Halifax, I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down

Okay, to be fair, it isn't so much the city that is bringing me down. In fact, I really do love this city. It's more like my apartment. Not even the whole apartment, really just the mouse problem. When I say mouse problem it sounds like we have one mouse. We don't. We have several. We have a mice problem. I kid you not, while editing the photo for this post I saw two scurrying through our hallway. This was a slight improvement over finding one in my breadbag last week (try picking up a loaf of bread to make a lunch for work the next day and finding a small beady-eyed rodent staring at you from inside the plastic...actually, on second thought, don't do that, it is a rather scarring experience), but is still not really okay with me. I've tried naming them, since this was a suggestion someone gave me when it came to dealing with the spiders that really liked my last apartment and it actually proved to be a useful tactic. It's not really proving so effective with the mice though. Harold, Tom Thumb, Hunka Munka...really, I just don't want to be living with them. On the bright side, I am writing this post with a poodle sitting in my lap, and while she doesn't actually care about the mice until they are dead, I feel slightly more confident as long as she is nearby.

The Brutal Mechanics

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Cow Head. The sign briefly points, a small road branching, winding among dunes and I want to follow it, imagining long-legged piers, sand spits trailing houses into the sea, but the pavement unrolls smoothly pulling me north, motion itself a tunnel, a spell, and I miss the turn, my chance of seeing Cow Head the way so many chances beckon flickering past, the streams, the little graveyards fenced with sticks, and high on a gravel beach a man spreading nets, his single boat perched on a spruce pole ramp and I want to talk to him, follow into his words, find him alone at dawn launching himself off the earth's edge, I could do it, stop here, let this be the spot it starts, rock, sea opening to whatever they really hold, but I don't, he's gone and I'm still zooming on, the car packed with bedding boots maps and the camera ready for use, I take the hills and valleys in a swoop as though the force it took to tear me away from home has not yet spent itself, and I just grip the wheel and go.

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The brutal mechanics of having a wish come true.

(John Steffler, The Grey Islands)

Sometimes life is hard. This is not the same as saying that it is bad. In fact, sometimes the hardest things in life turn out to be the best for us. The past month has been hard. Really hard. There have been adjustments, and setbacks, and rejections. There have been failures, and sickness, and sadness. There have been heartwrenching situations with friends, the kind where there is nothing I can do, but I want so badly to be able to do something. I think pretty much every day I say (usually out loud), "I don't want to be a grown up." I have, at times, wondered why I didn't just move back to Edmonton.

Don't get the wrong idea. It's not like my life has become some kind of catastrophe. There have been moments of exquisite happiness, and love, and wonder. There has been satisfaction, and contentment, and the feeling of being in the right place. There have been some excellent times with friends. And when all else has failed, there has been a dog to make me feel incredibly loved. Every time I drive the highway between Halifax and Wolfville, or take a walk near the ocean, I say (usually out loud), "I love living here." I have, at times, wanted to stay here forever.

It's been a while. And honestly, this blog might become much more sporadic. And it might become something entirely different than it is right now. I've been mulling some things over in regard to it, so we will see what shape it takes as time goes on. My life is shifting a lot right now, so it seems only appropriate that the blog shifts right along with it.