When I moved out to Vancouver in 1996 I was nineteen years old, naive, unaware, unaffected and completely oblivious to what was really going on in the world outside of my ignorant bubble.

I moved here with a man of Yugoslavian decent, the majority of his family resided in Belgrade, Serbia. I knew there had been a war but at the time I was too self-centred and un-educated to have realized much more.

Shortly after settling into big city life a request came from *Jeff’s mother to go visit a family that had recently escaped from Serbia and were living in the lower mainland.

Jeff had told me countless stories. Before we left Terrace he had spent a month in Belgrade. This was after Bosnia, Serbia, and Croatia had signed the Dayton Peace Accord to end the war in Bosnia- but us all, as fellow beings know- well before there was any actual resolve in the regions.

We went to visit the family, two parents living in a tiny two bedroom apartment with two kids. They had almost nothing, I remember they were so happy and thankful to merely see us I had an instant anxiety attack, I didn’t know what to expect, didn’t in truth understand why we were there and what his mother expected from us. Why would these people want to visit with a nineteen and twenty year old?

I knew that it was Jeff’s grandparents that had done whatever was necessary to get this family out and although it was very painful for Jeff’s mother, his relatives had decided to stay, despite their daughters endless pleas for them to leave.

We only visited this family once. Mine and Jeff’s relationship ended, he returned to Terrace and I went on to surviving with my own version of nothing.

A few years a go I took an interest in Africa. I feel very strongly that no matter what your financial situation we should all support causes and organizations that mean something to us. The Terry Fox Foundation, The WWF and the continent of Africa are the places where I concentrate any support I can offer.

It wasn’t until I took an interest in Africa, reading about Somalia, Rwanda, learning about what was really happening over in these countries, that I realized right in front of my face a family, a man I loved at the time had been and was dealing with a massacre of their own people, members of his family had been forced to toss bodies into mass graves and I somehow had no idea just how severe the situation was.

The realizations came in a flood, he had shown me books made to document the massacres, stuff you don’t see on the news, and I held stories in the back of my head but nothing that I wanted to think about. When the cloud of ignorance cleared I felt like I had missed an amazing opportunity to have learned from this family and to have done a fuck lot more than visiting them ONCE. I know I did learn from them but I realized the lessons years too late.
—
There is a genocide taking place right now as I type these words in the African country Sudan if you don’t already know the main area is called Darfur.
I’m no preacher, I’m no expert. But this is not America’s problem, it is not Canada’s problem it is the world’s problem. After WW II, after Yugoslavia, after Rwanda how in the 21st century can we allow this to continue to happen? Over 400,000 women, children and men have already been slaughtered. This is a genocide we can stop.
Every single one of us has the power to do something no matter how big no matter how small.
This weekend ALL OVER THE WORLD there are groups getting together in support of stopping the war in Sudan.
Here is how I’m participating: End A War [this is just one of many organizations with plans for this weekeknd]

*name changed

bunnies make me dance
hard core like Dance 360
dance dance dance dance dance

bonnets and sonnets
lame like grass makes me itchy
the Lord rise up-eth

bunnies have big teeth
all the better to eat you
bring a friends liver

eating real bunnies
tough on the psyche fo sho
chocolate better

bunnies and candy
what does Easter mean to you?
i like Jesus films

hunt for eggs today
chocolate is for suckers
hope you scrape your knees

bad kids get nothing
bunny perverts watch the hunt
Jesus makes a coat

seasons come and go
easter whups a mule’s behind
bunny, represent

:-O

I was in a funk– not a serious one just a couldn’t get up before 11am for a couple of weeks.
Normally February is such a hard month for me anyway that with the added surgery and over a full month of pain killers when I came down off all that shit I crashed a little mentally.

I did some strange shit but I did not commit any crimes or hurt anyone accept maybe some feelings and I was rude to some jerks. But really I was a big cry baby and stopped answering my phone [again or as usual??] didn’t sign into msn, played hours of Tiger Woods 2006 and just in general felt sorry for myself for the majority of March until Sunday the 19th.

But I LOST February and was alone through the majority of my recovery so is this not FAIR??? A friend of mine killed himself a few Februarys a go and I haven’t written about it because it sucked and it sucks every year to remember and go through because then I also have to go through my failed attempt over AGAIN and seeing it and knowing it from both sides is really fucking hard.

Maybe I’m never really THERE for the month of February.

You know the butterfly/scull part of my tattoo it is for him and me. The scull represents him because he is DEAD and we went to see Crossroads together STARING Britney Spears so I didn’t think he’d mind if it was PINK and he loved GUS and he was FRENCH from FRANCE but loved Lance Armstrong?? He is why I LOVE Lance Armstrong. His full name was Pierre-Henri Cade. February 4th 2003. Gone. He used to ride his bike next to me on the trails in Stanley Park during my runs so I wouldn’t get abducted and bought me books all the time and brought me coffee to my work, he believed in me so much and in my writing and I haven’t met too many people as fucking awesome as he was. The scull also represents my botched attempt and how I fight suicidal thoughts daily. It reminds me that HE didn’t make it– the butterfly is ME because I FUCKING DID. The eyes are because I KNOW he is watching me and because after he killed himself I went through a MAJOR selfish period where all I could think about was how I COULD NOT KILL MYSELF NOW because he did and it would be like the fucking Virgin Suicides or something except we are older and not related but then WHO WOULD BE NEXT??? Fucked I know but grieving is fucked.

He never left a note, not even for his girlfriend or family. We got a translated– beyond touching letter from his parents and that is it they know no more than we do.

I have my theories but they are mine.

Tattooing my CAT on my arm has nothing to do with PH it is simply a representation of the ONE steady and constant thing I have had since her arrival in 1994 [other than the almost three years with Adam] who has never judged me and loves me and will still sit with me when I haven’t showered or changed my underwear in five + days. The early days in 1996 when I moved out here where some of the loneliest, cold and near homeless [considering what I was living in] times ever. My cat fucking rules and if she could talk I bet she’d say I’m the BEST MOM EVER.

WOW good thing I’m out of my ‘funk’.

SWEET! we finally made it out. And was it EVER nice to be out. It was a tad chilly and my ass still a tad sore but we went anyway.

ABC is back from working in Kelowna for the weekend. SWEEEET.

When he originally left he said he wasn’t going to shave. Fine with me, I haven’t shaved my legs since sometime in January. Plus, I happen to LOVE his Wolverine look.

Normally in very different ways and under very different circumstances Adam and I can be extremely defiant. Every now and again we end up on the same idiosyncratic page of defiance. We rebel against something so stupid we only end up hurting ourselves.

The last time we did a ‘drug store’ shop together we came upon the newest edition to razors, the five blade with a sixth blade on the back for those hard to reach places. I instantly launched into murder jokes how this would be like the best thing EVER to slit throats with. All the while throwing in shit like WHO THE FUCK NEEDS A FIVE BLADE RAZOR you could seriously accidentally kill yourself with that shit.

We happened to have NEEDED razors and we buy the same ones, they are normally pink. WHY buy men’s and ladies razors when they do the same fucking thing, it isn’t like we share the actual RAZOR. That would be gross.

I know that neither of us was conscious of it at the time but we both obviously went into major rebel against the system mode and ended up with two blade razors.

I can hardly shave my fucking armpits with these things and with regular hair growth on my legs I had to go back over like a 100 times. I knew I was going in for surgery anyway so I just stopped shaving my legs. I also find shaving my legs in the winter at all pretty over-rated.

This morning while I was in one of my recovery ’sit baths’ Adam began lathering up to shave off his some of his Wolverine hotness. I was watching and could not stop laughing. I said I know man they are totally crap, as I’m watching him slowly and gently trying to find a way to get the hair off his face.

Shaving my armpits takes three crosses THREE CROSSES, which is so bad for my skin and so 1991. We took it too far, we should have just gone with the three blade, now we just look like bleeding idiots.

We have decided that we will only buy razors with a minimum of three blades but still agree that the five blade is taking it too far and pushing shaving to heights that should only be attempted by your clone if you are lucky enough to have one.

I brought this photo home with me from my recent Northern exposure. I don’t remember ever seeing it before and every time I see it I fall more in love with it and am so thankful that my family and I had the chance to really– for real work on shit.

*title: bookends by: simon and garfunkle