What a day. Full of family, friends, food, and several other wonderful things. And yet, as we speak, a wonderful woman is also denying herself life-giving sustenance in order to draw attention to the needs of her people. Chief Theresa Spence has been without food since December 12th. In light of this, I found the following Christmas meditation to be incredible enlightening and challenging. If you’ve had a happy and content Christmas, this perhaps isn’t for you. If you are still longing for something more, read on. Continue reading
The Day We Stopped Spadina
One of the most unexpectedly awesome gifts this birthday year was a higher-up at my job stopping by with a CD that was previously thought to have been sold out. Based on the 1972 Governor General’s Award-winning book of poetry Civil Elegies by Dennis Lee, it’s an amazing collection of songs set to music by Mike Ross. Although everything in there is incredible, I thought I would leave you with one thought: the demonstration against the Spadina Expressway which led to the saving of several Toronto neighbourhoods. After the poem, I’ll attach the photos I found of what Toronto might have looked like had it gone through. Continue reading
The Day I Filed My First Police Report…
… was the day before I turned 27.
I think the next year of my life is going to be marked by vigilante-ism. I can’t help it.
I watched a woman yesterday almost get hit by a car door. On purpose. The passenger in the car opened the car door to scare the cyclist, and it was only through the last minute closing of the door that they got away with not killing someone. What would possess someone to do that? I mean, really? Really? REALLY?! I wanted to follow the car down the street in bumper-to-bumper traffic and sit in front of the car until they chose to hit me just so that I could make sure they got in trouble for it.
Here’s the story: I was walking to rehearsal last night for Robin Hood, minding my own business (listening to section parts, if my director is reading this), when a guy started screaming obscenities out his car window. That’s not so crazy for Toronto, I’ve seen it once or twice, usually around prom season when some group of teens decide to try drinking for the first time and feel like they’re flying. No, the crazy part started when a cyclist passed me heading in the same direction as the car, and then had to slam on the brakes when the car opened its curbside door INTO her path. And then, just as she was about to hit the door, it closed, she made it by, and she was gone. I could hear the maniacal laughter of the driver in my head as he drove away. It clicked in my head after that the guy must have been screaming at her for some reason, and so decide to pull his little prank to “teach her a lesson”.
One of my cast mates in the show shared a little pearl of wisdom with me about the whole situation (or at least the part about standing in front of cars to exact revenge). He knows a guy who knows a guy who is a Colombian drug dealer. Who has killed people. Whenever he gets angry about something like this, he thinks about the driver being that guy. So, not so much with the standing in front of cars anymore for me.
Needless to say, City Luke was furious. I did what any drug dealer-fearing, justice-loving guy would do: I wrote down the license plate number and called the non-emergency police line. Officer Badge #88731 was very nice, and she let me know that there wasn’t a lot she could do, but that I was welcome to file a report on-line.
So I did.
Is anything going to come of it. Probably not. That’s sort of depressing.
But if you know the woman who almost won a door prize on Dec 12, 2012 at about 5:45pm on Queen’s Park Crescent, you let her know that I’ve got her back, and would gladly go to court or wherever to see this crazy guy get punished. Even if I have to stand in front of his car.
Alligator Pie
Full disclosure: I work at the theatre where this show is being performed.That being said, I’m unashamedly proud to say that this show is one of the best pieces of theatre that I have seen. Take into account the fact that I grew up reading Alligator Pie, and that I love all of the creators of this show, and I love the care that they took in putting this together.
First things first: the Wikipedia article on Alligator Pie is woefully inadequate. So is the one for Dennis Lee. I was going to send you there for more information, but apparently all you can do is learn the names of the poems in the novel. Disappointing.
Moving on.
The 10 Commandments of Engaging Politics
The Presidential election is only weeks away...and it's getting ugly out there. I mean...really ugly.
And before you think I'm just talking about the political process, the political parties, or the respective candidates, I was actually talking about you, me, us, and them...the people. And by people, I'm also especially talking about Christians.
Sometimes, I feel it would be appropriate to label how some Christians engage the Presidential election season as "
On the day of election recovery, here's a good few thoughts for 2016.
NaNoWriMo: It’s a Real Thing
This post is cross-posted from Nanomusical.com – which is where I am blogging as part of my contributions to the web musical that I worked on. Consider this post your advertisement to watch it – it’s hilarious!
It’s come to my attention over the last little while that NaNoWriMo is real.
Toronto the Good
Thanks to Spacing.ca, I found this incredible video this morning. I couldn’t help but share it. Cities like London, Paris and New York (I’m heading there next week!), even places like Cairo, have been romanticized over and over, in movies like Sherlock Holmes, Paris, Je T’Aime, and TV shows like Friends and Seinfeld. Here in Toronto, we’re missing that long history, not because we don’t have history, but perhaps because Toronto is a place of transition, the Ellis Island of the North, if you will, full of people on their way somewhere else, even if that somewhere else is Brampton or East York. Shawn Micallef of Spacing mentions another reason: “the city seems a smokey-misty busy place, making itself so quickly there was no time to make anything pretty.” Toronto is a city still in its adolescence. We’re growing up, and with that comes the pain of realizing that we’ve lost some of our childhood memories to fuzzy note-taking. This video is a beautiful reminder of our past. Enjoy!
On the City and the Country
On the City and the Country (or, after living on an island for two weeks, why cities are necessary, but the country is equally as important)
Idiosyncrasies VI: Fiscal what?
If it takes $50,000 to take this:
to this:
Why would a “fiscally conservative” mayor want to spend $272,000 to put it back again? What does that accomplish other than being pridefully arrogant?
[Photos by Lucas Oleniuk and Colin McConnell, both of the Toronto Star.]
Urbanity in Downtown Baghdad
This week, I’m going to steal a page from my friend Heather (pun accidentally made, but definitely intended) and write about a book that I’ve just finished reading, and which I highly recommend: Captivity by James Loney. It’s an auto-biographical account of his 118-day kidnapping at the hand of a few Iraqi men calling themselves the “Swords of Righteousness Brigade”. (More details about the story can be found on the Wikipedia article here). The book itself talks about Loney’s life, his kidnapping and captivity, as well as his views on peace, war and faith in the midst of trial.
It’s a fascinating read, and one I would recommend to anyone of any faith (I say this to cover the fact that Loney and his group worked for an organization called Christian Peacemaker Teams, although they possess fairly liberal views). It speaks loudly and clearly about the role that faith plays in our day-to-day lives, and how an interruption of the type that Loney experienced can shake our worldview to the core. I won’t comment on the narrative too much, but ask that if you find the time to read a non-fiction book this fall, consider adding Captivity to the list. I got it as an e-book from the Toronto Public Library, and so can you.
What I am going to write about is probably considered (at best) a side note of the book, but to me was a completely engaging concept. It only really struck me at the end of the book, but here it is: Loney and his three kidnapped co-workers were abducted, held hostage, and released all within the confines of the urban fabric of Baghdad. Not once in their captivity did they leave the city.
Continue reading
