illustration by George Barbier

Addressed to my sister, it reads:

Last night a very handsome man told me I was "delightful."

Last week we found an apartment together. Last night he proposed. I'd have to say I'm awfully pleased (though also troubled by my preposition-ended sentences).

But next time I have a "feeling" about something, this evidence of my keen insight will make me insufferable.
g. 

 

ps: This means I am in possession of my very first diamond. (Possibly my last.) It's very small, but I don't think it' s any less nice for that. Since I don't have gorilla hands it will, in fact, be fine.

 

illustration by Belinda Chen

The flat roof across the alley from my office window is covered in little puddles. (I admit, I will miss this view. No yellow tailed hawks will land outside the tiny ground floor window of my new office.) The sky is grey as evening - a purgatory sky. The day will start tomorrow.

Eight, eight, the burning eight
Between Sunday and Monday hangs a day
so dark, it will devastate

g.

 

 

illustration by Alec Strang

I was kneeling on the floor, scrubbing at the base of some table; it must have been one of those old desks, with a low platform for storage. I noticed a few ants. I pushed it back to discover hundreds of them piled, ant fashion, into a groove on the floor. They were tiny and hard, flesh pink, shiny and anemic-looking - like pale roe, only frantically, senselessly alive. I recoiled, was about to find some way to kill them, when I noticed that they seemed to be moving back and forth to a spot still covered. I pushed back the table again to reveal a jagged hole in the floor as big as my hand. I leaned forward and peered inside.

Just a few inches below the floor surface hung three or four sacs - like cocoons - filled with ants. Five or six inches across, their surfaces seethed and roiled, bloodless, pulsing organs. Suddenly, one of them dropped to the sub-floor with a popping sound. The membrane split and the insects spilled out. 

I decided to douse them in kerosene and set them on fire.

I woke up, repulsed.

It's no wonder my dreams are disturbing; lately my life is charmed. I don't know why, but it's the way my brain works. When I'm miserable my dreams are respite - idyllic, uplifting. When things are going well they are ghoulish.

Just this week we found an apartment and I discovered I have money in the bank (I'm terrible at keeping track of those things). My ancient work PC was unexpectedly replaced with a shiny new one. This morning I found and bought an honest-to-god Art Deco cabinet at the Salvation Army for $60 (see photo blog). My mild-mannered boss at the shop stood up for me with a bullying customer and one of the managers at the office sent me a style guide so I can take their editor's test (which, if they have work for me, will double my pay). C has found money on the ground twice and received a government tax rebate he didn't know was coming. All that's left is for the cat to lay a golden egg.

But while I wait, I will dream of slaughter and plagues.
g.

 

 

 

I
I am so sad I don't know who did this. It's lovely. Well, except that it makes no sense. 
Why would she hold a leash in her right hand for a dog that walks on her left?

The apartment is ours. We sign the lease tonight.

I've already made a plan for the office/den that involves lots of bookshelves and a cozy chair, along with my old wood work desk. I have, in very stereotypical girl fashion, decided on a colour scheme of stormy-lake blues and cool, ashy browns without consulting C at all. I have a delightful idea for a bird motif in the kitchen...

My head has been so full of the new apartment; now the reality of moving is starting to settle in. I have been here for eight years. For the last four, my kitchen, bedroom and living room have been in the same, large space. It was quite wonderful, in fact, like living in a hotel. I'm suddenly wary of having so many rooms. 

But, oh! I'm going to be so close to Roncesvalles! On summer mornings I'll walk out of my door and stroll along the empty street, looking into shop windows and sipping coffee. The little Polish delis and fruit stands will be our grocery stores. Enormous High Park, with its paths and steps and strange little zoo, will be our yard. 

Looking around the nest I've built here, I'm sad - but I'm excited, too. I've been yearning for something - anything - to show me my life isn't frozen in place. It never occurred to me, but this apartment has a lot to do with that feeling. I've watched tenants and boyfriends come and go. One full time job and a pretty serious relationship started and ended here. I'm the only thing that hasn't changed and, cumulatively, there are days I feel I'm being left behind. It's time.

This is a very good thing.
g.

 

 

illustration by Yelena-Bryksenkova

It was just off Roncesvalles, the main street in the west-end Russian and Polish neighbourhood. I've been living close by for the last eight years and it's always been one of my - if not my very - favourite place in the city. A mix of gentrification and old school holdouts, the strip alternates between chi-chi cafes and boutiques side by side with drugstores, butchers and bakeries that have been there forever. The houses that fill the subdivisions on either side alternate traditional and majestic - their tenants comprised of aging eastern European immigrants, young yuppy families and renters. It suits me.

I wasn't really expecting anything from the apartment. I didn't have a chance to anticipate and, though I was the one who found the listing, I couldn't remember anything about it. One of the owners, a woman, greeted us at the door. She was out of breath and laughing. She instantly launched into some story about standing on the newel post to change a light bulb. She ushered us in out of the cold and left us on the landing to wait for her husband. A man in his forties with light hair and an open expression jogged down the stairs and shook our hands.

And then we went in.

What can you say about those old converted houses? They are always odd, always particular to themselves. The front door opened up into a large room of indeterminate function. "You could use it as a dining room," the man said, "or an office, depending on what you need." To the right, separated by French doors, was a small living room with a big picture window facing the street. Above, the transom was the original stained glass in dark reds and blues and greens.

The man turned left and led us along a short hallway. He pointed to the right with a grin, "That's our retro bathroom." I looked inside to find (to my delight) a blue toilet and tub. The kitchen was next; painted a garish yellow, it was big enough for a table and had a nice substantial window. "You can do whatever you like with the colours." I smiled apologetically and evened out my expression. 

The last room was the bedroom. After all the hardwood, it was the only room with carpet. I only thought about it for a second before I was distracted by the sheer size of it. The current tenants' queen-size bed looked inconsequential. The dresser and crib (the latter indicating the reason they were moving) didn't seem to cut into the floor space at all. 

And finally, at the end of the bedroom was a door to a mudroom - a perfect place to for extra storage and bikes. It led to a tiny deck and "shared" garden.

C was wary of living under the landlord. He worried about whether or not we could afford it. All I could think about was what the colour scheme should be and how I could show those campy blue fixtures to their best effect. I tried to decide which table would be best in the kitchen and how we'd augment the closet situation. (No matter how perfect a space, I have learned there are almost NEVER enough closets.) I pictured the office-den I would create, imagining my brown chair next to my big bookcase. Maybe I'd put it in the corner between the narrow window and the old radiator for winter reading. Of all the places we'd seen, this was the one I wanted. It caught me completely off guard.

So we filled out the application.
Now we wait.
g. 

 

 

illustration by Garance Doré

Since the weekend's blowout with the landlord, I am a woman possessed. Relocation is all I can think about.

We went to see two yesterday. The first was very much like hotel. It was in a stately old Victorian in my favourite Toronto neighbourhood (which explains why we went to look at something so expensive). Walking in, though, it was not at all what I expected. All the charming unevenness, the odd angles of an old house were gone. In their place were modern neutrals and some sort of stone finish in the bathroom. The fireplace was inoperative and very very clean with a large mirror above by way of ornamentation. There were, in fact, an astonishing number of large, expensive-looking mounted mirrors. I felt like I'd walked into an excellent hotel. 

We took our time looking through the place. There was absolutely no doubt it was nice. To start with, it was warm. I'm in the kind of head space where, if you presented me with a really big mitten I would probably consider moving in. I am sick of shivering. The kitchen was small, galley-style, but with plenty of cupboards and counter space. Whoever had put it in considered the space well. All the fixtures were against an interior wall with a cut-out facing the big, open living room. There was a decent space to the left that could have been a dining room or office. There was - randomly, inexplicably - a 7' mirror on the wall. The bedroom was quite separate with a large and neatly remodeled closet enrobed in floor-to-ceiling mirrors. I wondered if every day would be an exercise in fleeing my own reflection. I started trying to work out how I might hang curtains to cover them,  like a Victorian in mourning. The windows were on two sides and absolutely enormous. When I took a closer look I realized they didn't open.

I stood in the kitchen imagining a living room full of people. It would be a beautiful place for entertaining. Too bad we don't. I tried to picture where I'd put my favourite, $80, second-hand, brown velour armchair and couldn't find a single corner that wouldn't make it look ratty and cheap. The space was too slick, too modern. It was actually a bit snobby. 

We left - crestfallen. I had pinned a lot of hope to that place. We'd seen so much middle-of-the-road crap; tiny "spacious suites" with "Juliette" fire escapes, oozing with we-can't-be-bothered-to-fix-it-properly "character." I'd assumed giving in to a higher price meant instant success. (How have I not learned that lesson a thousand times over?) We went to a coffee shop to get warm and talk. I told C that I could go either way but it didn't make my heart sing. C said for that price he wanted a fireplace that worked. 

We'd both thought this would be The One. When it clearly wasn't, C mentioned there had been another rental on a street close by that he'd made arrangements to see. We could still call and confirm - did I want to? Why not, I said, since we're here...

g.

 

 

 

illustration by Lulu

 

 

illustration by Sandra Suy

Honest-to-goodness snow. I woke up to a winter wonderland, as the hoary old phrase goes. Every roof is covered and cars glide silently along our unplowed street. It's as beautiful as only snow can be and, for a moment, I don't care about the cold apartment or work or anything. Snow!

I finally got down to making fruit cakes yesterday. I should have done it weeks ago. Fruit cake is an interesting thing. The mention of it inevitably leads to a grimace or some terrible doorstop joke - and there are very good reasons for that. Most of what passes for fruit cake is an insult to cakes everywhere: ill-considered bricks of red and green maraschino cherries (the most carcinogenic food on earth!) bound by damp wads of too-much batter and imitation brandy and almond extract. And that's the quality kind.

When I was a kid our neighbour brought us her own version of a Christmas "fruit cake" every year. It was a white pound cake full of jujubes. I shit you not. I remember slicing it open like a science-class frog and marveling at the candy colour bleeding out in pastel rings, each piece a crumbling swatch of Marimekko. There was no question of eating it: as instinct should indicate, chewy candy and dry cake are not complimentary textures.

The fact is, most people have never tasted a good fruit cake. And I make a very good fruit cake.

Mine is filled with pecans and cranberries and currants. The dark, fragrant batter is all butter, brown sugar, eggs and brandy, heavily scented with cinnamon and cloves. It's rich, but there's only just enough to bind the fruit. Once it's baked and after it cools, more warmed brandy gets drizzled into tiny holes on top. The cakes are wrapped in liquor soaked linens and packed away in air-tight containers. In the cool and dark, slowly slowly, the fruit absorbs the spice and alcohol. 

The smell when you unwrap those linens (which are now utterly dry) is magic. The taste is... Christmas.

This year, for the first time, I made the full recipe rather than halving it. (There is never enough to go around.) The instructions were written in weights (2 1/2 lbs raisins, 2 lbs pecans, etc.) all of which required some rather sketchy conversions. I didn't realize until much too late that none of my mixing bowls were even close to big enough to stir batter that demanded 15 eggs. Eventually I had to unpack my 20 qt chili pot and scoop the mixture into bread tins with a stew ladle. Necessity and invention and all that.

And today the apartment smells like heaven and there are five brown loaves on my counter.

And snow!
g.

 

 

illustration by Laura Laine

It drifts past my window, lazy and sparkling. I'm hoping turns into something more. There is so much promise in the first snow - a clean slate for a new season. And it's all tangled up in the holidays, too. Maybe, as adults, it's the last Norman Rockwell expectation we can count on. 

We had a terrible, awful fight with the landlord yesterday. He is quite literally insane. He accused us of sabotaging our own living spaces just to make him miserable. I have to get out of here. That psychopath is getting way too much of my brain.

In nicer news, I made my first batch of Christmas cookies. They were absolutely average (as the first try tends to be). It doesn't matter. The novelty will carry the craft and they'll be eaten in a couple of days. And now that I remember how to conjure this domestic magic, the next batch is bound to be better.

I plan to test this theory today.

g.

 

 

illustration by Belinda Chen

I've grown so accustomed to sleeping with the lights on, or the TV. When C stays over he turns everything off before he goes to bed (which, I suppose, is normal). It inevitably leads to my waking before dawn.

I lie in bed while my mind races through the silence. It roams unchecked by distraction, free to take any shape in the dark. I start to think about the landlord and what to do about the heat. I think about work. I think about my depressingly unformed future and dad and bills and Christmas is coming up so fast. I still haven't put up the fruit cakes and they will not be anywhere boozy enough if I don't do that Now. I should see dad next weekend. I should call him - is it too early? When's the last time I paid the phone bill? If they lay me off at the end of March I should make sure to try to pay things well in advance. I should do that Now.

I lie still for a while and pretend I might sleep. Eventually the cat comes and lies next to me, purring. He likes having someone awake as his own night winds down. I crawl out of bed, shiver, put on my slippers. If it's before seven I go into the office and work; after, i put on coffee.

Now it's eight and I hate that I'm up, but the laundry opens in an hour so I may as well start my day.

g.