February 1: A friend texted this morning to say that we would have to change dinner plans because she was not feeling well, and my little demented mind went immediately to an episode of the Goon Show titled Lurgi Strikes Britain. The Goons were three guys: Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe, and some guy named Peter Sellers. They were on BBC radio during the 50’s and early 60’s and laid the foundations for later comedians, notably Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
That connection was perhaps front-of-mind because I’m reading a great book by John Cleese wherein he says: “(The Goon Show) made the best use of radio that has ever been achieved in comedy, mixing a huge variety of wonderfully silly voices and astonishingly creative sound effects to tell ridiculous stories with humour that was witty, insane, insanely logical, breathtakingly stupid and thoroughly subversive…”
The Dreaded Lurgi which strikes Britain causes the afflicted to cry out “Eeee Yakka Booo” for no apparent reason. It turns out to have only one cure – the ability to play a musical instrument. In short order, with much anarchy and diversion, an air-drop of millions of brass musical instruments is organized and the country is saved.
The Lurgi has entered the lexicon in some quarters as a descriptor for an unspecified illness. I use it from time-to-time and I’m usually greeted by quizzical looks. In any event, I hope my friend overcomes her bout of Lurgi – without having to learn the Sousaphone…..
January 23: Back in the 60’s, I went all Greenpeace over the issues around the proposed construction of nuclear power plants in Ontario. Leaving aside nagging questions about the safety of the technology, there were two issues that I didn’t feel were resolved: Firstly, there was the question of how the spent nuclear fuel would be transported and stored long-term, and secondly, there was the cost of the program which was staggering, even in 60’s era dollars.
Some 40 years later, there is still no clear solution in sight to the question of secure storage. The current front-runner seems to be deep disposal in a location that may or may not compromise the Great Lakes. We are in a push-pull between a municipality which sees the storage proposal as a longer-term employment opportunity, versus the potential environmental damage which must be assumed by the greater public over the next 1000 years or so. Whatever the case, there’s still no answer.
DAVID COOPER / TORONTO STAR
The initial cost of constructing Darlington and Bruce was truly staggering and they have only gotten more expensive. ( The final cost of Darlington alone was roughly $14 Billion. ) Hydro users are still paying a “debt retirement charge” on every monthly bill for their construction, and several weeks ago, the Province decided to fund about $25 Billion in repairs and maintenance for the existing nukes.
Granted, the nuclear industry provides roughly 30,000 jobs (direct and indirect) across Canada*, and nuclear plants provide almost half of the Provincial electricity, but I have often wondered what alternative future might have arisen had the Province decided to spend even a fraction of the initial budget of the nuclear program on the development of alternative energy sources. With that 30 or 40 year head start, we might now be in a leadership position in alternative industries. Instead, we put all our eggs in the basket of an expensive, complex and ultimately unsustainable technology. We seem to have painted ourselves into the corner of having to shore up nukes until other sources of energy can be developed.
Similarly, we are facing an economic downturn brought on by our reliance on fossil fuels, particularly oil. I don’t think there is any doubt that we are seeing the end of carbon-based fuels, yet we can’t seem to get beyond the urge to yank the stuff out of the ground and send it down a pipe to another country for processing. Surely there is an opportunity now to think differently and invest in other sectors – perhaps bio-medical research or aerospace – that might make a long-term contribution to a more sustainable Canadian economy and move us away from being “hewers of wood and drawers of water”. If it keeps going this way, I may have to dig out my Greenpeace T-shirt.
* By comparison, the auto parts industry, based largely in Ontario, had a 2008 employment of roughly 100,000.
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Or there’s this February Report on Business article by Eric Reguly:
January 11: Yesterday brought the shocking and sad news that David Bowie had died. I saw the headline “David Bowie has died” at Yahoo.ca and for a nanosecond thought it must be another ridiculous rumour, but then the “oh my God” moment followed as reality took over.
I have to admit that I was not a big fan of his earlier stuff. The music was not the good ol’ rock ‘n’ roll where I was comfortable. “Space Oddity” was released in 1969, when the Billboard Number 1 song was “Sugar Sugar” by the Archies. “Changes” was big in 1971, when the Number 1 song was “Joy to the World” by Three Dog Night. In time his music became part of the soundtrack to my life and those of many others.
His appearance, persona and performances were way out there. It was challenging in a strange and slightly disturbing way that forced me to think outside my personal boundaries. But that was the point. “Performance art” was not widely accepted at the time. Pushing the sexuality envelope forced me, and many others I’m sure, to confront my own feelings not just about the music, but other issues like homosexuality and gender identity. And just when I thought I might have come to terms with one iteration of the man, a new and different Bowie would appear. No doubt about his staying power: all told he released something like 27 studio albums, 9 live albums and appeared with others on 49 compilation projects. As one of the pundits on CBC pointed out, half in jest I think: “He survived disco…”.
And I think that’s what makes me sad. Here was a guy who was not afraid. He put his art out there no matter the context of the days and was always open to the next challenge, the next page in the story. He was a master showman, and I mean that to apply to his life as well as to his stage presence. While many celebrities live with a public persona that is more marketing than reality, his presence felt more genuine and legitimately part of his music and artistic expression. That he was an artistic genius seems inescapable, and the world is a sadder and less vibrant place with him gone.
There is nothing more painful than watching someone do something they don’t love because they think it’s a way to get people to love them. DB
January 2: I started writing this blog almost a year ago because I felt there were some fairly significant changes coming in my life and I thought that writing about them would be an interesting and creative way to explore their significance. A secondary purpose was to create a way to share some information on my trip to Europe during the summer that didn’t involve bulk e-mail and downloading pictures. At first it was quite intimidating; what could I possibly say that had meaning for anyone else ? Gradually I came to understand it as another form of artistic expression – I’ve enjoyed writing this material more than you’ve enjoyed reading it, of that I can be certain.
And really, a lot of it has not been terribly analytical. As the old saying goes: “Way down deep, I’m shallow”. But I hope that I have exposed some of the truth that I feel and that it will have resonated with you from time to time.
The events I foresaw in January (my move and the trip) have passed pretty much as I anticipated. I am very happy in my new home; the convenience, the location in an “urban” environment, and the closeness of my Mum and Sister, have all had a positive effect. I feel that I am growing stronger living here. I’ve posted a lot about the trip elsewhere. Suffice to say that I’m also happy with how it worked out as well. It wasn’t perfect, but no trip ever is.
Past the foreseeable events, there were others – happy and sad – that affected me as well. Marisa and Joel are married and have an “instant family”. What a wonderful and happy adventure for both of them. Marisa is no longer “my little girl”, but rather a mature woman with bigger responsibilities than I have at the moment. It has been a welcome challenge for me to accept the fact that our roles have substantially and permanently changed.
Sadly, we lost a couple of very good people last year – both shocking and disturbing for their suddenness and prematurity. Ed and Annette were co-workers from Etobicoke days, and Norah was a special friend. They all left us far too soon and with so much yet to accomplish in their lives. I’m at an age when this will become more common, and facing my own mortality is uncomfortable but necessary. As a friend says: “If this was a football game, we would be deep in the fourth quarter.”
So we have been granted another new year, a blank slate full of optimism and promise. All we can do is go forward a day at a time, and accept the challenges as they arise. I can see some really positive things in my life, but like last year, it’s the unknowns that are troubling. That said, I’m feeling more comfortable with myself than I have for some time. With the right attitude, and support from all of you my friends, I look forward to making 2016 a very good year.
December 29: I heard a robin a couple of days ago and like many other times, its’ song took me back to a memory I have of my Dad sitting with me in the bedroom of the first family home on Soudan Avenue. It was bedtime. The window was open a bit and someone was mowing a distant lawn with a gas mower. A robin was singing as the sun set. I was 4 years old and I remember to this day the feeling of peace and security of that night. I’ve been thinking a lot about Dad lately because he died 3 years ago today.
Sadly, when he died he was not the kind, generous, funny man I knew and loved. Alzheimer’s had turned him into a stranger. But this was not the first time he was a stranger to me. Dad was an alcoholic who drank heavily during the first two decades of my life. As a child, I had no understanding of alcohol and its effects, so it was confusing and upsetting that my Dad would disappear with a couple of drinks and a foolish, stumbling stranger would emerge. His behaviours during that period affected the person that I have become, and it’s convenient to blame him for some of my many faults and failures.
Lately though, I’ve come to understand him from a different perspective. As he tucked me in bed that night, he was less than 10 years removed from the navigator’s seat on a Halifax bomber. He had flown 33 missions and survived flack and a ditching in England. Once home, he went back to school, became a CA, got married, had 2 kids and bought that house on Soudan for $12,000. And he turned to booze for reasons we will never know. His disease affected his judgement, and he interacted with me in some ways that are still painful to recall. But he wasn’t acting maliciously or malevolently – he was always doing his best as he understood it in the moment.
Somewhere in my early 20’s he got sober. He went to AA meetings and quit cold turkey. I’m ashamed to say that I don’t know the exact date, because I was too self-absorbed to realize that a small miracle had happened, so every year in more than 30 years of sobriety, his (re)birthday would pass unnoticed.
What emerged was a warm, gregarious and supportive man. He was fundamentally a people person. He enjoyed his life. He loved golf and hacking around golf courses with him ultimately brought us closer. In October, I visited the Toronto Hunt Club where he had been a member. I sat in the parking lot for a while watching some groups straggle in off the course in the late afternoon sun. He would have been right at home with them, laughing and trading bullshit about the shots made or missed. That’s the guy I remember as my Dad – the same one who was tucking me in more than 60 years ago.
PS: Two days after I wrote this post, I went out the back door to discover at least 50 Robins perched in the trees over the garage and singing their hearts out. While I know that it’s fairly common for some Robins to overwinter here, I’ve never seen more than a handful at one time. It’s almost as if someone knew…..
December 15: For as long as I can remember, Christmas has been among the most stressful days of the year. I’ve always been uncomfortable being the centre of attention, and Christmas seems to me to be all about being the centre of attention. Opening gifts means having to display the right mix of excitement, surprise, and gratitude for something you probably don’t need, while giving gifts means having to find “the perfect gift” for someone you may not really know that well.
The fact that the season has become the most important period in the year for retailers speaks volumes about our attitude to Christmas. Even charities put on an extra push during the holidays trying to capture some residual generosity. How many more weeks of that idiotic talking goat do I have to endure ? It feels like we’ve lost what Christmas should really be about.
And here is where I struggle: what should Christmas be about ? I’m not religious so celebrating the birthday of someone who may or may not have existed is unimportant to me. I have no issue if others wish to do so, although I wonder whether those who follow other religions are comfortable with the Christian focus of the holiday.
Ultimately I feel that the season should be about gratitude; a celebration of the fact that the year is drawing to a close, we are nearing the shortest day of the year, and we have many things to be happy about. Most of us have supportive families and friends, our health, and a reasonably comfortable life. Lets take a moment to reflect on the good fortune that brought us here and the truly wonderful things we have at our disposal. In the genetic lottery of life, millions are not so fortunate. We won the big one…..
Much has already been written about the horrific and tragic attacks in Paris. Unfortunately, my feeling is that this is “the new normal”; attacks of various forms will happen for years to come. The possibility of actually being involved has to be vanishingly small, yet the possibility of an attack, and the fear it engenders, is corrosive. Antoine Leiris, whose wife Helene Muyal-Leiris was among the 89 killed in the Bataclan concert hall attack on Friday evening, posted this message on Facebook:
“Friday night, you took an exceptional life – the love of my life, the mother of my son – but you will not have my hatred. I don’t know who you are and I don’t want to know, you are dead souls. If this God, for whom you kill blindly, made us in his image, every bullet in the body of my wife would have been one more wound in his heart.
So, no, I will not grant you the gift of my hatred. You’re asking for it, but responding to hatred with anger is falling victim to the same ignorance that has made you what you are. You want me to be scared, to view my countrymen with mistrust, to sacrifice my liberty for my security. You lost.
I saw her this morning. Finally, after nights and days of waiting. She was just as beautiful as when she left on Friday night, just as beautiful as when I fell hopelessly in love over 12 years ago. Of course I am devastated by this pain, I give you this little victory, but the pain will be short-lived. I know that she will be with us every day and that we will find ourselves again in this paradise of free love to which you haveno access.
We are just two, my son and me, but we are stronger than all the armies in the world. I don’t have any more time to devote to you, I have to join Melvil who is waking up from his nap. He is barely 17-months-old. He will eat his meals as usual, and then we are going to play as usual, and for his whole life this little boy will threaten you by being happy and free. Because no, you will not have his hatred either.”
Would that we all carry this attitude forward in the months and years to come.
November 13: On November 4, Marisa delivered 2 beautiful twin girls; Naomi Maya and Jaia Camille were each about 6 and a half pounds. With their arrival, I crossed another chronological watershed- like turning 50 – that tends to define our stage in life: I became a grandfather. That this is a life-changing event for her is without doubt, but this is my site and so for now, it’s all about me.
Part of my discomfort with my new label is that my own grandfathers seemed to be ancient. On my Father’s side, Grandpa was the epitome of the dour Scotsman; aloof and reserved, he sat in a chair and said little when we visited him and Grandma in their apartment on Sherbourne Street. If you got close enough he would mutter something and slip you a handful of Scotch Mints from his vest pocket. They remind me of him to this day. He had been a machinist for CN and I remember being fascinated by the fact that he had lost part of an index finger, presumably to an industrial accident. Since my own Father was the youngest in the family, Grandpa seemed to me to be very old. He died aged 78 when I was still in elementary school; Grandma lived to 86.
My Mother’s Father was relatively young. More active and fit than Grandpa, he played a bigger role in my life. I was fortunate enough to spend time at the cottage with him and Nana, when they were alive and after they passed. He let me use his workshop and taught me how to properly use a few tools. He taught me how to run an outboard boat, although I often suspected this was a way of getting me to run to town so that he could stay at the cottage. He set a foundation and an example for our family that endures to this day. Still, he seemed incredibly old, even though he died only three years older than I am today.
And of course there is my own Father who was Poppa to my Sister’s children. Dad played soccer in high school and golf throughout most of his adult life so he was relatively spry. He was in good health until his last few years and he participated with his grandchildren more actively than either of my grandfathers. I was able to travel with him and Mum and some of the grandchildren several times, including a couple of weeks in the southern US playing golf. These were wonderful memories and he has left large shoes to fill as a Grandfather.
So now I find myself crossing that invisible barrier into geezer-dom understanding that I too will be seen as that incredibly old guy who sits in the corner and surreptitiously hands out treats – monetary or otherwise – all the while muttering about things that are largely irrelevant to the kids. The strange thing is: I’m kind of looking forward to it…….
October 30: I had the privilege of working with Rob Ford when he was City Councillor for Ward 2. He told me one afternoon that “politics is a blood sport” and that was certainly how he played the game. He was not afraid of being unpopular, and he won my respect for being direct, diligent and committed to what he believed.
When he became Mayor, I had retired so I had no involvement with him. But the whole City was treated to the soap opera of his behaviour as he descended into his various addictions. Unfortunately, I’ve seen this play before and know what happens in the final act. But then, something amazing happened: He got clean and sober. Most people are unable to gain sobriety on their first attempt and he apparently accomplished that and returned to City Council. I felt a quiet admiration for his strength and courage in dealing with his addictions, even while I held my breath expecting the “inevitable” relapse.
Then a kick in the gut: a cancer diagnosis. And not just any cancer but one that is aggressive and usually deadly. And again, something amazing happened. After treatment he was declared cancer free. He returned to City Hall, began working out, and declared that he felt better than at any other time in his life.
Last week we heard that there had been “a bump in the road”, and yesterday we learned that the cancer had returned. We discovered this because Rob Ford told us so on live TV as he left the hospital having just undergone a bladder biopsy and a meeting with his Doctors. I don’t know whether he agreed to the interviews, but it certainly appeared that the press had “cornered him”. Here he was, clearly in physical and emotional agony, having to deal with a gang of reporters intent on a headline for the evening news.
OK I get it; he’s a public figure and lives, to an extent, in the public eye. But nobody should be forced to stand on the sidewalk and recount their medical history to the media in detail. That he is “99.9% certain” that it is malignant is heartbreaking, but it is also something that we have no right or need to know. When he was battling addictions and running the City, the press had a right to ask pointed questions. Yesterday they went over the line and descended to the level of driving slowly by a car crash. Love him or hate him, Rob Ford is entitled to his privacy and our respect.
February 1: A friend texted this morning to say that we would have to change dinner plans because she was not feeling well, and my little demented mind went immediately to an episode of the Goon Show titled Lurgi Strikes Britain. The Goons were three guys: Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe, and some guy named Peter Sellers. They were on BBC radio during the 50’s and early 60’s and laid the foundations for later comedians, notably Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
