We are approximately 8 months into a global pandemic. I few months ago I lived in Ottawa, the nation's pretty capital, with roommates. I craved community and the madness of my home town so I moved. Now I live where all the poets come from. As I type I am sitting in my apartment, alone. It’s in the heart of what most people who have never spent any time here would call the rough neighbourhood. My apartment, throughout the day, is flooded by the most beautiful light. My place is near a street corner. THE street corner. It has a huge billboard, a mailbox, a garbage that has slots for paper, plastic and trash and a needle disposal unit. THE corner also has a bus stop. Every morning I see an older man in his security officer uniform and a young man with a man bun smoking a cigarette wait for that bus. The bus stop also serves as a “safe” place for my city’s sex workers do their thing. Weekdays around 4:30 or 5 o’clock is a busy time. Weekend mornings also seem to be popular.
Why am I starting a blog? Well, 8 months into a pandemic and I haven’t done a thing. I haven’t learned how to play the ukulele (that has never been an ambition of mine btw). I haven’t learned how to record, edit and produce a podcast. I haven’t figured out what my perfect skincare routine is. I haven’t learned all of the latest tiktok dances. I haven't learned how to make bread. I haven’t become anything special. Ok ok. It’s not that dark. I have done two online courses - The science of well being (the irony is not lost on me) and that course that David from Schitt’s Creek promoted and that everyone signed up for afterwards. It's called Indigenous Canada and is given by the University of Alberta. I did that and you should too. But those aren’t skills or a talent that I am perfecting. I also started a Bird Biology course but I stopped at chapter 6 and haven’t done anything in months. That sounds more like me. Start, do a deep dive, get distracted by something else, or my anxiety, move on to the next thing and repeat.
My therapist says that I need to stop interpreting my vast interests as something negative. It’s ok to do a little bit of everything. It makes me well rounded, more interesting, able to have conversations with all kinds of people about all kinds of topics. True. True. But, I’d like to be special. To have a talent that people recognize and appreciate. Something that once I’m no longer in this world will be left behind to show that I existed. Proof of something, not sure what.
Soooo, I’m writing a blog. It’s going to be filled with very random short texts, not the phone kind, that I write based on, but not solely from, prompts from a book that I bought in 2015 that I never used. It’s called “The Write Brain Workbook: 366 exercises to liberate your writing” by Bonnie Neubauer.
Her short author description written in the book says that she “is a late bloomer who didn’t discover her creativity until she was in her thirties. Now in her late forties, her inventive energy enables her to continue to be a kid at heart, leaving creative sparks wherever she goes.”
I’m 40.
I guess, I’ll be a late bloomer too. We’ll see.
Some of these random short texts might be autobiographical they might be total fiction they might be a bit of both. I will write about my neighbourhood, my life, and anything that come to mind. Bref, je veux écrire. Ah oui il se peut aussi que des textes en français se faufile parmi les autres. They will most likely be fairly rough, not edited too much, older, newer, brilliant, good or maybe they’ll suck. Again, we’ll see.
Here we go…