Posts in category "Photos"

Autopilot

Cohen and MacBook Pro

I’m cur­rent­ly on autopi­lot. Doing with­out think­ing, and just being.

It’s a strange feel­ing because I’ve been try­ing to get to this lev­el where I’m no longer con­scious of try­ing to be at this lev­el1. It’s a recur­sive night­mare. But now that I’ve been here for a few days, I’m not sure if I like it. I can’t tell if it’s because I’m not used to it, because I feel like I’m miss­ing some­thing, or because I feel way too over­stim­u­lat­ed.

I tried to sched­ule a day of rest, aka me time, aka her­mi­tiz­ing in my house, in between every event, but that did­n’t work out. I won’t have a sin­gle day to myself until the 3rd of January. I was hop­ing for a hol­i­day where I could sit and do noth­ing for two days in a row, just so it’d be like a long week­end at least. I’ve been try­ing to cel­e­brate because I fin­ished my con­tracts ear­ly, but I sup­pose these last few days have been enough of a treat, even if it’s left me with­out any time to with­draw and reflect.

One day I woke up at Darren’s house, went down­stairs, turned on the TV, and Serendipity had just start­ed. I remem­ber watch­ing this gener­ic hol­i­day dri­v­el set in a New York Christmas at Vicky’s house back when I was in uni­ver­si­ty. It was def­i­nite­ly Christmas back then cause I was back home in Toronto, before my par­ents divorced, and we went to house par­ties as a fam­i­ly. It was it’s own lit­tle serendip­i­tous sign, remind­ing me the hol­i­days were here, and I should take it all in for a sec­ond.

  1. Croupier, star­ring Clive Owen, is com­plete­ly based on this idea. Go see it. [↩]

Two (and a half) Days in St. Louis

Day one

At secu­ri­ty, I’m select­ed ran­dom­ly for a screen­ing. The guard asks my age. “Twenty…”, I begin, try­ing to remem­ber if I’m 27, 28, or 29. “Twenty. Okay.”, he says, cut­ting me off. Somehow, he believes I look near­ly a decade younger than I am. For two days, I’m packed light, with no checked bag­gage. In my rush, I for­get to get some American mon­ey. This wor­ries me.

Ottawa airport

Plane in Ottawa

Continue read­ing “Two (and a half) Days in St. Louis”…

29 1/12: The Adolescent

A lit­tle while ago, I stopped shav­ing. I had the flu for about five days, and already had a five-day shad­ow devel­oped when that began. Then with a lack of social engage­ments, I decid­ed to let it keep grow­ing, lest I lose such a gen­er­ous head start that only began because I was too lazy when I was sick.

I took this pic­ture, and it was more than three weeks with­out touch­ing a razor at that point.

Self portrait at 29 1/12

 

Aaron always keeps a neat­ly trimmed beard, so I asked him how he takes care of it; which direc­tion to shave, what length to start trim­ming, etc. It was strange to be seek­ing shav­ing advice from some­one at this point in my life. Most of the hair is around the mouth and on chin, with only an embar­rass­ing half-dozen wires sprout­ing ran­dom­ly from my cheeks, so it required a touch of main­te­nance.

For a long time, I did­n’t know what to think of it, whether I liked it or not. Aaron said to me, “Sometimes, you don’t need to know”, and I went with that for a while. Maybe time would give me an answer.

Soon after, I start­ed shav­ing again. It was­n’t get­ting any thick­er, and I did­n’t think I could pull it off.

I turn 30 in 11 months, and I still can’t grow a beard.

The Turning 30 Series