2024-01-26: mtl

supper with friends tonight. homemade montreal smoked meat sandwiches on marble rye with fries and lots of mustard. thick slabs of meat; not sliced thin as in the deli, thicker —

coincidence, but montreal coming up a lot today. i was reading some old journal entries, incl. one where i mentioned i'd just come back from a conference in montreal. in the comments: one of my online friends, who for a year was one of my only offline friends, admitted it was one of her favourite cities as well.

i've been only once since my life's trajectory stabilized, back in 2007. i went with my partner, we stayed at a dumpy hotel, but the location was good, rue ste.-catherine, and from there we made our way everywhere. we found the below-ground cafe in old montreal where a friend poured his heart out to me in 99; we climbed mt royal in poor footwear and paid for it; we saw habitat 67, we went to the botanical gardens and to the big o, we saw anthony calvillo and a bunch of teammates amble by in alouettes shirts and flip flops.

to say nothing of three years before that trip — going to that conference, looking up an old friend, wondering should i, should i — remembering the admissions to each other, years before — being taken, being faithful, deciding not to call.

journal