Loeb, and I know now that Lisa Loeb sucks.
Honestly I would be a bit weirded out if this kid did that to me right now, and I'm hoping she's not as bold as I was back in the day. I wouldn't have the heart to tell her I'm not that cool, and that I definitely don't have it figured out.
She might laugh in her I-don't-get-it kind of way, because kids never get what adults mean when they are self-depreciating.
Then it would be really embarrassing for me because I would be serious.
Please kid, don't come talk to me.
This blog is about learning lessons (note: we usually call them 'lessons' if they are embarrassingly painful, and 'experiences' if they are deliciously good...) as an adult. It's a reminder that we're just as much babies as we always were. We wear bigger shoes, and we're more comfortable taking the bus on our own (I'm still actually super uncomfortable with this, just saying), but most of us don't have a clear and concise picture of everything we want to be. We blur the things we want to have, and the jobs we are cozy snuggling into with the people we want to be, and the lives we want to be living. We are all just as confused and new as children are-- we just become better at faking it. We don't ask questions every 30 seconds anymore, and we certainly don't go shamelessly sitting on Vicky's lap. The worst part about learning the painful stuff as an adult is that adults are expected to pull up their trousers and "know better". Well, if you haven't already gathered from my introductory rant, I obviously don't know any better about anything.
SO.
Since I moved to the West coast on my whimsical little trip, I've gotten a couple stings in the heart.
I came out here after having spent an entire summer again, in solitude, far removed from city life in general. Prior to living in that cabin for the summer, I was on a pilgrimage in Spain. I'd been recharged, and I had my fire back. I came out here seeking change and adventure, throwing responsibility and the advice of naysayers to the wind. This, as far as I'm concerned, couldn't have been avoided. I wanted to leave, I booked my ticket for 3 weeks before I came, I'm here. Bam.
That's how I work.
...However!
I think I'm gunna chalk up some of my Brittney-should-have-known-better moments to that attitude I had upon arrival.
I had a lovely way about me! I was feeling good, I was happy to have met all these new people, and I didn't understand how anyone couldn't be on my same page. And really, how wonderful is that? I was open-armed, romantically in love with life, and I had the best of intentions for myself and the people who entered my life. It started when we settled into our new apartment.
Our household was living in our communist little peace-land, happily depending on each other, trusting each other, needing each other. We made dinners together, shared food and money; we were poor and new here, so we all helped each other ease into Vancouver. The first couple weekends were, as one might expect, a little wild. A wind would pick up, a lightning bolt would sound off in the distance and suddenly a shitstorm of Irish people (friends of our adopted house goblins from Dublin) would unleash into the place. Beer cans would litter the floor like a fleet of hail, people hanging from things, house goblin footprints all over the countertops. At first, Julia, Simon and I (best friend, and best friends cross-country rideshare) thought it was awfully fun. We just figured things would calm down eventually.
It wasn't only because they were Irish and spoke like little leprechauns that we adored them. It was because they understood what relocating was like, and we didn't have to go through all of the learning alone. They were charming, funny, and shamelessly lived up to the Irish stereotype of general hooliganism. At first, that was endearing for some reason. Except we didn't know how far it could actually go from there.
I'm going to spare everyone the gnarly details by playing a wordgame. I'm gunna say one word or event, and then I'm going to follow it with a 1-2 word description.
Weekends- Apocolyptic Drunkenness (or insert 'drug bingeing', which we did not participate in. Promise, Mom.)
Weekdays- Prohibition
Parties- 3 Days
Brittneys Weekday Birthday- Work Tomorrow
Julia's Weekend Birthday- Fighting/Cancelled (or insert '36-hour party', which, again, we did not participate in)
Christmas- Slave cooking (or insert 'Goblin Invasion')
The parties got worse after Christmas, which was by far, the worst holiday I've ever had. It was after the craziness of Christmas that we gave the first major ultimadum. I didn't know how to deal with 9 wretchedly hammered Irish people (who chalked up their behaviour that day to being "Irish" and drunk, which I never understood), while Julia and I were cooking for all of them. Number one, I don't really like cooking for a bunch of people. I especially don't like cooking for a bunch of people who are drooling all over themselves, won't leave me alone, and who generally just suck at drinking. Christmas ended with a goblin getting a fist in the mug by yours truly, crying, breakups, and then everyone leaving the house to drink at the pub-- all but the two dears who invited everybody over to eat and drink with us in the first place. Oh, and cleaning the house for 3 hours after the shit-posse left. Merrrrryyyyy Chrissttmmasssss!
I should pause here and say that by writing this blog, I run the risk of a couple people getting kind of upset with me.
I just realized that....
Whatever.
I've got to tell you a little bit about what happened in the house in order for you to get it.
It became very evident after a fire extinguisher was set off in our house (sounds funny, but really isn't) that we weren't willing to deal with the partying anymore. I should say it's not really the partying I am against, but the "sessions" as the boys would call them. After having seen them drunk enough times, we came to realize that they eerily morphed into other people under the influence of alcohol. They couldn't touch alcohol throughout the week, and treated it almost fearfully. I have actually never seen people get so nasty to one another, try to rip cupboards off the walls, or tap their fingers on the counter waiting impatiently to sprint to the pub on a friday night at 6pm. Watching the truth about the boys unfold in front of our eyes, which we had been patiently ignoring for a long time, was both very scary and very embarrassing.
Because we were nice, easygoing, understanding and caring people, we let some really crazy shit go on for a pretty long time.
I don't want this entire blog to be about shitty experiences, though. Like I said, it's about lesson-learning, and from the madness I think we all definitely learned some lessons. I like to believe that the boys are remorseful for hurting us, our friendship and each other.
So, in the end, though we loved the boys, we realized it was time to let them go, because none of us were happy. When they were packing up, though it was for the best, we still felt really sad. Like I previously mentioned, I like to believe we all had the best of intentions. When the tension was released from the house, it was like an excorcism had occured. The negative energy had been vaccuumed out, through the walls, out the vents to collect with the rest of the toxins in the city air. There was a resounding, collective sigh from the leftover housemates that lingered about for days. The decision to sever the group was at the expense of a few of us, however. Me and Julia decided that it was best for us to cut our losses, and move onward together-- friends are always fail-safe, as we say-- though we'd thought extensively about giving up here and moving back home. We decided to move into a rooming house together, chisel away some of the posessions we've acquired so quickly, and build up our finances again in order to be back in a position of independence. Besides, we only came out with a couple bags, and we both know we can live with very little.
Here's the thing. Trust is a double-edged sword. It is one of the most beautiful feelings to trust your heart, and goodness, into someone elses hands. Although, its betrayal can be responsible for some of the most insidious wounds, deep down in your gut. Over time, we teach ourselves through this pain and conditioning that trust is a hot, yet delicate thing, and we begin to dish it out in smaller doses than we might have as a child. One of the biggest reasons children are such beautiful creatures, I think, is that they trust in everything. They are hungry, and they trust that we will provide for them. They trust in our protection, love and knowledge, because they have no reason not to. Those who are brave enough to trust are brave enough to love and forgive, and are in turn the most fearless creatures on the face of the planet.
I think allowing open-hearted trust may be the most difficult thing for me to learn. I'm constantly being provided with new reasons to trust and not to trust, and I've been searching for the balance between the two. To trust where trust is due, but never at the expense of my own well-being, which is the main reason for seperating from my housemates. In some cases you really have no idea that your trust is being betrayed. I like to believe that every moment has it's genuinity, though, even if later it feels false. So I guess this means that I will probably go on making my best attempts to genuinely trust people, giving second, third, sixteenth chances. Giving both my goodness and my heart away so frequently, because when it is accepted and reciprocated there is nothing better. My best, and longest-standing friendships are based on this act of sharing. I do this though, with the knowledge that I will likely be nicked, stung and lashed a few more times for it.
I really, truly love myself the most when I am in love, when I am giving, when I am passionate and helpful to others. The consequences of those character traits are obvious. It's like entrusting a papery new heart into a watery new love. You float on it's waters carelessly for a while, like a little hope-vessel. Perhaps it takes you on a bit of a journey, until the expiration date arrives, and dissolves your paper-heart in it's water. All things do, inevitably, come to an end-- this we know. I guess all I can really hope for in the future is to be happy with the fluidity of things, and the fact that I was taken anywhere, to learn anything, in the first place. Adapting to my environment, and applying all the new knowledge I learn each day, is the only way to really survive.
Maybe all we can do is to help each other through it, and be our own steel-crutches as we learn these valuable little lessons...
Onward and Upward,
Brittney
When I was still in single digits, I'd look up to all the older kids and I'd be like "Woah. These guys have it made, they must know about how to do it all". People who were 23-years-old when I was 8 were Gods and their lives were already all sorted out. 20-somethings were on the same page as my parents; anyone in highschool and beyond were grown-ups. Grown-ups had jobs, could stay up late, drove cars and made phonecalls in their important-sounding voices. They made decisions, and all their decisions must be right decisions, because I didn't see much of a difference between a right decision and a wrong one yet. When I was an adult everything would be easy, and by the time I was one (however it is people suddenly morph from adolescents into adults...) I should probably already have a job, a house, a car, babies, and be going on vacation to Florida or something.
I'm sitting here blogging with you now, and this little pixie of a child is staring at me from across the cafe. She must be about 9, and she seems pretty intrigued by me on my little netbook-- flicking away on the little keys, my fingers sounding like scurrying beetles. I wonder if she sees me like I would see the kids on the back of the bus, gawking back at them with my sticky, apple-juiced lips hanging open. I remember Vicky, with her long, cool hair and her Lisa Loeb glasses, a highschooler-- the one who, in grade 3, I walked right back to and sat on the lap of. I wanted to be like her. I'm kind of laughing thinking about it, because she probably did listen to Lisa Loeb, and I know now that Lisa Loeb sucks.
Honestly I would be a bit weirded out if this kid did that to me right now, and I'm hoping she's not as bold as I was back in the day. I wouldn't have the heart to tell her I'm not that cool, and that I definitely don't have it figured out.
She might laugh in her I-don't-get-it kind of way, because kids never get what adults mean when they are self-depreciating.
Then it would be really embarrassing for me because I would be serious.
Please kid, don't come talk to me.
This blog is about learning lessons (note: we usually call them 'lessons' if they are embarrassingly painful, and 'experiences' if they are deliciously good...) as an adult. It's a reminder that we're just as much babies as we always were. We wear bigger shoes, and we're more comfortable taking the bus on our own (I'm still actually super uncomfortable with this, just saying), but most of us don't have a clear and concise picture of everything we want to be. We blur the things we want to have, and the jobs we are cozy snuggling into with the people we want to be, and the lives we want to be living. We are all just as confused and new as children are-- we just become better at faking it. We don't ask questions every 30 seconds anymore, and we certainly don't go shamelessly sitting on Vicky's lap. The worst part about learning the painful stuff as an adult is that adults are expected to pull up their trousers and "know better". Well, if you haven't already gathered from my introductory rant, I obviously don't know any better about anything.
SO.
Since I moved to the West coast on my whimsical little trip, I've gotten a couple stings in the heart.
I came out here after having spent an entire summer again, in solitude, far removed from city life in general. Prior to living in that cabin for the summer, I was on a pilgrimage in Spain. I'd been recharged, and I had my fire back. I came out here seeking change and adventure, throwing responsibility and the advice of naysayers to the wind. This, as far as I'm concerned, couldn't have been avoided. I wanted to leave, I booked my ticket for 3 weeks before I came, I'm here. Bam.
That's how I work.
...However!
I think I'm gunna chalk up some of my Brittney-should-have-known-better moments to that attitude I had upon arrival.
I had a lovely way about me! I was feeling good, I was happy to have met all these new people, and I didn't understand how anyone couldn't be on my same page. And really, how wonderful is that? I was open-armed, romantically in love with life, and I had the best of intentions for myself and the people who entered my life. It started when we settled into our new apartment.
Our household was living in our communist little peace-land, happily depending on each other, trusting each other, needing each other. We made dinners together, shared food and money; we were poor and new here, so we all helped each other ease into Vancouver. The first couple weekends were, as one might expect, a little wild. A wind would pick up, a lightning bolt would sound off in the distance and suddenly a shitstorm of Irish people (friends of our adopted house goblins from Dublin) would unleash into the place. Beer cans would litter the floor like a fleet of hail, people hanging from things, house goblin footprints all over the countertops. At first, Julia, Simon and I (best friend, and best friends cross-country rideshare) thought it was awfully fun. We just figured things would calm down eventually.
It wasn't only because they were Irish and spoke like little leprechauns that we adored them. It was because they understood what relocating was like, and we didn't have to go through all of the learning alone. They were charming, funny, and shamelessly lived up to the Irish stereotype of general hooliganism. At first, that was endearing for some reason. Except we didn't know how far it could actually go from there.
I'm going to spare everyone the gnarly details by playing a wordgame. I'm gunna say one word or event, and then I'm going to follow it with a 1-2 word description.
Weekends- Apocolyptic Drunkenness (or insert 'drug bingeing', which we did not participate in. Promise, Mom.)
Weekdays- Prohibition
Parties- 3 Days
Brittneys Weekday Birthday- Work Tomorrow
Julia's Weekend Birthday- Fighting/Cancelled (or insert '36-hour party', which, again, we did not participate in)
Christmas- Slave cooking (or insert 'Goblin Invasion')
The parties got worse after Christmas, which was by far, the worst holiday I've ever had. It was after the craziness of Christmas that we gave the first major ultimadum. I didn't know how to deal with 9 wretchedly hammered Irish people (who chalked up their behaviour that day to being "Irish" and drunk, which I never understood), while Julia and I were cooking for all of them. Number one, I don't really like cooking for a bunch of people. I especially don't like cooking for a bunch of people who are drooling all over themselves, won't leave me alone, and who generally just suck at drinking. Christmas ended with a goblin getting a fist in the mug by yours truly, crying, breakups, and then everyone leaving the house to drink at the pub-- all but the two dears who invited everybody over to eat and drink with us in the first place. Oh, and cleaning the house for 3 hours after the shit-posse left. Merrrrryyyyy Chrissttmmasssss!
I should pause here and say that by writing this blog, I run the risk of a couple people getting kind of upset with me.
I just realized that....
Whatever.
I've got to tell you a little bit about what happened in the house in order for you to get it.
It became very evident after a fire extinguisher was set off in our house (sounds funny, but really isn't) that we weren't willing to deal with the partying anymore. I should say it's not really the partying I am against, but the "sessions" as the boys would call them. After having seen them drunk enough times, we came to realize that they eerily morphed into other people under the influence of alcohol. They couldn't touch alcohol throughout the week, and treated it almost fearfully. I have actually never seen people get so nasty to one another, try to rip cupboards off the walls, or tap their fingers on the counter waiting impatiently to sprint to the pub on a friday night at 6pm. Watching the truth about the boys unfold in front of our eyes, which we had been patiently ignoring for a long time, was both very scary and very embarrassing.
Because we were nice, easygoing, understanding and caring people, we let some really crazy shit go on for a pretty long time.
I don't want this entire blog to be about shitty experiences, though. Like I said, it's about lesson-learning, and from the madness I think we all definitely learned some lessons. I like to believe that the boys are remorseful for hurting us, our friendship and each other.
So, in the end, though we loved the boys, we realized it was time to let them go, because none of us were happy. When they were packing up, though it was for the best, we still felt really sad. Like I previously mentioned, I like to believe we all had the best of intentions. When the tension was released from the house, it was like an excorcism had occured. The negative energy had been vaccuumed out, through the walls, out the vents to collect with the rest of the toxins in the city air. There was a resounding, collective sigh from the leftover housemates that lingered about for days. The decision to sever the group was at the expense of a few of us, however. Me and Julia decided that it was best for us to cut our losses, and move onward together-- friends are always fail-safe, as we say-- though we'd thought extensively about giving up here and moving back home. We decided to move into a rooming house together, chisel away some of the posessions we've acquired so quickly, and build up our finances again in order to be back in a position of independence. Besides, we only came out with a couple bags, and we both know we can live with very little.
Here's the thing. Trust is a double-edged sword. It is one of the most beautiful feelings to trust your heart, and goodness, into someone elses hands. Although, its betrayal can be responsible for some of the most insidious wounds, deep down in your gut. Over time, we teach ourselves through this pain and conditioning that trust is a hot, yet delicate thing, and we begin to dish it out in smaller doses than we might have as a child. One of the biggest reasons children are such beautiful creatures, I think, is that they trust in everything. They are hungry, and they trust that we will provide for them. They trust in our protection, love and knowledge, because they have no reason not to. Those who are brave enough to trust are brave enough to love and forgive, and are in turn the most fearless creatures on the face of the planet.
I think allowing open-hearted trust may be the most difficult thing for me to learn. I'm constantly being provided with new reasons to trust and not to trust, and I've been searching for the balance between the two. To trust where trust is due, but never at the expense of my own well-being, which is the main reason for seperating from my housemates. In some cases you really have no idea that your trust is being betrayed. I like to believe that every moment has it's genuinity, though, even if later it feels false. So I guess this means that I will probably go on making my best attempts to genuinely trust people, giving second, third, sixteenth chances. Giving both my goodness and my heart away so frequently, because when it is accepted and reciprocated there is nothing better. My best, and longest-standing friendships are based on this act of sharing. I do this though, with the knowledge that I will likely be nicked, stung and lashed a few more times for it.
I really, truly love myself the most when I am in love, when I am giving, when I am passionate and helpful to others. The consequences of those character traits are obvious. It's like entrusting a papery new heart into a watery new love. You float on it's waters carelessly for a while, like a little hope-vessel. Perhaps it takes you on a bit of a journey, until the expiration date arrives, and dissolves your paper-heart in it's water. All things do, inevitably, come to an end-- this we know. I guess all I can really hope for in the future is to be happy with the fluidity of things, and the fact that I was taken anywhere, to learn anything, in the first place. Adapting to my environment, and applying all the new knowledge I learn each day, is the only way to really survive.
Maybe all we can do is to help each other through it, and be our own steel-crutches as we learn these valuable little lessons...
Onward and Upward,
Brittney
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Homage To Summer- Part 3
It seems that all of my summer stories have come to an end, all its sagas and all its stories are now a memory, all in the past, safe as can be.
An homage— a small smoky shrine is the best way I can think of to pay my respects to it. I want to share it with all of you, so that you can in some way be a part of its loveliness and steal a bit of its magical glitter for yourselves. It’s now time to live currently, to give up the memories, to move forward in this new place that I am calling my home.
I just moved into a cool apartment with three other people, who are all doing the same thing as me— trying to carve a little spot for ourselves in the city of Vancouver. One is my best friend, one is the rideshare she found through Craigslist—an awesome Australian dude with whom she shared a one-month long roadtrip to the west coast to eventually meet me. The other is an Irish guy, Mark, who I met on the bus over here, and things are sorting themselves out slowly but surely. I’ve adopted rolling cigarettes from him, and also using the term “ya mad ting”. How wild is it that this guy was living in the very town in which I grew up? Huntsville, Ontario, and we’d never met until halfway through the trip, at an airport pub in Winnipeg. We had the same landlord! We lived on the same street in this small town, at different times mind you, but also haunted the same pubs this summer! I almost blew a gasket when they (him and the guy he was travelling with in Canada) told me, and I knew we would be friends. My best friend is in all-out adoration of him as well, so it’s worked out for everyone, really. I would prefer if they got married so he could become a Canadian citizen and I could wear a stupid eighties cocktail dress to the wedding, but that’s just me.
It’s pretty amazing what we’ve done with only a few weeks time and with a determination to make things work for us. We’re now ‘Drive Kids’ as the saying seems to be, just walking distance from the trendy Commercial Drive.
Anyway, so where the story was left, I was not here.
I was still living in that cabin in Dwight, Ontario, just on the edge of Algonquin Park.
I had no idea I would be where I am right now.
Get your snuggie, and a cheese sandwich or something, because the next part of the story is just as whack as the first two parts.
So I wasn’t sure if I’d never see “You Rock” shirt dude ever again.
And it’s not because I didn’t want to, because he totally sparked my interest. It was mostly because I didn’t want to even think about it. He was in Toronto. I wasn’t.
He said he would come and see me, sure, but he was also ridiculously drunk when he’d said that. Who the hell was this guy anyway? All I knew was that he was incredibly sweet to me for absolutely no reason, and that he had a snoring problem and a really cool t-shirt. Not enough, right?
All the while, some friends from Toronto had been bugging me to come down for a visit. I did live there all last winter, and the last time I left Toronto had been under hasty circumstances. When I left the clinic that strange day early in the summer, my friend had waited for me in the parking lot to whisk me away to the safety of Muskoka to heal—heart and body. I didn’t want to leave that wretched memory of Toronto in my head.
So, for the next week or so after the Fortress party, “You Rock” t-shirt dude and I spoke a lot over Facebook, and he said he’d take me out when I got there. A bit over the phone, too. Cool. He was incredibly charming. Not surprisingly, since he was funny, witty, and seemed to have an answer for everything I said. We could banter back and forth, and not so strangely, I like that a lot. We’d talk about funny stuff, and I’d read him captions from the Encyclopedia of Monster and Other Mysterious Creatures.
I booked a bus ticket to visit Toronto for a few days, hopped it, and went straight to visit one of my oldest friends who was living on Bathurst after having split with her boyfriend. We all hung out, I met a few people, made instant buddy-pals with the man-of-the-house Brando, and then we decided we wanted to go out dancing. So I called upon “You Rock” dude to come and meet up with us. He agreed, as I knew he would. See part 2; dancing is how we met, it only made sense.
By the time we got to the Dance Cave, Brittney Rand was already a few beer into it.
I was busy stomping my feet to Veruca Salt or something equally hipster and nostalgic, when “You Rock” dude tapped me on the shoulder. He gave me a huge hug, and obviously got involved with our dance party. Eventually we were forehead-to-forehead and I asked him to come home with me. And by home, I mean Brando’s carefully constructed “camping room” in his house on Bathurst.
“You Rock” dude and I ended up eventually back at his place after hanging out with my friends for a while. Turns out everyone was fucked on MDMA, me excluded.
So snuggling commenced. We stayed up all night.
I really, really liked him.
Funny thing: I liked him so much that every night after that first starry-eyed one I spent with him in his little room, I spent back there. Of course I visited with friends too during the day, but every night we spent together in his little room. Night time is the strangest time, and I think it’s made exactly for lovers. Days are filled with too many other things to think about, too many other tasks, too many sounds and sights, too many carhorns and subway rides. Nights are still, even in the city, and when you are wrapped in a lover’s sheets there really is no other concern. Those hot summer nights were sweet, filled with whispers and entwined fingers. We connected instantly. It was fun and lovely and understanding, and I was sad when I had to leave it, though I didn’t say so to him, because it was much too soon to be getting attached to such a homely little monster.
I hopped the bus back up north, and hoped it wouldn’t be too long before we would be able to sit together again, for me to scratch his beard, for kisses behind the ear to come back to me.
We tried a couple times to get together after that, and after some frustration with the distance, he eventually, happily, took the train to see me for a few days. We hadn’t seen each other for about 3 weeks to a month at this point. We had spoken most nights on the telephone at late hours, and I’d wake up in the middle of the night if I got a phone call from him, just for chatsies sake. It was nice to have someone who understood my humor; who wasn’t demanding of me, who was honest and uncensored with me. I learned many of his secrets and revealed many of mine to him, and we cooed over that telephone just building up to the moment when he stepped off the train. It was quite crazy—we had really only spent those few nights together and we had it pretty bad for one another. We were getting ourselves into something sticky.
I wanted to see him in my stomping grounds, to see how he would react and interact with it. He was a city kid, and though we were much the same, I figured I could surely teach him something about where I came from and it could be fun.
I picked him up from the train station in the white pickup truck that I borrowed from my work.
I couldn’t wait to touch him, though we couldn’t on the drive, because I’m a new driver, and I might have killed someone in my state of elated excitement. We got out to the cabin in the woods, and immediately fell into the bed kissing one another. So many nights on the telephone we’d said how we planned to not leave that very bed for the entirety of his stay.
We did, however, only for latenight dance mix ’95 dance fests, walks down the dirt road, him writing at the beach, food, Nintendo, WWF 1997 (I love you Stone Cold Steve Austin and Brett the Hitman Heart) vhs viewings and to use the washroom.
It was just the loveliest.
The end of the summer was strange, because I didn’t know exactly what I was doing. I didn’t know if I was going to Toronto, which was a circumstance that “You Rock” dude and I could possibly work with, or if I was going to British Columbia. I went back and forth on the subject. All the while, I was consorting with the most wonderful of creatures, having a great time in Ontario. I could be happy anywhere, really. The options were difficult, because Toronto was safe and B.C. wasn’t—I had no plans beyond the bus ticket out here. But I was drawn more to what wasn’t safe. I was drawn more to the unknown, what I didn’t know, and even though I was falling in love with “You Rock” dude, it simply wasn’t enough for me to stay. We knew this on that last visit of ours. We knew that though our chapter was insanely delicious, and we were eating up every bit of it, that I was bound to leave. It was a dangerous decision for us to have made, to fall into things with such a force of openness, knowing that it would commence. I felt guilt to be the one to leave. I didn’t really know why I was leaving either, but I guess when there is a mystery strong enough that’s biting at my ankles I have to explore it. And it was at the expense of that precious love, which is now a figment of my imagination.
After I dropped “You Rock” shirt dude off at the bus stop, after the loveliest dream ever, I didn’t know how to feel. Our nature was to be fun. We were having so much fun, we waved and hugged goodbye like we would see each other again soon. We could have, since my summer work contract was coming to an end. Except that I had bought a one-way ticket to the West coast for the following Friday and he hadn’t.
Hopeless romantic that I am, I wasn’t satisfied with our goodbye, and I had to see him again.
On the Tuesday before I left (on the Friday…) I took the bus down to see him again for one last night.
This visit was just as joyous and spectacular, but for me, was laced with a bit more sadness. I honestly didn’t know when I was going to see him again. This man, the one whom I couldn’t get out of my mind since the night I met him, was about to be a part of my old life. I resisted that. It drained me, and I couldn’t make sense of the immense feelings I was giving to him. It was even more confusing because I wasn’t sure, even if I’d stayed, if he’d have me. Our whole relationship was based on a total of 10 or 11 nights/days spent in the same city or town. The rest was over the phone. I knew that he was confused about other times he’d been broken-hearted in the past, hurt by them, but all I wanted to do was make everything better for him—to sort it out for him, and bake him cookies, and kiss his forehead and take care of him, and download muchdance mix ’93 for him (his favorite).
Our last night together we spent dancing, again, forehead-to-forehead at our special Reggae bar in the Kensington Market in Toronto. The same place where, earlier on in the summer, we’d hid away and kissed on the escape-route stairs on the back patio. One of our ‘things’ together was our love of Reggae and Dancehall music. We spent the night in his bed again, in his little apartment, in our little fantasy world.
We sat at the bus station the next day not really sure what to feel, but the feelings were a little more intense than the last time we parted, since we really realized that this would be the last we’d see each other for an undisclosed period of time. He kissed me goodbye at the station, and shortly after I caught my bus away from him. Again. A woman on the run—not really sure of anything, but riding on the wings of free birds, exploring, and hoping that the decision she’d made was best for her heart.
We left one another, yes, but continued to talk on the phone for a while. I’d call him at almost every bus stop across the country, until I got to the West Coast. When I first got here, a short time ago to me now, I was homeless. I hadn’t arranged anywhere to live, I wasn’t sure if I was going to try and work in Kelowna or stay in Vancouver. I was living out of all of the following: a) my aunts apartment in port moody outside the city, b) my best friend’s car, c) anyone’s couch that’d take me (I have so many numbers on my phone from meeting lovely people who wanted to take me in for the night) and d) the SameSun Hostel in downtown Vancouver where the Irish guys were staying that I met on the bus. Of course we didn’t pay for the rooms. We’d stay anywhere for free.
In this time of the complete, unrelenting chaos that was my life, I grew very weary. Since we’d decided to stay in Vancouver, we were apartment searching constantly. My mind and heart were so tired from the stress and the heartbreak of losing a lover. I hadn’t had a chance to think about the situation with “You Rock” dude and I at all, and the first thing I thought to do was drink. Have fun. Dance.
Which is totally acceptable if your heart isn’t hurting too bad, and if you aren’t too too lonely.
However, what happened was that I got loser drunk.
I got loser drunk, loser sad, and loser lonely.
I had a one-night stand with somebody who wasn’t “You Rock” dude.
Fuck sakes.
For me, it really did nothing but make me feel even worse than I already had felt, which was hard to imagine. This other guy wasn’t doing anything right. He wasn’t playing the role for me. He didn’t know where to kiss me, and it was frustrating. All I could hear, see, smell, what that somebody else wanted me more than ever on the other side of the country. And I was allowed to have that feeling. Things were basically over between “You Rock” dude and I. Yes, we were talking, but what else were we going to do? How long could it go on for without tearing us up, so that we could allow ourselves enough dignity and pride to walk away from it? Neither of us wanted to let go, it seemed.
The day after this happened, I woke up and wanted to dig a hole and live in it for 56,000 years.
Naturally, the person I wanted to comfort me was “You Rock” dude.
I was honest with him, told him how I felt, and evidently it didn’t go over well, which I understand now.
Needless to say, after texting back and forth about it, some squabbling and some drunken, pathetic texts to him from me, it ended. It ended not only because of the one-night stand, but because there simply was no other way. But I wasn’t done there. No way.
No, I had to call him at 4am after a bottle of wine and say that “this call would be the last one I ever dial” and all sorts of other dumb shit about resolving our issues and tying things up properly. I said if he never returned my call that I wouldn’t try reaching him again.
And guess what?
He never did call me back.
And so, after much sobbing to my best friend—bless her patience— attacking this crazy life from all possible angles, I kind of thank him for sparing me. For sparing us. Because I know I wouldn’t have walked away from him if he hadn’t me. One foot had been left in Ontario, one string untied, and I guess he tied it for me. At this point, I don’t have much to keep on my mind from back home. I am completely and fully in the present, and taking life’s punches as they are swung at me.
I’m liking my little neighbourhood. I have everything here that I need and want, and once I get working I will have some structure back into my life. I have a little, cute park in my backyard with swings and benches for sipping tea on. I really, and wholeheartedly, am excited about the adventure I am embarking on for at least the next six months. I plan on producing lots of artwork, building a ceramic cat collection, many shrines, and collecting crop tops to wear on my back porch with a rolled smoke in hand. And it’s not say that I don’t think fondly of “You Rock” dude anymore, because that’d be a flat-out lie, but I think things just work out as they should. As I said, night time is especially for lovers, and its night time when I think of him the most. We both always knew we’d meet again, somehow, somewhere, someday, but now wasn’t our time.
So I guess since my Homage to Summer is finished and written, that I should continue onward into the rest of fall, and shortly into winter. I’ll be making new memories, new mishaps, new art, new dance parties (www.decentralizeddanceparty.com – this is how I spent my Halloween….wa wa wee woo…). As I always do, I’ll tip my cap to the moments I’m fondest of from my past, and hope only that more will keep coming to me.
Farewell Spain.
Farewell Villafranca.
Farewell to the faces I remember from the clinic waiting room.
Farewell heaviness!
Farewell to my dusty cabin in all its stress, Jack Daniels nights and new friendships.
Farewell to my home, for a while, until I get worrysome that you don’t exist anymore and come back to see you.
Farewell to all the nights skinny dipping in the river in Bracebridge.
Farewell to ‘no pants dance parties’ at the Griffin, after hours, singing Against Me! covers on the house guitar.
Farewell to the country’s endless starry skies, and last but not least….
Farewell to lovers who come swiftly on the most magical and auspicious of nights, for whom I’ve offered slices of my heart and do not expect a thing in return.
It was just the best, and I’ll keep it safe, on the highest shelf in my mind.
Onward and outward,
Signing off,
Brittney Rand.
An homage— a small smoky shrine is the best way I can think of to pay my respects to it. I want to share it with all of you, so that you can in some way be a part of its loveliness and steal a bit of its magical glitter for yourselves. It’s now time to live currently, to give up the memories, to move forward in this new place that I am calling my home.
I just moved into a cool apartment with three other people, who are all doing the same thing as me— trying to carve a little spot for ourselves in the city of Vancouver. One is my best friend, one is the rideshare she found through Craigslist—an awesome Australian dude with whom she shared a one-month long roadtrip to the west coast to eventually meet me. The other is an Irish guy, Mark, who I met on the bus over here, and things are sorting themselves out slowly but surely. I’ve adopted rolling cigarettes from him, and also using the term “ya mad ting”. How wild is it that this guy was living in the very town in which I grew up? Huntsville, Ontario, and we’d never met until halfway through the trip, at an airport pub in Winnipeg. We had the same landlord! We lived on the same street in this small town, at different times mind you, but also haunted the same pubs this summer! I almost blew a gasket when they (him and the guy he was travelling with in Canada) told me, and I knew we would be friends. My best friend is in all-out adoration of him as well, so it’s worked out for everyone, really. I would prefer if they got married so he could become a Canadian citizen and I could wear a stupid eighties cocktail dress to the wedding, but that’s just me.
It’s pretty amazing what we’ve done with only a few weeks time and with a determination to make things work for us. We’re now ‘Drive Kids’ as the saying seems to be, just walking distance from the trendy Commercial Drive.
Anyway, so where the story was left, I was not here.
I was still living in that cabin in Dwight, Ontario, just on the edge of Algonquin Park.
I had no idea I would be where I am right now.
Get your snuggie, and a cheese sandwich or something, because the next part of the story is just as whack as the first two parts.
So I wasn’t sure if I’d never see “You Rock” shirt dude ever again.
And it’s not because I didn’t want to, because he totally sparked my interest. It was mostly because I didn’t want to even think about it. He was in Toronto. I wasn’t.
He said he would come and see me, sure, but he was also ridiculously drunk when he’d said that. Who the hell was this guy anyway? All I knew was that he was incredibly sweet to me for absolutely no reason, and that he had a snoring problem and a really cool t-shirt. Not enough, right?
All the while, some friends from Toronto had been bugging me to come down for a visit. I did live there all last winter, and the last time I left Toronto had been under hasty circumstances. When I left the clinic that strange day early in the summer, my friend had waited for me in the parking lot to whisk me away to the safety of Muskoka to heal—heart and body. I didn’t want to leave that wretched memory of Toronto in my head.
So, for the next week or so after the Fortress party, “You Rock” t-shirt dude and I spoke a lot over Facebook, and he said he’d take me out when I got there. A bit over the phone, too. Cool. He was incredibly charming. Not surprisingly, since he was funny, witty, and seemed to have an answer for everything I said. We could banter back and forth, and not so strangely, I like that a lot. We’d talk about funny stuff, and I’d read him captions from the Encyclopedia of Monster and Other Mysterious Creatures.
I booked a bus ticket to visit Toronto for a few days, hopped it, and went straight to visit one of my oldest friends who was living on Bathurst after having split with her boyfriend. We all hung out, I met a few people, made instant buddy-pals with the man-of-the-house Brando, and then we decided we wanted to go out dancing. So I called upon “You Rock” dude to come and meet up with us. He agreed, as I knew he would. See part 2; dancing is how we met, it only made sense.
By the time we got to the Dance Cave, Brittney Rand was already a few beer into it.
I was busy stomping my feet to Veruca Salt or something equally hipster and nostalgic, when “You Rock” dude tapped me on the shoulder. He gave me a huge hug, and obviously got involved with our dance party. Eventually we were forehead-to-forehead and I asked him to come home with me. And by home, I mean Brando’s carefully constructed “camping room” in his house on Bathurst.
“You Rock” dude and I ended up eventually back at his place after hanging out with my friends for a while. Turns out everyone was fucked on MDMA, me excluded.
So snuggling commenced. We stayed up all night.
I really, really liked him.
Funny thing: I liked him so much that every night after that first starry-eyed one I spent with him in his little room, I spent back there. Of course I visited with friends too during the day, but every night we spent together in his little room. Night time is the strangest time, and I think it’s made exactly for lovers. Days are filled with too many other things to think about, too many other tasks, too many sounds and sights, too many carhorns and subway rides. Nights are still, even in the city, and when you are wrapped in a lover’s sheets there really is no other concern. Those hot summer nights were sweet, filled with whispers and entwined fingers. We connected instantly. It was fun and lovely and understanding, and I was sad when I had to leave it, though I didn’t say so to him, because it was much too soon to be getting attached to such a homely little monster.
I hopped the bus back up north, and hoped it wouldn’t be too long before we would be able to sit together again, for me to scratch his beard, for kisses behind the ear to come back to me.
We tried a couple times to get together after that, and after some frustration with the distance, he eventually, happily, took the train to see me for a few days. We hadn’t seen each other for about 3 weeks to a month at this point. We had spoken most nights on the telephone at late hours, and I’d wake up in the middle of the night if I got a phone call from him, just for chatsies sake. It was nice to have someone who understood my humor; who wasn’t demanding of me, who was honest and uncensored with me. I learned many of his secrets and revealed many of mine to him, and we cooed over that telephone just building up to the moment when he stepped off the train. It was quite crazy—we had really only spent those few nights together and we had it pretty bad for one another. We were getting ourselves into something sticky.
I wanted to see him in my stomping grounds, to see how he would react and interact with it. He was a city kid, and though we were much the same, I figured I could surely teach him something about where I came from and it could be fun.
I picked him up from the train station in the white pickup truck that I borrowed from my work.
I couldn’t wait to touch him, though we couldn’t on the drive, because I’m a new driver, and I might have killed someone in my state of elated excitement. We got out to the cabin in the woods, and immediately fell into the bed kissing one another. So many nights on the telephone we’d said how we planned to not leave that very bed for the entirety of his stay.
We did, however, only for latenight dance mix ’95 dance fests, walks down the dirt road, him writing at the beach, food, Nintendo, WWF 1997 (I love you Stone Cold Steve Austin and Brett the Hitman Heart) vhs viewings and to use the washroom.
It was just the loveliest.
The end of the summer was strange, because I didn’t know exactly what I was doing. I didn’t know if I was going to Toronto, which was a circumstance that “You Rock” dude and I could possibly work with, or if I was going to British Columbia. I went back and forth on the subject. All the while, I was consorting with the most wonderful of creatures, having a great time in Ontario. I could be happy anywhere, really. The options were difficult, because Toronto was safe and B.C. wasn’t—I had no plans beyond the bus ticket out here. But I was drawn more to what wasn’t safe. I was drawn more to the unknown, what I didn’t know, and even though I was falling in love with “You Rock” dude, it simply wasn’t enough for me to stay. We knew this on that last visit of ours. We knew that though our chapter was insanely delicious, and we were eating up every bit of it, that I was bound to leave. It was a dangerous decision for us to have made, to fall into things with such a force of openness, knowing that it would commence. I felt guilt to be the one to leave. I didn’t really know why I was leaving either, but I guess when there is a mystery strong enough that’s biting at my ankles I have to explore it. And it was at the expense of that precious love, which is now a figment of my imagination.
After I dropped “You Rock” shirt dude off at the bus stop, after the loveliest dream ever, I didn’t know how to feel. Our nature was to be fun. We were having so much fun, we waved and hugged goodbye like we would see each other again soon. We could have, since my summer work contract was coming to an end. Except that I had bought a one-way ticket to the West coast for the following Friday and he hadn’t.
Hopeless romantic that I am, I wasn’t satisfied with our goodbye, and I had to see him again.
On the Tuesday before I left (on the Friday…) I took the bus down to see him again for one last night.
This visit was just as joyous and spectacular, but for me, was laced with a bit more sadness. I honestly didn’t know when I was going to see him again. This man, the one whom I couldn’t get out of my mind since the night I met him, was about to be a part of my old life. I resisted that. It drained me, and I couldn’t make sense of the immense feelings I was giving to him. It was even more confusing because I wasn’t sure, even if I’d stayed, if he’d have me. Our whole relationship was based on a total of 10 or 11 nights/days spent in the same city or town. The rest was over the phone. I knew that he was confused about other times he’d been broken-hearted in the past, hurt by them, but all I wanted to do was make everything better for him—to sort it out for him, and bake him cookies, and kiss his forehead and take care of him, and download muchdance mix ’93 for him (his favorite).
Our last night together we spent dancing, again, forehead-to-forehead at our special Reggae bar in the Kensington Market in Toronto. The same place where, earlier on in the summer, we’d hid away and kissed on the escape-route stairs on the back patio. One of our ‘things’ together was our love of Reggae and Dancehall music. We spent the night in his bed again, in his little apartment, in our little fantasy world.
We sat at the bus station the next day not really sure what to feel, but the feelings were a little more intense than the last time we parted, since we really realized that this would be the last we’d see each other for an undisclosed period of time. He kissed me goodbye at the station, and shortly after I caught my bus away from him. Again. A woman on the run—not really sure of anything, but riding on the wings of free birds, exploring, and hoping that the decision she’d made was best for her heart.
We left one another, yes, but continued to talk on the phone for a while. I’d call him at almost every bus stop across the country, until I got to the West Coast. When I first got here, a short time ago to me now, I was homeless. I hadn’t arranged anywhere to live, I wasn’t sure if I was going to try and work in Kelowna or stay in Vancouver. I was living out of all of the following: a) my aunts apartment in port moody outside the city, b) my best friend’s car, c) anyone’s couch that’d take me (I have so many numbers on my phone from meeting lovely people who wanted to take me in for the night) and d) the SameSun Hostel in downtown Vancouver where the Irish guys were staying that I met on the bus. Of course we didn’t pay for the rooms. We’d stay anywhere for free.
In this time of the complete, unrelenting chaos that was my life, I grew very weary. Since we’d decided to stay in Vancouver, we were apartment searching constantly. My mind and heart were so tired from the stress and the heartbreak of losing a lover. I hadn’t had a chance to think about the situation with “You Rock” dude and I at all, and the first thing I thought to do was drink. Have fun. Dance.
Which is totally acceptable if your heart isn’t hurting too bad, and if you aren’t too too lonely.
However, what happened was that I got loser drunk.
I got loser drunk, loser sad, and loser lonely.
I had a one-night stand with somebody who wasn’t “You Rock” dude.
Fuck sakes.
For me, it really did nothing but make me feel even worse than I already had felt, which was hard to imagine. This other guy wasn’t doing anything right. He wasn’t playing the role for me. He didn’t know where to kiss me, and it was frustrating. All I could hear, see, smell, what that somebody else wanted me more than ever on the other side of the country. And I was allowed to have that feeling. Things were basically over between “You Rock” dude and I. Yes, we were talking, but what else were we going to do? How long could it go on for without tearing us up, so that we could allow ourselves enough dignity and pride to walk away from it? Neither of us wanted to let go, it seemed.
The day after this happened, I woke up and wanted to dig a hole and live in it for 56,000 years.
Naturally, the person I wanted to comfort me was “You Rock” dude.
I was honest with him, told him how I felt, and evidently it didn’t go over well, which I understand now.
Needless to say, after texting back and forth about it, some squabbling and some drunken, pathetic texts to him from me, it ended. It ended not only because of the one-night stand, but because there simply was no other way. But I wasn’t done there. No way.
No, I had to call him at 4am after a bottle of wine and say that “this call would be the last one I ever dial” and all sorts of other dumb shit about resolving our issues and tying things up properly. I said if he never returned my call that I wouldn’t try reaching him again.
And guess what?
He never did call me back.
And so, after much sobbing to my best friend—bless her patience— attacking this crazy life from all possible angles, I kind of thank him for sparing me. For sparing us. Because I know I wouldn’t have walked away from him if he hadn’t me. One foot had been left in Ontario, one string untied, and I guess he tied it for me. At this point, I don’t have much to keep on my mind from back home. I am completely and fully in the present, and taking life’s punches as they are swung at me.
I’m liking my little neighbourhood. I have everything here that I need and want, and once I get working I will have some structure back into my life. I have a little, cute park in my backyard with swings and benches for sipping tea on. I really, and wholeheartedly, am excited about the adventure I am embarking on for at least the next six months. I plan on producing lots of artwork, building a ceramic cat collection, many shrines, and collecting crop tops to wear on my back porch with a rolled smoke in hand. And it’s not say that I don’t think fondly of “You Rock” dude anymore, because that’d be a flat-out lie, but I think things just work out as they should. As I said, night time is especially for lovers, and its night time when I think of him the most. We both always knew we’d meet again, somehow, somewhere, someday, but now wasn’t our time.
So I guess since my Homage to Summer is finished and written, that I should continue onward into the rest of fall, and shortly into winter. I’ll be making new memories, new mishaps, new art, new dance parties (www.decentralizeddanceparty.com – this is how I spent my Halloween….wa wa wee woo…). As I always do, I’ll tip my cap to the moments I’m fondest of from my past, and hope only that more will keep coming to me.
Farewell Spain.
Farewell Villafranca.
Farewell to the faces I remember from the clinic waiting room.
Farewell heaviness!
Farewell to my dusty cabin in all its stress, Jack Daniels nights and new friendships.
Farewell to my home, for a while, until I get worrysome that you don’t exist anymore and come back to see you.
Farewell to all the nights skinny dipping in the river in Bracebridge.
Farewell to ‘no pants dance parties’ at the Griffin, after hours, singing Against Me! covers on the house guitar.
Farewell to the country’s endless starry skies, and last but not least….
Farewell to lovers who come swiftly on the most magical and auspicious of nights, for whom I’ve offered slices of my heart and do not expect a thing in return.
It was just the best, and I’ll keep it safe, on the highest shelf in my mind.
Onward and outward,
Signing off,
Brittney Rand.
Friday, October 29, 2010
A Touch Of This Gravity (New Poem)
So, in between the Homage posts, I thought I would post my newest piece of writing. Again, it's meant to be spoken, but I think it's still worth reading. It's romancey. I dunno what's gotten into me.
I was on a bus ride home from Toronto. I'd just said goodbye to a wonderful lover. People all around me on the bus were touching, snuggling, and coo-cooing all around me. Touches are magical things.
Anyway....
Im fascinated how the simple brushing of bodies
morphs into a tool of love—
an adze, a sketch of skin, a flimsy
momental friction laced with everything
lovers need not say to one another.
A touch becomes his touch, her touch
your loveliest of touches.
We become kittens for it.
We stay up all night pining for it, we adore it—
we store it in our chests and it becomes the
very language of this adoration.
We save our most special finger dances
for the brows of our most exhalted—
kiss the napes of bodies so salted by
short breaths, and in each small sweat
our two bodies become
valted in one another.
These moments are simple magic,
extracting miniature lightning strikes
that light us up like matches.
A touch of this gravity can cast bluish shadows upon my heart.
It follows me through every single part
of my journey.
It stays within the brightest banks of me and
I am a fiend for the deepest forest of it.
And so
a touch like this can be a dangerous city
for a heart like mine to visit—
for when the touch is gone like a ghost
the touch becomes
1000 times more exquisite.
When it passes, each time,
I bind my hands
for
just
a
minute.
And pay respect for lovers lost enough
just to give it.
I was on a bus ride home from Toronto. I'd just said goodbye to a wonderful lover. People all around me on the bus were touching, snuggling, and coo-cooing all around me. Touches are magical things.
Anyway....
Im fascinated how the simple brushing of bodies
morphs into a tool of love—
an adze, a sketch of skin, a flimsy
momental friction laced with everything
lovers need not say to one another.
A touch becomes his touch, her touch
your loveliest of touches.
We become kittens for it.
We stay up all night pining for it, we adore it—
we store it in our chests and it becomes the
very language of this adoration.
We save our most special finger dances
for the brows of our most exhalted—
kiss the napes of bodies so salted by
short breaths, and in each small sweat
our two bodies become
valted in one another.
These moments are simple magic,
extracting miniature lightning strikes
that light us up like matches.
A touch of this gravity can cast bluish shadows upon my heart.
It follows me through every single part
of my journey.
It stays within the brightest banks of me and
I am a fiend for the deepest forest of it.
And so
a touch like this can be a dangerous city
for a heart like mine to visit—
for when the touch is gone like a ghost
the touch becomes
1000 times more exquisite.
When it passes, each time,
I bind my hands
for
just
a
minute.
And pay respect for lovers lost enough
just to give it.
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