Here are two entries I just found on my computer - so glad I keep archived materials!
Well that was kinda interesting... I knew different folks back then.Tuesday, May 25, 1999
Welcome back folks. I made it to John's cottage after days of strife and infighting, internecine warfare and crankiness. Agnes, Blair and I drove up to Rosseau and stocked up along with way with fireworks and gin and suds and food and such stuff as that. We all sat at the marina, the first to arrive, and prepared ourselves. The ride out to the island was quick and painless. And then we awaited the others' arrival. The island was beautiful at that point and it all started off quite wonderfully.
Most would say that the next few days were quick and painless. I had a great time. Aimee noted that I was distraught at one point. I suppose I had been unaware. But I was also incredibly high for a time, off life and such stuff as that. Something has altered. There were twelve of us. Agnes, Aimee, Angela, Elizabeth, Sarah, Simon, John, Phil, Craig, Dan, Nick and Blair. Thirteen: Bertie the cat. I'm not counting the salamander John touched the evening we all stumbled and boated to the cave with a fire, or the chipmunks Phil conversed with for a rather long time. There were photos and roof-hoppers, the floating dock turned adventure raft for too many of us. I sat in and fell out of a canoe. Agnes sketched trees in the wood, and hunkered down in the hammock. Some of us read, some wrote, some wrote poems, some wrote notes. Four of us fell into the lake this weekend. That's a record, I think. There was a graveyard, and lilacs, couples and singles and shingles in the very cool night watching the stars and a shooting star that I missed. We collaborated on a drawing of a creature, section by unseen section. It worked out wonderfully. Nick had his lap-top, don't ask me why (he played computer games on it for a long, long time - his parents kept him in a cellar room for his first 8 years), and Elizabeth, exhortations that happy-happy-happy flow out of me. Angela was with her friend Craig, whose brother it turned out went to California and Colorado with me when I was 14 and a ward of Appelby College, John Aimers [allegedly - added Feb 2006] almost throttled him in class . Good god I made it out of there alive. Aimee was my minister, my confessor, and Phil was singularly hilarious. John may actually have injured himself laughing at two points that I know of. Occham's Razor became a song. Sarah quoted Dante and hammocked galore. Dan seemed to be wet a lot, and then he went for the chain-saw. Blair was very huggy all weekend. I left him on the phone with Matt from Victoria for a while, and John and I poured gin and tonics. I will add more as I remember more and more and have more time to write. It'll all come back to me. There are photos of buttocks galore from the weekend.
The sun and weather was nice for most of the weekend. It rained all Sunday, I think, or was it Monday? Monday night coming back from the dock, coming back from dropping off Agnes and Dan at the marina, I left Sarah in the car to warm up, and returned for the fifth trip to the island that day, in the putt-putt boat. It was dark by then, and the wind had really come up. I was at peace again after a couple days of unease, and smiling a lot. The waves were choppy and in the open part, swaying and nasty. The wind kept hitting the boat, and then suddenly I was almost laying in the boat, hand on the outboard throttle, hand on the boat, wondering if I'd been able to be decent this weekend, whether if-I-drowned-had-I-lived-the-last-bit-well. I was soaked through to the bone, and wondering if I was just being melodramatic. I was really scared that I'd flip over, and drown with my new shoes on. In retrospect I don't think I was being melodramatic. Although the water wasn't freezing, it was dark, choppy, and I was wearing heavy clothes, out in the middle of the lake. It was really awful and exciting all at once. I reflected on how more precious life is to me than ever these days than when I was 21 and more, how it is good that I have been telling people more how much they mean to me. I thought as I drove the boat about how people drown in the movies, and in the news, and how I always think they were weak, or how mad I'd be at friends if they drowned because they didn't try hard enough, because all you have to do is simply not panic, and float like you do in a pool, and just relax, but then I realised it would be so easy to drown that no wonder they drown...
Something has altered. I feel a change. Dunno what it is really, I just feel a bit more real today. And that was just one of 11 experiences this weekend. What would I give to know another...So, onwards goes this week. I'm applying for that business loan next week. I'll have a new system in two weeks I hope, and then onwards and onwards...
Sunday, May 16, 1999
Last weekend was a blast. This past week has been juicy. This weekend was nicely done. Last weekend: Friday afternoon arrived at John's. We went straight to a Roti store just around the corner from his house and ordered two gi-normous rotis. Mine was really hot 'n spicy. That didn't satisfy us, I was searching the menu with panic-stricken eyes, and John just looked sad and depressed, his nose ran, and he didn't even have the spirit to do anything about it. So we ordered another one, and split it. We both felt much better. Certainly, they weren't as amazing as Kori's makes hers, but I'd say that they were almost as good. Oh, John bought, so thanks!We then drove back to his place, and dropped the Firefly off. We walked to the Beverly Bar (just across from the MuchMusic annoying place) and made it to the third floor where Agnes and Dan and AGO people and other people I sort of recognized were. Dan is taking the web course that John is, and Agnes works at Kodak in the cinematography department. Agnes knows Stephanie Marsh (through Alex Pruden), and when Stephanie paged me that night, Agnes phoned back claiming that she'd recieved Stephanie's page. That set Stephanie and Aimee and everyone else back in Oakville into a big tizzie, and when Agnes would phone them, I'd phone on the next pay phone wondering why they kept paging me. It was a moment of fun, you know. Stephanie gravely suggested that Agnes call Bell Mobility and inform them that someone else (her friend Simon, who you haven't heard of? Oh) had Agnes' pager number too. I arm-wrestled a lot, and could hardly move my arms by the end of the night.
Saturday afternoon we all lazed about the sofas and made earnest plans to go to Angela's Cave-dweller barbeque. We realized that we, between the four of us, had 3.4 Newton/Pounds of will force between us, little more than what is required to put Salsa on three Tostitos. So we called and called and called and finally left a message with our regrets. Agnes and I drove to the video store, rented Romi and Michelle's high school reunion, and Rounders, bought some beer, gave a beer to a homeless guy, bought French cigarettes and party supplies (those vaunted Tostitos) and crawled back. We all set up on the super-sized bed in John's basement. Drank beers, ate food, chocolate, tostitos, popcorn, and that was good.
Sunday morning-afternoon: Drove down somewhere in Toronto. Stopped in at a second hand bookstore. I bought Julian Jaynes' The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind and a book on clinical psychoanalytic applications, mostly about post-Freudian theory, self-psychology, object-relations tasty stuff. I've read most of the latter during the week, and am really excited about it. The former is a big, heavy tome. Dr. Tory Hoff, my history of psychology prof in 3rd year told me to buy it, as I seemed to really dig his lecture on it (his was one of my 4 favourite classes of all time). Well, now I have.Then the four of us went to a breakfast place, 50's style. I had eggs over easy on a pancake, and sausages and stuff. Dan has his first eggs benedict, John had what I had and Agnes had a piece-meal request and seemed quite happy about it...All in all, that weekend was one of the best I've had this year. Went to Sneaky Dees on Wednesday night with Phil, Aimee, John, Angela and hundreds more invited guests. Enough said.
Went out to dinner with Ray Peacock this past week at Thai Satay, up by the Go Station in Oakville. 9 out of 10, very tasty and fine and delicious, I highly recommend going. Joan's been away in England and Ireland for the past two weeks and just got back last night. Whippoorwhil is in the harbour now, and awaits an upright mast.Worked, went to court, went to appointments, talked with young offenders.
That's all for now. Hope you are all having a good time, and didn't get too hungry reading about all the food I consumed."
Oh yeah.