tamed

'Cause even on a bullet train
or a jet plane
I won't leave
'cause I'd be alone.
- Kidding Ourselves, Stabilo

"What does that mean -- tame?"

"It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. "It means to establish ties...But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music out of my burrow..."

The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time. "Please -- tame me!" he said.

"I want to, very much," the little prince replied. "But I have not much time. I have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand."

"One only understands the things that one tames," said the fox. "Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends any more. If you want a friend, tame me . . . "

"What must I do, to tame you? asked the little prince.

"You must be very patient," replied the fox. First you will sit down at a little distance from me -- like that -- in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day . . . "

The next day the little prince came back.

- Le Petit Prince, Antoine de Saint Exupéry

deck the halls

I am so in the Christmas spirit. I can't remember looking forward to Christmas as much as this year... Perhaps when I was four.

Today, I was introduced to the bowels of the storage room, where we defied all WSIB warnings by climbing on rickety metal shelving to retrieve: several boxes of glass balls, six strings of silver beads, five strings of fairy lights, four gold-trimmed garland, three chubby Santas, two turtledoves and a scrawny, top-heavy Christmas tree.

Le Front Reception
(a.k.a. My Hideout)

Chris, our creative director, getting into the Christmas spirit.
Or, perhaps, drunk.
Turtledove #1.
The Santa doll plays "Here Comes Santa Claus" in an eerie, recorded voice when his hand is squeezed. I suspect the Santa doll to last until the end of the week. If it's lucky.

Our Charlie Brown-esque Christmas tree.
Turtledove #2.

boost

It's not every day that one gets to have a cameo in a commercial. Especially when that day is your first at a new job. I love working for an ad agency.

These PSAs were produced for a company called Boost (which used to be the Toronto Child Abuse Center) and done by the ad agency I work for, Yield, pro bono. Yet another reason why I love my job.

"Boy"
(I'm in the courtroom scene)


"Girl"

touché

As iron sharpens iron, so are we:
Our wits, our words, our wills are often caught
In swordplay; leaving both sides overwrought
And out of breath, though neither claim defeat.
Some might find us brazen, not so me
Although our love is oft a lover's knot
We burnish one another's sully spots
In light of an alliance yet to be.
For now, I rest my head upon your chest
Until the cadence of our hearts are one,
My fingers and your own create a nest
Until the warmth of both have been outdone,
I step towards the steps that you request
Until a greater fusion has begun.

silver bells

Oh no. It's only November 8th and I'm already humming Christmas carols...

It's not entirely my fault. First, a friend of mine blogged about Christmas turds (?). Then, this morning, I witnessed the first few flakes of winter outside the kitchen window. Over lunch, I read an article in the Toronto Star about the window decoration on Bay Street. Which nearly made me cry.

I can remember going to "see the windows" with my great, great aunt Dodie back she was alive, back when I was young, back when the Eaton Centre was owned by Eaton's, back when we had one-dollar bills. I love that the city is so much a part of my childhood. It's why I love the Christmas carol Silver Bells (beware: link will get the song stuck in your head all day) - "It's Christmas time in the city..."

On my way into work this morning, due to an accidental lie-in, I was doing my makeup on the King streetcar.
Lady next to me: "Wow. Applying liquid liner on a streetcar. You're brave."
Me: "Toronto, born and bred. That's all I gotta say."

do you mind?

Do you applaud fear
Do you hold it near
Are you afraid to live your life
The way I perceive
In my arms I’ll catch you
Do you mind if I always love you

Heaven’s gonna burn your eyes

"Heaven's Gonna Burn Your Eyes" (Thievery Corporation)