Back in the late-1990s, after I passed on the keys to the Malcolm Lowry Room and my time was truly my own, I found myself in the habit of getting up each morning and, as quick as I could, getting in my car and driving somewhere. I had a number of these somewheres in my life, the most visited being a cafe just east of Commercial Drive, on the south side of Charles Street, called Harry's. It was only after shooting three games of pool while kibitzing with Harry that I felt focused enough to return home and do what I do for a living, and that is write.
Somehow, for some reason or reasons, I find myself back in this habit. And so it was that I set out yesterday for the MCC Thrift Shop on Fraser Street, in search of what I don't know. The whats this time turned out to be two cotton place mats in a shade of green (sage?) that have, through no conscious effort, become an accent colour in my living space, as well as a beautifully constructed wall hanging made of twigs from a bush or tree, likely from the other side of the Pacific. Supplementing that, the usual array of books, CDs and DVDs, but this time just books, which include:
Other Fires (1986), because I mentioned it in a recent piece I wrote for Ormsby Review of another anthology, called emerge 21,
and Marie-Claire Blais's St. Lawrence Blues (1973), because she passed away last week and all I ever knew of her, besides reading with her at a festival once, is La belle bête (1959).
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