Loose Woman in Zurich

Fun - just got this from my blog friend Alan Millen, a fellow mad Beatle lover and musician I've never met who lives in Zurich and sent this from the Odeon, a legendary artists' café there. 

I guess Zurich isn't in lockdown. Thanks for the plug, Alan!

I do understand the people who are so frustrated by our current lockdown that they break the rules. It must be unbearable for a small business owner to lock the doors just before the Xmas shopping season. It's shocking even for me, who all year rarely shopped, to go out and find almost everything closed. The best business these days: delivery trucks. That's how we'll save Xmas. Well, at least I won't be moaning about the saccharine music in stores. 

But it feels hard, especially as now the days are shorter and colder and darkness is descending. We need lots of inner resources to stay afloat. Like my friend Chris, in the blog to the left, who never stops doing stuff. He has been like that his whole life; where we see nothing, he creates something, often laboriously. But most of us do not have that drive and creativity. The winter will be very long. 

I started to read a book praised by my blog friend Theresa, also to the left: Undying: Pain, Vulnerability, Mortality, Medicine, Art, Time, Dreams, Data, Exhaustion, Cancer, and Care, by Anne Boyer, an "extraordinary and furious new memoir," says the NYT, of her diagnosis with an aggressive breast cancer and the horrible chemo ordeals she went through. I couldn't finish it and returned it early to the library; I'll try another time. Right now, I'm sorry, I just can't read rage, I can't read disease. Not that I'll be turning to fluff, but something with a bit more bearable. So, two books - the wonderful 150 Glimpses of the Beatles, a beautifully written tour from the beginning with wry snippets about their lives, their fans, their enemies, like Noel Coward, who loathed them but insisted on meeting them. The book just won a big nonfiction award in England. 

And Sarah Manguso's Ongoingness: the end of a diary, which explores her 25 years of diary-keeping, a subject close to my own heart. She kept her diaries online though. Mine are in boxes under the bed, muttering away down there. What to do with them? A bonfire? Over my dead body. Which is quite literally what my children might do. 

Tuesday was my beloved friend Ken's 85th birthday; his family gave him the Cubii he requested so he can exercise through the winter. And yesterday was my Dad's 98th. Last night I read the short Prologue of the new book about him and Mum to my home class; they liked it a lot. Much-needed encouragement early in the journey.

Yesterday, there was a disappointment; the Vancouver publicist told me happily last month that a local CBC host asked for the book and wanted to interview me. Great! She booked a tentative time for the interview: yesterday at 1.30. But as time went by there was no word from the host; she didn't reply to emails, and the day went by sans interview. We were ghosted. So far, the media coverage of the memoir has been a short Radio Canada interview in French. 

C'est la vie. 

Today, another disappointment: a guy came to see if I can have a gas fire stove installed and the answer was almost definitely not for various reasons. Later, I'm giving Debra a lesson in voice and comportment for a Zoom webinar. And then maybe as a special treat a few more episodes of The Crown. Delicious. Yesterday was startlingly warm and lovely, a good day for raking; I saw a guy in shorts. Today again is very mild but grey. We'll take mild.

Go Joe. 

Two images from Chris's blog, the first something I'd like in my backyard:

Toronto's second best bartender and Ian Brown, first best CNFC speaker

So Toronto is locked down again as of Monday. Sam's bar will only be able to sell take-out bottles. Thomas's work will probably continue, and so will mine. But how lucky I am; unlike many I have a roof, work, health. 

I also have pinkeye. And, well, a small complaint: the fireplace guy who was supposed to come Friday to make sure I can install a gas fire stove and then to order it, so I can keep warm this long cold winter, just called to cancel because of the lockdown. He says he'll come in February. It's the fireplace channel for me. 

Eli came for a sleepover (before I realized about my eye - hope he's okay.) The boy is a merciless player of games. I'd prefer to read him stories. But we played a long game of Monopoly in which he absolutely crushed me. Hotels everywhere. We played last night, left it set up at bedtime, he woke at 7.30 a.m. raring to get back to it, plotting his purchases. I managed to get him to watch a bit of TVO so I could have a cup of coffee before my total evisceration. And then Go Fish too - he won every game.

He has just learned to sign his name in cursive! Beneath the portrait of me painted in 1959 by a Hungarian friend of my American grandmother's that I've always hated. Love the signature, though. 

A triumph on Thursday: our first CNFC webinar with Ian Brown went fantastically. He was superb - very funny, chatty, full of fascinating stories about people we wished we knew - Calvin Trillin! He was inspiring about writing and generally warm and open. It was recorded and will be uploaded on the CNFC website for all members.

Then an even greater triumph: Sam Dobie the runner-up in the Best Bartender competition. He is the second best of the hundreds of bartenders in all Toronto, and in one of the smallest bars in the city! Bravo my son. Too bad you're now not able to do what you do.

Friday I had a telephone interview with Vancouver book podcaster Joseph Planta about the memoir. "I don't often finish the books," he said, "but yours I whizzed through. I enjoyed it very much, it was a pleasure to read. I got a lot out of it." He told me the scene with the Vermeer was moving and unforgettable. Lovely to hear. We talked for almost an hour. 

On the other hand, Audible.com has once more sent back our audiobook files with a petty complaint; this time, our engineer said it was as if they themselves had damaged the files. It's like sabotage. Infuriating. 

Yesterday was beautiful, but I think that was the last nice day. Today, chilly and grey. My grandson and my eyeball have worn me out. Luckily Anna sent over piles of food - soup, stew, homemade hummus. Fed by my daughter, it's "The Crown" with wine tonight.

Anna sent me this of Ben. Be still my beating heart.

more nice words about the memoir, and French onion soup

Cheer on a dull day: 

From Ian: It's a terrific read. Quite the story, quite a life, to date; I wonder what your next "part" will bring. I'm amazed at the rich detail in your recollection. I hope the book receives lots of favourable attention. And somewhere along the way, I hope you were charmed by an uncircumcised penis. 

You'll have to read the book to understand the reference!

From my dear friend, sublime musician Shari Ulrich, on Amazon.ca. Sorry, the print is either too small and fits or doesn't quite fit and you can't read every word. Hope you get the gist. 

And from Lila

Yesterday's treat: the giraffeman came to cook a huge vat of French onion soup. Four bags of onions caramelizing - divine. Soul food.

notes about taking notes

Only a writer perhaps will understand what this means: last night, as I watched a documentary, Monterey Pop, I got up, scrabbled around for paper, and started taking notes.

I used to take notes all the time, because I was an essay writer. Everything that happened could lead to an essay, so the neurons were firing constantly. What's the story here? What does it mean? Throughout the nineties, partially because as a single mother and teacher my time was limited, I produced a stream of short personal essays: 24 in the Globe in ten years and nearly as many written and read for the CBC, plus other newspapers and a few magazines. One year, I had six essays in the Globe and a friend said, "I enjoy reading your column." Finally, I published a compilation called Back Page Stories - my first book. 

And then the Globe stopped paying even a measly $100 for half a page of work, and a producer at CBC's Fresh Air told me my writing was "not edgy enough" for the program. I started focussing on books. A mentor talked once about the breath in writing needed for a sprint and for a marathon. I hadn't the breath for both sprints and marathons.

But recently, as I struggle to get my latest marathon Loose Woman into the world, I finally took heed: very often when nonfiction books are published, it says at the back, "Excerpts from this book appeared in - ..." with a list of magazines in print or online. Even if you're working on a book, it's a good idea to get excerpts out there as you write. So that's my new plan: essays and excerpts. Sprints. A job in itself, not just the writing, but figuring out what should go where - unlike in the nineties, there are now hundreds of online places. So -  which? 

I don't have much to say about Monterey Pop - one observation, that the young audience was absorbed in the music, focussed on the stage with eyes and ears rather than taking pictures or filming or scrolling, because there were no @#$# cellphones in 1967. How did we survive, communicate, photograph, check in obsessively with each other? One thing was clear: we really listened to the music. 

Also, that the film is a paean to the talented sixties icons who died so young: Jimi, Janis, Keith Moon, Otis Redding, Mama Cass - even Brian Jones there in the audience. Who knew it was so dangerous to be a rock star? And what was with the smashing and burning of guitars? It looks ridiculous - infantile - now.

But those observations do not an essay make. Though can I point out that even this post is a kind of essay about essay-writing? That even as I was jotting notes last night, wondering about an essay, I realized it could be a blog post. In some ways, I just realized, I've never stopped writing essays. 

Yesterday was lovely and bright; Ruth and I had a long masked walkabout in the 'hood. Today is dark, wet, and drear. But there is work to be done, not to mention The Crown on Netflix. (Have I mentioned The Queen's Gambit? Just the most fun, and the last five minutes spectacular. No pat clichéd ending here. Marvellous.) My cold is nearly gone. Never have I been so glad to have a mere cold. As another friend used to say, It's all good. 

Here's today's only mention of the orange blowhole, still trying to smash the planet:

And here's what I'm contemplating for my living room, if it's possible, which it may not be. A perfect inspiration for note-taking.

remembering

At five to eleven on yet another glorious day, four old planes flew high above in formation. I listened to the Memorial Day events from Parliament Hill, thought of my family members who served to defeat evil, and posted Dad (on the right) and his brother Edgar in 1944 on FB.

But Anna did much better. She and Ben created this. On one poppy, my mother and her sisters, on another my father and his brother, on another my in-laws, and then a soldier of colour who died under difficult circumstances and an Indigenous WW1 nurse. 

Lest we forget.

Such a heavenly day, even with a head cold it's hard to stay inside - easier to work when the weather's lousy. Did errands on the bike - I can carry six bottles of wine in a backpack! Success.