This Canada flag kinds of says it all about my country: a bit screwed up for now, but eventually it’ll unfold back into admirable functionality.

It’s my second annual Canada Day blog entry, and I have to say, the overall energy this year is shockingly different from last year, when everyone felt pretty defeated and deflated and despairing.  I couldn’t even write about the state of our country last year; instead, I said all I had to say with the header picture, and then went on to spend the entirety of the post talking about my top song of all time.  This year, however, we’re feeling a lot more pride about where we’re at, a lot more hopeful about where we’re going, and a lot more protective about our culture and regionality in general.  This was spawned by two things: An absolutely puerile, deranged U.S. president who kept joking / threatening to annex Canada (not even linking to that whole thing), and the fact that the statement-sock-wearing namby-pamby who we called a Prime Minister–yep, that guy in blackface–finally, finally got the hint that he was despised, and took an extraordinary hit to his ego and malignant narcissism by resigning.  He hasn’t been seen since March, and nobody has noticed / cared.

We now have someone who seems to be intelligent, competent, and effective, and yet also has a great sense of humour and good taste in music.  Time will tell.  The combination of these factors led this entire country to unite in shunning American products and encouraging the purchase of items that are made in Canada, which has been done with great enthusiasm and willingness.  Most of these goods have the “Made in Canada” label proudly displayed beneath them, and people are perfectly happy to select them over their Freedom and Liberty (big LOL) counterparts.  It’s nice to see that we all came together to hate Trump in the same way we came together to hate Trudeau; whatever it takes, I guess.  Canadians are a lot more petty than anyone gives us credit for.

These matters also spawned this “Elbows Up” slogan / campaign that was supposed to indicate we would never surrender, as though we were some kind of poutine-gobbling collection of toque-clad Winston Churchills, or at least a bunch of defiant Cory Harts, but it seems it was used for merchandise more than anything, because I don’t have a solitary fucking clue as to what that means.  I heard it’s connected to hockey somehow, but I have far more in-depth knowledge about the meteorological complexities of Northern Africa (i.e. it’s hot) than I do about hockey.  

There we have it.  Canada Day.  And I am staying in today, because not only is it way too warm out for my liking, but it’s going to be bonkers out there.  It already is, because I went to London Drugs for a SodaStream cartridge, and lower Davie Street was like Playland on half-off day (note: no such thing has yet happened).  If yesterday was any indication, today will be a day to test one’s ability to exist among other human beings without calmly grabbing a battery-operated immersion blender and terrorizing the city with it.  Instead, I went for a lovely, peaceful walk around part of the Seawall today at 7 a.m., which was, obviously, extremely healing.  

See, yesterday was a prelude to what would happen today, a national holiday with a temperature of 28 Celcius (that’s…I have no idea what that is in Farenheit; pull it together, America, everything about you is falling apart).  Yesterday was also a very hot day for early July, around the same temperature, and mid-afternoon after many tasks, I decided to hit the beach for the first time this year.  My beach, my favourite beach, Sunset Beach, the one I’m lucky enough to have right down the hill from me.  It’s a five-minute walk from here, and I love the place.  It’s the Prince Harry of beaches, the Spare, to English Bay’s Prince William, except Sunset Beach is very attractive, low-key, and doesn’t make life a living hell for those close to it.

That’s my part of the beach down there. Yes, MY part.

One thing I appreciate about Sunset Beach is the Vancouver Aquatic Centre, a Brutalist monstrosity just beneath Burrard Bridge that looks exactly the same from every angle: like an angry, beleaguered, neglected, imprisoned trapezoid.

The front of the Aquatic Centre.

The back. It’s the same.

The left side. For realsies, this is a feat of architecture.

The right si–okay, you get my point. IT’S ALL THE SAME.

Anyway, I shlepped down to the beach with my beach stuff, excited about breaking in my brand-new, electric-blue, retro-style bathing suit.  I usually have somewhat janky swimsuits because I don’t really care, but this year I felt I should get something aesthetically appealing.  Everyone at the beaches here–I’m not exaggerating, everyone–has a flawless body, as though they’ve been training all year just for this season, and they probably have.  So while I’m okay with how I look, I also decided I don’t want to wear my ragged bikini top from 2009 and my boy-short bottoms from 2005.  I’m growing up, folks.

The beach wasn’t particularly busy, as it never is, but there were a fair amount of broasting folks who had come out to enjoy the first truly hot day of the year.  Plenty of space was available, so I randomly took a blank spot on the sand a little bit closer to the water, because the first thing I wanted to do was have a dip.  Incidentally, I am usually one of just a few people who actually slosh into the water here and swim, and I have no idea why this is, but it’s always the perfect temperature and the 360 view while you’re paddling around is magnificent.

People, beachin’.

After shucking off my smock and having a delightful splorshing-around without getting granulated by a boat, I trudged back to my blanket to read, absorb the sun with some sunscreen, and relax.  Since it’s small and never as packed as English Bay or Kits Beach (God, I hate that place), going to Sunset Beach is generally a very peaceful experience.  

This lone pineapple on the beach says it all.

Well.

Of course the one spot I chose–the one spot on the entire beach–had to be the most intolerable, unbearable place I could have laid down my blanket.  

Person, bitchin’. Just you wait…

Three teenage girls were beside me.  They all had jangly silver jewelry, full-face makeup, perfectly flat teenage bellies, and the sort of long, fake talons that didn’t make a lick of sense to me, since this demographic texts more than anyone else, I would think.  I sometimes get fake nails, keep them short, and yet I still fuck up my messages so badly I just end up dictating them.

They did not stop speaking the entire time.  The entire time.  I have never heard people talk like this; nonstop yapping, predictable and interminable giggling, overlapping interjections, squealing exclamations of delight and amusement, and they did not take a single breath or break.  Not one.  And the strangest thing is, I have absolutely no idea what they were talking about.  It was as though they were speaking an entirely different language.  One of the only words I could make out was “fuckin’,” because all three of them used it at least once per nine seconds.  Now, I am no stranger to cursing; I use it sparingly in my writing (twice so far in this piece, which is far more than usual), but when I speak, I definitely swear more than I should.  I always say it balances out my eloquence–ahem–but I really need to get a grip.  However, even I was completely taken aback by how rough, unintelligent, and repetitive their use of this word was.  

Did I swear like this as a teen?  I thought to myself.  I can’t remember, it being a thousand years ago.  Perhaps I did.  Perhaps it was one of those things that we all did in extreme overkill because we discovered the shock of being able to use bad language and thought it made us cool, just like we thought smoking cigarettes turned us into instant badasses.  I honestly can’t recall.  But it was as though these girls were a record skipping on that one word:

“I’m so fuckin’ excited!” 

“That’s so fuckin’ cool.”

“He was like, fuckin’ [unintelligible].”

“Where’s the fuckin’ sunblock?”

“We should go to fuckin’ Coachella…I’m going to fuckin’ Coachella.”

“[Unintellgible] but I can’t, because I’m not fuckin’ nineteen yet.”

In between that one adjective was this ongoing conversation that, I’m telling you, made absolutely no sense to me.  I cracked open my book (Nick Hornby’s “How To Be Good,” which is extraordinary) and somehow lost myself in it for about fifteen minutes, everything else fading away.  When my back got too hot, I closed the book, and those girls were still carrying on in their high-pitched, excitable, faux-sophisticated way, never pausing, never stopping, and still making no sense.  I tried listening to them without being obvious, and I think I could make out something about “I kissed him once” and “I work at [unintelligible],” but it was like three people speaking rural Cantonese at exactly the same time, yet all understanding one another perfectly and keeping a permanent flow.

Reader, they didn’t shut up once.  Not even when all three of them flipped onto their stomachs simultaneously, as though rehearsed, which I admit I found somewhat impressive.  To make matters even worse (this isn’t even an I’m old and I hate the youths rant….uh, or maybe it is), they had a portable stereo and were playing this sort of generic, annoying, bland EDM stuff that was like incidental music in a show about teens going to a party.  At one point they all lightly sang some of the lyrics together, and then went back to shredding their young throats raw.  

I tried sitting up and staring at the water, watching the many boats go by.  I tried admiring the cute tykes stomping around in the shallow end with their parents holding their small hands.  I tried focusing on the many peaceful, perfect bodies around me, lightly snoozing in the warmth, while I happened to be in the one very spot that was occupied by a trio of unendurable prattlers.  I could not do any of those things successfully.  I packed up my stuff and left, thinking that there had to be a lesson in there somewhere.  There was.  It went: I am so glad I never had kids.  

* * * * *

Early that evening, probably around seven, I decided to go to the downtown library (one of my favourite places) to both return a book, and pick up one I had on hold.  The night was still young and lovely, the sun wasn’t a ball of heck in the sky, and it would be nice to pop down there.  I work there a lot–in fact, I have worked out of there since I was in college–and I am way past fond of the place.  It’s actually the library’s 30-year anniversary, and I think I’m going to write about it at some point.

Vancouver Public Library, Central Location: My haven and pal.

I don’t like walking through downtown at all for myriad reasons, but it’s unavoidable.  I have to do it almost every day, whether it’s going to the library or Skytrain or the gym, but I really don’t like it.  Nonetheless, I reckoned that a young-evening stroll to the VPL would be some brief and light activity as I ran an errand, so I left my West End apartment and made my usual way there, which happens to be smack-dab through the middle of downtown.  There’s no other way to get to the library from my place unless I want to do a complete circumference of the inner city, which would take me roughly an hour and fifteen minutes, as opposed to the twenty it takes to get there directly from where I live.  

I hit Burrard Street, and immediately regretted what I had set out to do.  

Because it had been a gorgeous day and it was right before the holiday, the city was packed.  Sidewalks were stuffed with groups and pairs of tourists clutching shopping bags, strolling families, collections of friends, people staring down at their phones and bumping into me (typical in this city), and more cars on the downtown streets than I ever usually see.  It was mayhem, at least to me, since I cannot bear crowds and I walk quickly, with purpose and direction.  As I tried to get to my destination, it was like a video game of the damned, with your heroine dodging and weaving and ducking and swerving among rubbernecking, meandering droids as she tried to reach the golden castle, or whatever happens in video games.  This is the most accurate way to sum up my walk from the tree-lined, peaceful streets of the West End through downtown.

I finally made it, absolutely drained, and returned / picked up my books.  Doesn’t matter what they are.  I realized I would have to do the exact same thing on my walk home, took a deep breath, and as I deftly maneuvered my way back, I decided the only way to deal with it was to do what I’m doing: Think of it as a quick story and write about it.  

Maybe not the best capture, but I promise you, it was like an ant farm.

So that was yesterday!  Do you think I’m going out there today?  For any reason?  You’re cute. 

…and I guess that’s it.  Thanks for letting me spout about Canada Day in my very own way.  I guess this was more about Canada Day Eve, but whatever.

Happy 158th birthday, you nerdy, amusing nation.  True north strong and free, indeed.  Now just explain to me what you mean about the elbows, because a nation of people walking around with them poking up into the air doesn’t really seem like an appropriate, dignified way to demonstrate to Trump that we mean Business.

Happily vented,

Nadya