Writer's block

The longer that I have lived, the more I have come to understand the old proverb that states "change is inevitable". I will never again be eighteen years old playing Sunday afternoon football with my brothers and friends in one of their backyards. However that does not mean that with the approach of fall each year, with the changing of the leaves on the maple trees and the first morning when I step out the door and see my own breath, that I will not be mentally transported to that huddle where eight or so young men in old high school jerseys debate the virtues of the "hail Mary" play. After living in Hamilton for four years I am much more aware of the difference in air quality between the steel city and Peterborough. In Hamilton the smell often forced me to brace myself as I stepped out the door in the morning and thus gave me an ample distraction from the nostalgic remembrance of the brittle feel that the first tackle of a football game brings in October.

However. this escape was not permanent, and on the way to school this week I passed a pickup football game in Nicholl's Oval. The shouts carried through the air, the first aromas of Northern Ontario fall and the motley coloured uniforms of the game all seemed to reach out and give a tug at the string attached to the section of my heart that still belongs to the thrill of only slightly organized sport.

This theme of change was carried from the street on the way to school right into the school building itself. My own classes are now filled with people who are interested in their courses and all of whom fully intend to be achieving A's on a regular basis. Quite the change from my first year Redeemer courses where attendance felt optional and homework was done on a need-to-hand-in basis.

This morning at ten minutes to nine I stepped into the lecture for a first year class that I will be leading tutorials for and sat with a few other TA's at the back of the lecture theatre in Ottonabee College. The contrast was immediately humorous as, for the next forty minutes, I observed the children of 1991-92 step into one of their first university courses ever. Some of them had laptops for msn and games, some had notebooks for doodling and a few showed up with nothing other than a friend to chat with in the event that the class was too slow for their liking. Very few of them appeared to be interested in the A's that had been so coveted in my class from the day before.

The nice thing about change is that regardless of how things are in life, you can always count on them changing in some way. This provides a vast array of opportunities for people to change themselves without upsetting the status quo of the world around them. As Brad said, going to a new school is a great time to grow a beard, because then everyone that you meet will know of you as a guy who "has always had a beard". Interesting thought. I think I will settle for a moustache. Needless to say, Laura said that I had better change my mind on the moustache or we will be having a change of living arrangements.
So I think that aesthetic change will be shelved for a while and get back to laundry. The need for change never ends.

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Now we know in part...

I don't know about the rest of you, but the last few days feel like a blur.

The weekend was spent entertaining Laura's little sister Kathleen who came to visit us from Hamilton. It was quite a whirlwind of visiting the zoo, shopping at Winners, walking up George Street and window shopping, watching ducks and picnicking at Del Crary Park. We sent Kathleen off at five a.m. Monday morning so that she could make it back to Redeemer for registration. Meanwhile Laura and I had registration of our own to deal with.

Laura dropped me off at Brad's apartment and Brad and I shouldered past intimidating kindergartners as we walked to Catherine Parr Traill College, Trent's graduate campus. We felt very similar to kindergartners ourselves as we walked with a great deal of uncertainty into our first day of grad school. The motto that Trent uses is taken from a text in 1 Corinthians 13 where Paul states that now he knows in part what he will one day know in full even as Christ knows us in full. How appropriate. It seemed that the longer I sat in that cramped, non-air-conditioned room, and the more explaining that was done about our role as teaching assistants, the more confused I became about how exactly I had managed to slip through the net and manage to get myself accepted to this position.

I have just begun to grasp the meaning of the impostor complex which apparently plagues the world of academia. My paranoia began to grow that, at every break time and as every new presenter began to speak, I would hear my name called and someone would tell me that there had been an unfortunate mistake and that I had actually not been accepted into this program and that I was barely qualified to enroll in a compulsory grade ten Canadian History class. After re-reading that last sentence seven times I am sure that they would be right.

Fortunately, various speakers, past TA's, teachers, prof's and others all confessed to these same symptoms and fears that are barely hidden under the surface of any academic speakers' professional exterior.

On the whole, Trent seems to be an alright place. Like all institutions that are well known for their scholarly reflection, Trent is situated along a gorgeous river, has a mouthwatering library of resources and a variety of good trees under which one might sit and contemplate the hospitality Trent has shown in providing three free luncheons, nachos and beer.

I have never been one to push my luck, but I think that this requires that I smooth my disheveled countenance, pick up my mask and resume the facade that I am, in fact qualified to be pursuing my M.A.

Tot ziens

Back in my day...

Today Laura and I went grocery shopping for our second week of groceries in Peterborough. Grocery shopping can be fun and it can also try our self control as we attempt to maintain our body weight while living on the paltry sum of fifty dollars a week. Thats right--five, zero. Today we both got a good laugh. After we had scoped the online sales ads, planned an attack strategy and escape route, we set off to buy a weeks worth of groceries. As we walked into No Frills, a man(considerably overweight) with his wife was lamenting to his daughter that, and I quote, "Twenty years ago we used to be able to live off of fifty dollars worth of groceries for a week..." Needlessly to say we barely made it past this gent before Laura burst into laughter. Now don't get me wrong, we would love to spend a hundred and fifty dollars a week on groceries but that is out of the budget... and ridiculous since we can make delicious meals while staying within our budget.

In the afternoon we put our apartment through what Laura has come to refer to as our "weekly cleaning". We are also cleaning because tomorrow Laura's sister Kathleen is coming to stay with us for the weekend. Not only are we trying to impress her with our great housekeeping, but we also have to entertain her for the weekend. This guarantees a trip to the zoo, maybe a walk down George Street and a visit to the Canoe Museum or Quaker Oats. I can only imagine that she will need a break after all of the excitement that Peterborough has to offer.

Just thinking of all that work has me ready for a nap.

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Fresh Paint

It is slowly beginning to sink in that in a week I will not be rejoining my friends and fellow students in the familiar halls of Redeemer University College as I have done for the past four years. I will not be forced to give 400-fifteen-word summaries of my summer to old acquaintances as hugs, handshakes and vacation experiences are swapped at the back-to-school BBQ.

Life will be quite different this year. New school, new town, new profs and strangest of all-new roommate.

Living with a girl is quite different from living with the boys at dorm 14, dorm 25 or Bridgeport. Laura has not invited me to go pranking, play pick-up hockey or get out of bed and watch the news at the ungodly hour of seven am. My apartment does not smell bad, there is no pile of dirty dishes covering most available surfaces and and I am not welcome to leave my contact case/toothpaste/razor out in the open on the bathroom counter. Additionally I have not eaten Kraft Dinner, Hamburger Helper or Pizza Pops yet and do not foresee any of those in the upcoming menu.

Moving into our new apartment was also strange. Unlike many other places I have lived, we cleaned everything, floor-to-ceiling, before we put things away. We also spent three days painting, three days organizing and countless hours re-cleaning. Laura still thinks that our house is dirty, messy and the pantry is grossly under-stocked. This makes me laugh. The apartment is already cleaner, homier, tidier, more organized and better stocked with food, than any place I have lived since leaving home for university.

That's as far as my coffee will get me this morning.

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