I'm Not Really Sure How True This Is

Sometimes I go through a phase where I don't write anything in my blog which is kind of happening right now. I think about writing in my blog a lot but then I can't think of anything to say. Don't worry though, here are some other things I haven't been keeping up with lately:

+ my budget (still haven't completed January yet)
+ my laundry
+ my journal
+ reading books

There is an explanation though and the explanation is that I have ADD. You think the above paragraph is short but it actually took me 11 minutes to write because I had to clean my nails in between every sentence. Is that gross? Sorry. It's my ADD.

I'm not entirely sure how accurate this "diagnosis" is because if I have ADD then probably everyone has ADD, but I am also of the opinion that everyone DOES have ADD and so do I, but because everyone has it then it's not actually a thing (except for people who actually have like real ADD) and therefore we should just start selling Adderall in pharmacies next to the Midol so that everyone can be super stimulated without period cramps and we'll be really productive and stop global debt, poverty, etc.

Oh no wait is that screwed up logic? Am I just talking out of my ass? Hmm. I'm bored.

WHAT THE MOTHER OF CRAP HAS HAPPENED TO MY DESK/LIFE

Not pictured: entire contents of wardrobe on bed.

Safe to say my life is in disarray. Is the semester over yet?

The Roof of the World: The Pamirs, Tajikistan

i spent my first night in tajikistan
in a squat toilet shitting out my insides
bent over in a spiderweb of pain.
i was thankful, at least,
for the darkness a squat toilet provides.
thankful everything disappeared
into a black hole in the earth.

in my private squat toilet hell
i imagined them finding me in the morning.
pants down, lying in a pile of my own shit and blood.
barely conscious, begging for water, chapstick,
and a new pair of jeans, and to line me up
against the crumbling wall,
shoot my decrepit fucking body
my head was unfortunate enough to be attached to.

i came back to vomit,
my face in front of a hole full of shit,
bringing up what i had choked down,
with my cellphone flashlight
waiting for the battery to die or the sun to rise,
whichever one came first.

in the morning we drove through the pamirs;
remote mountains near remote mountain borders.
they call it the pamir highway,
the roof of the world, "the world's greatest road trip",
and i slept through the whole damn thing.


Karakol:

click on the pictures to scroll through.

Murghab: 

Asshole Mountain, near Murghab:

I think the idea that I can't have everything infuriates me

I think the idea that I can't have it all drives me insane. Why can't I take 18 credits and have a job at the same time? Because that's insane. Why can't I learn the things I want to learn? What did I come to university for? To be a writer. Oh yeah, to be a writer. That's what I said before I came here. I said I would be a writer with or without university. But aren't I writing right now? Isn't anyone who writes a writer? Oh, but to be a good writer. Ah, well.

Here I am. I want everything. An apartment with a living room for fuck's sake. A job that doesn't take everything I am for minimum wage plus 10cents. It's nothing. It's something. I feel broken.

If I don't like it why do I do it? If I demand better what does that make me? Insolent, maybe. Ungrateful.

Can I get some quiet? I know, I know, I know. It's just this day. But I can't be quiet. I can't turn me off. There's always someone in there, knock knock knock, right, she says, why can't you have it all. And then another, you have too much. Oh, help. You'll never have enough.

Oh, and I want and I want and I want it all.

[the temper trap - fools]

conversation, 2:39pm, wednesday

emily, did you write your paper?

of course not.

what have you been doing for the past 3 hours?

nothing. i made an internet purchase.

you have not moved from that chair for 3 hours.

i found the cat in the bathroom. lying next to the heater.

write your paper.

i can't.

why not.

i am defunct.

you are not.

yes i am.

no.

yes.

this is stupid.

yes.

write your paper.

in a second.

how many cups of coffee have you had?

2.

now you are feeling insane.

yes.

too much coffee.

no.

drink more?

soon.

can't move?

no. defunct.

not defunct.

just dying. the cat has a cold i think.

maybe you should clean the apartment.

i can't.

why not?

i have to write a paper.

write your paper.

write my paper.

write it.

write write write.

write it!!!!!

typing now. type type type.

it's a cat! i'm a cat

cat cat cat

we're a cats

there's a cat in the house

this semester i will do everything

MORE COFFEE, LESS SLEEP!

i will do it all: school, work, eating, drinking.

normally i can't do it all. normally i am very slow and require many hours of sleep therefore limiting me to about one activity a day. but, no! this year/semester (starting small) i will be in a constant state of motion. except right now because i'm in the library where there's internet.

anyways, so far my new life is going great. i am not freaking out about 6am wake ups and i haven't cried in like a week! though i might drop a few tears when i buy $300 worth of textbooks for one class.

Identity Crisis #3: Am I White?

This is a better written off shoot of one of my other identity crises. Despite being Chinese/having an "Eastern" background sometimes I still feel like I'm an Orientalist/appropriating other cultures.

++

When I look in the mirror I don't see a Chinese person. I don't see a Jewish person or a lesbian. I don't see a boy or a girl. I don't know what I see. I think I see someone who is just scared of being anything.

I was born in Canada to immigrant parents but to immigrant parents who themselves had been raised in Canada. My dad's family moved to Toronto when he was around 10 and my mother's family moved to Montreal when she was around 5. They were educated in Canada and have not lived outside of Canada in over 20 years or maybe ever (since they moved here)?

I was raised in the suburbs in a fairly white neighbourhood in a middle-class family. There was enough money for me to play sports and have toys and have food everyday and also pay medical bills because my mother was ill (though I didn't think of these things when I was a kid). I went to high school and there were, like, 3 black kids. I think there was one other Chinese kid in my grade. The "biggest" minority were the Jewish kids, about 5 or 6 in the sports program my dad had enough money to pay for. Everyone else was white. This is not to say "I'M SO OPPRESSED" this is actually to say I grew up in an extremely white setting -- so much so that I accidentally let slip "other white people" in reference to myself to Laura in February and she asked me if I considered myself white. And I've thought a lot about it since then.

This is the opposite of "I'm oppressed". When I fill out job applications and they ask me if I'm part of a minority group and list a bunch of options, I feel like I'm exploiting something when I mark off "Chinese" (I don't, however, feel bad about marking off "woman"). Being Chinese has, luckily, never limited my options, at least not that I know of. I don't think I've ever not gotten a job for being Chinese, though once I didn't get a job because I don't speak Cantonese.

I've lived my life in white neighbourhoods, gone to school with white kids, played sports with white kids, had as much money as the average white person, have been taught mostly the same values as non-religious white kids. If you went into my house without knowing who it belonged to, you would probably never guess "Chinese". You might guess "Jewish" if you search really hard and find our menorah, but then you would probably be confused by my step-mom's Christmas decorations. The Chinese food we usually eat is take-out. Just like other white people and Jews on New Year's eve (JKKK).

I have had the opportunities that white, middle-class people my age have had. If asked who I identify most with, between a Chinese person from China and a white person from North America, I would choose a white person from North America. But in some situations among non-asians I can't help but feel extremely Chinese. I've gotten weird questions like "Do you have statues of Buddha in your home?", or people will say something about China and might add in a "no offense" in there (what even?) or ask me if I know the answer (I don't). Someone once told my friend that she thought I was "pretty for an Asian". It used to bother me that people assumed I knew things about China because in my mind I was so clearly not Chinese that I just couldn't understand why people would think I would know. I understand better now (but that doesn't make it right). When the subject of China comes up I suddenly feel extremely conscious of looking like a Chinese person.

But I feel like an impostor in a half-Chinese person's body. I know very little about China. Before I took a class on China last semester pretty much all I knew about Chinese culture was that General Tao chicken is not an authentic Chinese dish. I didn't even know which city my family was from or which dialect of Chinese they spoke.

When I look in the mirror I don't see a Chinese person. I definitely don't look Jewish. I don't even consider myself a real Jew, in fact, my half-assed attempts to celebrate major holidays are probably an insult to real religious people. I consider myself more "queer" than "gay" or "bisexual" because I'm still trying to figure myself out, but queer people can look like anyone.

I don't see a white person either though. I know I'm not white, I just have white privileges, for the most part, right now. What does that make me? (Answer: confused).

when you wait for the dawn to crawl through the screen like a burglar to take your life away*

I am a 20 year old getting my BA in Creative Writing with a minor in Political Science and yeah, I know those are two completely different things.

My therapist told me there are steps to becoming [x]. Like there are steps to becoming anything. Like if I want to be a writer then I have to do this this this this this this and this and this like everybody else and then I will be a writer. And if I want to be something else then I will have to do all the steps to become that. I said I feel like I should be doing more things right now. I said my life feels boring and like a habit. My therapist said what did I expect I am an undergrad I am doing all that I am supposed to be doing right now.

I grew up thinking there was a world of possibilities for me. I could be anything. Anything! Anything in the whole world! When I was 12 we had to present a project to our class of what we wanted to be when we grew up. I wanted to be a hockey player. I told my teacher I didn't need to learn math because I would be a hockey player and I could pay someone to be my agent and do that shit for me. I wanted to go to the olympics.

Then I learned that women cannot (yet) be professional hockey players (unless you're Hayley Wickenheiser (but you're not)); they have to pay to play and have jobs on the side. Or, really, have a job and play hockey on the side. And there are 80 trillion people in Canada who play hockey, and ~23 players on the olympic hockey team, so, yeah, you do the math. I can't.

Anyways, the moral of that little story is that I learned I can't be just anything. So in high school I decided I wanted to be a writer, which was the other thing I was good at. I liked to write fiction but I really wanted to be a poet because I loved to read and write it. Cool, but you know where this is going right. The moral of this story is that I can write poetry but I can't be T.S Eliot (toilets) and I had good ending for this sentence but I can't remember it.

Blah, blah. That's depressing, yada, yada. But I'm still doing what I like to do, which is nice. Only now, instead of being confident that YES I WILL BE A MOTHERFUCKING WRITER LIKE JK ROWLING i am terrified by the statistics and the idea that I will have to work a part-time job at American Eagle to make rent because only 5 people will read my poems and only 1 person will buy it because everything is available online for free. And I am terrified that I'm only average. That my writing is mediocre. That I am good, but just "good", and not like, Irving Layton Award Finalist good. You know? Ever felt like you were just "average"?

I was wondering, as I left my therapists office, when adults lose their sense of possibility. When is this shift from thinking there's more than one way to do things, to being convinced that everyone who doesn't walk in a straight line is lost? I feel like I am on the cusp of maybe realizing that I do need to do this this this this this this and this and this to "become" a "writer". And I'm doing it? I am totally following this nice little path that's been paved for me. Is a BA is the new high school diploma? What is life?

Part of me is trying to cling to this idealistic rebellious free-thinker hopeful defy-all-odds mover shaker dreamer achiever view of the world. Is the 'real world' a box that, once you go inside of, you can never get out of?

Katrina dropped out of college but she's one of the smartest people I know. And when she writes, she has 10 times more stories to tell than I do. See, I want to be a writer, but I don't have much to say, which might be a weird thing for me to say as I've had this blog for over 2 years now.

It all just sounds average to me. Like everyone else feels the same way as me and we are all going to write the same thing.

*bukowski wrote this

A Story With Two Morals

I went to bed last night around 11:30 and woke up at 1am with some serious stomach pain. I thought that if I rubbed my stomach it would go away, but it didn't. It stayed. It stayed for hours. It hurt to move. I sweated and moaned and rubbed my stomach and I'm pretty sure my roommate would have thought I was masturbating if he had been awake, but I wasn't masturbating, just dying. I think I died over one hundred times last night.

I tried desperately to think of what was causing the pain. It can't have been the cereal I ate. I ate it all the time and never had such a terrible stomach ache. It must've been the carrots I had at dinner. They were kind of old. They had smelled okay and looked okay and tasted okay, but thinking about it now they were probably rotten and eating me from the inside.

As the pain continued to exist, I began to panic a little bit. I considered calling 911 but I didn't want to wake my roommates. I've been watching Grey's Anatomy a lot and I imagined Dr. Arizona Robbins feeling my stomach and saying "abdomen is hard, order a CT" even though she's a pediatric surgeon and I'm not a child anymore.

She can operate on me anytime. Then maybe after we can do this -

Erm.

Anyways, I was basically delirious last night. Even though I've been working on a few different blog posts about how much I like my room in my apartment ("my space"), I really wished I was at my parent's house. If I had been at my parent's house I would have knocked on their door and made them take care of me. Living by yourself means you have to be responsible and take care of yourself, I understood that, but last night I really understood it. I didn't want to throw up, not because throwing up is gross (it totally is), but because I didn't want to clean it up. If I had been with my parents, they would have cleaned it up. THE JOYS OF PARENTING.

I have no idea what was wrong with me. I thought briefly about googling "how to fix serious stomach pain" but I couldn't do anything but lie in my bed uselessly. I thought about eating some chalk (in the 9th grade I learned that eating some chalk is essentially equivalent to taking some pebto bismol). I'm not sure how much that would have helped. I fell asleep for real around 4:30am after spending most of the past 3 hours clutching my stomach in the fetal position, convinced I was dying of twisted insides.

The moral of the story is: even though being independent, and responsible, and taking care of yourself like a motherfucking adult is a good thing, sometimes it's nice to let other people take control. Sometimes all you want is someone to spoon you and squeeze out all the pain. There are people out there who want to do that for you, so you have to let them. Even though in this case there wasn't really anyone to help me. Also the other moral of the story is: don't eat rotten carrots.

Where Are My Keys I Lost My Brain

Do you want to hear a funny story? I'm sure you do. Today I had a Very Important Exam and I forgot a few things at home:

1. a pen

2. the keys to my house

3. my brain

Fortunately I managed to get a pen but not the 2 other things. That's okay because I have tonight to stave off insanity before the next Very Important Exam.

Today I wanted to talk to you about WINTER but I totally forgot everything I wanted to write about a few days ago and haven't been able to remember since. So I'm sorry I have the mental capacity of a fetus. There are so many hipster photos of the desolation of winter on tumblr, you can just go look there.

Anyways, I'm just going to tell you a few things, in a addition to the few things I told you last week.

1. there are 222 unread items in my google reader

2. what should i eat for dinner?

Alright, so there's not much going on in my head that doesn't have to do with school. Look, here's a graph I made about my brain.

I sure hope that that's mathematically accurate as I am one of those people who are mathematically challenged ("I crack jokes now and then, but it's only because I struggle with math" - Tina Fey).

But seriously? The end of this semester is kind of making me sad. See, even though I didn't really like this semester, I really liked this semester. I think I didn't like this semester because I was really sad for half of it. But once things started to pick up, I really enjoyed my classes. Except for the Canadian Law one which makes me want to BLOW MY BRAINS OUT (though I still think it's a really important class to take and therefore am proud of myself for sticking it out and simultaneously disappointed in myself for forgetting s.10 of the Charter on my VIE today). And even though Concordia's library is not as cozy and comfy and beautiful as Dawson's, I've still come to appreciate it for its weird sections and stairs that make me out of breath, even if right now there are too many people and not enough chairs and desks.

Basically I am not ready for this semester to be over (I am kind of ready for exams to be over, though) (I would like to learn things and not have to prove that I've learned them). I am, however, really excited to read things that I want to read and watch movies that I want to watch! So far I have ~2.5 weeks of break to read:

1. Veronica by Mary Gaitskill

2. Inferno by Eileen Myles

3. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles by Haruki Murakami

and 2.5 weeks of break to watch:

1. the episodes of 30 rock I've missed

2. Last Train Home

3. Trembling Before God

and anything else that might come up.

Also I'm going to England the 22nd of December with possibly no internet which might be the most freeing thing in the world. Not that I don't love you, internet, but sometimes you are just so overwhelming and clingy. I'm coming back though, don't worry.

This Train Is A Long Goodbye

Have you ever been on a train and dreamed about being on a train? Well, I have. I woke up at 4 this morning to catch a train that would take me to a place where I could get on another train. I fall asleep on the second train, and that's where I have my dream.

I was asleep on the train and then I woke up. Someone I knew was sitting next to me. She wanted me to read to her aloud. She couldn't read the word 'schedule'. I tried to read aloud but every time I did a few words would come out and then my mouth would hang open and I wouldn't be able to close it. I could only make sounds in the back of my throat. I knew that I was capable of reading aloud, only my mouth wouldn't move. I fell back asleep.

When I woke up there were a few little girls boarding the train. They must've been 9 or 10 years old. One of them sat next to me. I dozed off. I woke up and one of their friends was getting on at a new stop. She had a striped blue and white shirt. My clothes were all out of my bag. How did that happen? The girls seemed to be running away from something. They huddled together and spoke to each other as if they had a plan. I started picking my clothes up off the floor and putting them back in my bag. I had to reach over the girl next to me. Sorry, I said. I went back to sleep.

I wake up in real life with a little bit of drool on the side of my mouth and a slight fear that if I try to speak my mouth will hang open and never close again. There is a person beside me in a striped shirt. It has only been an hour and a half since I fell asleep. I'm supposed to be asleep for the next 10 hours.

Have you ever said goodbye to someone at a train station? Have you ever sat in your seat and looked out the window and the person you care about is standing there waiting for the train to leave? I have, and all I want to do is jump out the window and leave the train behind. But the train starts to move and my girl starts to cry. I want to ask someone when I will see her next but I'm afraid to know. I lay down across two seats and let small tears crawl down my cheek. Hey, how're you doing… the ticketman comes to collect my ticket. His voice trails off as he sees me crying and he avoids eye contact. I fumble with my ticket. Sorry, I say. He says nothing. I go to sleep. I want to sleep until the boa constrictor in my chest unravels and slinks away.

When I wake up again on the second train the person in a striped shirt is gone. I am unsure if they were ever there or if it was something I dreamed into life. There is no evidence of their being there. I want to go back to sleep but instead I write. The shake shake of the train makes me feel like vomiting when I stare at my screen. I write until I feel fully nauseous. I want to be asleep. I write 'I want to be asleep'.

I want to be asleep.

I have a brown paper bag full of snacks for the train, but I'm not hungry. I pick at the food on top; chips, some candy, and a peanut butter bar. It is only till much later that I check the bottom of the bag for more food. There's a napkin underneath with words written on it and I feel my throat close up and my eyes burn again. There is a flood behind my eyelids and if I keep them closed it will not leak out. To anybody else, I suppose, the napkin is just a napkin. But to me it's a little bit of home, or a little bit of a place where there's warmth and comfort. It's a part of a safety blanket. I keep it at the bottom of the bag.

The train is very cold. I wear your shirt and your sweater and your hat. I want to feel like I am wearing you, but it just feels like I am wearing your sweater.

++

In relation to the earth and the universe, we are just two tiny blips on a very big map. There are many people who have lived before us, and many who will live after. There are many people in our time who we will never meet, who will never know us separately or together, will never be touched or changed by us, will never know our names. We will likely be lost in the history books, but we have found each other. We exist to love and to be loved, to know that our own stories are enough.

This Is An Important Lesson About Seizing The Day

"Sad things: I came back for my shoes and someone had bought them. I feel more bothered than I should be. guess I should learn to carpe diem or something."

Some days I wake up and feel like SEIZING THE MOTHERFUCKING DAY. Some days I wake up and feel like sleeping the day. This is fine because our society is not set up for all people to seize all days all the time.

"Seizing the day" relies on the idea that the future is unknowable. That means that you could die in 5 minutes or tomorrow morning or right now. If you die right now, the last thing you will have done is read these words. Is that how you want your last seconds to be spent? Have you accomplished everything you wish you could have ever accomplished before you died? No. You haven't. The goal of seizing the day is to MOTHERFUCKING DO THINGS YEAH because everyone knows you regret the things you didn't do more than the ones you did. It's better to try something than to spend the rest of your life wondering what could have been.

If I died right now my grave would read:

Emily Choo

[dates]

Daughter,

Girlfriend,

Unpublished author,

Employee of American Eagle

Um, LAME. I mean, of course, there is tons of shit that I have done but it's too long to fit on a tombstone. If I were to operate on the "carpe diem" philosophy based on my fake tombstone and the idea that I will die tomorrow, I would quit my job right the fuck now. Then, most likely, I would wake up tomorrow, still alive, and then I might die and my tombstone would read:

Emily Choo

[dates]

Daughter,

Girlfriend,

Unpublished author,

Unemployed

The thing about seizing the day is that humans have habits and responsibilities that lie beyond the face of "today". So how do you seize the day when you have a bunch of shit that you don't want to do? What if you have to do shit that you don't want to do today so that you can be happy tomorrow? We can't skydive every day, you know.

The answer is this (I am telling you the answer to life, the universe, and everything): 42.

Jk.

The answer is to seize the day some days. Seize the day on important days. Buy the shoes, but keep your job. Do your homework, but when you go out, make it count.

Here is some good advice from my favourite TV show 30 Rock:

Live every week like it's shark week.

Dress every day like you're going to get murdered in those clothes.

And some of my personal advice:

When the time comes for someone to write your obituary, make sure they have something to write about.

Emily Choo

[dates]

Seized the day,

most days.

I Made This For You

In order to relieve the boredom of Summer Two-Thousand-and-Ten I decided last Sunday to make a quilt that's not even really a quilt but actually just pieces of cloth sewn on to each other. To make this the longest project ever I didn't use a sewing machine and I decided to make a video of it. Lucky you! This video took up about 25 GB of harddrive and a billion hours to edit. Which is good I guess, since the point was to entertain myself for a long time and it worked. One of the downfalls of the video though is that it's really boring to watch someone sew things, even for like, 4 minutes. Remember last year when I made a video for no reason? This is kind of like that, except my hair is not as terrible/AWESOME.

Anyways, here's the finished product:

Before we talk about it, here's the video:

how to spend a sunday from Emily Choo on Vimeo.

Everything is made up of old clothes, thread, and a shoelace. And also a hat and cotton balls.

It took me 7 hours to sew that shit because I put individual windows on the blue and purple buildings. I wanted them to look like buildings but they kind of just look like blue and purple rectangles. The white thing with stripes is also a building that I couldn't be bothered to put windows on.

The yellow thing is not, in fact, a giant spider in the sky, but the sun! The green thing is not a volcano, but a tree! The black blob is not a poodle, it's a cat! The red thing is a sidewalk.

In 10 years when I'm really famous people will want to pay me for this decorated piece of cloth. Keep that in mind. That's about it.

and I found stories from June 2009 that I'll never publish

Yesterday was a bit of an unusual day. You may have noticed there was no music monday (perhaps you didn't). That was because I turned off my computer and didn't turn it on again until around 2am Tuesday morning.

See, yesterday after I ate breakfast at noon, an unexpected thought fluttered through my head: what if I don't use the internet or my computer for the rest of the day? So that's what I did. The idea to do it came before the reasons occurred to me. There are 1 and 1/2 reasons.

1: Every once in a while I have a strange desire to pack up and disconnect myself from the rest of the world. You know, like Chris McCandless. I feel like too many things control me, and many of them stem from my computer or the internet. I want to stop caring about twitter and email and what happens next on whatever TV show I'm watching. So I turned off my computer.

1.5: I'm tired of being disappointed when I wake up. I don't know where the disappointment comes from because I have low expectations (or do I?) for almost everything, but there it is in the morning. So, again, instead of checking autostraddle every 10 minutes or playing bubbleshooter and not being able to stop, instead of sitting hunchbacked over my desk musing over how huge the internet world is and how I can access so much of it from inside my room, I closed my computer and went out into the real world.

Just kidding. I didn't go outside. But I did really turn off my internet.

Fourteen hours without a computer is not really that long. Every time I go to New York or Philadelphia I have no internet for about that amount of time. Granted, I do have movies if I want, but mostly I count on sleeping for over half my trip.

Before I had a laptop I was still using the giant desktop in my basement, which one day, decided it would just turn off whenever it felt like it. As you can imagine, this was highly inconvenient. One second I'd be chatting on MSN writing a paper, and the next thing you know I'd be staring at a blank screen. It turns out the fan was broken, so the computer would heat up and not cool down and then it would turn itself off so as not to explode. That took a while to fix. My dad said I could use his laptop from 1995 but I would've rather smashed my head in with a brick, so I did my homework instead.

In any case, I figured I could handle a day without my computer, and it would be a good character builder or something.

The first thing I did was clean my desk. It took me a while. I found lots of old school shit, scrap papers, important documents, and old birthday cards that still had money in them. That was the most exciting part. I made $140 for cleaning my desk! The universe is trying to tell me something maybe.

I didn't have my itunes to listen to so I had to listen to CDs the way they were meant to be listened to. I listened to Around the Well by Iron & Wine, Asleep at Heaven's Gate by Rogue Wave, So Jealous by Tegan and Sara, and You Can Play These Songs With Chords by Death Cab for Cutie.

Then I started an art project that I can't tell you about because it's a secret. But it took me a long time. Luckily I had all this space on my desk to actually make "art".

I finished reading 'Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close'. It was good! I haven't completely processed my feelings about it yet though. I think it might actually be one that I won't read again unless it's to quote something.

I talked to 3 people I hadn't talked to in a really long time. Tania came over and we played video games in our sweatpants and that was nice.

Sometimes I really wanted to play bubbleshooter but mostly I didn't miss my computer. I didn't have any emails to read and I sifted through tweets but none of them were at me so all in all I don't think my presence on the internet was noticed or missed. That's okay! It made me feel good actually. Like there's no reason for me to sit in front of gmail all day.

On that note, I'm going to go use the HMV gift card I found while cleaning my desk and then I'm going to do something that doesn't involve staring at a 13" screen.

sometimes you're flush and sometimes you're bust

"i'm interested in applying for the job," i said, motioning to the sign outside the restaurant that said they were hiring.

"do you have your cv?"

i gave it to him. he looked at it.

"you have no experience."

"i know, but i'm a fast learner."

he wrote 'no experience' at the top of my resume.

"we're looking for someone with experience, but we'll see if something comes up."

when do you think is a good time to go back and convince him to give me something to do, give me some money? tuesday, or wednesday? or thursday?

okay, so maybe i didn't even know what the restaurant was called, maybe i had to look it up, but who cares, i am smarter than most people and this man should pay me to take people's orders. maybe this is a dumb summer job in between american eagle and getting paid to write this shit, but who cares, the future is bright.

in 5 years i want to make you wish you knew me right now.

There is Nothing As Lucky, As Easy, Or Free (blindsided)

vii.

I never really dreamed of heaven much, till we put him her in the ground.

viii.

At first it's easy to pretend it isn't there; that loneliness, that empty space somewhere in your life. First you pretend you're crying because you were the only kid in grade 3 who forgot to bring scissors and glue to school on arts and crafts day. You sit in an empty classroom with a teacher who had big, black curly hair. She loved The Beatles, just like your aunt, and she asks you if you need to see the counsellor, and in a moment of weakness you say yes. Then you get over it, and when it's time for your meeting you feel upset at being interrupted while you were cutting paper with your friends, colouring things, making fake houses. But you go anyway, and pretend you don't know what it's about. And you lie, because you want to go back to safety. You want to go back to denial.

It was easy to ignore life, actual physical life, breath, the act of breathing and moving and smelling, touching, thinking, feeling. It was only when I realized she was dead that I realized I was alive. Suddenly life -- the concept of being alive -- was different.

ix.

I never thought about it for years. It, I never thought about It. You know, that event. I didn't make the connection between the scissors and the glue, and the event I had truly forgotten at home.

My dad said it was okay to cry but I didn't because my cousins were nearby, and I didn't want to cry in front of them. I wanted to pretend like I didn't care, because maybe I didn't. Maybe it was easier that way. I wanted to go home and be alone in my room. I became used to that feeling.

Maybe we all did.

x.

There's nothing left but fuzzy memories and an excuse I keep and use when it's convenient. Instead of pretending that it didn't happen, I make it all that has ever happened to me. So when something hurts, when you hurt me, I pretend it's not you, it's not you, it was this thing that happened to me a hundred years ago. When I feel like you're leaving I pretend that it hurts because I was left so long ago and not because I simply just want you to stay.

xi.

At first I missed the body; then I missed the mind; then I missed the concept. I'm stuck on the idea that my childhood could have been different, that the rest of my life might have been different. Now there's one less thing to return home to. I can feel my memories of being a kid disintegrating; I mean really, sometimes I wonder if the first 13 years of my life were real, if I ever lived in a different house than I do now, was there always someone other than Tina around? Did I belong to a family of two at one point? I don't think so, no, it just wasn't real at all.

No, no, and life is just so fragile, and maybe we spend all our years trying to reach the point we reached when we came out of the womb, so delicate and malleable, but we can't go back, no, no we can't go back, we just go forward and hope we'll reach "second childhood and mere oblivion, sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything". Maybe we should take the broken pieces and turn it into something new, and we build our own events, because whether we have a purpose or not is irrelevant; we are just going, I mean, we are moving, and life will move you whether you are ready to move or not, so I mean, just don't sit there among the brokenness, take the pieces of your life and make a house or something, make a bicycle, make a friend, I don't know what, just fucking do it, go on, do it, go go go.

xii.

Move, like today never happened, today never happened before.

The Different Kinds of Shoppers at American Eagle

After working at American Eagle for a while, I've come to recognize various types of shoppers. There are many. Most of them suck, but every once in a while someone really fun to serve comes along. Obvs not all people fit into these categories. Most of them do because, newsflash, we're all the same. If you work in retail, or in a walk-in store, you probably know these people.

+The Silent Shopper

This customer doesn't speak English, French, or any known language. When you ask them a question they stare blankly at you. You assume they don't want your help.

+I Don't Need Your Help

These are the people who think they know the store better than you. They don't look at you when you ask if they need help with anything, they just keep walking and say to the air "no, thanks". These people will never make eye-contact with you. They think of you as a silly child and wonder why you're bothering them with questions like "what size are you looking for?" when they're destroying all your hard work looking for a shirt at the bottom of the pile.

+The Teenyboppers

The teenybopper is never alone. Usually they come in groups of 3 to an entire classroom of children. They never buy anything, they just mess up the shirts you just spent an hour folding. They try on 8+ items and then leave them all in the fitting room. Then they stand around and talk and be loud and touch things and leave their candy everywhere.

+"I'm In a Rush"

This customer makes a beeline for the nearest employee. They demand your immediate attention. They are looking for something specific, usually for somebody else because they got the size wrong last time. They want you to find one item in the entire store and they want you to find it now. They're very busy and will tell you so. They also assume that you are not busy even though you're helping someone else. Sometimes this customer will come in 10 minutes before close.

+I'm Looking for Something That Doesn't Exist

There are 2 different types of this kind of customer:

1) They describe something with such precision and claim that it was on the website and yet it is nowhere to be found. Or they want you to search the entire backstore for it.

2) They saw something in American Eagle in a different store than the one you're working at in 2005 and are wondering if you still have it.

+I Want to Try on Everything in the Store

Though this customer is usually friendly and open to suggestions, the downside is that they will literally try on everything you suggest. This is the customer who will spend $500+. They will also take forever and will want new sizes in everything. They want your opinion about two jeans that look exactly the same. Usually it is a family or at least more than one person. Sometimes they will come when you're about to close and stay half an hour after you've already shut the doors.

+The Dudes

Dudes are pretty easy shoppers. They listen to you while you try to describe a pair of jeans they might like even though you're a girl and don't know anything about boy jeans. They try on 1-3 pairs, find one that fits, and buy it. Usually spends about 10-20 minutes in store.

+The Couple

They want to kiss next to the shelf you need to get something down from. They hold hands. One will say "I don't like that colour" and the other won't buy it because they don't have a mind of their own. Either they will keep coming back to the fitting room to try on different things and think it's a really fun date to go shopping together or they will just walk around being annoying and in love without buying anything.

+The Grandmother

Two types of grandmothers:

1) Shopping for her grandchildren. Has no idea what to buy. Will buy pretty much whatever you say is "cool".

2) Shopping for herself. Likes cardigans. Will buy pretty much whatever fits/is comfortable.

+The Space Shopper

This customer is lost in space. They walk in quickly, never stop at a table but look around at everything. Like the "I don't need your help" customer, they don't like eye-contact or help. They never touch anything in the store, do one quick walk around, and leave after 30 seconds. This customer only serves to lower your conversion rate.

+The Angry Mother

Is sometimes combined with "I don't need your help", "I'm in a rush", and "looking for something that doesn't exist". This customer is shopping for her children. She isn't sure what size they are because they are growing. She asks you lots of questions about the promotions and sales. She will interrupt you and try to outsmart you. She wants that 30% discount. She thinks you are stupid and uses "that tone of voice" with you. You know, the reprimanding one. She is impatient at the cash register. She'll also check over her receipt in case you made any mistakes, and when you don't she will glare shiftily at you as if you tried to deceive her in any way. Her look is one of "just because I didn't catch you, doesn't mean you didn't do it".

+The Family

This is a crossover between "I want to try on everything in the store", "I don't need your help", "the grandmother", and sometimes even "the ideal shopper" featured below. They need a lot of different sizes. They crowd the fitting room. They always want your attention. The plus side is that they are willing to spend hundreds of dollars. Can spend over an hour in the store.

+The Ideal Shopper

The ideal shopper can potentially make you love your job. They come in, have an idea of what you want but will let you suggest other things that might interest them, they are polite and smile a lot, they try things on with the intention of buying them, thank you profoundly for your help, feel really good about themselves, and walk away with a new pair of jeans. They are patient when you are looking for a size and they recognize that you may have to help other people at the same time. The ideal shopper is 18+ years of age, and actually wants your help.

I'm Not Really Sad, I'm Just Trying to Become a Better Person

but then i thought, "what if i never grow up?" i mean legitimately grow up. what if i'm stuck in this awkward year where my parents still do my laundry but i buy my own toothpaste and i take the bus to school and i can't drive and i don't know how to do banking or

there's a fear of growing up, but what if i just don't? what if i'm that person who can't do things for themselves? what if i can't have real relationships with people or if i live with my parents forever and they wash the dishes every night, what if i never learn to be a person, what if all my friends grow up and blow away...

and what happens if i can't get a job? what happens when i forget how to learn? will i have my own set of cutlery will my bed always feel so big and empty who will pay for my retainer to be fixed? who will say "i'm sorry", who will apologize, who will take the blame who will feel bad feel pity who will look down at me and say i'm sorry i failed and will i say i'm sorry i failed i never ever ever grew up i just never never learned i just stuttered and stuttered all my life.

what happens if i never figure out how to cook a chicken? what happens if i forget how to use the toaster? what happens if my hands fall off!? what happens if i forget how to write, do people suddenly become illiterate what happens if that's me, that's me, that's me. what happens if no one reads my book what happens if i don't write a book because my hands fell off and my eyes fell out and i have no goddamn legs. i'm just a box, i'm just a box, i'm a square and is someone sorry now, will someone take the blame, will someone claim responsibility for the empty cardboard box out there on recycling day?

what if i never learn how to tell a good plum from a bad plum or where the potato section is, what if i can't pay my library fines what if i can't find the library? what if i disappoint my grandmother? who is going to write about me? does anyone listen in class? what if i'm the person who forgets how to ride a bike? and i have to learn twice? my legs are gone! i just wanna wear suave shoes again. cardboard legs and cardboard shoes recycle me. i don't wanna cycle, recycle revenge. if i ever go away, who will buy me tea?

what if i have feelings and no one else has so many feelings and i drown other people, what if i drown people with me. like what if who i am is too big. what if i am a giant ocean wave, enveloping bodies and beaches and sand -- what if when i write i actually sound like obasan, the worst novel ever.

and what if i screw it up, what if my feelings consume me. what if i screw it up by being afraid of screwing up.

one day the lights will go out in my room and they will not turn on again. one day the boxes will be filled, they will be moved and loaded onto a van, the house will empty, the walls will be bare. one day we just will not be there.

[all pictures from before i die i want to]

++

I have thought about it and I have decided that my greatest fear is not dying, not not living, not "moving forward", but ignorance. More than being ignorant or naive, I don't want to be stupid. I don't want to think I know things but get them wrong. Socrates wouldn't like that. I never want to drown in my own confusion. I hope that I always strive to be better, be smarter. I hope I never settle for anything less than I deserve. I hope I stop thinking that I don't deserve happiness. I hope I never forget what learning actually is. I hope I never forget the person that I am right now, and the things I believe in. I hope that people never listen to me and think to themselves that I am stupid or that I don't know what I'm talking about. I hope I always present myself as an intelligent, well-read, creative woman. I hope that my intelligence never goes away -- I don't care what I look like, how tall or short I am, where I live -- I hope that I never stop reading and thinking and solving because that is the core of who I am.

Read my book, 'cause it's gonna be written.

A "Critical Review" & "Analysis" of the Month of March

I had great expectations for March. February sucked as much as anything could possibly suck, and March to me equaled spring, hope, light, flowers, happiness, sunshine, rainbows, unicorns, freedom, etc. It was kind of disappointing mostly because of my impossible expectations, but I've decided that overall, March was okay. Just okay. Like it could have been worse.

Essentially very little happened in March that was significant besides a fun trip to Philadelphia/NYC. I read two books or maybe 3 or 4, I don't even know. I had 3 shifts at work. I found something new in an old friend and I don't know what to do with it. I pretended I didn't have any school work to do. I bought new jeans. I had several serious moments of anxiety/panic that I would never be able to sustain long-term relationships with other people and thought it would be best to run away to a cabin by the sea, but those are feelings that are not unique to March. Also, though, I realized that I have a brain and can therefore handle the scary things it takes to be a grown up. I'm convinced I have post-menstrual syndrome, something I made up that has the same symptoms of pre-menstrual syndrome only it's after you get your period. Apparently this is just called "being moody", a theory which I reject. I got accepted into a university where, if I attend, I will graduate with a degree in something useless, but something useless that I am moderately good at. So there's that.

I have mixed feelings about April. On the plus side, according to this ovulation calculator, starting tomorrow I'm very fertile till April 6th. Also on the plus side, I'm expecting the weather to be EXCELLENT. And by "expecting" I mean "demanding". This weekend is supposed to be around 20-25 degrees so that's a good start. Unfortunately I'll probs be inside tackling the massive amount of work I've left myself with.

In conclusion, I'm happy to be done with March if only because it means we're one month closer to summer. Is it May 14 yet? (that's when my summer officially starts)

Also, word on the street is that something exciting is happening at autostraddle tomorrow, so you probs want to make sure you check that out.

And In Short, I Was Afraid

But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
though I have seen my head [grow slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet -- and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
and I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
and in short, I was afraid.

T.S Eliot - "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"

++

I have a fear of bikes. Really. I'm afraid of going too fast, afraid of losing control, afraid of getting hurt. I'm afraid of getting my pants stuck in the gears. I'm afraid of the gears ripping a hole in my leg.

It might be because of that time I hurtled full speed down the steepest hill my 6 year old eyes had ever seen and flipped over the handlebars. My aunt decided to walk her bike down but my cousin rode down so I did too. I just followed people in those days. I rode right into a pile of rocks and forgot what brakes were for.

I don't want to get hurt. Hurt, (how could you have forgotten?) hurts. I don't want to die.

++

I'm also afraid of horses, which is really stupid considering I went to horseback riding camp for two years. I followed my cousin there too.

It's not just that, though. I'm afraid of drowning. I like the air, I like the ground, and I like both to be readily available. Maybe it started in Mexico when I followed my cousins into the ocean and was gasping for breath, for control of something -- the water, the ground, my limbs maybe, -- something that would get me out of there. I discovered the ocean is beautiful from the shoreline.

I'm afraid of driving too fast. I don't even drive. It's not even the accident potential, it's the I'm-afraid-the-car-is-going-to-blow-up feeling, which is less likely to happen than an accident. I have no control. When I was little I never liked when my dad twisted and swerved. As the highway whizzed by I quietly imagined car crashes in the backseat.

I guess it goes without saying that I'm afraid of airplanes too. I don't want to crash in the ocean. I don't even think I'd make it to the ocean, let alone the emergency exit. I'm afraid of the oxygen masks the lady in the video so calmly puts on, like the last seconds of her life aren't just ticking away. I like my own air. I like my feet on the ground. Real ground.

Maybe it started some eight years ago, when I suddenly realized I was about to fly over the ocean in a giant piece of metal. I was going to England with my grandmother and I was about to say goodbye to my dad. Maybe it was because I was afraid to leave, or maybe I was seized with a panic and certainty that we were going to crash. I refused to even go to the boarding gate. My grandmother cried, she thought I didn't want to go with her. And right then, I was afraid to tell the truth.

I can't control anything on a plane. Turbulence practically makes my heart stop. I don't want my last meal to be plastic chicken. I don't want to die in a place where no one outside the plane can reach me. I don't want to die in no man's land. I don't want to die. And I don't want to survive on a plank of wood because I don't want to be eaten by sharks and I don't want to die of starvation, 'cause then I'll really wish I'd eaten the plastic chicken. I don't want my last meal to be plastic chicken.

I don't want to nosedive into the ground. If it wasn't clear, I'm also afraid of roller coasters.

Other things I am afraid of: Jumping too high on the trampoline, skiing down double black diamonds, skiing, cancer, hospitals, not recording everything because I am afraid of forgetting.

What it comes down to is this: I'm afraid of pain, and I'm afraid of dying because I'm not ready to go. Hurt hurts. Every single one of my fears is based on dying.

But more than that, I've been afraid to live. This is something I've known for a long time. I've felt it, as people moved faster than me in other directions, and I stood there because I'm too scared to move. This is something I've struggled with; how do people do it? How come my cousin went down the hill without a scratch? How come everybody I know likes to drive fast?

I'm afraid of the physical things and the mental things. I'm afraid of knowing things and not knowing things. I'm afraid I'm doing it all wrong.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
would it have been worth while,
after the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
after the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor --
and this, and so much more? --

T.S Eliot - "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"

++

It was Christmas 2008. The first time I had ever spent Christmas somewhere without snow.

I don't know why, but I'd just had the urge to go to California. I missed the weather, the clouds and the rolling fog, the ocean from from a safe distance, the big houses, the other world. I missed San Francisco, which felt safe, and Berkeley, which felt cool and homely.

It was fun to watch people walk down the street wrapped up in their jackets and hats and earmuffs in 11 degree weather. Somewhere north of the border there was a snowstorm happening.

I loved the decorations on the houses. Outside it looked like spring, and yet, there was santa on a roof. There were reindeer in the yard. It's weird to imagine Christmas with no snow but I loved that crisp feeling in the air. I loved the smell of Berkeley, the shops, the streets, the laughter. I loved my aunt's house, the sheets, the cat, breakfast in the morning. The colours of the flower petals were more vibrant, the food more organic. Yes, everything there is good, good, good. I felt good.

But it turns out there are scary things in Berkeley too. More things I'm scared of, like people. Also, there's me. Sometimes I'm scared to know who I really am. Sometimes I'm scared that someone might see me. You know, really see me.

There are also bikes in Berkeley.

And hills. Big hills.

Do I dare
disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
for decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

T.S Eliot - "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"

We decided to go for a bike ride on Christmas morning. I'm afraid of bikes. I used the smallest one, which even then was too big. I tried not to be afraid, but it's hard when you're afraid of everything.

Going for a bike ride up a hill with my family? The irony wasn't lost on me. I'm afraid of getting hit by a car.

The top of the hill was beautiful. I could see the whole city. I could see the clouds and the rolling fog, the houses with lights and decorations. I could see forests of trees which seemed to be greener than any I'd ever seen at home.

The only way back was down, down, down. My cousin began his descent easily, breezily. Even my aunt went ahead of me, experienced and steady. I started after them, slowly. I guess I still follow people. My cousin was way ahead. Occasionally I could see the back of my aunt's windbreaker, puffed up with the wind, at the corner of a turn. My hands were gripping the handlebars tightly, my stomach was tense. My fingers were holding the brakes halfway, ready to do the full squeeze at any time.

The thing about going downhill is that you don't need to pedal. Gravity will take care of everything. I don't really want gravity to be in control, I want to decide how fast or slow I go. The thing with gravity is you don't have a choice. No one does.

My cousin made it look easy, riding down a mountain. Everyone makes it seem that way. I remembered that last time I followed a cousin down a mountain on my bike.

But I was already going down. My aunt and my cousin were getting further and further ahead of me. And then it just clicked. I was in San Francisco. It was 11 degrees. It was Christmas. I was outside, I was alive, I was in love with the big scary world. Maybe there was something waiting for me at the bottom, maybe there wasn't. It didn't really matter. I loosened my fingers on the brakes. I let go.

There is something very freeing about flying down a mountain when you don't want to. The colours blur together, the air fills your lungs, the ground disappears --

There was nothing at the bottom. The road continued as it does, as they all do. I crossed it and went home.

The truth is that I'm still afraid. This could be one of those stories where my life changes for the better when I finally let go of my fears. But it's not. I went back to Montreal and stayed the same, for the most part. But that's not the point. The point is that I did it. I left Prufrock at the top of the hill. For a glorious half hour I sailed through life. I opened my heart and touched the sky.

Let us go then, you and I,
when the evening is spread out against the sky...

oh, do not ask "what is it?"
let us go and make our visit.

T.S Eliot - "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"