Magdalena O!

his office, 2005

I came to see my grandpa in Poland because he had developed Alzheimer’s and it happened quickly and he was probably going to die in the next week. The first day I was there, we talked and hugged a lot and he spoke really lucidly so I didn’t think it would be such a big deal. He seemed so enthusiastic about everything and had his charming sharp memory. The next day we woke up and his eyes started getting shifty and his enthusiasm was more erratic, even though he was able to hold conversations, he would get distracted. “Oh wow, look at that pattern on the window curtain, it’s so bright,” he would say, go up to it and fixate his gaze. I started crying, and I would hold him and tug on his shoulders. Then in the evening I realized he hadn’t eaten so I tried to bring some food into his room and he was laying all twisted on his bed in his pajamas saying he cannot eat anymore, the pain is too strong and he doesn’t think he will be able to eat again but it’s okay because he can have water. I wasn’t sure how long a person can survive without food, but I thought maybe something like a week if they just keep drinking liquids. I was trying not to break down in front of him so I ran out and cried in my room the rest of the night until the morning. I went back in as soon as the sun came up with my puffy eyes to make sure he was still alive. He looked even more indistinguishable but I tried to make him laugh, and say all those silly idioms we shared between us. He would laugh, missing all his bottom teeth because he stopped putting in his dentures. I don’t really remember the rest of the dream, but I remember each day seemed to drag on (in the dream) because as it was happening it was all going by too fast. I don’t know too much about Alzheimer’s because my grandpa died on blood poisoning, from a variety of reasons but particularly because as a dentist he had the ability to over-medicate himself. He died three days before I was supposed to fly to Poland to take care of him in 2005.

A photo of mine is in the Wychwood Barns Fundraiser Gala on April 15, but because there are many people involved and they want to maximize the donations no one is given a free pass and the tickets are 75$ so I am obviously not going. I wish I could go, the Wychwood Barns are one of my favorite places in Toronto. We might be given a discount on tickets, I don’t remember, but either way, anything higher than 0 is above my government loaned budget. I hope my photo sells because then maybe I can make a little bit of money, or at least pay back the printing and frame costs. My parents have never been on vacation since we moved to Canada 20 years ago. My parents cannot even afford my dad going back. Yes, I go back a lot, because of legal dealings and because I have attempted to set up my life so I can. I cannot imagine not being able to travel, not being able to go anywhere outside my small radius of Southern Ontario. This summer I want to sell off many of my things (even though I have so little extraneous shit) because I feel stifled and suffocated and immobilized by them. Ok, maybe most of the furniture I will put in some sort of storage space because it’s stupid to sell something you will need again, but it still has a similar effect!

Too much restlessness and anxiety make for a badly focussed Magda and I need to get this paper done by tonight no matter what.

I had the most intense dream ever. I woke up from it prematurely then went back to bed and slept through my alarm, because there was no way to just get up and go from a dream like that.

It was one of those, it’s oh so real dreams that leaves you paralyzed. It was one of those, I wish it was real, why can’t it just be like that in real life dreams.

I want to puke.

Every sensation, every word, everything.

I wish I could just replay the dream over and over, until it wills itself to happen.

Not knowing is the ultimate punishment for me.

I like to stay up late into the night and dream. Photo and design by me.

I woke up this morning to a sky mexican blue. I woke up from a dream involving one of my cats, Ruffneck. I took him to Toronto Island by boat to let him play in a large field, because he’s never been outside. Except on the way back, he kept trying to wiggle out of my grip and I realized it would have been prudent to bring his carrier. But he’s pretty well behaved, and enough squishing him down on the bench did the trick. The sun burning through my mustard yellow curtains brings so much toned light onto my wood floor, but instead of soaking it in like always, I sit here with the water still dripping from my hair on the laptop, dripping exhaustion, dripping consequence to getting smashed. Too many experiences have very clearly explained to me that drinking, especially hard liquor is just not for me. Although, on Friday, at some art opening I ended up at, there was no hard liquor, there was booze and plenty of it free. Shooting champagne glasses, having the bartender pour almost an entire wine bottle into two wine glasses, shooting faux smiles with all the artists I met during the exhibition earlier, we went to some lounge after where vintage porno was showing and plenty of gorgeous tits, but I needed food and the walk to the nearest pizza place killed me, so ready-to-puke and knowing I was in for a twelve hour work day, I had to go home.

“You just puked up all your food.”

“No, didn’t you see, it was only the cheese.”

The point of it all, I felt like shit and still do. I’m not hungover, I’m just miserable. Although I don’t drink too much as it is, maybe I just won’t do it if I’m really really tired or have to be productive the next two days. It’s funny that alcohol has such a negative effect, and when I party, nothing else even comes close to that.

DREAM DECEMBER 25TH, 2003 MORNING

Me and Jason with others on a road trip because I went to Montreal, but it was supposed to be me and Steve, and I had other people to hang out with but somehow we started hanging out and it was us together.
We were driving & I was still kind of sick from my homeopathics so I was resting in the seat a lot still. The driver was crazy, driving all over the roads. I get up and he talks to me, and almost crashes into a huge ton truck that barely swerves out of the way. We almost die again when he does the same thing, and at one point turns the wrong way and we end up in a field that has a house attached to it.

Jason & I stumble in & I have my yellow Ikea blanket covering me because sometimes I don’t wear a top. We lay down on the floor among a huge mess, not even thinking of the owners. I play with his hair & we awkwardly kiss. I’m without a shirt now & nervous. Our one other friend stumbles in; he ís much older. We get up because we realize we have to go, & as we get up I lean over to kiss Jason, even though I am always the one to keep things in secrecy & he kind of doesn’t want to do it, but then gently does it anyway.

An old lady that looks like my grandmother, wearing a blue dress but only speaks Latino. After everyone leaves I go back to the house & ask her is she lives alone, thinking maybe I could go visit her sometime again. She has an adopted daughter, which is really just a caretaker.

There is a hypochondriac girl traveling with us, so somehow we end up at a house, maybe it was the old lady’s house? to all take showers even though I don’t want to wash my hair yet because tomorrow is the big day & I want to get some nice hair products in Montreal on Boxing day. So instead I just wash it with soap, just to manage it because it is pretty dirty. The others girls are all in the shower too, somehow we all fit & discuss the hypochondriac clean freak because we haven’t let her in. I’m trying really hard to wash myself & my hair in such a way that the girls won’t notice that my breasts are of different sizes. One girl dyes her hair prior to us coming in & I freak out but not really because it is red & I think it looks like blood.

Running down a Montreal street over and over, with no top on. Who am I running to catch? Who am I running to? I know I’m not running from anything.

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