prairietrip

Westward Bound And Back

This is the story of my trip out west to my homes in the prairie provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan and more notably, Winnipeg, Brandon, Minto, and Regina. It was a great experience for travelling through the special places that were the forebearers of the person I am today and I wanted to take people through the journey that was my trip, not only through physical distances and space, but the spiritual and emotional journeys that occurred over the past two weeks in January. I hope you enjoy!

Wednesday, January 15th - I woke up early after very little sleep and the last night of seeing my boyfriend, John and made my way to the subway. I travelled to the airport via the shuttle bus and within two hours I was airborne to Winnipeg, MB. When I arrived, my friend, Carl, whom I've known for about 3 years, picked me up and I got my first taste in almost a year of that clear, dry, cold air of the prairies. We drove around for a bit, stopping at a few stores, going for a bite to eat at a deli-style place and then heading back to his house. I dropped off my stuff and we sat around chatting about each of our worlds in the past year. I made a call home to tell Mom and Dad that my plane had arrived well and also a call to my ex now just good friend, Jason to make plans for the visit. In the evening, friends of Carl named Bob and Brent invited us to see a free screening of "National Security", which ended up a dreadful movie, but we had a good time with our hosts. Carl and I ended up watching TV and going to bed.

Thursday, January 16th - Carl and I slept in late and watched TV for a bit before heading out for dinner. Carl showed me the fine cuisine of dim sum which was great. We then headed over to Jason's apartment. We all visited for a bit before Carl left and Jason and I got a really good talk. We sat and talked for a bit and then later decided on a movie. Jason was the gracious host, using free passes for us to go see "Star Trek: Nemesis", which turned out to be a great movie. After the movie, we went for supper and just talked. Jason confessed that it was not easy being a "drag queens boyfriend" and I admitted that I wished I had talked more about my feelings. Jason and I dated a number of years ago and it felt amazing to reconnect with him. There was a magic in the evening and it was agreed that we had to e-mail more and talk. It was probably the best evening of my entire trip.

Friday, January 17th - Another sleep in day, but man did I love it! In the afternoon, Carl headed out to get groceries and I took the spare time to work on my play. It was great just to take an afternoon without a care to work on it and I was grateful to finish the edits that I had been working on for a while. Carl came back and cooked an amazing supper before we headed out to Gio's, one of the local bars. We were supposed to meet up with Kevin, Danny and Roger, but I must have got my messages mixed up. Nonetheless, I had a great time with Carl before he headed home for a romantic evening himself. I ran over to another bar called Club 200 where I visited a friend named Stephan and had a great chat. I also ran into a few other people, Peter, Sabrina, and soon headed back to Gio's to meet up with Jason and his friends. We danced till about 2am and Jason gave me a ride home.

Saturday, January 18th - My parents arrived at Carl's place not far past noon, where they met Carl and his boyfriend, Lee, and Mom finally got to see the antique horse racing poster. It was a first occasion for my parents to meet one of my gay friends and I think Dad did much better than Mom as he had no fear entering the house. Carl looks like one of the most straight-laced gay man you'll ever meet and that was a nice way to introduce Dad to my world. I then went for lunch with my parents at Boston Pizza where we caught up on life. We did some shopping at Michael's and St. Vital Shopping Centre, where Mom bought the lowest priced new book for me for $1.24. At around 5pm, we headed off to Brandon where my brother was performing Jack from "Into The Woods". The show was amazing and difficult and Ken did a great job with his role. Ken and I chatted for a bit before we all went for coffee and donuts. We dropped Ken off at a cast party and headed to my parent's home in Minto. I gave Mom and Dad their Christmas gifts of CD's for the car ride home since they had a new CD player in the car. When we got home, Mom gave me a part of my gift to me, a book on Canadian theatres, which made me laugh because I got Mom a book on my theatre for her gift, somewhat the same exact gift to each other. I also gave the rest of Dad's gift of the "Letters From Wingfield Farm" play and the horse-head wine stopper, both of which Dad loved, reading excerpts around us later after bathroom deliberations.

Sunday, January 19th - We got up a little late and headed into Brandon for a little shopping. My mission: a huge bag to carry stuff from Minto to Toronto, socks, underwear. Mission accomplished! Hehehe We had a great time shopping and for the first time, I didn't hold back my conversation for fears of what Mom and Dad might think. I think my parents may have got a different view of me this trip. We got home in the evening, had a little supper and I just rested, playing with the computer a bit where I was unable to get Hotmail still. Arrgh!

Monday, January 20th - I woke up later to try and help Mom clean up the house a bit which failed miserably. Instead, I started at my room where I helped clear a number of boxes and finally throwing out my grade nine science tests which I'm not sure why I kept because I was horrible at science. I also came across creative writing which explained my crazy state of writing from an early age. I found a part of John's birthday gift, a small set of wicker doll house furniture that I had as a child. He loves wicker and I think he'll get a kick out of it. The funny thing that happened that day was the finding of a lot of change in piggy banks. Mom asked me to maybe roll some of it and maybe I might be able to pay a loan payment on a loan that I had $158.00 left to pay. Well Mom underestimated my value of saving. By the time, we finished rolling the next day, I had put together $147.50 and Mom managed to cover the other ten bucks of the loan. In the evening, I took some pictures around town before I froze to death in the minus 30 weather. We just stayed in the evening.

Tuesday, January 21st - I woke up late again (do you sense a theme here?) And then started my laundry. In the evening, we all travelled to Boisevain where I had went to high school for Mom and Dad's league bowling night. I just watched most of the evening, working on my play more. There was one awkward point when Dad's friend, Henry Timmer asked me if I was out to visit my girlfriend, to which I replied with a "huh" type of response of "girlfriend?" After realizing that he was speaking about my best friend, Amy, who came out last Christmas, I emphatically denied her as my girlfriend, not once, twice, but three times in the same phrase. Possibly he may think that odd. Hmmm. After the league was done, Mom and Dad bowled off for their Thursday night game since they were taking me to Regina that day. In between games, I bowled (really well by the way) and Mom and Dad kept with insisting that I bowl league sometime. We travelled home, awaiting my last full day in Minto.

Wednesday, January 22nd - Mom and I woke up and travelled to Boisevain again for Mom's haircut. This gave me an opportunity to go to the library to see if they had placed the books I had (anonymously) donated last Christmas. The story goes that Mom and I got into a fight, not over the books, but the note to the librarian, last year and I was told that I should not tell people I was gay. Well being the stubborn individual I am, this year, despite telling Mom I wouldn't talk to the librarian, whom I had known for years, I did and donated another for the collection. After, Mom and I visited my great Aunt Darlene and Uncle Ken. Last year had been upsetting for me since I couldn't say anything about myself to them. This visit, however, I decided to let Mom censor me instead of myself. It was quite humourous, Mom changing the subject anytime it got a little close to uneasiness. Nonetheless, we had a great visit. When we were driving back home, Mom and I had an interesting conversation about donating blood when she told me Uncle Ken couldn't and I said I couldn't because I was gay. This created a weird talk about that, but I think it was good for Mom to know a part of me that was discriminated. In the evening, Ken came out for supper from Brandon and we had a little chance to talk, though it was awkward at best. We exchanged gifts from Christmas and after watching a few hours of reality TV, we headed off to bed.

Thursday, January 23rd - We got up late (as was usual by now), said my goodbyes to Ken and headed off to Regina. It wasn't bad until we hit the border of Saskatchewan. That's when the roads got hard with blowing snow. By the time we were a half hour from Regina, we could barely see twenty feet in front of the car and the drifts were getting big. When we arrived, we went shopping for a bit, developing my film and then getting a hotel for Mom and Dad for the night because of the weather. We picked up Amy from SIAST and we drove back to Amy's place. Mom and Dad headed off to shop a bit more while Amy and I caught up a bit. When they got back, we went for supper. Before we left the house, Amy made a comment about how looked like girlfriend and boyfriend to which Dad replied, "I can always dream." At supper in Smitty's restaurant, I quickly brought out my photos including the one of my boyfriend to ensure that the "dream" didn't last too long. We had a great supper and then my parents dropped us off at Amy's Dad's place before heading off in the morning. Amy and I went out after to her dance studio for a practice with her dance partner which was hilarious since he was a friend of mine from about six years back, but we didn't know it was either of us.

Friday, January 24th - We woke up early (for me it was quite a change) and went to SIAST where Amy had class. She is learning to become an EMT person. During the day, I stayed on campus where I worked on my play and finally got into my hotmail account. I went through a crazy period when I found out my play had been half gone and left with two scenes constantly repeating for a hundred pages (I fixed it with my back-up disk) and then finishing up separating the dialogue from the stage directions before meeting Amy again to go home. There was also a period where I played the Guns N' Roses pinball machine, but thankfully that nightmare didn't last long. In the evening, we went for supper at Amy's Dad and Stepmom's place and it was great to see my "adoptive family". We headed back to her place to go out to the bar, but Amy was beat. Instead, our friend, Kent came over with the Buffy: Third Season DVD and we watched a couple of episodes before saying goodnight to Kent and going to sleep.

Saturday, January 25th - We woke up early for our ride, Sean, to go to the dance competition called Showcase 2003. When we got to the Ramada where the competition was being held, we set up the cameras which we were going to be taping the event with, a job that Amy wanted me to take on. The three of us went for a little breakfast before the competition began. The event went great, with Amy dancing well, despite the drama of having her father and mother in the same room without bloodshed, and the videotaping, despite having a really bad zoom function that jumped in and out if used, was surprisingly okay. A group of the dancers and myself went for a quick drink before I headed off to have a supper with Darcy. Although we didn't quite make it to the movie, it was great being around him, his intelligence and quick wit. In the evening, I went back for the awards ceremony to discover Amy and Shaun winning best newcomers and Amy picking up the best multi-dance. There was also this guy named Trevor (whom I still think was hot as hell) who liked Amy and I bugged her to ask him out. After a few dances by a professional dancers and a great conversation with Lori, head of catering who I knew, I took off for The Outside, the gay bar in town and ran into Robin, a friend I had meant to call before going, but just happened to be there. We had a great time dancing and he nicely drove me home after where I found Amy had invited Trevor back. Not long later, Trevor left and I got giddy over him for Amy.

Sunday, January 26th - We woke up early to go to church with Amy's grandma and cousins. I also got my first look at David the vicker, who was pretty cute and a great speaker. After a nice breakfast at the church and a conversation with the pastor, I headed off downtown to catch a bus to volleyball with my friends. I surprised them by improving from the last I played with them and they surprised me by getting me back to play in Calgary's gay and lesbian volleyball tournament. After volleyball, I got back to Amy's place where Amy and I had a wee bit of an argument over Trevor. I pushed way too hard for her to go out with him and we ended up being silent with each other. I was supposed to go to a movie with Darcy, but he ended up with other plans, so I just stayed in.

Monday, January 27th - I woke up and went to SIAST with Amy again where I checked e-mail and then headed for the university. I printed copies of the play I had been working on for Amy's Christmas present and then ran into various people at the university, including the Pat and the staff at College West where I worked as a resident assistant, Adam Budd, who invited me for supper and Melissa, an former acting student who switched to police studies with enthusiasm. I then made my way downtown to go see friends at the Ramada where I used to work as a security guard, but unfortunately, they were not in. I then had a great experience when I went to get money from the bank machine at the Credit Union. By some odd chance, I ran into a former resident and friend from the residence, William Gibbons, and he informed me that his sister, a former RA and a good friend of mine, was in Regina and working not far away. Rebecca Gibbons was one of the first people I came out to back in 1999 and my visit with her was absolutely amazing. We caught up and now I will be able to connect with her as well as another friend, Tracy who moved to Calgary who I will try to see in April. After our talk, I went meet Adam, Blair, his roommate and Darcy (who I called to come to) for supper and we had a great time talking about everything from my life in TO and Darcy in drag looking like Mama Cass (hehehehe I'm so much in shit for that). After supper, I went back to Amy's place and we made up for the argument we had and then we headed to Amy's Dad's place for a last visit where I gave Ryan a copy of the play with strict instructions not to open it till the next day. We went back to Amy's place and before we went to sleep, I gave Amy the play which I'm pretty sure she liked as her gift. :) The next morning, Darcy would pick me up to go the airport and after a quick drink and talk, I headed back to Toronto filled with the feeling that it was time to go back, but still missing what I had left behind.

Thanks to all the people I got to see and spend my time with visiting and catching up. I had an amazing time and hopefully I get to make that trip again next year. :)