It’s not always easy living with those one loves most.
Often one forgets how to love them best, but we have a remedy for this.
We call it “The City”.

One day last year, in early summer, me and this blonde, we drove out to Burnaby for a bullshit interview at an RV rental joint.
Things weren’t going so well for her. Too many plans, too many disappointments.
I guess I was there for moral support.
I waited in the car- my red car.
Made some phone calls, picked my hang-nails, day dreamed, the usual.
When she was finished I think her dissapointment had reach an ultimate low.
Frustration and sadness were setting in.
“Let’s just forget about it for now. We can go to ‘The City’. Have some good fun. You need to take you mind off of all this.”
“Ah! Fine. Let’s go. Maybe I can find some pants.”

I don’t remember all we did that day. I don’t think she bought anything. I did: a favorite black jacket of mine. I think it’s quite swell.
We both felt better though.
It was the sort of desirable change that converts actions into rituals.
I think that’s what sets best friends and family members apart, in one sense, from everyone else: sacred, exclusive, practices.
In a sense we’re all apart of countless religious orders, with their specific forms of praise, supplication, grief, and atonement to be practiced at the appropriate moments.
Needless to say, me and this swan-girl, we practice visiting “The City”, and we experience the good fruits of our discipline.