Babelzebra

The risk of being vulnerable

2011-10-31T18:10:00.004-07:00

Originally posted on the Monkeytree website @ http://monkeytreecreative.com/2011/10/on-blogging-and-sharing-my-writing/

Sean reminds me, when I forget, that a blog is only useful when you actually write something in it. At the same time, I’m not sure blogging is something I’m going to enjoy. I write prolifically, but I’m picky about sharing what goes on in my head.

Nevertheless, I was sitting in a coffee shop in downtown Toronto last week, having coffee and conversation with a friend who I have a great deal of respect and affection for. We were talking about the many ways a person can get their voice out if they feel something they’ve written has value. He actually had his little black book with him (not THAT book, although I imagine he has one of those somewhere too).

If you’re a writer, you know which book I mean – the one where you scribble thoughts and ideas that strike you as interesting, where you jot down sudden inspirations or random passages that come to you on the bus or while you’re people-watching in the park. We all have those – I tend to have about five at a time, and usually forget what I’ve written in them for days, weeks, even months on end. Those books are an important appendage to anyone who’s a writer. I actually found myself ‘keeping score’ of the number of times he felt I said something worth writing down. (Four)

As we were talking, I asked him if I could flip through his book and read some of his ramblings. Now I recognize that this was a very cheeky and perhaps downright rude question – especially as I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be nearly as forthcoming with my own raw thoughts. To his credit, he only hesitated momentarily before pushing the book my direction and allowing me free reign. I admit it – I was impressed.

The whole experience got me thinking. His willingness to share his work with me, without pre-tense or explanation, made me squirm a bit. And after I jotted a reminder to reflect on this whole experience down in MY little black book (which at this stage in life, is actually a very unsexy spiral bound notepad with lined pages), I came to a few conclusions:

Putting your writing ‘out there’ (when it isn’t commissioned, requested or assigned), requires a certain willingness to be vulnerable. It means opening yourself to criticism, argument, maybe even disdain – sometimes with people you really desperately want to impress.

1) You have to trust that when you do send your words out into the universe, people will respond to them honestly – and you might really love what they have to say, or you might not. You don’t get to pick. I can do this with work that isn’t personal to me – but I struggle to do it with anything or anyone that really matters.

2) There are a million people out there who write and blog. In the past fifteen years, ‘writer’ has become a title claimed by anyone who can string two or three words together and call it brilliant. And those of us who actually make our living this way need to stick up for ourselves. There are some lousy writers in the blogosphere, writing a lot of really bad stuff. Surely I can at least MATCH, if not improve upon, some of the improper grammar, bad sentences, incoherent thoughts and overdone academic prose. On the other hand, those individuals are actually demonstrating their ability to be vulnerable, and I’m not. So really, what gives me the right to criticize?

3) The older we get, the more we protect our reputation, our identity, our thoughts, our ability to be vulnerable. Sitting beside this twenty-something wonder, who’s open to possibilities and unafraid to share his thoughts, reminds me that I really should spend more time with twenty-something wonders! I hope when he’s forty, he comes to the same realization. I’m going to focus on some sixty-somethings next, because I imagine their vulnerability is of a totally different kind (any volunteers?)

My final thoughts in all of this are quite simple. If we Monkeys are going to expect those we ‘work with and for’ to sustain a blog… if we’re going to ask them to come up with fresh, new content… if we’re going to expect them to be vulnerable to their audience and post their opinions or ideas… then we really need to be brave and take that step ourselves.

Perhaps blogging will never really be my thing. But I will do it. Because Sean says I have to. And because I’m inspired by what you can gain when you’re willing to be vulnerable and trust that what you throw out into the universe will be valued, nurtured – and maybe even occasionally admired.

Health Workers Lead Alternative Medicine

2011-09-24T18:41:00.000-07:00

Originally published in Common Ground Magazine, September, 2011 @ http://www.commonground.ca/iss/242/cg242_healthworkers.shtml

A recent study by Johnson, Ward, Knutson and Sendelbach suggests healthcare workers (at 76 percent) are more likely than the general population (at 63 percent) to use complementary and alternative medicine. This is an important step forward for CAM; doctors and nurses regularly rate in the top five most trusted professions in Canada and their willingness to embrace and endorse CAM as a positive add-on to conventional medicine promotes the acceptance of this important field.

Over time, many theories once considered controversial have become part of good healthcare practice. As a result, more and more Canadians are using elements of complementary and alternative medicine without even realizing these practices – therapeutic massage, acupuncture, etc. – were considered unorthodox a mere 20-years- ago. A 2007 study undertaken by the Fraser Institute found approximately 54 percent of Canadian adults had used CAM therapies in 2006 – a more than four percent increase since 1997. A similar study in the US found a 10 percent increase over a similar time period.

A growing body of work suggests CAM will only continue to increase in popularity as more and more consumers recognize the benefits of complementary or alternative therapies and treatments. And consumers have become savvier when it comes to managing their own healthcare. New technologies, access to the Internet and higher levels of education have made health information accessible to most Canadians. For many, the opportunity to investigate complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) is appealing and adding elements of CAM to their regular health regimen is a natural next step.

The Dr. Rogers Prize Colloquium, which is being hosted in Vancouver on September 23, will examine how four Canadian clinics are currently integrating CAM with conventional medicine. The $250,000 Dr. Rogers Prize celebrates the contributions of leaders and trailblazers who have dared to pursue new and unfamiliar approaches that fall under the expansive umbrella of “complementary and alternative medicine.” Named after one of BC’s leading advocates for CAM, the Dr. Rogers Prize is awarded biennially to an individual who has made a significant contribution in advancing this important field. The gala award dinner brings together a wide range of practitioners in the CAM field and has become a gathering place where ideas and discussions can flourish.

Moderated by Harvard University’s Allen Grossman, the innovative Colloquium features a panel discussion with representatives from the four clinics. Panelists will tackle questions about the successes and barriers to building and maintaining these clinics and share some of the lessons they have learned. The four clinics represented are:

1. Integrative Healing Arts (Vancouver): Founded by naturopaths Larry Chan and Eric Posen, this clinic helps clients achieve optimal health through the integration of modern science and traditional healing arts. The clinic offers naturopathic and chiropractic medicine, massage therapy and rolfing, Traditional Chinese Medicine and acupuncture, nutritional consultation, weight management programs and a naturopathic spa featuring the Rejuveness system.

2. InspireHealth (Vancouver): Founded by physicians Hal Gunn and Roger Rogers, this clinic focuses on integrated cancer care. Its underlying philosophy is that treatment must be provided for a patient’s mind, body and spirit. InspireHealth uses an integrated approach that combines standard cancer treatments with nutrition, exercise and emotional and spiritual support.

3. Integrative Health Institute (Toronto): Founded by naturopaths Meghan Walker and Erin Wiley, this clinic was founded on the premise of open and constructive communication between practitioners regarding all aspects of patient care. Inspired by the experiences of naturopaths working with women and their families in rural Africa, IHI believes in providing patients with access to varied medical philosophies and the practitioners who share a common vision
for integration.

4. The Seekers Centre for Integrative Medicine (Ottawa): Founded by physician Richard Nahas, this clinic focuses on utilizing the best therapies from the worlds of alternative, traditional and conventional medicine to help people heal. The centre focuses on several key programs: Integrative Cancer Program of Care, Pain Program of Care, Cardiac Program of Care and Women’s Health Program of Care.

Following the panel presentations, attendees will have an opportunity to participate in breakout groups and discussions about CAM in Canada, both now and in the future. All participants will be encouraged to consider ways the community can develop stronger networks to improve discussion and collaboration throughout the year.

The day will culminate in the presentation of the $250,000 Dr. Rogers Prize and a gala dinner. “Due to the number of significant contributors in the field, and the difficulty in discriminating between their achievements, the 2007 and 2009 Prizes were split by a hung jury,” stated Juror Dr. Joseph Pizzorno. “However, we promise you one winner in 2011!” The 2009 Prize was split between Dr. Hal Gunn and Dr. Bud Rickhi and the 2007 Prize between Dr. Abram Hoffer and Dr. Alastair Cunningham.

The Dr. Rogers Prize Gala and Colloquium will provide Canadian leaders and innovators in the field with an opportunity to network, discuss and share their ideas for how to move complementary and alternative medicine forward in the months and years to come. This is an exciting era as integration and collaboration between CAM and conventional medicine becomes more of a reality.

The Dr. Rogers Colloquium will move the field one step closer to realizing its full potential.

For more information about the Dr. Rogers Prize, Colloquium and Gala on September 23, visit www.drrogersprize.org

In the footsteps of very short giants

2010-06-03T11:06:00.000-07:00

Mount Ngauruhoe (aka Mount Doom)

The only good thing that came out of the university course Itook entitled “Forms of Fantasy in Literature” was the addition of the Lord ofthe Rings Trilogy to my bookshelf. Notthat I read it during the class. Nope. I bought the Coles notes,grabbed a few quotes from various parts of the books, and submitted a very mediocreessay about the “eternal battle that is waged between good and evil”. I aced the course with very little effort,which was my whole reason for taking it in the first place, but I sure didn’tlearn anything, except perhaps that Coles notes were created for lazy buttslike me.

Several years later, in a moment of boredom, I picked up thefirst book and began reading. How had Iever found these books boring? I plowedthrough the trilogy over the Christmas holidays, unable to put it down andmissing numerous family dinners and events in my quest to find out whetherFrodo made it to the fires of Mount Doom and saved the world.

Since then, we have all been introduced, and reintroduced tothat magical world, thanks to Peter Jackson’s immensely popular movies. If you haven’t seen them, you must get offyour computer and GO WATCH THEM RIGHT NOW. I’m serious. You have no businesssitting here reading my silly blog if you haven’t yet taken the time to exploreMiddle Earth.

Bag End

So imagine my delight when my best friend decided to spend ayear living and working in New Zealand. What an opportunity! Work wassending me off to a conference in Sydney, Australia anyway, so it made perfectsense for me to add a couple of weeks and tour New Zealand. Ofcourse, my friend envisioned our New Zealand tour a bit differently. She was considering which mountains to hike,ocean cliffs to explore, restaurants in which to dine. I was tracing a route that would allow me tosee as much of Middle Earth as possible.

To her credit, my friend was quite tolerant!

Remember the scene where the Nazgul
is silhouetted on the path? This is the
spot (thank you bike guy!)

We wandered around Mount Doom, which actually is a verystrange and creepy looking place… we visited Hobbiton where we actually got tostand inside Bag-End… we cowered under the road in the spot where Frodo, Sam,Merry and Pippin hid while the Dark Rider sniffed their trail… we dipped ourhands in the water where Aragorn washed ashore… we wandered around Rivendell… we visited Saruman’s estate…

The thing is, I relate to Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin -those hobbits who left the Shire without knowing what was ahead of them, onlyknowing what they were leaving behind. Frodois like the prototype for every high school grad who straps on a backpack andheads off to see the world. In some wayshe reminds me of me - I grew up in a place very much like the Shire - a small,friendly, out-of-the way town with endless forests, rolling hills and shinylakes. When I left that small town forthe big cities of the world, I had no idea what to expect. It was terrifying, it was exhilarating, itwas soul-changing.

Like the hobbits, I owe my own small town a great deal ofgratitude for providing me with the roots I’d need to discover my own wings. So thanks small town. Thanks hobbits. You might be called small, but your impact ishuge!

So you've come to a bridge, in an unfamiliar land
And you know it's a bridge that you're going to walk on
And the only thing you know, is everything you know
Will do you no good from here on
The day that you spin from your little cocoon
Well you can't be prepared for the beauty you'll find there
You'll find beauty, in the toughest of places
And I will be thinking of you
One day you will come back, with wrinkled hands and grey hair
And there you will stand on this spot and you'll marvel
How the place is still the same - though you are somebody else now
Fly on butterfly...

The Final Victory Goes to Great Big Sea

2010-03-02T00:25:00.006-08:00

I owe Great Big Sea a great big apology.

For us Vancouverites, the past two weeks have been a blur of events, ceremonies, celebrations, street parties, houseguests, lineups and mayhem. It’s been fun. At times it’s been exhausting.

When the Barenaked Ladies took their final bows at last Monday’s Victory Celebration, I was relieved. Their performance was one of the highlights of my year as I cheered the rebirth of a great Canadian band, complete with the Fabulous Four logo on the drumkit (in case any of us should make the mistake that they are somehow less now that Steven Page has moved off into obscurity).

Nelly Furtado was the hometown crowd’s dream entertainer and made being British Columbian seem like a magical thing. The Guess Who might only have one tired old song, but they had us cheering along with every “Mama let me be”. INXS brought back Canadian reality show winner and fan favourite JD Fortune for what might be a lasting (or not) reunion. Even foreigners Stereophonics managed to capture the energy of the city, despite leaving out their signature “Long Way Round” (hey we Canucks watch Ewan and Charlie too!)

But one fact has remained true through each of the Victory Celebrations I’ve attended over these past two weeks. Most of the 30,000+ attendees are teammates, coaches, families, friends and countrymen of medal recipients, and they’re there for the athletes. I’m not complaining - this is entirely as it should be. There’s an amazing energy and feeling of goodwill that comes over you as you watch someone realize a lifelong dream. But it is a bit unfortunate for the bands that follow, because by 7:15, most of the attendees and their medals are heading for the exit signs.

The bands have handled it gracefully, although I imagine it must be a bit disheartening to watch your audience dwindling away as more and more blue seats appear out of the darkness. With his usual humour and good nature, the Barenaked Ladies Ed Robertson managed to gloss over the obvious stampede, reflecting on the pink and yellow outfits of the Germans (ye gads), the general insanity of Vancouver’s streets and the disappointment faced by those in the international audience who had turned up looking for naked ladies.

When I heard Great Big Sea was on tap for the final Victory Ceremony celebration, I worried. Putting aside the fact that Canada would be playing their most important hockey game of the tournament to that point (save the ‘possible’ gold medal game), or that it was the final Friday night of the greatest Canadian binge of all time, or that we would be on track to win four medals that day, I didn’t believe Great Big Sea’s brand of entertainment would hold this highly critical international crowd. I anticipated that, like the rest of the entertainers, the audience would start to dwindle after the medals were awarded and as the hockey game reached its big climax.

I was wrong.

From start to finish, the majority of the audience stayed. They stood. They sang. They danced. The Russians were doing some sort of clogging routine down to my left. A little Japanese girl and her mom were dancing in the flat area at the top of the first level stairs. The Chinese were using their bronze medals to loudly and somewhat violently toast one another. The US athletes on the concourse were trying to figure out how to chant “U-S-A” in place of ‘fare thee well’. The normally reserved Norwegians were fist-pumping to Excursion Around the Bay.

It was a win.

In fact, of all the Victory Ceremonies in these past two weeks, it was the biggest win.

Vancouverites were looking for an opportunity to express the joy and exuberance these Games have brought to our province. Great Big Sea gave us what we wanted and in doing so outplayed, outperformed and outshone every other act that had taken the same stage. They pushed energy, tempo and excitement into the heavy concrete of BC place and made it vibrate with energy and joy. There’s nothing wrong with being the world’s greatest party band when you’re the centre of the world’s greatest party.

Well done Great Big Sea. Our athletes may have owned the podium, but you owned the stadium.

I Hate Myself for Loving You

2008-09-28T01:22:00.004-07:00

I'm not sure what I think of Geneva. In some ways, it feels like a typical European city. There's the lovely old historic areas where the elite go to dine on fondue and chocolate; the rows of trendy designer stores with names I don't recognize because "these designers are so exceptionally funky their names are uncommon" (little ole me didn't know you could purchase a mini-skirt for a mere $40K); and right outside my shitty little hotel, the red light district with it's late night brawls, scantily clad hustlers and blank-eyed druggies. This part of Geneva I understand. This part of Geneva I embrace.

But from my office window at WHO, the view is somewhat different. Here I am perched high above the city, amidst gently rolling hills and forests of vibrant green. From here Geneva looks very much like Vancouver. Scrubbed clean and shiny for the endless stream of world leaders and diplomats who sweep in to visit the UN offices on a daily basis.

I am disturbed by it all. Here on the outskirts of one of the world's most expensive cities are the spoils of international unity - the United Nations and it's band of self-righteous brothers. I can see crowds of tourists walking around the Palais des Nations... black suited bankers bustling in and out of the International Monetary Fund... middle-aged feminists emerging from the International Labour Organization. Here on the very edge of the city, the organizations that set the course for the world perch on their high hill staring loftily down at the people in the city below. The people working street corners and emptying dumpsters. Total disconnect is one of the best ways I can think of to describe Geneva.

The WHO itself is a museum of artifacts and antiques, most bestowed on the UN by visiting leaders. From the elevator to my office doorway I pass a chinese living room set, gifted to the WHO by some long-dead Chinese Emporer, a painting presented to the Director General from an Israeli president, the bust of a doctor in Nigeria. The artifacts are slowly taking over the office space, crowding out the shelves that I foolishly expected to be filled with earth-shattering research and plans of healthcare renewal for those who suffer the most.

I wish I was more surprised. I wish I had come to Geneva believing that the bright blue flag that so proudly flies in front of these buildings had a magical, overarching power to bring out the best in people, in leaders and in countries. But bureaucracy is bureaucracy, no matter what colour of flag is flying in front of the building. There are people here who want to do good. Who will do good. But there are a lot of people who are here for the prestige, the money, the lifestyle. Who will never touch a foot in any of these countries whose future they are supposedly directing. Who will never experience starvation, desperation, war.

In the words of the immortal Joan Jett, "I know who you are, and I'm not impressed."

Speechwriting: The fine art of not putting words in other people’s mouths

2007-06-21T23:06:00.000-07:00

My favourite politician and

good friend Colin Hansen,

who taught me how to get

people on their feet.

I sorta kinda hate to do this but... if this is a site where I post things I publish, then it shouldn't matter if it's actually fascinating reading or... well... not so fascinating reading. Right?

This is an article I wrote for Ragged Right which is a publication of the International Association of Business Communicators. On speechwriting. It isn't that it's bad, it's just that... you know... when you're given a topic and so many words, there's only so much you can do.

Anyway, published it was, so blogged it is. And for those who actually wish I'd write something original soon, rest assured I'm working on it!
=======================================
A month after writing my first political speech, I was asked to transcribe the audio for a website. I was halfway through the first page when I realized there was no similarity between what I had written and what the Minister said. In fact, at one point he paused and mentioned someone had written a speech for him - but it wasn’t very good. At the next event I unwittingly stomped all over protocol by marching up to the Minister and asking him why he didn’t like the speeches we were sending him. The answer? No one had ever asked him what he wanted to talk about.

Several years, and hundreds of speeches later, I realize I had inadvertently stumbled upon the most important rule of speechwriting - know the person you’re writing for! True speechwriting isn’t putting words in the mouth of a politician or a CEO. It’s organizing their thoughts and ideas in a way that makes their speaking engagement easier.

Speechwriting Rules:

A few preliminary questions can make the difference between a disaster and a standing ovation. I watched one CEO struggle through an entire speech because I had used 18-point font (his eyesight required 24). Ask them what broad ideas they want to convey, what format they prefer, if they want sentences or bullets, if they like headings, etc.

Develop an internal database of topics and ideas. I keep a notebook with me to jot down quotes, stories and ideas. The tuna sandwich you ate for lunch, the old man on the corner, a quote from your favourite movie – these can be great speech fodder if you’re creative.

Remember that speechwriting is not like other writing. An audience doesn’t have instant replay. Keep it fresh. Be conversational. Use simple, emotive English.

Listen to the little man in your head. Read it to your cat. If you have to reread a bullet to get the inflection or content to make sense, it’s no good.

Develop a sense of humour and don’t be offended when your speaker changes or omits something.

A speech has a beginning, middle and an end – leave the audience a few clues as to where the speaker is. It’ll keep them interested.

After you finish, go back and cut out the unnecessary words, rephrase the awkward bullets and say it to yourself. Do this again and again, until you can’t find anything else to edit.

Read – books by Michael Waldman (Bill Clinton’s speechwriter) or Peggy Noonan (Ronald Reagan’s speechwriter), will give you an enormous amount of insight.

Your goal is to write a speech that will raise the roof – and then fade into the background when it does. I’ve never had a cabinet minister point to me and ask me to take a bow during his standing ovation. So enjoy the moments of laughter and applause, because that’s all the acknowledgement a good speechwriter gets.

Andrea Burton is the former lead speechwriter for the BC Ministry of Health and continues as a senior writer in government, authoring numerous reports. Under her own company, Babelzebra Communications she provides strategic communications consulting. She can be contacted at andrea@babelzebra.com or call 604-762-4743.

If the angels knew us better, maybe we wouldn’t have to scream

2007-04-11T02:59:00.000-07:00

Vancouver is strange… you can brush your cells off on thousands of other people daily but never touch another soul.

Sitting in the corner of a dirty coffee shop on Hastings, Arrie pulls stories from inside her with the speed and accuracy of machine gun fire. Her eyes rarely focus, darting instead to the tired waitress manning the cash, or the washed-up pimp playing solitaire in the corner. Her fingers endlessly worry the frayed seam of her tattered shirt, but I’m not expert enough to know if she’s high or nervous or both. She’s throwing stories at me one after the other, and it’s all I can do to keep up.

==================================

He follows. She rides. They are energy rushing down the hallways of invisible waves, owning the moment until it fades. Adrenaline. Fire. War. She jumps up onto concrete and keeps running, looking back occasionally to watch the railroad police become smaller and smaller and blend into the graffiti art. He laughs crazy disaster laughter. His bones shake when he laughs and then he coughs and spits up blood on the concrete next to her. She hopes it infects the whole city with his virus so that he doesn't have to die alone.

"The fumes from the spray paint is probably not too great for you, Fred," she tells him.

"Living ain’t too good for me at this point, Arrie. So I might as well have fun and do what I love." And then he looks up at her and smiles a big smile, exposing the blood dribbling down from the empty sockets of his crack cocaine destroyed teeth into his crazy beard full of sweat and dirt. The top of his head is bald and the hair that remains hangs around in small scraggly clumps. He's got dirt, blood and spray paint staining his shirt. He looks like a cross between Einstein and an old bum who somehow had LSD crystals blown into his wandering eyes, leaving him permanently spun out. Beautiful and revolting are united into a bunch of violent cells that make up Fred.
Soon he’ll be just another stranger of an angel that plays jokes on her from the gutters of heaven. Until then, she’ll make sure he has enough spraypaint to mark his stories on the walls, immortalizing pieces of him for years to come.

==================================

She’s one of those girls in the back of the newspapers. She’ll show up at your door for 60 bucks and then come inside for more. Her smile is infectious and beautiful.

She smokes all your Newports and makes your skin sweat. But you call her and she comes to your door again and again. Sometimes you wander down the street to the bar where everybody knows your name but not your heart. On dark nights she drifts off to sleep next to you and you believe the illusion you’ve created. You joke about how you resemble the characters in "Leaving Las Vegas". That’s her nickname for you, MikeLeavingLasVegas, and you believe in you and you believe in her and you believe in the ad in the back of the newspaper.

When she leaves you to destruct alone, it isn’t hate baby. It’s all love. She knows you so well. You’re in her brain and her veins and her soul. But you don’t know her. She’s just whoever you wanted her to be.

==================================

The old lady shuffles into the clinic with the other broken souls, the sores covering her face marking her as a victim of the virus that keeps killing her extended family. She stops beside a young, tattooed girl, " Arrie, you bitch, why you never call me,” she asks out of breath, angry, but still smiling.

Arrie looks up through bloodshot, invisible eyes, "I did call you Aida. Last Sunday. You were sleeping and I even called you the Sunday before that but you never answered."

The old lady laughs. Choking on her laughter. "I'm such a bad mother!" she says giggling. Arrie laughs.

In the course of Aida's dementia she’s confused the young girl with her daughter. Arrie always plays along, the only one who refuses to call her crazy. Because in Aida’s world, Arrie is her daughter. They embrace and the people around shake their heads.

The counselors at the clinic say Arrie is only encouraging her insanity, but the truth is, she’s only ever seen Aida smile when she loses herself in their special mother-daughter reality.

==================================

On Hastings now, trolling among the junkies and the hard-core street walkers, Arrie stands out. Still young enough to be beautiful, despite the fact that in another five years the opiate will have wrinkled her skin and dulled her eyes.

She saw an old friend yesterday. "Dee what happened to your teeth?"

Dee’s smile spoke slowly of self-destruction. “It makes sucking dick easier" Dee laughed.

Arrie laughed.

They laughed together.

Arrie says you can’t understand unless you’ve seen Dee working the corner, waiting to turn a trick.

Turn a trick.

“I can’t stop using that term”, I tell her “… it gives the illusion of magic.“

Arrie shrugs, “It’s like Maya Angelou said bitch, 'Still I rise'”

==================================

This morning she hitched a ride from an ancient Russian man. He had whiskey breath and was swerving all over the road. He told Arrie she was "too pretty for tattoos" and then held out his arm, exposing faded bluish ink tattooed on his hand.

"What is that?" She wondered.

"Just numbers,” he answered. “I was in the concentration camps when I was a kid. They did it with hot metal." He told her stories that made both of them well up with tears.

At the end of the ride he held his hand out towards her and spoke softly. "Can I touch your hand?" he asked. "I haven't touched a pretty girl’s hand since I was in my twenties."

She held out her hand towards his and his eyes lit up. They accomplished human connection.

==================================

She wasn't supposed to wait
Until her disease escalates
It’s spreading like wildfire
And we all know
Fire can either kill or transform

==================================

All she wants to do is dream. That’s what the opiate needle is for. She just feels things so intensely and everyone around her seems like a zombie wrapped up in a material world of bullshit. She just doesn’t want to feel. He called her an empath. He said it can be a lonely world when there’s so very few of us. She wishes for her dead road dog to sing her to sleep. She can wish all night but reality will always set in. Still nothing grows and beautiful demons come whisper obscenities in her ear… to go reach for that telephone number of her gangster with all of his gun shot wounds, crumpled in a garbage can somewhere and ask him to sell her some of her ex-lover/poison. Her veins are thirsty but her mind is strong. And all the angels that have died before her know just what the answer is… sleep. Sometimes the weakest heart can have the strongest will.

==================================

She sat across from a dark woman with snakes in her eyes, vicious and smiling.

"I don't want to fuck," Arrie told her.

"Well, you don't have to, our agency offers other things, private dances, sensual massage, but all the other girls fuck, its where the money’s at," she replied slyly.

"Well I don't want to."
"Okay" she giggled and her potbelly rumbled "But I guarantee you after working one week you're going to be on your back like the rest of the girls. Don't nobody think you’re special."

==================================

“You want to know what it’s like?” Arrie asks me. “It creeps up real slow like dope-sick vomit rising in your mouth and you look around and nothing makes sense and nothing ever really did.”

She can't write because she can't express this thought the way she wants. She tried to express it the other night and instead ended up in the emergency room choking on charcoal and her own vomit. Opened her red eyes and thought, is this hell? Sure looks like it.

And there was an AIDS patient scratching her skin off through the other curtain, scratching until she saw blood, and for that one moment when she looked up it was like they were sisters in a past life and were connected through this intense energy that died as soon as it was born and then she just kept scratching, digging her fingernails deep into her decaying flesh.

“If I could have spoken I’d have told her she was beautiful,” Arrie says. “And if I had a shotgun, I’d have shared it with her.“

==================================

Her mother was Chaos, ging 95 miles per hour as if silently whispering to the sky, telling her we were ready to die. ‘”C'mon Baby, Fuck with us.”

“Hitching rides with serial killers and when we heard him talk about the smell of rotting flesh my homeboy reached for his gun and I held him back because I could see the scars in his soul, and they reminded me of mine.”

Arrie crumples the cup and jerks to her feet with a flip of the bird. “Whatcha gonna write anyfuck? 'Dear Life, You are such a bitch… and I want to lick your pussy.”

==================================

They stayed up until four am in the alleyways, searching for dumpstered food and other thrown away treasures including roses, pizza, astrology magazines, a scooter and a perfectly good bicycle. It's crazy all the things people throw away.

She’s been sweating all night. Kicking methadone is worse than street dope. She’s on a low dosage but still it hurts and her dreams are insane. They scare her and she lives with that same insanity all day.

“It hurts”, she says turning to stare out the rain-splattered window.

Only certain seconds of life are beautiful.

==================================

Mother mother, can you hear me? Sure I'm sober, sure I'm sane!

2006-11-30T01:00:00.000-08:00

I recently received an email from an editor friend, asking me to write a 1000 -5000 word story outlining “your strangest or most illuminating university memory – one that ended up contributing to your future, or one other students might relate to and/or learn from”.

Gak. That’s just the kind of thing I hate. First of all, I don’t exactly remember many of my university escapades, and I’m fairly sure some of you who acted as my partners in crime back in the day would agree some things are better left undisclosed. Then there’s the fact that using anything in my past as a How To manual for future students isn’t exactly going to produce a generation of kitchen-capable, mathematically-inclined rocket scientists.

However, dutiful friend and occasional lazy contributor that I am, I spent some time pondering potential ideas (next time she might ask me to describe what kind of tree I’d most like to be, or to share my most embarrassing moment, and I need to have some credit set aside in my Contributor Account to allow me to tactfully ignore those requests.)

So let’s see. Should I talk about how annoyed I was with my roommate Ingrid because she kept calling her sweet boyfriend Chris a ‘psycho’, despite my protests that he was a true gentleman and a delightful overnight guest? Should I provide the details of the drunken night where the topic swung between Vojtech’s sperm donor potential and Joel’s mother’s reaction to his crotch rot? Better yet, how about the day in English class when I asked Lucy for Tampax and she responded loudly with “Do you want the kind you push in with your finger or the ones you smack in with a hammer?”

While these may be true stories, they aren’t going to provide any key life lessons to future students, aside from perhaps “never ignore your roommate’s intuition” (Chris ended up murdering a fellow student in the engineering building over the Christmas holidays); or “don't go near Joel” (whose mother yelled, “Oh God, stay away from the dog!” when he shared his problem); or “enunciate, enunciate, enunciate” (which would have ensured Lucy didn’t start searching for push pins I could use on the residence bulletin board).

Because none of those stories were quite right, I turned to a topic that is shared by all university students. Parent/Student Crisis Communications. At the moment this is a doubly satisfying topic. Not only are there legions of stories I can share, but my mom hasn’t figured out that clicking the links in my email signature will allow her to read my articles.

At 3:30 am one unfortunate morning, about a month after I left home, my mom was awakened by a phone call from a complete stranger. As she answered, the caller slurred, "Hi Mum? It’s me… I’m in jail for drunk driving."

Now, I should point out several important facts:
1) I was not in jail for drunk driving. I was peacefully asleep in my dorm room.
2) I didn’t own a car.
3) Between the hours of about 10pm and 5am, my mother enters a strange and confusing head space. During these hours she may or may not remember our names, the city where we are currently living, our ages or exactly how we are related to her.

My mom thought she was talking to me. It didn’t occur to her that it might be someone else (and it couldn’t have been my sister who has made a career out of convincing my parents she’s Ned Flanders to my Homer.) In my mom's mind, I was the only potential culprit, so she settled down to talk to this drunk kid, all the time assuming she was me.

Obviously I didn’t make enough of an impression during my first twenty years.

Because I was 'drunk off my ass', my parents got little information out of me. They didn't even find out what jail I was in. For a half hour, they panicked. Mom wanted to call a lawyer. Dad was all for letting me stay in jail to “teach the damn girl a lesson."

(Which it did. If I get in trouble, don't call Dad.)

In desperate need of more information, my mother called my roommate to see if she knew what had happened. I answered the phone. This was unexpected.

"Andrea, what are you doing there?!"

"Mom?????? Wha--? I LIVE here!”

"But what are you doing there?"

"I'm sleeping! It's four in the morning!"

"No, you're not. You just called from jail!”

"I'm sleeping!" And in case she had somehow missed my earlier point: "It's four in the morning!"

And then came the inevitable: "Are you in jail or are you in your room?"

Before my sarcasm had a chance to wake up, dad got on the phone to sort out exactly what was happening with his “drunken, no good, loser daughter who might as well just stay in jail because sure as hell no one is posting bail for her any time soon!”

The whole charade began again.

"I'm not in jail," I kept insisting.

My parents couldn't figure this out. They were angry with me for not getting arrested. "You said you were in jail, damnit! Why aren't you in jail?" I felt badly for disappointing them like that, but I wasn’t in jail, so there wasn’t a lot I could do.

Eventually, I had yelled enough, and they had yelled enough, and everyone understood that I hadn’t been arrested.

Meanwhile, somewhere in a jail cell sat a very confused and inebriated young woman.

Initially, I chalked the whole incident up to a practical joke, but I eventually realized that not only do I not know anyone who could come up with that elaborate a setup, there just aren’t that many people in the world who would assume my mother wouldn’t recognize her daughter’s own voice.

I later learned that there had been a misprint in our local phone book, and the drunken kid had no idea she’d asked the police officer to look up and dial the wrong number. Little did she know she’d use her one precious phone call to have a five-minute chat with my lovely mother.

How did this incident have an influence on my future? Well…

I never sleep with the phone beside my bed.

I am fully aware that rationale parenting hours are between 6am and 10pm inclusive. Anything outside of that is a crap shoot and should be avoided. Which I do - effectively.

The next morning I signed up for a crisis communications course - which has proven to be very useful when managing media issues and exploding cowpies for government.

After all, you never know when you'll need to talk a big cheese politician out of jail at 4am.

This is My Letter to the World that Never Wrote to Me

2006-11-08T23:38:00.000-08:00

Yes, I know. I owe you an email. You think I’ve forgotten, but the truth is, I’m well aware that it’s my turn to contribute to our bungee cord pattern of correspondence. In fact, I’ll confess that I’ve owed you an email for quite some time now. I’ve been meaning to write. I just can’t seem to get my act together.

I almost wrote you yesterday but then I started surfing and before long it was 3am. I can’t send email at 3am because whenever I do, some wise-ass insists on responding with ‘what the freak were you doing up at 3am!?!? I sure hope that was EST not PST! Go to BED woman!’

Ok, but I’d like to remind you that following your pre-approved emailing hours allows me to shift the email tardiness blame by at least a year. Maybe more.

I used to respond to messages within hours – sometimes even minutes. Now it’s more like days… or weeks… sometimes months... Back then, email was exciting. I would write to friends. I would write to family. I would write to complete strangers who stumbled on my website and accepted my invitation to just say ‘hi’. Now I’m lucky if I remember to email myself to-do lists and meeting reminders.

Actually, I’m not sure why I don’t email anymore. Maybe it’s the fact that a little bell shrills from my blackberry within seconds of a new email appearing in my inbox (this would be helpful save for you eager little Toronto beavers who arrive merrily at work by 8am where you proceed to whip off email responses with no thought to us poor sleeping blackberry slaves). Maybe it’s because email is now an obligation, not falling much short of those maternal dictates of “don’t forget to send a thank you note to Aunt Mary if you know what’s good for you!”

Once in a while I’ll sit down with the lofty goal of emptying my inbox. In order to be successful at this, I have to ensure I have several hours of free time yawning in front of me. Why? Because I’m incapable of responding to one or two emails at a time. It’s all or nothing baby! I prefer to let them accumulate and age, leaving enough stories and misadventures to properly distribute across my audience, ensuring no one (myself included) gets bored too quickly.

Despite saving several hours for the task, nine times out of ten my ‘Email hours’ are quickly sucked up by Internet Research (ie, procrastination) – usually in the form of interesting websites, online surveys, celebrity gossip mags or political satire sites. For instance, the other day as I settled in for my allocated emailing time, I stumbled across a riveting article about Tiger Woods and his decision to get into golf course design...

I don’t even like golf. What’s wrong with me?

I’m not sure, but one thing is clear: I am a bad emailer, and that means I am in a constant state of emaipology.

For example, my good friend Leigh, who lives in Korea, emailed me nearly a year ago. True to the nature of all poor emailers, I had prefaced my last missive to him with the disclaimer that I am the world’s worst emailer. True to the nature of my good friend Leigh, he didn’t even pretend to accept my lukewarm excuses. “World’s worst emailer?” he wrote. “Yup!” But in fairness to me, sometimes he takes a while to write too, and quite a few of our emails have begun with, “I’m sorry I haven’t written for so long, I’ve just been busy.” Unfortunately for me, I have a feeling Leigh actually is quite busy. For that reason, I'm not going to mention that my time has been taken up with... well... golf.

Then there’s Jeff, my good friend from New Brunswick, who emailed me last spring to tell me he’d dreamed I travelled to New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland in the fall of 2006. Great! Unfortunately, according to Jeff, I don't behave any better as a figment of someone elses' dream, because I forgot to visit him during my holiday. It's now halfway through the final month of fall 2006, and while Jeff can be assured he's not the next great prophet, I am ashamed to admit there's been no reassurance about my travel plans - or lack thereof - from either the dream me or the real one. Sorry Jeff.

Or my sister, bless her frozen little Winnipeg butt. My mom called a few weeks ago to ask if I was mad at Beth, after all I haven’t responded to her repeated email attempts. I tried to explain that one email from her every four to six weeks is clearly not enough pressure. I need much more frequent nagging than that. The fact that my nieces have gone from diapers to lipstick in the amount of time it's taken for me to answer even one of Beth's emails is something best not brought up over Christmas dinner.

And Al, thanks for sending me the evite, though to be honest, I do live in the same apartment as you and walking to my room would probably have been quicker than logging on. I do plan to attend the party, and I’ll RSVP eventually. It’s just that I went to your evite.com page to tell you I was coming and noticed that everyone else had left a witty comment. Unfortunately it was 3am, and I just couldn’t think of anything. I was going to write “Woohoo!” but then I saw that Brian had already put that down. I considered “Rock and roll!” but that seemed a little too Vroomanesque. I’ll RSVP tomorrow with an appropriately wittified comment. Ok Saturday. Maybe Tuesday at the outside?

These days, I've actually reached the point where I'll just phone or text friends who email me. This makes no sense, of course. Email, after all, was supposed to free us from the phone. When my friend Tracy emails, for example, I simply call or text her. "You live in the apartment downstairs. You don't get e-mail from me," I tell her. I'm too busy not emailing far away friends to write to a nearby friend like her.

I've talked with several friends about this, and they too feel a certain malaise when it comes to email. The thrill is gone. These days, just about everyone has email, and we all receive far too much of it. Even my mother is nagging me. "How come you never call?" has suddenly been replaced with "how come you never email?"

I tell her the truth of course. I’m studying golf.

Take Me Away, To A Place Where Good Times Roll

2006-09-06T18:24:00.000-07:00

I am 35 years old, at Malkin Bowl on a sunny Saturday night. I’m exhausted. I feel as though I’ve been here forever, waiting for Great Big Sea to take the stage. I’m already cynical and unfair. The crowd is old. Balding men love Great Big Sea. When did this happen? I’m not ready for this realization: that these are the same people who were young, dancing next to me at Great Big Sea concerts 10 years ago. They are old because we are all old.

Even the band is old and I’m rocked by this. They’re pulling songs from my past, as fresh and vibrant as the early concerts, when I pushed my way up front, hoping for a bead of sweat to fall on me. It seems strange to be here in the present with this music. So strange, I find it hard to stay, my mind abandoning the doped up throngs of middle-aged men and peoples’ parents bobbing up and down, hands in the air.

Suddenly I am 24 years old. I am lying on my bed clutching the album he gave me. For time it comes, and time it goes, it makes the strongest tree to bend. It is bittersweet and painfully ominous. I can practically see whatever it is that existed between us disappearing into the night. Love is leaving and I’m dealt the crushing blow of powerlessness, the searing pain of lost love. Kings and Queens have no defence, time brings all things to an end. It is new and cruel and awful and it hurts, it hurts to be alive.

I am 25 years old, huddled at the top of Zobor Mountain while the wind and rain whip around me and lightning streaks across the Danubian Plain. In my pack I have the remnants of the care package I travelled so enthusiastically into the city to collect from the border guards just this morning. Tears and raindrops are running down my face, soothing the new, fist-sized bruise that is throbbing under my eye. I can't bear to return to my sterile room with its ghosts and demons. I prefer to stand alone on this mountain, numb to all but the storm and the grinding of my tapedeck playing the only music the border guards left me. And I was feeling so alone. I was looking for someone or thing to remind me of my home. What I wouldn't give to have somebody nod or wink at me. I am so scared. There are eyes and ears in the walls, strange men lurking in the shadows, fists and shouts that my injured soul can't understand.

I am 26 years old, hurtling through the pitch black night, my sister in the passenger seat. We are driving to meet the rest of our family, already on vacation at Redstone Lake. Midnight has passed long ago and we are delirious with caffeine and chocolate. I've got a smile on my face and I've got four walls around me. Got the sun in the sky all the water surrounds me. My car is zipping across the bridge at Fort Irwin, so narrow it seems that we are skimming the very surface of the water. There are no other cars around. We have the radio turned up full blast, the windows down all the way. We are sharing this moment before our lives branch out and take different directions. At the end of the day, you've just got to say it's alright.

I am 28 years old, standing at the front of the church that raised me, carefully positioning my dad's guitar, his fishing rod, his favourite ball cap, a picture of us. Soon initial bliss will pass, this precious time might be your last. His best friend is telling stories of their childhood, family legends of Newfoundland capers, brand new boots that 'fell' into the outhouse, disappearing bicycle tires and schoolroom pranks. I am full of tears and laughter and comfort. Tried to think of what to say, when words came he'd already gone
I am 30 years old and I've downed nearly 750mL of Raspberry Stolichnaya in the past five hours. Today I was fired. My staff has come to my home and we are having a wake. The room is full of drunk, angry, loud people having a hell of a good time. I've always said 'all the rules are made for bending'. And if I let my hair down, would that be such a crime? Luke and I stand on the balcony and rant. He tells me he is quitting tomorrow - he does. Sean tells me he is going to kick some ass at that place - he does. Sarah tells me she's going to poke endless fun of the VP - she does. I wanna be where nothing needs to matter. It's enough. What a lucky unemployed bitch I am.

I am 32 years old, a bonafide adult in a black suit and heels that I will later regret. I'm standing behind a bank of microphones feeding lines to Canada's 22nd Prime Minister as he shares his opinions on the softwood lumber issue with the press gallery. The lines are mine, but I agree with approximately 0% of what he has to say. I am embarrassed and frustrated and sick of spinning garbage I don't believe in. The Premier glances over, frowns a bit, considers my set face, leans over and whispers "didja have the egg salad or the tuna?" As long as the rivers still run to the seas, hey lucky you, lucky me.
A jolt to my chair from an overzealous fan brings me back to the present. The crowd is shouting for an encore. Great Big Sea, I imagine, is hanging back until it’s just the right time to deliver. Their return to the stage coincides with my return to the present and the venue fills with a roar. Teebs rubs my back and bounces on his toes. Here, and now. The band sings: It's all brand new and it shines right through…

NOTE: This is not a review, so please don't berate me, yell at me, email me, complain to me, question me or otherwise BUG me for not getting the set list right and yadda yadda. If you want a review, go read someone else's blog. Also, the concept for this came from an as yet unpublished article I wrote about another band, but friendship and sweet memories have made me hesitate about tossing that one out to the public (GT, if I ever change my mind about that, you'll be the first to know).

Roll Over Roberts

2006-07-15T13:27:00.000-07:00

So I’m sitting around wondering, as I often do, what is Julia Roberts up to these days? Then I realize that’s not the question I should be asking – not under any circumstances, really. The real question is this: who cares anymore? To which I respond with a resounding, "not me!"

I submit that Julia Roberts' over-exposure on-screen and off, fueled by questionable choices in her "private" life, can only mean one thing: she’s done. We’ve had it. It’s time for her to hand over her official Golden Child sash. Which begets another query: to whom should she hand it? After much careful consideration, I have the perfect nominee…

ME!

I’ve never won an office before. Perhaps it’s because I’ve never run, but I don’t know if that would have made any difference. But this one I’m sure about. I think I’m the ideal candidate for the new Golden Child and in the following paragraphs, I’ll share with you the startling similarities between Ms. Roberts and myself that back my position.

You had no idea, did you?

First, and perhaps most obviously, we both have huge mouths. Hers, in the sense that it is, well, physically huge and, if you ask me, quite off-putting. Mine, in the sense that I seem to completely lack an edit function.

Recently she was widely panned for her Broadway appearance in Three Days of Rain. I can relate. I received mixed reviews for my grade eight performance as Beatrice in The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man in the Moon Marigolds. (In my own defense, our school septic system overflowed the day before opening and I was forced to perform my debut role on a flatbed truck in the nearby United Church parking lot.)

We both played clarinet in middle school.

Or try this one on for size… Our romantic histories are not dissimilar. We have both had "feelings" for Kiefer Sutherland in the past yet neither of us saw that dream come to fruition.

Roberts doesn’t speak to her actor brother, Eric. While I do speak with my sister, albeit rarely, I can say with confidence that if my brother were Eric Roberts, I probably wouldn’t speak to him either. No matter how many times I’ve watched Star 80.

Am I freaking you out yet or what?

Once you start examining her exhausting filmography, you’ll find even more eerie comparisons between the two of us. For example, one of Ms. Roberts’ first films was a little indie flick called Mystic Pizza – and I love pizza. Too weird!

Next, in Steel Magnolias, Roberts won many hearts – and an inexplicable Oscar nod – playing the terminally ill daughter of Sally Field. I can modestly assert that some of my own best performances were as a child, faking illness to avoid having to go to school. (The inequity of the comparison being that, unlike Roberts, I was rewarded only with brusque instructions to march my ass to the bus stop right this minute or it would be marched there for me.)

It doesn’t stop there. Of course it doesn’t. She was in a film called Sleeping with the Enemy. I, in turn, have slept with several people I now consider enemies.

Last but definitely not least, Roberts finally won an Oscar – and about every other award known to man – for her role as Erin Brockovich, where she played a fearless, spunky attorney’s assistant who winds up seeking justice for a town whose contaminated drinking water has been killing its citizens. I, on the other hand, have fearlessly and spunkily drunk many a glass of water of dubious origin – and survived. Who’s the hero in this equation?

There! I’ve said my piece. It’s funny how you think you have a strong case about something until you put it down on paper, see it laid out in black and white and realize – it’s air tight, baby! I’m not the next Golden Child …I’m the Golden Child right now.

So, hit the road, Roberts. There’s a new heroine in town – and if there’s only one thing I inspire women to do during my reign it’ll be something Julia never did – eat!

Thank you! Thank you, very much! Look for my autograph on eBay!

It's Only A Flesh Wound Lambchop

2006-05-18T01:43:00.000-07:00

Every now and then my self-proclaimed good nature is challenged by an old-fashioned funk. The past few weeks and months have been that and more - frustration at work, poor communications on the home front, the necessary yet devastating rupture of a longterm relationship, the anxiety of failing to complete a goal I set for myself years ago. Self-pity is a heavy load and one I carried bitterly home with me tonight, convinced that circumstances were conspiring against me and dammit "if the world wants me to be miserable then I should at least wallow in that misery and share it with my fellow man."

I didn't want to go home, I didn't want to stay out. So I ended up at the local Rogers Video, scowling at the latest releases and finding guilty pleasure in the act of elbowing other patrons who dared stand in my personal space. Certainly my behaviour was childish and churlish. And oh, so satisfying. Until I noticed a ‘for sale’ copy of the film version of Hedwig & The Angry Inch. While it hadn’t exactly seized me the first time I saw it in the theatre, considering my mood it seemed appropriate to choose a movie with Angry in the title. What I didn't expect to discover was that I'm apparently at a place in my life where I am vulnerable to the story of a German transsexual singer who has had her songs – and heart – stolen by a young rock idol.

For those unfamiliar, let me back up just a little. On the surface, Hedwig & the Angry Inch is the tale of a young gay man named Hansel living in Berlin before the fall of the wall. When an American army sergeant dangles freedom in front of him in exchange for a quickie marriage and a sex change operation, Hansel agrees to become Hedwig. The sex change operation goes wrong and Hedwig winds up living in a trailer park, abandoned by the sergeant and left with an 'angry inch.' To make matters worse, the Berlin wall has fallen and her sacrifices seem for nothing, leaving her with a trailer full of consequences.

While that may seem like plenty of plot to deal with, Hedwig is really about far more than that. Questioning the very nature of love, the show is inspired at least in part by Plato’s Symposium, upon which the shows defining song "Origin of Love" is based. John Cameron Mitchell’s incredible ear for dialogue and Stephen Trask’s heart wrenching lyrics pay homage to everything from punk to glam rock with generous nods to Queen and the androgynous stylings of Bowie and Iggy Pop.

How had I missed this before?

It’s funny how you can read the same book or see the same movie at different points in your life and while the piece itself hasn’t changed, you have – and its meaning and significance is somehow altered. The first time I saw the film, I thought I understood Hedwig for what it was – an entertaining, touching and truly bizarre story of someone searching for her other half.

When I encountered Hedwig the second time, something inside me had shifted, was instantly magnetized, drawn to the very same character in a way I hadn’t been a few years before. It was like the absolute and sudden attachment of an adolescent crush, desperately seeking solace and understanding in songs, books, film (The Smiths, Douglas Coupland, Sixteen Candles.)

What had changed for me was this: in the months before I saw Hedwig the second time my world had shifted. In some respects I had climbed higher than ever before, but I was also losing my grip on what mattered, slipping backwards even as I convinced everyone around me I was still treading water. I had suffered what felt like an absolute dearth of understanding of how broken and confused I felt. And then I found it, in Stephen Trask’s lyrics in "Origin of Love."

Hedwig sings:But I could swear by your expression
That the pain down in your soul
Was the same as the one down in mine.
That's the pain,
Cuts a straight line
Down through the heart,
We called it love.

It was as though someone had reached inside of me and touched the part of me that ached, found it, turned it over in their hands, acknowledged its existence – and done so with a beautiful swell of gut-wrenching music. The very acknowledgement, the very concept that someone could see and know the pain in another was what I’d been seeking for months

It wasn’t just the music, though. Where before I had seen a caricature, a freak show, now I truly understood Hedwig. Here I was, wanting to take her out and put my arms around her and tell her that yes, the pain was the same pain. That even if the cause was different, I still knew what it felt like to feel broken, to wonder if you could find enough love inside yourself to mend.

At the end of the show, when Hedwig reaches her own personal triumph, her own transformation and reconciliation with her demons, I didn’t feel healed. But I felt hopeful. There’s nothing lonelier than believing you are not understood. I finished the DVD not so much knowing that I was going to be alright, but able to acknowledge for the first time in months how not alright I had been. I had to acknowledge how far down I'd sunk before I could even begin to contemplate a climb out. And that was freeing in a way that’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn't been there.

Hedwig, I'm sure, would understand.

The pieces of the heart that have been ripped away from me

2006-04-05T00:21:00.001-07:00

Odds are good that if I asked where you were on June 11, 2000, you wouldn’t remember. At various points, I was staring at the walls waiting for the phone to ring, fidgeting nervously at a low-fare travel agency and lying on my bed waiting for the night to tick away.

I’ve always intended to write something meaningful and significant about that day my dad died. Every year on the anniversary of his death, I tell myself that this will be it. And every year, the day comes and goes, blanketed in misery and remembrance, and I end up crawling into my wordless bed making promises for another year, another day, another memory.

So tonight not being a particularly meaningful date for me, I was hoping I would be able to share the meaning of life with you, or barring that, the meaning of death. I thought perhaps I could wrap up the last five years of grief and loneliness and package it as Experience. Show you the resilience of the human spirit. But like the endlessly blank pages of the 'anniversary musings', the truth remains. I can’t make the death of my much loved father into a lesson in Experience.

Since that day, June 11, 2000, I have learned more about dad than I ever knew before. I didn’t really know the reaches of his life. I didn’t know him as his friends did - those aging, rough men that crowded into the Kosy Korner for coffee and gossip every morning. I didn’t know the many lives he touched until I saw the sea of faces at his memorial service, the sprays of sympathy cards delivered to the house, the flowers that arrived from across the province and the country. I saw his life’s work in the devastation written in the eyes of people I had never met before, never even heard of - who reeled at the thought of him being absent from their lives. I saw it in the shaking hands of his friends from the Rotary Club and the teary-eyed faces of the men from the hunting camp.

Maybe we don’t know anyone truly until they’re gone. As my sister and I stoically gathered memorabilia to display at the memorial service, I wondered what secrets we would find. Would we find evidence of his double life? Did he have another family somewhere? What would we uncover in the drawers of his bureau, in the pockets of his jeans? What would we uncover that would shock us?

The answer was…nothing. What we found was everything my father was. There were no surprises, no hidden secrets. There was no shame. There was just a man, 58 years old, and the trail of his everyday life, toothbrush still out, deodorant uncapped, glasses still on the counter.

I’m not sure the past years have made me stronger or smarter. In fact, I’m convinced that I know less now than I did then. I can tell you this though: life will just happen to you. Bad things will happen and you may never be able to find any reason. Worse yet, it’s possible that there may not be any reason at all. Some things simply are and in the wake of them, we have the choice to soldier on or curl up and refuse growth outright.

For me, I have the sense, if only slightly, that I am alright. As a family – and as individual people – we have had to figure out a way to survive this, to keep going, to live our lives and to know joy. We had to step out like newborn fawns on shaky, unsure legs. The passage of years and the lessening of the pain isn’t an ending. It’s the beginning of recovery. An emergence from darkness. A chance.

I have his watch. I have his glasses. I have his wedding band that I wear like a talisman around my neck. Those things are part of my everyday life. But I also have a secret. In the very back of my closet, behind boxes, an old pair of skates and discarded books there’s an old flannel hunting shirt buried in a plastic bag. I hardly ever think of it. Very rarely touch it or move it. I don’t discuss it. I don’t share it. Sometimes though, I open up the bag and bury my face in it. And the essence of who my dad was, his scent, his presence, surrounds me. And sometimes that's almost enough.

We are confusing and confused beings, our strength and vulnerability battling within us, our ability to feel love directly connected to our ability to feel pain. I can tell you that everything – virtually every single thing – in my life has changed, not even so much because of the absence of my father but because life has shown me what it can deliver.

"When someone you love dies and you aren’t expecting it, you don't lose him all at once; you lose him in pieces over a long time - the way the mail stops coming and his scent fades from the pillows and even from the clothes in his closet and drawers. Gradually you accumulate the parts of him that are gone. Just when the day comes - when there's a particular missing part that overwhelms you with the feeling that he's gone forever - there comes another day, and another specifically missing part." – John Irving

The Full Bodied Whine

2006-03-28T23:22:00.001-08:00

A young friend was raving the other day about a website community she’s recently become involved in. Now my experience with websites and message boards has thus far been pretty unremarkable and occasionally has resulted in terror-soaked dreams of crazy stalkers and unbalanced basement geeks. However, the site to which my friend has become a frequent poster has been written up in the New York Times. In my world, that implies some sort of credibility.

By the time I typed in the URL, I was already confused – and that doesn’t usually happen to me unless I’m visiting The Onion. The subject of the website? "Quarterlife Crisis". I had to find out what was going on, and find out I did…

I just don’t know if I want a boyfriend right now. I’m just so busy, you wouldn’t hardly believe. I mean, there are lots of guys out there but I just don’t think I can add one more thing to my busy schedule.

I can’t believe I never came to this site before. It made me cry when I read all the posts from other girls just like me who are going through the exact same thing. I feel so much better about life.

I’m just dying. I don’t know why everything has had to go so wrong all at once. I’m so grateful to find a website where I can be supported by such thoughtful people. I would just die without this place. You are like family to me.

According to the website this is precisely the sort of questioning and confusion that serves as the basis of a quarterlife crisis.

And here I thought it was just part of being awake.

But they're not kidding here. They're actually slapping a 'Disorder of the Moment' title onto something we all go through in an attempt to make us feel that much more insecure and defective. And apparently, the "classic symptoms of a quarterlife crisis are feelings of indecision, helplessness, uncertainty and anxiety." First of all, can we really claim that the symptoms are "classic" when they've just invented the disorder? Second, aren't all those feelings just part of being twenty-something? The period in life when you decide what you really, really want, change it a thousand times, worry about it and then wind up with something totally different?

Sure, some people have it worse. They're called worriers. And psychiatrists have all kinds of nice pills to help take the edge of the anxiety. Certainly if someone is obsessed about their failures and their uncertain future, then they are probably obsessive and should seek treatment immediately.

As if it wasn't alarming enough to read the message boards on the site, I’ve since learned that the concept of a quarterlife crisis is now old news. One article proclaims that dot.com-ers are particularly vulnerable to it. Well, duh. If I spent the first half of my twenties slaving away at a dot.com that promptly slipped right off the map at the turn of the millennium, I'd be a little anxious, too.

Stepping back from it all, it occurs to me that maybe I'm just pissed off because there is a new crisis with a funky name and, chronologically speaking, I no longer qualify. That means I'll have to wait for midlife.

Anyone up for a one-third life crisis?

I Am An Astronaut! (Well, I've seen the moon at any rate...)

2006-03-02T01:00:00.000-08:00

A few short years ago, telling people I was a writer evoked one of two reactions. Some would smile benevolently, indicating that my words had registered but they’d rather not hear any more about it. Others would burst out with wistful envy and awe, “Oh, I’ve always wished that I could write!”

Lately something has changed. Admiration for those of us who genuinely plod away at the art of wordsmithing (in the hopes some sort of payment will follow), has virtually disappeared. Nowadays, when I’m forced to confess to being a writer, I most often hear, “Oh my god, what a coincidence, I’m a writer too!” Yes indeed, in 2006, everyone is a writer. (When did you all stop wanting to be actors?) Everyone has a keyboard, a printer, a website, a blog, a postcard and when they marry those to an opinion, dirty joke or observation, they believe themselves to be inducted into the dubious camaraderie of the literary world.

With the utmost respect, allow me to state what should really be perfectly obvious. For those of us who have toiled for years battling sentences into submission while consuming gallons of bad java or arguing with obtuse nouns during the dark hours of the night, this is unspeakably insulting. Put it this way, upon meeting the First Soprano of the London Opera at a social occasion, would you burst out with “I’m a soprano as well, I sing in the shower!”

You see my point.

What I want to know is this: when did good writing stop mattering? I’m talking about good writers in a world where the bible of scribes may as well be renamed, "On Writing Well Enough." If the answer is – as I am coming to expect – before my birth, then don’t tell me. I can’t afford to know.

(Can I afford not to?)

B.C.'s Latest Nurse Recruit

2006-02-26T22:47:00.000-08:00

This is something a bit out of the norm from my usual style. I was asked to write a column about B.C.'s new Chief Nurse for working.com, and since part of the purpose of this blog is to gather my stuff in one place - in it goes.

British Columbia’s new Chief Nurse Executive is ready to tackle the challenge of leading the province’s largest group of health professionals. After only a few short weeks on the job, Paula Bond has already helped negotiate new tentative bargaining agreements for nurses, learned the ins and outs of the Ministry of Health and visited hospitals on the Island, the Lower Mainland, Fraser Valley, the Interior and the North.

“Meeting as many of British Columbia’s nurses as I can is a huge priority for me,” says Bond. “I want to see their practice environments, hear their issues and celebrate their achievements.”

Bond began her nursing career as a student in her hometown of St. John’s, Newfoundland. While her love for her hometown has never waned, Bond recognized the opportunities nursing could grant her to explore the world and share her passion for people and health care. Since graduation, Bond has taken her practice and skills to such diverse locations as England, New Zealand, Australia and the United Arab Emirates. During a stint in Saudi Arabia, Bond helped lead the commissioning of the new King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. On completion of this project she headed to South Australia where she completed her Masters in Nursing at Flinders University.

“No matter where you travel and work in the world, the challenges and opportunities remain the same,” says Bond. “But if you go into new situations with an open mind, you discover endless opportunities to meet new people, develop new relationships and learn valuable skills and lessons that are transferable anywhere.”

Having completed successful tenure as a staff nurse, middle manager and director in hospitals around the world, Bond accepted the position of Vice President and Chief Nurse Executive at Windsor Regional Hospital in Southern Ontario. While at WRH, she was the clinical lead for a major integrated restructuring program.

“I don’t want to hear that something can’t be done,” says Bond, “I want to hear how we are going to do it.”

In September 2005, Bond began to wonder where her skills and experience should take her next. British Columbia was looking for a new Assistant Deputy Minister of Clinical Innovation and Integration and Chief Nurse Executive and on February 6, 2006 Bond accepted the appointment. She will lead major initiatives to ensure high quality, evidence based and patient centered care leading to improved health and wellness for British Columbians through an affordable, multi disciplinary health services structure.

“I came here because I believe this province has one of the most progressive, stable health systems in the country and possibly even the world,” says Bond. “And, after many years of practice, I was ready to explore a new side of the health system.”

“As well, Deputy Minister Penny Ballem is a well-known visionary whose ideas are challenging the status quo of health systems across the country in a very positive way. I wanted to be part of what is happening right here in B.C.”

Always willing to share her experience, expertise and vision, Bond has spoken about clinical based nursing research to audiences throughout the world. “I am passionate about increasing the profile of health care and health care professionals in British Columbia. Our nurses are doing a fabulous job of providing quality care in a changing environment, and I hope to be part of getting that incredible story out.”

Like Pierre Trudeau's walk out in the snow...

2006-01-22T02:02:00.000-08:00

Forgive me.

I told myself this blog would not be political. No no no. I will not discuss politics. I told myself this blog would not be personal. No no no.

I have to break that rule right now because I'm envisioning the life being squeezed out of me in a country where prime minister Harper is in charge. Officially, tomorrow is election day in my country. Tomorrow is, quite possibly, the day my country will die. For whatever lame-assed, unforgiveable reason, my fellow countrymen seem to be considering putting the Conservatives into office.

Yes, the Liberals were corrupt, and apparently that made Canadians stupid. For two reasons. One, because stupid is what electing this conservative, pro-life, anti-gay, pro-US, anti-Kyoto, pro Iraq monster as our prime minister will be. Two, because the Liberals are no more corrupt than any other government - they just didn't hide it as well.

Stick a fork in us, we're done.

Oh Canada, I was proud to call you home. I will miss you.Friday, January 20th, 2006
Michael Moore Statement on Canadian Election

Michael Moore is currently in production on his next movie. As an avid lover of all things Canadian, he has issued the following statement regarding Canada's upcoming election on Monday

Oh, Canada -- you're not really going to elect a Conservative majority on Monday, are you? That's a joke, right? I know you have a great sense of humor, and certainly a well-developed sense of irony, but this is no longer funny. Maybe it's a new form of Canadian irony -- reverse irony! OK, now I get it. First, you have the courage to stand against the war in Iraq -- and then you elect a prime minister who's for it. You declare gay people have equal rights -- and then you elect a man who says they don't. You give your native peoples their own autonomy and their own territory -- and then you vote for a man who wants to cut aid to these poorest of your citizens. Wow, that is intense! Only Canadians could pull off a hat trick of humor like that. My hat's off to you.

Far be it from me, as an American, to suggest what you should do. You already have too many Americans telling you what to do. Well, actually, you've got just one American who keeps telling you to roll over and fetch and sit. I hope you don't feel this appeal of mine is too intrusive but I just couldn't sit by, as your friend, and say nothing. Yes, I agree, the Liberals have some 'splainin' to do. And yes, one party in power for more than a decade gets a little... long. But you have a parliamentary system (I'll bet you didn't know that -- see, that's why you need Americans telling you things!). There are ways at the polls to have your voices heard other than throwing the baby out with the bath water.

These are no ordinary times, and as you go to the polls on Monday, you do so while a man running the nation to the south of you is hoping you can lend him a hand by picking Stephen Harper because he's a man who shares his world view. Do you want to help George Bush by turning Canada into his latest conquest? Is that how you want millions of us down here to see you from now on? The next notch in the cowboy belt? C'mon, where's your Canadian pride? I mean, if you're going to reduce Canada to a cheap download of Bush & Co., then at least don't surrender so easily. Can't you wait until he threatens to bomb Regina? Make him work for it, for Pete's sake.

But seriously, I know you're not going to elect a guy who should really be running for governor of Utah. Whew! I knew it! You almost had me there. Very funny. Don't do that again. God, I love you, you crazy cold wonderful neighbors to my north. Don't ever change.

Michael Moore

(Mr. Moore is not available for interviews because he now needs to address the situation in Azerbaijan. But he could be talked into it for a couple of tickets to a Leaf's game.)

Expecting the Unexpected

2006-01-01T00:02:00.000-08:00

Every now and then I think of Alfie. Especially on New Years Eve. I have Alfie Eve memories. The millenium bust to be exact. We were duped into spending that night at 'the office' to ensure the computers didn't all burst into simultaneous self-destruct mode at midnight. They didn't. We played cranium. We made a time capsule which is somewhere in the basement. We laughed a lot. I think there was some singing involved. One of the best NYE I've ever spent.

And then... well... and then... Some friendships go the way of the dodo don't they? I'll let Alfie tell the story though. In fact, literary license has graciously allowed him to make two people into one in this article. Fair enough. I'm the bitch boss in case you're wondering.

To make sure I give proper credit. This is from the Royal City Record where Alfie is a staff reporter. His words. Not mine.

We will see what we see.

Friendship a precious gift
Alfie Lau, staff reporter

I received one of the best Christmas gifts ever this year. It didn't cost a cent and it was one of the most unexpected presents I could have ever imagined.

The gift was an e-mail from an old friend that I had fallen out with years ago over something that now turns out to be a misunderstanding.

The e-mail begins: "I hope I find you well. I wanted to say hello, wish you well and tell you that I've really missed your friendship over the last few years. This isn't just Christmas sentimentality, it's something I've been thinking about for a long time."

To backtrack a bit, four years ago I was stuck in a dead-end job that I didn't enjoy, but the one saving grace was I had a good group of "friends" as co-workers.

One Black Friday, when the company was taken over by a British firm, several of us were handed pink slips because we were now redundant. Compounding my situation was I was actually in Edmonton, on vacation, when my severance package came via FedEx. The signature on the waybill indicated it had been sent by my friend, still employed by the company.

When I called her up and asked what happened, I was met with what I thought was a cool, dispassionate, nonchalant attitude. The thought that kept on running through my mind was "friends don't let this sort of stuff happen to friends."

A personal phone call would have been nice, but seeing that signature was all the evidence I needed of betrayal. Bitter at losing a job I didn't enjoy, that was the last time we spoke until that e-mail came to my inbox two days before Christmas.

I mulled over what I was going to do for two days. I had long put that situation to the back of my mind.

Instead of looking at the job loss as a negative, I had the chance to turn it into a positive, give this journalism thing a strong effort instead of just taking the first job that came up the pike. But not until that e-mail came did I think I should try to rekindle that friendship lost four summers ago.

Replying honestly and openly, I said I was amenable to a Boxing Day meeting but I could offer no other guarantees. Did I want to be friends again? Don't know, it might open too many old wounds. Did I appreciate the olive branch of reconciliation? Sure, but maybe the time for that friendship had long since passed.

When I met up with my old friend that afternoon, it seemed as if the good times had never ended. For almost two hours, we talked about what happened four years ago, what's happened since and how, in so many ways, we've matured in that time.

Were mistakes made? Sure, but on both sides. For my part, I was too quick to judge, too quick to place blame on my friend for being Judas. For her part, she was too invested in the corporate culture and protecting her job to realize that I thought she was severing our friendship and not just a job.

But the biggest mistake we made was, we didn't have this conversation sooner.

Besides one e-mail exchange shortly after the FedEx package, we had not communicated at all. And all it took to rectify matters was an honest two-hour conversation.

I found it incredibly heartening to know that, in her own way, my friend had stayed in touch. She told me she was a regular reader of my work and not only could she cite chapter and verse on articles I had long forgotten about, it showed me that what I write on a daily basis does have an impact even if it's not immediately recognized.

Both of us admitted the thought to reconnect had come and passed during the most unusual times: during a Survivor episode because we would spend countless Fridays rehashing what happened the night before; during American Thanksgiving, which I always celebrated by staying home "sick" to recover by watching football on TV; during the 2004 Stanley Cup finals, when her favourite player - Fredrik Modin of the Tampa Bay Lightning - hoisted the Stanley Cup over the Flames I had partied heartily with on the Red Mile in Calgary.

"I realized that I missed you and deeply regretted not continuing to open up, funnily enough, when I watched Freddie Modin hoist the cup over his head," my friend said.

"I realized at that moment that the one person (the only person) I wanted to talk to and the one person who would find it as funny/astonishing (and maybe infuriating) as I did was you. It was sad to not share such a funny moment with the only other person who could've laughed as hard as I did about it. I'd thought about contacting you over the years of course but at that moment I was struck with real sadness."

And perhaps that's the lesson I learned this Christmas season and the one I want to impart to anybody reading this. Think about any relationships that you've lost over the years and, no matter whose fault it is, take that first step and reach out.

If the gesture is not reciprocated, you haven't really lost anything, but if something is still there, it will be a gift that keeps on giving.

Irreconcilable differences are often reconcilable and, as I found out, all it takes is a little effort.

As I discovered in the waning days of this year, I have a lot to be thankful for this holiday season because a friend found me again. And that just might be the greatest gift of all.