Turning Amish.

Tonight Art City hosted a fashion show and dance jam for kids in the West End community. I left the shop early to zip down just in time for the fashion show. Kids paraded down a catwalk lined by haunted rainbow trees with obvious pride, the art stars hogged the mic, it smelled sweaty, the floor was sticky from spilled apple juice and popcorn crumbs, and it was brilliant.

I went dressed as an Amish matriarch thanks to Josh's mom, who kindly sent costumes all the way from Amish country in Ohio. A couple of days ago while volunteering for Art City for the first time, in between all the chaos of sewing costumes and a 20x20 bizarre quilt for the body of a giant paper mâche witch head, we test drove our His and Hers costumes at the neighborhood grocery store. I have to hand it to the Amish, it is really hard to be stoic while trying to decide between the tuna or the salmon for a pretend husband's lunch in a grocery aisle. Any how, the outfits were well received by the general public and they were tonight as well. A 45 year old mermaid approached me at one point during the fashion show and said, "You know, there is an Amish man in the crowd tonight; it could be a good match". Sadly it could have been but our unique attire was a premeditated deal and not fate. Someday my Amish prince will come.

I hiked up my demure navy dress with the subtle rose overlay and danced my face off with a million neighborhood kids to the likes of Usher, Avril, Gwen, Beyonce, Hot Chip, Peter Bjorn and John, Snoop and Rhianna to say the least. 'Twas a nice evening and my first enjoyable Halloween in a long while.

From the sounds of things, tomorrow I might attend a Blood Bath party at the Boozecan (same place where the art show was). Apparently, everyone has to wear white and at some point in the evening someone will throw 5 gallon pails of fake blood over the entire crowd when we are too busy dancing to notice. Sounds like one for the books.

Happy Halloween. Good things are happening. November looks clear.

Margaret.

Below are some haggard photos of myself as an Amish matriarch in my room shortly after arriving home, post dance jam. Can you say Hildebrand or what? My simple face rocked that bonnet so hard, a few people had no idea I was even in costume. I went to Cafe 22 in costume to show Rabbi my handiwork and her, Shira and Meech took one glance and passed it off as avant-garde. What does that say about my usual gear then? Oh dear.Also, this morning I found a bunch of photos on the internet taken by Aaron from last night. Grandma, I sewed that giant witch's quilt/dress, no biggie. Enjoy. Apparently I sure did. I need to learn to dance properly.

Fast times.

I wish I had this. Two people inside a giant sweater, top bun peaking out, good worn-in boyfriend jeans/belt, washing machine in the kitchen, lover in stripes. The whole nine yards. All that jazz. I want it.

Today has been busy and is going to get busier. Woke up at 5:30 to make tea and get out the door to open the bakery in time. Made two deliveries before nine, came back, drank a cup of coffee, shot the shit with my favorite customers: Bunny (who is a 70 year old man) and Margaret (84 year old knobbly knuckled Jew who is spry as a spring chicken) at the round table on my fifteen. Then came home, drove all over the city with Yannick to look for the perfect reading chair. Found the perfect reading chair on the opposite end of the city but couldn't fit it and the matching bird-of-paradise covered hassock into the car. Drove home frowning, warmed up the leftover taco's from last night's dinner and watched parts 3-8 of the Secret Garden on youtube. Exciting. My lady Michelle Hooey is coming at three for a lesson in simple bicycle maintenance and then it is off to our printmaking class at Martha street studio. After class, I am zipping to The Tallest Poppy for Meg's goodbye party and then am meeting Janessa at the University to print photos. Holy. The entire week is shaping up to be the same pace. Breakneck. My favorite pace of all.

Gotta run, wash the dishes and then the floor. If you find any handsome devils in striped shirts, send them my direction.

Left wanting, Margaret.

post script: photo jacked from The Selby. I don't know how to link websites. Can someone please enlighten me? Thanks.

Frin and Fran.

Had a bachelorette this evening. It was all around mellow. Ran into Billy and Megs, we had a round of drinks in fellowship. It was nice. Skipped out early on the bachelorette thanks to a crisis at the shop in the Exchange involving three ballin' bartenders from Brandon. They were nice about the fact that I sent one of their bags filled with three hundred dollars worth of purchases home with a family from the country. Oops. Long story short, we figured it out and Erin presented me with a new pair of glasses intended for Christmas. She knew I could never wait that long. (I can NEVER wait that long). She can never wait that long.

Thanks sug, I am pysched on these glasses.

Last night I sat cross-legged against Katie and Rabbi while watching a babe bluegrass band called The Magnificent Sevens play. It was magical. Alfie biked beside me all the way home. It was nice. Richard was there, slipping Joni M albums onto my turntable. Andrew and Alfie were there too. Rebecca and I kneeled in the kitchen laughing hysterically over nothing and everything. It was really nice. A sociopath and I shot the shit in front of one hundred disastrous people dancing at Whiskey Dicks. They stared, we stared. Us in our slim fit jeans and cotton t shirts and leather jackets, them in their short jersey dresses and popped double collars and the frosted tips. Two worlds divided by a single fence. It was (kind of) nice.

Going to watch 'American Beauty' alone. It's just that kind of Saturday night.
These are my new glasses. Thanks Frin. Love you.

Frances.

A half liter a day keeps the witches at bay.

Goodness me Beth, my apartment smells like fresh cut lilies. Maybe that is because there are fresh cut lilies sitting on my round coffee table.

Rabbi and I just arrived home to our separate abodes after a night spent drinking half liters in a dark cafe. We sat inappropriately and I complained about the music three times. The man with the shaved head working in the cardigan from the Bay tried to please us by changing the music three times from hip hop to elevator to euro groove and back to elevator and eventually I threw up my hands in despair and stopped complaining. Beth I check your post everyday and everyday I write you another letter. There are many letters, clippings, books, news items, feathers, leaves, photos, craft projects and magazine rippings gathering dust in the corners of my home. It is safe to say that you should be able to expect something in the next few days. I hate deadlines, but for you I am willing to set some boundaries for myself. Mail Beth's jazz, Madge. Just mail it. Just mail it, already. Thank you for your drawing. I am going to post it because I love it and because you nailed it. Lilies in the air, floating in front of my nose, hints of my favorite smell on my wine lips. Thank you is not enough, again.

Beth drew the picture at the very bottom of all this babble. I hope it makes her blush. Someone I do not like anymore took the photograph it is based upon, but her rendition made me fall in love with the image again. Thank you is not enough Beth. How do you know how to give of yourself so well? So beautifully? Giving and timing are your gifts. Your forte.

I need to learn giving and timing this year.

One year ago today I was at Anne Frank's house dragging my fingers along her wallpaper just trying to remember everything. Trying to soak in every floorboard and every magazine clipping she taped to the wall in loving desperation and in boredom. I was in Amsterdam wearing a stupid fur hat and a red jacket with a side braid, walking and touching the walls of Anne Frank's broom closet of a bedroom. I walked a lot. Rebecca to my right, Kit to my left, we were always walking. I ate a lot of cheese, drank one hundred espresso, read foreign magazines, smoked cigarettes beside canals, sat on benches for three hours and watched the boats go lazily past, drank two euro bottles of wine straight from brown paper bags and never felt better. I was snapping children in bus shelters with the whitest of white hair, singing without a parental guide in sight. I was at the Stay Okay hostel with the orange furniture that Erin would have loved if she would have seen it and was leaning my arms on the table with the candles and the mismatched cafe chairs and making eye contact with these two stand-in sisters at night.

So many times a day I go back to that cafe in my head, and daydream about the feel, the smell, the music playing, the handsome men pouring espresso with flicks of the wrist flashing, euros dropping into the tin change basins (our hands never touching European hands like they did and do in Canada). I almost forgot about that exchange (or lack thereof) until today when I caught myself daydreaming about Amsterdam while doling some lady's change directly into her palm. What a luxury that is as a shopper in Canada: coin exchange from palm to palm. Don't take it for granted. Doorknobs were a foot higher than we were accustomed to, not to mention the sparing eye contact and the men! The men were different too. It was easy to stand in a room and choose someone to fall in love with. They were all lovable and strange and new.

Slouching low, low, low in the red booth with Rebecca made me want to go back, but also made me want to move forward. Last year at this time I had no idea I would be where I am today. Art shows and new friends, crumpled letters being exchanged between stranger's hands in a dark hall, teacups arriving in the mail, and one very broken heart were all the things forcing me to fall in love with all the unknown parts that had been inside of me all along: making art, bantering with influential people, learning to build a wheel, tuning my own bicycle because I had no other options, meeting artists, doing laps in white-washed studios with my mouth agape in bewilderment, befriending authors, attending bourgeois book signings with my best friend, making a proper espresso, quitting a job I hate, singing in front of people, karaoking, printing photos with a new friend, wanting to go to art school for real, jamming in a great living room, playing soccer (even if it was a one time deal), learning to love my body, relaxing, speeding up, slowing down, appreciating nakedness, appreciating clothing, falling in love, falling out of love, traveling twice, hitting rock bottom on a 10 mile run in the Alps, taking a risk and applying for something I knew I would love, jumping into printmaking (blindly), cooking for bigger groups of people, making music, prioritizing, saying goodbye to best friends, maturing, blossoming.

All of these are examples of lessons learned, or lessons in the making. What a year it has been. I finally feel I am coming into my own and God only knows where I will be one year from today. All I know is thanksgiving. Today I am pleased, tomorrow I think I will be as well. Next year, who knows.

Test strips.

Devendra is playing. Clean hair is hanging past the shoulders at long last, Janique is eating chips daintily over Aggy Dean's glossy mug plastered across the front page of POP magazine in the corner and Jane B. is locked away in the darkroom. I was just in my own small darkroom, dragging fingers of a feather's weight over glossy white photo paper checking and rechecking before exposing it. Jane(ssa) is teaching me to print photos today. We snuck into the basement of the Photography faculty and she handed a box of paper over to me like the little boy with the five loaves and two fish. I won't make 5000 prints today, but I made three and am pretty excited about it.

Rabbi, I know my homework was to place Suf's Seven Swans album on my turntable, dim the lights, light some candles, draw a bath and soak, but this opportunity seemed just a bit more enticing. So many opportunities at opportune times this week. Don't fret pet, tomorrow we will lock eyes and interdigitate our fingers over a bottle of Cousin's finest vin rouge.

With love and unaccustomed eyesight, Madgeburg.

Red dots of joyfulness.

All you steppers out there lookin' sharp: thank you one hundred dollar bills flying through the air like one hundred seagulls; I have no other way of putting it. I am feeling a great lot of thankfulness. Thank you for coming, standing awkwardly, being fish out of water, being too cool, not being cool enough, being supportive, making fun of the other artists (DAD), spilling wine, laughing, craning necks, looking at my photography with your noses an inch away just trying to understand why I chose what I chose. Thank you BETHHHHHHHHHH for the stunning flowers sent all the way from two provinces to the west. HO-ly. I cried upon collection. I was floored. You are incredible. Thank you.

Thank you mum for buying the one print for your bathroom that I thought no one would notice. Thank you Marj, Jim, Rick, Karen, Grandpa, Grandma, Daryl, Pete and lady (I was too faded to remember a name), Jenny, Erin, Derek, Rabbi, Andrew, Meach, Shira, Janique, Josh, Janessa, Alfie, Mum and Dad and er'body else who booked off and made an appearance even though there were one hundred other things going on in the city yesterday. So many times last night I stood back to stop dancing or walking or drinking to just look at everybody being so joyful in that gross, white washed room. Just stop to watch everybody who came out to support somebody, not necessarily me. But for those of you who made time for me, I am so grateful. Thank you. The show was a great success. All of the people on my mental checklist came and were duly ticked off in thanksgiving. Four of six pieces were claimed and I am psyched to think of my prints in these peoples' bedrooms and bathrooms and living rooms and whatnot.

Loco and JJ, you were duly missed as well and your respective phone calls made me choke up when it came time to press the number seven on my mobile's keypad to delete your hopeful and well-wishing singsong voices. It wasn't the same without the two of you. The dance floors are never the same without you two. We did cut a rug until 4:30, but it is never the same.

Here are some photos courtesy of my mother. I was very joyful in all of them.

Ich Habe Genug pt. 2

Ich Habe Genug. I have enough. Stop.

This was running through my brain today in the studio while going back and forth from my work table to the paper bath to the ink station to the press. Apparently, I have fine inking skills. It must be said, my mother taught me everything I know. I like to roll out the ink at a ferocious pace with my head tilted an angle in order to see the ink turned into velvet. If you listen really close, you can hear when it is ready. Who needs eyesight anyways. I printed seven pieces from a giant linocut and was delighted with every single one. Outlines in the whitest of white of seven men leaning against a wall in 1978 in the blackest of ink came to be today. Like an apparition out of thin air. Stop.

I had such a terrible day today. It started out far too early for my own good. 5:30 early, and I drove the giant bread truck with such a vengeance even I hadn't a clue what came over me. My knuckles were white and clutching the steering wheel but my driving gloves didn't give me away for even a minute. Two loads and twenty million racks of multigrain and harvest home bread later, I finished my shift still under a dark cloud and raced home to pick up film to drop at Lab Works in order for it to be printed in time. I made a Kim Kroeker worthy lunch (grilled cheese on harvest home, home made tomato soup from my mum) and ate hurriedly as well. I hate rushing when I am eating. Eating should be done slowly in order to savor and remember such goodness. No goodness at my table today. I swallowed (barely) and raced to the Exchange to pick up prints and ran into Ruthless on the street and collapsed in his embrace. Then I raced home on Jessica Alba and cut, matted, cropped, dusted, Windexed, framed, screwed, and fussed over my submission for the art show. In all of my hurrying, I managed to sob for three minutes to Erin on the phone thanks to a print crisis, pack up my stuff, race BACK to the Exchange and think of ideas for my class. Stop.

Suffice is to say, walking into the studio fifteen minutes late carrying four frames in a giant Christmas gift bag was a breath of fresh air. I dropped my shit, peeled of layers, plunked down beside my new friend Michelle (who is unreal), threw on my apron, doused paint thinner on my rag and got busy. I love that place. I love the pace, I love my immediate ease upon entering, I love the smell, I love the people. Today the aforementioned anarchist kid brought in a container of doughnuts that he had dumpstered behind Safeway in the Village. I ate one because he was watching and I wanted him to think I was cool. It was stale, but not terrible. I guess I passed the test because later on he weaseled up beside me as I was rolling and re-rolling with the power of a thousand starved demons and invited me to his show at the Mondragon. Cute. Anarchist date. Or not. Stop.

My head aches again from the turpentine. Rabbi force fed me carrots, toast and red wine to help my pain but as lovely as her attention was, it still hurts. There are not a lot of places I love more than Rebecca's apartment in Fall. Candles burning, Charlotte Gainsbourg playing, tea steeping, wine breathing, couches sagging, light dancing, faux fires raging. I love it and I love her. Thank you for taking care of me Sister Budyk. You would make a great nun. One great badass nun. Stop.

Time to rest. Stop.
Madge.

Photographic suicide.

Blown up photographs laid out just so across three apartment floors. Familiar heads are bent over in examination, trying hard to conjure up something, anything. Constructive criticism cuts like the sharpest knife and yet I still am able to walk away from it all feeling grateful for these people brave enough to clear their throats and pinpoint what doesn't work, and what does. The show my work will be showcased in is a mere nine days away and I feel like I am free falling. My body feels like it was pushed out of a plane, a million feet above sea level; kicked in the behind by a fifty-something man's Reebok and I am heading straight for solid earth with nothing to break my fall except the sheer excitement of the unknown. I cried openly, blatantly in Para Mix today while showing my sister my enlargements. Customers stared, I didn't care.

Nervousness translates.

I am excited. If anything, I hope this translates.

Huffing on Tuesdays.

My head aches from all the paint thinner. What a wonderful welcomed ache. I don't care that this is yet another post about my class, I really don't, I am just plum excited. Today Billie Holiday set the pace of the studio for this girl. First Billie to start off the evening and then Sujan Stevens and Ratatat to close the night with a dance jam. Tying my "We should do this more often" printing apron around my waist into a loopy bow felt good and right, and pulling my first print through the press felt really good. Really, really good. I can't describe how it feels really. If you print, then you know. First there is resistance as the pressure builds, then there is the real build up as the press nears closer and begins to emboss, the blankets seize under the weight, and then there is a pop that surprised me every time it came. And I printed about six things and still my shoulder jerked back in glee every single time. My first few monoprints were simple in composition: black and white, clean lined, busy, unruly, streamlined. Sort of an extension of myself, I guess. My character traits embossed on japanese rice paper. Every thing was inspected at an arms length, at an angle, tilted towards the light with timidity. "Too little ink", "too much ink", "uneven distribution, Madge", "try again", "better now, go again, slower", a little laughter with everyone feeding off everyone else, "brilliant", "go ahead, go again. It's fun, no?". Yes, it is the most fun I have ever had.

I am hemming and hawing about what to say. Articulation is impossible at this time because my veins are coursing with coffee with a whisper of cream and sugar, my stomach digesting Tante Daryl's mental tamales, and my head is hazy from all the turpentine. I was put on scraper and roller cleaning duty and was happily holed up in a room with a giant turpentine bath for about ten minutes. Being elbow deep in a sea of poison for that long will go to anyone's head. Again, what a welcomed ache. I cannot stop grinning. I couldn't then and I cannot now. All this is just too long overdue.

Turning the wheel on the press was exactly how I imagined turning the helm of a sailing ship to be. Today I was Rose of the printing press and it was invariably satisfying, I must say. The striking white haired, white toothed Inga from Iceland started off the class with a monoprint demonstration on our existing linocuts from last class using a simple soft roller technique. I liked her style. If you are ever wondering what to do with your outdated phonebooks, call Inga. That lady knows how to ink up a phonebook. In between slashing pages upon pages with excess ink, she showed us how to set the pressure of the press down to a finger's width in broken English and how to set up and tear down our areas. She showed us how to soak paper and roll it out with someone's abandoned rolling pin on a table heaping with muslin, and how to shade and layer to create an illusion of depth on our prints. The last colored monoprint I did came out a wild, garbled mess of mustard yellow and fushia ink. I liked it but preferred the plain black to the color. Practice, practice, practice, I guess. The perfectionist within just wants to be good right off the hop. Patience, patience, patience, I guess.

Candles and vinyl and an email to JJ and a letter to Loco call. My drawing pad beckons, tea steeps in the yellow kitchen. How on earth does one go about putting a damper on the effects of caffeine? Dear me. Looking down at my lap, my ex boyfriend's jeans have taken their first hit of ink. One tiny streak of mustard yellow is one titanic reminder that I am better off alone. Jack eventually fell off the floating door and died. Rose stayed on the floating door and ended up alone. Alive, but alone. I am alive and alone. She got over it, forgot about him, side saddled a horse on a beach somewhere and moved on. So will I. One ink stain at a time, I am moving along; grinning.

The people in my class call me Madge. Even the sixteen year old anarchist kid who claims he "hates art", he calls me Madge too. I really like the way it sounds coming out of his mouth, "Madge".

Queen of the Singles Table.

Holy holy holy. Nothing gets me going these days more than Chad VanGaalen does. The first song 'Willow Tree' off his latest album, "Soft Airplane" just about does me in. I listened to it eight hundred times today in the country. Chad is a musician from Calgary who is inspired by drawing in his basement, his number one love, and their number one love child, Ezzy. Goodness.

The other day at my first printmaking class at Martha Street studio while my head was bent in concentration, while my eyes were following the unruly course taking place on the linocut in front of me, while my hands attempted to steer the chisel into some sort of tangible relief, while my cheeks flushed half in pleasure and half in frustration, someone slipped José Gonzalez into the stereo when no one was looking and I coincidentally slipped into this incredible universe where nothing in the world mattered except what was taking place before my very eyes. Everyone else in the studio--along with any hesitation or trepidation I had had initially--crept out the back door of my head and there I sat, in a trance, singlehandedly delivered into this unknown utopia by José. Smiling. Smiling contentedly as strips and coils of linoleum flew off my work table and piled around my stool like premature snow banks. "Slow down Meg. Good composition, but slow down. Enjoy" was tossed over my shoulder by my teacher. Little did he know I WAS working slowly; as slowly as my hunger for that room, for those tools, for those people, for those paints, for those archaic presses, for those babes toting giant silk screens to and fro in the corner of my eye, for those smells, for those thousand dollar prints drying to my right, for those words of encouragement I have been dying for ever since I could hold a crayon. I was making art painstakingly slow and enjoying every minute of it.

I don't remember the last time I have felt this/that happy. Today as six of us sat around the dinner table in the country poking at our leftover soup and buns, my mum was wracking her brain trying to think of her biggest regret as a parent. Laughingly, I suggested, "a lack of art programs for your (black sheep) child?" and while she nodded duly in agreement to my point, her biggest regret turned out to be choosing to house the family computer in the basement out of eyesight and out of earshot in lieu of a position upstairs. Whoops. No biggie Mum, we turned out alright despite all the sleepless nights spent as Chatty Kathy's on MSN and ICQ. My point is, where I am lacking in childhood classroom attendance in said unaffordable art programs, my enthusiasm and appreciation as an adult-attendee makes up for lost time. So Mum and Dad, thanks.

Enthusiasm is hard to come by these days. I guess my current stance is best said with Danielson Famile lyrics: "Bring it on Old Man Winter" for I am one enthusiastic lady. Now if only I could rope in a handsome Prince to bring to Kroeker gatherings. I am getting deathly tired of my reigning position as Queen of the Singles Table. Shit. Thanksgiving is a double edged sword that way: I am both grateful of my freedom from baby-sitting anxious Meeting-the-family-for-the-first-time Lovers and vexed by my perma state of singledom. Thanksgiving gets my marital status goat. Oh my, I smell inspiration for my next linocut. In actuality, it is not all that bad. All the blissful new married couples have to keep their mouths shut when I hog all the babies because I AM Queen of the singles table. So, in that light, I am cool with the arrangement for now.

Okay, I want to bathe and drink Malbec, listen to Chad and call Rabbi to compare Thanksgiving horror stories. Again, to close: Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter. Bring it on Old Man Winter.

Nobody's Margaret.

Post Script: That last salutation was for you Ruthless, cue my melodious laughter.
Post post script: I think the photos below were taken during a very happy time in my life. I miss you JJ, very much.

I'm Sorry. I can't see you.

I cannot help but feel the need to write this evening. Though the hour hand swells well into morning, I am drawn to this thing like a bee to a hive. From the start of the day with Janessa: swapping stories and unfinished sentences back and forth rapidly on the space that separated us by a hair. I worked eight hours with this magic human being and walked away from our locked store doors in the sinking light of day only to feel even more inspired by her in her absence. Then came a half hour at home listening to Chad Vangaalen on vinyl (not counting the bike ride from work to home where I opted to listen to the wind). I ran to Derek's to pick up a custom maple frame for my show and ran into Alexei on the street coming out. While we were mid conversation about Ryan Mcguinley--like magic--four casual bike messengers/secretive Friday Night polo players came streaming past us like four golden salmon swimming against stream. I stood in a trance for a long while, longer than necessary with my white collars flipped up in defense, and watched them pass in all their unapologetic athletic glory. What magnificent men. I thought men like that only existed in fairy tales: these magnificent men on track bikes riding past in a stream of color and polo sticks tucked into messenger bags, and cycling with hats, heads bent with their brims upturned in the wind. After all that came a dinner party at Sula's, in her warm living room in her warm home with six intense women. All the elements of the universe were represented in the individual plates heaping with steaming comfort food around a teak coffee table: Air, Fire, Earth, Water. Three Fires danced recklessly to old time beats, two stepping in exhibitionist harmony. One Air huffed and puffed in a corner, pouring her angry demise into the spine of an outdated fashion magazine. One Water was telling an emotional story in the back corner. Everyone's lipstick had come off by that point thanks to all the collective smacking-of-lips-togetherness-in-nervousness motion. Earth scowled upon us and crossed her arms in distaste but still steered us like only the strongest women can do. We were steered to the graffiti gallery and I couldn't do anything but go along and whip out a coiled-ring notepad when I had nothing left to say and draw like hell. People approached me now and then, curious to what was being transcribed with such a ferocity, but I kept drawing, unabated. Then the steering hand pulled us toward the Exchange, toward the Albert. We got out and walked the street a few times in between two parties going on 40 feet apart from each other. Then I met Shannon in the bathroom and it was like a breath of fresh air, she was all feisty and terrifying and I was dragged outside with wool tights-covered knees knocking in silent protest. Out we went and happened to run into a slew of people we knew. Thankfully Mister Ruth came along and there was immediate comfort with the passing of a single quote, "Beef tongue" to help ease us deeper into the night. Each other hanging onto the other for steadiness. We sauntered around, laundering cigarettes off unsuspecting teens and filling up the air above our head with laughter and smoke. Thankfully, we were free to go and I was kindly side-saddled home by a real gentleman. I felt like a real lady with my pointy shoes and crossed-legs even when the men in the tiny SUV beside us honked at us on Portage Avenue. To bike home with tiny white leather gloves covered in red wine spills, with a throat stripped owing only to the screaming match held with the men of Raper Park across the river. We left eventually and I simply forgot that I was ever wearing white.

Wonderful night, right?
Right.

A real lady.

Jessica Alba's fifteen minutes.

Today I got the average fixed gear rider's equivalent to an anonymous love letter. Scraggled in your typical Dad font in capital lettering across a 'Suggestions ou Commentaires' sheet from Mountain Equipment Co-op, was a simple note folded up and woven into the spokes of my back wheel. It made my day. Made my year. Maybe even made my life. I am a cyclist and this love letter set that fact in stone for yours truly. I wish a million shooting stars that I had a scanner.

Either way, as you can see below (brought to you by Apple) it read: LOOKED GOOD ON FGG. I beamed. If you don't know what FGG is, sorry, do your homework. I had to when I started this relationship with my bicycle months ago. Too bad that I ruined any and all street credit by mounting my bicycle after working at the store in the Exchange wearing towering four inch heels. There goes my reputation. A lady on a fixy wearing heels? SACRILEGE. Oh well. I was psyched.

I love you Jessica Alba, you are my best friend.
Madge.