While some people spent their long weekend huddling together for warmth in sleeping bags (which gives me serious May 2-4 flashbacks to high school: watching my friend puke out the fire or crying after my boyfriend puked all over our tent/me), I chose to escape my life the city by running away to the suburbs for a while.
I’ve written about my time in the suburbs before. For some reason, perhaps the same reason I couldn’t see myself living there, they are a great place to run away to when I feel the need. I’m sure the fact that I have amazing friends who live there is a huge factor (I doubt I would stay at a hotel in Burlington just to ‘get away’ from it all). So this weekend, I left my computer at home and went to the ‘suburban cottage’ in Streetsville for a couple of days. And you know what? It was exactly what I needed.
My domestic tendencies pretty much begin and end in the kitchen, so when said suburban hosts told me they were spending the weekend gardening, I ended up as the de facto chef. This worked out, since I just picked up the newest issue of the Vegetarian Times (yes, I am that cool) and I had a another recipe in my arsenal I wanted to try out on other people. Everything turned out pretty damn well, if I do say so myself — shamless plug: all my cooking adventures can be found under StephNotStephanie on Instagram. Making food for others also helps justify the hour and a half prep time (fuck you, ‘thinly sliced’ root vegetables), plus you can recruit them to help if necessary. The suburbs were actually really lovely (although I learned why I’ve never been to Square One before, and I won’t be going back), and I felt good coming back to Toronto (until I saw the disaster that is my room).
Those couple of days of relaxation were really well timed: my business partner and friend is getting married in three days (!), and I’m co-MC, so the next few days are going to be a balancing act between work, wedding prep (I’ve been attempting to test-drive mascara in anticipation of ceremony tears, and have scientifically determined waterproof mascara is horseshit), and my life in the city, my city. Escape is nice for a while, but home is where the Steph is (even if it includes drag queens fighting at 3am under my balcony and a room that looks like it threw up on itself).
Steph Not Stephanie 