In which I skip out on Instagram and Facebook for the month of March but still allow myself the internet.
Gone in sixty seconds. And yes, this IS the way you are supposed to eat pizza. #welldone
This post is brought to you by this gluten-free pizza, which I put in the oven as soon as I dragged my weary self through the door after two days of driving from New Brunswick, separated by a terrible night of sleep in a very comfortable bed (said terrible sleep brought on by a neighboring room of giggling girls who were enjoying life well into the wee smalls through no fault but their own indefatigable youth).
We are home, and I will say more about everything tomorrow.
In which I skip out on Instagram and Facebook for the month of March but still allow myself the internet.
Alive, thanks to the patient ministrations of the lovely Khristian Weeks. I was totally fine, and then I wasn’t.
Still, I lost probably the nicest day here in terms of weather, and that sucks.
We manage to make it out to pay our property taxes in the drizzly wet day, ironically the warmest since we have been here. Saint John has not put on her most dazzling coat in the rain. There are still slabs of salt-filled ice six inches thick and a foot or more wide acting as ramps from the street to the sidewalk. Picking up dog shit seems to be against the law here (Khristian calls them canine fecal sculptures), and I will never complain about the occasional pile in a tree well in Baltimore again.
Regardless of weather, it is sad to leave this place, although I think we are ready to come home, given what we can’t really do right now on our property due to lingering illness and weather.
No pictures accompany this short missive today, and fewer pictures in general, I have noticed. It is odd that I take fewer pictures since my sojourn from Instagram. I just don’t see the point, necessarily. You take pictures to share, or to keep a record, and I have no need for either of those things right now.
Things are shifting. I have not figured out how just yet, but they are.
In which I skip out on Instagram and Facebook for the month of March but still allow myself the internet.
Never is the tyranny of the every day posting more oppressive than when traveling.
There is so much to report, so many things happening, but this is not meant to be a journal or travelog. And yet that is the temptation when I am not surrounded by familiar things. But I will resist. For me, writing here and in poetry is a way to process things, and the little book I keep by my bed is the journal – and rarely shall they intentionally meet.
There is an element of travelog here, but, I realize, not enough to give my three regular readers a full and complete picture of our experiences in Canada so far.
That’s ok. I am still trying to process things, decide which way I am pointing in terms of my creative practice and what will happen when the clock ticks midnight on April 1. These days on this blog are violating pretty much every rule when it comes to building a following, but that’s ok, too.
If you are following along, that’s just lovely. Thanks.
In which I skip out on Instagram and Facebook for the month of March but still allow myself the internet.
Utterly and inexplicably delicious.
This glorious piece of gluten-free toast slathered with molasses and margarine is just one of the beautiful parts about Catapult Coffee & Studio this morning. I find out later that the shop is opened by a Jesus-based ministry, not my favorite, but then there is this: they are living what they preach, which is good, I suppose. I try not to let that bother me – they were so gracious, the coffee was so good, and molasses on toast is probably my new go-to breakfast.
Perhaps that’s just how they lure you in.
Anyway. We loved every part of the shop. The coffee, our toasty goodness, the people, the beautiful handmade tables and other crafts on offer. WWJD? Probably stay and drink his coffee and STFU.
As we were sipping hot coffee in the lovely shop, this man walked in.
Agent de la paix.
The fact that he is a “peace officer” was even more poignant when I stupidly checked my email and saw the front-page article in The New York Times Magazine from Sunday that outlined exactly how (and why) Baltimore City is (possibly irredeemably) so violent and corrupt. Imagine if in Baltimore the police considered themselves keepers of the peace, wore the words like a badge on their chest – how would things be different?
It is a hard thing to reconcile, this magical affair I am having with Saint John and my feelings for Baltimore, the city I call home and the city that increasingly breaks my heart. It’s so easy to stay ignorant of the issues Baltimore faces – I could stay in the white L and ignore the black butterfly. So many people do, and the city makes it so easy for white folks to remain ignorant.
It’s nice to get away (and that’s what the Saint Johnners say – we are from “away”), but as always, wherever you go, there you are.
