I still have a blog, but everything’s different. First year is done and I’m living at home now. It feels weird going from the enclosed personalization of my dorm room to the open, nostalgia-inducing comfort zone of my childhood. But the size is the main difference. I feel like I’ve moved from the vault at a credit union to the vault at Fort Knox. One thing I won’t miss is the hallway. Every time I left my room, I’d stare down the long row of doors that is Nootka’s 4th floor and all I’d think of is The Shining. For some reason, when I walked down that corridor, I could swear that two twins were going appear in blood-stained shirts and torment me, saying such terrifying things as,
“Did you hear that Radiohead broke up?”
or
“Apparently M. Night Shyamalan is going to direct a sequel to The Shawshank Redemption.”
Wow, frightening stuff. One thing I’m very grateful for is that at home I’m given nutrition. A frightening realization I made within my first month in rez was that I was in charge of my own health. I always feared that, left to my own decisions, I’d eat myself into Jabba The Hutt, totally disregarding iron requirements, necessary vitamins, food pyramids, and other colour-coded nutritional information. So it became a chore to identify what was good for me and what was bad. Helpful hint: anything in bright packaging with a grammar-disregarding “z” is usually astonishingly bad for you. For example, I’m pretty sure cheezies, chicken wyngz, and sugar stikz are not part of a balanced meal. Anyway, I had to think of that stuff. And while it was one of many experiences that will prepare me for the rest of my mature life blah blah blah, there’s nothing like having mom there to give me what I need, like a Secret Service slipping the President some avocado because “I need the potassium.” Of course, I do sound a bit conceited relating myself to the President, but, who cares, it’s summer.
I have had some defining experiences since the end of term. Seeing Roger Waters’ The Wall show was the perfect opening ceremony into the unknown chasm that is summer. It rocked with gentle truths: that flashing lights were cool, that bravado and showmanship mattered, and that the solo in “Comfortably Numb” is one of the best of all time. While it might not have been the best concert in an emotional sense (that crown goes to Dan Mangan’s performance at the Alix Goolden Hall) or even in a purely musical sense (which would go to the two hours I saw Eric Clapton make sweet love to a guitar), it was the best in a sense of power. Leaving BC Place, I had the feeling that my soul had been shocked into overdrive, as if Roger Waters himself held the jumper cables to my heart, yelling out,
“If you don’t eat your meat, you can’t have any pudding! How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat your meat!?!”
In all honesty, I don’t know what this summer will hold for me. Maybe it’ll be a time for reflection and discussion, a time when the recess of the mind allows the fermentation of knowledge, when it delves into the deep abyss of my subconscious and identifies who I really am. Or it could just be lying on the couch watching Mad Men. In a perfect world, it might be a bit of both. So, as I write this from a kitchen table, staring at a badly framed replica Van Gogh my parents love, I bid you adieu, for now.
Ah, the first summer blog song. This would seem like the place where I’d post the new, hot song that all the kids are surfing to. However, I’m taking a bit of a different approach. Here’s James Vincent McMorrow with “This Old Dark Machine”. I hope you like it.