HUMAN WRECKAGE

And So That Was Christmas

When my divorce lawyer suggested I investigate personal bankruptcy proceedings, I had a hunch rock bottom was coming up fast. Financial obligations for another were all in my name. I was living in a disused backroom in a friend’s bungalow, closer to work but a long way from my usual hangouts. Little Feat played constantly in my head, “I’ve been down but not like this before.” Christmas was coming.

Because I can be something of a windy, pop music snob, I am certain of the year. I was 40 and U2 had released ‘All That You Can’t Leave Behind,’ the band’s last essential record to date, in my view. Its title struck me in a paradoxical way. I remember writing a letter postmarked Calgary to my father in Ottawa, medium point blue Bic on sheets of graph paper. I did not ask for his help. I did tell him I was beyond the verge of losing everything but most of those things I’d come to realize hadn’t meant much to me.

Like father, like son. By the early 70s it was apparent my parents’ marriage was through the guardrail and over the cliff. My father accepted a Bell Telephone transfer to Ottawa from Montreal. His bolt hole was a minute studio apartment downtown, a few steps from his office. The kitchen area was a suggestion, there was a hot plate, and a hole cut in the wall allowing him to wash his dishes in the bathroom sink. He thought that was clever. When I visited on weekends I slept on a camp cot by the mini-fridge. He slept on a second-hand pull-out bed. He did have an ironing board and a wooden box of shoe polish, buffing rags and brushes. “Whatever one’s circumstances, it’s important to present.”

In 2001, Tim, a close friend since childhood, was kicking around his bungalow in Calgary. His partner was visiting family overseas for Christmas. He was inclined to stay put. I couldn’t afford to go anywhere. He told me he had a vacuum-packed hunk of smoked meat in his fridge, brisket imported from Montreal. Its use by date was coming up, why not spend Christmas together chez Tim?

I went shopping on the eve of our big day. I bought a box of hot wings and a loaf of sliced rye. The Safeway cashier was very cheery. “You’re my first customer today who isn’t stocking up for tomorrow’s big feast!” I said, “Oh, but I am.” I then asked her for two packages of Player’s Light regular. I arrived at Tim’s with my groceries, cigarettes, a case of beer and a bootleg videocassette of ‘Cocksucker Blues,’ the long-suppressed Rolling Stones '72 tour documentary.

We contrived to steam the smoked meat on the stovetop until the fat was transparent. We warmed the bread in foil in the oven, careful not to toast it. We smoked, drank, ate, drank and smoked like the exiled kings we were.

Tim had one of the biggest televisions I’d ever seen in a private home. He also had a CD player spinning a 200-disc carousel. Of course he did. I was reminded of our younger days in Montreal, an afternoon or evening spent listening to music with Tim was always time well wasted. And lately we’d been playing a new game in Calgary with pub jukeboxes. One of us would plug the Rock-Ola with enough coins to dictate the next dozen songs, but only select six. The other was required to complete the set, run blind, no repeats allowed. Some confusing strategy was involved: “He always plays ‘Thunder Road,’ but he knows I know that. So if he called an audible, it’s likely ‘Tenth Avenue Freeze-out’ or ‘Jungleland’ in which case I’ll go with ‘Backstreets.’ Then again… is there any Dave Mason on this thing?”

Everybody has experienced a “first” Christmas; an infant or that recently vacated chair at the table, a divorce decree or an obituary. Still, the spirit of the season encourages survivors and next generations gather. And I suspect Christmases tend to blend together in a crucible of memory for most of us, the years in that house, the years in this one. Hard to pin down a particular December. The weird ones stand out, as they should, as they will. Tim and I had a blast making do in less than ideal circumstances.

meGeoff has been your most unreliable, unbalanced and inaccurate alternative source of holiday cheer since 2013. Sign up for e-mail alerts from the Crooked 9, use that thingy on the right. The second wave is still cresting and winter is coming; you’ll need a distraction.