Oui, c'est moi!

I wish I could write poetry. I would write a piece about my multi-blooming Candy Wind hibiscus and how she is me.

I *heart* Interpol

Here's the video I took at Osheaga 2007. I thought my camera had sound capture at the time, silly, silly me.

...they hadn't wanted it

Before Time Altered Them

They were full of sadness at their parting.
They hadn't wanted it: circumstances made it necessary.
The need to earn a living forced one of them
to go far away -New York or Canada.
The love they felt wasn't, of course, what it once had been;
the attraction between them had gradually diminished,
the attraction had diminished a great deal.
But to be separated, that wasn't what they wanted.
It was circumstances. Or maybe Fate
appeared as an artist and decided to part them now,
before their feeling died out completely, before Time altered
them
the one seeming to remain for the other always what he was,
the good-looking young man of twenty-four.

Constantine P. Cavafy

[In the years after my parents' divorce, I found this poem, bookmarked by my mother in a translation of Kavafi poems. It still makes me cry to read it. I am afraid of pain, but I am more afraid of ignoring its existence.]

I went to my first ever march on Saturday. Somehow I manage to have the best friends ever, including but not limited to, Brian and Andre, who went with me to join the hippies for a bit, hoping perhaps for a little molotov cocktail action. No such luck. It was a silent march, so quiet along Sherbrooke on a rainy Saturday that Brian decided he *wanted* to chant. The organizers shouted a couple in English and French once we reached "Norman Bethune Park", ie the sliver of dirt on the corner of de Maisonneuve and Guy. I was wondering: is it weird that Norman Bethune was so tied into China when we're discussing their unispired lack of action vis a vis Burma? Just a thought.

It felt good to do something that can be qualified as solidarity. But I am no fan of what seems like "professional activism". Someone Brian knows, who he calls "an extreme vegan" (ie eating honey is "obviously" immoral) was a busy bee these days, going from this "demo" to another about the next controversial topic du jour. Not my thing. I guess it is this type of person who must be in charge of sending emails entitled "protest went great!" Is this, like, "tried your recipe, it went great!"? Or "had that date last night; it went great!"? Woohoo. I don't know. Not my thing. I'm still really glad I went, and I'm thrilled Brian and Andre were there too. Some people are just awesome.

An article in WIRED about `open source politics` and the group on FB through which I found out about the protest.

click on the image

Let your heart feel for the afflictions and distress of everyone. - George Washington

What is the difference between an outpouring of compassion for people displaced and killed by a tsunami and this?