A lot has happened since we last hung out. I've moved back to the city (or Canada, as my friend Tim likes to say) and in ways, it does feel a little like I've returned after a long exile. Been here a year now and the first couple of months were wonderful. Walks down to the beach, streetcar rides to Queen West, and the food. Yum! I cannot tell you how happy I was to be back in a place where you could get decent take out past 8:00 pm. Alas, Covid struck in March and the world became a different place.
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Some of you may ask why I came back at all. To be candid, I needed to hit the reset button on me. Work was going well from my firm's perspective, but most everything else about me was in shambles and I felt trapped in life I didn't want to lead. Wake up at gross o'clock on Monday mornings, fly to DC, work ridiculous hours, return Thursdays (also at gross o'clock), struggle through Friday client deliverables, admin and meetings until it was time go to prison (more about that later), come home, take chemo, barf my way through Saturday until it was back for more volunteer time at the jail, watch <insert sport here> on Sundays, do laundry and go to bed by 9 pm in the naïve hope that gross o'clock wouldn't seem so bad. Oh. Did I mention that some of this frenetic behaviour was spurred on by the fact that my best friend fell back in love with his ex and disappeared from my life completely? The only way I managed to cope was to keep myself so busy that I didn't have time to think. If I stopped, I cried. I was in a very bad way.
So here we are at the start of my second year back in town. While I wouldn't say the move miraculously transformed me, I think my family and close friends would argue that I no longer seem like I'm constantly on the verge. In fact, I know that I'm feeling more like my old self because I'm reading again. It's been a journey for sure and I had to trick myself into it. I started out by getting a three-month subscription to a reading box so I would feel compelled to read the novels. Oh my god what drivel. The accompanying swag was often way better than the book.
Then, on a whim, I got a subscription to Audible. I'd go out onto the balcony, rock gently in the hammock and drift away to the classics. It was a wonderful way to ease myself back into capital L literature.
Where does all this blather leave us? I am going to commit to a year of reviews. Like before I'll give you author and publisher, but this time I'll also include my mode of consumption -- Kindle, Paper, Audible. I'm also going to try come up with a new rating system that works for both text and performance. I keep wondering if an audio book has more in common with a play than a novel. Thoughts for another day.
Once again, I wish you all a very happy 2021. Looking forward to this year's journey with you. I can only imagine what we'll find.
DES
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