I spent the first half of 1984 employed as a telephone interviewer for market research. I was in no hurry to return to home support work following my burnout and I hoped my new position would provide me with interesting respondents and still fulfill my need for human contact on the job. It was of course survival work and it didn't pay well. I worked five hours a day, early evenings four till nine. I lasted in this work until July. The nature of my last two survey interviews I found to be particularly disturbing and to my supervisor's chagrin and amazement I wasn't pulling any interviews. "You're usually such a good producer" he said. The penultimate survey was about international coffee. The last was about international banking. I was even then somewhat aware of the kinds of human rights abuses and the morally egregious actions in both these industries and I simply could not reconcile working even by proxy for these parties with my Christian faith and my strong, almost tyrannical, sense of ethics. In July I had a dream of the telephone room. All the stalls were covered and dripping with blood. Then I developed a chronic soar throat which my doctor diagnosed as a strained larynx. I knew God was telling me to leave this work. I resigned and with a note from my doctor went back on Unemployment Insurance.
I suppose I got along okay with my coworkers, who were themselves quite a mixed bunch. I never went to the pub with them after work, but I wasn't the only one. There was one particularly obnoxious young woman from Calgary. We quite hated each other. When I came into work one rainy day with an umbrella she sneered, "In Calgary the only men who carry umbrellas are gay." I let that one pass. Then another day we were talking about the Walk For Peace And Nuclear Disarmament, which I was trying to get people in the office interested in. She brayed "I didn't know there was a COMMUNIST among us." I fixed on the bitch the cold impaling glare for which I was already famous and feared and muttered "Honey, I'm way further left wing than that." She never bothered me again.
The Self Proclaimed Apostle and I had by then partially reconciled (he insisted that he would never fully forgive me and I remained safely aloof from his manipulation) and after work we would meet with other friends of his at a very bizarre and funky café where we plied our ministry of presence in the local gay and sex worker community. We were surrounded by every possible denizen of the queer community including seven foot trannies and hookers of all genders. We welcomed everyone to our table. The conversations got very interesting and often laughter abounded. Sometimes so did tears. I became a kind of emotional sponge for the turmoil, the drug overdoses, the heartbreaks and the sense of worthlessness and rejection that many of our friends carried with them. I thought it was intercession and I think some of it was. But I wasn't addressing or acknowledging my own tragic lack of boundaries.
I was going nonstop. At the crack of dawn I walked two and a half miles to snooty church for daily mass and stayed for breakfast in the clergy house with the twee Anglicans. This was their own little universe. Following, I would walk home again in reverse direction, carefully routing my walk to pass through the maximum of parks, green spaces and quaint and attractive neighbourhoods. Since I would have had perhaps four hours of sleep, upon returning to my basement apartment I would go down for a prolonged nap with CBC Radio Two turned on, back in the halcyon days when they still played classical music. I would wake up at around midday, work on a batik, then go for a walk or a coffee at a local café. As well as making batik hangings of birds I was writing my novel often passing many hours sitting in cafes while working on my manuscript. I returned home for a meal then, at three in the afternoon or so I would walk downtown to my market research job. From there I went to the funky café with SPA and gang, then wandered into various gay bars, never as a participant (though it could be argued that simply by being inside those places I made myself a participant). I would simply stand or walk around a bit, silently praying. If I saw someone who knew me I would stop to chat for a bit, often learning of matters and crises that I could pray for later. I would get on the bus perhaps at one am and get home before two and very quickly roll into a bed.
I had a cat in those days, a grey and white long hair named Smokey. She was a gentle, friendly and loving presence. She became a neighbourhood cat. If I was upset or troubled, especially following a difficult night of ministry she would sit next to me on the arm of the chair, knowing not to climb onto my lap but to sit right by me in support. She was wonderful. I learned a lot from Smokey.
People often told me that I did carry a strong spiritual or sacred presence. As one wag put it, "You have an intense spirituality. And you frighten me." Even though I was found to be attractive by some it was this same presence of God that held many back, some of whom otherwise might have really tried to exploit me.
Altogether it was a difficult, intense and messy year. To this day I still believe that God did lead me into all this. I also made a lot of mistakes, some of which I might still be learning from.
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