Dancing at the Metropolitan

Today was a very strange day.

After hibernating on Monday, I had to venture out for an appointment with my cranial sacral therapist. She has now moved to a great new office at Yonge and St. Clair, so enroute, I was toying with the idea of visiting Mt. Pleasant cemetery, because I'm weird.

As it was, I ended up kind of woozy after my appointment. I don't know how she does what she does, but I do know that I feel a million times better afterwards. She's been doing a healing protocol on me that helps to moderate the body's response to stress.

That being said, I was pretty out of it when I was leaving. She was telling me that she had done a lot of work on my hippocampus [I think that's what it was] which is an emotion centre of the brain which goes right to your adrenals. So if you're feeling stressed, this situation basically results in a vast amount of cortisol going into your system. And this is apparently a mechanism that is somewhat screwed up for me, and appears to be the cause of my general state of spazdom these days, the whole not sleeping, not eating great, what the hell is my problem thing..

Anyway, afterwards I decided that Mt. Pleasant would have to wait. A latte was in order and then perhaps a trip to Indigo at the Eaton Centre as I still had some money left on a gift card I received at Christmas. Before I got on the subway, I decided to add another task, namely getting the bloodwork done that my doctor had ordered a while back. But as no phone was presenting itself so that I could see if a clinic was nearby, I popped into a magazine store instead.

Why are there so many magazines? How does Knitting magazine survive? At any rate, as I glanced around, Tracy Chapman's "Fast Car" came on the radio. There I was in a store at an intersection in one of the wealthiest areas of Canada's wealthiest cities, and I couldn't help but find it ironic that I was listening to what is probably the greatest anthem to Disenfranchisement ever written, while surrounded by the entitled and cashmered.

Finding no magazine that interested me and no phone to see about a clinic in the immediate area, I decided to head to Queen Street and go the MDS Lab at Victoria street. It was just as well, because the nurses there totally rock. It's the only lab I've ever been to where I haven't ended up with a bruise on my arm afterwards. I also appreciate the fact that they have a little basket to put your [ahem] urine sample in so you don't have to walk back out to the front desk with it, as the alternate scenario is awkward to say the least.

"Hi. I'm Zesty. Have you met my piss?"

When I came out of the clinic, the carillion bells of Metropolitan Church were being played. It was absolutely beautiful and for a moment, I could see what the area must of been when it was the Rosedale of its day. I thought the church would more than likely open if the bells were sounding. I don't consider myself very religious, but I've always liked churches. When I worked in the downtown core, I'd go to a church on the odd lunch hour because I found it soothing. The Metropolitan is one of those churches whose interior has always eluded me, but today I struck paydirt, and was able to go inside.

To describe the stained glass in the Metropolitan as breathtaking is almost ridiculous in its understatement. I was absolutely gobsmacked. Yet the church is a curious mixture of the ornate and plain. The glass was spectacular; the rest of the church, however, was very basic and functional.

I'm not sure what happened, but somewhere between the subway and the bloodwork I got a little worn out and melancholy. I sat in one of the pews looking at the grand display of stained glass above the altar, and just started bawling my eyes out. Nobody working in the church seemed to mind though. I guess they are used to that kind of thing.

But I just kept looking at the altar, wondering what the point of it all was. Why am I here? Why do we all have our struggles? What does it all mean? Why do people have to die? Why don't we know what comes after? Why do we all feel so lost sometimes?

I suppose the greyness of the day had gotten to me. After the sparkle and rush of the holidays, a city can seem lonely and tired.

So I got myself together, looked around the church a little more and then went to Indigo. I was just glancing at books and magazines, seeing if anything took my fancy. Nothing did, but I made the fatal mistake of picking up and reading a bit of a book called Predators. It was left in the self-help section for some reason. It's basically how child predators go about finding victims and how we as a society are so conflicted about it. We want to castrate the bastards after a first offense, but of course if it's our family member, our minister, our kid's teacher that's accused, then all 26 kids must be lying.

I don't know why I do this to myself. I just can't take abuse stories about kids and animals.

So I got on the trolley home just in time for rush hour, feeling quite gutted. When I got home, my neighbour was outside doing some clean up in her garden, which used to be her husband's pride and joy. I just didn't have the heart to just head on inside. So she cried and I held her hand and she talked to me for a while, about how dearly she misses her husband, how she prays to him every night, how she's not able to eat or sleep. I told her she MUST see a doctor. She looked quite relieved. I think in a way, she needed permission to go from someone.

Before we finished up she said "I'm so sorry. I talk at you but my english. It no good. You understand?"

I squeezed her hand tighter and replied "Oh I understand. I understand you just fine."