abaculus

There is an absolute storm raging in Vancouver as I type. The wind occasionally reminds me of its continual patrol of the neighbourhood by roaring outside my window every now and then, splattering sheets of rain onto the glass with additional force.

In the last year and a half I’ve been residing here, I’ve never heard the wind and rain go at the trees like this. A mild drizzle that people frequently complain about, I’m used to — but this? I was beginning to believe that Vancouver never storms, and, to borrow a consumerist phrase, I’m loving it. This is what rain should be like, buckets and buckets and buckets of it!

Come pouring right on down and let the winds whistle to their hearts’ content: I’m going to sleep like a babe tonight; this is what home feels like.

I’ve just gone through a list of 500+ contacts on my email list (and this is quite different to my Facebook list), cleaning out the vast majority of people I don’t need on there anymore.

Quite a significant number of contacts were those that were “one-off” emails: info at so-and-so websites, or people who got in contact for one event and I’ve never seen again. Others were people who have left their current situations and no longer use those old email addresses. A couple reminded me of long-ago embarrassing and painful times when you’ve sent emails you regret in the dead of night and in fits of emotion — yes, I can clear those out of my contacts list without hesitation.

Yet quite a lot were names that sounded vaguely familiar in ways I no longer remember, leaving me with the unsettling feeling of having troubled waters I cannot see the bottom of. Who were these people and what parts did they play in my life? I sat over one, struggling to remember where the name had come up before, and finally recalled a woman who had helped answer my questions about UBC before I came. That is one story I remember, but the rest are lost: I could search, but what would knowing them do? I no longer see these people; none of this really matters; I’m never going to talk to them again — but something inside me feels uneasy with this conclusion, because once upon a time, these people came into my life and did something, and I have forgotten it all. How much of life am I losing out on by the simple act of not remembering?

“Fall back, Spring forward,” someone quipped to me when teaching me how to adjust myself to Daylight Savings when I first got to Canada. I still don’t understand the point of Daylight Savings, but when the whole country’s doing it…

I have most unwillingly sprung forth today and lost myself a precious hour. There I am busy studying for my midterms this week, gazing outside the window at the random snow flurry we had, and thinking, “Hey, it feels like four o’clock.” Look at the clock: 6:05 PM. Argh, dinnertime! Begin flurry of simultaneous laundry and study and feeding of the self in hopes of regaining the two hours I thought I had. Strange, I usually have a pretty good sense of time — but no, Daylight Savings has mussed up my internal clock and it will take me a couple of days to adjust.

In the meantime, it’s multitasking to the max.