Nous Avons Mangé Tout

Rebekah and I spent the long weekend in Montreal. After the week from hell (G license driving test, hearing about my Concordia rejection/acceptance, doctor's appointment, Starbucks slowly turning into Degrassi) we decided enough for enough and left Ontario behind, through basically every mode of transportation we could. We drove, trained, walked, bussed, and cabbed,  finally to arrive at the new McGill residence, our home base for the whole trip. We were pretty tired, but we hadn't crossed borders to sit in a hotel room, so after a few yoga flows (me) and a few wardrobe changes (us) we went out on the town.  We walked through the beautiful Parc du Mont-Royal, and ogled all the people there. It's probably confirmation bias, but Montreal has a population of beautiful, stylish young people. Attempts to tally the number of lookers we saw failed en masse. Maybe everyone just looks extra beautiful in long weekend sunshine.

That night, after a dinner in a deli on Rue. Ste. Catherine, we were getting ready to go out and party in the Village. We'd scoped a couple of bars to go dancing. As we changed and smeared ourselves with makeup, I heard something over the French chatter on the TV. I walked to the window, looking out into the night and saw legions of students filling and marching up the street. We're talking hundreds of angry, sign holding, chanting, ON THE MARCH young people, protesting the tuition hikes that are set to happen in the province. It wasn't that I was frightened, I'd seen the marches on the news, but when I saw a metro bus of cops in riot gear go by shortly after the parade had passed, needless to say we knew we were in for an adventurous night on the town, and an overall trip.

The only thing you need to know about the night out is that we hit a bar called Unity. Aptly named, it was filled with all kinds of people, rocking out, having a good time, whether it be on one of the two dance floors or on the patio on the rooftop. Oh yeah, and then shortly after midnight,  a couple of adorable faced guys took the stage and did this AMAZING lip sync/synchronized dance number to "I'm Glad You Came" by the Wanted, who I don't give a damn about, but damn if this wasn't awesome. Bek and I seemed more excited about this than ANYONE else in the room. Jaded Francophones? We cabbed home, dodging labyrinths made up of cop cars, showered and passed out with that bloody song in our heads.

 The next morning, We ordered fresh croissants en Francais, and realized just how much practice we would really need before we became any shade of fluent.

 The details of the whole trip would take me quite some time to write about, so I'll keep it brief. We shopped, and bought things.  We ate Schwartz's, this amazing deli on St.Denis, we took in 'Lawrence, Anyways' the latest film by my favourite Canadian director, Xavier Dolan. We ran around the floors of the residence in search of late night snacks and ran into Neil Patrick Harris. (Sort of.) We hit the waterfront. We walked almost EVERYWHERE, and we barely had a moment to sit down.

Overall, the trip was so awsome, it was only a matter of time before Murphy's law gave us our due. Our bus got stuck in bumper to bumper traffic on the way home. People-getting-out-of-their-cars-to-play-catch delayed. Then, at the bus station in Kingston, the coachline moved our entire bus onto a different bus. The only problem being the second bus had LESS seats than the  first. So who got stuck, stranded while the bus companies sorted it all out? Yours truly, of course. Then, our new ride was sweltering hot, like...Moksha Yoga hot, and we rolled into Toronto just after 11 o'clock, 2 hours behind schedule. We got back to the car and drove home. I passed out after 1:30AM. Oh yeah, but I OPENED at Starbucks the next day so I was up and at 'em by 4:15AM. WOO.

The whole time in Montreal I was thinking, could I live here? Work here? Function here? Rebuild a life? Trying to stay objective without dreams of poutine, iced tea and the high life clouding your vision is harder than it seems.

Answer: Tentative yes.
I've even cleared up some of the mythology around my admission offer. Oui oui, English Literature is like studying for an English degree at another university. No, my degree won't be affected by the "mature" status of my entrance. 

In terms of the future: BA (English Literature) + Professional Writing (Skill set) + Experience = WRITING JOB. SOLID THEORY.

Now it's about 70-30 in favour of me going. What's holding me back now isn't the money, or the trips I won't be taking because I'll be in school and broke. It's the idea of dropping life as I know it and picking it up elsewhere. As many times as I've felt stuck in Waterloo, or that I would give it all to  run in the opposite direction for a new chance, now that I've kind of got the opportunity in my lap like a pet bear, I'm wondering if it's going to love me when it wakes up from hibernating or maul me beyond recognition.

FIN.