hanging on the hinge between one year and the next. waiting for rita to pick me up. we’re on our way to ashok’s place to celebrate the arrival of the new year. spent the day with my folks, shopping for a teapot for my new place, scoping potential apartments for them to live should they choose to move here. lunch at alleluia. sorry jeff and leonard, a different spelling. yook see chow mein and yit lai cha, my new favorite lunch. yum. they drove me back to the little east side house afterwards. we drank the last bottle of wine from my summer in france five years ago, which i’d been saving for them. sad watching them trudge towards the bus stop in the late afternoon rain.

much help from my dad yesterday, assembling desk and storage units. my mother packed me a bunch of groceries. it’s been great having their help and hanging out with them. i’m looking forward to having a normal leg soon though. this healing business takes forever.

ashok breezed into town yesterday too. met him for a drink at stella’s, a belgian beer and tapas place on the corner where santo’s used to be years ago. it’s odd being back on the drive and experiencing it as a stranger. there are neighbourhood stories attached to these locations– about workers getting sexually assaulted at santo’s, about two women getting kicked out of joe’s cafe across the street for kissing… haven’t thought about these things for years. a few of the old businesses are still there, but a lot has changed. and yet the street feels the same. me and my robot leg went to sweet cherubim this morning in search of breakfast. they have the cereal i like, that kind that comes in the green eco-friendly bag. but not the kind of tea i wanted, the good old newfoundland orange pekoe kind that you drink with canned milk.

reading for sunburst, thinking about projects for the residency. it’s grey and dark out. i feel sleepy.

chris, sandy and jordan a few days ago. not at the kp. at steamworks in vancouver. it’s a myth that vancouver stands at sea level. it’s well below, and we are underwater breathing.

late xmas night, hanging with my sis.

i spent xmas eve with roy, slav, their daughter elise and niece danielle, eating sushi and drinking wine. long talk with slav about soul work and true paths. she belongs to a metaphysical church and has a very different way of knowing the world than i do. but conversations with her always move and change things for me in ways that are never predictable but always productive. after supper we pulled runes inscribed on strips of paper and tied with red yarn from a basket she’d prepared. excerpt from mine:

joy, light 12
“… your term of travail has ended and you have come to understand yourself in some regard…the shift that was due in your life has occurred… it is time to take your earned lightness and joy and enrich the life of others…”

bodes well, yes?

i fell asleep in the new house to the sound of rain on the rooftop. woke this morning and had a bath in my new deep tub. breakfast at a miraculously open cafe on the drive. my mom and sister picked me up and we went to see the picasso exhibit at the vag. supper with the whole family. the gastronomic adventure continues– peking duck, salt and pepper crab, scallops and snow peas, jellyfish, pork hock. port and dutch girl chocolates at home afterwards. yum.

opened the box of sunburst books this morning. it was very full. i’ve started reading. wish i could talk about it, but it’s all confidential until the award is announced.

all my worldly, or at least, the portion of it that i chose to pack, arrived yesterday at the new house off victoria drive. the new roommates were around, and seem chill and nice. aimee, the doula, attended a birth a few days ago and was telling me about it. she seems like a woman whose life is full of magical moments.

yay for minimove, recommended to me by janet neigh, who never gets these kinds of things wrong. everything arrived dry and intact. there are a lot of books to unpack, decisions to be made about my archive, and many many novels to read for the sunburst award, which i am jurying this year. i’m too tired to be worried about it, but the box of eligible books is big, and there are apparently two more coming. ok, i’m a little worried about it.

the movers were late, but they called to let me know. my family and i went to pondok, this amazing indonesian restaurant on commercial drive that belongs to the family of my friend nancy pang (whom i haven’t seen in years. are you out there, nancy?) the nasi goreng and laksa ayam were amazing. afterwards we went to the santa barbara market and wandered down to dutch girl chocolates in the piss pouring rain. old haunts in a wet haunted city. it was nice to share it all with my family, even if they were disgruntled by the traffic and the sog. people stared at my robot leg, but i don’t care.

i’ll have christmas eve supper tonight with roy and slav, their daughter elise and niece danni.

the whole city is one big traffic jam, but i am allowed to practice yoga again and i am oh so zen. stuffing my face like a happy little piglet with all manner of west coast delicacies– fish cake from mui garden, bagels and rugulas (sp?) from solly’s, shredded pork chow mein from the halleluyah (a cafe that very nearly almost beats jeff buckley’s rendition of the leonard cohen song). it was a comedy of errors trying to pick my sister up from the airport, but she is here now. different family members have been taking turns playing chauffeur. my car purchase earlier this year has achieved high approval ratings. movers arrive tomorrow. i’m looking forward to sleeping in my new room in my new house, where i will live with a boy, a girl, a dog and a cat. i’m scared of the cat, but as long as it stays downstairs i’m sure all will be well. several much loved members of the calgary community have also recently arrived to smooth the landing. calls from old vancouver/constantly-in-transit friends bode well for entry into this new episode of my west coast life.

photo just outside vancouver earlier this afternoon. man, it is ever dark in this neck of the woods. have now arrived in the couv, and dropped a load of stuff at my new place in the charming commercial drive area. haven’t lived in that neighbourhood since the early nineties. i have a lovely loft room in a shared house, but won’t sleep there ’til the movers bring my bed, hopefully before xmas. late supper with the parental units– congee, duck, fresh shitakes, a bottle of delicious sake courtesy of nikki and natalee.

made it out of town. here’s the approach to roger’s pass yesterday afternoon, with a car full of books. i thank the stars, or whoever is responsible, for the arrival of my dad, who helped me through the trials of packing and drove the whole way across. can’t wait ’til i’m allowed to drive again.

i’m still in calgary. much diminished social function, devolving to a reptilian state in which the slightest body movements require the greatest of efforts. the movers come today, thank goodness. after that, i’ll do a second round of packing for the car. my dad is with me. it’s making a huge difference having his help. we’re going to road trip. must clean up to make the place habitable for my good friend sandy lam, who will sublet from me for the next six months.

there was series of books about trains that talk. i used to read them when i was a child. “i think i can, i think i can…” said some little train. if only i could do this by thinking, i’d have been in vancouver a long time ago.

tarot readings at ming with jill, paul and nikki (and all the kids from school) the day before yesterday. my car was impounded (another sordid episode of my one-legged adventures, even though i now have a tentative two.) nikki and paul helped me rescue it. afterwards, paul went to get jill, and some beer. we ordered from singapore sam’s and ate on my living room floor. then we shuffled down the street…