Your mileage may vary

Reflecting on new-ish beginnings and the end of an era

It's the last day of January and flurries melt on my skin for the first time in five years. He ordered an iced capp of all things, said the medium looked like a large. I tell him that's North America for you. I drink a Brown Sugar Shaken Espresso. I used to have the app but today I'm paying with my Mauritian card. The barista is excruciatingly nice for no reason. She turns the payment terminal to me. 18, 20, 25%. Since when do we tip at Starbucks? I fumble with my card, tap it on the wrong end of the machine. This will happen a handful of times before I get the hang of it and embarrassment will tug at me every time. I'm from some version of here, I should know better. At arrivals, land acknowledgements, a relatively recent phenomenon, one I've only witnessed on Zoom or satirized on Reservation Dogs. I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about them. It all feels performative. You won't get your land back but we'll acknowledge that we stole it from you. Near Timmies, a faded "Welcome to Canada" written on a Ukrainian flag. In the middle of all this, a rude immigration officer talking down to us. If you're immigrating you owe the state unexamined deference. It feels a certain way to be on the other end of this, witnessing what my parents did in the 80s. My passport is a privilege I've only recently understood.

The construction of a nation. Canada hides itself behind all this fabricated niceness. It's interesting how a state built largely on pillage, deceit and stolen resources has such a rigorous immigration process. A well oiled machine. Will pander to foreign migrants just to treat them as second class citizens. The Canadian dream is alive and under zero scrutiny. Everyone's moving and whoever isn't wants to. There's no crime here. Canadians are so nice and not racist. Healthcare is way better than in the US so it definitely works well. Ignore the used needles lining the streets. Ignore the mentally unstable white guy screaming incoherently at patrons. Ignore Twitter threads about police brutality. Ignore the encampments in DTES. Yes homelessness is an issue but just avoid those areas and you'll be fine. Focus on the barista who said thank you so much for no reason and all the things you can buy once you've gone up the corporate ladder. Just play nice will ya?

*

I can't tell if everything is way more expensive or if I'm just adjusting to living in dollars still. I feel uncool. My tattoos aren't visible and I don't have anything Arc'teryx. All of my winter gear is from six, seven years ago. Michelin is here now and a restaurant I visited in 2016 made the cut. I console myself with this smidgen of intheknowism. I've always cared a little too much about this. We go to Phnom Penh and the bò lúc lắc is good but I’m not sure I will ever crave it. Massy Books is what some of my dreams look like. Whole sections on Disability Justice, Indigenous Poetry, Black History, Feminism and Gender Studies. We try Oatly and Earth's Own. I see places on TikTok and can just go. How refreshing. Coffee at Timbertrain and Novella are highlights. My list keeps getting longer. I have the best XLB since Din Tai Fung at a food court in Richmond. It barely snows and I don’t need a tuque most days. When the snow melts it’s all green underneath still, and from certain angles, February feels a lot like fall. T&T is my new comfort place. All my favorite greens and world class boba should I want some.

Now that I'm in my thirties cycles are repeating themselves. Some things are the same they were 14 years ago, 31 years ago. Shopping at Garage. Sitting at Indigo for hours. Dairy Queen's chocolate dipped cone. I get to have another emo era. Swapping Paramore for Sweet Pill, side swept bangs for curtain, black nail polish chipped all the same. I'm an assemblage of entirely new cells but some of me is foundational. How long do things bear repeating?

*

It's not so much that I miss it. I spent the last two years trying to flee. One year of planning and procrastinating and a year of waiting. I knew the parts I loved and would miss. But even the sand got dreary. I'd exhausted all the dopamine. There's no excitement in a bol 5 from Ti Kouloir anymore. Sunset boulevard looks like any street. I know the exact spots where it cracks and dirty rainwater pools. I know the corner where the stray dogs laze in unthreatening packs. I know which road to take to minimize catcalls and sleazy eyes. I got too close to love it the way I once did. Too close to look past all the ways it hurt me.

It's not that I miss it yet because hell, how stupid would that be. How cliché to miss the ocean when it looked unimpressive at my doorstep? Now I dream in cerulean waves. It’s not that I miss it but I don't want to forget. I don't want to forget waiting so long for the detour bus on Sundays. I don't want to forget Andrew's old house, impromptu trips to Super U and ham paninis at Kristen's. I want to remember the first jianbing at OG Nina's, the first time we had drinks at Marmite and the trash can full of puke. My pink cup, my clear cup, my blue plate, my chipped plate. I want to remember Chez Popo éclairs, my chatty eyebrow lady and Kabann Rouz minn bwi. I want to think back on three pandemic years and having Mont Choisy practically to myself one August afternoon. I want to remember the goddess at the end of the lane, the sharp turns of the last Triolet bus, the GBLC flanbwayan. My crop tops and Mango pants era. I want to remember the first year I didn't hate my body as much, the beginning of disability, the beginning of a marriage. The family time at dusk, Anjy's Cakes, getting tattooed by Emmy, obsessing over fish fragrant eggplant, my growing book corner, the tiles in our bathroom. The Desambers, the new friends that made everything good, the BLM season that changed so many of us. Dozens of Coffee Nut hangs, banter with baristas and regulars turned community. Jars of Mayver's dark roasted peanut butter, boxes of digestion tea. The Bridge, frozen berries, sourdough, banana chips in lieu of Shapes, my first salmon phase. Becoming a metalhead, scream-singing in the car, the gigs, the community. There's so much to love still, so much to remember. The bad, I lay to rest.