The Scene and Herd

What about Bob is a really great movie.

The Blockbuster across the street doesn’t carry it (which is probably why Blockbuster is going out of business) so I haven’t seen it all that recently, but I’ve always remembered when Richard Dreyfuss tells Bill Murray to take a vacation from his problems. Every vacation should be, in essence, a vacation from your problems, right? And yet, to have it put that way is somehow appealing because it makes a vacation seem so accessible, a personal decision that no one can interfere with. All you have to do is declare that you are taking a vacation from your problems and then you’re on vacation.

I love vacations. I know everyone loves vacations but I love them more. I think about vacations fifty percent of the time and I don’t even have a job. When I was a kid I would get hella depressed to the point of tears on the last night of Christmas vacation. After two weeks of family togetherness I didn’t want to splinter back into the real world and go back to school. I wanted to stay home with my brothers. During summer vacation, before I was even in kindergarten, I would ask my parents every single day if my brother, Adam, had to go back to school tomorrow or the day after or the day after. Whenever it was that his summer vacation was going to end, I was going to need a lot of notice to prepare accordingly.

Now, a strike is a tricky business. A strike allows participants to avoid going to work, and it is certainly a change from the everyday, so it is kind of like a vacation. But it leads to disorder. A strike is a vacation of problems, which is why this summer’s municipal workers’ strike has got me all messed up in the head.

Last Wednesday night, Dupont Street dutifully lugged six weeks worth of trash, recycling and compost to the curbside. It sat there, expectantly, for two days before the garbage truck chugged along overnight and collected everything but the recycling, which is still sitting out there three days later. It appears the whole street has collectively decided to not risk pulling the recycling back in off the curb, just in case the truck makes an unscheduled return. Furthermore, everything smells bad because the compost leaked onto the sidewalks and the streets.

In the past six weeks, I haven’t been taking the recycling out that often because there’s no space outside. Since the bottles are piling up in the kitchen, I stopped doing the dishes unless I really have to. We have a fruit fly problem. The compost is full so my fridge is a disaster because I’d rather old food pile up in a cold refrigerator than sit in the sun beside the porch. I also stopped cleaning my room, going for a morning run and writing any blog entries. These last three have nothing to do with trash collection, but when the city is a mess and the kitchen is a mess, I really can’t feel responsible for anything. In short, I’ve neglected all my regular duties because I’m on a vacation of problems. The whole city is on a vacation of problems and it feels very familial. I’ve a real solidarity with my neighbours in these chaotic last days of this grimy situation. It’s almost enough to make me wish the strike would go on just a little while longer. I don’t want us to go back to school tomorrow, you know?