Re-Shagging and De-Fragging My Life

Oh man, I have several things I've been itching to write about the past couple of weeks but with a new strangely ideal but heavy teaching gig added to the shuffle, a trip to Toronto this past weekend, and a recent visit here from Jesse, it's been a long reach to the keyboard.

The visits from Shmariko and Jesse were catalytic. Jesse and I had a particularly sad time saying goodbye when he last left here. My quality of life was so profoundly boosted by having these loved ones stay with me it made me decide to stop fence-sitting and say no to some old things, hello to some new ones. As several of you are aware, I've been really on the line about whether to stay here or move to Toronto since last Christmas. Good reasons to stay, good reasons to go: dear friends, gorgeous city, cheap big apartment, involvement in a life-expanding and maverick research project on one hand; dear friends, family, boyfriend, and potential of more regular, lucrative, and interesting paid work on the other.

Three things decided: (1) me living alone in no matter how nice or cheap a place is crummy for my life as a whole, (2) I can't live in Montreal for a whole 'nother uninterrupted winter this year, it's just wrong, (3) I need to make some serious moves towards making some more money and, if also possible, reducing the scheduling chaos of my life. The constant ups and downs of teaching lots of little contracts, etc., presents enough of a challenge to this organizationally-impaired dame without also continuing to live an emotional life so often painfully split by intense goodbyes and 500 kilometres.

In short, it's time to give Toronto a bit of a second chance. For the rest of the summer I won't be accepting any new teaching contracts. Instead I will try to get more proofreading work--also nutso scheduling but, unlike with teaching an hour or two at a time, you get paid well and for the hours you actually work. The experience and connections will hopefully assist me in getting similar work in Toronto.

I'm trying to find someone I know or someone friends can vouch for who would like to sublet my apartment for the upcoming school year or perhaps just the winter semester. If I get into the special McGill BSW program and if by next winter it still seems to be the best thing for me to do, I'll need to come back to Montreal from May 2006 to August 2007. If I end up returning, I hope I'll be able to re-join the advisory committee for the bi healthcare access study. I still need to talk to Viviane about this once my plans are firmer.

Today some things related to my Montreal/Toronto dysphoria and finances strengthened my belief that these changes should happen.

Especially those who've lived with me can appreciate the marvelous fact that despite my many all-night bus trips between here and New York and Toronto, my otherwise erratic sleeping habits, and my hatred of early mornings, I've only once in three years not been right on time for a class I had to be on the road for by 7 am or otherwise. But I altogether missed one--this AFTERNOON.

I rolled in from Toronto at dawn, taught a pronunciation class at 9:30 without a hitch, went down for what was supposed to be an hour's nap before another gig later in the day, and didn't wake up until screaming an hour after the class was to have begun at the city's nether shore. Every teacher's special nightmare. It's bad enough accidentally missing a class as a student! Can you imagine what it's like for elementary school teachers? One I know has three alarm clocks.

Thank god my class was a private with a very genial repeat student who likes me and my teaching a lot. The last class with him will be a conversational, with the beers on me.

The other harrowing truc du jour...

Last weekend Toronto was in the middle of a weeklong lava-hot smogfest that makes you understand why the murder rate goes through the roof in the southern states when there's a heatwave. The stench of rotting garbage juice on Queen Street when I arrived there at dawn Friday actually made me gag, and I used to be content living above a veg vendor in Chinatown for chrissakes!

It was my birthday when I arrived, I had a little bit of money to play with, I decided I needed to buy some linen pants. On day four of the heatwave with my pants puddling on the floor, grimy from constant wear, I woke up ready to punch Jesse for trying to snuggle with me and decided I needed two. This meant I wasn't going to be able to pay my bill in full this month but "Fuck Hydro. If there's even one other wave like this to ooze through, it's more important I stay out of jail this summer," I thought.

I came home this morning to find the leaking corpse of my recently deceased fridge. From the rich aroma wafting from it I could tell that Montrealers spent the weekend down the hall in hell from the Torontonians.

What does a live-alone woman with puny-armed friends do with a 400 lb dead fridge from the 50s? I must ask myself, what would a grown-up do in this situation? Why oh why did you have to die on my watch, sweet 'Dairy Bar' Philco?

Now I will spend the rest of the month on one of those fancy all-fresh-food diets the wealthy yoga set enjoy, which I guess is a good thing. The past month was all about creamy pasta and guacamole. I may not be able to keep anything around the house cool except celery and my ass, but that means my ass will soon fit very comfortably into my terrific new pants.

Isn't it great how sometimes everything just works out?