Here’s a recording of my dear friend Lookens singing one of his compositions, “I’m looking for a friend today.” And a picture of us improvising some kalimba music in my kitchen a year ago, on February 16, 2022. Today is Valentine’s day, the 14th, and my thoughts can’t help but turn to love, to mon amour, Loulou, one of the greatest friends I was blessed to have, for about 8 years of my life. He died on February 21 last year.
Life can be lonely, right? I mean, even surrounded by other people, we all have those moments of unbearable solitude. Moments when we feel so isolated or disconnected from others. And when the absence of others is a void that’s hard to bear.
Z has started at his new school. GO. He’s in the same class as his best friend L, who has the same name as the nice secretary who helped us do the paperwork to get him in, and M, his frenemy or maybe his future best friend. His teacher seems kind and told us she doesn’t assign homework. BONUS.
I put the remaining boxes on the curb for recycling so it’s starting to feel like 85% of setting up this new home is done. Can I STOP obsessively tidying and organizing and get on with the real WORK NOW? WRITING & MUSIC-MAKING.
Today the caps lock key keeps Accidentally activating DUE TO MY BANDAGED MIDDLE FINGER and I’m letting it tell me what IT WANTS. Sometimes it autocorrects itself sometimes it doesn’t. Today, IT SMELLS LIKE CAT SHIT HERE though it may be the bowl of Life cereal beside me or does everything just smell like cat shit for real? Mental note to further investigate source of smell.
The inside of my mouth still preoccupies me. My geographic TONGUE tastes and feels everything acutely, including the slightly acidic taste of my mouth and the gaping hole where the two teeth were removed last week. Mental note to email DENTIST FOR X-rays so I can get a SECOND OPINION on whether or not I Truly do need to spend $2000 for another curettage and subsequently visit my dentist every 3 months for the REST OF MY DAYS as he claimed during my last visit. Mental note to watch T’s recommended YouTube video of ex-dentist’s prescribed regime for maintaining most optimal PH-balance for saliva and to pick up some apple cider vinegar tablets for general optimal health. Also, to email dental clinic to send me the X-rays so I can go shop around for a second opinion. My dentist is too handsome, gay and charming and so very smooth and quick to print out a bill, schedule a next appointment. He also appears to love inflicting pain a little too much, although he also feigns sensitivity. Dentists are professional scam artists who prey on people like me who are both poor and full of bad habits they feel guilty about.
Before the endless mental to-do list surges and overwhelms your mind, THINK OF SOMETHING ELSE TO WRITE ABOUT.
Dreams. My dreams lately have been more vivid. I remember dreaming last night that Maman sent me bedsheets in the mail, that my siblings were gathering around a table of food and all of this made me feel happy. That I visited my old place and C. was busy painting it lilac and M. was telling me she was going to move in once the health regulator inspected and approved it.
Although it is sometimes logistically challenging to live without Internet, now that it’s been over a week, I see how much influence it has on our lives and choice of activities. Z. has rediscovered Lego and rainbow-looming, since video gaming is no longer an option and I’ve rediscovered reading and writing because I can’t numbly scroll through social media posts. Wifi’s supposed to get installed here on Wednesday but I pledge to set much stricter online & screen-time boundaries from now on.
The trick with Z. is to include myself in rules. Any rules or goals I set I have to follow as well. That way he won’t feel that they’re hypocritical and he’ll enjoy the challenge of following them more if we have to face it together. Hope I am right about this.
I must get ready to go to Café Moustache and work on Internet-reliant things. Send emails and such. Work on final edits of gentrification podcast. Work on uploading first medicine podcast recording, work on an email to A. and H. to follow-up on last night’s Zoom art talk. Listen to latest the Radio Renoviction episode. Write to M. about organizing a spa day and write to C. about helping me drive stuff to Ecocentre.
That’s lots to get done, and it doesn’t include groceries, emails to Z’s new school and after school care, and probably more tasks I’m forgetting right now. The list really never ends. But blessed be this day of action. I’d rather have endless tasks than no tasks at all. It’s autumn, the lazy, hazy days of summer are done, time to get down to business again.
