The other night we had a dinner party. The guest list read like a Pitchfork press release: “…featuring members of The Dears, Metric, Stars, Death From Above 1979.” It’s nice having people over, since it’s replaced my going out. Sometimes I feel like I’m missing something, being at home all the time. But then that odd night when I do go out I remember instantly how much it sucks, so it’s infinitely better having friends come to me. Amy made a joke about my being skin and bones, to which I retorted: “Don’t worry, when you all leave I will eat my loneliness away.” I regretted the comment as soon as I made it. I don’t usually feel lonely, but sometimes, like tonight, when Neptune’s gone to bed and everyone’s heading out to the bar or to see a show, I feel left behind. It’s just me, blogging, holding down the fort. I think that’s part of “becoming a mom.” Now I make corny jokes, I’m even starting to think puns are funny. I certainly can’t drink like I used to; that’s what a year and a half of sobriety does to a person. I tied one on after our ICA show in London and curiously didn’t get a hangover; I got gut rot. My stomach rebelled. My salad days are definitely over and I’ve moved on to my tobbouleh days.
Living in Parc X is great. We don’t have anything trendy up here. Occasionally hipsters will float through for the adventurous feeling they get from coming up to the Indian restaurants. We don’t have a Dollarama, we have a Dollartheque: where nothing is dollar but everything ranges in price from $0.33 to $49.99. Then there is the junk shop on our corner that advertises the price of 88 cents in scribbly, upside-down magic marker eights on flourescent bristol boards. Below the price, in small writing it reads: “some items.” Anyway they have just about everything on three floors of total chaos. I went upstairs once and was afraid for my life, worried that at any moment several boxes of polyester flowers or multi-coloured laundry baskets of various sizes could fall into the aisle and no one would find me for weeks. I’m not sure the basement is even part of the store. They have the seats from their minivan down there among unopened boxes and other strange, waterlogged things.
Our post office is frustrating. It is in the back of a fake depanneur and is run by the most miserable people I’ve ever met. I think a Greek mother-son team where the mother barely speaks a word of english (but can sell stamps like nothing else) and the son has been forced to take on the family business and every millisecond he is there ruins his life. At any rate, in classic Montreal style, they are pissed off to be serving you, which makes all the customers pissed off to be mailing things. It’s tense in there. I’m tempted to call the ombudsman on them. Yes, that’s right, I said ombudsman.
Natalia Yanchak 