Saturdays, Sundays, and Holidays

On July 28, 1972, you might’ve seen a full-page ad in the paper that read, “Tomorrow morning at 9 a.m. the Royal Bank will open and never close again.” That particular tomorrow was a Saturday, way back when most banks closed at 3:00 p.m. (maybe 5:00 on a Friday) and were most certainly locked up tight on Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays. Twenty-four-hour push-button banking had come to Toronto, and that summer at the CNE, if you didn’t mind waiting in line, you might even have tried it for free at the Better Living Centre, maybe even won a five-dollar coupon!

Now, this was supposed to be the story of an 11-year-old boy—brand-new to the big city—who one Sunday afternoon that September, just happened across the Bankette they’d installed at the east end of the Colonnade on the south side of Bloor. I don’t know how long he stood there watching one person after another just doing their push-button banking, but I do remember he did not want to leave. It was like watching an episode of Star Trek—a glimpse of a future where you could get all the money you ever wanted just by pushing some buttons.

But then, after all that time I’d spent checking the Might’s Directory to verify the exact location of that particular machine, digging through the Toronto Star archives to confirm the date, then searching for images of what those ATMs actually looked like back then, and of course rebuilding the Bankette logo from the small fuzzy photo someone had posted online, I began to feel badly for that weird scrawny kid, who wouldn’t realize just how weird he has been all his life, didn’t realize it until more than 50 years later when he came here to write it all down.

Inspired by Saturday Afternoon and Sunday Morning. Bankette logo based on a photo from this page. Keypad photo by Alina Kushnarenko. Money slot based on a photo by Andrzej Rostek.

I was born with a plastic tree in my house

Pip the Cat came from a hoarding situation in North Bay. That’s all we knew until this week, when a pal told me that in a six-degrees-of-separation way, she may have a personal connection to that very house. When I volunteered for a dog rescue, I did a home visit to a hoarder. The adoption failed, but I still can’t unsee her situation. Yet addictions come in many forms. I personally fight my Bowerbird tendencies: Artisanal pottery, vintage Christmas bulbs, festive garlands, quarter-sawn oak.  It stems from my trailer park roots and a longing for a pedigree that isn’t mine.

Inspired by Sunday Morning and Substitute by The Who. Photo by the author.

Sunday Morning

Inside my skull, every heartbeat strikes like a timpani mallet. Outside, it is blindingly bright. Sunlight pierces my eyeballs with the force of a rapier thrust. I close them in repentance. Whose idea was the tequila? I am shaky, clammy with crapulence. My stomach rumbles, portending rebellion, a traitorous uprising. The dog whimpers, wanting to go out. I breathe in. I breathe out. On the air, there is evidence of canine flatulence. Eyes still shut, I reach for the Tylenol, fingers scrabbling with the child-proof lid. I breathe in. I breathe out. If I remain perfectly still, it doesn’t hurt. 

Inspired by Saturday Afternoon. Photo by And-One.

Saturday Afternoon

Outside the tiniest of snowflakes float. Inside, sunlight from the window hits the dust motes hovering above the hot air vent. The furnace has kicked in, rumbling melodically from the basement. The fridge hums. The cat on my lap purrs. I flip a page in my book. I notice the soft sound of my rough fingertips moving over paper. I breathe in. I breathe out. A gust of wind outside now. The snow scatters—the last of the autumn leaves dance. The cat shifts her weight, resettling on me. I breathe in. I breathe out. I turn the next page.

Inspired by the afternoon. Photo by NetPix.

Close Enough

By the time I decided to shave off my first real beard, I’d pretty much forgotten how—mostly because I’d started growing it not long after I started shaving at all, and years after my father had left, taking with him any benefit I might’ve gained from his example of proper technique.

Without that, I attacked my face with an ignorance fed mostly by advertising that emphasized the importance of closeness, shaving this way and that, until all trace of stubble was gone, leaving me with a painful appreciation of how some things are better when they’re just close enough.

Inspired by Leda and the Pelican. Image by Gemini, proving that the AI doesn't know how human males shave any better than I did back then.

Leda and the Pelican

Some women have good legs. Others have nice hair. I have a beautiful décolletage. Despite a decade of sunny seasons as an archaeologist. Not a line nor wrinkle. I slather sunscreen and cosset it in silk scarves, serum it, and gua sha it. But here’s something: I've just been diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease. So now I take a pill every morning for the rest of my life. Because if my dead thyroid was left to moulder, it would be replaced by a goitre. A FUCKING GOITRE. I’m sure there’s a Greek or German cautionary tale about vanity in this somewhere.

Inspired by Let’s Not Talk. Image of my 63-year-old neck. No filter, no goitre.

Game Day Rituals

In pursuit of sporting greatness, I could not rely on talent, of which, the evidence demonstrated, I had little. Luck, then. To attract it, I employed intricately constructed stratagems. Example: I pulled my left skate on, then the right. Then I laced the left one up, then the right. 

      This never led to athletic stardom, but it did leave me with life-long rituals to follow during championship runs—like wearing the team jersey, t-shirt, and fan socks. And never laundering them during a win streak. These necessary measures have led to repeated tensions in the household at otherwise joyous moments. 

Inspired by an epic playoff and World Series run (thank you, Blue Jays). Image posted by the Toronto Blue Jays.