By Lucy

I’m starting to look forward to being back in Canada.

Which may come as a surprise to some, because I’ve had more than one person comment that I seem to be avoiding coming back. It’s not true, I’m not avoiding coming back or dreading coming back. I am looking forward to driving my car, the steady drumbeat of scaffold work and having a solid paycheck, and not having to translate everything I say into Kiwi.

I’m also looking forward to being back on keto, bonkers as that may be. I like the way it made me feel. I prefer a lot of the food you’re allowed to eat on it. This will probably be my last round of keto, for the foreseeable future. It’ll be nice to feel in control of something for the first time in a while. Even if I was cooking for myself at Glenorchy, I was only cooking the bare minimum with what I could afford, 2 out of 4 burners on the stove didn’t work, I had limited space in the fridge… I was cooking to stay alive, not to enjoy the food.

Speaking of, I’ve started watching the Bear. I didn’t want to watch it for the same reason I wouldn’t cook in a professional kitchen. I can feel my blood pressure ratcheting up with each F bomb (403 in season 1, 578 in season 2, although 200 are from episode 6 as Donna has a meltdown), all the yelling and screaming and throwing things… But I wanted to stay in the zone and get ideas for my new book, so I made myself watch it. Mad respect for including the cost of 1971 Levi’s, with selvedge and everything. Yo, if those are mint shape, they belong in a museum! They are worth so much more than he got paid for them.

I get why some people watch it, the same way I get why people watch drama manufacturing machines like Big Brother. I didn’t enjoy the first bit, but as the show starts to come together and the yelling tones down, I started getting into it.

I also find the name “the Bear” interesting. Did you know that “bear” isn’t actually the original name for the animal? Bears were so feared by the early Normans that they called it a bear because they were afraid speaking the name would summon the beast, and the original name has been lost to history.

Gunshots keep me up all night. According to Kelly, there is some sort of device that makes a sound like a gunshot when a bird lands on it, some high-tech scarecrow. Of course, it still sounds like a gunshot and it’s still disruptive in the middle of the night!

Sunday is cloudy and cool, but not raining. I’m being left to hold down the fort; Simo is off to help Kelly with something, something they need Gary’s help for as well. Tess and Simon are off to Ashburton to explore. Ethan is dead to the world, sleeping off his hangover. Just me and the dogs.

After the usual morning chores, I’m off to garden, a trowel and snips in my pockets, my hair tucked up into my cap with my two new pins. Earl has calmed down enough that we can leave her off the leash for most of the day, so she becomes my shadow again. More than my shadow, actually; she keeps throwing herself in between whatever I’m working on and me, demanding pets. Which encourages Luigi to do the same, so I’m being tackled by dogs more often than I am actually getting work done. Why is this trainer making her more like a regular dog? Or is she defrosting because she loves me so much? I don’t understand pets.

At one point Alex and his wife come running past me with bows and arrows, saying they’re going hunting. They come back not even an hour later, saying they just shot some hay bales.

Alrighty then.

I could probably go for a run today, but I should lay off it. I’ve got the TV hooked up to my laptop still, so I decide to dance.

I can’t remember the last time I danced. It’s hard to do when you’re renting rooms; the person under you doesn’t appreciate it. Especially at Wolfgang’s place, there wasn’t enough room between the radiator, the desk and the bed to do a jumping jack, so dancing was out of the question.

Here, though, there was no one under or around me. I couldn’t turn the music loud enough to reach the main house, even.

I opened the door to let the heat out and danced. I lasted probably 45 minutes, rotating between fast songs and slower songs. I felt like I could have kept going, but decided against it, just in case I was too worn out for Monday’s switchover.

After that, I fall asleep for a couple of hours. Catching up from my insomnia the night before. Tess and Gary also had an afternoon nap; just one of those days.

Simo’s got another guest for dinner tonight, a special guest who has a diet severely limited by illness, so he keeps coming back to Simo because she caters to his limitations while keeping it fresh and interesting. We have dinner early, burgers. Alex has grated carrots to top the burgers with, for some reason.

We talk for more than an hour after dinner is done. I’m delaying going to bed, because once tomorrow comes, Tess leaves. Even still, I’m the one who decides to go to bed first.

I’ve made a plan for after here. My new friend Richard offered to let me housesit for him until I head off to Invercargill. Food isn’t included, but I can feed myself for 100 a week, so way cheaper than paying for rent. Plus, unlike Glenorchy, I won’t be working odd hours; total freedom. I’ll be right downtown in Christchurch. I have to walk the dog and water the garden, at my leisure. I asked him what kind of dog he has and it’s just a little Jack-Russel, thank god. It’ll be nice to take a well-behaved dog on a long walk.

Still, I feel a stab of sadness as I cemented the plans. I had some half-baked plan to ask Peter if I could stay at his place. I haven’t seen Wellington or anything north of Christchurch, so it would be a good excuse to.

It would also be a good excuse to get to know Peter better, as it were. We’ve been doing the usual back and forth. I have quibbles. Unlike, say, Jan, who it would have been easy to get to know because we were staying at the same place, I am nowhere near where Peter lives and I have no plans to go that way until I come back in September, presuming I even do. Making an effort would require investing into a relationship that doesn’t exist yet.

Still…

On a whim, I asked him how old he is.

60.

He’s 60?

Of course he is.

It’s a good thing I’m alone in my cabin, as I descend into hysterical laughter. You’d almost think I couldn’t tell, except I knew exactly how old the Vagabond was as soon as we met. He was the oldest person on the job site and people often tease him for it, not to mention his snow-white hair. Peter had neither of those tells.

Christ, moving on from the 65 year old to the 60 year old. Maybe I am developing a type.

You wouldn’t even be the oldest guy I’ve dated, I debate saying, except that it playing all my cards. And I haven’t really decided what I want. I don’t have enough information to decide. It’s hard to put the genie back in the bottle once you let it out.

Turning it over in my mind, like a coin I am debating flipping.

I send it.

He takes it in stride, already leagues better than the Vagabond, who would have fallen right into self-pitying lamentations about stealing my youth.

I like it. He knows my age, I know his age, I don’t care, let’s move along.

He expresses that his interest was piqued by me having my own bike, which is interesting. And refreshing. I wasn’t sure what effect having my own motorcycle would have on most men before I bought one, but mostly it seems to be an affront to their masculinity. Either that I don’t need to be pillion, or that I am strong and independent. I’m not even opposed to being a passenger, depending on the occasion; I had already resigned myself to the fact that even once I had my own bike in Canada, I’d be a passenger to the Vagabond more often than not.

Ahh, it’s such a seductive thing, isn’t it, the possibilities of a relationship? A man who likes to travel, who rides motorcycles, who enjoys my independence instead of preferring I’d cleave to his side. Someone settled and mature.

He says maybe we’ll connect when he comes back to Christchurch. He’s down in Invercargill now.

I do some quick mental math. He’ll be back in Christchurch for Valentine’s.

Not that that means anything. And I hate Valentine’s. I can’t remember a Valentine’s I’ve enjoyed.

What did I do for Valentine’s last year? I think me and Rich were on the train back to London from Edinburgh, because it was the cheapest day and we both hate Valentine’s. And then his head exploded.

Monday is a work work work day. I have to pretend I’m moving out. First, however, Simo needs the table set; 9 for dinner tonight. What’s the difference between a white wine glass and a red wine glass? White wine glasses are shorter, apparently, for some reason. Something about the red wine glass needing to be bigger to “let the aromas emerge”. Each place setting needs a white wine glass, a red wine glass, a water glass, a dinner fork, a dessert fork, a salad fork, a big butter knife and a small butter knife, a dessert spoon, a dinner plate and a small plate for buns or something. Except for the place setting for the single child, who just gets a water glass. Between it all I have to keep chasing Buffo the cat out of the dining room before he decides to start throwing plates on the floor.

I notice, belatedly, that Simo’s nice plates are the 195$ American Versace plates featured on John Oliver. What a curious connection.

Time to clean up the cabin and return it to a state fit for guests. Sheets in the wash, plug the TV back in, wash all the dishes, remake the bed, vacuum the floor. I don’t feel like repacking all my stuff, so I just move it out to the deck. Once Simon and Tess have headed out, I can just throw it in the back of the side-by-side and drive it over.

Tess is trying to be helpful, which is annoying. Of course, she doesn’t know this is a lie and I’m not leaving. It’s ironic when both the Czech boys and Jan left without a backwards glance, but she hangs around. Even though I am waiting for her to leave so I can move back into my cabin. Her and Simon stay for lunch and leave around 12:30.

This surprises me. Tess asks Simo for a hug and Simo says she doesn’t like hugs. But she offered me a hug before I left? I offer Tess a hug instead and we hug for a long time.

Finally they’re on their way.

Because I told them there was guests staying and we have guest sheets – which, to be clear, isn’t a lie, guests do stay in here and there are guest sheets for it – they packed up the usual woofer sheets. I track them down, remake the bed. Refill the sugar. They didn’t leave any toilet paper… did they just happen to use it all, or did they pack it up in their car? They left a mostly full bottle of shampoo behind, and a mostly empty bottle of “soap free body wash”. Well, at least I won’t have to buy any until I get back to Canada. I will smell like coconuts for a bit. Other than that, they’ve left the place nicer than anyone else.

There is a new kettle… did the old one die? I also noticed they threw a bead of silicone on the joint in the ceiling where most of the mouse poop falls down. I remember suggesting it, but I also suggested they ask Simo first and I’m willing to bet they didn’t. It is kind of annoying that she isn’t taking it seriously.

Since we have guests for dinner, everyone else has left except me and Gary, and Simo is mentally preparing for dinner service, I offer to cook for myself.

I decided to watch Sonic 3 with my free night. I didn’t watch Sonic’s 1 and 2, partially because I have a deep, abiding hatred of Jim Carrey, and partially because I hate the usual video game movie problem. They take the game character and put them in the good ol’ US of A, for absolutely no reason. We have the Sonic ’06 problem all over again, where Sonic et al don’t look right next to regular humans, but also we have Sonic being a hero and saving the world, which Sonic wasn’t. OG Sonic was a classic 90’s anti-hero, nominally the good guy but only by virtue of the bad guys having no redeeming features whatsoever. The whole point of the original games was to go very, very fast through the levels designed for you to go fast through, then beat up Eggman because screw Authority, man! And then throw up the horns, I suppose. Sonic in particular had a hilarious habit of holding up his index finger to the screen if you were going too slow, a PG middle finger.

But Sonic 3 has Shadow, Gerald and Maria, so I had to watch it.

See, cuz the other 90’s disease Sonic had was the pop-culture mandated “rival”, a character who is basically the main character, but “better”. Except to stop us from liking the rival better, the rival had to have some unredeeming features of their own, which in Shadow’s case was the fact he was a black-and-red-coloured goth, and constantly bubbling with barely contained rage.

Shadow’s always been right on the edge of being too much of an edgelord to be likable. Like Venom, except everyone liked the Venom movies so what do I know? (Actually, I was debating watching them as well, cuz I like Tom Hardy). The Shadow the Hedgehog game in 2005 was what pushed him over the edge into cringe-worthy. I mean, why is a character who can explicitly run faster than the sound of speed riding a motorcycle? And why are characters in a Sonic game shooting each other with guns??

The game had a certain charm, though, buried under all the fluff. *Spoilers* Shadow’s whole character arc is that he was being experimented on by the military, including Eggman’s grandfather, Gerald, to find a cure for his granddaughter, Maria (You may ask, if Eggman and Maria have the same grandfather, are they siblings or cousins? Both the game and the movie sidestep this and leave it unanswered). Maria and Shadow bond, classic “girl meets monster” stuff. But then, the president ordered a purge of the military base and Maria got shot, right before Shadow gets put into stasis for 50 years. During which he forgets everything except that he hates the military for shooting Maria, and wakes up with intent to kill everything vaguely human-shaped. Cue game (and movie).

It was ballsy for a game to include the explicit murder of a child (Maria is only, like, 10 years old) and the nuance that goes into it, as Shadow learns to navigate his grief and try to find a reason to live after Maria is gone. In between shooting impractically large guns and shouting about Chaos Emeralds, lest you forget this is a children’s game and not a psychological examination into the darkest of hearts a la Breaking Bad.

The movie keeps most of this in, stripping out some of the fat. I approve of Carrey playing both Eggman and Gerald, and you’ll probably enjoy it if you loved classic Carrey CGI shenanigans, like The Mask. It’s still very much a kid’s movie, best exemplified by everyone calling Shadow “The Ultimate Lifeform” for no real reason (what does that even mean?). The movie also goes a step further by explicitly connecting to a theme of family and belonging, which is good cuz the game basically forgot Eggman and Gerald were related and neither comment on the other’s existence. Although the heavy-handed attempts at juxtaposition are silly. In the movie, moments before Eggman finds out his grandfather is still alive, he’s lamenting about how he has no family and how family always lets you down, with 0 connection to anything currently happening on-screen.

Also, every time Eggman and his assistant Stone were on-screen together, I don’t know why it exists but the homosexual subtext is just text. I kept screaming “kiss him, you fool!” at the screen cuz they have so much sexual tension. It’s unbearable!

Also also I’m glad they didn’t bother trying to introduce Rogue, Shadow’s romantic interest, an anthropomorphic bat with a bustier and human breasts… because rule 34, or something.

I got paid by the last place, effin’ finally. 440 bucks, which is more than I expected, actually. That’ll cover me for food and lodging until I head back to Canada, methinks. I submitted my review of them; 4 stars, some pros and cons, ending with “I didn’t enjoy my stay but someone else may love it”. I think that’s enough to express my displeasure without being stupidly angry. They haven’t reviewed me yet, dicks. And Worldpackers blinds the reviews; they can’t see my review until they wrote their own, so they just hadn’t wrote one, no connection to my content.

(Also, I have decided that Shirah probably stole my headphones. Not that it matters).

Tuesday I discover there had been an earthquake. I double-checked on the seismic activity website; January 19th, 3.2 magnitude, 6km deep. Just enough to shift the foundation. A couple of the doors stick now, and the gate to one of the chicken coops. Yay.

Which reminds me, the earthquakes have been ramping up. They are background noise for the most part, New Zealand never really doesn’t not have earthquakes. But they’ve been increasing in frequency and strength, especially around Wellington, and New Zealand is overdue for a “big one”. I noticed in the few months between when I first visited Greymouth and now, they’ve put out a lot of signs about what to do during an earthquake, and it’s on the radio as well. Will I be here through a major earthquake? That’s interesting.

Well, it’s a good thing I don’t know anyone in Wellington…

That train of thought dies. I do know someone in Wellington now. Not that it makes a disaster meaningless if I don’t know anyone personally affected, but y’know…

Tuesday morning, we have a pile of dishes. Turns out there was 10 for dinner, not 9. They didn’t have wine, which is good for me cuz fitting the wine glasses into the dishwasher is difficult, but they wanted a lot of mixed drinks, which is a lot of work for poor Simo. We go over to the computer to decide a plan of attack.

“And then once they check out, we have to change every bed…”

“Simo.”

“We’ll need to use both washing machines, I don’t know if it will dry on the line when it’s this cloudy…”

“Simo!” She finally stops and looks at me. I point at the screen. “They’re here for two nights. Not checking out today.”

“Oh!” She perks up.

It is wet and miserable today. Like England. I tidy around the kitchen. She wants me to clean the cooker, but she still thinks I know how to use a gas stove. What is cleanable and what isn’t? How does it come apart and go back together? A mystery. Clean the range hood and put it back together.

Selling the bike isn’t going well. No interest from anyone who isn’t a scammer. I drop the price down to 2 grand. Richard says a dealership would only give me 1.5 for it, but I’d take that just to be done with it and not be broke anymore.

That being said, since I’ve been paid and I can probably limp along to my first paycheck without selling the bike, and I’m coming back to NZ, maybe I just don’t sell the bike…

I would need somewhere to store it. I can’t leave it here, we keep hoping Simo will sell the place soon. Kelly is a possibility. Richard has said I could leave it there and he can sell it if I don’t sell it before I leave, and I can’t imagine much of a leap from leaving it there to sell, to just storing it until I get back/ selling it if I can’t come back.

We adjust my days off. I was hoping for Wednesday off, but that’s not in the cards because of the guests staying for two nights. Simo still owes me a day for last week, so I get Thursday, Saturday and Sunday off. Time to relax and organize.

The Soroptimists in Thunder Bay have started getting invites to virtual events from Australia. The result of my relentless ambassadorship. It’s nice to see that turning into something!

Gary isn’t home for dinner and she had a late lunch. Can I cook for myself? Yes, I can make myself some instant noodles. She chides me for eating a lot of them, but I’m not sure what the other options were. Am I allowed to cook something out of the fridge? She tells me to have some fruit and I grab some as well, but what I really need is protein. Sadly, all the cloudy weather has reduced how much the chickens are laying, or I’d just ask her for a couple of eggs.

Someone messaged me from Worldpackers, asking for more clarity about Glenorchy’s pay, which I was happy to provide! And here I always scoff at the idea of reviews.

Wednesday is a bright, sunny day. We attack the cabins once the guests leave, every single sheet and towel needs to be washed. At least the work is straightforward.

Simo complains about how I take the sheets off the line. I usually just crumple them into a ball in the basket. I’m not sure why it matters when she irons them anyway, but I might as well learn. I have nothing but time now! I’m supposed to fold them in half on the line, then half again, then take them off the line and finish folding them until they are small enough to lay flat in the basket. It takes a few, but it starts to work.

The chickens managed to undo my fix for the fence! I open the gate so they’ll go back in when it gets dark. Since tomorrow is my day off, I won’t have time to fix it. Oh well. It’s not like they go far.

She’s chatty for dinner, although for once my glowing impression of her sustains a chip. I tried to tell a story relating to Lord of the Rings, but she interrupts to mention that she doesn’t like Lord of the Rings and tells a story about how much she loves Tom Sawyer. For the first time I am disappointed by her actions. I had taken a chance to open up to her and she either didn’t see it or didn’t care. Is that my fault for withdrawing and not really talking about myself, or is she sort of self-centered?

She does mention in grade school she was the tallest girl. I was the shortest. I didn’t really hit a growth spurt until I was 16, and then I had another one in my early 20’s once I moved out of my parents place. Now I’m not really tall, but people tend to describe me as such. I think my confidence adds to their mental image of my height, but it’s interesting. I’m still the shortest girl in class in my head.

At 4:30AM, I wake up. I forgot to close the gate and the chickens will be out in the morning! I stomp out to the chicken run and close the gate, then spend a long time laying in bed not able to fall asleep again.

Thursday, my day off! Thursday is technically, ironically, a holiday. Waitangi day, commemorating the treaty between the limeys and the Maori. A lot of people go to Wellington to be heard by the government and I wish I could join them.

I play more Rimworld, watch more of The Bear, write a bit. Go for a jog. I’m exceeding 6 kilometers on my runs now. I’m also starting to struggle. Maybe I should take a couple days off. Up to 45 seconds for my plank.

Guests check into the Mulberry cottage, the real reason I had to be out.

Friday, more chickens, more turnovers.

Simo is out, but she just left me a list and told me to pick whatever. I tidy, wandering around with the feather duster, listening to Abracadavre on repeat because that’s just the sort of mood I am in. Wipe down the windows. Remove things from drawers and wipe down the drawers. The maid of the estate, hiding dark secrets.

I also just like how the stanzas for the song mimic the riddle game from The Hobbit.

The poly conversation rings through my head. I did almost forget I am poly, and it’s gotten me into a false dichotomy. I can still love the Vagabond and want to have a relationship with someone else. Of course, it’s also true that both the Vagabond and the future person might be jealous or unhappy with that, but I need to focus more on myself. I shouldn’t try to force myself to be over the Vagabond for someone else. If they can’t accept that I am not over him, they should move on themselves instead of demanding something from me that I can’t give them.

I don’t feel/

like I am real…

That was one line from Joker that got me. Probably a line a lot of incels liked, really, but ignore them.

For my whole life I didn’t know if I even really existed.

But I do. I really, really do!

Gary is back for dinner, still not eating much. Simo makes a lovely dish of rice and fresh mushrooms that he doesn’t finish and dumps into the chicken bucket before I can offer to eat it. He must have pancreatitis, I recognize his fading away and the list of meds on the kitchen counter as the same ones as my dad is on. I’ve tried to talk to Simo about it, but she dismisses it, either because she doesn’t want to acknowledge how dire things are or because… well, that’s the only answer, isn’t it?

It’s hard to watch another man die of the same thing my father is dying of. Especially where Gary reminds me of my dad. Especially since I haven’t talk to my dad for a year and a half, and I don’t know when I will see him again.

The Trump situation makes me laugh. A dry, mirthless laugh, but a laugh nonetheless. I’ve been telling people for months that it would be bad, and few people believed me. I knew he’d back off on the tariffs as well, because I know what most people don’t; Canada is the top exporter of the potash they need to make fertilizer, for their precious factory farming lobby. Among other things.

The tariffs have nothing to do with economics, anyway. He gave the game away; he said he’d rather get rid of income tax and go back to the government being funded by tariffs. Which makes all the sense in the world; he doesn’t own anything, or import anything. He just licenses his name, which would be subject to income tax, but not tariffs. Isn’t it clever?

I do wonder about the threats to annex countries. I’m not sure how serious I think that is. People tend to think of the map of the world as fixed, but it’s important to remember that there are people alive today who remember when the lines on the maps were being redrawn. They are not that cast in stone.

Do you know who was the world power before World War 1? You don’t. Pop culture’s memory ends at World War 1; the Americans gave the Germans what for in 2 jolly wars and that was that, the new world power was born. But it was such an absurd idea at the time; a former British colony, so far away over an ocean, taking control like they have.

It was the Ottoman Empire.

But then, people have such a narrow view of everything. Like the people who say the pyramids were built by slaves. The pyramids were built before the concept of money existed. The population was divided into people who nominally owned land, and people who worked on that land for room and board. The pyramids were a decades-long project guaranteeing a place to call home, food, and alcohol. People were thrilled to work on them!

I’ve said all this before, but it bears repeating for the kids at the back.

Trump, pared with climate change, is the end of an era. And what a short era it was! Not even 100 years. Who will be on top next? It’s hard to say what card will be drawn once the deck is shuffled.

Personally, I just hope the internet is still around, when it’s all said and done.

What began as the rantings of a minor celebrity, first on 80s daytime television and later on stage at Vegas, now helps shape the world.

– Andrew Liu