Anata Dake No Mono

Over this weekend, Rebecca's sister came with her daughter, who is kind of sort of my niece. I admit that for a long time I would get annoyed when people I knew would post pictures on social media with their nieces and nephews and act like they were their children, but now I get excited to see her and understand the whole thing. She's nice and sweet and hearing "Uncle Tim" fills me with warmth.

For two days the temperature has hovered around zero and there's been more sunshine than usual. When you look out the window and keep your eyes away from the ground, you can believe that spring is coming. February is half over and the end is in sight.

Those two things have lifted me up a little bit from the deep low that I get into during the winter. I wouldn't say that I'm completely on my feet, but my legs are working to get me to stand up. It's hard to stop and look around during this year of coursework. There's always another essay to start and another reading to do. It seems unbelievable when I stop and think that it's been seven months in Montreal now, at once like I'm only on a long trip here from Ontario and like I've lived here for five years. Strange.

It's hard to force some words out, when I don't know what I want to say. That usually means I have to, *shudders* think about my feelings. I don't that minutiae about my degree is good fodder for the IMU machine, but it does seem like that is sort of all I can focus on. The only way to succeed at PhD is to throw myself completely into it, so I guess that I just have to accept that school is dominating the other parts of my life right now. That's how I frame it to myself at least. It's okay to put songs, zines, and short stories aside while I focus on this.

A little bit of knot in my chest, but one that has started to unravel. In a couple of years I'll look back at it and think about how it's been a straight thread the entire time.