2:05PM
Mood: piss and vinegar
Song: Miss You - Etta James
Link: 2010 Vancouver Olympic Bid
'
It's a funny thing being took under the wing of a dragon, it's warmer than you think.'
~
Amsterdam Vallon on Bill The Butcher from Gangs of New York
THE WORST CHRISTMAS
OK. So in the news there has been news of more terrorism and a woman giving birth to her own clone.
That makes my news of a very, very bad Christmas seem even more worthless. In case you haven't cottoned on so far...I have had a most discomforting Christmas holiday.
On Christmas Eve day I worked from 10:00AM until 5:00PM with my mother and my crazy aunt Wendy
for ten dollars an hour helping unpack a lawyers new home. I shleped boxes of crystal and framed paintings all morning and then I organised suits and leather shoes on my hands and knees for seven hours and only got paid 70$. It wasn't so bad because at least I would get to buy mam a Christmas gift this year. It snows a little, the sky grows dim and still he's showing no signs of letting up. I, in turn, grow more and more discouraged until I'm at the point where I cannot tear my eyes away from the ink black window showing me my own sour expression. He lets us off at 5:00PM and I'm trying to hurry because I have to get to the shops before they close. I had thought they closed at 5:00PM but mother assured me they closed at 6:00PM so I was doing fine. He pays us with a check we cannot cash because the banks are closed and so mam has to give me her only money to run into Sears with. It's black outside, pouring sheets of big slick rain drops on the pavement and there are about 500 cars trying to come and go through one entrance at once. I somehow weave my way through this to reach the huge glass front doors only to be greeted by a woman in her fourties (slightly rumpled, tortoise glasses, red nails, frown lines and black pumps) who opens the door just enough to bark at me that they're closed and then quickly shuts the door and locks it with a neat click. It was bad. There I am standing alone in a sea of people passing me by who pause just a moment to catch the show of the little girl standing in the rain looking like somebody stole her first Christmas. Close enough. I felt really humiliated so I just stood there a moment before turning and walking on down the sidewalk. When I got back to the car I was kind of stunned so I didn't speak.
Mother decided to take this personally so I got fucking shouted at for a good ten minutes before
she took the time to notice I was crying. I
couldn't help it. *sigh* I just worked
so hard to
get that money so I could buy
her a gift and she was shouting at me. Thus the disaster that was my Christmas began. We went home and I got into the house and went directly to the toilet to throw up. Then I showered and tried to wash the bad feelings away and at 8:00PM I went to bed. I kept waking up every couple of hours and crying myself back to sleep. Mam made a turkey dinner but I couldn't eat so she ate alone. I felt bad. When I woke up the next morning my eyes were almost swollen shut. I went to
the living room expecting to feel at least a little better until I remembered that we had no gifts. I wanted to cry again but couldn't so I just stared at the tree for dear life. Then that made it worse when I started to notice that it was dead and there were no decorations on it. Christmas morning and there are pine needles everywhere, no ornaments (with the excpetion of green lights), no pretty tree skirt and not a single stocking, card or package to be seen. I swallowed my disapointment like a good little soldier because when your fucking
nineteen your not allowed to be a child and care that you have no gifts
or cards. I turn to mum and she looks away and I go right back to my room and sleep until 10:30AM.
I get up again and nothing is better and I don't want to even think about Christmas so I go to my room and
play the Queer As Folk soundtrack as I write my morning journal entry (canvas, hardcover, cotton paper).
All too soon it was off to the fucking family's to celebrate this joyous holiday. I get there and I don't want to be there and I try to smile and be polite but finally just end up in a corner curled into a plush velvet recliner, wrapped in a wool blanket with a kitten on my lap. I keep getting
looks from the others but I pretend I'm asleep when they come near so I don't have to face them. Dinner comes soon enough
and it's nothing I haven't had before. Raspberry wine was good. I'm tired and still trying not to make eye contact and all I want is to go home and try and have at least what's left of Christmas in my own home.
No such luck. I ask mother if it's time (it was 7:30PM) and she humiliates me infront of everybody by saying no as if I was proposing we torch the place or something.
*sigh*
I'de had enough but my elder sister decides its her duty to set baby Sheena straight so she bites out at me '
Go and sleep in my room, Sheena!. Now, I never let people talk down to me so we just stared at each other murderously for a moment before I let it go because I didn't want to disrupt anybody's good time. Fakers. I decide I don't want to be near my sister so I put my coat on and go to the car to sleep instead. I had my walkman out there anyway. I'm sitting there pondering why I even bothered to come when my sisters husband taps on my window. I roll the window down a little and he starts in on me emediately.
Why am I always trying to take mother from them?
Why am I so antisocial and unchristian? Then he starts accusing me of hating my family and not knowing what's good for myself.
Obviously big sissy has been having words with him about yours truelly.
*spitting* I defend myself and he gets louder and finally I tell him to go back inside and let me alone. He does. I always thought he was a lot better than that. He doesn't even know me and he somehow knows my life story. Fucking
inlaws. I don't mean that. I'm just upset.
BOXING DAY
I went to Walmart with the masses and mam at 9:00AM on Boxing Day morning.
I bought the second season Queer As Folk sounstrack which I'm in love with and two Sony slidecase CD-IT blank tapes to make Elizabeth new mixes on. I also bought a new dvd player. That was good.
That was a relatively good day because everybody was just as eager to forget about Christmas as I was myself.
BELOVED VANCOUVER
Yesterday my day more than made up for my bad holiday.
I went home to where I was born in the uber city of
Vancouver.
It's a very large city with too many highways, hotels, shops, lawyers and
Prada shops.
The city boasts over one million people (many for Canada), lots of excess and glamour, fast cars, sky scrapers, impatient drivers, the theater and
Robson Street (a strip of street lined in cosmopolitan shops). I was in absolute heaven. I'm definately a city girl. I felt like I had come
home. I shopped a little on both
Grandville (a very long a famous street with many attractions) and Robson before mam and I caught the 5:10PM showing of
Gangs of New York at the Grandville 7. I haven't seen a film at that theater since my father was alive. I must have been six years old. I think we saw
Bambie? It's an old fashioned theater with plush wine seats, big screens and three levels. The crowd was very arthouse and the atmosphere was very relxed but expectant.
GANGS OF NEW YORK
This film was amazing!
It's my favorite film now. I was captivated. The trailers rolled and the first sound you hear is scraping.
Then it's a man's face. He's shaving with a blade. He cuts himself and hands the blade to his small, unkempt son who goes to wipe the blood on the blade on his shorts. His father stops him, telling him never to wipe the blood off a blade. The entire film grips your attention. When you hear Leonardo Dicaprio's voice for the first time you felt the crowd sit straight as a whole. Leo Dicaprio is really
something special. You can
feel his presence. I can remember the strangest detail and emotion. One of the most quotable films I have ever had the pleasure of watching. The world of
New York in the 1800's is one worth knowing about. I cannot praise
this film enough. I cannot wait to see it again. Now, of course, I'm going to have to go and
slash the film up...but that's not exactly a
bad thing...now
is it? I think Bill The Butcher is the best villan to cross the screen in over a decade.
Brilliant. I spent scant moments in the dark of that theater with a pen in my hand, trying to scrawl quotes as they came onto a copy of this weeks
Gorgia Straight by the light of the exit sign over my shoulder.
When we finally got out and back onto Grandville street it looked
alive. I
felt alive.
All of the spindly trees lining the cobble walk were light up with white lights, there were venders selling
roasted chesnuts and hot chocolate, people in their scarves and winter coats bustling up and down against the wind and a man to my left singing an old folk song with his guitar. If you looked up and over the bulidings you could see the grand city of Vancouver lit up as well and the old tower clock glowing
bright over the city. It was such a sight that emidiately I thought I would liked to have taken a photo had I brought along my camera just so that I could send it to Elizabeth (who,
by the way, has not yet replied to my letter) and say
This is my Vancouver. *smile*
And so, I may have had a bad holiday but I guess none of it really does matter as long as somebody is there to share with. You know?
Sap. *wink*
GET IT ON.
