nassau.

so three days ago i was sitting in my room.. sick and tired of the weather and itching to get out and see something new.. then it hit me; my marvelous parents and younger sister were leaving for the bahamas on saturday.. ang and i's plans for getting down there at a later date were becoming more and more uncertain and before i knew it i had talked to my employers and our flights were booked.

left regina saturday morning after a night of snow fall, with a good chance of more to come.. landed in toronto and was met by julie and phil who graciously took us out on the relatively snow-free town. found an amazing hole-in-the-wall indian restaurant and ate our hearts out.. did some window shopping on queens st.. caught a movie.. and back to the airport we went. from 1am to 8am we tossed and turned on the strategically uncomfortably placed airport benches.. and by noon we had reached paradise.

brilliant sunshine, white sand, and turqouise waves crashing along the coast.. mom and cousin don met us at the airport with clyde in the front seat.. dusted off my shades, and off we went. picked up some over-priced groceries and 'kalik', then dropped the bags off and did some adventuring along the water. mom, frank, and em zipped out with mary and brad on their boat while we got a salad ready to take over to aunt lori's for supper. will be leaving here shortly to meet up with grandma et al over there..

"If my siblings and I hadn't all grown up under the same roof, chances are our paths would never have crossed as adults. And our lives would have been infinitely poorer. Because we are a family, we have worked hard to stay connected even when our relationships have become strained as a result of our wildly different perspectives and life choices. Accepting and celebrating our differences has given us all an opportunity to widen our horizons, to become more tolerant and empathetic of others, and to experience the unconditional love of family"..

tonight i went to the globe theatre to watch my dear friend judy wensel perform in a dark comedic drama, marion bridge; i found this exerpt in the program from the artistic director of the globe adding her personal thoughts to some of the play's themes. i quite agreed with what she had to say.

and judy rocked a very unjudy-like roll. i loved it.

thinking in years.

i'm happy. not a whole lot gets me down these days. except maybe the weather. i enjoyed some crucial hangs over the holidays.. relaxed in an unrestful sort of way. i've somehow snagged the coolest friends in this city, and i love both my jobs. yet, i can't shake this feeling of urgency: i need out. things are getting too comfortable. i need to move.. see new places.. experience new things.. when i'm sitting on my laptop i find myself surfing different airlines, scoping for deals.

one of these days..

just finished my first graphic novel.. alice in sunderland.. and now feel the need to go to sunderland. or just england, or whatever. a friend and i were discussing that it did seem too coincidental that one wouldn't even need a work visa to go over there for some time.. i also coincidentally have a wonderful cousin just south in scotland.. and several friends in germany.. korea.. newzealand.. there is also the family in the bahamas.. my host family in haddonfield.. philadelphia.. montreal.. vancouver..

i'm trying to convince my boss to open up a store in new york. she'd have both a devoted employee as well as night security - i'd be sleeping there, as rent in the apple is expensive. i wouldn't charge for security, she'd be getting a stellar deal. so far she hasn't taken the bait.

my situation spawned when i started thinking of my life in years. here we are, 2010. i've been gearing up to start school again soon. still have a long ways to go.. then i keep wondering if i will be here for that whole time.. then we're talking years.. and i'm out. i can't do years right now. months is all i can promise. i don't know why i am this way. but i just know that i need adventure and change. i remember why i always missed home while away; now i'm missing nomadic life. and i don't want to get comfortable until my body wont let me be otherwise.

I finished reading A Passage to India a few weeks back and came across this interesting blurb in the appendix:

Peter Burra's Introduction to the Everyman Edition

Perhaps it is chance, more than any peculiar devotion, that determines man in his choice of medium, when he finds himself possessed by the obscure impulse towards creation. The distinction between the functions of one art and another is not clear; they have a tendency to overlap, to merge, even to identify themselves, in a manner which prevents definition. They have one common subject for discussion - the life that is lived and known by men; and since it is not at once apparent why men who are intimately involved in living that life should desire to contemplate so immediate an experience in any remoter way, another activity (criticism), as old as themselves, has attended upon the arts from their beginning, which has constantly and variedly, but never quite satisfactorily, attempted to explain the reasons for their being. In the advanced state of everything - of life, that is, and our ideas about life - that we have achieved today, people have set themselves to define the difference between the real life which we live and the life which the arts present to us. That such a difference exists is in itself sufficient indication of how advanced we are. Various processes have led to the existence of these conditions, and the most important is the artist's practice of 'selection'. 'Most of life,' says Mr Forster, for example, 'is so dull that there is nothing to be said about it'; and even if you disagree with that - Mrs Virginia Woolf, for her part, seems to suggest that the whole of life is so significant that not one fleeting impression should be missed - the fact remains that real life is chaotic and formless, and the artist is faced with the problem of confining his impressions of that life into a space which is infinitely smaller than itself and with at least one of the dimensions removed. He has no other alternative, therefore, than to select what seem to him its most significant parts, and to arrange the chaos into some sort of an order. Inevitably the life he presents is something much neater and tidier than the diffuse reality. It is probable that most people take the impressions afforded by art - especially the novel - so much for granted that they sincerely believe life itself to be quite a neat and tidy event and suffer from shock or melancholy if something occurs to disturb their belief. Paradoxically, the more actually 'like' life a work of art is, the more nonsensical it appears to them. One of the most interesting aims of modern writers and artists has been the attempt to dispel this illusion of life's tidiness.

step up.

work has been my only means of consistency these days. i'm continually struggling with making the effort in friendly relations. i constantly reminisce, i think pleasant thoughts of friends who are going about their lives in the same city, and yet i find it so difficult to make that one simple coffee call.. my energy is up, i'm happy, really not a lot to complain about; although i realised how inefficiently i can, and have been spending my 24 hours in a day. so, here's to making that effort; if only a miniscule blog post that then diminishes my aspirations into cyberspace, hopefully the blatant self-reflection will now make it happen. it's out there.

night and day.

after stooping with ave and stewey, watching lightning flash through the changing leaves lining college avenue, i walked in the house to darryl laying down some keys in the dining room. dim lighting, peaceful serenades sweeping through the empty house. there's nothing like a little piano to lift the spirits.

wot is rolling steady and i'll hopefully be getting more hours on the next schedule; the coworkers all easy going and fun to pass the time with. today we played travel-sized "guess who" during a lull in clientele. last night i worked my first bartending shift at a new restaurant in the city called "the fainting goat". it's a very chill, friendly atmosphere. i felt comfortable behind the bar, and by the end of the night i had a good portion of the drink menu down. shaking martinis, garnishing ceasars, and muddling mint leaves for mojitos. the food looks delicious, although i haven't had a chance to try any dishes yet. i feel like it's a good fit for me, and i'll only be working there a couple nights a week. a clothes retailer by day, and a mixologist by night.

employed.

i've officially been a working girl since sunday. it's pretty great. the legit wot in the southland. all the anxiety and unwanted anticipation i had leading up to this point was for nothing. now i look forward to my shifts, and when i have days off i wish i could work for someone else. yes, this is what i have become. pathetic, desperate.. broke. however i have also been thoroughly enjoying the time spent at home when i am not at work. i've been reading lots of books these days. jeannette walls' "the glass castle" was a riveting story about her growing up with an alcoholic father and a mother whose head was in the clouds. a quick read, but hard to stomach at times. days without food, parents who don't believe in doctors and hospitals, living in garbage and filth - and that's when they actually had a roof over their head. an incredible and beautifully written memoir. and i just started into "a passage to india" by e. m. forster.

please either give me your shifts to work, or call the house. i may be in need of some human interaction.