Macca and Beth!

Now on hold with Air Canada - half an hour so far - am going to cancel, I think. Sigh.

But - Penny just sent me this from England. Can you imagine? Cosmic. LOVE IT!!

This way madness lies

Crystal Pite, ""The Art of Downsizing" on CBC

What to do about my end of March trip to Europe? Unlike EasyJet, which today sent a cheery note reminding me of my flight from Paris to Venice on March 28 - Venice which is completely shut down - Air Canada is offering refunds or exchanges for travel in March. My travel companion Bruce has cancelled his entire trip; he'll be home in Vancouver to see his balcony tulips come up for the first time in many years. Lynn writes from France that lots of things have closed down and large gatherings are forbidden, tho' so far there are not many cases of the virus. But, she says, if you have to be two weeks in quarantine after returning, as people do from Italy, perhaps it's not worth it.

So - wait and see.

In the meantime, the feast of Toronto continues. This afternoon I rode my bike in the cold sun to see the National Ballet production of the latest piece by Crystal Pite, an immensely talented choreographer from Vancouver. Her magnificent Betroffenheit was one of the most powerful pieces of dance I've ever seen; her career skyrocketed after that, and when I was last in London, she had a piece at the Royal Ballet that to my disappointment was sold out, no tickets available. This new piece is not even half an hour long, so the National programmed two other pieces first, the stellar Chroma, and the ridiculously old-fashioned melodrama Marguerite and Armand, which is like a prissy parody of classical ballet. I treated myself to an intermission glass of Prosecco after that.

But Pite's piece, from the very first moment, is stunning and profound - gorgeous choral music, lights, costumes, and the power of the emotion she produces with bodies, more than 30 lithe young bodies, including Siphesihle November from South Africa whose life in documentary I watched only a few weeks ago. Glorious, moving - she is reflecting on human impermanence and mortality; of course, there were tears. Here's a tiny preview.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqgH4pnvEFQ

Home on the bike for a glass of wine and a jar of soup delivered to my door by my friend Cyril. My cup runneth etc. Particularly after yesterday, when I went with Anna to an exhibition at the Jesuit Forum organized by Anne-Marie - a photographic history, with large panels, of racism and annihilation in Palestine and among the Indigenous people of Canada. This time, it was Anna who cried. A devastating exhibition.

And now the CBC news is saying that Indigenous and northern communities are so poor, they have no resources to deal with a virus. "These kinds of things disproportionately affect people who live in poverty."

Jesus.

PS. For another kind of treat, I just watched this lovely doc, "The art of downsizing" on CBC Gem. Hope you can see it. It also made me cry - it's really beautifully done. Though it did make me look around here in horror. Downsizing a four-story house, after 34 years? Yikes.
https://gem.cbc.ca/media/cbc-docs-pov/season-3/episode-14/38e815a-01267a783cc?cmp=newsletter_CBC%20Docs_705_353

EasyJet and Blackstone: FEH!

Just spent the whole morning on hold with EasyJet, music blasting through the speakerphone - at one point, I muffled the sound under a pillow. I'm booked on two EasyJet flights, one from Paris to Venice at the end of March, and one from Budapest to Paris in April. Venice is the epicentre of the Italian virus breakout; the city is a ghost town, and Bruce and I have cancelled our trip to Venice and from there to Vienna and then Budapest. It says on the airline's website that most flights to Venice have been cancelled and travellers will be contacted for a refund. I have not been contacted, so, after various fruitless, infuriating attempts to get in touch other ways, I called their Customer Service number and waited an hour and a half, trying not to listen to the horrible music.

Finally a nice woman came through, and we spent the next hour going back and forth. But in the end - my flight to Venice, for some reason neither she nor her supervisors could explain, has not been cancelled, so there's no refund for that flight and certainly not for the Budapest one. Hundreds of dollars out the window.

But - first world problems.

More work yesterday with my marvellous social media assistant Sophie - but it's going to be tough, I just do not see the possibility of posting something on Instagram every day, and as for Twitter - no. Just no.

Last night, a fantastic doc Push, about the global housing crisis. Joseph Steiglitz, Nobel-winning economist, explained that it all started in the 80's with Milton Friedman and his idiotic trickle-down economics. "He gave corporations and the rich permission to be greedy and immoral," he said, later saying that giant corporations like Blackstone, which buy affordable housing, renovate, and triple the rents - and have enormous political clout - are "evil." The doc did show cities like Barcelona fighting back, trying to buy back housing and battling giants like airbnb, which makes things worse. But truly, evil is rampant. I think of my children and their friends in precarious rental housing. The heart sinks.

Finished Five Days Gone: The mystery of my mother's disappearance as a child, by Laura Cumming, who was interviewed by Eleanor Wachtel not long ago. It's well-written, but I did skim, I confess - many minuscule details in her search for her mother's story.

I hope Joe Biden announces Elizabeth Warren as his running mate. Or another of the terrific women who ran, with Warren as Sec. of Education, plus Mayor Pete and the others in some capacity. Please God, let the Dems get it together to defeat the GOP. Talk about rampant evil.

PS Brad, friend and student, just came over to help me upload, or is it download, Spotify and to put Netflix on my phone and TV. Took hours but I'm connected, almost. Thanks Brad!

What a complex world. The whole day so far - it's now 2.30 - wrestling with technology.

It's now 4 and I've been struggling with websites to list my house for rent in July. Finally got it onto one only the site won't accept jpeg photos, only jpg. At this point, I gave up. Enough already.

Small Print Toronto, Us/Them

Was just at a grand local event, down the street at the Daniels Spectrum, organized by a wonderful organization called Small Print Toronto, which organizes creative and literary events for kids. This was about building a city for cats and mice. Eli, Ben, and their friend Kyla built assiduously. I've already written to this group, offering my services. I have no time - but what they do is important.

Anna, Eli and Kyla building, along with lots of others. Anna made a little house she called "Affordable housing for kitties."

 Eli's airplane.

The collectively built town. Someone made a hospital with a helicopter on top, and someone else a spa with lounge chairs and pool.

It's a beautiful Sunday, cold but very sunny. We went after to the boys' favourite playground where they rollicked in the snow.

And then to Wendy's next door for a fast food lunch - sometimes, I confess, the easiest solution for feeding kids. I had their new plantburger - indistinguishable from meat. With enough ketchup, mind you, anything is indistinguishable from meat.

On Friday, to the theatre with Robin, who was given free tickets to Us/Them, by a Belgian company. It's a re-imagining of a horrendous event, a hostage taking by Chechyans in which hundreds of people died, and is told from a child's POV. Also aimed at kids. Beautifully done.

And - my upcoming trip to Europe has completely changed. No more Venice, Vienna, Budapest with Bruce, cancelled because of Covid-19 - what to do with my 3-week ticket? Now I'm spending a week in Paris with Lynn, as before, (where, I just learned, the Louvre is closed) but then I'll go home to Montpellier with her and stay with her and Denis for the next 2 weeks. I don't know how they'll put up with me in their one bedroom apartment, but Lynn says I can sleep on a mattress in her office. Two weeks in Montpellier is nothing to sneeze at. There will be cheese. Lucky moi.