Boats in the ocean at English Bay
I knew that leaving the house today would be a total disaster and I really had no intention of leaving my room for the entire weekend! First off, I live right beside the ocean at English Bay, so no matter when you go out in the summer, it’s crowded and noisy! I know I should move to some sort of rural area when I can just be at peace but I like the convenience of living downtown…there’s tonnes of grocery stores a minute away and parks and beaches and shops and restaurants…it never takes me long to get to where I got to go and get back home and into bed….and those rare times that I do go outside, I get to look at the ocean, the mountains, the trees and feel the sand in my toes…it’s beautiful.
There’s so much going on this weekend…it’s a perfect storm of events….it’s the long weekend, it’s gay pride weekend and I live in the gay district of Vancouver so it’s just buzzing with parade people and to top it off, it’s the last night of the Honda Celebration of lights where hundreds of thousands of people camp out at the beach all day long to watch some fireworks for 20 minutes.
It took me all day to work up the courage to get dressed and go for my walk! I promised myself not to do any fantasizing about anything in order to stay in the moment and deal with the feelings that arose.
When I got outside, it was a hot mess out there…even the side streets were littered with people. People, people everywhere! I wanted to turn right back around and run, not walk, back into my building but I forced one leg in front of the other and marched onwards into the thick of it down by the ocean.
The beaches were packed with thousands of people trying to get a good spot to watch the fireworks that are set off on a huge barge on the ocean. As far as the eye could see, there were tonnes of boats…the entire English bay region looked like a huge dock. It sickened me. Every year an infestation of people come down to watch the same old boring shit, fight for a parking spot, be hearded around like animals when the event is over…not to mention all the drunken brawls that inevitably happen.
I pick up the pace, walking faster now to get this over and done with. My mind keeps trying to fantasize about stuff but I keep drawing it back to the present moment…grounding myself in it by smelling the bbq’s, looking at the flowers, watching and trying to be actively interested in the people and what they are doing. It’s sensory overload and all of a sudden this huge world becomes too small for me as I feel squeezed from all directions. I am of this world but not in it! Only a few more steps now and….ahhhh home! Relief washes over me as I know that my bed is only a few moments away and I can hide away from the reality that awaits me beyond my four walls. Isolating feels like home!
Till tomorrow,
Don't wanna walk 