La vie, la mort, pi les ptites boules de poils

Aujourd'hui on a endormi Spoutnik, notre chien depuis 16 ans maintenant.

Presque aveugle, complètement sourd, les cacas et les pipis partout, les fixages de murs...

Ils ont duré longtemps. Mais il avait pas l'air d'avoir mal. Tant qu'il souffre pas, que mes parents disaient. Les vets nous disaient depuis 4 ans déjà qu'il était sur le point de mourir. Mais le pti gars, il s'accrochait. Il chialait pas. Il n'aimait plus les marches mais des fois il avait des élans d'énergie. Mes parents l'endormaient pas, il avait pas l'air d'en avoir fini.

Hier soir par contre, c'était la crise d'épilepsie. Je l'ai pas vu, mais ça l'air que c'était assez violent merci. Tellement que mes parents croyaient que ca y était, il s'en allait tout seul.

Le reste de la famille était là aussi. Pas mon frêre car il habite à Sherbrooke, mais Mini-Cookie, Chuchotte, Peter, Frizbee. Ils se demandaient bien ce qui se passait avec le doyen, celui qui les a accueillit sans méchanceté.

La nuit a été dure ça l'air. Il avait des nouveaux signes aussi... Les jambes qui lâchent, les gémissements. Sa petite énergie n'y était plus. Ils m'ont demandé mon avis... Je ne suis plus aussi optimiste qu'avant, plutôt réaliste maintenant.

"Tant qu'a étirer ses souffrances... Aussi bien lui donner une belle mort"

Lui ce qu'il aimait, c'était ma mère et les écureuils. Pas trop compliqué, le Spoutnik.

Il a une très belle histoire quand même. Dans le temps, ma mère passait à l'animalerie toutes les semaines acheter des grillons pour le gecko de mon frêre. Une journée, un nouvel arrivage: une portée de chiots, tous beiges sauf le petit Spoutnik tout noir. Chaque semaine ma mère y retournait, et chaque semaine il y en avait un qui partait. Sauf Spoutnik.

Et ensuite c'était les semaines de solitude. Le pti a regardé ses frêres partir sans trop savoir où ils s'en allaient, et éventuellement il les oubliait. Chaque semaine, son prix baissait.

Une bonne fois, c'était rendu que la cage était incluse avec le chien. Il n'était plus un petit chiot, il ne partirait surement pas. Ma mère l'a prit par pitié, sur un coup de tête.

Moi et mon frêre, on était fous comme dla marde. On a tellement rit avec ce cabot tellement bizarre. On a choisi son nom d'après un dessin animé qu'on aimait beaucoup dans le temps, Capitaine Star. Spoutnik, c'était son chat. On trouvait ça cool.

Tantôt je suis passé lui dire mes adieux. On lui a donné un bon dernier souper, des saucisses, de la bouffe de chat molle (y'adore ça), et des ptis biscuits pour chien. J'ai demandé à ma mère si elle voulait parler à mon amie tattoueuse pour un pti souvenir.

Moi j'me suis assis à côté de lui, à lui gratter derrière l'oreille tranquillement. Il me fixait avec ses yeux pleins de cataractes sans trop comprendre mais il me laissait faire.

Un gros bec sur le front.

"Viens-tu avec nous au vet?"
"Tu-malades... Bin trop pleuré quand on a fait endormir Cookie"
"Ok. Bin, passes souper cette semaine d'abord"
"Ok. Bonne soirée"
"Bye"

Repose en paix mon Spoutnik, en espérant que notre famille t'as donné une belle vie.

Réflections de banc d'parc

Je sors du métro Lionel-Groulx en réalisant que je suis moins chaud que je croyais.

Je donne un gros deux au mendiant tattoué dans face et me dirige vers l'arrêt de la 211, cet autobus que je fréquente depuis 15 ans.

Manqué de 1 minute. Le prochain: minuit 18 genre. Bo pa nyan, ca me donne le temps d'aller m'acheter un café pi un bagel, plus que le tattoué dans face. 

À la station-service/Tim Hortons le gaz est à 143.9, 6 cennes de moins que vla 6 jours.

Gang de crosseurs.

Pendant que le gars sur l'autre banc s'endort je réfléchis à ma soirée.

Si à 15 ans on m'avait dit que je ferais 30 minutes d'autobus pour aller trainer dans un tattoo shop à boire de la bière AC/DC et me faire tattouer un dessin random par une amie, j'aurais dit "fuck oui".

La ride d'autobus consista d'un duel entre ma volonté et le sommeil, ça s'est terminé 1-1.

En débarquant une belle gothique me lance un sourire.

Je lui répond en levant les sourcils mais en débarquant je réalise qu'elle est surement jamais allée aux Philippines donc elle ne sait pas que je viens de lui dire salut.

Ah bin.

More Don Det Reflections

It's a nice sunny Sunday here in the english-dominant upper-middle-class suburbs of Montréal and as one of my old co-workers would say every day for the whole season, it's hot as bawls.

I find it harder to feel comfortable in the summer than in the winter, mainly because in the coldest season you can always put more clothes on but during the warmest part of the year there's only so much you can take off.

Coincidently, today's entry is called:

Comfort

More and more I find myself sitting in the internet shop here, watching hockey game recaps of the Habs while my mind starts to drift to my comforts from home.

Tv.
Couch.
Bed.
Manageable room temperature.
Hot shower.
Food ready in minutes.
Music shows.
Friends.
Beer.
Diversity of said beer.

I'm reflecting on this in my hammock on the balcony of my bungalow which hangs over the Mekong. My living quarters consist of a second hammock for guests, a large bed with cheap mattress, pillows, a fan and a light, all contained within a bamboo square room. I also have a mosquito net that I don't use (it blocks too much of the precious wind created by the fan) and a window that I don't open (the street is made of sand so by the end of the day my stuff was covered with an inch of dust).

I could use a drawer.

I spent so much effort at home looking for simplicity. For some reason, it's hard on my continent. There's just too much available for every possible need.

Here you make do and I think it's great. The Laos people are also not used to having furniture or much of anything, really. Lately there has been a sort of economic boom and for the first time the locals have "big money". They build giant houses (compared to their hutts) but they don't have anything to put in. No extra money and as is mostly the case, the products are simply not available here.

A TV with satellite, a table, mattresses on the floor.

I was also on the internet to try and find work back home for the summer.

The fact that I've lived with nothing but the shit in my backpack should help me however, because no matter what job I get (fruit picking, marina work, landscaping) I'll have to live with very little in order to save good money to come back to Laos as fast as possible.

I can't wait.

I'm finally getting the life I've always dreamed about.

I just needed to get depressed first.

Halfway through the Don Det notes... more or less

It is with a not so weary body, a mind on caffeine and the ears full of Fake Problems that I open once again my schoolbook of Don Det scribblings to share with you bits of what was easily the best 3 months of my life.

I'm happy to have been able to share it with dozens of amazing people, characters and party members that collaborated to this, my first adventure as a solo nomad human.

For those of you that were not there, these lines spew forth from the past, out of my mind and onto paper, later copied onto a virtual surface available everywhere in the world...

"Everything's amazing right now, and nobody's happy" - Louis C.K.

Well, I'm happy.

Enough attempted poetry for now, here's an entry!

(If my writing style seems to have changed it's because I've been watching a tonne of videos from these guys over the last few days, I think they're the best thing to happen to Youtube).

Peritos!

Last night Sandy gave birth to 8 little furry blind creatures. It's the first time in my life that I get to witness a dog's pregnancy and the aftermath. I won't get to watch them grow into adulthood but I should be fortunate enough to play with them for a month or two, long enough to imprint my face, smell and voice on them.

Smiley face.

That was the end of it originally. Peritos means puppies in spanish, yes I picked it up from the argentina  chickas.

I didn't witness the puppies exiting the dog's vulva live and although I'm naturally curious I'm not sure I needed to see it just yet in my life.

Turns out there's a lot more to taking care of puppies than I first thought and since we're not even sure Sandy was over one year old (talk about teenage pregnancy! You slut (her 3rd nickname)) I was overly protective of her. She didn't leave their side for the first few days so we'd go into Arron's bungalow where she had done her business (right under his bed) and leave leftovers and water easily reachable for her.

We'd get woken up by sounds of the puppies yelping and it took me a few days to realise that - since they were blind and could barely move - this was their way to let their mother know where they were.

The pups became very popular very quickly (especially with female travellers and clients) and once their eyes opened and they started walking around and pooping we moved them to larger quarters. That meant that now any Don Det resident had easy access to them. That meant that sometimes I'd be walking around and see whatshisname driving around on his motorbike with 3 puppies in the front basket.

At the same time a dog smaller than Sandy, probably 6 months old, decided that One More Bar was his new home and decided to take up residency. There was a breed of dogs - or at least a family branch - on this island that looked like nothing I've ever seen. They had barely any hair, were pink and scruffy and fugly as hell.

Some backpackers were saying they were the result of mating between a dog and a pig.
Some backpackers are idiots.

Anyways. This unfortunate little guy was probably the last survivor of the most recent batch of little gremlins the poor mother birthed and was now looking for a new home.

That's right, in Laos, the dog adopts YOU. Sandy wasn't even Ken's in fact, she just kinda showed up one day and started being the awesomest dog ever.

After a few days of the little bugger disgusting/gathering pity from the clients I started to evict him a few times a night. People (mostly female travellers/clients) would go aaaaaaawwww and look at me with sad faces making me feel like an asshole as I was literally kicking him out of the restaurant, until they'd see Sandy full of motherhood and protective bad-assness show up and kick the living crap out of the little dood.

So, in retrospect, I did it for his own good.

He's probably living on the beach now with all the ugly discarded dogs of the island, being hated by the indigenous population but accepted by the invaders, the falang, the weird pale and tall people that show affection to animals and don't see them just as nuisance, food, or tools.