16 things i can’t get enough of…

• coffee – one day it can cure cancer, the next it’s the cause of cellulite and celine dion’s comeback tour. whatever. i love it. and it loves me. and we’re going to be together forever. or at least until i see something shiny.
• text messaging
• picture messaging – you might think that these should be in the same category, but i beg to differ. there is something so exciting about having somebody send you a picture of something. i guess it’s because it takes you to exactly where they are at that moment, even if they’re across the world from you. don’t make me tell you how many words a picture is worth.
• this, and this, and this man
• long distance phone calls
• brunch
• japadogs
• boston – you are loud and brash and painfully beautiful and i am hopelessly in love with you.
• the pure, unadulterated joy of not waking up to an alarm
• arrested development – it’s still funny.
• books – some girls have shoes, i have hardcovers.
• my c.o. bigelow ultra mentha lip chap – i think “ultra mentha” is bath and body works’ code for “crack cocaine”.
• emulsified egg products – mayonnaise, hollandaise, bearnaise, baconaise…basically anything ending in “aise”.
• laughing until the tears stream down my face and i’m caught gasping for air, choking out “oh god, stop…i can’t breathe…can’t breathe…” before falling over. this is the true meaning of bliss.

hostile, mass.

I live in the city of glass. It’s to let the light in, or so they say. The trouble is, I’m so tired of everything always being so new and so clean. Shiny, crisp edges of buildings reflect shiny, wet pavement. One might argue that it’s Howard Roark’s dream – where tall, clean cut, functional skyscrapers dominate the city. I just want to see something with a little bit of character, a little bit of history. I’ve been told more than once that I have an old soul. Perhaps it’s my premature grey or the fact that I grew up with a significant age difference from my siblings that lead people to assume that I’m older than I am. I also have a love of antique jewelry but I fear that’s neither here nor there. I am enamoured with the East Coast. I am in love with looking out at the ocean and seeing where the earth bends.

I grew up in Lynn Valley on the North Shore of Vancouver. There is not a lot to tell people about it – lots of trees, trails, wooded areas and people who own Golden Retrievers. Short of scenic beauty, it was never known as the nicest area of the North Shore. Groups of disenfranchised youth would roam the streets on weekend evenings. Actually, that’s not entirely true. We weren’t really disenfranchised at all, we just were made to walk around instead of drive because our parents were smart enough not to buy us cars like the Westlynn or Edgemont kids. It’s amazing how little forethought or direction could be put into an activity that so largely governed the way we spent so much of our time. In fact, it might have decreased the enjoyment if we had. I suppose this presumes that there was any enjoyment to be had in the first place.

There was one particularly exciting evening when the local 7-eleven caught fire. We sat at the bus stop across the street and watched it burn, simultaneously enthralled with the flames while mourning a place where we had spent so many lunch hours and evenings loitering in front of. I don’t think it occurred to any of us until much later that week that we were watching a gas station burn down. It was just, as far as we were concerned, a pretty good way to kill a Friday night.

I would later spend time living all over the city, even making one move back to the North Shore, before coming to East Van. While I hate the fact that I’m often woken up to the sound of drum circles or lesbian pride pancake breakfasts happening in the park across the street, I’m willing to put up with it for what I get in return: beautiful old houses, uneven sidewalks, knowing the girls behind the deli at the market and cheap rent. I think all of this adds up to the main reason behind my love affair with the North Eastern United States – for me, beauty and history go hand in hand.

I made my return to Boston with mixed emotions; excited to go back and see the city that I am so inexplicably devoted to and apprehensive about how leaving it again would feel. Although it was mildly comforting to be able to navigate my way through Pearson with confidence, by the time I touched down at Logan my heart was in my throat. My head pounded slightly (probably due to lack of sleep and caffeine consumption – a direct result of Air Canada having me arrive at the YVR an hour and half before it opened. Looking back on it now, if I had known that that would have been the least of the problems Air Canada would cause me on this trip I would have taken it with a grain of salt…) and I wondered how it was possible that I was already stressed out about leaving when I had just barely arrived. Travel not only messes with your sleep schedule, but your eating schedule too. I’m lucky if I manage to get a coffee in me, let alone any type of food. Couple that with the fact that by the time I realize I’m hungry or should be eating something, I’m 34,000 feet in the air or in an airport where I’m left to debate the nutritional merits of Cool Ranch Doritos vs. Pork Rinds. None of this lends itself to being 100% on top of your game. As much as travel can mess with the actual traveller, I’m often left wondering about the people who have to deal with the travellers. Restaurants and coffee shops inside airports must operate on a special level of bizarre. If people in the regular service industry think they’ve got it bad, imagine what it would be like to do the same job but with customers who are 75% more stressed out that usual. Families trying to feed jet lagged children chicken strips in whatever cheezy restaurant is closest to their departure gate, agitated couples drinking vodka tonics and Bud Light while slowly coming to the realization that perhaps they should have tried assembling a piece of IKEA furniture together before deciding to take on the logistics of a transcontinental trip, business men and women blearily telling their Starbucks barista to have a good morning at 11:00 pm – these things happen at every hour of every day. I get service rage just thinking about it. All of these things aside, I was largely relieved that this time around I would be carrying a much smaller suitcase. And that I knew where I was going after leaving the airport. And that it had stopped snowing. I got in a cab and spent the next 15 minutes listening to my driver sing Britney Spears at an uncomfortable decibel level while we traveled to the South End. Then, after a few slightly panicked minutes of me praying that I wasn’t standing in front of the wrong door, looking for keys and introducing myself to a total stranger, I was home. Or at least the place I would be calling home for the next 7 days. Here’s a lesson for all of you: Don’t casually invite me to stay with you – I WILL SHOW UP. I have no qualms about setting up camp in your house (even if I have only collectively spent a maximum of twelve hours with you prior to showing up on your doorstep), eating your food (provided you keep any in your house) and drinking your beer (I am not worried about you not having any in your house because if you didn’t it’s unlikely we would be hanging out in the first place). Consider this your formal warning.

Showing up at someone’s house is one thing. Showing up at someone’s house while they’re at work and letting yourself in is another. Doing these things and having a total stranger greet you inside? Well, that’s just a recipe for fun if you ask me. It was there, in the living room of a brownstone in the South End of Boston, where I would meet the person who was to be my partner in crime for the next seven days. The fact that he was from Milwaukee was just a bonus. My knowledge of the mid west is fairly limited so I was pretty excited to have someone’s brain to pick over such things as breweries and ways to ask people to shut the door. Yes, this was going to be a good week.

I have always been able to find joy in the minutiae of life. In fact, it’s often the little things that get me through the day – the sound of the coffee maker starting up in the morning, the late night, post work routine of emptying change from pockets and putting it on the third shelf of the bookcase or into a 3 litre Jack Daniel’s bottle, walking to the platform as a completely empty train pulls in – it’s these things, more than anything else, that govern my daily happiness. My week in Boston would be filled with lots of little things (not waking up to an alarm, Miller High Life and in suite laundry) and lots of not so little things (Celtics tickets, Magic Bullet parties and what would later turn out to be the longest flight home anyone has ever taken) but was the Thursday that I would spend driving around Lynn, Massachusetts that would essentially make my whole trip. Even the most bland and lifeless of places can seem interesting provided you have the right tour guide. Luckily for me, Lynn was far from lifeless and I would be hard pressed to find a better tour guide if I tried (and I thankfully didn’t have to. When you’re riding with a keg toss champion, you know you’re in good hands.) Located on the North Shore of Massachusetts (hmmm…familiar?) Lynn is home to roughly 89,000 people. It’s main claim to fame is shoemaking. Oh yeah, and something about starting General Electric, but it was really the shoemaking that held my attention – any city that has a building designed after a shoe has got to be worth seeing. Perhaps it was all the sleep I’d gotten in the last four days. Perhaps it was because I was 3,000 miles away from work. Or perhaps it was the fact that I had spent the better part of the morning drinking pints of Guinness poured from Molson Canadian pitchers somewhere in East Boston that made the idea of going to the Lynn Museum enough to have me on the edge of the passenger seat, squeaking “Really? Really?” to the point where I think the suggesting of the idea may have been slightly regretted. In any event, I got to go. And it was awesome. Yes, I did just use the word “awesome” to describe a tiny local museum, curated by a woman who was equally eager to tell us about her dinner plans as she was to inform us that if the giant wooden shoe suspended above head were to suddenly come loose from its cables, her death would be instantaneous and painless so we really shouldn’t worry. By the time I left my face hurt from smiling.

When it comes to travel, or general conversation for that matter, there are few things more satisfying than talking to someone who not only knows what they are talking about but love it as well. You might assume that these things are intrinsically linked but I know a shocking amount about applying wallpaper – a skill set that I am neither passionate about nor sure how I came to possess such a plethora of information on. You can imagine my joy as I got to see Revere Beach, the General Electric plant and drive through Nahant. No, the word “joy” is not an understatement. When it came time for us to pick up our friends to go to the Celtics game I was nearly overwhelmed, I was like that kid who was so excited to ride the rollercoaster that he threw up before he even got on the ride. Strangely enough, I would at some point in the not so distant future become so overwhelmed that I would throw up. Twice. True story. In the meantime, however, I got to enjoy watching the Celtics play the Bulls, debatable concession stand poultry products, one or two High Lifes, having random notes shoved into my wallet and what was by far the finest public display of fist pumping I will ever see. When I am old and grey(er) I will look back on that Thursday and smile.

The rest of the week would pass by in somewhat of a blur. My East Coast host would return to work and my Mid West adventure companion and I would pass the time with a few burgers, a few beers, some football games, one or two awkward situations and several war story swapping conversations. I would have time to run through the city while pondering its strange obsessions with St. Germaine, double parking and the ludicrously high number of cars driving without lights on. Sunday morning would come far too quickly.

6:00 am found me wide awake. I got out of bed and put on my running shoes. I ran from the South End, across the Boston Common to take one last look at the Mass. State House, down through the Financial District and into the North End. I turned left and began heading West along the Charles River, making my way to Fenway. The morning air was cold as I sucked the last of Boston into my lungs. I inhaled so hard I choked. My mind began to wander back to the days I had spent aimlessly meandering the streets of the North Shore, whether it was on foot or by car, talking with friends about nothing in particular but somehow feeling that we were being truly profound. I started to wonder what was so different about driving around in cars with white boys, talking about rap, aside from 10 years, 3,000 miles and my now having the capability to buy my own beer. Unsurprisingly, I couldn’t come up with an answer. There was nothing different. In the last week I had managed to find people eager to teach me about Mid West geography and the finer points of Hot Pocket preparation. People who were willing to welcome me into their homes, lives and bike clubs, all the while appearing seemingly unphased by the fact that I don’t live on their street. Or own a bike. I leave Boston knowing that people went out of their way to make sure I had a good time. And with a new found soft spot for The Black Eyed Peas. Sure, there were some moments that I really wish didn’t happen and there were times when all I could think about was how it didn’t have to be this difficult but there was so much more to outweigh all of that. And the best part? They were all the little things. The minutiae won again. From having someone make me instant ramen noodles at 2 am to my understanding why it was so important that I get a picture of the Strawberry Ave. sign – they all added up to make my time spent in Eastern Mass. completely worth it. And if a 7-Eleven caught fire while I was there I can say with a fair amount of confidence that I would have three of the best people a girl could ask for sitting on the bus stop bench next to her.

My ride to the airport was filled mostly with silence. I didn’t have any words readily available and lacked the motivation to try and locate any, knowing that they wouldn’t have come out right even if I had. By the time my luggage was being loaded out of the back of the Jeep I was completely divided between wanting to be anywhere other than where I was at that moment and wanting to remain perfectly still in the hopes that the inevitable would simply not happen. I stood on the curb and said goodbye. Walking through the automatic doors, I was instantly in the exact same place I had been three months before – leaving Boston and having it break my heart. I imagine the woman at the check in counter thought my flood of tears was because of my flight being cancelled. I was happy to let her think that. I sat at the gate and watched Minnesota destroy Dallas.

“Who are you cheering for?”

I suddenly realize that I’m being spoken to by the guy sitting next to me.

“Hmmm?” I manage to stutter out.

“Who are you cheering for? Dallas or Minnesota?”

“Oh. All I know about football is ‘Go Patriots’.”

“Well, I guess you’re leaving the wrong city, aren’t you?”

My telling him that I felt like truer words were never spoken probably would have resulted in him furthering our conversation which, at this point, I was completely incapable of doing so I just smiled and said, “I guess so.”

All it took to bring me home was nine hours at Logan, four hours at O’Hare, two highly disappointing vending machine dinners and one instance of hair washing in a airport washroom using hand soap. The good news is, if Air Canada makes a royal mess out of your flight you get a free bag of chips. So that’s nice.

When it all boils down, what have we learned? Tell the truth, sit in lawn chairs in the living room, drink High Life and laugh. A lot. Because life is too short not to love the little things.

And you stay classy, Boston.

And if you can’t stay classy, at least stay beautiful.

in closing…

• american girls can talk football like canadian girls can talk hockey.
• vermont may be for lovers but it certainly isn’t for me.
• east coast boys are killing west coast boys in the way they pour their drinks, tell a story and treat women.
• east coast coffee is amazing. seriously.
• there are the people you will meet that will become little more than strangers who know your name. there are the people you will meet who will go miles out of their way to make you feel at home on a national holiday that doesn’t apply to their country. they will do this with offers of turkey sandwiches and brooklyn rock bands.
• your heartstrings will snap at 13 days or 6000 miles. this theory has been tested and proven.
• the nfl is a bit absurd on the best of days. it is especially absurd in the snow.
• i am an east coast girl trapped in a west coast postal code.
• i love miller high life.
• makahs maahk is fine. bookers will change your life. for the better.
• they shoot peppermint schnapps in nantucket. it’s weird, but you’ll wind up doing it anyways.
• if you say “wicked” in boston people will think you’re trying to act like a local. to the best of their knowledge, the word does not exist outside of the 617 area code.
• the boston coast guard is probably more familiar with me than i would like.
• lobsters can get big. really big.
• you could tell me that you just ran over my cat in a new england accent and i would probably ask you to marry me.
• if you happen to be in boston, head to stephanie’s on newbury street. ask for dave or pete. tell them i sent you. actually, maybe don’t tell them that. they probably won’t serve you.
• if you happen to be in nantucket, head to the rose and crown. ask for ronnie. you might have a hard time getting a hold of him as he will spend the first two hours ignoring you. you should probably bring a deck of cards.
• i have mastered the art of eating dinner out of a vending machine.
• crying while you’re drinking bud light is a certain kind of low.
• nothing makes me laugh quite like hearing the word “brar”.
• running out of the ocean screaming “SHARK” is never really well received. it’s an even tougher crowd in martha’s vineyard.
• do not suggest the idea of a martha’s vineyard vs. nantucket baseball game. just don’t.
• never underestimate the power of a post closed-kitchen grilled cheese.
• i’m not looking forward to paying for alcohol.
• you haven’t really had pizza until you’ve been to pepe’s.
• there are few things better than collapsing, exhausted and teary eyed, into the car of the person who will miss you each and every day that you are gone, wait at the arrival gate until well after midnight, shop with you via text message and tell you that your life will be okay – even when you feel like you might have just accidentally ripped your own heart out.
• if you bought me a drink, dinner or a book of poetry – thank you. if you got up at an insanely early hour to drive me to the airport, in massachusetts or bc – thank you. if you gave me directions to the train station, coffee shop or bathroom – thank you, even though some of these were incorrect. if i gave you my phone number, i expect you to call me. if i told you i’d miss you, i meant it. if i found myself at the hands of some questionable decisions with you, trust me, i wanted to be there.

-six

vermont might not have maple candy but connecticut has lobster, right?

Alas, no maple candy to be had.

I did experience a near diabetic coma due to maple latte consumption. I should have known better. I should have, but I didn’t. Isn’t that always the way?

While driving to Texas I came up with a mathematical theory for timing the moment when your heartstrings will snap. It occurs at either 6000 miles or 13 days, whatever happens first. And, oh, that moment. The one where it hits you, like being sucker punched in the stomach. It’s both terribly ugly and painfully beautiful.

It happened in Vermont. I was looking for mittens. I have impossibly small hands. I have, as of yet, been unable to find mittens that don’t make me feel like I’m wearing Andre the Giant’s oven mitts. I figured Vermont would be the best place to experience success in my quest, but that’s neither here nor there. In any event, I was in a store, aimlessly meandering about and not really paying that much attention to anything. And there it was. A song that sounded so much like home I might as well have been on the morning train, clutching my coffee cup like a shield and planning my attack on last night’s cash bags. I’m not sure if it was the day 13 rule or the fact that I had such an amazing time in Nantucket, but I was suddenly wishing that I was anywhere but where I happened to be standing. I didn’t even find any mittens.

After serving what felt like a three year sentence in Small Town, VT, I found myself with three days before I had to be in Connecticut. My friends and family rate at the Fairmont and the fact that I knew where to go when I got off the train made going back to Boston an easy choice. The fact that I’m in love with the city is just icing on the cake. Tickets were booked and it turned out (lucky me) that I would have to spend three whole hours in Springfield, MA. My four hour train ride was going to take me seven hours to get to Boston. This seemed more than a little unfair but faced with the option of staying in Vermont I went ahead and boarded the train. I might have been able to handle the three hour layover. I probably could have not even looked up from my book by the time the train pulled in. Unfortunately, my three hour wait turned into a five and a half hour wait and I was at a near breakdown state when I was finally on the train. As I said my final fuck you to Springfield, I noticed that someone had spray painted “FUCK THE BLIND” on the side of a building. I thought about how ironic it was that the intended recipients would never be able to read the message and considered the merits of braille vandalism as we pulled out of the station.

It could have been the fact that I hated Vermont. It could have been the fact that it was Thanksgiving and I was 3000 miles away, feeling sorry for myself. It could have been the weather. All I know is that the three days I would spend in Boston were exactly what I needed. I could go to somewhere and have conversations with people that knew my name (that sounded oddly like a Cheers reference. It wasn’t meant to be.) I ran along the Charles River. I wandered around Berklee (again). I drank fantastic coffee. I was home.

Like I’ve said before, solo travel does have it’s downsides. I began to become jealous of the people on the train with me. People that would have loved ones waiting for them on the platform. They would get into cars and have comfortable conversations. They would sleep in a bed that they knew. A bed whose sheets didn’t terrify them. And I would be left there, trying to figure out where the hell my hotel was. As I got off the train in New Haven, someone was waiting for me and I would get into a car and have comfortable conversation. It didn’t even seem to matter that we had never met before. Her son is a friend of mine and she graciously offered to put me up when she found out I would be in the area. Over the next four days we would compare stories, drink margaritas, eat pizza and cook lobsters that were the size of newborn babies. I have a special soft spot for the Constitution State after that visit. I also have a pretty stunning memory of a grown man attacking a lobster with a hammer.

stats report – round II

number of times i have been asked if i was being stood up while having dinner alone – 3

number of times i have wished that amtrak had better service on sundays – 14

number of beds i have slept on that didn’t make me want to remove my spine the next morning – 1

number of times i have over-tipped someone to avoid having to tell them that i didn’t want to go out with them – 1

hockey games taken in via text message – 1

rolls of film used – 4

books read – 5

pairs of clean socks left – 3

hikes completed – 3

postcards written – 13

postcards sent – 0

nightmares about work – 1

years added to my life by amtrak – 25

dinners consumed out of a vending machine – 2

number of times i have packed my suitcase – 6

headaches – 6

concerns over where my favourite chapstick is – too many to count

concerns over cost of phone bill – too many to count

pairs of new jeans – 2

pillows in the bed that i am lying in – 5

lessons learned about the merits of the maple latte – 1

things i miss…

• having my clothes in drawers
• my bed
• jack and oliver
• home cooked food
• thanksgiving
• hockey
• caesars
• the seawall
• santa barbara market
• my front door girls
• my pub girls
• my bar boys
• my duvet
• ronnie and erin
• grocery shopping
• coral
• being in a car, aimlessly driving nowhere
• you

things i don’t miss…

• paying for alcohol
• the sound of the phone ringing at the front desk
• vancouver public transit
• the sound of my alarm clock
• the sound of my roommate’s alarm clock
• wearing heels, and a dress, and makeup
• smiling for 9.5 hours every day
• going home and grinding my teeth at night from smiling 9.5 hours a day
• my upstairs neighbours
• my downstairs neighbours
• doing dishes
• having to answer my phone when it rings
• the permanently incorrect temperature level of my apartment
• talking to people i don’t want to talk to
• answering various questions such as:

“Are these prices in American dollars?”

“Do you give American change?”

“Did this place used to be a boat?”

“Do you know what a Bloody Mary is?”

“How long is the wait?”

• my bathtub

vermont has maple candy, right?

I have great concerns for the state of the Western world as we know it due to the extremely high number of flights offered at 6 am. Who needs to be going places that early? I think we’d all be far better off to take a lesson from our relaxed European neighbours (hello…they came up with the siesta…) There is no way you would find a Spaniard, in a perfect mix of panic and exhaustion, stumbling about a hotel room trying to ensure that they managed to pack everything. This just wouldn’t happen. It does, however, happen to me.

After checking the room for the umpteenth time and loading my bags into the car of someone who 5 days ago was a total stranger, I arrive at ACK. It more resembles something the size of a motel rather than an airport but the presence of airplanes and flashy lights managed to convince me that I was indeed in the right place. I checked in and placed my bag on the scale. I was then told that my carry on bags needed to be weighed. I was then asked how much I weigh. This seemed a bit much but I guess in the spirit of not having my plane go down over the Atlantic I should play along. I was handed a pink piece of plastic with a number on it which was supposed to represent my boarding pass and told that I would be boarding through Departure Gate 1 (the naming of this gate was clearly well thought through considering it is the sole departure gate in the airport.) When it came time for boarding we were herded to our appropriate spaces on the tarmac by airline employees saying things like, “Okay, Pinks over here, Reds over there” which made me grateful that they hadn’t decided to separate us into “Shirts” and “Skins”. I watched the sun slowly creep up over the Atlantic while our luggage was loaded into the plane. I’m using the word “plane” loosely here. It was actually something more like a “plane-let”. A plane-let being piloted by a man (again, using the word loosely) who very well looked as though he might have reenacted this scene no fewer than two weeks ago. Okay, okay…maybe three weeks. Luckily he managed to avoid being distracted by something shiny or a Pokemon episode he had recently watched an we touched down in Hyannis in one piece. It then took a cab ride to the bus station and a bus ride to the train station to bring me back to Boston.

There is an interesting relationship between early morning travel and things your body thinks it’s okay to consume. It was only 9:30 am when I arrived at South Station but I had already been up for close to four and a half hours. This made for an interesting mental/gastronomical dilemma as I wandered the food court. I had already had bacon and eggs at the airport so this would put me at my second breakfast. Later I would move on to elevenses, but for now I had to mediate the argument between my brain and my tummy. Brain was saying that it was time for brekky (and then we would try to take over the world…) and tummy was saying that we had already had brekky and we should move onto other things – like chow mein or whatever the hell they serve at Cajun Tornado. I eventually settled on some sort of sandwich which seemed to leave all parties involved feeling somewhat satisfied. That is, of course, until 20 minutes later when I was hungry again.

Train travel is not something we West Coasters typically do. We just don’t really have the infrastructure. My train ride from Boston to Vermont would prove to be a new challenge for me and my self proclaimed ability to subsist on the sole consumption of Cool Ranch Doritos and coffee. The first leg of the trip went off without a hitch although as we neared my transfer point in Springfield, MA, it became apparent that the whole town was on the wrong side of the tracks. Either that or the good people of Springfield just had a certain penchant for creating piles of things: tires, bricks, plywood, broken office chairs, broken hopes, broken dreams, microwaves…I could go on and on. Standing up to get off the train involved me trying to navigate me, my three bags and my coffee cup down an 18″ aisle. This was already complicated enough without the guy sitting two rows in front of me suddenly standing up and cutting me off. Well, that’s not exactly right. He didn’t so much cut me off as get tangled up in me and my luggage moving system. He was now standing between me and the suitcase I was dragging behind me.

“Oh, wow, you’ve really got caught up here. I’m just going to sneak by you.”

Blank stare. No movement.

“Okay, I’m just going to keep on going here…”

Blank stare. He starts grabbing his bags and winds up pushing me into the lap of the guy across from him in the process.

“Whoa, alright. How about you go first?”

“Can you throw that out for me?” He gestures to a water bottle sitting on his seat.

“Excuse me?”

“Can you throw that out for me? I don’t really have a free hand.”

“I’m sorry, neither do I.” I felt like telling him that he happened to be cutting off the circulation to my left hand as we spoke but thought better of it.

“Bitch.”

And then he pushed past me. As I walked behind him I noticed that the ID tag on his backpack said that he was from Providence, RI. I am planning on writing a letter to Obama requesting that once NASA is done bombing the moon if we could give Providence a go.

I waited a small eternity for my train to Vermont to arrive. I then waited a second small eternity for it to leave the station. Sixteen minutes after leaving the station we stopped. I know I’m not an old hand at this whole “riding the rails” thing but it was starting to feel like the “Mr. Magoo reads War and Peace” book on tape could end before I reached Brattleboro. The train began moving just as the small child kicking the back of my seat became intolerable. I think the force of the train starting up threw her backwards, which is good because it might have been awkward if I had been the one to throw her. It suddenly dawned on me that we were moving in the direction that we came from, and very slowly at that. I looked out the window and watched the same scenery we had seen moments go past. We began to pick up speed which was comforting but speeding back in the direction you came from isn’t exactly my idea of progress. As it turns out, a freight train had derailed somewhere up the line from us and we had to change lines. I was kind of hoping that our alternate line would be right next to the line that had the derailed train on it so I would be able to witness my first train disaster. Alas, it was not to be so. How crushingly unfair life can sometimes be.

Feeling much better about life (a shower and nine hours of sleep will do that to you) I went out to take a look at the town I would be calling home for the next four days. For those of you back home, Brattleboro, VT is like the lovechild of Commercial Drive and New Westminster. There are people carrying their new born babies in hemp slings or driving their car with their “Think Local, Eat Local” bumper stickers, art galleries, organic food co-ops and cute, trendy shops. There are also an abnormal number of people listening to Iron Maiden, run down houses and groups of disenfranchised youth aimlessly wandering the streets. It’s the first place I’ve been to that I don’t want to be wandering around at night in, but it does offer some great opportunities for picture taking. While taking pictures of a mural on the back of the movie theatre I heard a sound that, if you have heard it before, is unmistakable. It’s the sound of a typewriter. I am standing in a parking lot, in Brattleboro, in the rain. I turn around to see a guy sitting at card table. He has a sign but I have to move to closer to read what it says. In the most beautiful instance of dual realization I have experienced, I discover that he is offering to write poems for money and he happens to be none other than the guy who called me a bitch on the train. This was too good to be true. I was unable to control myself long enough to ask him to write me something but am considering going back tomorrow and trying then. Seeing him sitting outside a grocery store with a typewriter in the rain was enough enjoyment for one day.

The apartment I have here is great. It is in an old, brick building overlooking the Connecticut river. There are bizarre knick knacks everywhere you look and the place is filled with paintings and books. For your enjoyment, I have taken a totally random cross section of the book collection. Here are some of the titles:

• American Folklore and Legend
• Grandmother’s Kitchen Wisdom
• 1001 Ways to be Romantic
• The Joy of Sects
• Black English
• Women Who Run With The Wolves
• Reefer Madness
• The Qur’an
• Roger Ebert’s Book of Film
• Mushroom Hunter’s Guide
• Indian Givers
• For Whom The Bell Tolls

What more could a girl ask for? If Hemingway gets a bit dull I’ll just move over to learning the best place to find Morrells. It’s a fantastic system.

For now though, it’s time for bed. I’ve got a big day tomorrow and it starts with a maple latte, which sounds just gross enough to put me in a diabetic coma thus making me want to try it.

-Six

now then, what rhymes with nantucket?

Solo travel can be trying at times. When there is no one to laugh with/keep you company while you wait for a train that doesn’t come and the ferry that you just missed to return, it can get a little dull.

Thank god for people watching.

After finally making it to South Station I had three hours to kill before my bus left. Luckily, there was a plethora of visual stimulus to help pass the time. There is no one allowed on the platform until the bus is ready to board. People line up outside the appropriately marked door and wait for the bus driver to open the door and call out the destination. The greatest part about it is that you can’t actually understand what the driver is saying. It’s a great way to send one last final shot of panic into traveler’s hearts before boarding the bus. “What did he say? Am I in the right line? I thought this was the line up for Woods Hole but I’m pretty sure he just announced that we were going to Woodstock. Shit. Is Woodstock close to Woods Hole? Can I just walk there if I get off at the wrong stop? What’s my name?” You will wind up boarding the bus anyways and just hope that you’re heading in the right direction. It’s all part of the adventure.

Before boarding the bus to nowhere I was able to be completely entertained by a a man that I have named “Loudest Bus Station Guy” although I’m sure his real name is something like Archie or Rod. We never learned his actual name but he did insist on learning all of ours.

“What’s your name?”

“Tess.”

“Steph?”

“No, Tess.”

“Oh, okay. Can I call you Steph?”

He went through a similar routine with everybody else sitting near him. Once he felt that he had gathered an appropriate amount of incorrect information about us all he proceeded to talk about his luggage. No, not his baggage, his actual luggage. He was carrying a rolling hockey bag.

“Do you want to know what’s in here?” he asked to nobody in particular, “well, I’ll show you.”

I was desperately hoping that it would be something awesome like a decapitated mannequin or a life size cut out of Kevin Spacey.

“Check this out” he excitedly squeaked.

He began to pull out every single piece of a drum kit minus the actual drums and proceeded to walk me and everyone else through each part as if he had just discovered the worlds most exciting archeological find in the last 200 years. Somewhere between the stand that would have held the snare drum and the hi hat I managed to pick up my book and start reading. About 20 minutes later my bus pulled in and I thankfully boarded. As the bus pulled out of the station I caught a glimpse of him frantically rearranging bags and cymbal stands.

After finding a seat and learning that I was indeed on the correct bus I began to rummage in my bag for my iPod. Taking public transit in a city that is not your own isn’t super conducive to mindlessly zoning out to the sound of Ira Glass’s voice. One missed stop and you’re in Roxbury which, trust me, is not where you want to be. The beauty of taking a charter bus is that you can turn on the tunes and stare aimlessly out the window all the while resting assured that you will wind up in the exact place that is digitally displayed on the front of the bus. Three lip glosses and a half eaten granola bar later I manage to locate the iPod. This, unfortunately, doesn’t happen before the woman in front of me is able to place a call to someone who could only be identified as “Cookie Wookie”. Possible candidates for the owner of the charming moniker include husband, boyfriend, daughter or bichon frise. The soothing sounds of everybody’s favourite NPR Jew could not come soon enough and I quickly jammed my ear buds well into the sides of my head in the hopes of drowning this woman out before we introduced another Muppet into the mix.

Seventy five miles down the highway we passed a school bus with fifty children wearing matching white school shirts, pressing their faces against the glass to see inside our bus. Thank god for tinted windows or they might have been able to see me doing the exact same thing. Maturity is such a beautiful thing.

Upon my arrival in Woods Hole I disembarked the bus and gathered my luggage. I then wandered into the ferry terminal and tried to pick the best spot in which to weather my hour and a half wait. It was here that I was able to come to the conclusion that all ferry terminals smell the same – a mix of salt water, hard plastic seats, questionable food and anxiety. My grandparents live on a small gulf island off the coast of Vancouver and I have spent many a weekend waiting for the ferry to either take me there or deliver me home. I usually accomplished this mission with either a Sunshine Breakfast or an extra large bag of salt and vinegar chips. I had neither of these weapons to fortify my time spent waiting for the Lady Vineyard to come and pick me up so I settled for David Sedaris (I managed to not leave this one on the plane) and C-SPAN. I’ll give you a cookie if you can guess which one was more entertaining. The ferry ride itself was short and sweet and I was in Oak Bluffs before I knew it where, conveniently, they were in the middle of a boil water advisory due to an E Coli contamination of the town’s water supply. At this point I raised my hands to the sky and thanked the Travel Gods for this wonderful gift. How did they know that I wanted to brush my teeth with Evian and get better acquainted with the idea of hand sanitizer? I must have done something right in a past life because I was turning out to be one lucky, lucky girl. Thirteen hours of a travel only to discover that I was going to have to spend all night drinking tequila instead of water? Man, this is amazing. I’m not going to even write a Christmas list this year on account of all the good fortune I’ve already received. Okay, maybe I’m getting a bit carried away. I’ll still write the list.

The island is beautiful, just don’t tell that to anyone from Nantucket. It appears the locals on the two islands have some sort of rivalry although no one has been able to give me a definitive answer on why. Regardless of what anyone on Nantucket says, the Vineyard really can deliver in terms of scenery, decent coffee and friendly locals who are more than willing to draw maps on cocktail napkins for you. Nantucket can one up them in the number of people willing to pick up your bar tab and convince a line cook to make you dinner long after the kitchen closed but I did run along the Atlantic shoreline, lie on warm, sandy beaches, and swim in ocean without getting consumed by a shark. That’s a pretty fair score if you ask me.

Seventy five dollars worth of ferry fare later and I found myself on Nantucket. The brick sidewalks and cobblestone streets are stunning but they do pose a problem if you’re walking in heels. It’s best to just remove the shoes and walk barefoot if you’ve had a few cocktails (don’t worry, Mum, I’m doing more than just drinking – sometimes I take pictures and shoot the occasional email home.) If heading out on your own in this town feel free to peruse my list of handy tips for making friends with locals…

• Don’t get discouraged if you’re ignored, just keep drinking until someone finds out you’re Canadian and asks how close Vancouver is to Toronto.
• Ask for a tutorial in NFL football. Don’t bother asking about college football, they don’t really care about it.
• Don’t mention Martha’s Vineyard.
• Don’t mention the idea that Bud Light might be carbonated rat piss.
• Learn to play Rummy.
• Make sure you thank whoever made your dinner be it lobster or late night grilled cheese.
• If you can’t understand what is being said to you because you are talking to someone who has the Newfie equivalent of a New England accent just smile and nod. They will then either refill your drink or bring you something you didn’t order. Either option is fine.
• All you need to know about NFL football is “Go Patriots”

So go forth, make friends and drink Cape Cod IPA. You won’t be sorry.

-Six

stats report

number of times i have sat at a train station waiting for a train that never came – 1

number of hours spent waiting at said train station – 3

number of self pictures taken while waiting – 16

number of deleted self pictures – 14

busses missed as a direct result of no-show train – 1

ferries missed as a direct result of no-show train – 1

cups of decent american coffee consumed – 13

cups of shitty american coffee consumed – 0

hangovers – 1

rides taken with total strangers – 3

ferry rides – 3

ferry rides that could have passed for highway (or waterway) robbery in price – 2

ferries that serve alcohol – 3

emails home to reassure my father that i am indeed still alive and people are being nice to me – 15

friends made – 7

friends made named ronald – 2

friends made named ronald who happen to be bartenders – 2

number of delicious local beers tried – 3

number of mentally drafted letters to work explaining why i am not coming home – 11

boil water advisories – 1

books read – 3

robert frost poems read while at harvard – 6

torrential downpours – 3

torrential downpours that i have been out in – 3

bowls of chowder – 3

bowls of lobster bisque – 0

text messages to best friend urging her to get on the next flight out – 6

sunburns – 1

miles run – 24

miles run so hungover i wanted to die – 7

number of times i have been thankful for google – 2 million

number of counting crows songs purchased off itunes – 1

concerns over contents of water due to need to purchase counting crows songs – 16

times i have wanted my own bed – 12

chiropractor appointments scheduled – 1

number of times i have been thankful that i am not living in the back of a car – 5

number of times i wished the person i lived in the back of a car with was here with me – 27

miles left to travel before i’m home – 3878