The Canadian Writers' Collective

Writing, and writerly tangents

Friday, October 03, 2008

A Dog, Happiness and Even a Book

I have this haircut. It’s not difficult to maintain, but it does require that I do one thing. After I shower, I must comb out the bangs. Which explains why I didn’t shower today: I didn’t feel I could—my comb was in the garbage, after having been fished out of the toilet, where it had been dropped by the youngest member of my household, my son. So it was, that this morning, when his father realized that he was running late and that he couldn’t, as usual, do the daycare drop-off, that I went out into the streets of my oppressively stylish neighbourhood, unwashed and uncombed, pulling a sniffly-nosed four-year-old in a squeaky red wagon. With any luck, I wouldn’t run into anyone I knew. We made it one and half blocks. It was in the sun on the corner outside of the drugstore that I was planning to hit for a comb as soon as it opened at 9 o’clock, that I saw her: my art crush, Heather O’Neill, walking a dog and looking gorgeous. I had to turn away. It was too dazzling, it was too much. And my question, for those of you who can relate to the experience of losing a comb and foregoing a shower only to turn a corner and run into a grinning idol, is how should this be handled? I'd like to take it as a good omen, a sign that we might all one day have a dog, happiness and even a book. I hope that this is not too presumptuous.

14 Comments:

Blogger Sandra Cormier said...

Every time I decide to put out the recycling in my pajamas, that's when a dozen cars decide to zoom by. Erk.

Fri Oct 03, 10:09:00 pm GMT-4  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Chumplet, that's exactly the feeling!

Anne, who needs to change her blogger password

Sat Oct 04, 08:54:00 am GMT-4  
Blogger ad said...

It was inevitable really... but I understand your reaction. I have a crush on Heather O'Neill too...

Sat Oct 04, 09:50:00 am GMT-4  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I thought you might. Probably there are legions of us out there.

p.s. This morning I put moisturizer on my face only to realize that it had been infected with little-girl sparkle from a Hannah Montana lip gloss. I look very 1994. Hope that I don't run into any authors that I admire today.

Sat Oct 04, 11:17:00 am GMT-4  
Blogger Tricia Dower said...

Glad to see you back, Anne!

Sat Oct 04, 11:18:00 am GMT-4  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I almost didn't make it for this post, Tricia. But thank you!

Sat Oct 04, 11:21:00 am GMT-4  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I just crossed paths with Rawi Hage, but I haven't read his books yet, so I don't know if I needed to worry or not about the state of my bangs.

Sat Oct 04, 03:12:00 pm GMT-4  
Blogger Andrew Tibbetts said...

At my disastrous reading this summer, in the audience was Jackie Burroughs, my favourite actress (A Winter Tan, Careless, Tales of the City). She smiled at me. Before the disastrous reading.

Just this week I saw her again on the street and she smiled. As if she has forgotten the whole sordid mess! And I'd thought that maybe she'd convinced herself never to leave the house again for fear that she might have to endure anything so awful. I've never been happier to have made no lasting impression. (I do believe that my hair was nice, however!)

Love me some Anne Chudobiak!!!

Sun Oct 05, 08:39:00 pm GMT-4  
Blogger TJL said...

That's why living in Verdun wasn't seem so bad!

Mon Oct 06, 02:53:00 am GMT-4  
Blogger ad said...

Rawi Hage doesn't look like a bangs-fixator. I think you're safe... for now.

Mon Oct 06, 03:58:00 pm GMT-4  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

What? Some people don't fixate on bangs? I don't believe it.

Mon Oct 06, 04:26:00 pm GMT-4  
Blogger ad said...

I'm combing mine right now...

Mon Oct 06, 04:55:00 pm GMT-4  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Take care of those bangs, I say. They begat mine!

Mon Oct 06, 06:30:00 pm GMT-4  
Blogger Sandra Cormier said...

When I was about ten years old, my mom cut my bangs so short everyone could see my unibrow. I was devestated. Gosh, I remember it so vividly forty years later...

Oh, crap! She even sent me to the store right afterwards! Gawd!

Wed Oct 08, 08:37:00 pm GMT-4  

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