Vancouver, as you know, is something else.
It’s a computer simulation of a city, even excluding the inescapable hazy green downtown windows.
The rich are too rich, the poor too poor, and nobody has the anything to consider anyone else. Everyone talks to themself but never to a stranger.
We’re too busy, too broke, too determined, too wet, too on the way to a mountain walk.
They tax your gluten tolerance to guide assimilation.
They hire covert advocates to make you feel bizarre if you don’t make your own almond milk, butter, oil.
They convince you that the alternative to a beer from a second-rate brewery is a water.
They ride tandem bikes so you accept their presence.
Couples cling to each other, on the bus, walking down the road, as if one of them might blow away.
I wait for my Mary Poppins to find me a new place after a sudden renoviction.
Empty condos increase in value while they devalue everything else.
The crows fly back to Barnaby to roost. Even they can’t afford to live here.
The country’s finest weather has the most goose-feathered vests.
It’s nice here, but there’s no good roofs to sneak onto.
Ghost weed wafting through the personless road stops you in your tracks.
Fireworks are legal one day a year, when the ghouls are out.
The parks have illegalized balloons. A waste of plastic is claimed. The used needles are fine though.
If you leave a bag of powder on a bench, they’ll only care that you’re littering.
See a dude chilling in Tea Swamp Park.
Looking for a drink, but all the bars are closed. It must be one o’clock.
High-end restaurants with idealized lighting, looking onto Oppenheimer Park, with the server assuming you’ll never decipher their menu.
A little logo next to the calligraphy, indicating a meal share, so if you buy that dish, they’ll give some food to a hungrier person. Are they fed a duck confit or a Mr. Noodles?
All the friends come from somewhere else. The real locals only know this place, oblivious to the outside world.
Ignorant calls from construction sites persist, but it’s different here. From “Nice small business!” to “Your tax bracket is so high! But baby, I can set you up with an offshore company we can funnel money through, save you some come April.”
Drivers never learned how to be behind the wheel. Their passengers jump out to stop the flashing green.
Tuesday afternoons, the coffee shops are full. Nobody works, nobody is working here.
Trees so big they got they own trees. Nah Jeezy, those are branches.
Insurance covers the registered masseuse who prepares my kale.
Robot smiles and SoMa styles. South of 16th might as well be Tsawwassen. King Ed, King Ed’s too far for me.
They say you can’t make art in the west, where the comfort is high. Am I proving them right, or proving me wrong?
It’s hard to justify being depressed with the sun where it is.
Waiting for the big one to take us all out. Until then…
Oh Vancouber, you’re not all you’re cracked up to be.
Namaste, muthafuckaaaa