the first day, part one

The first day of school.

All I have to do is write this simple sentence and everyone will understand the complex connations associated with it.

I'm still reeling from my last day of summer, that being Labour Day. Well, not the actual last day of summer, but my free-wheeling days are over for now. On Sunday I got a call for R., who has been on a two week expedition in Cuba with his lovely girlfriend G. They had landed in Toronto, and I remembered that I offered them our place to crash when they arrived, which would be around midnight. Unfortunately, their flight was delayed, and they may miss the last bus into town. So, L. and I, while at a lovely barbecue (thanks J. and J.) decided that we would surprise our friends and show up at the airport to pick them up. After our soiree L. booked a car and we made our way to the airport. When R. and G. saw us at the arrival gate, the look on their faces was classic.

The next day, after a leisurely breakfast, and a stimulating conversation (any opportunity for me to talk about the anthropology of narrative building is a good one) they left for the Island. Oh, I should mention that when I say (write?) Island, I mean Vancouver Island.

While we were entertaining R. and G., my friend K. called and we arranged to get together and rebuild the fence in his backyard. The fence has the ardenous task of separating K.'s house with the alley, but the sucker is leaning so badly he has to tie it down like a overactive dog. Minutes after R. and G's departure, K. and T. came by to pick me up. K. and I dumpstered some two-by-fours from a demo site nearby, and set off to work: we removed the fence and re-nailed it, dug four holes (two for each side of the jamb, the posts were nearly composted), nailed the two-by-fours to each side of the posts, poured quick-dry concrete into the holes then refilled them. The job about three and half hours. We were dirty, tired, hungry, and had rebuilt a fence using second hand materials.