Dying in Palm Springs

Being back in the desert stirs up many fond memories of my time spent in South Dakota, which is strange, considering the landscape looks nothing like South Dakota and I'm pretty sure Palm Springs would beat Pine Ridge in a heat wave contest every time. All the same, South Dakota is where I did most of my dreaming, before I got to the point where carrying out dreams became difficult, and yesterday as we slogged up the sandy paths of Joshua Tree Park I was recalled to simpler times where rattle snakes were a valid concern and I spent my days thinking of creative ways to kill people, since I couldn't think of creative ways for them to carry on living (they were story characters, just to be clear).

Sometimes you just have to wait until your boss skips the country

Every once in a while, someone casually asks me why I stopped blogging, and if I'll ever start again. I find this both endearing and shocking, since I generally assumed no one was reading anyway (unless of course it's my mom saying this; she even sent my blog posts to my brother sometimes, like a truly devoted fan. Thanks, mom.).

The reason I usually give for putting the blog on hold is somewhat vague, but I was reflecting on it today and I realized there were actually some very specific reasons I stopped. One, I was extremely dissatisfied with my life, so dissatisfied that I no longer saw the humour in the situation and was in danger of turning my blog into an outlet for whining only (also, life got a lot less exciting after I graduated from university), and two, one of my many bosses (for I always held several jobs) mentioned to me that he'd come across my blog and appreciated that I avoided saying anything mean about the company in it. Apparently he'd missed the quiet edge of desperation that slipped into my voice (or so I thought) whenever I wrote about any of my current occupations. Clearly this meant I was not as good a writer as I thought I was, but also I'd better watch that I not get any better at it, at least until I quit all my jobs and any bosses I'd had moved (ideally to distant cities), all of which actually happened a few years ago (no really, they skipped the country, at least all the ones I was still keeping tabs on (see below)).

Then I continued to not write the blog, and instead concentrated on using Facebook to nose into the lives of other people, mainly ex-bosses and vague acquaintances I had met in distant countries years ago and no longer had any meaningful connections with. When I began to feel like too much of a stalker for my own good (and realized that Facebook itself had the power to be an even worse stalker than I was), I decided it was time to cut myself off.

It occurred to me at this point that I should probably resurrect my blog so that people could still keep track of me, but then immediately after that it occurred to me even more that this would defeat the whole purpose of deleting myself from Facebook on account of having willingly offered up way too much personal information to the internet to really be good for me. Yet, here we are.

I Could've Been So Cool

You know those tv shows and coming-of-age stories with the weird nerdy kid trying desperately and failing miserably to be cool? And the synopsis on the back of the VHS tape always promises it will be a timeless classic because everyone remembers a time in their childhood when they were that person? Yeah, that wasn't me. Some people are born cool, some people try desperately to become cool, and some people are offered a handful of invitations into the "cool" group and puzzle over them, mistake them for coasters, and come back to them years later thinking "huh, I could've been an underground alternative hip-hop guru picking street fights and bootlegging copies of Ill Communication at the age of 8. Go figure."

Okay, maybe that only happened to me.

How do I Life?

One of the dangers of returning from abroad is you* never know what you'll* remember about how life was before you* left. For instance, it appears that my memories of how life was in, say, January, have trumped the memories of how life was in May when I left. For instance, I remember having specific drawers in which I kept specific articles of clothing, but it appears closer to the end of April I began employing the "mix all the dirty and clean laundry together, pile it on top of the dresser/rocking chair/desk and let the fates decide if you get to work looking clean and pressed or like something that crawled out of the gutter" approach to sorting laundry.

I also remember keeping a rather meticulous filing system. Upon going through said files it seems the system only remained meticulous until about March, when I began adopting the "choose three records at random and throw them out, choose one thing to tack to the bulletin board (choose the honored bulletin item based on how important the envelope looks, not on how important the contents is, and for God's sake don't bother actually opening it to check), then shove everything else onto the desk that you'll be piling your clothes on top of in April" filing system.

And, of course, the general rule of thumb became "make sure everything you shove in here will resurface, save for the one item you really need". I wonder if my bank takes blog posts as statements of account?



*That's what I call the royal "you" meaning, in fact, I.

Home and safe and ready for more

There's something about being abroad that makes it almost unthinkable to return to life the way it was when you left it. I'm speaking as an unmarried 20-something with no assets to speak of*, so maybe if I had a house or a partner or a dog I would feel differently, but having virtually no obligations**, halfway through my Europe travels I sort of decided to...well, to quit the job I've had for the past 4 years and actually pursue something in my field. Oddly enough, it worked out rather well for me.

One might argue that when I was in Vienna maybe I should have been applying for jobs in Vienna, or at least on that continent, but I was, in fact, applying for publishing jobs in Winnipeg, and it would appear that I actually got one, so now I will be following my childhood dream of correcting proofs and designing posters (yes, this is what I did as a child, don't judge me).

So when I got back from Europe, I suddenly had a new job, a new course of studies, a new assignment to find a car to get me from point A to point Studies, and a pile of papers spread across the beautiful kitchen table that has been most irreverently used as a desk for the past year or so. Also, a reminder I'll be participating in the Death Race relay next year. Feel free to look that up. On top of that, I've quickly re-established my addiction to anime shows, especially AKB0048 (thanks, Kathy), and any and all literature it may spawn (again, thanks K). So yeah, life goes on, long after the thrill*** of living is gone. Or whatever. Being a teenager sucks. Being 25 is way better. Ignore Bruce Springsteen and all the literature he may spawn.

*assets: children, a marital partner, a house, a car, a high-maintenance pet, any or all of the above.
**except for the fairly simple one of showing up to work on time and sober, and responding to any texts my boss/coworkers might send me.
***thrill of living: something that apparently all blissfully unaware teens are supposed to experience, but I, as an intensely self-aware teenager, spent the majority of my time studying in my bedroom and not experiencing first hand until you "walk on", which apparently happened 5 years ago. Thank you, Mr. Springsteen.

Amsterdam

I'm not gonna lie, the amount of times I've walked past a postcard stand and considered just sending postcards to my friends, family, and boss saying I won't be coming back number in the...well, every time I walk past a postcard stand. If everyone I loved could just start living in other countries, thusly removing the incentive to stay in one place, I would really appreciate that.

Amsterdam apparently has the exact same climate as Vancouver. I know this because it turns out one of my colleagues from a pop culture conference I attended last year moved from Vancouver to do his Masters in Amsterdam, and he lives a block away from our hostel. What are the odds? So yesterday we got a tour from a (semi) local. He brought us to a free university where we all had to pretend to be Dutch students. It fell apart when it became obvious none of us speak Dutch, but they insisted on feeding us anyway.

Today I saw the narrowest house in Amsterdam (reportedly, the owner is taller than his house is wide), sampled aged gouda, saw the outside of Anne Frank's house, and then met Patti Smith, the gravity of which I would have appreciated more if I knew who Patti Smith was. No I know it's shameful. But hey, I met her, and got to watch her sign her name in a book that I was pretending belonged to me but actually belonged to the man with the leopard-spotted fauxhawk (yes) standing in line behind me. So that was cool.

In just over 24 hours I will be packing my bags for the last time. I'm already compiling a list of places to go the next time I come to Europe, though.

Vienna (retrospect): the pros and cons of being in a butterfly house

When I was a child I was terrified of many things, like getting splinters, eating anything that might have a vegetable hidden in it, and coming in contact with any kind of insect ever. As a totally mature adult I've managed to establish an indifference to splinters and an appreciation for all vegetables (except for celery and usually tomatoes), but I don't think I'll ever be okay with having bugs on me and that's perfectly fine with me. This brings me to the question of butterflies. People talk about butterflies like they're not the same thing as an insect, just because they're pretty, like people will decorate their children with butterflies and never address the fact that they're basically just bald moths or praying mantises with wings, neither of which are things I'd expect to see on a baby hat or little girl's hairclip ("look honey I got you some more of those bald moth hairclips you love!" no? No.), but everyone pretends butterflies are fantastic, which is how I ended up in a butterfly house in Vienna, taking pictures of beautiful things that terrify me.

To be fair I had forgotten I was upset by butterflies until I got into the schmetterling haus and realized I was about to be surrounded by them. There were all these signs up reminding us to please not touch the butterflies (sure!) and all these tourists ignoring them and making their friends and family members pose with brightly coloured insects on their fingers like they were Disney princesses or something (my god, people, don't you realize what you're doing?). I was torn between taking pictures of all the pretty colours and fighting the urge to kill the ones that got too close, and then I discovered that the green dress I was wearing made me look like a gigantic hedge for them to perch on, and there were butterflies landing on my skirt and excited tourists running to me and picking them off as if I were some sort of butterfly tree. What a fantastic time that was. Wish I could post the pictures here but my phone doesn't like to cooperate with many upload sites, so you'll just have to take my word for it ( be my Facebook friend and relive the trauma with me).