Memories Here & There

[dotinthesky]

The guy who books my tickets to Brasil used to sleep with a gun underneath his pillow. I know this because his mother-in-law is my mom's best friend. I once had to spend the night in a hotel in Sao Paulo because he'd booked my connecting flight to Londrina the day after I arrived. I was very pissed off. We still use that travel agency because friendships are sometimes thicker than blood.

When I was a kid, my father would sometimes take my brother and I camping near the sea during Summer. We'd spend the whole day at the beach and, at night, I'd read Agatha Christie novels inside the tent until the mosquitoes got the best of me.

When I started smoking pot in high school, I'd make my best friends (Karla, Sue, Susannah and Janet -- yup I was the only boy) watch Siouxsie and the Banshees videos. I thought they were the trippiest videos ever; they laughed at Siouxsie and said she was Robert Smith in drag. I got my revenge when Karla was spooked by the skeleton dancing in the video for "Cities in Dust".

I did mushrooms for the first time in Janet's dorm room in McGill University. She played Abba and I felt like the music was coming to me from another planet. Then I cried during Tracy Chapman's "Drive".

When Kevin and I moved to London, we lived in hostels for two weeks. It was a week exactly after 9/11 and there was a young american student, Aaron, in our room. I still dont' know if he figured out we were a couple. He'd go jogging in Hyde Park in the morning, wear a shirt and tie to the theatre (which he would attend by himself); he was from Albuquerque, New Mexico, and he had native blood.

Comments

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

I thought you might like it. It's the kind of entry you write! ;-)

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

I didn't feel like writing about my boring work day, so I figured it would be nice to put these memories down.

[missfairchild.livejournal.com]

This post is lovely and is going into memories :o)

[missfairchild.livejournal.com]

Gosh. We fetched up in London at the same time, to the day. I find it hard to believe that it's more than four years ago - do you?

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

Did you move straight into a place of your own, or with other people? I am scared sometimes of how fast time has flown since I've been here... but I guess that's just life. I love the fact that London is no longer the labyrinth that it used to be when we first arrived. At first, I always felt disoriented when I'd climb out of the Tube.

[amanda-mary.livejournal.com]

I, like others, think this entry is magnificent.

If you don't mind me asking (since I'm relatively new here), where did you grow up?

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

I'll write one day a post explaining everything (which will be helpful for all the new people who add me). Here's a condensed version: I was born to an English father and a Brasilian mother in South Africa. When I was six, we moved to Brasil, where we lived until I was 16. My dad was suddenly promoted and we moved to Singapore, where we lived for a year and a half before moving to Hong Kong. Lived there for two years and finished high school. Went then to Montreal for university, stayed there for five years, met my boyfriend, and then had to leave because my student visa expired. Went back to Brasil for one year, saved money and moved with boyfriend to London (he has an irish father, so he had the passport to work) and have been here ever since (four years and a half). Phew!

[lelapin.livejournal.com]

that's so cool! i'm totally jealous. i've never left america.

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

Which country, or countries, would you like to visit when you can travel?

[lelapin.livejournal.com]

i don't really know! maybe iceland, japan, france, or colombia...

[purplethings.livejournal.com]

I cry at Tracy Chapman's songs even when I'm not high on anything. She is just so good and... real.

I always like your posts, even when I don't reply :)

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

Thanks baby! I remember a friend of mine in the 80s who lived beside a Tracy Chapman fan. This neighbour would play her album on repeat, so those were always in the background when I'd go visit him.

[bandaloop.livejournal.com]

You shroomed at McGill - Oh do I have a story about McGill! :) You went to McGill? Excellent! On other fronts, so far so good with the house sale... and I have a lot to do this afternoon....

I love Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Cure! ( I had to look up Smith's band - my brain is so usless ) I saw them here back 4-5 years ago. It was great gig! That's it I'm going to open the box with my CDs and listen to the Cure! After I gog to the store and get another beer! :)

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

I love those two bands too. People said I would grow out of them after high school, but they were wrong.

I did my BA in Concordia university, but had friends who went to McGill. Also, once I was finished with my BA I did a 6-month intensive french course in McGill. So, yeah, in a way I did go to McGill.

What's your story about McGill?

[bandaloop.livejournal.com]

Ps - I love the Deprivation Tank Avatar!

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

It's a swimming avatar! :-)

[msanthropist.livejournal.com]

I stayed in a hostel in London for 10 days when I visited...only had to share a room with my traveling companion though, but - what a hole!No wonder it was so cheap!!!

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

Was it near Bayswater Tube by any chance?

[beeorkendurkey.livejournal.com]

yes. what they said. and things.

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

Boys Briefs 2. here. and things.

[msanthropist.livejournal.com]

I never cried on shrooms. Only always laughed so hard and long my face always hurt the next day from my "perma-grin"! I don't know Tracy Chapman's "Drive", how's it go, lyric-wise? I use to play her debut album when it first came out over and over again and the guy I was dating felt like I was torturing him when he'd hear it! "How can you listen to this shit?!" I loved it-all of it! I discovered Robert Cray at around the same time and was given to listening to a lot of Sade and Berlin, Indigo Girls, stuff like that...we broke up...(he was more into classic rock like a lot of Beatles, Grateful Dead, Zeppelin, which I also loved but...

[aeonflux.livejournal.com]

You DO TOO know Tracy Chapman's drive, you have the album it's on. It goes, "Remember when we were driving, driving in your car. Speeds so fast I thought I was drunk. And I-ee-I had a feeling that I belonged. And I-ee-I had a feeling I could be someone, be someone." In it, she's talking about how she has to quit school to take care of her father and how she just wants to escape. It makes me cry too.

[copscopulating.livejournal.com]

siouxsie is the best

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

She really is.

pictures from london

[saint-narcissus.livejournal.com]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/74055219@N00/

Ollie, the group of drag queens & freaks from the pub I work at were in London for the film festival/ movie about "tranny shack". here are some photos. I performed with this group last night at SFMOMA, twas absurd!
have a wondrous weekend!
xo -david

Re: pictures from london

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

Those photos look wicked! Are there any, somewhere else, with you in then?

Have a wondrous weekend yourself!

Re: pictures from london

[saint-narcissus.livejournal.com]

yup, i'll find link and send it to you!

-david

Nice quote

[(Anonymous)]

Term, holidays, term, holidays, till we leave school, and then work, work,
work till we die.
-- C.S. Lewis


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Hello

[(Anonymous)]

I'm new here, just wanted to say hello and introduce myself.