Ottawa

The first adventure of summer 2017 - a trip to Ottawa with Anna and her sons, to visit 97-year old Auntie Do, who still lives alone, and my brother Mike and his son Jake. We flew, as this is the last time Ben flies for free - he's 2 in a few weeks. It's a marvel to arrive in Ottawa less than an hour after departure, instead of a 4 or 5 hour slog on the highway or on the train.

The day was hot and gorgeous; thunderstorms predicted for Friday so we made the best of it, a picnic in Britannia Park to let the boys blow off steam, a visit with Do to show off Eli's artwork from school, then out to Chelsea in the Gatineau where my brother lives. We went to the Gatineau Yacht Club, a wonderful place in the woods where people keep, not yachts, but small sailboats; Mike has one, largely for sitting and drinking beer in, I gather. A swim in the cold Gatineau River refreshed us all, though Ben was less than thrilled. Eli followed 10-year old Jake around, and Ben did his best to throw everything overboard. We got a bit sunburned. Then back to Mike's for our usual dinner there - hot and cold smoked salmon, since that's his business.

I drove back to Britannia at night, to the airbnb I rent near Do's. The usual way was closed for the Ottawa Blues Fest - the music was LOUD, young crowds pouring in, not like staid Ottawa at all.

Ben on the plane - banana bread from Mr. Porter.

Eli shows his artwork to Auntie Do. A serious discussion ensues, despite the 92-year age gap between them.

Ye olde swimming ole in the Gatineau - Jake about to jump off that rock. O Canada.

Today, thunder predicted. Anna is in the Gatineau hoping the rain holds off, and I'm on my way to spend the day with Do. Hoping, as always, for her genes.

picnic

Summer summer summer - just had a lunch of my homegrown lettuce, tomatoes, and basil, with goat cheese, walnuts, and avocado. Now I need some cows and goats for cheese and chickens for eggs... NOT. The roses are almost done, sadly, but there are buds on everything else. Garden joy.

Had a list of things to do this weekend - films, documentaries, the Videocabaret plays at Soulpepper - and didn't do any of them. Yesterday, I rode my bike to Ashbridge's Bay - on bike trails all the way there - for a picnic with my dear friend Annie. She brought chilled white wine and trout sandwiches, I brought my cherry tomatoes and dessert, and we sat on isolated rocks by the lake, eating and getting caught up. She is the director of the local Jesuit Forum which works nationally and internationally on social justice issues; their goal is to save the world, and if Annie has anything to do with it, they will. She told me about her friend and colleague, Father Bill Ryan, a brilliant Jesuit priest who is in his mid-nineties and very ill in hospital - he has requested an iPad so he can return emails. Bill was in a seminar recently, discussing God with a fervent young Catholic, who said he found God in the liturgy of the church. And Bill said, "I find God ... in trees."

My kind of religion.

The picnic was glorious. We rode our bikes around this lovely lakeview park with its many god-filled trees, and then I rode on trails all the way back.

Spent the evening reading a wonderful book, at least for Beatle geeks like me: Dreaming the Beatles: the love story of one band and the whole world, by Rob Sheffield. Now this guy has LISTENED incredibly closely to their music, along with every other band's, and writes beautifully, with humour and warmth, about why the Beatles are by far the best and will last forever. Music to my ears, literally as well as figuratively, as I Googled various songs I hardly knew to listen more closely. He singles out Ringo's drumming on "In my life," the finger snaps at the end of "Here, there and everywhere" - geeky stuff like that. Heaven.

So- it's hot. Hard to believe I have two more weeks of teaching - it feels like holiday time already. And then - what holidays mean to the freelancer - time to really get down to work.
PS
Just got this darling note from Bell - whose services were disconnected from here months ago. I didn't know Ma Bell loved me quite so much.

Hello Dear,

This is a reminder that your bill due date has passed and we have not

yet received a payment from you. 

Amount due:          $ 17.53

Naomi Klein forever

It's on my list to buy Naomi Klein's new book "No is not enough." What a brilliant woman, I cannot get enough of her. It's always been my sense that our western societies started hurtling in the wrong direction in the 80's, with the far right policies of Reagan, Thatcher, Milton Friedman, and the Chicago economists, telling us the giant lies that taxes are evil and wealth would trickle down - blatant untruths which many in the U.S. still believe. Here's the best summary I've heard of where we are in the world right now, in an interview with a British journalist:

CL: Naomi, you speak of a “crisis of imagination” especially in our political culture. Cut through it if you can.

NK: Right. So this past 40 years, since what we call the neoliberal project began—which accelerated so much under Reagan in this country and Thatcher in the UK—was a set of policies: privatization, deregulation, low taxes paid for with cuts to social services. As more and more people were excluded from participating in this economy, there was an explosion of mass incarceration, of criminalization. This is the neoliberal project, but the flipside of it was always to say that there is no alternative to this project, as Margaret Thatcher famously argued. Sure, you know, these policies may hurt in the short term, or in the medium term, or now in the long term, but the alternative to them is apocalypse.

And so a huge part of that neoliberal project that we have been living for 40 years, those of us who have been alive that long, has been about constraining the imagination and creating all of these borders around what people will even put on the political table for fear of being condemned as communists or socialists or whatever the smear of the day is.

And that is what’s falling away, and you see that so clearly in this millennial generation that has been powering the insurgent campaigns of Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn. They know they were lied to because they remember the 2008 financial crisis, when trillions of dollars were marshalled to bail out the banks, so they know that it is possible to intervene in the market. They’ve now seen Donald Trump talking about renegotiating trade deals that we had all been told could never be changed once they’ve been signed. This is a malleable moment for better and for worse, right? Progressive ideas are surging in popularity as the Trump administration savages people’s health care policies. You know, the state of California, stepping up in the California Senate, just got one step closer to introducing single-payer healthcare in the state of California, a massive economy.

So, Trump is creating a situation because he is himself a system failure, and people are seeing this. They’re seeing not just the election of Donald Trump but that the market cheered on his election, that the media cheered as he launched missiles on Syria over chocolate cake at Mar-a-Lago.

People are seeing this as a need to get at the underlying causes, and we’re seeing this in the boldness of the progressive agenda, the willingness to go deep. But at the same time we have to be cognizant of the fact that these are not the only ideas that are gaining popularity. White supremacy, misogyny—these are surging to the surface. They are playing out on people’s bodies and people’s lives in blood and violence. So, it’s really a race against time because that vacuum left by the neoliberal project collapsing—and it has been in a state of collapse since 2008—is allowing other ideas to bubble up to the surface, and some of them are very, very dangerous indeed. 

Toronto glows

The rain stopped, and the evening was glorious. Jean-Marc and I rode our bikes to Nathan Phillips Square, which was packed, with 3 stages set up for music, and where there is now a row of the flags of indigenous nations. JM showed me those proudly, because Richard now works at City Hall and this was one of his initiatives. Richard was not with us last night because he was on CTV, chatting with Lloyd Robertson about Prince Charles's visit. Oh the famous people of Sackville Street.

The crowd was as diverse as it is possible to be - every colour of skin, from the darkest to the palest, many inter-racial couples, many cappuccino-coloured children. A family I watched - the father in long white tunic, the mother in white niqab, her eyes barely showing, their daughter a vivacious young woman in a bright red dress with bright red lipstick. Each new generation moving right along.

And - the work went well yesterday, really well. Also moving right along. Thank you, Canada.

PS. Jean-Marc and Richard have discovered a place on Parliament St. called Tasso, that on the weekend sells incredible croissants and pastries - only in the early morning, until they sell out. My dear neighbours arrived with a basket of flaky deliciousness and the New York Times, and we sat on my deck amidst the flowers, the 3 of us with Carol, my friend and tenant, eating and talking. For hours. With the greenery, the tranquillity, the lavender, and the rich buttery pastries, we could have been in Provence, but we were in the heart of downtown Toronto.

Thank you, Canada.

Happy Canada 150

I am wearing my red moose t-shirt and my sparkly maple leaf pin; both radio and TV are tuned to CBC's coverage of the day. Auntie Do is sequestered in front of her television in Ottawa. Anna, Thomas, and the boys are visiting a  friend's trailer in the country, a place with no toilet, no running water or electricity - doesn't get more Canadian than that. I think Sam is playing baseball with friends and then going to work, ditto.
I just set off on my bike to check out Nathan Phillips Square and other festive places, but the sky is dark, rain is imminent, and I turned back like the coward I am. Rain has forced the cancellation of the popular air show on Parliament Hill. But Prince Charles and Camilla, who are in attendance, did not get wet.

Today the whole country feels like family, a big warm family. Even the First Nations surely admit that things are getting better; money is being given for much-needed improvements, at last, and the Prime Minister and his wife went inside the protest teepee on Parliament Hill yesterday and stayed, talking to the indigenous protestors, for 40 minutes.

I have lived in this country since October 1950, when I was 2 months old; I remained a landed immigrant with an American passport for decades, finally taking the oath of citizenship in my early forties. A proud day. I remember July 1 1967; I was 16, and we were on our way from our home in Ottawa to Expo 67 in Montreal. Perhaps I will live to see July 2067. I will be 116 years old.

But let's assume not.

I read in the paper this morning about the arrival of health care in Saskatchewan, on July 1 1962 - how all the doctors went out on strike in protest, and many citizens joined them, fearful of what the new system would mean. But eventually the fuss died down, and before long, all the other provinces had health care too. Watching what's going on in that benighted country to the south, I am even more grateful than usual for the enlightenment we take for granted. Our respect for government, for gun control, for the public school system, for inner cities - all things many of our southern neighbours despise.

I love my country. Happy 150, Canada. We stand on guard for thee.