Through Absence

I've long been absent. I'd run away, with some stolen summer, hiding for 9 days in Vancouver. If you're thinking it's not summer in Vancouver right now, it's winter, well you'd be right. It wasn't the weather, it was the warmth of friendship; of good conversation, happiness, love.

Here's a post I'd written before leaving but had no time to publish:

Christmas is in the air. I can feel it through absence. The streets are bare, like a Christmas tree without ornaments. Wreaths, red ribbons and twinkling lights adorn windows and doorsteps like flowers in blushing bloom. Then there's the occasional snowman or reindeer, a penguin wearing a santa hat, all of them staring out with glee into empty space.

There's an idea for a really bad horror movie: Rudolph's Revenge, The Abominable Snowman, The Punishing Penguin; inflatable Christmas decorations that embark on a murderous killing spree, savagely extinguishing an entire small town in rural Arkansas. At the apogee of the climax, Rudolph, his red nose bright with the blood of the innocent, a demented glazed-over look in his eye as he sings "I'll go down in his-to-ry," while he gores the town sheriff with his plastic inflatable antlers.

Tomorrow I leave for Vancouver, to spend time with a few friends. It'll be fun. I've never taken an international flight before, but boy am I happy I shaved my beard before this journey. Imagine all of the harassment and inconvenience I'd be subjected to with that pubey tumbleweed on my jaw. I fear it won't save me from my passport photo though. I look like a pedophile; reminiscent of a younger scruffy-haired Pee-Wee Herman. It's truly heinous. When they ask me why I'm traveling I'll just do that laugh Pee-Wee used to do, the one that sounds like an old bicycle horn. Surely that'll allay any lingering suspicions.