Life and Death are of Supreme Importance

Here are some of my thoughts about Life and Death:

I should send out invitations to my funeral. Get people to RSVP just so I can get a feel for the friendship level. And for how many party sandwiches I should bill to Metro Transit and the other people in the world who have stolen my time.

People should send out birth announcements with boxes for friends to check off whether or not they approve of the passing on of genetic material.

I do approve.

I don’t approve.

When I die, I want a specific cause of death stated in my obituary with elaborate details regarding how this cause came upon me, and for how long. No ambiguities.

One of the most annoying things to me is obituaries that are vague about the cause of death. So all obituaries annoy me.

Died peacefully,

Died suddenly,

Died accidentally.

What does that mean? Everyone is dying to know how they died.

When I die, I want my cause of death to be elaborately and specifically described in my obituary. No holding back. If it was a long illness, say what the illness was. If it was an accident, say what kind of accident. 

And if I am hospitalized for some mysterious cause, please include regular updates of my condition on my Facebook feed.

I wouldn’t want to leave my friends hanging.

Also, in case of an accident, I want them to know the details so they can avoid the hardship for themselves.

And if it is an illness, I want to give them all the warning signs. That way they can ponder and obsess over their own symptoms.

I’m a really good friend. I hope you come to my funeral. In your RSVP, please indicate whether or not you have food restrictions. I will accommodate you as long as I feel that your digestion problems are legitimate, and not just some neurotic ploy to cut out carbs and other caloric indulgences. A funeral is no time to hold back.

Metro Transit no longer owes me funeral party sandwiches because they replaced the April bus pass that I lost on April 1^st, despite the fact that I never put my name on it. That was nice of them. I even gave them a homemade chakra card. Probably this is the first chakra card they ever received.

That’s the end of my current thoughts on Life and Death. 



This is the chakra card for Metro Transit. It is not likely I'll be remembered for my photography skills.



Or for my dorky photo shoot with kale.

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This is the chakra card for Metro Transit. It is not likely I'll be remembered for my photography skills.

Compost Girl

How I became the Compost Girl

On Friday afternoon, I took on an act of environmental heroism. One of my bosses was going straight out of town that evening so she didn’t have time to dump the compost at home.  My other boss was overburdened with her own small child, along with a big pile of recycling and laundry bags full of the children’s nap sheets and the dirty rags we use to wipe up their mess and the Lysol. My two remaining co-workers who both have cars didn’t think twice when my bosses said that this week’s compost would go into the trash. But not I.

“I’ll take it home,” I immediately volunteered.

“On the bus?” said my laundry and child-burdened boss.

“Why not?” I asked.

“You’ll get kicked off,” said Co-Worker One with Car.

“No, I won’t. Metro Transit owes me big time.” I explained that I carry around a carefully documented list of all the days that Metro Transit has made me wait excessively in horrible Halifax weather, and the three and a half times they made me late despite my unfailing punctuality at the bus stop. When I die, I will bill Metro Transit for the time and misery they cost me and all the money will go to vegetarian party sandwiches at my funeral. Metro Transit dare not say anything about the compost.

“The other passengers might give you dirty looks though,” said Co-worker Two with car.

“They deserve it for massacring my ears with the hideous music blasting out of their headphones,” I replied smugly.

“Well, that’s very noble of you,” said Co-worker One with Car, smirking.

“Yah, you’re like a superhero,” said Co-worker Two.

“Compost Girl,” said Co-worker One.

Both co-workers with cars started laughing until tears formed in their eyes.

“I don’t see what’s so funny,” I said. “I’m just taking one for the environment. I’m an environmentalist.”

“Can you please write a blogpost about this, Compost Girl?” said Co-worker One. “I mean, if you had a blog."

Co-worker One is the only one who occasionally reads my blog. My bosses don’t know about it because my blog is so edgy and controversial that it would definitely get me fired. Add the Adventures of Compost Girl to the existing heaps of menstruation, vibrators and potty training theories and this blog will only get edgier.

I poured the mountains of decomposing napkins, lasagna, Moroccan bean soup, mediocre hummus and whole grain crackers into triple layered Sobey’s bags. There were three bags in all. I lugged the bags down the hill to my bus stop on the Bedford Highway. The bus was nearly empty, but a construction worker and Muslim couple were sitting at the back where I sat down. Nobody looked up when I sat down and as the ripening odours wafted through the back of the bus, the couple continued their faint dialogue and the construction worker kept flipping through his Metro newspaper. The bus driver let me off at the corner of Robie and University Avenue.  I trudged the two kilometres home in Halifax’s standard un-Christmasy foggy drizzle. As I walked, the plastic bag handles dug into my palms and left red creases. After I dumped the compost into the green bin in our driveway, I smelled my hands. They smelled like vomit, but it was nothing a little biodegradable dish soap couldn’t handle. 

The End. 

Notes from 2016: I feel like I did this a second time. On the bus ride home, I'd somehow switched my phone into accessibility mode. I fumbled frantically to try to get Siri to stop yattering away at me. My bus stop came and Siri was still relentlessly dictating all my options which was extremely discombobulating. After I got off the bus, I decided to go the the Rogers store on the corner of Spring Garden Road to see if they could fix it. It wasn't until I'd gotten the customer service people to adjust my settings and finally silence Siri when I realized I'd completely forgotten about the two bags of compost. I must have left them on the floor of the bus. That day marked my last attempts at environmental heroism.

 



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