The Short and Long Term Effects of Doublebooking

Saying yes to everything has been my conscious effort to open up to new opportunities and actualize intentions I would have ordinarily put off or have been too lazy to get to. It exposed me to new concepts of art, media, and consumption and even inspired better working and eating habits along the way (the trick is to do more of one than the other). Through all the introductions, I felt it feed and intensify an appetence for human relations. Of course, picking up on new bars, blogs, and beats were all fine too but being able to share them with just the right company is where it’s at for me.

All of these people, with their varying fixations, come tied to so many different passions and commitments that, often, we can’t help but want to be a part of them. Not so much to play a particular role within their projects but to understand how they came into existence. Do I care about what you do? Sure. Do I really? Of course not. I do, however, care for you and why it is that you do it.

Once I was open to this notion, inspirations snowballed and all sorts of unexpected characters found their way into my life. I think of the night I ran into the inscrutable 17 at some Rosemont dive I had never been to. He’d been there recording sights and sounds of a staged yet unscripted interview but after we arrived, he made sure to take long intermittent breaks to talk tunes and philosophy. A few weeks later, we shared half a case of warm beer and shot a commercial together. Go figure.

The incredible thing about this behavioural change is that it resulted in a type of prioritization, an unconscious reordering of what matters and what matters more. But while your brain rewires itself to convert a never-ending to-do list into a lifestyle, your pride takes the opportunity to use these newfound engagements for traction. You work, and you play, and you give yourself pats on the back for being able to accommodate them all while making sure you’re really seizing that day. In the early going, it’s just a matter of scheduling and active recommendation; shifting locations closer to one another; weaving between new friends; going to bed a little bit later and penciling brunch in a little bit earlier. That’s all.

But despite our ability to sometimes pick conversation out from thin air, many of us will ultimately succumb to the complexities of human contact. It can happen when we condition ourselves to facebook while microwaving lunch, or brushing our teeth, or loading that HD YouTube video. Multitasking ain’t what it used to be. Saturated pools of strangers move towards mobocracies and last-minute tweaks turn into ungraceful cancelations. Before long, you’re surfeited with overlapping commitments and forget why you had said yes to them all in the first place.

For 26, there were simply no more dates for all the open-ended rain checks, no more hurry-up beers to drink and make amends, and certainly no more room to develop a deteriorating connection. One beautiful part of saying yes is that you’re free to ask the questions you like in order to gain and regain assurance. Once stripped of this privilege, the unresolved diffidence can consume you. Our once indelible parallels were now so faint and unconvincing that we couldn’t even dream of, let alone suggest recovering from such a distance. And, as quickly and as intensely as our friendship began, it ended — all the yesses neatly funnelled into an uncontested no.

In the last year, I’ve watched a fair share of double-booked events cancel each other out, many of them because of misinterpreted words or innocent actions that furthered the invidious situations. What worries me most is that not only do we recognize and accept our egocentric tunnel vision, we are actually willing to defend it. Friends become chores, and chores become excuses but being technically right about something will never do you much good just as postponing rendezvous after rendezvous will never fully clear your schedule. Somehow we continue down the same path, refusing to reveal or even admit to the discomfort it causes. We rationalize it as the basic result of being too busy, one that we are unashamed of. Our plates full, our inboxes swamped. Are we really too tired, or are we just tired of them?

Monday Morning Rant: Bixi

These past three years, I’ve gotten around Montreal with little more than a bus pass and a Bixi key but, last summer, when 15 noticed the black and red-trimmed plastic dangling from my keychain, he couldn’t help but shake his head, almost in disgust, at the fact that I supported the bicycle sharing system. Why not? I responded. And what followed was a brief but insightful debate about the whole program and those who make use of it.

It turns out people don’t hate Bixi; they hate the dickheads who ride them. And If you’re unsure about whether or not you’re part of this dickheadedness, then perhaps you should ask yourself some of these questions the next time you wrench a Bixi from its Telus branded bike rack.

Must you use the sidewalk as your personal bike path? It’s one thing to hop the curb when you sense danger, or when it’s time to take a breather; it’s another when you insist on tailgating pedestrians, impatiently ringing your bell, demanding that they move aside. You won’t get too far on those three gears so instead of traipsing around, do us all a favor and walk the damn thing when you’re not on the road.

Why aren’t you wearing a helmet? Maybe you’re a tourist or riding around town for the first time but if you’re anything like me, going to and from work every other day, you should just buy one already. The one distinction motorists make between bixiers and cyclists is that, amidst the ruck, cyclists have the awareness and coordination to get the hell out of the way so making the argument that you bike only occasionally is little more than a reason to shell out the few extra bucks. You don’t see Communauto drivers going around without seatbelts, do you?

Should you really be tweeting from your bike? @BIXImontreal couldn’t care less that you’re on one. @RiMartineau won’t call you out on la belle vie. Only Segways are less cool than these things so, please, enough with touting your phone while you ride. Focus on the road and your surroundings because your friends don’t care what you’re doing right this instant but they’ll be pissed if you die and fail to check them in on facebook.

Enough bitching about the ads, kay? How can they possibly bother you this much? There are always going to be ads, always. They even double as decent and tasteful mudguards. But if you’d rather pay more for your membership, fine. If you ride the metro or bus without ads, fine. If you Google without ads, YouTube without ads, and buy apps without ads, fine. Otherwise, get over it. They’re just ads, dude.