Busy Break

I've bit a bit of a mess since I've gotten back from Canada for winter break. As usual, I had an allergic reaction to my parent's house, which seems to have morphed into a proper chest cold. I'm sleeping lots, and hacking up an ungodly amount of unpleasantness. It doesn't help that it was a really busy break - there was lots to do and see and people to spend time with, so my amount of quality down-time was pretty low. There was even a surprising amount of late nights. My sleep deficit, I have to say, probably hasn't improved much since I finished classes in December. As a result, I find myself being reluctant to leave my bed before 1:30PM.

I'm pretty out of it.

But with precious few days left before classes resume, the pressure is mounting. There's homework to do, and I think my long list of things to write/blog about needs to be addressed before it becomes too late to address them. And, oh boy, it just happens to be the perfect tool for procrastinating my school work just a little bit longer.

This winter break was... Fragmented. Splintered, even. People coming and going all the time. The only time my entire family was together was for my sister's wedding, so we didn't even get time alone as a family. It's kind of a shame, but it's also life. Everyone (yours truly excluded) now has a significant other of some sort, complete with plans and obligations of their own. Which, don't get me wrong, is pretty great. It just starkly illuminates the fact that we're all moving on, and the core family I grew up in is no longer the family that takes priority. Oh life. You're so... Relentless.

I visited my home town first. I dropped in to see my high school IT professor, who I got pretty close to during my senior year there. I try to drop in whenever I have the chance, which is about once every 2-3 years. It's just a basic check-in and catch up, but I can tell he appreciates it. And for the support he gave me through my time at that school, it's the least I can do.

The stars somehow managed to align so that I could spend a day with an old friend that I probably hadn't seen in... Seven or eight years. Shaun. We went on some pretty divergent paths... Him getting married and working up north, getting divorced, and now living off of employment insurance back in the Greater Vancouver Area with a new girlfriend. Apparently, they don't share any common ground in terms of what they watch, so they mounted two 50" TVs side-by-side in the living room with headphones. He also told me that he loves customer service and working or interacting with random people. It was good catching up. He was always kind of a quirky dude.

I stayed with my sister's family (her, my awesome brother-in-law, and their ~1 year old girl) for most of my time there. I haven't really been that close to them before, but it was good to be around them and play with my niece. She's a cute kid. My sister and her husband are really polar-opposite people in some regards, though, and it's neat to see how well they compliment eachother.

My younger sister had a wedding between Christmas and New Years, which was announced 5-6 weeks before it happened (that's a story in and of itself). It was small, maybe 20 or so people were there (about 16 of which were from my side of the family). On one hand, I liked how intimate and simple it was... But on the other, it didn't feel like a wedding. At my sister's request, I played the photographer. I hated it. I hate shooting people. Can't stand it. I pretty much did candid stuff from the sidelines while various other relatives handled the formal shots, but still. I don't quite have the skill for it, and it shows. Alas, my sister and new brother-in-law seemed happy, and that's what counts. More power to 'em.

My brother, who was practically my best friend growing up, was pretty busy this year with his serious girlfriend and her two daughters. I got to spend a bit of time with him, hanging out and baking for an evening and shopping for a day. I later taught him how to drive stick in his gf's car. On previous breaks, we'd hang out a long and I'd always hang out at his place, but... Things have changed of course, and the time we spent together felt more like a token of what we used to do. Life marches on, and it's the end of an era. Kind of a bummer, but that's how it works.

I spent a little bit of time with my father, going for lunch together and hanging out at the elementary school where he works for a short time. It's quite something to see him at work... I feel like his profession has always been a total mystery to me, despite the fact that he was working at all the elementary school's I've ever attended as a child. A week or so after that, the two of us went out kayaking together on a calm, cool BC lake. The air was crisp as we meandered to the mouth of the river and back. At one point, there was a pair of bald eagles flying and calling to eachother. It's a pretty magnificent sound, and one I had almost forgotten was a part of every day life when I used to live in a northern native fishing village. Being on the lake, in nature like that... So beautiful and vast and calm and perfect... Unbelievable.

After coming back from kayaking, I sat down with my mom to learn about the traditional craft of Ukrainian egg decorating. It's something she'd always done as a hobby, and it was pretty fascinating to really engage with her about it. She stopped as I was becoming a teenager and picked it up again after I had left home, so what I knew of it was primarily childhood impressions. Sure, it was neat to see it again and fully comprehend the process. But as someone who has recently become an artiste, it was a real treat to witness the process first-hand (and participate - she showed me how to create my own). Even moreso, it was truly incredible to properly appreciate the skill and craft my mother possessed, that I had never really been overly aware of before. My family is full of left-brained professionals (librarians, IT admins, teachers, etc), and I've always kind of wondered how I ended up being the only one involved in a creative field. Little did I know that that was already present in our home from the get-go.

I feel like I'm getting to know my parents as people, not just my parents. Slowly, mind you. In a way it makes me really happy to connect with them more as peers, but at the same time it's heartbreaking to realize they're not quite the infallible, bullet-proof guardians you thought they were. We're all human, apparently.

Then I flew to Calgary. I should pause for a second and mention that ALL of this was possible because my aunt and uncle offered to fly me there to hang out for the entirety of the break. I made a counter-offer that if I were to fly to my original BC hometown for Christmas, they could fly me to Calgary for New Years and then back to New York afterwards. That's what they settled on, and it was a pretty cool thing they did for me. I was planning on staying alone in NY for the duration of the break, and I'm soooo glad I could spend Christmas at home and see my aunt/uncle/cousins for New Years.

We did... A bit of everything together. We cooked and ate some good food, helped my sister and her new husband move in together, went out for my belated birthday mystery international cuisine dinner (quite possibly my favourite tradition ever - we ended up doing Portuguese this year), did some bowling, I put in some gaming with my cousin, played the uke with my uncle, went skating with my aunt, and generally hung out. For New Years, we went skating out on a pond and played the customary Beatles Rock Band to usher in 2014. It was good stuff. I've been told "But you could've spent New Years in Time Square!!!!", which while true... Isn't even remotely worth that time spent with my uncle's family.

At one point I was talking with my uncle and aunt, and remarked how my uncle was a semi-father-type figure after I first moved to Calgary, helping me with car stuff and all around common sense skills and knowledge I hadn't acquired yet. He was quick to correct me, saying that I was like the younger brother he never had. We spent a morning out together, getting breakfast and then getting a killer straight razor and hot-towel shave. It was at the Best of Seven Barbers, supposedly one of the best shaves in Canada (which, for the record, was a damn fine experience). He referred to me as his 'friend' to the various people we interacted with during that morning. Again, it was one of those cool moments where I was drawing closer to someone not as a relative, but as a peer.

While I was in Calgary, I also managed to hang out at the office for a day, where I rubbed elbows with a few old co-workers and even more new ones. I also spent most of a day with a close friend/coworker, which was... Bittersweet. Then before I left, I managed to even go for a quick breakfast with a classmate that was in town before going back to Scotland to continue her Master's program.

And then I flew back to New York on a hellish day of plugged sinuses, exhaustion, delays, and transfers. I was so desperate to get home at the end of it all that I bought a public transit ticket, and after not being able to find the proper bus to get on I paid another fair to board the express shuttle that was about to depart in front of me. The last few days have been a smear of coughing and miserable sleep, with bouts of lucidity and brief productivity inbetween.

Right now I'm feeling pretty lonely. I miss all those people I left behind in Calgary, and all the family in BC. I miss all those kind souls I care about. It was pretty jarring to go from a setting where loving people were waiting, expecting to see me and hang out... To landing in a giant city full of people, none of which even know I exist, and wouldn't even care if they did know.

I was lonely when I first arrived in the summer, too, but then I was so busy and overwhelmed I didn't have time to articulate it and notice it was there. And now here it is. I'm sure I'll settle back into things and be fine within a few weeks as classes pick up. But at the same time, knowing that it'll get better doesn't necessarily make it easier. That's the frustrating part - having perspective and experience doesn't really make the current (and temporary) discomfort less distracting and more comfortable.

I have this certain desperation building in my head, where I feel like the people I care about are among the most important things I have in my life, and I don't want to miss out on them, or lose those friendships and connections. I gotta get back to Canada. Screw working in New York, I gotta get back home where I can be with the people that matter.

I know that's the loneliness talking, and I'm sure it'll fade off soon enough. But still... There are people in my life I'm glad I know, and I don't want to stop having them in my life.
-Cril

David Newman - Funeral/Rebuilding Serenity