Hello, cops! This is an open letter TO YOU.
I understand that you have to do your job. I understand that most of you do not have high school diplomas and therefore you feel inferior and decide to lash out with your authority. I understand that loud parties on the most un-predictable of evenings (ie the Saturday before Halloween) are apt to bring out your agressive side. Have some Chai tea! Seriously. I understand that being in a uniform gives you the same sense of pride that other uniformed entities, ie the SS, have also experienced. I understand that I am being over-dramatic and I want you to understand that I understand this.
What I don't understand is that, after you busted up a medium-sized party and made us go inside, you did not leave. I don't understand that, after the stereo was turned off and people lowered their voices, you decided to come inside anyway - to TRESPASS - and grab a quiet man off the couch, who'd barely said a word all night, and drag him outside, throw him on the pavement, and kick his ribs, while you laughed. I don't understand why a female cop wrenched a beer from my hand - IN A PRIVATE BACK YARD - and dumped it onto the grass.
I don't know why you're so bored.
To anyone in Victoria - watch out for Saanich Cop #299. This is the number he gave when I asked. No way of knowing if it's true. But keep an eye on your wallet and your beer if he's around.
I'm listening to Noam Chomsky spoken word at the moment, which is calming me down somewhat. He has such a nice voice. He so sarcastic and sad and I love hearing him say "Haiti" and "Cuba" and "Truman actually was in awe of Stalin," and "world government is a set of shadowy institutions" and "I think that's kind of a metaphor - it not like they actually get together - but they do; it's just extremely boring." If I had my way every Canadian and American schoolkid would have to read "On Power and Ideology" before seventh grade, I don't care if children that age are not considered "advanced" enough - of course they are; let them read it and see. At least maybe they might vote then, and fight for the High School Vote, which I can't believe still does not exist.
Wild mood swings in progress re: my Halloween costume. This is the first Halloween I have ever dressed up - wasn't allowed to as a kid - and I was going to go as Leela from Futurama but my fabulous purple wig won't go into a high ponytail; then it was "punk milk maid," but the itty bitty dress felt TOO itty bitty, plus I had no fishnets; then it was sleepwalking anarchist, complete with black shit-kicking boots, a cream negligee, and flannel winnie-the-pooh pajama bottoms, but Matt despised it and I didn't have the confidence to go through with it; now I'm considering a kind of flamboyant WW2 era corporal. Meh. Maybe I won't dress up after all. The party's in about 4 hours and it's wicked-cold out.
Hm. So apparently I'm only worth $1,638,437.52. Though I'm guessing that's in American coin. Still, wouldn't I get more off a smart pre-nup and a flawless divorce?
Okay, so this one isn't quite as good as the others, but it should still be entertaining.
I had a paper that needed completing on Monday night, so, with what my father has sometimes commented on as my "infinite wisdom," I hunkered down to the ol' computer at about 10pm. Now, the ol' computer has been fucking me over lately, but all appeared to be going well. The whiskey flowed, the feminist indictment of Fatal Attraction sprang from my fingertips and through the keyboard, magically appearing on the monitor. Matt went to bed about midnight; I popped one of my red-and-orange antibiotic pills, and worked through the bottle of whiskey at an alarming rate. I was done by 2am and made to save-to-disk: then, my computer ate the disk. It wouldn't come out; it wouldn't save. I began to yell and bang on things; Matt, awakened, asked me to turn out some of the lights. I ripped all the cords out of my computer and inexplicably dragged it across the house to Matt's computer, thinking it would somehow work if I did this; Matt was summoned as I drunkenly pulled on cords and fell over and raged, raged against the dying of the light. After half an hour he gave up and went back to bed. I dragged the computer back to my desk and DROPPED it on the floor. Pieces fell off - the disk, however, didn't. I washed some butter knives and tried to pry it out, wisely unplugging the power bar after the first few attempts. Matt asked, again, for me to turn out the lights. I realized I had murdered my computer. I began to cry. Matt got up and turned out the lights. I searched for his digital camera, hoping to take pictures of my computer screen - which still, somehow, in God's mercy I'm sure - displayed my essay. I had a sober thought: no way would a digital camera help me, or anyone. I found my notebook and, for the next hour and a half, transcribed my essay from the screen to looseleaf, weeping and raging at the clock and cursing pen after pen that went dry and died in my woeful fingers. In bed by 4:30; up at 7 to head to the computer lab at school and type it all out again. Oh - I also got disturbingly high on the penicillin/whiskey cocktail and was overly aggressive during my morning workshop. Also I was fifteen minutes late, and coughing like a junky while people were trying to talk.
Drunk on beer and rye, and trying to finish my Fatal Attraction paper, which is due tomorrow and must be completed tonight. It's easy going, because I have lots to say, but I'm worried about sticking to my thesis statement, and also about the bibliography. I haven't written a real essay in over a year. I'm not sure what's expected of me. It's a challenge, and GOOD in that way that building character is GOOD, but fuck, I can hardly type. Also, I don't have a title yet.
When I was a child, I was punished for reading books.
To clarify: after reading books for 8 hours or so, I was asked to do my chores, and when I refused, my books were taken away. Or if I was insolent, I had to skip my reading-before-bed routine.
Fair, I guess. But it's a sinful habit that's stuck with me. Today I had a list of homework to do, completed half of it by 3pm, and then bought a book at Munro's, which I've been reading since then. Homework be damned! But I find it ironic that in every creative writing class I've attended the instructors counsel, "Read, read, read: other than writing, it's the most important thing you can do," and I read, read, read, while my homework goes undone, while the clutter builds up in the various rooms of my house, while laundry lies in dirty piles, while Sambuca cries for attention and I toss her plastic bags, saying, "Play."
An x-ray, a nightmarish missed-bus-stop journey in Pat Bay territory, another x-ray, and a packet of pencillin later: the teeth come out next week. (that's right - TWO of em.) Been furtively drinking beer and hoping it won't cause a "reaction" with the antibiotics, and considering going to a house-warming party at A's house this evening. Don't quite feel up to it. But don't quite feel up to recovering in bed, either.
Disaster struck on the way home from work today: the top of a wisdom tooth, which had been threatening for the last couple of days, poked itself through the top of my gum, and I fell to pieces. I think I terrified Matt: he opened the front door for me and I was sobbing uncontrollably, banging my head against the refidgerator door etc. I have an extremely high tolerance for physical pain - emotional pain is another matter - and I never cry when things hurt. It was baffling. I tearfully called several dentists, and wound up making an appointment for tomorrow at 9:30 am. They better tear the bastard out, and give me lots of powerful drugs. I wonder how much it will cost? I have 70% coverage, so we'll see. The pain. Steph gave me some marvelous white pills so I'm feeling better, but gah, I want it all over.
I've had a widom tooth removed once before, when I was 17. For some reason I thought I was there to have a filling placed, but once I was strapped into the chair and unable to speak the dentist mentioned offhand to the assistant that they were pulling a tooth. I shouted, but no dice - out it came, and then they told me I couldn't smoke for 48 hours or I could get BONE ROT, which terrified me. I wasn't smoking cigarettes at the time, but I was going to a party that night, and asked the assistant, "What about weed? Is weed okay? Ask the dentist about THC." Again, no dice.
I'm a huge bleeder. This is going to be messy.
The poem is finished - done. Printed off and copied, though not yet stapled. Yes, that's right - one of those hideous two-pagers, which I normally hate unless of course they rock. It's too long. Steph read it and said, "There's a lot of good material in here," which means tons of the lines have to be slashed, and she's right, but I also feel it should be like five pages longer, you know, a true epic. But it's hard to write a true epic poem when you're not Allen Ginsberg. His poem contains lines like, "America why are your libraries filled with tears? America I used to be a Communist when I was a kid I'm not sorry. Are you going to let your emotional life be run by Time Magazine? I'm obsessed with Time Magazine," whereas mine is stuff like "Canada you gave the Press away. Canada you don't like movies set in Winnipeg. Canada the downtown east-side is laughing and writing books. The Olympics are going to be a disaster." Oh well. We'll see. I have a strong urge to go on that Tibetian-monastary-on-Salt-Spring-Island-pilgrimage-with-Ben immediately and write pages and pages of genius drivel.
I've recently discovered that I look FABULOUS in straight, shoulder-length light pink hair with bangs and a curl at the ends. Unfortunately I stole this hair, while drunk at the frat party, and have to give it back next Tuesday. In exchange, I will be given the blue leather jacket I forgot on the living room floor, marinating in a puddle of beer that had seeped in from the deck where I'd just shotgunned the third beer of my life. The frat party was fun, but I missed the limbo contest, and also the cops. Matt and Mike R walked me home at a disgracefully early hour - never again will I bring a 26 to a party and refuse to use a shotglass - where I laid down on the living room floor playing with my pink hair and trying to get to the bedroom.
Metric concert on Saturday! I'm so excited. We're going to have a last hurrah type thing at Jess's place beforehand, as she's moving out at the end of the month, and I intend to dance dance dance to the Party Monster soundtrack.
I'm re-writing a poem at the moment, called "Response" and inspired by Allen Ginsberg's "America." I have many doubts - I've already written an Allen Ginsberg poem this semester, and "Canada" just doesn't have the same ring as "America" (although I'm trying), and I'm scared I'll be accused of ripping off AG because the format is so similar. Gah! I'd rip out my hair if I didn't love it so much. Other writing projects: Am thinking of scrapping "Scopophilia," the one-act play that was one of those fun, daring experiments that just didn't work out because, among other things, I had forgotten to insert dramatic tension. Gah again! I'm thinking of re-writing it as a short story, as it's all cerebral and physically static, etc. Which means I need a new play in three weeks. Perhaps something about socialist pre-schoolers? I've been toying with that idea for months; maybe it's time to finally hit the drawing board.
It's kind of sad that the most significant event in my life this past week involved a bunch of rye spilled all over my back-pack and homework at 9 am on Tuesday morning. Worse, perhaps, was the fact that *many* of us had planned to smuggle booze into class, and I was the only one who remembered, re-confirming my fears that I drink too much or alternatively, drink at inappropriate times.
Is "re-confirming" a word? Think so.
Is it bad of me to want to actually BE Rage Against the Machine?
I'm going to a frat party on Saturday! I have learned the handshake. Have vague fears re: initiation - will I be expected to prance around in cotton underwear, hitting people with pillows?
I didn't think fraternaties existed in Canada. Or that I would ever be a member of one. Perhaps I'm just a token.
These are the movies I have seen this week: "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," "Run Lola Run," "Goodbye Lenin," "Dance Girl Dance," and "The Anchorman." I highly recommend all, except "The Anchorman." One of these movies I actually rented through a vending machine in a supermarket! So surreal and fun and ominous.
I watched "Fatal Attraction" last night, for the first time, as I have to write a paper on it for my Feminism and Film class. For many moons people have been warning me not to see this movie, because after all, if I had a nervous breakdown after "La Dolce Vita" happened to me, how much worse the reprecussions from "Fatal Attraction," which was actually made after I was born and the world was supposed to be more advanced? Well, I've only watched the first half so far, but instead of being profoundly disturbed, I found myself laughing - it is too predictable, too familiar, for me to cry. Glenn Close is going to die, and Michael Douglas will have the happy home life he always deserved - after all, it's not HIS fault he fucked an anonymous stranger while his wife was away. He was tricked by her blonde perm! Gah. The paper will be fun to write.
A fabulous lunch with Matt and Ben! Having lunch with those two always puts me in such a great mood: the wit, the bitchy cattiness of everything we say, always punctuated by sophisticated movie quotes and shouts of "The gin!" An iffy waitress, but whateva.
Oh the plans I have! I want to have an artists' commune, a huge house with walls painted orange and green and purple and a massive kitchen, with an outbuiling that will serve as a studio for the musicians, and several airy attic rooms for the writers. There will be a large organic garden, making us semi-self sufficient, and chickens which we will raise for their eggs, but we will also love them as pets. We'll cook feasts together in the evenings and always listen to a lot of CBC radio, and there will be many large dogs who can do tricks, and we will all be somehow idependently wealthy so we'll never have to work, unless you call walking to the liquor to store to pick up a case - a case - of Jack Daniels "work."
Got drunk last night for the first time in four days. It was okay. Would have been more fun sober, I think. I got on the bus to go home at around 10, and when I looked up a few minutes later I realized it was the wrong bus. Had to walk for like half an hour. Stagger I mean.
Dinner with Matt's fam last night - for Thanksgiving, though a few days early. We had salmon baked with brown sugar, lemon, and mushrooms, plus baked squash and boiled potatoes and salad and pumpkin pie. Best quote of the evening? Matt's mum: "Do you guys know Farley Mowat? I think he's my favourite Weird Person."
In a few minutes I have poetry class, then a shift at work, then some brewskies with the girls (if they agree - we're all a little leery of the Felicita's patio lately), then a film screening of the first short films in a production class here at school. I'm finding it increasingly bizarre to balance my work life with my student life. I feel like neither a worker nor a student, and yet both.
Props to buddies living abroad: Danika, Miguel, Maggie, Ryan-and-Aya: hope things are going well in your respective countries.
Grr. How do computers break? Mine never used to. I always treat it very well. But it's all not starting and shit. This is why I'm at the computer lab at almost 7:30pm, trying to finish the first draft of my play. I'm not in a writing a play mood. It's called "Scopophilia" and will likely be considered too intellectual.
Matt and I made that cool soup on Saturday: some of the ingredients included pineapple, yams, peanut butter, tomatoes, lime juice, onions, garlic, ginger, and cumin. It was a roaring success, but for some reason I like making soup way more than I like eating it.
Flashes from the weekend:
* Showing Dave - with great pride - my new harmonica on which I plan to play the blues, and asking him for some 'pointers,' and having him say: "I don't know what to say."
* Showing the same harmonica to Ryan, who said, "I wonder how this thing works?" and then played a really fast song on it.
* Meeting someone at a party who I have seen for years in photos but never met, and deciding to ask her such things as, "Since I'm a Mountain-Person and you're an Ocean-Person, do you think we perceive the world differently?" thereby ruining it all.
* Waking up on Saturday convinced someone had kicked me in the head; having Matt tell me that I'd actually walked into a closet and refused to get up; he said he'd laughed, that it was "slapstick."