Only you

I read an article a few weeks ago about loneliness, and it made me really sad.

Not necessarily because I felt I could identify with it on a daily basis, but because I have experienced in the past, and certainly will again, the sickening pang of fear upon the realization that sometimes it’s me and only me, and am up I to the challenge?

Dealing with those feelings, fleeting though they were, was challenging, and the intensity of the sensation of relief that washed over me when I talked sense into myself and picked up the phone to reach out to a friend or family member was tremendous. But it made me think: what if that feeling never went away? What if that sinking, pervasive and all-encompassing sense of aloneness was perpetual, a constant companion, something you had to carry around with you like a heavy handbag, or ten extra pounds you want to lose and can’t?

I got to thinking about this on Saturday night while I was out celebrating a friend’s birthday. (Leave it to me to start worrying about being lonely as I’m throwing back glasses of red wine as if they were water, in the accompaniment of five good friends). However, there was a man at the bar we were at, mid-forties, with a Philip Seymour Hoffman air about him. Top-heavy, balding, poorly dressed, and very much alone.

The man bopped about the bar, dancing as if he were the only one in the room, which from his perspective, may very well have been true. He started off hopeful. Imitating some of his younger, more attractive male counterparts, he tried grabbing the hands of a few women, hoping they would go along, would just start dancing with him. Time and time again the technique proved disastrous, until one older, bolder woman placed both hands on his Point Zero-covered chest and gave him a good, hard shove. Deterred but not entirely discouraged, he started dancing alone. He would alternate swaying movements with fast-spinning, both-arms-out movements, banging into couples, bachelor party members, single women and men alike, oblivious. Or was he?

Watching this, I remembered reading somewhere that for a person to maintain a healthy emotional equilibrium, he must come into physical contact with at least three people a day. Animals could be substituted.

Imagine not having anyone in your life to touch, no one to hug you, hold your hand, pat you on the back, and so you leave your 1 ½ and you set out for Peel Street and you pay your $7 cover charge, buy yourself a drink because there is no one else who will do that for you and you close your eyes and spin to an overly jazzed-up rendition of ‘Spank’ and hope to reach out, touch, feel, connect?

Keeping the space

I hate MySpace. I hate everything about the concept of MySpace. A hot, festering cesspool of teenage boredom, antipathy and ignorance, to me, MySpace embodies everything I have grown to despise about pop culture.

After reading this article, I loathe it even more. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.07/murdoch_pr.html

Did you know that anyone and everyone who signs up for an account is automatically befriended by someone named Tom? Fake friends, folks. Who was the marketing mogul behind this genial decision? What was the thought process behind the creation of a generic 'Tom'? Is MySpace looking to singlehandedly save the self-esteem of shy teenage girls and creatine-consuming boys, ensuring that each and every user has at least one friend in their file?

Gross.

What I want

And I want to drink eight glasses of water a day.

I want to grow my own organic vegetables and have all the right political opinions. The kind that make people look at me with squinty eyes. I want to shun reality television and watch only foreign films. I want to be able to walk by the Gap and wrinkle my nose and think ‘no thanks’ while I make my way over to shops with names like “Milk.”

I want authenticity, honesty, just the right combination of naivety, cynicism, optimism, and hope. I want to read the New Yorker, Colours and Harpers without feeling proud of myself.

I want to stay up late drinking red wine with a man who wears square glasses and chain smokes and doesn’t own a hairbrush and doesn’t have a real job and will talk to me about the book he’s been writing for twelve years without checking my watch and counting the hours of sleep I’ll get before I have to be at work.

I want to stop making excuses.

I want to stop wanting.

I want to write terrible poetry and think it’s great. I want to be funny. I want to be thought-provoking. I want to own a pair of dancing shoes and use them. I want someone to fall madly, sadly and desperately in love with me. I want to keep someone awake at night. I want to break someone’s heart. Except I don’t.

I want to not to care what others think. I want to be a raging bitch. I want to stop saying I’m sorry. I want to stop feeling sorry. I want to tell her I hate her, I want to tell him I think he positively sucks. And then hug them both so hard I can feel their heartbeats. I want to be ten again with scraped knees and red, messy wild hair. And a flat stomach and not know what it means to have a flat stomach.

I want to stop changing my mind.

I want validation and not want to want it. I want to move away and I want to stay right where I am. I want the answers. I want to feel ok with not having any of the answers. I want not to be afraid of being on my own, I want to not be afraid of being me. I want to stop feeling ridiculous.

I want to want to eat tofu.

I want to tell my high school boyfriend I miss him. I want to be sixteen again and drunk on screw-top wine and convinced I’m going to be great.

I want to cry. I want to stop crying. I want to finish the book I’ve been reading for three weeks. I want it to stop being hard. I want to live in a basement apartment and listen to Sarah Harmer’s ‘Basement Apartment’ and not feel the irony. I want someone to bring me home strawberries and not the Californian kind.

I want my head to stop hurting, I want all of this wanting to stop eating up my energy at a furious rate. I want to refuel on M&M’s.

I want to throw out my vacuum and not care about antibacterial soap, anti-aging cream, birth control and antioxidants. I want not to know that one day I will be forty, with two kids and a dog I am indifferent to and will laugh at my twenty-five-year-old ramblings and indulgences. I want to dust by pursing my lips and blowing and not care.

I want to stop instinctively smiling at babies and wanting to cuddle them. I want to wear clothes that make me look fat and not care about split ends. I want to be a bad friend, and know my friends will love me anyways.

I want to fall into a deep, lovely sleep and wake up laughing.

Truly, truly I do

It's all grey to me

The amount of press releases that find their way into my inbox during the week is just incredible. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t suffer pangs and twinges of guilt as I swiftly remove the bulk of them from the little wooden box only to swivel around and dump them directly into my recycling container. I mean, some of these companies go to what appears to be a significant amount of trouble to communicate their products in fairly inventive ways, and unfortunately, the amount of space available in our magazine isn’t able to accommodate them all. I’ve seen CDs, slide shows, hard copy photos, full colour brochures, invitations, the list is endless. But, one of the many I received this morning caught my attention, and as such, I’m using it in our September issue. The woman who penned the thing signed it, “Very truly yours.”

Now, I don’t even know this woman. I wouldn’t be able to pick her out of a crowd of two people. But hey -she’s very truly mine, and I think a distinction needs to be made here between the connotation of truly, or sincerely, or kind regards, and VERY TRULY. It almost makes me feel like she’s made me a candidate for her first born child, or something.

Very truly yours,

Heather

Living the Goodlife

So, after much deliberation and a fair bit of money spent on hand weights, stability balls, yoga mats and running shoes, I've decided to stop kidding myself and join a new gym. In my defense, I have been pretty good about working out at home, but the endless stream of Adidas-clad people I can see filing in and out of Goodlife Gym with what I consider disturbing regularity from my balcony (usually while I am wearing something flannel and spooning ice cream into my mouth) is starting to get to me.

Sigh.

Gym: You win. I'm coming back. But I'm not happy about it.

It's for you!

As I was standing in line for the Britcom show last night at Just for Laughs, I was privy to a conversation being had by a rather large group of 40-something women. In between bits of boisterous laughter, complaints about teenager daughters, the colours of this season's golf pants and the pros and cons of home-cooked meals verses takeout, one of the members of the group warned her comrades that it was time to shut off their cell phones, so as not to disrupt others during the show.

On cue, charms, theme songs, beeps and flashing lights went off, as these women disconnected from their husbands, babysitters, and daughters named Courtney. However, delving into the World Without Cellphone proved problematic for one of the women.

"I don't know HOW to shut off my cell!" she cackled, staring at her pink, sparkly Razor confusedly.

Um, is no one else concerned about the possibility that Montreal is a city that houses people who are incapable of performing the strikingly simple act of closing a cellular telephone? Has no other occasion in this woman's life proven to be important enough as to provide the impetus for learning how to perform this task? Is no one else frightened by this?

Let's just say that my friend and I made certain to find seats far, far away from "Mrs. I-don't-know-how-to-shut-off-my-phone." I'm just speculating here, but I don't think it would be that much of a stretch to assume that someone who has never, ever shut off their phone, has a spectacularly irritating ring on their cell. A digital version of 'Stop in the name of love,'or 'Hey Jude' comes to mind...

Baby on the brain

In all, a good weekend. A weekend spent with good friends, old friends, in the company of lots of alcohol, (perhaps too much alcohol if the size of my headache this morning serves as any indication), sunshine, swimming pools, laughter, and good food.

I’ve noticed lately, that many get-togethers with my friends have, increasingly, included the company of children. Small ones. Shouts of ‘don’t touch that!’ or ‘isn’t she absolutely adorable,’ and discussions centering on diaper rashes, the pros and cons of breast-feeding and nap times have infiltrated our late night talks about men, the predominance, or total lack of them, in our lives.

Yes, some of my friends have made the cross-over into the realm of parenthood. While I sit safely on this side of that overwhelming jump to the ultimate in responsibility, it is impossible not to wonder what it must be like to have another, tiny human being completely dependent upon you. As I watched one of the tiny toddlers in question run across the lawn to his mother’s wide open and waiting arms this weekend, the look on my friend’s face was one of pure, raw love for this little person. The details of her personal life, and the dynamics of her relationship with the father of this child are difficult at the least, tragic at the worst, and yet, the pleasure she derives from mothering this little guy warms my heart every time I see them together.


But as the weekend drew to a close, and I came back to my apartment, consumed with concerns about my laundry, the salmon I have marinating in my fridge, and the looming deadline for the story I have to write, I realized that I’m just not ready to sacrifice my independence for another person yet. I feel I still have such a tremendous amount of growing up to do, and the thought of knowing that a daughter or son would be dependent on my every move, every decision, terrifies me. And so for now, I will live vicariously through my friends, increasing in number, with children of their own. I can give bottles, take for walks, sing to sleep, wipe tears and clean sticky fingers, and know, that at the end of the day, these children will be safe from my foils and fumbles, my mistakes, small, large, and glaring. That they have mothers ready for their responsibility and care, and that it will be a pleasure and a gift for me, to watch them grow into the people their parents help shape them to be.

Minus one

And then five became four...

These are the girls who have carried me through thick and thin, who have been my nearest and dearest since before I could barely walk. Here are the four of us, celebrating the first wedding in our group.

The Wedding Guide

My feet look akin to little bloated Polish sausages, my hair is missing a few key bobby pins, I'm wearing half my meal and my mascara has mysteriously travelled from my eyelashes to my cheeks, but the wedding is over, and it was beautiful.

Here is a note to all single women looking to survive a wedding of one of your best friends. I've here compiled a brief list of the essentials. Be sure to include as many as possible, if not all these items.

1) It's cliché and I apologize for it, but at least a few kleenex. I'm not a big crier, truly I'm not, but let me tell you -when you see your friend coming down that aisle on the arm of the man who used to drive you home from sleepovers cut short because you were homesick, it would take a cold, cold heart not to shed a few tears.

2) A practiced, I-could-kill-you-with-my-eyes stare for all of the well-meaning, slightly overweight, entirely over-permed women who will inquire with saccarine sweetness when you're getting married. Or even worse, if you have children yet.

3) Band-aids. Ladies, one of the only things that's going to make the night worthwhile for you is busting some serious moves on that dance floor and your feet will need some extra care after the inevitable in-between-courses rendition of Brown Eyed Girl.

4) Tylenol. You're going to drink. A lot. And after about 11 p.m. you're going to trade in that red wine glass for some serious hard alcohol. Your head with thank you for it.

5) Single guy friends who love to dance.

6) Single guy friends who hate to dance and will be willing to sit with you as you shovel yet another chocolate-covered strawberry down your throat, telling him in between bites all the fabulous plans you have for your life now that you don't have to share it with anyone. It also helps if said single guy friend will actually believe you, or fiend belief as you relay this information.

7) Lovely, fuzzy pyjamas to come home to. Maybe top off with a nightcap, to congratulate yourself on a job really, really well done.

I’ll take the trees

I get razzed sometimes for living on the West Island, but as I went for a walk in my new neighborhood last night, I realized why I like living where I do so much.

There is a maple tree on one of the streets near me that is so massive, its owners have attached all these wild-looking cables to keep its branches from flopping over. It takes up practically the entire lawn, and I can just picture the kids who live there hiding underneath that incredible tree when it rains, the thousands of green leaves shielding their baseball-capped heads from getting wet.

The lawn is a little overgrown, a few dandelions dot the front yard, and yet instead of invoking judgments of laziness, these bright yellow weeds and long grass seem to say to passersby, ‘sorry, I was too busy enjoying a beautiful afternoon in the pool, with my friends and family to bother about lawn care.’ And I like this.

I also like the fact that I am about 142 steps from a little corner store that sells fat-free (come on, 97% is as good as) Haggen Daaz vanilla frozen yogurt. Yes, it’s $6 a pop, but when it’s that good, who’s counting?

What it should look like

Yesterday, Eileen and I went to the waterslides, something I haven’t done in at least eight years. So, we packed up a cooler, slathered on the sunscreen and headed out to Super Aqua Club.

At one point, as we were waiting to get on one of the slides, I noticed a little girl standing in an adjacent line, and I turned and said to Eileen, ‘don’t you ever wish you were seven again?’ to which she replied, ‘what, so I could wear a bikini with my tummy hanging out, and not have a care in the world?’

I think it sounds pretty good.

And then it changes

I was recently voted in to join a board of directors for a women's shelter. I had my first meeting at the home yesterday. As I walked through the communal kitchen, as I navigated my way through bruised faces and sunken eyes, crying babies and open jars of mashed pears, it made me feel more than a bit silly for yesterday's post.

Being married is not the goal. Helping other women, young old, wealthy and strikingly poor, work their way out of painful and destructive relationships is a much better one, and a much better place to direct one's energy.

A wedding story

One of my closest friends is getting married next Saturday afternoon. My bridesmaid dress, shoes and jewelry are all ready to go, and if the sunshine cooperates this weekend, as it’s scheduled to do, I should have something resembling a suntan to go with the ensemble. So, on the outside, I will look the part. But on the inside, I know I will be standing at the alter, watching this girl, this woman I’ve known since I was 8, embark on a whole new life, a life away from me.

No, she’s not moving. She will be living in the same house she and her fiancé bought nearly two years ago now. And, being the friend she is, I know there will always be a well-worn spot on her couch for me (although I now have to share this space with a little Boston Terrier, but I think we’re getting used to each other). We will still have movie nights, we will still sit out on her deck until all hours of the night drinking cheap rosé wine and munching on low-fat wheat thins smothered in garlicky humus. The only thing that will be different is the pervasive and sinking realization that she has reached the next stage in her life, while I continue to feel like I’m still trying to grasp the basics.

Oh, I know. Being married should not stand as a hallmark of achievement for a woman. I realize and on some primary, instinctual level, even believe this to a certain degree. I’m content with the things I’ve done in my life. I’ve been fortunate enough to do some interesting travel, I have a university degree, a good job that I love. I have fantastic friends, a supportive family. I know that many of the things I’ve done, I likely would not have were I already married. And yet, it’s the uncertainty. The not knowing whether or not I will end up with a husband, house and kids, or a condo, cat and houseplants. And it’s scary. I would be telling a tall tale if I said this didn’t frighten me, and on particularly bad nights, keep me awake.

We single women tout the same lines, sing the same song, recycle the same assurances to one another as though these bits of hand-me-down wisdom were anchors in a severe rain storm. “You’ll meet someone when you least expect it, you’re better off by yourself anyway, you need to be alone, you’re too good for him, he wasn’t right for you…neither was he.” Yet, as we marry off our friends, one by one, our faith in these beliefs, if they can be called that, wanes. We watch our friends build happy and fulfilling lives with their partners and magically, their creativity isn’t suddenly and shockingly stifled, they don’t lose sight of themselves or their goals, they don’t even really change all that much, except they don’t always feel a need to be out in some bar on a Saturday night. And to watch this, time and time again, chips away at the single woman’s confidence that she’s better off alone. Maybe she’s not.

Perhaps it’s the experience of having a very-long term relationship crumble around my knees. Maybe it’s hearing, ‘Heather, you’re such a swell gal, oh, oh, excuse me but… there’s something on the bottom of my shoe, could you pass me a Kleenex or something…man, it’s on there like GLUE….it seems to be…oh, it’s…it’s stuck…what IS that? Oh, oh wait a minute now….oh, Heather that’s your HEART, oh, I’m sorry…please forgive me.’ one too many times. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m going to my friend’s wedding alone. What I do know, however, is that it can be difficult for a woman in her twenties to feel good about being single, especially when there are so many positive examples of wonderful relationships right under your nose.

And so, next Saturday, at 3 p.m. I will walk down the aisle, in my yellow satin dress and stand beside my friend as she enters married life. And I will be happy, really and truly happy for her. But when the wine starts flowing and my feet start to swell from my high-heeled shoes, when I’ve eaten so much wedding cake that my dress feels tighter than it should and the couples with kids are long gone, I might take a minute and feel a little sad for myself when I realize that when I go home, it won’t be to pack for my honeymoon. It will be to go home alone.

I’m getting a cat.

Metropolis mayhem

I went to the Martha Wainwright concert at the Jazz Fest last weekend. There are not many artists I’m willing to herd myself into a crowd of sweaty, slightly drunken fans for, but Martha is one of them.

So, I’m standing in my little carved-out space at the Metropolis, and the opening act, this whistling-violin-guitar playing guy Andrew Bird comes on. Now, this guy can really belt out a tune with his whistling antics. It was impressive. What was NOT as impressive, was the man standing beside (practically on top?) of me. The-backpack-toting-I’ve-already-had -about -15+ beers-and-it’s-only-7:30-and-yes-you-had-better-well-hope-I-don’t-have-a-mean-case-of-dandruff-because-there-is-going-to-be-a-lot-of-mad-head-shaking-going-on-in-this-corner man to my immediate left was problematic from the get-go.

First off, he made what I will, in all fairness label a strong attempt at mimicking the whistling from Andrew Bird. However, as is the case with anyone who doesn’t know a song off by heart, it’s impossible to sing directly in synch with the lyrics, because you don’t KNOW THEM YET. So buddy next to me is whistling notes totally off cue, and it’s maddening. When Martha does finally come on stage, it becomes immediately apparent that the real show is going on right beside me.

Buddy is screaming his head off. He’s throwing his hands around, the backpack smashing into his neighbours, the dandruff flying wildly. No one is looking at the stage, everyone is looking at my bosom buddy. And yet, his friends, the five or so people with him, are apparently oblivious, and every half hour or so tap him gently on the shoulder and say, ‘Wannanother beer, Steve?’ (I truly deserve serious accolades for the heroic restraint I demonstrated in not ripping that plastic cup from his hand when the tally crept upwards of 20).

But, it made me realize something. No matter how crazy someone is, no matter how much he drinks, yells, or how little he washes his hair, that someone will still have friends who love him. That even though each of those friends was delivered a blow to the stomach from the backpack, and one even got a fist to the head when Steve-O felt the need to show hearty appreciation for a song, they never let him know just how irritating he was. They shrugged their shoulders when met with angry, frustrated glances from other concert-goers, and tapped Steve affectionately on the shoulder when he took a sip of his beer. But most of all, they made sure he had a good time, Steve-style.

Now. If that’s not friendship, I ask you, what is?

One in every bunch

So, I'm taking a summer class. To say I embarked on this venture with the sole, noble intention of gaining further insight into Quebec's political system would be a lie. I have vain hopes of getting myself into a grad program and I need the credits.

But why, oh why, does there have to be one of THOSE GUYS in the class? You know the kind I'm refering to -the guy who sits in the front row, waving his arm around wildly in the air, the guy who won't let the professor finish a complete sentence without offering up his own, twisted interpretation? The guy so hopped up on coffee that the hand in the air twitches with nervous anticipation, and as the minutes tick by and his hand grows numb with all the frantic flapping, he starts to bounce up and down rapidly in his seat, driving all other students to complete and utter distraction?

A message to that guy: Students don't pay to listen to you. Please, put your hand down, and for the love of all things sacred, stay the hell away from anything caffeinated.

Why the airline industry has sunk to a new low

Asian airlines are lobbying for standing room only tickets on some of their flights.

Despite that this clearly flies in the face of the safety regulations we’ve all learned to abhor (How many times do I have to watch an overly made-up flight attendant show me how to fasten the seatbelt I’ve already been wearing for a half hour, I mean really), it implies an almost vile, capitalist mentality. Apparently, SRO passengers will be strapped to a padded wall for the duration of the voyage, like cattle. The $5 pillows and lack of edible food on flights was enough. But this? Where, oh where do we draw the line? Will the next cost-cutting measure see passengers forced to pedal the plane, invoking reminiscences of old Flinstones cartoons?

And don’t even get me started on the ‘density reformation program’ North American airlines are embarking upon.