sigh....

Sorry I haven't updated with anything really substantial lately. This is supposed to be about my adventures here in Chicago.

This past year has been one of the most difficult ones in my life and I feel beat up, worn down.  I want some semblence of normality.   Breathing space.  I don't think I'll ever get it.

I felt like I belonged in T.O. and now I'm here and I wake up every morning with a profound aching in my heart for something I had and seemingly threw away for something as superficial as a "job".  I need a community of friends around me, and I don't think that's possible here.  I'm going to stick this out for as long as I can, but I don't think that it will be as long as I imagined it to be.   Eyes open for T.O. area:  Sunnybrook, PMH, Mississauga, Oshawa, Newmarket.  Something HAS to come up.  
I really feel like an alien here.  I need Canada.

sorry...and thanks

been feeling really down is all.  it's been difficult here and i honestly need the words of encourangement from friends.  also, i've been slightly delusional from lack of sleep and food the past 2 weeks.

i shall continue to write....

update 3

this will be the last update for awhile.  not that many
of you actually read this crap anyway.

i'm too busy with work and too distracted to think
about writing anything.  my "writing" has always
been a delusion anyway.  i've decided to completely
thrwo myself into work to avoid thinking
about my situation and my loneliness.

maybe it'll change but i don't anticipate it to .....

update 2

chris's diet plan:

1) don't work for 6 mths and don't eat to save money.
2) get a job in a city where you don't know anybody, work
all the time because you have nobody to hang out with and
no time to meet anybody, and don't eat because you don't
have time.

i think i've dropped 25 lbs in the past 10 mths.

yeh, i guess it's a career and that's what we are supposed
to want out of life. stress, depression, high blood pressure,
rapid weight lose, hallunications. boy-o-boy! that's what
life is all about, ain't it! gosh, i'm so grateful that i'll die
young but have a rewarding career. i'll be so admired by
society. it warms the cockles of my glucose-starved heart ...

update

hey all,

work's been fuckin' me in the ass like revenue canada.  busy busy busy.  heopfully soon it will stabilize.

i have 2 movei reviews for you soon:  "Two Lane Blacktop" (an American car movie) and " Pierrot le fou" (by Godard).  hopefully soon.

take care
miss you

hugs, kisses, and beers

Athiesm

This is something that people don't like taking about, and for fear
of offending family and co-workers, I tend not to talk about it
either.  But this explains why I think religion is bunk all soo soo
well (and it's funny):

http://www.jhuger.com/kisshank


Hank is such as asshole....

last weekend.....

I've been real busy this week helping to get a PET-CT scanner (medical imaging equipment) up and running, so that's the reason for no posts lately.

That said, the weather last weekend was awesome.    15 degrees C and everyone was out and running around.  I made it to the park and the beachfront for the first time.  Yes, this city has beaches, although I'm not sure about swimming in Lake Michigan....

Here's some pics:











that's all for now....ttys...

Long way from home ....

I miss:
Grossman's and walking in to see Sean and Ian at the
bar.
Open mic night at Ein-Stein with Josh doing his schtick
and all the musicians who show up.
The sight of the CN Tower no matter where I am
in the city.
The streetcars and their silent travel.
Kensington Market and Pedestrian Sundays and the
honest sense of community that is embodied there and
having to go from shop to shop to get all the ingredients
for cooking a meal.
The chaos of Chinatown.
Canada.
My friends.

For the first time in my life, I had a community of friends
around me that had made me feel like I belonged. A family.  
The closest thing to an honest family with all the love and
acceptance that comes with that, outside of flesh-and-blood
family.  I can honestly say for the first time in my life, I
felt at home, even more so than I think I ever felt in my
hometown.  And what did I do?  I gave it all up for ajob.  
I feel like I betrayed them and myself.  Reached in and 
yanked  the bloody heart out of my life and stomped on it.  
I haven't felt like this since I left Nova Scotia back in '95.  
Actually, this may feel worse.

I miss you guys so fucking much I can't express:  Camille,
Joe & Louise & Jadylene, Agne & Tokai & Monir, Melissa,
Al, Mohammed, Sean, Ian, Carl, Enzo, Jon, and everybody 
else who has crossed my path and made  me feel like family.

I have to keep telling myself that I will be back to T.O.
someday.  I want to live in Kensington Market and wake up
each morning to that place.  Strolldown to Moonbean, grab
a fair-trade, organic coffee, and go to work knowing I'll be
coming home to wonderfull neighbourhood in the evening.  
THenmaybe going and having wine and talk with Al or
Camille or ATM or maybe swinging by Grossman's for  a
beer or 3 with Sean and Ian.

I know  wouldn't have been happy living in Oshawa, that
I would have hadto buy a car, but Iwould have been
closer to all my friends.   I wake up everyday wondering
if I made theright decision.  Don't get me wrong:  this
is a great city and all.  But at my heart, I am Canadian
and I need that sense of the land that I always got no
matter where I was in Canada, that sense of space,
which is lost in the city, but still that knowledge of that it
is out there and, as a Canadian, that I'm part of it.  Also,
myself, I need family.  I'm always searching for family.   
Trying to build family.  My own family has always seemed
ghostlike and barely there, partly, I suppose, because I'm
adopted.  I suppose then, that's why I'm always searching
and trying to build family:  to replace a concept of a family
I never had.  

with much love to my family, you know who you are,
have a beautiful sunday ....

The city wakes up....

The city came alive today.  It was like an anthill.  People scurrying everywhere as the thermometer hit 16 (celsius, of course).  It was the most activity I'd seen since being here.  The sidewalks in Lincoln Park crowded.  The bar patios overrun.   People finally started to shake off the long heavy haze of winter.  

I went up to Reckless Records on Broadway to buy the new Nick Cave CD (damn, imports) and walked around.  Visited a couple of used bookstores.  Sipped a beer at the Galway Arms.  Bought a screen/room divider and CD rack for the apartment.  The leisureness of the warm spring day seemd to change everyone's moods and bring them out.