it’s lent. i’ve always tried to give up something for lent, or not do something, or do something extra, but frankly, this city has made me a lazy catholic. i don’t like any of the churches that we’ve been to very well. we like the dominican mass more than just about anything, ever, but it’s only once a month and we can’t always go. we just don’t have the community that we had in wheeling and in morgantown, or at one mass every fall at the soa protest, and the community is a vastly important part of the deal. i know that all that’s supposed to unite us is our faith, but somehow that is not always enough for me. i didn’t even go to mass yesterday, and i kind of… just don’t care that it’s lent. i really don’t think god cares how much coke i drink. or how much craft supplies i buy or how much time i waste on facebook. the things that god possibly cares about are things that i already do try to do (or not do), regardless of the time of year… aside from things that are too expensive, etc. (like eat entirely organic – i think god does care what i do to the earth). someday we will find a good faith community again (for me), but i don’t think it’s going to be here. maybe i will be pleasantly surprised. but for real, there is more grace in going to see bluegrass on the weekends and seeing the same people all the time even if we don’t necessarily know them, because being a part of THAT community has shrunk this city to the size of a pea, it seems. and hey, they play gospel songs. i have met more people in this city as a fan of bluegrass & oldtime than i have as a catholic.

so this year i’m not vowing to give up a vice because i really don’t think it matters to anyone other than myself, or do something nice for someone every day because i don’t see that many people every day, and i do give everything i am able to at least one small person all the time. i think that’s good enough for god. because she is a mother, too. and waking up (for good) at 5:30 in the morning and moping copious amounts of vomit off of myself four times before 11:30 a.m. has to count for something.

so this morning when my brain was semi-functional at 7:30, i was pondering all of this and abruptly decided to do something random for lent that has nothing to do with god or my faith. something that will just keep my brain alive, because that’s really all i need right now. everything else is just fine, but i feel like my ability to think clearly has all but disappeared, and who can ponder their faith or the nature of god or the existence of god at all with  dysfunctional brain. the first thing that came to mind that’s doable was haiku, so i grabbed a piece of paper and wrote one before i could ponder the idea for too long.

i am going to write haiku for lent.

lenten haiku, day one

why are you so cute
and up so fucking early?
sleep more, little shit

happy morning baby.

and so i don’t feel too guilty about any of this, i will read a short daily meditation aloud to hazel. i know she doesn’t get it (hell, i don’t get them half the time), but she likes to have anything read aloud to her. at least that will give me something to talk about with my theologian husband :)

listening: billy bragg & wilco

kate: “hi, we’ve looked over the information you gave us yesterday and we do have an available midwife for your due date – nicole. if you’re still interested, we can set up a time for you to meet her this week or next week.”

emily: “great, but i have a question first that you may or may not be able to answer. i tried to call my insurance provider yesterday and they hit a computer snag and couldn’t help me: we’re covered under UHIP (readers: university health insurance plan for international students), and i’m not sure if it covers midwife care for americans or other international students.”

kate: “okay, here’s the deal: you don’t have to have UHIP or OHIP (readers: ontario health insurance plan, which ontario residents have) or anything at all to receive care from us. you just have to live in ontario.”

emily: “no insurance?”

kate: ”no… you only have to live here for us to provide care. we don’t need to bill an insurance company.”

emily: “but you don’t bill me, either?”

kate: *pause* “no… we bill the ministry of health. you would only need to provide coverage or be billed for any ultrasounds and lab tests that you might need or want done (readers: which UHIP does completely). the rest is taken care of.”

emily: *silence*

kate: *laughs* “i just blew your mind, didn’t i?”

so… mikey and i are going to meet nicole next wednesday. and she’s free. FREE. thanks, ontario ministry of health.

…tonight we were spending our last night in west virginia. one year ago tomorrow we were picking up our uhaul, packing all day, saying goodbye, and driving for a million hours to a hotel outside of buffalo (i cried most of those million hours, alone in the car with the cats). one year ago on sunday, after a few hours of sleep, we drove the last few hours through a torrential downpour, and then moved everything into our apartment in a slightly less soaking rain. i don’t remember what happened during the few days after that – i was in a what-the-hell-have-we-done daze. and now: 

things i love & will miss:
- the most, if they don’t leave us first which a lot of them will: bible john, ella, julia, nick, erin, rohan, graham, ian, delores, the maxwells, mark & andrea (&sophiebaby), jenny & walter (&kayleedog), brett & flannery (&littletobias).
- walking everywhere and occasionally taking public transportation, aka never having to drive.
- savoring Car Music when we DO have to drive.
- yummy restaurants in all directions.
- relatively cheap organic food just across the street.
- “weird” groceries that you couldn’t get in small town wv – i.e. anything ethnic except for soy sauce and crunchy chowmein noodles, definitely not sauces to make indian food which we use allthetime. and the maple leaf cookies from the dollarama, which are not ethnic.
- affordable healthcare that meets our needs (minus eyeballs and teeth, maybe less important than the general functioning of our internal organs?).
- paisley having other dogs to play with.
- reallllyyyyy good beer. really good.
- the possibility of seeing every band that we could hope for (within reason).
- colorful, non-smelly money / the novelty of a pocketful of change easily equalling ten bucks. it’s like surprise money.
- a million bead & fabric & art stores.
- really good record stores (and i do mean RECORDS!).
- easily-accessible recycling in our building for everything that can possibly be recycled: glass, plastic, paper, lightbulbs, batteries, ink cartridges, vhs tapes, cds – and the freestore to give away things that are still usable. when i finally get worms (next 3 weeks) for composting, we will barely have any trash.
- that big lake.
- how a nice, big park feels like heaven, and not just normal.
- the instant-gratification of having everything we need nearby.
- watching the verrrryyyy occasional, worth-$13-apiece movie in a massive, high quality theater.
- the smell of the subway.
- the view.
- the dollarama – pinnacle of dollar stores.
- getting to watch lost even though we don’t have cable.
- random festivals.
- the pride parade.
- how i never have to breathe other people’s cigarette smoke in any public establishment.

things i was excited about before the move but have never taken advantage of:
- never been to wholefoods, but we were so excited to live within walking distance.
- have never gone to the doctor for free because i’ve never gone to the doctor (although that is going to change because i need to go to the girldoctor this month for a regular checkup, and i’m completely terrified to have someone new).
- being able to bike everywhere safely – we’ve never gotten bikes.
- tons of museums – never been to ONE. why? i don’t know. i like to stay home.
- never gone to the beaches. same as above.

things i will gladly leave behind:
- the light & noise, although if it weren’t for that city hum that comes with large buildings the nosie wouldn’t be much different than morgantown as far as people/sirens/traffic.
- the crazies that make me nervous at night when i’m walking paisley / scooping poop is a chore that i can do without.
- the expensive beer & cheese & juice.
- that life-draining feeling i get when we’re passing through the financial district at 4pm watching all the suits hurry by, which we hardly ever do but it’s pretty awful.
- that life-draining feeling i get when i walk by all the really high-end stores on bloor street / general yorkville wealth & snobbery, which we do a lot because it’s the north side of our block.
- the canada post in general, and having to fill out two million customs slips per week for etsy shipments (the people at the post office are amazing, but the options are not).
- the primitive banking.

things i can’t wait to get home to:
- all of the obvious family/friends/locations.
- gabe’s & target.
- klaussen pickles & double stuf oreos & beers for one dollar.
- air & silence & the dark & crickets & peepers.
- netflix.
- my future vegetable garden.

i’d say we’re doing pretty well. mikey can add his own things. i will do this again next year. don’t let me forget.

 

ps, i’ve sold 600 things :)

“big city bluegrass” = some of the best bluegrass i’ve ever seen, period. come visit in the middle of the week so you can go to high lonesome wednesdays at the silver dollar. it’s within walking distance, is only three dollars (but beers are $5.75 a pint - can’t win ‘em all), and you can get not-mugged walking through all the pretty tree-filled campuses after dark. crickets and treefrogs do live in this city. just not on my street.

i think you will probably find us here at least twice a month, even though they don’t know any hazel dickens or gillian welch, and the guy who knew all the words to rocky top quit the band. they are still superb.

listening: neil in my head

tonight we took paisley to a new Dog Place. it was the best yet – one block from home, a large fenced-in corner of mikey’s campus. lots of shade, lots of dust (which she loves) and grass (which i love). much more pleasant Dog People than anywhere else, who convene to collectively disobey the leash rule. i think we can stop looking for a place to run, now. while we were there a toddler raccoon fell at least 40 feet from a tree and hit the ground with a huge thud. he layed there twisted for a few minutes, moving one leg, and another girl and i were starting to cry. no one knew what to do except hold all the dogs, and then he got up and went back up the tree. animals kill me, and i want them all for pets.

last night there were friends:

last week was nick’s birthday (plaid shirt), today is ian’s birthday (black shirt), and next saturday is graham’s birthday (white shirt). that’s a lot of birthday gathering.

when we walked home we snaked through crowds that had gathered on a blocked-off portion of bloor street for the opening of the new addition of the royal ontario museum, which i think is hideous and mikey thinks is good. it was all of the yorkville elites, donor-snobs, sparkly costume dresses, drunk and stumbling to waiting limos. they had it lit up all fancily, so it was pretty, but it seriously looks like something came careening from outer space and sunk itself into the middle of a beautiful old building… in my opinion.

the most enjoyable thing i’ve witnessed during the whole construction process was a crane dangling a port-a-john about thirty feet above the pointiest part. was the crane operator trying to make a point?

on the walk home from running paisley we stopped at the grocery store across the street to get fruit and popsicles. we were sitting at a table out front eating the purchases that would melt in the two minutes it would take us to get home, and our friends mark & andrea wandered by with their new baby, sophie. a few minutes later brett & flannery came along with their baby, toby, so the six of us stood there and chatted for awhile while trying to keep one dog and one awake baby satisfied with standing still. it was the most home-like thing to happen here, i think. now if we could only have crickets and/or treefrogs, and if it would ever get totally dark and quiet, and if we could go by a six-pack of beer at 11pm on a wednesday night if we were in the mood, i just might stop complaining all the time.

i am mere minutes away from settling onto the couch with mikey to watch the first pilot episode of lost (this is not redundant – the first two episodes ever are “pilot 1″ and “pilot 2″). it’s time to educate him.

 

listening: an old get up kids song in my head
reading: bountiful container

Four exciting things happened today:

1.) I went to John’s to watch the premier of Lost. I think I’m a little bit disappointed (by what they didn’t show), but I won’t really know until next week. I don’t want to talk about it on here and be a ruiner.  Someone start a blog with me where we can discuss Lost. I didn’t know which canadian channel it’s on until we got there, and found out that it’s one of the handful of channels broadcasted from the city that we get totally clearly on our telly… so I don’t have to use my friends for their cable every Wednesday night. Yay. Also on this channel was a preview for the new episode of ER……. how long has Uncle Jesse been a doctor on ER??? I might need to start watching it again.

2.) I went to the post office to mail some things, and while I was in the Manulife Centre I decided to look for a toy store that I knew was down there somewhere in the underground layer. I never knew this detail because I don’t often go wandering around in retail places just to look at things, but I can go through there – underground – all the way to two different subway stops. This means that when it’s blizzarding and I want to cry, I walk out my front door, across the street, in another door, and I’m out of the cold until I’ve gotten where I’m going (or have to go aboveground to get a streetcar or bus, and some stations have streetcar transfers underground). I might not be a frozen, miserable little canadian after all.

3.) I found the toy store and my quest for dice came to an end. I’ve looked all around for six dice with which to play farkel, and have come up with nothing. This was one of those fun, smart toy stores with lots of science toys and games and things for adults like binoculars and knives and giant microbes and magnetic poetry for any human being that exists. And with ten or so containers of random windup toys, keychains, and odds & ends, there was a tub of multicolored dice. I got six black ones. Does that make me seem morose?

4.) We have no control over the heat in this apartment, and our bedroom has been sweltering even with the window open and a fan sucking the cold air into the room. Today I couldn’t stand it anymore and removed the child guard that only lets you slide it open four or so inches – Breaking The Rules – so that we can open the window all the way and not die from the heat. There’s a screen, for those of you worried about the cats, and if they go psycho and tear through that and fling themselves out, they’ll land on our safely-enclosed-balcony. It’s highly unlikely that they’ll even care. Aside from the occasional attempt to dart into the hallway, they have no desire to try to get outside. They care more about chewing on the plant that hangs in that window than they do about anything going on outside.

5.) Oh, five things. I got some canadian vanilla maple tea, and it is superb.

The new decemberists album is really good.

Today Mikey and I spent the afternoon in Stratford with Mario & Jenn, who are here for a few days for the Shakespeare festival.

They brought oreos!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We went to the most magical toy store ever. This photo will be on the website soon.

I keep looking at this and missing them a lot.

Looking at a little flyer from that store, I see that Canada’s thanksgiving is October 9th, and they’re closed. It made me wonder what Canadians are giving thanks FOR, so I’ve consulted the interwebs. It seems that they are simply giving thanks to god for a bountiful harvest. No pilgrims or massacres involved. I can get behind that. Tofurkey on October 9th, anyone? I can harvest some sprouts.

Oh also, this evening at dinner I had a gin & tonic, and it was at least a dollar cheaper than everyone else’s beers. Where AM I?

I’m going to steal the haircut of one of the waitresses at this restaurant. Just you wait. I’m going to have bangs for the first time since… junior high?

I have no more Lost for a whole year. It was amazing. I cried during almost every episode. I can’t believe the writing talent behind this show… it’s not human. During the last few episodes I had to take several extended breaks to allow my blood pressure to return to normal.

- no more Lost for a whole year.
+ get to see Mario & Jenn tomorrow at the Shakespeare festival in Stratford (and discuss Lost).
+- there will be action figures this winter. I don’t know how I feel about this. Mikey will pout if I have a sawyer toy.
- bread goes bad REALLY fast in this country. This might seem silly, but it’s true.
+ but that’s probably because there are less preservatives.
+ my cousin is mailing me cheese from South Dakota.
- Hershey’s chocolate is not the same.
+ Mikey wallowing on the floor with Dorothy pinned in his arms… “STAY! you aren’t a prisoner, you’re my daughter!”
+ metal-on-metal bang announcing mail arrival.
+ it’s supposed to get warmer over the next few days.

I want to learn how to make handmade books / photo albums. Like… ones that are bound really well. Archival. I also still need glass & metal handling knowledge for some pendant ideas that have been in my brain for months. Why do I have to get a real job. Why?

Also, day 4 sprouts, plus some new babies where we’ve put part of the first batch into salads or pitas or just our mouths:


mmmmmmmm.

Today Michael John and I went to the Vegetarian Food Fair, successfully navigating both the subway & streetcar systems to get there (technically they are the same system, but it was still scary). It was way bigger than we’d expected and we hung around for a few hours trying to absorb everything. I bought a tiny little hydroponic sprouting contraption to grow bean sprouts (or whatever – eventually start some vegetables for the balcony-farm) in our kitchen. Apparently bean sprouts contain all known vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and proteins. A couple handfuls a day is all it takes, and they are very yummy. Maybe it will cleanse my body of all the coke and candy that I put into it. I bought two bags of mung beans from the hairy chested old man who was demonstrating and passing out spoonfuls to eat, but lentils and garbanzo beans are also good candidates. You can literally grow anything in it, but for now it’ll just be bean sprouts for eatin’. I already started a crop. It took three minutes and they’ll be ready to eat in two days…. or five days if we want taller, leafier sprouts.

Downside: the way the dome fits onto the base reminds me of the large sized panera catering bowls for salads. I will never be able to escape this when I’m working with it. It’ll always be a panera salad bowl.

I also talked to some people from Annex Cat Rescue about fostering. My only concern is that Dorothy can be a raging psychopath and I don’t want her traumatizing whatever other creatures we might want to welcome into our home. I think that if we started with some middle aged or older cat who doesn’t take shit from young kids we might be okay. She might be a terror with kittens, and besides, would I ever be able to actually give up a kitten that I loved and nurtured? Not likely. On another cat note: Dorothy is constantly begging for people food and today I found out something that she loves and that makes her go vocally nuts. Until today, that list only consisted of cheese, but now we can add tapioca pudding to the list.

On the way home we stopped on Queen Street, which is the place that we will be spending all of our money until we leave this city. Every book and music store that we could hope for, in addition to two or three city blocks with bead and fabric stores lining both sides of the street. I wrote down a few books to add to my Amazon wishlist because I will NEVER buy a new book in this country. They are so expensive. And alcohol is so expensive. Alcohol prices are all government regulated, so there’s no cheap place to buy beer. Today we were laughing at some sleek, rich suit buying a sixpack of bud. It figures that I moved here with someone who only spends his money on three things, two of which are books and beer.

We bought the new Magnolia Electric Co. album and it’s AWESOME. More like Songs:ohia than the older Magnolia stuff, which is good for me. I prefer his slower, more depressing stuff. We’re going to see them play on Tuesday night and now I’m even more excited for the show. Jason Molina writes the most beautiful/depressing lyrics and I’ve never seen him smile and he’s probably the saddest person ever, and I will never be able to utter a single word to him even though Mikey knows the bass player and will likely talk to them at the show. I will stare at the tops of my feet. I am so intimidated by musicians.

turn your lamp down low my love, goodbye
I hear the whistle singing now to the lonesome pine
I know that we faded out
but oh, did’t we shine
didn’t we shine

Listening: Magnolia Electric Co. : Fading Trails and M Iafrate, live from the couch
Reading: Dominion by Matthew Scully