By Lucy

I woke up Sunday feeling like I had been hit by a truck. I had the post-shutdown flu.

Of course, it’s not a real flu (I mean, it could be, but not this time). It’s just the combination of extreme physical effort, extreme temps and random toxins all hitting your body at once. My resting heart rate ratcheted up by 4 points. Every muscle in my body ached. My throat hurt and my nose felt like something was stabbing it. I was blowing bloody chunks every time I blew my nose and I had to consult Scott for a nasal spray.

But I slowly healed. I was in no rush back to Thunder Bay; my Factor box gets delivered here on Tuesday, after all.

The bruises faded and the cuts closed. My chapped lips and the peeling skin on my hands came together. Blisters surfaced and melted away. With my bottle of vodka empty, I don’t foresee a desire to buy any more alcohol for the medium-term.

I made an attempt to contact my birth father and ask him about relatives I have in Manitoba that I could visit. He basically told me to get lost and I’m getting tired of that line repeating itself. He also tried to be all “you should make up with me and your mother before I die”, which I exclaimed aloud to Kathy and she agreed, it’s the worst kind of emotional blackmail. I already came to terms with the fact that when I saw him at Oma’s funeral was likely to be the last time I saw him alive and he should be grateful I keep offering him the opportunity to apologize to me!

I ordered my new iPhone. I was hoping to have another week of shutdown pay in my pocket first, but no point in putting it off and risking Apple upping the price.

I texted Jeremy, “Should I go with 128 or 256?”

“1 terabyte or bust.”

“That’s not how that works.”

“It’s all a lie, storage is cheap as hell.”

“Ok, but does it change anything else on the phone?”

“No.”

“I should go with more storage, then.”

“Nice, do the opposite of my advice.”

“You didn’t actually offer any advice!”

I gave up and called Brandon, which turned into a half-hour phone conversation.

Around noon I went for a nap.

I spent the afternoon playing Rimworld. Jeremy’s dad has learned Jeremy might come to New Zealand with me and started quizzing me about what New Zealand is like.

Duff bailed on shutdown to drive back to Winnipeg and get his truck (he was borrowing his brother’s). I think him disappearing from shutdown the day after I got laid off does nothing to stop the rumors we are dating, but of course I have no control over that and just live with the consequences.

In the afternoon I dragged Kathy out for a walk around the property. She showed me the confusing number of abandoned cars on the property, the boiler and furnace rusting away in a field, and the beaver-created lake that looks like the set of a live-action Fallout movie. She also showed me the motocross track they used to run; licensed by the government and everything.

Apparently the cost of insurance for the track was too high for them to justify keeping the track open and they closed it in 2015, which is too bad. I’ve noticed Scott still watches motocross in his spare time, when he isn’t watching Fox news for some reason. I debate asking him if he could get me into motocross. Even Duff thinks its a bad idea, with my health problems, but since when has that stopped me?

Monday I felt marginally better. Not really better in any measurable way, but I should make myself move.

I went to the store to buy some groceries. As I wandered down the wrong aisle for nasal spray, I walked past the hair dye. Something caught my eye; a box of copper dye. Maybe I should switch up the blonde.

Then to Mark’s. I need new socks and underwear, mine are worn out from the constant wash and wear of 6 months. To treat myself, I bought the white Converse with little red hearts and roses. Providence! They were on sale.

I’ve had an affection for Converse for a while. When I was 11 and in the halcyon days of early Facebook, when the internet promised to connect us and not divide us, I ended up talking to a guy who claimed to be a teenager from Manchester. I say claimed because I could never confirm it either way, my parents forbidding every option. We spoke almost daily for 2-3 years, so if he was a predator he was damn patient and didn’t get anything exciting out of me, but I suppose sometimes people catfish for other reasons. All that mattered to me, at the time and today, was that he was a source of comfort at a time when I had few friends or even a confidante. He provide an outlet for some of my darker thoughts and lonely feelings.

Anyway, Ryan liked Converse, so I bought a pair of Converse to mimic him, and just kept buying Converse for a while, even after we stopped talking. I liked that they breathed well, felt light on my feet, and came in a variety of fun colours and special releases. I stopped buying them when I fell in love with Riekers, but since Riekers has disappointed me I’m going back to Converse.

As usual, Mark’s has a hilariously awful selection for women’s clothes. There were maybe 2 options for steel toed boot socks, slightly more if you wanted generic work socks. I ended up going with some socks that were on sale that claimed to be woven with copper for “anti-microbial” benefits.

I went home, had some lunch and a 2 hour nap. When I got up, Jeremy’s dad told me it was too nice outside to hide inside.

It was unseasonably warm outside. Over 20 degrees. That’s not right.

Still, I already had plans to do a nearby hike that was advertised as in “gnome country”. Gnomes being nominally earth spirits but nowadays everyone thinks of ceramic garden gnomes. I always giggle to myself – in Italy, because you pronounce the E at the end of every word, it’s pronounced “gnom-eh!”. (Or oliv-eh)

It was practically offroading to get to where the trail began. According to the map there was 2 parking lots depending on where you want to start the trail, but I could not find the second parking lot for the life of me. I ended up parking by the side of the packed-dirt road behind another fellow. Belatedly, it occurred to me to text Kathy and let her know that there was a non-zero chance I could get eaten by a bear.

The trail was nice. Someone’s put a bit of care into it. You could also mountain bike it if you want. Took me about 45 minutes – I opted to do the shorter course before I pushed myself too hard.

On my way back, I paid for it, apparently. As I drove over one of the innumerable pot holes on the road, within spitting distance of the driveway. I heard a pop but thought nothing of it, ’til I parked and hopped out of the car and heard “hisssssss”.

Well, that’s a neat trick. I popped the sidewall! I watched the car sink on its springs as the pressure left the tire.

I ran inside the house. “Scott! Can you patch a tire?”

He came out and looked at it. “Well, I can try.”

The main problem is being a 4 hour drive from town. The first thing I meant to do when I got back to town was to swap to my summers anyway, but now I had to get there.

He came out with a plug and stuffed it in the hole. The hissing stopped. We filled it up with air and it seemed to hold, but sidewall punctures are always sketchy.

I had some vague plan to hang out with Eli in front of the hotel, but now I’m not moving until I have to. When Kathy came home, we had dinner and then sat outside with teas and watched the sun set.

Tuesday was pack-up day. Strip the sheets and throw them in the wash, wipe down the bathroom, pack up all my things. Sweep the floor.

Kathy was away at work, so it was just Scott to witness my leaving.

I sat there impatiently waiting for the email to come in informing me my Factor box was ready for pick up. I had made plans to go to the movies with Kevin that evening, which I kept referring to in my head as a date without having confirmed it as such. What is a date, anyway? As 1:30 ticked by, however, I realized with the time change I wouldn’t make it back to town in time, and had to cancel.

Duff texted me, “Come say goodbye?”

Sure, why not. I’m no longer going to make my timeline anyway.

He’d gotten back early this morning and switched to night shift. He was in shorts because of the nice weather, and there was a large port-wine scar across the back of his calf. When I questioned it, he said it was a skin graft from a motorcycle accident. He fell off his bike performing a jump, the throttle got stuck and he landed on the still-spinning wheel which ground all the skin off.

“We never got completely wasted together!” He complained.

“To be fair, I didn’t really drink much this shutdown.”

“No?”

I shrugged. “Nope. Trying to avoid it.”

“Probably healthier that way.” He slumped back into his chair. “It’s hard not to. We face death every day, you know.”

Yeah, I know, and both of us are death seekers, but I’m at least trying to fight it. You are not.

I allowed myself an hour to talk to Duff, but it was hard to tear myself away at the end. I reminded him I had eggs and cream slowly going off in the hot car.

Picked up my Factor box, packed some of the ice packs in with my eggs and cream, and off we go.

The drive was predictable and boring. There wasn’t even much in the way of construction or tractor-trailers on the road.

I was surprised when I got back to the house. A lot of the dog-proofing was still in place.

Dinner and bedtime.

Wednesday I decided to do too much too fast. That could basically be my mantra. Halfway to silicone valley already!

I had a hair cut scheduled first thing in the morning because it made sense to me at the time and I really really needed a hair cut. We’re going on 8 months without one now.

I liked my hair stylist, which is good. The last place I tried in Thunder Bay was serviceable but we didn’t really click, if you know what I mean. Of course, no one could compare to Julia. This stylist is a young woman who, it turns out, has been preparing for her own trip to New Zealand, so she was thrilled to bits to question me about it.

I gave her some general instruction because I wasn’t super particular about my hair cut this time. I wanted some layers to take some of the heaviness off my head. She suggest face framing layers and I went with it. I also had her move my part slightly off centre, because I like the idea of having one side of my hair over my shoulder and the other side coyly shading the side of my face, like the mysterious glamourous world traveler that I am.

She commented several times about the hilarious thick and high amount of hair I have and I felt a little bad as she struggled to blow dry it. I have been spoiled by Julia.

I asked her about hair dye and she had some time that morning, but she guessed it would take 2 hours and I guess she was miscalculating how much my mane would fight her (I was correct). We scheduled it for the next day.

Next, home for lunch.

The start of conclave makes me want to watch Angels and Demons again. I avoided commenting on the pope dying because I have a deep, abiding loathing of Christianity and the Catholic church in particular, but I have no personal grievance with anyone who practices a faith. Tom Hanks does a lot to make Dan Brown likable and the story was massively re-written to make something resembling sense instead of the usual verbal upchuck that is Dan Brown’s contribution to airport lounges.

I have a certain affection for the movies that is entirely coincidental. The first movie came out around the time that my family visited England, so it was fresh in my mind when we visited some of the filming locations and I found it fascinating. It was also funny that in Rosslyn chapel, they had to barricade the room that they find Mary in because tourists kept picking away at the walls and floor trying to find the secret room that doesn’t actually exist.

Away to the spa for do more damage to my wallet.

When I got back from the spa, I watched the remake of Nosferatu (on Prime Video) in an attempt to keep myself nailed to my chair and enforce some rest. I thought it was pretty good, dark and gothic, light on jumpscares. It leans heavily into psychosexual horror, and while there is some nudity and on-screen sexuality, I didn’t find it gratuitous. I suppose it depends on your tolerance. There is full frontal female and male nudity. Hooray for equality and penises on-screen!

For better or worse, as I watched the leering, monstrous Orlok explain his motivation to our waif-like protagonist, I had a sudden flashback. Something the Vagabond said. The last thing he said that night.

You seemed lonely, like me.

That’s it, the missing piece. It’s not just that I love him. It’s that I felt so seen by him and no one else seems to.

But it doesn’t matter if he gets me better than anyone else, if all he uses it for is to hurt me. It’s no replacement for trust, integrity, or a real commitment.

I am not afraid to keep on living,

I am not afraid to walk this world alone.

I suppose, a sentiment expressed by the movie itself. There is a difference between thought and deed, and a line between desire and consent.

Also, amusingly, at one point Emily came home and Hanuman ran out to the foyer and jumped on her, causing a scream that perfectly echoed a scream coming from the movie, which made me jump.

In the evening, I made a mistake. There was a general meeting for the sailing races. I glanced at the email, saw that it said “Thunder Bay Yacht club”, and went to the clubhouse by the marina. What I forgot is that the clubhouse at the marina is the “Temple Reef” yacht club, and all the boats are in dry dock on Mission Island. Oops! It was mostly dry technical stuff anyway, but I made an appearance nonetheless. At this point my commitment is more to Chris than sailboats anyway.

After everyone came to an agreement on the rules of engagement, we had a brief social event, during which basically everyone offered me a beer. Including alcohol-free beer, which I don’t understand because I don’t enjoy the taste of beer.

Chris left early, but me and Kevin wandered down to the boat and took a look at what still needs to be done. Kevin said they were coming down to work on it Saturday, which sounds good to me. I wanted to make an attempt to put some “sweat equity” into the boat.

On Thursday, I busted out my new Converse and went for a jog around Lakehead University. It was just cool enough to require my hoodie, and sunny, delightful for a jog. Did a basic work-out. Hopped in the shower so I wasn’t all sweaty in the chair.

I warned the hair stylist explicitly and in detail that my hair resists dye.

We decided to put some streaks of bleach in to create highlights and then a base colour.

She sort of forget that my hair is a work-out and you could tell she wasn’t managing her time effectively. She had to ask someone else to take over while she saw another client, and then recruit a second person to help with my roots and blow drying my hair. It took about 3 hours from start to finish, and as the hair lightened up under the blow dryer she said, “oops! It does resist the dye”.

Duh.

She offered me a hair mask to take home and touch up the red myself, or another appointment. A free appointment? Of course, they still charged me far too much when the job was technically not done correctly and I miss Julia. I don’t blame the stylist; she’s still in training and the studio sets the prices, not her. I presume there’s probably some mechanism for disputing it, but I am too tired. Blah.

In any case, it looked more towards the blonde than the strawberry, which wasn’t terrible, it just wasn’t copper.

After a brief break, I grabbed Jeremy and went back to my place to grab my PC. Time to get serious!

We spent the evening coding it up. Well, he was coding and I was tweaking my existing snowmobile model. There is a difference between modelling for yourself and modelling for a game. I had to go back and reset all the origins for the various pieces and Godot still wouldn’t place it properly so he had to set it manually but it’s fine.

My new iPhone came in, along with my personalized Airpods so people like Shirah don’t steal them again.

I bricked my phone as I was transferring it over. I accidentally hit the forgot password button and it wouldn’t let me back out of it, which meant it wouldn’t let me install any apps except what came on the phone, so I was limited to basic calls, texting and email until Apple unlocked it. Yay. I love spending more than a grand on a phone that I can’t use.

Home for a rest, methinks.