drop off

i'm still dreaming crazy dreams and letting too many of them get away. except that i woke up to a cruel 5 am alarm with the anger of this last one still locked in my jaw, its last confrontation still burned behind itchy eyes as they adjusted to reality. it was my dad. there had been an entire grocery store to paint before the grand opening and my father's silent instructions were apparently the only thing standing between me and my deadline. the problem was that the paint had gone clumpy. it hung on the wall like spoiled milk. but it was the absurdity of what had put me in such a compromising position, stuck between my urgent sense of duty and everyone else's blatant disregard for it, that led me to finally snap. after being forced to get into my car and drive to the site of the family soccer game he was watching with Puji and my brother, i got right in his face and mumbled things i would never dare say in real life. and i remember exactly how his incredulous eyes bulged out of their head - no doubt a stranger to stark, passionate truth - as my iPhone tore the hazy blanket right off that terribly climactic moment. the air in the bedroom felt thick with guilt as those last lucid moments began to recede. i was suddenly relieved i was getting up way too early for another airport drop off. and on Friday the 13th no less - not that it would raise any particular cosmic alarm bells for my practical father. was this psychological payback for the last disappointing post-income tax sum up? possibly. but there were other subconscious clues of stress building: the passing conversation of my mother sending a lawyer's letter many years after the fact, once again usurping the legal system to make a point that no longer needed to be made. i swallowed hard, wondering how many more times i'd have to do so. and there were other things that reality snatched from me before i could get them down. the mental indigestion of my dreams has become the place where i go to make sense of anniversaries that are no longer relevant, like old shoeboxes whose memories have long since escaped me. some people have already accumulated a lifetime's worth of memories. i can't seem to hold on to any. all i got are these random shards of dreams, their meanings to be reconstructed only after they have left me for good.  

forget the cat. there was never even a bag for it to jump out of.

I'm not sure how I want to remember today, if at all

There was a perfect five minutes during a Scopa game with my Nonna where she was really cleaning house. At one point, I just shot her a glance and asked her if she was done. She laughed and picked up another card and then patted me on the shoulder as she corrected my Italian, repeating the line to herself before laughing some more. She'd end up winning the game. And unlike my grandfather, I'd never belittle her for doing so. I'd never take anything as a game of cards so seriously.

I should have stayed there and played another round to twenty one. She'd ask me how much we were betting and then forget my ridiculous answer just as quickly.

This way there would have been no stress injected into the rest of my night. No need to argue over a hockey game that no one could really watch anyway. No need to beat our heads on the same issues. To explain where there was no explanation. To compete where there is no competition.

We should only ever have to struggle with ourselves and never with others. Tonight I learned, again, why that is.

Yes, I am still incomplete and unfulfilled and maybe it is in my nature to always feel this way. I'm idealistic and unrealistic. I'm a dreamer - always was and always will be. I don't need to be examined, cross-referenced or boiled down. You get it or you don't.

The more I surround myself with people who do, the less I want to be around those that don't.

Missed call

     In the end, the bad news wasn't anywhere as bad as expected. When my mom called me and declared those words I held my breath and braced for the worst. I could feel my head slowly dissociating in anticipation. Because bad things always seem to happen in succession. Never one without two, two without three, three without four. And how many bad pieces of news were we at now, anyhow? Between the two oceans, I had lost count.
     But in the end it was just property damage - a tempo collapsed under the weight of snow and neglect.  It was only dented steel. A broken windshield. Competing insurance claims in the making.
     The biggest tragedy was that we made such a big deal of it in the first place. That we had to go there again. We can be such small people sometimes. Small people with our small problems. The only thing that should have mattered was that you were lucky enough not to have been sitting in that car. Life was kind enough to spare us that scenario. Kind enough to spare me that phone call.
     And so I spend the rest of the day trying to remember just that. Through all the conversations and the semi-awkward chance meetings, that's what I whispered to the back of my own head.
     Thank you, life, for sparing me that phone call.
       

Shoot the messenger

     Uncle Dom spoke about the old days. The early days. The days when there was still some back-and forth in that happy little apartment on Vianney. Some banter. Some respect. And what felt like love.
     My brother was eager to hear all about it. Of course he was. I guess I was too. We weren't really around for what sounded like the golden years. We didn't get to see those happy times and we almost never heard about them either. Those exciting times when simply ironing the clothes was a conversation starter. When friends would come over. When they would all sit around and pose for pictures. Those days felt too far away. Too buried in the past.
     There's no time for the past now. Not when you're dealing with the present and fretting about the future. These days there aren't too many happy things to report on the family front. These days even congratulations and thank you's ring hollow. They're short-lived and they don't mean much. And they'll never mean much. My parents were born alone and now they'll die alone. And they'll both have to deal with that fact someday. In the not-too-distant future. Alone, of course. I guess I'll have to deal with it as well. I got dragged into a lose-lose situation and I somehow managed to come out numb. I'm not happy and I'm not sad. Yesterday I was neither. We were all neither. Just having a coffee and over-analyzing. Trying to put ourselves in shoes we'll never understand. Trying my best to ignore that phone call. The one I've been answering ever since I got back home.
     I spent the better part of last night waking up to the same thoughts in my head. The dreams of the waves from the night before replaced by one sickening thought. That there's no such thing as closure. That bruises never heal properly as you get older.
     I kept that phone call to myself. I keep a lot of shit to myself these days.
     No more. I have swallowed your frustrations and spit them right back at each of you for the last time. I am done cross-examining your emotions. I am done explaining. Pleading. Translating my thoughts into your separate languages. Smoothing things over. Taking punches. Doing your dirty work. Being accused of taking sides. I am not interested in becoming that thing you despise in the other.
     Mommy. Daddy. It's time you fight your own demons. 

the nod

     We reached a deal but there were no handshakes. No champagne and no congratulations. There would be no smiles to this settlement.
     At least it was a less stressful meeting. Last Saturday I had been so nervous I had barely eaten anything all day. I blamed whatever anxiety I had been feeling up until that moment to that particular meeting. The one that was apparently doomed to fail before it ever got started. The culmination of all the nasty phone calls. All the brutal honesty and all the bullshit. And all the things no son should ever have to hear. But that was last week. This time my mother and I sat down for some liver with fried onions. We even managed to slip in some leftover cold Espresso before she looked at me and wondered aloud if we should get this show on the road. I nodded and went to go get my father downstairs. I walked back upstairs on my own. Just to show how impartial I was. We all sat there in awkward silence. I felt bad. But only because I hadn't offered to make him a coffee as well. There were some last-ditch questions about the house evaluation. Some last-minute explanations that would be repeated and only partially understood. Some last-minute bad blood. But it didn't change much in the end.
     Column A, B and C awaited patiently.
     When there was nothing left to say my father asked his soon-to-be ex-wife if she was okay with everything. And then she looked at me and said that she was okay with it if I was okay with it. She trusted me like that. On any other day it would have made me uncomfortable. But I wanted out. We all wanted out. So I agreed and she agreed. My father rose from the table and sank silently down the stairs and into the basement, his days suddenly numbered. I kept the reality of it at bay.
     I looked at my mother then, nodded and fought back some tears. The nod said that she had done the right thing. The nod understood that she had done this for us, her two sons.
     But the nod also acknowledged my role in this entire thing. I had just rubber-stamped my parent's divorce. Had given it my cold and indifferent blessing. But that wasn't all. Because I had stirred the pot. Maybe I had even inspired my mother to action. Most probably. And now we were all entering unchartered territory. Together. Alone.
      

a little more lightweight

     Today on the drive back from Subaru I didn't take that side street off the service road. The one I had taken just the other night. The one with the tiny magical church at the end of it. With the front-lit Jesus statue (or is it Mary? Jesus) just standing there, inviting and creepy. The most unassuming Heaven's Door you could ever imagine. Just sitting there. Before that final right back onto Saint-Laurent.
     Turns out it wouldn't have been the right way anyway. A large tree had cracked in half just above the trunk and crashed right into the cab of a parked truck. The truck was not spared and the street was completely blocked by a damn of thick branches. My brain registered the shape of the disaster out the corner of my eye but it took me a solid twenty five seconds and one reluctant u-turn to realize this was not the kind of thing you see everyday. So I photographed and reported back. Even though I had vaguely heard about the power outages on the way back. Even if I vaguely heard the wind howling all day. The nondescript knocking around of plastic garbage bin on asphalt as I played phone in for a bargain! with at  least three different dealers, just to see who would throw in something (anything) more than just the winter carpets that would compliment the shiny hunk of metal awaiting me at the end of the exercise. And this was a good day to be investing in metal. An auspicious day to buy a car - the start of Diwali and all.
     But today was something else. Today was so many things for so many different reasons.
     A missed birthday with no phone call. Some last-minute goodbye wishes. A day to reach out. To rebuild. To nurture. Not from the ground up. Never again from the ground up.
     Everything I set out to do today I did. The car. The hot water tanks. The re-connect and the background check. Whatever had been lingering around since I got back, really. Whatever I couldn't get away with blaming on jet lag any longer. The afterglow had dimmed a little. I had been beaten back down into reality. As if. As if I had expected anything less from life. Everything except the evil eye. And maybe the old tightening of the chest, first thing in the morning. So I had to let a little more of that weight go today. For myself and my well being. More promises followed. Tomorrow I would even start to run. And when the wind finally started to die down a little we watched the Muppets. Because it was still in the DVR. And we were all so much older than we might have been our first time watching. But there was still so much magic in those puppets. And everything seemed to come alive when I saw all those smiling faces go up on my wall. Those rows and rows of beautiful and colourful smiles. You would find no inner struggle in any of those rows of smiles. There would only always be life.
   

When it rains, it pours

I can not properly explain the last three months of my life.

So I'm not even going to bother to try. Not right now. For now, I will let all the most painful and beautiful details remain tucked away in emails, texts, letters and conversations. In promises made and promises broken. Let them fill the air like so much incense; so that they may choke the painful sobs that might forever float down the loneliest hallways of my mind.

I hope I never forget this day. The day after my Nonna's 93rd birthday. The day I woke up and realized that we are all very much on our own. That true happiness is fleeting and true misery unavoidable. That you get what you deserve even when you don't deserve it.

It will be the day I met my father and realized just how broken we can all become when we lose ourselves in the clutch of others. It was a conversation we had started years ago, back when I had just finished writing my album and was filled with happiness and hope. It could have been today. He was just as lost then as he was now. And even though my light had gone dim, it was still more light than he had probably seen in years. And so he paced the room as I tried my best to guide the man who had spent so much of his life doing the same. He gave me pessimism and I responded with possibility. And as I heard myself speak, I considered which of us was actually more blind.

But then what does it matter? We all walk through this big world alone and in the dark. The only hope is that somewhere along the line, you find someone with more light than you ever thought possible. Someone who's willing to walk with you into the unknown.

I am ready to spend the rest of my life looking for that person.

someday, i'll meet you halfway

It's not often I get to write about my father. Maybe there is nothing as complicated in this world as the relationship between father and son.

My best moments with my dad have been spent around the kitchen table, locked into some intense debate about the Middle East or the market or technology or the meaning of life. The conversation almost always begins with an innocent (but loaded) statement on my part. I'll say how terrible it is to scroll through the latest Gaza body count on Twitter and, before you know it, everyone else around the table just melts away into the background. In these moments I almost always lose track of what I'm doing. I forget that I'm eating. I'll get up fifteen different times and absent-mindedly refill my glass with water I will not even drink. Sometimes I will get really flustered - particularly when I hear myself unsuspectingly trapped in a circular argument or even agreeing with his point. I wouldn't call either of us true debate team material. He's a very intelligent man with a calculating mind and an unwavering grasp on history; super practical and sometimes cold-hearted when analysing a situation. While I definitely inherited that cold logic, I have always been more of an idealist and a humanist. Even a space cadet at times - more like my mom. I worry for the human race and I don't always assume that things will magically work out for the better.

So there we were, three or four hours in to lunch yesterday afternoon, still huddled over this crude map of the Middle East my father had scribbled on the otherwise useless Montreal Gazette. The rest of the family had long since disbursed, my brother's eyes likely still rolling from wherever it was he goes to half listen. Israel would had no choice but to fight indefinitely because WE could not afford to have it not exist. Not with three thousand years of Western history at stake. Children, sadly, would continue to die. Maybe one day that will change - but probably not for a hundred years. My heart cannot accept that this problem cannot be solved. But my mind has to assume he may be right.

And it's not so much about being right any more. Maybe when I was a younger and our views were even more diametrically opposed, there was an element of that. I think every son (and maybe even every daughter) probably spends most of his life secretly trying to prove his father wrong. I know I still do.

But these debates have evolved into something altogether. To me it's become more about connecting with the man on things that obviously matter to the both of us. Because I realize that my father has spent his whole life amalgamating all this knowledge and formulating all these opinions and he needs to share them just as much as I do. He needs to argue with me as much as I need to challenge him. The worst thing you can do to people like us is not care what we think either way.

So for as long as he and I are around the debates will rage on.

And one day, we're both going to be able to look at each other and silently understand that somewhere in all those tense moments, we probably agreed with each other far more than we let on.

all in the family

two dreams in two nights where i'm fighting with my father. the first was kind of strange in that our entire disagreement had to do with my cousin Michael losing his wristwatch at the dinner table - and me apparently disrespecting him and the rest of the family by not having helped looked for it. but then even that argument seemed to have a more serious undercurrent to it, like we weren't discussing wristwatches but something else (my grandmother) completely. last night's dream was more intense and far more realistic. it actually started with my brother. in it, i was kind of calling him out on the fact that he's too quick to dismiss me or anyone and rarely thinks ahead when he's working. then i took it too far - as usual - and got too personal and he storms out, which is when my father walks in. "what did you say to your brother, he was working so well?" and even though i probably overreacted, i hate the fact that my father's only concerns seem to be those of efficiency. so i let him have it. except the second i open my mouth i have the distinct realization that i sound like my Mom - not just in the argument but my actual voice. frustrated, i can't help myself. i want to blame him for forcing me to have to work with my brother. i want to tell him he doesn't understand the cross i have to bear. but i don't go there. it's a heavy argument without anything actually being said.

the cloud with no silver lining.

I've been thinking about my grandmother a lot lately. Ever since she came over for Thanksgiving and just kind of sat there on the edge of the couch, not quite that far from us but still watching from a distance behind her glasses. There's been a distance growing for some time now. I feel it's a confused sort of distance, like maybe she's no longer exactly sure what is going on with each of us at every moment and plays it safe by smiling and listening more than she speaks. I still catch her speaking to Amy in Italian, which is always a good sign. She's better one on one. And she always seems to know where I'm at in my life, even if she repeatedly asks me if I have two cats or just one. I understand why she might be confused but I'm not even sure she remembers that one of them died and was only later replaced. I always smile and answer the question, like nothing was. But maybe something is. Maybe the Alzheimer's is finally starting to catch up with her - and in more ways than just her forgetfulness. Maybe she's also starting to get a little paranoid. And maybe she's starting to feel like she's becoming a weight that few of us are truly willing to shoulder, my Mom excluded. And maybe she's partially right.

All I know is that I always visit every Sunday with the intention of trying my best to be as close to her as I can. But it's getting harder and harder to do. I'll rub her shoulders and then she'll tell me she's in the clouds and I'll believe her.

I understand. But we both live on very different clouds.

the golden goal

i was playing soccer on the big field and my father was watching. he never shouted a word of of protest or encouragement but i knew he was there. i could feel his eyes. i knew i was never going to be good enough to be a pro and i knew he did as well. still, i had received a good ball fairly deep in opposition territory and i wanted to impress him (and maybe even prove us both wrong?) i broke toward the one defender in front of me but overshot. i watched the ball get away from me before it bounced off his body. this happened two or three times before i finally managed to get a step on him. i cut right and to the centre. except instead of trying a shot i simply feathered a pass square to my brother, who i had only caught last second dangling in my peripheral vision. it felt like a leap of faith- the same way he had barreled up the field despite the strong odds i would either lose the ball or decide to shoot. he finished perfectly. we celebrated wholeheartedly and hugged, like nothing else mattered.

I am my parents' son

It was good to see my parents last night.

I should clarify. It was good to see my parents more relaxed last night. More than they've been in a long while, anyway. The Cuban air definitely did some good. But I think being away from Nonna had even more to do with it - as difficult as it would be for my mom to admit.

It's a terrible thing to call anyone a burden - let alone your own mother. And I still can't bring myself to even consider my grandmother being that to anyone in our family. My uncles might act like it and may even agree with their wives in the privacy of their own homes. But I know they all care in their own ways. They all sympathize with my Mom but no one is willing to do anything more about it. Everyone's got their own problems, it seems.

And so my Mom (and my father, by proxy) has shouldered the heavy brunt. My Nonna was always difficult when it came to her health, but the Alzheimer's - although still in its relative infancy - has made living with her and caring for her even more frustrating and stressful.

So last night at the supper table, with Nonna still sitting in a hospital bed in Room 658B, the three of us had a very frank and honest conversation about how to help my Mom avoid having another nervous breakdown over this. And being a reasonably fair split between the two of them, I really feel like for the first time in a long time I was able to find a way to reconcile their very different approaches without stoking any of the old fires.

I felt like a judge and psychologist. I heard both sides. I translated viewpoints and gave my own when it was relevant. And I couldn't help but think of Don Corleone in the Godfather, doing his best to manage a generally unsolvable situation that is only likely to deteriorate.

It made me appreciate both of them so much more. And understand myself a little better.