My Temporary Suburbia
I’m going to be updating sporadically for the next two and a half weeks as I am housesitting and caring for animals at my best friend’s huge beautiful house nestled in the fleshy breast of the Markham suburbs where the horticultural club membership per capita is through the roof. Her family has gone back to native country for her grandma’s 95th birthday. I’m very worried about her; the country she is in is still in the middle of a guerilla war and the last time she visited a mall was bombed a mere 24 hours after her family visited it for supplies. Although her family is quite wealthy and her current lodgings are more than comfortable, to know that she is living in potential danger really scares me.
Back in Markham, I am dealing with more mundane stresses – the stresses of suburbia, animals and human relationships. You may think that living in the suburbs is tranquil but it is not. The most obvious problem is that the house and property is big and require a lot of maintenance to keep it habitable. Sand and grime from outside is constantly being tracked inside and it’s amazing how fast the dirt builds up. There seems to an ant problem in the house and, being so close to the woods, there is definitely an insect problem. I’ve been killing about two earwigs a day, which seem to continuously pop up on the kitchen counter. You seem to always be trying to keep the wilderness out.
The cost and logistics of food and fuel is killing me. The last time I bought and prepared food was in Hong Kong and food is so much cheaper there. I averaged one and a half dollars for every meal in Hong Kong. Here, I average seven dollars per meal with food I prepare myself. Do I have to stop eating fresh fruit? I see why people buy in bulk and on sale now. You simply can’t afford anything otherwise. I don’t even want to get started on fuel. The house is 55 k away from my work and driving my boyfriend’s American car is a money pit.
My best friend is an animal enthusiast and over the time I’ve known her, has had, a varied number of lizards, snakes, mice, rabbits she picked up off the street, a litter of cats, and a sugarglider. Right now though, I have it easy and is taking care of a mere two cats, a dog and a school of fish. The fish don’t do much to the house but the dog and cats are shedding everywhere and driving me nuts. I’ve always hated the smell of animals on people and think it’s plainly embarrassing when you can tell if a person has a cat or dog and I’m scared that my clothes now also has that pungent smell and I am walking around unaware of it.
The dog has been an issue. When my best friend was here, it was fairly well behaved. Now that it’s gone, the dog is now bordering on feral, barking all night, attacking passerby’s and refusing to obey commands. It tried to attack a kid on a bike and my boyfriend had to pull him off. It seems like all its training and good manners that my friend schooled him in has gone out the window. I’ve talked to some dog owners in my company and it seems that the dog is taking advantage of us being not dog-savvy. They are right, I’m not used to being around dogs and I’m not an aggressive person at home. Now it seems like I have to be out of character in order to get a good night’s sleep and injury-less walks. I’m terrified that animal control will come by.
