When does a home cease becoming a home? That's a question I ask myself on a daily basis. I should clarify that it's not my actual apartment that distresses me (especially since the new curtains we bought at Urban Barn really brighten our living room), but the city I live in. I feel the love for Calgary is definitely gone. I could rant about escalating housing costs and rents, soulless condo towers replacing heritage buildings, the blind devotion to the provincial Conservatives, a lousy theatre scene (though One Yellow Rabbit is a standout), the tiresome "Fuck Edmonton because _______", but it's much more than that.

I'm tired of Calgary. There are good people, some swell, hip folks, good local music, an abundance of arthouse theatres, plenty of outdoor activities, but it's time for a change. I've grown up as a nomad, living in exotic locales such as Saskatoon, Edmonton, Winnipeg and Calgary, earning the "Has Lived in Every Prairie Province" award (I'd rather have the cash). I don't know what it's like to have lifelong friends or to have attended a high school reunion (I spent the last excruciating semester of Grade 12 in Calgary), but I have bumped into too many ex-girlfriends in downtown Calgary (always at my favourite drinking establishments, sigh). So many friends have fled Calgary in the late Nineties and my best friend left for Vancouver for law school two years ago (and never contacted me again--was it something I said?), so I'm thinking it's my time for an exodus.

Maybe I'll drink a six-pack of Pil and listen to Sebadoh in the dark...