himynameisobed

[himynameisobed]

another day another psychic.

i was walking to a clinic from my parents house and was waiting at the light at university and elm when a small, southeast asian man standing by me started saying something to me. i had my airpods in, so i missed what he said, but he seemed to be pointing to the corner of his eye so i assumed he was complimenting my sunglasses (which everyone has been doing recently). he laughed and said something like, "no, you're a very lucky man, you have such a kind face," and proceeded to basically tell my fortune. i've encountered something like this before, a long, long time ago back when i worked at hollister, and after that interaction, the yogi asked if i could give him a discount on his purchase, so i knew this was probably some sort of scam, or that he'd eventually ask for some money; but i'm also a spiritual person, and i find these things interesting and think maybe they're some force of the universe anyway, so i decided to let him keep going. he told me that i had 3 lines on my forehead that meant i was going to live a long and happy life (up to the ripe old age of specifically 89), and that i had a lot of friends. he told me something like things will work out well for me, and though i'm mostly carefree, i have a tendency to overthink certain things, and i should avoid doing that at one point, he handed me a small piece of paper and told me to crumple it and then blow on it, so i did. then he told me that i once had a jealous friend in a past life - someone who was pleasant to my face but wished the worst for me in private - and that in this life, i should keep my most important plans to myself. "my advice is in conversations, speak less and listen more. but you can talk to your family because they're blood." and then he asked me to pick a number from 1-9 and name a colour i liked. i picked 7 and blue. we continued talking, about how when i start to overthink things, i should switch from thinking to prayer. at one point he told me i'd be receiving two pieces of very good news in the next month. then he told me to straighten out the small crumpled piece of paper in my hand. i did, and on it was written the number 7 and the word blue - the number and colour i had picked earlier. i'm always impressed by these things, even knowing it's probably some trick or sleight of hand. i don't even remember him writing anything down on the piece of paper to begin with, though he must have at some point, and i can't recall any opportunity he would've had to switch the piece of paper considering in my memory i was holding it the whole time. then he asked me to blow on the piece of paper and put it in his little cache, and when i did he asked me to put in some money too. suspicions confirmed. at first i refused, thinking i didn't have any on me, but then i remembered i had some cash from the weekend, so i gave him a $5 bill. later, i googled this whole interaction and found that it is indeed a common practice known as the "lucky face scam", but honestly, i don't mind parting with $5 for the sake of some unconventional entertainment and words of kind fortune. after all, people pay psychics all the time (although they arguably haven't been tricked into the interaction). and besides, i do tend overthink certain things and talk too much anway (as do we all). who knows, maybe just speaking all those good things out loud will somehow manifest them. likely not, but never say never.

[himynameisobed]

"I understand just reading your letter why you would be drawn to her. And I understand, too, why you would be drawn to Naoko. There's nothing the least bit sinful about it. Things like that happen all the time in this great big world of ours. It's like taking a boat out on a beautiful lake on a beautiful day and thinking both the sky and the lake are beautiful. So stop eating yourself up. Things will go where they're supposed to go if you just let them take their natural course. Despite your best efforts, people are going to be hurt when it's time for them to be hurt. Life is like that. I know I sound like I'm preaching from a pulpit, but it's about time you learned to live like this. You try too hard to make life fit your way of doing things. If you don't want to spend time in an insane asylum, you have to open up a little more and let yourself go with life's natural flow. I'm just a powerless and imperfect woman, but still there are times when I think to myself how wonderful life can be! Believe me, it's true! So stop what you're doing this minute and get happy. Work at making yourself happy!" - Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami

[himynameisobed]

mid-may.

i've been having a pleasant string of almost-summer days that make me grateful. last saturday, amber and i went to cirque du soleil and had what seemed to be a life-changing and eye-opening experience - at least in the immediate aftermath, when we talked about leaving our boring, everyday lives to join the circus. (my toxic trait is believing that i can develop the capabilities necessary to be a cirque du soleil performance if i wanted to, even now, in my close to middle age) the human body is an absolute marvel. we saw mesmerizing contortionists, a man stacking chairs to an unbelievable height while also performing acrobatics, a man whose feet were strapped to one long stilt, who was launched into the air and did several flips before landing in perfect balance - it was insane and thrilling and now i truly believe every one should see one of these performances at least once in their life. after the circus, we went to my friend beth's 30th birthday party and it was cute. i'm trying to live more of an alcohol-free life, but it's difficult when i say i'll only drink on special occasions and every occasion seems special. got a bit tipsy, played with a dog, stood outside smoking a cigarette and talking about the upcoming movie, "killers of the flower moon." and when a friend of mine gets tipsy too, sometimes we get closer than we probably should. easy affection, a strange pull, some yearning for a deeper intimacy that might not be wholly appropriate given the context of everything. or maybe just a little bit of a harmless flirtation. the next day is sunday and i'm too hungover to go to church. i meet my sister at my parents' house later though, and we head to bang bang to stand in line for 20 minutes and get ice cream. we walked all the way there, which was impressive, but maybe a bit unnecessary. i'd invited conor out for ice cream, but he flipped it over on me and instead invited me over to a little party he and his friends were having at Tommy and Ronan's place. i wanted to go just to properly meet one of their friends, Shane, who had just immigrated to Toronto a couple of days before and has maybe the coolest natural hair colour i've ever seen. my sister and i get to their party, which is happening on the shared patio space on their building, so there's a bunch of random people there, and we find everyone talking to a group of australian girls. i play it cool with shane, pretending to be just noticing him, and strike up a nice conversation. he seems sweet, and a bit shy and sensitive, but also like he can have a good time. a nice addition to the group, in any case, but i guess they've all been friends forever. later we go to stackt market, and shane confides in me that he thinks it's overrated and he's bored, so i suggest going to crews. to my delight, he seems excited about the idea, but conor and i had been texting renee and she said she was at karaoke, so we went to meet her there instead. it might've been the wrong move since we ended up having to get a separate room anyway and barely seeing renee, and crews honestly probably would've been more fun, but it is what it is. shane leaves early saying he's tired. he leaves without letting most people know, and i feel bad he didn't have more fun, but there's always next time. the next day i meet my david, amber, and michael (+ michael's wife) at the beach. it's a nice day out and we walk along the board walk for a stretch before heading to a barbecue restaurant for lunch. my friend liam, his friend william and william's room mate meet us there. i feel kind of bad because i think liam thought we were going to have an actual beach day - a day of casual drinks on the shore, playing beach volleyball or some other sport - but really we just wanted to be outside in the nice weather and go get food. i think i accuse him of misunderstanding what i said when i invited him, but really i should've just apologized. in any case, he said he'd be ready for next time - that he would get some sort of ball himself and we'd all be able to play. he lives in the beaches but apparently rarely goes to the beach, but next time we'll make a day of it. our waitress at the restaurant is unnecessarily rude, making mistakes and accusing us of them and refusing to answer questions in any helpful way. it's honestly astounding, and i make a loud remark about how she needs to learn how to just do her fucking job that i hope she hears while she's walking downstairs. at one point she'd brought us what she says is a pork sandwich, which none of us ordered. she goes, "well, it's someone's, i wrote it down," and we say none of us ordered it so she goes back to the kitchen and comes back saying it's a brisket sandwich. our friend asks to confirm if it's pork or beef (since he can't eat pork), and she dismissively says something along the lines of, "i can't tell just by looking at it." so we ask her to go to the kitchen and check. and it was on her way back to the kitchen that i make a loud remark, and honestly after that she was quite a bit nicer to us so i think it worked. it's crazy how service can truly make or break a dining experience. we were 9 customers who were just trying to have a good time and enjoy the long weekend, and it seemed like this waitress with a stank ass attitude was making it her personal mission to ruin everything. to be honest, i think she was also a little bit racist or ignorant. maybe she was just a basic white blonde girl whose spent all her life in the beaches ever only with other white people, so she has no grasp of any possible experience beyond that. two of the people we were with were from cameroon and were asking her very reasonable questions that she was treating as stupid. i want her to try going to cameroon and ordering in french off of a menu that she doesn't understand. she literally had no patience or empathy, but i'm hoping she's just young and will grow out of that. after lunch, we walked along the beach some more and when we parted ways, i went home and took a nap until 9pm. all in all, it was a nice weekend with nice weather, and now i'm going to go back to trying to finally finish my portfolio.

[himynameisobed]

my sister asked me to write a poem for mother's day so we could put it, along with messages from all my other siblings, into a homemade card she painted. for mother's day, we had a post-church lunch at a place called epicure. when our sandwiches arrived, my sister and i had no idea whose was whose because neither of them looked like what either of us had ordered. it turns out we had completely misread the menu because it was so difficult to read and make sense of. i ordered "the northern" instead of "the southern", which is what i actually wanted, and my sister got a sandwich with bocconcini instead of the broccoloni she actually wanted it. it was very confusing and i commented on how bad the user experience of that menu was and my sister made a snide remark on how i'm probably going to be so annoying now after having completed my ux design diploma program. it's true though, i'm starting to notice little little quirks, strengths and flaws in the design of every day things and products. after lunch, we walked around riverdale, which has become something of a mother's day tradition. it's always warm enough to have a nice walk, but still a tad too chilly to go to the waterfront or the beach. and when we got home, we watched the movie "fresh" at my sister's insistence. it wasn't as disgusting as she'd initially made it out to be, but it definitely reinforced my lack of desire to date (lest i end up with ritualistic cannibal). all in all, it was a nice mother's day. and tomorrow, i'm going to try to get some solid work done on my portfolio after having accomplished absolutely nothing today (for the 6th business day in a row). wish me luck!

[himynameisobed]

fear.

so much of it, bottled up, the pressure building and building and building. the cap threatens to screw off, the carbon sizzles. i can almost here the whistle of a tea kettle blowing. the same sense of urgency, and alarm. such a frightening sound for a mundane thing, all that screeching supposedly followed by the warmth of a grandmother's voice saying "tea's ready!". high pitched, desperate whistle on a calm saturday afternoon. is that what this fear is? some punctuation in an otherwise unremarkable and ordinary day. and all for what? something so superficial and meaningless. something beyond any effort to control it. an age is over faster than you realize. a touch of beauty is left in the past. we, as a society, are obsessed with reaching back, begging for a return, never willing to let a new reality settle. what would it mean to simply move forward with grace - to leave things where they belong? to be able to turn backward and instead of reaching out, simply glance down with a knowing smile, and then turn forward and keep going, head held high. wouldn't that be nice?

[himynameisobed]

january update.

first month of the new year almost done and things are looking up in a quiet, steady way - which, i think by now, is something i've grown to prefer. i had a birthday party for my 30th birthday. i wasn't going to at first. i was maybe going to have a nice dinner with friends, and then another dinner with cake and presents with my family, but i was out with my sister one day when she suggested having a funeral-themed party (a fun little death to my twenties celebration) and i thought the idea was so funny i had to execute it. i drafted up a fun little mock-funeral service invitation and decided the party would have to be. i ended up renting a space out, inviting over 100 guests (though i'm not sure how many actually attended), and mandating an all black dress code. "you should wear white." another banger of an idea from my sister, but i added a black veil for the vibes. the party went really well, except for spotify deciding to stop working after i'd spent a considerable amount of time curating a playlist specifically for the event. but it was friday the 13th, so i'm grateful that was the only thing that went wrong. everyone seems to have had a good time, and though i was too busy flitting around the room to really spend time with anyone (they say it's hard to have fun at your own wedding after all), there were speeches (eulogies, rather - given by Frances, Camilla, Conor, and my sister - all of them funny and then touching), and cake, and free-flowing drinks, and so many of the people i'd wanted to see but hadn't had the chance to for so long all gathered together. and by the end of the party, things were getting a little blurry, so i'm sure i had my fair share of fun too. the rest of january was just lazing about. i resigned from my job a couple of weeks ago to start a bootcamp (that started today!), and instead of working through my notice period, my manager said they'd just pay me out for it and I could just get more time off. i've been doing a lot of deep cleaning that i've been putting off for forever, playing video games, and returning to the habits i want to foster - namely, reading, writing, and drawing. sometimes i light candles and bask in the quiet, and i'm grateful to be perfectly content in my own company. i've also been experimenting with not drinking anymore, which has been going pretty well. i've gone out a couple of times and just drank non-alcoholic beers and mocktails, and honestly, the energy of the environment (usually bolstered with loud music) and going through the motions of drinking are enough to induce a pretty impressive placebo effect. i was worried i wouldn't have fun without the alcohol, and myabe i'm not as wild and won't go home with as crazy stories as i used to, but i still end up having a good time, and surprisingly staying out later than a lot of other people. i don't even miss the alcohol that much so i think i'm going to keep this going indefinitely and see what happens. the only thing is i feel like people are a bit judgy when they find out i've made the conscious decision to try to stop drinking - and moreso when they find out it's not just for dry january, but instead an actual lifestyle change. i've gotten a lot of why's and perceptively insincere congratulations's, and there's definitely pressure to drink to contribute to the overall vibe of the crowd (i even had a friend rescind an invitation to go out for drinks because she was already tipsy and i said i would go but not drink - "i can still come out and have fun!", "that makes me feel so not fun thouth"), but i've never been one to bow to pressure. the way i see it, i've done all the drunk nights out before, and they're all for the most part the same, even if they are entertaining. a little blurry, a little messy, a little reckless and wild. people love telling stories of the antics i've gotten up to when i'm drunk, but i don't need to be the story anymore. i'm 30 now, and i want to see if not drinking opens up my life in new - and maybe better - ways. i want my weekends back, and i want more energy and i want to be more creative. more and more i'm seeing alcohol - at least in the ways i consumed it (namely excessively, and without any restraint or moderation) - as a scam, and i don't want to buy into it anymore. so that's me at 30 - quitting my job, starting a bootcamp, quitting alcohol, and hopefully moving london, england by the end of the year. which reminds me, i still need to fill out my visa application. it seems i still haven't gotten over the trap of procrastination yet, but hey, nobody's perfect.

[himynameisobed]

habitual poison

the stubborn inclination toward what's easy instead of what is good. the several small paralyses that pile up into a monument begging to be worshipped, casting shadows over little things that might actually bring you joy. countless hours doom-scrolling instead of picking up a pen. hitting snooze five times in the morning - 5 minutes stretching into 45 - instead of splashing cold water on your sleepy face and getting on with your day. subconsciously absorbing yourself in other people's lives instead of living out your own. forgetting about the quick lock of your own presence in a slowly darkening room. intrusive thoughts that things might never change while every key to every door is five feet from your hands. they look so heavy that you pass them by, but the great trick is the doors were never locked at all. Choice is a wily fickle friend, ducking behind a million corners every single day, and yet, when you think about it, you are the master of your own fate. grab Choice at his next turn and look him dead in the eye. life is as bound or as boundless as you make it, but it takes a strange amount of courage to turn away from all the little deaths laid out before us, and choose, always, to live.

[himynameisobed]

i sit to write in a coffee shop for the first time this year. it's early august and the air outside is thick with pre-rainfall heat. someone recently told me that coffee has a 12 hour half life, and i don't exactly know what that means but i'm trying not to drink it past noon if i can help it - if i'm trying to sleep at around 10:30PM every night. so i order a decaf. i need something warm, and want the flavour - something to soothe me in the early evening hum. i sit alone at a large table, facing the full-wall window beyond a row of tables for two and three. i watch a young man walk in and pleasantly kiss who i assume is his girlfriend with a tenderness often reserved for the familiar. sometimes i envy these small comforts and affections, but i am happy nonetheless. happy to be sitting in the light bustle of the shop. i didn't realize i'd missed the tardemark noises; the clanging of baristas' utensils, the comfortable buzz of anonymous chatter, a tap running water for a few seconds before turning off - the hiss of steam, someone calling out an order, and the calm, unthreatening music floating over everything. what could be more perfect for someone looking to quiet all their inner noise? a man reads his newspaper and sips his drink alone. he's older and looks relatively content, and i wonder about his life and if he's happy - if he has a wife (or husband) who he loves dearly, or children who have all grown up and fled home to start new lives of their own. or maybe he has no one and these are treasured stolen moments when he can be in the company of others for at least a little while. he's stopped reading and now he's staring out the window and i wonder what he's looking at. there are tables outside too, scattered along a makeshift patio, and trees strewn in between. i see the animated face and gestures of a woman probably recounting some new personal tale to her companion. she alternates between laughing and looks of horror or disgust. she turns her head to scoff and waves her hand dismissively, and i have a feeling she might be talking about a man. it's nice to sit here and soak it all in. i want to make a regular practice of it, so i can get even a little bit of writing in, day after day. and all it costs to stay indefinitely is $2.89 for a cup of decaf coffee. i bet it's cozy here in the winter. i imagine what it must look like from the outside, from the perspective of a shivering passerby hurrying home through the cold. surely she would gladly walk through the warm yellow light spilling through the full-wall window into the 6PM dark. maybe she would look in and smile at the thought of the warmth waiting for her at home. and on the inside, there i would be, cozy in an ovesized sweater, maybe sitting in the same spot i'm sitting at now, watching her walk by. maybe there will be a light snowfall, and it'll make a pretty picture through the window. i'll look around to see if anyone else is struck by it - all of us there, sheltered from the cold, happily tucked away in some softly-lit, quietly buzzing corner of the city - but no one will have noticed. they'll go on talking or reading or lightly laughing, so i'll keep the beauty of the moment to myself. i truly believe there's something magical about coffee shops on winter evenings, and i hope to find that small everyday magic again this winter too - in cups of decaf coffee in the new dark of early evening, safe from all manner of snow and storm.

[himynameisobed]

oppressive, muggy heat presses down like a heavy, lethargic blanket all across toronto. i took a streetcar home from my parents' place and was instantly annoyed at the crowd of people packed in. a few boys came in a couple of stops after me and stood at the entrance, even though there was enough room to move down. i watched people struggle around them to exit for stops afterward - they were in everyone's way and couldn't give a damn about it. that kind of selfish entitlement in people frustrates me. i don't know how people can move through life being that inconsiderate and obtuse. it's not a good look and nobody appreciates it. how hard would it be to do what's good for other people? why do you want to be cramped at the entrance of a streetcar anyway, having everyone chafe across you as they rightfully try to get off? down the aisle, i found myself sweating uncomfortably. and when it was my turn to get off, i was trying to be patient, but some random guy cut me off, jutting right in front of me, quick as a dart, as if worried the doors were going to close before he could leave. "sorry!" he said in a flash as i audibly let out a deadpan "what the actual fuck." does nobody know how crowds work anymore? has the pandemic really stripped us all of our common sense? i'm calmer now, in the sweet chill of my air-conditioned apartment. the evening stretches before me and i'm probably going to start a new video game soon. i want to finish my visa application, but i don't know if i have enough information. in this heat, everything seems to move slowly, and i wonder how many more minutes i'll lie in bed.

[himynameisobed]

blood.

bad habits die hard and sometimes i feel like i'm on the verge of letting one rot, but then at the very last minute, on the brink of some new horizon, i turn back to the corpse, pick up the defibrillator, and send a new shock through its system. i breathe life into what should be a dead thing and welcome it home like an old friend i've outgrown but can't shake off, as if it's some essential part of me, incapable of separation without me withering away. sometimes that happens with old friends; they become family, with ties stronger than blood. blood, blood, blood. fresh blood drawn from an old scab i can't help but pick, even though i know better - even though i know it will likey leave a scar. and i wonder how it's tainted me. i wonder where it's left its mark. and can anyone else see but me? or is it a wholly inward kind of shaken, something i can keep solely to myself? maybe it's my cross to bear, but wouldn't i be better off if the burden could be shared? deep shame is a lonely pit, and now i'm the corpse, stuck six feet under, breathless and watching shovel-fulls of dirt cascade all around me. i can see the sunlight peeking through the scattered earth. perhaps i have enough in me to reach for new life. and maybe i can leave that other corpse behind. day by day, step forward, grow the distance with enough time. and like lot fleeing sodom, let me never look back. when the temptation draws near, will i be flesh or will i be salt?

[himynameisobed]

some memories of new york/gov ball, june 9th - 13th, 2022: standing in the hallway of clark's apartment and eating a genuine new york bagel. he was trying to keep me a secret hoping to surprise vasu, but she was on a work call that just wouldn't end so we gave up and i headed back to my hotel. picking up flowers with rob for vasu's party. he wrote in the group chat that he'd be another hour or so, but the message must've sent late because he was stumbling through our hotel room door only a few minutes later, coincidentally right while i was on a video call with conor so they got to say hi to each other. vasu's party, which was nice and intimate, up on their apartment roof with a great view of the city. a new york summer sunset with a few good friends i hadn't seen in a while - who could ask for anything more? and drinks and photos and new friends who came out with us later, to a bar i barely remember (the eagle???). no recollection of how we got home, but apparently robby bought everyone pizza. an impressively authentic chinatown, and finding a relatively nice public bathroom in a surprisingly fun mall. waiting 3 hours in a will call line in a sea of teens and agonies. sweltering in the oppressive heat, bodies pressed against bodies in a pulsing, shapeless, untamed mass. i think we saw maybe four people faint in our direct vicinity, and i watched a few people give up and decide to go home. admittedly, we picked a bad spot, and sometimes we were with people in the crowd and then i'd turn around and they'd be gone and i'd wonder where they went. probably to some smarter spot to get to the front faster, but honestly i felt too old to shove my way through hoardes of what looked like highschoolers. but the break of joy and sweet relief once we were out of the crowd and inside the festival grounds. i remember starting to finally feel the buzz watching louis the child, which i'd never known was right up my wheelhouse. and then, later, kid cudi, who made a lasting impression. three days of a festival and going out afterward every night. and amidst all this, a visit to the met, a walk through central park, trying shake shack for the first time and not even getting a milkshake. a couple of brunches, dinner in flushing, an arcade bar with a pinball machine that kept eating our tokens, and a gay bar (for better music) where i flirted with a bartender as my friends watched. an afterparty in a dark, sweaty basement with not enough ventilation, where a woman started teaching an impromptu dance class and we stumbled over ourselves trying to follow all the steps. and lots and lots of new york pizza. all in all, it was a great and somewhat fuzzy weekend. i got to see old friends and make some new ones, and listen to good music while soaking up the summer sun. one of our favourite stages was actually a little bit of a hidden gem (sadly, we only discovered it on the last day) where a dj was playing bangers and everyone was dancing. and OH: i met jordan alexander, who stars in the new gossip girl, at the festival, which is maybe the most new york thing to have ever happened to anyone in the history of time.

[himynameisobed]

repeat lessons.

a lot can happen in the span of a few weeks. i meet a friend for drinks after watching what is now my favourite movie from recent years (everything everywhere all at once - i've already seen it twice, cried both times, and i'm seeing it again on tuesday). i haven't eaten any dinner, and before meeting her, i've already had a couple of beers at eataly, where my friends and i went after the movie. the kitchen was closed so all they could feed us were pistachios while we sat. my friend and i catch up over a few cocktails and then we go downstairs where we hear the faint thumping of music beyond a shadowy corridor. apparently there's some underground club connected to the restaurant and a semi-famous dj from the uk is playing. we each pay $30 and walk inside, and honestly the music is pretty good. we buy more rounds and get drunker, and we meet a couple of guys throughout the night. i don't remember how the conversations start, but we end up letting one of them tag along when we head back to my friend's condo for a night cap. suffice it to say i fall back into bad habits and make a mistake - i let something start and then snowball, and it must be hours before we crash into the consequences because when i step out of the daze, it's getting light outside and i know i owe someone an apology. the next weekend, my friend and i meet for a walk along the waterfront and i take it as an opportunity to hash it out. i bring it up so we can unpack it, and by the end of the walk - by the time we find ourselves seated on a patio - everything is settled and i'm grateful we can put it all behind us - laugh it off as some semi-funny, semi-horrifying story we can maybe tell at parties in the not so distant future. i buy her a beer for the trouble. that night, a boy i've seen a couple of times asks me if i want a free ticket to go to a concert with him. but i'm tired, and the music isn't really my jam, so i stay home to rest instead. he ends up coming over after the concert, drenched in sweat, and we share a bottle of wine on my couch while he shows me a bunch of his favourite music vidoes. i lend him a shirt so he can feel drier. his phone dies and he lives pretty far away, so he ends up sleeping over, but my apartment is so hot that we can only cuddle for a little while before shifting to opposite sides of the bed. in the morning, he complains about a hangover and gets ready to leave while i stay in bed, hoping to catch a couple more hours of sleep before meeting my family at church. throughout this week, i let myself fall into old traps that i really should know how to avoid by now. yet tonight, even after another set of blunders, there is a sense of renewal and hope. i think i'm getting in my own way and setting myself up for failure. i convince myself that consequences aren't of any concern, but deep down i know that everything has a price, and every action warrants a reaction. desire is a thing i'm working through, and i'm hoping that i grow up soon and realize there's more to life than short-lived fun. the hope comes from the knowledge that if i'm getting in my own way, i can also get out of it. and what might life have to offer when i do? all i have to do is reach out and grasp it. let bygones be bygones, take it day by day, and watch the world open up before me.

[himynameisobed]

the little steps.

yesterday i sketched for the first time in what feels like forever. i pulled up a random photo on instagram and got a feel for the pen skating over my surface pro. at first i hated what i'd drawn, but when i look back at it now, it actually doesn't seem that bad. i also finished a book yesterday, meditated, and wrote a few notes in my new-old observation journal. all in all, it was a pretty good day for the habits i'm trying to build for myself. today, i worked out in the morning before work for the first time since before i can even remember. some people say that working out at the beginning of the day will leave you feeling energized for the rest of it, but that was sadly not the case for me. i didn't feel particularly tired or sleepy though, which i guess is a good sign since i've been feeling abnormally groggy since mexico. i think my body will just have to adjust to the new schedule before really feeling energized. i woke up at 6:45am so i could go through my morning routine and still make it to the gym in time for a full workout before work, and i think i'm going to try to make this a consistent practice. i've always wanted to be a morning person anyway - the kind of person who can enjoy a nice, languid and unrushed breakfast, idly sipping coffee and maybe doing some light reading or writing and preparing for the day. this month is looking up in terms of enforcing good habits and letting go of bad ones - of putting better things into practice. but then again, it's only been four days, so it would be a bit of a disaster if i'd already messed things up. still, i feel encouraged and reinvigorated, as i do at the start of every new month. i have it in my head that if i can be consistent with these daily habits, it'll somehow make me a stronger, smarter, happier and more fulfilled person. i mean, i know there's more to it than just reading and writing and working out every day, but i'm allowed to hope these things can only help. they say that insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. i plan to do these things over and over with hopeully the same outcome: a steadily improving quality of life. let's see if i can keep this going.

[himynameisobed]

here are some photos of me in speedos in cancun. at one point, wes said i had 0% body fat and i said “thank you.” how’s that for toxic!!

[himynameisobed]

i always complain about not getting enough rest yet don’t do anything about it.

above: the only group photo we took this past weekend was this somewhat blurry, kind of scary photo of everyone joining me in bed and i love it. the last couple of weekends haven't been very restful and i think my body is starting to pay the price. two weekends ago i was in cancun, abusing my body in various ways. i was there with a bunch of coworkers for 5 days and 4 nights, and i blacked out the first two nights. apparently on the second night, my VP and director of sales found me dancing by myself in the resort disco, wearing nothing but my speedo and a flimsy little beach coverup. i wasn't even wearing shoes, and i have vague memories of a sticky floor because of it. i actually lost my slides and an old, classic pair of shorts that night and never got them back, which should be enough to really summarize how cancun went. i took it a little easier the second two nights out of sheer necessity, and spent a lot of time lounging in various pools and getting more sunburnt than anyone would've wanted for me. people kept telling me to put on sun screen or go inside, but i don't really feel burns, so i ignored all of that advice (to my detriment). now, after some pretty intense peeling, the burn has settled into a nice tan. people seem to like it, but i feel like tans always make me look a little older. and there's also this tiny new sun spot on my nose and i'm wondering if it'll ever go away. still, i managed to rally the last night and go to coco bongos with a bunch of people, and at the end of the night this british guy that one of my hot van girl coworkers brought over kissed my cheek and it was very charming. then, when we were leaving, i said bye to him and he kissed my hand like i was a princess and i took it as yet another sign i should probably move to england before it's too late. this past weekend, i went to london, ontario with frances and jordan to visit jacqueline and see the place she bought (and her dog). the night before, i went out to crews and tangos with conor and stef, and we drank double rum and cokes all night, which probably wasn't the best decision considering i had somewhere to be pretty early the next day. for some reason, i like to act like i can still drink as though i were in my prime years in university, but that's absolutely not the case at all and i need to learn how to accept that and moderate. i actually made it a goal on friday night to control my drinking and not hook up with anyone, and i failed on both accounts. but you know what, a new month is just beginning and i feel reinvigorated. anyway, london was fun and it was really nice to see jacqueline and get a crew together again. we started drinking pretty early, and at one point we considered going out. we called the only bar any of us had ever heard of in london (barney's?) and asked what the vibe was and they told us the line was 45 minutes long and full of 19-20 year olds. so that was a hard pass from us. instead, we stayed in and played a series of drinking games (cunties, ride the bus, slap cup, four corners), and all in all it was a pretty fun time. at the end of the night, we settled down in the living room and i put on "to all the boys i've loved before" yet again, and yet again, i was basically the only one that watched it. frances and jacqueline retired upstairs pretty early, and jordan fell asleep soon afterwards. i kept reacting to things and making comments as though i was watching the movie for the first time and jordan was still awake, and at the end of the movie, i said something like "wasn't that nice?" to complete and utter silence before creeping upstairs to the guest bedroom. we went for brunch the next day before driving home, and when i got home, i slept for 12 hours. i fell asleep at 6pm thinking it was just going to be a nap, and i ended up waking up at 8:30 in the morning. honestly, my body probably needed it, but oversleeping left me in a pretty groggy state all day. i don't think i've fully recovered from mexico yet. my body doesn't feel like it's at 100%. but i'm hoping the haziness will wear off in the next couple of days or so and i can go back to feeling normal. i'm looking forward to not doing much this weekend. i feel like i need to chill out and i really want to finish the video game i'm currently playing so i can start a scenic postman simulator that i've been watching clips of. i really am not who i used to be and i'm not mad about it at all. bring on the quiet nights in and the money savings. i think i'm going to trade in random nights out for saving up for the trips i have planned for the rest of the year. i'm excited to see what the summer brings. maybe i will learn to finally break bad habits and let go of old demons. maybe i will learn how to not drink so much when i go out, like a normal, sane person. maybe i will learn how to not redownload hell apps in the middle of the night or early morning just because i'm bored and a little bit lonely. here's to hoping!

[himynameisobed]

an effort.

tonight, after watching an episode of heartstopper and mindlessly tapping through endless stories on instagram, swiping through online shops and clicking through the targeted ads (festival clothes before i go to new york in june), i finally pulled out my tablet to try sketching for the first time in months. only to panic when i found my pen wasn't working. i've left the tablet with the pen tucked into the case at the foot of my bed, untouched, for quite a while now so i was initially scared i'd crushed it in my sleep or something, but a quick google search and vague memories of my younger brother experiencing the same thing with his pen made me realize the battery was probably just dead. i didn't even know these things had batteries, but i unscrewed the bottom of the pen and one fell right out. it's a tiny little thing, a AAAA battery, and i thought surely shoppers drug mart must have them, so i quickly put on some clothes (and a hat because my hair was in no state to be seen in public after experimenting with my part) and made my way over. i asked the cashier if they had any AAAA batteries and she pointed me to the back of the room, and i stood there looking at the batteries display for maybe 7 minutes before accepting they weren't there. then some vague memories of walking around college and spadina with my brother late at night - popping into random convenience stores and the 7-eleven, trying to find the exact same batteries - came flooding back and i realized it was a lost cause. google let me know i could probably find the batteries at best buy, which is luckily across the street from my apartment, but it opens at 10am tomorrow so i guess i'll pop in after work. i'm trying to figure out when i should go to the gym. i really don't want to plan to go in the morning - mostly because i know i probably don't have the willpower or discipline to actually wake myself up - and i've made plans for the night, so i guess i'm going to have to go right after work. the old me would've just written it off as a skip day, but here i am, trying to commit. i also have to give a potential subletter a virtual tour of the apartment for sadiq, which, honestly, i'm not looking forward to. the last couple of subletters i've had were really not the best and have traumatized me when it comes to noise. one of them would literally yell into her phone at 2am, with the phone on speaker. like....really? i didn't want to hear even one side of the conversation, let alone both of them. and every night i would text hear asking her to keep it down, which made feel like a bitch, but i had to wake up for work early in the morning so i honestly didn't care. in my mind, being direct about it was better than secretly hating her, wishing she'd be quiet and resenting her for not being so, pressing the sides of my pillow to my ears all through the night. not that i was a perfect roommate at all. she had issues with my cleanliness because she was hyperclean, and i could've definitely be a cleaner, more intentional roommate, but she was passive agressive about it. when sadiq was finally home, she made him have a talk with me about it, and when i asked why she waasn't talking to me herself, he said it was because she thought i wasn't good with confrontation. even though i was going through the confrontation and she was completely cowering out of it. honestly, i feel like more people need to hone their conflict resolution skills, but that's just me. i really have no problem having difficult or awkward conversations. sometimes i even relish it. i'm the kind of person who called a meeting in my living room with my other subletter and his girlfriend to tell them i thought it was disrespectful that she was coming around and staying over so much and making me feel like a third wheel in my own apartment - a two-bedroom apartment that was made for two people to comfortably live in with anything more being claustrophobic and too much. like if you want to live with your girlfriend, get a place together. the straw that broke the camel's back was when she came over with a full carry-on suitcase of stuff and i tersely asked, "are you going to be staying over all weekend?", and she said, "yes." i called the living room meeting immediately after that. and yes, she did continue coming over, but she made sure to hide out in my roommate's room whenever she was there, which was fine, he was allowed to do whatever he wanted with his own space. i just didn't want them taking over the shared living areas all the time, which i think is understandable. because what was i supposed to do? awkwardly sit there while trying to read or draw or whatever while they made incessant and, to me, inane conversation and fondled each other? no thanks. i'm actually getting worked up thinking about my past subletters, so i'm going to have to make my terms really clear with this next one. or maybe i should learn to not be so sensitive and to be a more gracious, patient and forgiving person. i'm going to go with the former and hopefully learn the latter later. anyway, all of this is to say that i really did have every inention of drawing tonight, but now here i am, writing and complaining and getting worked up for no reason. i'm going to go play wordle, maybe listen to some gentle music and read and bit, and then go to bed.

[himynameisobed]

coming back in little steps.

i've been steadily riding a wave of guilt over failing to commit to the things i want to practice. i don't remember the last time i seriously wrote anything, and i don't remember the last time i turned my tablet on, or opened my sketchbook. and then, after so long apart, returning to these things always seems like such a daunting and herculean task. this cycle repeats over and over and over again. i'm certain i've written about this particular brand of disappointment in myself before. i lay down excuses that keep me from action; it's a busy week at work, or i'm going on vacation soon so i'll just get back to it when i return, or maybe i've had a long video call with a friend so that becomes my evening activity for the day. and then, when i finally dig my heels into the dirt and start back up again, i feel the familiar release. things start to flow and i remember that doing these small things makes me feel so much more myself. i consider myself a happy - or at least a luckily content - person overall, but writing and drawing - making and creating things - shoot a different kind of life into the monotony of my every day, and i often regretfully forget that. i've been committing to my fitness pretty strictly recently, so that's been good, but i want to do more. but what can i realistically commit to? what is going to last? how can i mentally make these things not seem like a chore? because they really don't feel like a chore when i'm doing them. it's just starting that's always the toughest part. maybe i can commit to being more aware - to trying to see the beauty in ordinary things, and writing it down. or taking a photo of something i think is pretty every day and drawing it out. i just have to remember that what i make doesn't have to be good, or important, or particularly sublime. it just has to be done. that might be a fun little practice. it might even make me appreciate things more. i'm going to start carrying an observation notebook around with me everywhere i go. i have the perfect little one i bought in a stationery shop long ago, probably hoping to do this same exact thing. let's give it a go for all of may and see how it goes. one small piece of writing or one small little drawing every day. or maybe every couple of days. i don't want to get too ambitious, lest i fail and am once again paralyzed by my own disappointment in myself. good luck to me!