Bilingual

On the last Canada Day of the millennium, 
I was three months into living away from everything 
I knew in my life up to that point in time. 
Away from my father’s grandiose expectations.
Away from my mother’s constant, non-stop fussing. 
Away from my boss’s regular tirades.
Away from Louise’s lovely flattery. 
All of that was part of a different lifetime, 
when I was but an engineering dropout 
who worked at Starbucks and spent his free time reading 
at the library with his fiancée 
and her friends who sat with them once in a while. 
I decided I was no longer any of that, 
though what shape I would take instead was still unclear.