020: Snap

And just like that, there goes the Holiday.

Well, in a sense. Tomorrow's Boxing day, and we begin the rapid tapering off of Holiday stress. Last year, on New Year's eve, I worked, and things were so dead that I went home early for one of the few times in my life.

I got Eric a job at HMV for the season. I had my doubts, but I took a leap of faith, because I knew I wouldn't have been able to live with myself if I hadn't offered. We're getting on well, but I feel like there was some friction generated with certain co-workers, not because he was not cool to them, but I did feel like there were communicative misfires. And there was one incident where he was almost fired for being late. That was a fun day.

I was thinking earlier about how times have changed, how I'm suddenly really aware of how I've left the stress and insanity of school behind. It's manifested itself in an unexpected way. Now I'm in the store and I just... don't see it the way I used to. I remember last year, my mind reeling all the time, split between places. I felt like shit. Now it's just... my job. I show up, I work, I go home. Nine to five. I do occasionally get stressed, but it's not a falling-apart-at-the-seams, collapse-to-the-floor, get-me-a-drink type of stress, just a light headache, "ugh, what now?" kind.

The past two months have been rather eventful. There was one incredible night where Chantelle and I went to Hamilton and met Joel Plaskett, who is utterly incredible to his fans, even when they geek out at him. It was one of those rare nights where everything went perfectly. We even got home as planned.

Then there was the beginning of December, when I left my iPod at the family gathering (which also went rather better than you'd think, aside from not getting the iPod back nearly as quickly as I should have.) We had a whole issue of family drama that was very rapidly and miraculously put aside and, from all appearances, things just worked out. And of course, the work Christmas party where Chantelle and I had a nice moment reflecting on all that the last two years have brought us.

Christmas was nice enough. I noted to anyone who would listen, this was the first Christmas Eve since I started working here that I didn't take a shift... although re-reading my entry from Christmas Eve 2008, it's different from how I remember, so I guess we must have missed out the Christmas Eve Chinese food that year. But that, and other traditions were in place, including midnight wrapping while drinking and watching Christmas movies. We watched both the Blackadder and Muppets Christmas Carol (which really seemed to his Eric) as well as Cooper's Christmas, a warped Christmas movie we discovered a couple years back, featuring some good Canadian comic actors like Jason Jones and Sam Bee from the Daily Show.

Christmas day began with Eric waking us up early because something had woken him up early and he thought it was 10 when it was 9. So he caused the rest of us to miss an hour of sleep because he couldn't double-check his clock. Anyway, after opening stuff, we went to Dad's for a nice afternoon, talking about old times and times before our times, thinking of Grandma and Granddad and eating grilled cheese. We looked at old Christmas photos and watched ourselves age a decade. In particular, I go from a gawky teenager to a gawky twentysomething. But my skin improves, anyway, and I figure out what to do with my hair a bit.

Soon as we left and got home, it was off to Toronto to have dinner at Aunt Karen's. More gifts, some dinner and playtime with the kids. Cam still hasn't outgrown babysitter, a game where I basically yell at them until they get tired of taking my abuse and want to switch roles. I say this all the time, but I can't wait until they become uninterested teenagers who don't want anything to do with their big cousins.

After some fun with the Christmas Candle Ghost, we said our long goodbyes, then came home to watch Doctor Who. This whole thing has been patently ordinary, compared to other years. It was only two years ago that I woke up on Boxing Day to the news that Eric had drunkenly wandered downtown and left me a rambling message about it.

I don't know how to take any of this anymore. All I have is my uncertainty. I was having stress dreams for a while (being attacked by a customer with a knife, being trapped in another co-worker's nightmare) but they seem to have subsided. Now all I want is to relax. To have a breather and plot out my next move.

Do I have to say it? I miss writing in here regularly. So many things seem to have happened and slipped my mind, my life has less focus than it used to. It's all in my hands, so I don't know what to say. But there's also less to write about and of course way, way less to desire to write it. Which is sad, because the blog has always been a nice way of housekeeping, getting shit in order to get real writing done. On Tumblr, where I generally kick it nowadays (aside from the music blog,) I'm constantly stopping and considering whether anything overly personal is worth sharing. Here, I'm back to not caring because if there's an audience I'm not aware of it and they don't make themselves known.

I'm glad for that. I should come back more often. I feel like I say that every time, but these are the stories I'm left with. This is me.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto