summer amusement.

summer's coming fast and i personally hate the weather and i prefer to be in my air conditioned home. but there are some things that are just too irresistible and summer friendly. i have decided to give myself some goals that i think are reasonable and sexy. can goals be both reasonable and sexy? well i think so. so let's get on with this.

mika's summer goal extravaganza

• stop being pathetic over one christopher (the love of my life.. or so i think).

• gardening (i have a ton of new gardening ideas and plants that are just waiting to be planted).

• grow edible and ornamental things.

• learn new recipes, preferably vegetarian friendly for my vegetable loving friends. 

• catch up on all my history books that i have purchased for personal enjoyment -- particularly my juicy book on the wives of henry VIII, and maybe do some research on my favourite "absolutist" monarch louis XIV. 

• watch a ton of good movies

• a buffy marathon with my lovely jeremy

• plan a bunch of fun outings with my nearest and dearest

• again, with the gardening. 

• focus on what i want to take for next year's classes - hopefully i'll have a more fun schedule?

• summer job? i really want money. i like money, but money does not like me. 

• be a girl for like a month and lose some weight so i can wear pretty dresses. and not look like a fat bag.

• new converse? 

• going to the caribbean - i  hope to get some sand in a bottle and visit some slave plantations to see records and whatnot. i have to see for myself what i've studied these past few years at good old u of t. 

• my mixed cd masterpiece project -- making decent mix cds for friends..

• writing letters. i miss snail mail

• new music and concerts. i love both. so a combination of the two would be lovely

okay i'm done with the list. look at the picture of one of my fave flowers i left you, convolvulus sepium aka morning glory.

shit on toast.

i am trying hard to be understanding in these difficult times for the TTC. but dude, having been really inconvenienced by the TTC, i would have to say that i'm quite disappointed. i have no contentions about their strike. i feel as a democratic country, everyone should be entitled to strike. 

i just wish that people could have been warned ahead of time to make proper arrangements. 

i totally do not agree with the fact that the TTC decided to shut down all service to all subways, 

buses and streetcars at 12:00am. toronto could be a dangerous place at night. there are people right now who are coming home from work, studying, going out, running errands and whatnot. it is bad form to see the TTC suddenly cancelling all service. i would have been more accepting of it had they done it in the morning. people need to get home. they have seriously inconvenienced people tonight and i really cannot believe this happened. 

i support the TTC. i feel as though people take them for granted. i have been a witness to TTC drivers being verbally abused. seriously, i'm surprised it took them that long to strike. toronto as a city treats our drivers like shit. we should respect the people who work almost all hours to get us home and to work safe. but what they did tonight is unforgivable. 

i am personally inconvenienced and extremely worried about making my exams on time. i need to tutor kids tomorrow and i will have to cancel that. i need the TTC tomorrow to get to my university's library, but i guess that's going to have to happen at another time. arrgh. i'm frustrated because i have no control over anything. and it's not like i have access to my parent's car at the moment. 

that blue eyed kid.

i got an unexpected call yesterday evening when i was dining with my family at our local chinese restaurant. it was a call from an old friend and an old love. i was shocked and surprisingly very giddy. i don't have feelings for him anymore, but that one part of me that used to love him. that one part that was conveniently tucked away made itself known. suddenly, i found myself excited and relieved to hear his voice on my answering machine. he started his message casually enough commenting on how glum i sound on my answering machine, and said i should be more cheerful because i'm a cheerful person. which i admit gave me a smile. then he delivered the news. 

he's moving away. moving away with his girlfriend. 

he told me he got a job there and that he's leaving me very soon. my heart felt like it dropped  to my stomach. i feel as though all my friends are moving far away and i'm left with ridiculous people. i miss him already and he hasn't even left.

i don't know if i will permanently lose touch with him. as much as i don't want to, there's a sneaking suspicion that it's an increasing possibility. he seems to be slipping through my fingers while i try to grasp at my linkages to him. i guess yesterday's message was more than a goodbye. to me it was relevant in other ways. yesterday's message was a confirmation that all my little fantasies about us being in love were so far-fetched and wrong. he never loved me in the way i wanted him to, at all. he never liked me the way i wanted him to like me. he only loved and liked me as a friend.

i could have been that girlfriend who moved with him. but he chose not to choose me. it's a hard and bitter pill to swallow. but if i am if anything,  a girl with great coping mechanisms. i've been fucked in more ways than one this year and the years previous and i can take more. 

i have cold comfort in knowing that i'm one of the people he chose to hang out with before he left  to that fucking barren land. i would have been more hurt and wounded had i found out through facebook or some other type of messaging media. i will miss him, he is first and foremost a good friend of mine. we have fun, we make each other laugh. i will miss my friend. with all his eccentric sensibilities and his icy blue eyes. if i'll miss anything, it's the way he smells. i have this amazing olfactory memory.. i'll just miss the way he smells, it reminds me of a happy time. i'm uncertain if i want to hang out with him before he leaves. i'm afraid i might cry or do something idiotic. i hate saying goodbyes to people i really really like or care about. it's so hard.

needless to say, his message for me will be saved on my cellphone for a very long time. as sick as it sounds, i really liked hearing his voice. i missed it. and when i'll miss him. at least i can hear his voice, even if it's for the last time in a long long while.

i love you.

i think this deserved its own spot. 

i'm trying to be brave for a friend who might have cervical cancer. 

we don't know the results yet but i'm anxious about it. she doesn't know how much she means to me. 

she was my idol for my formative years, she was a companion, someone who listens and cheers me up with her sunny disposition. 

she is a creative force, a beautiful girl and full of life. i don't want that robbed away from her. she won't be able to read this, but i have a message for her. 

hey you, 

i think you're strong and beautiful. at this time there are moments where you can't be strong and you wish that you didn't have to deal with this shit. i don't know how to relate, but know for sure.. that i'll be strong for you if you feel you can't be. i love you. know that i'm always here for you to talk to. we've been friends for a while. know that you can count on me should shit go down.

love mika

take a picture, it'll last longer.

i wish i could capture picturesque shots of my life and categorize them in an album. i could label them with witty, catchy titles. or under them, would be a footnote of a painful memory. i would clutch this album to my chest and smile and say "this is my life, these are my memories. i lived all these things." the catch is that i wouldn't be able to share this with anyone. frankly, that's fine by me. 

there are some memories that come to mind. those are moments that i wish were immortalized in some form of media. i thought them epic. if i could bottle those feelings and encapsulate the moment in one screenshot, i think i'd be pretty happy. but i can't. as i rely on my memory that's slowly fading away as time goes, one sort of loses touch with these special, albeit rose coloured and biased memories. these shy awkward glances, smiles,  and completely random and beautiful nights, kisses, smells and tastes.

this is why i'm so frightened of alzheimer's. my sister and i lost our grandmother to it. she lost her memory and was often confused she couldn't link the faces she was seeing to memories because she lost it all. i could think of nothing more tragic than losing memories of places and people, like where you live, your favourite colour, or your favourite ice cream flavour, the first A you got in school, your most embarrassing moment, a funny joke, how to make a mean margarita, your child's name.

memory is so dangerous and fleeting. 

the problem with my being nostalgic is that i can't seem to let go at all. a trip down memory lane can lead to happiness, regret, longing, pain, bitterness – hardly any of my trips take me down happiness avenue, i'll tell you that much. nor do i come back with an nice souvenir to show my friends. it's like picking at scabs. over and over again. until everything is raw and red. it's always about what did i miss, or what could i have done better? it's a shortcoming on my part, but still. all of these memories... for them to be categorized, filed and captured only to be seen by me is something i'd want to happen.