lolamatopoeia

My parents took me out for breakfast on the morning of Christmas Eve. We went to the usual place, the one my family lovingly calls 'The Old Cunt', and where my parents don't need menus. I ate french toast and ham while my parents spoke loudly to all the passing-by local restauranters they know about how much they want me to produce grandchildren for them soon.
"I'm 23!"
"So what? I was 20 when I started!"
    "Yeah, I was 21 when I started popping them out. You need to get a move on, we want lots of grandkids and I mean LOTS!"
"Oh gee, thanks guys. Well, you're definitely going to have to wait a while on that one - I've got years of school left, I mean, that's if I get in ..."
"Hey, and if you don't get in then you can always be a hairdresser down the street and maybe Tudor can get a job as a bike courier around town and you can live down on Hincks* street with your seven kids!"
"Very funny".
The worst part is that I think they were only partly joking. I just shook my head, smiled at the loyal customers and buried my mouth in my coffee cup.

Later in the evening, my parents fulfilled their Christmas Eve destiny by eating candied nuts, fancy cheese and crackers, and getting buzzed on cheap wine at the Mayor's house.  For Christmas, they like to watch a rotating silver and blue tinsel tree, drink at a mini bar and listen to the old couple down the street complain about each other over a roaring television screen fireplace. I usually stay at home alone on Christmas Eve and wrap presents. For some reason, this time it all feels different. It just feels kind of bleh. Usually, on Christmas, television offers me at least a little entertainment - with specials, marathons, etc. - to keep me sane. This time, the only thing close was 'A Christmas Story' marathon. I don't like 'A Christmas Story'.  After slouching on a pull-out bed filling out applications all day, I was not in the mood to sit around watching something I dislike and going slowly crazy alone indoors. Plus, my dinner hadn't been digesting properly. I needed air. I grabbed the leash, the dog, a plastic bag and my outer gear and we went for a late night walk in the rain.

My dog and I trudged through the slush and puddles down empty streets where coloured lights dangled on windows of sleeping houses. We walked in the middle of the road, past the site of one of my first instances of teenage employment, and past the home of the boy I dated in highschool who will soon be husband to a lovely girl and owner of a lovely house in a city I'll soon be leaving. Their driveway was full and I wanted to knock on the door as I passed by to wish his family a Merry Christmas. It wasn't that kind of nostalgia, it was just that I missed the warmth of that family on Christmas and we usually see each other yearly - they're always pretty great around the Holidays - but it was late at night, and it might have been weird.

I kept walking and travelled down the street which shares my family name. In the winter, you can always tell which areas of town house a lot of kids since every other house has either a snow man or an ice fort/igloo on the front lawn. We walked in zig zags down the quiet street and I was remembering the nights when I would shut my eyes so tightly in efforts to make myself fall asleep because my parents had told me that Santa won't come until I'm asleep. I've always taken a long time to fall asleep; those night were torture.

We turned back when the rain from my hair started dripping down my face and my dog's paws were in a constant loud splash. We passed the house in which I lived until the age of 6 or so, where I remember running bare-bellied and bare-footed after puppies and astro pops, and then passed a group of 14 yr olds with Labatt's Blue on their breath and peach fuzz on their chins who wished me 'Merry Christmas' as they stumbled by. I walked by the first house again on my way back and noticed their lights were on, and I imagined music playing.

My parents had come home before I did, me with my wet face and hair and a dirty wet elderly dog. I've come back home to wrap up a package of Dentabones for my dog.

It's been an odd Christmas so far.









*Hincks Street, in my small town, refers to a street in a bad area of town - sort of like Cheapside or east of Richmond in London, or Jane & Finch in Toronto. On Hincks street, however, the biggest dangers would be getting breathed on by a mulletted, Nascar hatted, high-topped, acid-washed Export-chugging porch monkey, getting smoked up by a 35-year old live-at-home with a bad dye job, or getting knocked-up. Our family used to live near Hincks street, when I was very young.

I'm going home for Christmas tomorrow, I think.  I get to see my dog! Maybe when I get home I can actually go Christmas shopping. I still have to buy for three or four more people and I'm starting to get a little nervous. I want to punch Martha Stewart, Regis Philbin, et al. in the face for reminding me, yet again, that "it's only one more week 'til Christmas!" just now. Fuck off, morning show hosts.

On Saturday I finished the essay I had been putting off for weeks. If only I could be as productive as I am during my final day of writing during every day of writing. I wrote eight pages in less than eight hours on Saturday, but for five days I had been stuck on page six. Pretty ridiculous. I really should leave myself time to edit my papers too - I can only hope there are no more than a few glaring errors like half-words, unfinished sentences and incorrect 'there/their/they're' usage. I'll cross my legs and fingers that a paper on Flickr as a panopticonic site where self-portrait artists ultimately have no control over their own images, being under an intricate system of surveillance and where participation in the community is a constant shifting of power relations, will make some sense to my Professor the grader. We shall see. I'll just worry about being more efficient on the writing of the next two - at least, for them, I'll have my dog beside me at home for help.

I returned home grumpy on Saturday night after dropping off my essay, and Tudor was naked in the kitchen cooking dinner. You can't get much better than that. My mood soon switched to the positive and my stresses of the day melted away until we were cuddled on the couch with tea and French cinema.

Yesterday Tudor played hookie from work, claiming something about a plane crash and a comatose state, and we spent most of the day never leaving each other's arms. It may have been the best day off ever. Eventually needing some fresh air and eggs, we travelled down the street in the late afternoon to the geriatric mall/Cherrhill Village Mall where Christmas displays have been placed near benches where they twitch and sing and generally freak people out. Later on, after we filled our bellies with some roasted chicken and during a few Christmas movies (and a Canadian short entitled 'Turkey'), I sat down to decide on my future for the next five years. I decided on setting certain hopes on Toronto, Hamilton and Montreal. Today I shall begin getting the application process underway, or maybe just avoid it a li' bit longer. We shall see how this one turns out. There's always Starbucks for the ridiculously over-educated.

Tudor should be coming home soon. He's quitting his job today in favour of a prospective job that won't kill his mind and soul, and in moving back to a city that won't make him want to run into oncoming traffic (like me). I should go and get dressed soon.