August 9, 2024
I’m still in Montreal. Tomorrow is my last full day. I think we’re going out to some dance festival. I’ll be back in Toronto on Sunday.
There was a big storm here today. It was the remnant of tropical storm Debbie. It rained all day.
I think it might’ve stopped now. The news was showing all of the flooding happening here in the city.
I’ve been inside all day. I really need to go for a walk. I’ll probably do that after this.
Buzz died two days ago. It was really sad. It’s so strange that he’s gone. I don’t have any memories of this house without him.
He was one week away from being 17! The vet said that he’d never met a Yorkshire Terrier as old as Buzz.
I’ll start on the 7th. We woke up somewhat early that day. We were going out with Mami’s walking group. The plan was to check out an old military fort outside of Montreal.
We took the bus to the subway station. We met all of her friends. There was a slight problem, because one of the cars was small and could only fit four people. We had three cars and fifteen people had shown up. So one of the woman went back home.
So we started driving. Mami and the driver got lost. It was somewhat frustrating for me. Mami’s phone was in the trunk. All they needed to do was pull over and grab the phone. We could’ve used Google Maps and figured things out in seconds.
I sometimes get frustrated with old people and technology. I feel like they’re making things harder than they need to be. I just breathe and let them do what they want.
The drive was nice because I talked to the lady sitting next to me. She told me about all of the places she’d travelled to. We finally found the place.
A staff member of the museum walked with our group and told us all sorts of interesting things. She was speaking in French so I didn’t understand unfortunately. It was alright because the group members would occasionally translate for me.
The fort had first been built by the French in the 1600’s. It was originally built with wood. It had burned down a couple of times.
Then it was built with stone, because the British were expected to arrive shortly. I think the British took control of the fort soon after.
In the late 1800’s it was abandoned and fell into disrepair. A local man put in a lot of effort to save the structure. He got money from the government to preserve it. In the 1970’s there was a proper restoration effort. They restored and strengthened the walls.
Now it’s a museum and you can walk through all the rooms. It’s right next to the water. It was really cool.
We had lunch on the grass. Then we walked around for a bit longer. Eventually we got back in the car and headed home. This time Mami used google maps. It only took us 35 minutes to get home. It was very fast.
Mami had a vet appointment for Buzz that afternoon. He hadn’t been doing very well. He seemed fine when I arrived. He was running around and jumping on the sofa. He was asking for snacks just like normal.
He changed at some point. He suddenly seemed like a different dog. He seemed to become senile. He started to pace all over the place. He would walk in one direction, then turn around and walk the other way. He would do that endlessly.
And he couldn’t see properly, so he kept walking into things. The worst part was that he was having trouble standing. He would suddenly shake and then collapse to the floor. It was pretty sad.
Each day he seemed to get worse. So Mami took him to the vet. She was taking a while. She had been gone for nearly an hour and a half. The vet was only a five minute walk from the house.
I checked my phone and saw that she’d messaged me an hour earlier. She had asked if I was home. I replied, but she arrived back to the house about ten minutes later. I knew something was off, because she came in quite silently. I didn’t hear any leash.
She came into the living room, her eyes misty and her voice shaking and said ‘that’s it’. She started to cry. She said that Buzz had been put to sleep.
The vet said it was only going to get worse. It was best to do it now. I think was the right decision.
Mami was and still is obviously pretty upset. They’ve been together for seventeen years. He was on Salt Spring when I was only nine!
I’m really glad that I was here. I’m glad that Mami wasn’t alone for this.
Yesterday was the first full day without Buzz. We went to the latino part of town that mom had recommended. We also checked out a big market. Mami bought some plants and maple syrup.
We went for dinner at a really good Vietnamese restaurant. We came home just as the storm began.
Dreams
I was with a friend. I think we were in a restaurant. We were commenting on a family sitting close to us. I think my friend said that they were E.T.’s. I was trying to get a better look at their faces.
Suddenly the man and woman both looked up. They were staring right at us. They seemed very kind.
There was definitely something different about their faces. We knew that they weren’t quite human. They had a child with them.
They took us outside. They were showing us something on a TV screen. For other people the TV screen displayed a feed of nearby security cameras. For us it appeared as something different.
I can’t remember what it was. It didn’t matter. I was just happy to be with the E.T.’s.
I was with dad. He was asking me if I had heard about a war that had broken out in Tel Aviv. He wanted to show me the wreckage. First he showed me drone footage on his phone. The city was on fire.
Then dad wanted to walk with me through the wreckage. He wanted to get closer and closer to the fighting. The sounds of bombs and gunfire grew louder.
Eventually I decided I didn’t want to keep going. I told dad that I was leaving. I felt that he was disappointed, like he had wanted to be close to the violence. I turned around and walked in the opposite direction of the war.
