28 December 2012

Well Deserved Day Off



Sonja and I both value our individuality above all else. We are proud of who we are and if you do not like you can fuck right off. We both admire people who value their individuality similarly. It takes work, especially in a place like Canada where our authouritarian communist hockey culture places the team, at all times, ahead of the individual.

Being individuals in partnership means making room for one another to do one's own shit. That is why this morning, as the sky began its slow transformation from Guinness black to the translucent murk of the head of the same beer when poured properly, I laid there rather than get up. Laid there listening to Sonja get ready for work. Women make quite the racket getting ready to leave the house in the morning.

At last Sonja entered our bedroom and kissed me good-bye. "There's a list of shit for you to do on the fridge," she coo'd after her lips had left my pillow creased forehead.

I waited for the slam of the door and the sound of her car roaring to life then I got up. It would just be me and the dog today.

Once I had eaten and taken care of a few of my assigned chores my dog and I went out to play in the light rain, making our way towards the pub and its 11:00 AM opening as we did so. It was a bone chill of a walk even in my long underwear, heavy coat, gloves and hat. Two degrees, slightly warmer than our Premier's most sincere smile coupled with the humidity of a jungle.

"You're late," my waitress informed me as I first piled my outer clothes on an empty chair and then sat, comfortable as a King on his throne, at the bar from where I could keep an eye on the Hammer through a window. "It's a minute past eleven."

While I believe a man should be able to get a drink somewhere at any hour of the day or night I have never been one to visit such establishments before eleven. It is something the fucking English drilled into me.

Soon as I had ordered beer and food other people trickled in. First the old timers who arrive at the same time every day they do not have an operation scheduled; then working people like me with plans to get fucked up on a well deserved day off.

Just before I left John, who I know more than I would like to, and his wife Jenny, who I would like to know better, walked in. John's face was red as a sawmill's books and his fingertips were bandaged like he had fell in a fire or something.

"What the fuck happened to you?" I asked him.

"Just got back from Saskatoon. Spent Christmas with Jenny's family. Got myself a little frostbite. Could have been worse though. Think all the rye I was drinking saved me. That Saskatoon's a fuck of a town. They have more varieties of rye in their liquor stores than they do wine."

Saskatoon is still old time Canada. I have to visit there some time.

No comments: