when I was 23, my feet got eaten by the english channel. I queued for five hours at wimbledon to see the williams sisters play doubles. I received a graduate degree, saw a bald eagle and ate overpriced poutine in trafalgar square on canada day. I hopped a fence to escape an overzealous pony with an affinity for human flesh. I decided to like curry and take an ambiguous stance on black pudding.




I started playing the pipe organ. I took a train I thought was bound for sheffield and ended up in a small country village in northern england at one in the morning. I carved my first pumpkin and baked my first pecan pie. I played chicken with the tides in a part of scotland where the summer sun never really sets and slept in a hostel that had a graveyard in the garden. I learned to cross-country ski.




now I'm 24. it's time I set aside my childish ways and move on to bigger and better things. only problem is, I've already been chased around a field by a maneating pony and eaten congealed blood, and it doesn't get much better than that.




of course, that's what I thought when I was five and my sister and I would hide behind the living room chair to eat the homemade chocolate suckers we'd stolen from the cupboard. the ones our mom meant to send away to the kids in orphanages. my sense of morality has developed throughout the past 19 years, I think. hope. though those chocolates were fantabulous. yummers. especially the pink and green ones. love white chocolate.


happy birthday to me.