Week 22, 2026: Full-size toiletries
Listening to this AXWN set while I type up my weeknotes. Sorry it's so late.
My lockscreen and I are still getting used to my new post-hibernation era where I’m styling my curls and wearing make-up again. It often tells me that it has no idea who I am and says it will in fact need me to enter my extremely long password. Someone saw me type it at the till while uttering a million apologies and said are you writing an essay?
That’s to say, I’m getting around the town and meeting people. Nearly everyone I talked to this past week was a person I hadn’t met before. That will probably be the case for a while. I don’t mind. I keep meeting people of such a wonderful caliber.
I met up with JK's cousin at a park. It was a sunny day and he had a sparkling water can waiting for me. There were kids behind him playing baseball and everyone around us was in shorts and sunglasses, smiling big because the sun was out. He attentively listened to everything I had to say and I was continually impressed by how much he knew about the world. Later, when I asked him about his memories with JK, it made me emotional to think of my friend as a small child. A part of me wishes we knew each other then but it’s okay because I know her now and I can work on knowing her until one of us drops dead. Her cousin said he’d like to have me over for dinner sometime and I said I’d like that too.
On my hour-and-a-half walk home, I passed by several places that were open late. Comedy clubs and pottery classes and tattoo shops. He called Toronto the greatest city in the world and I had the words swimming in my head while I looked around me, hands in pocket. Someone else would later call it the greatest city in North America, and I’d sit with that too.
I was meant to meet Zoe at the bohemian teahouse and I was early. I went in at five to six to grab a table when the guy who worked there told me I couldn’t stay long because of an event that was about to start. While asking him clarifying questions, I suddenly found Zoe standing next to me asking him some more. I knew it was her because I had seen her Yo La Tengo covers but wondered if she knew it was me because she was meeting me sight unseen. It wasn’t until she said I’m supposed to be meeting someone here that I had my answer. Yes, I quipped, it’s me.
We hugged hello, then sped-walked to another spot a few blocks away, where it was silly easy to talk for three hours while sipping a coconut concoction. She took me to one of her favourite bookstores afterwards and I quietly watched as she asked the bookseller how business was going and they conversed about the terrible winter that’s now behind us. I kept thinking of more questions to ask her on the way home but settled for telling her that I’d love to keep hanging out. She’s the first person I met through Bear and I massively lucked out.
Friday was hard. Or, an amalgamation of small hard things. I accidentally locked myself inside a bathroom. I received confusing news. I wore my nice new flats to a date where we ended up walking for hours and I was not in the right mindset to share that I was in spellbinding pain. It was my first first-date in years. We had picked up drinks from an espresso bar and J wanted to check out the coyotes trail. She wasn’t sure how to feel about my iced sparkling lemon americano but I think we both hated it. We talked about the novel she’s working on and the collage-making parties she likes to throw. I can’t remember if I said anything interesting, only that I left not knowing how she felt about me.
I moved house on the weekend. I’m now in a real flat and own full-size toiletries. I woke up early, having slept late, to a room that needed immediate packing. My flatmate came over to help move me into our new flat. He brought the suitcases downstairs and loaded them into the Uber while I profusely thanked him. I sat next to the driver and he jumped in the back. She was very friendly, the driver. We talked about henna artistry, Venice boats and the terrible winter that’s now behind us. It was mostly just us two chatting, though I tried to bring in Steve a few times.
In the East End flat, I unpacked everything while on a video call with my mother. There was this sinking feeling in my chest, even though I had just experienced the warmest welcome. Steve heated us pizzas and I followed that up with a nice shower. I looked around my new room and couldn’t shake off the exhaustion and lonesomeness. The first night in the new bed is always tricky.
It was a little better the next day. I wished my mother a happy birthday and made a note to look into mattress toppers. The TTC delays meant I was thirty-minutes late to my date with A. She took it okay, even though she’s from the part of Europe that’s not lenient with tardiness.
There were a few location changes, the pizzeria and the park and the nice Mexican place with the back patio. It was seven hours, after all. Seven hours, and lunch became dinner. In the pizzeria, we talked about the places we lived and how we both ended up here for a similar reason. I showed her my cheese rankings list when we were sitting on the grass and she said I’m surprised by how many opinions I have about this list. We talked about writing while sharing nachos on the patio. Will you mention me?, she asked, and I showed her the time on my lockscreen to warm up to confessing yes it’s inevitable. She did a fist pump.