The coloured lights still festoon my window. They adorn the lower half like a cretinous multi-hued smile. A Christmas smile. They have been up since the Sixth of December, St. Nicholas' Day, the beginning of Christmas. I sometimes sleep with them on, or lying awake like a superannuated baby lying in his crib staring at a coloured fish mobile.
I watched and guarded and scrutinized myself throughout this month of December, knowing that depression would be lurking in the shadows, a hungry leopard ready to pounce. I watched, I waited. It didn't come. Now it is New Year's Eve. Still no depression.
I haven't had an extraordinary Christmas. The early weeks of the month I dedicated to decluttering and cleaning and to include in my daily routine extra cleaning duties to make my place fit for company. Then I proceeded to invite people. My friends from Mexico for dinner, then for coffee, then my friend from Peru for dinner, then a Canadian friend for tea and dinner, then my Mexican friends again for brunch Christmas Day.
That was my Christmas Day, before going to work. I spent the afternoon and had dinner in the small psychiatric facility where I work. This works well for me since my friends never have time for me Christmas Day and my family is either dead or missing. Christmas Eve was very quiet, spent watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas on Youtube, baking cookies and preparing the bread pudding for brunch on Christmas Day. I went for a long walk after dinner at work and spent the balance of the evening at home alone. Boxing Day I attended the Open House of La Sombra Pesada, formerly known as La Bella Luz. It was difficult and some of her friends are people who have caused me a lot of pain. She did not approve of the way I blogged about her dear little idiots afterward and when I refused to apologize ended our friendship.
That was yesterday. I am still watching for the dark grey beast of depression but I feel fine. Not even my ex-friend has been able to summon it forth. I had a good one and a half hour nap this evening just following dinner. I didn't want to move. Sleep wasn't great last night though it wasn't that bad. I felt needed and my services well used to day. Beyond that I'm not divulging anything. Client confidentiality you know.
They say the Northern Lights are going to appear over Vancouver tonight but I am undecided about braving the cold outside. We had an earthquake Tuesday night, the anniversary of my Christian conversion. At 11:30 or so I was jolted awake but thought I'd merely had a bad dream. I lay awake then checked the twelve o'clock news. There was an earthquake. A mild one. Only a small photograph of Mother Teresa tucked behind the posthumous portrait of my mother I painted in 2007 had fallen to the floor. I quietly dismissed from my mind any fear of aftershock (unlikely following a mild earth movement) or anything worse happening, then slowly found my way back to the chambers of slumber. I was annoyed that the quake happened late at night on a week day. I did have to get to work in the morning but the tectonic plates don't seem to know or care anything about our artificial rhythms of life. If a major quake has to occur it should be in early summer at ten am on a Monday. Absolutely no consideration or good manners from these quarters!
Of course I'm spending this evening home alone. This has become typical. I'm not sad about it and I'm not feeling sorry for myself. Social isolation is a fact of life in Vancouver, this Dumb Blonde of Canadian cities. I will likely stay indoors, finish writing this drivel, listen to the Ideas program on CBC Radio One, work on a painting and watch on Youtube the last part of a film version of the Count of Monte Cristo in Spanish dubbing. Then I'll read a bit of two different novels: in English Timothy Findley's Headhunter, and in Spanish a translation of Sieg Larrson's Millenium trilogy. I have tonnes of books in my home library (more than six hundred) and less than ten percent have I read. Tomorrow I have friends coming for dinner. They speak English as a second language and I am now going to more diligently read my English language novels so I can pass them on to my friends from Mexico. Reading novels in a second language is great for growing in your adoptive language.
This is my way of celebrating New Year's Eve.
I expect to be in bed by or before midnight. There is going to be a fireworks display at midnight but I've seen plenty of fireworks in my time. It's cold out, it'll be noisy and crowded and really for me it's just another night. I don't make New Year's resolutions. I try to make and live out my resolutions throughout the year. I find this method very effective.
Happy New Year everyone!
please pass this on to a few others.
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