Carbon Operator

After ten minutes of unsuccessfully trying to satisfy the captured Athenian women in God of War: Chains of Olympus I started to feel a newfound sympathy for the heterosexual male, until I remembered that I have never kicked anyone off of the bed for incorrect input.

The 401 is a legendary highway that runs along southern Ontario and Quebec. It is the lifeblood of the greater Toronto area, and it connects my hometown of Kingston to Toronto. My family used to make frequent trips to Toronto in my youth to visit relatives or Canada’s Wonderland. Later, in my teen years my friends and I used to drive up to go see concerts, go soak in Queen West’s hipness, or hit the similarly legendary comics shop The Beguiling in Mirvish Village. There was always a perverse sense of optimism connected to passing the “401 WEST” sign on the ramp, plus it’s a lovely stretch of road.

My host in Toronto, a friend of hers and I went back to Kingston today for some poutine and Vietnamese food, and to see what had changed. It rained the whole time, making the whole presentation beautifully bleak. A lot of the stores have gone under or moved. The building I used to live in downtown has been remade into an eyesore. My hairdresser has done quite well for himself.

I had a chance encounter with some old friends, and some of the news left me conflicted. I’ve been sitting browsing things I shouldn’t be for the past few hours. Maybe I should have left well enough alone but it’s becoming clear to me that getting my next job is probably going to take longer than I can reasonably expect to surf the air mattress waiting for me in the next room. I had to investigate my options.

There was something I wrote about the place and people there in a line of dialogue for a screenplay a long time ago, and it has held more true than I would ever have wanted. I had good times in Kingston, and I had some of the worst; and I had to do desperate things to get as far away as I did. They say you never really leave Kingston, and if you can you’ll never stay away, for the ones who are lucky enough to even get out. Some of the shop fronts have changed since I last set foot in the place over the holiday season of 2001; but it also appears that time is marching as slowly as ever. Adding to the problem is the fact that history has started repeating itself but I won’t be getting caught up in that madness this time.

Eight days ago I left my home to return home, and today I went home. I don’t know how to feel about it.

It appears that the Toronto chapter of the IGDA may be more active here than the video game industry itself, judging by the turnout at last night’s monthly social gathering.

As the familiarity of my homeland is sinking in I am still finding in hard to believe that I was in Texas yesterday. This morning hit me particularly hard, because nothing here is mine, and my place among these things is makeshift at best. Spending the night having my face swatted at by one of my all-too-gracious host’s fur demons didn’t help.

The next task is finding a job and finding myself a new place, wherever it may be. I’ll be getting myself a new phone number tomorrow. I did a lot of panicking before the move, and wonder if that is what helped the flight, trip through customs and arrival in Toronto go so smoothly for me; or if I simply did a lot of worrying for nothing.

I have to find myself a new job as soon as possible, but the question is what is between now and my eventual success? I think of the box of Smarties I had earlier and know that the answer is fear itself.

They taste remarkably the same.