My Dream House

Do you ever imagine what your dream house would be like? Me neither, but I do have a recurring dream about a house (which belongs to me in the dream). It’s like a sitcom of the continuing misadventures in Megan’s Nightmare House.

[P.S. I don't own any property IRL, especially not a house.]

The first thing you should know about this house is that it isn’t even located in the city where I live. I just go there occasionally to check on it and make sure no disasters have befallen it (spoiler: disaster zone is its natural state). And every time, I wonder why I haven’t gotten rid of it yet.

One of the house’s primary distinguishing features is that the doors don't quite latch properly—and definitely don't lock—so they frequently creak open of their own volition, admitting all kinds of inclement weather, rodents, and burglars. (Why haven't I gotten this fixed yet?) For some reason, there's always a passageway that connects it to other housing units, or occasionally to a college dorm (I don’t even know… terrible design if you ask me). So at any given time, random strangers might flow through the creaky self-opening doors—but mostly it’s just a looming, unrealized threat. The interior is usually pretty barren, with moldy carpet that is particularly weather-worn around the wide open window (which is flanked by tattered gauzy curtains billowing in the stormy breeze).

At some point during the dream, I inevitably recall with horror that I have a cat, which I have forgotten to feed or provide litter for. [P.S. I don’t have any pets IRL.] Usually the next phase is for me to foray into a shadowy basement that is one enormous room filled with boxes and old housewares—basically it looks like if you tipped a Value Village on its side so that all the contents accumulated in a giant heap. Then it's a matter of tentatively poking around and discovering that the single cat somehow multiplied into about a dozen cats, all in a gaunt and rabid white walker-esque form. On one occasion, the cats were in a crawlspace above the ceiling (in the absence of a basement). Then, at least some of the cats escape out of a self-opening door, and I spend the rest of the dream trying to chase them down.

I don’t read too much into dreams, but my takeaway from this one is Never Own A House.

Tales

Once in a while I find myself remembering something that I haven't thought about in a decade. I would like to linger over my memories more often so, to that end, I thought I would start writing them down. I've created a repository for tales from the past, which is mainly intended to be a memory lane in digital space for myself. This Tales blog is one of several writing projects I began this year, and I've been far more prolific in it than in the others.

The Ten Plagues of My Apartment

I hate to break stride, especially since I've been in the middle of writing another angryrant, but maybe a little comic relief is in order (even if it's a dark sort of humour).

Thursday morning I awoke to a mysterious dripping sound, which I reported later, from work, to whoever was in charge of the building in the manager's absence. When I got home, I saw that he had helpfully placed a 5-gallon pail beneath the drip, which freed up the container I had originally put there so that I could use it under a second leak.

The paint on the wall developed an impressive blister as water welled up between it and the drywall, and worked its way downward alarmingly quickly. Luckily it burst itself before it got halfway to the floor, and the carpet sponged everything up very neatly.

I did speak to the actual building manager on my lunchbreak next day; she explained that they had had to open up the walls and take up the carpet. I was a little afraid of what I might find at home that evening, but it had not devolved into too sorry a state:

The walls are much more intact than I was led to believe. The billowing carpet is a little unsettling, but the workers barely pried into my belongings while relocating everything into random other locations. If I squint slightly and look at the fans out of the corner of my eye, they almost seem slightly soothing, which is fortunate since they need to be on 24/7 until Monday.

Between the noise, the bits of plaster all over, the gaping holes in the wall, the wintry industrial-grade breeze, the heap of furniture and other possessions tetrised into the living room, and the unrelated problem of ants everywhere, my apartment is really not a hospitable place at the moment.

On the other hand, the guy I reported the leak to in the first place noticed the ants "all over the kitchen counters" so they'll invite an exterminator to the party. I'll be glad to have that cleared up, though I'm not sure I believe it was as infested as that. I'm the one who squashes ants all day, after all, and I've never seen more than 5 on the counter at once, which I don't classify as "all over."

The silveriest lining is that the drone of the fan drowns out the guy upstairs, who acquired an electric guitar several months ago. While he demonstrates a complete lack of musical understanding (i.e. he thinks that the louder he amplifies it, the more it qualifies as music), I have to commend him for practicing constantly in an effort to perfect his technique. I've recreated a sample of his playing, and would be happy to provide a transcription if anybody is interested:


Back to the apartment invasion: I figured that they would probably also notice that the new "low-flow" toilet (which they recently installed as part of a building-wide conversion) runs 100% of the time, and would want to extend the invasion by another week or two to fix that. So, I finally took the 2 minutes necessary to glance into the tank and fix it myself, which on retrospect would have eliminated the annoying filling sound for the past few months, but also increased the amount of electric guitar audible in my suite. Life in this apartment is such a paradox.

November Adventures

November wasn't marked by any single major events like the past few months have been, but it was still one of the bigger months of the year.

The biggest news of the month is that I quit my job at the VCM and have started working at UVic. Some kind of career change or positive move has been an idea I've tossed around for a long time, and although there is a lot about my old job that I loved and miss, I really couldn't hope for a better opportunity than this. I'm glad I was able to get an interview at UVic; I knew it would be no trouble to wow them in person with my incredible poise and self-confidence.

Okay, so I distinctly lack poise and self-confidence. But they ended up overlooking that, so it worked out all right.

In the few days between jobs, I went to Vancouver with fellow NIN fan @ectobot for the concert. Taking the ferry seems like a mini-cruise—at least on the initial sailing. I head straight for the buffet, which I guess is what makes it seem most like a cruise. The trip back is always a little excruciating. Fortunately, they added unscheduled sailings both days, so we didn't have to wait around too terribly long. The concert itself was fantastic, as expected. Along with getting to visit a couple stellar Vancouver-based friends, in all it was a super trip.


Not too long after that, we went to the Vinyl Cafe Christmas Show, which I'm insistent upon making an annual tradition. The show was even more fun than last year, if possible.

So now I'm busy with work, learning all the new things that come with a new job, trying to remember a portion of the new people I meet every day, dealing with my own and other people's mixed feelings about the change. When I'm not at work, lately I've been coping with an onslaught of medication side effects, compounded by persistent problems like migraines, sinusitis, and other delights.  The whole ordeal leaves me with little time or energy to do anything other than cower in bed. It's like I'm 22 again.

October is Saskatchewan Month

Right on the heels of my last trip, October is Saskatchewan month. This was my 5th trip in under 11 months (3 of those being international) which is very atypical for me.

More accurately, October is Thanksgiving month, but I've wanted to get back to Saskatchewan during the fall for several years now. There's just nothing like the gold of aspens on the prairies in autumn, or the burnt orange of pea stubble after harvest. And there's nothing like family at Thanksgiving.

Plus there are cats:

Autumn has always been my favourite season, and it was glorious to spend some time in a place where it's so vividly showcased. It always takes me a while to find it, but my tree is still alive and well :)

September is Las Vegas Month

Well September has long passed, but I've been severely lacking in inertia and haven't gotten around to writing until now. But September needs writing about, for September is Las Vegas Month.

Gotta admit, I really enjoy going to Vegas. I love the spectacle, and the soundtrack that accompanies you down the Strip, and the shows and the round-the-clockedness. I love the power I feel at traveling by myself, and the genuine contentedness I take back home with me after a trip with no objectives other than leisure. I love becoming completely nocturnal, and eating gelato for breakfast at 7pm or cheesecake and coffee at 4am. I love mingling with friendly strangers, and chatting with the bartender (who kindly let me stay hours past closing), and strolling in the night air without having to wear a jacket. Most of all I love the chance to hang out with one of my very favourite people.



One of the few things I don't like is the slow moving, counter intuitive, frustratingly unpredictable pedestrian traffic. I walk at a pretty good clip and invariably found myself behind a daisy chain of waddling packs, more often than not teetering for miles down the strip on stilettos. I don't know if it was deliberate, but every single couple seemed to walk as far as humanly possible apart from each other while still holding hands—and had the uncanny habit of weaving to cut you off if you tried to skirt around them. Seriously, it was like they had all set their armspan to /range 10.

On the other hand, some guy actually ran out of his store in the Fashion Show Mall, chased me down, and said he thought I must be European from the way I walked and dressed. Shrug. Harmless accosting happened pretty frequently actually, which is what I get for wandering around alone.

I didn't end up seeing any Cirque du Soleil shows this trip, but did catch Blue Man again and had a pretty awesome seat for it.

I wore these boots 100% of the time I was there... and we're talking extensive striding from one end of the strip to the other in 40ºC desert heat. The boots were a pretty big gamble considering I bought them the day before I went, but my feet were resilient the whole trip so it was definitely a more successful gamble than anything I achieved in video poker.

August is Birthday Month

[Second installment in the new monthly Thing of the Month series]

Most people who know me a little will probably tell you that I hate birthdays, and in a lot of the most ubiquitous ways it's true: I don't like the typical spammy Facebook wall of variously iterated "happy bdays"; I don't like the begrudging work posse who gather around a hastily assembled card and scatter the very instant that tact allows; I don't even like a simply and dutifully uttered "happy birthday" from most people.

Some people can appreciate this overwhelmth of polite sentiments, which is pretty admirable to me. But I also don't like how most greetings are accompanied by an insincere "how are you" whose answer is often left unheard or unwanted—and this is what "happy birthday" feels, to me, like it is becoming. I want my birthday wishes to be heartfelt and all the more special for their rarity. But I do want it to be special.

August may have been one of my lowest points yet,  but I'm grateful for super friends who took the time to make my birthday feel special—even (or  maybe especially) if they didn't even realize they were doing so.

When I was in high school, I had a tiny little tiger finch. We'd leave his cage door open so he could fly around the house whenever he wanted, and he loved to sit among the plants in the living room, look out the picture window, and sing about what he saw. Sometimes in the summer, we'd hang his cage out on the deck so he could feel the warm summer breeze and mingle with the goldfinches who clustered at a nearby feeder.

One day we hung his cage outside without noticing that the cage door was still open, and he flew away. It's a large farm with any number of predators; although I despaired of ever seeing him again, I spent the whole afternoon searching, cage in hand, in the hope that familiarity would entice him (even though he wasn't particularly tame and was certainly terrified whenever I had to handle him). I didn't find him.

The next morning, though, I looked out on the deck to see him back inside his cage, enthusiastically eating seeds. I guess he felt free enough in the home that sheltered him.

July is Piano Camp Month

This started out as an imaginative description of the first two weeks of July. I'm not so sure what it is anymore, but it's more than the sum of notes I scrawled during those two weeks.  I haven't attempted a work of creative nonfiction of this magnitude since my writing class back in 2005ish. And yes, it's best to approach this as being more creative than otherwise.

July is Piano Camp Month

I don't attend the camp, mind you; I schedule it, and am physically on site, and dream and breathe piano camp for its duration. This two-week project (along with the weeks preceding it) is a test of all kinds of resilience. Because I've passed this test successfully (dare I say brilliantly? no, too vain) in the past (or at least it appears so on the surface), I get to re-experience the magic every year.

Initially, it's like one of those logic puzzles where you're given a number of clues, from which you're supposed to work out who bet on which horse in a race and which horse won and what colour of hat everyone wore.  Except there are 70 students (and counting), a dozen teachers, a fluctuating number of classes, and a worryingly small number of spaces. The clues unfold slowly, over the course of a few weeks, with key clues being withheld until the deadline is almost upon you. And you actually have to solve it (I may very well be alone in this, but when I get a little stumped on a logic puzzle, I flip the page and start a new one. Unfinished things bother me, so I might put a random solution in. I do this with Sudoku, too, if I find I've made an error somewhere and don't feel like retracing my steps; I just fill in numbers and move on). And perhaps the worst part of all is that once you complete the puzzle and show everybody the results, you invariably get a dozen messages modifying the clues you originally worked with. If you were to graph it, you'd need several extra dimensions (one of them dedicated entirely to frustration). But I had done it before, I approached it again, and all was ready for July 1st.

The next part of the project is the camp itself, which doesn't actually take place where I work. I'm given a reading room as office space, though it's ill-equipped: no computer, no phone, no ethernet jack (which wouldn't be a problem if I wasn't working with my teenaged laptop, who sports a stylish floppy drive but doesn't do that wireless thing laptops are doing nowadays), and the photocopiers I can use are way the hell across campus.

Being there is a little like what I imagine solitary confinement might be like. Once in a while someone comes to interrogate you, but the rest of the time you are alone, sitting in a chair whose design is based not on comfort but rather on the most cost-effective way of outfitting an entire campus with objects physically capable of being sat upon. Each interrogator has a unique approach on how best to break you (it really seemed deliberate, too). Some bring emotion into the room knowing that, in the arbitrary way that those with power decide these things, we're more likely to accommodate troublesome creatures. Some know that honey is more tempting than vinegar, and keep their manner sugary while managing to lace in enough toxic passive aggression to fell a rhino.

It eventually (actually, quickly) becomes too much effort to even care. I don't game much anymore, but all I could think was I am at 90 stacks of Seething Anger, and pretty soon somebody's going to get 1-shot.

Left alone with only my own rabid thoughts and the muffled sound of people being irritating, my thoughts tend to become increasingly black until I have to convey them to my notebook so that I won't forget all the things that enrage me.

For someone who clings to rare happy moments of social interaction like sunbeams in a wasteland eternally menaced by storms, there's a very real toll to having every single instance of human contact for two weeks be negative. As in, it's not just two weeks of extra-strength unhappiness; it's two weeks that trigger a storm that takes tremendous effort and time to break. Or maybe it's two weeks that deal the deathblow to the fragile sunshiney peace that I've worked so hard to build. I guess it amounts to the same thing.

Feigning appreciation enrages me, but I do it anyway. How were you to know that I'd be at the absolute end of my rope? How could anybody know that by this point my heart would be so stonily cold that this gesture makes no imprint at all? And yet, when the teachers stop in to give their farewells and best wishes, I get a little (a very little) verklempt in a "you guys are truly beautiful people" sort of way (not in a "gosh don't you wish we could stay here for another week day minute" sort of way).

The final blow comes when summer school ends and it's back to work in the office, with the ringing phones and the random passersby and the people. All the people. Little kids and elderly concert-goers, staff and customers, people who are a sight for sore eyes and people who induce a cringe just by walking in the door. People who call our number as if it were the peanut butter hotline (why peanut butter? who knows. who do you call with your general questions about life?). Plus I've been out of the loop for two weeks, and have even less answers than usual. By some twisted Pavlovian conditioning, I've become accustomed to an intense solitude where almost every person to approach me will leave me with a little more despair. Back at work, I can feel panic rise when the phone rings. I can feel anger literally burning me inside, and I have to get out for clear air to quench it, however slightly. I'm consumed by resentment, and I can't even say for sure why I'm resentful, only that it's aimed at just about everybody, including—maybe especially—myself.

Leaving Hope

A few years back, I lived in a cramped upstairs suite overlooking Clover Point for a little less than a year. The ocean was almost at my doorstep. Some days the wind would stir the water and it seemed like the ocean was taking over the shore, with big waves breaking and a misty haze reaching up toward the clouds. The parasailers were always out there, even on those ocean-charged days.

It was a low time for me, for many reasons. I spent almost all of my non-class moments in my apartment, mostly listening to Leaving Hope (still one of my favourite songs of all time, and which seemed to aurally fit the landscape) and watching the people on the point. I was mesmerized by how the parasailers would just run out off a high cliff, and the wind would catch them and carry them up and away.

Now I associate that song with those parasailers, and with the ocean on those days when it crept up land and sky.

[It's slightly past the opportune time for some birthday stories, but I found this draft post from 2006 while trawling through my unpublished posts. Commence obligatory birthday post.]

The first story takes place on my 18th birthday back in 2002, while I was in Quebec on a 4-H exchange trip. I had been staying with my exchange family for about a week, and since they smoked in the house all the time you have to imagine me in a state of being unable to talk out loud, and being unable to inhale without coughing violently. For a week. [Editor's note: I was able to recreate the sensation using only Cuban-grown mold and pestilent travelmates this past winter.]

Now imagine me having spent two days sitting in a barn in Quebec City waiting while all the French people walked around in a circle, pulling cattle around on ropes. But not just any cattle. First, there was an elaborate ritual that involved clipping their hair in such a way as to make them look bonier, then painting the black spots black. Then carting them to Quebec City and pulling them around on ropes in circles.

Then they made me pull one around in a circle, in front of a lot of people. I didn't have a clue what I was doing. Did I mention that these people all spoke French and I don't speak French? All that my exchange person was able to communicate with me was something about a "Joooje" (judge). Whatever.

So the first night in Quebec City we stayed in a hotel. The second night (the night of my birthday), we stayed in a pig barn. Oh yes, a pig barn. But not just any pig barn. This one had some stalls (for lack of a better term) containing bunk beds with festering mattresses on them and garbage all over the floors. Apparently you were supposed to pay to sleep there, but as I said they were no more than stalls, and the walls didn't go all the way up to the ceiling, so we climbed over the wall and commandeered some more "rooms." Very early in the morning, all you could hear was the BEEP BEEP BEEP of tractors cleaning out the pig-portion of the barn. There was another 4-H exchange person from Manitoba there too, and we sat around waiting and joking about how slow these French people were, and I said something about how I bet one of us would miss our flights back home two days later. Yes, good joke Megan.

This wasn't part of my birthday-day, but they dropped me off at the airport in Montreal half an hour before my plane was scheduled to leave (keep in mind that this was the summer of 2002, still in the wake of the whole 9/11 deal, and people were supposed to be at airports at least an hour or two in advance). So I did miss my plane, and they gave me a ticket for the next flight and told me to go through the express line, but the lady wouldn't let me go through it and refused to speak English to me. So I missed the next flight, and by that time I was getting very uneasy because I had to make a connection to get to Saskatoon, and that flight only goes once a day. Finally I got on a flight and very fortunately the connection to Saskatoon was delayed.

I am never going to Quebec again.

Now let's fastforward to my 21st birthday (last year [Editor's note: gosh this is an old post]). I had been working at camp for a week, and the last day of camp happened to be my birthday. So, there was the traditional last-day-of-camp party, which was extra big because it was also the last camp of the summer. The idea was to drink a lot, but it was also a Sunday and all the refreshment stores were closed. So, we got me about 8 of those Red Bull type drinks.... I can't imagine why. I drank 3 of them and got too sleepy and had to go home (and also had to stop for several naps along the way [Editor's note: I realize now that what I interpreted as sleepy episodes throughout that summer were actually the first rumblings of my migraine problem]).

So those are my two most memorable birthdays. Growing up, every birthday was quiet, spent at my parents' farm, because nobody remembers summer birthdays.

[Editor's note: this concludes the original draft, and a slight updation is in order. Here follows this year's birthday story.]

I have a self-defeating personality to uphold, and part of the upkeep involves insisting that I don't want my birthday acknowledged. At work, this sentiment is sincere; I don't want the whole office to gather round the glow of a lighted cake and sing happy birthday to me (impatiently, because the sooner the song is over the sooner CAKE TIME). Fortunately, almost nobody actually knows my birthdate, except one single person whose own birthday happens to be the day before mine (and to whom I am quite certain I'd expounded at length about my dislike of birthdays).

I feel somewhat secure in the fact that my birthday falls upon a Sunday this year. But the Friday before, there is an evil plot afoot. I begin to worry when a good friend lets slip that she knows it's a special day. The next time I see the person who knows my birthday is pending (let's call him Banjo), I quietly ask him to kindly not tell anybody. To my surprise, he becomes suddenly angry and stalks off. About two minutes later, Banjo comes in the office with a card that he's secretly gotten everyone in the office to sign, along with the dreaded candle-lit cake. I manage to choke back my fury fairly well.

The great joke in all this, of course, is that it's not actually my birthday until Sunday; in fact, it will be Banjo's birthday sooner than it will be my own.

Tales from Cuba

I spent the last two weeks of January in Cuba, on a continuing education tour with the University of Saskatchewan. The group (16 of us in all) was primarily birders, and despite the fact that I am not a birder (or wasn't, previously)—and that I was approximately 30 years younger than everyone else except my sister—it was unequivocally the best experience of my life yet (far surpassing National Youth Choir, which had until now been the best—I guess great things come in two-week chunks).

As always, my first concern was migraines. I had been weaning off my daily medication so that by the time the trip came around, I would be finished with it. I worried that the withdrawal would trigger headaches while I was away, but I packed a lot of Maxalt along with regular tylenol and advil. If there was one thing I was prepared for, it was headaches!

I didn't actually get any headaches the whole trip until the second last day. Instead, somehow a fair number of us got sick about a week into the trip (not pointing any fingers, but perhaps next time *someone* might consider not traveling with untreated viral pneumonia). This I was not prepared for. Going through my scrawled notes, a particular theme becomes apparent: "Things to bring next time: cough syrup, lozenges, cold medicine ..." During a lunch stop in Cienfuegos City, I went into a pharmacy but they said they had nothing resembling an antihistamine.

In addition to the virus, I reacted unexpectedly strongly to the mold (and every single place we stayed—except the military resort at Topes de Collantes, which was immaculate—was so saturated with mold that it seeped from the curtains and out of the air conditioner). I only have allergy problems during the spring cherry blossom season here at home, so I didn't take along any allergy medication at all. Amy miraculously didn't have a mold-reaction, and kindly shared her medication wealth with me. We referred to the whole rotten virus-mold deal as "plague."

Eventually, my coughing became worse than the time a couple winters ago when the doctor gave me narcotics in an effort to spare my lungs. Using every single antihistamine-type pill that my entire family had brought along (very good thing that none of them needed the pills), I was able to ration it out so as to last until the departure day. There wasn't enough to be comfortable or allow for a proper night's sleep, but it was far better than nothing.

That last week was more miserable and unpleasant than I can really explain. One evening I skipped supper and stayed in my hut coughing, until a terribly sharp pain started in my abdomen. For the rest of the night, it felt like something might burst with every cough, but that was about the worst. We went on a 6-hour catamaran ride while at Cayo Las Brujas, which I mostly spent in a fit of unstoppable coughing; since I couldn't even breathe above water, I didn't dare try snorkeling, though the corals and fish were reportedly spectacular. I did enjoy the delightful dolphins on that catamaran trip, though; one of them wouldn't stop kissing me.

The last couple nights were in Havana, in Hotel Ambos Mundas ("where Ernest Hemingway stayed" is its claim to fame). Piano music drifted up through the lacy wooden shutters from the lobby below at most hours of the day/night, but the mold was worse there than anywhere previously. Between that and too much sun during a city stroll, my head gave in and I had to spend an afternoon/evening writhing in bed. Maxalt to the rescue! By the time we had to leave for the airport the next morning, I was able to stand without throwing up. Anyway, I think that just about satisfies my need to wallow about the plague aspect of the trip.

There was so much so see and experience in Cuba, but I don't feel that I could do it justice. The unique warbly call of the Cuban crow. The 60-km causeway to the cayos that looks like an endless highway stretching into the sea with no particular destination. The young boys who want to sell you their pesos (which have Che Guevara's face on them) for your more valuable convertible pesos (which don't). Scattered flamingos wading through the swamp as far as the eye can see. Fossilized corals all along the path to a series of caves. Narrow cobblestone city streets filled with people and a few carts drawn by a thin horse. People napping inside their old-fashioned automobiles at the seaside resorts (automobiles which are always bright and completely rust-free, despite the salty humidity). A man with a chicken tethered to his straw hat, as a means to make money off photo-taking tourists. Throngs of Cubans milling around at highway junctions, holding pesos in the air and trying to hitch a ride to work (days in advance). The ceremonial parade of colonial-attired soldiers performing the nightly cannon shoot in La Cabana castle. Beachcombing Cubans trying to sell you conch shells (which we were advised were illegal to bring back to Canada), and striking up conversations in broken English ("Which province you from? Quebec? Saskatchewan? Winnipeg?"). The fading sunset over Zapata swamp, and the lengthy bus wait inside its closed iron gate as our guide walked to the gatekeeper's home so we could escape. Weather-worn apartment buildings streaked with black from the humidity, always with clothing hanging on the balconies in an attempt to dry. Seashores of sharp limestone pocked by centuries of erosion. Warm salty waves lapping around your ankles as the clear blue sea crawls up the limitless white sand beach (and not a single person is suntanning). Palm trees growing on sheer cliff faces. Lone, tethered livestock grazing by the roadsides. The flash of bat wings as they silently flit in and out of lamplight as dusk sets in, drawn by the mosquitos hovering around a table of tourists (drawn by the mojitos). Hotel towels and blankets folded each morning to resemble animals, complete with flower petal facial features. Cubans standing in the meridian of the highway (or right in one of the lanes) holding up blocks of cheese for sale, miles and miles away from anywhere. The unapologetic bump of a Soviet truck's bare metal seats up a windy mountain trail. The sinus-clearing sting of jincila, a concoction made of ginger, honey, water, lemon, rum (mine without), and pure fire. Guava jam and cheese.

Blue-headed quail dove, Cuban trogon, parakeet, Cuban parrot, Cuban crow, bee hummingbird, flamingo, Cuban pygmy owl, strigid owl, screech owl, roseate spoonbill, wood stork, cattle egret, great blue heron, Cuban tody, ovenbird, Zenaida dove, great lizard cuckoo, brown pelican, Cuban bullfinch, Cuban green woodpecker, pied-billed grebe, stripe-headed tanager, American coot, yellow-headed warbler, nutcatcher, caracara, emerald hummingbird, turkey vulture, black hawk, ibis, reddish egret, frigatebird, kingfisher, peregrine falcon, cormorant.

What impressed me most about Cuba was the complete lack of Americanization. And although Cubans would undoubtedly like to do things like use the internet, have more than the bare minimum of amenities, or listen to non-80s pop music (or maybe that's me)—still, there's a purity to Cuba now that I'm very glad I got to experience. I have no doubt that all that will change, and Starbucks will drop down its spreading roots into that beautiful country (much like its native mangroves). I realize that it's easy for a tourist to say that it's a shame Cuba will have to succumb to capitalism, since at the end of the day I got to go home to simple luxuries like ballpoint pens and flushable toilet paper, but there you have it.

Things I will remember most from Cuba:

• the unspoiled natural beauty: being a nature-oriented tour, we got to see a lot of it. Nobody documents Cuba's nature better than Juan Carlos—his photos are amazing.
• the food: they served us the most fantastic soups imaginable. We were warned that we would find the food bland and repetitive; I didn't find it at all bland, but it was basically always the same meal (vegetables, an unreasonable amount of rice, and your choice of fish/chicken/pork/beef).
• the dogs: there were stray dogs everywhere, really dainty little things that quietly and hungrily watched you eat, or lay baking in the sun in the city squares. Sometimes they're wearing clothes.
• the music: every day a new group of musicians would set up in whatever restaurant we were eating at, play music, and gather tips. There were at least a couple particular songs that every group played.

Victoria. Saskatoon. Varadero. Havana. Vinales Valley. Zapata Swamp; Playa Larga, Las Salinas, Bermejas. Guajimico. Cienfuegos City. Trinidad. Topes de Collantes. Hanabanilla dam; Rio Negro. Cayo Las Brujas. Jardines del Rey Archipelago. Havana. Varadero. Saskatoon. Victoria.

Sweet Life

For some reason, everything always comes back to Starbucks. Or caramel frappucinos, if you want to get really fundamental. Sitting in Starbucks, morosely sipping a caramel frappucino and seeing that Hiring Baristas, February 13 sign across the street. Incorrectly answering "I'm partial to frappucinos" when asked what my favourite coffee shop drink was during my interview (frappucino is a failproof identifier of a Starbucks customer). Ducking into Starbucks on lunchbreak, feeling mortified when the head barista there outright asked me where I worked and triumphantly cried "I knew it!!" upon my answer. The coffee shop has been in my mind a lot lately. Perhaps because I pass by there once in a while these days, and try to peer inside from the opposite side of the street without having them see me. Mostly, I see the owner grinding espresso beans, making the shot, steaming the milk, pouring the drink, grinding espresso beans, making the shot, doing the milk, pouring the drink... and I think how awful it must be to do that job for the rest of your life. All he's really doing is taking pride in making the most beautiful drink in the world so that some Joe Cool can take one glance at it before gulping it down. Over and over and over every day. Sometimes I catch a glimpse of sweet Mrs. K and wonder how she's doing, and if she'll ever retire. Lots of times I wonder where my coffee-brother coworker went; I'd like to see him again. It was good times, even if the rest of it wasn't. I stopped going to that Starbucks after I quit at the coffee shop, and I haven't really gone back there until today. But today I did go back there, and even though it was freezing outside I ordered my usual caramel frappucino and muffin. And the same old barista was there. I tried to remember his name while I stood in line, but since it had been 6 months since I'd been there, and I wasn't wearing my old uniform, I didn't expect him to recognize me anyway. So I sat at my little round table, eating my muffin and sipping morosely at my caramel frappucino, wondering where all the time goes. Where all the people go, who slip in and out of your life. If they remember you, like you remember them. "Hey, do you work over at Dolce?"

Symphony Splash 2007

40,000 spectators spill over the land fronting the parliament building in front of the inner harbour, into the water in canoes, dragonboats, and barges that now jostle for the best position from which to view the stage. Those who have water permits have been there all afternoon, as have the people who have staked claims on the best chair locations all afternoon.

Rich people in black suit coats and white gowns lounge on a rooftop patio on the Empress, which stands grandly facing the inner harbour across the road which is just starting to rumble with the drums of the Canadian Scottish First Regiment Piper Band as it starts to march towards the parliament building. A radio personality suggests that the patio people in black suit coats and white gowns rattle their jewelry so that the pipers may perhaps hear them, but they pay no mind.

The stage is a barge anchored in the inner harbour, and on it various bands and radio personalities have whiled away the afternoon in anticipation of the main attraction of the evening, which has finally (almost) arrived. The pipers pass along and are gone. Now the stage is dominated by the Symphony Orchestra.

Fast forward: the greater part of the two-hour concert is over, the sun has finally sunk out of sight and the water has stopped glaring at me, and then it begins. Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture starts with the old Czarist Russian National Anthem, "God Preserve Thy People." Then the French and Russian National Anthems are heard in conflict with each other. Suddenly, the Royal Canadian Sea Cadets set off their cannons, and five shots ring out, smoke rising over the water to the left of the stage barge. All eyes are on the spot where the smoke is now disappearing, when suddenly bells begin pealing out along with the symphony from behind the audience where the carillon tower stands near the parliament building, which is now aglow in its nightly lighting. All heads turn, and murmers of "the carillon" run through the crowd. The music builds, builds, then explodes in a shower of fireworks at the climax. It is exactly V for Vendetta, without the destruction of the parliament building.

It isn't quite over; the Canadian Scottish First Regiment Piper Band has stealthily been boarding the barge for some time, and now they take the stage and play two encores along with the orchestra.

It is the most spectacular symphonic event I have ever witnessed. And they do this every single year, they have done this for 18 years without fail. It is certainly this city's greatest tradition.

***
Not much is new in my life since I last wrote anything of substance, but in many ways there is not much that is unchanged. It's another time of upheaval, and I don't quite know how to deal with it.

One thing that is most definitely different from my last post (actually, it changed the following day) is that I did receive my violin after all. As foreseen, I do indeed bring out the worst in it.

I spent a week back in Saskatchewan and had a great time at the traditional St. Swithin's Day Picnic (the first annual traditional St. Swithin's Day Picnic, I should say). Many a photo on Facebook. I got a new camera. I slacked off in music theory a lot and ended up frantically writing fugue expositions the day before my final lesson, then got there and he only had time to go through one of them but he said it was such a good effort that I'm to spend August reworking it into a full fugue. I return to Saskatchewan for my brother's wedding, at my favourite time of year. I hope my new camera can accurately capture my favourite colours of autumn: pea stubble, aspen groves. I suppose I missed that magical moment of a field of brown caraway swaths lying on the green stubble beneath.

And then it's back in time to move houses, then starting up classes, then arranging composition lessons, and possibly instrument lessons. Then saying goodbye, for now.