Chapter One: Peru was too Optimistic.

I'm suppose to be half-way to Peru by now. Instead I'm halfway finished a one-hour flight to our nations capital-Ottawa. I was suppose to be leaving Halifax behind me forever and going on a fantastic adventure. I had met a young man named Alex who looked an awful lot like Jared Leto. He was couching it like me while holding down a shitty job at another Irving Gas Stop. He told me his father lived in Peru holding some kind of position in water purification. Could have easily have been a lie but it didn't seem to matter much at the time. I just wanted to go see Machu Picchu. I had been reading about those spectacular ruins since I was a child. I was in love with ancient cultures. South America was littered with cultural artefacts that remain unsolved in their mysterious silence. I obsessively read about them and had every intention of seeing them all in person one day.

Instead my dreams were thrown out due to lack of an adventure partner. I couldn't very well travel all the way to South America alone. Alex who was excited and seemed very adventurous turned out to be nothing more than a lay about. He wasn't homeless because he was being sexually bullied by a room-mate. He was homeless because he didn't like to work more than 15 hours a week, which left him broke. Alex made his livelihood by mooching off friends and whatever he made at work was spent on beer and drugs. And what an addict he was. Mostly an E-tard but often playing with all sorts Special K and various relatives of speed. I was always fairly indiscriminate towards pill poppers. Mostly because at the time I was one. However hard chemicals like acid and K frightened me. I never took uppers either. I always used tranqs.

So when Alex decides he enjoys Halifax and wants to live it up in dingy pubs stuck in a K-hole, I realised that my dream of going to an exotic world was destroyed. For a while I toyed with the idea of going it alone but stopped daydreaming. I would have never made it there alone. Thus being homeless and pretty much jobless, as I had quit my gas station job after a nasty fight with my boss. He wanted me to work a double and I refused. I was speaking with an old friend name Jenny on the phone who said "hey, if it sucks so much there, come up here and you can stay with me!"

I was delighted by her offer. I hadn't seen her in years. We always kept in touch however through letters, emails and phone calls. Peru for Ottawa didn't seem like a fair trade off but it was the best offer I had. One thing I did know, I had to get the hell out of Halifax.

So there I was sitting on a stupid plane. I hate planes and prefer to travel by some means of ground transportation. It turned out it was cheaper to fly to Ottawa than take the train. The plane I took on the way up there was one of those extremely small ones where there it's all coach and no first class. It's horribly crammed and every time the plane hits an air pocket everyone holds their breath and sighs at the same time which of course makes everyone else more nervous. You know, knowing your not the only one in fear of your life is probably the least comforting position. At least if everyone else is in denial of death you can try and play gate yourself.

After about 20 minutes of the flight they start going around with that drink cart that really hurts your elbows when you've got an isle seat. I order a Gin and tonic. They give you those little gin bottle that have like an ounce and a half of liquor in them. I rather like those because you can get two small drinks out of them. The great thing about getting drunk on planes is that when you land your a hundred times more drunker. It's something about the air up there in that plane that just doesn't make you feel so drunk. Or maybe it's just because your sitting down the entire time.

I end up making conversation with the St. Mary's University student sitting next to me. He reminds me of an old Newfoundlander roomie I once had. He's got the matted looking auburn hair. He's mostly likely a jock. The conversation is boring and pointless. "what do you do?" "have you been to Ottawa before?" "I hope the weather is good there" "can you ask the stewardess for another drink?" okay well that last one was mine. But you know the same boring dribble. At least I didn't get stuck sitting next to one of those disgusting old men. You know the kind with the hair growing out of their ears and poorly shaved face. They obviously have money but they are still wearing that damn rug-like tweed jacket from 1964. You know the ones. They take a drink and somehow every time a bit escapes their mouth and dribbles down their stubbly double chin. God they make me sick just looking at them. You know they're some sort of powerful business man, but for some reason hygiene didn't enter into it! But those men are the worst to get stuck on a plane next to. They're always leaning over you for no reason and calling you "young lady" while trying look down your shirt.

Anyway, I'm getting a little tipsy and bored. I'm considering asking the jock to join me in the bathroom. I've never gotten laid on a plane and figured it would be an interesting experience. I take a trip to the bathroom to surmise the possibilities. Unfortunately it appears that the jocks arms would probably have a hard time fitting through the door. Inside is a disaster of papertowl and moistness.. it just didn't seem like a very sexy atmosphere. It makes you wonder how passionately someone would want to fuck to make themselves do it in there.