I am far, far closer now.

I'm not sure where to begin. I guess my own story has gotten the better of me.

Bombay felt like home from day one. Maybe that's because Puji felt like home from the moment we shared that first rickshaw ride from the airport. How Smita woke up from her sleep and invited me to sit by her side, my sleep-deprived head still in subtle shock from the humid mess of cars, scooters and people that was somehow nowhere near as shocking as everyone would have me believe.

From those first moments I fit right in. And I have been fitting in ever since. For me there was no jet lag. No trouble with the food. No moments of panic. No homesickness. No doubts. No regrets.

For the first time in my life I don't feel pressed for time. I don't feel bad for being a lazy bum - even when we don't leave the house before four or five in the afternoon. Everything gets done as it must. Nicely. I don't fight the heat or the honking or the traffic. I don't stare at all the dogs and people sleeping on the side of the road on those late-night drives back from wherever. Or the beggars without arms and legs at the train station; the little girls squatting on the beach to do their business. I don't feel like I have to rush to snap a picture of every last famous building mentioned in the Lonely Planet. I don't feel like a tourist and I don't want to be one either - not in this city anyway. I feel like everyday has somehow been a good day, packed with so many perfect little moments that simply cannot be packaged into neat little sentences; so many beautiful and personal conversations that wouldn't make much sense repeating here. It's only in these moments that I feel the distance. Distance, for sure. But not any loneliness.

Two weeks in and I feel like I have all the time in the world. It's early, I know. This is still the honeymoon phase. I'm forever mindful that tomorrow, everything can change. But today was a good day and tonight has been a good night.

Everything that is out of my control will remain so. And I don't feel like I need anything else right now.

   

Masha, right on cue

I was in this exact same spot the last time Masha randomly knocked on my door.

She was drunk the first time we met. She sort of stumbled in, looking for the piano. It wasn't in the safe anymore, she explained. I guess she had gotten used to coming by and playing it there. I'm not really sure how she knew it had ended up in my room. Lucky guess, I guess. Then she kind of just barged in. I was sitting on the couch, reading Interpreter of Maladies and trying to decipher Shukumar in a bid to make sense of my own turmoil. She apologized for the random visit and went straight for the piano. She started playing and was quite good for someone who kept on insisting she wasn't. She asked if I could accompany her on the drums. I agreed, even though I really couldn't. It was awkward. But we ended up jamming for half an hour regardless. She ended up coming back at least once more that night - apologizing both on the way in and on the way out. She promised she'd be back in about three months.

Tonight was about three months, give or take. And I was on that same couch. Except this time I had no clues to decipher; no characters to read up on. Just broken text messages. And emptiness. And Masha walked in after poking her head into the small cat flap I had added especially for Angel. She apologized again and walked straight to the piano. She insisted I looked too young to be a building owner. Wasted, she made sure to remind me not to 'rape her' or anything. I laughed and agreed. Luckily I didn't have to play drums this time. I just listened to her play, watching her fingers stretched delicately over the keys. She played a song she felt could pass for a complete song and spoke of lyrics she was too shy to sing.

When she was done we spoke about songs that made her cry and others that made her want to run. We spoke about life and loving too much and the pitfall of complete happiness - at least as far as her own creative process was concerned. There was something to be said about turmoil, I said, only half believing my words. She asked me to tell her the most important thing I had learned in life. I said it was that things are never as sure as they may seem; that learning to accept that was the only way to live.

She agreed, asked me for my name again and thanked me for the talk. Told me she'd probably see me again in about three months.

I wondered how long she might knock next time before realizing I wouldn't be there to open the door.

butterflies

I can't pinpoint the exact moment things started to change. On the inside.

I am becoming less and less sure of where I'm headed and yet more and more convinced that it's in the right direction. All of which has left me feeling at peace with the present.

Something I have not felt in a long time.

mayday, i can`t explain

I'm always going to have a soft spot for May Day.

Let's put the plight of the international workers and all the student protests and the death of Bin Laden aside for a second. Six years ago to the day, my brother Mark and I opened the first side of il Terzo Piano. It was our first jam space. Well, the first jam space we built ourselves - and a first of many hard lessons in construction, cost over-runs, sound leakage and nation building.

But when it opened, it became the coolest spot in my universe. All turquoise blue and sunburst orange. There was Vox Populi and D Open D in Room 1, Broken Palace in Room 2, odd couple Nick and Jonathan in a windowless Room 4 and Kamikaze in the deluxe suite. Humble beginnings, but with so much promise. Like Balzac had been at one time. And it didn't take much for the place to catch fire. In the next three years, it became the place to be. It was the place to spend your Tuesday mornings and your Sunday nights. It was the place I would run to from my parent's during the summer and the perfect place to have a snowball fight on a March night. It was always Franco's last stop after tour - and just a short drive to the quarry, if need be. We walked its stinky streets and admired the giant reservoirs from the roof in states few people would ever understand. We poured bending guitars into the hallways and shared our most intimate words on her cold, hard floors. The vibe was almost always positive, the pad parties were epic and those of us dedicated to the real cause all got to create some special music there. For me, the place peaked with Uptown VineRise, still months and months after our final pad party in the back section and before things went really sour with the landlords. And the band. But every musician will have their own story; their own beginning and ends.

And even in those last two years, when everything was broken and cold hard reality crept into those magical hallways; when the early wounds were torn open, the salt poured and the place left to slowly rot from the inside, I always found a good reason to go back. It wasn't always easy. But it was always necessary. Because that place was ours until the day it wasn't.

In my head, it'll always be all shiny and new.

flash, flash. everything with the flash

Davey Cleinfeld isn't one to mince words. That's what I love about him the most.

"I really feel like last night was super junkie," he tells me over the phone. "It's like I had quit smoking for a year and someone handed me a cigarette. And I took it for no good reason."

I can hear him pacing upstairs as he's talking to me. He's right. Him and Vito went way too far on the slots yesterday. Which apparently makes me the big winner of last night's random midnight casino escapade. I was literally out the hospital door when I got the offer. I agreed more for the outing than anything else. My luck usually stinks. I am an avid believer in the reversion to the mean.

My parents might secretly suspect I'm some kind of closet gambler, but I'm really not. I just like the momentum of it all. I only play when I win. So I stop dead in my tracks when I lose. Dave plays until his pockets are empty. And he knows it. Which is why he rarely goes anymore. Fair enough.

But there we were. What makes Montreal's casino so rotten is that there is no attempt to even glam up the fact that most people are there to lose money they don't even have. The decor is stale. The dealers lack personality. It's like the city's biggest back-door gambling operation with the collective charisma of an indoor parking garage. Nobody looks like they're having all that much fun.

At least we were having a good time - a Wednesday night and all. Another three Campari Grapefruits on the way would have made it even better.

I abstained from the slot machines but the two of them fed every Monte Carlo, Wheel of Fortune, Grand Prix, High Roller and Vibrant Seven machine they could find, zipping from floor to floor and constantly splitting cash and winning tickets fifty fifty. Cash in, cash out. Cash in, cash out. They were doing alright pre-Roulette (an impossible table that kept our collective $60 in chips entertained with endless black for a good 45 minutes) but it was all downhill after that.

And the more they lost, the more they bet. We ended up staying way longer than any of us were comfortable with. And in the end, I was the declared winner because I left with five bucks in my pocket.

We negotiated the "walk of shame" and promised a better outing idea next time.

But then again, it's just money. And in the grand scheme of things, not all that much of it. I'm much more interested in lazying around all day and might just take Davey up on that offer to go play in that nice, light snow that's been falling steadily since last night. And clean up nice.

SOS-JEUX (VERSION MAMAN)

These are the kind of late-night phone calls that make me smile...

Mommy: "Hi Rob. Sorry to call you so late, but my motherly instinct has been bothering me for the last three days and I have to ask you something."

Me: (now concerned) "Why, what is it?"

Mommy: "Did you go back to the casino and lose all your money?"

Me: (relieved) "Are you serious? Is that why you called me? Do you think I'm a gambler or something?"

Mommy: (laughing) "No."

Me: "I told you I didn't want to leave that night. That's when I had the luck. Doesn't mean I was going to go back. It's over now."

Mommy: "Yeah, I understand. Anyway, that's all I wanted to know. I'll be able to sleep now."