Blood & Rhetoric

Krystle: Are we having a good time?

Jana: Of course we are! We’re at the Drake! A place for artists and hipsters! A haven for the bohemian! A citadel for the urbanely-cool!

Random Guy: I am so gonna get some! Look at the ratio, bitches! 3- 1! I can’t lose!

Steph: This music is inducing a seizure in my person.

Krystle: Yeah what is this shit? And who’s this bitch beside me all up on my shit?

Jana: I think it’s trance. Or dance. Or trip-hop. Or….god I can’t do this. I can’t pretend anymore. Listen, just fucking smile and act like everything is normal. This place rocks. NOW Magazine says so. So keep going through the motions until we can finally get the fuck out and pretend we LOVED it. God I need another drink.

I knew it had to end.

And truth be told, it was getting a bit monotonous. The cottage is a great place; but there’s only so much sitting in one place I can do before I start pining for a sleek, sexy computer in front me bursting with information and multitudes of blindingly-shiny other things.

(Yes I do get the irony of that statement, thanks.)

Not that I’m complaining or anything. Not really. I read a few books; got some writing done; got a great tan and etc. Good times. But now I’m ready for a longer and more adventurous vacation somewhere else in the world, and perhaps in the cruel Canadian winter time when the entire population is contemplating the sweet release of suicide. Maybe Chile? Argentina? China? Hmm? We’ll see.

One thing I certainly won’t miss is the massive hordes of blood thirsty mosquitoes covering every exposed inch of flesh at dusk.

(And no, DEET is not the answer. That stuff is dangerous and I will not give birth to mutant children sometime in the future when children actually become a desire and not just a cute pet-type thing other people have.)

But the bugs got to me to thinking about all those novels I’ve read where the hapless hero and/or heroine are wandering through the woods. And y’know what? I really can’t recall (at present) a single mention of insect harassment. Nothing that sticks out anyways. I distinctly remember in this tedious piece of navel-gazing garbage I couldn’t finish the doomed lovers running to their fates (gasp!) through a thick forest and having crazy sex in a forest and sleeping naked… in a fucking forest! In the fucking summer!

And it never even consciously occurred to me that there was anything wrong with any of those scenarios until this last week brought back the harsh realities of the natural world. And I’m talking harsh as in a million dollar cottage on a private lake harsh with barely a neighbour within shouting distance. So imagine a forest with no shelter in the oppressive heat of summer when the mosquitoes and flies and other critters are out at full force?

Egads.

Just something to think about. Oh and the whole insect-borne diseases like malaria thing…

Cottage time!

No phone. No internet. No television. No Work!

NO TECHNOLOGY!

Well there’s a boat I guess, and music and stuff of that nature.

And I will have personal writing to do like (hopefully) catching up on all my 2YN assignments. And I’m sure I’ll read several books.

But other than that it will be an entire week of: beer, rum, smokes, and enough red meat ingestion to kill a saner woman.

Basically, like last year, an entire week of THIS:

THIS:

And even, THIS:

There are drawbacks of course; being self-employed means no sweet company vacation pay. And when I get back, I’ll be slightly behind and racing like a mad woman to meet deadlines. But that doesn’t matter. Not for the next week it won’t; not as I’m laying on a dock in the sun and drinking or pathetically trying to learn how to wakeboard.

For those of you living in say, the freakin’ Bahamas, this won’t mean much; but, for us Canadians forced to hibernate like animals six months out of the year, it’s pure heaven.

I came accross the hillarious and time-wasting (yes we need more!) FAIL Blog today.

Behold:

I chose the above image because when I was her age, I too was obsessed with drawing penises and titties.

On the streetcar, sort of nodding off and jerking awake. I’d had the sort of day where you wake up already exhausted and it never quite comes together from that point. The kind of day where existential angst keeps creeping in on you and you start to wonder what, if anything, is worth it anymore. And so I arrived ten minutes late to the prearranged meeting place he had suggested– which turned out to be a cozy, intimate restaurant, and I was a little perturbed by his choice of location but shrugged it off to paranoia. After all, although this felt eerily similar to other situations I had been in – situations gone horribly, awkwardly awry – it was no reason to jump to conclusions.

He would know me from my picture but I had no idea what he looked like, and so I stood nervously at the door, scanning the mostly empty restaurant; waiting for some lone soul to claim me.

I felt like I was on a blind date instead of a “business” meeting – a feeling that would only increase in intensity as the night went on — but I’m getting ahead of myself here.

And then finally a tall, dark, handsome man in a suit comes over and introduces himself.

We’ll call him Jack. Because I like that name

We’ll call him George.

The “business” in question was a potential job. One of those multifaceted types that included writing, blogging, marketing, and video hosting with television potential (they all believe the television potential line) and so basically it translated into your typical media gig of insanely long and irregular hours with third-world-country standard hourly wages.The ad was seeking an “attractive and engaging female host with strong verbal and written capabilities” and I like to think I am those things. So I applied with my resume and headshot and “George” contacted me for a face-to-face meeting.

And so here I was at this stupidly trendy restaurant. Your typical Toronto spot serving the standard generic-Asian-fusion fare at inflated prices.

And here George was talking about everything but the job at hand. And asking a lot of personal questions.

And it’s starting to get awkward because he’s complimenting me.

Him: “You know, Jana, you seem so different from the models I typically work with.”

Me: “I think that might be because I am neither a model or your co-worker.”

(Thinking: thanks asshole. Is this akin to the Say are you a model? pick-up line other jackasses are so fond of using on women? Every woman? Because you’re starting to make me feel like I want to rip your face off.)

Insert long tedious monologue by him where he expounds upon the various times in his illustrious director/producer career where he’s gotten a “break” for other nubile young females like myself working in the media/writing field – or “modeling” as he refers to it interchangeably. This speech also includes him telling me he’s been compared to George fucking Clooney (who says that?) and name-dropping all the Very Important People he’s “friends” with.

At this point I haven’t mentioned my boyfriend yet, as I’m still clinging to the hope that this is in fact a business meeting and not a surprise first-date and I’m putting on my most glacial Eastern European façade in the hopes of deterring him. The glacial Eastern European thing usually works very well for me, but it’s obviously going straight over his head.

And as the minutes tick by, it starts to feel too obvious to even mention a boyfriend as I obviously am on a surprise first date, and mentioning one will make me look like one of those girls who lies to deter unwanted suitors and then this train-wreck of an evening will be even worse.And I shouldn’t even have to do that, goddamn! Because this is a meeting right? An interview? A professional thing? Right??

Oh no it’s not? You mean that’s asking for too much? Yes, indeed.

And to make a long story short: I cut the evening early and went home feeling dirty and confused.

And this brings me to my point: I fucking despise 99% of the people who list themselves as being in the “entertainment industry.” Fucking hate ‘em. I’m friends with some wonderful people in the field. But I’m also acquainted with some of the biggest pricks. I’ve unfortunately dated this breed of man and he is invariably the most obnoxious, selfish, egotistical, insecure asshat you will ever spend time with.

Kinda like a lot of the assholes in “finance” or the striped shirt guy, but possibly worse.

I’ve been in too many situations watching a group of insecure posers preening for their peers — who have neither the clout nor the influence they themselves believe they do — practically begging to suck their cocks for a chance at something. Anything. But dear lord gimme something

And I see a lot of writers doing the same. Begging and pleading and stalking agents and editors.

And I just want it to stop.

I stayed up late the other night and CityLine was airing one of it’s hilariously bad soft core porns and I stopped to watch for a few minutes because the TV menu guide listed the description as something about a writer — and of course the plot revolved around a young woman with enormous titties fucking and sucking her way to a publishing contract.

Granted, I seriously doubt that this happens ever, or often anyways, but it did make me giggle. And then my sleeping boyfriend woke up on the couch and gave me a weird look. Right before asking if we could reenact the scene on the TV.

This is Nightwish with their video for the song Sleeping Sun.

It makes me feel refreshed the same way eating a grapefruit does.

Yessss indeed.

I know that complaining about the snow while living in Canada is an exercise in indulgence. But I’m going to do it anyways. Because it’s March 26th and we’re still buried in it.

I may have lived in Toronto for most of my life, but my ancestors come from a place where the average temperature in January is 10 degrees, and I don’t think I’ve ever fully acclimatized myself.

It’s really fucking cold up in this bitch, and unless temperatures return to normal soon, I may have to go on Prozac. Or Jack Daniels. And despite the romantic image of the drug addled, struggling writer, I’d really rather not.

I think the fact I’ve been putting off a real vacation for four years is the real culprit behind my bitterness. I’ve been meaning to backpack Mexico for the last couple of years, but it keeps getting put off. Last year’s excuse was messed up paperwork which would have prevented me from legally leaving Canada. This year’s excuse: I’m a broke mothafucker. Next year’s excuse? TBA! I’ll probably go and get myself knocked up or something equally stupid.

And from the Too Much Information file: I got my period this morning.

I should have worked from home today. I should have stayed inside where it’s quiet and cozy and peaceful with nothing but my computer,  my thoughts, and Jimmy the cat for company; but nooooo, I had to drag myself out here. I spent a good part of the morning trying really hard to pay attention in a meeting but really I was counting the number of times per minute my uterus tried to burst its way out of my abdomen.**

And I’ve noticed in the last week or so that the Canadian geese are starting to return from wherever the hell it is they go in the autumn. Poor things. They came here to frolick, and mate, and make little Canadian geese babies. They’re probably as shocked as I am by the injustice.

**14

My motto used to be “do it all now; sleep when you’re dead.”

And oh boy did I try.

I was working a full-time, 9-5 job, as a secretary, part-time as an English Lit. tutor, attending 3 full courses at the University of Toronto, taking Real Estate courses towards my Realtor license, taking theatre courses, auditioning for theatre and film, conducting a Toronto-Cleveland  long-distance relationship, and trying to work on a novel and several short stories.

Everything. All at once.

Needless to say, that all fell apart in a very messy and pathetic manner, as I sobbed uncontrollably in my ex-boyfriends car one night after drinking way, way too much. I think I kept repeating “I just want ONE day off!” and screaming “Don’t touch me!”  whilst apologizing every two minutes.

Good times. Really.

That was a few years ago, I was fresh into my 20’s and ready to prove my family wrong by finally making a success out of myself in an effort make up for all the fear and procrastination and laziness that had made up my teenage years. But of course I went about it all the wrong way and got burned out in the end. Luckily I didn’t have a full-blown nervous breakdown — the drama in the car that one night proved to be the extent of my hysteria — but I still didn’t learn my lesson. I still tried to do everything. All at once. And I attributed my lack of success to my lack of discipline and effective time management.

Only now, in the past year or so, am I realizing the full extent of my childish stupidity. 

You can’t do everything at once because one of those things is bound to suffer. But you can do a few things.

And maybe it’s better to start with one thing and work real hard at it until the process becomes second nature, or at least more familiar and comfortable. Only then can you move on to the next. Only then can you be a success, because you’ve given your all to the one thing that mattered most at that particular time.

When I finally realized that, life became easier. I found full-time work as a copywriter (by luck, but they haven’t fired me yet) and I now get to work from home. I’m excited about expanding that business and getting more clients. I decided not to try and pursue a career as a writer and actor at the same time, but to focus on my novel and freelance work. After many, many false starts and pages of wasted prose and half-finished scenes and stories, I’m finally on track with my novel. I’m working at my old office as an internal auditor for extra cash, setting my own hours and days. And I’m happier. So very much happier.

 In a way, I still feel that sense of failure creep up on me every now and again, because I could have been doing this all earlier — if I had only known. Ah the ironic wisdom of a twenty-something looking back at her 19 year-old self! Hilarious.

And until I’ve achieved a certain level of success, I’ll always feel in some tiny part of myself like a failure. To be completely honest, until that first novel is published and I’m staring at my book in my own hands, I’ll probably still struggle with this inadequacy. And after that step is achieved, who knows what fresh fears and anxieties will surface to plague my over-analytical brain. 

Life was so much easier once upon a time when I was still scribbling stories that began “Once upon a time…”