Adirondack
Xe is relaxing in a green-painted wooden Adirondack chair on his green-stained patio he built last summer. Well, he designed it, the guys built it, but his wife’s family, particular all her younger male cousins were surprisingly gutsy and helpful. Why does he feel like he was never that capable of any movement that could be described as agile? And if he wasn’t then… odds are…
Xe looks down at his increasingly pronounced gut and sighs, then takes another swig of this bold refreshing 6.5% Canadian beer he’s holding that probably isn’t helping with the belly but definitely does wonders for the existential ennui and fear of aging it generates! He sips again and it’s so bitter and cold it’s sweet. Agh. Nothing like sipping ice cold beer after a day at work, sitting on your patio, looking at the sunset thinking about how — it never meant as much to him to be Canadian as it has this last little while. Most of our countrymen’s attention has been on domestic problems, or on foreign powers threatening our friends. To have, at any stage, stepped forward and suggested that Canada needed to be prepared for a fascist takeover of a country that spent the last hundred years assuring other countries of their territorial integrity in the face of “might makes right” authoritarian tyranny, they would have laughed. Crazy people predicted shit like that, and that’s all.
Xe lifts his bottle, here’s to you, stop being wrong all the time except when you’re not, ya loonies! We never know when to ignore you!
Pouring out a little of drip of the bottle in a private gesture he doesn’t acknowledge further and thinking ‘rest in peace’ before downing the rest of the beer and setting the dark brown bottle down. What does it mean, to be Canadian?
It used to be something we were proud to leave undefined. When asked for what most Canadians considered our cultural shorthand equivalent to, “As American as apple pie!” the bubble sort brought us, “As Canadian… as is reasonable, under the circumstances.” And until recently, mouth-breathers had even started proudly putting “F*** [political candidate]” stickers on their rear windshield like their houses all had carbon monoxide leaks. Bro, it’s not a team, these are serious discussions about policy. If you’re interested… learn about it for real. Not politics. Laws. How they’re made, why they fail, what was even being attempted. The person he imagined would have gone into politics gave up on life so — shit, make a note to mention that his therapist. What time is it? Oh he’s a little buzzed. That’s why he said that. Right. Belligerent. Woo! Courage enbouteillé!
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No, on the real, he holds politicians up to a certain standard. Essentially a, regardless of political affiliation and without the scandals, Bill Clinton level of understanding shit. Not the going on and on, and not the using words to make it seem like he knew what was going on, just the vast amount of what seemed like very accessible and concrete knowledge. A problem wasn’t just a blob, if you hear the way a very smart politician breaks down the issue, if they’re being candid, it’s a traffic jam with multiple overlaps, and to get one car out, or really get anywhere on anything, you have to politely ask some to move, shove others, call in favours, look for opportunities, be tricksy and false, and lastly, want to win very very badly. Nobody is dedicating the money, time and effort required to succeed at unjamming anything to make something happen unless they expect a worthwhile return… which hopefully isn’t always money but…
Donald Glover and every other talented son of Jehovah's Witnesses warned us about the nature of America. We were too busy seeing them co-opted by a media system that turns all protest into commerce. “Down with the government” isn’t a subversive statement, no! It’s… a great way to move merch! And once you have a shirt that says it, there’s no real need to… revisit the issue, right? They know where you stand.
He was one of those that would have told you, Americans aren’t the kind of people who would let this happen. They’re dumb, but, they’re not that dumb, right? are going to be the famous cursed words on the lips of many an ally in the next few months. But it was never about intelligence.
Most Canadians believed most Americans had too much integrity to treat a brother this way.
Xe sips again, having collected the bottle by its neck with his fingers, fantasizing about — a brighter… future, or some happy shit. Or just a less depressingly historically predictable present. So sad that we do it to ourselves, you know? Your dogs in coffins, his dogs in coffins. Neighbour hating neighbour. That’s what this is. One more reminder that was never needed of how high the cost can be… when you break a best friend’s trust.
That’s what really hurts. That you do it to yourself. You know, you know.
