breathe

snow-tipped air
sharp in a throat
sore
from born-again smoking

glide
through the raw
red
circular slide

race through the
fractal map
of my dying lungs
charge through to
my bleeding heart
surge up to
my flailing brain

a rush of cool
of perfect
of fulfillment
of everything
and then
so quickly
it races away
hot,
tainted
bumping
and grinding
its way out of the pink

and then again
and
again
innnnn
and
ah
o
ooout.

his & hers

so ok, maybe i'm getting old...

but i tell ya, i'm sick to death of the avant-garde/post-modern/pre-i-don't-know-what inspiring bar and restaurant owners. specifically, i'm tired of having to spend valuable peeing time deciphering clever, genderless photos or symbols on bathroom doors.

ok, i can appreciate everyone wants to be clever, and hooray for them. really. i fully and heartily encourage cleverness and artfulness and creativity. but there's a limit, isn't there?

the other day, my friend alana and i were both fooled by the very effeminate pilot on the door to a toronto bar's washroom. it was only the (blessedly empty) urinals upon entry that gave away that this was no chick's washroom.

i know it doesn't matter for single-occupancy rooms, but what dude wants some chick walking in while he's talking to a man about a horse? or, for that matter, if he does happen to want it: what chick wants to be in that situation?

can we please just go back to good ol' fashioned "his and hers" logos that stodgy old fogeys like me can interpret? please??

(grin)

undeliverable mail

so i just tried responding to a "fan's" email after too many months, and alas the email account no longer exists. i'm really sorry for the delay in response... so anyway, "audrey hepburn"/pretty_1975, if you're still reading my words, here's my reply:

> is that your real name?

yes, kaen is my real name. well, it's short for "kathleen." some people got kate or kathy, i got kaen. and i love it!

> I am afraid to tell you where I live, for the fear of 'turning' you off
> completelty - I live in 'toronto' sad, but true.

i was really shocked to read this. i know i was really happy to be back in vancouver, but i'm dismayed that experiencing joy to be back there somehow had to translate into my disliking toronto. sure, there may be things i don't love about toronto, but there are things i definitely don't love about vancouver either. and there are also things i love about each city. and i do, i love toronto. i love the buildings, the mass, the amount of things going on and on and on. i even love the silly tower!! i'm sorry you don't seem to really like this city, and i'm even sorrier you somehow interpreted that i also dislike it.

anyway, hope yer doin well,
k)

gravy capital of canada

so i spent my summer months in drumheller, alberta.

a few quick facts:
- drumheller is located in the awe-full badlands of alberta, about an hour northeast of calgary (get it, awe-full? bad? get it? please note my geeky attempt at humour is in no way meant to imply the badlands are awful - they are in fact beautiful. stunning.)
- it is the "dinosaur capital of the world," and home of the world-class Tyrell Museum (that i never actually made it to, funny how those things happen)
- it has about 8,000 residents, according to their municipal website (http://www.dinosaurvalley.com/) but i find that hard to believe. i suspect many of these residents are the neo-gypsy "rig pigs" who work the oil fields for several months at a time before movin' on. either that, or they're all hiding in sub-terranean dwellings. either that, or 8,000 is a lot smaller than i think it is...
- it is a hole. i don't mean that in the deragotary, colloquial way - i mean it literally. to get to drumheller, you must descend, descend, descend into a valley until you are what feels like miles below the surface of the planet. it is, as such, the perfect place to hide out from the big, bad world up above.

months later, i look back on my time in drumheller as... a bit of a blur really. and in some ways, it feels as though i wasn't really ever there.

but boy, was i. i strolled its streets, giggling at the cement dinosaurs that grace almost every street corner, sometimes creating whole stories and lives for them. my favourites were the dalmation-asaurus that lived outside the firehall and the nerd-asaurus (complete with buck teeth).

i savoured the culinary feasts and foibles of pretty much every restaurant in town. my favourite was a greek restaurant that surpassed even some of the restaurants i went to in athens. oh those long slow evenings of lamb and retsina. it was also one of the few restaurants that didn't have a majority of its menu items topped with gravy. i'm telling you - drumheller may call itself the dinosaur capital of the world, but i will always know it as the gravy capital of canada.

i (we) had a sushi party in our fabulous "penthouse." (you'd need to see it to understand the humour. yes, it was on the top floor. yes, it was bigger than any other "suite" in the place. but no, it was not the kind of hotel that has "a penthouse.") anyway, our sushi party: we had discovered a beautiful little cafe run by a very charming japanese lady. noticing a few sushi items on the menu, we got to talking. well, we had to order a week in advance, but let me tell you, we had quite the little feast that night! we even found bottles of sake at one of the... i counted it once, was it 8? local liquor stores. anyway, we found sake and found sushi and found willing participants. it was a blast.

i recited passionate poetry at a local gathering of wordsmiths. drumheller may be a small town, but don't be an ignorant urbanite: people are inspired to create, even when not overshadowed by a city's buildings. yes, city-slickers, it's true. and no, it's not all hoaky. i heard some wonderful words, and smilingly sailed some wavelengths with the gentle residents of this hushed valley.

i met an avid amateur archaeologist. we'd noticed him one evening at a local pub, and we marvelled at what was surely the skinniest man either of us had ever seen. he was a mop-man: stick-thin with a mad mess of grey hair. later that evening, we stumbled upon and gathered around a table spread with his day's findings: bones, teeth, petrified wood, crystallized bits. he eagerly told us every detail about his findings and methods. fascinating, all of it. he was a diligent amateur, zealously reporting important finds to the local pros. he even had a dinosaur species named after him!

i met a palm-reader, a soul-seer who told me december would be a time of great happiness. as i prepare to spend it with my lover, it's possible this is what she was talking about. or maybe she was just drunk. either way, she was a sweet, shiny person and i was glad that she felt a desire to try to see my soul.

i took my visiting nephew to the reptile museum. with large smiles and wide eyes, we watched a host of slithery beasts. we marvelled over the wild colours, wild shapes, wild ways of these wild beings. and i lovingly watched him cower from the boa constrictor a staff member offered to wrap around his shoulders. (the boa a younger, sweet-faced, angel-haired girl eagerly embraced in his stead. hooray for the destruction of gender roles!!)

i hosted a salon. sort of. see, i was returning from 3 weeks in newfoundland and calgary. back in drumheller, i had lost my social momentum and needed to do a bit of soul-searching anyway, so just hid in our hotel room, writing instead of going out and reconnecting with/reinviting the friends i had made before disappearing for almost a month. so rather than being a bustling salon, it was an intimate evening with a local music-making duo. i'm listening to one of their songs as i type. it was exquisite, and rather than feeling disappointed with the small turnout, i was instead treated to a private concert by two gentle troubadours. it was a great night.

i met a chameleon-haired pixie. a group of us went to see a band one night and her wild dancing and freakish sexiness inspired me to dream up a burlesque troupe. i had several local gals interested, but again the trip to newfoundland truncated the momentum and then i just left a few weeks after coming back from that. so the burlesque troupe remained an unrealized fantasy. but perhaps some day, i will return to see it fulfilled.

and i even joined its working class. near the end of my sojourn, i decided that while i do like being a kept woman, i like being independent even more. so i got a job! i hesitated over the options. like the rest of alberta, drumheller was (is still?) in the throes of a staffing crisis. not only could you be sure to find a help-wanted sign in almost every window in town, some stores even had to cut their hours due to the staff shortage.

i chose to serve cup after cup after cup of coffee. i first did this at Diana, a chinese/"canadian" cuisine establishment. it seemed always moderately busy with nice enough folk. but mostly, i was drawn to the orange booths and flowery aprons. i mean hell, if you're gonna sling hash in a small town, may as well do it proper-like, ya know? well, unfortunately the OCD owner bitch-slapped any possible fun out of that experience. at the end of my first week, i found myself in a competing restaurant having breakfast. a few shared words with the waitress found me some sympathy ("oh, you don't want to work there") and a job offer.

so i started serving at Yavis, a family restaurant/pub. it was certainly a better job, but i never did make it over to the coolio pub side. i was instead trapped in family restaurant hell. when i got what would be my final schedule, it promised a week of 7 am shifts. although it would mean leaving my lover (until a more propitious time and locale found us?), it was not a difficult decision to load my shit into my visiting family's car, and hitch a ride back to vancouver.

and so my summer in drumheller came to a rather sudden, but not at all bitter end. thanks for an interesting blur of a summer, gravy capital of canada.

sugar crash

what a sweet time i've been having. as mentioned a few posts back, shortly after arriving back in vancouver i found a really great job. if you go to this website: katkam.ca, you can see where i spent the last days of summer. just past the beautiful Burrard Bridge, to the upper right of the photo, you'll see Vanier Park. in that vast, sweeping green glory, up til last wednesday, stood the tents of the Bard on the Beach festival.

what a beautiful place to spend my days! how many times did my breath catch as i beheld the bright blue of the ocean framed by lush green grass and majestic mountains? i got to spend the last weeks of summer working in a park where people go to fly kites and share picnics.

for three weeks, i worked as production assistant. it was great work! essentially the site's “caretaker,” i strolled the gorgeous grounds and even got the use a skill saw on several occasions. yea, power tools!!! and of course, what a thrill to be earning my keep in theatre. shakespeare may be a stretch from the indie theatre i tend to call home, but it's still theatre! wigs, costumes and props. stages and lights. and that sense of family. stalwart stage managers, wise-quipping actors and techies who can talk for hours about the finer points of control boards. and ghosts, of course.

AND I WON AT POKER, outwitting and outbidding a dozen other texas hold'em hopefuls. it was glorious!! also noteworthy was the pitch in putt in stanley park, a “sport” i do not excel at.. but i had a ridiculous amount of fun and between the smiles and chat, i could not stop from gasping in admiring pleasure at vancouver's most majestic park's endless wonders.

as if that wasn't enough, each shift was bookended by a bike ride from commercial drive (where i'd been living) down to the seaside bike trail. weaving through sunday strollers and smartly dressed joggers, taking in all the sweeping beauty. i can't tell you how many times i caught myself breathing, almost reverentially: “it's so beautiful!!!!!”

when the run came to and end, i worked on the crew, pulling down tents and pulling up floors. as back in may with kids fest, i loved the work: chortling with the other crew members and feeling my limbs whirr and purr in action. unlike kids fest, i had spent almost two months instead of only two weeks in that world; it made it just that little bit harder to let go. each fallen tent was a mild torture, a reminder that this exquisite experience was finite. on the first day, one of the actresses came into the tent she'd been performing in. she gasped, seeing the seats all gone and the stage up in splinters. it already looked so barren, and i could feel her trying to grasp onto something intangible. something that now lived only, ever, in memories.

after three weeks, it was over. the last tent had fallen and finally, i had a day off. i was slow and lethargic, hardly moving, hardly thinking. just barely being. a drastic change from the activity of the last weeks. it felt kinda like a sugar crash. that sweet sickly feeling that leaves you bloated and sleepy.

but smiling. for oh, how sweet it was...

zing a ding ding

we all know those missed moments. those frustrating exchanges that leave us tossing and turning in bed, overcome with the too-late, too-perfect snappy responses. when we wish we could have said something, christ anything, before the moment slipped away. well tonight, i'd like to raise a glass and toast my uncle for avoiding such an unfortunate fate.

this uncle is tall, lanky and wonderful. great smile, great sense of humour, great soul. he is quiet, gentle and smart as a whip.

once upon a time, my parents used to have a business. and then one day, stuff happened and they no longer had a business. who knows, maybe they blew it. maybe they got screwed. maybe there was an orgy of miscommunication. maybe some guys were real fucking money-guzzling, anal-raping, sociopathesque (in that, you know, get-ahead-in-business kinda way) jerks. i wasn't there, i don't know.

but let's just say that years later (and not long ago), a certain money-guzzling, anal-raping sociopathesque (in that, you know, get-ahead-in-business kinda way) jerk strolls into my uncle's workplace (a scrapyard). the jerk wants to sell.. well, without giving away too many revelatory details (it's a rather specific item that few people would have), let's just say he wants to sell a big ol' metallic cylindrical thing. however, instead of being offered the large wad o' cash he had been dreaming of getting for his big ol' metallic cylindrical thing, he is told that not only will the scrapyard not buy it - they will in fact have to charge him a wad o' cash to dispose of it.

cursing and muttering, he storms away. on his way out, he passes my uncle.

"hey," my uncle's soft voice says. "i know what you can do with that big metallic cylindrical thing you're trying to get rid of."

the jerk pauses, failing to recognize the man he has met before (they had met through my folks' business). "oh yea, what's that?"

"well, you can take it and then shift it so it's oblong. then you can bend over and shove it up your ass."

and oh, what fun to grinningly imagine his face aghast as he flabberghastedly stammers, "wha... who... ermph..."


ok, so it wasn't oscar wilde. but i still would have liked to witness it. oh, that second just before the line, when the jerk thought he was being offered help; the way he must have been listening intently...

and so cheers! yay for you, sweet uncle! i'm sure you savoured the delicious moment for us all.

exiled expressionism

it's a funny thing, language.

just ask my "cunning linguist" (ba-dum-pum) friend miranda, and she'll tell you about the many intricate and joyful twists of the word.

and you know, i like words. (incase you hadn't guessed.)

sometimes, it's just the sound of the stacked syllables. an example of this quasi-fetish lies in my undying lust for a band called soul coughing. i won't digress too much, but i will say i saw them live at the now tragically defunct starfish room, and it remains one of the best shows i've ever seen or dreamed of ever. EVER.

soul coughing was fronted by a poet (and backed by brilliant and quirky musicians). these fellas liked to play. and oh my fuck, the lyrics... i could spend whole days wantonly wrapping my lips around their words: "quadrilateral i was, now i warp like a smile." "flipped an ash like a wild loose comma." "janine, i drink you up." "

aw fuck, i could dedicate a whole post exclusively to the words that sprang from their songs. but that would be UBER-digressing and so i must resist!

right then... so i remember once, miranda and i tried to invent our own slang. not like how young kids create their own personal language that the big uns won't understand. nope: we wanted to hear strangers uttering our expression in unknown bars in unknown cities. we were young (ahh, won't we always be, in some silly way?) and our attempt was so amateur, it kinda hurts a little to remember it. at that moment in time, "everyone" kept saying, about damned near everything: "that's crazy." (the line has since been replaced by some reference to smoking crack. it may have changed since, i must admit ignorance if it has.) well, we thought, wouldn't it be hiLAYrious if we started saying: "that's perfectly sane" instead.

yeah. it didn't catch on. but damn if we didn't think that was the cleverest thing this side of lordbyronia.

which brings me to the topic at hand.

my computer time of late has been more sketchy than a downtown eastsider's excuse for needing money. (a lost tourist? have a car broken down and need some 83-zone transit fare? puh-lease. i can respect need, but don't insult us.) but tonight i was granted the sacred gift of having just the right amount of energy to not flake out in front of a boob tube (living in borrowed homes has meant a lot more tv than i'm used to - damned that accursed afflicted addictive ridiculousness!!!!!!!), and just enough energy to plunder my soul for thoughts. and so i wrote a blog thingy. and then i reread it. and then i reread some of the posts that preceded it.

and i saw a trend. i'm not talking about the deep heavy inner cycle trend shit. yeah sure, i saw that too - as always (the gift and curse of keeping track). but i'm talking about something more frivolous, so chill the fuck out already!! the trend i refer to was a sad little turn of phrase i used in most of my last blog entries.

the formula: "this side of." a recent example: "isn't this just the loveliest day in the friendliest city this side of happy land?" another recent example: "the sweetest bus ride this side of the rainbow." and one more, just for kicks: "the best free music this side of the french quarter."

christ on a stick, repetitive much? and i had NO IDEA i was doing it. i bet each time i came up with the turn of phrase, i giggled at whatever i'd just written. but come the fuck on kaen (witness me slap my wrist): just because you're amused and you thought it was "clever with a capital K", it DOESN'T mean it's worth actually dressing up and sending out into the world! i mean shit girl, you're amused by smoking a bowl, sipping some wine and puttering around home blathering to your silly self. so: what the fuck do you know???"

but i have to warn me (and you, if you care): no end in sight. i already have a new expressional trend. the formula is: "since sliced..." (you know, from the expression "since sliced bread".) for example (the first impetuous utterance to inspire my new expressional craze): "oh my fuck, that is the cutest thing since sliced kitten."

well......... much like "perfectly sane", my attempted: "the stupidest thing since sliced Bush"," "the hottest thing since sliced Branjelina" and "the weirdest thing since sliced Raelians" just haven't caught on.

(either.)

bah. what the fuck do i know of trends...

simmer down, sista!!!

so let me tell you about the other day. it was a beautiful day. (again.) (my god this city is beautiful.) (but i digress.) i was starting my fabulous new job that beautiful afternoon. (yes, afternoon. for those of you who've figured out i'm a bit of a night owl, you can imagine how deleriously blissed out i was when i was told my training (for a theatre gig, did i mention that?) started at 3 pm...)

i kicked off the day with a slow, sumptuous tea-sippin morning in my fabulous friend's stunning home. (which she graciously found a way to get me the keys to when i suddenly appeared back in town while she was away; woohoo to her and yay for me!) and then i prepared to "dash off to work" - allowing myself a very luxurious hour to cycle down to my beautiful new "office" - a gorgeous park overlooking the gorgeous ocean, and oh so conveniently right off the gorgeous seaside bike trail.

did i mention it was a beautiful day? flecks of wedding dress cotton candy frolicked in an aegean sky. it was a hot summer day, but with none of that smog-heat-humidity-from-hell i'd grown to cower from back in the old homeland.

humming, smiling, admiring and riding, i plunged into my day. at one point, i found myself needing to cross a busy street. in my stupid-grinned cyclandering, i'd lingered too long one one bike trail and had strayed a half block too far to join up with the ritzy seaside trail. but ah, look! a half block back sat the brightly painted slash slash slash of white perpendicularising the busy street and connecting right to the blessed path i'd been seeking! a sign, to be sure, from the gods. (or bike trail engineers.)

so i moseyed on over to the crosswalk, leaned back in my bike's sadistic seat (well, it can't all be purrfect, can it!?) and waited for the cars to pass. now let me be clear: vancouver is a pedestrian's paradise. if i had *wanted* to cross at that very moment, i could have. the slightest gesture of intent would have inspired an immediate vehicular ceasefire.

as it was, it turned out all i needed to do was admire the beautiful sky. because as i was doing so, i heard a lull in the traffic hum: oh, my turn! but in fact, a kind man had stopped his charging car for lil ol' me! how gallant! i waved and smiled at him and made my way to the median that seperated the opposing directions. and i paused there, waiting for the lone oncoming car to pass.

and don't you just know it, once again the kind car had stopped for lil ol' me. "well golly gosh," i said to myself, "isn't this just the loveliest day in the friendliest city this side of happy land? shucks."

as i wheeled across that last side of the street, i lifted my head to wave at, and smile at the driver. la la la-la! and man, talk about a shock to the system when i looked up and witnessed a perhaps beautiful woman's face contort into tex averian animosity. i rode by in frozen horror, suddenly beholding the mad mug of beelzebub itself. i felt my face contort into confusion as her eyebrows fused into a jagged hedge, her eyes wide and rolling, her mouth contorted by hate.

"YOU'RE NOT A PEDESTRIAN!!!" she shouted, gesticulating madly.

(you don't say)

i couldn't even begin to imagine what the hell her problem was, so i hastily retraced our brief encounter's steps. well, i hadn't cut her off. i had paused patiently in the median, and she had willingly stopped for me. so perhaps her foam-lipped words held the clue. i'm not a pedestrian. right. well, perhaps the issue is that bicycles not allowed to use "pedestrian" crosswalks, and it's a cause that is very dear to her heart. well, if bikes can't use 'em, colour me ignorant and i'd love it if someone could clear that up for me. most especially because while it was perhaps not specifically indicated by signs in this case, quite often these city-planned paths *specifically* (i.e. as directed by white-on-green-signs) cross these sacred crosswalks. so if it's "illegal" or "wrong", someone should talk to the city, cuz that's a big problem...

so... would it have been better if i'd dismounted and walked across? i mean, it would have made me a "pedestrian." but would that not have slowed the process, potentially causing her head to literally explode? cuz i ain't joshin ya when i say she didn't look too far from it as it was...

still today i haven't the foggiest clue in hell what she needed me to do. and that was frustrating. but mostly, i just feel bad for her. she had done something nice - pausing her precious day to allow a smiling stranger to pass. (even though i would happily have waited the 0.8 seconds for her to drive by before crossing...) but instead of appreciating her moment of generosity, she decided it was actually a perfect moment to unleash the volcano of vitriole she'd been drowning in since/because of ...? who knows. maybe she'd had a fight with her asshole husband. maybe she had irritable bowel syndrome. maybe her daughter had died in a cycling accident while cycling across a crosswalk.

what do i know of it.

all i know is suddenly, i found myself flailing in her tidal wave of negativity, and my mellow was seriously harshed. well, certainly surprised. shocked a little. and so, what was i supposed to do with this fresh load of shit? ingest it as i ingest everything life tosses at me? and then what, get all irate? take it out on some other unsuspecting innocent? get pissed off at that first fella: "he should have just kept going so i could cross when there was a healthy lull and nobody would have been inconvenienced!!!" get pissed at this woman who might be having a rough moment/day/week/year and had decided to take that out on everyone who should stumble across her puerile path because she hadn't figured out how to cope with the real problem in her own fucking world?

well, i guess i could have done that. i'll admit, i contemplated it for a second. but then i just shrugged, smiled for the kind man who wanted to do something nice for a fellow human on the side of the road, sighed a little for that poor miserable woman who hated that same stranger and hoped she felt better soon, and cycled on my merry little way.

cheers!

today was a great day.

after a few sluggish days of outstretched attempt, i have found a home and work. a really cool home. a home in the core of my east side pride. and the trickiest part: a fabulous temporary home that will just see me through to nov, when i settle into my proper new home. a home in which i can unpack my bags and start so many tomorrows.

and work! really cool work! work with great people on a great festival on a great site in a beautiful city. work that will keep me moving in the big air. work that will take me in its warm fold and deliver me to october - right when other swirls of opportunity should be meeting in a delicious apex of yes. work that starts TOMORROW!!

and work with a boss so cool, i could grinningly say to him, when he offers me a position i'm all over like a puppy's tongue on spilled shmutz: "you realize this means i'm going to miss pete and erin's famous island party this weekend??" (on an island, not "island" themed...). a boss so cool, he figured out how to work it so i wouldn't miss it.

and so i raise my chin to smile upon, and raise a glass to toast the beneficient gods who always take such good care of me. thanks!

surrender, dorothy

since parting ways with my sexy beau in march, i have had the key to 10 places in which to lay my weary head, and unpack my worn bags. 10 beds in 5 months.

i have had to negotiate the smoking, liquor and recycling vagaries in 4 provinces.

and i'm now on my 4th phone number (3rd area code) of the year!!

...no wonder i sometimes feel so exhausted!!

but now the wind has blown west, and i find my feet landed on vancouver soil. this time, i even think it's for real: i'm actually looking for work and a home. the time to hide from reality has passed, and i'm ready to start living again!

i'm ready for ebulient banter with friends, old and new. i'm ready for festivals and art galleries. i'm ready for anonymity. ...and standing out from the crowd.

small time life was interesting. (for the two tiny months i experienced it!) some of it was GREAT, namely: i'm well started on a play i'm very excited about, and did some great work on my poems. even submitted some stuff! so that was very, very excellent. but i'm a city girl. i love the plethoraness of it all! i love the ceaseless din and whir of life. i love pubs with walls of exotic fish...

so then, there's one more month of summer, and i am alive in the city!

click. click. click.
there's no place like home.

alive and kicking

i've been getting a lot of comments and emails from friends and "fans" asking me what the hell is up. i know it's been aeons since i've posted, and i'm sorry! i'm even sorrier to say: no end in sight!

i've spent the last 2 months or so in work or play that brings me far from computers. either because of time or location, i just have very very limited access to computers. like now, i'm exiled in small-town nowhere writing up storms of poetry and plays. i gotta tell you, it's pretty exciting and i feel blessed to be able to devote a few months to nothing but writing (except for one contract job next month that will bring me to the only province i haven't been to: newfoundland! i can't wait!!!) but i digress... basically, all my creative energy seems to be devoted to works larger than this blog has ever strived to be.

but most significantly perhaps, i've been bored for months of the blah blah, here's what i did today posts. this is nothing new to most of my readers... but add to it that if i did that now, the posts would basically be:

- went to one of a handful of restaurants for brunch
- went back to the room/to the park to write
- went to one of a handful of restaurants for supper
- went back to the room to write
- went to bed

ok, i'm oversimplying. i am meeting people, living fun and enriching experiences...

but...

well, there's other stuff too... small, but that weigh on me and contribute to a general lack of inspiration when it comes to posting. one is that i feel irritated that i should be completely shut out from someone's life, yet somehow they get to keep reading about what i'm doing. there's something about the blatant unfairness that really irks me. and i think a part of me is still reeling from that psycho-bitch's flurry of attacks against me. yes, she was a ridiculous, small-minded idiot. but it still fucking hurt and why should i want to open myself up to that??

i don't know, i really don't...

but i promise you, if i come up with any inspiration to make this blog interesting again - to you, but mostly to me, i will post... um... post haste.

until then, have a gorgeous summer!!
k)

home sweet home

well, here i am. in vancouver at last. for real this time! or well.. for a month anyway.

it's almost hard to wrap my brain around the fact, the reality that i'm here, actually really here.

my last bit of time in toronto was quiet. i spent much of it alone. in a way, you could say i had retreated to lick my freshest wounds after yet another sad sorry failed love. but it wasn't quite that... there was a quietness. a sense of mourning without the gnashing-teeth, torn-shirt, i'll never love/be loved again melodramatic bullshit. it was slower. softer. like the hushed quietness of a funeral. it was a time of sacred silent sorrow, a respite after the loud, crashing months that preceded it. it was a time to be quiet, and to say goodbye to a beautiful man that i loved very much - the hottest man i have ever loved, and the best kisser i've ever known. it was a time to relearn experiencing great moments and not sharing them with him. a time to relearn mornings that didn't start with a "good morning my love" email. a time to fall asleep without his sweet, perfect kiss; without his glowing warmth beside me.

and slowly, eventually, i woke up to the fact that oh my god, i had so little toronto time left!!!

so i bought a molehill of multi-coloured, knee-high socks. i treated my tastebuds to my first zabaglione, with some incredible italian not-quite-ice-wine, not-quite-port digestif. i cycled the beaches with bright, shining friends. i went to massey hall for the first time (funnily because i'd managed to.. um.. procure them - and by them i mean a band i grew up knowing and liking well enough - some... ah... road necessities). i saw ronnie burkett's newest puppet magic. with the help of fabulous friends, i belly-laughed my way through hours of a futurama marathon. i drank expensive wine and savoured fine french cuisine with my favourite hunter. i washed away martinis with boothfuls of well-wishing friends at an all-night cafe.

and now i'm in vancouver. and oh, my first day back... yesterday was GREAT. everything is so green and lush, canopied with white and pink blossoms, erupting with loud tulips. there was colour everywhere and the air was thick with the smell of living things. everthing was beautiful: the air, the trees, the flowers, the smiles, the men...

and then i got to enjoy some mind-blowingly good sushi at a table crammed with smiling friends. as i told them, i think this gypsy has learned an important lesson about friendship. wherever my travels may take me in this big ol' exciting world, my heart is forever bound to vancouver. well.. until my friends move away, i guess. i love these people and oh - to be among they who know and love me. they, who support me and my hare-brained ideas. they, who will playfully yet forcefully argue the semantics of "jock" vs. "outdoorsy". they, who will remember the things i don't, and dilligently and patiently remind me of them. they, who want to inspire and encourage me. they, who will gently chide my low self-esteem. they who know my silly cycles and love me "anyway". just as i love them.

it's nice to be home.

transit is the opiate of the masses

it's mayhem
it's a marrakesh market
it's the first time free citizens go to polls
it's studio 54 at 2 am
it's a boy's first overeager orgasm

it's rush hour in toronto.

i usually ride my bike: bright fake flowers nerdishly woven into a basket guiding the path for a slow-pedalling, flower-sniffing flake. this transit stuff is like safari to me. i usually confront it with bemused delight or in a slim-grinned daze. but when a friend's fervent argument perked my eyes and ears, well wow - the shit that goes on!

we queue:
quanine convelescents
pining for the drug cart.
the air is thick
with the slow-minded
sedated
sociopathism
of 9 to 5ers
at 5:23

but when the bus dodders in, the hive comes alive and the air becomes stained with a frantic desperation. shoulders are squared and elbows enflare as the mighty congregation pushes toward the light. my friend is jostled from me, and shoots me a disparaged look. i sigh and lean back into the throng, letting the frenzied squeeze themselves into their salvation. by the time i am pinballed into the bus, my friend and i are decades apart. i crane my neck, hoping to reassure her with a smile: i am here, i am alive!

and the bus dodders forward.

the bus is thick with humans. i have a moment to reflect, and reimagine the mayhem. i imagine myself as knightess in shining armour, crying out my friend's disgruntled dismay. the clouds part and gleam on me as i exclaim: what are you, a bunch of fucking barbarians? i mean, *what* is with the shoving? there is a fleshy mass before me, as solid as it needs to be to prevent me from moving forward, no matter how hard you push. and the butting-in business? if you're so fucking frantic to get a seat for those 7 blocks that separate you from your couch, wait for the next goddamned bus - oh look, there it is, pulling in right now.

i chuckled to myself, head bent coyly, as i imagined my archangelic ranting. and then i peeked left, i peeked right. i saw a young man, a boy, a yoot. scruffy thing. the first time he helped out a struggling traveller, it was sweet. the second time, it was downright exultant. and then, when some young girl singsonged: "this sure is a busy bus," well by golly, i reckon it was just about the sweetest bus ride this side of the rainbow.

ok, i got carried away with that last line and it sounds facetious, but i actually pretty much mean it. ...dang gummit!

as we emerged, sucking in my friend's inner-suburban-galaxy-far-far-away's sweet, sweet air, i thought: perhaps i'll sway her cynicism. help this sisyphus find something to savour of her daily grind. i asked her: "so, what was your favourite moment of the transit ride?"

"when this guy made the guy who was hogging two seats have to shift over so he could sit."

well ok sure, i can see that. i hate those fucking seat hoggers. and i laughed, "i thought maybe you'd say the girl, or..." and she laughed and we laughed and she'd actually been sitting near the girl and told me all her cute ramblings despite her sad, hippie name. and i thought you know what, we all find our zen where we can.

cheers to you, sister!

Sunparlour Players

so last night i headed on down to the Tranzac to see the Sunparlour Players, and enjoy some of the best free music this side of the french quarter. if you haven't had a chance to savour the Sunparlour Players yet, that would explain that hollowness you sometimes feel in your gut on those cold, lonely mornings.

the Sunparlour Players (a.k.a. Andrew Penner and Mark Schachowskoy) are like gospel with all of the thumping and none of the bible. they’re a glass of mint julep served by a pixie in a hickory-smoked arcade. they’re fried chicken served on a quilt of patchwork pin-up girls, spread out on blue grass under an orange sky. they’re a train teeming with painted ladies and boozy bearded blackjackers, careening, speeding, charging charging through a prairie sunset. they're hungry sex on a hot afternoon in a summer field buzzing with cicadas. they're that scene in pulp fiction where uma thurman gets an adrenaline shot right to the heart.

or as my friend glowingly said, "they're like hillbilly punk!"

they're intense, they're fun, they're powerful, they're danged talented, and they have more energy than a 10-piece funk band.

they. are. great.

and lucky for all of us torontonians, they have lots and lots of gigs all over the city! you can go to their site (http://www.andrewpenner.ca) to get all that information. and until you get a chance to actually head out and see them, you can listen to them here: http://www.myspace.com/thesunparlour .

now excuse me, i’m going to go sit by a campfire, eyes closed in blissed out appreciation and hands clasped in giddy anticipation, and wait ever so impatiently for their upcoming album…

zen and the art of packing

i recently moved, which means i got to spend some time filtering through drawers littered with the many scraps of a well-lived life. mosaics of scrawled thoughts, theatre programs, concert tickets, first drafts of plays draped in a tapestry of alien scribbles. i've sifted through clothes, cds, movies, books - what comes, what doesn't. and i have the double added bonus of serving a double-packing duty: the stuff that goes into storage until i figure out what i'm doing with my life, and the stuff that will join me for the next few months as i journey back to vancouver, and then..? stay there? somewhere else? the world is my oyster, and i like it raw!

it was fucking great!

unlike most normal, healhty humans, i love packing! sifting through the memories, the slow deliberation, the remembering, reassessing, reassigning. it's very therapeutic, actually. an opportunity to take stock in one's current reality. what have i been up to? is it what i want to be up to? what will i need for what i want to be up to?

delicious!

what can i say, i simply love packing! i've always loved packing, and i will likely always love packing. which is probably a good thing, considering how many times i've moved in my life. i've lived in more homes than years i've been alive...

it's a wanderlust that was fostered in my childhood by parents who always strove for more. sometimes we moved for work - my dad the bank manager would get offered a better position far far away. but sometimes, we moved for the sheer joy of it.

i loved those sunday afternoons, crawling through the streets, trolling for open houses. i loved walking into strange homes that might some day foster so many fights and laughs and memories. i loved trying to imagine the memories: where would i put my bed? would i have a sleepover? who would my friends be (if it was in a really different neighborhood)?

i just loved all that possibility oozing from the hitherto unseen carpets and stairways and paint colours, all the things that i might one day hate or just ignoringly take for granted.

and so i guess here i am again, on another cusp in my cuspy life. and yet, not a cusp, not really. i have figured out who i want to be when i grow up, i'm just travelling to the land of friends and connections to see if i have a better chance of doing it there than here. perhaps i won't and i'll come back. perhaps i will, but come back anyway, with a bit more experience (and expertise?) under my belt. perhaps i'll get whisked off to some new land that i hadn't even contemplated.
who knows? i don't, not really. i'm just here for the ride, the great wonderful thrilling ride that is life.

whee!

why, dear god, why???

since i first started writing this thing, this blog, i've had many different people ask me the same question. the question ranged in tone from incredulous to dismissive to accusatory to awed, but it was always the same: "why do you write your blog!?"

why do i feel this compulsion to share my thoughts and feelings and stories with a faceless audience? why do i open myself up to criticism and judgment? and i have to tell ya, it's a valid question.

so why do i write this thing? i could answer with the haphazard way i stumbled into it...

i was writing a play in which a character wrote a blog. (given the huge disdain for blogs, the blog has been replaced with a zine, incidentally.) a desire to better understand this strange blog world was coupled with a new friend's invitation to visit his blog, so i decided to check it out. well at the time, in order to comment on his blog, i actually had to register with the blog site - a clever manoeuvre that had me setting up the full look and feel of my blog before i could proceed with my all-access pass to comment-land. so there i was, suddenly with somewhere to dump the mess of scribbles i was already engaged in anyway.

well ok sure, that could be an answer. but it would only explain how i started, not why i continue...

well, i'm a writer. i write a lot: i write down things i observe, i record funny or interesting snippets of conversation, and i write to sort through the jumble of thoughts that are attempting to help me figure something out. like my life...

when i first started "recording" these thoughts publicly, it didn't even occur to me that anyone but my fellow blog-friend would even look at my blog. and then eventually i started telling friends about it. and then i started giving the link to people i would meet and have interesting conversations with - so much less intrusive and actually so much more effective than exchanging e-dresses that nobody will ever use.

and then one day, a stranger commented. some person in the states that i had never nor would ever meet. then someone from montreal. then someone from texada island. then an old friend found me and we reconnected. and i realized that my life and thoughts and feelings were actually being read. meaning they were laid out there for anyone to see - kin or stranger, friend or foe.

and yet, i kept writing.
why??
why this desire (is it a need?) to spread my soul's legs for the whole world to stare at?

is it a low self-esteem? (perhaps)

is it a need for acceptance? (surely in some way, but ultimately i think not.)

am i just pathetic? i don't know... maybe i am. but if i am, i stand amongst an army of beautiful, pathetic soldiers who have felt an unstoppable compulsion to share their soul and experiences with the world. Vincent Van Gogh, William Blake, Charles Bukowski, Leonard Cohen, Jack Kerouac, Frida Kahlo, Beethoven, Sylvia Plath, Hank Williams Sr., and on and on and on. a legion of open souls. can we ever truly understand what inspires artists to bare their souls to the world? maybe not. but we can agree that it always makes us all that much richer.

and it's not just artists! most humans exist for contact. so that even a conversation over the water cooler about some reality tv show becomes an exclamation - a manifesto of self: THIS is who i am, THIS is how i think, THIS is why i feel! we are social beings, stretching our souls out always to connect, to relate to our fellow humans. to understand each other - and by necessary extension ourselves - a little better.

now i won't pretend that my blog ramblings are as inspired or amazing as the artists i referenced. i do have "some" grip on reality! but every so often, i'll get a comment from someone on the other side of the globe, or down the street, who can relate to what i've written, or who is moved to feel or think from what i've written. and in those beautiful, tiny, human moments, i (and hopefully my readers) can feel that much more connected to the community of souls that populates our globe.

futility

i’ve seen some pollution in my day.

i’ve eaten Tokyo crackers, individually wrapped, then wrapped in bundles of 4s, then 8s, in 2 columns, in a double-wrapped container. i’ve seen mounds of litter cradling decaying street cats in Athens. i’ve swooned on the belched fumes of mile-long parades of punch-buggy taxis in Mexico City.

so as i sit here dilligently peeling away all the scotch tape applicants have slathered all over their envelopes (and as a side note: what, where they afraid the application would attempt a getaway? what is with the obsessive amount of tape? sometimes i wonder if they even want us to be able to open them…), as i sit here peeling away each strip of tape, tearing out each plastic business-envelope window, i can't help but wonder: what’s the fucking point!?

lovin the lovin

i love valentine's day. no - let me be precise: i love holidays. i love solstice/xmas/whatever, i love easter, i love halloween, i love st.patrick's day... i love 'em all!!

ok, i know some of you may want to argue:
that valentine's isn't a "holiday".
that valentine's is a corporate cash-grab, a joke played on stupid unsuspecting consumers by greedy hallmarkers.
that couples should love each other every day of the year.

first, let me respond to the last one: duh. no fucking kidding. so if that's the way you think, why celebrate your birthday while you're at it? i mean, shouldn't you be happy to be alive every day of the year? retarded, eh. well, that's how i feel about people who refuse to celebrate valentine's. ok, maybe you're single, or freshly dumped, or just in general cynical about love. in those cases, i sympathize, i mean look at my checkered love history - believe me, i can relate.

but for couples, refusing to celebrate valentine's is just stupid or lazy or both. i mean, what is so wrong with taking one evening to do nothing but celebrate your love? is it really so evil??? frankly, i think it's beautiful. and no, it doesn't mean you can't celebrate it any other time. it doesn't mean the dues have been paid for the year, and you can go along taking each other for granted and treating each other like shit. it just means you've taken this one night to do nothing but be in love.

well shit man, sign me up!

as for those of you who rage against the corporatization (is that a word? should be) of the holiday, ok - you're right. but just because the capitalists are cramming diamonds and chocolates and red roses down your throat, doesn't mean you have to buy it. literally and figuratively... don't want to support the hallmark-created holiday? make your own card. don't wanna be a cliche and buy roses? don't! it's only a corporate scam if you let it be. same with xmas or easter or mother's day or any of the holidays. (i'm reminded of that simpson's episode with that fake holiday, what was it? that was funny...)

i say this so often, i should probably have it tattooed on my ass: our culture is desperately lacking ritual. for that reason, i find myself looking for any opportunity to create ritual. and i find opportunities in holidays. these occasions ask us to take a step back and celebrate something. ponder it. appreciate it. these things are not only wonderful, they're really important.

ok sure, you don't have to do it on some day that some religious zealot picked hundreds of years ago, but why not? are you so rebellious that you have to fight every convention, whether or not there's a rational reason for it? i mean hey sure, whatever floats your boat. but most of the people who don't celebrate valentine's aren't picking alternative dates to commemorate the great gift of love. they probably don't like celebrating anniversaries either, and i think they're just being lazy.

so anyway, i've been savouring the love vibe, and so i proudly wore my red blazer yesterday, shouting out to the world: i love love!!! and you know what? i had the bestest valentine's ever!!! sure, we bought into some of the hooha: he bought me lingerie, and i spent all my allowance on ridiculously overpriced (but also ridiculously beautiful and ridiculously yummy) Godiva chocolates. and we went full-cheese with candles and wine and fancy dinner, ooh la la. but most importantly, we shared a beautiful night doing nothing but being together and being in love.

it was... well.. a lovely night. and i'll celebrate that any day!

the "real kaen", part 2

in addition to my birthday, i've also tried changing my last name. although not "officially" or "legally" (yet?), i have come up with a far superior last name.

"but kaen, we love you the way you are!!"

yeah yeah yeah. but is it really me? gather 'round kiddies, let me tell you a strange and interesting story.

when i was still a fairly young thing, the government of Canada changed a pretty significant law. previously, when a First Nations (or what the government still likes to call "Indian") woman married a non-"Indian" man, she lost her "Indian" status. became white, i guess? which whatever eh - you are who you are, no matter what the government calls you.. sure. except we're talking about losing out on the "freebies" (as the idiots call them) - the repayments our government offers First Nations people in exchange for having robbed so much of their land, lives, history, culture and dignity. so when the law changed and those women could "regain" their status, it was kind of a big deal.

well my gramma (from the Ojibwe nation) married a whitey. when my dad discovered she was now, again, First Nations, he decided to look into what that meant for him and his children. he had no idea what he was getting into...

some things were not a surprise: his real father had died before he was born. (or so the story goes. fact is, my gramma never talked about him which breaks my heart in many ways.) some things were a bit shocking: his step-father had never legally adopted him. so when he ordered his birth certificate, he discovered that the step-father's last name, which donned all his ID, was not his real last name. his legal last name was actually his mother's maiden name. my dad actually had to legally change his name so that it matched all his ID and information.

so technically, my last name shouldn't have even been what it is. for that reason alone, i feel no particular connection to it. but even more significantly, it belongs to an EVIL, terrible, horrific, awful, ugly-souled, horrible man (this would be the step-father, in case i've lost you), whose legacy i don't want to carry or honour, and with whom i don't want to be connected in any way, shape or form. AT ALL.

hold on - it gets strange.

as it happens, we eventually discovered that this name that i bear isn't even my evil step-grandfather's. the story is muddled and unclear. what we do know is that at some point in his scarred and sketchy youth, he turned his back on "Robertson" (his real last name) and "borrowed" (stole?) his aunt's boyfriend's ID and assumed it and its name for the remainder of his life. was it to pass as old enough to work the railroads? was it to run from the law? the mind reels. i know i have a flair for the dramatic, but believe me when i say without exaggeration, this man was capable of despicable, disgusting, horrible things.

so then, other than that it's a neat little fucked-up story, what does my legal last name mean to me? it carries an evil and abusive history, perpetuating the chosen identity of someone history should be lucky enough to forget.

what i chose instead to do is ask a bunch of my closest friends to try to describe me in 5 words (preferably adjectives). i then collected the responses, found recurring themes, and in keeping with my french heritage, translated the words into french, morphed them all together, and came up with Valoise.

unlike the "new" birthday, which i've already grudgingly conceded, this new last name is something i refuse to give up. some day, i hope to legally change my last name. it is, i firmly believe, a better representation of "the real kaen."

the "real" me

it's been quite the ride - this past year, these past few months. and i anticipate the next few weeks will be filled with some big questions and big decisions.

let's start this journey into "the real kaen" by talking about my birthday. about 3 years ago, when i first moved to the big smoke, i decided to change my birthday. ok ok, i can never change the day which saw me spurted from my ma's loins, i know i know. but i was changing the day i would celebrate my birthday. stop rolling your eyes, ok, i know. but look, my birthday is january 3. can you think of a worse day to have to celebrate? ok, maybe january 1 or 2 - those could be worse. but trust me, 3 is no picnic. people are burned out. they have thrust themselves headfirst into their resolutions - dieting, quitting smoking, you name it. they are broke. they want to curl up and watch tv - not go out and do more feasting and celebrating.

the second problem was the astrology. i'm not a huge astrology person (which you could ironically ascribe to my capricornican nature). but i've learned that the people who ask you "what's your sign", are. so i was always reticent to tell these people that i was a cap. i've read the horoscopes, i know what people think: capricorns are uptight, money-clinging, perfectionistic, workaholic, attachment-fearing recluses. this does not describe me, not even a little bit.

so i went on a quest with some close friends to find the sign that best described me, while also being in a more celebratory season. we settled on may 6 - taurus (which is also my rising sign) and as it worked out, the birth date of Orson Welles. (citizen Kaen - get it? get it?)

well that was great, really it was. i loved the few times i got to celebrate what i lovingly call "princess day" in may. what i didn't love were the raised eyebrows, rolled eyes and scoffing, humouring laughs whenever i explained the complexities of my dual birthday.

so i gave up.

when i told a close friend i was reverting back, she exclaimed her delight. "you keep trying to change yourself, but we love you for who you are!" it was a sweet gesture, touching really. but is january 3 really the "real me"??? this year, i went back to january 3, and it sucked. we had no money. we were on a post-holiday fast. and my boyfriend discovered a birthday greeting from my ex that drove him a little insane, and we fought. and nobody called. is this "the real me"?? does this sad, lonely, cold, broke, burned-out day truly represent "kaen" better than a warm, springy, light-vibed day in may?

i sure as shit hope not...

the beast awakens

hello hello and sorry sorry sorry. i know i've been painfully negligent, and it's not through lack of caring. really, you know i simply adore each and every one of you.

but i'm here now, stronger and smiley-er than ever!

or... i would be. if canadians weren't so fucking stupid.

i hang my head in shame over yesterday's election results. after shaking my head at our hapless neighbours to the south, i am shocked and awed that we have elected our very own monster. so much for being unique, canadian, socialist, open-minded and wonderful. so much for health care, pro choice and supremely sophisticated human rights. we now have our own dubya. this is what my fellow country people have said they want.

...or do they want it?

i was ABSOLUTELY HORROR-STRUCK last night when Rex (on CBC) read an email from some fucking moron. the person said they'd "voted Conservative to punish the Liberals". um... hey dumbass, you're not punishing the Liberals, you're punishing yourself. are people really this moutarded?? and if you wanted to punish your party, why hand the "reward" over to the very scary enemy? what about the NDP????

well you know what, i'm not gonna slit my wrists just yet. it's a minority government, with more than enough Liberal and NDP seats to ward off, i hope, any fascism. i guess we'll just have to wait and see what the Bloc do. wow, an alliance between Quebec and Alberta - who'd've ever thunk it?? craziness...

and you know, i am actually pretty thrilled with the leap the NDP has made, and am particularly tickled that my vote contributed to one of the NDP seats in the house. (and a big cheer to the Parkdale/High Park riding for not only voting in Peggy Nash of the NDP, but for showing up in such amazing numbers! over 70%!! yea!!!)

so hang in there kids. it'll pass. let's just hope mr. scary-evil-man doesn't get to do too much damage before the morons either stop "punishing" the Liberals, or realize there's another, better choice...