LIV: The Frame is Part of the Picture

So, it's the end of the day, such as it is. It's also the end of the week, for whatever that's worth. Both of those things seem to have buzzed by in an instant.

This past weekend was of course Thanksgiving. There wasn't much to it, we had our nice gathering at Mel's parents' house on Saturday, with me bringing my carrots and turnips (actually rutabaga) and that was great, lots of pictures were taken with the kids and baby, some playtime, some cry time, all that. I just kind of drifted around to wherever I could be of service or provide conversation. The doggy boys were left with dad and Deb.

The rest of the weekend we did running around and chores. The top order of the weekend was to find Mel a dress for the upcoming wedding we are going to. We were surprisingly successful at, of all places, Value Village, with the caveat that it had a tear at the seam. We decided to go ahead and take it to a seamstress and for a mere $9 got it mended.

The other matter was to finalize our adoption of Bastian. I can't help but have mixed feelings about it, because as much as I love him, he's really changed the dynamic around here. I'm doing so much, it feels like there's there's not much Scotto time anymore, but does there really need to be Scotto time? The weirdest part is perhaps bed, because Bastian always wants out at night, and so I end up coming to bed after Mel.

I didn't end up getting that job, or a second interview, or whatever, with TJX. It doesn't feel great but it isn't surprising or that depressing. It would have been nice, and there is all the usual "what now" about me, but I'm a bit inured to it now. I do think I'm going to have to start bending my principles and intentions a little bit as far as what I'll go out for and do, at least on a short term scale.

I wonder every single day if I made the right decision but every single day I think yes. I think about how despairing and hopeless I would have been if I had not left that job. How directionless, how futile life would have felt. Because what would I be working toward? What would I be persisting for? Just to get up tomorrow and do it all again? Every single time that question pops into my head, the answer comes out the same. And I know it, because the moment I decided to quit came to me in clarity. In a way few decisions ever do for me, when they involve upsetting the apple cart. The decision where you know that is the only way to go. They don't tend to come to me easily, so when they do, I listen.

I thought I had more to say, but there's actually not much fresh content here. Just the usual blathering I guess. But I'm not in a bad mood or particularly down. Life is fine.

Guess I'll chop it there.

Until next crisis, keep on rockin

-Scotto

LIII: Coinage

I haven't really done much today. This is sadly not unusual. I had a really good rhythm going for a while but lately it's been hard for me to get out of the starting blocks for a day. That's something that I need to examine and rectify in the not too distant future. Obviously acquiring a second dog is a huge part of it. And that's not being undone anytime soon.

I spend too much time on Facebook or on Words with Friends or Solitaire as I recover from dog walks, and by the time I'm ready for action, there's something else going on. This is certainly a "me" problem though.

I will say, I am in a bit of a creative rut. The thing I'm working on, I've stumbled a bit on and feel little incentive to get back to. But it coincides with a bunch of other things. Monday, I got a notification that I had acquired a job interview with a pretty major retailer. So I gave myself carte blanche to not feel pressure to stay active during the day. Yesterday, Mel had to go to Oakville for a dentist appointment. She was pretty inconvenienced by it -- she made the appointment when she was working for BDO, so she would have gone to the Oakville office and worked there until the afternoon. As it was, she left here around 2 with a lunch she didn't feel like eating until 4. Then she spent the evening with her parents (staying surprisingly long, getting back around 9, kind of leaving me to putter around and have a pizza dinner, which I ordered on the basis that it was more economical than the sushi I was kinda craving, because I would then have a lunch.) Then today she went to the city to see a colleague, which coincided with me taking the car in for an oil change. Miraculously, the car required no extra work. But that kind of took up my energy for the day even though it was a simple matter. I also read a bunch because I'm in the middle of this Beatles book I'm enjoying.

So, I had this interview yesterday while Mel was out. I'm kind of iffy on it, I don't think I performed very well. It was one of those video interview where you basically just record yourself answering questions. It didn't feel very comfortable to me, but that's a me problem (a lot of those going around these days.) I'd be interested in the job because it's 2 days per week in office (in Mississauga) which is fine for me, I guess. But I really feel like I crapped the bed in my responses. But it could all just be in my head.

It was just a relief to get an interview, you know. A little bit of respite. Those are hard to come by sometimes, and they really bolster my self-esteem like maybe the future isn't completely hopeless. I don't know. Something will find me. Maybe. I don't want to be a sponge forever, but also hey, somebody's got to walk the doggies.

Beyond that, times have been pretty busy and the outlook going forward is about the same. I told you about our outing the dad's. The next day we took the doggy boys to the pet store and got some treats (and a winter coat for Basti) then got our own treats (slurpees) before coming home to watch some Netflix. We had burger-wraps for dinner, and watched the 1995 Spring Valley Lip Sync, which dad had given me a copy of on USB. Mel was a lot more enthused about it than 1994, because there were a lot more familiar faces. Still hoping to uncover a copy of 1996, someday, somehow, somewhere. 

Maybe there's more to say, but I got distracted and left it here. Ta!

Keep on rockin'

-The Scotto

LII: Timer

This Sunday morning disappeared in a haze of staring at my phone. There is definitely this pull within me to do something creative with my time, but this despairing sense of futility. Not because I can't or because it goes nowhere, but because I just feel the time slipping away under my feet. It's hard to get into the zone. After waking up, walking two dogs, and enjoying my coffee, what mental and temporal resources do I have?

And yet here I am, around noon, still just kind of chilling, waiting for the wife to wake up.

Yesterday was a hectic day, which may explain her sleeping in. It was Dad's 75th, and I had reached out about doing something special, but it kind of devolved into more or less a standard gathering with only a couple of unusual factors. One was that Alan and Pat were over. The other was that they went and got dinner from the supermarket, which ended up being... sandwich trays? I had initially pitched doing Jimmy the Greek like we did with mom, and it kind of morphed from there. I think the sandwiches were a callback to the "open house" I held for my birthday, but that was an afternoon 'do, and this was firmly in the evening hours, when it's a bit weird to be eating egg salad. But ah, whatever. It was different.

The hecticness came in because Mel had an appointment to get her nails done that day at noon, which I assured her would be enough time -- and it was. We left the house around 11 so we could get our customary A&W breakfast. I then meandered and found a place to read my Beatles book. (It feels like every year I read a book about the Beatles. And why not?) Then we had to pick up a variety of gift cards and greeting cards and such, and then the cake and ice cream that we were on the hook for. We got home around 2:30, which was good, but then we needed a little snack and some downtime, so we didn't end up leaving for Dad's until 5. Which was fine, we got there ahead of Alan & Pat and way ahead of Eric, who was coming from work whenever he got off (which ended up being around the time we finished eating.)

It was nice! It was. Good to see my aunt and uncle. I was a little concerned because obviously I am not in a really interesting place in life, and I suspect people don't really want to hear about my adventures in unemployment. But of course, Mel's work is always interesting and we have the dogs to talk about, and Brandon had his own recent travails, and Alan and Pat had their travels tales of our cousins' lives to catch us up on, including my one cousin splitting from her husband, seemingly quite amicably. And Dad and Deb had Dad and Deb things and Eric is always a wild card. so honestly I was not left that badly exposed and it was a fine night.

I'm contemplating whether I want to go for an ethically-questionable tech sector job that conflicts with my personal values. It's not a guarantee I would get it but it is a likely shot because it's not exactly skilled work. How badly do I want money? And more importantly, how badly do I want to be "employed" again?

Hm. Hmm.

I'm writing. I feel slightly disengaged from it but it goes. I do better during the week when I have "a few hours" between dog tingz and wife tingz and life tingz. At the very least, work would cut through my procrastination time, spent melting my brain with doomscrolling. I'm thinking a lot about the Big Projects I would like to do. Big Boy Books. They burrow into my brain and sometimes I think I have something that people could want, but then I get down on myself. And that's before I even try to make it. There's a couple of plot things I'm tripped up on, but that's where the writing happens.

Owel.

Other than that, life is good. We were getting into the car yesterday and just going over all the things we had to do and Mel asked me if I was real. She does this from time to time and I never understand it. Like I'm so good I couldn't possibly be factual? Like I'm idealized, made up? Flattering, but let's not put too much pressure on me. I'm a deeply flawed and in many ways inadequate person, and she knows it, but sometimes that all disappears and it's like I'm her perfect person. It's nice to be thought of this way. I love her. I love us.

It's nice to be stable, you know?

Keep on rockin'

-Scotto

LI: Ingredients

Didn't I used to be so productive on Saturday mornings?

Nevermind that "productive" is such a toxic word, let's allow that it's something I want to be sometimes. Getting a dog changed that, and getting a second dog all but eradicated it. And I love Hank (and Bastian) and the love I feel for and from them is satisfying in its own way. But I do lament the end of the days when my weekend mornings consisted of getting up, getting coffee made, and plopping right down at the computer from 9 to noon. Instead, it's up, two walks, coffee and rest, feed, more rest and scrolling, and then if there's time I get to what I'm doing for maybe an hour. Then again, I was supposed to be a parent by now, so it would have ended up like this anyway.

But I have my weeks. Oh, they're not perfect. I do get a fair amount done, at the expense of other things. But then I'm also always running around. It's a weird balance. Life and Scottness.

Cleaning needs to be done. I am actively afraid of what's going on in my vegetable crisper right now, but I can't seem to man up and face it.

I'm coming to terms with a compromise that may need to be made to get back to contributing to the household. My thinking is that some structure and responsibility and earning power will focus me. I'll get away from faffing about looking for a quick fix and focus on long-term goals. I've been looking at some of my "real" writing lately, and regrettably, a lot of it seems good to me. I know it's hard to make other people -- that is, the people whose job it is to gatekeep these opportunities -- see what you see in your own writing. But annoyingly, I believe in myself. To some degree.

The week has breezed by. Last weekend, we went to the Toronto tempo game, which was a fun outing. A nice afternoon at Coca-Cola Coliseum, spending $30 on concessions, getting a free t-shirt. Good vibes even though the team lost. The New York Liberty were sinking a ton of 3's (I said this somewhat passively to Mel and the woman in the row in front of us turned around to agree.) Back at home, we had Bastian in the wire crate, with a camera on him. He did not seem to be having a good time. Ever since he had his tummy troubles he started hating being crated even more, which our foster contact suggested was because there was an association between the crate and suffering. 

We also spent some of the weekend making Bastian's snuffle mat out of an old Canadiens blanket we got from Value Village. Mel was enjoying it so much she wondered if we could make more and sell them. Obviously not as a job but to make some garage sale-level money. I'm not opposed to it, but we had a hard enough time finding one blanket that suited our needs.

There seemed to be a lot going on this week. Mel went into the office on Tuesday; I spent Monday night rigging up a lunch for her to take in, taco bowl. Wednesday, she was too overworked to join our workout, which she was pretty despondent about. Thursday, we took the dogs to their first ever training session, ostensibly to get them to make peace with each other ( which is kind of happening naturally) but also to work on place and sit. Mel is good at getting Bastian to sit, but I haven't had much luck. Hank of course is a pro. The trainer suggested we feed Bastian in the crate to build up positive associations. So that's been good.

She was so worn out by the outing Thursday night, and by a noteworthy acid episode overnight, that we ended up skipping out on a planned dinner with the girls (and Jermaine) Friday evening. It would have been kind of stressful to get out there, but we were planning to make it work, and indeed Mel did get off work in good time that day. in lieu of a dinner out, I got us prime rib dinner from Fortinos, and we watched the cheesy Willy Wonka game show on Netflix.

That about covers it. I don't think there is time to do anything meaningful with the rest of my morning so I'll probably just putter a bit and play games while we try to figure out what we want to do for breakfast. 

I'm trying not to be too nostalgic lately. I feel bad about how much of my mindspace is not in the present. I could do better and be better.

Could be a good day. Crisp fall weather, sun is shining. I know Mel wants to get things done. Who knows.

Keep on rockin

-Scotto

L: A Memory You Told Me

This post comes to you from the couch at night. I'm kind of chilling a bit before I join Mel in bed. We are trying to get Basti comfortable spending time in the wire crate for when we are away -- tomorrow we're going to a Toronto Tempo game -- so I wanted to sit up with him a whole to make sure he can get acclimated. Looks like there isn't an issue. He seems relatively relaxed.

Anyway, being that I'm writing this on my phone, don't mind any typos or weird autocorrect things.

I was thinking today, for whatever stupid reason, about whatever went down with Josh in Grade 12. I don't dwell on stuff like that, but if I ever wrote a book about the my high school years (Teenage Millennial Psycho Nerd) it would be in there as a major point. My conclusion was of course that we left things on good terms in 2013 when he came to my place to hand over some books of mine he'd borrowed and misplaced (Bone comics) and I bear him no ill will, but I wondered whether I had actually said much about my position on things. Why and how it hurt. I remember certain parts of the substance of the conversation, him kind of explaining his behavior and me kind of accepting it. Again, I do not hold a grudge. On the off chance he messaged me tomorrow to go for a beer, I'd go. But he's got better things to do, I'm sure. No grudge is held, the wound is healed, the scar will just always be there. And that's a function of how forcefully our friendship ended, intentionally or not. It ended and I moved on to be friends with other people and life went on and neither of us had the cause or opportunity to ever rebuild it beyond a long delayed fence-mending. 

Maybe there's a slight lack of satisfaction on my part for how that last conversation went, but that's my cross to bear if I didn't speak up. As I always told Mel, closure doesn't really exist. Some things will gnaw at you until the end.

But it's 98% a dead issue. 

My remembrance of all that led me to the previous time to that that I'd seen Josh, when we were already in a state of coexistence. He came and saw the Half-Past play in 2009, four years prior. I don't remember much about what was said then but unlike the 2013 convo it was captured here and it seems to have been reasonably cordial. Apparently I already knew he had the Bone books at that time. Well, I always knew, and he admitted it then.

Of all the moments to go back to, I rarely pick that one, perhaps because my memory of that weekend is so vivid. And because I know what I wrote then was only part of the story. At some point in that recounting of events, I mention that Kat the stage manager "kept me company." I can now confirm -- as a happily married man approaching 40 -- of course that means we made out. I kissed roughly one girl every year from the time I was 17 until I met Mel, and she was 2009. Not only that, but we got pretty far too, until someone walked in on us and she decided to call it.

Re-reading that post, she had a cutting little line I had forgotten about, "What are you, looking for fall in love tonight?" Jesus, hadn't she just spent several months watching my play? I always was and wasn't. I was obsessed with love but knew I was incapable of understanding, giving or receiving it. This is true because the first year or so of my relationship with Mel was built on me trying to learn that. So I yearned, knowing better than to expect it, and the best I could hope for was some illicit drunken smooches (and a few well placed digits). After I gave my answer to that, whatever it was, she asked if I wanted to make out. I said yes (knowing better than to openly try to be romantic) and off we went. I always liked that, because Cary had warned her and assistant director Erika about my tendancy to make out with girls at his parties, meaning she deliberately sought out my services. Flattering.

Seems a bit silly to dwell on it now. I promise you, despite mountains of evidence to the contrary, I don't actually live in the past. I just like to visit it sometimes.

I should kiss my wife. Well, she's in bed. 

I also read a post from 2022 about how happy I generally was, cof what it's worth.

Anyway, I should get my head back to this decade and go relax. Bastian seems at peace in his crate. Hope it can last.

Today was a fine day. Late breakfast, watched reality TV while eating Pur & Simple Benedict's, then we worked on making Bastian's own snuffle mat, which has been on the docket since we acquired an appropriate blanket at Value Village a few weeks ago. It was nice! A good Saturday. 

I applied for some jobs I won't get. One job I didn't apply for listed under Benefit (singular) "On-site parking." Wow, don't everyone apply at once. Another listed as remote but put under requirements "Available to work in office 5 days per week." I reported it for inaccuracy.

That will be it for tonight. We have peace in the valley. May it last.

Keep on rockin'

Scotto

IL: Blink and you'll catch it

Oh! Ghost days.

This is a term I came up with for days that just seem to disappear doing nothing. I will admit that they seem more common now. I grab my phone and I just look at Facebook for a while and then I stop, then I pick it back up in case anything interesting has happened, like with this Macklemore/Ed Sheeran thing, and then I put it back down, then I pick it back up and then... well, it's almost 5. 

I feel like an idiot when it comes to time budgeting. I could have such full days. I see myself as only having about 2 really productive(? if this is important?) hours per day, at best. Then there are dog walks and lunch breaks and errands to run. But I remind myself that running errands is technically productive.

My problem seems to be in finding motivation and energy to do things that I like to do during a day. Writing, blogging. And things that I really should do like PD and job searching and cleaning. And almost none of it gets down. I had been developing this policy. Every day, do something for the dogs, for myself, for us, and for the house. It's a nice idea but tricky in practice. What I do know is that something really nasty is going on in my vegetable crisper that I need to clean out.

Today even got off to an early start; Mel went in to the office today, so we were up and at em, and out the door around 7. I came back and fed the dogs and waited a bit to walk them, doing whatever I do in the morning in the meantime. After walks, I did a bit of image sourcing for my blog, showered, and got back to wasting the days.

Bastian has had a few issues lately. As you know, he was throwing up last week, but we got him relatively settled. When we put him back on kibble, he became more regular, then for good measure the vet gave him some gastrointestinal meds and food, which I had to drive out to get on Monday. He also seems to have developed an aversion to sleeping in his crate. He was keeping us up all night with barking, and when he would be in there he would pant profusely, but be at peace when he was out, so we let him sleep out of it. We let the woman who runs the foster service know, afraid we had broken the rules, but she understood and encouraged us to do what we needed to to get him feeling better. So he's been sleeping in our room lately, happy as a clam.

And with that, you know, I think I can say we've pretty much decided to keep him. And by that I mean, I've stopped dragging my feet on what seemed to be the likely outcome from the beginning. Obviously I've had my concerns, and they haven't gone away. But I know that if we were to adopt him out, Mel would feel sad, and then we'd get another foster dog, and then we'd have a hard time parting with that one too, and the process would continue on and on. So why not just end it now? I feel Mel understands -- I certainly hope -- that this is it, that 2 dogs is our limit and we can't keep filling the house up with dogs. So if she sees sad foster stories in the future, she's going to understand that there isn't anything we can do. I told her that we can't have more dogs than adults in the house. (I initially said people, but then corrected myself when I realized we're still trying to have a baby. The baby can't walk a dog!!)

I just told her that last night on our way to Nonna's. We went to see her because Mel's parents have been away on vacation, so it was nice to pay her a visit, bring some food, play some cards, watch a bit of Dancing with the Stars. 

I've been on a particular kind of music kick lately. I made playlists of all the songs that made the MuchMusic Countdown top 10 in 1999, 2000 and 2001 (actually, June-June of each year, for whatever reason.) It's interesting to kind of go back over the top hits that were sharing air space at the same time, since in memory it all gets jumbled up. And to find those ones that didn't endure so much, especially the CanCon. Remember Choclair? He was all over that.

So I don't really have much more to say. I think I'm going to walk Basti, then either get back to blogging or maybe even clean the kitchen

Keep on rockin

-Scotto

XXXIX: The Business / Follow-through and Follow-up

Were you ever aware of the good times when they were happening?

In my mental rolodex of times in my life, I was thinking about late Grade 12. The distance of decades has made it seem like a golden era of sorts, but at the time I had as much turmoil as any, much of which is recorded for posterity in this blog. I'm not saying I'm nostalgic for that. Maybe the opposite. Maybe it's good to have a reminder that even the better times in your life had some clouds. I did admit, in one post, that while I was pretty negative I did have "a lot going for me" certainly compared to other years. Jeez, just be glad I didn't start this operation in Grade 10.

I'm a little sad sometimes because as confessional as this blog can be, it's not unfiltered. It's a public forum -- just one with no audience -- so it still gets filtered. Triply so back then when I knew people were checking in. So it behooved me to be coy. So if there was something (or someone) I was really into, I had to downplay it. Which makes it hard to trace the map of my feelings back all these years later. But hey, it's better than nothing.

To answer the question at the top of the blog, yes. I vividly recall many times throughout 2022 and 2023 when I was aware this was potentially as good as it was going to get for me. I was sitting in my house, taking a nice long breakfast -- oh, those Dempster's Cheese Bagels, how I yearn -- and my coffee, doing Wordle before booting up my computer to start my day anytime between 9 and 9:30. Do not think for one second it was lost of me that I had it made. I appreciated the fuck out of that, and consciously thought often about how idyllic my life was in that era. And I always rue how it was taken from me, but that doesn't mean it wasn't beautiful while it lasted, and I knew it. I even wrote about it on tumblr of all places.

And I'm saying all of this because I'm having one of those moments right now. It's been a slow, lazy Sunday, the kind that starts late and is over before you know it. Mel and I didn't even have breakfast (salmon bagels) until about 2 (after I went out and procured some coffee drinks from Williamses) and we sat around watching bad reality TV on Netflix for a few hours before she had to go do some mandatory professional development. In actual fact, I got up relatively early because one of the dogs -- won't say who -- has gotten pretty demanding in the A.M. So 8-10 was spoken for, but I was then able to define most of my day. And the reason why this is so idyllic because someday this may not be the case. I mean, it may not be as free as it was when we had no dogs at all, but someday we'll have kids, and every bit of our lives will be for them. and that'll be great, but it won't be this. I liked today. It wasn't perfect, but it was ours.

Yesterday was chaotic. Actually it was several days worth of chaos. We had gotten the invite to go to the trailer to see Lori, Gail and Karen. Bastian had had tummy troubles off and on during the week. Brandon had to bow out due to Chase falling ill. Ali couldn't make it because of a plane ticket mishap. The whole thing seemed like it might fall apart. At the eleventh hour, the trottage had a plumbing issue that threatened the whole thing, we didn't even know if it was on until the following morning. Once we had it confirmed, we scrambled. We had to go to Oakville to drop the dogs with my dad and Deb, then pick up my mom where she was waiting around the corner. It was a long drive and my mom regaled us with tales of her problematic friend, as well as her work which is always dramatic. We sure got a lot of her over the course of the day. It felt like the drive took longer than usual, leaving Oakville around 12:15 and getting to Spring Valley a little after 2.

Well. We had a good day though, sitting out in the sun and talking to the aunts and Cam. It was nice to catch everyone up on what was going on and to hear from them about their own lives. We played some cornhole. I didn't have much to say for myself, more "couple" stuff. We ate after 5, had a quick dessert, then hit the road. We took the usual way home, even though it was getting dark. It's a lot more serene than the other way. We dropped mom off at her door around 8:45 (Mel went in to use the restroom) then doubled back to dad's to pick up the boys. By the time we got home, we were just wiped out, we crashed. But Bastian wasn't letting us rest.

Sigh.

Anyway, these are days. I could probably tell you more, but that about sums it up.

Keep on rockin'

-Scotto