Return of the Sun

Prelude to summer. It's been a month since the escape. What now?

Life will wait for you, sometimes

I should be studying. How many times in my life have I said that? How many times in the last year, week, hour... Put my head down, dig those heels into the soil, do the task bare in front of me. I care about my work. It matters to me. I know this now, as the haze and perversity of the past years recedes. But then why does it feel like life is slipping by?

Been so busy jumping through hoops. Did I not notice?

I read old posts. The last one is from just over half a year ago. Bright summer.

Next slide.

My own state: growing tired of the anxiety, the weight on my chest. But just push on for another few months. Just in time to feel optimistic again for another positive July blog post. I'm lucky.

And in the mean time... we are losing our loved ones. The hospital trips increase in frequency. I see people in their exit years all day everyday at work, but it doesn't prevent me from seeing the age spreading on the faces of my peers, my friends, my chosen family. I reflect on the lives that have come into mine for a time and moved on. And everything is moving on.

I realize that all my music mentors have died, or retired, or disappeared. Even the man who used to fix my violin and re-hair my bow is retiring.

And I'm left wondering, questioning whether any of it ever happened.

And I'm trusting, or rather I've been trusting that life will be there waiting, when I'm done with this obstacle course. But despite my age, I'm only just beginning.. just now beginning to see it. To see that life doesn't wait for any of us.

If I could, I would hold onto all of you forever. I'd preserve you... just as perfect as you are right now. I'd sing always. We'd all get lost together in dreams on Thursday nights at the Wired Monk. I'd learn all those languages, translate my grandmother's thoughts and memories. We'd watch the sunset and sunrise everyday. And everyday would be always.

On A Night Long Ago

Recently I came across this poem, buried for over a decade. Amused in an embarrassed mind, regarding the solid colours of my then emotions, but also cherishing those unplanned moments when passion blinded judgement, and pen made permanent my fears. I do remember.

_________________________________________

My slightly open window pouring out
Into the void, black night of summer air,
And all my thoughts are her.
The darkness speaking silence.
But all my youthful being begs for answers,
Just to know
     Will she be safe, all those years
     The fear of dark felt harm on her seizes my chest
     Will she find something that she'll smile at
     Her eyes are not meant for stinging tears
     But laughter, dancing brightness, child's joy
     Will she have that
     Will she hurt
     Will she grow hard to eat that hurting stone
     Will she be driven deep into the cave of isolation
     Will she feel alone
Tell me no, tell me never
Tell me that crazy world where she is headed will not poison her,
  Will not stab or scar her, will not do her harm
Tell me she will be fine
  And that she'll grow in all the ways she seeks
  Some ways I may not understand, but she so much desires
Tell me she will always feel my love for her
  And that its endless threads will wrap her warm at night
Tell me, night, that hence you will look after her
Tell me, oh please tell me, she'll come back to me,
  And that somehow some distant night like this,
  She will rest,
  We will rest, in each other's arms again,
  Safe together from the chilling world beyond the window.
Tell me.
But this silence,
Only silence.

Open Those Eyes

Always bouncing back and forth between perspective and focus.

I'm lured into focussing on recent events. But I fear losing perspective. But then, doesn't perspective just make everything seem less important?

An Hour's Difference

I've recently been reminded, if you change the time at which you head out to work in the morning by just one hour, the city, the world is entirely different. Quiet streets are bustling. Dark is light. Cool is hot. People look different, dress different, move different. Everyday the trek to work, the brief glimpse outside of home and destination is just a snapshot of the world. That snapshot colours my entire belief about where I live. And it can so easily be changed.

Unchained

The weekend before last, I finished my last call shift for the next two years and the last in-hospital overnight call for life, potentially. Being on call is something we expect to get used to. Five years of arranging every aspect of one's life around a minimally flexible call schedule is enough to orient one's attitude to living life that way. And while many in this profession will continue to do so, I am treated to a two year escape from it. A return to life amongst the people around me. To remember how to manage the responsibility of being the one deciding how I will use my time. To learn how to be a person to the people I care about. Every family reunion skipped, every friend in distress neglected, each wedding invitation declined, each acquaintanceship allowed to wither is because I decide it so, no longer simply because the hospital beckons and pulls on the chain around my neck. In this moment of rapid transition, I'm caught with the fear that it was never the hospital or the chain at all, but only my own nature that has kept me apart. Goal: show myself that to not be true. For years now, feeling useless to care outside the hospital walls, but now... this chance to balance, to care for those within the walls who need it, and to care for those outside the walls who have long cared about me. Seize it, take it and run. Dwell no longer on the past and those who cannot forgive me for it. Cherishing those hearts and joys that have endured through, and opening my own eyes to more to come.

Old And New

I am just a little mystified by the comparison between old friends and new. And the last few weeks have highlighted the contest. There is such a comfort in falling into the company of those people who know you, have known you, seem like they will always know know. There's not the slightest urge to impress them, you know you never could by now. Their impressions of you have already grown such long roots, another single day's gusts will not topple them nor lift them skyward. There's comfort in discovering reciprocated motionless affection can persist the decade, though the persons themselves may be distant at times, closer at times. The dynamic between any people is transient, but gratitude and the acknowledgement that significance once occurred can be permanent. An unexpected phone call from the east coast. A lingering chat under the rain creeping in. A meet-up after half a year without face time. And I'm reminded of my own good fortune.

But the new face. The vanity that goes along with it, curious what the other sees when looking in our direction. Which is funny. A new audience today doesn't suddenly make me anything different than I was yesterday. So why do we wonder? Maybe because it actually does change us. Maybe, because we identify ourselves partly by how we relate to our world, when a new face arrives and is allowed to enter, it changes our world just enough for us to re-evaluate ourselves. I've often felt before - the difference between knowing someone and not knowing is a universe. Plainly, today I know someone I didn't know yesterday. And as a result life is different today than it was yesterday.

The mysterious woman who sat down across from me at Starbucks, with whom I ended up discussing career, dreams, family, love, and hope. A complete stranger and in the span of a few hours a friend. Never to meet again. But never the same from the encounter.

The manically forward custodian who leapt in front of me, only to start whistling classical masterpieces to me. He confessed to being a championship whistler in Europe. Detained here in Vancouver only a few more months before being reunited with his family. He really was an excellent whistler. Passionately preaching to me the importance of doing what I love, being who I am, and embracing people. He made me late for my meeting, but I could only interpret him as a godsend. He lifted me.

Open Eyes

And a day spent in the sun, walking the city. Thankful for the sun. Thankful for the infinite sky. For coffee art. For public art, both appealing or not. For digitized marine life. For the power of a new face to teach me something new about all of it, and about myself. For unknowingly helping me realize I'm opening my eyes again, looking, thinking, and wanting to do something with it. And with the nostalgic feel of depressing the shutter button, the sharp snap of the shutters, knowing it's time to pick up my camera off the shelf again.

Photo taken courtesy of a Canon Rebel, not my usual. My trusted friend, my old Nikon, isn't it time we got together again?

Reaffirm

There isn't a photo to accompany this entry.

It's been exactly 10 months since my last post. As time goes on, I seem to have less to say. Or maybe life has been good, and my mind has been content. So there's been no need to question the existence of the universe on blogspot.

The Olympics are upon Vancouver, and downtown is a non-stop party zone. In particular, I notice more street performers, roads exclusively for pedestrians, and longer line ups for everything. The line up for Japadog on Burrard and Smithe is nearly a whole block long. It's fun. Festive. Cities, crowds, and parties have a way of altering our calibration of worth. How else could people be convinced to stand in line for 40 minutes for a hotdog.

And I like this. I am touched by life when something, anything, means so much.

It was a little over 10 years ago I decidedly left behind a music career. And though, despite all my whining, I do not regret my last decade of choices and actions, it grows more and more apparent with each nightfall that I cannot leave behind that part of me. If I ever had any skill with a musical instrument, it's long left me. I'll sing to myself in the alley. If I lose my voice, I will still stamp my hands and feet. Take that away, and I'll still hear the world in my head. I don't know how to feel alive otherwise.

So let me promise myself... that I will not let myself lose touch again.

The Search for Meaning

Coffee.

It's everywhere. Money.

There's so much, it spills. Garbage. Back and forth and all along the streets.

The man is holding out his hat on the corner of Robson and Thurlow, smacking his lips, shifting from foot to foot as if he needs to pee, asking for money. or coffee? or garbage.

And I'm drinking it, sitting right inside.

They walk back and forth. Pretty clothes. Eye shadow and BMWs. Armani and Lululemon. The sun is shining today. Across the street, a girl is strumming her guitar and singing her own songs, selling her CDs. No one is buying. There is a recession, isn't there. Out in front of the Art Gallery, it is now late evening, a young dude masked by his hair and sunglasses, belts out songs in Japanese, a crappy amp broadcasting his earnest simple guitar chords. His voice is ugly, but in tune. People walk by, look. Freak. He doesn't care.

I am touched.

A moment ago, a display for the "Canadians for Democracy in Iran." Lots of text and graphic shots. I remember the anti-abortion displays on UBC campus. images of extracted fetuses next to canadian quarters. A bus drives by with "tax deductible mortgage plans" advertised along the top.

Today at the hospital we discuss a man who was started on hemodialysis, then diagnosed with metastatic pancreatic cancer. The dialysis will prolong his life from weeks to months. Family wants the dialysis to continue. We would never have started dialysis on a man with metastatic pancreatic cancer. He wants every bit of time he can get, even if it means being needled and made hypotensive every other day, and spending his remaining days on a hospital acute care ward, instead of in his home.

Choices.

I hear about a bombing in a part of the world I've never seen. That I probably wouldn't accurately locate on a map. When was the last time I even looked at a map of the world. Everybody seems to care about the green planet these days. Even on my coffee cup, there's a reminder to be green.

Green is the colour of envy. Green in the face, right before you vomit.

I know someone. She's been cheated on at least twice by the same guy. She doesn't leave him. She sees the good, the potential, the hope. Loyalty? Optimism. The best endure the worst. The hematologist at the hospital confesses in a brief moment of self-pity, "if you're nice, you get left with more work." If you're kind and forgiving, you get wounded more.

As I sit here, I worry I've lost all my friends. Because I didn't work hard enough to hold them. Did I work at all?

But isn't there something more important?

The girl in front is reading through her ALDO receipt.

Isn't there something else?

People dying for stupid reasons. People dying for no reason. Esprit having a sale. It was a great show. I got a raise. Tonight is parent-teacher night. That cake looks delicious. We should have coffee sometime. Am I gaining weight? Will private school ruin my child? We've lost our appreciation for reality.

What do you care about? Why do I care? Do I...

This is not life.

This is not life.

But...



I'm in love. And it's entirely inside me.
Everything that matters is here and there. And nowhere else.

all the people

i want to spill my insides out. it's never appropriate.

this is victoria. here till the end of january. working on a cardiology hospital ward. days start at 6:30 and end at 6:30. when i'm not there, i'm here: starbucks. endless 2hr internet. and the days go by.

i want to tell you i love you. yes... i still love you. i love that your forgave me over and over again as i grew up. i remember the tears you wept as she scolded me, so hurt to know your son had lied to you. because i am a liar. i love that you always loved me, never stopped believing i was a good person. even after i lied to you.

and i still love the memory of my younger years. i remember walking through the cold. satchan, so cold, but refusing to wear a coat. it was like you wanted to shiver. just to feel it. and you are still my sister. our separate different lives. our twice a year correspondence. but still sincere. i never had the chance the tell you, and you will likely never be reading this, but when we saw mrs. wilson for the last time, i'm glad we were there together. to know that the last time she saw us, we stood beside each other. like old times.

mrs. wilson. i owe you so much. and yet so much that i owe you, i've lost in recent years. my mother believed i was good natured. and you believed i was talented, that i was inspired. you raised me too, from the first day i picked up a violin, so fearful of so many things... till i was old enough for you to confide in. to tell me you were dying. and as we publicly celebrated your retirement, alone i knew you'd soon be gone. a secret. for me to watch you die. just as i was commencing my medical career. loss is the first lesson. your memory makes me want to be talented and inspired, just as you believed i was.

mr. polson, i didn't make it to your funeral. i haven't forgiven myself yet. you gave me more credit than i deserved. you believed in my shostakovich. you'd be so disappointed with my scales now.

ilya, i didn't nurture our friendship. you were right. "missed opportunities." i never told you, but i always feared offending you. you have passion. i never wanted to risk disagreeing. maybe that made me stay distant.

brian, when you moved in, i stopped coming home. i'm not good with sharing a home with other people. but over the course of our years, the indications of your presence became so important. you saved all my friendships. you needed no more and no less space than me. you helped me escape toronto when i had no one else left to turn to. and i have no other roommate in my heart hereafter.

and keith, you know me too well for my own comfort. our vices are too similar. we see the ugly side. and laugh of it. you'll be there when i've fucked up big. you've been there each time. it's silly that i still prop up the pride i do before you. you see everything on the other side.

ge, you don't read these blogs. especially if there's so much text. but i love you too. we're connected not by choice, but by blood. but that doesn't stop you from being my hero. my fortress wall. you've wisdomed my life for my whole life. you work harder than anyone i know. and remind me what's important. your compliments are validation. my violin practice always went to shit when you walked in the room. that's how much your opinion has always mattered. i try to be smart. but in the end, i just need to please. and now... you know my darkness. you know my despair, even though we don't talk nearly as much as everyone expects us to.

i'm a broken body. a fractured mind. a sappy heart.
i'm not a kid anymore. i'm an adult. i don't know myself any better. i just have a larger shoebox of memories. my shoes are holed.

i met a girl. i fell in love. and now... because she wants me, i start wondering what 'me' is. and i realise i don't know. everything i think is something, it turns out to be just a cover for some other embarrassing emotion or fear. or a learned behavior from a strong memory of hurt. running away.

this is victoria. i'm here for another week and a half. working on a cardiology ward. the days start and end. i'm here. wherever that is.

tell me... where are you? where are you.. do you know something more? i've given you everything inside.