Goodbye Montreal

I just wanted to say one last goodbye. So this is the end. Or is it only another beginning? Like Scarlite says in Ben X: "La fin=le début" This is me saying goodbye from the steps on Oratoire St-Joseph. Goodbye for real les amis! xoxo

You Keep Me Hangin' On

I have recently received word that my days in Montreal are numbered. That's right, I am moving. Not only am I moving, but I am moving to, of all places, Toronto. My life has gone through many changes since my last post and considering this will be my very last post in "Natalie, Sans H" I feel it is necessary to give you all an update.

After the marathon, I had to start going to physio because I contracted "runner's knee" which totally ruins one's life if one is the active type (I am such a one). I grew depressed and started to watch TV show after TV show, which eventually turned into TV series after TV series. I felt trapped in the city, since during my childhood on PEI I always went cross country skiing with my Dad after school on weekdays. Here there's none of that. (Although I did get a spot of exercise now and then from having to help people push their cars out of icy parking spaces). I voted a few times. I went to France for Christmas and visited Mont St. Michel. I finished my M.A. thesis (before going to France) and I started making a movie for the NFB.

Then something crazy happened. I sent a piece of my writing to a magazine competition called the Broken Pencil Indie Writers Deathmatch. I never imagined they would even consider my story, "There are Two 'i's in Wii". Then I received an email from the editor saying my story had been selected among the top eight to compete online for readers votes. They have since taken down the page that shows my story. The battle was tough and I never imagined I would get far, but then suddenly I realized I was winning and not too long after that, I actually did win.

Then, in the same week as I won that contest, I received a letter from the University of Toronto offering me a very good opportunity (cha-ching!) to do a Ph.D with them. How could I say no? After all these months of working and studying full-time in Montreal, and trying to get someone to read my hobby writing, I finally get some pay-off. Who would have thought? The only thing is that now I feel pretty sad about leaving this crazy city. Will I enjoy Toronto just as much? Will there be the same big city challenges there as there are here? Is it more like PEI since more people speak English there? I guess time will tell.

I won't, however, be leaving you, dear readers. I am starting a new blog to go with the new chapter in my life. I'm not sure of the title just yet, but when I am, I will edit it into this space here ASAP. Also, I'm sure it will be bigger and better than this one ever was, especially since I am honing my tech skills - as you can see I have already learned how to create a hyperlink (and there's more where that came from). Ciao ciao les amis! Until the next chapter! xoxo

The Big Two Six

On…with…it…then…
On…with…it…then…
On…
with…
it…
then (sigh).

I am on my seventeenth mile and this is what my mantra has become: on…with…it…then. Mile one, where have you gone, my mile one? You flew by like a bird and we floated together weightlessly above the ground, sailing, riding the voices of the street-lined cheerers. Mile two became rhythmic, like a pulse. But I still didn’t have a mantra. I had no need for one at that point. I was still sailing. Somewhere before mile ten my rhythm became a voice in my head, what I imagined was Lance Armstrong’s, and the word he repeated was “Strong.” Simple. Short. Motivational. The voice became a drumming of strong! Strong! Strong! Strong! with every stride. I imagine the purpose of the mantra is to somehow create a rhythm and mentally mask the pain and fatigue you feel with positive language.

Unfortunately, I’ve never been one to get sucked in by propaganda.

Slowly my “mantra” transformed into a low, unearthly vibration of “on with it then.” The voice became bored, toneless and banal. Reminiscent of a recording of the Hopi Indian chanting we listened to in my ethnography class, it would sometimes stop repeating itself altogether and simply sigh with defeat. Then other times, when my hips and knees felt as rickety as two dried-out pieces of beach wood, the voice would come back, angrily: “You idiot! Why are you doing this? Who is this jerk with a Mexican flag on his shirt? Who is this sun-baked bimbo? She’s passing you? You passed her two miles ago! Say it ain’t so! Say it ain’t so. Say. It. Ain’t. So.”

Say…it…ain’t…so…
Say…
It…
Ain’t…
So…

Sigh…

It’s hard to think at this point. What mile am I on?
“Whatmileisthis?” I ask in one exhalation to the guy next to me. He shrugs. The sun is burning. I navigate my way through the other runners to the shady side of the street. I look back. Good, Greg has spotted me. As long as he knows where I am, I don’t have to think. Thinking exhausts me.

“Go Canada!!” I raise my hand in thanks as I pass an excited woman holding a little girl. I am really impressed by these people. I am much more impressed with the volunteers and the supporters than with myself. I would never set up a chair on the side of the street and cheer on runners for five hours. How exhausting! I suppose what I’m doing is exhausting, but it’s different. You never hear anyone telling their kids about the time they finished cheering on a marathon.

“Gatorade! Next block, both sides!” A guy yells.
“W-water?” I pant.
“Right after the Gatorade Ma’am!” Wow: “Ma’am.” How classy. He looked concerned. I have to admit that I like having people concerned for me. Just a little. And there is plenty of opportunity to have people concerned for me during this marathon. They are on the sidelines, with all the water and r ‘n’ r they can get. Meanwhile I’m busting my groin trying to finish this thing. People seem to look at us runners from the sidewalk with an expression of “I commend you.” Americans also love to cheer for us Canadians, and Greg and I are wearing matching Running Room t-shirts that have a sort of biker’s look to them. With a Canadian flag in the front and back, and the word “CANADA” written down the side, we are hard to miss. So actually people look at us with a mix of “I commend you,” “Are you ok?” and “cool! You’re Canadian.” I’m just a little, Canadian girl, and people are concerned about me. “Une Blondinette,” as Greg’s mom calls me.

Actually, I am twenty-six years old.

In my life B.R. (Before Running) I was a typical busybody: school, work, boyfriend, friends, etc. But for the last six months, my life A.R. has given a new meaning to work. I have learned how to squeeze eight hours of editing, three hours of reading, one to two hours of running and trace amounts of hours eating into each day. By 8 p.m. my morning coffee seemed like a distant memory. Or should I say herbal tea, since I had to give up caffeine due to my naturally high-strung temperament and lack of sleep. I began to consume enormous quantities of cereal, cottage cheese and pasta prima vera at any given opportunity. The purpose of lotion was no longer to moisturize but rather to prevent underarm chafing. I would like to cheerfully say, “running is a lifestyle,” but the truth is, running is work.

“How are you?”
“I’m okay Greg, but I can’t talk right now. My knee is killing me.”
“Okay, keep going.”

It’s true. My knee has been hurting since the 9th mile. It is a chronic problem I’ve had for three years since a huge Haligonian fell on me during noon hoops. I’ve never had an x-ray because the pain always comes and then disappears again. Just when I’m about to get an MRI, it goes away and I figure it is gone forever. But right now it has come back with a vengeance. Even my shin, foot and hip on that leg are in pain. It’s sort of a numb pain, as though I know there is pain, but I can’t really tell how much weight I am putting on it or how supportive that entire leg is. If I pay attention I can tell, but it is not working like it should. That I am sure of.

I also know that I can’t kneel on that leg, even when there is no running pain. Kneeling has always hurt since that day at noon hoops.

It’s hot. Normally when we ran in Montreal on days like today I would take off my t-shirt and hold it in a little ball with one hand. But there will be no t-shirt ball holding today. This is the marathon. No stopping. No nudity. No listening to pain. I have worked for today and there will be good results damn it!

Greg?

Oh my God. Oh my God OhmyGod. He’s gone.

No he’s not. He’s way ahead. I can see his right arm and some of the back of his head but there are too many people. Oh! He’s looking back! Hi! Greg, it’s me! I wave to him. My wave says, “It’s okay. You can go ahead of me. My knee is too sore for me to keep an eight minute a mile pace.” I look down for a minute at my knee. I look up. He’s gone. This time for real.

So far during this race my enthusiasm has come in waves. Right now it is at an all time low. The tide is out as far as my enthusiasm is concerned. The worst part is that I know I can go faster. My heart is barely beating. I have conditioned myself to go much faster than I am now and I am not even tired. It is just my knee that is slowing me down and that is depressing.

I barely remember my life B.R. You know, back when I was young. When my white skin was shocked by five minutes of sun. So shocked that it would scream in its strange, silent language writ in freckles.

MILE 19

What? Already? Somehow I ran the last two miles at a pace of ten minutes a mile and yet they seemed to go by so fast. How is that possible? I guess by slowing down I feel less pain, which probably makes it seem shorter because I am not agonizing every second.


IT’S NOT A COMPETITION!

People hold up all sorts of signs with encouraging words on them. This one is especially nice to see right now since I am feeling down about not maintaining my goal pace. But the problem with “It’s not a competition” is that, actually, if you want to win, it is. And who doesn’t want to win? There’s always someone you are competing with, even if it is yourself. Right now I am secretly competing with a man of about sixty-five who has been running beside me for the past five minutes.

I, on the other hand, am twenty-six.

Most women my age are having babies. In fact, the marathon is sort of like a baby. The training period lasts about as long as a pregnancy. You often find yourself eating a little extra, sort of like caloric insurance. You can’t drink or smoke. Your boyfriend shares the experience with you, and in fact, it brings you closer together. Then on the big day it is an excruciatingly long and aerobic activity to finish the thing. The pain is unbearable. You sweat and ache and moan. But then at the end, you feel nothing but joy. Allegedly. I have yet to reach the end, of course.

What is that? I stare at the back of two brown legs running in front of me. They are thin and wiry, yet somehow the skin on them is loose, as though it lost its elasticity ages ago. It’s the sixty-five-year-old! He’s snuck in front of me. And he’s picking up speed. I try to push my legs. I can’t tell if they are going faster. I look down at them as if to plea, come on guys! I know it’s been a long day! But they don’t seem to listen. Or maybe they are listening and are going faster. Everything is just kind of numb. Especially in my left leg. The injured leg.

Worse than the pain is the humility. “It’s not a competition,” they say. When the newspaper prints the race results, they say that everyone who finishes is a winner, no matter what your time was. But in my mind I can see headlines of a different sort: SIXTY-FIVE-YEAR-OLD MAN LEAVES ONCE SELF-DESCRIBED “FIT” TWENTY-SIX-YEAR-OLD IN DUST. It’s only in my mind and probably no one will know about this man, but I can’t stand it.

I think about Greg. Where are you? Are you thinking about me? You are probably at mile twenty-four or twenty-five by now. I miss you. I miss you. I… Misssss…Youuuuu…

I…
Miss…
You…

I’m no longer going to look at my watch. Keeping track of my pace just stresses me out. I’m going to think about meeting Greg at the end. That is all the motivation I need.

“Thanks!”

I actually manage a cheerful grin. The volunteer on the sideline just gave me a Powerbar gel. It will be my third of the race. The drink, orange slice, wet sponge and gel exchanges have gotten simultaneously trickier and easier as the marathon progresses. Trickier because I am completely worn out and even coordinating my hand to meet theirs without falling has become increasingly difficult, and easier because I know better what to expect with each passing exchange. For example, I now know to stop pumping my arm upon reception of a glass of water.

I squish the gel in my hand to warm it up and make it more liquid. It helps it go down easier and God knows when we’ll get to another water station. I haven’t had to use the washroom yet, thankfully.

MILE 22

Wha?? I suppose I am not really paying attention since I stopped keeping track of my pace. Now I just want to ride out the pain until the end. I am sure my left leg is broken in half by now, but I refuse to look at it. I have enough of a visual in my mind’s eye. I know that I am barely going faster than some of the people I see walking on the shoulder, but I refuse to break my stride. I worked for this day and I will not give in to the pain.

I look around. I have been looking at the buildings and the scenery, but frankly there are so many people that it is difficult for me to focus on anything but not bumping into them. I like looking at the storefronts. The small businesses are encouraging to me. They are like warriors too. They never give up either. They are in it for the fight.

MILE 23

Something is happening. I can’t feel the pain anymore! I’m tired, don’t get me wrong. But the pain that has been throbbing for the last eleven miles is so numb that I don’t even feel it. There are only three more miles, if I go at top speed, I might be able to qualify for Boston. Three hours and forty minutes! Can I do it? My watch reads 3:19:23. That’s how long I have been running since I crossed the start line. Let me see. I ripped off my “3:30:00” pacing patch miles ago when I felt too much stress and pressure with it penetrating my back. I could feel it taunting me. But maybe I could still qualify for Boston. To make it in at three-forty, I will have to go at a pace of seven minutes a mile. I have done that before, the question is, can I do it now? In this heat? With a broken leg? After twenty-two miles?

People around me start getting excited. They say things like, Okay! Only three to go! Anyone can do three little miles! with huge smiles. I am running faster now. My breath is shorter, but not too short. My leg is, well… I believe the technical term is “Ow,” but if there is a chance I will make it to Boston, I can stand a little more pain.

Funny thing is, it’s easy to think three miles is a short distance, but now that I’m in the midst of it, I feel like three miles is an eternity. We used to do intervals on the 400 metre track in our neighbourhood and three miles is a lot of laps at our fastest endurance speed. I’ll just slow down a little and then for the last mile I’ll go as fast as I can.

MILE 25

Mile 25! Mile 25! I look at my watch: 3:36:10. Okay now is the time to give it my all. Now is the time to push it! PUSH IT! PUSH IT!

PUSH IT!
PUSH!
IT!
PUSH!
IT!

Can I run a mile in four minutes? Can anybody? Has it been done before? Surely somebody on the planet can run a mile in four minutes. Then it’s possible? As long as its possible, that means it’s within reach. My reach.

I feel lactic acid in my legs and for the first time in a few miles I look down at them. They look thin and white. I look ahead of me at a woman in blue about twenty metres away. It is my mission to pass this woman. I watch her t-shirt like a hawk. I shorten the gap between us little by little. She seems like a mirage, but I know I’m getting closer. With every person I pass I am almost there.

“Hunhoo,” I involuntarily let out a moan. My left leg has given way. I didn’t fall or trip, I just weirdly started limping without realizing it. My leg has become supportless. Come on, It’s only a little farther. I am now beside the woman in blue, but I can’t seem to get ahead of her. We stay like this, suspended in horizontal equilibrium. And then I realize that Greg will be waiting for me at the finish line. I don’t care about Boston. I don’t care about finishing. I don’t care about my leg. But I do care about him. How I’ve needed him this past half hour. I squeeze my eyes shut and clench my teeth. I pump my knees up with my hips. I pass the woman in blue.

I turn the corner and it is the last corner. In front of me the crowd is getting louder. I see the finish banner a couple hundred metres away and I sprint. My knee is bad, but I can still sprint. Once I pass the line, I briefly look at my watch: 3:43:44. I continue to jog.

“Water?”
“Thanks.”
“banana?”
“ok, thanks.”
“Medal?”
“Wow, that’s really nice!”
“bagel?”
“uh, that’s okay…”

The other runners look horrible. They are hunched over and hollow. I limpily jog through the crowd of them for what seems like another two miles.

“Where are the family meet-ups?”
“Just keep going straight toward the beer tent, you’ll see them.”

We agreed beforehand to meet at the “B” stand because Greg’s last name is Berge. He is probably waiting for me and I can’t wait to see him. He’s probably been waiting for fifteen minutes or so. I hope he’s not disappointed. I jog a little faster. I know I probably should relax and let my legs walk off the strain they’ve been under for the past three and a half hours, but in this case the end justifies the means. What I mean is, my emotional healing must come before, and perhaps even at the cost of, my physical recovery.

There it is! I see the “A-B” stand. Approaching it I see numerous runners wandering around, studying the faces of people in their radius, looking for their families, their true loves. I look around. I look around some more. He’s not here.

Not to worry… I’ll just si-OWWwww! S-sit down. Geez. My thighs are screaming. I awkwardly thump down on the grass without bending my knees. I finish my water and take deep breaths as I let the sun dry my sweat.

“First marathon?” A forty-year-old man is sitting beside me.
“Yes. Yours?”
“No it’s my eighth.”
“Oh that’s great. Are you happy with your run?”
“Yes. It’s the first time I’ve made the Boston qualifying time.”
“Oh good for you!”
“You must have qualified too if you got here now.”
“Well, not exactly, I-“
“Arrgh!”

The man is lying on his back, holding his leg up. He is in pain.

“I get really bad cram-aaaaah!”

I look at his calf muscle and can actually see the bulbous cramp jutting out from his leg. It looks horridly inhuman. Quickly I pick up his ice and hold it to the muscle.

“Take deep breaths!”

He breaths in and slowly lowers his leg. I think about Greg. Where are you?

A woman and an adolescent boy come over to us and hug the forty-year-old Boston qualifier. He gets up and slowly walks away with them, excitedly regaling them with the course of his run. He doesn’t look back.

Alone I look at my watch. It’s been twenty-five minutes since I sat down. Where is he? Oh! There’s James…and Greg’s mom…And his step-dad, J-P.

“Hi,” James says.
“Ohhhh ma Cherie!” Monica says.
“I am so glad to see you guys!” I say, “But have you seen Greg? He was supposed to be in front of me! He was supposed to be here waiting and now it’s half an hour and I don’t know where he is and a lot of people were falling down at the end and a lot of people were getting carried off the course of stretchers and I don’t know what to do!”

My eyes are wet and Monica looks concerned. She suggests we ask a police officer about fallen runners. James gives me a hug and some tears trickle down. I am feeling pretty weak at this point. It is hard to keep it together. And since I’m among family, why bother?

We stand in silence, looking around at all the runners… then, he slowly approaches us.

“Where were you! I waited and waited. It was the first thing I did, come here. I thought you would be here waiting for me so I jogged when I should have been walking because I didn’t want to keep you waiting. I only wanted to meet you and hug you and be reunited and you weren’t there!”

“It has taken me this long to get here from the finish line. I picked up my bag and got my photo taken and then I wanted to walk slowly to give my legs a rest.” His face was tan and tired.

Then we just shut up and hugged.


I didn’t qualify for Boston, and I definitely didn’t make my goal time, but I finished. My first marathon. My first twenty-six miles at age twenty-six. Sure, most women my age are having babies, but at least I will have a great story for them when I do have babies.

Monkey See, Monkey Do (In My Case - Like Camus)

It's funny how hard it is to write well. Every time I go back to a dusty piece of writing on my hard drive I am taken back to the time I wrote it. I relive the moments that led up to its production and I remember, particularly, what I was reading in those moments. Take, for example, a piece of writing I stumbled on this morning. It has Camus written all over it [brace yourself(ves), it's long]:

An Odor Less Serious

The clock is nearing noon. It is a cafeteria somewhere. There are noises and people everywhere. Some people are buying their lunches. One girl, one particularly serious girl, nears a row of splatter stained microwaves. There she waits her turn to warm up some macaroni and cheese. The boy ahead of her opens the microwave door and takes a forkful of a brown stewish substance. He eats it quickly, pauses a moment, then turns on the microwave for another minute or so. But during the instant the little door was ajar, between the time he opened it, took a bite of his stew, and closed it again, a strange thing had happened. An odor had escaped from inside the microwave. It was an odor like none other. Strong and grizzly, it had swept through the ten-foot radius in which our serious girl was standing. It had diffused the air from floor to ceiling within this radius, including, the air that had, at the time, been occupying space in our girl’s nostrils. The effect of this odor was not the same as that of a peppery smell, for no one was sneezing. The effect of the stewy smell was rather one that made a severe mark on one’s being, claiming any territory it touched, coating thickly and clinging heartily onto clothes, hair and the like. One can only imagine what that odor turned into upon clinging to one’s breath.

“That is a very strong smelling stew you have there,” Our girl said in a voice much more serious than was ever intended for cafeteria chatter.

The boy turned around, took a look at what he determined was a hot thing, and said,
“You know what they say about guys with a strong smelling stew don’t you?”

She looked at his face. It had a curious expression: playful. Yes, that was it.
“No, I don’t. What do they say?” She replied with a seriousness of tone that didn’t quite fit the cafeteriousness of their surroundings.

He dropped his playful expression and one could almost hear it clammer on the floor. He didn’t answer. Instead he went back to watching the little green light bulbs in the side screen of the microwave. They changed every second or so. They were numbers, descending in order.

Our girl looked at her macaroni and cheese with a seriousness much more serious than God ever intended for such gazes and did something she never would have done before. She lifted up the container of lunch high above her head. Then she flipped it over and dumped its contents onto the head of the playful boy in front of her. She watched it sink into his hair like yellow paint on a paintbrush. It was a rather saucy helping of macaroni and cheese and so the gooiness was thick and ready for dumping on heads. He turned around and she saw that he had globs of the stuff on his eyebrows and nose, parts of his face that jutted out a bit from the rest.

She raised her eyebrows in a less serious manner than usual and walked away. She walked out the doors of the cafeteria, down the hall, out of the building, onto the snowy sidewalk, down the street and into the metro station. When she sat on the metro, she noticed that the man next to her inched away slightly after a few moments. He had plenty of room so his inching away made no sense. What’s more, usually men, all men, are very happy to be near our girl. Normally men try all sorts of tricks and games and lines to get as near as possible to the serious thing. So it was quite perplexing that this man, today, was inching away.

She could only assume that it was the stewy odor still clinging to her person that was pushing him out of its occupied space.


Clearly this is autobiographical, and clearly this was written a couple of years ago, and, crystal clearly, I was reading Camus at the time. I'm ashamed that my writing style and its influences are so transparent. Living in Montreal I encounter so many people and experience so many adventures that I want to describe with words, but that end up expressed in the words of others. Even if I think I am writing in my own words, it becomes apparent that I am just using the same metaphor, the same structure or prosaic frame as somebody else and filling it with my own content.

I remind myself of Arundhati Roy. When I read "The God of Small Things" I felt like I was reading Rushdie's "Midnight's Children" for a second time. She even used the same analogy as Rushdie in referring to the discomfort of having stubborn mango hair stuck between two back molars. Do I do that? Are other people's analogies, metaphors, stories, stuck in my subconscious like the stubborn hair of a mango wedged between my teeth? Have other people's ideas penetrated my being so much so that they are a part of my physiological makeup? And now, for the life of me, can I not prevent from recycling their riddles and artistic structures?

A voice is something that is unique to each of us, but when mine becomes a chorus of Camus, Rushdie and whoever else is wedged into my subconscious, how can anyone isolate the sounds my personal voice box makes, other than gargles from struggling against being drowned out?

The only time I'm ever writing without thinking, without trying to sound clever or witty or funny or poetic, is when I am writing these blogs, or my diary. And frankly, I don't know if these writings are all that interesting.

Blog Eat Blog Kinda’ World

In my mind, the world is like a book. Everything I see and experience turns into a description in my mind. When the fridge door opens, when my pencil drops to the floor, when I have encounters with different people, all of it turns into words in my head. It’s not really the feelings of all these experiences that I remember, but rather the words that they become… I can always remember the words. Sometimes even when I don’t want to. They haunt me. And that’s where writing comes into play. I have this urge to write down all the words that are in my head, describing my experiences. And if I don’t write them down, well…

It’s not so much the act of writing that I enjoy. Even the word “enjoy” doesn’t really describe how I feel about writing. I really do enjoy the written word and words in general, especially when they are strung together in clever ways. But I don’t choose to write. I never, when I was little, said to myself, okay I have decided to become a writer. For me I have to do it. I don’t do it to be happy, but if I don’t do it, I will be unhappy. It’s odd.

It’s like a Pacman game.
If I don’t eat him, he will eat me. It’s not that I want to eat him, necessarily. It’s just that my desire to live is stronger than my apathy about eating or not eating him. The same goes for writing. It’s not that I want to write, but if I don’t write and arrange the words as I see fit, I am worried the words will take over, take control of themselves and describe my experiences in ways that I cannot accept. In a way, I have to eat the words before they eat me.

So writing for me brings a whole new meaning to the expression “dog eat dog” world. I don’t think any dog really wants to eat another dog in the first place, it’s just that their need to survive outweighs their distaste for dining on dog.

And these are the kinds of things that require prioritization.

Postmodern Potpourri

As I sit here, waiting for 4pm, typing, still as a word, my body governed by mid-menstrual paranoia and lower-abdomen agony, I wonder about clouds.

I tell school friends that I don’t have time to walk, study or chat with them. I clammer on with writing. I tell people like Nick Dodd and Keith Serry that I simply don’t have enough time to be their POP Montreal media volunteer this year. I continue motionlessly. I tell myself I don’t have time to rub lotion into my screaming heels. I think about clouds.

And if I think about clouds long enough I will eventually arrive at one cloud in particular. It is a nice cloud.

But it is wrong to call it “a cloud”.
It is “The Cloud".
“Stephan The Cloud,”
to be wordier.

And then I wonder, what if Stephan weren’t a cloud? What if he were a flower?

There is a band—a group, really—called Windom Earle. But they weren’t always that way. The brainchild of Stephan The Cloud is not as brainy as its brainfather.

People talk about postmodernism today and they say that it is the reflection on all previous theories and thoughts. They say that it is a sort of perma-present self-awareness, like I am writing stuff down right now but I am aware of how it will be received and remembered by my readers before I even finish this sentence. See?

Anything that falls under “Postmodern Art” is really just bits and pieces of art by other people that has been cut up and replaced in new and unusual orders, forcing us art-consumers to breath it all in at once, like a plurality of poisons, or a potpourri of beautiful—albeit dead and dried-out—flowers.

Take, for example, disco dancin’ DJ mixes. Today, quite popular. They represent something of a postmodern streak in pop culture, what with their endless sampling and repetitive be-be-beats.

Stephan The Cloud loves literature by Don Delillo.
But that’s not all. At least one of his favourite types of comic reads are those that incorporate any lack of authentic drawings by the author/illustrator. In fact, the fewer the drawings, the better. For images, in comics, Stephan The Cloud truly enjoys cut up heads, legs, eyes, arms and bodies of people in magazines that are then re-assembled in disproportionate and asymmetrical ways to represent the characters in the comics he reads. His eyes devour their cut-up, Frankenstein-Creature bodies like a cannibal.

But let’s relaunch the Windom Earle moment. Yes, it is a group. Some may say they love to parody. Any Kelly Clarkson song that emits from Stephan The Cloud’s lips is hilarity. Windom Earle does covers. And originals. “But covers?” You say, “Aren’t they uncreative?” But in Earle World, as in Postmodernism, it is understood that anything repeated or redone, is never really art unless it is repeated or redone in a different way, at once commenting on the original version of the “thing” and expressing something altogether new and creative by way of form and format. The content of this new expression of an old thing may at first appear the same, but thanks to the clever spinning of it—that is, the new form and format, the new method of delivery, the new packaging—the content, upon digestion, will also be modified into something completely new, maybe even oppositional from its original version.

1) I eat cheese by ripping open the plastic with my teeth and noshing on the bar, utensil-free.
2) I shave the cheese ever so delicately and create a replica of Louis Pasteur’s portrait on my plate, eating his hair, eyes, nose and mouth—in that order—with chopsticks.

The content of activities 1) and 2) is the same: cheese. The form and format, however, are quite different, rendering the entire experience and the emotions attached to it equally if not more different. The difference between 1) and 2) becomes so great that, at least in my mind, the content also becomes different. And though I did not create anything different than the core object of cheese—it is, then, now and always, cheese—I still created something. Therefore, since I created something, that something is art.

And the same goes for Stephan The Cloud and his clever group, The Windom Earles. They are postmodern? Maybe. But as an audience member, as a thinker of clouds, as a fan of Stephan, I can say, first hand, that of all the cut-up, recreated, reused and redone things Windom Earle throws into the air, not one plurality of it is poisonous. For I have breathed it in, and it is all a sweet, sweet potpourri of pleasure.

Kitten Heel 'Cat'astrophe

I have always been a believer of the "If you work hard enough, you can achieve anything" school of thought. But as I grew older, I realized there were a few clauses missing from this statement. For example, I wanted to be a rock star... or a pop star... or anything that resembled Madonna. My parents must have picked up on this because they put me into piano lessons. At first I caught on extremely quickly, learning the scales through and through. Then I started learning songs; my teacher liked Simon & Garfunkel classics like "Scarborough Fair" and "Feelin' Groovy." I was having a great time. But when she evaluated me, she told me I had severe problems with rhythm: I couldn't keep a steady count and my rhythm was sporadic and out of sync. And that's not all. I had additional problems with my ear... There wasn't anything physically wrong with it, just that, musically speaking, I had none. I could not discern an A from a B, and I couldn't recognize minor keys at all. So I practiced for a while, and soon got annoyed at my lack of talent.

Then I decided I wanted to be a writer... and I'm still working on it.

Next came becoming a model. I'd always wanted to pose in dramatic positions for the camera. Something about having all the attention on me seemed exciting. I was not very attracted to the commercial modelling industry, but rather the fashion model scene, where everyone pouts and extends their hips. They all just looked so powerful. I thought they were beautiful, powerful, independent and artistic looking. Unlike the commercial models, they looked like they weren't posing for me or anyone who might look at the picture, but rather for themselves... they just always posed like that, with a look at the camera that said "I don't care what you think: this is me, take it or leave it." So I looked up agencies. There's Ford, there's Next, there are many... and I looked up their criteria for models, because I truly believed I had a shot. I didn't and don't think I am beautiful; I just like the spotlight sometimes. Often the criteria were listed as follows:

1) 5 foot 8 or taller (I'm 5 foot 7)
2) proportions of 34-24-36, or parallel (I'm not)
3) symmetrical facial features (I've broken my nose, I have the slightest hint of jowls, my cheekbones are invisible, my teeth are beastly)
4) must be able to pose and photograph well (CHECK!!!)

So three out of four ain't bad... except when it's three wrongs out of four. Whatever happened to my "if you work hard enough, you can achieve anything" belief? If I worked for the rest of my life at growing, I don't think I'd ever reach 5 foot 8 or taller. I had come to a realization: some things are out of my control.

But let's get back to that writing one. I tried writing in elementary school and found success: "Natalie, you are a very descriptive writer." Then I tried it in Jr. High: "Natalie, your poem is simple, yet clever." High school: "How you wrote five pages describing one bite from an apple, I don't know." And then I began writing articles and essays and short stories for about six years. I often wrote about music, movies, plays and other various thoughts and events and cultural phenomena.

One area of the arts I didn't tap into too often though was fashion. I had always wanted to be a fashion writer. I had always wanted, deep down, to be one of those girl writers with all the clever repartee and sass that they fuse into their fashion police or collection review columns. They are witty and cheeky and they have a way about their writing that makes them impossible to argue with. I love fashion... I read the magazines, I watch Jeannie Bekker, I keep up with the times, but I've always had some sort of insecurity when it comes to fashion and style. Although I'm interested in it in general, I seem to quickly lose interest in it when it becomes the focal point of a conversation. I also find it fun and amusing as sort of a marginal, unnecessary indulgence. I just can't seem to wrap my head around taking it too seriously. Having posh clothes and make-up, though fun, is not a necessary thing. It is just something to think about on a Saturday shopping trip or when hanging out with girls - after all the important things in life are taken care of.

But sometimes I forget how I feel about fashion, and dream about being a fashion writer just the same.

On those days I usually look the part. I try to dress up a bit, in something that is stylish, though not necessarily comfortable or utilitarian. Take for example, that day last week when I was in one of those moods. I dressed up in a swanky little dress with an expensive cropped jacket and wore the cutest little kitten heels. I went down town as usual to conduct some interviews; I had three in total: two bars and a new shoe store. I was feeling pretty confident in my outfit so I walked like I owned the sidewalk. After about two blocks, the widest part of my foot started to feel the extreme pressure of the cute kitten heels. I turned up my ipod and ignored the pain. After my first interview I moved on. I looked down at my sore feet and I could see that near my toes, my feet were turning red and a bit blotchy. Ow. I hadn't even walked as far as I normally do. They were really sore by now and no volume of my ipod could drown out the pain. These shoes had a little strap in the front and they were open-toed. By now this strap was digging into my flesh and I could feel it chafing away at my skin. I wondered how so many women wore shoes like this all day long. How could they stand the pain? I didn't know whether to respect them or fear for their podiatric health. By the time I had reached the street of my final interview—a shoe store, ironically—I was unable to conceal my pain and I was practically limping. But I refused to walk barefoot on rue St-Denis. Women were floating by me, leaving a gust of Dior’s latest poisonous scent in my nostrils and disappearing behind the narrowest of tree trunks; that’s my way of describing how beautiful, stylish and thin the women in downtown Montreal are. I was not about to walk barefoot among them.


I was just about to march into the shoe shop when I stumbled and almost did the splits right there on the sidewalk. My right foot skidded forward at an accelerated speed while my left foot remained planted behind me. My right foot just kept sliding forward until finally it slowed to a stop. And there I stood for many seconds, like a tee-pee. My a-line skirt was now stretched across my a-line leg position. I felt something on the right side of my face. I turned in that direction and saw that it was stares. Yes, my kitten heel catastrophe had occurred right in front of one of the many street-lined Montreal terrace restaurants. And it was on St-Denis no less, one of the coolest places to see and be seen. I was definitely being seen at that moment. The moment was frozen. Even if I tried to laugh it off like I would have on PEI, I knew that on St-Denis, in Montreal, this was no laughing matter. I had committed some kind of cardinal sin of walking with grace. I was sure everyone who had stopped eating to stare at me was thinking, "Boy, isn't it obvious that she is not from Montreal? Where do you think she's from? Probably PEI, eh? Yeah, that would be my first guess."

When I finally started to feel the heat of my face go down a bit I swallowed my petrification and slowly pulled myself together. I pulled my lags back into position. But something was wrong. My right foot was feeling strangely comfortable and pain-free. I glanced down at it almost apologetically to the people on the terrace. There it was: my cute little strappy kitten heel, dead on the sidewalk. My right foot stood naked and flat on the pavement, while my shoe lay mangled and destroyed on its side. To be exact, the strap had been severed, rendering the shoe unwearable. For some reason when I saw this dead shoe, rather than feeling sad, I felt a sick kind of pleasure, like I was glad this shoe was destroyed, like it deserved it after the Hell it had put my feet through. Its death had given me some sort of newfound energy and power. Ignoring the terrace people, I slipped out of my left shoe, scooped up the heels and marched into the shoe shop for my interview. I told the owner my story and he offered to glue the shoe back together with some sort of high-end glue he had. "No," I said, "I won't be needing these shoes anymore." And with that, I bought a pair of much more comfortable, equally stylish—though less girly—flats.

I turned on my ipod and walked home. I had learned my lesson... Even if I fantasized about being a fashion writer or a fashionista, becoming one was not worth my comfort and freedom of walking as far as I liked. When it started to rain, I—without thinking—took off my cropped jacket and wrapped it around my ipod. I didn't want my music to get damaged!

Only after I arrived home and realized I might have destroyed the material of my jacket in favour of my ipod did I realize that maybe consciously I like the idea of fashion, but obviously it is not one of my priorities on a subconscious level. The ipod was less expensive than the jacket, but all I cared about was the music. It was a moment of clarity.

A few days later I was editing a Spanish student's English paper. I came across a word I had never seen before, "ouroboros". I asked the student what it meant, to which he said, and I quote, "Oh, don't worry, you don't need to know. You will never have to use that word in shopping situations." He thought this was hilarious. But I wondered how he had gotten the idea that I am some sort of shopping addict when I think of myself as having an awkward style. I told him that yes, it's true that if I haven't used the word yet, I probably won't use it much in the future, but it won't be because I am too busy with shopping.

It's funny how we don’t really know who we are, or even what our dreams are. Dreams cannot be about something we are merely interested in, they have to consume us. I cannot be a rock star because I love escapism, or become a model simply because I love attention. And I can definitely not become a trendsetter or a fashionista just because it would make me feel feminine and pretty. Because these are interests that fulfill something that’s lacking in me. They make me feel better because of the associations I make with them. But they don't consume me.

So from now on I'm going to stick to the things that have always been present and obvious to me, these are the things that consume me. Things that are so important that I don't have to think about them or try to make them happen. For example, I write for work, I write for hobby and I write about other people's writing for school. I'm beginning to see some consistencies here. Also, I don't try very hard to socialize or spend time with my friends and family, I just do it. I guess it is the things that are natural and automatic about me that make me who I am. Making music proved that I am tone-deaf, becoming a model would have required extreme surgery and wearing kitten heels was pure masochism. To me, those three realities do not scream "natural". (But I still pretend I'm a rock star or a model or a fashion icon in front of the mirror once in a while.)